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It is only after work, so drunk that he can barely stand, that Max dimly realizes he's definitely pulled a muscle in his arm.
He glances at the woman persistently making eyes at him across the room before looking away arrogantly – he isn't in the mood to make a move right now. Max knocks back two more shots and stands up, stepping out the bar's back door to smoke a few cigarettes in order to disguise the smell of gunpowder on his hands. He's still reeling from the thrill of combat, the crisp staccato of gunfire reverberating inside his head. He isn't quite sure what part of his mind is supposed to be processing these lingering emotions, though it hardly matters. Either way, the alcohol isn't doing anything to numb them.
He curses as he fumbles the lighter, grinding his unlit cigarette between his teeth. It's pathetic, really. He isn't some newbie, his hands are only shaking so much because of how relentless he’d been, firing shot after shot after shot...
Today's job had been such a drag. Marko had called him afterward on the hotel's second floor telephone and scolded him for being too public. Had he shot twenty people in the head as a publicity stunt? Maybe. He had hung up after a few choice words and gone straight to the bar.
He still hadn't managed to light the cigarette in his mouth. Max can feel his patience running thin as he barely resists the urge to chuck the chewed-up piece of garbage into the gutter.
“Do you need a hand?”
The sound abruptly stops his turbulent train of thought, his irritation slowly fading as he looks up. Inside the bar, he can hear the crisp clink of ice cubes against glass as the bartender pours drink after drink, ringing clear and bright like the voice now colliding against the inside of his skull, cooling its swollen innards and slowly melting into a red liquid that collects in the soft pink grooves of his mind, solidifying into a person he might recognize.
One of the stranger's hands holds the lighter in front of him, igniting it with a deft flick as the other cups the sputtering flame and brings it to the end of Max's cigarette. The orange light dances in his eyes for only a second, flashing by so quickly that he's unable to see the other's face. It is an unthinking impulse to breathe in as the cigarette glows a dim red, half-burned tobacco mixing with an indescribable stench that causes him to frown and squint as he exhales a thick cloud of white smoke. The smell has returned to normal by the second inhale, and the frenetic buzz of his thoughts quiets beneath the fragrant haze of burning tobacco and nicotine, allowing him to focus his attention on the man before him who had so kindly lit his cigarette.
“Thank you.”
That inkling of familiarity within his heart is lit aflame as two green eyes watch him through the smoke and smile. The man dangles a cigarette between his fingers, which he slowly brings to his lips before suddenly leaning forward and lighting it with the one still in Max's mouth. He is so close that Max can see the veins beneath his eyelids, blue and green, like shining silk threads woven into flesh and blood.
“You're the person who was on the phone,” Max states matter-of-factly.
“Ah, yes, I am. Your memory's pretty good, you recognized me from just my voice.” He doesn't exhale a rude puff of choking smoke like Max does, instead turning his head, the smoke slowly rising in thin wisps from his mouth, his lips soft and sensual as they part slightly to speak.
“I had to take care of other matters this week. How are you and Marko getting along?”
“I don't think he cares for my methods.”
He chuckles. “No, no, I think Marko likes you a lot, you can always finish any job he gives you. He is a bit nitpicky though, isn’t he?”
The two stand in silence for a while before the man speaks again: “My name is Charles. It's a pleasure to finally meet you.”
“You as well. I thought your job was just phone calls…”
Charles can't help but laugh at this, his cigarette dangling in a way Max can hardly understand. It's almost a decoration, he thinks, a seductive accessory held in a way that is both intoxicating and incomprehensible between his lips, his teeth, shifting in a way that is impossibly tempting. More often than not, he's simply letting the wind blow away the fumes in front of him rather than allowing the sinful smoke to settle in his throat, wind down his windpipe, and take root in the darkness deep within.
A quiet voice whispers to him as his gaze lingers on Charles's lips, urging him to drown these thoughts in another drink.
“Actually, my job is only phone calls because I don't have enough hands-on experience, so they won't let me do any other work.” He shrugs. “I'm not bound by an NDA or anything, if you're wondering.”
Charles discards his cigarette with a small flourish, pulling out his phone to check the time. “I have to go home and sleep now. See you on the next job.”
When Max returns to the bar, the woman who had been so interested in him before is already gone.
