Sunday, August 20, 2006

 

08.20.06

DISCLAIMER: The following is a macabre tale of a dark and serious nature. Please do not continue if you feel that you cannot endure such a story. Cheers.

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He'll tell you that he doesn't have insomnia, though that's the technical term for it. As an acquaintance, he'll just tell you that he has trouble sleeping at night. But if you're one of the chosen few, he may feel compelled to tell you of what haunts him in the still hours of the midnight, of the various demons that torture him from the depths of the shadows, whose contorted shapes do nothing but remind him of events that transpired in the past.

Do you live in fear? I mean, truly terrified of something-- scared for or of life? Most are lucky enough to not have to live with such burdensome thoughts-- he used to be one of them.

More than likely, he will spare you the long story-- that he just had his short time handling politics. He'll say that, in a nutshell, there were often disputes between parties and eventually, he evolved into the man who was sent to quell a quantity of qualms in the area. But very quickly, like a moth to the flame, he was drawn in and the risk of each solution rose considerably.

Things were getting deep and he was being brought down with them. With their age, people's egos grew-- their intelligence and immaturity exponentially worsening. Vendettas were constantly growing, retribution seeming to be the only option.

Living under these conditions left him jaded to many experiences. The violence of men and their testosterone-driven ambitions over territory and material things were things that only shocked him in the very beginning-- not because he got over it, but because one had to get over it in order to be strong enough to do what he did. It was only when things of this nature deviated from the alpha-males and their peons and began burgeoning into the lives of females that a dark flame stirred within him-- that was his weakness.

His deep-rooted hate for the male mind was a direct result of his environment. There's a keen difference betwen streetsmarts and booksmarts and here, he had a clear advantage in both over all the men he dealt with. But the ladies here were another story and of another caliber. The roles they played in these neighborhoods and the actions they took nurtured within him a soft respect for the female gender. He never fought over his boys-- only with words and compromises.

But, mess with a girl in any shape or form, physically or verbally, and there would be guaranteed payback. He called them his "songs" and his quartet of retaliation sang his lyrics to the unfortunate-- their heard crescendos of pain amplifications of the melancholy in the female community they had created.

He was the Venus Enforcer and soon he became more feared than loved. He had a composure and form that presiden'ts would have been envious of. He ruled over the county with an undisputed iron fist. With his strong hold of power, he was very rarely perturbed or distilled, his raging fire of retribution saved for female cases.

The last time he lost it, a girl he hardly even knew was reported to had been raped at a party. He approached her in confidence and it was confirmed. He felt that it was his duty to deliver an opposite but unequal reaction.

Instead of his usual quartet, he rounded a band of ex-cons who owed him a favor. It was a saturday evening and the target and friends were jumped outside of a local liquor store. He and his crew, which consisted of three, were taken to a back-alley where they were blasted with a prison song of forced attrition. Poetic justice-- four virginities to pay for the stolen value of one.

He never gave the group, known as the Northside Aristocrats, another thought-- he usually never had to.

Two weeks later, the NSA retaliated in a violent guerrilla knife-frenzy. However, they weren't after him-- at least not physically. He didn't play by the rules, neither would they-- they went after one of his best friends, his right-hand man.

The ambulance didn't make it in time. He suffered a slow death due to blood loss, the result of multiple stabbings lining the stomach and chest.

Do you know what it's like to hold a loved one in your arms, watching them breathe their last breath, the small light in them fading away until there's an emptiness in their eyes?

After that, he distanced himself from that town and everyone there. The place that he once regulated with dignity had regulated him in the end, making him one of its victims.

It was memories like this that lurked in the darkness and slowly ate away at his soul. He couldn't sleep because at times, he was paralyzed with fear from knowledge-- the knowledge that he or anyone wasn't invincible and that the world is a crazy place with a severe imbalance of good and bad.

But more importantly, his faith in humanity was shattered-- he was terrified with the knowledge that even he could succumb to the travesties and horrors he once prevented.

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Docking out...
-Ryan : ...

Ryan posted this at 2:32 AM.