Page 24 of Overcast

“Feeling a little attacked here, Bishop.” Mills flicks his focus to me. “I’m not the one who takes saws and wire cutters to people’s fingers and tongues.” Now both of them are peering over at me.

“What is this a pissing match?” I leer. “I’m taking off.”

“Fucking great,” Mills mutters before I can even take a step. “I get to play babysitter. That wasn’t the deal.”

“You mean how I got to play one when you wanted to fuck with the child pornographer you discovered in LA? I got to listen to him scream like a bitch for an hour and a half while you—” I air quote him. “—ran to pick up food.”

“It was busy,” he retorts, averting his gaze.

“You were fucking that married redhead,” Bishop claims. “So, yeah…you were eating alright.”

Mills leans over the table. “She’s divorced, for the hundredth time, and how about you enlighten us with your wisdom on what Marty can—”

“It’s Emric,” I snap, squeezing the neck of my beer. “You don’t call me that.” Bishop appears unaffected, as always, while Mills shakes his head disapprovingly.

It may not be a big deal to them, but it is to me.

Emric is who I am when I’m with them, B723—remorseless and bloodthirsty. Picked up by a clan of vengeful outcasts that called themselves the Samaritans, and instead of getting a hug that he greatly needed at ten-years-old, he was handed an assault rifle and lessons in vengeance.

Preached to death that petitions and prayers were worthless when an individual sinned against you.

When men and women knew right from wrong but still did it anyway.

Emric is a monster, a character I keep very far away from Reagan. He was shoved away when Rea dragged me by the hand to her house, proclaiming that she was going to rat me out for what I had done.

I murdered her father.

Who, in turn, ordered the bomb raid on Tolnova, the village I lived in with my family near Russia. Where their ashes remain, now blown away with the wind and soaked into the soil that lies underneath it’s rebuilt city.

Two younger sisters, a mother, and a father.

I blew Reagan’s dad’s brains out and had zero remorse for what I had done at that tender age of ten.

Also didn’t think of the consequences afterward. My goal was to avenge my family, and I did.

All while following Reagan faithfully as she tugged on my hand to tell her Mama what I had done.

She was the first person I’ve ever fallen in love with after my parents and sisters was murdered, and I’ve trailed behind her ever since.

Except, sometimes, I feel as though I should’ve allowed her bloom and let her go.

When Mama adopted me, I became Marty. A troubled boy who turned into a man with a mad admiration for the two women who saved me.

Who made me believe in something else other than hatred and violence.

But it never fully stopped the demons that resided within me from coming up to the surface to play for a little bit.

“Kindness,” Bishop vouches through the empty space between us. “They say it gets you far.”

“Huh?” Mills sets down his Coke can. “One more time?”

“She needs to eat,” Bish continues. “Bring her something, show her that you’re—” He quickly sizes me up. “—somewhat human.”

“I don’t require her to like me,” I point out. “I just need—”

“Information about how someone almost drowned your sister. The only family you have left. You’re desperate...and it shows.” He doesn’t hide the disgust in his tone. “The more you torture this chick, the more she has to play with.”

Play with?

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