Darko Cernovsek
Soul Of Vengeance
DEEP IN THE LOWER LEVELS OF THE COLONY... THE RED DISTRICT
A baby-face, hairless, not even a manly stubble, looking at least ten years younger then the actual age of the twenty six years old man it belonged to. Bright blue, deceptively innocent-looking eyes. Agron Mar had learned to cope with it, over the years. If anything, the rough neighborhood he grew up in, had a habit of chewing up and spitting out anyone not tough enough to handle it.
It was easier, if one looked the part. Or acted the part. The gangs were quick to snatch up the good actors. The problem was... Agron was not a good actor. He didn't have it in him, to play tough, convincingly. He was as bland as a wall, with about as much personality, and a stutter, that made any kind of conversation an exercise in patience, for the other person, and an exercise in frustration, for Agron himself. In Red District, residents were known for many things, but patience wasn't one of them.
And therein lay the crux of it. The deep-seated rage, hiding behind that innocent, simpleminded-looking baby face, and bright blue gaze. A fulcrum of angst, covered by a mask of affability. Tormented. Self-destructive. A pain-hound. Sociopathic. Fearless. On the inside.
A baby-face, on the outside. Atop of an unremarkable, slightly chubby, heavyset body. Abron was neither handsome, nor buff-looking. While he was in fact physically quite strong, most of it was covered in fat. Without looking closely, nobody would pay him a second look. Utterly forgettable in appearance.
An easy target. Or so it seemed. Only if one took a closer look at the man's face, and knew what to look for, would the telltale signs become visible. Pronounced cheekbones, hardened and calcified from many microfractures. A cleft chin, slightly irregular in curvature, as the bones grew stronger after each instance they were fractured. A strong nasal bridge, where the cartilage calcified and hardened, from the many blows it took, over the years. And the skin... baby-like in appearance, yet thick, leathery to the touch. Dead nerve-endings. Used to taking hits. Near-impervious to pain-stimulus. Temples hard as a drum, used to being pummeled repeatedly.
Most of it self-inflicted. Punching himself. Slapping himself. Pounding his head into the wall. Conditioning himself, willing his body to become tougher. Agron hated his "weak, stuttering" body, to such a degree, that self-punishment became a form of catharsis, for him.
Strength through pain.
That was what his father told him, every time he beat the shit out of him, during his childhood. Agron took that to heart. Unknowingly, his abusive father gave him the foundations to build upon. The premise. The idea. That weakness can be beaten out.
The most ironic thing? It could be. Agron was living proof of that. His entire body was a monument to pain and self-loathing. Hardened to a machine, from it. His masochism had reached such a level, that pounding the crap out of himself was his daily ritual. Every morning, when he woke up. And every evening, before he went to bed. He couldn't sleep, if he didn't suffer beforehand. And the more his body hardened, the worse the self-beatings got, since he needed more... stimulus... to feel the same level of pain. Bashing himself in the ribs with dumbbells. Headbutting the wall until his forehead bled. Punching himself in the testicles. Forcing his girlfriend, to whip him until his back was red with welts. At first, she rejected. But after a few sound beatings he inflicted on her, whenever she would refuse to play his sick game, she learned not to question it.
***
He walked toward the local watering hole. The Smiling Ghost, it wrote, in flickering, badly-maintained turquoise neon tubes, above the entrance. Grey facade damaged in several spots, covered in graffiti. Yellowed dried-piss stains covering the lower wall, up to knee height. Beer cans everywhere, a few discarded syringes, since the place was also a local hotspot for junkies to shoot themselves up with heroine.
A stench of bodily fluids, cheap beer, and misery, exuded from the dump.
A couple of streetwalkers, voluptuous yet hardened-looking women, needle-marks on their forearms, in skimpy tops and mini-miniskirts, giving anyone a half-decent view of their pierced, shaved crotches lacking panties, hung around the entrance. When they saw him, they gave him a scornful look.
"Oh look, if it isn't Mister Babyface... word to the wise honey, steer clear of the Ghost, tonight. Meclaw is here with a couple of guys, and you know how much he... likes you. Especially after last time." - one warned him.
