Kandra Talon flipped away from her phone as the living room's light flipped on. What stood beside the switch, arm outstretched and toes on their tips to reach the button, was a pajama clade boy. His hair tousled by a frivolous dream or three which roused his silken strands of blonde into what could only be described as a hornet's nest. Seeking an eye's draw were the vast amount of triceratops, glistened by their heady horns then playful smiles stuffed with grass, as well as chasing velociraptors that pranced with glee as their claws patted on a tropical land's muddied earth. The creatures kiddified into cartoonish forms across the boy's clothing. A desire of paleontology that then manifested in the plush toy of a brachiosaurus whose elongated green neck spouted out an extra foot from the pit of the boy's arm. The source of all of Kandra's greatest fears but shared by her most lauded achievements.
Expertly stealing the bottle away from the kitchen's counter, Kandra slipped the empty vessel, without a word, into the trash. All a moment before the child's glance rested upon her slackened figure.
Gawping, the child pointed at the woman dressed in her ragged state of an undershirt that was nearly torn away by excess use, left with remnants from spilled drinks as well as reopened scars. It was not the attire she wished to be bearing to the child yet found no other as the price for clothes skyrocketed that same month. She would be lucky to even afford socks in the coming year.
"Mommy, I heard Aunty Em!" The soft smile bursting with warmth weaseled its way onto Kandra's face. She was unable to prepare such a stoic facade for Charlie.
Shifting away from the kitchen's counter, she wagged herself over to the growing boy. "Yes, you did. I just finished talking to her."
An excited stomp broke out over Charlie's twitchy leg. "Oh, wow! Can we go see her?" Kandra remembered the conversation, even the slightest element of pain which rang out from the silence emitted by the woman. She wished to see Charlie as well, but it wouldn't do to have him miss class. Considering his maturity to witness such gruesome malevolence from violence was not an issue. The boy had since infancy seen such sights that it wasn't a problem worth much thought. Too many times to count had he aided Kandra in her return home, bloodied and bruised from an excruciating day at work. It would be the same, or at least conveyed to him in the same manner.
"Yep, we'll go see Aunty Emelie tomorrow. But not until after your classes, understand?"
The excitement now dotted the rise from the boy's eyebrows as his stomping ceased, "Ok, Mommy. Don't lie. You better return home early so we can go together."
"Of course, I will." In one fell swoop, Kandra picked the boy up, scooping him into her arms like a cradle. Despite his age and extended length, she still found strength to carry the child on occasion. They passed the hallway, darted from side to side with ever more drawings that increased not only in intricacy but legibility. By the tender age of ten the boy had become quite an expert at his craft.
Once in their bedroom, Kandra placed Charlie on his two feet then flung off the covers waiting for him to insert himself into the center of the fixture. When he did so she patted the boy on the head then pushed the sheets up to his chin, placing a kiss upon his cheek. She made her way back to the kitchen but was called by the child again as she reached the doorway, "Mommy?"
She zipped around, facing her boy, "Yes?"
"Wh-when will you be coming to bed?" She sighed. The boy had caught wind of the startling black bags that plastered her eyes with a forewarned story of sleepless nights. Insomnia partnered with the excruciatingly tepid calls from her place of work brought about such terrible conclusions for her sleeping habits. It had been a while since her last night of solid rest.
Kandra looked back to the kitchen noticing the light remaining its dimming hue. The bulbs were always burning ever quicker. Addressing Charlie again, "I'll be back in a minute, have to get a midnight snack before nodding off." Once more she returned a peck to the boy's face effectively assuaging the worry from his mind. Finally able to slink away, Kandra ensured to do just that.
She reached the living room and flipped the switch off then carried on to the kitchen.
Nothing would impede her from resolving the promise made to her child. A single beer from the fridge and from there she would snuggle her way back to the boy blanketed by the warm covers stitched from real cotton, a treasured artifact. Together again, the night may perhaps give way to a welcoming sleep that would invigorate her for the approaching week.
"If only," she wished.
By chance of a flickering shadow which was uplifted by the shine of the moon's stare, Kandra caught a peculiar image. The window which commonly was left latched then barred with a double stack of books on its inner ledge, was left bare that evening. This evening one of such peculiarities would never have alerted the woman, especially when she had retired from her place of duty. Most often Charlie would take the books to read or doodle, perhaps he may have unlatched the window in order to make mention of the passing cars which honked throughout the day. However, she knew the books had been stacked there when she came back that evening. Charlie was fast asleep leaving no avenue for why the window ledge was bare of materials. Why that latch was undone, and why when she peeked with haste plagued focus, a sharp but subtle crack manifested on the wooden frame, stood as reminders of inadequate reasoning.
The room went chill with a sullen cold. An aloof fatigue washed over Kandra as she pieced together the purpose behind the window's present state. A reason which now captivated her gaze as she watched it drift across the room from behind a shelf of knickknacks Charlie constructed. In its entirety the figure cracked her knowledge with its glowing red eyes, filled with a hateful vengeance unlike any other. Then, once she gazed into the amassing pools of blood which devoured the man's appearance, his aura bloomed outward onto her.
