The Boy Makes His Play

"Hah, hah, hah, hah-!" My breaths broke through tense lips. My legs, so close to giving out, kept pumping, sending me flying forward with every step. It was only barely enough to keep me ahead. "Hah, hah, hah, f-fuuuuuuuuckkk!!!" I screamed to keep myself afloat, no matter how little it may have helped. Behind me, I could hear the remnants of a massacre. The once calm people had resorted to hysteria. This wasn't judgment, this was the final cleansing, and I was the one leading it. I had talked before about meat shields but…but this…

"Hah, hah, hahahahaha! Ahahahaha!" Laughter poured out of my throat. It felt like one big dream. It was just too fucking much. I prayed, oh god, to you who may have been watching above, I begged him to end it! End it!

My thoughts reverted to nothing as I reached the point I'd been told to head to back in the bathroom. A break from the running sounded perfect. My legs finally halted, and it took all I had not to collapse, my muscles pulsing like they had acid pumping through them. No part of me wanted to face what was waiting just behind me, but…for the plan. Slowly, I turned around.

"A…a…"

Covered in red and pink, shreds of human sticking to the beast's body, it stared at me with its reptile eyes. I watched as it raised a finger to where a mouth would be if it had one, and it…tore…it tore one into existence.

It tore through its own unpierceable skin, and with its messy, fleshy new mouth, it sneered, with teeth stained black.

I felt it then, with absolute certainty, that this had to be the end of the road. No, I begged for it to be, and for it to be quick. Well, partially. I did also wanna live too. Pretty confusing, I apologize.

"N-no…please…no…" My legs collapsed as I tried to drag myself away. It walked forward, each stride confident and light, and reached out, grabbing ahold of my head. Raising me up from the ground, I felt Its tight grasp, and heard its manic chuckle. It caused my eyes to bulge. I felt the might of a god toying with the idea of a slow and violent crushing of my skull. "Ah, please…" I whimpered. It didn't listen, not for a second.

It kept squeezing. Harder, harder, harder. My brain began to quake, forcing memories through my head like all of them needed to be remembered here and now. They were all worthless. Just visions of apathetic people, uncaring in the face of another's death. People who didn't bother to acknowledge me. Not even once. 

I was all alone before, and I was gonna die alone too.

I hated it. So much. I hated every last one of them.

"I…hate them…all of them." I squeezed the words out.

It responded with another chuckle. Perhaps it found my hatred amusing, or just the fact I was bothering to keep going at all. Regardless, all I said still rang true, and that's all that mattered to me.

So, as I was lost in those final thoughts, I heard something that caused my heart to leap. I heard the sound of a girl coming to save me.

"HAH!" She rammed a screwdriver through the bastard angel's earhole. It screeched, letting me go to turn around and punt her straight in the stomach. "Grk!" The sound of her ribs cracking and her pained exhale made me feel sick as I fell to the ground. I held my screaming head, in so much pain it was near indescribable. The memories mixed with my senses to create a rave of stimuli in my own head. Quickly though, I turned around, ready to react to whatever came next. There I saw the angel, staring down at me. It was…just staring. As it did, I could tell from its narrowing eyes that something was wrong. Had the screwdriver actually reached its brain? No, it would definitely be dead by now if that were the case. So, then, what the hell is this? It began to move its head this way and that. It made a hiss, angry and confused, before turning away from me.

Can it…not see me?

The thought made me recall my conversation with the girl on the rooftop.

Was this…what that god guy saw in me?

I felt my eyes widen, realizing where the angel was headed.

With my hand still tight around the hammer, an instinct kicked in that I had never experienced before. One stronger than any fear of death. I hopped to my feet as It raised its hand up to grab the screwdriver, and, with a bit of windback and a lucky angle, I slammed that screwdriver as deep into that head as it would go, the hammer hitting it dead on. The angel froze up. I held my breath, watching, waiting. Its body spasmed once, twice, and, finally, FINALLY, it fell to its knees, and then it's stomach. It was dead. I had killed it. A flurry of emotions filled me up as the hammer dropped from my hand.

"Marcus!" I heard someone call my name, but I was too deep in my own head to react.

Killed. I killed it, I really did. It and…how many…people? How many people did I kill? I…I couldn't even imagine…so many that would take weeks to mop them all off the streets. Oh god…and then...in the back of my mind…I thought of all those memories. Memories of apathetic nobodies, of people who acted like they didn't even see me, or yelled at me for every little thing. People who…had given up on everything, for the sake of just getting to keep on living without fear of judgment. Not humans. God's puppets.

Did those people…really even qualify as people?

"Marcus!"

That's right. They were just shells. They were walking husks, filled with blood and meat. Nobody really died. They all died a long time ago. They weren't even worth saving if I could have helped it. Yeah, yeah! Th-though, after I took a second to really think about it, I believe there was one person who I could feel was different.

"Hey, Marcus!"

I look up from the body of the dead angel to see the girl in front of me, holding my face.

"Marcus, snap out of it."

"..."

"Marcus…"

She could hear everything. Every single thought in my head was leaking into hers. I didn't wait for her reaction.

"We won." I spoke the words into existence. Her face remained worried for just a moment, before a smile formed on it.

"Yeah, we won."

…

We sat atop a rooftop along the edge of town, watching the river that sat just a few yards away from the farthest road in town. Holding a can of soda, I felt like things had turned to an unreasonable level of normal after what had already happened.

"That's okay, you can relax a little. Enjoy the normal while it lasts." The girl says while sipping from a beer she'd stolen from the dispensary. I nod, returning to my soda.

"Right, sure…"

"You're bothered by the people dying part."

"No…I'm bothered that I feel so mixed on it."

"Hmm…" She seems to chew on my words for a moment. "I think it's okay to not be ready to think about stuff like that. We're alive right now. I think that's the only thing that really requires thinking on at this very instant." Her comfort, while not enough to fully ease my mind, was enough to make me smile.

"Thanks…uhm…"

"Hmm?" She cocks her head. "Oh, I never told you my name." She taps her chin. "Call me Maki."

"Maki…" Huh. That was a nice name. I watched as her cheeks turned pink.

"Hehe, it is a pretty nice name, isn't it?" She giggled. I sighed, drinking from my can. The hundreds of questions I had racing through my mind could wait till tomorrow…cause there was no way I was letting her escape till then. So, I may as well enjoy the sights for now.

I stared up at the red eye in the sky. I felt it watching me. I gave it another friendly wave.

I'm sure I can expect to be its focus for a long while at this rate.