Rival Pt. 2

“Say it. Say you won’t tell anyone.” That was the voice of a man. An aggressive one.

A woman seemed to be in distress. “Please, master, I kindly ask you to unhand me.”

“Un-unhand you? I fucking love you! What the hell do you mean unhand you!?”

“Please, master, I have a husband.”

“Fuck you and your cuck husband. Tonight, you’re mine. Have my children for me, you whore.”

Well, I’m not an idiot. I knew exactly what was happening here and even if I felt disgusted more than anything, it seemed like I was the only person here that could do anything.

My feet broke out into a swift sprint that still maintained the elegance of my tiptoes. I began to brace my chest as I approached the door and I slammed into it. Luckily, it was enough to bring the door down. It may have been unlocked but that wasn’t something I was going to risk taking my time with.

Inside the bedroom was a maid with all her clothes off. Tears were rolling down her face and she was shaking uncontrollably in fear. Her lips quivered as her light cries pained my ears. The man was no other than Lars. There was an open bottle of wine on his nightstand. He appeared to be drunk. His movements were slurred and he was unusually unfocused.

“Haha, boy-wonder joins the party, would you like a spin of old Malila, here? She’s a bit of a fighter but they all go down easy after a while, ain’t that right, girly?”

I approached Lars and it seemed that he either didn’t care or didn’t notice. My fists landed straight in his jaw. The force of my punch sent him flying and he hit the back of his head on a window.

“Ma’am, please gather your belongings and leave. I’ll take care of this.”

Lars recovered almost immediately. “No, don’t you go anywhere, you bitch. Baney, clearly you don’t know how to make a woman feel welcomed so how about I do the foreplay and you can get in on the action later…”

Another punch to his face took him clean out of consciousness. I turned my head towards the maid and nodded to signal she should leave. She gathered her clothes and did her best to compose herself before exiting the room.

I carried Lars and laid him on his bed and decided to sit on a chair in front of it until either the morning or when he woke up. If he wakes up in the middle of the night, who’s to say he doesn’t snatch another maid in passing? My father told me not to remain alone with him but I can’t just let him get away with these disgusting acts if I can help it.

As boring and unfortunate as it was, I decided to stay in Lars’ room doing nothing for the majority of the night.

…

Four hours later, Lars’ body began to move. Not in the same way he’s been moving while asleep. It seemed as if his body was telling him to wake up, now. I positioned myself sternly on the chair I sat on. Looking awkward here could mean the difference between a positive and a negative confrontation. So far, Lars has been an extremely sarcastic yet smart individual. I can’t treat him like a monkey even if he acts like one.

By the time he sat up and realized I was there, I'd already had more than enough time to perfect my pose and I felt confident about the conversation we were about to have.

Lars looked more annoyed than surprised when he saw me in front of him. “Kid, what the hell are you doing in here? Did you wanna cuddle up to Uncle Lars after a nightmare?”

“You’re disgusting. You probably don’t even remember what you did.”

Lars laughed and yawned at the same time. “Honestly, I have the worst headache right now, but I could never forget a good lay. When you came in all hero-like, she probably caught feelings for you instantaneously. Talk about stealing my thunder-”

“Stop messing with me. Why would you do that? You know, I’m going to have to tell the mayor and my father about what you’ve done. You’ll go to prison and likely for the rest of your life. Crime in Ylvona is basically non-existent so they’ll make an example out of you.”

Lars rolled his eyes. “Augh…. Kid, if you take everything so seriously, you’ll never have fun being alive. Besides, you’re not going to report me to anyone, you still owe me that favor. This sort of feels like you’re tying my hands behind my back but just for you, this will be our little exchange. I fixed your leg, and you forget what you saw here tonight. Seems quite generous if you ask me!”

I wanted to punch him again. “You think I’m going to protect a filthy rapist?! What a joke-”

“Nuh-uh, when you say it like that, I sound like heh, I sound like a bad guy. Let’s be reasonable adults here! I still know about your secret. I’m sure your father doesn’t want anyone else to know either based on what he told us last evening. I didn’t want to pull this one on ya’ kid but like I said, you’re tugging my arm here…”

Dammit, there was no way I could let him get away with what he did to that poor girl, but there was probably a better way to talk this out that didn’t end up with me cornering myself. Shit, why can’t I do anything on my own?! It always just leads to more and more trouble for everyone and myself…

“There’s no way… There’s no way I can let you get away with something like this, Lars… You’re the epitome of human trash. You want to expose my secret? Fine, but at least you’ll be rotting right where you belong. Yeah, you-”

“Hahahaha! Rotting right where I belong! What a hilarious thing to say. No, no, I shouldn’t laugh. You’re right. You tell them about what happened here and I will be rotting ‘where I belong.’ And what do you think will happen to you when I tell them you’re a disgusting creature that ignites into the very thing that brought humanity into ruin? You know deep down in your heart that everything I told you on the elevator is true. They’ll silence your existence, force you to be experimented on and when they have all the info they could juice out of you, they’ll put a bullet in your skull and make it as if you never lived to begin with. You’re damn right, I’ll rot where I belong, but so will you.”

Is there really no other option here? Can Lars really get away with this?! If my father were here, he’d find some way to bring this deviant to justice without tarnishing his or anyone else’s reputation. What would my father do…?!

“Lars, what’s your schedule looking like tomorrow?”

For the first time, Lars wiped that sarcastic grin off his face. “By tomorrow, I imagine you mean today since we are in the AM hours… Anyway, I’m not doing much of anything today, but tomorrow, I have a scavenging mission. Standard biological material gathering. As you and every other beady-eyed kid knows it, walker-slaying…”

“What the hell is walker-slaying?”

“Are you serious, kid? Sun-walkers? Or do you Milfants call them something different over in that shithole?”

It’s been a while since I’ve heard someone refer to anyone as a Milfant. An egregious slur used by the early Ylvonians that would often move back and forth between the two cities during the first days of the conversion. You call anyone a Milfant back at home and it’s just another way of calling someone broke and worthless.

It appeared that Lars was talking about dweller-slaying. If he’s high enough status as a scavenger to go on dweller-slaying missions, that adds even more credibility to what he told me on the elevator… What else is he capable of? How many skills and jobs does Lars really have?! No, that’s not the right thing to think about right now. How can I use this against him? Think. Bane, think!

“Walker-slaying, huh? If that mission is tomorrow, how about I come with you?”

Lars scoffed, “Are you kidding, kid? You’d get eaten alive out there. I know you think you’re all hot because you're Edwin’s son but Sun-Walkers ain’t no joke.”

I can’t let him get away with this. What he did here tonight was absolutely irredeemable. But if he’s going to force me into a corner like this, I have to play my best card to make things as engaging as possible…

“Instead of having both of us tortured which even you could agree is boring, how about I come with you on this mission, and let’s say on the surface, the walkers this time around were a bit too rough to handle and either you or me couldn’t make it out alive. A true shame but it seems a lot more exciting than torture, right…?”

Lars gave an extremely toothy grin. His teeth shined brighter than ever. “Haha, I knew you had some fire in you, kiddo. I’m no idiot, I know you easily overpower me, or anyone else for that matter on the surface. We’ll discuss ball rules on the day of, but you have yourself a fantastic deal!”

I couldn’t help but smile right back at him. “I look forward to it, you disgusting genius…”

We parted ways for the night but little did Lars know, I was camped right outside his bedroom door. I wasn’t stupid…