This is Akila, with one message: like "Cry at the World," this is an AU fic, but not totally. In my other fic, I would make no reference to the real world. In this fic, this world IS the real world. This means you'll be seeing some characters in a while that you know very well. Thanks, and "The Only Way Out is In" is not finished, it's on hiatus! I can only upload this because I have about fifty pages of this already written that I just looked at. Okay? Thanks.

The Sum of You've Done

If you ask yourself a question

Receive the answer you don't want to hear

Then why do you cry at the world?

When in your head is all you have to fear?

The tree rocked from the wind, it leaves whipping away from the branches and flying off wherever the wind went. The roots that had bound the tree to the ground began to rip away from the earth that was their sanctuary, yearning upward. The wind slammed into the bark, forcing it away from the tangled roots. With one mournful howl, the tree uprooted and crashed into the pavement below, its leaves spread out, a green mane.

Crisik watched the tree for awhile, until the matenience crew from the city arrives to cart the fallen giant to its grave. Raising his collar against the wind, he stepped away from the doorway and proceeded to walk along the sidewalk. There was nobody on the streets, all taking refuge in either homes or the various stores that lined the pavement. Crisik shook his head in disgust. There would be no kill tonight, at least not until the storm let up.

He entered the poor part of the city, the part that was dominated by broken and smoldered buildings. Lowering his head against the soaking rain, Crisik eyed the homeless and crazy, who were either shivering against the sides of buildings or curled up against a sort of fire in a trash barrel. In the dim light, Crisik evaluated each face the best he could, but it was fruitless. He continued on his path.

He paused outside a burnt out building, its shingles falling and the rusted doors hanging loosely by a petty bolt. The windows were shattered, the frames still a reminder of once was. In the light, he could barely make out a form huddled in a doorway. The rain splattering over him, the cold air picking into his bones, the bite of hunger deep in his stomach was suddenly pushed out. He stared at the figure cowering in the way.

He could be an average homeless man, one whose life had dealt him many harsh blows and had landed in a broken doorway. He wore the typical attire of such, dirty clothes and unkempt hair, his face a grown out in a messy beard. The worn leather bag he carried, it was such, patches missing and threadbare. But the blanket he wrapped around himself was not.

It was a new blanket.

Crisik threw himself into the space between the two houses and took off his cloak, rolling it and storing it into a damp cardboard box. He began to rip his clothes, tearing at the seams and pulling off shreds. He pulled out patches of his short black hair and kicked off his shoes and socks, his feet bare. Crouching down, he grabbed wet dirt and smeared it onto his face and hair, rubbing it until it stuck. He stood up and cautiously poked his head around the corner. The man was still hunkering in the doorway. Checking for the warmth in his pocket, he scuttled out from the alley and slowly made his way toward the man.

Crisik stopped in front of the man's doorway and waited for him to look up. When he did, the man made a squawking noise and tried to scramble away but Crisik held him back.

"'scuse me," he said in a thick accent. "May I shares yours doorway wit you?"

"What?" the man squeaked in a high voice.

"May I stays in yours doorway?" Crisik repeated slowly.

"Oh!" The man jittered in relief. "Uh, sure, I guess." He grabbed the leather bag and moved over, allowing Crisik the right side.

"Thanks." Crisik sat down heavily in the space provided. "I really needed a place for me to stays."

"No problem," the man said, smiling. "I'm Thomas. Who're you?"

Crisik's ears perked. Could this possibly be? If it was, the man was stupidly pitiful. "I'm called . . . Crisik."

"How unusual," said the man named Thomas. "Very. I've never heard of the name Crisik. Is it Latin, maybe?"

Pitiful. Awfully pitiful.

"It's what I'm called," Crisik shrugged. "So that's my name."

"No offense intended," Thomas said quickly.

"None takens," Crisik replied, looking up at the doorway. Thomas was quiet for a moment.

"Why are you here?" he asked finally. Crisik eyed him. Unless he was playing a game of sorts, he was terribly stupid.

"Landlords, they kicked me outs," he lied. "I have no place else to go, so I wanders around."

"Oh." Thomas messed with his fingers for a second while Crisik watched him warily.

"How 'bouts you?" he asked carefully.

"Me?" Thomas feigned surprise. Crisik listened attentively as he started to talk. "I really don't like talking about it that much. But I'm very tired of running and I need somebody to confide in. Can I trust you?"

Naïve. Awfully, terribly, coldly stupid. Or he was really what he said he was.

"I have no ones who knows me," Crisik said, hiding his interest.

