My Little Lucifer

Oh god. Out of all the bad situations I've gotten myself into, I think this is the only one I can't handle.
This time, I think it's entirely possible. I think I could die.

I can hear their footsteps gaining on me, swinging over a chain link fence, climbing onto bins and over walls, then, finally up onto the top half of a fire escape. Leading up onto the roof of one of the hundreds of apartment blocks that crowd this area of New York.

"Stop him!!" Every one of my muscles is burning and begging me to stop in the worst possible way. My chest feels like it's going to explode any minute now, I can't get enough air in. I think I'm running on pure adrenaline now.

I keep sprinting and jump over the few feet gap between two buildings, making sure not to look down. Some stop, but I can hear someone still gaining on me.

All of a sudden, as if in slow motion, I'm jerked back. Due to the speed I was running, I just stop for a second, but then I'm falling on my back. Crashing onto the floor offers a sudden relief to my burning muscles.

He's looming over me, the youngest in their gang, I knew he always had it in for me. He's tall, almost as tall as me, brown hair, with brown eyes to match. He's athletic. He's been my rival for years, and finally beaten me. I know he's thrilled from the look in his eyes. He doesn't even have to say it. He knows that I know.

He stand up, landing me a swift punch in the gut, just to wind me even further.
I just lay back against the concrete ledge on the roof and gasp for air like a fish out of water, feeling like my lungs have shrunk even further.

The rest of the gang catch up, running and jumping over the final gap. Their leader is the last to get there, he knows he doesn't have to run, he ambles across, nodding to my rival.

"Good work Tyler." He looks at me and snarls with distaste. All of a sudden he's dragging me upwards, and slamming me up against the block containing the water tanks. Pain registered dully in my head but I was still entirely focused on not being able to breathe.

"Where is it?" He hissed in my face. I couldn't speak, he dropped me.

"We wait....if he's not able to talk...we wait until he is...and if he still won't....then we make him." They all laughed cruelly and sat down.

I was breathing normally again for ten minutes before he made me speak, dragging me back up to my feet.

"Answer me."

"I don't know." He punched me in the stomach, making me cough and splutter for air.

"Where is it? I'm not gonna keep asking so nicely."

"Oh, well there goes my night- fuck!!" He punched me in the nose.

"Ah...you bastard..."

"Watch your mouth."

"Or what? You'll break my nose a bit more? Damn...I'm trying to find it too. I don't know where it is."

"You found it. We know you have."

"Does it look like I've found it? You're wasting your-" The leader finally snapped, this time his eyes were murderous, face red, and the vein in his temple looked ready to burst. So I ran again.

"You can't run forever!!" I cursed and jumped off the building, soaring through the air until I crashed onto the next one's fire escape, running down steps until I ran out like a cornered animal.
I took a risk and jumped to the floor, screaming in pain when I felt my ankle crack at an odd angle underneath me. I rolled over, crying out again when my weight eased off it.

"I've got you now!" I scrambled backwards into the next alley, cursing my ankle that sent shoots of pain through me every time I moved. I heard his footsteps approaching me.

He appeared in the alley, hand disappearing in his jacket and reappearing with a knife. Fear hit me like a fist and I tried not to show it. He'd kill me if he got the chance, and it didn't look like I had much in the way of fighting him back.

"Try not to scream too loud." I tried best as I could to hide the pure panic that was rising in my chest. If I couldn't fight, I'd at least rob him of the opportunity to get what he wanted.

I would not look scared.
I would not scream.
I'd die not giving him what he wanted.

His eyes glinted as he crept closer.
And Closer.
Closer.

He knelt down to me and ran the knife over my cheeks, not breaking the skin, but making sure I felt it.
"I want...to hear you scream...I want you to feel pain you didn't even know was possible...I want..to carve...things into your body...tell everyone what you really...are..."

I made a decision to think about other things, I didn't want him to be my last thought before I died. I thought about my brother, my parents, and my best friend. Pain made me bite my tongue as he ran the knife harder along my cheek, making me cringe as I felt the skin splitting apart, a deep gouge forming in it and warm liquid seeping down my face.

In a blur, something flew down in a dark shadow and the leader was ripped away, flying through the air, in the distance I heard a sickening thud. One hand came up to my cheek on instinct as I looked up to see my saviour, or an even worse fate.

What I saw sent shivers down my spine and made my chest feel tight again.

He stood tall and casually, leather jacket, dark jeans and dark hair all helping the shadows to conceal his face. Something about him wasn't normal, besides the fact that he had just picked up a heavily muscled post-adolescent man and thrown him hundreds of yards away. He had a strange aura about him that absolutely terrified me, and yet something about him drew me in, lighting an insatiable curiosity within me.

"What have you gotten yourself into, kid?" His accent, husky with a slight southern twinge to it made my hairs stand up.

"I-I...I don't know....exactly..." He chuckled and lit up a cigarette, I was so beyond shocked, he was acting like it was a quiet Sunday afternoon, not like he'd just saved my life and killed another person.

"Want a puff? Might need that getting seen to. It always relaxes me."

"N-n-no thanks...." He shrugged and pulled out a phone, calling for an ambulance before giving me a small salute and running away as the ambulance pulled up. If it hadn't been for the siren lights, I wouldn't have been able to see him jump, springing right up to the fire escape I had jumped from, and disappear with impossible speed into the night.

The ambulance people tried to speak to me, but I just couldn't muster a word. It wasn't until hours later, they'd kept me in for supervision, when I was finally able to start answering the nurse's questions. They called my best friend Jordan, he arrived quickly and ranted at me the whole way home about getting myself into trouble with these people.

"Oli - are you even listening to me?"

"Of course."

"What did I just say?"

"Something about me being irresponsible and I'll get myself killed, or was it the one with 'Oli surely there must be something else you can do to entertain you than trying to solve all these dangerous crimes and shit?" Jordan glared at me.

"Sorry for caring. I won't bother next time."

"Yes you will. I'm not angry at you for caring, just don't act like my mum." He sighed.

"So who was this guy that saved your ass?"

"No clue. He scared me shitless though J...honestly, I've never seen anything like it-"

"So you wanted to shag him. Big deal. You want to shag half the guys you lay eyes on-"

"Fuck off mate. Quit with all the gay shit, it weirds me out. What I meant was, okay so Jason was on the verge of carving shit into my face and he just appeared out of nowhere, picks Jason up and THROWS him away, calls and ambulance then runs away. What's more, he jumped up onto the fire escape that I broke my leg-"

"Ankle."

"Whatever...jumping from in the first place. Jordan I'm not even kidding that fire escape must've been three of me high, at least. And he jumped onto it like a bloody cat!!"

"Maybe he's the new superhero...Catman...." I rolled my eyes and smacked the back of his head.

"I'm not exaggerating J."

"Oli, look, you've been through a mega shock tonight, been in a lot of pain and under a lot of stress, you need rest. You probably saw it differently to how it actually was." He sighed as I held in my anger, not able to believe that he was right.

I saw that man. I know how it happened. And there was something not right about him.

I decided to find out.