Ego's Trap | ✔

43 | Anything for Ane

"What makes you think that I can or will do something for you?"

"I'm not asking you for a favor, Joel. You owe me, and you know that very well, so you'll do it. I mean, unless you're dumber than you look."

Joel scoffed, rolling his eyes and playing his favorite role: the clueless blockhead. "I owe you? Since when?"

I shoved my fists into the pockets of my pants. I had to keep myself cool, but every step, every damned step, I felt needles prick my skin. "I'm not here to play around, Joel. Do you really think I want to talk to you, especially after what you did to Ane? She genuinely thinks you tried to kill her to this day. She's traumatized enough for all of the gods' sake, and you just had to make it worse. You're a fucking asshole."

Joel chuckled a bit at that. "Hey now, nothing actually happened── you had someone to help you, so calm down. Not a single scratch on your precious Ane, big bro."

"Wow, you're ridiculous. So what? Normal people don't like to hurt or scare others."

"Am I normal to you?" He looked up at me, waiting for me to say something. When he realized I had no intention of responding to that, he sighed and said, "I thought so."

As if nothing had just happened, he continued with what he was saying beforehand: "I don't know who they were── whoever helped you── but they're good, scary good. Did you know that Steve's my right hand man? Nobody can knock him out cold like that, unless they're inhuman. Steve doesn't even know what the hell happened. Neither does Demy. All they know's that they were hit. Was it Jade── oh, no, nevermind that. She's still healing... ha, geez, your girlfriend's got some issues, man."

"You literally gave her the pocketknife, asshole."

"Hey, it's not my fault that Ane used it. You can't blame me for that. Besides, she told me she would've used her so-called 'trusty knife' anyways. She's got a screw loose, I'm not kidding when I say that, and it's coming from me," Joel said, shrugging. His nonchalance made me want to throw him off a bridge. He was testing my cool, my patience, and I was more than convinced that he was doing it on purpose. "Anyways, that's not what I want to talk about. Let's... let's talk about the one who helped you back at the hotel, yeah? As I said, they knocked out Steve── Steve, for fuck's sake! Steve's a massive human tank, so it's crazy, bro. A beast that can knock a tank out like that, oof. I would kill for someone like that. Why not get them to do whatever it is that you want instead of me? Pretty dumb to come over to me with someone like them on your hands. Also, why not tell me a little about who they are? Someone like that, man, better make good use of them, you know? Give me a clue, at the very least. Do I know them?"

That was it.

My hands rushed over to his collar, and thanks to all of the adrenaline coursing through my veins, I pinned the bastard against the hallway's wall. My arms trembled from the weight they were suddenly supporting, but again, thanks to the adrenaline coursing through my veins, I was able to push through. "You disgust me. Don't fucking say that. Don't you dare say it again, you bastard," I snapped. "I'll use you in a heartbeat instead of them not because I'm dumb, but becase you don't mean anything to me. They're precious to me, and more than anything else, they're nothing like you; they're not a sick fuck, they're not a bastard," I continued, holding him tighter and feeling my head go blank immediately afterwards. I had to take a deep breath again to force myself back into orbit. "Where did my brother go, the one from ages ago? Where did that sappy little crybaby go?"

Joel's face scrunched up into an expression I didn't want to read as he slapped a hand onto his chest. "That little guy's in here, trust me. It's just a hard-knock life for him, is all. Uncle Wilfred keeps pushing that little guy around, Daniel. It's not easy, it's not fucking easy," he said, with his eyes as wide as they could possibly be, threating me with tears I didn't want to see. "Heh, what am I saying? You don't understand. You're not the one being forced into a damn band of vigilantes or crime lords or whatever it is they want to call themselves. All you have to worry about is the pretty face of the family business. Must be nice."