CS: Blood Lines (Cont.)

“You expect that this would be where your life was going to go?” A slow wind began to pick up and the trees rustled, slowly whispering secret things to each other. Sometimes Reno thought it might be true that they talked, he wish he could understand what they said.

The bodyguard seemed to think about this, stroking his chin in the methodical way of a man who thinks that such gestures helps one think. “I really think few kids really expect to grow up to be part of a crime family, sir,” the bodyguard said after a moment. He glanced over at the other bodyguard who gave a shrug and continued to smoke.

Reno nodded slowly, “I know I didn’t.” He turned around and stared at the house, the living room’s light was dying away as the logs had been burnt as far as they would with such a dull flame and no one tending it. He glanced out towards the wing where the servants quarters were and then up as far as he could see. All the lights were out in the entire place and yet here he was, still standing, thinking, dreaming. Some people said that he probably had insomnia, but it wasn’t that at all. He could sleep just fine, he just didn’t seem to want to, as if he found it boring. He glanced at his allies, “You willing to listen to something? You can’t tell Tony, all right? Cuz you work for me.”

“Of course, boss,” the bodyguard said.

“I pay your bills, all right, so don’t forget that.”

The other bodyguard let a plume of smoke roll, watching it fade away in the wind, “We got it, sir.”

“A war is brewing, gentlemen. And it ain’t the one that Tony is talking about. Yeah, that war is going on and we have to make sure that the Cappollas come out on top, cuz if we don’t, we’ll all be dead. But that’s not the important war. The truly important war is the war of ideals, the war of change. Tony is getting older and he’s hiding away in that room, cut-off from the truth, from the world, from even any indication that the Cappollas are running fine. Which they aren’t. Everyday we’re losing ground. Tony’s men aren’t doing their job and this new guy, this new guy might be the one to turn around the fight. But when all is said and done, if the Cappollas come out on top, Tony can’t stay. He’s got to go. He’ll only cause more problems because if there is one guy of all the gangs who loves power too much, it’s my dad. You follow?”

“I think so, sir.”

“Tony’s going to try and make sure that Max, the new guy, comes out licking his boots. Well, we’re going to make sure that we get Max up off the floor and working with us. Cuz if we do come out ontop of the syndicate war, it’s going to be that guy who carries us there and he’ll be the one to carry either father or son to victory. But Tony doesn’t know how to finesse or how to empathize. I do.”

“Of course you do. You’re one of the best,” puffed the other bodyguard.

“Don’t kiss my ass. I hate kiss-asses. Back to what I was sayin’. We have to make sure that Max comes out liking me better. Now tomorrow he’s going to go out there with us and we’re going to see just how damn good he is at handling the day-to-day situations in the city, and that will be when we need to win his favor.”

“Got it, sir.”

“Good. Cuz there are lines being drawn, gentlemen. Lines that will divide this city between the syndicates, that divides families, that divides the winners from the losers. Let’s make sure that those lines are drawn with our enemies’ blood, all right?” He turned and marched into the house. The two bodyguards watched him go, the one still methodically puffing on his cigarette as the other continued to stare after his boss.

“That man is going to cause problems,” the one with the cigarette said after a moment.

“Which one you talkin’ about?”

“Take your pick.”

$$$$$$

You or them….

That was all there was in the long run of things, whether it was you or the other guy going down. You had a gun, they had a gun, and it was whoever got the drop or the shot, whoever had the luck or the skill, that really determined things. You see the movies and one of them hesitates or they talk as they spiral around each other. Friendly banter. That doesn’t exist. There is no time to talk. There is only time to squeeze the trigger or to feel the pain, one or the other, nothing else.

Out in the sands and the war torn buildings filled with innocent women and children, out in the fog and the smoke where you can only see two inches in front of you, that was all that mattered. If they were six years old you did not hesitate, because they did not. To see such a people not afraid of killing, not ashamed of killing, with such born and bred hate in their eyes is something far more disturbing than words. How does one not let it get to them?

You kill them. And then the face goes away because you don’t see it anymore. That’s the truth. There is no haunting after image, not after awhile. Pictures and images fade in the mind so fast that there’s no worry that something might last. In a whole day we do eight million things, we remember three or four because we tell ourselves that they were special. Which ones get that distinguished favor? That’s all in how you look at it. Me, I see a bird flying, a kid laughing, I remember that…that replaces the memory of a man dying.

But that is a difficult thing to just do. The face of death is a horrid thing, not because it is twisted to hideousness, anguish, or even pain. It is, rather, because the face looks so completely calm and still, so unhappy, unemotional, as if existence really did stop within that being. Look in the face of death and you will feel no afterlife, no hope, no joy, just the misery of the end.