Spoony the Pussy One: Life is in the Render Queue

[Guest]

I wish everyone posting about COVID was dead.

Believe me that I would love dearly not to have to talk about Chinese Kung Flu. But our governments are fucking with us and idiots like 'Grab a Jab' guest are too fucking stupid to realise it

[Kugelfisch]

I bet most of those morons that push the shit aren't even vaccinated against much more dangerous diseases.

[Deckard]

I wish everyone posting about COVID was dead.

There's only a 1.8% chance of that happening from Covid.

Whatever gets the job done, I don't give a shit.

[Newhalf]

What happened to my beloved Spoony thread, you MONSTERS!
Take it outside.

J/k, Spoony does nothing anyways.

[Dingus Bajingus]

Thread sucks, post bunnies.

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[JL Unlimited]

Thread sucks, post bunnies.

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[VoiceOfReasonPast]

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You stole my idea, so all I can do is one-up you

[wulfenlord]

Moderators, ban any misinformation about safe and efficient COVID-19 vaccines.

I hear you, tender and soft specimen. At one time, Noah was exactly like you. A passive-aggressive dickhead, while also yelling for MODS!, see his gaming forum entries in the days of yore

So pibbs, how many shekels to your Patreon for you to review Spoonys Highlander fanfic which is only posted in his old RPG forums, never before seen on his defunct website or his dusty blogger account?
Highlander: Pariah (prologue, 1-9)
Highlander: Pariah (10-25, epilogue)

[Guestfag]

So pibbs, how many shekels to your Patreon for you to review Spoonys Highlander fanfic which is only posted in his old RPG forums, never before seen on his defunct website or his dusty blogger account?
Highlander: Pariah (prologue, 1-9)
Highlander: Pariah (10-25, epilogue)

Awesome fanfic, 10/10. Comedy gold
This is my favorite part, in spoiler, because there is too much cringe to be seen

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[wulfenlord]

Fucking forum software with archived threads or some shit. Here, have the prologue + Ch.1 because I want you to suffer

(also preface: this shit is from 2005 - this is Spoonys own preface:

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About 5 months back I started writing a fiction involving all-original characters, set in the Highlander 'verse. I'm not exactly an obsessive fan, and I've only seen a scant few episodes of the television series. So I feel obligated to mention that the only continuity this fiction follows is my own. No established characters or concepts from the movies or series are used herein, save for perhaps the notion of "Watchers."

I mention this because the Pariah story should be viewed ostensibly as an alternate universe, and you should look at the story being told with fresh eyes, as if the movies had never happened and the story were being told over from the beginning.

As a second preface, I don't consider this fiction to be vulgar or crude, and certainly not pornographic. However, we are talking about a fiction in which the characters' ultimate goal is to decapitate their opponents. There will of course be violence and occasional strong language. I'm no expert, but I'd probably rate it in the PG-13 to R range, depending on your sensibilities.

It's been a while since I've updated the fiction because of schoolwork, but the work has not been abandoned, and I feel this is a really fun story to tell. I hope you enjoy it.

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Prologue: Just Drinking in the Rain

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The Spice Rack
Seattle, WA
October 22, 2004 – 11:30 PM

Drinking alone is one of the worst things a professional alcoholic can do. It keeps one in the house, away from friends, away from help, away from supervision. Such sessions usually degenerate into an angry, self-pitying depression that ends in unconsciousness and accidental eruptions from at least two of the major three evacuation portals of the human body. Jack Donahl preferred it that way. He didn’t feel like talking to anybody. He didn’t feel like being cheered up. All his mates were either dead or rotting in some damned English prison. His arthritic knees ached in this close, freezing weather. He was sitting in the rain. And tonight of all nights, he felt allowed to get bollixed and reward himself with some self-pitying depression.

Donahl reached into his jacket pocket and retrieved a collection of little liquor bottles that he’d grabbed from the hotel minibar on his rush out the door. He laid aside his shotgun microphone—mindful to keep it pointed towards the topmost church window-- and knelt down on the rooftop of the building, spreading out the bottles. He sifted through them looking for whiskey, and eventually settled on a runty portion of Jack that probably cost five bucks. He didn’t care; he’d set this day aside specifically to get steamboats, because Quint wasn’t going anywhere.

He spun the cap off the bottle one-handed with practiced ease and raised it slightly to the shrouded moon. “Dia is Muire duit,” he said roughly and drained the bottle. He exhaled a low breath and propped himself in the corner of the restaurant rooftop. Another bottle. He’d never had Crown Royal before, but he drank that too and hated it. He didn’t really read the third one’s label-- figured it was American vodka, which is why it tasted like water. Just when he was getting nicely numb, the sound of someone climbing up drew his attention to the opposite end of the roof. Donahl eased his headphones off and draped them around his neck. A head poked its way over the threshold and the man swung his leg up.

“Jack?” the man called. He rolled up at last and stood, dusting his pants off. He was a roundish fellow that would have looked at home shelving books. Not fat, just unathletic. His hairline was desperately retreating to the back of his head, to the point where even a comb-over, last bastion of the balding man, had to be abandoned. He dressed like a physics professor, and an unimaginative one at that. From head to toe, his clothes were nondescript, dullish brown and gray department store fare.

