I tread towards him with little care. His face is behind the faint street light, gleaming bleak yellow as before, they shine the edges of his butch cut brown. But I can still see him clenching his teeth behind tensing expressions, especially so around the corner of his lip.
The small percentage of my senses not occupied in sucking in every last drop of adrenaline or issuing imaginations of the pain tomorrow morning.
The little part of it is telling me to drop it. The kid didn't do shit, didn't instigate any, didn't participate, and it won't be easy explaining why I struck a tenth street to the old bastards at Glasgow. But another side of the twisted logic hits me. And the wicked track this train of thoughts goes sends a shiver to both sides of my jaw.
"Come on....They almost got me, didn't they?" The scream is still continuing behind me as if the squeal of tires before a car crashes while mine sounded just like its futile breaks.
The kid steps his left foot off the street, now blocking half of the streetlight and exit. The shadow lengthens an even more pathetic threat in my next step.
How would he explain to the rest of his world that he was the only one untouched in a skirmish his friend started? I thought to myself, and stepped aloofly into the excuse as much as it is a lie to my knowing.
"What's your excuse? Prettier face? Tenderer skin? Got school tomorrow?" Only after the remark left my mouth and four and a half steps away do I realize how true it is. He's much younger than the rest. At most about 17, and his eyes are more than telltale. Those aren't of frighten. More on hesitation, a special kind of ambivalent. And it grips me by the throat and forces me off the rage I was in like a cold shower.
I know the look. It's a well in the middle of the ocean, a swallow, the center of numb is a deep and bottomless pit of self-conflicting emotions like a swell of all the doubtfulness and vile thoughts in the same pot. He's never taken a life, and is in the process of convincing himself. Most importantly, there's a devoid of fear. It's a matter of choice not opposition. My line of sight rolls down to the hand in pocket.
It's easy to look at the end of a muzzle when there's nothing you can do. But trying not to blink is impossible, and the fear in mind manifests under such scenario. He's about four steps away, possibly with a finger inside the trigger guard.
Think, think for fuck's sake!
Is it possible to be faster than the pulp? With my hands still on guard, which one's faster? Left or right?
Neither.
He'd be faster if it's really a gun, the only chance being some kind of miracle the first shot does not put me off commission.
Fat motherfucking chance.
If he decides to shoot me while the piece's still in pocket I would drop dead before reaching a meter radius.
Well, get him to pull the tool out then.
And I ain't got better choices, I need to assume...shit, I'm already assuming whatever he's holding would off me. I need him to give initiative first.
I let go of my hands, let them fall naturally by the waistband of my jacket.
"Where you get those silvers from boy?" I keep the shiver under my skin and tone as subsided as possible but his reactions are almost nonexistent. "Eugene?" No reaction. "Arseny?" A shock grazes his eyes but he forces off all the reactions on his face as it grows colder.
Nicely done lad.
"That dull fuck Igor who can't even make a parrot laugh?" I move my left foot forward slightly. Now he's wavering with a tilt of brow and a very well hidden squint as if trying to recognize me. But that ain't entirely good news since I spot a twitch by his left pocket as something pokes near his jacket's zipper. I let out a meek smile in tiredness all over my face.
"Igor, Igor... did you stay under his wing after initiation?" As composed as he's been for this long, those dark brown pupils behind shadow tilt to my left for a blink then a stiffness by the outline of his chin stretches. "Shit, what am I talking about." I let out a wide grin and moved my right foot forward past my left. Now three steps away, barely good enough for a kick's reach.
"You haven't got your cherry pop, have you? No X on none of the pieces." Cling on the hemp rope string on his wrist accompanied by the quick open and close lips indicates he's nearing the breaking point.
X as in Roman number. On the silver pieces of Tenth Street's, numbers above 10 are usually some very nasty accomplishment. The kid's got his shit together after watching his mates getting their heads chipped in, but still way too fucking young and oblivious.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
"And if you were one of his strays, doesn't that mean," Now for the final push. "You ain't even tenth street. Just another mongrel fucking orphan." I know how those words cut you. I know very well if it hits, it will string you up by the neck and brand you with fire and burning iron for the rest of your paranoid life.
And it landed perfectly.
Eyes on fire he shouts something indecipherable with his left hand pulling a stick of iron out of the pocket. By the size, I'd say it's a 38 I thought to myself as I pull the same trick off the bag. Left foot a leap forward right leg swift forward like an axe aiming at the back of his palm approaching where I imagine it'd be holding the pistol. I lean my whole body into the kick to narrow myself and if the bullet does ignite...Well, I'd have hopes for better results.
My right leg's tibia impacts first at the back of his hand drawing forward, I can nearly see the turn of its cylinder before it got knocked off his hand, hit the wall before bouncing off to the ground. A drop of his mouth with a blink of his eyes gave me the encouragement to slide my left foot through the asphalt alley with my hands on guard next to my brows. But seeing the last finger of his left hand curling in an awkward position, I clutch my hands into fists and shift my torso along with my mass forward and back and skip forward to his arm's reach.
Now, now...let's see how well the city handled you.