The last time, Meclaw Rox made the mistake of shoving Agron from the barstool, when he felt the man was in his seat. Abron had smiled, and politely told him to find his own stool to sit on. Naturally, Meclaw didn't take kindly to that, slugging the youngish-looking man. To no effect, other then severely bruised knuckles, as they connected with Agron's rock-hard cheekbone. The second punch was likewise resisted by Agron, before he returned the favor, his fake politeness shattering under the onslaught of deep seated rage, his own hardened, calcified knuckles splattering Meclaw's nose. As he retreated, covering his bloodied face and broken nose, Meclaw Rox swore Agron would pay for that.
"I k-k-now h-h..he l-lll-lll..." - he paused there, face scrunching in visible block, before he could push the rest of the word out, "...ikes me. I ll--l-like him too." - he smiled an unsettling smile, at the two women. Eyes remaining bright and bubbly... yet cold. Ice cold, just like his fake smile, covering a broken soul.
"Fuckin' freak..." - the whore muttered, turning her gaze away.
"Don't say I didn't warn you!" - she called after him, as he went in.
***
Inside the bar, Meclaw was sitting at the bar, flanked by a pair of large, tough-looking leather-clad punks. One was bulky and with a bit of beer belly, the other was more lanky, but wiry and strong. Agron recognised them both. Both of them, along with Meclaw, were a part of one of the local gangs. That alone made most non-affiliated residents give them a wide berth, in a mix of fear and respect.
Agron's fear was beaten out of him, long ago. As for respect... he only respected people that treated him kindly, showed patience toward him, and understood his... habits. The number of which he could count on one hand, and have fingers left. The rest... fuck 'em. He would never say that, that wasn't his way... but he felt that way about them. They were beneath his notice, unless they provoked him. Then they would suffer.
He hated himself. He hated almost everyone else. And he feared nobody, and nothing. A combination made in Hell, for the express purpose of turning a person into a sociopathic machine.
"Hey... look who it is..." - one of Meclaw's punks growled, nodding toward the entrance.
Meclaw himself, a rather muscular, yet lean man, with the oily, smarmy look of a self-important poser and narcissist, complete with wearing sunglasses indoors, and being dressed in designer hoodie, turned away from the waitress he was currently harrassing...
...his face twisted into a voiceless snarl. It still hurt, when he breathed on his nose, because of that stuttery asshole!
"HEY!" - he roared, getting up from his stool. Agron only glanced at him, lips twisting into a slight mocking smirk, deliberately goading him on, then ignored him, seating himself on the nearest stool. He motioned for the waitress.
"I'm talkin' to you, you fucking retard freak! You got a lot of balls, showin' your face here. I'm gonna skin you alive, for last time!" - Meclaw continued, now furious, stomping over, pulling out a nasty-looking switchblade from his pocket, his two monkeys at his flanks.
The few other patrons present at the time, quickly found as much distance as they could, between themselves and the two antagonists, while the bartender spoke up indignantly.
"C'mon Mec, don't make a fuckin' mess in my place this time---"
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" - the poser-looking gangmember snapped, not turning his gaze from Agron.
"Grab him!" - he told his two thugs, "I'm gonna take my time with this fuck..."
The two of them gripped Agron by his arms, holding him tightly, as Meclaw stepped close, and brandished the blade in his face.
With a roar of rage, coming out of nowhere, past that bland, doofy-looking expression, Abron kicked out at the man, catching him in the gut and sending him staggering back, as he started thrashing against the grip of the other two.
One of them slammed his face into the counter, the other brought a nearby bottle, bashing over his head.
"Aarrarggghhhaaarrrgghh!" - Agron continued roaring incoherently, only thrashing harder, not even phased from it. His rage simply spiked higher.
"HOLD HIM, GOD DAMNIT!" - Meclaw roared, wheezing from the kick, trying to get close, but there was no restraining the berserk lunatic. Agron's random jerks, bites, kicks and thrashes, and upwards of 110 kilos of mass, succeeded in headbutting one of the thugs, making him loosen the grip on his left arm, a trail of blood painting itself from the man's eyesocket, as he now staggered away, covering his right eye.
"Fucker..." - the other punk growled, starting to punch Agron repeatedly in the neck.
Agron started laughing hysterically, at the pain, barely phased, as his free hand scrabbled around the counter, for the smashed bottle that they used to bash over his head. He found a piece, and stabbed it viciously into the other punk's shoulder.
"Aaghhh!" - that thug cried in pain, but barely had time to do so, before Agron's own fists were upon him... landing in an unrelenting, berserk-driven barrage of blows.