“Ah Christ,” Donahl swore. “Not tonight.” He scooped up a pair of high-tech binoculars and plastered them to his face, surveying the road under night vision. He looked for Quint; maybe he’d slipped out early for once while Donahl was getting rat-arsed and not looking.

“Calm down, Jack,” the man said, stepping over near Donahl’s impromptu pub, “My boy’s not here yet.” He knelt down and plucked up a bottle. “I came by to see how you’re doing.”

“Oi can’t hardly stand this pu**y Yank sh**e yeh call whiskey, Vaughn,” Donahl grumbled. He lowered his binoculars and sat back down on the wet rooftop. The rain picked up, and he huddled miserably in his corner. “Oi’d kill for a proper glass o’ Guinness. Might as well be drinkin’ tap water.”

“You okay?” Vaughn glanced over at the church across the street.

“Celebratin’, son, celebratin’.”

“Sure looks that way,” Vaughn observed at the state of the rooftop. “Quite a setup you’ve got here. Microphone, video, starlight…”

“Pullin’ me plum,” Donahl griped, punctuating his frustration by spinning the cap off another bottle.

“What?”

“Doin’ nothin’. Wankin’ in the bloody rain. Oi’m peachy, Jason, absolutely peachy. ‘Bout yeh?”

Vaughn reached into his coat and produced a silver flask. It looked expensive, and was engraved, although Donahl couldn’t read the script in this light. “The other guys chipped in and got you this, Jack. I know it’s a little stereotypical considering you’re Irish and all, but ehm…well, happy birthday.” Donahl blinked in surprise and reached out to take the flask, and was surprised at its weight. He unscrewed the cap and wafted it under his nose.

“Oh thank God,” Donahl breathed, his eyes rolling back in relief. “It’s been weeks, mate.”

“Thought you’d like a reminder of home,” Vaughn smiled. “What are you now, a hundred?”

“Seventy, ya twit,” Donahl belched. But he seemed in good humor. “But thank yeh far the gift, eh.” A melancholy look crossed his face, and Donahl hung his head. “Ah well. Drink wi’ an auld man?” But Vaughn pointed his thumb over his shoulder and shook his head negatively.

“I gotta go. Take it easy, all right?” He waved good-bye and headed back towards the other side of the rooftop. A sharp ratcheting click at his back caused Vaughn to freeze in his tracks.

“Not here yet,” Donahl said with frost in his voice.

“What?” The rain picked up. It was heavy and cold, and for a long while there was silence between the two men. Silence, except for the drumming of water all around them and the low rumble of distant thunder. The rain wouldn’t last much longer; the sky was already beginning to clear. But here, it persisted. Here, the weather seemed to match the foulness of Donahl’s mood and what was about to happen.

“My boy’s not here yet,” Donahl repeated. Vaughn said nothing but raised his hands up. “The hell’s that meant tae mean, Jason?” He stood up and pointed his gun at Vaughn’s back, still holding his flask in his other hand. “Yaer boy’s followin’ you for a change?”

“Jack, come on, Jack,” Vaughn said, turning around slowly. Donahl pushed his nine millimeter handgun into Vaughn’s shoulder and made him face the other way again. “You don’t need that. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Tell it tae me bollocks, Vaughn,” Donahl snapped. He tried to put it all together through a haze of terrible Yank liquor. “Yer boy’s coming here? Followin’ yeh? And you…” Donahl shook his head in disbelief, “How did yeh even know Oi’d be-- Yeh followed me here? Tae get tae—“

“He…he just wanted to talk to Quint, Jack. Please. He just wanted to talk.” Vaughn was a terrible liar. Donahl had heard much better bullsh**e from much harder blokes than this.

“I can hear steel on steel over me headphones,” Donahl snapped, “On holy ground.” Donahl looked over at the church and cursed himself for being so dense. He tightened his hand around the gun and willed his head to clear. “You muppet. And yeh knew this would happen, eh? An’ yeh wouldnae come up here unless yeh were plannin’ to make sure I snuffed it, too. If all yeh wanted was Quint, Oi’d never have laid eyes on yeh. So why,” Donahl hissed, “are you here? Eh?”

Vaughn turned his head to look back, but Donahl poked him in the spine with his gun again. They both could hear the sharp ringing of swords clashing against each other from the headphones around Donahl’s neck, even over the sound of the falling rain. They listened for a while. “Jack…”

“Yeh dinnae have the minerals tae kill me face tae face like a civiloized murderer, did yeh?” Donahl spoke softly, his voice dripping with disgust. “I wasnae t’always a Watcher, ye dumb yella sh**e. An’ like a pu**y, yeh’ve gone an’ poisoned an auld man’s whiskey.”

Vaughn stammered, “Jack, I swear it’s—I just thought--“ He trailed off as Donahl reached over his shoulder and smacked the flask against his chest.

“Drink it, Jason.”

“Jack!”

“Drink the whiskey or eat a bullet, mate.”

Jason Vaughn didn’t move, except to shiver, and once again time seemed to slow down. The only sounds that could be heard were the high-pitched tinny sounds of a distant sword duel through a pair of headphones, and the deep rumble of the weather all around them. They could see each other’s breath in the cold, hear the stress of every inhalation. For a long time they dwelt on the silent, common knowledge that only one man was going to walk off this rooftop.

