Catharsis (Book 1)

by D. Andrew Campbell

  Mr. Bass Voice is correct. Leroy's (At least I'm assuming that's what his name is going off of this conversation.) scent has started to emit the sour tang of nervousness. He's hiding something. I don't even need to hear the heightened pitter of his heart beat (Which I can easily discern from the others with barely any effort at all.) to know that. This poor guy reeks of nerves and lies.

  "I'm not weaselly. You know I hate that." His voice rises but there's little force behind it. The words are empty. "And I mean I'm not sure if I saw them or not. I saw something on the ground after the thing went in the window. It could have been them. I don't know. I didn't stick around." I can hear him breathing heavily. The rasp of air moving through him reminds me of a small kitten playing in a paper grocery sack...rattlely and hollow. "I ran." Another brief pause and I can almost hear him changing his thought direction. "I mean I ran to come tell you guys."

  "You mean they might be lying on the ground out there and you left them?" The anger in the deep voice is unmistakable. "Geezus, Leroy, they might be hurt."

  The rumble of his words is followed by the sound of the doorknob turning. They're coming in. Now. The suddenness of their decision throws me off for a brief second, and I run through my options.

  Hide. Always a solid option, but there’s not enough time. More importantly, I don't think I'd do real well sitting still right now. My body feels like it's channeling its own electricity. It wants to move. Badly.

  Flee. I could turn and make it to the window and dive out by the time the door fully swings open. All they would see is a blur flashing through the window before their eyes could even adjust to the room. A good second option, but not what my body is desiring right now. Flight is not how I'm geared any more.

  Fight. I could attack them and remove them from the equation. Surprise is a powerful ally. And blindingly fast speed and strength make pretty good partners. Plus, this is what I want. The energy welling up inside of me needs a release.

  With the decision made, I mentally prepare myself for what the next moments will hold. I need to embrace who I am. And what I am.

  The door bursts open in an explosion of wood and muscle as the baritone-voiced guy shoulders his way into the open space. I had been prepared for a large man due to the deepness of the voice and the confidence I could smell leaking through in his pheromones, but I'm still not prepared for what comes barreling towards me. The man's physique is an impressive exaggeration of the white-boy hulk I left outside on the lawn. Whereas I thought the previous pale-skinned hoodlum had been large, this man appears to swallow men like that for breakfast, and still have room left in him for a full order of pancakes. The darkness of his skin and the size of his body give off the impression of being pulled into a rapidly approaching black hole. The sight staggers my concentration for the faintest of moments.

  And then I realize my fortune: he isn't looking at me. Or even into the room. He's walking towards me, but he's still looking over his shoulder at the other two guys behind him in the hall.

  "...better hope they're ok," the deep rumble of his voice continues as he closes the distance to me. "Or so help me ga-"

  His voice cuts off mid-word as I sprint the few steps to him and propel myself upwards like a small Hispanic missile and jam my outstretched fingers into his Adam's apple. His height works against me, and I'm robbed of the satisfying crunch of crushed cartilage. My rigid fingers smash his voice box, but the muscle wrapped around his neck (and the insane height I have to travel upwards just to reach it) act as a protective buffer that absorbs most of the impact.

  But I certainly get his attention - his enraged, steroid-infused attention - which is certainly an unintended and unwanted side effect.

  Realizing the ineffectiveness of my initial attack, I quickly transition into another one (Attack-advance-attack, I repeat the mantra my father taught me years ago and use it to keep myself calm as I realize I might be scaling an unbeatable foe.) and reach out to grab his right arm as I fall backwards away from his body. Locking my hands tightly around his wrist before he can fully come to grips with what is attacking him, I bury both my feet in his stomach and launch myself full force out and away from the tree trunk that is his core body.

