by Haywood, RR
‘If I said no what would you do?’
‘Huh?’
‘If I said no, what would you do?’ He stalls for an answer. His mind too full of lust to compute anything other than the feel of her tits in his hands and the sense of urgency pushing in his groin. ‘Would you take me anyway?’
He nods and licks his lips making them overly wet, ‘yeah, gonna fuck you…’
‘If I said no, you would make me. Is that right?’
‘Yeah,’ he pants, leering as he drags her close. She goes with the pull. Sensing his mood and the edge of violence threatening to spill over. His hands go to work again. Kneading. Squeezing. Groping. Painful. His tongue licks her neck. His foul breath blasting across her face. Still she holds. Feeling his erection driving into her hip as he thrusts like a dog on heat.
Nick. Beautiful Nick.
He grunts. Thrusts. Squeezes. Licks. His hands squeeze the bruises on her arms. His face pushing into her swollen cheeks. His head butting into her black eye.
This is our way. Nick said that. We do the right thing.
Zayden gets rougher as the lust builds. His hands tugging her top up, grunting with frustration and the knowledge he can take what he wants. She lets him work. Letting him have what he wants, feeling his hand tugging the waistband of her jeans down.
You protect your own. Pain is just pain.
‘Off,’ Zayden grunts, pushing at her jeans, too stupid to realise they’re still done up.
‘In a rush?’ She tries to sound coy but the words come out whimpered and weak.
‘Fuck yeah…’ he snarls and a new idea comes into his mind, ‘You gonna blow me…’
She wants it. He can tell. His fingers fumble at his belt. Tugging to free the pin from the hole in the leather. He yanks it over, then pulls it free. His fingers moving to the button on his jeans. They get wrenched open and the zip pulled while he bends to push them down.
The pants come down and it stands out, pointing grotesque and disgusting towards her. She looks down, using every ounce of self-control not to show any adverse reaction but the terror is clear in her eyes. He gloats on the spot. His face flushed and blotchy.
She slowly drops to her knees, knowing what must be done, willing this to end, tears fall down her cheeks, ‘close your eyes now…’ she looks up, staring at his face, imploring this to end but he only sees her pretty blue eyes. ‘Zayden, close your eyes for me…’
He clamps his eyes shut and thereby at least giving her this awful second of her life some degree of privacy. The smell is disgusting. His body unwashed for days and a young man raging with hormones needs to wash. She fights the gag and turns her head in an effort to draw clean untainted air but her hair brushes against him and that single delicate touch makes his hands clamp on the back of her head and he thrusts his groin at her.
She reels back. Caught off guard. He thrusts again. His eyes still closed. She weaves away, sensing his frustration growing as his hard fingers dig into the back of her already painful head. It must be now. Do it. Lilly, you have to do it. She gets the object free from her pocket, bites the orange cap off and reaches round to drive the needle into the soft flesh of his buttocks and pushes the plunger down, forcing the clear liquid into his right arse cheek. He grunts, snapping his eyes open at the sensation in his backside.
‘Something bit you,’ she blurts, spitting the orange cap out. He scowls. Sensing something is wrong. His face morphing with lust fuelled rage. Why isn’t she doing it? It should be in her mouth by now. What’s that feeling in his backside? It feels hot like he’s shit himself.
He reaches round as she darts forward, desperate to keep his attention on her but he takes a step back as his fingers find the syringe to yank the hypodermic needle from his flesh. He stares down at the syringe and blinks.
‘What’s that?’ Lilly asks, buying time with a growing panic that the drug won’t work.
‘What the…’ he frowns and looks at Lilly, ‘what…what’s…’ the heat in his arse cheek spreads out, blossoming down his legs, through his groin and up his back.
Now. Do not hesitate. She lurches to her feet with eyes wild as she drags the scalpel from her pocket and lashes out to slice the surgically sharp blade across his neck but it barely whispers across his skin merely opening a shallow wound that oozes blood down his chest.
