The Misvan Gatu: Intentions

Chapter Two // Leo

Leo

He stood there looking pleased that I had joined them in their insanity. They had promised me money. Actually, an unthinkable amount of money, and I was assured that the patient was a man that had hurt hundreds of people. He worked with them before I replaced him, so that made this okay? Didn't it?

He called himself Box and he was a sleazy, disgusting excuse for a man. He thought it appropriate to flirt with me, while a man lay in front of him dying. Hell, I don't know what he thought of me, but I'd never, he didn't have a chance. Everything about him repulsed me; he had very little hair and what little he did have was slick with grease, just like his personality. It wasn't just his appearance; though he smelt like he had rolled around in horse manure for a year. It was laughable how he thought he was so irresistible and with the gift that I had, it terrified me. Something lingered around him, an evil that even an ordinary person could detect. My conclusion was that he must have really pissed off the dead. 

I swallowed the bile rising in my throat, and picked up the needle laid out on the tray next to me. It was filled with a dark purple liquid. Steadying my hands, I grasped the lifeless man's arm and jabbed the needle in, quick and painless. I turned to face Box, my stomach twisting painfully when I saw how happy he was. "So, he won't feel anything?"

"Not a thing." He winked and licked his lips, reminding me of a snake. I took the clipboard out of his hand and checked the procedure once again for the hundredth time.

"So you'll give me the money after this is done?" I dared a glance at the guy strapped to the table, before a strong sense of evil washed over me as Box sighed heavily.

"You can count on it." He clapped his hands together and raised his eyebrows; as the guy slowly stopped struggling against his bonds. Everyone in the room fell silent and I held my breath as I waited for the drugs to take him to the edge. My eyes met his and I saw him pleading with me to stop. I saw the panic explode inside him when he realised that I wouldn't, and I saw his strength slip away. A weak shell of a man lay before me and I was about to do something I didn't even think possible two days ago. I was about to take his soul. Uncertain, I turned once more to the lump of a man stood behind me.

"I've never done this before."

"There are many things I believe you haven't experienced yet. It won't be long now. Maybe I could help you feel more comfortable after this is done?" He chuckled and winked again, looking me up and down. He was the living, breathing example of a predator and there was no way that I would become his prey.

"I'm fine. Thanks."

From being a little girl I have always had a sense of smell that was out of this world. Now I knew I did literally have a sense of smell that was out of this world. Before my dad died he started to smell like wood burning. I didn't know. I was ten years old for God's sake! and I didn't know. I cried myself to sleep for months after, because when he left the smell didn't go away. 

He was a fireman and he'd died; trying to save a little boy from his bedroom when the house was burning down. The people that came to see my mum said the house was a death trap, the whole house furnished with wood; old fashioned and small. It was then that I realized I had a gift. I was special. I tried to tell my mum I could smell smoke, and explain to her what had happened. She didn't listen to me. She quit smoking before I was born, but when dad died she picked that lighter back up and my whole life went up in flames.

 I had access to power that no little girl should ever have. I was gifted, and all my life I believed that I didn't deserve it; that it was a curse, that maybe in a past life I was a bad person and in this life I had to pay for it.

I turned my attention back to the guy lay vulnerable and powerless on the table. Maybe he was a bad person too, maybe this is how he attones for his mistake. A tear rolled down his cheek and without thinking I swiped it away with my index finger. He didn't deserve to cry. His skin was as cold as ice and the fire behind his eyes had faded. I stared into the golden brown of his eyes and watched as he gave up. His struggle was ending and his eyes fluttered shut with resignation. 

With a calm energy, I wrapped my power around him in a shield, and watched as his soul poured through his nose and open mouth. Souls are made from such a strange substance that it always fascinates me when I see one. His was a pale blue, with streaks of bright green that caught the light and sparked like electricity. A soul is made of liquid and gas; the fluidity of it is simply amazing, an orb of beauty. The mystery of life, the unanswered question that has intrigued a millennia of people from different cultures. The soul is a whisper amongst the screams and shouts of every day life; unnoticed and unheard, a breathtaking power locked away in each of us. 

As it swam away from the body, I grabbed it with my shield; like shrink wrap it encased the soul and held it suspended. To my surprise the soul didn't fight, it just submitted to my power. I wondered how long it could last outside of a body, and shivered as it pulsed; the sensation felt in the darkest corners of my being. I had to strip away the human part of it and take in the pure energy that was left. It was ecstasy, my body trembled with pleasure, as I pulled on the soul; extracting the electric swirls of green. It was just like drinking a glass of water with my mind; refreshing. The blue darkened with each extraction, and I was aware that the life in the soul was dying. It grew smaller with each extraction, until all that was left was a perfectly round, black marble of rock. My concentration slipped as I drank the last of the electric green energy and I dropped the rock. Box was right there to catch the soul in the palm of his hand. Before I could question him, he pushed past me and gave the rock to Frog.

"Box, what are you going to do with-"

"-Leo, darling. It is absolutely of no importance for you to know that." He cut me off, blunt and to the point, his arrogance fuelled an anger I didn't know I had. The energy I consumed was cracking my skull in half, worry ate away at my nerves. I had never felt so much power harnessed within me.

"What's happening to me?" I grabbed my head and closed my eyes, the light in the room was too bright. I felt two of the men who watched me earlier grab me, and I found that I didn't care. I was exhausted, if they hadn't have grabbed me, I would have collapsed to the floor instead.

"Oh, don't worry Leo, we'll take good care of you. It's the after effects of the soul extraction you just performed. You'll sleep like the dead now, but don't worry yourself too much," He barked a laugh before he continued, his voice seeming to echo off the walls. "When you wake up you'll feel more alive than you have ever felt before."

Something about the way he spoke made me feel nauseous, what had I done? The last thought that crossed my mind before I passed out, was one that chilled me to the bone. It looked like the predator had finally caught his prey.