"Mama?" The little boy coughed against the black smoke, but his feet kept running, his heart pounding a mile a minute in his little chest.
He had to find his parents. There was fire everywhere, and his mama and papa had been taking a nap in their room because it's hard work taking care of a six year old child and working two jobs.
"Mama!" The boy cried again, running up the stairs, almost tripping on the last step, scrambling on frantic feet down the hallway.
Fire...Fire everywhere. It was coming from all the places of the house, and the smoke was blinding and choking the boy's little lungs, but he didn't care. He was too scared to think of anything else. He had to find his parents.
The boy coughed, hacked and coughed some more, eyes watering so badly, and burning so much he could barely see an inch in front of his face. He yelped loudly when a crack resounded from the ceiling, and a beam fell directly in front of him.
He coughed again, covering his mouth with the sleeves of his jammies, remembering how, at school, they taught the children that smoke rises and they should get on the floor to keep away from it.
The beam was blocking most of the hallway, and the boy saw only one opening near the bottom of the floor where there was a triangular gap, just big enough for him to squeeze through.
He sucked in a breath of heated air, dropped to his knees, and started to crawl through. The smoke didn't get much better down there, and when the boy carefully crossed through, placing one soot-smudged hand over another to make his way along the floor, he could feel the flames from the fire-eaten log on his tender back.
But he could bear it. He's felt worse pain than this. The children at his school were bullies, hurtful and spiting to a child that was a decade younger than them. But it wasn't his fault they advanced him five grades. They said he was clever; genius-level intellect, his headmistress had told his parents.
Well, he was thankful now for their constant tormenting. He had enough pain tolerance to deal with this heat. He could deal with it. He could bear it.
He just needed to find his parents, and then they could all leave this house, and then the pain will stop.
The pain will stop.
"PAPA!" The boy cried out, voice strained and hoarse from the smoke and the screaming. He'd gotten through the tiny opening, and was off running down the hallway again.
The door to his parent's bedroom was wide open, and black smoke was billowing out of it, like how it had come out of their oven when papa had accidentally burned the turkey during Christmas dinner last year.
And as before, the boy dropped to the floor, crawling on his knees and hands to the opening. Why weren't his parents answering him?!
"MAMA!" The boy coughed out, rounded the corner and fumbled his way into his parent's room. "PA - "
The boy choked on a startled gasp, eyes watering but too paralyzed to close against the sight before him.
Fire.
Mama...Papa...
They were on their bed; The same bed he liked to jump into in the mornings to wake them up. And they'd grumble playfully before pulling him down and tickling him to within an inch of his life.
But they weren't sleeping. No. They couldn't be sleeping when the flames were devouring their flesh like they were a pair of human-sized candles.
The boy's age meant he was too young to understand the full impact of just what he was seeing, but he was not a stranger to the idea of death. His dog, Mr. Pickles, had died from choking on a piece of cork he'd accidentally swallowed. He'd been two at the time, too young to know what to do, and his mama had been in the loo when it happened. He'd cried when Mr. Pickles finally fell silent, twitching on the floor every once in awhile.
His mother had told him that the cork had clogged his windpipe and Mr. Pickles couldn't breathe, so God decided to take him away from his pain and suffering. He's in a happier place now.
Then, did that mean that God had come and took his mama and papa away? But what about him?! He was in a lot of pain right now. The fire from the log had burned his skin, and his lungs and chest felt like it was on fire...like his parents were.
Why wasn't God taking him away? The pain. It hurts so bad.
He didn't know whether he was crying or if the smoke was causing the tears to stream down his face. He didn't care. He screamed, he yelled, he crawled to the bed, grabbing ahold of any parts of it that wasn't on fire and shaking it with all his tiny muscles would allow. Surely his mother and father would hear him and wake up to soothe him.
They'd shush him, cradle him to their chest, and rock him back to sleep.
The fires licked away at his skin, and the boy cried out, vision blurring with the smoke and tears clouding it. The fire burned away the flesh from his parents' bodies, turning it black. Soon there'd be nothing.
