Chapter Text
A sickening scene, yet one all too common, with crimson spreading across the floor of a dirty and cramped alleyway. Standing in the puddle of red, three men face each other, with one of them, Lerato, staring down the barrel of a gun. Moments pass with only the sound of the blood dripping onto the floor echoing before a bang resounds.
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Footsteps echo through an empty hallway, the sound occasionally stops before continuing, and the footsteps increase in frequency before stopping on the other side of a large door.
The door slowly opens, and the face of a young man with tired eyes peeks inside. There are many people inside, each talking loudly, laughing, and not even bothering to look at the homework on the board. He looked past most of them until his eyes locked onto the messy head lying flat on a desk; the head belonged to a man sitting by himself.
Walking towards the man, he used his finger to tap on the table in an attempt to wake him up. After a moment with no response from the man, he flicked the man’s forehead, to which the man quickly raised his head, rubbing his forehead.
“Lerato, do you have any money?”
“No”
“Don’t you want to buy me a-”
“No”
“Come on,” he stretched out the phrase in a pleading tone.
Lerato wipes the drool off his face, looking around to make sure no one else saw the saliva on his desk before wiping it with his sleeve.
“...fine, but nothing too expensive.”
Mosa, his brother, nodded before telling Lerato to meet him on the ground floor. Lerato started packing up his stuff, and as he did, he looked up to see his brother talking to someone, most likely a friend, on his way out. He then looks around him to see the groups of people around him, and he specifically looks at two girls beside him. They seemed to be having so much fun, laughing so hard they practically couldn't breathe…he then looked around himself to see rows of empty chairs.
Lerato then walked out of the room and began walking down the stairs. As he did, he waved to any familiar faces while avoiding any deep conversations with them. When he reached the ground floor, Mosa had just waved his friends off. The two then walked out of the university building and into the nearby market area.
They looked through the food stalls trying to see what would be worth the little money they had, but unfortunately, they had gone through the entire market area without seeing anything they could afford, much less anything that looked particularly appetising.
“Hmm, didn't you say you knew a place that sold chips, cheap?” Lerato said
“Yeah, but it's pretty far from here. Are you sure?” Mosa asked
“I know, I'm sure we'll be fine, after all, there are two of us,” Lerato responded while raising two fingers.
“Ok, just make sure to put your watch in your bag,” Mosa gestured to his bag.
“Yeah man, I know, I wasn’t born yesterday,”
You know what, I'm not gonna do it! Letaro thought in slight annoyance. Lerato quickly puts his pocket watch in his pocket and sees it effectively disappear in his pocket. No one is gonna see it.. I'll be fine he thought in satisfaction.
The two then walked through a few crowded areas until they finally arrived at the vendor. As his brother places an order for both of them, Lerato waits close by but far enough that he is still a part of the crowd on the streets.
“There aren’t any clinics near here, so if you get hurt here, you'll likely die. So don’t make a fuss and do what I tell you.”
Just then, he feels something sharp poke his back, and a man stands next to him. Lerato tried to look back, but whatever the man was threatening him with dug deeper into his back, so he just continued looking forward. The man then directed him to walk past his brother until they were near an alleyway. Throughout the walk, Lerato was trying his best to keep track of his surroundings in case he could get away from the man.
As the two turned into the alleyway, Lerato felt a huge force smack into his back, and he fell onto the ground. When he turned around to face the man, the first thing he noticed was that the man was only holding a knife; he had been worried the man held a gun, but this revelation gave him hope that he could find a way out. The second thing he noticed was that the man looked to be in poor health.
“Ok, so just make this easy for me and empty everything in your bag.” The man shoves the point of his knife in front of Lerato's face
“Ok, ok, I'll do it, just put the knife away.” Lerato quickly drops his bag, but looking inside, all he sees are books. “It’s just books in here.”
“You think I'm stupid. Clearly, you don’t understand your situation.”
“No, I can give my bag to you if you don’t believe me.” Lerato leaves his bag on the ground as he then shuffles away from it
The man quickly looks through the bag, but after finding nothing of immediate value, he sighs and then looks up from the bag to Lerato. “Fine, just give me the thing in your pockets,” he said in slight disappointment.
Lerato looks down at his pockets and sees the circular form poking out. Sighing, as he takes out his pocket watch, he can do nothing but wish he had actually listened to his brother and wasn't as stubborn as he was. He slides the watch over to the man as he pulls his pockets out to show that there is nothing else.
Once the man had the watch, he inspected it and realised that it was incredibly expensive, looking between the watch and Lerato, and an idea sprang to his mind.
“Say, is your family rich?” he asks.
“No?”
“Then how do you have this?”
Lerato only answers with the quiet raising of his brow, but soon after, his eyes widen. Was this man seriously gonna hold him hostage?
“My parents don't have much to give you.”
“Yeah, sure, but I'm sure they are willing to pay whatever they have. Don't you agree?”
