(Davian's P.O.V)

The cold was barely noticeable. I inched in through the backdoor as the breeze ruffled my clothes once more. I looked behind me to make sure I wasn't being followed. They weren't expecting me to come but I couldn't be too sure. They knew I was dangerous and I had a reputation for not letting shit slide and this...this was...

"Fuck."

I muttered, leaning on a post and letting the weight of emotion push me to the ground. My eyes burned with unshed tears. This, this was too much man.

"You need to get up."

I slapped myself on the cheek, psyching myself up for what needed to be done. My knees gave out and I stretched out my legs, looking up and allowing the tears to fall.

"Real men don't cry. They blame it on onions or the Lakers winning."

I chuckled, remembering what Nick always said whenever he got too sappy from rewatching Friends. I swear, never met a niggah that...

There was a ruffle from over the fence as I heard Max begun to bark before going silent. I immediately stiffened when torch light started shining through the small chain link fence.

"There's nothing there man, Max is tripping as usual."

Marc's voice was easily identifiable. 

"Yo Dre, check your dog before I put a bullet through the one eyed freak."

There was a scuffle before I heard the solid thump of a fist landing on a body.

"Don't call him a freak!"

Andre yelled back.

"Hey! Hey! Stop this shit right now before Papa hears you two fuckwits."

Serena, Andre's sister and our 'girl's manager' said. She was and wasn't a pimp. She liked to call herself a 'proprietor of pussy'. Shit used to make me laugh before I went in and did time. We even used to have a little something going on in the past.

Now...all I could feel was hatred for Papa Fred and his kind. 

The torch disappeared and I heard them all enter the house. Tensions were high right now but it didn't seem as if they knew that I had survived. That I had gotten out of the apartment alive. That I only had a bullet on my shoulder but was relatively okay. That I was okay only because Nick shielded me with his body. 

I wrapped my fingers around my trusty Colt 1911 and removed it from my pocket, only slightly wincing at the pain in my shoulder. The blood was leaking from the hasty glued wound and I could still feel the bullet inside my flesh in the middle of the arm and chest. 

I breathed heavily, studying the gun in my hand under the waning light of the moon. Then I grabbed it and placed it right next to my temple, clenching my jaw. I could do it here...right now. I could end it all. 

A shot to the head and a release from this life. It would be so easy. I wasn't afraid of death. What I was afraid of, was living. Living without the most important person in my life. Bitches came and left, Nick always stuck by me. I was content to hustle for money the dirty way. Hitting up liquor stores with Dre and Marc before Papa Fred decided we were ready for the real shit. 

Nick never abandoned me. Even when I pushed him away. 

Fuck. All those memories reminded me of why I couldn't pull the trigger. In many ways, Papa and the Gang had been a family but Nick, Nick had been real. Nick had been the brother I never deserved. And after taking a fall for Dre over allegations about an attempted Manslaughter, he had finally convinced me to get out. 

And I had agreed. I got out and my so called family tried to off me. It wasn't anything personal either. Once you're in this life, getting out wasn't easy. But...they made it personal when they took out my best friend.

That's why I couldn't let shit go. No. Most of the gang were not around. I had made sure of that. I knew how to stall them. They were over at 6th street owing to a call about our rival gang being spotted around our turf. But the ring leaders, the ones who mattered were around.

I got to my feet and cocked the gun, slowly releasing it. You would be surprised at how much noise the cocking handle makes. I stretched my neck, swallowing the grunt of pain at the agony on my shoulder. Slowly unlatching the hatch holding the backyard door closed, I snuck in. I knew this place like the back of my hand. 

Max was on me in a second.

"Shh boy...go get it." I threw the piece of meat out into the street and watched the hound run after the tasty treat. He trusted me and would be knocked out for about 10 minutes. Somehow that felt worse than what I was planning.

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I secured the hatch and slowly walked towards the house. The stair boards creaked when I stepped on them, before I finally reached the door step. The buzzer did not work. 

Papa Fred usually made about 50k a week but he still chose to live frugally. Most of our...sorry. Most of the gang's money was spent on the corrupt cops on his payroll. I also made sure to send a little gift to some high profile news channel about just how dirty the arm of the law was. By trying to kill me, Papa had caused what he was trying to avoid.

I knocked on the door two times without a response. Andre and Marc were probably high already and lazing around on the couch while...I looked at my watch. Yup, Papa was probably watching game highlights as was his daily routine. Which meant...I felt someone make their way to the door while complaining.

"I know y'all can hear me Andre. You better not show your fucking..."

Serena's words cut off once she opened the door and found a gun pointing towards her forehead. Then she looked at the person holding the gun. My cold dead eyes stared back unflinchingly.

Serena's breath hitched. Guilt and fear warred inside her eyes.

"Davi...?"

I pulled the trigger and blew her brains out. The shot rang out through the house and I had scrambling feet.

"Serena!"

Papa Fred's voice was usually deep and menacing but today it sounded panicked and rushed.

