The Snake that Swallowed the Dragon

And in between the moon and you

the angels get a better view

of the crumbling difference between wrong and right …

Vicious sat upon his throne, towering, built of lies and deceit and the blood of both the guilty and the innocent. He sat above them all, above dignity, above shame. Above honor. He sat and he looked down upon it all with pity and disgust. He didn't need any of it. He was Vicious, head of the Red Dragon Crime Syndicate. Head of an empire.

He controlled everything. He was fully informed of the happenings of the Red Dragons, the White Tigers, the ISSP. He stretched his fingers and marveled at the power he held at his very hands. He had it all. What he had been longing for since before he had even met Spike. He had been waiting for these moments since he was sixteen years old, new to organized crime. And Mao always said he'd go far.

Had Mao predicted this?

Would he have predicted Vicious to not only usurp Mao himself, but the elders? The elders themselves? It was up to him to sever them all, and he did. Oh, he did.

And now he sat, his Katana leaning against him forever stained with the blood of his comrades, his teachers, and all whom he held dear to his icy heart and he felt not pity for them, but regret.

Regret. Regret was something very new to Vicious, and although he would never admit this to anyone, even himself, he was experiencing it. Was it the blood of the innocent? To him, nobody was innocent and so it didn't matter. The inability of others to survive was not his problem. There was no right or wrong about it. It was the law of the land. A basic instinct to either kill or be killed. He did not regret killing anybody. He never had.

And so now that he had a kingdom at his very hands, he felt regret that it was all he could ever have. He felt regret that it was all he could ever want.

"Rocco." Vicious said, to the man at his right, one of the only men who had been faithful to him since Spike has left. Nobody talked about it anymore, despite the fact that the event had been burned into their minds. Spike was a great man, one that could have gone so far if only... but 'if only's' didn't matter. Not to the Dragons. They accepted his fate.

"Rocco. Do you know of a man named Pilate?"

"I don't believe I have heard of him, sir."

"He lived so many years ago." Vicious' voice was coarse. Old, but a spark played behind his eyes. "He was a villain. A king, even."

"I see, sir."

"And one day a man was brought to Pilates feet, one that was truly innocent and the world knew it. Perhaps the only truly innocent man left on the earth. But the crowd jeered, and thirsted for blood and his innocence did not phase them. Pilates will was the will of the people, so he ordered the man to be crucified." Vicious continued, "And so Pilate washed his hands in front of the crowd. He claimed that he washed his hands of the blood of the innocent. And then he sent the man off to die."

"Heh."

"He washed his hands as if that would redeem him." Vicious said, "Tell me, Rocco, if I washed my hands would that redeem me?"

"Is redemption really worth it?"

"No."

He looked at his hands.

It was raining.

Holding her coat in cold, wet hands, Vicious stood above her on hard concrete. Her golden hair wasted on the rooftop, pushed crudely out oh those haunting grey eyes that lay closed, her limbs sprawled out, cold and hard. It had been three long years since he had seen the woman. And she was stunningly beautiful, even as death had taken her.

Julia.

He stared at her and tried not to feel. This was the woman who had fought beside him every day. He could feel her back against his, the determination in her eyes as she fired, slender fingers clutching the dirty pistol. He could see her hair, that yellow hair, flying behind her as she slammed her heel on the gas of whatever car she was wrecking next. Oh, he had never met anyone who could drive like her. Who could shoot like her. She tamed that car like it was an animal, used her weapon as fangs. She was a beast. His beast. And he looked upon her with pride in his eyes.

She was his.

Julia.

The concrete was stained the color of rust from the blood washed away by ceaseless rain. He wondered what she looked like when she died, when the bullet pierced porcelain skin, when her frail body hit the ground in a slump. He wondered if Spike was with her. He let an empty laugh escape his lips.

Either you kill him, or you both die.

But as he looked upon her through pitiless eyes, and remembered the feeling of her skin against his, the damp sheets sticky with sweat and brittle emotion, he found himself thinking that she may have deserved a little better.

Vicious refused to define his feelings for her. He did not consider whether he loved her or not. What would it bring him, knowing that he had loved the girl? He had given his heart and soul to the Syndicate. He had nothing left to give to a woman, and it wouldn't have been worth it if he had. He knew this. It wasn't that he didn't believe in love, it was that he had no faith in it.

