Vincent woke up at nine the next morning. No calls or anybody attempting to wake him up, so he watched it tick over to ten, then to eleven, then to twelve, and then to six. Vincent finally rose from his bed, maneuvering his way through the room, ducking under the cloth, and exiting the office into the main living quarters. Tod was in his room. Vincent decided at this point that they might as well hold off on their mission till the next day.
He moved to Catherine’s room and looked around, it was spotless and most of her belongings were shoved into her cabinets. Vincent shoveled the belongings into a garbage bag, Tod quietly opened his door and peaked across the dining room to see Vincent disposing of Catherine’s things before withdrawing back into his room. After cleaning out the room Vincent moved back into his bed and sat out the rest of the night.
At exactly seven the next morning Vincent sprung up from his bed and hurried through his room as fast as he could before bursting out his office door. He sprinted towards Tod’s room and knocked to wake him up.
“I’m not going.”
“Yes, you are actually! Be up in thirty,” Exclaimed Vincent.
Thirty minutes came and went but with no word from Tod, Vincent knocked again to no response. After knocking for two whole minutes with zero response he exited the house and turned to see Tod’s window wide open. Vincent immediately jumped into the car, started it, and accelerated as fast as he could. After tracing the path out from Tod’s window to no avail and driving through every street in the nearby city with no sign of Tod, Vincent decided to just get on with the job.
Vincent swerved through the city and pulled up at Eiliesh’s apartment building.
“You weren’t there yesterday,” Started Eiliesh
“Yeah, I figured we could use some time to cool off.”
“Where’s Tod?”
“No clue, he just booked it. Just us this time. Unfortunately, he also destroyed our access to wormholes, so we’re gonna have to jump ahead in the list till we get to one that’s actually on this planet,” Vincent paused as he scanned the list, “Which… leaves us with… target number five.”’
The car took off and they moved off the road back to the desert. Vincent was half concentrated on driving, the other half on the tracker for the target. The car suddenly spun around, nearly sending Eiliesh flying out the window. Eiliesh saw a green, saturated jungle up ahead that stood out from the dry empty desert. Vincent stopped the car at the edge of the jungle and they both exited the vehicle and rounded the back of the car. Eiliesh grabbed both the pistols and Vincent armed himself with the Tommy gun.
Eiliesh led the two through the jungle. Immediately they were met with a strong wall of congealed vines, possibly man-made, Eiliesh promptly took out her pocketknife and began swinging it through the vines. The two continued their way through the jungle with Eiliesh clearing their path of any vines or leaves in the way.
“I need a minute, let’s wait here,” Vincent uttered nearly out of breath.
“Jesus man, we’ve been in here for ten minutes, have you not been training for this?” Eiliesh questioned.
Vincent interrupted his frantic breaths for air, “I’m here for direction and durability, not stamina, I’m dyin’ here man.”
As they sat on some stumps in the woods Eiliesh was about to say something when Vincent quickly put his finger over his mouth signaling to keep down. Vincent directed Eiliesh’s attention to the tracker, the pointer was spinning at a slow even pace around them, the target was circling them.
Until the spinner suddenly stopped. It Pointed directly behind Eiliesh, the silence was interrupted by a loud slash behind her, sending her jumping forward toward the clearing they were waiting in. She unholstered her weapons and fired both pistols once at the woods behind where she was, which led to a deep guttural yell echoing through the woods. The woods went silent again.
Vincent and Eiliesh were now waiting for the target to make the next move. The silence was deafening until it was interrupted by Vincent’s phone ringing out. He immediately threw his phone, but it was too late and when he faced back toward Eiliesh there was another slash and the tree next to him had a massive gash torn in it. The gash had a glowing blue substance left in it from where the weapon hit. Vincent flew forward and pulled out his Tommy gun. Suddenly his eyes were met with a large creature. Its brown fur coated its almost human-shaped body, the arms were too long.
Its jaw unhinged revealing rows of teeth as it lunged forward holding a massive glowing battle axe with the same magma texture as the orb. Vincent rolled out of the way of the giant beast, and Eiliesh began firing her pistols, sinking each bullet into the creature’s fur making blood spurt out toward her. It spun around swinging the battle axe as it did, nearly taking off Eiliesh’s head, but she managed to duck out of the way. Vincent began unloading his Tommy gun on the beast before it could strike Eiliesh with the axe.
Vincent ducked out of the way when the beast spun around attempting to pull the same maneuver as Eiliesh, he wasn’t as fortunate, the axe grazed his forearm. The flesh surrounding the wound was covered in a thick blue substance that started melting his flesh away. Vincent circled the clearing in an attempt to reconvene with Eiliesh who was at the other side, as he was running around, he continued firing his gun into the beast.
Vincent came up next to Eiliesh while the beast was distracted and ordered her to come with him. They both moved behind the tree that was slashed initially and drew the creature’s attention. They moved around the tree with the beast, circling it a few times before the beast decided to slice through it again.