  I do my best to envision myself swinging on a rope swing out over a lake as I kick away from him and swing out and around in a wide arc with his right shoulder as the center of my fulcrum. The propulsion of my launch combined with the excessive length of his arm (I honestly feel like a toddler playing with their parent because the size difference is so pronounced between the two of us. It's ridiculous.) allows me to nearly reach terminal velocity as my body swings around behind him through the empty room.

  As his right arm hits its full backwards extension and his elbow locks into place, I channel the sudden change in direction into my momentum and whip my feet around towards the back of his body. As I complete the move, I allow time to slow down (It’s become natural to me now) so that I can determine my most effective strike point. My initial thought is to target his shoulder joint from behind and separate the arm socket thus rendering his arm useless (Maybe even permanently if I hit it just right.). But that might not put a gargantuan man like this down. Even worse, it might just enrage him and allow him to attack me with his remaining arm.

  Dismissing that, I eye his spinal column and mentally count unseen vertebrae to find the best place to cripple him and remove him from combat forever. A perfect strike to the seventh vertebrae will make him a paraplegic and remove him from battle now and forever. But his muscles still worry me. Their firmness will act as a buffer upon contact and reduce my ability to make damaging contact. I might go from paralyzing him to merely knocking the wind out of him or even worse, I realize, I might just give him a large and unsightly bruise.

  My final option is a strike to the back of the head. Least likely to be permanent, but most likely to be effective and best of all, his muscle will do very little to dampen a strike to his skull. Making a concussion my ultimate goal, I adjust my trajectory and point my heel so that all the force of my impact will flow through the smallest area and inflict the most damage.

  With a blink, time accelerates and my aim is as true as I could have asked. As my heel smashes into the finely shaved skin on the back of his head, the rubber sole of my sneaker does little to lessen the jar of the impact. His head snaps forward, and the instant limpness of his body informs me of my success. Still holding onto his arm I ride him to the ground like a giant dark-skinned meat wave crashing upon a midnight beach.

  Once we've landed, I spin in place so that I can see the two remaining men in the hall. Three seconds have passed since he entered the room. That was fun. Slowly parting my lips, I smile at them and quietly say, "Next".

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  The rush of adrenaline and excitement that floods my body as I stand on top of the dark man-mountain almost overshadows my ability to sense their reaction to me. Almost.

  Contrasting smells of surprised curiosity (from the big man's friend) and absolute terror (from Leroy) fill the air and accentuate the snare drum rat-a-tat of their heart beats ramping up.

  Attack - advance - attack, I remind myself.

  "Who the holy har-," begins the friend before I leap straight at him from the fallen man's back. He's tall and lanky and physically unimpressive (Not just in comparison to the original baritone who entered the room - who would make even most NFL lineman appear waifish - but just in general. He's not an imposing drug house thug at all.), and I decide to dispose of him equally as quickly.

  Landing feet first on his chest I let my legs curl underneath me, and allow my full weight and momentum to load itself into my body, before I jettison myself backwards off of him. The strength of my push combined with his surprise and loss of balance results in a spectacular finish. He leaves the ground as his body rockets backwards the short distance to the solid plaster-covered wall a few feet behind him. He impacts hard enough to smash the drywall into a body-shaped crater that cradles his bod
y and holds him upright and leaves him vertical long after he's lost the natural ability to do so on his own.

  As he flies away from me, I arch my back so that my hands come in contact with the ground first and I use what little momentum is left in me to bring my feet over my head and into a perfect backwards somersault. Leisurely, I straighten myself into a standing position and turn to face the last person in the hall.

  Standing less than three feet away from me is a scrawny mouse of a man (I can now see why the "ferret" crack earlier bothered him. The resemblance between this man and an elongated rodent are uncanny.) dressed in dirty, dark jeans and a white t-shirt sporting a red smiley face with a sword behind it and what I can only assume is some rarely heard band's name emblazoned over it in faded and cracked letters.

