#6: Life on the Street #5
The Pocket charged at the gray scaled, ten horned monstrosity at top speed, his fist ready to split it's skull and send it's brain flying out. This hideous beast had been responsible for the deaths of over a dozen gangsters at the hands of completely innocent people, using it's powers to turn them into puppets when it clearly had the power to do so itself, and starting the bloodiest riot in Chicago. This beast had made the mistake of calling him a pansy and a coward, and it was time that he showed this young demon-
It jumped to the side and kicked his left ankle, digging it's talons into him and ripping through his skeletal "skin." The blow sent a jolt through his body and rattled his teeth while sending him flying through a burned brick storefront.
The Pocket lifted his head to look at the gashes in his leg. Black Dekllanian blood oozed from it, practically indistinguishable from his black pants. His nervous system handled the pain easily, and he would be able to heal quickly from such a minor wound, but that didn't mean that it didn't hurt him. Nothing should have been fast enough to avoid a Dekllanian running at top speed, nothing should have had the strength to knock him back this far. Nothing but light and a nearby explosion should have even so much as made a scratch on his body!
For the first time in almost forty years, he felt fear.
A drawn out roar was his only warning as he pushed himself up before the ceiling collapsed onto him. Deep, undeniably malevolent and hateful laughter came from above him.
"To step into a snake's nest is to allow yourself to be bitten" the beast rasped. "Is this your endgame, Pocket? To prove your stupidity? Your inferiority?"
It's huge gray hand shot through the ceiling rubble and wrapped around The Pocket's throat. He was then lifted out and stood face-to-face with the grinning, reptilian-eyed beast before it spun around and raced towards a burned car. It stopped less than five feet from it and threw him through it, coating his head in ash and the remaining flames. Burned metal and broken glass scraped his "skin."
He only stopped when he crashed through a window, or at least where one had once been. The Pocket fell onto a sea of wine and shattered bottles. Some of the glass managed to cut into his blank eyes, eliciting a shriek of pain from him. The light from the flames that had gotten onto his head burned his face black and scorched his hair.
"To think, that two vigilantes such as us could work together to wipe out their species. But a pipedream! You are an antique, Pocket, leaving these people helpless to defend themselves from the barbarians of the streets. Antiques are of no use!"
The Pocket's eyes had not fully healed yet, so he was unable to see the beast as it charged at him and grab him by his temples before it flung him back outside. He landed on several police officers who were trying to get back up from the beast's red light that had washed over them.
The blades of the three news helicopters were still clear to him. His eyes were now healed and he retracted them into his head to ease the remaining pain. The beast's footsteps were directly in front of him.
"And here I was, thinking it would be difficult! How foolish of me" it snarled before it unleashed a demonic laugh. Such an ugly noise was able to stand The Pocket's nerves on end and give any mere human pause.
Pushing himself up meant nothing when the beast was fully able to take advantage of his exhaustion and slam it's tail into him with enough force to send him flying a good four feet. Blood fell from his mouth and colored his teeth a sleek jet black.
"Look at these helicopters! The world now watches you struggle. Your glory is gone!"
The Pocket opened his mouth and vomited black blood mixed with pasty white saliva. The beast's foot came down on his back and pressed him onto the asphalt.
"Believe me, Pocket, when I say that I am filled with sorrow. I expected a fight! But then, what should I have expected from a monster that only kills bottom-feeder street thugs?" it mockingly asked him.
"Such...such nerve from a reptile...that treats innocent men and women like puppets. I too am sad; I am about to be killed by a coward!" The Pocket managed to growl through the blood and bile in his mouth.
The beast roared once more. "I AM NOT A COWARD! Such nerve from you, you piece of shit! I will build your tombstone, and it shall read, "Here lies a COWARD!" How, then, will you argue in death?!"
He saw his chance. The Pocket grabbed the beast's knee, but he didn't see it's glowing horn, the smallest of the ten on it's body. A blood red light poured from it and struck The Pocket at point blank range. He couldn't hear his own screaming over the memories, images that had started resurfacing a few days ago. Each memory replayed itself as if though it was actually occurring, his eyes only seeing what had happened nearly sixty years ago. As a child, as a soldier, as a husband and father. Everything came back, whether he liked it or not. The memories lasted only a few seconds, and yet, they were too slow to bear.