That cut through the tree severed it from the bottom and it started falling towards the beast. The back of the tree rocketed backward doming Vincent directly in the head while narrowly missing Eiliesh. The tree hit the target in the head knocking it out and as it continued falling, the tree fell onto the beast’s ribcage causing it to collapse under the weight. Eiliesh grabbed the axe and sat down waiting for Vincent to wake up.
After about ten minutes Vincent woke up and looked around confused.
“OH, YOU GOT THE THING!” Exclaimed Vincent.
“Mhm”
Vincent looked through the woods for his phone and saw 9 missed calls from Tod.
“Oh my god, we need to go.”
“What happened?” Asked Eiliesh
“I think Tod might be in trouble.”
They ran through the woods faster than before. Eiliesh was trying her best, but Vincent ended up getting about twenty feet ahead of her, considering she had to lug around the axe the whole time. Vincent got into the car and drove it through several vines and into the jungle towards Eiliesh so she could get in faster. They whizzed off to go find Tod.
“Did you call him back?” Asked Eiliesh.
“Straight to voicemail.”
“How are we gonna find him?”
“I don’t know.”
Vincent paused while looking through his phone
“Wait, he left a voicemail”
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Vincent was met with a deep robotic voice on the recording, “Vincent I presume, I know what you’re doing, however, I know a lot more about this than you. You need to come to the apartment building that you just picked someone up from, eighth floor, room thirty. Before I go, I need to ask, do you really know who your employer is?”
Vincent sat in silence for a moment, “What does he mean?”
“Don’t ask me, how should I know?”
They continued driving when Eiliesh’s eyes wandered to Vincent’s arm, “What the hell happened to your arm?”
“I don’t know, the axe left some kind of residue, we’ll deal with it later.”
They swerved through the city, nearing their destination. Vincent and Eiliesh exited the car and Eiliesh handed Vincent one of her pistols before he tucked the Tommy gun away in the trunk. Entering the apartment building, they walked into the elevator and pressed the eighth-floor button, and it began to slowly rise.
The two began walking down the hall until they got to room thirty. Vincent debated knocking but decided to bust the door open instead. After slamming his shoulder into the door, it broke open, he immediately brandished his pistol and aimed it into the room. He pointed around the main area of the apartment and saw nothing, no signs that anyone even lived in there until his attention was directed to a door.
“Wait here, behind the wall,” Vincent whispered to Eiliesh.
Vincent opened the door as fast as possible and aimed the pistol into the room. Upon opening the door, he was met with another pistol aimed back at him. Vincent scanned the room quickly and saw Tod sitting against the wall to his right. He made eye contact with his son and Tod shook his head, telling Vincent to put his gun away. Vincent heeded his son’s advice considering Tod knew more about this situation than he did and retracted his weapon to his holster.
Tod’s and now Vincent’s masked captor began to speak, “Good.” They too lowered their gun but continued to hold it and put their hands into a fig-leaf position, resting one hand on the hammer.
“Now that I have you both here-” Their speech was interrupted by a bullet fired by Eiliesh from the doorway. It sunk into the person’s head, but no blood was excreted. The captor immediately raised their gun and shot Tod in the ribcage leaving the same blue residue that was on Vincent’s arm. It didn’t burn Tod’s flesh like it did Vincent’s, but it left a hole nearly 5 inches in diameter in Tod’s flesh.
“A new friend, you too, take a seat,” The captor’s voice was clearly altered by the mask, “Got any other buddies I should know about?” Vincent shook his head. “Good, so this is the gang trying to take us down? Y’know we aren’t all buddy-buddy to be fair, we just kind of bond over our addiction… these weapons are more of a curse to be fair,” The captor looked around the room for a moment before continuing, “So, what do you think the reason is that you’re collecting these things?”
“The King. He told us to get these out of the hands of anyone because of what they do to the people,” Vincent answered
“I wouldn’t consider him a king to be fair.”
“The Void King, the ruler of the Voidlings?” Said Vincent.
“Oh my! He’s using the highest tier of royalty as a mule. That’s hilarious. Hold on… but…” The captor paused for a moment, “He wouldn’t. OH. This isn’t a mission just to collect these things… this is for you.” They pointed towards Vincent, “They could do this without you easily, but it’s you, their mission is to”- The captor’s words were cut off by a bullet flying through the window and carving out a massive hole in their head. The hole was coated with the same blue residue.
Vincent immediately stood up and peered out the window. Across the street was a building but nobody was in any of its windows. After scanning outside for another moment to no avail he turned back to the body of the captor, he grabbed the gun that they were holding.
“Target number eight,” Vincent said as he picked it up.
“Oh, hell yeah!” Eiliesh said as she stood up.
Vincent helped up Tod, who was struggling to walk due to being beaten, and the hole that, at this point, had healed to only be about an inch now. The three of them walked out with Tod’s arm wrapped around Vincent, using him as a crutch. Vincent helped Tod into the car, and they began off towards the castle.
“So, my little fugitive, what happened,” Vincent said.
“I ran toward the city, and I was tazed and thrown in the back of a car that they knocked me out in with some kind of gas. When I woke up, I was in that building and he was already calling you on my phone.”