***
Idle chatter fills Max's headset the moment he turns it on – though he tunes it out immediately, as Charles is not among the voices he can hear. By the time he's snuck into the building's basement, the communication channel is quiet, though it seems his partner today is not Marko or Horner. Max cannot help the warm smile on his face as his green-eyed friend's playful tone rings light and airy in his ears.
“Heads up, that passage on the left is being monitored. There's two security guards too, so be careful.”
'Be careful.' Charles always enunciated some of his words with a slight French accent, which Max found utterly adorable.
“I will. By the way, do I get any kind of reward for this?” He knows it's a bold question to ask, but it’s too hard to resist.
A heavy silence settles over the channel, and for a while, Max wonders if Charles will even bother to answer him. It is only when he finally speaks again that Max can let himself breathe, his heart resuming its usual steady rhythm. “What do you want?”
You. He almost blurts the word out, biting his tongue as the memory of that dimly lit alleyway overwhelms him, Charles leaning in close, their cigarettes touching in a small burst of flame. He shifts his hold on his gun and fires, the bullet cutting through the hazy smoke of his daydream and finding its target, Charles's admiring words mingling with that precious moment in his mind. Skill and practice has turned combat into little more than a simple chore, so Max dedicates most of his focus to the fantasy in his head, basking in every little word of praise coming from the other end of that headset. He wonders how that cigarette tasted in Charles's mouth – it must have been different from his, somehow, more distinct. He wanted to sample those lips beneath the ashen flavor of cooling smoke, following those thin, white wisps to somewhere far away.
“I don't know, we could get a drink?”
Laughter resounds in his ears. “I don't drink.”
“What? But you smoke.”
“Yes, but I don't drink. Smoking won't make you lose your mind, but drinking certainly will.”
“Okay, well... Charles, you have to give me some excuse to see you again.”
“You don't need an excuse.” Charles's voice echoes in his ears, enveloping his head like thick smoke – who said smoking couldn't make you lose your mind? “After this job is over, I'll give you my number. Is one call enough of a reward for you?”
***
Golden rum goes up in flames as the bartender sets the drink's top layer alight and slides it over. Max isn't quite sure of how much alcohol is mixed into this one concoction, but he doesn't particularly care, focusing only on finishing his work, getting drunk, and finding someone to spend the night with. He knows this kind of self-destruction isn't the healthiest stress reliever, but it will always be the fastest, and that is far more important to him than any long term physical effects.
He roughly pushes through the crowd of bar goers in his path and exits the building, sneering at the ‘12 Steps To Sobriety’ poster tacked onto the bar's front door and trying to ignore that longing for something more pulsing beneath his more urgent physical desires. His first task is visiting his psychiatrist to pick up his weekly dose of Chronos. Afterwards, it's booking the first hotel room he can find and crashing for the night.
Max doesn't notice the tiny card on his hotel room floor until he's slipped on it, swearing furiously as he crashes onto the bed, the syringe in his hand still miraculously intact. He needed this, needed one brilliant blue syringe after almost every job he had. He could give up alcohol, smoking, cocaine, numerous other illicit substances that he couldn't name... but Chronos? He'd die without Chronos. It gave him endless power, let him see the future, turned him into an unstoppable killing machine. The sheer mental strain of it all had almost killed him the first time.
He'd tried drinking instead, replacing one addiction with another, but it had only made things worse. Max winced as he remembered the trembling, kneeling feebly on the bathroom floor as his limbs shook uncontrollably. The tremors were so bad that he'd barely been able to hold his phone and call his psychiatrist, convulsing helplessly on that cold, hard tile as he waited for them to come and take him away.
That first time he'd seen Charles, it had almost been enough to distract him. Standing in that alleyway, waiting for Charles to light his cigarette, he'd nearly forgotten that he was just some junkie, slowly strolling towards Hell.
Max pushes the needle in, falling back onto the bed in a hazy reverie as the Chronos courses through his veins. He dimly realizes that he hadn't even thought to check the syringe for air bubbles. He can still see that business card out of the corner of his eye, the scantily clad women distorting in his blurry vision, each digit of the obnoxiously large phone number warping and twisting into small plumes of white smoke until he can no longer see the room around him.
He instinctually reaches for his phone, though he isn't calling his psychiatrist this time. His hands tremble violently – the Chronos isn't going to wear off anytime soon – but Max pushes on, painstakingly pressing each digit and pulling together his last shreds of sanity to confirm that he's correctly typed in the number Charles had given him.
