Nightingale

Chapter Four: "O'Connor Can KISS MY ARSE!"

Pretty shit life considering I used to live quite well making costum guns for people, leading to what I do now.

O'connor can kiss my arse I thought to myself, entirely agreeing with Merick even if he was a little idiotic in the way he said it. I feel empathy for him entirely as I watch him stand back up outside and stumble into the poorly lit street. 'least he has a wife still, mine left me for some rich politician, a fat, ol' portly bastard who talked like a smug Brit. The only reason he isn't dead is because I'd have been hunted and tossed somewhere into mainland Europe to be eaten alive in banishment....

Didn't seem like too bad of an idea now. If only he wasn't across the puddle.

The TV screen still glowed slightly around the edges a deep blue, with a ten centimeter hole where glass and plastic use to be and then spidering fractures going in all directions. I admire his boldness. "Anythin' else Aaron?" asked the bartender of whose name I had forgotten. I just shook my head no, not making eye contact with the ugly lad whose head was as bald as a desert and whose gut hung over his belt line like a tsunami of extra skin. I didn't care to see what stained, lightly colored tucked shirt he wore this night.

He walked away to the other side of the bar where another drunken face beckoned his attention with an unarticulate grunt somewhere between HEY!? and lad? I just stared at the lable free bottles stacked across the back and into the mirror at my pale, feckled face lined with brown stubble and dirt.

Hadn't had a shower in weeks, and it was far to balmy for a swim.

I stared ahead blankly, not wanting to think or interact with anyone around me. No pretty women were to trod into this dump, no intelligent man to converse decently with seemed to exist anywhere anymore. I was tired of thinking because all that lingered anymore was bitterness and poverty. So I blacked out of reality and felt the warmth of alcohol lightly burn my stomach.

I was interrupted by something entirely contradictory to what I just thought could happen.

A gorgeous redhead sat down next to me, looking straight at the side of my face as I glanced attentively over at her. Blue eyes and a face that was sharply cut enough to resemble a sly fox. "And who are you?" I asked, hoping my breath didn't smell too horribly of beer and nasty bar food. 

Maybe tonight I would find a piece of luck.

She leaned forward onto the bar, waving the bar tender over, who was more than happy to see such a beautiful face, completely ignoring a request someone else had just made. "What can I get for ya beautiful?"

"A shot at O'Connor," Did I just hear what I think I did? Was she a rebel?.....

My question was answered before I could ask. The bar tender's face grew into a grimace over his bushy eye brows, and a bouncer appeared behind us suddenly, placing a hand on both of our shoulders. "Come with me," he grunted the words out more than he spoke. I did as he said, expecting fully to be kicked out without the option of coming back, standing and following him towards the back door.

I was surprised when suddenly he turned left around the bar, and lead us into a locked door, entering the code and unlatching the metal door with a loud clunk. He opened the door, holding it open for us and gesturing us into the pitch black corridor. The woman entered before me, flipping a switch that lit up the room in a white-washed glow. I followed, squinting in the fresh light.

The door closed and latched behind me, and I took in the small room for a moment. Two chairs in the center, a small table between them and two cans of cola laid out and sun-faded from sitting on a market shelf for years. She turned the chair ninety degrees from the table, dragging it slowly as it grinded lightly over the white-tile floor. She sat and crossed her legs over her light blue, tight fitting jeans. "Sit, enjoy the soda that took me two days to track down just for your liking. We have much to talk about Aaron," She knew my name? How?

I was cautious and my nerves raced like a scared feline even through the alcohol. At least if I died now, it was by the hands of a beautiful girl. I doubted she wanted to kill me, as it would have happened already. But I am nervous by nature.

I popped the soda can open, it had been two years since I had lay my hands on one of these lovely things. Though the same could be said for beautiful women as well, so I was interested and still falsely hopeful as she watched me while I drank. 

A little flat, decadantly sweet. Loved it. Now was my mind speaking of the soda or her chest? I couldn't tell under her black sweater.

"Your work with rifles was legendary in the old days. I believe it was you who supplied the custom Super Magnum to Lieutenant Becking before he was sent with the Americans about five years ago, the same man who turned down one of the brand new American Rail guns rated for two thousand meters or more. Am I right?" She was directly on the point. I said nothing, just nodded and scrutinizing her movements and speech.

"Aaron Agnew, you were quite hard to track down. I've been looking for you for almost two years now and...."

"Who gives a shit? What is it that you want and why am I being treated like royalty?" I was tired of this little word game. I really wish people could just get to the point, just blatantly state outright what they want.

"Make rifles for the rebellion, or customize them for us and we will give you asylum, food, freedom in the future if we win, which you can help,"

"And what is your relation to the, what was your title, the Nabaelan Guard?"

"I am Nabael, though you can call me Choloe," She straightened the chair, facing me and crossing her fingers. There was no way I was addressing the leader of the rebellion, only seen holding a pistol with a blackened face on propaganda broadcasts and a blackened face.

"Bullshit," she reached into the inside of her sweater, and removed Scythe, the famous pistol. It was a colt 1911 plated with silver, and engraved with Celtic knotting down both sides of the slide. Jesus, I actually was or I was being fooled damn well. She placed it on the table.

"Your first task: replicate that design on an M416 you'll find underneath your mattress when you show back up home. Do it and return it where you found in a weeks time, and I'll take it as a yes. Don't, and I guess you'll just keep your current life and being an idle watcher when I win..."