They Already Knew the Answer
The room felt wrong the moment you stepped in.
Concrete walls swollen with damp, paint peeling like old scabs, a single bulb hanging from a frayed cord that swayed whenever the wind outside shoved the building.
The air tasted like rust and wet asphalt.
Everything in there held its breath.
Four men occupied the place, but only one sat at the table.
The kid was soaked through, clothes clinging to him, hair dripping down his neck.
You could smell the rain on him, that cold street smell that meant he had been dragged inside without warning or chance to think.
His eyes kept darting from the table to the shadows, never settling.
He looked like someone who already knew he wouldn’t walk out.
Across from him sat the man in the dark coat.
Heavyset, thick hands resting calmly, shoulders relaxed in a way that didn’t match the anger burning behind his eyes.
He didn’t need to shout.
Power sat on him like a second skin.
Behind the kid stood the scarred man.
Tall, carved out of something harder than concrete, jaw clenched, a long pale scar cutting across his cheek like a signature he had earned the ugly way.
He didn’t blink much.
He didn’t breathe much either.
Just waited.
By the door stood the guard, arms crossed, expression carved from stone.
He didn’t speak.
Didn’t need to.
He was there to make sure only one exit existed and it wasn’t freedom.
The man in the coat reached into his pocket, pulled out a cigarette, and placed it gently on the table in front of the kid.
“Take it.”
Just a quiet look, nothing more.
The kid shook his head instantly.
Hands trembling.
That refusal said more than anything he could have spoken.
The coat exhaled slowly.
A calm, disappointed breath that filled the room like smoke.
“So. Let me get this straight.”
“We set up a transport nobody, and I mean fucking nobody, knew about. Locked tight. Clean. Untouchable. And somehow it gets snatched off the street like a toy in the rain.”
His gaze hardened.
“And you want me to believe you had nothing to do with that?”
The kid’s voice cracked before it even came out.
“I didn’t say anything. I swear. I didn’t talk to”
The scarred man slammed the back of the kid’s head into the table, the sound ripping through the room like a gunshot.
Wood shook.
The bulb trembled.
Blood dotted the surface.
“Don’t fucking lie in front of him. You think we’re idiots? You think we don’t know what a rat looks like?”
The kid wheezed, coughing, forehead pressed against the cold table.
“I’m not working with the cops. I’m not”
The scarred man hit him again, a sharp fist to the ribs that folded him over like paper.
The man in the coat leaned forward, elbows on the table now, staring straight through him.
“Then explain how they got the route. The time. The people involved. Explain how blue uniforms show up to a job nobody outside this room had the balls to whisper about.”
The kid shook his head frantically.
“I don’t know. I didn’t tell them, I didn’t tell anyone”
Another hit.
This one open-palmed across the face, snapping his jaw sideways.
“You’re dripping bullshit all over this table. Say it. Say you sold us out.”
“I didn’t please I didn’t”
The coat’s voice cut him clean.
“Someone talked. And somehow it’s always the ones who say they didn’t.”
Rain hammered the roof above them, heavy enough to feel through the floor.
The room tightened around the kid like a fist.
He tried lifting his head, but the scarred man grabbed a fistful of his hair and slammed him back down, the crack echoing sharp and final.
The guard didn’t move.
Didn’t blink.
The kid’s breath stuttered.
Blood ran down the table leg and dripped rhythmically onto the floor.
The coat stood up slowly.
“He’s going to talk,” he said quietly.
The scarred man smiled without warmth.
“They always do.”
The bulb flickered once, twice, then the room drowned in darkness.
