by Gold Baron
She turned uneasily in her sleep as the cold breeze blew in through the open French doors of the balcony. Her sister likewise stole the sheets away to her side of the bed. They never heard the clicks, lost deep in troubled dreams. Nor heard the bang, never saw the flash, nor felt the impact. No, they were quite dead, a gaping hole in between their eyes.
The figured sighed deeply as he replaced the .50 Magnum Desert Eagles in their holsters on his hips, motionless in the silent night. He wasn't startled as their bodies began to convulse, nor alarmed as their heads curled like dry leaves on a fire. A moan passed through the dark room and out into the streets, a wail that passed unnoticed in the city that never awoke.
"Good people caught in a bad place."
He silently left the room, the flickering hall light catching a glimpse of the trailing white trench coat, the spinning pendant.
The man's teeth glimmered white as a sly grin spread across his face. He drew a final puff from the cigarette, the end glowing brightly as it fell to the ground, stomped out by a heavy boot. He savored the taste and then exhaled long and slow. He took one last gaze at the open balcony as he put his hands in the pockets of his black trench coat. Someone, at least, was awake that dark afternoon.
"Which side are you on, my friend?"
He shivered in the cold blackness, or was it the black void within him that made him shiver so? Always his mind wandered back to that shattering, that falling apart. He forcefully closed his mind to the painful memories. He sat for a time in the drizzle, the cars racing past on the street beyond, the flashing neon lights, the women on the corners, the men in the shadows; it all meant nothing to him, merely pictures flashing on a screen.
He turned the raw steel over in his hands. Its edges were chipped and dazzled, cracks like wrinkles of age. And as he peered into the prism, he saw all he had once known flash by, lost forever. He gripped the shard tightly until it dug deeply into his hands, drawing blood.
His depression was only interrupted by a tall woman that paused before his alley, sharp eyes piercing the darkness, seeing right through the shadows, right through him. The emerald eyes seemed to glow with fire as she lowered the brim of her hat over her face, a lock of fiery-red hair falling down in a playful curl. She pulled her raincoat close.
He muttered under his breath, "I won't be used." She pretended not to hear as she approached him.
"What the fuck, man?" He was the stereotypical ghetto inhabitant, and as happened so often, he was in trouble again. The switchblades came out, the nines, the bats. And as his back hit the brick wall, he realized his life was over.
"Hey, we don't mean to disrespect or nothin'. Just doin' business, ya understand?"
"Hyeah, business..." He closed his eyes tightly as the gang moved in closer, his entire body tightening in anticipation of the deathblow. The seconds ticked away in what seemed like an eternity, his heart beating in his throat like a runaway freight train, but it never came.
He meekly opened his eyes to see a tall man dressed in a black overcoat. What the hell was a white boy doing in the neighborhood?
"Yo, man, we didn't mean nothin'!" one of the gangsters cried out as their leader bellowed over in pain as the white boy twisted his arm around backward, a sickening pop as it broke out of the socket, ending with a crunch as his hand gave way to the powerful grip. The knives and guns all fell to the concrete as they turned and fled.
"What do you think he deserves?" the tall dark figure asked coyly of the trembling victim, braced against the wall, the gang member's mangled hand still in the tall man's powerful grip.
"What the fuck is this, man? This some kinda joke? Are you with the cops? What the fuck?"
His hand snapped open like a bear trap, and the poor man ran away, more of a hobble, really, holding his mangled, dislocated arm in his other.
The man against the wall looked on in horror as the tall dark figure drew out a large automatic pistol, drawing back the hammer with a firm click and bringing it to bear on the fleeing man.
"What's your name, son?"
"What the fuck is this?"
A bullet skipped harmlessly across the sidewalk between the fleeing man's legs.
"The fuck? Uh, Germ... m' real name is Jeremiah, but everyone calls me Germ. My mom was real religious, ya know?"
"Well, Jeremiah, you have the power over a man's life in your hands. What do you plan to do with it?"
"Wha--? What do you mean?"
The gun blew out the back of the man's kneecap twenty yards away. He fell to the ground screaming.
"Shit! Fuck! What the fuck? The fuck was that for?! Jaysus Christ! Leave him alone! Christ!"
The gun unceremoniously disappeared into the folds of the coat. "How did that feel?"
"Wha-what do you mean?"
"You know what I mean. How did it feel to have so much power, the power over life and death?"
"Fuck, you're fucking nuts!"
"Maybe... but I know that you've had a run-in with these boys, owe them some money. Have a little addiction?"
"The fuck does it matter? Who the hell are you?"
"Maybe I'm your guardian angel. I offer you a crossroads: one way leads to a life of luxury and safety, the other..." He let his words trail off, and Jeremiah glanced back at the dying man on the sidewalk. "The choice is yours; which do you take? Save a dying man, or save yourself?"
Jeremiah reeled back. He couldn't believe how horrible this night had been. Maybe it was just a hallucination. Yeah, that was it -- too much coke!
The man glanced at his watch. "You're not trying, Jeremiah. Time is wasting."
"Yea, I think I'll... I'll go with..." A grin spread across the tall man's face as the words echoed down the empty street. "You."
"You are a wise man, Jeremiah Daniel Smith, a very, very wise man."
"That's far enough," a voice echoed from somewhere on the rooftop.
"The fuck are you?" Jeremiah cried, looking upward at the new figure.
"Tricksy, what brings you to this part of the city?" the tall man said. "Isn't it a little late for you to be out? Such a bad part of town and all?"
The man on the roof said, "Your humor doesn't amuse me, Eclipse Trinity, now back off."
"And what does holier-than-thou think he's doing? I offer this fine young man a better life. You should be familiar with just causes. What's the problem?"
"You know why," said Tricksy. Your heart is as black as the sky it walks under. You have no soul; you will find no redemption among the stars."
Jeremiah quietly slid down a side alley.
Eclipse said, "You know the stars aren't coming back, Tricksy. It's every man for himself!"