The Wild Ones - 1 - The Start

19.

Max closed his eyes and breathed in slowly. He felt light-headed and distant, as if his brain had taken leave and all that was left was a headful of air. He put a shaky hand to his head and rubbed his temple, if only to get a sense of reality. He opened his eyes again. Tom was still soldiering on, searching through reams of paper with a cold blank face.

"You OK?" Tom asked, not looking at Max.

"Nope. Not one bit," Max said breathily.

"I bet he's alive, you know. They're probably wheeling him into an ambulance right now."

"He was shot and fell about twelve feet down to a solid floor," Max stated.

"People have survived crazier things."

Max stared at his brother. He was tired of him constantly playing devil's advocate. He was trying to help, trying to ease the pain and add some optimism, but he constantly came across as a stubborn idiot.

"Do you think he's insane?" Fear crept into Tom's voice.

"Sane people don't shoot other people," Max replied.

"You sure about that?" Tom watched Will closely. "He's sane enough to know what he wants, whatever that is."

Max thought for a moment.

"What the hell are you after?" he yelled out of nowhere. Will stared back at him in slight shock and amazement, as did Tom who wanted nothing more than to stick a sock in his brother's mouth.

"What?" Will managed.

"I mean, it has to be something important. You just killed a man to get it. And you're damn sure it's here, whatever it is. So, what is it?"

"I've already told you, you moron, it's a page with 'confidential' over--"

"Yeah, I got that, but what is it in particular? What is it for?"

Will continued to stare in bemusement, clearly not expecting to be chatting with hostages. "What do you care? Just find it and I won't put a bullet in your skull, OK?"

"What do you mean 'what do I care'? Of course I care; you just shot my uncle dead in cold blood. I'm not gonna just sit here and shrug it off, am I?" Max's tone began to get increasingly louder.

"Max," Tom said, warning his brother to calm down.

"You really think your uncle was some saint? He was a sick, twisted excuse for a human being; he deserved to die."

Max reciprocated Will's confused looks. "God knows he wasn't a saint, but he did nothing terrible enough to warrant his death."

"Really? What's this then?"

Will unzipped his coat and pulled his t-shirt down by the collar, exposing his chest. Max and Tom both stared in horror. Directly in the middle of his rib cage, Will's skin seemed thin, nearly translucent. Beating away behind the delicate outer layer was a large black heart, disturbingly clear, as if looking at it from behind tissue paper. It was made only more distinct by thin red lines running across it.

Max and Tom didn't know where to start. Will zipped his coat back up and continued with his searching.

"Now find me that document," he said coldly.

"Wait, our uncle did that to you?" Tom said, totally unable to process this idea on top of everything else he'd experienced today.

"Well done."

"But...why would he? What is it even?" Tom wasn't really thinking about his words anymore, just spewing out whatever came to mind.

"You really need to shut up now," Will said, gritting his teeth.

"Just, please tell me, I want to know what happened."

"I said," Will turned around and cocked his gun. "Shut up."

There was a loud bang and then a deep thud. Max looked across to his brother, barely able to catch his breath. Tom looked back and furrowed his brow. They both turned to look where Will was standing. Except he wasn't anymore, instead now lying on the floor in a pool of champagne and broken glass. Becky stood over him, holding what remained of the bottle of chardonnay from earlier.

"Well that was surprisingly fun," she said witha smirk.