Waking can be a violence. And no one burdened with disturbing thoughts, or existential anxiety ever wakes up “peacefully”. For Pete it was the first time he’d slept since everything had begun. The antihistamines had done their job. Even so, it wasn't a gentle drifting off; but more like being abruptly shut off with a switch. And waking up was equally jarring.

  By the time he felt the morning coolness of the bedroom, panic had already taken hold. Never truly ceasing; he had fallen asleep during a tempest that was still raging as dawn broke. The sensations of unreality enveloping him while he made his way to the bathroom.

  “Why does my own damn face look wrong?” he asked, looking at his reflection in the vanity mirror.

  It was his, yet somehow…not. Like a person staring too long at a familiar word, when suddenly the letters don’t seem to “fit”.

  But, despite the sickening sensation, Pete forced himself (once again) to appear just normal enough, so that Natalie left for work believing he was bouncing back from his “flu”.

  And watching her drive away, he allowed his fractured mind to settle on that morning’s obsession. One that had been wedging itself into his subconscious. The object at the center of his plans for the day.

  The twelve-gauge shotgun in the back of his closet.

  From the moment his mind “broke”, the awareness of the loaded weapon lurked like a shadow. Hardly a second passing that he wasn’t aware a possible end to his pain might be only a room away. A brief, violent moment, and then it would all be over.

  There is no shame quite like the shame a person feels when contemplating suicide, even if that consideration is immediately followed by aggressive resistance to the idea. The fact that it was ever a notion at all seems like a failure.

  People are raised to view suicidal thoughts as taboo. The last surrender of the weak. No life trauma, tragedy, or stress could ever serve as an acceptable excuse to take "the coward's way out."

  Not to mention the potential religious implications that Pete had become increasingly concerned with.

  “Let’s assume there is a God,” Pete pondered. “If I kill myself, how can I be sure that this will stop? What if it gets worse? I can’t know for certain if suicides go to Hell, but I definitely can’t be sure that they don’t."

  Pete's internal debate raged on. "And what about Natalie? What about her life? Yeah, I’m real fucking sure that her husband killing himself a month after their wedding wouldn’t be humiliating at all."

  But eventually, frustrated by lack of resolution, he turned from the fear and ended his one-man dialogue, promising that as long as he could control his actions, he would fight to the bitter end. “I can’t kill myself. Not if I’m sane enough to prevent it,” he decided.

  Then, aloud, he finished with, “And if I do completely snap and end it all, it sure as shit won’t be with my own damn gun!”

  So, angry, scared, and swearing, Pete walked to the closet, pushed aside his clothes, and faced the shape of death in chrome lined steel.

  “I can do this,” he said. “I have to.”

  Slowly, he reached for both the barrel and self-control. Terrified that his hands would somehow, spontaneously act on their own. That he would be unable to resist pulling the trigger. Visions of the scene playing out on repeat. The blood on his clothes, the unnatural position of his dead body on the floor.

  But despite the barrage of disturbing thoughts, they remained just that. Fears and images restricted to his internal prison. Even fading in their strength once he lifted the weapon from the closet.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Pete exhaled in relief. “Still in charge.” He realized. “Now we just have to get the shells and get out of here.”

  He opened his sock drawer and found two boxes of shotgun shells in the back. He took the gun, all the ammo, and walked out of the apartment to his car.

  To his great surprise, he found that focusing on driving helped to alleviate some of the terrible physical and mental tension. He was slightly less panicked. The forced distraction of operating a vehicle, somewhat soothing.

  “Okay,” he said. “That’s a nice twist.”

  He drove slowly, about fifteen minutes outside Athens to a state park he knew had a shooting range. Hoping that arriving in the morning, on a weekday, would give him some privacy.

  Pulling into the parking lot, he was relieved to see that he was, in fact, alone, surrounded by woods, except for the clearing of the range itself.

  It was a beautiful day, which struck him.

  Strange to think that under a picturesque blue sky, surrounded by nature, on such a quiet morning, a broken man had come to unleash thunder and fire.

