Endless Online: Oblivion's Blade

by M. H. Johnson

  The football jock blinked and swallowed, grimacing into Val's gun. "Look, man, it wasn't that deep. I didn't force her to do anything she didn't want to do. No man, it's all good times in Pappa Bear land." He swallowed again, taking a desperate sip of brandy. "Seriously, Val, no one put a gun to her head like you're doing now. If it hurt so bad she couldn't stand it, she's not some poor street girl turning tricks, she just has to go to her parents and get into rehab. Yeah, embarrassing, but not that deep. Clarissa went straight last semester, now she's an honors student. She won't even talk to us now, getting past her past and whatever other bullshit her counselors drilled into her head, but do I hold it against her? Hell no. It's her life, she can do whatever the fuck she wants."

  He shrugged. "Christine still wanted to party. I told her it was cool, just let it be like old times. Hell, Val, I knew from the day she came crawling back that she was still shagging you. I even told her I didn't give a fuck, so long as I came first. As long as she still had feelings for me."

  Val frowned, a nervous Terrance suddenly breaking eye contact, even with the gun pointed at him.

  "It wasn't that easy for her." Val's voice was dry as the desert as the truth grew ever clearer in his mind's eye. "She couldn't just fuck you, then fuck me, and call it all one big party. She isn't like you. She wanted someone who cared about her. She couldn't stand the thought of cheating on me, so she broke up, even if she hated herself for being so desperate." Val blinked away a hot tear. "I know she still cared about me. I know she regretted the choice she made. Do you know how I know, Terrance? She was still wearing my goddamn ring! Now hanging up on your goddamn mirror! The look she gave me the day she died was nothing but regret! What happened, Terrance? Did she try to break up with you a second time? Did you hate the idea of Mr. Pappa Bear with all his happy times coming second place to a stupid gamer nerd? Is that why you beat her to death?" Val's voice had become a ragged shout. Terrance's eyes flashed.

  "Don't you shout at me, you goddamned shithead! I don't give a fuck about your gun. You want to kill me? Go for it! I fucking guarantee your DNA is already all over this room. She was your girl too, fuckhead. The more it looks like I did it, the more it looks like you killed me for vengeance! Everyone knows she was fucking both of us, Val. Now take the goddamned money and get the fuck out of here!"

  Val cocked his Browning. Terrance grew utterly still, only his blinking eyes giving away his terror.

  "This is a 1911 Browning, Terrance. It shoots 45 caliber slugs that will leave a dime sized hole in your forehead and a baseball sized exit wound when it blows out the back of your skull. Standard issue military sidearm for over seventy years, this is one of thousands that are all but forgotten." Val flashed an icy smile. "You'd be surprised, how easy it was for me to get this. And you're wrong, Terrance. Note my ski mask? Disposable attire I'll never wear again? The gloves? The fact we're having this conversation during a blackout? I could shoot you here and now, and it wouldn't mean a goddamn thing. It would never get back to me. Why should it? You're not responsible for Christine's death, right? So there's no fucking reason for anyone to associate me with shit!"

  Terrance shuddered and blinked. "Please, man, please... it was an accident." He began to sob.

  Val's voice turned strangely sympathetic. "I get it, man, I get it. Now why don't you get this shit off your chest and tell me what really happened? Maybe it will never get back to you. Who the fuck would take my word over yours? But at least I would know. Please, Terrance. Just tell me what the fuck went down."

  Terrance shuddered and nodded. "Promise me, Val, promise me you won't shoot me dead?" Nervous and panicked, Terrance was visibly swaying.

  Val nodded, solemnly resheathing his gun. "I promise. Now why don't you tell me what really happened?"

  Terrance blinked in amazed relief, taking another sip of brandy. "Sure, man, fuck. I had too much to drink tonight, but that's what I get. The least of what I deserve, I know. And please, man, I'll tell you but... don't shoot. Let me make amends. I'll hook you up like you wouldn't believe. Just don't shoot me, okay?"

  "I said I wouldn't. Now tell me what went down."

