Catharsis (Book 1)

by D. Andrew Campbell

  "Come on, man," I continue to purr at him in my huskiest voice. "I will totally make it worth your while." Pausing, I try to let that sink in before I say, "I'll make it something you'll never forget."

  So dirty. I feel so dirty. After tonight I’ll need every female ancestor I've ever had to forgive me.

  I can feel him waiting on the other side of the door, and I know he is weighing my offer. Slowly licking my lips and looking up at the tiny peephole through my lashes, I do my best to seal the deal and bring him to my side.

  "Not tonight, honey," he finally says with an obvious tinge of reluctance in his voice. "Any other night, I'd say yes, but not tonight."

  A small part of me wants to analyze his answer as I believe there was a hidden compliment in there for me (A lewd one aimed at my sexuality, but it's still the kind of compliment I've never really received before.), but the bigger part of me realizes I've just failed and he's getting ready to walk away. I'm out of options. Searching my brain, I grasp on to the only thing I think I have left...

  "Leroy sent me over," I say hurriedly to the door. "The guys are hurt, and he thinks all the money might be gone. He needs help, and..." I pause for a moment as I consider how to end this. "And I'm scared."

  Hoping that's enough to get them to come out to me, I do my best to imitate the sounds of someone sobbing as I slowly crumple to the ground on the front stoop. At least I want it to look like exhausted crumpling from a distance, in reality I do my best to keep my toes underneath me and ready to spring.

  "It was so awful over there," I whimper softly between my "sobs". "That big Chinese guy looked serious about killing them, too. I can't believe it (I figure the more I throw at them to keep them off-balance the better off I'll be at getting them to believe me.)."

  As I listen to the muffled voices behind the door (Reluctant Guy apparently is discussing options with someone down the hall.), I decide to play one more card in my ploy to keep them focused on me. It's a gamble to let them know I'm aware of its existence, but I think it'll be enough for them to want to get me inside.

  "And what is Cummerlin? He kept talking about Cummerlin..." I make sure to say the name of the street of the other house that Leroy knew about more than once to get the point across. If I know about it and I heard about it from the supposed "attackers", then these guys will want to know what else I heard. And the only way to do that is to open the door, right?

  After another heated exchange behind the door (Mr. Reluctant is arguing that I should be brought in and questioned. Down The Hall Guy thinks it could be a trick and they should wait. My money is on Reluctant winning, especially since I'm guessing he might already have his hand on the doorknob.), I wait out a short silence as I continue with my theatrical sobbing. Finally, the telltale clicks of locks being turned reach my ears, and my body tenses in anticipation (And a healthy dose of nervousness. I'm pretty sure I can rely on my speed and strength without triggering a meltdown, but I'm far from positive. This could get real scary, real quick.).

  As the light from inside the house spills out and the door cracks open, I cease my sobbing and smile up at the dark face silhouetted in the doorway.

  "Showtime," I hiss through my parted lips and then launch myself at him.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  Due to the light behind him, I can't make out much of his features aside from his wide, round eyes bulging at me as I fly through the air.

  "Aaack," he screams (Not sure if it was at me or just yelled in general. Good chance he wasn't sure, either.) as I watch him attempt to swing the door shut again, but there is no way I am letting that happen. Not after all the work I went through to finally see the inside of this place. Plus his startled reaction time isn't nearly on par with my heightened reflexes. By the time his brain has figured out what's happening and sent the message to his arms to close the door, I'm already smashing against it like a runaway motorcycle (I'd love to compare myself to a runaway train or even a truck, but I simply don't have enough mass or power right now to measure up to either of those forces. I doubt I'm even up to "car" level right now. Settling for "motorcycle" seems like a good compromise, as even I would be embarrassed to have to say, "I hit the door like a hurtling moped".).

