A note from Seoul:
Now you must realise I'm not the most apt writer. I tend to switch tenses as a glamour queen switches lip glosses. So if you'll pardon my tense switching, I'm sure you'll find this story quite pleasing and maybe even entertaining.
Cheers.
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"We forgot Goyro, didn't we?"
The cigarette hung limply out of the corner of a lopsided grin as I rubbed the knuckles that had been forced into contact with his ugly mug. We had left the devil dog behind and my mood was lifting up like a man in a lawn chair strapped to a hundred helium filled balloons. As custom though, there was a loaded shotgun ready to shoot me down if I got too far up into the clouds. You can tell by my horrible metaphors, I'm sure, that something bad was going to happen and send me back plummeting to earth.
"Don't we have to take him with though? I could have sworn the Ace said something about taking him with-"
"You heard nothing." I smiled sweetly, smoke pouring from between my lips and into Krao's face. He coughed into a black sleeve. "You got that? If you don't then I have a gun that's perfectly willing to explain it to you instead."
As stupid as Krao actually is, he got the point and clamped his mouth shut like a good boy should. He knew better than to question my threats, especially after I had already punched Goyro solidly in the face only minutes before. My knuckles still tingled in fact. Great way to relieve stress.
"You realise your cigarette is basically all ash now right? It crumbling right- " He was right, and I spit it out and replaced it before he had even finished the first sentence.
"What do you mean?" I blinked innocently, puffing out a brand new batch of smoke into his face as I had before, but more deliberately.
"You're a jacka-" Splat. I was actually glad to see Goyro this time. Almost.
Wait...not really.
Goyro waved from on top of Krao's back, tail wagging happily in front of Krao's nose which in turn produced a sneeze. The plummet back to earth was more like a crash.
"Bless you!" Goyro patted Krao's nose affectionately. "You guys are awfully slow. We could have made it out of the building by now!"
"There is no "we", dog kid." I picked him up by the back of his collar, similar to the way a mother dog picks up her brood by the back of their necks. "Now get your tail on the move or I'm leaving you behind again, preferably with a bullet in your head right between the ears."
"Okay!" Goyro jumped out of my grasp with a kick to the face. I grabbed him a again, a red footprint apparent on my pale skin, even in the dull light of the Ace's floor. The sound of glass shattering was prominent as I tossed Goyro out the window from the top of our over one hundred story building.
"SEOUL!" Krao looked out the window in pure terror and shock as Goyro went tumbling down.
I began to walk coolly towards the "elevator", hands in my pockets out of habit, whistling a merry tune. I paused as we reached the service shaft doors, and watched as Krao, panting, ran up to them as I stepped inside.
"What the hell is your problem?!" His eyes were wide, almost fish like in proportion while my ice blue eyes stared back indifferently.
"My problem is currently falling down one hundred fourteen floors at a breakneck speed." Krao threw up his hands in half-fury, half-exasperation.
"How can you just kill someone like that?!" The spittle in my face was almost as refreshing as a cool ocean breeze on a summer's day. Almost.
"Oh don't worry, muscle brain. I've thrown him out of a much higher building before." I feigned a yawn, tossing my cigarette to the ground without interest.
"That's not the point!" Krao growled angrily, fists clenched.
"Then what is the point?" I grabbed him by the front of his shirt, my cool exterior crumbling away to reveal some inner turmoil. "Do you want to survive in this world?! From the way you're acting now, you don't have the slightest clue how to! Mercy is gone. Accept it!" I roared furiously at him, exploding, and he cowered, tumbling backwards into an awkward mess on the floor. "We've been left here to survive on our own! To fight amongst ourselves to see who will live and who will die! If I had the strength to throw Goyro out the window and he didn't fight back, doesn't that mean he's weaker than me?! I watched my family die because they were weaker! WEAKER!"
A knock at the door in the night.
"Mother? Father?" Fear.
"Seoul, you must hide. Don't come out no matter what, okay? No matter what you hear or see from your hiding spot, stay there." Weeping.
"Mother, what's wrong?" A knock again. Pushed into hiding.
"Mother? Father?" Fear.
"Seoul, you must hide. Don't come out no matter what, okay? No matter what you hear or see from your hiding spot, stay there." Weeping.
"Mother, what's wrong?" A knock again. Pushed into hiding.
The service elevator door shut as I watched Krao staring at me from the floor with a mix of fear, hate, and...understanding. He understood now was I acted so cold, why I distanced myself from others, alienated myself from the rest of the world.
Peeking from in the coat closet. Men with guns. They hit Mother and Father. Bite lip. Mother said to keep quiet...no matter what.
Many gunshots. Screaming. So much screaming. Crying. Begging for mercy. Silence.
The men left. Blood. So much blood. Mother's beautiful face is ruined. Father is unrecognizable. Disbelief.
Crying.
My family.
Dead.
Why?
WHY?!
Many gunshots. Screaming. So much screaming. Crying. Begging for mercy. Silence.
The men left. Blood. So much blood. Mother's beautiful face is ruined. Father is unrecognizable. Disbelief.
Crying.
My family.
Dead.
Why?
WHY?!
Why did I tell him my secret, my weakness?
I finally understood too as I slumped against the back of the elevator, eyes clouding over. I wiped away at my eyes with my sleeve, staring blankly at the small wet stain it left on the black fabric. Tears?
All this time I had acted so in-human, like a man who believes himself invincible even when the world is falling apart around him. A cold figurehead spitting out indifferent pleasantries and resorting to violence when it wasn't even necessary for the situation, shunning the very word "friend" and those who used it. So childish had my fears been, they were inbedded into my mind like some sort of animal instinct. Survive! My mind screamed, avenge your family! Had I become the very murderers which I despised, wanted to reap my vengeance upon? The gunshots rang out in my head again as my hands clasped the gun inside my coat with disgust and threw it aside with a hard clack, watching it skitter across the metal grating that was the floor with cold eyes. So in-human... My head sunk into my knees as more tears found themselves on an unfamiliar face.
"But I am human. So human..."
