The Hanged Man

Thankfully, the last time I was unable to fulfill the urge to desecrate the corpses in an entire building was my middle school classroom. I remember sitting at the back of the class, but it wasn’t even the one near the window, it was one of the two in the middle of the classroom. Fitting I suppose. 

On that day, I remained in my seat like a useless cog in a machine, tuning out the mindless meat bag of stupidity that society called a teacher. I was imagining myself killing each person in the classroom one by one.

‘Oh this one? Probably just a gunshot. The one next to him? Hmmm, maybe, the punishment used by the Mongols, uhh, quartering I think it was, where the horses split apart the person into four parts. Cool.’

And so on. 

Ah, picturing those days, it was hell. I can’t even imagine being in that situation, unable to do anything because of the so-called righteous society. 

When I finally got bored of thinking about the wondrous sight of the death of my classmates, I remember staring out the window wishing for something more. Anything more. After all, I was destined for something great, unlike these utter fools who cared naught but for their pitifully low grades.

Then it happened.

The days after the event, people called the day the Nights of Disaster, named due to the unending night that came amidst the chaos that week. I, on the other hand, call it the Days of Salvation, for, wasn’t it the opposite of what the public said?

On this day, people got superpowers, what the government now calls mutations, and what I call 'gifts'. I think this fits the ability much better than a simple mutation. It is a gift from the heavens, sent by God to give his children the proper gifts they need to thrive and claim their proper place at the top of the pyramid.

During that morning, I finally got to escape my forsaken life as a regular nobody, and transformed into something better, something greater. Unfortunately, my younger self didn't fulfill his wish of seeing death, a fact which saddens me to this day.

…

I took a puff from my cigarette, my black trench coat blending into the shadow of the alleyway. A passerby revealed themselves under the musty yellow light of a lamppost, glancing toward me, most likely at the smoke. His eyes faltered at my blindfold. A regular, not a super. He quickly walked past. 

Leaning my head against the cold stone, I took a small glance toward the street again after a moment. The small patches of light from the haphazardly installed lampposts revealed the rubbled surroundings full of broken down metal and rock. A district that hadn’t been restored after the Days of Salvation. But the person I was waiting for still did not appear.

I took another puff from my cigarette, smoke swirling above my head into the night sky.

The particular female I was waiting for was another one of the dogs of the UHA, those moronic bastards, who had made a routine inspection of the district every day for the past month. They were not far from restoring it, New London was soon to run out of room. Not that it mattered.

After a glance at my old, beaten up watch ( it was still a bit aways off for her appearance), I closed my eyes and began to reminisce.

The first six weeks after the Days of Salvation were the best time. The worthy received the gifts from God and were able to take control of the world from the corrupted fallen who were in place. What the people call chaos, I call rebirth. It was truly heaven.

A second later, a ping of shame struck my heart as the memories of the first night entered my mind. The single blight in my history. I was too rash, too naive, too caught up in the thrill of killing. The scar of my right arm began to sting with my pain, but I shook my head out of my delusions. 

Back to the exposition. 

After the nights of darkness, the people began to call the ones with gifts, supers. Hoping, wishing, for Superheroes, like the ones they read about, Superman, Batman, etc., would save them from their misery. 

Then by the miracle of luck, they came. The heroes. It was as if the whole of humanity had saved its luck from its entire history and used it at that exact moment. First came The Golden Savior from the US. Powers like the old Superman, almost straight out of the comics. Of course, there was no kryptonite. The others soon followed. Europe’s Angel of Verdun and Goliath, China’s Steelheart, Japan’s Phantom, and more. They came like a flood, as if they were waiting. 

The creation of the UHA, the United Hero Association soon followed, vowing to ‘Protect the Public from Dangerous Mutated Individuals’, becoming an organization for managing supers.

Most villains were captured and killed the following two months. The ones who resisted or worked together were raided by heroes from multiple countries. 

I, of course, was not captured. Their powers could not compensate for their utter lack of intellect. My gift exacerbated that difference. 

Ah, of course, I haven’t told you my gift, haven’t I. An oversight on my part, I’m too used to only dealing with the only intelligent being on this planet

That day, when the sky was blackened like a total eclipse, I could see. See more. See everything. My gift was the power of sight. My eyes are different from yours you see, different from every single super that roams this pitiful earth. I can will my eyes to see anything, as long as my energy can support it. Even fate and time are no match for my eyes, however much they may try to resist. 

