by Frances June
Before I could finish the sentence she was inches from me. She was small but there was some power that buzzed around her like an electric current.
"What? If you see me again, what?" She asked, like she was egging me on.
My hands scrunched into fists in my pocket. If she'd have been a guy I'd have probably punched her all the way to Queens by now.
Counting to ten wasn't going to get me very far in this situation so I did the only other thing I could do. I walked away.
I was hardly four paces away before she caught up and fell into step besides me.
"Oh come on, I was just teasing. Stay and talk." She grabbed my arm and tried to jerk me to a stop but all she did was let the beast out.
Within seconds I had hauled her into an alley way between two streets. I pinned her to the wall with one hand around her neck and the other gripping her upper arm. I knew which hand to apply pressure to but the temptation to squeeze was a strong one I'd only live to regret.
"Whatever it is you think you're doing you need to stop. You have no idea who I am and no idea about what I'm capable of, got it?" I was inches from her face, leaning in so close I could smell the sweetness of her lipstick.
She struggled to speak. I barely noticed her hands clawing at mine for relief.
"I know..." She gasped before trying again. "We're the same."
My grip loosened and she dropped to the ground coughing.
A moment of fear washed over me, my head felt like all of the blood had left it; draining away with my self-respect. If I ever told Morgan about this she's be equally pissed and elated that I'd finally cracked.
When I felt the blood rush back to my head I leant down to help her up full of intention to apologise except before I could reach her a jolt of pain from the back of my skull sent me sprawling onto my side. I felt the blood that I'd so recently had returned start to slip down my cheek and through the gap in my lips heating the side of my tongue with its metallic tang.
"Fuck." I spat the blood and looked up in time to see a guy dragging Chastity up by her hair before slapping her to the ground again. She fell like a rag doll. All dislike for her dissipated with my sense of self.
Wave upon wave of unbalanced dizziness washed over me, pulling me every which way like one of those rip tides people warned you about but you still got caught up in them anyway. I couldn't even make it to my feet. It didn't matter; by the time I was on my hands and knees a boot sung towards my face and the darkness of pain swallowed me whole.
Chapter Seven
I f I thought waking up to a bed without Morgan was depressing, I was way off. Waking up tied to a chair with chains and seeing the same sickening sight from Billy's place of death was sickening enough for me to feel the bile rise in my throat.
I'd been dragged to a dark room but it couldn't have been far because the sun was still shining through the painted windows. It wasn't great logic but it was all I had.
The room had the faintest stench of paint and iron. From the look of the symbols painted on the floor it was clear where the smell was coming from. A mental scan of my body told me it wasn't my blood so that was a relief.
It was strange to find myself so calm, despite the sickening churning that was happening in my stomach. I guess all the years of scaring the crap out of out-of-luck addicts had hardened me to the antics of criminal beatings.
"Hey!" I yelled as loud as my I could muster. I had no doubt I wouldn't be heard by passers-by but it didn't hurt to expel the anxiety of being tied to a fucking chair. "HEY!"
With my body weight behind me I began shaking until the chair rocked back and forward. In my mind I'd be able to rock the chair over, the chair would break and I'd be free and ready to kick the living shit out of the asshole's who'd hit me from behind. Reality had other plans.
Before the chair could even tilt any way that might have led to the start of the plan a firm hand on my shoulder shoved me down.
"Quiet." His voice was hoarse but it was more like he was doing it to mask his identity. When we walked around to face me I got a sudden jolt of fear, on top of my current level. You might say I was approaching petrified. The guy was tall and built. He was carrying a strange bowl but the thing that set my heart pounding was his face or rather, the mask he was wearing. Pure white and featureless. Not original but it was jarring enough to spark something primal inside me.
When he knelt down beside me I saw red liquid, thick and dark, in the bowl. The paint from the floor. He slid a long, curved blade from his pocket and held it to my throat, the sharpness bit into my skin sending shooting pains down my entire body. The slow trickle of blood that oozed out tickled and stung but I couldn't scratch it. My rage bubbled.
