Chapter One: Traitor
The mud was cold and wet. That was the first thing Charlie Barken noticed as he slid on his belly along the tunnel his best friend, Itchy, had dug under the prison in order to rescue him. That and the darkness. The darkness was absolute. He couldn't see where he was going. He couldn't even see the small form of Itchy, digging through the mud, rocks, and dirt, in front of him. He could just hear both of their frustrated grunts as they slid through the narrow tunnel, praying there was very close up ahead.
They'd been moving along on their bellies for what felt like at least three hours when Itchy paused. Charlie opened his mouth to protest, but Itchy had already started taking huge gasping breaths in. A few moments later he sneezed. A few moments after that he gasped and sneezed again. This time the sneeze was so violent it knocked him to one side. Charlie let out a huff of frustration as Itchy's boots hit him in the face.
"Itchy," he hissed, "A few more degrees to the left!"
Itchy tried to glance back, but stopped the motion halfway when he realized he wouldn't be able to do it properly. Instead, he just moved even more to the same side, hitting Charlie in the face again.
Charlie knocked aside his feet this time, brows narrowed, hissing, "No! Your other left!"
"I'm sorry, boss," the smaller man replied, continuing to inch forwards. I got dirt in my nose," he added by way of explanation.
They pressed on.
In the dim light provided by the lantern Itchy had used while digging this tunnel, Charlie observed his friend.
Richard Docksand had been given an unfortunate name at birth and an equally unfortunate appearance. He had olive skin, a long thin almost horse-like face, and unusually short body that still managed to appear long and thin. His fingers and toes were long and thin as well. Overall, it gave him the look of someone having been stretched out like a piece of taffy at birth. He wore overalls with a t-shirt underneath and steel toed boots. He had a baseball cap on as well, something Charlie couldn't understand why he'd bring here. Itchy gotten his nickname due to the fact he itched when he was nervous. Something bullies in school made sure to point out as often as possible. The only redeeming feature about the small man was his silky mop of chestnut brown hair and matching eyes. Charlie suspected both of them put together was the only reason Itchy had ever been on more than just a pity date.
Charlie looked very different from his best friend and had a completely different background as well. Charles Benjamin Barken was almost too handsome for his own good and he knew it, often using it to his advantage. He was twenty-five and muscular with a mop of hair that couldn't decide whether it was blonde or brunette and eyes that were a deep chocolatey brown. Basically, he was everything Itchy wasn't. Often people commented on what a shock it was they were friends. Charlie had chestnut hair as well, but his was streaked through with gold. Everyone believed he died it, but it was, in fact, just a natural occurrence. He was currently wearing a prison getup, but his normal attire was black jeans, black t-shirt, black leather jacket, and black shitkickers. To go along with his good looks, Charlie had also been born into a wealthy white family, a fact he kept easily hidden by the other fact that they'd disowned him. Another thing Charlie did was gamble. A lot. And before he could spend his entire inheritance on building a casino, his parents cut him off. For them, it was probably the right decision. Since, Charlie had been arrested several times. This was the first time he'd been given a prison sentence.
Itchy paused again.
Charlie sighed in exasperation again. He'd run into Itchy's foot. Rubbing his head, he asked, "What was that?"
"It's a pipe," Itchy replied. He didn't move any further.
Luckily, Itchy had made the passage wide enough that Charlie could – for the most part – easily maneuver around him to see what he was talking about. Sure enough, blocking their path was a very rusted pipe. At one point, it might have been painted, but it was hard to tell in the lantern light's haze.
Digging in a tool belt strapped to his waist, Itchy produced what appeared to be a handheld drill. He raised it to the pipe. "Here let me try this."
"Hang on," Charlie said quickly, "I think that might be a water main."
"Water mains are green, this is red," Itchy said confidently, fitting a screw to his drill.
"You're color blind," Charlie retorted. "You've always been color blind."
Itchy nodded absentmindedly. He wasn't really listening. "That's true, but this is green."
"It's red!" Charlie said without thinking.
"Red?" Itchy asked. He drilled into the pipe, trying to cut it half to clear it out of their way.
Almost immediately the small tunnel began to fill with water, which was the bad news. The good news was that it had also, somehow, opened up a hole in the earth above them. Itchy and Charlie clawed at the earth, trying to get above the water before it claimed them. Somewhere in the distance, the alarm was sounded as the water main burst up through the surface in a spout.
