This is a rework of the chapters I had up, nothing mayor, nothing to crazy..just fixing and changing a few things here and there that I did not like when I first uploaded them. Through AI art I tried to make the main character, the closest thing to it that I managed is the image for the fic.
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Speech = ``...´´
Thoughts = [...]
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The first thing in her memory when she woke up was pain, a hot, scorching pain crossing through her little body at every direction. It was as if every inch of her body had been sent ablaze by an invisible force, only cooled down by the red blood stains running down her slim, marred wrists onto the ground below.
The faint echo of her ragged breaths was the only source of noise that she could hear of or make heads about, each intake of air coming at a random pace through dry, broken lips. Specks of blood coating the soft flesh and her pale chin into an organic dark shell. Her vision was hazy at best, a bloody blurry mess at worst, like looking through a cracked mirror with only one eye opened while simultaneously trying to gouge it out.
A situation that was not aided by the laid out she found herself in.…, no matter how well acquainted with it she had grown.
A rather small room, if it even could be called that. Shrouded in complete darkness.., only beret by the poor, dimmed light of the moon pouring down on her back through a rather small circular window and the thin slits of the door before her. A light that she had grown used to bath her while she was trampled down under the weight of their bodies, to illuminate her shame as she could only hear the sound of their grunts and huffs breathing down at the back of her neck and their burning touch.
A glow in the darkness that she had grown to hate as it spoke of the world that existed outside the shrouded veil she lived in. How its bitterness slipped in to the cracks like water as his mouth tasted its acrid taste of ashes made from ashes of what she was denied time and time again, of the reminder of her inability to move further away than the crumple little existence of the four walls around her.
Always so close, so close...yet so far away.
Freedom…
She tried to speak, her lips weakly parting ways…, but nothing but a wordless ghastly gasp left her lips. Her tongue refusing to obey her will as it remained still in her mouth. Static, useless…just like she had expected. Just like every other night.
Just the way they wanted her to be...
And yet she could move her head…, she could feel her fingers burning her, her veins threatening to burst from hours of induced numbness as she slowly flexed her fingers at the pace of a snail. Yet movement all the same...
The effects had weakened, just enough to grant her some of the strength and autonomy they had robbed their precious doll. But if that revelation was meant to lift her spirit, to make her feel a little less miserable... then it failed for its power was still there.
Inside her, hampering her.., slowing her thoughts down to a crawl, yet not placating the pain she felt or the mind drilling sensation scratching at the walls inside her skull. Enhancing them even..
She hung her head low...
She did not know for how long she had been placed in that position, but her limbs felt completely numb.., or they should have been. The burning sensation of weak muscle fiber long extenuated from hours of been forced into an unnatural position as her arms were held up by a pair of worn out ropes was still there after all. Pulling her up from the ground floor just barely, never allowing her to set foot on it, nor swing to far when hit.
Like a doll dangling by strings….or a puppet.
She tried to breath in, to take a deeper breath, but she only managed to take in a weak wheeze before she was attacked by a painful fit of coughing. Her throat sore and literally unresponsive for the moment..
She did not dare look down to see whether her clothes remained as they should have or if he had done.. more. Preferring to cling to the release of the fogginess of her memories than the ugly truth that was more than likely waiting.
Sometimes it was better to nor remember anything, to fall down into the depths of the nothingness and to wake up the next day with no clue of what had happened. So she decided to focus on what was around her instead.
It was a slow process, but in time she started to pile up the things she sensed. Her eyes felt heavy, almost as if clinging to remain shut for dear life. A cold shudder crawled up her back while she felt the air grow thicker and harsh around her, warmer even, almost clogging her throat when she took a wrong timed breath.
Everything around her felt dry...to dry for an attic in the middle of winter. Did they leave the stove on?
That did not stop her from trying to peer through the poorly lit room in search of something, or someone. The silence had always been a welcomed friend of hers, but something told her she was not alone.
It did not took long, for there he was, a few feet from her the only thing that humanly should definitely not belong in such secluded room. Large like one of those bears she had saw once in the distance of her first attempt out but with nothing of their grace…
The darkness shrouding his form quickly dissipated as her eyes tried to burn an imprint of him in her corneas, thinking about it...he was not that tall nor imposing now he was hunched over, what once was an elegant black tuxedo was now left in a rather unkempt, dirty.., wrinkled filled manner.
