After falling back into bed and curling up in the fetal position, I stopped moving. At some points, I wondered why Vale was so willing to let me skip guard duty, but Revy said that nobody had seen much of him the past few days. He only came if there was an emergency or if he needed to give orders.
Nearly disappeared a few days later. At least, I think it was a few days. They all started to blend together, turning into one long stream of miserable hours. We never bothered going to look for him.
I think it was about two weeks later that Scott showed up with another guard. He looked awful, like he hadn’t been sleeping. There were dark veins around his eyes and his whole body sagged.
“Is anyone else here?”
“No,” Revy said. “It’s just us.”
Vale stepped aside and the guard with him pulled down her hood.
“Vera!” I ran up and hugged her, finally having a reason to move. “I’m so glad you’re alive. How did you get back into the Gray District?”
“I never left. Scott has been hiding me.”
“So, that’s where you’ve been disappearing to?”
“Yeah,” Vera said, taking his hand. “He’s been with me.” She smiled up at him and some amount of happiness came over his face.
“We should go back,” Scott told her. “You can’t stay out very long.”
“He’s right. The people here feel bad for the Truands, but they’re also scared to death of dog-creatures,” Revy said. “We’re glad to know you’re alright, but you should stay in hiding.”
She put her hood back up and hugged me again. “If you ever need me, Scott will tell you where I am.”
I was filled with joy, even after they said goodbye. Knowing that I hadn't hurt my friend made my sadness bearable, though it was still a lot to carry.
"I thought you were feeling better?" Revy asked me as I fell back into bed.
"A little, but... I just need to think."
He sat down next to me. "Is there anything I can do to make you better?"
I smiled as I saw how genuine his concern was. Revy didn't show concern for very many people.
"I think I can start healing now, but I need a favor from you."
Chapter 48 - Revy Micer
I was never good at this sort of thing. Rae was always very adept at staying in the shadows, but it wasn’t something I had felt the need to learn.
I snuck out of the bushes just as the guard passed out of earshot, and was surprised by the man I found waiting for me. Standing on the other side of Cage Five was a man covered in tattoos, with a 50 cm blade strapped to his belt.
“Are you Sirius?”
“Why do you want to know, fairy?”
I showed him the black box.
“Give that to me!”
I handed it to him, but it only took him a second to realize that it was empty.
“I hope you can understand my hesitance to hand this over to you. I’m giving a syringe full of strange liquid that I picked up from a rather intimidating guy in a suit, to a man covered in tribal tattoos, who lives in a cage.”
“Where is Rae? Tell me now!”
“She’s fine, but she didn’t feel well enough to make her delivery.”
“I don’t believe you,” he told me. Contractions around the mouth allowing for the teeth to become visible. Obvious tightening of the jaw and grinding of his teeth. A common snarl, but incredibly intense. This was rage.
“Calm down. I still have what you need.”
I showed him the syringe and saw relaxation in his hands, which previously held the bars in an iron grip. I took that to mean that he was somewhat calmer.
“Keep it,” he said, lowering his head.
“What?”
“I don’t want it!” he screamed, angrier than ever. “It’s all out of control!”
“Be quiet or the guards will come.”
“I need her help! My world is falling apart, my people are volunteering to die and my own wife plays me like a harp. Rae is the last person I trust.”
I tucked the syringe into my pocket. “Leave Rae out of your problems,” I said as I walked away. “She has enough to deal with.”
“Please, I need her help!”
I didn’t answer him.
The walk home was surprisingly peaceful. I stayed hidden in the shadow of the overpass, wishing Scott would let us use the secondary entrance for situations other than emergencies. The few police and civilians wandering in the Presidential District hurried about their business, anxious to get off the streets. As I walked the length of the Shining Ring, it made me wonder just how long the police could hold their defensive line against the monsters and the sunset junkies, when it stretched across the entire city long.
People seemed more at ease in the Gray District, which was a real change, compared to how things used to be. It was just before eleven pm, and there were still children playing in the street. Their parents watched from up on the catwalks, and friends and lovers enjoyed the night sky. I even saw a change in myself. I felt as if I was enjoying life more than usual.
I stood outside for a while, enjoying the cool night air. I watched a few kids playing tag under the full moon, the adults talking to one another and the junkies staring up at me, neon ooze leaking from the limp mouths and cold, dead eyes.
And then they were gone. They disappeared, like ghosts, leaving no trace behind.
“What the hell?” I mumbled to myself.
“A little white lie.”
“A lie of omission.”
I turned to the voice, but found no one there.
“What the hell?”
“Why, Revy?”
Despite the vague words, I knew exactly what they were referring to.
“I have nothing to answer for. We needed to get rid of the vapor problem. It was the only logical option.”
“Then why did you hide us?”
“Why didn’t you tell Scott?”
“Why are we gone?”
“Removed.”
“Hidden.”
“Incinerated.”
They looked up at me, hundreds of bodies. The corpses surrounded me on all sides.
