The day ticks away. Scanning documents, looking for connections, waiting for the phone to ring. I was never happy with the waiting. It’s always easier when you aren’t personally invested in the outcome. I know that if I allow it, this will eat away at me. Poison me. I can’t allow myself to descend into the rush of taking. Making no mistake, monstrous as it is, the feeling of self righteous fury made manifest and acted upon, safeguarding my people and my girls, is addictive.
That rush as you pound after your prey, making the target, and standing over this person. The sound of the gun, the silence as their body bleeds out. The light fading. The flight to safety. All floated on a endorphin and adrenalin high.
It’s not until after that you start crashing. Sometimes you are in first stage adrenal failure. Your body gives so much for those moments. And the memories…the chase comes in fragments, the planning sticks with you. But it’s those last minutes that haunt. You run through the catalog of the targets misdeeds, hoping to talk yourself into calm. Hoping that what you did was justified. Sometimes it is. Sometimes, you just can’t convince yourself. And those are the sleepless nights. Holding your girls. Trying to keep yourself from flying apart.
This time there is none of that ambiguity. But their faces will still haunt me. Still look back, glassy eyed, pleading for one more second of life. And I will smile, grim and frightening. Dark fire dancing.
Maybe that makes me a monster.
So be it.
Pelgris 