He was pressed against the wall to her right, his head hung down between his legs, but not enough to cover his face completely from view nor the grimace of agony settled in stone on it, though it sometimes changed forms into a wicked grin between each blink of her eyes. Pale skin like the fresh now of winter now adorned his once disgusting features, a peculiar purity that was only tainted by the large cavity caved over his skull, a now noticeable trail of blood falling down from the clearly open wound.
…..
That would explain the puddle of blood he was standing over. It still took her a while to realize what she was looking at. Her eyes blinking with a strange look in her eyes when she did.
Dead, he was dead...
That pale skin, the silence.., that stillness was far too rigid to be anything else and yet she glared at him for a minute, then another. Almost uncertain whether she was still within the realms of reality or delusion. Refusing to even blink nor knowing if she had that choice at all, her eyes crying out by such strange refusal, tears sliding down her eyes into her glistening skin, making her feel its coppery taste into her mouth.
But she could not help it.…
She would Not help it, not as she glared at the hollow husk of her former tormentor. Her hands started to flex weakly at first before they closed into two tight fists, a strange sensation started to stir up inside her, like meat hooks clawing her flesh from the inside out until she could no longer ignore.
Hurting her.
Breaking her.
Empowering her...
Her jaw clenched, teeth slowly starting to grind at each other as those strange emotions started to take hold, to take control. Eyes narrowing into a distasteful frown, disparaging emotions flashing through what once was nothing but a hollow husk of apathy.
For a brief moment the cage cracked, its walls shuddered that had been neatly placed through the "re-education" as something...different started to come out. Making her body writhe and shudder uncontrollably...
How dare he….
How dare that thing do this to her? How dared it die without her been aware? What had she done to not be a conscious participant!? It did not seem fair.
Nothing was fair….
Whether it was fueled because the situation or her newfound anger at the seemingly unfairness of his premature departure or a desire to move away from her confinement, she soon found herself tugging at the cords downwards with what little strength she had left.
A futile effort that had been proven correct time and time again every other time as the angles her arms were held would prove hard to manage such feat by others, let alone for someone of her meager stature and strength. They seemed to enjoy her attempts though...
But right now she did not care, she wasn't thinking. Her mind was too blurry, too much under the effects of the drugs to care the way the ropes were digging into her flesh. How her body even when given a new dose of new found power could do little to hold as the mess that it had been left.
Creeak…..
The rough sound of strands snapping one after the other would not be what she was expecting, nor she fully comprehended what was it at first. Had she looked up, she would have noticed that the very same cords that held her seemed to have been slashed by a very pointy object, leaving only a skeleton of the strong and resilient rope behind.
One that she had unknowingly torn through in her ignorance….
A second later, the next thing she found out was the way the solid surface of the floor would fare against her skull as gravity pummeled her against the ground, rather uncaring of her well being. Not something she had really put much thought on it sadly, given the fact that she had been hanging like a piece of meat for who knows how long.
A muffled grunt of pain escaped through her bruised lips as a result, tears falling down her cheeks as her lungs almost burst through her chest as a result of the fall, a clear indication of a few broken ribs now puncturing the flesh inside her. She would have cried out…, but nothing else would come out from her throat.
Even now she barely could keep herself away from fading away in the comfortable embrace of the nothingness, the darkness that was calling out to her as she lay down on the floor, obscuring her eyes. It would be so easy….to let her loose herself to the such painless embrace.
But she refused. Something was….different, and it was not the dryness spreading through her throat as the air around her became a bit more thicker. Strangely there was something else she sensed, something that had to do with the floor she had fallen into like a lifeless rock. It felt warm instead of the eerie sterile cold she was used to.
The thought of staying there crossed her mind for a second before it was pushed aside, the gears of her mind rotating painfully slow, and yet she felt her mind clearer than before.
Less…. heavy.
She bit her lips, not wincing in pain as her teeth came into contact with the broken, covered flesh. No.., she lacked the naivety to think this... was a ploy of some sort. A game where she was the main attraction.
She had seem many things since her… "employment". The screams, the muffled sounds of pain through the walls, the specks of blood in the wooden floors or carpets. How some people just disappeared. Never to be heard again.
But following the rules she was save..
They never killed their guests, it was bad for business...
It was their rules...
She had to, it was the only way-
Then that serenity and certainty became shaky, feeble. But what if they did? What if the rules had changed? What would they do to her now that he had died during her working hours..? She did not know, and mere thought sent shivers down her spine as her mind wandered places someone like her should never had to.