At the same time, his nervous system had gone past overload. Fire consumed his flesh and innards and his blood felt like it was leaving him in greater and greater amounts as if though he had been completely dismembered. The Pocket couldn't even bring himself to scream any longer. The lungs in his chest had been seared and the air was hardly there anymore.
The beast laughed again; The Pocket couldn't bring himself to care. It crouched and grabbed him by his hair, pulling him up to face it.
"A Dookloonioon, is it? You grow more interesting the more I observe you! Such natural inhuman strength and speed, the taking of heads to fool the hunter. And such empathy you possess! It must have been so difficult losing everything you had regained, everything you had attempted to do better than your father. And to a criminal; a former brother in arms. Now you see that we are both quite the same, no?"
The Pocket shuddered at that. The beast's voice had broken somewhat when he had mentioned the loss of his family to the psychotic veteran. He knew that this thing's father had also been murdered by a home intruder, a single knock on the door resulting in tragedy. Perhaps they weren't quite different. After all, they both killed criminals. Maybe Aaron was-
No. He had killed only a handful of criminals so far, and that was because Aaron had pushed him into sparing him. Many of these gangsters were mere children coaxed into becoming thugs by their older, more hardened compatriots and had nobody to serve as a role model for them. Deep down, they were scared. Of him, the police, anything that seemed even remotely like a threat. When he did kill, it was with his bare hands, with his blank eyes meeting theirs. But this ugly beast? It watched from the sidelines, hijacking the minds of innocent people and forcing them to dirty their hands when they had no business doing so. The Pocket still didn't know why he fought these criminals. Was it because he had seen a kindred soul in Aaron and was compelled by him? Was it because he saw he no change in the humans when he killed the innocent who suffered? But this thing knew, and instead of finding the man who did it and killing him, it had decided to eradicate everyone who fit it's bill.
And what if it succeeded? Where would the beast stop? Would it possess all innocents and take power, becoming an authoritarian figure in it's war on crime? Who would be able to redeem themself if they would simply be torn apart for something so insignificant as shoplifting?
No. He was better than this. He knew better.
The Pocket's arm shot up and jammed his thumb into the beast's left eye while his other fingers pressed against it's left temple, beginning to crush the skull.
"Get your pathetic hand off of me, you, you…" he started to say.
He remembered some words Aaron loved to say.
"-you FUCKING ASSHOLE!"
As the beast screamed, it slashed his face with it's claws. He growled and stomached the pain before punching it's jaw; a satisfying snap reached his graudls. Deciding to pull back, the beast briefly revealed it's blood-filled eye before it covered it. With that, The Pocket rose.
Rage gripped him. Yet, it did not drown out his knack for strategy. If anything, it only made it that much clearer once he struck his first blow, gripping the beast's shoulder and ankle before throwing it through the top of a charred car. He ran to the car and tore off the hood before walking towards the beast and throwing it through it's stomach, slicing it open. A howl escaped it's throat and The Pocket went back to the car. The car engine was torn out and chucked onto the beast's healing stomach wound. Bending over, he picked it back up and wailed on the beast. With superhuman speed, the engine collided with it's head, mouth, and ribcage. Ribs split and burst from the chest, fangs flew from the mouth, and parts where the skull was hit cracked and even collapsed onto the brain in small chunks. It's eyes had nearly flown out of their sockets and blood raced from it's nostril slits and and mouth, but oddly enough, it's horns were unfazed by the blows.
The Pocket gripped the beast's elbow and helped it up. He ran to the front door of a shop and spun once before he sent the beast crashing through the door. Glass covered the floor and the two door handles were ripe for use. And put to use they were. They slammed onto the beast's body and broke every bone that was struck, The Pocket punctuating each blow with five thousand pounds of force and moving his arms at almost nine hundred miles per hour. Within seconds, the handles were in pieces, and so the beast was dragged through the glass. Thousands of shards sliced through it's gray scales and drew ever more blood; The pocket was sure that if this thing was human, it would have died from blood loss by now.
