Voices of the Departed
By WickedSong
Disclaimer : I do not own Noughts & Crosses and I never will.
Jude McGregor stood, ready, his gun poised. The man in front of him stood hands up, fear in his eyes as Jude had expected – as he had wanted. The Cross man stood there and Jude felt hate, resentment for this man who he had never met before but felt that he and his kind of people brought upon all the misfortune in his life. His father, Callum, Lynette, Cara, all dead because of Crosses.
Jude knew he was making excuses, not for anyone but himself. He had to blame someone, anything and if he could make the Crosses – the daggers his scapegoats then so be it. He only had his mother left but he had lost a reason for existing when he murdered Cara. When he kicked and punched her he lost control but not only control, he had lost himself.
"Please" The man asked, his hands slightly trembling but it was nothing to do with the cold wind which had passed through the dark streets only lit by the flickering street lamps "I have a family. My wife, kids, please"
Jude was ready but as he was about to pull the trigger it didn't seem like the man in front of him anymore. Who was it? It looked, strangely, it looked like his father.
"Dad?" Jude asked, not daring to believe. His father had been dead for years, years. There was no way he was standing in front of him now, where the Cross man had been "Is that you?"
"Why do you do this Jude? Why don't you repent for what you've done, instead of kill more?" His father asked sadly and disappeared, only to be replaced by the face of Callum.
His little brother stood there, and Jude could hardly believe it "Why, Jude, why?" Callum only simply asked and then it was Lynette.
Jude thought this was surreal but when his sister – his dead sister opened his mouth he couldn't shout back.
"Why did you let this happen, why do you kill?" She asked and then she disappeared too and Jude was left wondering what the hell had just happened.
The three people in his family that, effectively, he had killed, or turned into monsters, or destroyed them were talking to him.
Jude looked down at the gun and everything looked the same again. The same dark alleyway and the same Cross still scared of the possibility of death and despite the thing that had just happened – the unexpected voices, faces, bodies of the people who had died he was going to pull the trigger. They couldn't stop him, no one could. No one could get to him; no one could play with his emotions. No one except Cara.
There she stood, her face pale and she stood behind the Cross man like a ghost, a heavenly angel who didn't deserve to be killed.
"Why Steve?" She asked "But your name is Jude. I died remembering Jude, not Steve. Why him, why me, why everyone, why do you kill?" She asked again and just looked at him, her eyes glassy. She was like the others, she didn't need an answer from him, she just needed to ask him and then she was gone.
Jude did something that he had vowed never to do then. He let the Cross man go. He gave him mercy and all because of Cara. It had not been his family, it had been the girl he had fallen so stupidly in love with him. One of his rules and he had broken it and Cara had to pay the price for that. Just like every Cross had to pay the price for the misfortune in Jude's life. They would pay that price. If only Jude could get the voices out of his head; the voices of the people he had killed or let die. Those voices would haunt him forever.
This was only meant to be a really small thing and it is but strangely it made me very emotional and I almost cried at it. :( Hope you enjoy.