He'd gotten so used to sitting in place, staring at the empty streets and letting the stench of it all waft into his lungs. He'd gotten used to despair, self pity. He hadn't taken action in such a long time.
Which is why it was so unbelievable that he found himself swinging his fist into the idiots face with such energy. For once, his blood was pumping, his focus was laser sharp. Even the sting of his knuckles on the brutes face was welcome.
His victim hadn't done anything particularly wrong, at least not before he slipped into the alley after the girl, this nameless 'boy' had come doing his rounds, as he always did. He'd knocked his large callused hands on the doors of the open shops, as always. The owners had come out, put on their fakest smiles, handed him a wad of cash, a roll here, and the old woman with the roadside grocery had put a trembling hand in her discolored cloth bag to give him a crumpled note.
All this was normal, expected, after all the boy was with the Taliban, not the middle eastern powerhouses who taken control of their country, but the local taliban, a barely there gang borrowed the name to show their ferocity and ambition, in the eyes of their fiefdom.
The 'boy' hung with them, roved with them and so was assigned a neighborhood in the worst part of the worst part of the city, to collect whatever rent he could. Backed up by the taliban, the boy was untouchable.
His knuckles were getting sore, from pounding the man's face in, the boy beneath him, dazed, still bore a look of shock, like he couldn't conceive of the disrespect being shown to him. Nero wasn't stupid, he knew he'd crossed a line, and now he had to make sure the taliban boy couldn't cross back to safety.
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Dazed, it was easy to roll the nameless gangster onto his back, easier still for Nero to straddle him, wrap his inner elbow around his neck and pull, as hard as he could, as long as he could, in the closest thing he knew to a choke hold . The man shuddered, somewhere in the back of his head he must have known Nero had decided he had to die, he scratched, wheezed, the breaths came out of him in rattling wheezes. It took a surprisingly long time, Nero thought, Nero had never done this before, but he had to make sure, there was no way out, but through.
By the time he was sure, his adrenaline had settled, back down, so his arms ached from exhaustion, it was all he could do to lean onto the wall of the building as he stood, in the narrow alley the confrontation had taken place. Deeper back, he could see the wide eyes of a young woman, staring at him, backed against the very corner of the alley. He tried to raise his hand, to signal to her that she was safe, only for her to flinch.
Her eyes darted to the only exit , He was suddenly aware that he was large, and very close to blocking the only exit to the area a murder had just taken place, He stood up, suddenly on jelly legs and moved away from the entrance, allowing her to bolt away like a racehorse.
Now he was alone, in the most densely populated shanty of the city, next to a taliban corpse. He dragged himself to the dead body, and started rummaging through the pockets. Like all boys, he'd often fantasized about a thug's power, now he was surprised about their poverty. He took all the cash he could, his watch, a good fake, his chain, a terrible fake, and prepared himself to be a discrete fugitive.
He walked into the sudden blinding sunlight and found himself surrounded by a curiously quiet crowd, He raised his hands.