Mirrored Faucet

Kage released the man's restraints letting the body collapse onto the concrete, shattering its nose in the process.

Without a second glance, Kage proceeded onto the ladder, unlatching the top cover. Exiting into the doctor's garage, he prepared himself to head back out into the stormy May weather. The building had changed little since his last outing here. Some newer chairs, without their stuffing leaking out, as well as more relics were repaired since, including an accordion sporting mounds of wrapped duct tape around its bass register.

Judging from the array of never-ending shelves filled from top to bottom, Arthur had a selection he would never grow tired of. Yet, he was nearing bloodshot in each of his dozens of eyes due to the stress placed upon him by one child.

Before he could bear the weight of more ceaseless noise, Kage fled to the confines of Arthur's now shared bathroom sketched to its cramped four feet by five width and length.

There he could rest, alleviating his world to the rhythm of the leaky faucet.

Drip…

Drip…

Drip…

No more words. No more wretch inducing faces infiltrated by bugs.

Alone at last.

Kage peered at the mirror. It was a quick glance. He hated mirrors after all. He hated what he looked like. But he wore a mask here hiding that hideous mug of his father's.

Nothing was his own. Not those eyes, not the ever-elongating hair, especially not his strength. Despite the years, the memory of that firm grip of his father remained buried under some rubble. Kage stole away as a cheap knock off just with more power to hurt thus causing pain.

Drip… Drippity..

Drip…

Drippity… drip…

Drip..

With great effort he raised a palm to cup the bottom tip of the wooden board in front of his face. Another burst of great energy shakily withdrew it, nervously displaying his own face back to himself. What he saw was a clone before him, one that could take his place if he only whispered an approval.

Was he ready?

Was it time?

Then, the face he thought was a clone reacted the same as he expressed.

Winking his left then the right eye, sticking his tongue to the bottom left of his lip, scrunching up his nose then brow he surmised it to be indeed his face.

There was no clone…

Yet.

But just as Kage felt the need to leave the mirror alone, the mirror's face provoked him. An all-too-common smirk spread on the lips of this demon plastered in his image. Its lips crawled out determined to spread into a toothy grin that lengthened the end of its chin.

Transfixed, Kage gripped onto the sink's counter molding his fingertips into the Silestone. Finally, the clone pushed against the glass, desiring to be freed from its prison. It wanted to see the true world instilling its tyranny to the masses.

The truth was nearly out. Although the devil had been unchained, the presence couldn't manifest its body completely. It was on limited warranty and consequently angered by the prospect.

Its fingers pressed into the glass pushing outward warping the surface into itself. Suddenly, Kage found the strength crashing his knuckles into the mirror shattering it. Over and again, he splintered the bits into thinner pieces until all that survived was on the floor or scattered into the flesh on his hands.

Drip…

Drip…

Drip…

Everything went back to normal just as they were supposed to retain. Kage was himself without difference.

Nothing had changed and there was much to be done.

No going back, only forward. That's what reality was from that point on to the frightened youth. Reality was the day after this one and then the next and the next after that one.

A knock on the door brought Kage's attention back to the outside world. There was more than himself to worry about in the end.

Opening the door, Kage found himself face to face with the bug man, Arthur. "I see ya done and broke some mo' shit o' mine. Get the fuck out!" Kage left the room to be led by the owner into the main living room. At least it was the closest description for the area they stood in, as it was the only viable room unsullied by the stench of septic, gore, or sterilized steel.

As he was seated in the mucus-colored cushion of a chair propped up by four wobbly legs, Kage's attention couldn't be held. For some reason nothing in this "house" felt real. It was like the center of a typhoon where everything crashed to be maimed around him. Yet here he remained untouched accompanied by a silence which could snap into the screams once more at the drop of a hat.

This inability to relax produced itself on the surface of his body. Heavy bags sagged highlighting the branches of red in his bloodshot eyes.

Arthur noticed the tick to the boy faster than Kage realized himself. When he sat down the only thing Kage's right foot did was bounce in motion to the drum of an activated engine. The curl of his lips as his tongue flopped into the open air to glisten them in saliva. A need for something to suck on and inhale into his lungs quenching an unbeatable thirst.