And then, it all stopped. The rain weakened and dribbled to a halt. The sound of swords and microphone static ceased. All that was left were heartbeats that throbbed loudly in the thick, wet air. Shots rang out, but they came from the church across the street. Vaughn ran for it, primal fear pushing him onward. He crossed the distance of two rapid strides before more shots rang out, and Vaughn pitched wordlessly onto the rain-slicked roof—a shot through his neck, and another in the back of his head. He slid across the water a bit, twitched his leg, and laid still.

Donahl was already packing up his kit when a cacophonous shattering sound drew his attention across the street. The top of the stained-glass window of the church exploded outward as a man dove through it. Amidst a shower of lead, blood, and colored glass that twinkled like fireflies in the streetlight, he fell from the second floor and crashed with a sickening crunch onto the stone stairway in front. Donahl cursed himself again for being such an old fool and shouldered his satchel. If Vaughn was here, that meant—Donahl looked from side to side and clenched his fists, trying to figure out what to do. Quint wasn’t going to make it.

Quint limped to his feet, collapsed, and drug himself forward into the street. His gait was awkward and his forward progress was made in a lurching step that barely qualified as a limp and was more a crawl. He rolled off the curb and into the street, oblivious to the little orange car that had just cruised through a green light at the intersection. Donahl squinted his eyes, a dark expression etched on his face. The car’s tires shrieked on the slick asphalt, a vacuous gravelly sound as the bald tires hydroplaned. The car fishtailed, swerved one way, then the other as the driver overcorrected, and hit Quint off-center in the knees. Quint was blasted clean out of his shoes. He bounced off the hood, spiked his head into the windshield, sailed straight up in the air, and landed on the side of his neck and collarbone as he fell across the edge of the vehicle.

Donahl looked away. He walked over and retrieved his flask, and emptied its contents on Vaughn’s body. “Drink’s on you, mate.”

Prologue: Sanctuary of the Faithless (because multiple prologues are a surefire sign of being an artisté extraordinaire )

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University Christian Church
Seattle, Washington
October 22, 2004 – 11:30 PM

The city looked abandoned from where Quint stood atop a flight of narrow stone stairs. “Abandoned” was perhaps not the right word, more accurate to say that the city had a vacant feel to it, but still a life of its own. Quint could see no one walking along the street, and it seemed both comforting and frightening that, in a city such as this, he was alone. Occasionally a car would pass, a low rumble and a sharp glare of light made potent by the glimmer of rainfall that quickly faded into the night. Quint was alone, but the city was alive; the passing vehicles made him imagine the city breathing.

He leaned his head back and let the hood of his coat fall. The icy bite of the rain on his skin made him grimace. Quint loved the rain. It felt fresh and cleansing on his face. The sound of it soothed his nerves and loosened the tightness that often gripped his neck. He loved the reflection of city lights and neon on black puddles. Some might say that it poisoned Quint’s mood, that his personality was dark and dreary. That it gave Quint some angsty schadenfreude to revel in a phenomenon that causes misfortune and trouble to so many others. Quint had thought about that, but decided the only thing about rain that really filled him with angst was the notion that humanity had finally found a way to screw even that up.

Angst. Ah well. If the shoe fits. Quint wasn’t any part of the solution either, so who was he to judge? Leave it to the beret-wearing rich girls on algae diets, and the long-haired guitar-strumming guys trying in vain to score with them via the sensitive-guy route to chain themselves to trees. Quint spit his gum out in the nearby planter and drove such inane thoughts from his mind. He was just upset because his Walkman crapped out last week.

Quint slicked his hair back with a lazy swipe of his hand, and turned away from the street. He pounded on the door a couple of times and waited. After a few moments, the door swung open. A black man on the light side of thirty leaned against the doorjam, wearing after-hours business casual: a button-up gray shirt with the collar loosened and charcoal-colored slacks. He had closely-trimmed dark hair, already graying at the edges. He had the carriage of a man without cares and who had long ago stopped bothering to suck in his gut.

“Didn’t think you were gonna make it,” he said.

“Traffic. Good to see you again, Bri.”

Brian smiled warmly and swung his hand out. “You too, Dex.” Quint gripped his wrist and they shook hands. “Come on in. I’ve got pizza rolls, and Trump’s about to fire that one guy. I love Tivo.”

Quint rolled his eyes and almost reconsidered entering the church, but did it anyway. “You’re a minister. Can’t you denounce reality TV or something?”

“You just don’t deal well with change,” Brian said over his shoulder as he led the way to his office. “I got American Idol cued up. One of those audition episodes where everyone’s terrible.” Quint made a guttural sound.

“I’m just going to sit in the hall down here. You have a good time though.”

“Sorry man,” Brian turned around. “You looked sour. Thought I could help a little. I know you don’t want to talk—“

“I don’t,” Quint said in a harsher tone than he meant to. He corrected his tone, “I just want to be alone for the next 30 minutes.” Brian nodded sagely, looking as if he wished he could help. But he didn’t intrude. That's why Brian was one of the best friends a man like Quint could have. He seemed to understand that Quint had a lot of mileage on him, and most of what he kept bottled inside wasn’t anything he wanted to feel better about. Brian walked down the hall.

