Alex crouched in the shadows of what had possibly once been a car of some kind, the grime and blood coated knife gripped too tightly in one sweaty hand. He had a gun stuffed in the back of his belt, a snub nosed thirty-eight, but it was empty. No bullets or even casings when he found it in the dumpster.
"We're gonna find you, doesn't matter how long you hide or how far you run!" The punk's shouts caused him to wince in his hiding place. For what seemed like the millionth time in the past four hours, he wished he was just back at the University, cramming for some obscure exam on information he would never use while eating cold pizza ordered two days prior to consumption; or perhaps hastily made Ramen noodles…Alex's stomach growled at the thought of food, reminding him that he hadn't eaten in more than a day. Footsteps, gravel crunching beneath heavy boots, were faintly approaching from the left.
"Come out, come out, wherever you are!" Came another yell. Alex was quivering, terrified of the masked and tattooed brute that he knew was searching for him. In his mind he saw the sweat stained wife beater, possibly white at one point, stretched over the chest of the thug. From each side sprouted the thick arms capped off by a metal baseball bat clenched in the ham-sized fist. Was this to be his killer, his executioner? Alex feared death; he wasn't going to lie about that. He could see the image of a baseball bat heading for his face within his own mind, crushing bone and throwing his brain tissue across the remains of the car that concealed him. But it was all product of an overactive imagination, inspired by the high stress and adrenaline levels that came with his present environment. That environment now consisted of bloodthirsty gang members out to murder him in the most brutal fashions conceivable by their completely unstable minds. Now, the sandy-haired youth cowered in hiding, his boyish features making his twenty years of life seem only to be around sixteen. He wore a ripped and torn t-shirt beneath his denim jacket. His black Levi's were caked with mud at his ankle, the knees worn away from several years' use.
The footsteps were close, just on the other side of the rusted remains. He knew what he had to do; the same as he had done for the past three hours. The shaking slowly left him as an unnatural calm crept throughout his body. His eyes went from wide with fear to almost half closed but intense, filled with murderous intent. As the footsteps passed, he rose silently on his tennis shoes, hunting the hunter. The knife was dull, unfit for slicing so instead he flipped it around in his hand, the blade facing down. In one swift movement he plunged the knife into the side of the Hood's neck with his left hand and twisted, his right hand grabbing the metal bat. If it fell, the noise would have attracted other hunters, making survival extremely difficult. All that issued from his victim was a dull thud as his knees hit the pavement, and wet gurgles that were his attempts at breathing through a blood-filled windpipe. The bat pulled free of the thug's grasp and Alex released the knife, leaving it embedded in the other's neck. A swing and squelching sound later, and it was the hunter's brains, not his own, that decorated the husk of a car. Was it wrong that he felt this way, so empowered and elated from taking another's life? No, he hadn't been taking life; that was too pretty a description. He was butchering them, brutally murdering men that sought to do the same to him. Alex kept repeating to himself that it was all for survival, yet the more he repeated it, the less it seemed a valid explanation.
"Aha! Good work my rising star. I knew you had it in you; I knew you would make it beautiful." It was the Director's comment about his latest kill, a sick and twisted man if ever there was one. Alex only knew the man as the Director, a radio-hazed voice in his head that came from the small receiver in his right ear. It was only a one-way device, not allowing Alex to respond verbally. Surely the microphones on the countless hidden cameras throughout the city would bring his comments to the Director's attention, though that would only serve to attract several more hunters. The young man did not want them going towards him unless he had given them a reason to on purpose. However, the lack of two-way communication didn't stop Alex from giving the Director a silent 'Fuck you' in his own mind. As unpleasant as the Director's company was, it was the only thing keeping him fully aware of the situation and, in an odd roundabout way, alive.
Alex tried to ignore the voice in his ear as he bent down and grasped the recently deceased by his ankles and dragged him over to where Alex had been hiding previously. He was sure to remove the knife before leaving, stowing that in his belt for later use while he kept the metal bat out as his primary weapon. Out of habit, he searched the body for anything useful, coming up with only a few unidentifiable pills. He noticed how there was blood wherever he touched the cadaver. His hands were spattered with blood, but it was not all from this kill, but his previous one as well, and the one before that, and the one before that, and the dozen or so before that. Kneeling there, gazing at his crimson palms, he realized just how much he had changed…