He picked up the beast and threw it straight through a police car. Surprisingly, it was able to push itself up and gaze at him with nothing but concentrated hatred in it's reptilian eyes. Shaking and heaving, the beast grabbed the police car and cast it at him. But it was slow; the toll on the beast was more than clear. Red blood caked it's whole body. Parts of it's head and chest were still healing. Speed wasn't even needed to catch the flying car; The Pocket stood where he was when he caught it. Running towards the beast, he made it seem like he was going to club it with the car. Just as he expected, the beast jumped out of the way with what little energy it had left.
That was a mistake.
The Pocket turned to the beast just as it jumped away in the nick of time. With the remaining momentum and with all of his strength, he threw the car at it from less than four feet away. The car split in half and sent pieces of metal and glass right through it's body, shredding apart muscles and internal organs. Bones were outright pulverized from the close range impact and multiple crunching noises could be heard. One of the tires slammed into it's face and tore more than half the skin off.
Once the debris had fallen, The Pocket wasted no time in charging forward and throwing punch after punch at the beast's gore-covered face. Each blow summoned more blood from it's mouth. Bones could be heard snapping and muscle was flattened. He grabbed it's shoulders and spun it around before a solid haymaker slammed into the beast's jaw. With that, the beast was sent flying twenty feet and crashed into the pavement, tearing up the ground.
Looking around, he saw the police officers getting back on their feet. Most were still clutching their heads and faces and moaning from the pain of the light. The sound of what appeared to be many breaking bones caught his attention.
A pool of red blood was forming under the beast's unconscious body as his muscles vanished. The bones in it's body appeared to be twisting and shifting and the body grew shorter, with the tail receding into the body. Fangs started turning into normal human teeth and the snout receded into a normal human mouth. Lips grew out. A normal nose started growing from the nostril slits. The sinx inch talons shrank. The ten horns on it's body vanished back into the body and the holes where they had been, including the beast's other wounds, healed. The skin turned dark before the rustling scales grew into each other and lost their texture, becoming normal human skin before black hair started sprouting from the body.
"The hell is that?"
He turned to the source of the voice and saw that most of the police officers had returned to their senses. The moment he looked at them, they noticed him and went for the guns they had dropped when they had been hit by the beast's light.
The Pocket looked to the other officers across from him. His eyes locked with those of the black trenchcoated, slanted eyed policeman, the one who had screamed so angrily for him to get down on the ground. Not much had changed in those eyes; they still possessed the same burning ambition and frustration as when he had first seen him. He looked down at the beast and was greeted by the sight of a male human. A mere child, perhaps not even eighteen years old, and yet he had somehow gained the power to turn innocents into weapons of his revenge. In that mere boy's voice, there had been such eloquent malice, it was almost unbelievable that a child was capable of spewing such hatred. It was even more unbelievable that a young boy had been able to turn an entire city into a blazing inferno of distrust and resentment.
He heard the sirens. They weren't far away. The Pocket turned and sped through a store, knowing that he was no longer needed here.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
So this is what a hangover feels like. Well shit, looks like mom and dad were right for once when it came to parties in high school.
Such were the thoughts going through Detective Stephen Wong's mind as he forced himself off the ground. The last thing he remembered was that ugly gray reptilian thing blasting him and every other police officer with a blood red light, and then the memories had flashed by. Every single one of them. Personally, he didn't mind the memories; most of them were meaningless crap anyway. But of course there was a catch to it. When that light had washed over him, his nerves weren't just turned up to eleven, the dial had been practically ripped off. Fire had swept through him and utterly paralyzed every appendage of his body. What had been a call by the police chief to control a riot in downtown Chicago had turned into a curbstomp by something that had literally come out of nowhere.
They had thought The Pocket was the weirdest thing they had ever seen. Obviously, they were wrong.
Reminds me, Wong started thinking, what the hell has happened to that freak? From what I heard, that lizard thing was pretty pissed at that werewolf thing for not helping it. Fucking Foundation is gonna be pissed if their little culprit turns out to be dead.
