WARNING! This chapter contains quite high violence and brutal parts! It may be upsetting for some readers!
Chapter 30: Death Comes Reaping
Jake and Sherry were happy to be reunited again, but Jake couldn't help but feel totally responsible and guilty for Sherry resigning at the DSO.
He stood and looked distastefully at his reflection in the grubby mirror and grimaced, the weather had been quite bad since Sherry arrived so they'd decided to wait until it let up before checking out the lagoon and Power Plant.
As he stood in the run down bathroom he thought about everything at blinding speed, Albert, Alex, Sherry, Chris, Jill and himself, they were the main parts to this story now. All intertwined in a fatal web.
Fleetingly, he thought about Chris and Jill, where were they? Had Hunnigan told them to go after Alex anyway? Something in his gut told him she had, although he'd tampered with the plans, Hunnigan had always had faith in Sherry so she would leave her to it?
"Who knows…" He whispered shaking his head as he flung an off white coloured towel over his shoulder, and took one last look at himself, mainly at the scar running down his face.
"JAKE!" Sherry called from the other room. "We've got trouble!"
Jake almost knocked the door off its hinges as he stormed out to her half naked.
"Look!" She said pointing out of the only window in the room, and had taken cover under it.
He did as she said, and peered around the side, being careful to keep as much cover as he could behind the dirty rose patterned curtains.
"Ah shit, not even two days peace?" He questioned rhetorically as he smirked seeing the group of men from before, only this time with machetes and guns. He witnessed as they were knocked the owner of the hotel out with the butt their gun right outside the hotel steps.
"Looks like we got some company!" He sang watching as they filed into the building. "Better gear up!"
Sherry sighed and rolled over the bed as her equipment was over the other side of the room, she placed her gun holsters on her arms and looked at Jake smiling broadly.
"You gonna fight with no pants on Jake?"
He frowned and looked down shrugging, he was only wearing boxers; really tight black ones, and didn't realize how much they showed off his package until he glanced down.
Unfortunately for him he looked down at the wrong time, discovering something hit him hard in the face. He grunted in discomfort pulling the material away seeing it was his black denim trousers and Sherry giggling with a blush.
Sherry mouthed 'Sorry' at him and watched with innocent eyes as he dressed, quickly finding herself in awe of him when gunshots and screaming were heard from below, she snapped out of it and frowned in anguish; the men were on their way up, and hurting the innocent while doing it.
"What do they want?" Sherry asked in a hushed voice as she jogged over to Jake who had now taken cover on his knees behind the bed near the window.
"Hell knows, I just want to kick their asses for causing trouble to these people."
Sherry continued to watch him as she took place next to him, the way his muscles flexed as he reloaded and checked his gun, the concentration on his face as he did it, the way his brows knitted together as he grimaced.
"What are you looking at?" He asked fiercely, feeling her eyes bearing into him from the side. He waited for an answer but put a hand over her lips before she could speak because he could hear the men down the hallway, and their room was the second on the floor.
Seconds later the door was kicked in with around 6 men waiting to move in, but discovering the people they were looking for began a heavy assault.
One after another they shot at the spot Jake and Sherry's heads had been before they ducked.
"One… two…" Jake counted to three when he predicted they would run out of ammo and have to reload; beginning to shoot back with force. He and Sherry were more than skilled with their firearms unlike the gang that had decided to attack them.
Jake concentrated his shots to the head while Sherry concentrated on their torso's, so that when one assassin went to his knees in pain Jake would shoot them in the head with a callous leer.
Needless to say it didn't take long for them to beat the group down within minutes and only one remained to which Sherry shot in the chest and waited for the last shot which didn't come. Instead, Jake vaulted over the bed towards the man, kicking the gun away from his reach and stooped down to grab him.
"Right asshole, you're coming with me." Jake seethed through his teeth angrily, grabbing the man by the arms tightly and dragging him into the room.
"Jake! What are you doing?!" Sherry exclaimed with worry.
"Questioning him! Go see if they have information on 'em."
Sherry nodded and ran out the door to the corpses and began her search, to find nothing but ammo and small knifes.
In the meantime, Jake had been tending to the wounded bandit patching him up haphazardly as he didn't want the man alive for any longer than he wanted, in seeing this Sherry told him she would go and see if anybody below survived the attack and if they needed medical attention, she would help.
Sherry made her way down the worn carpeted steps to the first floor and saw blood everywhere, it was seeping out of the rooms and splattered up the corridor walls.
As she walked into the first room tears came to her eyes; a family with children had been slaughtered mindlessly, hesitantly she checked for a pulse on all of them with no luck, why? She thought to herself, half their heads were gone.
The second room was the same except the people had been slashed with a knife as well as being shot, a deep pained sigh came from her mouth as she continued to walk through the hall with a unfathomable guilt panging in her gut.
These people died because of her and Jake, more innocents dead for no good reason.
Everybody on the first floor was dead.
Thankfully on the ground floor the managers wife had come to after being knocked out like her husband, but the sight of the blood, gore and bullet holes frightened her into shock.
'At least she's okay…' Sherry thought enduring the horrible sights as she walked past more rooms with the departed, almost all had been beheaded, there was no way they could be alive so she moved on.
The last room she was overwhelmed with happiness; from what she could see from the bullet holes it had been barricaded on the other side and people were talking in scared hushed voices from within.
"Scumbag!..." Jake yelled, "Fucking talk!" He continued, glaring at the man with a smile on his face, raising his fist to punch him. "Best talk before I beat it out of you."
"…"
"Fine." Jake said with a smile then landed a powerful blow absurdly hard on the man's face near to the jaw, almost dislocating it. He heard him grunt from the pain and smiled darkly, all those years of being a merc had been close to being forgotten while he was with Sherry, but now they were as clear as day he hadn't forgotten the techniques to torture someone.
