The Assassin's Shadow

Chapter 27

Cody's expression immediately hardened and he tore his gaze away from the picture to glare at me.

"Key word there being "were". That was a long time ago."

"And you obviously still love her, even though she's dead."

The fury that had been on Cody's face before came back with a vengeance and he whipped out his gun, shooting the picture frame from my hand and nicking my finger in the process. Blood dripped from the wound but I ignored it as I dove behind his desk in time to avoid another bullet. I grabbed my own gun from it's holster and clicked the safety off.

"If you loved her so much why have her murdered?" I shouted at him, peeking around the corner of the desk so that I could try to shoot at him.

His figure was there and then it was gone as he bolted, reappearing in front of me in a second. He grabbed me by my throat and threw me across the room, making me crash into the door I had seen before. The door crashed in under my weight and I fell into a room that was indeed a bathroom. Cody was instantly pinning me down, wrapping his fingers around my throat and squeezing tightly.

"Because she betrayed me!" Cody shouted in my face. "She swore she would always love me, that she would always be by my side and then she tried to leave!"

He picked me up off the ground and threw me at the sink, my head crashing into the faucet. I felt the blood trickling down the side of my head but I did my best to ignore it as I had more pressing matters, namely the psychotic man who was once again in front of me. I quickly flicked my knife out and used it to cut a gash in his side. As I began to fight back, Cody grew more and more angry.

"I promise you can't beat me, Elaine. Who the hell do you think taught Ash how to fight?"

"I'm guessing you." I told him, doing my best to avoid the brunt of his mad blows, most of which were far too fast. My powers were doing their best to heal most of the damage and if I had been anyone else I would have already been unconscious. "And who taught you?" I asked, trying to distract him.

Cody laughed bitterly, his emotions running wild and allowing me the opportunity to get a few more blows in. "I taught myself. Had to protect myself from my insane parents who decided my powers were a mark of the devil."

"You knew Ash then, didn't you? She helped you get out of there." I realized, breathing heavily. This struck a chord with Cody and his blows weakened slightly, allowing me to push him off of me. We stood for a moment like that, both bent over slightly and breathing heavily.

"She was my girlfriend." Cody finally whispered. "We ran away together, we were going to build a place that was safe for people like us."

"And then you started changing and she didn't like it." I nodded.

"I didn't change!" Cody shouted.

"Then how could you order the death of the woman you loved!" I shouted back. "YOU betrayed HER!"

Cody's whole face dropped as I said that. It was as if he always knew that, but didn't want to admit it to even himself and I noticed with shock that tears began to fall from his eyes.

"It wasn't supposed to be like this." he whispered.

"Too late for apologies now, Cody." I told him.

He looked up sharply right as I raised my gun to shoot him and just as I pulled the trigger he disappeared. I flicked my last knife out and twirled around, thrusting my arm out and it immediately met with flesh as it embedded itself into a chest. Cody's face held nothing but shock as he realized too late that this had been my intent all along.