Emisarry - III

For Zahra, who awaited Retribution with bated breath.

3. Retribution

She flicked the light-switch up and down, not really knowing why because she knew it wouldn’t make a difference. Her blood turned cold as he started to speak. The voice was faintly familiar, as if she had heard it in a different lifetime, yet it was also smooth and radiated strength as he said, “You really did not think that I would leave it at rest did you?”. She was trembling now, because she had recognized exactly who was sitting across the room to her. He pointed to a chair on the other side of a desk and continued, while she sat down obediently, “Nothing you say now is going to make a difference to me, you took away a person I loved and you never stopped to think what it would do to me. Now you shall know how that feels”. Before she could stifle it, a moan escaped her lips and it quickly turned into a scream as she saw the room itself ripple and vibrate. The darkness seemed to twist and change into shapes. It was slowly giving birth to limbs and bodies. Within seconds it was complete, as about half a dozen creatures, shaped like humans, yet composed entirely of the darkness, stood deadly still in the room. All at once they started to move towards her. She pushed the chair back and ran screaming out of the office. She was running past the corridors again and the hospital seemed strangely empty and quiet. The shadows overtook her on all sides, and one passed right through her. She felt cold when that happened and stopped. Within a second, the screaming began. It seemed to emanate from the building and it violated every part of her. She shivered in terror and slowly made her way forward. There was only a little light filtering in through the windows and she realized it was nearly dawn. She could now discern where the screams where coming from and she tried to follow the source. It was the children’s ward she realized and after another dozen steps or so she was standing at its door. She opened it with great trepidation and her very first look made her sick. She fell to the floor and vomited, as one of the shadows transformed its hand into a scythe and ripped out a little child’s intestines with it. Something nudged her and she recoiled in horror and screamed as she saw it was the severed head of an 8-year old she had treated for pneumonia that very day. The screaming stopped and she knew it was because everybody else was dead. She got to her feet and ran towards the exit. She stumbled over the remains of a nurse and nearly fell but kept her balance somehow and managed to get to the entrance. She pushed against it with all her will but it wouldn’t budge. She screamed again, out of sheer frustration this time. She looked towards the security desk in vain, but the guard sitting at his desk could do nothing to help her, not with his throat slit wide open. She started running again, not knowing where and screaming for all it was worth. Finally she fell out of sheer exhaustion and just lay there.

“You surely did not think it would be this easy, did you?” he asked. She couldn’t bother to look up and in response, coiled up into a fetal position. “I told you I would take away somebody you loved. Not these people who have already died for your sins” he continued, but she could detect an edge of sorrow in his voice, as if he was not happy with what had happened. Then the true meaning of what he had said hit her. She raised her head and her worst fears were realized. Standing between the shadows behind him was her little daughter, not yet 6. “Leave her alone, for the love of God, she’s innocent” she pleaded. “I could have used the same argument years ago” he replied. He turned towards the shadows and pointed towards the girl. One of the shadows stepped forward and raised its hand as it slowly shaped itself into a blade. “She loves my daughter!!!” she screamed, just as the blade started to slice through the air. The next thing she knew was a flash and the report of his revolver as the shadow’s head exploded, sending a shower of blood and brains everywhere. His hand had moved far too fast for her eye to register the movement and the only thing that was silent testimony to the fact that he had even fired was the still smoking Rose in his hand. He put the weapon back into its holster and stood silent as if in thought. She slowly moved forward and beckoned her daughter to come to her. She hugged her to her chest and tried to soothe her as the child gently sobbed in her lap. Another one of the shadows stepped forward and started saying something in a language foreign to her ears. He slowly turned towards her. She could see him clearly now, as he started to unsheathe Rune. His face was no different than it was all those years ago and yet it was. There was deep etched sorrow there, but what really stood out were his eyes. The same shade of hazel she remembered from so long ago, but they were empty. That is the only way she could define them. Empty. He let the sword hang by his side for an instant and then turned in a wicked arc, slicing upwards through the shadow’s torso. He turned towards her again, letting the end of the sword touch the linoleum. Blood flowed along its length and started to collect in a puddle at his feet. Behind him, the shadow dropped to the ground, neatly, in two pieces. He turned to address the rest of the shadows. “Disobedience will not be tolerated. Now be gone, all of you” he commanded. There was power in his voice, and he himself commanded an overwhelming presence. It was supernatural and hypnotic she realized. The shadows backed into a wall and melted into nothingness. He looked at her for a while and then sighed. “I cannot say I am sorry for what has happened because I am no longer capable of such emotions. For what you did, I cannot and will not forgive you. All that has happened here today is akin to what you did all that time ago” he said. She was angry at the comparison, “The slaughter of innocent children is the same as me stopping my sister from loving you?” she replied. “Sadly yes, I do not speak for her, but you certainly killed the child in me that day. What I am now, I am because of what you did”. She gritted her teeth and replied, “What you were doing was wrong. It was wrong, all right, and nothing you say can make it right. What I did, I did for the best. For the both of you”. She knew that she had gone one step too far because his eyes were no longer empty, they looked ominous. His face showed no emotion, yet his eyes betrayed anger. Anger such as she had never experienced before. Rune rose to his side and slashed across her feet. For a moment she felt nothing, then a pain so intense it blotted out everything. He had decapitated her below the knee and whenever the bleeding stub would touch the floor, a white-hot pain would shoot through her whole body. She lay there screaming as her child hugged her. “You have forced my hand. Her very mention became your dues ex machina but you have forfeited that right because you underestimated our emotions then and you still do so now”. He raised the blade and it seared through her rib-cage, right below her breasts and she could feel the blade go between ribs, slide right through her heart and come out the other side. She gasped and every breath was harder to come by. She looked at her daughter, who had crawled to a corner and witnessed the execution. She looked at him, and saw the unmistakable shimmer of a teardrop on his cheek. He closed his eyes and went down on his knees. The barrels of Aces and Rose were the last thing she saw.

He was lying back again. He felt no different. Not bad, not good. He felt nothing except overwhelming loss. The same as it had been for years. He kept staring at the fan; nothing was justified still.