Lerato looked at him with a pensive expression. This guy is insane, and to think this all happened because I was hungry, broke, and just a little bit stubborn, he thought while letting out a sigh. He then frowned and began slowly standing up, while thinking that, as much as his mindset up until this point was not to fight and just comply, as he thought it would let him leave with his life, clearly that was not the case now, and so there was only one option.
I have to run!
Lerato quickly turned around. He wasn't fully standing yet, so he stumbled around at first, running his hands along the floor before picking up speed. The man stood there for a moment before soon chasing after him.
“Hey, you're gonna make me actually hurt you, kid, slow down, and I might consider only a light punishment!”
“Yeah, and what's that?” Lerato yelled back
“Maybe I’d cut a few fingers off, that way it would also act as motivation for your parents!”
Yeah, he is definitely insane, Lerato thought as he turned the corner before stopping just shy of it and turning around. When the man eventually took the turn after Lerato, he was met with Lerato throwing a tuft of dirt at the man’s face. The man stopped to rub his eyes, but as he did, Lerato ran up to the man, and the man thrust his knife forward. The knife slashes his cheek, but even so, Lerato raises his leg and harshly presses it into the man’s crotch.
The man kneels with one hand holding his crotch. He looks up at Lerato and slashes his calf. In response, Lerato just turns away from him and keeps running with a slight limp, following the alley until he makes it back onto a crowded street. As he gets deeper into the crowd, he looks back and sees the man come out of the alley, and the two lock eyes.
Lerato grits his teeth and runs in a random direction, and the man quickly follows after. Lerato begins slipping through the many pedestrians, occasionally being blocked by groups of people packed too tightly and having to go around them. The culmination of this constant slowing down causes the man to be only a few steps away from being able to grab him.
The crowd eventually begins to thin out, and the two enter a road mostly used by carriages, with the man freshly hot on Lerato’s tail.
This guy isn't giving up. Why, I swear I'm not worth all this trouble! Lerato internally sneered and looked only to see the man 2 or 3 paces back. Panic began to settle in. He had run from the man and hurt him, so if he caught him, whatever horrific things he was going to do to him have probably multiplied in severity, and on top of that…he has no idea where he is!
Deciding he cannot be caught no matter what, as he could meet a fate worse than death if he was, Lerato stomped his foot into the ground, pivoting to his left and drifting onto the road where many carriages rush by. The man stops in his tracks and watches as Lerato races across the road, and Lerato almost reaches the other side of the road.
but just before he does…
The distracting bray of a horse resounds throughout the road, accompanied by the harsh scraping of the gravel beneath a carriage’s wheels. Lerato’s eyes shift to his left as he locks eyes with the haunted look of the driver.
As quickly as he physically could, he put his arms around his head, jumped, and directed his feet towards the carriage. In an instant, his feet landed on the back of a falling horse. Then, lifting one of his feet, it landed on the side of the toppling carriage right as he was launched 6km away.
Lerato quickly came down, his body contorting in awkward positions as he rolled to a stop. As the dust settled, Lerato lifted his head and, with his bloodstained eye, looked to where he last saw the criminal, only to see him and the driver arguing over something. It seemed like he was trying to pretend to be Lerato's father, and the driver was laying into him. Lerato then looked ahead of him and saw another alley, so with the little strength he had, he got on all fours. He struggled so much for just that; it felt like two shelves had fallen onto him, and he was being forced to carry them.
As Lerato slowly crawled towards the alley, the voices behind him quieted, and a hand held his shoulder.
“I did always tell you to listen to me; now see what trouble has befallen you.” The words echoed out of the criminal's mouth; he had such an obviously fake smile that even a toddler could see through it, but the driver didn’t actually seem to care much about anything other than his carriage, even looking to Lerato with scorn.
Lerato stood still for a moment before throwing his foot at the man’s crotch yet again, and as he kneeled in pain, looking at Lerato with intense disdain. Lerato wiped the blood and dirt on his hands in the man's eyes. He then began painfully trudging into the alleyway. Once he was decently inside, he couldn't help but look back.
However, the man wasn't following him; instead, he just held that same look of disdain he had earlier, but noticeably restrained himself, like he physically couldn't go further. Lerato used this opportunity to prop himself up against the wall, and once he was standing, he continued to use the wall as he walked further.
The adrenaline pumping through Lerato’s veins began to wear off, so it was only now that he realized the extent of the pain he felt. He was pretty sure the cut in his right calf was now wrapped around his entire lower leg; it felt like his ribs were poking into his lungs, the bones in his lower left leg were broken or at least fractured, and the most painful thing was the stabbing pain in his head.
He continued walking for what felt like hours; he couldn’t accurately gauge the time as these buildings were too tall, all he knew was that it was approaching nighttime. At this point, his eyesight was getting quite blurry, and the only thing to distract him from all the signs that here, in this alley, he would die was the splash of some kind of liquid under his feet.
The splashing continued, as all he cared about at this point was leaving the alley, that was, until a few steps in, he tripped and fell over something. It was too dark and too blurry; it felt squishy yet solid, and it was also so very wet. He found himself face-first on the ground, his face practically covered in this liquid, but even so, he used the unusually large hump on the floor to stand.
