Pulling off his face and looking into those eyes, he knows his life is supposed to flash before him at this point, but he won't let it. There's too much he doesn't want to see again. And not enough time.
He can feel his lips trembling and hates it, hates it as much as ever he hated anything, and closes his eyes for a moment of respite from the calm, uninterested blue.
In the blackness he sees her eyes, narrowed in hate as she tells him she wishes she'd aborted him, killed him in the cradle, anything that she didn't have to deal with him. He hears the sneer in the older boy's voice as he asks if he learned anything from his mother, hmm whoreson?
These are not the memories he wants to die with, and he opens his eyes, glaring at the man who should have killed him by now. The upward sweep on his eyelid heralds the release of tears, dropping in burning streaks to trace the gaunt contours of his cheeks. Maybe he should be flattered by the fact that Manhattan looks apprehensive, perhaps upset at the task before. Maybe he should be, but he's not.
"What are you waiting for?" The words leave him in a harsh whisper, and he realizes his lips aren't the only part of him trembling now.
Closing his eyes again, waiting, he smells the rot and shit in an underground hovel, the tiny shoe with the child's foot still inside and the mongrels snarling and trying to get the tasty morsel trapped within. He remembers thinking 'ruined' and not knowing if he means the shoe or the dogs, and the tragedy of realizing its both. Hating the thought as much as he hates the sight, hating himself more because he's too late to save this child too. Another dog to put down.
Another thing he doesn't want to remember, but what is there that he does? Existential as it query seems, it is, like most of his thoughts, entirely honest.
Time is passing too slowly, standing out here waiting to die. His voice leaves him in a whisper he doesn't recognize or believe will carry to Manhattan. "Do it," he tries to say.
He remembers working with Daniel and how they never talked. They never talked because he kind of almost liked Daniel, and didn't want to give the other man a chance to ruin it by saying too much. Didn't want to be invited to ruin it himself by his own mouth. So he spoke in fragments, walked unless he had to take the offered ride, and went on his own as much as possible. It paid to be cognizant of other's feelings, so it was usually Daniel he went to first with information or a theory.
In return for this, Daniel had learned to live with him. Friendship. But in the end, when push came to shove, Daniel hung up his cowl and put away his mask, leaving him alone again to stand as a barrier between dark and light. Friendship was frail.
Still, Daniel listened to him even when he thought he was being paranoid. Daniel had to understand that he was right again- peace couldn't last long, not when balanced on a pile of corpses. There was something almost comforting about that, because while Daniel might be a coward, he always came back eventually. Especially with incentive.
The seconds are crawling by, and he knows Daniel is standing somewhere in the background, wanting this to end differently but doing nothing to change the circumstance. His eyes narrow at Manhattan, and this time his voice is as strong and rough as ever. "DO IT," he screams.
And finally, it was done.
---
Guess what I just watched. And guess who was the only character I really liked.
