Dedicated to: Patricianduku
"I was born with an insatiable appetite for destruction."
~ promptuarium.wordpress.com
Carlton's POV
The cigarette smoke wafted into the air, making monstrous patterns. That was the problem, all I saw was monsters these days. They were everywhere.
I saw my reflection, through the smoke, in the bathroom mirror, discarding the blazer lathered in my friend's blood. Tugging on the edges of my shirt, I un-tucked it, staring briefly and the bullet graze wound on my lower abdomen.
Much worse was going to happen to me today. I might even die.
I let my head hang back, eyes closing as I exhaled smoke. It had been a good journey, long and strenuous. I'd always known that this was exactly how I'd die. I would fuck up big time, have some people going for my head, and I'd die fighting them. That was as heroic as it got for me.
And maybe this was it.
Tweaking my shirt sleeves halfway up my arm, I picked up my favourite pistol from the basin, examining its intricately customised designs.
Putting out the cigarette on the sink, I held my pistol in my hand, preparing myself for what was about to come. My father had gifted me that gun. He would be so proud and disappointed at the same time if he saw me right now.
I inched closer to the door, straining my ears. I heard nothing. Kicking the door open, I pointed my gun to an empty corridor. On the right was the projector room where I had come from. So I went left.
Placing my feet as slowly, as silently as I could, I tiptoed towards a door, my heartbeat ringing in my ears. Thump-thump thump-thump. I felt a bead of sweat trickle down my head. Everything felt extra sensitive. I even heard muffled buzz of machines from the projector room.
When I was close to the door, I finally heard voices coming right towards me.
Get yourself together.
I reminded myself all memories of training with my father's friend, Jovan. My muscles flexed, a long forgotten ardour making them feel lively again.
And my heart screamed at the men. Come at me. Let me see which one of you bastards did that to Dylan.
A man walked right through the door, busy talking to someone else. I took my aim and shot him on his chest, giving him a chance of survival, trying not to increase the head count.
The guy behind him fell pale, pulling up his gun at me. I was quick to kick it out of his arm, punching him square across his face. I yelled, wrapping my arms and pushing him back till he hit the wall.
I shot him in the stomach and he slumped down to the ground, leaving a messy streak of fresh blood on the wall.
My eyes snapped wide when I felt a presence behind me.
Fuck. I barely dodged a long metal rod that came plummeting down from behind. I gripped the metallic object, turned and kicked the man on his knee. He tripped backwards, giving me time to crouch and sweep my leg below him, causing him fall backwards.
I was panting now, endeavouring to grip the gun as I shot him on his back. My throat felt scorched dry. I needed something to drink, to feel alive. Preferably whiskey.
The vibrations of shoes banging on the carpeted floor as well as distant yelling, resonated around me. More men. And they were definitly more than three.
Picking up the metal rod, I ran out of the door, expecting to see stairs leading down but there weren't any.
The door behind me banged open, footsteps halting a few feet away from me.
Five.
Five men, I counted, as I turned around.
I noticed, all their guns had been tucked and they circled me, seemingly enjoying this. Especially the middle guy whose pistol visibly stuck out from the right side of his belt. It would take them atleast a little while to pull the guns out. "Carlton Hargrave," the middle guy huffed, "Surrender and we won't hurt you!"
Like hell.
They thought I'd be here in a half bloody shirt, with literally a dented metal rod in my hand and gun in another, looking like I had killed a man or two and just...surrender?
Very well.
I lifted my hands up, a smile tugging my lips.
They bought it. Now what kind of a man surrenders with his weapons still in his hands?
It took them off guard when I suddenly sprinted towards the man in the middle. But my eyes were on the man on the extreme left. I gathered momentum on the metal rod and flung it at it, with all the vigour. It struck him square across the face.
A gunshot resonated in the air as I shot the man right beside him, somewhere around his neck.
They were all trying their best not to shoot me, because maybe someone ordered them not to and that gave me an advantage. I dropped on the floor, sliding from between them. Getting back up, I slammed my shoulder on the middle guy's back so he fell face first.
Another man gripped my gun as if to pry it away from me, but shockingly for him, I went closer to him, slamming my gun in his chest and shooting him.
My head had started to bang as if someone was repeatedly hitting it from inside. My vision blurred for a few seconds, and the fifth man, still standing, kicked the gun out of my hands. Clattering, I watched it skate across the hall, far away from me.
He lifted his arm and I glared as he threw a hefty punch across my face. I collided with the floor, beside the middle guy I had shoulder-slammed earlier, coughing blood and breathing restlessly to prevent the spasms from closing my throat up.
A miserable groan left my throat as he kicked me in my stomach, right where the bullet graze wound was. My whole body shriveled up, sweltering tears stinging the sides of my eyes.
What was I going to do?
I inhaled sharply as I remembered something.
Swinging my arm backward, I reached for the man behind me, removing the gun tucked in his belt and shooting the one who had punched me.
I had no time to confirm if I had shot him right, my vision was blurred with my tears, my own breaths mingled with blood, threatening to clog my windpipe.
