The lights of the SUV crushed under Burke's bulk begin flashing spastically, protesting the fat man landing unceremoniously right on top of the engine. The car begins to bleed motor oil as if it were pissing itself and the alarm wails away into the night, warbling at no one who particularly cares. Burke collapses to the ground with a groan, leaving a long bloodstain on the twisted metal.

Burke's heavies, secure behind the locked doors of their own SUV, peer out of the windows with pure terror on their faces. Torn between helping their leader and just driving out of the campus at full speed, the heavies are left paralyzed by indecision.

Carl smirks confidently to himself, shirt and blazer in tatters thanks to his tussle with Burke. Pretty boy doesn't look any worse for wear though. Having his clothes ripped up just means that Carl is parading about in all his shirtless glory, showing off his well sculpted abs and lean figure. Even the hits Burke scored on Carl have left "artistic" looking injuries. Nothing as unseemly as gaping wounds or ugly bruises. The minor scratches and slight bloodstains merely make Carl look more manly and warrior like.

"How in the world does he do that?" I shake my head in disbelief.

"Shouldn't you be thinking about yourself right now?" Maus's retort interrupts my grumbling.

I click my tongue at Maus's words. Fleeing now as she suggests is incredibly risky, since it would put me in the firing line of the remaining hitmen. Good sense is telling me to wait the situation out, to allow Carl to wipe out the last of the intruders before I come out of hiding.

The gravel crunches under Carl's feet as he advances on Burke, ready to finish the fat man off. Burke manages to stagger to his feet and I can tell that the fight is already over. Burke's face is completely stained with blood and there's pieces of glass puncturing his skin. Fat man can't even stand up straight before keeling over again and falling flat on his bum. That last blow Carl delivered must have trashed Burke's sense of balance. Burke simply doesn't realize yet that he's finished.

"Attack ... attack ..." Burke gurgles with the last of his strength, a sausage like finger pointing at Carl.

And with that command the demeanor of the remaining hit squad changes entirely. All hesitation is lost and the heavies literally pounce out of their SUV ready for combat. The hit squad blazes ineffectually away at Carl, while Pretty Boy's soul weapon dances with deadly grace, deflecting and turning aside the tidal wave of lead assailing him.

"Holy shit!" I hiss as Carl's soul weapon slashes one of the bullets at an angle, drawing a shower of sparks that nearly blinds me. My instincts scream at me to dodge and I throw myself to the side, feeling burning heat slashing across my cheek.

I hit the ground hard, a slick wetness dripping off my face. Dark spots stain the ground and Maus stares at me wordlessly, her tiny black coal eyes observing me with interest.

"What happened?" I murmur, the numbing pain taking over my face making it difficult to speak.

"Destiny." Maus says with surprising gentleness as she traces the wound on my cheek with a forepaw. My blood marks those little rat toes as I stare hypnotized. Everything seems so vivid now, my blood becoming a neon highlight in the darkness.

"Do you want to rest now, Robert?" Maus whispers treacherously in my ear. The incessant metallic racket of Carl deflecting bullets rages on, nothing more than background noise.

"Rest? No. I need to escape. To live." I manage to push the words out as strength begins to leave my body. Weakness seeps into my bones and every cell within me is telling me one thing. That the time has come for me to lie down and sleep.

Forever.

"Can't be." I grit out, banging my head into the ground, "The wound is nothing more than a nasty scratch. How can it have this effect on me?"

"You're doing what comes naturally to you." Maus remorselessly continues, "I warned you, Robert. But you wanted to stay in the campus. To wait things out."

My sight begins to blur. I can barely see Maus now. But my blood staining her paws. That is still as clear as day.

"Help me." I reach out and my groping hands find nothing, "Please."

Maus's teeth flash in the moonlight, illuminating her vicious sneer. She's laughing at me. I know it. Maus came to watch a show and I've become tonight's entertainment for her.

"Nooooooo!" a young woman's scream echoes in the darkness around me.

"Can you hear her, Robert?" Maus mocks, "Can you hear her voice?"

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"Sara." I whimper, "Sara! Sara! Help me!"

"She mourns your death already." Maus smirks, "Your friend has no time for you."

"You bastards!" a familiar voice interrupts the fight before it breaks out again with renewed intensity.

"Boss." I groan feebly, "You're here too."

My head bows under a sadistic pressure made out of several thumping heartbeats. Carl's heart, vital and strong, a reservoir of nearly infinite strength. The goon squad, weak and nearly insignificant. Sara's heart, frightened but determined. The rhythm from Paul, open, brave and honest. And last but not least, my own heart. Slow, dying and running out of steam.

"Hoh?" Carl's infuriatingly suave voice carries over the cold wind, "You have an Awakened Soul as well, Paul?"

"What of it?" the boss snaps back and a shock wave from the fight gently ruffles my clothes.

"Why, why?" Sara sobs from somewhere I can't see, "Why did everything have to turn out like this?"

