Writing Prompts (Week 1) — I Am The Night

Steam rose from the sewer drains and darkness shrouded the streets as Sledge Kapinsky hurried home. He was breathing irregularly, beads of sweat forming on his square forehead, as farther down, the moisture made his dress shirt stick to his thick torso.

Frequently, he looked over his shoulder in either direction, and more than once he jumped and gasped. One time, it was just a cat, feeding on rats, which in turn, had been munching on a cockroach infestation inside a battered garbage can. Another, it was a drunk, as if from the grave, reaching up a grimy hand from out of the newspapers he slept under in a halfhearted attempt to beg for change.

Sledge was not the jittery type. As hired muscle for one of the city's largest "protection services," he instilled fear in others, not the other way around. His unflinching resolve and iron clad stomach for getting a job done, no matter what it took, facilitated his meteoric rise within the agency. He was not a low level enforcer anymore. Now, he helped call the shots, and others looked to him to steel their own jelly spines.

In his arrogance, he considered the hours after midnight to be all his. To rally them, he often proclaimed to his jittery mates, "I own the night."

But that was before the voice in his head started talking to him.

Like now.

Come on, Billy. You know there's nowhere to hide.

Sledge clamped his temple with thick fingers, a wild look in his eye. When the voice spoke, it actually hurt. At first, days ago, it was more of a buzz, a slight gnawing. However, it grew progressively worse, louder, more insistent. Still, that in and of itself, wasn't so bad. It was the sleep deprivation, caused by the voice keeping him awake all night, along with what he was doing to himself to counter that was ruining him. The strong coffee he gulped down by the bucketful to stay awake during the day and the Ambien he popped before bedtime was wreaking havoc on his nervous system.

And none of it was working.

Despite all his efforts, over the last seventy-two hours, Sledge was functioning off of three hours of sleep. He was beginning to doze on the job, calling into question his fitness for duty. That's why Rocini was giving him some R & R. And now, the more ambitious underlings were getting restless, thinking it might be time for some new leadership. Maybe even one of them.

This can all come to an end, Billy.

Then, there were the things the voice told him. Crazy things. Things he never thought of on his own. Things he would never do.

"NO!"

His scream of defiance echoed oddly down the abandoned streets. Too late, his meaty hands went from his skull to his mouth. He whirled about. Like so many times before, he saw no one through the gloom and haze.

The last thing he needed was one of the young guns following him around, waiting for him to crack up. Or paying a streetwalker to spy on him, or someone else Sledge might not suspect. It's something he would do, if he were them. It was something he'd done. Anything to gain the advantage, even over his associates. His ruthlessness wasn't just reserved for the general public.

What's a' matter, Billy? Talking to yourself? You finally losing it?

"You wish," Sledge said, much quieter this time. Before his outburst, he did not address the voice in his head. He wasn't crazy, but talking back was as good as admitting he was. Still, now that he had, there was something therapeutic about it. Like he finally had a way to fight back. People gunning for him, like cops and rivals, were tangible. They were real. They could be hurt, killed. A disembodied voice in his head was neither tangible or real, leaving him defenseless.

Ah, Billy. You can't just wish away something that's a part of you.

"You ain't me." Despite Sledge's words, he didn't sound overly convicted. His tone was less emphatic as it was pleading.

The voice couldn't be his conscience. Sure, he had a code, a moral compass, but it revolved around himself, his own interests. The voice suggested he actually cared about someone else, about all the things he'd done. He didn't. He knew he didn't.

That's not what ol' Doc Wallace said, now was it, Billy?

"How...?"

You know how.

No one knew about his visit to Wallace. Just him and the old man. Sledge had gone to him the night before to see if there was some kind of receiver implanted in his brain. At the time, it was the only logical explanation. Someone was trying to pull a fast one. He'd thought he'd felt a bump underneath his hair at the back of his head. There was a clump of blood there, and it itched. Turned out the bump was the result of a different kind of bug, a mosquito bite, and the doc said there was no trace of the electronic kind in his brain, or anywhere else inside him, for that matter.