I raised a hand and waited. The next person to come running towards the door was Marc. See, I've never really liked Marc. And Marc knew it. The second he saw me, he said,

"Shit."

And tried to roll away. 

A scream of gut wrenching, ball bursting pain escaped him because, well...I had shot his balls off. 

"Marc!"

Andre showed up just as Max begun to bark once more outside the fence. 

Andre saw Marc bleeding out on the floor and his sister dead under my feet and scrambled for his gun in anger, uncaring that I had one pointed at his face. Andre was a bit of an idiot.

A large hand grabbed him and pulled him over the corner. Another shot rang out as my bullet managed to graze his shoulder and his cries of pain begun.

"Papa...Papa its Davi! Davian is alive!"

I could clearly hear the distress in his voice. 'Yes, you ugrateful prick, I'm alive.'

"Davian! Impossible!"

Papa Fred's voice came out of the corner.

"Fred what..."

Serena's mom, Missus M and Serena's younger sister appeared from another room.

"Martha! Get out of here now!"

Papa was quick to say and Martha obliged with a scared look on her face. I had a clear shot of her back. All I had to do was pull the trigger and I could cause Papa the same pain of losing family that he had put me through. 

I breathed out and let them run through the front door. I was a monster but only to those who crossed me.

"I'm disappointed Papa. You used to tell us you were in the Marines yet... you're huddling behind the kitchen counter like a little bitch."

I taunted, digging my hand inside my pockets and bringing out the little surprise I had brought with me.

"You're a dead man Davi! I will make you scream you little shit. I'll fuck you up like I fucked your whore mother! I'll shove a broken piece of bottle up your ass and cut off your dick and balls you fuckturd!"

I tsked.

"So many profanities. Where is the refined businessman who wears the hide of a crook? Oh my bad, guess it's the other way huh?"

"Please Davi! Don't kill..."

Andre started to say before I heard a resounding slap.

"Shut the fuck up you useless piece of shit!"

I stepped over Serena's cooling corpse and arrived next to Marc who was trembling and lying on a pool of his own shit and blood. I put a bullet through his brains in disgust. His body slumped on to the ground. Max had suspiciously gone silent, I didn't hear any barking on the outside. The tasty treat had been laced with a knockout drug.

I stepped over Marc's dead body.

"So I've been thinking, Pops. I never really got to tender my resignation. I'm thinking of trying out a new career path. Subway's hiring and although I hear the pay ain't that good, it's honest work."

The door to the bathroom was now next to me. I knew Papa Fred. Fucker had a lot of patience. Too bad today it wasn't going to save him. I pulled the pins off the grenades I had been carrying then begun to count to 5 seconds.

At 3, I threw them towards the Kitchen before entering the Bathroom and jumping into the bathtub.

"Fuu!!"

I heard his voice as he realized my little surprise. The the curse was replaced by a loud boom that messed with my ears, left them ringing as I struggled to even breath.

Dust covered the entire room and a chunk of the door was missing. I stumbled past the debris and made my way to the Kitchen, gun at the ready. 

What I saw was nothing but burnt body parts that smelled like badly cooked meat. I couldn't even distinguish who was who.I bent down and saw a piece of an eye. It was blackened but I thought the eye was staring at me in anger and bitterness. 

I spit on his remains as I felt the anger and hate in me abate a little. Just a little mind you. I was still mad and I wanted to make them all pay. 

The back door was slammed open as the rest of my former gang walked in with guns. The pin from the third grenade dropped onto the floor as I turned around.

"Hey boys, what took your asses so long?"

::---------------------------------------::

As I lay there, feeling the cold metal of the bullets inside my upper body and the burn in the wounds left by a missing leg, arm and a huge chunk of my left chest, I couldn't help but think about all the mistakes I had made. The crime life was all I had known and now it was poetically the thing that led to my downfall.

The pain was unbearable, however I couldn't help but feel a sense of relief wash over me. My best friend was gone and the gang I had once called my family was now nothing but a distant memory. I had carried out my vow to avenge him and now it was time for me to pay the price.

Darkness begun to take over, clouding my vision completely until I saw nothing...felt nothing. I let go of life. My soul detached from my body. It was all so light. Light and heavy at the same time. Then I begun to see something once more. A red hole that occupied center stage in the darkness. A darkness I wasn't sure I was alone in.

The red portal beckoned me and I knew that my fate was sealed. It was an instinctual feeling. I was headed straight to hell, but I accepted it with grim determination. The crimes I had committed, the lives I had ruined, the pain I had caused - all of it weighed heavily on my conscience.

But even as I spread out my hands (if I had any) and allowed the pull, I couldn't help but feel a twinge of regret. Perhaps if I had made different choices, if I had sought redemption earlier, things could have ended differently. My background was a contributing factor but it shouldn't have been an excuse. But it was too late now. The only thing left for me was to face my punishment with as much dignity as I could muster.

And so, I took my last breath and passed through the portal, ready for whatever lay ahead. Hell may have been my destination, but it was also my penance for a life of crime.