"Aaarggaaggaarrrrrhaahhargggghahahahaaaahhaggeerheegggeerrraagggrr!" - the disturbed man continued roaring, mixed with manic laughter, as his hardened knuckles continued transforming the hapless man's head, shoulders and torso, into a mass of blood and cuts, eventually breaking his jaw, and shattering his right arcade.
Finally, as the man's consciousness was ebbing from the blunt trauma, Agron managed to grab him by the earlobe, yanking viciously on it. With a sickening tearing of skin, the lobe came off, in his hand, a gush of blood landing on Agron's shirt.
"Fuckin' crazy motherfucker--" - Meclaw breathed, terrified in spite of himself, at the sight of Agron swallowing the man's ripped-off ear, looking at him with those... blank... blue eyes. The other punk's unconscious, savaged body collapsed next to the bar, twitching softly from brain damage.
Then Agron launched himself at him, grabbing him by the throat with both hands, not at all caring about the switchblade still in Meclaw's grip.
The blade stabbed into his abdomen, as Meclaw tried to twist it, and increase the pain. Agron's rage only escalated further, and the pain fed him.
"Rrraarrgaarrrgggrhhahahahaaa!" - he continued roaring and laughing incoherently, blood seeping from the blade in his gut, as he bowled Meclaw off his feet to his back on the floor, starting to slam the back of his head into the unyielding laminate panels, while choking him at the same time.
Thud, thud, thud, thud... the dull sounds of bone-on-laminate filled the bar, as Agron was doing his level best, to open up Meclaw's skull.
The first punk, still bleeding from a nasty cut under his eye, approached from behind and caught him in a rear naked choke, dragging him off Meclaw... who was semi-conscious, wheezing on the floor, caughing blood, badly concussed, blood wettening his hair, from the nasty cut on the back of his head.
"Get... the FUCK off him, you psycho..." - he grunted, tightening the choke, as Agron again started thrashing, clawing, scratching and trying to bite. Pure lunatic rage powered him, veins standing out in his forehead, as he got up, first to his knees, then back to his feet, as the punk tried his best to keep him on the ground, hanging himself around his neck.
But the chubby man was too strong, under all that fat. His neck muscles stubbornly resisted the choke, and his constant thrashing and jerking, kept the thug from applying a full blood-choke on the carotid arteries.
Once back on his feet, Agron shoved backward into the thug, slamming him back on the counter. The sharp spike of pain through his back, made the thug loosen his choke fractionally, for a split second, enough for Agron to turn partway around, and in position to jab a thumb into his right eye, the same one he bloodied, before.
"Eegh..!" - the punk jerked back, squeezing his eyes tightly in reaction, and letting go... but Agron wouldn't let go. He pressed the thug onto the counter, and continued to dig around with his thumb in his eyesocket, attempting to put it out.
Finally, the bartender and the other patrons came to their senses, from the reeling shock of the scene unfolding in front of them. All of them were more or less aware that Agron wasn't right in the head. The rumors were abound. But none of them had ever seen, anything like this.
"What the fuck you all looking at?! Split 'em up!" - the bartender snapped, himself joining in, as the many hands grabbed Agron and the thug, yanking them forcefully away from each other. As they did, the thug rived on the bar, screaming, as his right eye was perforated, leaking out.
It took more then a dozen minutes, to talk sense into the berserking Agron, as five men had to hold him down, the rest of the patrons helping the half-blinded thug, and the semi-conscious, badly injured Meclaw. The other thug was still unconscious, and if appearances were anything to go by, actually fallen into coma.
"You got 'em, 'Ron! You got 'em. They ain't gonna mess with you again! Look at 'em. LOOK! They gone, man! They gone! Fucked up! You got 'em, killer! C'mon... c'mon, let's get you stitched up, in the back! Drink's on me. Alright? Come on... take it easy, man. You got 'em... you got the fuckers." - the bartender affirmed to Agron, grinning, pointing at the three brutalized men, being dragged out of the bar. The only one of them who could still walk under his own power, was the first thug. But he lost an eye, and he lost his pride.
Slowly, gradually, Agron calmed down.
"Thanks... you know that fuckhead Meclaw tried to rape me, once? They had it comin'... ALL of it!" - one of the waitresses spoke up, gratitude in her eyes, as she kissed him in the cheek.
Agron's bloodied face turned blank, and doofy again. But all he could think of , as his gaze stayed on the three men he just savaged, was how he didn't kill them. That made him feel strangely... unfulfilled.