"I'm on the run," said Thomas, hanging his head. "Mob matters. My father died before he could pay his debts and I just added to them, so I have something I really need to take of. I'm been running for about a month. My wife drops me off supplies and stuff when we can. I hear they've hired a bounty hunter to find me, can you believe it?"

"I know," Crisik said, taking the knife from his pocket. "They have. Because I'm the bounty hunter." He looked clearly into Thomas's eyes for a moment. Then he buried the knife into the man's abdomen, turning his head away.

"My. .. wife," wheezed out the dying man when Crisik turned his head back. "You'll. . . .die. . . .in hell. . . ."

"Thank you," Crisik told him, moving the knife further up. "I'm sorry." The man's eyes burned until finally the lids drooped and he slumped over the knife. Crisik pulled the knife out of the man's abdomen and wiped it clean of blood, again putting it into his pocket. He pulled the man's bag toward him and began to rifle through it, pulling up a wallet and papers. He left the bag and the man there, standing up and heading back to the alley.

Wiping himself of blood, he put his cloak back on and started away.

In the darkness, I can see

What is and what is to be

A striking glow, a burning flash

A thudding echo, a slamming crash

I don't want this burden, I never did

It's stripped me of all I've had to hid

"You're very easy to fool, you know."

"Please, I beg you, I plead for mercy! Just leave me be, I'm an honest man, a very-"

"Bad liar," finished Crisik as he paced around his captive, who was bound by his wrists to the wall, his ankles fastened to two heavy irons. "Believe me, if you were an honest man, you wouldn't be pleading your honesty."

"But I am!" cried the captive. "Please, I didn't do anything!"

"That's not my concern," Crisik replied. "I don't give a fuck if you raped and murdered a little girl."

"I didn't!" insisted the man, tears starting to stream down his dirty face.

"Like I said, I don't care. I could care less."

"Then why are you doing this to me?"

"It's my job," Crisik said, shrugging.

"You're an assassin!"

"I prefer bounty hunter."

"Whatever you are, you're a monster!"

"I'm the one holding the gun," Crisik reminded.

"Why don't you just kill me with your bare hands, you bastard?"

"You're certainly reckless," Crisik remarked. "A minute ago, your were pleading for your life."

"Like you said, you don't give a fuck," the captive snarled, his tears gone suddenly, his voice savage. "Just kill me already and be done with it."

"I wish I could." Crisik closed his eyes for a moment. "Believe me, I wish I could."

"Then why don't you?" the captive said boldly.

"You have certain information," Crisik started, coming close to his prisoner. "Information I would very much like to have."

"Go to hell," spat the captive.

"Thanks, I've heard that one before though. Now, not to be melodramatic on you, but this can either be very painless or very painful. If my sources are right, you're an erudite and so am I."

"If I am," snapped the man, "then what am I doing tied to a wall?"

"It depends on your definition," Crisik said. "By the way you say it, I assume you mean that your method of killing was somehow elementary."

"You bet your ass it was."

"Agreed," Crisik said, nodding. "It was very messy and you left numerous clues to your identification."

"If they were so numerous," the captive said, his voice amused, "then how did the police not find me?"

"You tell me," Crisik answered. "I don't care, nonetheless."

"You don't care about anything," the prisoner said bitterly. "Kill me."

"So we come back to this subject," the hunter sighed. "I repeat: this can be very painless or very painful."

"Shoot."

"The last person you killed, a young girl named Vanessa Travis, I believe. Where did you kill her?"

"Who hired you?" the captive asked, his voice brittle.

"I repeat: where did you kill her?"

"Who?" challenged the man.

"I don't like repeating." Crisik closed his eyes a second time and took his knife with its carved handle from its sheath. He approached the bound man. The captive glared at him in the dim light. His breath coming in shallow spurts, the hunter stepped over the two weights binding the prisoner's feet and held his blade against the flesh of the man's arm. "I'm going to ask you another question. If you make me repeat it, I will make an incision from your shoulder to your wrist, stopping short of your jugular." Crisik dropped his voice and leaned close to the captive's ear. "And believe me, it won't be a scratch."

"You watch too many movies."

In response, Crisik pricked the man's shoulder slightly. The blade went in, a pinpoint of blood appearing around the metal. The prisoner winced.

"Did Vanessa Travis tell you anything unusual before you killed her? Any last confessions, maybe? Some rekindling of some images?"

"Are you crazy?"

"Are you?" The hunter dug the blade in deeper. Blood began to gush from the point. The prisoner recoiled, his breath drawing in sharply. Crisik started to drag the knife down the arm, digging the blade in deeper as he went. The man started swearing loudly, struggling against the tight bonds that held him. Crisik stopped when he reached a hard surface under the skin; the man screamed.