  Sobbing, Terrance nodded. "God, it's been eating at me. I thought maybe you got it, the look you gave me at the funeral, but you were just so damn down, didn't even glance my way back at school, that I thought we were cool. Shit, man, I pitied you. I would have hooked you up for free, if you had asked. I'm serious, man, I kinda felt bad for you. I know it's my fault, but like, I felt like we were both in the same boat, somehow."

  "Just get to the point, Terrance."

  Terrance shuddered, nodding his head, star football player looking ragged and exhausted, blond curls hanging limp on his sweaty brow. "Yeah, about that." He sighed. "Fuck, it's just like you said. Just like you said. She... she and I... we hooked up again, she was sailing high as a kite, I thought it was all good, you know? That we were tight. She's the bomb, you know that, but damn, I swear, Val, she wasn't just a party girl to me. I really, well, I had feelings for her, you know? Anyway, after that first night, I thought we were cool, even though she was so quiet. She was taking hits like you wouldn't believe. I thought we were good, goddamn we partied hard, but she was crying at the end."

  He grimaced in self-disgust. "Damn, Val, I thought she was crying for pleasure, but she curled up and just kept sobbing, I didn't know what the fuck to do. I asked her what was wrong. It was driving me crazy, and she said it was nothing. I asked if she'd fuck me over again, and she said no, we were cool. I assumed it was just feminine shit, I don't know, sometimes the coke hits her hard. Most of the time she loves it." He sighed. "It was like that for awhile, then we seemed to be okay. We were laughing and chilling again, catching flicks and partying like old times, but then out of the blue she's sobbing, saying I strung her out and made her my fucking whore, that I was no better than a pimp, and she absolutely hated me."

  Terrance's eyes were wide, shaking his head, fists clenching at the memory. He looked furious.

  "That goddamn bitch! Everything I had done for her, every good time we had shared, was nothing! Bullshit! Before she met you, Val, she was happy and free, not a care in the world, and I knew we were tight. Fuck, she told me so many times that I was the best thing that had ever happened to her, that she wanted us to be solid for life, and then, out of the blue, she calls me a pimp and a pusher and that I made her my whore! That's fucking bullshit! I did no such thing! No one made her crawl into bed with me, no one put a line of coke up her nose! It was her fucking choice. All of it! She could have walked away at any time!"

  "And that's when you hit her." Val heard the words, dry and strange, as if spoken by someone else.

  "Yes, goddamn it, that's when I hit her! And I couldn't stop, Val! I was so furious, so angry, she made me feel like such a worthless shit when I just wanted us both to soar! Side by side! And here she was, saying I was a slimy lowball piece of filth! I am not worthless, I am not nothing! She had no right to say those things to me. No right!"

  He trembled, holding a shaking fist, glaring at Val, some fear having abated with Val sheathing his pistol. His gaze turned strangely pleading. "Do you understand Val? Do you get it? I loved her, Val, I really... loved her. And she took my heart, tore it out, spat on it, and called me filth."

  His fierce stance crumpled. He broke into exhausted tears. "Oh fuck, Val, it's all my fault. All my goddamn fault! I just, I just, I just wanted her to love me!" Pleading eyes gazed into Val's own. "Please, man, please... I just, I just wanted to go back to the way things were before."

  Val nodded. "Before the first time you beat her."

  Terrance sighed, his voice slurring as he spoke. "Fuck. Fuck it all. If I could take it all back, I would. If I could suffer a massive beating and bring her back, I swear, Val, I would do it right now." He swallowed desperately, gazing at Val. "I'll tell you what. Make me suffer. Blow out my knees, both of them! I'll fucking hurt for life, I'll scream like a baby, and maybe, somehow, I can atone. Goddamn it, Val
, I just wish I could go back!"

  Val gazed at Terrance, feeling as cold and bleak as death itself, gazing at his prey.

  He slowly shook his head. "Some things can't be taken back, Terrance. Thank you for the tears. Seeing your regret, it helps. Now lie down. It will make the next part easier."

  The jock's composure crumpled. He sobbed, blinking his eyes as if in a stupor even as he shook with terror, stumbling over his words. "Oh my god, oh my god, you're really going to do it? You're really going to shoot me? Please, man, please, I don't want to die! I am so sorry. So fucking sorry. Please, man, anything, it's yours. Just please don't kill me! Look, I'll explain it all to my dad. I'll be in so much fucking trouble, but when I explain, he'll see you rich, Val. I don't know your home life, but I can tell by your clothes that you're just getting by. I can help you, man. My dad will help you."