Nonethless... it felt good. It felt SO good. To finally receive validation.
A baby-face, hairless, not even a manly stubble, looking at least ten years younger then the actual age of the twenty six years old man it belonged to. Bright blue, deceptively innocent-looking eyes. Agron Mar had learned to cope with it, over the years. If anything, the rough neighborhood he grew up in, had a habit of chewing up and spitting out anyone not tough enough to handle it.
It was easier, if one looked the part. Or acted the part. The gangs were quick to snatch up the good actors. The problem was... Agron was not a good actor. He didn't have it in him, to play tough, convincingly. He was as bland as a wall, with about as much personality, and a stutter, that made any kind of conversation an exercise in patience, for the other person, and an exercise in frustration, for Agron himself. In Red District, residents were known for many things, but patience wasn't one of them.
And therein lay the crux of it. The deep-seated rage, hiding behind that innocent, simpleminded-looking baby face, and bright blue gaze. A fulcrum of angst, covered by a mask of affability. Tormented. Self-destructive. A pain-hound. Sociopathic. Fearless. On the inside.
A baby-face, on the outside. Atop of an unremarkable, slightly chubby, heavyset body. Abron was neither handsome, nor buff-looking. While he was in fact physically quite strong, most of it was covered in fat. Without looking closely, nobody would pay him a second look. Utterly forgettable in appearance.
An easy target. Or so it seemed. Only if one took a closer look at the man's face, and knew what to look for, would the telltale signs become visible. Pronounced cheekbones, hardened and calcified from many microfractures. A cleft chin, slightly irregular in curvature, as the bones grew stronger after each instance they were fractured. A strong nasal bridge, where the cartilage calcified and hardened, from the many blows it took, over the years. And the skin... baby-like in appearance, yet thick, leathery to the touch. Dead nerve-endings. Used to taking hits. Near-impervious to pain-stimulus. Temples hard as a drum, used to being pummeled repeatedly.
Most of it self-inflicted. Punching himself. Slapping himself. Pounding his head into the wall. Conditioning himself, willing his body to become tougher. Agron hated his "weak, stuttering" body, to such a degree, that self-punishment became a form of catharsis, for him.
Strength through pain.
That was what his father told him, every time he beat the shit out of him, during his childhood. Agron took that to heart. Unknowingly, his abusive father gave him the foundations to build upon. The premise. The idea. That weakness can be beaten out.
The most ironic thing? It could be. Agron was living proof of that. His entire body was a monument to pain and self-loathing. Hardened to a machine, from it. His masochism had reached such a level, that pounding the crap out of himself was his daily ritual. Every morning, when he woke up. And every evening, before he went to bed. He couldn't sleep, if he didn't suffer beforehand. And the more his body hardened, the worse the self-beatings got, since he needed more... stimulus... to feel the same level of pain. Bashing himself in the ribs with dumbbells. Headbutting the wall until his forehead bled. Punching himself in the testicles. Forcing his girlfriend, to whip him until his back was red with welts. At first, she rejected. But after a few sound beatings he inflicted on her, whenever she would refuse to play his sick game, she learned not to question it.
***
He walked toward the local watering hole. The Smiling Ghost, it wrote, in flickering, badly-maintained turquoise neon tubes, above the entrance. Grey facade damaged in several spots, covered in graffiti. Yellowed dried-piss stains covering the lower wall, up to knee height. Beer cans everywhere, a few discarded syringes, since the place was also a local hotspot for junkies to shoot themselves up with heroine.
A stench of bodily fluids, cheap beer, and misery, exuded from the dump.
A couple of streetwalkers, voluptuous yet hardened-looking women, needle-marks on their forearms, in skimpy tops and mini-miniskirts, giving anyone a half-decent view of their pierced, shaved crotches lacking panties, hung around the entrance. When they saw him, they gave him a scornful look.
"Oh look, if it isn't Mister Babyface... word to the wise honey, steer clear of the Ghost, tonight. Meclaw is here with a couple of guys, and you know how much he... likes you. Especially after last time." - one warned him.
The last time, Meclaw Rox made the mistake of shoving Agron from the barstool, when he felt the man was in his seat. Abron had smiled, and politely told him to find his own stool to sit on. Naturally, Meclaw didn't take kindly to that, slugging the youngish-looking man. To no effect, other then severely bruised knuckles, as they connected with Agron's rock-hard cheekbone. The second punch was likewise resisted by Agron, before he returned the favor, his fake politeness shattering under the onslaught of deep seated rage, his own hardened, calcified knuckles splattering Meclaw's nose. As he retreated, covering his bloodied face and broken nose, Meclaw Rox swore Agron would pay for that.