Further, Kage looked, eventually falling on a stained-glass window that lay to the left of the main entrance. It speckled its shiny brilliance across the floor glazed into the image of the Holy Mary, her head graced by the touch of God. A silent prayer snagged in his mind then was blown out in a brief huff clouding the chilly air before his mouth.

The doctor broached the subject with the boy, "How many more?"

Kage did not address the words. Staying silent in his afterglow of lingering violence.

"Aye, I asked ya, boy!" His vision leaked out the corner of his eye giving Arthur the barest of acknowledgement. "We at twelve, is that it? Did ya get wha' ya wanted?"

The lucky twelve were chosen with extreme precision. They began with the initial suspect mentioned by the detectives outside of Lisa's hospital room. Soon after his capture Kage took to work drawing out names of those above him, all of them except their boss. The elusive key to the lock.

Hours of surveillance took in account the executives determining those with near nothing to their names to be prime targets. Histories of suicide attempts, drug addiction, depression, hits which could be easily deluded into spilling information. Then, came those like today. Things with a stronger fortitude which needed to be broken before proceeding. At last landing that key onto the palm of Kage's hand.

Although Arthur did not possess the face to give off a hint to his emotional state, he did have a voice full of accent but etched in feeling. In that feeling was a worry unlike any other, not for himself or even the amassing number kept in his basement each day but for a familiar story proceeding to play out in his very abode. In that story, Arthur knew that if he coasted along at this trajectory it would end with a mayhem he wouldn't dare to hypothesize.

Losing sight of the window, Kage responded, "I have everything I can get from these pawns. A bit more is what's left. I'll be getting that last amount soon, no, there's no point in waiting… Tonight. Tonight, I'll get what I need then leave." Staring into the center of Arthur's hundreds of eyes a slight blister formed in the bunch. It was an indication of a tear attempting to crawl out, tears which were impossible.

"Then, ya gonna wind up like ya did on mah doorstep, huh!?" Arthur shook the room with his stomp on the floor. The shaking even wobbled the window of Mary. "Near death and blazing with pain from the knife wounds I saw… That happenin' again? Better not!" A click echoed in the room as Arthur's wings brushed against one another forming a hump to the back of his shirt.

Kage stood unthreatened and unperturbed by the bask of truth spat from the doctor. "I'll be leaving now, Arthur… See you later." He walked to the main entrance casting his eyes to the carpeting only to take in the sloppy stain spread all over it. It was dark, grimy and forever uncleanable. The evidence of his brush with death on their second encounter together. The first time he had tortured someone was difficult, but Arthur begrudgingly abided in lending a hand, guiding the boy through the correct demeanor to apply pressure to vital points in a subject's body. He corrected the boy's mistakes, turning the time into a teaching experience. Yet, throughout the whole event, Kage knew that the doctor was cringing in disgust, he was bound by code to provide aid to any and all things that passed him in need.

In the midst of his single-track mind, Kage came to an approval of the doctor. For some reason, perhaps guilt more than anything, Arthur abandoned his morals as well as his identity for Kage's cause. But a hand caught his bicep mid step, Arthur stared deeply into the expanse of the river in the boy's eyes. There he didn't know whether he could see a difference, but a burning spark rose out from the dark sludge manifesting within his core.

Kage opened his mouth only to be silenced as the cold grip of steel aroused his nerves. What lay in his outstretched hand dulled the floor a black shadow as its thirst lay unsated thus crying for sustenance. Chambered with five .45 bullets, a home for each, awaiting departure, the Taurus Revolver weighed tremendously in the palm of the boy.

Attempting to pursue the meaning, Kage was smacked by the stoicism beholden on Arthur. His very demeanor exaggerated to a seriousness unlike what Kage witnessed throughout his life.

"You bring 'em back… He a child, so ya bring em back, boy."

Tossing a coat on, he threw the gun into its pocket, hopefully to never be produced but always at his side in the event of the possibility. Hurriedly, Kage took up the backpack he arrived with, resting in its shallowly lit corner to the left of the main entrance, then cracked the door open a sliver.

Inhaling the moisty air of pollutants, he jumped from the step into the crashing tide of the day. Slowly becoming one with the explosive rounds of water blasting the world.

While the door fell on its final creak, a hunched over Arthur tinkered with a doll.

Its leg had shattered into bits of china.

Perhaps he could fix it.