  Val's smile was ice. "My dad's worth more than your entire family. I just don't give a fuck about clothes. But don't worry, Terrance. Relax. Just let yourself drift. We're done here."

  Terrance blinked in disbelief. "You're... you're going to let me live?"

  "I'm not going to shoot you, Terrance. But if you ever see me in school again, you'd best turn right around and go the other fucking way."

  He trembled, nodding furiously. "Yeah, man, no worries. Fuck, fuck, thank you, man! Oh, I will make this right, I swear it! No more dealing, Val. Jade, the other girls, I'll make sure they're alright, that they're not all quitting cold turkey. Then I'm out." He swallowed. "I fucking promise, man, this is a new leaf. I'm going to be worthy of this, I swear it!"

  Val nodded. "Good luck with that."

  Terrance smiled, the picture of exhaustion, falling into his pillows. "Goddamn. I'm glad, man, I'm really glad." His voice had fallen into a soft murmur, eyelids closing. "I'm going to make this right..." A soft snore.

  Val took a deep breath, centering himself, making sure all was as it should be.

  Suicide note in place on the desk. Empty pill bottle and brandy flask even now leaking the remaining contents on his bed. Terrance had drunk at least half.

  Val's eyes locked on the ring sparkling faintly in the reflected dim moonlight even as it hung on its string, and Val choked back a sob, suddenly haunted by Christine's bright green eyes, her hopeful smile. How she had wrapped her arms and legs around him, squeezing him tight, kissing him so deeply, making love to him so tenderly in his soft plush bed. His father, colonel and entrepreneur both, knew what it meant to be a young man in love. Perhaps because he was himself a widower, his other children now in college, he gave Val more leeway than most parents would. Val could tell his father liked Christine, though he had also sensed that something was off. That something wasn't quite as it should be.

  Val trembled and sobbed once, bitter regret flooding him as Terrance began to gurgle and wheeze. Silence as Val closed the bedroom door behind him, making his way with gloves on still, down the stairs. His heart lurched in his chest as he saw the shadow of a body, then a soft snore, one of the very few partygoers who hadn't stumbled home was out like a light.

  The kitchen was pitch black and not a sound to be heard. It was nothing to slip out the door, close it quietly, and make his way across the hedges to the neighbor's yard, from there slipping into the park nearby, more forest then not, with enough thick hedges that no one had spotted and taken the nondescript bike he had bought at a garage sale miles away just days before.

  Evidence dropped in a small pit he had dug a foot away from his bike the night before, and away he rode, just a kid getting a thrill with a late night bike ride. His hands shook with something other than excitement when he made his way back home after leaving his bike kickstand up at a neighborhood full of kids just a block away, a nice enough bike he doubted most kids would mind claiming it as their own, no matter that no one was poor in that stretch of town.

  His hands trembled as he tried to put his key in the lock, gazing in disbelief, suddenly unable even to open the door. A deep, shuddering breath, a sob he choked down, and finally his key was in and he was home. Freezing on the doorstep. His shoes. No, it was silly, but still, he'd be stupid not to be careful. Val knew that turning on the hose and washing them in the dead of night would have looked suspicious, but it was pitch black, and he knew his property like the back of his hand. There. Done. Any dirt or gunk that would place him anywhere was now gone. Carefully he took them off, leaving them in a discrete spot to dry. They, like the nondescript clothes he wore, would find themselves dumped in the clothes donation center, just as soon as he found the strength to drive over there.

  But not tonight. Sure as god, not tonight. It would be suspicious as hell, and he was in no shape to drive anyway.

  "Val, is that you?"

  Val froze in the hallway, stumbling to his room, heart in his throat. There was only one answer he could give. "Yeah, dad, it's me."

  A long silence. "Are you okay, son?"

  "Sure, dad. I'm heading to bed."

  "Did you lock the door?"

  Val paused and swallowed. "The door is locked. Goodnight, dad."

