Prologue
His hands were remarkably still despite his rapid breath, sweat rolling down a temple as he fought to tear his gaze from the man who lay crumpled on the floor.
Death was not an instantaneous occurrence that television would depict, nor was it the drawn out last words from novels.
It was hollow, the final jerks and uneven breaths from the man dying off in the quiet of the room as his eyes stared off into a distant place Vaughan had yet to meet.
Vaughan lowered the gun as he watched that empty gaze, wide eyed and looking to something beyond him, the blood which had quickly pulsed onto the ground now slowed and no longer flowed from the hole he had made in the mans skull, a last uneven gurgling as the twitches became less frequent.
Vaughan was certain the man had been dead far before that breath, before the twitches began, before his skin went from a mottled grey to an unnatural pale. Something of the way his eyes looked had began long before, as if the acknowledgement of his last moments were clear to the man alone.
The thunder of footsteps was unheard by him as he continued to watch the corpse, the cold unfelt from the broken window bit into his still frame, and he sensed as if his mind was very still -serene and racing all at the same.
He did feel the hands that landed on his shoulders, one grappling the gun from his sweaty palm as he gasped and flinched away, swinging the weapon into the larger grip until he was blinking up to the fiery coal eyes staring down at him wide and unblinking.
“Vaughan.”
This was right.
This was what was suppose to happen- the rescue.
The relief. Vaughan was waiting to feel the weight from his chest release, while the lightheadedness to stop him feeling as if he were in a downward spiral.
“I’m okay,” his voice was flat sounding almost as if it came from somewhere else other than his own mouth and he was amazed he didn’t feel scared, or sad, or anything really. That was normal after killing a man- to feel nothing right? He was processing- surely.
“I’m okay. I have seen death before. Technically- this is my second murder.”
He had to say the words aloud- and even the statement did little to waver his voice or tremble his body.
For his conscious had to keep the tally.
Vaughan was certain it was only to grow.