The two men pushed at each other, both eager to be in free air again. However, once they were both standing again, they realized they weren't exactly in free air. They were a few yards from it. They could both see the hole Itchy had dug under the fence and ran for it, shouting nonsense at each other the whole way.
"Don't think! From now on, I think!"
"Wait! My stuff!"
"Forget your stuff! I'll buy you more stuff!"
"Wait! My drill!"
"Oh, come on!"
"Oh fuck, I'm itching all over!"
"Not now!"
"I can't help it Charlie, I itch when I'm nervous!"
"Well don't be nervous!"
"Just-just scratch this…"
"It's not worth it being with you!"
They ran as fast as their legs would carry them down the dirt road turned into mud from the burst water main, gunshots from guard towers following them until they were too far away to be caught by their bullets.
A very old, very unreliable car was waiting for Charlie and Itchy at the end of the long dirt road. There was no one waiting inside, but the engine started much more quickly than either one of them were expecting. Itchy pressed the gas pedal to the floor and the car shot forwards, down to the road into the night.
"So what's the plan now?" Charlie asked, glancing in the rearview mirror to make sure they weren't followed, one arm holding onto the top of the car from the outside as they drove. His seatbelt was broken and Itchy wasn't the most careful driver.
Itchy shrugged, turning a tight corner tire-screeching quick. "I was hoping you'd know the answer to that one, boss."
Charlie let out what felt like his millionth exasperated sigh of the night. Itchy was his friend and he cared about him, but he was also a real knucklehead when it came to using his brain. "Well, I want to go see Carface," Charlie replied, looking out the window.
Itchy winced.
Charlie noticed just barely and whipped around. "What?" he asked. "What d'you know?"
Itchy shrugged. "Nothing, it's just that, uh, while you've been gone, Carface has really gotten the place fixed up nice. Really nice. He's making more money than before, but his goons are swindlers and he's not doing anything about it."
Charlie shrugged back. "Once I'm back I'll fix that," he said, his gaze going back out the window. "The business still belongs to both of us."
Itchy nodded, but he didn't reply.
A few years ago, Charlie and his friend Carface, had come across a half-sunken boat in the bayou. Other than being half-sunken, the inside was still pretty nice. For years, the two had talked about starting their own casino, becoming rich and then retiring to Brazil and, for years, it had seemed like a pipe dream. But when they came upon that boat, that dream seemed to feel like a reality. They knew they'd have to furnish and clean up the boat themselves if they wanted to keep from tax collectors and other government people. It would be illegal and they probably wouldn't make a lot of money to start out with, since it would have to be an underground operation, but they didn't care. Their dreams were coming true.
Then Charlie got caught robbing an ATM. It wasn't that big of an offense, but they soon caught up with everything else he'd been doing as well. It went to court. It was in the papers. And then, before Charlie really understood what was happening, he was being sentenced to death for a murder he did not commit. And just like that his dream was ruined.
For six months he sat in prison, knowing he was framed and being unable to do anything other than wait. He was told it was processing and his actual date of death would be in twelve months in case some new evidence came to light. In six months it didn't. Maybe it would've in another six, but by then it didn't matter. At month six, Itchy had, miraculously broken him out. He was free. And it sounded like he was coming home to more money than when he'd left.
Charlie could hear the sound of the casino almost a mile away and once Itchy turned off the road and went into the deep of the bayou to find their half sunken boat, the volume started to increase dramatically until Itchy turned another corner and there it was.
The ship didn't look the way Charlie had left it. There were more fairy lights strung over above the entrance in the riggings. It looked like there were people dancing on the tilted deck as well. There also appeared to be music. The entrance to the ship was different as well. There was the oval cut into the side of the ship that acted as a doorway in and out of the ship and was guarded 24/7, but now there was a red carpet leading up to the entrance, lined by velvet ropes hanging from golden poles. There were more neons in the windows. And there were windows.
Where did Carface get the money for all of this? Charlie wondered, staring up at the casino in a state of awe.
The two climbed out of the car. All of Itchy's nerves from earlier seemed to be gone as the two swaggered into the ship. A rat race seemed to be going on in the back – an addition to the casino shortly before Charlie was arrested; Carface's idea – but it stopped the moment Charlie walked in the door.