As he did this, he heard voices echo in the distance, but he paid them no mind. He tried to step forward, only to fall again. This time, he lay there for a moment longer, not immediately getting up; his only focus was trying not to sleep, as something told him if he did, he wouldn’t be waking up.
He slowly used his arms and knees to prop himself up, using the wall, and finally stood up fully again. Just as he was about to walk again, those voices grew louder and louder, with him only grasping his head and a deep grimace forming on his face until.
“Stop!”
Something broke through, he turned to face the sound and was met with a shiny thing directly in front of his face, and what seemed to be a man behind it. He squinted, trying to focus his vision.
Time froze as Lerato stared on, his eyes widening, and his jaw dropping.
A few inches away from his face was the end of a revolver, and behind it a man with messy hair and a surprised yet deeply irritated expression. Lerato could do nothing; he really was going to die in some decrepit hole where no one knew he was, before he could do anything worthwhile.
“Hey, dude, look at him, he can't be more than 17,” a concerned voice chimes up from behind the tall figure.
“True, and both his legs are busted,” the man says after giving a glance at Lerato’s legs.
“Yeah…he has nothing to do with us, we're just waiting for that glowing thing, right? " Let's just let him pass,” he says while looking at Lerato’s blood-soaked face with a concerned expression, “ he doesn’t even fully seem conscious.”
Everything became so clear all at once. Lerato’s eyes moved from the barrel of the gun to the man speaking before landing on the completely crimson floor. He then slowly turned his head to look back at the hump he tripped on. There lay two or three bodies haphazardly stacked on top of each other, each body being so mutilated that he wouldn’t even classify them as bodies, but more just clumps of meat with limbs sticking out of them.
“We can’t let him go; he knows what we look like. If he told any of the authorities, it could cost us.”
“I know, but–”
“Mr. Eggers is lenient, but even he would do what is necessary, and he’d have our heads if it were the reason his plans failed.”
It's as if time froze, the man applied greater pressure on the trigger, and Lerato hadn’t even noticed he couldn't breathe, and he had been quickly breathing in and out to compensate, but it wasn't working…
It was a sickening scene, yet one all too common, with crimson spreading across the floor of a dirty and cramped alleyway, and standing in the puddle of red, Lerato, a child who had only just turned 18, staring down the barrel of a gun, breathing his last breath. Moments pass with only the sound of the blood dripping onto the floor echoing before a bang resounds.
Lerato fell to the floor and laid limp.
“Behind us!” the once worried man shouts.
However, the floor beneath them was shifting and writhing, and then the two men who were already off balance were thrown into a wall.
“As smart as it was, that distraction wasn’t enough to throw me off!” From within the shadows, a gravely voice yells out, and from those same shadows, a man in about his 40’s, wearing what seemed to be a police uniform, emerged
The old man swipes his arm in their direction, and a ghostly mirage missing its lower half becomes visible and looks to push the shifting ground in the two’s direction. However, the two dodge in separate directions but are met with gunshots as they get their footing.
“How’d you find us so quickly!” the tall man yells
“Your friend's stamina was lacking, and it didn’t take us too long to figure out where you were after we caught him,” he responded.
“You must've wanted us to be stuck chasing him all night, but you underestimate my experience,” the old man spoke again.
“Ivaan got caught?” one of the men silently muttered.
“However you got here, you look like you're on your way to join the mush behind you, is that why at such close range you still fail to hit us!” the tall man antagonizes.
The old man then completely ignores the other man in favor of the one who dares to question his competency. He then almost mindlessly unleashed a barrage of bullets all directed at the man’s head.
The target of the old man dodges the shot by purposefully falling on his back, much to the old man’s genuine surprise. He swirls and rushes towards the old man as he attempts to back away and reload. However, right as he was about to strike, his entire body came to a stop, looking around, the man saw multiple ghastly hands latched onto him.
The old man quickly raises his gun to the tall man’s face, but as he’s about to shoot, a bullet shoots through his gun-wielding hand, and pushes his gun out of his hand. In retaliation, the old man sends the bisected spirit towards the man, a fair distance away from him, having the spirit extend its arms towards him, resulting in the floor softening and becoming mud-like.
The messy-haired man loses his balance, but still shoots at the old man, causing the man to back away from the stationary man in an attempt to dodge and get closer to his own weapon. However, two shots do hit the old man, one in his leg and another in his shoulder, causing him to lose focus. This loss of focus leads the hands holding the tall man to relent; the man then quickly pivots and runs in the direction of his partner.
He then takes out his own gun and points it above the old man, shooting a set of dilapidated stairs in between them. The already unstable structure then caves and falls, crashing directly in front of the old man with parts crushing his left arm, resulting in him letting out a pained screech.
“Sorry, old dude, but we know your friends are coming and we're not going to throw our lives away.”
“So we're putting our pride aside and letting you go.”
“If you nighthawks could mind your own business for a while, that would be a nice bonus."
The two escape while mocking the old man. Leaving him writing in pain in the darkening alley, soon to be bathed in the crimson moon's light.