The Pocket had caught his attention with how much it resembled SCP 1471-A-wolf skull-esque head, blank eyes, black hair and clothing, and a huge grin. That had been a good reason to contact the Special Containment Procedures; if they could test it, they could find out the whole reason behind MalO ver1.0.0 and answer some serious questions, like why the hell that thing kept sending pictures of itself to everyone who downloaded it. That wasn't gonna happen now.
The first thing he saw when his eyes reopened was the street. Usually, that meant nothing, but right now? It looked like an absolute warzone. The asphalt was churned up like how a tank rolled through a once beautiful field. Pieces of gray were all over the place and the yellow line paint had been all but ripped away.
His sight moved up and he saw a young black male; looked like a teenager. But that wasn't the end of it. The boy was naked and lying in a large pool of blood; most likely, it was his own. He was still alive judging by the fact that his chest was still rising, but his breaths were shuddering and drawn out. Judging by how sprawled out he was, he looked pretty beat up. Whoever did this to him must have been in a particularly bad mood.
Something black caught his eye.
Wong looked higher and saw the black clothed beast, the one he had come here for all along-The Pocket. The monster's pale eyes met his. For a brief moment, he wondered if this thing was a threat. Maybe-
Don't be ridiculous, Wong thought, instantly shooting down that belief. That animal is a threat to the whole world's security! If some psychotic aliens see this thing on their radar, they'll view us as a threat and then we'll all be welcoming our new alien overlords. Better to insert some Amnesiacs into the atmosphere, confiscate all video footage, and tell people that these riots were all because of that motherfucker Al Sharpton. And when we find the thing that caused all this, we're gonna lock it up nice and tight right next to 682.
Looking into The Pocket's eyes produced a rarely seen anger in a man like Wong. Here was an anomaly, simply running free and without any concern for the chaos it caused wherever it went. This asshole had murdered more than sixteen people by taking their heads, claiming that it was a superhero. He actually found himself standing in solidarity with the people of Chicago, for once. This goddamn bloodthirsty anomaly had volunteered to do a police officer's work, took it a hundred steps too far, and expected to be praised for murdering a few thugs.
Who does it think it is?', he asked himself.
Ambulance and fire sirens suddenly blared through the city. The Pocket turned and sped through a store at super speed, leaving. It just...left. That was it. It had decided that there was nothing left to do here. But then where was that beast that had controlled all of the people?
The sound of a fourth helicopter ripped through the air, but this one was much louder than the three news choppers. Everyone there looked up to see a completely black helicopter. That itself meant nothing, but Wong knew better. There was only one organization that possessed helicopters this abnormally huge.
The Foundation.
It landed and the door opened to reveal four heavily armed and armored men with black helmets and body armor. Shoving their way through the crowd, they stopped to glare at Wong through their visors. He scowled back at them. For what reason was he to blame?
The four men continued before stopping near the boy. They carefully picked up his seemingly unconscious body and quickly moved back to the helicopter. Once inside, the door shut and it climbed into the air before leaving.
What the hell do they want with a naked boy?, Wong asked in his head. Unless-
He couldn't stop himself from gasping.
The boy was the reptilian monster with the red light.
Wong didn't have any time to reflect on this, though; the first responders were here. All policeman immediately stepped aside to let them do their jobs. The EMTs bandaged the wounded people and felt their pulses before carefully loading them onto stretchers and pushing them into the ambulances. Once inside, they went to work hooking them up to IVs. Likewise, the firemen put out all remaining fires and did much the same work as the EMTs, gathering up the wounded and checking for their vital signs. The firemen were, after all, trained to save lives no matter the situation and as quickly as possible.
Several police officers were still in pain and talked to the EMTs about the red light and it's supernatural effects; namely, the flashing of the memories. The EMTs were obviously at a loss as to how to deal with this. Maybe if they were parapsychologists, they could cook up some bullshit, but this was way out of their league.
Medics. Never had to deal with superhero/villain battles before, Wong mused. That would change.
Another group was pushing their way through the crowd, but they weren't first responders. No, they were everything Wong despised. Liars, sadists, shit-starters-especially that last one. They asked questions specifically to divide the people and hoped only to get half-baked information for the sake of ratings. Gone were the days of honest journalism; the tabloid media was here, and he hated every bit of it.