Someone whispered his name, then they whispered it to someone else and before he knew it, Charlie was standing in the entrance to the Sunken Ship with every eye of every patron in the place glued to him.
"Hey guys!" he called out giving a dramatic wave. "What d'you know? What d'you say?"
"What d'you say? What d'you know?" Itchy replied.
"Itchy," Charlie asked, feigning confusion as he turned to his friend, "do we detect a look of surprise here?"
"Maybe we should go out and come back in, again!" Itchy replied, miming the gesture.
They were both grinning, but they both exploded into laughter at Itchy's pantomime.
"Charlie?" The voice brought them both back to reality. Charlie turned and saw an older man with a top hot and a glass of beer sitting at the bar. He looked genuinely confused. "Ain't you supposed to be on death row?"
Charlie frowned, his brows drawing together. "No," he said in a loud firm voice that left no room for argument. "I ain't supposed to be on death row. I got out."
"Things have changed since you've been gone," a woman leaning against one of the poker tables said. She was playing with a string of pearls in her heavily manicured fingernails. "Life hasn't been no piece of cake."
A smaller man with large eyes added, "Carface ain't been treating us too good."
Charlie rolled his own eyes at this. That didn't sound like him. More likely this guy hadn't gotten lucky enough times and felt he was being swindled. Or maybe he really was just that bad at poker. Some people were.
"Could you spare a couple of coins for old time's sake?" the man with the top hat asked. He was giving what almost appeared to be a rueful smile.
Charlie walked over to the one of the slot machines and pulled the lever. "Why have a couple of coins when you can have the whole bank?"
On the last word, he smacked the slot machine and, to the surprise of everyone in the room – including Charlie himself – the machine landed on the jackpot. Coins began pouring from the bottom. Everyone was in such a state of shock that for several moments no one ran to grab them. When they did, Charlie let them. Whatever Carface was doing was working. He had more than enough money. He didn't need to steal from his own slots.
Going back over to the bar, Charlie sat and had a beer, chatting with the other patrons. It was around this time that he saw Killer on the stairs.
Killer was the nickname for the young man that Carface had hired when Charlie was imprisoned. He'd gotten that nickname on account of how he used to be in a gang and therefore often thought the best way to take care of unruly patrons was by, well, killing them. Usually in a gruesome fashion. This was funny only because of Killer's appearance: He was a tall lanky kid with thick black glasses and a long nose to place them on. He was oddly proportioned too with a beer gut and skinny everything else. He had a mop of straw colored hair and beedy black eyes that saw more than you probably wanted them to.
It made Charlie a little annoyed seeing him again, knowing that Carface had so easily replaced him once it became apparent he was going to prison. Carface had said Killer's occupation in his position was temporary mostly because he was so quick to jump to violence, but now here he was all this time later.
Charlie turned back to his beer and took a long swig. Unfortunately, the only way to Carface now was through Killer. He was going to have to make that sadistic kid happy if he wanted to see his partner without a fuss.
"Hey Killer!" Charlie called, waving towards him.
Killer froze on the stairs as though he'd been caught doing something wrong. When he turned to look at Charlie, his eyes widened in shock. And for a split second, Charlie thought it looked like a different kind of shock: the you-shouldn't-be-here kind of shock. Then it resolved itself into the same surprised confusion that everyone else in the casino wore and Killer descended the stairs walking towards him, squinting all the while through his glasses.
"Charlie?" he asked, stammering slightly, another aspect that made his sadistic tendencies so bizarre. "Is that really you?"
"Yeah, of course it is, Killer!" he said, wrapping an arm around the young man's shoulders like they were best friends. "I was wondering if you could do me a favor and tell me where Carface is. I need to talk to him now that I'm back."
Killer nodded slowly, almost as though he were nodding to himself. Finally, he said, "Alright, I'll go find him for you. Wait here."
Charlie pulled his arm back and mimicked settling on the stool. "Happy to wait!"
"It's him, boss," Killer muttered, shaking his head. "I don't get it. Mr. Carface, I know what you're thinking, but I don't know nothing about this! We set him up for good." He'd been muttering long before he walked into his boss's room, going over in his mind everything that could go wrong once he told Carface the bad news. Killer was a nervous man though this came mostly from the fact his boss was much more dangerous and violent than he was. However, much to Killer's surprise, Carface was cool, calm, and collected. Almost as though he'd expected Charlie to break out. Who knew? Maybe he had. Carface seemed to be okay doing things the hard way just because he liked the challenge it would bring.