For better or for worse, she knew that this would not end with a normal punishment. Broken goods were not worth the effort to put them back together.., broken goods were no worth to keep around, broken goods did not give any profit back…
All the more reason not to stay put like a "good doll".
She slowly rose up, grinding her teeth against one another while cold sweat slid down her forehead as her muscles flared up in protest, pulling herself up a grueling pair of centimeters at a time. Huffing loudly, her breath ragged and pained while her heart started throbbing at the back of her head.
The door was not that far away, the room was already small as it was...and yet it felt the complete opposite.
Her feet staggered as she moved towards the only exit, forcing her to lean over some of the junk piled all around the room, her hands leaving bloody imprints on the surfaces of the boxes and the cloth some of the things were covered with. It would not take long before she realized the new addition her body carried.
His vile blood.., the foul, sticky fluid having smeared all her sickly skin and hair like some sort of scarlet natural paint that refused to peel away.
She would soon realize that would not the be the last thing she would get for free as her hand stretched out forward. Slim, bloodstained fingers shakily graving and holding onto the handle of the door...
Her eyes widened, her face creased as a stream of pain coursed through her, starting from her hand. She wanted to scream out, but empty air merely came out. Her legs shook as she heard the unmistakable sound of flesh heating up at an extreme pace, a pained, maddened grimace in her lips as she found herself unable to pry her hand away from the source of her newfound grievances.
The handle was burning, and along side the palm of her hand with it. She should have tried to move away, to put as much distance as she could from it.., but she was no longer thinking about it.
The pain in her body, the hurt of her burns, the dread of the masters punishment..they clotted her mind so instead of pulling away her grip grew stronger, pushing forward and graving with her other hand the handle of the door as-well and started to pull over and over the door towards her.
She had no time for this….
She could heard the sound of the door cracking, slowly opening with the motion, but falling short each time. Meaning that it had been left open, but something was blocking its path. The smell of burn flesh reached her nostrils, but did not stopped her. With one final push with she managed to pry it open, her pained fingers finally been able to slip away from their hellish grip as the door open up and slammed loudly against the wall..while she felt down into the ground on her back.
Allowing her to see herself opening up the gates of heaven...
And hell welcomed her with open arms...
She rose her arms more by instinct than nothing else, trying to shield herself from the unexpected flash of light assaulting her eyes as well the scorching air that was cooking her skin just by brushing with her. But even closing her eyes did not kept her away from becoming briefly blind by the sheer brightness assaulting her senses. Making her wander on, crawling without direction.
By the time her eyes managed to catch a glimpse of what was happening she was already halfway the hallway.
Her eyes were tearful and puffy, yet nothing could make her misunderstand what stood before her, what was responsible to make her skin crawl and shudder as her skin was almost metaphorically set on fire. Sweat sliding down her dirty, creased face into the floor below...
The droplets plashing softly with no distinction whatsoever to their scarlet cousins before they evaporated into the air by the sheer heat in the air.
Fire…
The building was on fire.., bright flashes of orange and red smearing the walls and the ceiling above her in their incessant hunger to consume everything in their path covered all she could see, leaving thick, heavy columns of black smoke to pour in and out everywhere else they could not be.
Stone, wood, furniture or paintings….nothing was spared. If tears had been starting to fall down her puffy eyes, now they became a constant stream of a bitter cascade she could do little about as the thick smoke hanged above her started to burn them.
Her mouth tasted of ashes and lost dreams...
She did not know what she was meant to do, what was going to happen next...so she wandered on, like a lost animal through the sections of the mansion that appeared now alien to her memory.
Slowly, one step at a time she dragged her way through the hallway towards the main entrance. Leaning against the scorched surface of the walls where the flames had left their ardent touch, though failed to break them down as her legs remained too tired to carry her all the way without collapsing. Her other hand tried to pry off the sweat from falling down her eyes as it quickly evaporated at the same time by the heat.
She noticed that there were other bodies around her too, though with the chaos surrounding her she could do little to recognize any of them, probably more of the guests. The scent of burn flesh quickly mixing up with the toxic wastes of smoke made her gasp, but not because of the horrid smell….
Shadows danced all over the corners of her eyes, seemingly uncaring of the situation they were in. Their bodies mangled and torn moved swiftly through the air like dancers on a saloon, sometimes they closed the distance around her, sometimes they did not. Curved horns protruding from their heads and slim slits of crimson where eyes should be only to disappear as flashes of white obscured her vision between blinks.