I couldn't help myself; I let out a truly blood curdling scream.
After it subsided the guy moved around me in a practiced motion, stopping at every symbol on the floor and humming strange words as he went as though I hadn’t made any sound at all.
It was stupid to think my brothers would charge in right at this moment to save me. I doubted even Jack had any idea who these guys were yet, but I still prayed for it. Waiting.
The masked man moved with purpose; he never broke his stream of mumbling, he didn't even look up when I began to shake the chair again, it was like he had totally zoned out.
There was a moment when I thought I might have done it, might have broken the chair, I even prepared myself for an epic take down; not even caring the dude had a giant knife. I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up. Mid-thrash another hand pressed my shoulder down with a force that told me he wasn't messing around.
"Don’t do that." He spoke with a thick accent, but I couldn't place it. I'd never been great with accents. It was European, I knew that much, but pinpointing the exact place wasn't an option. It wasn't like knowing if a guy was from Brooklyn or Queens.
Next thing I knew there was another knife pointed to my throat. It turns out that no matter how many times that happens it still causes your insides to feel like they've sank to your knees along with every ounce of bravery you thought you had.
"Why are you doing this?" These guys had to be the same guys who'd killed Billy.
There was no answer to my question and the knife remained pressed to my jugular, reminding me with every pulse of blood that passed underneath how close I was to Billy and his fate. Blacking out felt like a possibility but I couldn’t let myself freak. I was Saul Abraham, half of New York knew to fear the fuck out of me.
I stilled my mind with my anger management techniques and waited for any chance of escape. My thinking was that if I could wriggle free I could take these two guys. Before I'd finished the thought fate kicked me in my gut. I heard the door that was behind me open and the sound of footfall echoed all around. Too many to count, though none of them, bar the guy with the mask who was still chanting, moved into my eye line.
The energy in the room swallowed me whole. Any ideas of escaping left with the bravery I'd been trying to muster. I knew what was coming next; the torture.
"At least tell me why." My voice was quiet, lost in the chanting to the others I hoped, but the guy with the knife at my throat heard. He pushed the cool metal further into my flesh, the burning sent shockwaves through me, making my heart pound furiously.
"caue, caue..." His tongue flicked the words at me with venom.
"I flunked the classics, I know you speak English." I watched as the chanting guy painted a familiar design on the wall, his whole body moved with his hand as he drew it across the brickwork like an expert; dipping his hand back into his bowl before slapping more red on that dripped down so the design looked archaic and deadly.
The group behind started chanting and singing the words that the guy was drawing on the wall, the sound built up and up along with my heart rate.
"Caue, Caue-aspiciebat Olympo, Caue, Caue-aspiciebat Olympo"
When he was finished he turned, the knife the other guy held slid around so that the point pricked the base of my skull.
"Cave Bestiam!" He yelled just at the moment every else's voices stopped abruptly. He glared at me through the mask's eye holes. It was like his eyes glowed with an unholy light; it was clear this was a pretty insane cult, not just a couple of guys who held a grudge. If Billy wasn't their only target the game had changed.
"Slaughter them all." The group chanted at once, in English so that I'd understand the threat.
The guy with the paint dropped to his knees and stretched forward so his fingertips grazed one of the symbols on the floor like a demonic yoga pose. If Morgan had heard me think that she'd have a field day teaching me the finer points of how yoga could never be demonic. I held onto the idea of that chastising moment, letting it guide me from fear like a beacon.
The knife that had been pointing to the base of my skull fell away, the release of pressure was pure bliss followed by tension.
He appeared in front of me, like an unwanted mirage. He was big, round and heavy looking with thick arms like hunks of meat. He actually looked like the butcher from the deli on 10th. His face was shielded by the mask but nothing could mask his smell, which was testosterone mixed with pickled gherkins.