"I k-k-now h-h..he l-lll-lll..." - he paused there, face scrunching in visible block, before he could push the rest of the word out, "...ikes me. I ll--l-like him too." - he smiled an unsettling smile, at the two women. Eyes remaining bright and bubbly... yet cold. Ice cold, just like his fake smile, covering a broken soul.
"Fuckin' freak..." - the whore muttered, turning her gaze away.
"Don't say I didn't warn you!" - she called after him, as he went in.
***
Inside the bar, Meclaw was sitting at the bar, flanked by a pair of large, tough-looking leather-clad punks. One was bulky and with a bit of beer belly, the other was more lanky, but wiry and strong. Agron recognised them both. Both of them, along with Meclaw, were a part of one of the local gangs. That alone made most non-affiliated residents give them a wide berth, in a mix of fear and respect.
Agron's fear was beaten out of him, long ago. As for respect... he only respected people that treated him kindly, showed patience toward him, and understood his... habits. The number of which he could count on one hand, and have fingers left. The rest... fuck 'em. He would never say that, that wasn't his way... but he felt that way about them. They were beneath his notice, unless they provoked him. Then they would suffer.
He hated himself. He hated almost everyone else. And he feared nobody, and nothing. A combination made in Hell, for the express purpose of turning a person into a sociopathic machine.
"Hey... look who it is..." - one of Meclaw's punks growled, nodding toward the entrance.
Meclaw himself, a rather muscular, yet lean man, with the oily, smarmy look of a self-important poser and narcissist, complete with wearing sunglasses indoors, and being dressed in designer hoodie, turned away from the waitress he was currently harrassing...
...his face twisted into a voiceless snarl. It still hurt, when he breathed on his nose, because of that stuttery asshole!
"HEY!" - he roared, getting up from his stool. Agron only glanced at him, lips twisting into a slight mocking smirk, deliberately goading him on, then ignored him, seating himself on the nearest stool. He motioned for the waitress.
"I'm talkin' to you, you fucking retard freak! You got a lot of balls, showin' your face here. I'm gonna skin you alive, for last time!" - Meclaw continued, now furious, stomping over, pulling out a nasty-looking switchblade from his pocket, his two monkeys at his flanks.
The few other patrons present at the time, quickly found as much distance as they could, between themselves and the two antagonists, while the bartender spoke up indignantly.
"C'mon Mec, don't make a fuckin' mess in my place this time---"
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" - the poser-looking gangmember snapped, not turning his gaze from Agron.
"Grab him!" - he told his two thugs, "I'm gonna take my time with this fuck..."
The two of them gripped Agron by his arms, holding him tightly, as Meclaw stepped close, and brandished the blade in his face.
With a roar of rage, coming out of nowhere, past that bland, doofy-looking expression, Abron kicked out at the man, catching him in the gut and sending him staggering back, as he started thrashing against the grip of the other two.
One of them slammed his face into the counter, the other brought a nearby bottle, bashing over his head.
"Aarrarggghhhaaarrrgghh!" - Agron continued roaring incoherently, only thrashing harder, not even phased from it. His rage simply spiked higher.
"HOLD HIM, GOD DAMNIT!" - Meclaw roared, wheezing from the kick, trying to get close, but there was no restraining the berserk lunatic. Agron's random jerks, bites, kicks and thrashes, and upwards of 110 kilos of mass, succeeded in headbutting one of the thugs, making him loosen the grip on his left arm, a trail of blood painting itself from the man's eyesocket, as he now staggered away, covering his right eye.
"Fucker..." - the other punk growled, starting to punch Agron repeatedly in the neck.
Agron started laughing hysterically, at the pain, barely phased, as his free hand scrabbled around the counter, for the smashed bottle that they used to bash over his head. He found a piece, and stabbed it viciously into the other punk's shoulder.
"Aaghhh!" - that thug cried in pain, but barely had time to do so, before Agron's own fists were upon him... landing in an unrelenting, berserk-driven barrage of blows.