Like a broken screen….
After a long, grueling time….., she finally reached the staircase that connected the upper levels of the building. A massive thing that circled around in two directions prior that night, now nothing more than the skeletal remains from a hellish landscape brought out by a fever dream. A man made furnace where the flames flooded the entirety of the room.
Though she tried to gaze at a larger corridor between the main exit and the inner house a thick curtain of blackness obscured her path to the point of near blindness, almost prompting her to fall over the edge of the now broken handrails when she tried to move through it.
At the edge she was all but surrounded by the smoke coming from was burning behind her and beneath her, her skin was already growing black with dust and cinders that clung to her. She tried to breath but the only thing she tasted was blood, blisters started to appear where her skin had already gave way and exposed the muscle below. Her eyes giving in as they were not strong enough to shrug off the damage they were being inflicted…
But not fast enough to hide the next following lament that laid outside the ever encroaching reach of the torrents of acrid fumes.
``No, it cant be..…...´´
She muttered weakly, finally able to give voice tho what crossed her mind since she woke up in that room. The words echoed strongly in her mind yet nothing but a ghastly whimper came from her mouth as smoke clogged her windpipes with an iron grip.
The wooden stair steps..., the ones that would lead her out. They were no more.
The fire had gotten there before her, leaving nothing but an emptiness where the slabs of wood had once resided. Looking down at the distance between her and the solid ground below…, she knew that jumping was out of the question.
The only way out would be to learn to fly….
Weakly, she extended her arm forward towards the shambling form that her tired eyes provided of the door, an image growing smaller and smaller with each passing second. Fingers flexing over and over as if she could reach it.
So close, so close….and yet so far away, if only she could….just...
Her body started to shake, a strange screech…, barely audible under the hunger of the flames started to grow stronger as time went by, as if someone was tapping the floor. It took her a bit to realize that it was coming from.
She was laughing, a sharp, bitter laughter that held no mirth yet none of the acrid despair that her heart was swelling with.
Why would it? Wasn't it funny? The ever changing fortune that seemed to grant her a new path only to take it away..
It truly was something to laugh about.
Much to her distress she would not have much time to ponder about it as a sudden fit of coughing brought her to her knees, each burst wheezing air feeling like a stab in her guts. A grimace formed around her lips as she viewed with neither stupor or resignation the blood slipping from her fingers onto the ground below. The bitter taste of metal now fully saturating her senses as she smeared the rest with her torn up sleeve.
What could she do now? Was anything left to do? Did she even want to….?
Her thoughts would come to an abrupt end when a thunderous sound struck the entire house, like a giant pulling the building from the roots, it shuddered and cracked around her. A massive, guttural groan reaching everywhere as if it was a wounded animal breathing its last breath as chunks of stone and wood fell around.
Then the very ground she was standing started to move, shaking uncontrollably before to her horror it gave in. The structure no longer able to withstand her weight as its foundations were ravishingly consumed.
A muffled shriek was the only thing she could say as she fell down through the infrastructure in a matter of seconds, landing hard over a once proud oak table that probably had a richer history than hers. Smashing it into rubble along side her legs.
It was then that she lost consciousness….
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She woke up far sooner than she expected, given the circumstances….
Mangled and twisted into angles that they should not be her legs remained as unresponsive as they could be expected to be in their state, curiously, she did not felt as much pain as she thought it should. Probably a result of the substance still lingering in her bloodstream…, but for how long?
She cocked her head to the left, an action that demanded more force than it should have, a faint trail of blood following her movement from what seemed to be a cut on the back of her head. It would explain the deafening noise ringing through her ears….leaving her unable to hear a thing.
The world around her was still a raging fire, what little free space had remained free from the terrible reach of the flames had either succumbed or was on the way, though much to her surprise the air had grown lighter.
The heat had busted every single window of the small mansion as well the door had fallen from its hinges, allowing for some of the venomous air to slip by the now open gaps.
The door….
She did not know when she started, but she found herself crawling towards the broken remnants of it, or what it should be given that it appeared almost in perfect condition, albeit left open with no apparent regard of the cool air slipping by its opening. With only her hands to push herself forward through the blazing inferno the task became nothing more than a slow paced torture each time her legs bumped with the ruble.
One crawl after the other, ignoring the burns her hands suffered by her stubbornest, she made it to the snowy plains outside. The outside world was a stark contrast from the one she just came from.
