The Deviant

Four Twenty-one

Four twenty-one a.m and Maria found herself in the Ring. A meeting for the high ranking members to discuss important business. Years ago it was a way to settle their problems in a boxing ring, two people surrounded by red ropes and left to work out their differences. Now it was at a table, voices knocking back and forth like fists as they argued between each other.

The clean Iron hammers hanging on the wall behind the Governor screamed of strength. He crossed his muscular arms, the veins bulging as he clenched his fists. The spider web tattoo clinging to his left elbow pointed to Maria, her body slumped forwards as she sat in Alfie's chair at the table. The tight knot in her chest jerked her upright, her bones screaming as if she was iron and rust.

Alfie's leather jacket laid on the top of the table, sleeves splayed out like the feathers of a bird getting ready to fly. The raven tattoo covering Maria's shoulder blades moved as she sucked in a breath, her eyes snapping to the knife slicing through the black thread that secured his sergeant at arms badge on the back. A darker shade of black marked the absence of him, an unmarked grave above the Raiders patch in the middle.

She closed her eyes, taking in the mourning silence.

The Governor licked the corner of his lip. "By iron and blood, we will get our revenge!" He tossed the frayed Sargent of Arms patch on the table, his gaze sweeping over the room, the burly leathered bikers slamming their palms on the worn wooden table in agreement.

Maria chewed on a piece of minty gum, the flavour fading the more she pushed it around in her mouth with her tongue. Tears pricked her eyes at the mention of Alfie, but she crushed the gum between her gritted teeth. The twinge of fire piercing through her jaw distracted her as she gnawed away at the thought of eleven fifty-two.

"Let us never forget." A silky voice seeped through the low mumbles of grief. The soothing tone met with the screeching of a chair, a lean brunette woman stood up at the other end of the table. Her bronzed skin almost golden in the sunlight, eyes warm like honey locked onto the Governor.

The Governor's fists curled under his arms, his eyes narrowing at the woman who placed her palms on the back of her chair and leant forward. "Raveena now is not the time." His eyes darted from the brunette to Maria.

Raveena pushed herself up, her gaze trailing down to the pale girl at the left side of the Governor. She weaved her way through the members, her fingers gliding across the patches of their leather jackets. Each move she made calculated, her cold fingertips pressing between Maria's shoulder blades. The snake tattoo winding around her arm and baring its fangs under her wrist was like her tight grip, nails digging into Maria's flesh like the serpent's teeth.

Maria tensed as Raveena's hair touched her shoulder, her blunt cut slicing her bare skin like a blade. She inched closer to Maria, releasing a sigh, "where's your patch sweetheart?" Her whispered breath curling around the bloody knot in Maria's bleached hair.

Heavy boots rested on the table, "she married in, her patch and her title don't mean much without Alfie, but I'm sure you already know that Rav." The Governor's right-hand man leant back in his chair and linked his fingers behind his head. A smirk played on his thin lips, his blue eyes following Raveena's movements.

She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin, "of course I do. Little boys are always afraid of strong women, but I'm sure you already know about that Samuel." Raveena pressed her berry-stained lips together and blew a kiss to Samuel, her hair cutting through the air as she tilted her head. She placed a hand on Maria's shoulder steadying her shaking nerves, the blonde staring at the leather jacket on the table.

"Fucking vote then!" Samuel snapped, his hand swept through his dirty blonde hair in frustration. He blew a lone strand out of his face and rubbed his bleary eyes, his fingers following the contours of the dark hollows beneath them.

Raveena's hand slipped from Maria's shoulder and returned to her seat. "I already said that I'm not voting for this," Raveena said folding her arms over her chest, a silver dagger necklace glimmered in light and the sharp tip pointed out the scar between her breasts.

"Vote?"

Everyone turned to face Maria, the first word she'd spoken in the ring. The silence ate away at her. It wasn't the absence of voices around her that annoyed her, but the dull buzzing in her ear, the same sound that accompanied her at eleven fifty-two and stole her love from her.

"Following the events of the past few hours, some members have questioned your reliability." The Governor paused and glanced to Samuel on his right, "If so it means you will be a deviant, a member that has no charter but..."

Deviants were the wanderers, the members who either didn't know their place or didn't want just one home. They still did the bidding of the club but had to work for multiple charters of sister clubs, the only way out of the Iron Raiders was death. The Raiders had three different sister clubs in London and more up north, the iron hammers the only thing linking them to each other.

Maria chuckled and held her head in her hands, "casting me out," she mumbled into her palms. She dragged her hands down her face and clenched them in her lap as she dropped them. 

The Governor pushed Alfie's jacket aside and threw Maria's in front of her. He removed the knife from his boot and sliced the blade through the loose stitches holding the back patch of the iron hammers and the flaming skull. Maria's jaw twitched as he ripped off the clubs emblem with no remorse.

A black patch fell on top, Deviant in white capital letters. Samuel laced the dark thread through the jacket as he stitched it on the back, above the unmarked centre. Only the clubs name and her outcast patch clung to the back of her leather. The void still showing the outline of the crossed hammers. The skull's eyes, nose and teeth were burnt into the faded leather where the sun had touched it.

The bump on her forehead felt like a hammer striking her skull, she couldn't help but scowl at the Governor who's lips were moving but she didn't want to listen to anything he wanted to say.

Snatching her leather from Samuels grip, Maria swung the oak doors of the Ring open and walked out into the main room, her green eyes zoning in on the red exit sign. She didn't glance back as she waded through the tables, her heels sticking to the floor but that didn't falter her steps. Before she could push the door open, someone did it for her.

"Finally getting to stretch them wings, eh Blondie." The man who served her whiskey before the meeting nudged her out of the club, he tapped the wolf on his chest as a sign of respect.

Maria squinted in the early morning sun, the bitter wind tingling her cheeks and turning her nose red. She tilted her head back and breathed in, stretching her arms wide like a bird worshipping the warm rays of the sun on her bare skin. Lowering her arms, she turned to the row of motorbikes and their glossy gas tanks, the only beautiful things to come from the club were the bikes. She kicked the nearest one, the sharp tip of her stiletto heel leaving a dent in the paintwork.

Raveena burst through the entrance and out into the compound, her brows wrinkling at the destruction in the Blonde's wake. "Maria," she called after her down the strip of private road. "Go to Ramone."

"Who the hell are you to..." Maria spat back. Raveena shoved a few crumpled up twenty-pound notes and a scrap bit of paper into her hand.

"Your man wouldn't leave you without nothing. Nothing's lost." Raveena slipped away from Maria, her head nodding to the scrap of paper with the details of how to find Ramone.

"I lost it, the moment I lost him."