"Aaarggaaggaarrrrrhaahhargggghahahahaaaahhaggeerheegggeerrraagggrr!" - the disturbed man continued roaring, mixed with manic laughter, as his hardened knuckles continued transforming the hapless man's head, shoulders and torso, into a mass of blood and cuts, eventually breaking his jaw, and shattering his right arcade.
Finally, as the man's consciousness was ebbing from the blunt trauma, Agron managed to grab him by the earlobe, yanking viciously on it. With a sickening tearing of skin, the lobe came off, in his hand, a gush of blood landing on Agron's shirt.
"Fuckin' crazy motherfucker--" - Meclaw breathed, terrified in spite of himself, at the sight of Agron swallowing the man's ripped-off ear, looking at him with those... blank... blue eyes. The other punk's unconscious, savaged body collapsed next to the bar, twitching softly from brain damage.
Then Agron launched himself at him, grabbing him by the throat with both hands, not at all caring about the switchblade still in Meclaw's grip.
The blade stabbed into his abdomen, as Meclaw tried to twist it, and increase the pain. Agron's rage only escalated further, and the pain fed him.
"Rrraarrgaarrrgggrhhahahahaaa!" - he continued roaring and laughing incoherently, blood seeping from the blade in his gut, as he bowled Meclaw off his feet to his back on the floor, starting to slam the back of his head into the unyielding laminate panels, while choking him at the same time.
Thud, thud, thud, thud... the dull sounds of bone-on-laminate filled the bar, as Agron was doing his level best, to open up Meclaw's skull.
The first punk, still bleeding from a nasty cut under his eye, approached from behind and caught him in a rear naked choke, dragging him off Meclaw... who was semi-conscious, wheezing on the floor, caughing blood, badly concussed, blood wettening his hair, from the nasty cut on the back of his head.
"Get... the FUCK off him, you psycho..." - he grunted, tightening the choke, as Agron again started thrashing, clawing, scratching and trying to bite. Pure lunatic rage powered him, veins standing out in his forehead, as he got up, first to his knees, then back to his feet, as the punk tried his best to keep him on the ground, hanging himself around his neck.
But the chubby man was too strong, under all that fat. His neck muscles stubbornly resisted the choke, and his constant thrashing and jerking, kept the thug from applying a full blood-choke on the carotid arteries.
Once back on his feet, Agron shoved backward into the thug, slamming him back on the counter. The sharp spike of pain through his back, made the thug loosen his choke fractionally, for a split second, enough for Agron to turn partway around, and in position to jab a thumb into his right eye, the same one he bloodied, before.
"Eegh..!" - the punk jerked back, squeezing his eyes tightly in reaction, and letting go... but Agron wouldn't let go. He pressed the thug onto the counter, and continued to dig around with his thumb in his eyesocket, attempting to put it out.
Finally, the bartender and the other patrons came to their senses, from the reeling shock of the scene unfolding in front of them. All of them were more or less aware that Agron wasn't right in the head. The rumors were abound. But none of them had ever seen, anything like this.
"What the fuck you all looking at?! Split 'em up!" - the bartender snapped, himself joining in, as the many hands grabbed Agron and the thug, yanking them forcefully away from each other. As they did, the thug rived on the bar, screaming, as his right eye was perforated, leaking out.
It took more then a dozen minutes, to talk sense into the berserking Agron, as five men had to hold him down, the rest of the patrons helping the half-blinded thug, and the semi-conscious, badly injured Meclaw. The other thug was still unconscious, and if appearances were anything to go by, actually fallen into coma.
"You got 'em, 'Ron! You got 'em. They ain't gonna mess with you again! Look at 'em. LOOK! They gone, man! They gone! Fucked up! You got 'em, killer! C'mon... c'mon, let's get you stitched up, in the back! Drink's on me. Alright? Come on... take it easy, man. You got 'em... you got the fuckers." - the bartender affirmed to Agron, grinning, pointing at the three brutalized men, being dragged out of the bar. The only one of them who could still walk under his own power, was the first thug. But he lost an eye, and he lost his pride.
Slowly, gradually, Agron calmed down.
"Thanks... you know that fuckhead Meclaw tried to rape me, once? They had it comin'... ALL of it!" - one of the waitresses spoke up, gratitude in her eyes, as she kissed him in the cheek.
Agron's bloodied face turned blank, and doofy again. But all he could think of , as his gaze stayed on the three men he just savaged, was how he didn't kill them. That made him feel strangely... unfulfilled.
Nonethless... it felt good. It felt SO good. To finally receive validation.