Fucking assholes just have to see the bodies, don't they?, he raged. The reporters callously shoved the first responders aside without so much as a second glance; their cameramen followed their every move, cartoonish grins plastered to their faces. If he had his way, he would rip their huge yellow teeth out with his bare hands and film it all.
"Sir? Sir, what is your name?" one of the reporters asked him, running up the moment she saw him. The cameraman was some acne-ridden teenager with some of the most unwashed hair he had ever seen. His face couldn't have been more punchable; his smile didn't help at all.
"M'am, I do not have time to talk to you. Next time, can you please at least say "excuse me?"" Wong told her. It was just too bad that she was one of those types who didn't take no as an answer.
"Sir, can you at least tell me your name?" she asked. God, that smug little smile pissed him off like nothing else.
"Detective Stephen Wong, okay?" he grumbled before turning. The cameraman made some comment about "detective" being his first name. Wong resisted the urge to grab that camera and smash it over his head; such a comment wasn't even clever.
"Detective Wong, can you tell me why your police department brutalised the protesters today?" she then asked. He stopped and slowly turned to face her. Now, she had really done it.
"Are you serious? Are you really so stupid as to think that we brutalised these "protesters?" Listen, lady, one of those "protesters" threw a goddamn molotov cocktail at one of our officers! We saw a credible threat, and we responded as we always would in a dangerous, life-or-death situation. And when the others decided to overwhelm us, we responded as non-lethally as we could to drive them away. Do you really think that we would just sit here and let them trash the whole place?" he asked her, his tone growing in rage and disgust as he spoke. It would be an understatement to say that Wong was sick and tired of the media and public constantly believing that the police were a bunch of sadists who jumped at the opportunity to hurt protesters. Unfortunately, the woman didn't stop there.
"Well then why were the police so heavily armed before the protest turned into a riot?" she pressed.
"Because we're not morons! We saw what happened in Ferguson, Missouri. We knew that there was a high chance that this could turn into a riot and an excuse to rob stores. You really think we want to maim people and expect to get paid for that? We want to continue living too, you know!" he screamed.
"Detective Wong, don't you-"
"That is enough!" he shouted, loud enough for pretty much everyone else to hear. "I know what you and your pimple-faced cameraman are trying to do! You want me to get so mad I attack you and prove that police are animals, correct? Well, you know what? I'm not gonna touch you pathetic white trash representatives in the slightest! Let's see how well your ratings do when the big bad policeman doesn't turn into a raving lunatic. How's Al Sharpton gonna call the police monsters when they don't attack poor innocent people for no reason? How's Obama gonna say that the police need to show restraint when I don't pounce on everyone around me? Go back to your mommy and daddy's basement, 'cause your gonna be out of a job when your story turns into a bigger flop than 47 Ronin!"
He was pointing at the reporter when he said that. "Now you" he started to say, addressing the cameraman, "you just need to take a shower. How do your mommy and daddy feel about an ugly dork like you constantly stinking up their basement? My heart goes out to them!"
The cameraman suddenly threw his camera to the side and charged at Wong with a ridiculous battle cry. True to his word, Wong didn't touch him; two other nearby police officers were able to handcuff him without much trouble.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Farther down the street, another policeman was about to talk to a reporter when Stephen Wong's ranting caught both of their attention. Once he was finished, he turned back to the reporter. Thankfully for him, he was one of the more reasonable media types.
"Can you tell me what that beast said? Do you remember what it said?" the reporter asked.
"Well, I remember it screaming about how mad it was that this "Pocket" supposedly betrayed it; don't know the specifics of that. I do remember that it called itself "Hatred…"
Within an hour, news outlets all over the world were calling the beast "Hatred." With Slender Man being the world's first real superhero, The Pocket had now participated in the world's first ever real superhero/villain fight. #PocketvsHatred was trending all over social media. And then there was the fact that the boy turned out to be Charles Duke, a sixteen year old boy whose father had been murdered by a random gunman five days ago on Sunday. Late that Friday night, President Barack Obama held a press conference to scold Slender Man, The Pocket, and the very recent Guardian for taking the law into their own hands so carelessly. But he also expressed his disappointment with Detective Stephen Wong for mocking the leader of the nation-him-in an "incredibly rude and shameful manner", and very clearly told the police that they would not be allowed greater technology to enforce the law, even in the wake of the first superhero/villain fight.
