[i:42eeeb6270]I really loved that dog....

I keep thinking, if that drunk had walked home instead of driving my dog would still be alive. But some things are just meant....

The car skidded as the driver lost consciousness. Alcohol has a cruel way of lining your eyelids with lead just when you need clarity the most.

I’d thrown the ball, never considering the grass across the street from my house wouldn’t be safe. Six had run off to retrieve it when the car mounted the kerb.

I keep wishing it had been me instead of that mutt. He nor I saw it coming. There was a thud, a high pitched, mercifully brief yelp. Then silence. The driver didn’t even know what had happened. Lucky for him the police stopped me from telling him.

You were a good boy, Six.....

[b:42eeeb6270]CRACK![/b:42eeeb6270]

Jesus! That felt like a rib. Now where was I? Oh I remember....

The house was on fire. My family had moved into a rough neighbourhood. I couldn’t afford much better since I’d left the army. Things were tight, and my face didn’t fit. So it was inevitable I guess that something would happen. I fought as best I could, but they were too many and the smoke left me too weak. I could hear my son crying upstairs. Then blackness.

She walked through the flames, unafraid. Eyes more fiery than the fire itself. Heh, if she didn’t look so pissed I would have thought her an angel. But she was far from that.

She carried me from the burning wreckage and laid me on the grass. And asked me one question.

“Do you want revenge?”

I kept imagining my son’s face wreathed in black smoke, his little lungs choked and charred. My wife screaming as the inferno took her hair, her beautiful hair. Welding her earrings to her face. The answer was obvious.

“YES!”

Should’ve said no.

[b:42eeeb6270]THWACK![/b:42eeeb6270]

Fuck me, was that my arm!?

Keep remembering, ignore it.

The club? Yeah the club.

He had been watching me since I’d walked in. I took a table in the corner. Just wanted somewhere to think. Wasn’t looking for trouble. Guess trouble just comes looking for me.

“Hey! Boy! You’re in my seat.”

“You weren’t sitting here when I walked in. So what’s the problem?”

“The problem is, we don’t want your kind here. Ain’t that right, Blue?”

“Leave him be, Manny. We’re supposed to be enjoying ourselves.”

He ignored his friend, dumb move.

“I [b:42eeeb6270]am[/b:42eeeb6270] enjoying myself!” He grabbed my arm.

That was enough.

He didn’t see my arm move, didn’t see me switch positions, twisting his arm up and around his back. Stopping myself from breaking it.

“You still enjoying yourself?”

He strained, anger rapidly becoming fear.

“Fuck you!”

“Ok new rules. One, you don’t ever touch me again. Two, you ever come in here again and you’re buried. Three, I see you try anything like this again and I’ll break your shit off! You got me, [b:42eeeb6270]boy[/b:42eeeb6270]?”

He got me alright. Started off faster than a jackrabbit.

[b:42eeeb6270]CRUNCH![/b:42eeeb6270]

Ok now that’s unnecessary! I think I’m going to die in here....[/i:42eeeb6270]

---------------------

The bag swung with each blow. It was a large canvas sack suspended from the ceiling. The blows were expertly administered by a man, stripped to the waist, blood sweat pooling at his tailbone from the exertion. Each blow seemed enough to sink a battleship, never mind crushing a spirit.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Reed! Get your ass in here!” [/i:42eeeb6270] A second man shouted through the doorway. He was stockily built, shorter than the fighter. But it didn’t look like fat.

He shouted again, [i:42eeeb6270]“Reed? You hearin’ me? I need you to run an errand!”[/i:42eeeb6270]

The fighter stopped kicking the bag for a second. [i:42eeeb6270]“Gauge, leave it! He’s probably asleep. You know what a lazy bastard he is. We’ve got the package, it’s not going to go anywhere, so what’s the rush? That Torrie bitch, K, will get it soon enough.”

“Not really the point, is it Marco? Reed!? Are you deaf?”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Reed walked in. He didn’t speak, and something about him seemed wrong. Marco couldn’t quite place it.

[i:42eeeb6270]“You ok, Reed?”[/i:42eeeb6270] He swung a punch at the bag. The bag cracked when it should have thudded.

Reed shook his head.

Marco and Gauge stopped.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Sup Reed? You sick or sumthin’? Bad blood?”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Reed looked up, his head at an unnatural angle. He smiled creepily.

[i:42eeeb6270]“I’m not Reed.”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Marco’s face fell as the thing revealed itself in it’s fullest, stepping from the illusion as the “mirage-Reed” dissolved.

Gauge went for his pistol.

[i:42eeeb6270]“FUCK! Nosferatu! Hit ‘im!”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Too late.

Stillman moved impossibly fast for such a crippled frame. He spun Marco against the far wall, crushing his chest with his forearm. His paper-like, crumbling white face opened gleefully as he revealed his fangs. Marco had only enough time to whimper as the Nosferatu took his life.

Gauge fired off three shots, cursing as the wraith-like freak just soaked the impact.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Fuck you!”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Stillman turned letting Marco’s body fall.

He nodded to Gauge, then the open doorway.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Run!”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Gauge didn’t need encouragement. However the clean getaway was exactly the opposite. Stepping out of thin air, and into his nightmares came something far worse than the Nosferatu. It stood easily over six feet. Naked, and sexless thanks to the advanced decay it sported. It’s baleful eyes displaying a genuine love for the fear in Gauge’s eyes.

When it spoke, Gauge’s bestial instincts kicked in, loosening his bladder.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Going somewhere?”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Gauge landed hard on the floor under the bag, the lowest curve of the canvas stained a dark red from the contents inside.

Stillman nodded to the zombie-like figure. [i:42eeeb6270]“Carious, they’re working for K. He’ll know where to find her. I just want the bag.”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Carious smiled understanding.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Fine, take it. And Stillman?”[/i:42eeeb6270]

The Nosferatu turned towards the Samedi.

[i:42eeeb6270]“Yeah?”

“We’re even.”[/i:42eeeb6270]

Stillman nodded, pulling the bag from the ceiling, showering the floor with a large segment of the plaster as he dragged it across the room.

He ripped the bag open, the contents spilling out.

Pace was somewhere between consciousness and unconsciousness. His swollen eyes opened weakly. Stillman took a bloodbag from his ragged pocket, pushing it to Pace’s lips.

[i:42eeeb6270]“You took a beating, kid. Drink up, looks like you need it.”

“Stillman? That you?”[/i:42eeeb6270] He choked on the blood, spraying the unoffended Nosferatu in the face.

[i:42eeeb6270]“What took you so long?” [/i:42eeeb6270] He swallowed, grinned, then passed out.

Stillman grinned at his friend, [i:42eeeb6270]“got stuck in traffic”[/i:42eeeb6270].

Gauge screamed as Stillman left the room, disappearing into a grate with his friend under his powerful arm.

((awesome !

OH MY! I've been hit with a feast of reading pleasure today!! Got up feeling like H**L and now I'm feeling positively human! :shock:

I'm going back for seconds!! :shock: :shock:

((torrie bitch K who is that then ? hmmm

((Wait and see