  He worked quick, taking the shotgun and shells out of the trunk and walking to one of the tables to set up.

  “I’ve got to do this fast,” he reminded himself.

  He raised the weapon to his shoulder, aiming at a vague patch of grass fifteen yards away, giving himself no time for second-guessing.

  “Shooting for my life.” He sighed, his cheek pressed against the stock.

  BOOM! The first shot fired, and the gun kicked into Pete’s shoulder. Hard. Harder than it should’ve since he hadn’t steadied first. “Who cares?” he said flatly. BOOM! Another shot. Grass and dirt erupted where the buckshot tore into the ground. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Pete fired the last three shots in rapid succession, and the first five shells were gone.

  The thunder that had shattered the morning quiet stopped. The violence of it, however, lingered in the air among the trees.

  “Ten more to go.” He whispered.

  6E+24

  “It’s his will, Gabriel.” Raphael stood, arms folded watching the desperate scene. “The will inside this man.”

  Gabriel was skeptical. “He’s trying to survive, like all animals do. Perhaps it’s too early to canonize him just yet.”

  “You fear his Door?” Raphael inquired.

  “I fear his fear.” Gabriel met the eyes of his brother. Dark green locked with steely grey. “It was fear that was his failure. Fear and selfishness. Abaddon must’ve known as much. And besides, a weapon does not a warrior make.”

  Raphael looked back at Pete Bishop and his shotgun. The explosion of the dirt and dust, frozen in the still lens. “You’re right, Gabriel.” He conceded. “A weapon doesn’t make a warrior…

  …but courage does.”

  6E+24

  Pete opened the next box of shells and loaded them into the magazine. Then he raised the gun again.

  The trigger pulled. The Remington lurched, and in a blur, five more shots were gone.

  Five fewer chances to hurt himself.

  With shaking hands, he reloaded the last of the rounds, and dove into the violence a final time, refusing to allow room for doubt.

  And just like that, it was over.

  “Done,” he exhaled. His ears were ringing. The smell of gunpowder filled his nose. He stood there, shoulder aching, staring at the dirt cloud he’d created.

  It was then that he noticed something wet on his cheek, and reaching up, he collected a single tear. Pete watched it sparkle on his fingertip, catching rays of sunlight. A tiny shining thing, unaffected by the surreal scene around it. “Is this really happening?” He asked the droplet.

  And that’s when the exhaustion of adrenaline spent, settled heavy on his heart.

  He slumped, suddenly weak, fighting the urge to collapse. Wanting so badly, to lay down in the dirt in front of him, and waste away to nothing. He had done the scary thing, taken control of the situation, and accomplished his goal.

  Now, he just wanted to stop doing anything. Stop doing …everything. Curl into the weeds and be buried by time. Alone and no longer a danger.

  But he wasn’t alone.

  Not ever.

  Not really.

  “Still here, Nat.” He called out, glancing back at the car. “Still here.”

  Then, gathering his things to leave, he paused for one last look down the range, and extending his arm, flipped his middle finger at the spot of ground he had fired upon.

  “Fuck you,” he said defiantly.

  Odd, but for reasons he couldn’t quite articulate, he sensed that he was entitled to his anger, as though his immature gesture was meant for someone specific. As if all that was happening to him in that moment was somehow, not entirely his fault. He could feel it.

  He didn’t trust it.

  But he could feel it.

  6E+24

  “You're right, Raphael. His will is strong.” Gabriel watched as Pete made his crude gesture toward the grass. “Short-tempered, to be sure. Nonetheless… strong.”

  The moving lights of the Kaleidoscope fractals made Gabriel’s golden wings shimmer like the tear on Pete Bishop’s fingertip.

  “It reminds me of brave Abdiel,” he continued. “Facing down Lucifer, surrounded by the entire traitorous horde. There is no courage like that of the one who stands alone.”

  “Which leads once more to the inevitable question,” Raphael reminded his friend. “How much longer do we leave him to fight without aid?”

  6E+24

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