  I may not weigh much, but it's enough to knock the door backwards and into Reluctant Guy. His grip on the old, brass doorknob tightens as the heavy, reinforced wooden door swings into his face. His startled look at my sudden aggression is quickly replaced by a contortion of pain as the edge of the wooden door connects with his cheek and eye bone. Luckily there is no blood (I'm not sure what my body would do right now if it smelled the delicious tang of the red liquid that has had a hold over me these last two weeks.) as he slowly slumps to the floor in the hall either unconscious or quickly on his way to that destination.

  Landing next to him on the pockmarked beige tiles of the hall, I watch as his eyes roll back in his head and his body goes limp. Well most of his body goes limp, at least. Oddly enough, his right hand still has a death grip (I hope that term is not completely accurate here. I had no intention of killing the boy.) on the door handle and he hangs awkwardly from it.

  Lowering myself into a crouching position, I focus on the sounds around me. The heartbeat and breathing of the guy on the floor next to me both even out enough to let me know he is no longer conscious and in no danger of dying in the next few moments. If he were still awake and faking, then his heartbeat would be going wild after what just happened. Getting cold-cocked with a door by a girl you just assumed was crying and incapacitated would have to have an amped effect on the ol' ticker.

  And if he was hit hard enough to be close to death, then the heartbeat would be weak and stuttery. It's not. It's steady and strong and a dead giveaway of his current condition.

  Turning towards the direction of what I can only assume might be the kitchen, I can hear the other man, Down the Hall Guy, entering the early stages of a complete freak out.

  "Paul!" He shouts at us from down the bend in the hallway. "Wha' happen'd man? Wha' was dat noise? You ok?" There's a short pause, and I can hear him breathing loudly. "Why ain't you talkin'?"

  Aside from him making noise down the hall, I'm not picking up any other sounds in the house. There's a good chance he's the last one I'm going to have to deal with for the night.

  With a deep inhalation, though, I realize he won't be the last thing I have to deal with tonight. The pungent reek of whatever drugs they're storing or making here permeate the house. The air is thick with it. It's thick enough that I realize I can’t waste any time finishing this, because if I stay in the house too long then it might overwhelm me.

  "Come on man. Talk to me. Was I right about 'er?"

  The whiney sound of the man's voice snaps my attention back to the task at hand. Do I answer him and confirm his fears about what just happened, or do I remain silent and let his fear fester as I sneak down towards him? Both options have upsides. If I speak up, then I might be able to scare him into just leaving without having to confront him at all. But on the other hand, if he's too strong-willed to leave, then speaking up will just give him a warning and eliminate the element of surprise I still hold.

  Tough choices.

  I decide it's best to wait to speak and creep down and get a look at what I'm facing. Once I see who and what I'm up against, then I'll re-weigh the options.

  As I leave the opened front door behind me, I silently pad down the hall towards the remaining man and all the noise he's making. Each step I take, though, leads me deeper into the smells of the house. Apparently this guy has bunkered himself in the main supply room of the house, and the aromas drifting towards me are getting distracting. Every breath burns my lungs with foulness and I can feel the second-hand effect of the drugs as they hit my system.

  Suddenly having heightened senses is more of a hindrance than a super power. As the scent particles of different drugs flow into me I can feel my heart wanting to speed up or slow down depending on what type of drug it is. Waves of m
ellowness and jitteriness wash over me like competing oceans trying to pull me in opposing directions. Concentration has no longer become a weapon at my disposal.

  As I approach the last five feet of the hallway (I would have sworn this hall was over a hundred feet long and that I had been walking down it for over an hour given how mentally exhausted I was feeling already, but looking back at it now it wasn't more than twenty feet long.), I give up on breathing altogether and decide to see how long I can hold my breath.

  Pushing the remaining tainted air of out of my lungs, I hold onto the wall for support as I move as quickly as I can towards the kitchen's doorway.