And as if things weren't already bad, the guy behind me wrapped his arm around my neck. He was so quick, so agile, that he was already choking me. He pulled me on top of him so I lay backward on his chest, choking the life out of me from behind.
My heart came upto my throat, my head spinning suddenly at the feeling of not being able to breathe anymore. I punched him arms, tried to push them away, reached for his face, elbowed him chest. Nothing was working.
He was trying to make me pass out. And if I did, I didn't know where the hell they'd take me and what they would do to me there. It was worse than dying. I clawed my fingers at his hands uselessly and used my last breath to scream for help. But no one would hear me.
Reality seemed to be slowly slipping away, the edges of my vision blackening by every passing second. I coughed and gasped, fighting my conciousness, kicking my legs like a maniac.
I pushed my limits, but my vision went black anyway and suddenly I was younger. A similar situation. My trainer was behind me, choking me, and I was endeavouring to push him off. Because even though it was training it actually felt like he was trying to kill me.
I coughed and screamed.
My father was in front of me, arms crossed, looking as disappointed as a king who lost a war. And I remembered feeling horrible that I couldn't be the son that he wanted. I knew deep in my heart, a feeling that I just didn't want to accept — that my father wanted custody of Caden but he lost the custody battle against my mom and he got me instead.
And everytime I got that feeling, intense amount of rage boiled up in my heart, so wrathful and perilous, it could drive a normal man insane.
And it drove me insane too. It morphed me into a madman that did horrible things to people, it woke a monster inside that changed me. I began to feel furious for no particular reason. And it kicked my responsiveness to a whole different level.
My conciousness flooded back and I turned a little bit towards the right. And then, I violently rolled to the left with as much dexter as I could muster.
The man's arms loosened and I grabbed the opportunity to pry them away. I didn't entirely gain my strength back so all I could do, as blood continuously spilled form my mouth between coughs, was crawl as far as I could.
My vocal cords convulsed, robbing me of my voice and replacing it with excruciating pain everytime I breathed.
The man caught onto my shoes.
Angrily, I started slamming my foot into his face. What once was a mere act of self defence, turned into a vicious bloodbath. And I enjoyed every second of it.
I kicked him till blood covered his entire face, till he was no more recognisable. And I left him to die.
I found the stairs. Fuckin' finally.
Getting down was another thing. I gripped the railings, slipping down, tripping, half-dead. I coughed some more, wiping my blood with my already blood-drenched sleeve. I tried to take shorter breaths so my throat would hurt lesser, but my heart was racing and my breath came in long inhales and painful exhales.
I fell down once I reached the bottom, touching my forehead to the ground.
Come on soldier, just a bit more.
Breanna's face came into my mind, her contagious laugh and innocent demeanour, so worth cherishing. Thus, I pushed myself up, stumbling towards the parking lot, slammed the door open and walked in.
Nothing.
Lots of cars but not a soul in sight.
What happened to them? Was I too late?
Or...did they forget about me?
No, they wouldn't-
"Now I've got ya!"
The floor shifted from beneath my feet as I turned around and saw someone standing at the parking lot entrance.
The guy who I kicked in the face.
Blood glimmered, running down his head but it was as if I could feel his starvation for vengeance from a few meters away. And he didn't wait.
He reached for the gun and shot me.
My whole body fell numb. The ceiling above me tilted, no, I was falling backwards, a stream of my blood spraying in the air above me.
My head collided with the ground, a loud ringing noise echoing loudly in my ears for a few moments. My vision was completely gone. Replaced with a few patches of white, black and red.
Something moved in front of me.
I groaned trying to look up to see what it was, and when I tried, my whole left arm suddenly flexed into tremendous pain. I screamed in misery. Despite my burning throat, I screamed.
Slapping my hand where it hurt the most, my palm came in contact with warm, spilling blood somewhere near my shoulder.
I was shot, but it missed my heart by a few inches.
The sweltering, burning pain slithered down my body from the site of the wound, as if sparking all my nerves to ashes. And I groaned, biting my lip to keep myself from screaming too loud.
The man stood in front of me, lifting the gun to my face. He was huffing too. "I've been told not to kill you. But monsters like you deserve to be annihilated as soon as possible."
All I could do at the moment, since my whole body had given up on me, was inch backwards as far as I could get from him.
In the moment, a shrilling noise of car tires grating against rough grounds echoed throughout the gargantuan parking lot. From the left, a car came diving towards us.
And it slammed into the man in front of me, sending him flying across the ground, colliding with the parked cars around.
I had no time to react.
The car stopped in front of me. The door opened and out stepped Breanna Riley in her dusty sneakers and battered hoodie hanging low from her shoulders. Blood was on them and on her cheeks and on her hands.
But she looked perfectly fine, thrilled even. I bet the people who she encountered weren't fine though. Breanna's eyes met me, a smirk tugging her lips when she saw the mess I had made of my shoulder.
And she asked, "Lookin' for me?"
**********