Help me, help me! I want to scream at the top of my voice. But no one can hear. No one cares. I'm left dying in the bushes with a talking rat leering down at me. And all because of a scratch on my face.

Burke's dead heart. Cold, heavy. Soon I will be like him.

"You were meant to die tonight, Robert." Maus says as she prepares to leave, "Though you've managed to provide me with some excitement at least. For that I will pray that you find some peace."

You asshole. You fucking rat asshole. Never meant to help me in the first place, did you? I'll squash you, squash you with my fist, if its the last thing I do. Squash you until your heart goes silent and -

And

And

I can't hear Maus's heart.

I've never been able to hear Maus's heart.

She's dead. Like Burke.

"And what about it?" Maus asks rhetorically.

I recall Bart's words to me. Outlast the purge cycle. Manage to do that and you'll outlast death itself.

"Is that what you truly want?" Maus asks spreading her forepaws wide, my sticky blood forming a thin thread between them.

"That's enough, Carl!" Paul shouts in the darkness, "I won't let you hurt my family's retainers anymore."

"As I recall, it was Burke here who attacked me first." Paul sighs, "What do you expect me to do?"

"Burke's dead! Look at what you did to him." Paul snaps in anger, "At least let his men collect the body and leave in peace."

"Stop trying to cover for your family." Carl's voice is deadpan.

"I never wanted this." Paul snarls, "I was trying to find Burke all evening, to try to call this pointless feud off! But now -"

"Now its too late." Carl concludes.

"I refuse to believe that." Paul retorts with great intensity, "I promised to Sara and Robbie that we would live peacefully!"

"Robbie ..." Sara sobs.

"What will you do, Robert?" Maus asks again. Somewhere nearby, Paul and Carl continue their shouting match and generating drama.

"At any rate," Carl smirks, "You can't keep that promise anymore, Carl. And that young miss has seen too much."

"I won't let you hurt her!" Paul yells.

"I don't plan to." Carl frowns back, "But she can't be allowed to leave here unattended. Or go back to her regular life."

"What are you going to do to me?" Sara retreats backward in fear.

"Sara, I'm afraid Carl is right." Paul reluctantly admits, "You know our secret. I should have never let you get involved."

"So one of us needs to take custody of you, young miss." Carl flatly elaborates.

"Let's go, Sara." Paul tiredly says, "I'm sure you've seen enough death for one night."

"Death that your family caused." Carl smoothly answers, "Don't think I've forgotten how you're still trying to help your family retainers escape."

"Paul, I don't know ..." Sara murmurs uncertainly.

"Please, Sara, give me a chance to explain." Paul urgently reassures, "Things are complicated."

"What's so complicated?" Carl whistles amusedly, "For instance, I'm not the one launching terror attacks at schools. Its clear who is the safer choice for the young miss."

"Will you shut up?" Paul finally snaps in exasperation.

"Let the young miss decide for herself." Carl says to Paul. "Stop pressuring her."

"Sara," Paul replies after some hesitation, "Which one of us do you want to go with? Me or Carl?"

"What is your choice, Robert?" Maus leans close to me, her cold, dead heart beckoning like an abyss, "Let me hear it."

To live is to accept the inevitability of death. Two sides of the same coin, that is all it is. If it is my destiny to die tonight, then I will accept that fate.

So that I can live again.

That is the essence of the purge cycle.

My hand reaches out and Maus offers me the sticky crimson thread held in her forelegs. Forged out of my own blood, the thread glitters with precocious light. Beautiful and terrible at the same time. The thread of my destiny, demanding that I live so that I could die for this very moment.

My index finger reaches out and with the guttering embers of my strength, I snap the sticky red thread with finality. My heart howls in despair as the thread governing its fate is severed forever. And like a useless thing, my body and soul rejects the heart, letting it die, screaming, howling at me for refusing my ordained purpose. Pain floods my body, yet it feels like pure ecstasy. This is the agony of release.

"Through death, reject the purge cycle." Maus pronounces grandly, "Through life, accept the finite nature of your existence."

I squirm in the dirt, screaming mute curses at the suffering suffusing every piece of my existence.

"You have committed a great sin, Robert." Maus intones, "Rejecting your immortal soul. You will never enjoy the privilege of reincarnation ever again. Your next death will be your final one."

The stars shine bright on me, searing themselves into my corneas. This is judgment. Judgment on me for committing the unspeakable. For crossing a red line that should never be crossed. Maus continues her speech, raising both forelegs to the sky like a preacher.

"Yet as long as you do not die, your flesh will endure. It will endure even beyond the end of this world. That is the nature of the profane bargain you have entered into."

"You set me up." I gasp in agonized breaths, "You lured me into doing this."

"Your mind was ready. It had tired of countless reincarnations." Maus states coldly, "That was why you can see and understand me."

I curl up in a fetal position, sweating profusely, every pore bleeding filthy dirt. As if my body was cleansing itself of impurities to ready itself for rebirth.

"Outlast the purge cycle." Maus repeats like a mantra. "And through that, you will become like me. Outlasting death."

"Forever and ever."