No amount of tantrums or violent outbursts could induce that comfort from his mama and papa anymore. No. They were gone. Ashes to ashes...dust to dust.
He didn't stop screaming, though, not even when a pair of gloved hands picked him up and brought him out of the house. Didn't stop fighting, not even when he felt a pinprick on his neck, and the last thing he saw before darkness took him over was a gas mask. He wondered, in the moment before he dropped over the edge into oblivion, whether God was now taking him away from his pain.
He couldn't have been more wrong.
The pain was not gone, merely displaced for the moment, that's all his muddled brain could conclude when the boy woke groggily to a blindingly-lit white room. His limbs felt heavy, and his head swam as if he was on those carnival rides that spun you around and around until you staggered off and vomited into a rubbish bin.
A pair of unfriendly green eyes drifted into his vision, thankfully shading some of the light from his sensitive pupils, and the boy's slow mind finally registered that he was lying on a metal slab for a table. His wrists. His legs. All tied down.
Where was he?! Where were his parents!? Who was this man!?
He opened his mouth to ask, but nothing came of it except more gagging and coughing.
The man in the mask tsk-ed at him, like one would an unruly child, turned away to do something beyond the boy's field of vision. Though the man seemed unfriendly, he was all the boy had right now; his only lifeline to any chance at comprehending what he'd just woken to.
"Pl - " The boy croaked, throat a dull ache compared to the fire from before, "Please come - "
The masked man and the unfriendly eyes were back, along with a needle so sharp its tip glinted in the bright overhead surgical light.
"Hold still, kid." The man - doctor - said in a thick Russian accent, then sunk the needle into the skin at the crook of the boy's elbow.
When the boy woke again, he was in a bed. Lumpy enough where it was probably more fitting to be called a mat than a bed. And the place he was in was bare and drab and gray and dank and dark and small enough where it was more a cell than a room.
He was alone when he pushed himself up on shaky arms, looking around with suspiciously calm eyes.
The logical part of his mind told him, screamed at him, that he should be freaking out. He should be banging on the walls, looking for somebody - anybody - to tell him what was going on.
Where were his parents? They were gone.
Where was he? Was this a hospital? No, a hospital didn't have cells like these. He's been in the hospital a few times after a fight with a bully got too out of hand, and the food and environment could have used some improvements, but this...this was something different.
He didn't know why he was feeling so calm, probably had something to do with the stuff that Russian doctor injected him with.
Whatever it was, he found that he didn't really care. He was contented to just stay there. There was no fire, but his body felt warm. Warm enough where he didn't need the thin covers on his cot. The lighting was perfect, and the boy shrugged to himself, thinking this was better than being put into those foster care places that he'd heard so much about.
He brought his legs up to his chest, and hugged them with his arms. Rested his chin there, and let his mind wander. Time passed in its own rhythm, one that the boy was sure was too slow to be real. But he didn't care.
Some time during this endless litany of silence and contemplation, interspersed with random thoughts of his parents and fire, the boy had started to hum to himself, a lullaby his mother used to sing to him for him to sleep. The pain was gone, if only for the moment, the boy would be happy with that. His parents weren't there anymore, so he rocked himself for comfort. Hummed to himself for comfort.
They came days...but really could have been mere hours...later, unlocking his dark cell and leading him out with a tight grip on his thin arm.
The lights were too bright in the hallway, and the boy squinched his eyes shut to keep them from hurting. And even in the darkness behind his lids, the spots of white dotted his vision. The hand led him down a hallway, then another, then an elevator, then stepped out, to the right, down another hallway.
A knock against metal, and a call 'ENTER!'. The metal groaned as it opened, and the boy was pulled inside.
"Open your eyes, little one." A voice, gravelly with age and abuse.
The boy did as he was told, partly because he was feeling quite docile at the moment, and partly because the still sane part of his mind was telling him he better do as they say because he was in some deep shite right now.
The room had been dimmed, and the man behind the desk was shrouded in darkness, the only thing visible being his beringed hands and torso behind the heavily decorated, ornate wood table.