He reels back. His mind unable to process everything that’s happening. She lashes out, driving the attack forward with wild slashes, nicking his shoulders, arms and stomach. He swings an arm trying to hit her away but already the drug is in his body, making him weak and sluggish. Panic in his face and he draws breath to scream for help.
With a grunt she barrels into him, pushing him backwards into the edge of the mattress. His feet snag and he trips with her driving him down, knocking the air from his lungs. They land heavy. Bouncing on the sprung mattress. A fist hits her face hard enough for stars to blossom in her vision. With desperate panic she digs the point of the scalpel into his stomach, twisting her hand left to right to open the wound. He yelps and goes to scream but her other hand scrabbles up to clamp down on his mouth. He bites down, sinking his teeth into the fleshy part of her hand and she fights to not scream herself as she slides the short blade from his stomach and brings it up to dig deep into his neck. His eyes widen. Blood spurting hot and far across the floor and over the blue eyed girl staring down at him. She stabs again and again, puckering his flesh, gouging holes that spew hot blood.
He fights, bucks and thrashes but the powerful sedative gets pumped faster through his body. A combined effect of his heart increasing from the panic while his system loses blood faster than he can congeal or clot. His senses dull. His blows weaken. The blood flow eases and his eyes dim, gently closing as his hand thumps her side gently.
She clings on. Pushing her hand into his mouth, stabbing him frenzied and wild, willing him to die, wishing him to die, wanting him to die and through the crazed blur in her eyes she sees the very second his life fades from his open eyes.
Seeing him die drives her on. She stabs more. Driving the point in to ruin the flesh of his neck until it becomes flayed meat ragged and worthless. She grunts from the exertion. Sweat pouring down her face already soaked from the rain outside.
On her feet and she stares down at his form. His dead murdered form. Rage pulses now. Pure unbridled rage that seethes cold and wonderful. She has taken life. She has killed. She was pushed to the limit and killed in defence. The scalpel gripped in her hand drips blood and she kicks hard into his groin. Knowing he is dead but wishing the pain to be sent to whatever afterlife he now haunts.
She wipes a bloodied hand across her face and spits to the side. With her chest heaving and eyes set she turns slowly to face the door.
Move fast. Do not hesitate.
Still her mind works fast and she looks round for his assault rifle. Not here. He must have handed it over to whoever is guarding the others. She snuffs the candles out and in the darkness she feels down the wall to the frame of the door and gently eases the handle down.
She pulls gently, easing the door open an inch at a time. The rain is still hammering down with a thousand different drums sounding as the water strikes a myriad of flat surfaces.
She steps out in one smooth motion and pulls the door closed behind her. The whole of the fort is dark and visibility is reduced by the rain coming down. Only the orange lights of the rooms in use show. Far to her right are the police offices. The survivors huddled together far to the left. She stares ahead. Eyes unblinking. Scalped gripped.
She sets off. Heading directly across the middle open ground of the fort with the scalpel held down by her leg. She can only just see the sides from the middle which means the crews won’t be able to see her.
The rain comes heavy. The night is dark. All these things have been calculated and thought about but now the rage drives her on. Rage that is needed. Pure beautiful anger that pulses like a wild animal thrashing inside to be released. Let me out. Let me kill. Her top
lip pulls back, her head drops and her eyes remain fixed on the objective ahead.
She moves fast but ducks down to reduce her profile and she veers left into the shadows formed by the wall and her eyes strain to see any sign ahead. Nothing. She loses sense of direction and stops to drop down and kneel in the water with the rain soaking her body. Her eyes stare hard. Waiting. Watching. Something will show. The pressure to keep moving is great but her mind runs fast and clear. Wait. Watch. Let me out. Let me kill.
There it is. The soft amber light of a cigarette end glowing. Keeping her eyes locked on that exact spot she sets off again, still veering left. She reaches the wall and stops to catch her breath. Steadying her heart rate that thunders in her chest.
Pushing on and she takes it one step at a time. Keeping low and pressed as close to the wall as she can. The rain masks any noise she makes. The cigarette glows again. She heads towards it. Gaining closer with every step of her feet and her head cocked to one side straining to hear voices but hearing none.