"We pray for protection, from violence." He spoke, muffled and throaty. He knelt before me, his hand clutching something in his belt.
"You're the only people we need protection from." I didn't like where this was going, especially when the horde behind us replied.
"Vult." It was sharp like a bullet and just as painful. The sound ripped through me like a hot poker and I screamed.
"We pray for strength, from corruption." He pulled a hammer from his belt. Not one you'd find on a building site or in Home Depot but one you'd find in a courtroom. A gavel made from metal.
"Vult." They shot again, my body felt pain ripple through like an electric current. It was uncontrollable and I found I couldn't move my arms from the pain of it.
"We pray for forgiveness, from wrath." He raised the gavel and my eyes went wide. I knew what he planned to do. He'd snuck his other hand to my left wrist, holding it firmly in place. My hands were curled over the edge of the chair arms, I tried to move but I couldn't force my limbs to react.
As he brought the hammer down on my hand, smashing the bones with as much forced as he could muster under the power of prayer, I screamed.
"VULT." The rest of them replied on behalf of God but it was garbled nonsense, just a noise that existed outside of the pain that engulfed me like the flames of hell.
When he grabbed my other wrist my body reacted out of desperation. A need to survive that transcended the pain. It was like the world had stopped; time didn't exist, just this one moment where everything stilled around me.
"God, no. Fucking FUCK! Stop, please." Tears rolled down my face. People say your life flashes before your eyes when you die. It's cliché to say it does, it's probably cliché to say it doesn’t but it just doesn't.
The only thing that you know is the idea that you don't want to die and feel pain but you also want it to stop and be over and you want God to take you or whoever the fuck rips your soul from your body and sweeps it away for an overhaul. I had no regrets at the end, no moment of clarity that screamed in my mind and to the universe that if I survived this I'd be a better man and I'd give money to charity and never curse again. Even Morgan seemed like a distant memory that I couldn't hold onto long enough to worry how she'd survive without me.
He raised the hammer, his eyes glinted with satisfaction. The worst part was I knew this was only the start of what was to come.
"Get off him!" An angel in the dark appeared giving a kick to the guy's head that sent him sprawling to the ground with a dull thud. His neck was rotated at an odd angle.
The next few moments were like a rush of relief mixed with pain and the mental breakdown that came with it.
Even in the waves and waves of agony that throbbed up my arm and into my brain I could tell Chastity had made a mistake. In the fog of my mind her tiny frame was being surrounded by tall masked men in robes. They were ominous and threatening.
She kept them at bay with a metal pipe, swinging it left to right like you would if you were a lion tamer with really shitty equipment. They drew in close and backed away when she swung in their direction but it was only a matter of time before she was overcome.
"Run..." I said, the word came out in a whisper and she didn't let on that she'd heard me. She stood her ground like she was waiting for backup, buying time. She didn't attack or retreat. I wriggled my arms to try to help her but the pain from my shattered hand made me stop. I had to bite down the scream that wanted to escape my lips. The only way out of this was to keep a clear mind but I could feel that clearness slipping away into unconsciousness which I fought with every fiber of my being. Leaving her alone to face these guys wasn't an option.
"Drop it or he's dead." A clear voice put a stop to the circus as all heads turned towards me and the smart ass who'd picked up the knife from the floor next to the dead guy. He held the blade to my neck, his other hand gripped my hair and yanked my head to the side, revealing the target for everyone to see. Surely they couldn't just waste me now. I hung onto the hope that the importance of the ceremony meant we had time to get out of this. If they wanted me dead, point blank, they could have put a bullet in my brain at the market.
Chastity took the situation in. She was smart, you could see it in her eyes. She had a brain and it worked quickly. City kids like us had to know how far we’d go to survive, we had to know when to fight and when to cut and run. She showed no signs of the latter. Maybe she wasn't so smart after all.