"My arm! My arm! My fucking arm!"

"Did the girl tell you anything unusual?" Crisik repeated over the man's screams. "You can make it stop if you say it."

"She didn't tell me nothing!"

"I don't believe you. You're a thief and a killer. Why should I believe you?"

"What do you want?" the man yelled in agony. "Stop it! Good God, stop it!"

Crisik stopped short of the captive's wrist and extracted the bloody knife. Panting, the prisoner slumped against his ropes. The blood from his left arm spilled to the ground, staining the dirty floor below.

"Do you have an answer?" Crisik asked, his face turned away.

"You won't believe me!" the man shouted painfully. "You said you didn't believe me!"

"Maybe I lied."

"She didn't say anything!"

"Maybe you're lying."

"It was dark, and she was crying, but she didn't say anything!"

"What was she crying?"

"She was just crying! Crying for her mother, her father, God, somebody to help her! They all do!"

"She was a different little girl. Her father was very special."

"Her damn father is a Senator! He isn't special!"

"I need an answer."

"I don't have one!"

Crisik rested the blade on the other shoulder.

"She didn't say anything!"

Carefully, Crisik punctured the flesh and dragged the knife down.

When he finished, the captive was lying in a pool of his own blood.

"She didn't say anything!" the captive pleaded, his eyes flashing. "Please, she didn't!"

"How vain are you? How proud can a man be? The only life you're hurting right now is your own."

"Who hired you?" the prisoner begged. "Who was it? Was it the father? Who wants me dead?"

"It dosen't have to be that way," Crisik said harshly. "Tell me and I'll spare you."

"I know too much!"

"Maybe you don't. Maybe I just like killing."

"Don't be a fool, you already said she was different!"

"Maybe I want the information so I can threaten the father."

"She didn't say anything!"

"There are ways of marking your own death warrant." Crisik placed the blade lightly on the space between the captive's eyes. "Answer me."

"She didn't say anything!"

Crisik brought the blade down.

The man screamed.

"Cause and effect," Crisik said, his voice granite as he again looked away from the blood. "It's simple. You don't answer, you get hurt. It's simple as that. Somehow I don't think you're comprehending."

"Leave me be." The captive's voice was cracked. "Let me be. I'm maimed; I'm dead already. Just go away and let me die."

"Tell me. There are ways straining the body, ways of straining the mind. The mind can take much more than the body. Death is very traumatic and the mind will hold onto life as long as it can."

"You're on crack."

"I'm simply explaining a process." Crisik started pacing around his prisoner again. "Your body will want to die from the pain I'm giving you. But your mind won't let it. Do you understand? Do you understand how long I can keep you from dying, but how much I can give you?"

"Wacko, crack-o, psycho," the man began to sing, thrashing his bloody head.

"To put it in layman's terms," Crisik said, raising his voice against the cacophony, "torture."

"Sick-o, bucko, chip-o." The captive was banging his head against the wall.

Crisik held his stained blade to the man's throat. The prisoner stopped immediately at the touch.

"I can slit your throat," Crisik said slowly. "And you won't die. But I have arthritis. Sometimes my hand jerks . . ." He demonstrated by pressing the blade into the captive's throat. "Sometimes I can't control it. It's like it has a life of its own . . . but only sometimes. Of course, sometimes can mean anything . . ."

The man was silent. Crisik aggressively drew a thin line across the flesh. Blood trickled slowly from the wound. The prisoner remained shock still. For the first time, Crisik felt a twinge of worry.

"Tell me," prompted the hunter, coercing the blade harder. A sound was issued from the helpless captive; his eyes started to roll. Crisik immediately realized the first symptoms of a panic attack. If the man had one now . . . that would be devastating. With the amount of blood loss, the prisoner was most likely to slip into unconsciousness, perhaps even death. The hunter slapped the man's face.

"What?" gargled the prisoner through the blood clogging his mouth. "What happened?"

"You're going to tell me what the little girl said when you killed her," Crisik said forcefully, holding the man's gaunt, bloody face in his grip. "I want to know if Vanessa Travis said something when you killed her. Please, tell me now. If you tell me, I'll let you live."

"What?"

Blood loss.

"I need to know," demanded Crisik. "Tell me! What did the girl tell you?"

"She told me . . . she told me . . ."

"Yes," Crisik said eagerly, then turned his diction cajoling. "Please. Be a good person now; tell me what she said."

"She screamed for her daddy," the captive said drunkenly. "She screamed for her daddy to come and save her."

"I know that," Crisik said with controlled impatience. "It's a fact. But she was a witty girl. She was a rebellious girl and at the end she might have cracked, so that's acceptable. But what did she say before?"