Quint turned towards the main aisle and hesitated. “Pizza rolls?” Brian laughed and kept going. “Evil.”

Quint waited until he heard the door to the reading library close before he walked down the aisle. The hall was dimly-lit, the pews swathed in splashes of color from the stained glass windows behind the altar and chancel. The chancel was a walkway that stretched behind the pulpit, elevated above the congregation by two small flights of stairs on either side. It allowed the choir to file in from the left, stand in front of the windows and sing directly to the congregation, and exit to the right. It also kept the young acolytes from sleeping during the sermon, because thirty booming voices stood behind them at all times.

He stood in the middle of the aisle and closed his eyes, once more enjoying the sound of the rain against the roof and windows. He dropped his duffel bag heavily onto a nearby pew and concentrated. The acoustics were wonderful. The air hummed and throbbed as if it were special here, or magical, and the hair on his arms raised sharply at the sheer bliss of what he was hearing. He fell to his knees in humility. He swore long ago that he would never bow or bend knee to anyone ever again, except one person. And so, here he knelt.

“It won’t end. You know that, Quint. It never ends. I won’t be protected.”

Quint’s fists clenched in his hair. He bent low, pressing his head to the floor.

“I won’t beg. I am asking you now, and that should be enough. Make it clean. Then walk away.”

His teeth ground audibly, and his eyes clenched shut, but tears still squeezed through and fell.

“It’s all right. If I could have chosen anyone, it would have always been you.”

Quint gasped for breath as a shock coursed through his body. His spine prickled as he felt a new presence approach. Someone like him. Unconsciously, he reached for his bag until he remembered where he was. Holy ground. The doors swung outward, allowing a rush of frigid air to flood the church.

“Love in a hut, with water and a crust, Is - Love, forgive us! - cinders, ashes, dust.” Silhouetted in the doorway stood two men, side by side. The tall one had light, almost white hair that laid awkwardly on his head and drifted in the wind. He wore a trenchcoat, buttoned up against the elements and a red scarf wound around his neck. His eyes were narrow and full of malice, and though Quint had never seen him before, it looked as though the man held some deep hatred toward him.

The other man was relatively smaller, but had a body that carried much more density. Quint could tell he was well-built, and he wore his tailored business suit as if he were born to be in one. He had thin, round glasses balanced atop his nose that reflected the street light harshly into the room. His face was severe and stern, with immaculately-trimmed facial hair shaped into a Van Dyke-style goatee. An umbrella was propped over his right shoulder. Quint turned to face them, his eyes red and puffy, glassed over with fresh tears.

“Dry your eyes, Quintus. O dry your eyes, For I was taught in Paradise To ease my breast of melodies,” the man in the suit teased. He stepped inside, flanked by the larger man. The speaker closed his umbrella and leaned on it; Quint noticed that he carried a noticeable limp.

“You don’t get to call me that,” Quint said, his tone murderous. He instinctively knew to hate this man, and it wasn’t just because of the poetry. “And we’re closed for a private function.”

“Love has made you predictable, Quintus,” he continued. “For whom do you mourn?” Quint scowled and stepped forward, anger coloring his face, but the taller fellow in the trenchcoat stepped in front to shield the man behind him. Quint restrained himself, but the talky fellow persisted in provoking him. “Mortal? Immortal? What would she say to you, Quintus? ‘I long to believe in immortality. If I am destined to be happy with you here-- how short is the longest life. I wish to believe in immortality-- I wish to live with you forever’. “

“How short is the longest life . . . I wish to live with you forever.”

Quint’s jaw sagged open, and he staggered backwards in horror. He knew. It was a quote from Keats, “Letter to Fanny Brawne.” It was what she used to say, in dark warmth together. And when she said it, Quint felt needed. He felt important. When this man said it, he felt violated. The breath leaked from his body, turning acid in his throat. “Tell me how you know that,” he threatened. He will suffer. “Tell me what you want.”

“Hear ye not the hum, Of mighty workings?” he quoted. Keats again. Who was he? The man pointed his umbrella at Quint. “The days of peace and slumberous calm are fled. Our time draws short, Quintus. And so much depends on you.”

“Answer me!” Quint cried out. He could hear the door to the reading library open, and Brian wandered out. Quint cringed and called with a broken voice, “Brian, go back into the library.” He pointed a finger at the man who quoted Keats, his tone moderated into a cool assurance of imminent death. “Answer me.”

“You have fallen so far from your greatness, Quintus.” This Keats man seemed genuinely saddened. “There is not a fiercer hell than the failure in a great object. And what a hell you must struggle in. But you mourn, you stagnate, you rot. You live, and yet you are more dead than most who walk this earth. You keep wishing to undo time’s inexorable grind forward. As though a rose should shut and be a bud again. She has broken you, Quintus. And we know her name.”

The tall man finally spoke. "La belle dame sans merci,” he said, in natural French. With that, the Frenchman opened his coat and calmly withdrew a masterfully-wrought sabre and gestured to Quint with it as a challenge.