“I came to you for help.”
“You’re a bastard.”
“What kind of doctor are you?”
“I couldn’t help you.” I said to myself, collapsing on the ground. “I couldn’t help you. I couldn’t help you. I couldn’t help you.”
“I want to be a doctor!”
“Why would you want to do that?”
“So I can be just like you.”
“Son, you don’t want to be like me. This job isn’t glamorous.”
“But it’s fun.”
He looked down at me, his eyes full of wisdom and sadness. “Sometimes it is, but, when you work in a place like the Gray District, most of the time, you can’t save the people who come to you for help.”
My eyes snapped open, just as his head hit the concrete. Even as I pulled myself to my feet, I could still see the pieces flying away; my father’s skull shattering like a china teapot.
“Are you ok, sir?” a Black Jacket asked me.
“I’m fine.”
He helped me get steady before returning to guard duty, but only after I assured him that I could get home on my own.
I made it back to the clinic just fine, but, as I did, a single phrase echoed in my mind, over and over and over again.
“You know you’re a bad person, right?”
Chapter 49 - Rae Johnson
“Shift change!”
Upon hearing those words, the ten of us immediately hopped off the barricade and allowed our replacements to take over. I wondered if the other stations had been just as dull for the past six hours. It almost made me wish I was back on Revy’s pullout couch. It was equally boring, but at least I could sleep there.
“Contact right!”
Without even thinking, I hopped back into my spot and readied my weapon. I could, just barely, see something moving in one o
f the alleys. My heart was beating so fast, I thought it would explode.
“Fuck, never mind,” the commanding officer told us, as a plastic bag flew out and into view.
I felt as if rocks were tied to my appendages. My arms dropped to my sides, and my rifle nearly fell from my hand. I was relieved that there was no danger, but, at the same time... at the same time I felt strange.
My thoughts and emotions had been a jumbled mess for the past five months. Finding out Vera was alive had made my depression melt away, but it also allowed other feelings to bubble up to the surface. I remembered every single bullet I fired into the crowd of Truands, and knew exactly how many people I had killed. My guilt still hadn't gone away, but there was something else alongside it; embedded in my mind. I tried to cover it, but the feeling inside me was as strong as ever. The darkness wouldn't go away.
I remembered the power I had felt, holding them in my crosshairs. As the Truands stood at the bottom of the ramp, we held their lives in our hands; and, when they attacked, the world became black and white. It was just them versus us; and they lost.
“Rae, go home. We can handle this.”
I looked around and realized that I was the last member of my shift still hanging around. I slung my weapon over my back, but, just as I was about to leave, something caught my eye; a little white rabbit, sitting on the anarchic side of the barricade. It wasn’t really doing much, but, for some reason, I was hypnotized by it.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
I hadn’t even realized I was climbing over, until my feet hit the ground.
“I’m, uh…”
“Get back over here! It’s not safe out there.”
I knew I should have listened, but I couldn’t help myself. My feet seemed to move on their own, and I was already across the threshold. I inched up to it, closer and closer, but, just as I was about to grab the white rabbit, it moved. The animal jumped about a foot to the right and calmly sat there. I tried to grab it again, and it hopped away. It happened over and over, until the animal took off like a rocket, and I sprinted after.
“Don’t expect us to come in there after you!”
I kept chasing it, jumping over piles of garbage and rubble as I tried to keep up. I ran through the streets, in and out of buildings and down an alleyway, until I turned a corner and bumped into a sunset junkie with pink glowing eyes.
I grabbed my weapon, ready to defend myself, but he and his friend simply kept walking.
“Damn, I wish these trees would stop moving.”
“I know, right! The tiny ones keep bumping me.”
When my heart finally stopped pounding, I looked up and saw the white rabbit, sitting in the middle of the street, patiently waiting for me.
I followed it once again, but didn’t run this time. I was much more careful as I followed it down the street, and I stopped entirely when I saw it enter a building.
The front doors had been torn off of the ten story structure, along with most of the windows and walls. The top floor, however, looked like someone had tried to repair it. Most of it was intact, but a few parts had been covered with wood or metal panels.
I dived inside when I heard a gunshot. It was large caliber, very loud and a second one went off a moment later.
The rabbit was, yet again, waiting for me; this time at the bottom of the stairs.
“What kind of animal are you?”
It didn’t answer, of course, but simply began the long trek upwards. When I followed, it quickened its pace, hopping up the steps even faster. I followed the little bunny up all nine flights, until finally reaching the top floor.
There were only two places to go from here. One was a door marked, “ENTER AND DIE” and the other was the final set of stairs, which led to the roof.
The rabbit hopped up the last flight, not waiting for me to follow anymore. After a few moments, I could hear a male’s voice.
“Hey there, Mouse. Where have you been?”
I followed the animal, finding myself in something that looked like a cross between a military checkpoint and a bachelor pad. The rooftop was cluttered with empty snack food bags and hollow cans of meat and beans. Ammo boxes and empty magazines had been tossed aside as well, and, sitting on a reinforced table, under a canopy tent, was the largest sniper rifle I had ever seen.