"Killer," said Carface's voice from the back of the interior of a car that looked like it belonged in the world thirty years ago, "I do not wish that I should share fifty percent of the business with my partner, Charlie."
Carface was a heavyset man, dressed in black slacks, a plain lavender button up, and suspenders. He was in his late thirties, but really looked like he was in his late fifties. He had black hair and drooping skin, but a mean smile and black eyes that seemed bottomless and dangerous. He'd gotten his nickname from a car accident. It was also where he got the scar on his face that stretched from the corner of his mouth to under his chin. Like Itchy, his name had started out as a way to tease him, but eventually it became his name and what he went by while running the casino. Few people even remembered his real name anymore. No one knew this fact except Killer, Charlie, and Itchy, and, even then the only people Carface had actually told were Killer and Charlie. Itchy only knew because Charlie had told him.
"You want I should go squeeze his head with the pliers?" Killer asked, grinning maniacally, squeezing the windshield wipers of the car as he said it. He'd straddled the front of the car to speak to his boss within.
"Killer," Carface said gently, lighting up a cigar. "That is no way to treat an old friend. Friends must be handled in a businesslike way."
The bar grew crowded as the night went on. It went from Charlie and a few people sharing a couple of beers to an entire party's worth of people. Charlie had created a casino for that reason, but that didn't mean he had to stick around in it and finally decided not to when he got tired of waiting for Killer to come back. He knew where Carface's room was. He could find it easily without help.
Saying good bye to his drinking companions, Charlie sauntered up the stairs he'd seen Killer on and headed for the dark hallway that led to the bedrooms. Once of them was Carface's.
Suddenly the prospect at seeing his friend after six months apart was funny and Charlie couldn't stop from laughing. It wasn't until he'd finally reached the room he was looking for that he realized he wasn't laughing because anything was genuinely funny. He was laughing out of relief. A part of him had been very scared he was going to die.
"Carface!" he called, sitting in the small open area just outside Carface's door. "Hey, Carface, you descent?" He was still laughing.
The door swung open and orange light spilled out of the room and into the hallway. Carface stood in the doorway. He was a short man, but he managed to be intimidating anyway.
"Charlie?" he said, his voice full of surprise and happiness. "Oh, is it really you?"
"Is it really me?" Charlie asked, grinning back. "Is it really you?"
He moved passed Carface into the room.
Everything was decorated with red in mind. The armchairs had red cushions, the main color of the Persian rug covering the floor was red, the haze of the room was red, but it looked like even the wallpaper and pictures on the wall were red or had red in them. The only few piece of furniture that didn't have red on them were the coffee table with the radio on it and the car in the center of the room which served as a couch and a bed, depending on how Carface was feeling.
"Hey, you've put on a little weight," Charlie said, draping himself in one of the armchairs. He turned up the volume on the radio and bounced along to the tune in his chair. "I told you to stay off sweets. At least the place is looking okay. A little gauche, but okay."
Better than okay, his mind whispered, but Charlie's pride didn't let him say that.
"You know, partner, I'm proud of you," he went for instead, then he remembered the people in the room below and added, "But the customer's ain't laughing."
"Gamblers are never happy, Charlie," Carface replied, waving the statement away with the twitch of his hand. He turned down the volume on the radio. "You know that."
That isn't like him, a small voice in Charlie's head whispered, but he waved that away too. Turning the volume back up, he continued: "Yeah, but I've been thinking what this place needs, besides some new curtains, is some class, culture, choreography! And some influence of the theater! Dancing girls! What d'you say?" Then even if they don't win at least they'll have something more to do.
"Charlie times have changed," Carface said, gently. He turned down the volume on the radio again. "I've changed, you've changed."
"What are you talking about?" Charlie asked, his brows narrowing. What was really going on? He turned the volume up once more. "I haven't changed."
"Charlie, you've done time," Carface said sadly, shaking his head. "That's not good for business." He spread his hands out. As if there was no other way.
"What are you saying?" Charlie asked, sitting up slightly in his chair.
"You're a man with a record –" Carface began, but Charlie's frustration was too much. He cut him off before he could finish his sentence.
"I was framed!"
