Rash Decisions

(AUTHOR NOTE: The latter part of this chapter has been altered.)

A boisterous-looking young man walked through the subway station as he whistled to himself a playful tune.

He had a nonchalant expression and his hands in his pocket, yet his walk seemed confident and carefree.

On his torso was a yellow shirt with a few symbols on the back and long cargo shorts along with a pair of cheap slippers one could buy at their local dollar tree for 99 cents.

The subway that day was crowded, people walking in every direction and sprouting conversations all around the young man, but it seemed he had something else in mind.

"20 from cleaning the toilets, 10 from mowing the lawns, 30 from helping with the manual labor, and..." Leon began to count in his head, his eyes moving around in thought.

"Only 5 from washing those dishes. Che! That cheap old bastard. If he had given me 10 like normal, I would have had this month's rent." He indulged in his anger for a few seconds longer before taking a deep breath and closing his eyes for a few seconds.

"Well... I guess there's no other choice." A grim expression shadowed his face.

"Since worst has come to worst, I will have to-" He paused, not wanting to finish his sentence as if he was devastated.

"-not buy the next volume of One Piece this week." He said to himself with utter gloom as his shoulders quickly drooped in and his atmosphere changed to one of depression.

As he neared his bus station, Leon realized that the crowded atmosphere of people from before had lightened up a lot.

Looking around, there was barely anybody around anymore.

To his right near the subway rails however, he found himself looking at a group of people crowding over the edge of the rails.

The chattering crowd piqued his curiosity as he immediately began to make his way to the midst of the crowd to look over the edge.

While he walked he made sure to see how long it was going to be before his subway arrived.

About 2 minutes, so he had enough time to investigate.

After 30 seconds or so he made his way through the crowd which seemed to be getting louder by the second.

"Somebody do something!"

"How did this happen!? What the hell is going on!"

*SCREAM*

Hearing this caused Leon's heart to pace a little faster for some reason, as some bad thoughts sprung up in his head.

Finally, he made it to the edge where he saw an elderly man who had fallen down onto the rails of the subway track.

His eyes opened wide as he quickly surveyed the scene in front of him.

The old man's left leg was completely broken and lopsided with his pants drenched with blood.

The look on his face was terrifying, he was clearly in agonizing pain.

Leon knew that there were tunnels down in the subway-tracks where people could shelter if they happened to fall down there, but there was no way the old man was going to be able to make his way all the way into those tunnels, especially not with a leg as badly injured as that.

In that moment, Leon's heart felt as though it would burst out of his chest.

Adrenaline filled blood pumped throughout his body, and for some reason, all of his thoughts vanished as if something else had taken over.

Without thinking for more than a few seconds after arriving at the scene, he jumped into the tracks and quickly pulled the man up, wrapping his limp arm around his shoulder as he held him up to his feet.

Finally, Leon looked back up at the top of the edge where over 50 people had gathered around.

Out of nowhere he was assaulted with a barrage of bright, flickering lights that impeded his vision, even causing him to get a little bit dizzy.

"No one else helped…" The old man barely managed to say to him with a weak and raspy voice.

It seemed that he had been stuck down there for quite a while.

Leon turned his head back to the crowd.

He saw several people with their phones out, some even laughing as they recorded the incident.

The old man's words stung, but Leon knew that rage wasn't going to help him in this situation.

He tried to lift the man up but he was simply too weak.

Looking at the ridge of the tracks in front of him, there was no way he was going to be able to lift the old man over it by himself.

"WILL SOMEBODY HELP ME!?" He screamed at the top of his lungs to garner some sort of humanity from the people in front of him, but no one ceased their videos and hysterical screams.

The thing that infuriated Leon the most was the look on their faces… pity. It was fucking pity. Leon seethed at the fact that these pathetic people would pity him, when they could just help him instead.

There wasn't much time left, so Leon decided he would give his all before dying for such a stupid reason.

Digging his feet firm into the ground he lifted the man up above him.

His limbs were all shaking uncontrollably, veins protruding out of his face and neck.

Before he could push him over the edge, however, his strength suddenly faded and his body went limp.

He fell flat onto the tracks as the old man fell on top of him, making a bone crunching noise that covered his body with goosebumps.

All of the air was forced out of his lungs and he could barely see anything with all the flashing lights in front of him.

At that moment, the sound of the subway train quickly approaching entered his ears.

It felt as though reality had hit him. Was he the dumb one in this situation?

Should he have let this old man die?

In fact, why did he jump to his rescue in the first place?

By the time he thought of all of these questions, the subway was already mere meters away.

There was nothing he could do.

*SPLAT*