  "Val?"

  "Yes?"

  "If you ever need to talk, I'm here for you."

  Val took a deep shuddering breath, squeezing his hands tight. Trying not to keel over as a flood of emotions roared through him. "I'm just tired, dad. We can talk tomorrow."

  "Sleep well, son."

  "You too."

  Grateful for the dark, a trembling Val stood on the plastic garbage back he had left by his bed, struggling out of first one, then the other set of clothes until he was in his boxers alone. It was all he could do not to collapse in a shuddering heap as he bagged his clothes, then scooted the secondhands under his bed. What would soon be freshly cleaned clothes to donate to those in need, though not to the same stores he had originally bought them from. He wasn't that stupid, though god knew he had been a right fool when it really mattered.

  In his gut, he had known that something was wrong with Christine, even when he was falling in love with her. So often she seemed haunted by something, but when she was happy, she was so hyped she seemed almost drunk. And how passionate she was when they made love, holding him so tightly, sobbing in his arms when they had peaked together, saying he was the only one who had ever really loved her, who didn't make her feel like a thing. Even then he had been filled with a hot fury, a need to protect her. But she made him swear never to confront Terrance for having beaten her. To just let the past go like she had. But the past had its hooks in Christine, and it had held on fast.

  Only after her body had been found beaten and broken did the truth come out. The drugs that had been in her system. The awful rumor put out that she had been selling herself on the street to get her fix, just another tragic ending for a girl caught up in a bad scene. Only then did everything click, bitter insights gained as the seemingly disconnected clues all clicked into place, when Val forced himself to really look and pay attention to what was going on at school, going on with the former players in Christine's so recently ended life.

  Val's rage had turned to diamond hardness by the time he had all the pieces in place. So discrete he had been, so damn discrete, not a single question he had raised. But a bit of pot purchased, easy conversation with a former varsity wrestling buddy selling weed and soft shit on the side, and Val knew what he was going to do. Knew exactly how things would play in a dizzying epiphany even as he was sharing a beer with the kid, both of them laughing at the stupidest bullshit. And Val had smiled right along, jaw clenched so tight it hurt.

  And things had gone exactly to plan. His father would say only one time in a dozen did things work out so smoothly. Perhaps it had helped that he hadn't given a flying fuck what happened to him. He had been both furious beyond belief and filled with an icy bleakness, an acceptance of whatever consequences ensued. If he had died that night, he wouldn't have cared. But so long as he could act, he would not stop until he had his vengeance. And that he did, only realizing as he lay in bed, tr
embling and sobbing, shaking like a child, how awful was the prize he had fought so hard to claim.

  Sharp as he was, Val had always avoided the party scene, so what would have been clear to some had flown right over his head. He had been waiting for Christine to feel comfortable enough to share with him, to confide in him, to let him be there for her, when perhaps he should have broached the subject himself. Gotten her to open up, get it off her chest, crying her heart out if she must, and then they would get help for her. Together. But now it was too late. They could never have that happy ending together. The girl he loved, had sworn in his heart to protect, had died to brutal savagery, and there was nothing he could do to bring her back.

  Just like there was nothing that Terrance's parents could do to bring their own son back, the father standing stoic as his beautiful wife sobbed and sobbed endlessly as last rights were given, more than half the student body of his school at attendance, paying their respects, as was the unspoken custom for the families that had lived and prospered in that town for generations.

  And how those tears had cut into Val's soul. His father, also attending, said nothing, merely squeezing Val's shoulder as a father would as Val trembled and sobbed, desperate not to think, desperate not to recall every horrid moment of Terrance pleading with Val not to kill him, begging for a chance to make things right.

  The weather had been calm that day, unlike the raging storm in Val's heart.

  Not long after, he had spoken to his father about enlisting. Something in his father's eyes had left Val filled with an icy sort of foreboding. His father was no fool. But if he had suspicions about Terrance's death, he said not a word.

  His father had just stared from the other side of his desk. Not one for politically inspired bullshit, he poured them both a glass of wine, treating him like the man Val aspired to be. If you're old enough to kill, his father would say, there is no way in hell you can't be old enough to drink.