Featured Fiction: Revenge!

A lonely tree stood solitary on a darkening hill. Its branches were bare and no birds would roost in its empty canopy. The bark towards its trunk was peeling off and patchy in many places giving a diseased appearance. Gnarled roots grew twisted in the parched earth, meaning that the whole tree leaned crookedly on its base.

Sparse vegetation had appeared on the hill, sun-dyed brown, and now coated in sweaty dew. Two men stood beneath the tree. One was shaking, as if froma extreme cold, while the other was calm and assured.

“I told ya I’d find ya.” The second man breathed. “And I told ya, what I’d do to ya.”

There were no clouds in the sky to shroud the stars, not that any could be seen on such a dark night as this. The air was still – no wind had stirred since before sunset – and the silence was unsettling.

“I ain’t never meant for this to happen!” blubbered the first man, stiff and transfixed as a statue on a plinth of ice. “Johnny, please!”

Johnny just gave a derisive chuckle. “No.”

A gleam of silver caught the moonlight and shone coldly. The hammer was particularly shiny, devoid of any rust.

“How many roads must a man walk down?” Johnny smiled, a thin slit cutting his cheeks. Danny’s unsteady legs buckled and he fell to his knees, hands on his head, pulling at his hair. His brown suit, originally a ruddy hue, was stained with dirt from the thigh down and sweat from the belly up. A faded tie failed to conceal his mighty gut, which he had lavishly filled only hours ago.

“I…I d-don’t know!” He was tearing at the eyes now, nose running grotesquely. “What are you talking about?”

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.” Johnny hissed, moving closer so that his pale, cold grey eyes could stare down into Danny’s horrible brown ones, close enough to draw in the stench of onions and fear. “You betrayed me.” He forced out every syllable. “You led Sid straight to her. And then you kept it from me.”

“No! I-I…” Danny choked. “Sh-She went for h-him. She’s the one to blame. Not me!” He whispered. A dog barked somewhere distant, its deep growl magnified in the taut silence.

“Lies!” Johnny shouted. “I suppose it is fitting for you to die on your knees like the scoundrel mutt that you are. I just wish Blue-Louie’d never pulled you from Lachrymal Lake. It would’ve been so … easy … to let you drown.”

The metal face looked straight into Danny’s, who almost fainted at the sight of it. “Don’t! You need…” He didn’t even get a chance to finish the sentence.

The air around the dead tree exploded and blood pooled onto the dirt, quenching the grass. Three shots in total. A slow draught finally fluttered over the hill, carrying away the gunsmoke, and the smell of death.

Johnny looked down at Danny’s marble face with contempt. He spat on it.

“You should never have meddled in this boy.” He chastised the corpse. “Looks like this man won’t be walking down no more roads. What a shame.” Johnny pulled his coat around himself tighter, stowing his gun away from the forsaking moon. He was about to walk away before he turned around and kicked at the body so Danny now lay sprawled on his large stomach. Then once more at his groin. He lent down and whispered into Danny’s ear, blood still dripping out of it.

“Tell Sid; this time I showed you mercy! He won’t be so lucky.”

With that Johnny swept up like a bat and hurried away from the scene, anxious to not be discovered, and ardent on the pursuit of his next prey. One down, he thought.

The crickets’ started a gentle hum, which crescendoed as Johnny eventually left.

The tree stood just as before.