  I cock my head slightly to the left as I smile at him. "Hello, Leroy," I say in a deep, husky voice just slightly louder than a whisper. It has been less than ten seconds since his friend (Or accomplice...or acquaintance...or co-worker. I'm not really sure what the proper terminology for people working in an illegal drug den might be.) burst through the room's door. It's been a very productive time for me, but I imagine a relatively terrifying one for this poor man.

  Everything about Leroy's posture, scent, breathing and heartbeat scream at me his intentions to flee. His desire to run from me is so strong that it almost convinces me to let him do it. Almost.

  "stop," I continue in my quiet voice, and I push the thought into him. "you will not run. you will stay." Even after I say the words, I continue to be amazed at how this works. At my ability to now make people do what I want. It's exhausting mentally (I can only imagine it's similar to attempting to do long division in your head. At gunpoint. While spectators yell out random numbers to distract you. And a giant countdown timer ticks away right in front of you. It's certainly possible to do...and impressive when pulled off successfully, but it's not something you want to do often and remain sane or cognitively strong.), but it's preferable to chasing him down if he bolts.

  If he runs, I might hurt him in an attempt to incapacitate him. And although the chase might prove to be an exciting release of energy, right now answers are more important than thrills.

  Closing the distance to him in a single step, I invade his personal space in an attempt to continue our 'conversation' in a more confining manner. The hunger in me has abated for now thanks to my earlier confrontation with their friend in the dark room, but I still don't feel right. Or normal. My brain is having trouble settling down. As I get closer to Leroy and the delicious aroma of his fear begins to intoxicate me, my brain begins to dip into a frustrating world of cloudiness. This should be easy for me, but it's not. I'm having trouble sticking with a line of thought as my brain wants to jump from one topic to another. At the same time, there is a layer of muck and mental mud clogging my cranial gears. I can't settle or focus on one thought, and the thoughts I do have are clouded and hazy. I don't know what my issue is, but I certainly am not entertained by it.

  Now I just want to finish with Leroy and leave. The safety of my big, empty warehouse calls to me. I don't need safety from people (there is no one here that frightens me at all), I just need safety from stimulation. I want to be able to not think or hear or smell or see anything. I want to be free from whatever is dumping metaphorical sludge into my synaptic crevasses.

  And the postponement of that desire is making me grumpy. Really grumpy.

  "Leroy," I continue quietly as if my attention had been solely on him this entire time. "I have two questions I need you to answer for me, and then I can walk away from all this tonight and you and I will never have to see each other again. Will you help me with them?"

  My new friend doesn't answer the question even though I asked it ever so politely. He just stands very still and stares at me with large, open, mold-green eyes. Although he doesn't verbally respond to me, he does punctuate his silence with the occasional slow eye-blink.

  "I'm going to assume your silence is your version of polite patience, and you aren't actually trying to be disrespectful to a lady that has asked you a question. Because that would be rude, Leroy, and rude people make me angry. I don't want to accelerate my already impending headache with a sprinkle of impoliteness. Who knows how I might react to that. Do you understand? Please nod if you do."

  Staring into his eyes and not blinking, I wait patiently and count his heartbeats. After I silently count off his eighth beat, he quickly bobs his head down and up once. Most likely that's all I'm going to get from him for now.

  "Good. Now please answer my questions quickly and honestly and we can be out of here.

  First off, what's going on in the house next door? The one that people walk to after they drop off the envelope here. Is that where the drugs are? How many people are there now?"

  His only reply is to let his round eyes bulge out slightly farther than they had been before and his breathing and heart beat ratchet up to a machine gun tempo. All signs point to me being right on the money (no pun intended) with the questions. But it would be nice to have my suspicions verbally confirmed.

  "Leroy? Answer me, please." Keeping this scared man as the focus of my attention is getting more challenging. I'm picking up sounds in the house-creaks of wood settling, the rustle of fabric being blown by a fan, water whooshing through pipes-that keep niggling at my attention. Tuning them out is sapping me.

