The rain poured heavily throughout the western side of Gronaville. It settled on the shoulders of Officer Dern's uniform, grey on blue-grey, and turned the world into a smudged charcoal drawing. In the orange halo of a shattered streetlamp, the young man sat.
He was not trying to run. He was simply sitting on the curb, his back to the brick wall of the old Wilson's Pharmacy, his knees drawn up.
From a distance, he might have been waiting for a bus. It was only as Dern and his partner, Ruiz, approached, their boots crunching on wet grit, that the details resolved. The dark, gleaming saturation of his t-shirt. The rust-coloured streaks on his jeans.
His face was tilted up into the ashy rain, eyes closed. He was nineteen, maybe twenty. Not a child,not a fully grown man either. The blood wasn't his; Dern's trained eye saw no wound, no limpness of injury. This was a coating, a second skin.
"Son," Dern said, his voice loud in the muffled street. "You need to show me your hands."
The boy's eyes opened. They were the clearest, most startling blue Dern had ever seen, like chips of winter sky in the grimy tableau. They held no panic, no fury. Just a profound, bone-deep weariness. He slowly lifted his hands, the red-brown palms facing the officers.
Ruiz had his hand on his sidearm, his posture rigid. "On your knees. Now."
He complied, moving stiffly, turning to kneel on the wet pavement. The movement triggered something in him. His body convulsed, shoulders hunching, and a series of ragged, wet coughs tore from his throat. It was a deep, chest-seizing sound, worse than any sob. He coughed as if trying to expel a memory, hacking into the crook of his arm, adding a new, darker stain over the pavement.
Dern moved closer, his own heart a dull hammer. The scene behind the boy, through the pharmacy's broken door, was a study in shadow and carnage he'd already glimpsed and would need to process later. But this boy, this coughing, blood-covered boy, was the epicenter.
"Their...responsible" the boy rasped, after the fit subsided, his voice shredded. He didn't mean the blood. Dern understood, with a cold certainty, that he meant the act itself.
"What's your name, son?" Dern asked, moving to cuff him, the metal cold even through his gloves.
"Cliff.."
He announced.Not dropping the without a short and straight forward question.
"What you're doing....Is it right?"
Ruiz interrupted clenching harder on his side arm.Voice loud and commanding.
"Shut up,boy.You have the right to remain silent.Don't think you can't be punished right here and now"
Dern stared at his partner.A gaze demanding respect for his presence.His question had every right to be asked.He held stopped cuffing him halfway unable to answer his question.
The young man continued.
"You are both trained cops,am I right?
it's clear that all I did was engage in a fight.Check the blood on the shirt and that of the girl's inside, I'll gladly follow you to any lab of your choice"
Regardless,The young man was cuffed and taken into the car,by Officer Ruiz that is.Offiecer Dern?...he is dead.Shot in the middle of contemplating Cliff's offer.Ruiz a good officer in the eyes of the people but shows his true colors when he felt it wouldn't ruin his status.
"Didn't want Dern to get involved,who cares I'll just pin it on you too.Just like how I will pin the kidnap and murder of the Ronal's only heir."
He paused.Unease creeped in at the sight of Cliff's silent gaze.Cold,quiet, emotionless.It truly made him more cautious though his ego was definitely above a little scare.The previous grin he had returned as he got into the driver's seat.
"Listen you scumbag,you better comply or I'll make it far more worse for you.There was a bounty for the one responsible and obviously you look like a nice person to pin the blame on.The killer and victim are both dead I need an explanation to get that money,so do me a favor and shut that crap of yours."
.....
The steel door screamed on its hinges, then sighed shut behind him with a sound of profound finality. The cell was a slab of chilled air smelling of ammonia and rust. Concrete bunk, stainless steel sink-toilet, walls the color of old teeth. A single high window, barred, cut a pale slice of featureless sky.
He heard the footsteps recede, the jingle of keys fading down the corridor. The lock thudded home. Solid. Absolute.
He didn't move. The silence that followed was a new kind of noise, dense and humming in his ears. It pressed in, taking the measure of him in the sudden, terrible quiet.
"Executed in the next two days for a crime I never committed,how convenient"
"You look like someone with a whole lot of bad luck"
The voice projected from the shadow in the corner.An elderly covered in scars and dried blood.His white hair sagging down to his profound beard.In one hand,an empty plate the other supporting him onto his feet.
"You don't look like someone who is scared of dying.So young but with such an unshakeable heart."
"You can't know all that by just a glance"
The old man drew closer into the light,his face becoming more visible.He laughed aloud as if told a very hilarious joke.He tried to speak, but the laughter had its own momentum; the words caught, hitching on a fresh chuckle.
"Why so cautious? It was just an observation from the little experience I have"
Slowly his laughter came to a halt.The previous silence returning; except this time the two had eyes locked in a ln intense stare off.A brief encounter.Cliff didn't seem like the type to stare at people for too long anyway.
He turned attention to a different distraction,the heavy rain from outside the window.
(Creepy old man.He was giving me the death stare,I could feel it.Not that I'm bothered.)
FING!!
His ear twitched to the sound of metal singing through the air.Left hand moving to catch the plate coming from the side of his face.A stunt of utter reflex.Blood slowly dripping down his palm.The oldman seemed rather amused.Astonishing,he thought.
"You caught it.I was aiming for your neck.This going to be a long night"
End of chapter.New author still trying to get better at writing.please note down my flaws and share honest opinions.