“What are you doing?” Quint’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. The Frenchman advanced quickly. Quint rushed to grab his bag, but he barely had time to grab the shoulder strap when his opponent was on him. Quint dove past an overhead slash as he dove into the pews. He gripped his duffel bag in his hand, but had no time to search in it for his weapon. The Frenchman showed no quarter, no hesitation; he hacked into the pews as Quint scrambled to regain his feet. “This is holy ground, you a**h***!”

Keats laughed with a sardonic amusement dripping from his voice, “Is there such a thing for a faithless man?”

Quint screamed as the Frenchman’s sabre lashed across his collarbone. With mortal fear hastening his steps, he dropped his bag and scrambled to the altar. He fell over it, and sensed his enemy swiftly behind him. He rolled aside just ahead of another chop that rang woodenly off the altar. Quint snatched up an iron candlestick and managed to parry a slash meant for his belly. Quint hooked the Frenchman’s swordarm under his armpit and drove his palm into the man’s nose. The Frenchman stumbled backwards, clutching at his bleeding face. Quint hurled the candlestick into his groin.

He half expected the Frenchman to drop his sword after that, but he was only momentarily set back. Quint looked around for a weapon. His bag was out of reach. He ran to the pulpit. Nearby stood a pair of flagpoles: the American flag and the state flag of Washington. Quint wrenched Old Glory free from the base and tore the fabric away. The Frenchman regained his footing and bared bloody teeth at him as Quint spun the pole as a quarterstaff. Quint held the pole low across his waist, his hands spaced far apart at opposite ends.

The Frenchman rushed in with a furious yell. Quint had already sized up a flaw in his technique; he was a devastating fighter because he psyched himself up for gruesome murder when entering battle. His blows were all power, balanced by basic technique. Anyone caught unprepared could be easily overwhelmed, as Quint had been. But anger and power lead to mistakes. As the Frenchman charged, Quint flung his makeshift staff forward as if it were a pool cue. The poor lighting hindered depth perception, and in an instant, Quint was holding the staff at the extreme end like a sword. His nose crashed straight into the eagle that capped the flagpole, and he almost somersaulted backwards from the impact.

His opponent regained his feet, his face masked in blood that still gushed from his ruined snout. With another cry, he waded back into melee, his sword never at rest. Quint managed to parry the attacks, but his enemy was a brutal swordsman who had seen combat. He could tell. Quint was not suited for this type of combat, and he was being driven backwards steadily.

He dropped low as he parried a slash at his legs, and the Frenchman followed up with a high downward-arcing hack. Quint parried high over his head, the staff parallel to the ground. He clove the pole in half, and the sword collided with the ground. Quint seized the advantage and pummeled the Frenchman about the head with the broken ends of the pole. He clubbed him in the head with brutal rights and lefts, hoping to knock him out long enough to run or find a real weapon. He planted his pivot foot, and was spinning around to follow up with a roundhouse kick to gain some distance, but the Frenchman rolled under it and hacked upwards into Quint’s hamstring. Blood flowed hot down his leg and Quint seethed in transcendental pain. He felt his muscle ripping and tearing against the bone. He had to keep moving. He leapt forward on his good leg, gaining as much distance as possible. His enemy’s tactic was ruthlessness and overbearance.

“Dex!!” It was Brian’s voice.

Quint looked over to see Brian standing in the aisle. Oddly, he could see no sign of the man who quoted Keats. Quint had lost track of him. Brian had Quint’s duffel in one hand, and one of Quint’s swords in the other. It was small and deceptively compact, but sturdy and swift in design. Brian reached high over his head and hurled the gladius in Quint’s direction. It rang off the far wall and clattered to the carpeted floor. But it was close enough. Quint hobbled over and scooped up the old sword, and in one motion narrowly managed to parry the Frenchman’s lightning onslaught.

Quint was overwhelmed, and even though his technique was the best he’d ever known it, the Frenchman was too fast, and Quint was barely ambulatory. He fought a retreating duel, dragging himself up the stairs to the chancel that overlooked the entire church. To his left, the rain rattled against the stained glass like a snare drum. The Frenchman pushed him back with a thrust. Quint tried to get in a counterattack and slash at his opponent’s sword arm, but the Frenchman stepped forward and kicked Quint in the wounded hamstring. Quint screamed and fell backwards, nearly blacking out from the pain, and the Frenchman followed up with a brutal thrust into his belly.

Quint’s sword fell from his hand and he doubled over. The Frenchman laughed shakily at his victory and kicked the gladius to the floor below. “Il ne peut y en avoir qu'un,” he intoned, his mouth full of blood. So much for tradition.

“At the risk of sounding unsportsmanlike…” Quint groaned as the Frenchman raised his sword to finish the job. Quint rolled aside as the deathstroke fell and withdrew a handgun from his coat. He pushed it into the Frenchman’s ribs and squeezed the trigger several times. The Frenchman shrieked in pain and fell forward. “…you started it.”

Quint fell to his back and twisted away as the other man's body collapsed nearby. Quint considered taking the sabre, finishing him off. He swore under his breath and crawled away in an attempt to regain his feet. He heard a gurgling sound behind him. The Frenchman was back on his hands and knees. He gripped his sabre once more and was starting to stand! Quint allowed himself a moment to gape in amazement at the man’s persistence and resiliency, and it almost cost him. The Frenchman rushed to his feet and charged. This man was a pit bull, and faster than Quint expected.