  The wheeze of his breath approaches the high-pitched whine of a train whistle in my ears as he quietly squeaks out, "What house? I don't know what you're talking about."

  Brave man. Braver than I expected. But courage is not what I want from him right now. What I want is answers. And for an easing of the pressure in my brain. I need him to understand the seriousness of us hurrying. I want him to understand that immediately.

  "Think carefully, Leroy, is that really the answer you want to go with?"

  Blink. Blink. Wheeze.

  "Ye-," I let him begin his answer before I whip my right fist out with blinding speed and smash it into the bones of his rib cage hidden beneath his baggy t-shirt. The crack of the two ribs splitting is audible to me, but I doubt their sound will register with anyone else. Certainly not with Leroy who has suddenly become distracted by those same ribs, but not because of their muffled fireworks-like popping sound just below his heart.

  As my right fist retracts, I reach out with my left hand and gently cup his chin to support him and prevent him from slumping to the ground. His full weight drops into my grip, and I can feel my left arm tendons flex under the new weight. For a moment I'm amazed at my own strength and speed (And to be honest, I'm a bit shocked by my own viciousness. Where has this side of me come from? Is it getting worse?), and then I push that aside so that I can focus what bit of my attention I can still summon on the face gently cradled a few inches from my own.

  The hot breath against my palm comes in short bursts as the realization of what just happened sinks in for him. Slowly seeping into his eyes behind the fear is a new emotion. It takes me a moment to recognize it: sadness. And for some reason the existence of this new emotion hurts me more than I want it to.

  "You have two broken ribs now on your left side. They snapped cleanly, and as long as you don't try any strenuous exercise in the next few weeks they should heal without a problem (Thank you last year’s health class!). But they are going to hurt. A lot. And right now they will serve as a reminder. You need to understand that I know when you are lying. Don't do it. It's not worth it.

  Do you understand?"

  The huff-huff of his breath into my open hand slows down as he stares at me, and then the pressure slowly dissipates as he stands up and moves away from my grip. For some reason the fear smell on him retreats (I would think now would be a good time for it to increase severalfold, but it doesn't.) as he stands up straight and stares at me.

  "Yeah. I gotcha," he says slowly. "There's drugs there," he continues but doesn't say anything more. He just stands defiantly staring at me and gingerly
holding his left arm to his side.

  "Good. And how many are inside it right now"?

  He wants to lie. Everything about him screams at me that he wants to pick a number much higher than the actual answer in an attempt to intimidate me and scare me. But before he can open his mouth and prove me right, I let my eyes flick down to his left side and then back up to his eyes. It's subtle, but he understands.

  Sighing, he says quietly, "Just two. But they's good guys. Be nice to 'em."

  Ignoring his commentary, I ask, "Are they armed?"

  "Yes," he continues and lets his eyes drop. "But doan hold dat 'gainst 'em. It's der job."

  "Ok," I tell him. But that part may be out of my control. How I treat them will all depend on how they try to treat me.

  "One more question, Leroy, and we're done. Who runs this show? Who's your boss?" I might not be able to concentrate on much right now (And it's only getting worse with each passing moment.), but I figure knowing who I'm up against will help me in the future.

  The tall lanky man just glares at me and clutches his side even tighter. After a moment, he just shakes his head back and forth and says, "I doan know. I jess work fer the guys in dis house. I doan know who dey work for. I rilly doan."

  As much as I'd like to disbelieve him, nothing about his body language argues against what he's saying. He doesn't know. That line of questioning is a dead end. But before I release him into the night, one more question occurs to me that might help me find an answer to what I seek.

  "Ok, Leroy, I believe you. But since you couldn't answer that, here's a follow up to try and earn some please-don't-kill-me points." I pause and let him understand that answering this next question is of the utmost importance. "Do you know of any other houses like this one?"

  Immediately his breathing and heartbeat change, and I know I asked the right question. He knows. And the slow smile that creeps onto my face lets him know that I'm aware of that fact.