"Yeah, you'll find that a few of us younger guys could deal with you a lot better than an idiotic bear and a man in his forties."
'Mike, snap out of it.' I panicked, looking down at my bloodied hands. 'You're letting yourself block the way again.'
Flashback –
"Hey Delilah, do you think I'm a nice person."
"That's an odd question. I mean you've helped me out a hang of a lot." Delilah replied with a nod.
"Thanks. I needed to hear that." I sighed, looking back over the balcony.
There was a sudden gunshot from below and the bullet grazed a panicked Delilah. The world seemed to slow down as the bullet flew past her neck, causing a small splatter of blood as she fell back to the floor.
"DELILAH!" I cried out, jumping off of my chair to arrive next to her.
When I couldn't hear a heartbeat I jumped over the balcony and rebounded off of the trampoline below before crash landing on the road nearby. I was barely conscious but got to my feet and ran after the man with the gun. For some reason he was having trouble running and I caught up to him.
He tried to fire a shot and truthfully, I didn't care. I jumped onto him and steered him in front of moving traffic. I broke my leg and needed surgery to fix it. I asked my doctor not to tell anyone about the other wounds I'd sustained over the two years prior and he kept his word.
"It's all my fault." The little skitten wept as she clutched onto my hospital gown.
"No Delilah, it's mine." I chuckled sadly. "I should've stayed with you but I let revenge get in my way. It's my fault I got hurt like this." I sighed. "Sorry I made you worry."
"Mike." Delilah's dad started. "Here's a life lesson… if you want to help someone, help them out… don't go any further for your own personal revenge. If you keep going for some revenge you'll lose sight of the one you're helping and you'll get in your own way. It's worse for you and the person you're helping."
"That's going beside the fact that the guy's dead now, hon."
"To be fair he was wanted for thirteen counts of murder."
End Flashback –
I don't wholly remember much past that point but it brought me to my senses. My maniacal, dazed glare was replaced with a steely resolve as they brought out Nicha.
"So there were three others in the back, hey." I muttered, still shaking my mentality back into place. But all it took was a final jolt, that jolt was seeing Nicha with her clothes wholly torn off, tears on her face and a few shallow, barely-bleeding wounds on the inside of her thighs.
"We wouldn't want our little play thing scarred now would we?" Zack laughed.
Nicha was wondering who was the evil one in this equation, was in the pistol-wielding Zack and his horde of three or was it the blue deer who had stained himself red with blood, brains and death despite his life-giving aura.
'He had the strength to tear the roof off of a vehicle and kill two men without a single scratch. Is he really the son of the life giver or is he just some demon living among us.' She was fearful to say the least.
My aura flared again, this time without warning while I crouched down and crushed another moonblast in my right fist.
"Now we're getting somewhere." Zack smirked. His claws began to give off a steely glow, there was no doubt he was preparing to use metal claw. Yet he still raised the pistol and fired.
I moved in a blur as he continued to shoot straight ahead. "Die dammit!"
'Do not falter, do not stray from your path, do not fear and do not become slothful; even in the face of death.' I thought to myself as I approached point blank range with my forehead at the gun barrel. 'Even in the face of death.' I repeated.
My fist connected with his gut as he pulled the trigger, though there was nothing more than a click as he'd run out of ammunition. An ear shattering boom was heard in the barn as the fairy aura escaped my fist and flowed through his body, forcing it's way through his cells and dispersing. The wave splintered the aging barn's wood and sheared the metal support structure shattering any remaining lightbulbs, the few sources of light in the barn.
Yet he wasn't dead. Zack lay, burnt down to his muscle, barely breathing but alive and in pain, his cronies were out cold and Nicha had huddled against the cold, overturned van as a sense of comfort.
"Nicha." I sighed, clicking my tongue as I did so. "I'm sorry you had to see that. It wasn't what you enlisted me to help with. I let my own revenge get in the way." She didn't reply but was too scared to move. "I see. Well… before I was adopted, I had to make a deal to keep my orphanage going, particularly to keep my caretaker alive. Several times she told me to cut the deal, cut the deal, cut the deal and every time I ignored her. Every second day, I went out and I was beaten. I let Blaze beat me three hundred and sixty six times to make it up for what his wife donated to my orphanage. In hind sight I could've done something else, I made the decision because it was the only way to save my caretaker and when I make a deal I carry through with it. I had more than three hundred bones broken and missed out on one hundred days of school because of that. On the second last one I met Zack, on the last one I got Blaze and Arth arrested after killing another. I see Zack managed to get them out of jail early. But truth be told, I didn't smile through all of it like I'm known to. I kept a knife under my bed and after every beating I would slash at a point in my arms, leaving a scar… something I did to keep tally."
I let out a long breath and undid my tailcoat exposing my badly scarred arms. "I'm sorry you had to see that. But you're only the third person to see these scars." I tried to let out a chuckle but it faded faster than it came and left me with a tear in my eye. "And the fourth person to see me cry."
I knelt down and ran my hand over the stained jacket, the pink glow on my palms evaporating the blood, breaking it down so that all that remained in the coat was a hole… wait… a hole.
I looked down at my side, it wasn't a deep wound but having finally noticed it, the pain hit me like a bomb. "Nicha, I don't blame you if you run, but there are cops on their way, if you see them… please… tell them what happened." I was struggling to speak, shuddering as I did so, my white vest slowly turning red as the blood began bubbling out of the wound. "Just… don't let what I've done be done in vain and… if I'm dead by morning, tell the sisters at school… please… and thank you." I panted, tossing the coat over her as I fell to the ground, my body-wide aura from geomancy finally dissipating.
"Mike?" She mumbled, poking at me a bit. "Mike?" She asked a bit louder. "MIKE!?" She screamed as sirens arrived outside and she continued shaking me violently.
"Miss, don't move him, he may still be alive." One of the officers ordered as he moved in to inspect the scene through a hole in the roof, the only part of the barn still standing, albeit on the ground.
Estimated Publish Date of Chapter 15 – 21 Jan 2018