Quint put all the strength he had left into a desperate jump. He fired his gun into the window and crashed into it, praying his weight would be enough to carry him through. It was. Quint sailed through the frigid night air amidst a shower of colored glass and icy water. He felt like he was falling for a longer time than he should have, and then he plummeted hip-first into a sharp edge of concrete. His leg snapped with an audible crackling noise of broken celery. His knee was wrenched unnaturally to the side, and he felt his kneecap dislodge. His hamstring was healing, but the fall reopened the wound with a vengeance, and blood rushed anew from the gash.

Forward. He had to keep moving. His thoughts now were of escape. He clutched at his belly and threw himself forward using the power of his one good leg, one push at a time. He barely knew he was in the street until he heard the sizzle and slide of hydroplaning tires. Just as he regained some semblance of a standing position, he turned his head at the sound and was immediately blinded by twin headlights

He remembered flying. He did not remember landing.

He smelled motor oil. His vision was tunneled into narrow pinholes that threatened with each heartbeat to wink out of existence. He saw a yellow stripe and a flat patch of ancient chewing gum in breathtaking detail. His leg screamed. His arm felt like it had been crumpled into a ball. The side of his head was wet and sticky, and a knot throbbed horribly. He wished someone would answer the phone. He felt gravel still embedded in his face. Someone gathered him up and put him somewhere soft. It smelled like old hamburgers and hand lotion now.

“Take him someplace safe. Please. Please, stop panicking. Just drive.” Brian? Was that Brian? Something heavy thumped into his lap, made of cloth. His duffel bag. Brian?

He heard a woman’s voice, too, arguing. Afraid. He had to get out of here, but he could not remember why. He pointed his gun at the source of the voice. “Drive…” he croaked in a freakish voice. His ribs were broken. He felt shards of bone floating in his lungs. “Driiiive or I’ll …I’ll kill you.”

He couldn’t breathe. He tried to speak, but only blood leaked from his mouth. His vision was fuzzy, grainy, then gray.

“How short is the longest life . . .”

Then black. Then gone.

Chapter One: The French Connection

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Bellarmine Hall Dormitory, Seattle University
Seattle, Washington
October 22, 2004 – 11:55 PM


“It's nothing like you see in Lone Wolf and Cub,” Quint muttered with his lips pinched around a cigarette. With a trembling right hand he tried to work the disposable lighter, but his right was his off-hand, and Quint was already well into shock. His left hand was occupied, stuffed into his coat pocket so his shattered arm didn't hang uselessly at his side and alarm the woman on the other side of the bed. Before he embarrassed himself too much, she finally reached over and lit the cigarette, exhaling her breath out loudly enough to convey a mixture of anxiety and frustration. Quint grunted in gratitude and breathed in the smoke like an asthma patient's first truly free breath after an attack.

“Ton of s*** in the way,” he continued hoarsely as he fumbled at the tab to a can of Wicked Ale, “not the least of which being the spinal column. It's just...” Quint trailed off as he saw the woman turn a paler shade and shake her head in disdain. She lit her own cigarette and Quint felt compelled to speak again. “I've never seen one go off clean before. Not in one shot.”

“Look,” she started, but Quint was on a roll and cut her off.

“Especially not with that Roman or medieval-era stuff. Most of the time they're not even all that sharp. It's all about leverage and weight. Impact.” He was losing her. She looked away, out the window to the nighttime skyline. “You nail a guy with a 4-foot length of steel and he's gonna be f***ed up. Broken bones certainly. Internal bleeding something fierce most of the time. Might even lay your skin open pretty good if they do catch you with a sharp edge. But those samurai movies? Bulls***.” Quint paused for breath, a drag, and guzzled half the can before continuing. Shock blurred his sight and turned his voice into a dreamy monotone, and the concussion had ceased hurting and turned into a dull, numb throbbing in his head and the rising bile in his gut.

“Usually takes, a half-dozen...nine. Hell I'm not even really counting...makes me sick. It’s never clean. Never clean.” Quint finished off the can and stared into the blackness within it, as if it contained some Nietzsche-like abyssal insight. He was really just trying to block out the pain, or at least blunt it.

“Is this supposed to impress me or something?” the woman said, looking confused. She was probably trying to work out exactly how much trouble she was in. Whether or not Quint was going to kill her. She fiddled needlessly with her hair-tie and re-tightened her ponytail in back. Her hair was red, Quint thought, but for some insane reason she had chosen to dye it to black and streak it with violet highlights. Who would dye red hair? Two long strands of bright purple hair were carefully-arranged to dangle over her face—the only hair not ratcheted back in a ponytail to what seemed to Quint to be a painful degree.

She looked like she was running the tail end of a second shift, clad in a sweaty mockup of formal usher’s attire from a movie theater. It was stained with sweat, salt, and butter that would never wash out. A disgusting greasy cummerbund hung off her waist with an ill-fit. She was pretty, Quint thought, but seemed mired in a phase to deny natural beauty in favor of shopping at Hot Topic and the novelty of damaging her hair with Kool-Aid. She wasn’t pretty now, but nobody is after a double-shift and a car accident. He decided not to judge; she won the beauty contest by virtue of not having to pick broken glass out of her face.