And the voice?

"It's all in your head. Get some rest," Doc said.

Yeah, sure, Doc.

You can end this, Billy. You have the power.

"I'm not a rat!"

That was it. The most unbelievable part of all. The voice wanted him to turn himself in and testify against everyone else.

Aren't you? Where did you crawl out of, Billy? The sewer. Where all the other rats live.

"Shut up."

Really? Or what? You'll go running to your father? Oh, that's right. He left you before you were born, didn't he? Fine, you'll run back to your mother, then. Oh, wait. She left you, too.

Sledge grit his teeth. A snarl formed on his scarred lips. "She's dead."

By her own hand. Overdose. Heroin, wasn't it? Deadbeat Dad and Mom, the Junkie. You had no chance, didya, Billy-boy?

"Don't call me that. No one calls me that!"

Sledge reached into his armpit holster and drew his sidearm. He didn't know what he intended to do with it—he couldn't shoot at something that wasn't there—but it felt solid in his grip. Something real he could hold onto.

Besides, an idea, insane, deadly, yet freeing, was forming in his mind, taking root. Something the voice said. About getting rid of a part of him.

It was undeniable. The voice in his head knew things. Things no one else knew. No one alive, anyway. Sledge had seen to it. Or others and Nature had. So, how was it the voice knew so much? About his childhood. About his visit to Doc Wallace. About his name.

If there wasn't a bug in his brain, there was only one other explanation. There could only be one.

Whatcha doin', Billy?

"You sound worried," Sledge replied, leering. The voice conveyed no concern in the least, but saying so rejuvenated Sledge. As he started walking again, he drew strength in mocking, and from the revolver in his hand. That's what he needed. Cold, hard steel.

Are you?

"I ain't you."

The skyscraper he called home, Bell Tower, loomed silently as he rounded the corner. He crossed the street and made his way to the entrance. For the first time in well over an hour, the voice let him be. Sledge nodded curtly to the night manager, a sleepy twenty-something male with wispy chin hair and a jewel earring. Then he entered the main elevator. If the young man noticed Sledge was brandishing a gun, he did not show it. Thirty-nine flights later, Sledge stepped out on the landing and fished the apartment key out of his pocket.

The decision was made.

Inside, he surveyed the suite. By no means luxurious, it was still quite an upgrade from his earlier days, and that wasn't counting the months living on the streets. He'd earned this comfort. He'd earned more. There was still much more to be had. But before he could go after it, he needed to square his resolve. For the first time in days, thoughts were beginning to clarify. The world was starting to make sense again.

Switching the gun between hands, he removed his jacket and folded it nicely on the desk chair. He loosened his tie, dropped it on top of the jacket, then crossed over to the veranda and slid open the glass door. There was a breeze at this altitude and it felt good on his feverish brow. He went to the bar and poured a shot of bourbon. It went down smooth, numbing his jangled nerves.

He went to his room and plucked a pillow from the made up bed, then went back into the living room and and sat down on the floor with his back to the veranda. Cool air poured over him. His skin soaked it in like he was guzzling water.

The plan was simple. He didn't have a silencer. The pillow was thick, though, and if he pressed hard enough, maybe it would muffle most of the blast noise. No need to draw attention to himself if he didn't have to.

It was time to come to terms. He was a wreck. Worthless. A nut job. He couldn't continue this way. Sooner or later, he would slip up, and someone, some pimple-faced, pencil-necked punk, would take him down.

That was no way to live. Only the strong survived. The worse thing he could think of was wasting away, shriveling up day after day, powerless to do anything about it. That's what was happening to him. He was wasting away, and until now, he'd not known how to fight it.

It was simple.

The voice was inside his head. It was impeding him from doing his job, from progressing any further. He was dead if he didn't get rid of it, and he wouldn't be living the good life until he did. There was only one choice left.

The voice had to go.

Then, he'd finally get some sleep. A long, well-deserved rest.