“Tod, that one little galivant around town put me, and more importantly you, in more danger than you could ever imagine. I have a target on my head and the people who’re after me are going to take any chance they can get to get closer to me.”
The car fell silent for a moment.
“So maybe next time don’t do anything stupid, kay?” Said Vincent.
“Okay.”
They arrived at the castle and Vincent handed the booth attendant the same slip he’d been given before and they opened the gate before handing him back the slip. He parked the car, grabbed the targets, and approached the guard at the door, and handed him the same slip. The guard then began to lead Vincent down the hallways again.
“King’s asleep, leave them on the table,” commanded the guard.
“I think I’ll wait for him to wake up this time,” said Vincent.
“That won’t be necessary.”
“No, I have a few things I need to discuss, tell the two back in my car that I’m gonna be staying here for a bit, and tell them to get themselves home.”
“Sir I must-”
“No, it's fine, I promise,” Vincent said as he took a seat across from the throne.
* * *
Tod looked out the passenger window as a guard approached the car
“Your driver is apparently staying the night here, needs to discuss some things with the king. He said you two should head home.”
Tod shrugged, got into the driver’s seat, and began driving away.
“Catherine was my best friend, when Vincent said he was looking for employees I volunteered her for the job,” said Tod.
“Yeah, I knew her too, she recommended me the job, we weren’t very close though,” responded Eiliesh
“I just feel like if I hadn’t brought her along none of this would’ve happened.”
“And if Vincent didn’t have a phone, you’d be dead. You can blame yourself for anything with enough “if”s.”
The car pulled into the driveway of the house as Tod let himself out.
“Hey,” Eiliesh shouted from the car.
“Yeah?”
“Vincent told me there was an extra room?”
“Uhmm… yeah. You need a place to stay?”
“A little bit yeah, my apartment isn’t really the best place for me right now with all the police that are bound to be there.”
“Sure, I guess you could stay here for tonight.”
Tod led her inside and showed her around a bit.
“Is your chest gonna be okay after being shot like that?” Eiliesh asked.
“Probably, I dunno,” Tod said before he opened Catherine’s old door, “This is the room you can stay in for tonight.”
“Okay, thanks.”
* * *
The Void King emerged from his chamber again, being met with an empty room aside from the glowing axe and gun on the table. He sat in his chair and dialed a number not saved in his contacts.
The phone rang for a few seconds before being quickly picked up, The Void King was met with the same hasty voice, “Updates?”
“Yeah, they got the fifth and… I think… eighth target… yeah.”
“Okay, any casualties?”
“Not on their side, apparently your buddy was up to some stuff.”
“Yeah. Target number eight almost spilled the beans so to speak.”
“Who got 'em?”
“Target twelve. Is there anything else you need?”
“Uh, nope, that’s it.”
The call hung up immediately after. The king sat back in his seat, seeming somewhat relieved.
“Who was that?” Vincent said from the darkness.
“OH MY GOD!” The Void King yelled after being startled, “You scared me.” He paused, “That was none of your business, why are you here?”
“Target eight told me some things about you being a mule and apparently working under someone. And unless it wasn’t what it sounded like it seems like target eight wasn’t completely off base.”
“It's none of your business what I do with these things,” The Void King said in an annoyed tone.
“Yeah, you’re totally right, other than how Target Eight told me that this wasn’t about collecting the weapons, this is somehow about me… wait… was that The Diamond Council Leader on the other end?”
“No. It wasn’t,” said The Void King abruptly.
“Well, I was told you could easily get these weapons some other way, so unless you wanna have a little chat with me, maybe fill me in on a couple things, maybe you’ll have to get them some other way.”
“Vincent, get the hell out of here.”
“If I leave without answers I’m never coming back.”
“This isn’t up to you.”
“Have you forgotten who I am? You’ve heard the stories of me, no? If this is a threat, you clearly don’t know who I am, where I’ve been, and what I’ve done,” Vincent said while making direct eye contact with the king.
“Are you threatening me?”
“Yes, I am.”
“Fine, you want answers? I’ll give you answers,” said The Void King as he rose from his throne, towering over Vincent.
* * *
Vincent exited the palace and began walking home through the desert. He walked for hours but eventually made it back to his house. Opening his office door, he stumbled through the room, over the desk, under the cloth, and through his dark room yet again. Collapsing in his bed, he stared at the ceiling, he looked down at his arm, still burning from before.
Vincent rose from his bed and made his way to the bathroom, he’d grown numb to the pain at this point but when he ran water over it, it stung more than it’d ever stung before. He used a towel to pull the slimy substance out of the wound, after removing about half of the substance the towel began to fall apart so he had to replace it. The feeling of the towel scraping against his flesh was almost pleasant once he got used to the pain again.
After cleaning off all the slime and practically disintegrating three towels. He made his way to the kitchen and bandaged his wound that was previously only skin deep, which was now about one inch into his arm. Making his way back to his bed, he began to stare at the ceiling until morning.