Despite her average encounters with the presence of several Evolved, an occurrence which gave her the fortitude to even withstand a grimace from one of Unity's partners, this aura melted the woman to her knees. A hacking was brought forth across her raised hand finding not a blot of pink skin beyond the crimson fluid which sourced from her lungs. It was an aura that stole her ability to speak let alone rise from the floor to confront this man.
Finally, the man drew closer to the woman, yet what was unveiled was not the face of a veteran killer approaching his victim but rather a child. A horribly scarred child whose only expression manifested with a contained rage.
'From when had he entered the apartment? An hour ago? No, how didn't I notice?'
The boy drifted behind the woman, his footsteps leaving no sound in their wake, not even a breath was ushered forth from his maw. "If only? If only what? If only that sleep of yours could go on? If only the next day shall rise and with it, will you meet your lover? If only a week will pass with a child to return to your side? If only you could corrupt him as you have done to yourself?" The words echoed from her earlobe, yet the whispers of wind did not come with it. The teasing visages were made as if from a spirit and not a human being. "If only I had not come. Then I did, and now…"
Kandra pushed with all her might however she still couldn't muster the strength to face the intruder. She clenched her teeth lifting with both legs while she pushed with her hands. The limbs screamed in abject pain as they wobbled due to her excruciating demand. It felt as if the weight of the world came crashing upon her back forcing a reply of submissiveness. A reply she dared not give against this person for a sole salvation lay in her focus beyond all the pain. Her child's face remained ever brilliant, stealing the reasonable reality from her mind.
Thus, this reaction provoked an ounce of respect from the killer. Kage came expecting the very same vermin that he had shot down not a day ago but was granted an unbecoming will. One that made the woman's choices all the more unclear to him.
'How could someone so full of mental strength forsake it all? Why would she abandon her duty bringing the death of thousands because of so?'
Subsequently, Kage scoffed with a snarl and smirk mixed between the verses. He had decided the moment he stepped outside what his course of action entailed. No longer did he feel that abiding emotion to forgive nor understand this cretin. She was just another vermin with a time sensitive date before expiration.
Therefore, when Kandra managed to stand on top of her own two feet facing the intruder, she was met by the vicious stone that was tossed her way. Kage's fist flew into the woman's cheek snapping the bone through her skin resulting in the burrow of his knuckles to implant themselves into her olive flesh. The movement of his upper torso wrought Kandra to the floor splattering more fluid on its cleansed surface. This time, the woman was unable to stand, thus she covered her skull with either arm appearing as an infant cradled inside a womb.
A pitiful leer took hold of the wound before a second lecherous annihilation blew into her stomach. The bones beneath the punch creaked with volatile exuberance as they rejoiced at not being shattered. A similar statement could not be given through Kandra as the attack reinforced a pronunciation of blood from her mouth.
Kage hopped to his knees, laying them out to either side of Kandra Talon's figure. There he reached down to clutch either of the woman's arms into his hands. Kandra gazed upward attempting to free her appendages from her attacker yet was grounded by his aura as well as the grand power infested in the boy. Then, where she had gained the ability to maneuver, twist, and flail her arms with unmitigated control, was ripped from her as a break occurred in them. Kage bit a thumb through the skin passing into the bone of each arm before twisting his grip on them. The Chief desperately wished she could cry out at the agony ruptured in her as the arms dropped to the floor without a means to carry themselves. This wish was stolen from her own grasp as the aura from Kage simply ate the wailing which created a sphere of pure silence. A deafening silence that left the woman only able to remark upon the softly carried smirk which formed on the boy's face.
Her torture brought him immense satisfaction. Kage found another source for him to bring down wrath upon, a wrath manifested over the course of a decade. A concept that startled him for so long that he quietly fought with it, forcing the idea to the barren pits of resolution he possessed. Now, that wrath broke forward out of its coffin to forsake the life of another. Someone known no more as human, but a vile vermin worthy of extermination.
Kage's hands wrapped around the skull to his patient. Between the lifting of her head to its sudden drop, the woman coughed up a storm of pleading in which he didn't hear a single one. Instead, his precise attention drew onto his surgery that was about to commence. When her head dropped onto the floor a smattering of jam dripped into a steady stream, it was not enough for the boy. Afterall, she still had so much left to go. So, Kage picked up the ball and dropped it again, this time her eyes blackened as a wave rolled across her mind. Thrice more did this procedure go on before Kage judged the woman to be in her correct state.
He rested her unconscious form into a well-worn and beaten chair. A simple decorative item that someone could easily be bound into without much leeway to break free from, especially when the usage of their arms had been taken away.
A chain rolled out from under the boy's black shirt, it was strewn over his torso as walking around with a chain in broad daylight would have garnered unneeded attention. Kandra was thus tightly bound to the seat left ready for Kage's interrogation to begin when she awoke.
The boy believed himself to be in want of some gratification for his endeavor but knew none could be found at the moment that is. When he returned to her grasp would he experience such unfathomable grace he couldn't even imagine the prospect in its fullness.
However, he would not get ahead of himself.
The intruder's eyes joined together at the crouched child whose head poked from the slit of a bedroom door. Dare it shake in his presence. Dared it to tear up at his approaching cloak of a form.
'There's much left to be done.'