One hand gripped the armrest of the large wingbacked chair, and the torso moved forwards slightly, the chair creaking at the action. The boy got the distinct impression he was being studied. At any other time, without this damned haze clouding his mind, he'd be fidgeting under the scrutiny.
"You were quite the handful, dear boy, did you know that?"
The boy shrunk a bit from the criticism. Troublemaker, his teachers would always call him. Know-it-all brat, his older classmates would hiss at him. Handful, was just a more pleasant label.
"Do you know why you are here, dear boy?"
He bit his lip, worrying it in a way his mother always told him was bad for him. But it was a nervous tick, one that broke through the calm in his mind, and he was reluctant to stop this familiar gesture. His life, his memories, his personality, his very being was all that he had left in this world. He'd hold onto it with a death grip, and nothing could tear that away from him.
He shook his head, and the darkness above the man's torso shifted. A nod.
"I shall tell you then." The man said, leaning back in his chair with a small sigh. A henchman (because what else could the man in the suit, standing idly in the corner of the room until now, be) approached the man behind the desk, producing a cigarette from his coat pocket and holding it into the darkness where the man's head supposedly was.
The cigarette disappeared into the void, and then appeared for a few flickering moments when the henchman lit a match and held it to the end.
Smoke rose from the darkness, and the boy shivered. Black smoke billowing from his parent's room. MAMA! PAPA!
"You, my boy, have been chosen. Quite an honor, you'll soon find out. You see..."
Puff. Inhale. Exhale. Smoke. Shiver.
"The majority of the people in this world scurry around like ants, living their pathetic little lives filled with rules and regulations, and laws, and do's and do not's. Now, don't get me wrong, laws are the backbone of civilized society. But who make these laws? Humans. And humans are flawed creatures. No human walking this Earth would not succumb to their most base desires, if given the right amount of pressure on just the right spot. The point at which we succumb is what separates us from the scum of the world. Politicians, judges, even the nun working the homeless shelter. They wouldn't hesitate to - "
The boy shifted his weight from his right to his left foot, knowing this explanation would take awhile, so might as well get as comfortable as he could to wait it out. The man droned on and on about the corruptibility of the modern world, how criminals with enough money got off with only a slap on the wrist, and how convicted murderers, rapists, the most disgusting souls walked because some idiot in forensics forgot to wash their damn hands before handling the evidence...blah blah blah
"After all, justice in this world is just a bunch of principles, made by those with power to suit themselves."
Puff. Inhale. Exhale. The chair creaked as the man leaned forwards and stubbed the cigarette out in an ashtray on the desk. The gold ring on the man's left pinky glinted in the dim light hanging above the desk, and the boy's heightened sight picked up the large K on the ring. Could smell the distinct hint of cloves as the paper stick got crushed under unrelenting pressure.
"But, I digress. You, my boy, you have been chosen to be one of the few worthy enough to cleanse this world of its dirt. Just because a murderer has been released with all charges dropped, doesn't mean he'll stop killing. It'll be up to you, dear boy, to make sure he doesn't get another chance to."
The boy swallowed. Surely, he should be turning back to the door and making a break for it. If he were in his right mind, he would have. He would have told the bastard what he could do with his pretty, self-righteous words, then punch the other man in the bollocks before running as fast as he could out of this place. If only...
But he didn't. The logical, sane part of his mind was blanketed with a warm and calming veil, and all he could do was nod at the man when he asked whether the boy understood.
"Good boy, you certainly are a smart one. I knew it the moment I saw you at your school. Bright kid, I said to myself. Beautiful, too. You'd have all those pedophiliacs slobbering all over you the moment they lay an eye on your face, those deviant bastards. They deserve nothing less than having a knife shoved up their arses. You'd be the one doing that, my boy, and I just know you'll grow to enjoy giving those disgusting predators what they deserve."
The boy nodded once more, shifted again on his feet.
The man praised him on his obedience, such a good boy he is, sent him on his way with a verbal pat on the head as if shooing him to bed.