The air was cold, daggers made of ice clawing their way inside her battered lungs with voracity between each pained breath that she took, threatening to freeze on the spot if she so dare continued. A pain that she fully embraced as she laid down over the white fresh snow.
Tainting its soft and pure surface with the acrid smell of ashes and the taste of fresh blood. The silver moon and the stars above as her only witness, the wind howling above her head, brushing her face...almost playfully.
It was a strange sight to behold, the black silver of the night sky combined with the vibrant oranges and reds from the fire. She would have loved to continue to gaze at it...but the numbing of her legs had started to spread through the rest of her body. Everything around her felt….slower. The constant throbbing of her heart within her chest had started to dull, bit by bit...
A final sigh left her lips as she felt the last of her strength vanish, no longer able to keep the dark spots from forming over the edges of her vision. There was so little time left….
No.., there was no more time.
``So this is it…?´´
She muttered to no one in particular, her head downcast onto the humid white surface. Perhaps that was the reason why she did not notice the shadow that loomed above her, nor she heard the sound of footsteps on the snow until it was directly in front of her.
A feeling of dejavu struck her as she looked at her, a strange thing to consider as most of her features were obscured from view, as if a child had smeared a drop of black ink all over it. With the exception of her eyes, a pair of two cold emeralds that observed her in silence.
Tall, yet slim... she easily towered above her by a large margin, its thin body clothed in black only adding to that perception that she was more and more a figment of her damaged mind.
But did it matter anymore..?
The figure cocked its head to the left, perhaps puzzled by her appearance or her unexpected arrival, it would not last long though. The wind howled loudly above their heads, muffing the sound of her footsteps as she approached her before she pulled a strange metallic object from her back, aiming it at her direction.
She barely made out the sound of a faint click through the distant roars of the flames consuming the building and the violent winds brushing against her face, her heartbeat slowing down to a crawl...
One last glance at the blocky tool told her what it was about to happen, what needed to happen as she felt the cool surface of the weapon pressed against her forehead, a mumbling sound reaching her ears from the stranger, though she could not understand it.
A question of sorts or something else..? Whatever meaning it held, it was lost to her...but not the thing she held in her hand. All so similar to the ones the guards bore.
She tried to to stand up, but it was a futile effort as her body refused to move an inch. After everything she had endured, she should be lashing out, spatting with incredibility at the unfairness of this tale which was not even hers to write off, but she did not….
Why had she tried so hard? The thought lingered in her mind for a few moments before it was pushed aside, it did not matter, nothing from before mattered at this point in time. Why fret over such meaningless things?
`` I never... imagine it would be... this way... ´´
She croaked out, the words weighing heavily on her as they came out. She received no answer, she expected none.
Sometimes that was better...
It was then, for what could have been the first time in years that she allowed herself to smile. An indescribable feeling of gratitude washing over her as she softly closed her eyes before her dark savior.
At long last it could finally be over…
``Thank.. you….´´
A loud detonation quickly torn through the night sky like the rabid howling of the predators of the night.
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She woke up in silence, her eyes opening up slowly, almost sluggishly in their wake as they tried to adapt to their new reality. Her body felt numb and tired, as if she had been awake all night even though she knew that was not the case.
Such thing would have been trivial matter…
She remained still for a while, the throbbing of her heart slow and peaceful to the point they were non existent, her mind calmly picking aside certain thoughts lingering in her skull, tossing them aside into neatly made folders before focusing on others which held a higher priority, one by one until she left the board empty.
A mechanical process already embedded deeply into her psyche.
Meant to keep her focused, ready, sharp...for any eventuality.
It wasn't the first time she had that dream, the impact It had in her psyche far more stronger than she would have anticipated in her youth as the events remained engraved by fire both in her flesh and soul.
She did not mind in the slightest…
Like a postcard, it was merely there. Occupying space that could have been put to better use. There was no joy or sadness to have when remembering it. It wasn't special, not it meant anything to her.
What it had meant afterwards was a different matter altogether..
A before and after in her path.., a distortion in the river, a changing gush of wind, a ripple in the ground. The very moment in time she had died.
And became something else, something stronger...
He grunted with a sense of faint acknowledgment at that. If she were wearing her other faces she knew she would be fighting back the ghost of a smile from forming around the edges of her lips.
But not this time..
Her eyes scanned the room, even though she was already aware of what she was going to find.