But nobody really knew who that huge black helicopter was affiliated with.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
They sure as hell weren't taking any chances.
The armored men pushed two eight hundred milligram tablets of thorazine into Charles Duke's mouth before pouring water down his throat. With the kinds of abilities that he had displayed against The Pocket, nobody wanted him to wake up and kill them on the way to his "prison." It wasn't truly a prison; they knew that no formal prison could hold somebody-or something-like him.
An equally armored woman stepped out of the cockpit. "Has he been sedated?" she asked them. They all nodded in response. The woman went back inside the cockpit and said something, but they couldn't tell what.
It was odd that the containment center that the Foundation had recently built was only thirty miles from Los Angeles, where that "Slender Man" lived.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Nathan "Nate" Dillard prided himself on being calm and collected, no matter the situation. From his early days of leading the Black Street Sisters to the top of Chicago's gang world to becoming the city's premier crime lord and having to deal with all of the gangs who tried to defy his rule and the up-and-comers who wanted a piece of his empire, he had learned that snarling and frothing would get him nowhere a long time ago. Even in the face of a murderous superhero named "The Pocket", he showed no fear. Even as he walked to his messenger's room with a loaded gun, he showed no care.
Dillard turned around the corner and found the room. With a swift kick, it broke off it's hinges. It didn't surprise him that his messenger was in bed with another woman; most of his expenses went towards the most expensive hookers he could find. The man had always been something of an addict.
He raised his gun and fired a bullet into the hooker's head. Blood and brains splattered the messenger and the bed. With fear in his eyes, the man climbed out of bed and tried to run to the window.
Can't really run with that big of a boner, Dillard thought as he sprinted to the messenger and slammed him into the wall and pinned him with his hand around his throat and his pun to his face.
"You know what I just watched on the news?" Dillard gently asked despite the situation. "The Pocket just fought the world's first ever supervillain. The Pocket just fought the world's first ever supervillain. I have one less thorn in my side now, but you know what I'm wondering? Where the hell is that assassin you told me would kill this werewolf with ease?"
"He-he's a professional!" the messenger gasped. "That bitch does his homework! He ain't just some psycho for hire, he does his job!"
"Well, you better tell him that his homework's due pretty damn soon. If I don't have The Pocket's head by this Sunday, I'll have both you and him killed. And it ain't gonna be too pretty to look at. You'll just wish your head got taken. Understand?"
"Yeah-yeah! Now let me go!" The messenger squealed. Dillard whipped him with his gun.
"I run this shit. When I let you go, I say so. You have no right." With that, he let go and the messenger fell forward. Dillard turned and left.
He never joked around. When he wanted somebody dead, he had no problem getting his own hands dirty. It was why he hated El Miedo Humana so much, whoever he was. Always having to rely on hitmen was a weakness. Every now and then, a leader needed to show just how his employees got in line.
If this hit failed, he would love to meet The Pocket himself; with him, it was never so quick and easy. For Nathan Dillard, every moment of pain was personal.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
The messenger dialed his phone and put it to his ear. For sure, he was terrified, but he was also pissed. The assassin he had hired had nearly cost him his life and had killed the best hooker he had ever laid in his whole life. If he didn't hurry up, Nathan Dillard wouldn't be the only one having a word with him.
"You" the assassin answered, "what has you-"
"Shut the fuck up!" the messenger yelled. "I almost lost my life at Dillard's hands 'cause you're being slow as fuck! I bet you saw the news, Horn! Hell, I bet the whole world saw! What's The Pocket still doing here? Why haven't you called back yet?!"
"Patience," the assassin named "Horn" answered, "studying a creature like this vigilante takes a certain amount of time. Obviously, this thing is not human. I have found the best way to draw it out, but I still need time-"
"No, you need to hurry up! Forty six thousand dollars of mine just got wasted on the best hooker I have ever fucked, no thanks to Dillard! Listen, Horn, do you want five hundred sixty thousand dollars or not?!"
