by ML Banner
Tom held firm, matching the giant’s marble-like presence, even as an insect dug its mandibles into his cheek. He couldn’t tell if the giant saw him or was just concentrating on something in Tom’s direction. And as long as the giant didn’t move, he wasn’t going to move either.
The giant’s head snapped, as if something drew him out of his stupor, and the still image was alive again. The giant downed the remaining water in the glass, its emblem now evident. It was the Scooby Doo glass Drew had frequently drunk from.
Another violation.
Even though they had manipulated him, shot him, left him for dead, and took his house, it was the simple action of the giant drinking from his son’s glass that finally did it.
Tom no longer felt pain. He no longer felt sorrow. He felt anger. He felt hatred. He felt the desire—no, the urgency—to kill.
The giant put the glass down, turned and lumbered away from the window.
Feeling safe, Tom gasped, having not taken a breath once during the entire episode.
Revenge later. Work now.
Under the wheel well of the back tire, just inside a flap, was a spare key. Returning to the passenger door, he opened the creaky entry just enough to reach in and do the work of folding over the back bench seat to access the storage area behind it. All was much more difficult with one arm, the other pushing against his side. The backpack was quickly snatched from its hiding area and the seat back clicked loudly back into place, just as the home’s side door abruptly popped open. The giant stood at the doorway’s threshold, again gazing in Tom’s direction.
He must have seen me.
This time, Tom ducked down low, taking cover behind the truck, and then he quickly scurried to the back wheel, so he’d have cover in case the man started shooting at him again. Other than the engine block, there were few places that the vehicle would stop a bullet. He listened and leveled a hurried glance at the passenger side entrance.
Dammit! I left the truck door open. He quietly cursed himself.
There was no time to correct this, unless the giant went back inside.
Heavy footsteps tumbled down the steps and then rapidly crunched the gravel on the other side of his truck. The noise stopped and then plodded around the front of the truck.
Tom needed no further warning. He sprinted toward the back of his property, keeping down and running at a diagonal so that the truck’s frame would momentarily shield his movements. When he reached the first set of trees, Tom spun around and looked back, taking some comfort in the temporary murk of a deadfall.
The giant stood beside the open passenger door and stared inside. He abruptly pointed a pistol at the truck’s empty cab, and then spun and pointed the gun toward the darkness, again in Tom’s general direction.
He didn’t know if the giant suspected he was alive, or if he thought it was some other competing intruder.
Tom felt his lifeblood now dripping from the tip of his bent elbow. It was time to move. No time to waste.
Yet he held his gaze on the giant for a moment longer and chewed on his anger inside. It was a familiar feeling that gave him comfort. He longed for the moment when he would kill this man and his other two accomplices.
Then it started, just as quickly as it had stopped.
After a long dearth of songs from his mental playlist, which had gone silent all these years, a Pink Floyd melody blasted from an internal speaker. And he found himself running.
Hell’s Requiem Playlist, Track 3
Song/Artist: Run Like Hell by Pink Floyd
Keywords: your favorite disguise; roller blind eyes; guilty past; nerves in tatters; hammers batter down your door; you better run
07
He staggered into a stand of Aspens and Pines on top of a fairly good-sized mesa at the edge of his property.
The trees doubled and tripled, and then blurred completely. His head bounced off a rock-hard Aspen, slagging a piece of bark off the browning trunk onto a ground already littered with similar detritus. The impact, though, didn’t daze him: it had the opposite effect.
The realization struck as abruptly as the tree: he couldn’t go any farther without attending to his wounds. He probably wasn’t more than a quarter of a mile from his home, although it felt much longer. Yet, this elevated stand of trees was not easy to get to, demonstrated by his breathlessness. The area provided great cover, and it was defensible because of its smaller size and height. So he reasoned his intruders wouldn’t stumble upon him here, but if they did, he could protect himself.
This mesa was also a natural blind Drew and he had used to hunt a herd of deer that often fed nearby. Their trail passed by the northern portion of the mesa and they had spent hours together, quietly waiting. He recalled that as much as he wanted a deer for his son, he had silently hoped that none would wander by, as that meant more time together. Those were some of their most precious times; he had loved just being in his son’s presence.
Tom shook the thought away, having not remembered this even once in the years since Drew’s death. He needed to concentrate more, before he passed out again.
He wobbled a little farther, scouring the dusky terrain for someplace flat to work on himself. Either he was still suffering from the effects of the drug the woman had given him, or it was blood loss, or both. Regardless, he felt very weak and unsteady.
Finding a satisfactory area, he let himself drop to his knees and unslung the pack. The first aid kit was the first item to come out.
Morning light was just starting to trickle in through the trees’ gloom, just enough so that he could examine his wounds. Both entry and exit were oozing blood at a fair pace now. But the blood was bright red, indicative of not being arterial, so he reasoned he’d probably live through this, if they were cleaned and bandaged properly.
Even though he had field dressed bullet wounds before, it was never to himself. And it was difficult to bend in a way to see and work on the exit wound. But he muddled through it.