Sledge placed the pillow to the side of his head, then pressed the gun firmly against the pillow. An image of how ridiculous he must look appeared in his mind. In his wildest dreams, he never conceived of being here, doing this. Maybe he was losing it, after all.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath. Exhaled. All he had to do now was pull the trigger.

His finger flexed against smooth metal, meeting resistance. Then, there was a flash of flame, the muffled shot, as if miles off, and the spent case ejected, clattered to the floor.

For a split second, he watched as if in a dream, the bullet blasting through one side of his skull, leaving a pebble-sized wound. The shot burrowed through the quivering mass of his brain and exploded out the other side, taking a quarter of his cranium with it. Blood, gray matter, bone, fluid, all fanning out to splatter the floor rug.

And the voice. The voice went to.

Sledge did not move. Any moment, gravity would pull the upper half of him down, and what was left of his head would land with a sickening thud on the floor. No need to soften the blow. He wouldn't feel it, anyway.

No can do, Billy.

The words of the voice reverberated within. Defiantly, Sledge clinched his eyes tighter. It was just the last vestiges of thought being sucked out the new hole. Like the chicken's severed body, he was just flapping his wings. He was already dead.

Sorry, but you can't die. Not yet. You need to testify.

Sledge's eyes flew open. Slowly, disbelievingly, he removed the pillow and gun. There was a hole all the way through the fabric and filling, and the side he'd put to his head was stained crimson red. Horror tingled Sledge's spine. The revolver fell with a heavy clunk as he reached up to feel his temples. On the left side, where the yawning exit wound should be, there was nothing. On the left, blood, warm and sticky, was trickling down from a superficial wound. There was nothing else.

As if bitten, he hopped to one side, then batted the pillow away. He found the casing, and beside it, the bullet, flattened and still smoking.

He looked down at the gun, then stared at his blood stained hand. His weapon, the one thing he knew to be real, had just betrayed him. How was that possible?

It wasn't. He couldn't stop a bullet with his skull. No one could. It simply couldn't be.

Like the voice in his head.

"Get out!" he screamed. "Get out!"

Not until you testify. Only then, Billy. Only then.

Sledge screamed again, hitting octaves somewhere between a wounded animal and a hysterical infant.

He was lost. His mind was gone, sanity fled, just as sure as if the bullet had done its job. The laws of physics, of action and reaction, were violated. He couldn't trust any of his senses. Up was down, down up.

Without thinking—after all, how could he, bereft of reasoning as he was—Sledge leapt to his feet and did the only thing his instincts told him to do. He ran for the veranda.

Stopping a bullet from point blank range was one thing. Preventing his three hundred and twenty-five pound frame from pulverization as he dropped from a distance over a football field high, was quite another.

He'd fall quick as lightning, and smash like thunder.

Billy, Billy, Billy...

He reached the balcony and bounded up onto the wall ledge. In one continuous movement, he pushed off hard, spreading his arms out, like a bird of prey in search of an updraft.

He saw the street and the parked cars rushing up to meet him. Then, something light as air rolled him over and he was looking back up from where he'd come. Only then was he aware of something billowing darkly from his chest. Something impossible.

"Not yet, Billy. Not yet."

It was the voice. Only, it wasn't inside his head anymore. It boomed from the darkness spilling out of him, encompassing him round about, slowing his descent.

Gradually, Sledge and the darkness floated down. Then, several feet above the street, the darkness dropped him. He struck with enough force to daze him. Groaning, the wind knocked out of him, Sledge tried to move, but could only stare up helplessly as the darkness draped over him, swallowing him up. As it did, he could see the streetlights wink out, and then the full moon.

"Who...what are you?" Sledge breathed. Sheer terror coursed through him.

"You know," bellowed the darkness, "You own me, remember?"

Deep laughter rang throughout the empty streets, drowning out Sledge's primal screams.

About This Post

This post is for @themarkymark's #writingprompt contest. Theme this week was tension. Thought I'd throw in some noir with a supernatural twist while I was at it.

_{Image sources—Pexels, Pixabay, Pixabay and Pixabay.}