Sleep well, love, mama will see you in the morning, yeah?
He's led to the Russian doctor again, and this time, the boy's calm almost breaks. The man's holding a white hot brand in his gloved hand, and orders the boy to turn a bit. Somebody lifted his shirt, and then the world was once again filled with pain. Blinding hot pain. The skin atop the left side of his ribs sizzled and cooked when the brand touched it, and the smell reminds the boy of his parents being eaten by the flames.
He screamed...screamed so hard he coughed up blood.
When the brand was taken away, it offered only a modicum of relief. The boy would have sunk to the floor, sobbing, if it weren't for the strong grip on his arm. "You did well, kid. I've seen others bigger than you faint just at the sight of the damn thing."
The boy couldn't respond, just nodded because this seemed to be all they looked for in regards to his opinion on matters. They brought him back to his cell, leaving him there with his agony and his misery and his tears and the same question running through his mind over and over again.
Why has God abandoned him?
xxxx
They began his training the day after. And three years of grueling sparring and various advanced studies of all fields later, the assignments came. Needles constantly injected into his arms, keeping the calm in his mind. And then the withdrawals. Those were the worst. Kept him going back to his handler each and every single time he was done with the kill. Who his targets were, the boy didn't care. It was just another face in his crosshairs, another cock he was luring, another dead body.
But as the years passed, within the small amounts of clarity (a half hour at most in between coming down from his high and the desperate yearnings of withdrawal), the boy's rage and resistance towards his 'employers' grew. His defiance boiled like the brand on his body, like the flames that ate away his family. A fire rising deep from within him, always lit but flaring every time he had a hold of his sanity.
The human body was capable of adapting to many things, if given the chance to do so gradually. With the constant injections of the drug, his tolerance grew. And soon, he became more than accustomed to the dosage. But the boy never told anyone, certainly not the Russian doctor known simply as Mikael who liked to call him 'kid' all the time.
He knew this was his chance. The chains that bound him were fraying, and soon they'd fall away completely. He would be free. And so he began to plot. Laid insidious plans everywhere he was given the chance to.
The amount they injected into him took the edge off of the worst of the withdrawals, and the boy's had more than enough experience with misery and suffering to deal with the rest. All he needed to do was act normal, so that meant keeping the jitters and trembling to the privacy of his cell. He couldn't count the number of times he'd wanted to blurt out just how bad he wanted the next hit.
But then that fire in his heart sizzled as he looked down at the brand on his chest, was reminded of how his parents were conveniently taken away so that only his devotion to this cause was left, and the boy would worry his lip until it bled because that was better than speaking out and ruining the plans he'd set in motion.
All of the hard work was not in vain, and at the age of thirteen, the boy finally broke free from his captors.
He took the shot, some German politician that's been sexually molesting all of his female staff, packed up his rifle, and ran. He's got one hour to get back to his handler. Another half hour before the handler turns on the tracker to check his location.
That meant he had thirty minutes of clarity before the withdrawals kicked in. And another hour for him to get the fuck out of dodge.
The adrenaline of the kill and the thrill of freedom propelled the uncaged bird across rooftops, ledges, porches, streets, anyplace that would take him out of the city and into the obscurity of rural areas. That would be kind of hard, seeing as how he was in Dusseldorf. The tunnels, then, that'll have to do.
The boy slowed to a walk as he felt his high coming to an end, discarding the rifle and his clothes like a trail of breadcrumbs along the way. When the last piece of clothing, his pants, were shed and replaced with a pair of jeans he'd nicked from a laundry basket, he turned and went the opposite way.
It wasn't until he found a small nook in Dusseldorf's massive amount of underground tunnels that the boy allowed himself to rest. Shivering and trembling and in pain from the withdrawals now actively blazing its way through the boy's resolve, the teenager fell into restless sleep.
He woke and surfaced only to drink, and even that, he had to force himself to do, because he wanted nothing more than to just stay huddled in that hole and die. Or better yet, get some drugs into his system. His arms itched, and no amount of scratching relieved it.