And maybe she didn't, either. Maybe Spike was the only one out of the three of them that actually had a sliver of soul left in him. Maybe the Syndicate hadn't drained him completely. But Julia... Julia didn't expect anything from Vicious. She let him use her and came crawling back for more. Was it love? Or was it simply comfort, knowing that the two of them were in the same place. After all, it was natural for creatures, even beasts, to look for familiar things, comforting things.

And in the cold, cruel world of metal and money, Vicious and Julia may have looked upon each other for comfort.

"Which one of you did it?" Vicious stared at the men in front of him, his icy stare bearing into the eyes of his men. "Which one of you killed the woman?"

There was no answer from the dozen or so agents lined up before him, and although they tried to hide their nervousness, Vicious could sense the paralyzing fear.

"Tell me now or all of you die."

Vicious did not break the penetrating flare and the men parted, leaving a small, jumpy little man with a messy mop of hair. His shoulder was bandaged, obviously from a gunshot wound.

"Was it you?" Vicious was upon him like a hawk. "Did you kill the woman?"

"I-I was instructed to fire at will, sir!"

"I gave no instruction for you to kill either the woman or Spike." Vicious replied.

"I-I-but..." The man stuttered, cowering.

"Do you take orders from anyone before me?"

"I-it won't happen again, s-sir."

"No. It will not." Vicious's voice echoed throughout the chamber. "Kill him. Find the girl. Take her to Tharsis Medical."

"But sir... the girl is dead."

"Take her to Tharsis Medical. Do not question my decisions."

That was weeks ago. Reports from the hospital had claimed that the girl had indeed survived the treatments, and that she was doing quite well, apparently well enough to have run off. This irritated Vicious, even moreso the fact that he had expected it. Julia never was the type to hang around, even when somebody was doing her a favor. Perhaps it was fear, or perhaps she was just a wanderer at heart. Always looking for her place.

"You are a beast." Vicious said aloud to the empty silence, "That blood will never leave you."

He wondered how long it would take her to realize that.

The spot on his shoulder was sore.

Spike's bullet would do that to you. In all the years Vicious had known the man, he had never known Spike to ever do a half-assed job on anything. He may have lacked delicacy and precision, but he made up for that in other aspects. He always had a backup plan, and if he didn't, to hell with plans. He did what he did and it worked. The man never showed doubt. He never showed fear.

That was perhaps the only thing they had in common, the lack or doubt of fear. Perhaps that's what tied them together in the first place, and perhaps that's what had brought them both down in the final moment. Vicious was delicate. He was clean. He managed to get the job done, no holes, no mistakes. He worked something out, did whatever it was he planned to do, and even afterwards his care and utmost precision followed it through. He prepared for any complications whatsoever.

Spike and Vicious. Opposites, but you know what they say about opposites. With each one bearing the quality the other lacked, they couldn't have been better partners. And until Julia... well, until she came between them everything was just fine.

He remembered the first time he had found them together. He had his suspiciouns, but perhaps he was too wary of the truth to ever act upon them. But this time was different.

"He'll kill you."

"I'll let them say I am dead."

"Where will we go?" She asked, her voice straining, "What will de do?"

"Live. Be free." He had said, a sharp smile playing across a chiseled face, "It'll be like watching a dream."

The door was cracked, their voices crawling out into the hallway, shapr words falling on muffled ears. An unrecognizable pain in his heard, one of the first he had ever felt in his life, stained with blood and lies and deceit but never the sting of heartbreak. Never the sting of betrayal. But he was a grown man. He was Vicious. And he dealt with it the only way he knew how.

His best friend.

His lover.

He was trash to them all.

So the feeling seeped through him, hurt turning into anger faster than he could recognize it. Spike. The man who had fought beside him all those years. The woman who just nights before lay curled in his bedsheets. It was disgusting. It went against the will of the Order. They did not only betray him, but they planned to betray the Syndicate as well. The two of them would alter plans set by the Elders, the two of them could very well have brought the Syndicate down.

His mind wandered and his blood boiled. They were selfish. Cruel. Putting themselves before what truly mattered- The Order of the Red Dragons. You didn't just leave.

"Are you planning to betray me?"

"Vicious!"

"Even if it's a dream, it's an impossibility."

The cold metal of the barrel buried in golden hair, the way she sat, noble, dignified, never afraid. Even in the moment that could very well have been her death, the thought of a bullet to her head did not concern her.

"Are you going to kill him?"

"Yes. With your hands."