The room was shrouded in darkness..or whatever it was left of it anyways, beret of anything that it once made it held, it resemble more a worn skeleton. A crumbling ceiling from where the water rain would slide down onto the dirty mattress she was resting on, the walls striped of their paint and a floor that had seem better days…..
There was only one window from where came the only source of light from the full moon looming statically over the large buildings over the of the river. to small for a man to slip by through them and to big to shield the occupant from the inclement weather. The bars, although few in numbers compensated with their size, it had taken a bit of time to even remove all of them.
The prison had been built over two centuries ago under the pretense to treat the most of unsavory individuals, especially those diagnosed with mental illnesses in an effort to "treat" them, a smokescreen to gain public support for the reelection as mayor. Luckily for the inmates it had not even lasted half that time before it had fell into disused thanks to a series of rumors circulating from the guards. Plans to remodel the now abandon building into a war museum had been made, but the great depression and the following wars that had taken the world by storm had pushed those aside before they were thrown into the nearest trashcan.
Now a then of beggars and junkies the building continued to rot in the backyard of the New Yorkers ignorance. Curiously they never touched the mental section, perhaps fearful of whatever may have been done there.
It worked just fine for her…, she would be long gone before anyone would think of taking a look. If they even dared.
Her eyes then landed on the form of a large barrel protruding from the gap in the wall into the world beyond. Its scope directed towards the Shield island, awaiting for its owner to pick it up and use it after such a long, boring wait.
The black trigger craving to be put to use once and for all...
Her eyes then met the broken remnants of what what once would have been an inside mirror in the cell, the cracks all over its dusty surface as well the mold growing at the very edges felt far more real and accurate than the image that they showed back.
Clothed in a raven black trench coat that almost reached her knees and the large hat of the same shade covering her head it would have been hard to notice her from the distance as nothing else than a large blob of black or another ominous entity of this forsaken place. Not that the rest of her was any better….
Skin painfully pale, to the point that one would think she had bathed milk a few too many times. Her hair had lost its golden brightness, those brutal years taking a heavy toll on her, given way to a silver snow shade that fell over her back wildly as some sort of ethereal cascade. Her amethyst eyes were the only thing that had remained unchanged for the most part...though they had lost some life within them, replaced by a cold ruthlessness.
She looked sickly at best…
Why did she saw in her that she did not?
"You should try to smile more my snowflake…., that frown settled in your face is ruining a rather attractive face. You should take better care of it…."
The words came by and left without much leisure, her face not changing an ounce almost as if she had not heard anything at all. And yet, she shyly she rose her arms. Gloved fingers slowly trying to pry off a smile from her stiff lips that closed tightly into a deep frown, eyes drilling holes into her own reflection as if disappointed for her decision.
A minute passed, then another, but there was no change in sight. In the end she shook her head, lowering her hands and allowing them to fall lip to her sides before even the ghost of a tired sigh left through her lips. In silence, she moved away from her reflection in defeat.
She couldn't do it, it just wouldn't come naturally…
Not as she was right now.
Not with her true face.
"Things are never easy, if they were everyone would do it….but you wont give up, would you? Not for me….."
The words came out from a left field, yet trying to soothe her mind, placating the coldness of steel like a warm blanket, wrapped tenderly around her.
A tenderness that felt alien to her, a touch she had not felt since-
For a moment she thought she could feel the warmth of her arms embracing her from behind, that soft golden locks like the sun of mid day interlocking with her own, the way her lips barely caressed her skin. Playful hands moving down….
``Fuck!´´
She spatted, covering her mouth as she barely could fight back the bitter taste in her mouth from spreading, her neck was lit on fire by the unexpected wave of bile rising up her throat as those feelings turned repugnant and bitter in the heat of the moment.
Her fist clenched tightly, the leather creaking painfully under the pressure it was put through, then, without a second thought slamming it against the closest wall, leaving a massive hole on the already weakened surface that started to crumble on its own by the sheer magnitude of the strike.
Her fist ached just barely…, still tightly close. Still ready to be used again if she so willed.
But that would not come to pass.
She should have known better, to allow her mind to wander off towards those...places. It was only after a few seconds turned minutes that she managed to regain her composure, face creased into a deep scowl, teeth grinding against one another as cold sweat still crawled down her back. All while she moved towards the window.
