4 Chapter 4: Spill my Blood

Chapter 4: Spill my Blood

Third Person POV:

His head felt heavy. He had no recollection of what happened before this. There was a faint feeling of restrain on both of his hands and leg. Strapped into a sitting position, maybe tied on a chair.

He tried hard to recall something, anything would do, but he got nothing. His head was heavy but not hurt. At least he didn't seem to get smacked in the head.

Still pretended to be unconscious, he tried to analyze the situation from any sound he could hear, but...

"Sir, I know you're up. Please open your eyes." 

The tone of the voice was soft and familiar. He knew whose voice this belonged to.

He opened his eyes and was greeted by the sight of Emory standing before him.

Surprised that the one who did this was a friend, he instinctively tried to stand but failed to do so, as the restrain limited his movement. He never thought that Emory had the guts to pull off something like this.

"Emory, is this some kind of game? I'm afraid I'm not into this kind of thing." He tried to lighten up the mood with a small joke, but it didn't make the situation any more bearable.

"Leader, as much as I hope this is just a really bad joke, it isn't." 

Emory said with a bitter smile. He looked sideways to prevent Leader from reading his emotion before forcing himself to met Leader's eyes.

Leader had a very bad feeling about this. Emory looked Leader straight in the eyes. He had the look of someone who was going to break a piece of really bad news.

"Sir, You are going to... die." 

Emory placed the gun on Leader's head, making him flinched.

"I'm sorry... but... Don't forgive me..."

This was truly the worst possible situation.

"Hold on Emory! I don't understand! Are you perhaps holding a grudge against me?" Leader tried to remember if he ever offended Emory that bad, yet nothing major came to mind. Mostly just small jokes that would never offend anyone this far.

"Not at all. You treated me nicely, as much as you did to others."

"Then why?!" 

"That's..." 

Emory was going to answer the question, but his words were unable to come out.

There was a silence for a moment. Emory's gun trembling, his breathing got faster. He was looking straight to Leader's eyes, but now, his eyes were unfocused.

"...Who threatened you?" 

Emory flinched, seemed like Leader hits a bullseye. He knew how it looked like when someone had been under a threat as he had seen a lot in his life.

"Emory, You know everyone here is your friends, your comrades... We can help you!"

"There's nothing you or anyone can do about it, sir... The enemy is the highest man in this country..." 

Despair locked in Emory's eyes. His entire body shook as he tried to hide his fear. Never before Leader saw Emory scared so much as Emory would always risk his life fearlessly. It was easy to guess who the person Emory was talking about.

"...I see, it seems the king has found out that you were alive... Here I thought we hid you quite well." 

Leader chuckled but was unable to hide his nervousness.

Leader tried to think of a way to convince Emory that maybe he could help, but he knew it was futile. It was over for them the moment the king set an eye on his organization.

"But Emory... What would you accomplish by killing me? I still don't get it."

"It's either Caron or... all of you..."

"Oh god..."

Leader had now accepted his fate. He was not the type that would give up easily, but all these years of fighting and endless conflict had drained him out of his remaining strength and will to live. All he could do was to pray for his remaining comrades to survive the incoming tragedy.

"Why didn't you kill me when I was unconscious?" 

Leader asked out of curiosity. This time curiosity won't kill the cat, because the gun will.

"I want you to know that I'm your killer..."

"Why?

"So that you can curse me from your grave..."

"Oh, I will..." 

Leader chuckled. His fear subsided the moment he accepted his fate.

"Thank you." 

Emory seemed to be more than happy to accept his curse. This time he managed to steady his grips on his gun, fully prepared to pull the trigger.

"But not towards you, I'll curse the king who made you this way."

Leader's last answer had caught Emory off guard, but still, he managed to pull the trigger.

And would regret it forever.

BANG

Leader's head was now covered with red.

Emory's gun slipped from his hands and fell to the ground with a clank.

"Sir..." Emory dropped to his knees. He could see that blood started to wet the floor, but he was unable to lift his head to face Leader's lifeless eyes.

"You... You don't deserve any of this!" 

