Chapter 2: Familiar Faces
It got colder outside while I was in the bar. The bitter cold of the wind scratching my face, making the cut on my face twinge with pain. This isn't that big of a deal for me. I've dealt with far worse pains. Ones that time could never heal. I drudge through the cold and lonely streets, walking the all-to-familiar path to where I am heading. In the distance, I can see the lonely blue neon sign shinning through the darkness. Taverna is what it reads.
I push the door open and see the smiling faces and the good times that are being had by all. I walk slowly to the bar, looking at everyone through my dark sunglasses. They are having a good time, drinking to their hearts content and talking about whatever tickles their fancy. I somewhat envy them. The food here is beyond good and the wine is even better. I would love to sit down, but my first priority is meeting with my employer. I get to the bar, seeing the barmaid kneeling on the ground behind it, trying to clean up whatever some scumbag dropped to catch a glimpse at her underwear. Perverts. She knows I'm there.
"Be with you in a second, okay?" she says to me, standing up and reaching for a bottle.
"I really don't have a second, Julie," I say to her. She drops her glass, letting it shatter on the ground. Some people stop to see what happened, but soon continue with their conversations. She turns to see me draped in black. Funny, I would assume after knowing me for so long, she'd be used to seeing me. I guess no one is expecting to see someone presumed to be dead. Correction was dead.
"You're..."
"Alive. Yeah, that's the thing about death, it's all too complicated. So, is he here tonight?" I ask her. She starts to blush and nods. She leads me to a back room, cut off from the fun and excitement of the front of the restaurant. She opens the door in the very back to reveal a man in a blue and white suit holding someone bleeding by the collar.
"If you ever cheat me again, you will die. You understand me?" The man in blue asked. The bleeding man nods and runs off. He notices Julie. He doesn't notice me behind her.
"What the hell is it? Can't you see I'm busy?"
"Something important has come up, Mr. Niter." she said, obviously scared
"What the hell is so important?"
"Well, if an old partner just wanted to come by and see how's life" I say from behind her "Then I'll go home". I walk out from behind Julie and reveal myself to him.
"Oh dear God, you're alive?"
"Yeah, how's it been Seta?" I ask, smiling out of joy, something I don't do quite often.
"Jack David Griffin" he says to me from across the table. I sat down by now and he did so as well. We sit at his table he uses to do business and make transactions. "The infamously known killer called "Demon of the Night". I can't tell if he's mocking me or making me aware that my old title still exists. "What's it been, a year?" I laugh.
"I've been gone for three years" I say to him. "I had to, I was to caught up with certain affairs."
Yeah, I heard about that." he replies "You, out of all people..."
"I'd rather not talk about it now. So, how's business, Seta?"
Let me explain something first, because well, I forgot to say this earlier. Seta Niter is one of the most notorious crime lords in Central, or any place else in the State. He handles a lot of stuff, from money laundering to private hits, and he even does a job as a game host. Games where everything went up for grabs, and most went home in shame, in rags, or in a body bag. He found me when I was in a bit of a dilemma, and hired me on the spot, in exchange of a kind favor. And since I was presumed dead, he probably discarded the contract, but that's why I am here.
"It's going good as you saw earlier" he replied. "So, why are you here?"
"I'm here because I know you all to well" I say to him "When I "died" you probably thought my contract was ineffective and discarded it. And if you did, I need to know, are you expecting me to work for you again?"
He stares at me and takes in what I said. A few minutes later, he starts to laugh.
"The Demon of the Night, wants me to take him back. Why would I need you, I have it all." he says, between laughing. After while, he calms down. "But, if you're that desperate, I'll take you back in" he says, standing up. "I'll give you a good job, and then everyone will fear my..."
The gunshot stopped his sermon and started his screaming.
The back of the leg is a very fun place to shoot someone. They are helpless on the ground.
"I didn't come back to be with you, you pathetic scum." I yell at him while I kick him on the ground. "I wanted to make sure you were dead so you couldn't hold my name to yours." he begins laughing when I say this. I look at him, confusingly.
"You're a fool, Griffin. Everyone started to fear me before you came.
"That's bull and you know it. When people heard I was associated with you, they rather kiss your feet than piss you off."
"Yeah, but still..."
"But nothing" I say to him. "You're finished."
"Guess again," he says. I see something on the ground next to his hand. It looks like a circle with a square written in blood. I finally realize what it is.
"A circle!" I say,
"Yeah, you'd be surprised at what you can learn in three years." he says activating it. A spear emerges from the ground and badly scrapes my left arm, the one holding the gun. I laugh at his feeble attempt.
"You also forget things in three years, Seta" I pull the gun up and look at his eyes one last time
"Bye-bye" I say smiling firing four rounds into his pitiful excuse for a body. I kneel down and take his wallet. Hey, you know you would do it too if a rich crime lord was dead at your feet.
"Seta, your demise was a result of your foolishness. You knew that something like Alchemy alone won't kill me," I say, spitting on his body. "See you in hell" I walk up front, back to where all the commission is. No one could hear a thing that happened in the back. Some were too drunk, others probably couldn't hear over the volume of the restaurant. I walk to the bar in the back where Julie is waiting.
"Is he...?"
"Yeah, you got any gauze or something?" I ask her. She real is a nice girl, timid, but very nice. I'm glad Seta is dead, now she won't feel like crap. I soon discard these feeling of compassion and love. I hate those two the most. Human emotions are pointless.
She hands me a bottle of wine and the first aid.
"I can do it for you, if you'd like" she asks, blushing. I can see it in her eyes. I don't know why I never saw it before. All those times before when I saw her. The way she looked at me from afar. I am and was an idiot for not seeing it.
"Sure, but know this." I say, leaning over to her ear "Don't fall in love with me. You're only going to get hurt." She understands, but I know humans all to well. They'll do exactly the opposite of what you say. As she applies the first aid to my arm, I lift the bottle of wine to my lips and begin pouring the sweet nectar down my throat. I look in the mirror and am taken back a bit. Thus doing so, I gag on the wine. As I cough, thoughts rush through my head about what I saw in the mirror.
Maybe it was to do with the fact I drank to fast, or maybe it was because I saw the same three people from first bar. The woman in green and the boy with the skirt glanced at the mirror and met my eyes for a second. As their cold eyes met mine, I'm feeling an emotion that I thought I cold never feel. Fear.