``No...I wont….´´
She growled more than said to no one in particular, spitting at the ground before the anger in her eyes vanished. Leaving her expression vacant and empty as she reined herself in the same way a dog owner would pull from the leash of a mutt. Putting an end to whatever squabble was in the making.
There was almost no haste in her movement, no flaw in her approach as she put herself into position, fingers dangling as they took hold of the C15, placing it right where it had to be. Fingers tugging the gears of the scope as she tried to get a better look through it.
She had done a dozen times since she arrived, but she could not help but try to get a better zoom each time, a need to make the last take feel cheap in comparison. Three miles separated her from her target, two thousand yards more than what her modify C15 could cover under untrained hands.
None could make this shot once and believed they would hit, but she knew she could make it….
She only needed to wait for him to show himself.
[ It should be just about right-… ]
Her words came to an abrupt end as a whistling sound pierced the air before the night skies erupted in a bright series of colorful explosions. Dozens more following its example as they turned the horizon into an ever changing theater were the bright yet fleeting lights were the actors.
For the people that laid below the lights it would have been a sight to remember, for those who could barely see them from their homes it would have been a rather entertaining distraction of their mundane lives. For her it was just the ring bell calling her out to play.
She merely looked at the soft tickling sound emanating from her left arm, the constant humming of old gears trying to move the inner workings of the antiquated strapped to her. Both silver pointers signalizing the full moon engraved on the rusted gold plating metal.
It was midnight.
``Ah, just in time…..´´
Only three miles separated her from the artificial island built over the late eighteens now covered by hundreds of colored balloons and a few spotlights situated all over the main plateau, their lights illuminating most of the field by themselves. She did not need to look through the scope to notice the silhouettes of the myriad of guests moving around, nor to hear the livid echo of the orchestra trying to lighten up the night. A task becoming even harder at the non stop apparition of the fireworks.
She would need to be blind not to know what they were doing. A celebration, they were hosting a celebration. He was using the summit of his party to celebrate his birthday. She did not know whether applaud his foolishness or his boldness.
Perhaps neither….
Slowly her eyes wandered through the island, though mostly at the makeshift podium that it had been prepared for the speech. Her lips turned downwards slightly, her heart beat pausing for a second as her eyes caught a glimpse of the target as it came out from hiding, standing tall over the podium as he started working on the microphones.
He was small, perhaps a bit more than she had thought possible for some to stir up such problem as he barely reached the five feet up off the ground. His eyes were nothing but small buttons, carved deeply on what would be a round, gloated face after years of lack of care. Though he did not resemble the picture of the "Strong man" he loved to talk about, he surely did look the par of a crooked politician in a children's comic book.
With such an appearance it was a wonder the disgusting thing could even manage to create an image of a fair working man, while in truth been no better than his fellow schemers. The city denizens were blind to the truth…, only seeing what they wanted to see, as usual. Lambs did not care for what happened in the fields, or who their owner was..they just cared they were fed and little else.
Ironically, the syndicate had little interest for now in American politics. The man itself was just small fish compared with the greater goals of the master. Perhaps things could have ended there…
Had he not tried to black mail the wrong people.
The thought that the small little pig wearing human skin had the necessary brain capacity to realize how badly he had screw up was non existent. After all, pigs were just livestock...they did what their nature told them to do.
And there he was, gloating and smiling, exposing those crooked teeth into the open. Not even an ounce of fear could be spotted in his features, perhaps deluding himself even further in the treasures thought of safety on the cusp of his power, the masses surrounding him ignorant meat shield to use at his disposal. A needles task, for no gunslinger worth their salt would have wasted their time to made it through the heavy security measures.
So much money, so much favor spent to keep him safe for this day to arrive. And yet his foolishness had left his fate to chance
And she was ready to collect.
``Payne Winston, how arrogant can you be...´´
She muttered, mostly to herself as the scope aimed half a meter away from the little mans heart as she sensed the wind increasing from that direction. Of all the things the man could have done, he had to show off with been the only one wearing a bright red suit into that tide of black and whites of his guests.
It was fitting though, to wear a scarlet shade on what would be a crimson night. She almost felt sorry for the mess she was going to do to that fine silk, almost. But greed had no qualms of what it did, and neither did she.
A second later the soft click prior to the detonation reached her ears, one finger pressed strongly against the trigger. Eyes almost unresponsive and bereft of any emotion while her lips slowly warped into a dispassionate scowl, a ghastly sound slipping through them that did not seem to align with what had just been done.
`` Happy birthday..….´´