For the first time in a while, Emory cried. His tears mixed in the pool of blood under his feet.           

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Third Person POV:

"ARE YOU STUPID OR WHAT?!"

Caron's voice brought Emory back to reality. For a brief moment, he was reminded of Leader's death. It was just for a second, but he felt like an eternity had passed.

"The real enemy is the king! You're a victim!" 

Caron said while kept smacking the table.

"Would you say the same thing were the murderer someone else other than me?"

"I..." 

Caron was unable to answer that. 

Emory had admitted to his sins, so Caron decided to forgive him. However, if the murderer was someone else... Even if they had admitted to their sins, Caron would still kill them.

"Caron, you know that the king is the real enemy, but let's face it, you can't kill him, spill his blood, nor burn his corpse."

Emory's hand griped his sides. He had this habit when he got nervous.

"Emory, I..."

Caron couldn't reject it. Killing the king was next to impossible. That's why the only thing the organization could do was supporting those who were daring enough to do it. They knew they couldn't do it by themselves.

Emory paused, carefully tried to choose his next words. He wanted to choose the right word to encourage Caron to kill him.

"I can't give you justice, but I know how to relieve your hatred towards the king."

Emory stood up from his seat, took out his gun, and gave it to Caron. He then helped Caron's hand to point the gun towards his heart.

Caron's eye widened at the realization that this scenario would be unavoidable.

"Spill my blood. I have his blood in my veins after all..." 

Emory said as he smiled, a very bitter kind of smile.

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Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!

"It's useless! He was not listening to me! He was dead set on sending himself to the afterlife! Even if I refused him, he was gonna shoot himself to death in a locked room to make sure nobody could stop him!"

Caron said inside her head, panicking.

Caron spaced out, she faced Emory, but she couldn't look at him in the eyes. She tried to think of anything at all that could be a proper answer to stop a person on the brink of suicide, but nothing came to mind.

"Remember when Sergey had his sister killed by the king's soldier?"

Emory decided to provoke Caron.

"Huh?" 

The image of Sergey cried while holding his little sister's body crossed Caron's mind.

"Leader treats us like family because he was bitter that the king had executed all his children." 

The image of Leader cried silently while looking at his family album crossed Caron's mind.

"Stop it..." 

"Your mother died because the king had monopolized most doctors for his family and soldiers."

The image of her mother's dead body that had become very thin and sick laid on the bed crossed her mind.

"Emory, stop it!"

"Your father was executed for a false murder accusation. Even though later it proved to be wrong, the real murderer got spared. He could do that because he was the king himself."

The image of her father's public execution crossed Caron's mind.

"I SAID STOP IT!!"

Caron cried as she pushed Emory's back to the wall, this time pressing the gun on his head. Caron's breathing got unstable, and her pupil dilated. She had trouble controlling herself not to pull the trigger.

For some moments, the two locked in that position, neither move nor say anything... Until Emory decided to break the silence.

"Pull the trigger..." 

Emory was not resisting. His eyes closed, his body trembled, expecting a bullet lodged to his head.

"Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! I can feel that you're trembling from head to toe! You want to live! So why would you deny it?!"

"Pull the trigger!" 

Emory Insisted, not willing to conversed any further.

"Answer my question!" 

Caron cried while closing her eyes.

"Pull the trigger!"

"EMORY!!"

Their action betrayed their thought as they were lost in despair. In the end, they left their fate in the pull of a trigger.

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The night had ended with gunshots that echoed across the neighborhood.

There laid Emory, five bullets lodged to his body. Each one for every people that died in the organization.

However, Caron had held off the sixth bullet.

"Emory..."

Caron looked at the bloody gun in her hand.

"I saved the last bullet for the king."

Caron pulled the last bullet out of the magazine, the bullet was tainted in red.

"That is why... Keep living... Until the day this bullet pierces our true enemy."

Leader's curse lived inside Caron's last bullet.

Emory survived with critical wounds. Caron wouldn't let him run away to the afterlife.

By hope for a better future, they met.

By despair for the world, they separated. 

And by revenge would they be reunited.