Quint snorted out a laugh that soon turned into a wide grimace as his broken ribs howled in furious protest. “I’m sorry,” he winced, reaching for another can, “I’m not trying to sound like I’m hardcore on the off-chance it’ll turn you on.” He paused. “Does it?”

“No.”

“Worth asking.”

“Look, I’ll take you to the hospital,” she bargained. She seemed desperate to get out of this, and Quint didn’t blame her one iota. “They can help you. You can’t stay in my dorm room. There’s no room, and you’ll bleed to death, and it’s filthy here, and—“

“It won’t—“ he interrupted her, and searched for the words before restarting, “I don’t need a hospital. By morning all that’ll be left will be scars. Would be faster but someone hit me with their Pacer.” The woman shook her head and started to protest, but he quieted her with a consoling wave. “It’s cool. You saved my life back there.” Quint leaned back and reached into his coat. He withdrew an old .38 as nonthreateningly as possible and checked the ammunition. He swore under his breath, spun the chamber, and closed it against his leg.

“I’m not gonna hurt you,” Quint murmured, “I don’t care what you saw, because you don’t know what you saw. You can tell anyone you like once I’m gone. Just not tonight. And your dorm is fine.”

The woman looked about at the wasteland her dorm was. The bed dominated the tiny room, and the scant floorspace that was available was taken up with a mini-fridge, piles of clothes, a bookshelf, a television that had seen the Carter administration, and a pile of pizza boxes that almost resembled a shrine to our lord and savior, Papa John Himself. “It’s a s***hole,” she finally declared.

Quint popped the second can of ale with an agreeable nod. “Yup. Terrible underfoot. Cramped quarters. Small. Low ceiling. Beautiful.”

She hoisted a single eyebrow at the sincerity of his tone. “What’s that supposed to mean?” But Quint’s eyes widened in surprise and he seemed to tense up all at once, like a cat prickling up for a brawl.

“Get in the bathroom,” Quint groaned out as he climbed back to his feet. His muscles and bones protested and threatened to go on strike. “I don’t believe this guy.” The woman started to voice a question when a booming voice sounded from outside, loud enough to shake the door.

“Quint! Temps de mourir, tricheur!”

The woman spun around towards the door and ran for it, shouting for help. She flung the door open and pointed into the room. “You have to help me!” she shouted, “This guy—“

A tall man shouldered the door open, nearly knocking it off a hinge. He wasn’t large and muscular, but instead lean and tough. He was unshaven, and his light hair was in disarray. There was a manic wideness to his eyes that filled Quint with the feeling that there was true hatred behind his actions. He put his hand up against the woman’s face and ushered her violently backwards. She tripped over her old laundry and fell into the bathroom anyway. The Frenchman spun his sabre by the hilt, the mercury lights outside glinting off the steel and Quint’s own blood that decorated it. It was an impressive Napoleonic-era affair, probably an infantry officer’s sword.

“Did you see that?” Quint motioned to the bathroom in disbelief. “She totally sold me out.”

“Maintenant, Quint.” The Frenchman demanded, pointing at Quint with the end of his sabre. Quint could see blood staining the front of his clothes almost completely, and the sticky red footprints he left in his wake. Three small holes perforated his trenchcoat, highlighted by the wet blood glistening in the anemic urine-colored light. The last two wore trenchcoats as well; it served as one of the only wardrobe options useful to conceal samurai weaponry. Being seen with such things tended to make people think you were either insane or from a Renaissance Festival. If there was a difference.

“Come on, Pepé Le Pew, I already kicked your a** once tonight.” Quint said with a weary false bravado. He wasn’t ready for this. “I got a TV. Let’s watch Voyager and drink tranya.”

The Frenchman moved into the room to come after Quint, lowering his sword to waist-level. He took a high step over the pile of laundry in front of the door and stumbled. He kept rushing in and made an off-balance stab at Quint, who threw himself against the opposite wall away from the point of the sword. The sword punched clean through the cheap powdery drywall, and nearly sent the Frenchman flopping straight onto his face. Quint made a grab for the sword arm, but the Frenchman was surprisingly agile. He rolled through his fall, wrenched the sabre back against his body, and made another upward thrust towards Quint’s face. Quint twisted aside and downward, dropkicking his opponent squarely in the face. The bed broke Quint’s fall, and he sprung back to his feet.

The Frenchman crashed against the back wall of the dorm and hurried back to his feet. Quint gained some distance by backing up near the door, withdrawing an old, notched marine KA-BAR knife from his coat.

“What did I do, man,” Quint smirked. He went over to the bathroom and pulled the door shut just as the young lady within was just regaining her feet. Her protests were only barely muffled by the cheap door. “Is this over Freedom Fries? I had nothing to do with that.” The Frenchman either didn’t understand or didn’t care. He shouted and rushed forward again. He raised his sword, presumably for an overhead chop of some kind, but the long blade clunked into the ceiling. He abandoned this attack and tried to thrust once more, but the wasted attack bought Quint more than enough time, and he was already on the move. Quint moved in and clung tight to his opponent, powering him up against the wall.