The whole exercise was slow and painful. But the pain had its own reward.
After cleaning and bandaging his wounds, Tom dozed off, his body demanding sleep.
Immediately he started to dream.
~~~
It was a ghostly presence, which hung back in the shadows, just barely visible, like it belonged to the darkness.
Impossibly suspended in the murk, it remained in its place, waiting for the right moment, a moment he knew would come all too soon. Then, like a predatory bird, it swooped in silently. Its face was as pale as the moonlight, and the long scar it proudly wore made it look like it was beaming a malevolent gleam. But this specter was deadly serious and he knew it was here for only one reason: retribution.
He was desperate to escape but held down by the insurmountable weight of his own terror. He knew this specter all too well, and its thirst for the kill.
As if to confirm his suspicions, the specter held up its silver dagger: a shimmering metallic talon, poised and deadly.
It covered the final distance in less than a blink and was now hovering above him, gleefully eying his throat.
Then it struck.
The giant rolled out of bed, landing hard on the bedroom floor, yelping back the nightmare that still clung to him with his sweat.
He thrust out his new pistol—the one he dispossessed from the man he had shot—and panned around the room for the demonic apparition who had just taken his life in his dream. It felt like so much more than a dream to him.
He was only mildly relieved when he confirmed his throat didn’t have a gaping gash in it, sliced open with a silver dagger. He knew the dagger too well, having witnessed its owner brandish it on others more than once.
The woman on the other side of the bed wore wide eyes of her own and nothing more. She opened her mouth as if she intended to say something, but thought better of it. Instead she cowered for cover, sliding to the floor, fearful he might shoot her for something she’d said or done.
The giant man wiped the perspi
ration from his eyes, with the back of his other mitt. He quickly padded into the living room to see if this demon hitman or something like it was there.
Shorty was snoring on the couch, still clutching the bottle of Jack he had been given. But there was no one, or rather nothing, else here.
Dread cleaved to him and wouldn’t let go as if he had brought the spook over from the dream world. Logically, he knew it was just a nightmare, but he also knew that nightmares were often evidence of unresolved problems carried over from his waking life. Something was wrong and he felt it in his bones. If only he could focus he might be able to figure out what was bothering him.
But his mind was foggy from alcohol and the drugs the woman offered—the same stuff given to Mr. Rogers. Both prevented him from targeting on any one thought.
Then he remembered the noise he had heard earlier in the night and he vaguely remembered finding the truck’s door open. Someone had been out there. He just couldn’t see who it was. How the hell could he have seen anything in the dark, especially when the world spun—was still spinning?
He grabbed the bedroom’s door frame to steady himself. The room undulated under his feet.
What besides the truck door? There was something else.
He hung on to the thought about the open truck door and tried to remember what came next. Then the image of the homeowner he’d shot popped in his head.
A few of the still active neurons in his brain slowly connected the seemingly random images, and now it was starting to make some sense.
What if that homeowner was still alive?
The giant trotted across the living room with urgency, each step like an earthquake, releasing tremors throughout the small house.
He bounded out the front door, down the porch stairs, to the place they had discarded the man. He halted before a field of wilted weeds, in front of a large spot where the dead growth had been mottled down by the man they had thought they had murdered. But there was nothing there. No body.
He’s gone?
“Get... your... lazy... asses... outside!” he roared to the winds.
Shorty and the woman spasmodically darted onto the porch and tumbled up to the railing that separated them, still a safe distance from the giant.
“He’s gone,” the giant repeated, this time out loud.
“Maybe a mountain lion got him,” the woman said, now wearing a white T-shirt that hung just above her knees. She was busy smoothing down her frazzled hair, as if the neighbors were about to come over for coffee.
The giant thought about her comment for a moment. It was possible. A lion or pack of wolves could have dragged him away. He chewed on this thought for a long moment.
Although some blood was visible, there was not as much as he would have expected if animals had torn at the man’s flesh.
More neurons connected pieces of this puzzle: he should have bled out from his wounds, if he was wounded mortally.
“Get your clothes on. We’re going to search for his body.”
Hell’s Requiem Playlist, Track 4
Song/Artist: Bad Moon Rising by Credence Clearwater Revival
Keywords: prepared to die; in for nasty weather; one eye taken for an eye; bad moon on the rise
08
A few miles away
“Excuse me,” a female voice begged from the shadows.
At first she wasn’t visible, then it was as if one of the skinny trees had come alive, its spindly branches folding forward, roots scratching its steps one-by-one, until the tree appeared to materialize into a bony woman. Following her was a limping figure of a man carrying a young child whose blanched skin was stretched like a death mask.
“We smelled the food. Would you be willing to share? We don’t have much to trade.” Her eyes darted back to her husband and their child and then forward again to the man tending the coals of a small campfire. She waited for a reply. Her eyes cried out for help.
But the man said nothing and hadn’t even looked up to acknowledge their presence, much less give any sense that he had heard her question. Instead, the man stabbed at the coals, causing them to flare up and burst embers upward. Like fireflies, the embers swarmed around and caressed a small animal carcass suspended a foot above on a spit.