"Tomorrow. I will have it's head ready for you tomorrow. Tell Nathan Dillard that he can rest assured that by tomorrow, The Pocket's head will be above his fireplace. That is, if he has one."
The messenger bit his lip. If Dillard was here, he would be dead by now. "Don't say that Horn! Dillard could rip your head off your head if he thinks you're a liability! You best watch yourself!"
"I don't know. The way you're talking to me, you seem to be a liability with how much you whine. How much would you like it if I gave Dillard The Pocket's head...and told him that I'm not working with his syndicate ever again, because of you? I'll let you ponder that scenario. Take care."
"Go fuck yourself Ho-!"
Horn hung up on him.
He threw his phone at the wall. Horn was a double-edged sword, and he knew it. While the man was a methodical professional known for his tact and discretion, he was far too prone to studying his targets.
Fuck me!, he screamed in his head. Should have gotten somebody with a quicker trigger finger, somebody who doesn't waste our time and money…
He looked at the dead hooker.
...my time and money.
Nathan Dillard never made idle threats; if he said he would slice him to pieces, he would do it without batting an eyelash. And if Horn wanted him dead-well, he didn't know what would be worse. Horm himself doing it, or snitching to Dillard.
The reaper didn't have to be hanging over him so closely. Inside, he knew he was already dead.
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII
Houston, Texas…
Emilio Sanchez looked at his gun. Twenty bullets. Should be enough to keep the pigs at bay, if they happened to catch wind of what they were doing.
Ricardo Guerrero's car pulled into the driveway as he waited on the porch. Looking back at the upper window as he walked to the car, he saw the light being turned off. Perfect.
"You watch the news this afternoon?" Ricardo asked once he got inside. Emilio laughed at that.
"Do you really think I watch the fuckin' news? I don't give a shit about what the hell they say!" he sneered as they drove off. "All they talk about are a bunch of five year olds with cancer, hopin' they can make you feel sorry for the little bastards. Big deal! Bring 'em here, let's see how much longer those fucks are gonna be cryin' about their "awful" lives!"
Ricardo turned on the radio. "Yeah, well you better start watchin'. You know that Pocket in Chicago? That bitch with the skeleton wolf head and black clothes? He fought the world's first supervillain!"
"Man, what the fuck are you talkin' about? All I heard from some guys was that MS-13's leader got killed by Slender Man in Los Angeles and some dragon named "Guardian" beat the shit out of some faggots."
"No, I'm serious! Some gray lizard man almost killed The Pocket before it beat him up. And the lizard man turned out to be some sixteen year old who made all those people kill gangsters! And the news caught all of it!"
Emilio snorted. "Well what the hell does this guy call himself? 'Cause if he calls himself Lizard Man, then nobody's gonna take that piece of shit seriously."
"He calls himself Hatred."
Emilio laughed at the name and looked at Ricardo as if though he was high. "Hatred? What the fuck, that is so basic!"
"Yeah, it's retarded" Ricardo agreed. "If I turned into a supervillain-or even a superhero-, I would call myself Aqua Phobia."
"What kind of piece of shit name is that supposed to be? Like, what is "Aqua Phobia" even supposed to mean?" Emilio laughed.
Ricardo stopped the car and turned it off. As they got out, he started explaining.
"I mean, I just don't like water. You don't know what the hell hides under all that shit. So maybe, if I had the power to control water, I could beat the shit out of people and stop bein' so scared of it!"
"Okay, whatever you say" Emilio grumbled, rolling his eyes. "So today, we got a dead gang leader in L.A., some new superhero in Detroit, and the first supervillain in Chicago."
"That's one hell of a Friday the 13th!" Ricardo chuckled. They both laughed loudly as they walked to where their gang had told them they would be waiting.
(NEXT ISSUE: "Hatred" might be defeated and locked away, but there seems to be no end to The Pocket's troubles. Aaron Challis grows impatient with his soft attitude towards criminals, and a hired killer named Horn is in town, hoping to draw him out with a string of violent murders. Stephen Wong jumps at the chance to investigate the murders, with one goal in mind-find The Pocket. All this in The Pocket #7: Path of Corpses.)