"I know," Carface said, nodding sadly. Charlie had turned up the radio again. "You're like a brother to me. That's why…why…" He almost sounded near tears.
"Why what?" Charlie asked.
"We need to split up the partnership!" Carface burst out as though he couldn't hold the truth inside him any longer. Charlie studied his face. Even though he was upset saying this now, it was clearly something his partner – well, expartner – had thought very long and hard about.
"What?!" Charlie exclaimed. "Are you out of your mind?"
"They'll be looking for you," Carface retorted. His lips were pressed into a small pucker, his brows narrowed. "And where's the first place they're going to look, huh? Here. Here! I don't like it, Charlie, but it's for our own good."
Charlie crossed his arms over his chest like a petulant child and looked away. He didn't like his and didn't want to agree to it, but they couldn't keep a partnership if one of the two partners didn't want to have it.
"We'll set you up somewhere they don't know you," Carface continued.
"Yeah?" Charlie retorted, turning around, still angry. "Go on."
Despite himself he was curious about Carface's plan.
"Fifty percent of this is yours, right?" Carface said, gesturing to the room around the room. "Charlie, take it! You want a cut of the profits from the last six months? All in twenties?"
"Sure," Charlie replied, shrugging. He was more interested now than he was letting on. "I want one half of the cut of the bar's earnings too. I was the one who came up with the idea for it."
Carface only nodded as if that were fair.
Finally, Charlie grinned. "This is sounding better all the time."
"Then it's a deal?" Carface asked. He seemed eager.
"Well…" Charlie had already made his decision, but the way to do good business was to act like you didn't really want what you wanted. Especially when you got it. "Deal."
Carface smiled and held out a hand. "Well, put her there."
Charlie took Carface's hand and shook. The older man grinned, leading him from the room of red to the main lobby. The group of people at the table had grown, though from this distance, to Charlie, they all looked like clones of the same person.
"Boys, listen up!" Carface called from his spot next to Charlie on the balcony. "My former partner wishes to announce that he is going into business for himself!"
The way Carface said it made Charlie excited at the prospect too. He and Itchy could set something else up. He could make all of the rules and he wouldn't ever have to deal with Carface vetoing all his best ideas anymore.
"We're going to Mardi Gras!" Carface called.
Everyone in the casino whooped and cheered.
Charlie smiled. What could possibly go wrong?
Itchy hated Mardi Gras and always had. This was probably due to the fact that the first time he attended Mardi Gras as a toddler, he got separated from his mother for the entire duration of the party and ended up in the back of a police cruiser crying he had no idea where his mother was after a rather rough journey through the festivities. Ever since then, even when he grew up, the whole celebration seemed gaudy, unnecessary, and unnerving to him.
So if it hadn't been for Charlie he wouldn't have been battling his way through the crowds to the abandoned float he'd seen Charlie, Carface, Killer, and Carface's goons head towards. However, then the crowds had come with the parade and he was lost again. As lost as he'd been when he was five years old and crying for his mommy.
This isn't the same, he insisted.
And he was right. It wasn't.
It was much, much worse.
After Charlie disappeared from the bar, Itchy had gone looking for him and, in typical Itchy fashion, had gotten lost. He'd been turning a corner, trying to find his way back to the lobby instead of to Carface's room and found Killer with two other men around a bend in the hall. They were talking in hushed voices.
Normally, Itchy might've waltzed into the conversation, breaking it up immediately. He didn't like secrets and didn't think anyone else should keep any either. However, today was different. Today, he was going to watch and wait.
Something told him he needed to hear what they had to say.
"Did it eat yet?" Killer was asking the man to his right.
"Yeah, it ate," the man said, sounding disgusted, "but how come I got to feed Carface's little monster?"
Monster? The word registered late in Itchy's mind, ratcheting up the panic he'd felt ever since he'd come across this little gathering in the hallway. And then Killer said the words that made all of his panic feel at once justified:
"Come on, guys," Killer said, trying to use the assertive side he didn't really have. "You've got a job to do. Carface wants you should get rid of Charlie."
The words shattered Itchy's mind.
Carface was going to kill Charlie? Or, at least, that was what Killer's words had heavily implied. But why? He and Charlie were business partners. Almost as close as he and Itchy.
But that was before Charlie got set to prison, a voice reminded him. And, as though the information had been planted in his brain, Itchy knew why this was happening: Carface was a greedy piece of shit. He wanted all of the money to himself. It was written in a contract he couldn't have that. Not unless Charlie was dead.