  "I know you're out there man. I can hear you," he says to his unconscious friend behind me. "Why ain't 'chu talking to me? Come on." With what little energy I can muster, I move so that I can see the man talking. My eyes unfocus for just a moment as I release the wall and step out to get a better view. I can't tell much about the blur in front of me aside from size (Taller than me, but then again what guy isn't?), race (He's either a well-tanned white dude or a very light-skinned black guy.), clothes (Blue jeans, a white baseball hat and a dark colored t-shirt.) and facial hair (He either has a big, scruffy, dark beard or I caught him in the middle of trying to eat a raccoon. Right now, I'd honestly believe either one.).

  The other thing that catches my attention is a small black blob in his left hand as he holds it up next to his face. Whatever it is, there is a part of my brain urgently trying to get my attention to focus on it. Doing my best not to wobble on my feet, I stare at him and his black blob until I'm able to force them to snap into focus.

  Blink. Nothing.

  Longer blink. Nothing.

  Blink. Blink. And the room materializes out of the haze into a crystal representation of what I'm seeing, and I realize what he's holding.

  "Fahget it, Paul. Fahget you. I'm calling 'im," and my heart kicks into overdrive as I realize his thumb is quickly moving across the keypad of the phone in his hand. Now's the time to move. No more delaying. I can't handle more people here. I can barely handle the one in front of me now.

  "No! Wait!" I squeak at him as the knowledge of how challenging it is to yell when you have no air in your lungs quickly hits me. There's no power behind my voice. Nothing to carry it to him and get his attention. No reason for him to stop dialing.

  And yet he does. Whatever sound I made (As embarrassingly pathetic as it was.) was just enough to get him to look up and into the hall. Where he sees me standing in the open staring at him.

  "Who the he-," he blurts out, and I realize my impromptu plan is a success. In his surpise at seeing me, he lets go of the phone and I watch as it drops to the floor. Mission accomplished.

  As my conscious brain celebrates this small victory, a smaller part keeps hissing something about the man still standing there. Something about him moving. It sure seems important, too.

  Man, I sure miss breathing. The thought pops unheeded into my head. Thinking’s a lot easier with oxygen.

  Wrenching my eyes away from the phone and its journey to the dirty tile, I look back up at the startled guy to see him holding an even larger, blacker object in his other hand.

  Gun!

  My mind clears instantly as adrenaline floods my system and kicks everything into a new gear. I'm going to pay for this energy boost very soon, but for now it is desperately needed.

  Stepping into the kitchen, I accelerate to my right and towards the cluttered counter (I hadn't even realized it was there, and I can only assume that it's my subconscious mind guiding me and seeing things that I'm not even aware of.) and spin my body to make it a tougher target to hit.

  The room explodes with sound around me as the gun goes off, and I can hear the wall erupt behind me as each bullet tears through it. Even moving as fast as I am (I'm fast right now, but nowhere near my speed from earlier.), I can sense the explosions in the wall getting closer to me as he adjusts his aim to follow my path.

  The adrenaline that sent me on my original surge into the room is already fading (I knew it would come back to haunt me.) as I reach the counter and pick up the first heavy thing I can wrap my fingers around - a ceramic bowl still partly filled with old marshmallowy cereal and a large metal spoon. Continuing my spin that brought me to the counter, I scoop up the bowl and hurl it as hard as I can towards the man and his deafening hand cannon. The milk arcs behind the bowl like a slipstream created by a jet in a blue sky. I have a moment to enjoy the beauty of the image before the pink ceramic bowl smashes into his nose and shatters.

  I'm sure there was a satisfying crunching sound upon impact, but I was robbed of hearing it due to the roar of the gun and its after-effects on my ears.

  Breathing heavily (I have no choice but to breathe in now and just try to ignore what the foul air does to me. I know I'm going to fail at this, but "not breathing" is no longer an option.), I try to focus on the sounds in the kitchen to see if I can pick out the man's heartbeat or breathing. I hear nothing but ringing. My ears are useless for the moment.

  Glancing up at the man's face, I catch my breath and manage to finally stop breathing. His face is ruined. The shattering of the bowl on the front of his face shredded most of the skin into pulp. There is little left of his face and beard (I guess he wasn't eating a raccoon after all.) aside from blood.