His mind, tortured with nightmares of his dead parents locking him in a burning room. His body, a furnace from the fever raging within him.
One whole week, he stayed underground. And when he finally gained enough sanity back to stagger out into the light, breathing the fresh air as a free man in more ways than one...he cried.
Tears first, silent and wet against his dirty cheeks. Then he felt the sun on his skin, the wind sweeping away the warmth of it with its cold chill. A choked gasp, and the dam broke.
He barely felt the pain in his knees as they crashed against the hard pavement. His back slammed backwards into the wall behind him, and he let it all out. Choking, gasping on the emotions that overwhelmed him.
His ragged sobs buried into his hands, the crowds gave the crazy urchin boy plenty of space as they moved on blissfully with their life.
And beyond the backdrop of his joyous wails, a mantra repeated itself over and over again in the back of his mind; the last mission he'd ever partake in, one that he'd assigned to himself.
Kill them...Kill them...
Kill them for what they've done!
KILL THEM!
KILL THEM ALL!
xxxx
He didn't know how long he stayed slumped on the floor of the dirty Dusseldorf street, back pressed to the cold side of a building, hands shielding his face and tears from the world.
"Geht es dir gut?"
The question was unexpected. Not so much the question itself, but the fact that it was directed towards him, It was enough for his sobs to catch in his throat. His eyes drifted upwards to where a man with white hair and a concerned face was eye-level with him.
He opened his mouth to speak, but the days of malnourishment, of suffering, of putting one brick of willpower onto the wall only for it to crumble back down again and he'd have to repeat the process...all of that left him weak and dazed. He didn't know what to say. So he opted for nothing, closing his mouth and dropping his eyes away. The less attention he got, the better. His handler would still be looking for him.
"I said, 'Are you all right, son?'" The stranger repeated, mistakenly taking his silence as inability to understand German.
He lifted his eyes again, weary blue eyes staring into concerned brown. Brown, like the hot chocolate his mother used to make for him on cold nights.
"I'm fine." he said, and winced at the horrid quality of his voice.
"Ahh...English, then." the stranger said with a smile that brightened his face.
The boy huffed out a laugh, exhausted eyes slipping closed.
"Please open your eyes, son."
Open your eyes, little one.
The boy flinched slightly at the insidious slip of his mind, but obeyed, wondering why this man was crouched in a well-tailored suit on the sidewalk, talking to a dirty, trembling urchin boy (because that's all he was now. He had nothing left to him but his name, his memories, his weapons, and his revenge).
"When was the last time you ate?" The stranger asked, bringing out a bottle of water from nowhere, uncapping it and holding it out for the boy to take.
The boy hesitated. This could be a trap. The water could be spiked with sedatives. This kind man, with the white hair and laugh lines at the corner of his eyes and soft smile, could be the honey that'll lead him to his captors.
But his body won out, cursing his weakness, all the while accepting the bottle and tilting it towards his lips. He gulped it down in five quick chugs, coughing a bit at the end.
"Steady, son, you'll throw it all back up again at that pace."
The boy dropped the bottle to the floor, raising a dirty wrist to his mouth to wipe the spare droplets of water away. A hand caught his arm in mid-air, and it took all of the boy's willpower to keep from lashing out in defense.
But the man didn't seem to be trying to harm him, or pulling him by the wrist away into some unmarked white van. A pristine white handkerchief popped out of nowhere and appeared in the man's hand. Fucking magician or something, the boy thought to himself as he followed the journey of the white napkin to his face.
The stranger was hesitant in his movements, meaning he wanted the boy to see what he was doing. So the boy let him, let this kind man with white hair and concerned brown eyes that reminded the boy of happier times wipe water from his jaw and cheek.
His throat felt much better now, and he found he had more incentive to speak.
"Why - " The boy said, then cleared his throat to try and get rid of the frog lodged in it. "Why are you doing this?"
The stranger's smile turned sad. "Because no one should live without knowing the warmth of a friendly touch."