Feeling the pit in her stomach grow, she pressed forward, “We won’t be any trouble. My husband is hurt and we haven’t eaten in a long time.”
Still the man didn’t look up, finally roughly jabbing his poker into the ground beside him, an exclamation point to his non-replies.
The woman lowered her head, drained of energy and tried a different tack. Her shoulders hung, and her voice cracked. “We’ve come from the south and we’re trying to join a group following a religious leader called the Teacher. Have you run into them? Please answer this and we’ll not bother you again.”
The man behind the campfire finally looked up, flashing a smile so large the folds of his lips appeared to shoot up into his scalp. “Please join me,” he beckoned, his voice smooth and booming, like that of a British stage actor. “There’s plenty to go around.”
The threesome’s grimaces turned immediately to grins. They mumbled their profound thanks and ambled closer to the campfire, their eyes locked onto the meaty remains, skewered over the fire. It was smaller than a deer and thankfully it didn’t have its head or anything else to identify its species. It was probably better that they didn’t have to know what it was they were about to eat. At this point they didn’t care.
The British-sounding man, smile still firmly planted, unsheathed a sterling silver dagger from his belt and sliced off a piece of the animal’s loins, offering it to the woman.
“Oh, thank you,” she gushed and tore a chunk out of the best-tasting meat she’d ever eaten, though she was quite sure it was the hunger telling her this. She couldn’t remember the last time they had had much more than a few insects—last night’s meal. While chewing, she reluctantly handed the small slab to her husband, who coaxed their groggy little boy to gnaw off a piece.
“So tell me,” said the British man, his smile now gone. The deep trough along his cheek still remained, no longer filled with cheer. It was curiously empty of any emotion.
A thought flashed in her mind. He was empty, like he didn’t have a soul.
The Brit pointed his silver knife at the woman. “Since you came from the south, did you happen to pass two men and a woman with a small boy?”
The woman’s expression turned serious. “Yes, we did.” Her eyes looked skyward for guidance with the details. “Yesterday... I think. We didn’t talk to them though, because the one guy—a giant—looked creepy. They were all in a hurry. And they all had guns. So we just hid and watched them pass us.”
“And if I show you a map, could you show me where they passed you, and where they were coming from?”
“Yes, of course.”
The smile returned to the Brit, who then surgically sliced off another piece of the dead animal and held it out to them. “Please, come sit and let us talk some more. Then I’ll be happy to tell you what you want to know about the Teacher. In fact, I know him personally.”
Now closer to the Brit, she could see his eyes. They looked as black as night. And as she sat down beside him, she felt his coldness seep inside her, as if she were sitting next to something frozen. It was then she realized that they’d made a grave mistake.
Only a few minutes later would she confirm that their mistake was fatal.
Hell’s Requiem Playlist, Track 6
Song/Artist: Paint It, Black by The Rolling Stones
Keywords: my heart is black; red door; painted black; not easy facing up when your world is black
09
Tom was startled by a nerve-grating racket.
Although his eyes were open and he was instantly alert, he didn’t move, as he considered what he had heard, and as he listened for anything else. It had sounded like the thunderous roar of a bear, only with words.
The giant man who shot him could hav
e been the source of that rumble. The world around him was otherwise still. He waited for more while he considered this and his own situation.
Based on the amount of daylight and the sun’s location in the sky, he guessed it was late morning. He must have slept for a few hours, and although he still felt a little weak, he didn’t feel shaky. He snapped to attention and started to get ready. The thirst for revenge still possessed him.
Inside his pack was his Henry AR-7 take-down rifle. He pulled this out, slipped out the pieces from the buttstock, and assembled it in a few seconds. He grabbed the small eight-round magazine of 22 long rifle copper-plated hollow-point rounds and clicked it home into the receiver, swiftly pulling back the small charging handle to chamber the first round. He would rather have had Drew’s much more powerful rifle and laser sights, but they had taken this from him too. This was the only gun he had available to him. And it would be all he needed to do the job.
He laid this on his lap and snatched a water bottle from the pack and took a large gulp as he considered his next move. This was all part of his normal survival process, just as he was taught: to pragmatically examine the facts and his mission. Funny how the military sense of mission never leaves a soldier’s mind.
An ex-soldier’s mind, he corrected himself.
And what was his mission anyway?
Sure, seeking revenge or even justice seemed the natural thing for him to do considering what these intruders did to him. But didn’t he deserve their actions? He let them in—he could have easily turned them away, but he ignored all the red flags—he knew better, and he was the one who murdered his son and marriage...The memory of his ex-wife’s words reminded his conscience of this every waking moment.
He had built their home with his own hands and he developed and cultivated this property for their survival. But they were gone now. So what was the point of holding onto something that served no purpose other than his own survival? He obviously didn’t even care to do this or he wouldn’t have walked around with Drew’s rifle, loaded only with one round, if he did. It was just an automatic for him, the survival thing. But why survive at the one place that reminded him of them all the time?