"Just go, get out, you'll let her go, right?" Reasoning with insane men was hardly ever a great idea but maybe they weren't ready for collateral damage in their quest for whatever it was they were looking for. "She's innocent, won't God punish you for hurting her?"
I knew it was a mistake to bring the big guy into it a split second too late. The guy's grip in my hair was vice like, I was sure I could feel the follicles bleeding.
"Don't you dare speak his name." He spat in my face and pressed the knife into the side of my neck. This time blood didn't just tickle my skin, it poured down. Hot and deadly with a distinct sulphuric smell that ignited all the wrong parts of my brain.
"You just made a fucking mistake." I bit my lip hard to distract myself from the pain of my hand. I pulled at the chains as hard as I could muster, the idea that I could be hurt even more didn't cross my mind. I don't think he really believed I could do it so when my right hand broke free and I grabbed his knife hand he wasn't prepared for the attack.
Lurching forward I pulled his body weight with whatever hair I still had left attached to my head. His body was on my back and I took the opportunity to guide his hand, with the knife, into where I assumed his head was.
The look on Chastity's face told me I'd hit my target and sure enough, a moment later, the body dropped to the side of the chair with the knife protruding from the side of his neck, the blood on the ground all but washed out three of the symbols painted around me.
It was like a spell had been broken. The life pouring out of this guy sent a shock wave through the others. They began to murmur between themselves, their head honcho was lying at my feet pumping blood out like a burst pipe.
Chastity noticed the difference in their attitudes as well. Like a dog after being neutered they didn't know what to do. With all the bite taken out she swung the metal pipe hard across someone's masked face. It cracked down the side and he grabbed it, groaning.
"Get the fuck outta here before I beat every last one of you to death!" She brandished the pipe like she really could do it. For such a small thing she was as menacing as all twelve of them, at least that's how many I thought I'd counted but it looked like Chastity was in more than one place as well so I couldn't judge my vision as much as I'd like.
Sirens wailed in the near vicinity which made their minds up for them. They made their escape quickly, funneling through the door that was behind my field
of vision. A well-executed drill.
When the room was empty I collapsed forwards into myself. My broken left hand was still chained to the chair, my right hand and wrist didn't feel much better and I let myself sink into the relief of being saved along with the reminder of every place my body had been injured. The back of my skull, my hair, my neck, my arms and hands; every inch felt bruised and on fire.
Staying as still as possible made it easier for me to escape in my mind but it was a short-lived reprise. Chastity was at my side, pulling my face up to look at her. I could only just make out her tear stained cheeks and her smudged eyes which were swelling with eventual bruises.
"So brave." I smiled at her as best I could. I knew I'd failed to control my facial muscles when she frowned at me.
"You'll be OK, I called the cops." She took a second to check my neck and hands, undoing the rest of the chains that wrapped around my left arm. "The one who's investigating your brother's case..."
It took me a few seconds to sift through her words; she had more information about me, Billy and Jack than could be possible without some sort of spying.
"Who are you?" I tried to grab her hand but she backed away, looking towards the door that must have led to the street. The sirens had stopped meaning the cavalry had arrived.
"There's no time, I'll come and see you." She began backing away, ignoring my pleas for her to stay.
By the time Jack and his unit came crashing through the doors with their guns and flashlights Chastity had vanished. I let myself give into the pain and the trauma of the events.
"We got ya, bud, we got ya." Jack's face swam in front of me. He called in an ambulance; his voice held no emotion but I saw the horror on his face moments before I slipped into the dark.
Chapter Eight
I f anyone ever tells you hospitals aren't that bad they're lying through their teeth.
Waking up with wires hanging off you has a distinct way of making you feel too mortal for your own good. At first the beep of the heart rate monitor seems like a soothing lullaby, you drift in and out of dreamless sleep thinking that it's a small musical bird that must have decided to sit and sing to you at your window, until you realise the sound only exists to hurt you and the incessant glibness is actually the equivalent of a vulture swooping in for it's next meal.