The Chosen One - Chapter Three
Chapter Three - (For those interested the song that accompanies this chapter is Bernard Fanning, Shelter For My Soul)
A month later
The Man lay face down in the painful darkness and felt the heavy, soft rain start to wash the blood, dirt and dried filth from his naked, battered body.
And he prayed to a God he didn’t believe in for the sweet rain to wash away the dirt in his soul.
He hoped his death would be quick but he knew it wouldn’t be. He was never that lucky. But still he embraced the pure cleansing rain gratefully as he lay beyond exhaustion, face down, bleeding and unmoving on the crumbled broken asphalt outside the abandoned dry cleaning factory that had once held him captive.
The white hot flames crackled and roared close behind him, growing ever higher as the building that had shown him the truth of his nightmares burned violently to the ground, fuelled by barrels of industrial solvents and the Man’s fierce rage.
The flames of orange, red and blue swirled into a hellish inferno, billowing heat and destroying all evidence of the nightmarish acts that had been perpetrated there. Vast timber beams fell smoking to the ground, dragging metal chains and electrical wires with them as a section of the roof opened to the sky with a sickening crack.
History was being wiped clean through the violent act of combustion and strange malicious, dancing shadows lit up the surrounding broken walls like sneering hob goblins and twisted dwarves around a sacrificial bonfire.
The collapsing building seemed to shriek out its despair as it fought to stay standing, challenging the driving rain and the Man felt the pulse of heat on the bare and raw flesh on his back even as the rain cooled his thin, fever racked body. The building was defiant and fought to stay standing while he lay empty, silently hoping for his death.
Death was the only true freedom. Only there could he be free of the sounds of the screaming, of the terrible sight of his Master’s eyes, of the smell of his own sweat and filth and of the touch of the Stranger’s hands on him.
Would his death be through slow drowning or burning fire? The Man found he didn’t care anymore. He didn’t deserve to live so he simply lay there and let the blood flow out of his body, mingle with the rain and surround him in growing scarlet puddles. He knew from his distant past how many litres of blood were in his body and he knew how much time he had left as his heart rhythmically pumped what remained through his open wounds and slid down his naked body in rivers of blood.
Still he did not move to slow or stop the bleeding and simply lay, sprawled awkwardly across the ground from where he fell and watched the building violently burn. He deserved to pay the price for what he had done, for what he had become. It was the only truth that remained to him.
Rain ran down his once young face and into his eyes and mouth so his strange universe became increasingly blurry and oily tasting. The sharp smell of chemicals gave everything an acrid, bitter sulphuric smell while his eyes stung from the bite of the smoke. Rough gravel dug into his bruised flesh as he watched unblinking as debris exploded and hissed around him as the two elemental forces of fire and water fought against each other in the black night.
A symphony of wet percussion beat against his body, the strange glowing pulsing firelight showing the falling raindrops to be like strafing lines of steady machine gun fire as they fell in sweeping lines, advancing aggressively towards the fire. Small puddles grew quickly to gushing lakes as the gutters, blocked with trash and the forgotten refused to let the water to flow freely away.
Would the rain be able to cleanse him of his deeds? Would he be purified at the moment of his death so that finally he might rest in peace? A baptism by water to free his mind from the sound and sight of his torturous Master? Or would the flames crush him under heavy collapsing burning timbers until he was incinerated? Burned alive in a Hell of his own making? Would all that was left of him be crumbling carbon blowing away in the unforgiving wind? Mere ash to join the filth and dust on the streets of the surrounding slums? Part of the silent witness to unceasing human misery as crack whores and pimps plied their trade?
The Man could hear the Devil laughing at the edge of the parking lot as he watched his plight from under a distant flickering broken street lamp. And Tim knew what the devil’s laugh sounded like. It sounded like the catch of a cigarette lighter just as it fell to the ground with a clatter, igniting with a whoosh a wet trail of potent chemicals. A bargain made and sealed in blood.
It was done. It came at the cost of his life and his soul but it was a price he had learned he could pay.
He was free to die alone in the pure rain and a better death he could not have selected. There had been many times he had thought his death would come differently but ultimately now that the end was here he was free from the shadow of his name.
He would die as he had been born. Naked, wet, covered in blood and uncertain as to what lay ahead.
He found strangely as his once warm life drained away into the cold rain he wanted just once to see the glimmer of his distant stars again. But that would require being able to roll over. He already had too many things he had never achieved in his life so he simply added not being able to roll over to his list. Even if he had the strength, will and desire the thought of the gravelly stones being pushed into the raw meat that was the remains of his back sapped his strength. He had faced too much pain already. He would simply lay here until bittersweet Fate finally allowed him to die.
Besides the violent opera of his death meant he would not see the innocent stars as the oily black chemical smoke billowing from the factory concealed the gleaming white lights even better than the roiling black storm clouds did.
Was it was poetic that during his confinement he had wished only for clean water and to be left alone and now he lay dying in the rain, a solitary figure spread eagled where he fell surrounded by empty space and broken unmanned barbed wire fences.
With a scream of agony more of the building collapsed sending showers of bright sparks into the night sky as the rain began to triumph and smother the flames, leaving vicious charred scars across what remained.
And still the rain fell heavily and he began to feel only the cold as he felt his body grow still. He was becoming empty. Pain was irrelevant. Merely a learned response of the brain to prevent further damage. He had learnt long ago to ignore it. He welcomed the numbness of his body as it joined with his complete absence of thought.
The Man slowly smiled gratefully and his tired, stinging eyes fluttered shut. Once he would have screamed out and called for help, once he would have tried to stand and stagger to the gate but now he was nothing.
He was simply The Chosen One.
And he chose to die.
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The Man did not hear the wails of the sirens as the fire trucks screamed down the streets and the splashes of the heavily booted feet as they came towards him.
“Hey! Over here!”