“MOM!” He yells as the knife stabs me straight into my chest. Howler looked genuinely surprised by this outcome and straightened his tie, turning to that same wall.
“Yeah I planned that. Totally.” He turns back to my son and kneels down before him, watching me bleed out. “Holy shit kid, you’re one hell of a sadist! You know- I was actually going to just shoot her in the head so it was quick and easy, but you had to go the bloody and slow route!” My son tries to stab Howler again but he knocks the knife out of his hands with a simple slap. “Hey. bad. But seriously, you should really consider being a merc. They pay well, and you get to do a lot more killings. Alright see ya!” He says jumping out of the window, leaving my son dumbfounded and me dying of blood loss. The last thing I heard before fading out was Howler whispering one word. “Soft”
After my death, my husband, filled with grief, moved away with our daughter, leaving my son in Ace City to be homeless… He must feel so much guilt… I wish I could tell him, your mother still loves you, your mother will always be there for you… Dylan… My One…
Getting up, I try to run away but a bullet nearly hits my hand trying to reach the door handle. “Where do you think you’re going, ‘last girl’” he says kicking me to the floor. Twirling his gun, Howler continues.“Alright, traumatized kid is outta the way.” He says walking to me and pointing the gun. “I’ll give you 5 minutes to plead, and maybe, just maybe, I might listen!” On my knees, with tears in my eyes, I try to come up with the right combination of words.
“Please, I didn’t see much and I promise I won’t tell anyone! No authorities will come for you!” I say as Howler just stares at me, his smile finally faltering a little bit as he scratches his head.
“Huh… you know, haha, funny enough, I’ve heard that exact same excuse multiple times.” he says, kneeling down to my level and pressing the cold metal to my chin. His voice becomes a soft whisper so only I can hear. “Good effort though, I might believe you if it was the first time. So… B+.” Just as he’s about to pull the trigger, a knife goes straight into his head. Coughing up blood, he falls down with a smile. “Well… I didn’t… expect that…” As he collapses, my son, holding the bloodied knife, panted heavily.
“Are you okay mom…?” He says running up to hug me. I can’t help the tears running down… I must look so pathetic right now, but I don’t care. Embracing him, I cry softly on his shoulder as he does his best to comfort me. “There there… The bad man is dead.”
“Aw… Love wins once again!” Howler says from behind- wait shit. Kicking me away from my child. He backhands the kid to make sure he doesn’t get up.
“B-buh how- how did-” I say with my hands shaking. I point at him in fear and try to let out a scream but the sound won’t come out. Howler laughs at the attempt and sits down with me.
“Well, two reasons. One, there’s a reason my hair is purple” he says, throwing his hair back with a chuckle. “And two, I wasn’t shot. He was.” he says pointing at his own corpse in the corner. None of this makes zero sense to me as I watch my child get up from behind him. Howler turns to the side, and starts talking to someone who isn’t there. “Read carefully, bossfights users. You’re about to see peak.” Suddenly, my son lunges at Howler with the knife but he jumps out of the way, letting out a “Whoops!” in the process. However… since he was going completely straight to Howler’s back, the only thing in front of him was…
“Howler changed your times just because he could. He does this for everyone if he feels like it. So yeah, you’re late.” Well shit. That's what I get for not checking emails. Nonetheless, I got back into my cubicle and continued working. I then realized an application on my desktop that said cameras. I clicked on it out of curiosity to see what was going on and what showed shook me to the core… I can’t even describe what I saw there without feeling nauseous. Angered and horrified, I stormed to Phil and slammed the desk to get his attention.
“Tell Howler I’m quitting.” I said as he looked up with genuine fear in his eyes. I couldn’t tell if it was for his own safety or something else.
“Wait- wait seriously? It’s only been 2 days, don't you want to reconsider?” He says typing on his computer.
“No.” I say sternly, not backing down from my decision. “The second I can, I’m moving from this city back to the west” Phil looked up at me and held out his hand. Awkwardly, I shook it as he nodded his head.
“Alright. Good luck out there. And take care of your family.” he said with a bit of a somber undertone. Grabbing my things, I stormed back home for the day and hung out with my family, still not being able to shake off the uneasy feeling. That night, I woke up to the sound of my daughter crying in her room. I make my way over there and look over her crib. I pat her on the head softly, thinking about how great of a person she’ll be when she’s older. I turn around to get back home only to see a gun come out of the shadows and point at me.
“Well, what an interesting turn of events!” a familiar voice says as the man steps out to reveal…
“Mr Saber?” I say in fear. I hold my arms up as Howler scratches the back of his head with the tip of his gun.
“Who else would it be? Freddy Kruger?" He says laughing at his own joke. “Alright let me cut to the chase, Miss Doe. You, my friend, are a loose end! ‘Ate the forbidden fruit and now you must be executed!” He thinks to himself if the bible actually went that way, but he shrugged it off. “In other words, ‘Hi! I’m here to kill you!’” The gun clicks, finger on the trigger, the sound of my poor baby crying gets even louder. Howler looks at her in annoyance and sighs. “Not now sweetie. The adults are talking.” He then grabs me by the neck and throws me into the living room with such force, the table I land on completely breaks in half.
“...And you decided to live in the most likely place to get robbed? You got the survival instincts of a speck of salt, Miss Doe.” Howler replied, but seemed to appreciate my honesty. “Well then, you’re hired!” he says with a clap of his hands. I look up, overjoyed at the simple interview, and bow respectfully.
“Thank you so much!” I say with a warm smile. “I’ll make sure not to let you down!”
“I’ll hold you on that! Now get outta here!” He says turning around and giving a knowing smirk to… no one. Is he schizophrenic? Whatever. I head downstairs and go to my cubicle and begin to work. But then I realized… The work he wanted me to do was out of my expertise.
“Wha-” I say looking at the words upon words of medicine and different lab experiments on my computer until that secretary leaned above one of the walls of my cubicle.
“Shit… you actually got the job? Well you better hope you don’t get fired.” He hands me a stick of gum, which I take hesitantly. “You seem like a good guy, so let me give you a piece of advice… Good people die first in Ace City.” He says walking away. I can’t tell if that's a threat or not… After working way too much on figuring out what the hell “All in” was, I head home for the night with a man opening an umbrella for me.
“Care to walk?” He says in a french accent. The soul seems like it was sucked out of him, but I decided to walk with him anyway. For some reason, he continued to have the umbrella on even if there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. The lights illuminated the streets of bloodshed and gun violence. “My sister is jealous of you, you know?” the man said as he grabbed my shoulder before I could step on a corpse. “Not everyone gets the attention of Phil so quickly. There’s something different about you… you’re pure.”
“Uh… thank you?” I say a bit uncomfortable as he lets go of my shoulder. His eyes bored into me like he was trying to figure out what was going on in my head.
“This is your street, no? Go on then.” He says patting me on the back and letting me go. I headed back into my house as he turned around to leave. I made sure to close all the curtains that night. The next day arrived as I entered the door. Phil doesn’t even look up at me as I clock in.
“You’re late, Jane.”
“What? No I’m not...” He clicks a button on his computer and pulls up my schedule.