I sighed, taking another puff. A glance at my watch revealed it was soon to be time and I tossed the cigarette butt onto the floor, stamping it out. Then, wrapping my trench coat tighter around my body, I waited.

After a few minutes, I called upon my gift. The power to see. See through the blindfold and the broken down stone that blocked my sight. As I felt the familiar sensation of energy draining from my body, my vision changed. As I wished, I could see the figure of the women, walking down the street. It was indeed her. 

I then chuckled, realizing she had worn the disguise of a whore. Her gift, a minor one in Metamorphokinesis, made her perfect for patrolling in a ruined district that only contained the worst of society. Patrolling in UHA uniform here would only be asked to be murdered by the ones here. 

Behind the disguise which could not stop my vision, she was blushing heavily and fidgeting with her hands, her attempts at hiding it futile. She usually had disguised as a male drug dealer, but it seems that identity had been compromised. Though uncomfortable for her, it did not matter to my plan. 

She walked closer and closer, and I waited patiently under the shadow. Finally, she entered within the real sight of the alley and I began my hunt.

“Little Miss-y!” My tone was high and my speech slurred. “Com’ over here-I need some service.” 

I saw her look toward the alley and grimace under her disguise. She spoke before hesitating. “Ah, I’m not open for business today.”

I laughed seeing her expression of disgust. I then willed my eyes to share her vision, and a second later, my vision changed again, more energy than before escaping my body. After making sure that she didn’t see much other than my silhouette, I inched forward, letting her catch a glimpse of body, but more importantly, the trench coat that was in perfect condition.

“Ahhh-C’mo young lady, not open for business? How cou’d that be. Just be a sweet thing and come over here. It be a crazy world, why don’t we have a little fun…”

I saw her eyes tense underneath her disguise, and her forehead furrow as she caught the sight of the coat. She replied, albeit a bit slowly.

“Say, that coat there. Where did you find it?”

A bit to direct don’t you think? But it didn’t matter, I could reel her in now.

“Jus give me a night-I’llll sho’w you. The Coat is cool right?”

She didn’t reply. But I knew she was caught, even without using my gift.

“Just co’me he’re… I’ll sho-ww you.”

After hesitating a moment, she folded: “Alright.”

Trying to hide her nervousness, she approached the alley as I inched backward, hiding more within the shadows as she came closer. I reached within my coat and silently pulled out the knife. As she stepped one foot closer, I struck. Before she could react, I slammed the blade into her neck and in an instant she crumpled to the ground, spasming and her disguise wearing off. I caught her body before it fell to the floor and tucked the knife back into my pocket. I wiped a smear of blood that had burst onto my face.

There was no reason to celebrate. It was a given that my plan would succeed.

I pulled her dead body further into the alley and began to rummage her UHA, standard issue blue uniform. It was like one of the military uniforms in the days before supers, with slight adjustments. After turning her body and checking the secret back pocket, I found what I needed.

I have the access card, now for identification.

One of the few intelligent decisions the UHA made was hiding the fact that more than the access card was needed to infiltrate their buildings. I had discovered with my gift that it also required a retina, fingerprint, and DNA scan to get through their security gates.

Taking out the knife again, I turned the body back toward the front. I gently traced around her eye, her skin still flush with blood. Excellent. Plunging the knife into her supple skin, I carefully carved the eye out, making sure most of it remained intact, most importantly the pupil. Soon I had her bloody eye within my hands and taking a clear, plastic bag out of my coat, I placed it in. I soon did the same with her index finger, putting it in the same bag. For the DNA, I gently swabbed the inside of her mouth and put it in a capsule that I had also had in my coat.

Standing up from the cooling corpse of the female, for the first time, a small smile swept my mouth. Starting from this, my plans would unfold. Was it for power? Money? Fame? No, of course not. Those worldly matters are only for the weak, for God's Forsaken. No, I had a much greater purpose, given to me by the universe.

People were weak. Relying on heroes who were rotten and despicable, wearing a facade of justice to hide their horror. Just as I had seen, they too would get to know the true nature of the ‘heroes’ they worshiped. Soon. Very soon.

Death is too merciful. To truly see is the true hell.