"You won't kill me?"

"I won't," promised Crisik.

"She said . . . I wasn't the only one. Her daddy did too."

"What did she-"

There was a banging on the door of the wooden cabin. Quickly, Crisik looked at the bound man who was staring at him, his eyes blinking.

"Be quiet," the hunter hissed and crept toward the dirty window. He peered through the blood and dirt stained glass. A man stood fidgeting outside in the chill night, his fist slamming against the door. Crisik recognized him instantly with an angry jolt. He went quietly and quickly toward the corner where he had dropped his coat and picked it up, shrugging into it. He checked the pocket and found the warmth. Gripping it, he examined his captive. The man was drowsy, shaking his head, a last attempt to keep his consciousness. He would stay where he was. Looking out the window a last time, he opened the door and slipped through into the dark night.

"My orders were clear," he said with an aggravated calm to the fidgeting man. "You were not to find me until I came to you."

"I need to know," whispered the man urgently, uneasily. "I-"

"I don't give a fuck about what you need to know," Crisik interrupted. "You violated the contract."

"The contract-"

"Can now be held non valid," Crisik cut in. The man stared at him in horror.

"But," he sputtered, "I didn't mean anything. I just wanted to know. You can't do this! I made a deal with your people and you-"

"I live by my own rules," Crisik interrupted again. "I don't give a damn about what they say. The rules were laid down and you were expected to follow them."

"I can tell your people," the intruder said in last ditch attempt.

Crisik paused.

"If you did," he said slowly, "then I'd think you'd feel very sorry." He brought from its sheath the bloody knife. The man winced and stepped back, but he gained a swagger.

"So you have him," he said triumphantly. "That's why it's bloody."

"I have him," Crisik allowed, turning the anger over inside him, sheathing the knife. "Of course, sometimes it's hard to remember if they're alive or dead." He felt satisfaction as he watched the man's face again contort into horror again.

"But . . . you know where her body is, don't you?" he whispered. "You know if she's alive or dead?"

"I'll tell you this right now." Crisik mustered up the compassion he could feel. "Your daughter's dead, sir. If my people gave you false hope, I'm sorry. They knew she was dead. People like the person who took your daughter don't keep them."

The man closed his eyes in pain, the horror gone, now only anguish showing in every line.

"Strange," Crisik remarked. It was disgusting what this man had done, and yet he played like he loved his daughter. "Before I killed him, the man had some interesting things to tell me."

The man's eyes snapped open.

"Where's her body?" he asked in a strangled whisper, a tear streaking his old face.

"He didn't tell me that," Crisik said. Stupid Senator. How could he pretend to love his daughter when he had ordered Crisik to find out if his daughter had told the killer anything? He had ordered to know where her body was as an afterthought, Crisik though with disgust.

The Senator's eyes were wide.

"He told me what she told him," Crisik said carefully. "And I think you know what it is, which is why you wanted him killed."

"I loved my daughter-"

"I have doubt of that," Crisik said, turning his back on the man. "I've done my job. If you refuse to pay the money, remember how I found your daughter's killer. That was easy. Imagine how easy it would be to find you."

"You bastard!"

Crisik felt a force smash him against the wall and shove him down into the ground. The Senator was inside the cabin now. Crisik's senses came alive. Gasping, he sprang up from the dark ground and removed the warmth from his pocket, the .22 Caliber. Yelling, he held it in front of him, his finger on the trigger.

The Senator was staring at the man who had killed his daughter, who was still conscious, goggling stupidly up at them.

"I'll kill you, Senator!" Crisik shouted, holding the gun at the Senator's back. "Believe me, I'm not afraid. Step back slowly."

"My God . . ." The Senator was still staring at the half-conscious man lying in his own blood. "You didn't kill him. You didn't kill him. Goddamn you, you said you had killed him!"

"I lied," Crisik said coldly. "Back up slowly."

"I want him dead. For what he did to Vanessa."

"How about what you did to her, pal?"

"I want him killed . . ."

"Slowly," yelled Crisik, "before you're dead too!"

Suddenly it was happening. The Senator reached into the pocket of his coat and pulled out a gun, almost identical to the one gripped in Crisik's hand. The man aimed it at the captive's head.

"Wait!" Crisik screamed.

The Senator pulled the trigger. A sound filled the cabin; the bound prisoner slumped, dead.

Crisik stared in disbelief.

The Senator turned back around, his eyes dead as the man slumped before him.

"I'll be going now," he said shortly. Pocketing the gun, he strode past Crisik.

The hunter only watched him go.