“Uh, do you want to tell me why you’re here?”
I looked over at the man holding the rabbit in his arms, who was raising an eyebrow at me.
“Sorry, I just… I’m not really sure.”
He walked up to me, and looked into both my eyes.
“You’re not a junkie. You're a Black Jacket.”
“How did you know?”
“Well gee, I wonder,” he said, in the most sarcastic tone I had ever heard. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“I… I…” I kept stammering, but honestly had no idea why I had come all this way.
“You know, you really suck at conversations. Can you at least tell me your name?”
“Rae,” I told him, and only a second later did I realize that I should have lied.
“I’m Durango. Nice to meet you.” He walked back to the sniper rifle. “Care to help me do some painting?”
“What do you mean?”
“Grab those binoculars.”
I did as he said, and aimed them where the rifle was pointed.
“I’ve been working on this project all week, and I just need one more junkie of the right height… oh wait, I think one is about to pass by.”
As he looked down the scope, ready to fire, I saw what his project was; a smiley face, painted on a wall three blocks away using neon blood splatter and brain matter.
A sunset junkie passed by, oblivious to anything happening around him. Just as he walked in front of the final blank space, Durango took the shot. The junkie’s brains splattered against the wall, filling in the last blank space and completing the picture.
“Hell, yeah!” he cried. “Feels like I’ve been working on that forever.”
“It's…” I couldn’t finish my thought, but I wanted to tell him it was disgusting… and also kind of cool. The painting was comprised of at least six different colors of vapor-ized blood, making a rainbow smile. It seemed ironic, since a lot of people died to make it, their bodies piled right under the mouth.
“Well, that clears up everything I had planned for the day. What do you think?”
“It's such a waste. You killed a human being.”
“They’re pretty much dead anyway. Haven’t you seen them up close? They barely recognize anything. Unless they hear the words lykan, feral, dog-creature or Truand, of course. Then they’ll fucking swarm you.”
I looked at the rifle, and then out at the Sunset District. Everything was broken and dirty. Dead people were everywhere, and yet, here was a man who wasn’t taking it seriously. Was there enjoyment that could be taken from anarchy? Could this be a place where Jamestown’s constant tragedies could be shrugged off as a part of life, rather than being a constant burden?
“You want to take a shot, don’t you?” he said, interrupting my thoughts.
“I don’t know.”
He moved away from the weapon. “Well, until you decide, I’ll just leave this fully loaded sniper rifle out here in the open. It's one hundred percent unguarded. If anyone wanted to use it to pick off a few junkies, it would be completely out of my hands.”
I knew he was baiting me, he made no attempt to hide that, but the temptation was enormous. Having this opportunity dumped into my lap made me crave that feeling; the intense power of choosing whether another human being got to live or die.
“It’s a little larger than one of the President’s automatics,” Durango told me, as I placed my hands on the cold steel. “It’s buffered though, so the recoil will actually be smaller.”
I looked through the scope, and scanned the area.
“Choose something close, that way you’ll have a larger target, and won’t have to deal wi
th the wind.”
I lined up a junkie who was standing on the corner. His empty stare and blank expression made him barely seem human.
I lined up his head, and took a deep breath…
Bang
“Nice shot, princess.”
That was how I wanted to feel. The rush hit me as I watched him fall to the ground, never to move again. And then, before regret could even cross my mind, Durango pointed me to another target.
“At your two o’clock. There’s two girls talking. See if you can take them both out in one shot.”
I lined them up. One head, one heart, one bullet…
Bang
“You’re getting good at this.”
It was intoxicating, and yet it made me hate myself.
“I shouldn’t be doing this.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m not supposed to. I’m supposed to be helping people; guarding them.”
“And?”
“And I… I don’t know.”
“Morality is overrated. I want to know how you feel, right now.”
“Guilty.”
“Put that aside. No one else is alive in this entire district. No one is ever going to punish you here. No one will judge you. No one is watching. No one cares.”
I felt my guilt start to melt away.
“Forget how you’re supposed to feel. Fuck the rules and the people who made them. You’re now in a world with no police, parents or laws. How does holding this gun make you feel?”
I searched myself, and, for the first time in a long time, I forgot that I was sad.
“I feel powerful.”
Chapter 50 - Paige Wilson
“Madam President, you have a visitor.”
“Send them in.”
A young man dressed in slacks, a blazer and a sky blue button down shirt walked in. “Hello, Madam President.”
“Hello. What’s your name, son?”
“It’s Thomas, ma’am, and I’d just like to say what an honor it is to meet you.”
“That’s very sweet of you to say,” I told him, blushing a little. It had been a long time since I’d received that kind of flattery, but I quickly put it aside in order to maintain my professionalism. “So, what is it that you need, Thomas?”
Black Light: The Deplorable Savior Page 19