Volume VIII: Inherited Dysfunction

24. An Old Friend

I woke up alone, comfortable and safe, down in the sewers still. Why we hadn’t moved back upstairs I don’t know, but I was content where I was. I stretched slowly, feeling a bit groggy but otherwise alive and glad for it. I decided to make sure the bar was intact.

I found my mother in her familiar post behind the bar, wiping it down as if she’d never left. The place was closed at the moment, apparently preparing for her triumphant return. I had heard a brawl here earlier, but all signs of it were gone by now. She’d bid Gin to take her leave while she kept tidying up, checking the stock of liquor behind her.

“So just like old times?”

She nodded. “Sort of. Relic, I…”

And the door burst open, a disheveled gentlemen staggering past, Irish holding him up. She looked up at my mother with an expression of both fear and desperation. “He needs your help.”

She shook her head. “How did you know…”

“No time Harley. Just fix him.”

She helped the stranger to a chair, trying to sort out what sort of medical attention he might require. She sent Irish down to find the most able medical expert in the underground as she pushed pressure to a series of random injuries.

“What has he done to you?”

The stranger coughed up blood, resting his head back to stare at the ceiling. His eyes rolled over to lock on me. “What have I done to him?”

Harley stopped what she was doing to meet his eyes, and he pulled her hand up to lay something in the palm. And in it, he laid down a policeman’s shield, old and weathered, apparently forgotten with time. She wrapped her fingers around it, coming to some sort of realization beyond my understanding.

“I have the Cycle. The stories, all of them. He never gave the children the original. We kept them. I have everything. His reign of terror has ended.”

I tried to make heads or tails of things, but was quickly shushed and brushed off as the new player was brought down to the underground. I stood in the bar grasping a handful of blood-drenched rags, amazed how far and fast everything I knew had changed. Or had it? Was it always like this when I was young, strange people entering and leaving my life so suddenly? Maybe I’d merely forgotten the long days and even longer nights. Maybe I was mistaken. Or was I? It’s hard to tell anymore, no matter how much time I put into considering the issue.

I gave up and trudged back downstairs, waiting patiently for the moment my mother would inform me of this latest development. There was no word of Angyl’s return, nothing to explain what had recently transpired. I returned to sleep, hoping for some sort of release in the morning.

“Morning sunshine.”

I awoke to a considerably more battered Angyl at my side, smoking a cigarette despite being covered in ash as it were. She looked weary and beat, but yet, still standing as always. As I had no reason not to trust her at this time, I welcomed her return as something familiar. She was something steadfast and true, who would not lie or betray me. She would help make sense of this madness so that I could live to be the epic storyteller my family expected of me.

“I’m sure you’re pretty confused…I guess I should lay out a few things. A long time ago, there was a man. A man in love. And that man’s great love ended her life out of sorrow. Our blind hero, torn with guilt, never recovered. He spent his life destroying other lives in a desperate effort to quell the guilt and pain deep in his soul. Eventually, he stopped being a man, and became a legend.”

I nodded, showing I was keeping up with her.

“Despite his pain, he was entrusted with a solitary purpose, which he fulfilled when the mood struck him. To defend the innocent. Throughout his life, he found himself entrusted with a child that he was sworn to train to perform in his stead. That child would continue to punish the evil and end the madness that had plagued the community for generations. That child would live above the law, without rules or boundaries, and define truth as closely as one could.”

“You’re that child?”

She nodded solemnly. “I just killed that man. To him, all I was…was a tool. A toy to play with. A soldier to follow orders. And once I had outlived my usefulness he would have destroyed me like he destroyed all else in his life. So I beat him to the punch. I killed my mentor and burned his house to the ground.”

As outlandish as it seemed, I went with it. Stranger things had happened, and even if she were exaggerating things at the moment as a way to vent, I’d leave her to it.

“So what about the stranger that Irish just brought in?”

And she blinked. “A…stranger? What’d he look like? Have you ever seen him before?”

“Didn’t she drive you up? I’d have thought you’d have known about all this?”

She looked around frantically, suddenly paranoid of her surroundings. “No. She left before I did, I was busy destroying evidence. I had to make sure all loose ends were tied.”

“Well, you failed junior.” The voice was male and even, calm but dominant. He stepped forward slowly, a box under his arm. “You forgot about me, and you forgot about this.” He held it up to show her, smiling slowly as he did so.

“How…” Angyl’s tone staggered slightly, realizing that she was caught, seeing that her plan had been missing elements. She’d been slipping along the way and had failed somehow. I don’t know how or what, but it had happened.

“You think I didn’t know you’d come back for him? To report your success? Or to destroy him? And he knew it too. He would lay in wait for you for hours, hoping you’d come. But you didn’t. Once I caught wind of all the trouble down here, I knew it’d be soon, and there you were. Gun in hand. You didn’t want to talk anymore; you didn’t want any little jobs or missions. You wanted your freedom, so you took it, as you were meant to. You see tiger, we both had a common enemy. Damien “Klyde” Thompson – your caretaker, my partner in exile. We both wanted to be free. You just helped me get there.”

“But the stories…”

“Yeah, about those. My brother’s entire life was spent playing storyteller. And I can’t let his legacy die because of your arrogance. Your family was insane from the start, there’s no hiding it. And I won’t let you destroy the evidence to save yourself. The stories will be redistributed, as they were meant to be. And I will keep the original, thank you very much.”

The box was dropped on the floor, a bit dusty but sturdy. On the top had been carved the following: The Timeless Martyrs Cycle. I recognized the title, as everyone had heard of them. It was a collection of stories that chronicled the past 30 years or so. Everyone’s ancestors, our great beginnings…and ends.

“Saint…I…” she mumbled.

“Don’t tell me you’re sorry. I know you’re not. You did what you had to do, that’s fine. You thought you left me for dead when you hadn’t though. Some old demons are just too old and too tired to go down. I’ve lost everything else in this world, now it’s time to make amends and set all the madness and anarchy unleashed through the years to rest.”

He looked over me, hand outstretched. “I’m sorry, we haven’t met. I’m Saint Crowe, an old friend of your mother’s.”

“How did you…”

He smiled wearily. “You look just like her. And I might be your godfather if memory serves me correctly.”

I got up apprehensively, pulling his hand and hugging him close. I was so deprived of family in the world that anything, an uncle twice removed, would make my heart sing. There was something calming in his pain - his presence brought a sort of peace with it. I felt that with him around, and my mother, we would be able to find justice in the dark. Or perhaps I was too hopeful - it’s hard to say. He took his leave of us, letting Angyl fight with her thoughts. She took pride in her efficiency, failing in something she had set out to do was a let down to her. Without another word she marched out, her mind set on something. And despite our long heart to heart conversation, I could feel my trust begin to waver.