Only metres away now and she stops in the pitch darkness with energy pulsing through her limbs. With eyes staring, unblinking, with a screaming voice inside demanding to be set free to kill and kill until everything is dead. The doorway is recessed with a ledge over the top sheltering the smoker from the worst of the rain.
She steals forward with her eyes fixed and staring at the point where the end of the cigarette glows. She smells the tobacco in the air. Still no voices. Her body brushes the wall. The smoker lifts a hand to draw on the cigarette and using the doorway she gains scale of the size of the sentry on guard. Someone small. Not one of the crew chiefs. This will be one of the younger ones made to stand out in the rain.
With a snarl she rushes from the darkness slamming into the sentry staring ahead and not expecting anyone to come from the side. He yelps out, shouting but finding the point of the scalpel driving into his throat that hacks a hole shredding his windpipe and voice box. He goes down, gargling and choking as hot blood spurts from his mouth and slides down his ruined neck into his lungs. Lilly stabs into him. Slicing and hacking. Her aim deviating to drive the point through his eye. Killing him until he is dead. Killing him again and again. Killing him over until he lies ruined and destroyed. On her feet and the demon inside demands more so she kicks and stamps down, letting the beast free. She breaks the neck of the child on sentry. She breaks his nose, his jaw, his arms and his ribs. She gives back the pain she was given and more until that demon tells her to stop and take stock of where she is.
She gulps air, heedless of the rain pelting her face, heedless of the pain in every limb of her body. She drags the body out into the ground and stands to examine the door. A thick padlock looped through a clasp. She drops down to go through the pockets of the warm corpse. Cigarettes. A lighter. Bullets. A knife in his waistband. No key. She stands, thinking fast as the options present themselves. She could pry the clasp off with the rifle. She looks closer at the clasp. No good. The thing is flush against the wood of the door giving no space for something to be jammed in and the padlock is too thick to be beaten off without making a whole lot of noise.
She turns away, thinking of what to do as her foot catches on the plastic bag pushed back in the recess. She kicks it away then thinks twice and drops down to yank the thing open. Cans of coke. Crisps. Chocolate bars and a thick key on a black lanyard.
She grabs it and stands. Forcing the key into the hole that turns the mechanism within that frees the locking bar on the padlock that she slides from the clasp. She pushes the door open and peers inside to the pitch black interior. Back to the boy and she takes his lighter from his pocket and thumbs the wheel that creates the spark that ignites the gas coming from the opened valve. Flame is made. Fire that gives small heat and small illumination but it’s enough.
For a second she holds still. Knowing she is stepping into an armoury with a naked flame. Move now. Do not hesitate.
She gazes over the stacked boxes of ammunition and unused weapons. Rifles stacked against the wall. She spots the thing she was looking for. Boxes of them stacked on a crate to keep them off the floor. She opens the lid and takes several. Job done and she backs out, closing the door quietly behind her. She puts the padlock back on, slips the key from the lock and pushes it firmly into her pocket before taking the assault rifle from the boy’s dead hands. She checks it over, spotting the safety switch then finding the bolt which she yanks back. A shiny unfired round pops from the top. Loaded, made ready, safety off.
She sets off again. Stalking back across the middle of the fort. Her hair slick to her scalp and coursing in rivers down her face and over her lips. Her skin ripples with goose bumps as the cold eats its way inside only to be sent back out by the fire in her gut that drives her on.
One foot after the other. Eyes staring ahead. Breathing hard. Hands gripping the weapon. She wills herself on. Determined and holding that rage in check until it can be used. Across the central ground she wades through the water and passes the old armoury while facing ahead and walking as though she is meant to be there. They could see her if they looked but they wouldn’t see it was Lilly. They’d just see a figure walking. She risks a glance and spots the soft orange glows of torches or lanterns giving some small light to the place where Liam and his four keep guard. Smaller amber ends glow. They’re smoking and relaxed.