  At the sight of the red gore, my stomach flips and clenches, and the power of the hunger that sweeps over me is enough to drop me to my knees. My body needs the nourishment right now. I need that blood.

  Pushing myself up off the ground, my left hand slips as it slides in a pool of liquid on the tiles in front of me. Looking down, I see my left hand covered in the same liquid I was just planning on imbibing. But the guy's blood shouldn't be all the way over here next to me. It couldn't have shot over here when I hit him as the momentum of the blow would have taken it away from me, not towards me.

  But if it isn't his, then whose is it?

  Then I realize I wasn't as fast as I thought when I was running. Not all of the explosions from before were behind me. Apparently his bullets were faster than my legs.

  Lifting up my shirt on my left side, I look down and see two small, red dimples in my abdomen. Bullet holes. I've been shot.

  Slumping backwards against the cabinets, I try to ignore the wave of nausea and panic that wells up inside of me.

  "This isn't good," I whisper to the pulped face man laying prone on the ground several feet away from me. "This isn't good at all."

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  "I've got to get outside. Quickly," I think as I realize the severity of the situation. I can feel a darkness creeping up inside of me wanting to take over, and I'm not sure what it means. Right now I don't know if that darkness means death or me losing control to some primal part of myself focused on self-preservation. Neither option bodes well for me, and one of the options bodes very poorly for the unfortunate fellow sprawled on the kitchen tile.

  The warmth of the darkness flows up into me from some deep well that I didn't even know I had. It's inviting and friendly, and I can feel my conscious mind wanting to give itself over to it. It promises a release from all the pain and distraction around me.

  My father once told me that courage means being able to ignore the easy and pain-free path. Instead, we must embrace the challenging – and occasionally torturous - paths life has chosen for us. And tonight I'm not willing to give up on being courageous.

  Closing my eyes, I find what strength I have in me and focus it into a ball of motivation.

  I will get through this, I think before opening my eyes and looking around the room for an exit.

  The back door is boarded up and blocked with furniture as are the two small windows (Talk about a fire hazard in here! I understand their desire for security, but they've also created a death trap.) so that eliminates any of those choices. That means I have to go out the same way I came in.

  Doing my best to ignore the burning sensation flooding my gut (Both from the bullets now
in me and the hunger beginning to build.), I stand and turn towards the door. As I start to walk towards the open doorway, some small suppressed part of my psyche makes me step out of my way and grab the guy's ankle to pull him with me. He's heavy, and it's only going to exhaust me more quickly, but it's something I feel the need to do. He either needs to be out of this room or with me where I'm going, but right now I'm not going to stop and try to figure out which it is. That's a thought to save for later.

  Dragging the cumbersome weight behind me, I make my way down the hall towards the open front door. Every step I take leads me into cleaner and clearer air. The burning pain in my midsection doesn't lessen as I plow ahead (Actually the struggle and strain of dragging the guy is making the misery worse.), but the uncomfortable hazy film that had been infiltrating my brain and thoughts dissipates like frost in an early morning sun. Its loss is gradual and almost unnoticeable until I reach the doorway and a burst of wind whips past me and wipes the last dredges of it away.

  Panting, I suck in the crisp night air of the city and let it cleanse my lungs (I’m sure this is the first time that statement has ever been uttered.) of the horrid filth I had been breathing. With my lungs no longer straining themselves to clean every gulp of air I punished them with, I get a renewed surge of strength.

  Knowing my time with this strength is limited, I set about dragging both men outside and into the dilapidated grass of the lawn (Reluctant Guy was still living up to his name because his hand did not want to release that door handle. His grip was impressive.). Now to take care of my next issue - the source of my misery while I was in that house.

  There is no way I can possibly leave the drugs in there knowing they could soon be moved out onto the street. Judging from what affected me as I moved through it, there was enough in there to supply a small town with their poison. Or at least a large borough of a small city. Either way, what was in that house needs to be destroyed.