Shadow Walker

Death

It happened in slow motion—Montague's runted arm steadying the pistol against the palm of his oversized crab pincer; the sound like air compressing inside a muffler, before being spat out at speed; a dull thud; skin and bone collapsing on hard earth; a scream catching and bruising Dec's throat.

But no pain. No searing, ripping sensation as he'd always imagined of a bullet tearing flesh. Still, he was unable to move, think, or even breathe. It took him a moment to realise he hadn't been shot, and another moment to realise who had. At the sight of Mark on the ground, the top of his head exploded like the contents of a pre-packaged meal in a microwave, all he could do was slump forward, hands on his knees to keep himself upright. Blood was everywhere. It amassed in heavy rivulets from the collapsed crater of Mark's cranium to pool around the base of his neck, making smaller rivulets along the bitumen. He thought he saw Mark's leg twitch like a rabbit's after a perfect dead eye shot. And for a second, Dec was back on the streets of Atunda after the massacre, wading through a sea of sweaty, desperate bodies, covered in soot, dust and blood in all shades of coagulation as they writhed in pain and desperation towards the hospital doors.

Teegan had fallen to her knees beside the oozing body, all movement and gasping noises, hands here, there, everywhere, trying to stem blood, while checking for a pulse. As the seconds passed, her movements became more frantic until she was beating helplessly at a chest that refused to rise.

Dec looked for the gun. It sat where he had left it, propped against the wall, too far away to be of any use. Taking in the boy's skinny arms, remembering how they'd bowed under the weight of the rifle he hadn't been shown how to use, his anger simmered and rose to a boil. There was a dark red scab on Mark's forearm, where his wrist met the cuff of his shirt. It was in the raised scar pattern of a fresh glow tat—the sign of a Night Rider. Mark had been killed by the leader of a group he admired so much that he'd branded his love for them on his skin.

Fury tore through him, severing his mind from his body so that he floated in a state of detached consciousness, just as he'd done in his memory recall. But instead of being inhibited by the sense of danger that had filled him in Stanley's office, all he felt was an overwhelming, all-encompassing rage that carried him forward and sent him crashing into Montague.

He attached himself to the older man's consciousness like a leech to a limb, enveloping him so wholly, Montague barely had time to register the infiltration before it was too late. The police officer shuddered, gave a weak flicker of resistance, before relenting. Montague's mind was his own.

Through Montague's eyes, he stared down the barrel of the pistol, which was still pointing at Teegan, the sight perfectly aligned with a wisp of her hair making a curtain part of her forehead. Her expression was twisted, eyes wide like she was free-falling from a height.

He forced Montague's hand to release the metal trigger and drop to the side.

"Officer?"

Lazar's voice was needle sharp, pricking holes in his tether on Montague's mind. There was a flicker of recognition in Montague's awareness and a more forceful push of resistance as Montague struggled to regain control. But Dec held firm. There was one more thing he wanted to do in order to affect a 'water-tight' solution to the problem of a murderer.

One glance at Mark steeled his resolve. The boy had become an almost unrecognisable heap on the ground, so devoid of life he was already as dismissible as roadkill. There was no retribution for what had happened, but he could at least make sure it would never happen again.

Bringing the gun to his head, Montague's head, his finger tensed on the trigger. It was what Montague would've done.

"No!"

Dec faltered. The cry had not come from Lazar, but was pitched in Teegan's voice and layered with such desperation that Dec felt his resolve slip, exposing him to the horror of what he'd been about to do. In his momentary distraction, Montague threw himself at Dec's conscience with the force of a desperate man with a gun to his own head. Once, twice, three times, Dec was expelled so violently that for a second, he was left flailing in wide open space. Then, the insistent tug like a rubber band pulled him back towards his own body. Montague stared at the gun in his hands, then took stock of his surrounds, blinking and frowning as though trying to shake a bad dream.

Dec knew it was only a matter of time before Montague recovered and did something rash. So, conjuring every ounce of his physical strength, he lunged at Montague, tackling him to the ground, grunting as the impact thrust the air from his lungs. The pistol skittered across the bitumen. Dec braced himself for the struggle to come, the inevitable grapple with a man twice his mass and twice his muscle, only to find that somehow, Montague had blacked out on landing, the bulk of his weight pinning back it down by his injured shoulder, sending fresh pins and needles along his left arm.

By this time, Lazar was advancing on him with a look in his eyes that said he would finish what Montague started. When Dec tried to move, a ripping pain shot through his shoulder and brought hot tears to his eyes. And just like that, the sandstone walls of the alley began to cave in as his claustrophobia gripped and pulled him under. It was the massacre all over again, the straightjacket of the dying man's crushing weight, the fall of his chest as it decompressed with his last breath.

Lazar bent to pick up the gun that lay discarded on the ground a few inches from Montague's outstretched hand and Dec readied himself for the end. Then, all of a sudden Lazar was on his knees, body swaying precariously before he fell face first on top of Montague, adding more weight to Dec's dislocated shoulder. Behind him, the hooded man stood with a police baton in his hand. Dec's immediate reaction was to cringe, half-expecting the baton to come down on him next. But the man merely cast the baton aside and kicked the gun out of Lazar's reach.