"You got one more chance to talk asshole… So what's it gonna be?" He asked with very little sympathy… and no answer.
Jake grabbed him by the throat forcefully and began a choke hold around his neck whilst raising his other fist and began hitting him, soft at first but gradually getting harder.
Blood was pouring from the man's nose and white froth was forming around his mouth as he was starved of air, considering this, Jake let go and sat back on his legs watching as the man gasped for oxygen coughing.
"You gonna talk yet?" Jake asked once more, again nothing more than silence came but the strong intake of breath, he sighed and held the man's throat again but in a light grasp. "You came in here, attacked and killed people! WHY ARE YOU HERE?!"
"…"
An angry growl came from deep within Jake as he was starting to really lose his temper, and the man smiled even broader, however, the smile was soon wiped from his face when Jake ripped the bandages from around the mans waist and rammed two fingers from his free hand into the man's wound and began twisting them around.
The male wailed in agony as Jake pushed his fingers in deeper, the squelch from the blood was sickening but nothing compared to what he'd done over the years as a Mercenary.
Jake was patient and gave the man time to talk even though he maintained his silence well.
After a few more seconds, Jake removed his hand from around the man's throat and then his fingers from the hole and callously wiped the blood all over the man's leg, and stood.
"Tell me why you're here." He demanded with a swift kick to the man's groin, causing him to howl louder, his German accent emphasized more. "I said…" Jake repeated with another vicious kick to the area, "Why…" He kicked again, "Are you…" Another kick, "Here!?"
Jake was surprised he remained in silence even though he was sure he'd turned the man's scrotum into pulp.
"Man you are really! Startin' to piss me off!" Jake growled standing back and wiping his forehead on his arm, his eyes passing over the bathroom and the sink then smirked. "Come on asshole, time you cleaned up."
Grabbing the man by his hair Jake dragged him like a lifeless doll into the bathroom, and put him on his knees before the sink and slowly reached for the plug bunging it up and then started the hot water.
The bowl was steaming; the scolding water misting up the mirror and the bathroom in turn, he heard the man squeal under his breath - he knew what was coming, and tried to struggle beneath Jake's deathly grip on his head.
As soon as the man's face crashed into the water he screamed into it, almost drowning himself from the searing pain, bubbles formed around his cheeks and his body thrashed trying to escape.
"You gonna talk yet?" Jake asked disgustedly once he'd yanked the guy from the water, his own hand had been scolded a little from the man's thrashing but didn't care.
Again no answer, this time only because the man was struggling to breathe.
"Alright, alright… I'll give you a few more seconds… I'm not like you." He whispered in the attackers ear pushing his face into the porcelain sink slightly, "I can give a man a chance… Instead of murdering carelessly."
"… Hinrichten du..." The man blurted milliseconds before Jake went push his head into the water again.
"You wanna say that in English dickhead?" Jake replied with an evil scowl, pulling the man around to face him.
"...En... english? ..." The man asked frowning slightly, obvious he wasn't fluent in the language, but Jake stood by and gave him time to find the words. "Ex... execute... you."
Jake scowled looking to the side for a moment, before looking back not totally surprised by the sudden truth.
"Well, no shit Sherlock. Who sent you?"
The now red faced man shook his head, even he didn't know who his client was triggering Jake to growl in frustration not believing the assassin.
"Tell me who sent you!" He roared grabbing the man by the scruff of the neck, and pulling him into mid air with one arm while punching his stomach over and over.
"We not know who, or why! Just money!" The man pleaded and screamed as Jake went in for another punch to the gut. The man literally cried and wailed as Jake broke bones making sure they pierced his organs. " BITTE! NIEN! BITTE! BITTE! NEIN!"
"JAKE!" Sherry screamed from behind him, staring at the scene in horror and quickly dived for his right arm, "What are you doing?!" She yelled into his ear as he growled more trying to shake her off. "Stop it! JAKE! STOP IT!"
"Let go of me Sherry!" He snarled.
"He may be the bad guy Jake, but torturing won't help anybody!" Sherry still yelled heatedly as she unrelenting clung to his arm. "He is telling the truth! He doesn't know who sent them!"
The shouting wasn't having any effect; Jake wasn't having any of it, and he shook and shook but she wouldn't let go. His face was bright red on the cusp of turning purple through anger and persistently stared at the bloody wet killer wanting him to suffer.
"He killed innocent people Sherry! This is what he deserves!"
"He was sent to do this Jake! Look at his eyes! He's telling the truth!" She reasoned, trying to protect this murderer because her conscious was telling her to do so, and to her surprise Jake's fist slowly began to relax and went limp, folding his arm back down to his side unmoving in Sherry's cold hands.
He sighed angrily.
"See it this way Supergirl, his wounds won't keep him alive for too long anyway." He whispered to her with a cold glare, then stooped in front of the man he'd dropped. "You sure you're telling the truth?"
He nodded promptly, Jake smirked and nodded.
"I believe you man..." He said standing back up to his full height, glancing behind him out the corner of his eye to see Sherry standing with her arms now folded eyeing up the man, her gun holstered. "I really... do."
Her gun was an easy target and with his reflexes it was even easier job to grab, nobody had time to talk or blink, the trigger was pulled and the man slumped to the side dead; his brains blown all over the neck of the sink.
"Jake!" Sherry whined in a disapproving tone, "You could've just let him die!"
But Jake just shrugged it off handing the gun over, smiling widely enjoying the moment a little too much.
UPDATED: 16/01/2015 - Spelling, Grammar, Minor story changes.