Now as Itchy pushed his way through the Mardi Gras crowd – he'd followed Charlie and company there after he'd found them on the balcony – he also realized Carface was the one who'd had Charlie framed for the murder of that little boy.
Itchy shook his head. It was all so wrong and messed up. This wasn't supposed to happen.
Charlie B. Barken was drunk. Probably more drunk than he'd ever been in his entire life, which was saying something considering how much and how often he got drunk.
Somehow, Carface had managed to steal a float of a pink and purple dragon for him and their whole gang to drink, smoke, and make merry in. Though it was already an older float, the inside now was completely trashed and, if he hadn't been so drunk, Charlie might've felt sorry for whomever was going to find this tomorrow morning and have to clean it up.
Charlie continued to move his gaze around the trashed, abandoned float and, finally, they came to rest on Carface. Killer was sitting next to him, trying to get ketchup out of a bottle onto a hamburger, but, being very drunk like everyone else, was having a hard time doing so. Charlie's eyes flicked back up to Carface and some hazy part of his mind registered that his friend was speaking, quite loudly too.
"And I am sure that I speak for every dog amongst us in wishing you the best of luck in your new venture," Carface shouted to the people only half listening throughout the float. "And now, as a token of our esteem, we are presenting to you this lucky gold watch!"
A shining ray of sun was dangling in front of Charlie's eyes. He put his hand up in front of his face to fight off the glare before the watch turned idly to the side and he recognized it for what it was: an expensive golden watch, a red ribbon looped through the hoop at the top.
Grinning, Charlie snatched the watch out of Carface's hands. "Takes a licking and keeps on ticking," he slurred and then began humming to himself.
If he hadn't been so drunk and he hadn't been humming so loudly, he might've heard Carface say, "Killer."
Killer looked up from his fight with the ketchup bottle. His eyes were nearly crossed from how intoxicated he was. Still he managed to say, "Uh-huh."
"Take Charlie out back for the big surprise."
"Surprise?" Killer asked. His brows drew together, his hold on the ketchup bottle relaxing for a moment. "What surprise, boss?"
"The big surprise." Carface mimed slicing a finger over his throat.
Killer's maniacal grin returned. "Oh! You mean that surprise?" He squeezed the ketchup bottle too hard and half of it squelched out onto the palm of his hand and into his lap. Ironically, for someone as bloodthirsty as Killer, the sight of blood disturbed him and, when all of the ketchup splat out onto his lap, looking a bit too much like blood, he let out a soft groan and fainted.
Carface rolled his eyes. "You moron."
The pier was deserted this late at night. The Mardi Gras parades were long since over and everyone was at home in their beds, getting ready to work through a killer hangover the next morning. And as he led Charlie down to the edge, Killer, the man, thought it was fitting there was mist on the pier. It was almost too perfect.
Charlie on the other hand was so drunk, he hadn't questioned when Carface had blindfolded him and led him to the shipyard where his "surprise" was. In fact, he was singing to himself right now, some stupid song that Killer was pretty sure he'd made up.
Finally, they reached the edge of the pier. There was even a large red X that Killer had spray painted there hours earlier in case he forgot which pier Carface wanted Charlie to be on.
"This the mark," he muttered to himself, not worried about Charlie overhearing him. To Charlie, he added, "Stay here, and don't peek."
Charlie didn't hear a word he said, he just kept humming to himself.
At the top of the boardwalk was a large car. Carface stood beside it, grinning down at the blindfolded man at the end of the pier.
Itchy had spent hours trying to find the float Carface had stolen and by the time he finally had, they'd cleared out, already headed on to whatever fate it was Carface had planned for Charlie. So Itchy continued searching, looking all through the city, but he had no idea where to start and by the time he got to the pier, Killer was just reaching the top again, standing next to Carface, who was standing next to a car.
Itchy understood what was going to happen a split second right before it did.
Carface released the break and stepped away from the car. It teetered at the top for a econd before barreling down the pier, heading straight for Charlie.
Itchy screamed, but no one heard him over the sound of metal cracking every bone in Charlie's body as the car flung him over the side of the pier.
He was dead before he hit the water.
NOTE: pray for me. and by that i mean, pray that i actually finish more than one chapter of this fanfiction ffs