[TDS] The Good, The Bad, and the Sand

Prelude

"Samuel!" Adams shouted from the burning building. Even with the flames engulfing his legs, he crawled toward me through the smoke, anger in every move. They clenched their black and gold revolver hard, trying their best to reload it. I stared at his prone body until the wooden support beam burned down in flames, blocking my sight of him. I walked out the bar door, now turning to charcoal off into the small little town. It wasn't really a town, not anymore. The dead bodies lined the path, underneath the coating of smoke and ash in the sky. The only thing to remain being the sand that layers the ground, always present.

I can't keep doing this, I thought, through all the chaos in my head. It was nothing less than a dead silence out here, and yet here I was, filtering through all my memories. Enolizer, the Tower splinter group, always had me running these jobs. If I didn't complete them, I may as well burn with the rest of the townsfolk. I almost felt like waiting at the economy town for Tower forces to arrive, ready to shoot me dead on the spot.

I could wear a different hat. Switch out my red bandana, wipe the blood off my tan shirt or tint my sunglasses rose. Even then, nothing would change the tracks that I make in the sand. It's at the ground, where good and evil leaves a different footprint, leaving judgement open to those trying to follow them.

I could hide. I could run. I could change my name, get a Swiss passport. But nothing could leave my head now. I could only present the immolation I left behind for the organisation that holds me hostage. Can I really change the scales? Could I walk the line between good, bad, and leave a legacy in the sand?