Right jab as the front, aiming at the air next to his left ear but he still tilts his head back and subconsciously raises his injured left arm, the punch lands on his upper arm close to his wrist. He takes a step to the right, trying to use the small distance for an upper but my left fist's already at his throat with it being chambered back as soon as the jab was out. And with a push from my right foot tiptoeing my body forward, I perform a run-through. At the last split of second, the tenth street hinges down his chin with teeth clenching. The weight of half of my body transpired into my second knuckle, and the kid reacted with nothing but a shake of head.
Huh...kid's a touch taller.
With him still at such reach, I extend my right hand forward for a grab at his shoulder with another step forward trying to swipe him off his feet. That's when I saw the grin at close range, and something burning incredibly vivid inside those russet eyes.
It's almost poetic, seeing him regarding me as the problem of all's suffering, as his brain's survival instinct connects with his want to be off of his position. And I was, petrified to the point I almost didn't realize he's got his left hand under his jacket, probably on his belt.
Before my right leg could circle behind
he already stepped back leaving my waist exposed. Almost simultaneously, his injured left-hand locks my right arm in a tight clutch, pinning me for the slaughter.
A flip of his jacket and he's holding a 4-inch tool steel in hand. Hammer grip, leaning the blade back for a slash across my abdomen. I inhale all I can and force my body to falter back. If it did slash a wound it must've been shallow for I don't feel a thing.
But he's not stopping, the hand extends to the far reach of his arm, but the right corner of my vision. With a blink from the recurve outline of the knife's tip, he hinges the forearm forward like a piolet and drags my left arm into the stab. At the last second, I retract my right arm to block it with the price of a burning sensation at the bottom of my pinkie.
With my right palm just barely locking his wrist, we're locked in the longest seconds in my mind. I noticed his small breaths hyperventilating with those chipped lips red as hell under sufficient light, drips of sweat crossing on his rather puerile face with unmatched eyes of a brute on last breath.
The kid notices he can't overpower me with the knife in such an unpractical position so he tries to knee my kidney. To which he could barely reach, with both of our arms stretched out creating a space too far for......
I take my right foot back behind my left stand and the kid immediately responds by raising his left knee in the air to block the kick.
I hope. Sincerely, that you can still be a man after this.
I was planning for a kick, just not at his rib. With every muscle in my calf and thigh tense to the point of numbing, I send the kick directly upwards and straight. The tip of sneaker hits his groin, I feel something getting pushed in as he whimpers a broken scream before he loses the strength and voice to do so. I unclench my left fist and rotate my wrist as much as possible to the opposite side of his grab. Didn't take pounds of pressure before he releases it. Funny enough, the tenth street's first reaction was to grab between his trousers where the kick landed. And I finish my initial approach, stretch it back, and send it back with all I have.
A left hook right on his lip.
The lock is broken as he's now pulling his knife hand back out of reflexes. But my right hand's on it. A shift to the left facing exclusively his right hand, I bring my left palm on his wrist too as I rotate my right arm, flipping it upward making the knife's tip stand and his joint facing up as well.
My right elbow came vertically down on it, bending his arm while putting more pressure to both ends dragging his entire torso down with my weight leaning on it until the knife falls between his fingertips, clings a crisp ring on the asphalt surface as his hand remains wide open....and rotating outwards to escape my grasp with what I did a second ago.
I'm getting sick of this. Letting go of my right hand to slither it inside jacket, of all the things, my palm grips the ebony handle of the Zhnag dao as if it's the only thing I'm looking for. The knife's out through my jacket without resistance from the sheath or zippers.
Reverse grip slashes upward leaving a vertical slit on his running jacket and a visible cut on his forearm. Again, no resistance whatsoever, not even a drop of blood stained. I hinge the back of the blade against my forearm as if it's an extension of my body. And elbow it forward aiming at his throat. Of all resolves, the kid decides to catch it in bare palms . You dumb little shit....
By the foolhardy, the space isn't enough for a clean cut as he's practically gripping the sharp edge to stop the advance. Runs of blood from his fingertips and open cuts wash over a part of the narrow blade dribbling like a full bucket.
Irritation drills like a motherfucker, I push my left arm upon my knife grip as if choking someone. With the new pounds of force behind the blade, the running wounds on his palm shanks deeper till I can hear the sounds of seeping blood, paddling down the ground. And he does the only thing viable, back off to release the pressure but each step he takes I follow until he hits the wall with both hands gripping the blade.
The space between two faces is filled with the rusty smell of blood making me swallow the dryness in throat. The silver pieces on the hemp rope drowns a splatter of blood from its path down the wrist, they dangles between what little space left by his artery and sharp steel.
His lips agape, eyes drop, a smirk of blood smothers across his face in a parabola. But under the brink of his life, his breath, his blood loosing faster by the second. There are still fights in those dark brown eyes. Some struggle, some stubbornness of no origin.
He doesn't believe it neither.
That the end would come unannounced, and so meaninglessly. Nothing good came to you before, and so nothing bad should come before the good things start happening in your life. The mentality I'm too familiar with.
Let it be the realization or the shiver down my spine telling me I'm being watched by a third. I pull back the force on the knife, and a stable warm headlight from a black van stops two meters away, on the road, outside the alley reeking rust and soiled cloth. The driver seat window's down, a man's got his right hand on the steering wheel, left hand hanging out the window with a hammer-downed pistol. He looks bored as hell.