Quint smashed his head into the teeth of his taller opponent and jammed his knife up under his armpit. He did this twice, and then a third time. The Frenchman’s long weapon was useless here, and Quint didn’t concede the range needed to use it effectively. The sabre clattered to the ground as Quint rendered the sword arm useless. In desperation, the Frenchman tried to punch Quint, or to grapple him in a headlock, but Quint was relentless. He hooked a leg around the Frenchman’s knee joint and twisted, wrestling him to the floor. Quint pushed his knife against the Frenchman’s throat.

“Why?” he shouted. He grit his teeth and dug the blade into the man’s skin. “Pourquoi?”

“Vous devez mourir,” the man wheezed.

“Laissez-moi faire!”

The Frenchman tried to speak through a lung full of blood. He gagged and retched, and blood bubbled over his teeth and down his chin. He clenched his eyes shut and sprayed from his mouth as he shouted "Jamais! Vous allez causer notre perte.”

“What?” Quint was incredulous, and the Frenchman used the brief moment of surprise to lunge up. He clubbed Quint in his injured arm and tried to pull him over with it. The effort was feeble, and Quint drilled him between the eyes with the reverse end of his KA-BAR. Almost knocked out from the blow, he still resisted with all his strength, even when Quint replaced the knife at his throat. “Is this the way you really want this?”

The Frenchman’s eyes bulged as he attempted to cling to consciousness. His fists clenched at his sides.

“Don’t make me.” Quint dug the knife into the man’s throat. “Don’t make me do this, goddammit.”

“No!!” the college girl screamed from the entrance. She rushed forward and threw an arm around Quint’s throat. She pulled at him and grasped his knife hand. Quint’s weight shifted to the side, and with a roar of agony and defiance, the Frenchman lurched up and retrieved his sabre. He swung with his last remaining strength, aiming high.

Quint stopped resisting the woman’s pull and instead flung his weight backwards, which sent them both tumbling to their backs. The sabre arced high and wedged itself solidly into the opposite wall. Quint squirmed free of the woman’s grasp and plunged his KA-BAR into the Frenchman’s throat, just under the right ear. It went in smooth and silent, eliciting a low, sticky gurgle from deep in his chest. Quint ripped the knife to the left side. This was not smooth, and it was not silent. The woman made no sound, and only watched on in pale horror, transfixed by the grisly act.

Quint scrunched his face so that his eyes were almost closed, and he wrenched the knife away. For a long time, the only sound in the room was of a haunting, airy bubbling and the small scratching of muscle spasms against the floor. Quint tossed the knife away and sat still for a long while. He was staring into the eyes of the man beneath him, glassed over and sightless, but still looking squarely at him. He scrubbed his hands on the man’s clothes and stood. With a sudden intake of breath, the woman plastered herself against the wall farthest away from Quint as possible.

He went to his duffel bag propped against the bed and nudged the buckled flap open with his foot. He stooped over and carefully withdrew a weathered hatchet. He stared at the tool for another long moment. “You know what’s weirding me out more than what I’m about to do?” he said, his tone wavering. He turned his head to look at the horrified young woman with tears blinding his eyes. “I never learned French.”

With that, Quint bit his lip and almost threw himself back on the floor. He chopped at the Frenchman’s neck with grim precision. After four blows from the hatchet, Quint flung the hatchet next to the knife on the floor with a sharp ring of metal-on-metal. Quint closed his eyes. “It’s never clean.”

The air suddenly went dry, and Quint felt as if he had been doused with a bucket of sand. The world seemed to tremble, but it might have just been his heart’s throbbing. Against all reason, a swirling wind rose in the tiny room. The stack of pizza boxes collapsed, proving that it was the world that was trembling more. The television flickered to life, and the alarm clock near the bed hummed and tuned itself to the Top 40 station. The wind calmed, and then madness was unleashed. Electricity sprayed from the wall sockets. The television image shrank to a piercing white point, then the glass cracked and the electronics within burst all at once in a spray of sparks. Smoke and the smell of charred insulation filled the room, and every light in the building burst at the same time. Unseen hands seemed to pluck Quint into the air and he hung there unsupported as a maelstrom whirled around him. Chaos became tangible and dove into Quint’s eyes and blasted through his spine. He thought he was screaming, but he could hear nothing aside from a shrill ringing in his ears.

Quint’s hair felt like it was burning, and gravelly chunks of shattered and powdered glass ground into his knees. His muscles felt like they had been ripped from his body, stretched, abused, and stitched back onto his bones with fishing line. But he stood. His vision was grainy and washed-out, and his heart seemed to have a hard time coping with his sudden transition to standing. The woman sat with her knees pulled up to her chest, staring at him with an eerie, calm silence that signified she was well past her insanity limit for the week. He pulled her up to her feet. She was stiff and deadweight, but her legs dropped down heavily to the floor and she kept her feet.

“Lady.” Quint said. “Hey lady.” Her head jerked over to look at him.

“Kelli,” she breathed.

“Come on.” Quint buckled up his duffel bag and hauled it over his shoulder. He pushed her out the door, hoping that she still remembered how to run. Broken glass covered the entire block, glinting in the moonlight like fresh rainfall.