Ahead she spots a figure coming from the police offices. A solitary silhouette holding a rifle that starts walking towards her. Whoever it is must be heading for the new armoury. That lad she took down was only on his own for a few minutes then. She keeps walking and slowly works to adjust her grip on the things she carries, transferring them from her right hand to her left which she also uses to hold the barrel of the heavy weapon. Her right grips the handle, bringing it up slightly as the figure walks briskly towards her. Whoever it is keeps their head down from the rain still pouring from the sky.
They close the gap between them. A boy but bigger than the one she just killed. A crew chief, older, wiser and faster. She watches his head, gauging the distance and checking to see if they’re in sight of Liam’s crew sheltering in the old armoury.
Only a few feet to go and still the lad keeps his head down, watching his own feet splash puddles.
‘Hey, you seen Zayden?’ She calls forward in an ice cold voice. The boy jerks his head up and spots Lilly staring at him. The fact that she’s carrying an assault rifle doesn’t register for such a sight is now normal to him. He grins back, smirking at the gossip that spotty Zay was going to fuck the posh bitch.
‘Nah’ he says with a sneer as the butt smashes the teeth from his face. He drops instantly. The sheer power of the strike knocking him down. She follows through. Hitting down again and again until he goes as limp as the last one. Blood courses from his face and ears. His skull fractures, splintering with a crunch and he lies dead from the bones pushing through his brain.
Eyes up. Head up. She stands stock still listening, watching. The rain so loud it blots everything else out. She looks down coldly, seeing the pulped head and brains seeping through the cracks of his skull and not a flicker of reaction shows. She drops down and pushes one hand into the gooey remains of his head, coating her fingers with blood and gore that she wipes down her own cheeks and through her hair.
On her feet and she breaks into a jog with her eyes fixed on the orange glowing lights that shine the most of all.
She hears the voices inside. Laughing voices. Cackling voices. Someone shouts and everyone laughs. Harsh sounds that carry clear. They laughed at her when Sierra beat her. They laughed when she was on her knees feeding Aaliyah. They laughed at the pathetic scum outside going hungry and cold to die in the rain. They gloated with mouths full of crisps and sprayed coke out across the floor. They beat her down. Punching, kicking and making her stand in the corner.
Her eyes grow larger. Her lips pulling back. Her face and hair smeared with blood and gore that coats her arms and top.
They left her brother outside
to die. They left her brother to go hungry. Billy who has never hurt anyone. Billy and Milly who are innocent of all the sins of man. Children who have felt more pain than any ever should.
The eyes of a killer. We do the right thing or none of this is worth it. She knew goodness once. She saw it. Nick. Beautiful Nick who kills everyday so others may have freedom. Aye. That’s what it takes. That’s where the hardness in his eyes comes from. Across that ground she goes. Running faster to be there. To be there now with a voice screaming in her head to be let out to kill.
She pushes her head through the strap of the rifle and slings it behind her. Freeing her hands. She holds one in her right and grips the pin with her left. Blowers told her what to do. Blowers who has the eyes of a killer too. Twist and pull.
The laughing inside is loud. The smell of the cigarettes is strong and she strides in with eyes blazing and death in her gaze. A thing from a nightmare. A beast risen from the depths of darkness. Smeared in blood caked down her face and through her hair that lies matted across her shoulders.
‘SEE ME,’ she bellows the words with an intensity that brings instant silence and every head snapping over to the thing that stands in the doorway. Her chest heaves. Her head tilted down and she looks up, flicking her eyes from face to face. ‘See me,’ the beast inside growls the words out, projecting pure venomous hatred to every person in the room.
Twist and pull.
She twists.
She pulls.
The pin drops.
They rush to their feet, knocking chairs over but freeze when she holds the grenade up for all to see.
The blood drains from Skyla’s face. Aaliyah’s mouths drops. Sierra’s eyes stare fixed with the realisation of everything done wrong. Life plays out in that room at that second. Lives that flash before young eyes. A foe underestimated and in her they see the darkness of Howie projected for all to see. They see the hardness of Nick, Blowers and Cookey. They see Lani. They see Meredith They see someone who refuses to be beaten and has the will power to take the beating to come back stronger and meaner and with a brutality that pales their own malicious actions.