“Hey.” Every movement was pure, white-hot agony, and it took everything in him to keep his voice level as a thousand bloody massacres played before his eyes, gunshots echoing in his head. “You said I could have one call, right? Is now okay?”
He can't hear Charles's reply over the ringing in his ears, but he savors the sound of that gentle voice nonetheless.
Max lets himself fall into a trance, replaying battle after battle in his mind, the gun in his hands growing heavier with every shot, every kill. It is only much later that he realizes the extra weight is from the constant stream of blood coating his weapon, tiny rivulets of red flowing down his fingers and dripping onto the jungle floor below. This is his judgment, after all. This bloodshed is the consequence of war.
“How much did you take?”
Charles's voice, though distant and somewhat muffled, is as soothing as ever. This time, however, it's not coming from the phone beside him.
***
Max awakens to the sun streaming through his window, filling the sparsely furnished hotel room with a warm, golden light. A figure is slumped against his bedside, tightly clutching his left hand.
“Good morning.” Charles stirs, having been woken up by Max's movements. “I didn't know you were-” He gestures to the now empty syringe, forgotten on the worn carpet floor. “I really thought you were going to die last night.”
He studies Max's glassy gaze curiously, waving a hand in front of his face. “Hello? Are you still daydreaming?”
Max shakes his head, having fully recovered from the previous night's delirium. “I called you last night?” He sighs regretfully as Charles nods. “I can't believe I wasted my one chance to ask you out.”
“You're NULL.” Charles ignores his witty comment. His expression is completely unreadable.
“I thought New Mecca killed all of them. I know something happened during the Cromag War because any information on them practically disappeared afterwards. I would have never thought that the government was still using NULL soldiers.” He takes a moment to process the situation, lost in thought.
“Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against you, I'm not some vengeful veteran or an anti-government rebel, I just... I make calls. I do my job.”
Charles gets up to open the hotel room door and takes a conveniently timed plate of breakfast from the worker outside, which he places on Max's bedside table. “This didn't count as your phone call, by the way. You can call me anytime you need to. I'd never forgive myself if I missed your call and you ended up dying from it.”
Thus began a weekly routine – Max would call him before each Chronos dosage and Charles would watch over him and prevent any accidents. There were a few times when Max lost control, accidentally clawing his companion while lost in a waking nightmare. It was in those moments, suddenly sober and wracked with guilt, that Max wondered if involving Charles in the first place had been a mistake.
***
“Hello, you've reached Max's exclusive midnight hotline, how can I help you?”
His exclusive hotline. The phrase makes Max's heart lurch, which is somewhat worrying – these kinds of palpitations had only ever been a symptom of some substance in his system, a reminder of the miserable self-destruction his vices wrought upon his body and mind. Is Charles just another drug he can't live without, another addiction leading him to his doom?
“I need someone to come fix Max. I'm pretty sure there's something wrong with him.” Max’s tone is light as he holds the phone to his ear, falling back onto his bed and fidgeting with the unused syringe of Chronos in his left hand.
“Understood.” Charles replies like clockwork, his voice a familiar comfort in Max's ear. “Charles the human repairman is already on his way.”
A few minutes later, his green-eyed boy arrives, dressed all in red, smiling at him from the doorway, his voice soothing and almost ethereal. He sits by the bedside, reaching out to squeeze Max's hand. This man is his cure, the only person who can pick up the shattered pieces that remain of him and mold them into some semblance of a human being.
“What time are we going home?” Max's gaze is dull and distant as he hears himself rasp out the question. Charles must have replied, though the exact answer to his question escapes him as he fights to stay awake. A flurry of gentle kisses flutters across his forehead – likely an odd side effect of the Chronos still in his system, or perhaps some beautiful glimpse of a far-off future.
"Get some sleep. I'll wake you up when it's time to go."
***
Max jolts awake, groaning as his back painfully protests his hunched posture. He groggily lifts his head from the bartop and locks eyes with the woman a few tables away, a bemused smile on her face as she stares at him with curiosity and slight concern. He tosses the empty syringe still clutched in his fist and begins to search through his pockets, his hands closing around a half-full pack of cigarettes and one worn lighter, the latter of which he slams down on the bartop before half-stumbling, half-running to the bar's exit, heart pounding in his chest as he shoves open the door.
Those wide, familiar green eyes meet his as the figure in the alley slowly turns toward him, dangling a cigarette between his fingers.
“Can I have a light?"