Hoping to entice John with a modicum of a reaction, Roy's look to John reveals little more than a melancholic, unresponsive look forward to the long street ahead. Roy cannot help but reflect on this. Shame bubbles at the depths of his injured stomach. The topic brought up in such a way could be seen as insensitive, now that he thinks about it. Selfish even, for such as a reason of escape from irrational fears like this. As much as he had come to terms with things, it was always a question if John did, too. The err on the side of sadness washes over Roy in one of his rare cases of uncertainty. Just as he wallows in something familiar to him, John speaks.

"Gone for two years, living with this uncle of yours, and, still, you come back fighting as recklessly as you always have been. You know I have to ask." John stoically speaks with nothing more showing in his voice than the strain of carrying the man that he is calling out. Obviously, straining in something that Roy is struggling—or would struggle—breaking a sole sweat in doing; only strengthening the point in his mind.

Raising a finger of the hand wrapped around John's neck, "Nearly two years~", Roy jests as he maneuvers around a stack of red-solo cups as they cross the street.

"Did you learn nothing from him?" A fire underlines his words. Finally, catching Roy face-to-face, eye-to-eye, as he shifts his head back to Roy.

"Eh.. Bro. That's not what I was doing there." The hesitance cracking in Roy's voice with every word spoken. He goes to lightly scratch his cheek with his free hand, the second-hand embarrassment Roy was emitting must of been nothing short of immense.

They pause. The haunting whispers fill in the silence between the bickering duo. John detaches from his mortal shell of embarrassment as he buries it down deep. The answer being too important for him to be stopped by something as small as the fool he seemed to make of himself here to be. Cool as a cucumber, "What was it you learned there?"

"Control," Roy immediately answered.

The trudging becoming more of a waddling, the two make it across the street and onto the sidewalk in preparation for that eventual turn. The closer proximity to each returning crevasse passed, shined dim and digital light upon the festering life that could be heard echoing off. Be it shady fellows to the scavenging rodents, none had the care to be disturbed from their current vices. Yet, this was paid little attention to by John. For all John could care about, at this moment, is the absurd answer that his 'bro' just gave him. "Control?" John agitatedly teases, "Control of what, violence? You might want to ask your uncle for some kind of refund on that one."

Roy, instead of peeved, began to chuckle, and then, fully laugh. This caused John to chuckle a bit, albeit unsure as to what Roy thought was so funny. The two laughed as they passed through an intersection or two; their turn in sight, the clinic not too far off.

"Yeah, yeah," Roy waves off, "'No one succeeds without effort. Those who owe their success to perseverance.' Violence may still be my means, but I now know how to use it properly for my own goals."

"We're quoting people now?" John asks in a whimsical expression, yet he is the only one looking at the other he is talking towards. Beside him, Roy's eyes glance at the hazy darkness anchored to their backs. The shadows begin to outline those of the idle that once hid in aisles of passing dank crevasses. Their vices now enjoyed, their urges now satisfied.

Far enough behind to not require anything drastic, but the warning signs are there. They're not in any position to fight— much less run.

"'Ambition never comes to an end', especially for those with vague goals, " John ripostes, "And, by the looks of it, I wouldn't call this much of a success either." Motioning his own free arm at the sight of his dear buddy carried beside him.

Nevertheless, the motion goes unnoticed. Eyes trained at the outlines behind them, his heartbeats pump at twice their average, hot-blooded speed. Yet, without missing a beat, "'The man who moves mountains begins by carrying away small stones'," Roy contests.

The adrenaline begins to kick in. The pain from the injuries dull. By taking on some of the weight onto his own fractured ankle, Roy changes there penguin-like waddle into something more akin to a standard light jog. Their speed outrunning the stalking shadows, if only by a little bit more.

"My goals may look like vague ideals now," Roy confidently grits his teeth, "But, I know, deep down, they're very tangible promises. They're ones I have to keep to those that cannot fulfill them themselves."

Between the strain and dulled pain, the two turn the corner at record speed. Even with garnering the worried glance from John, his fired-up company keeps up his smiling grit as his head turns forward for the last time. Not fairly far off from the the turn itself, the haunting collection of ambulance sirens can be heard in the distance. The hospital, John had mentioned before, had must've been close. If that was the case, then the other location wasn't to be that far away either. From waddle to trudge, and, eventually to rush, the brightly hazy entrance to the clinic was finally in sight.

Regardless, this didn't alleviate John's new worries, nor questions. At one time, he might've been aware of the internal workings of Roy's justice-obsessed brain, but it has become evident that he wasn't as knowledgeable on the subject as once assumed. Through all the questions that this day has brought the poor straggler, it's the ones about Roy that has, and had, been bothering him the most. As they stop mere steps before the hazy, lit entrance of the clinic, John stops beating around the bush. "Roy. What are you talking about? You've never told me anything about any hard-line goals of these, and now, not only do you have some, you've taken on other people's hopes in the two years after disappearing from off the face of the earth? From me? I thought we were practically brothers, Roy?"

They stand there. Roy—no longer looking back, no longer focusing on anything else all around them—keeps himself trained on John, facing—and talking—to him directly. Through his bloody and bruised aesthetic, Roy cuts away his persona— if only for the person in front of him. "You're right. You deserve an answer. Probably all of them. But, it's not right to just hear one side on things. It's not fair. Many things have happened in these past seven years—most you know—but these past two and a half was something I needed time on. I still need time on."

Roy removes his arm from around John's neck as he holds it out between the two of them. With his hand open, "But, I promise you. When time comes, I will tell you everything. I just need five more months. That's all I ask of you. Dad and I will tell you everything, just have a little bit more patience."

Hesitant as he may be at first, John's hand twitches beside him. The thirst for answers, the time spent in the metaphorical dark always taking its toll; John knew the value of patience by this point in his life. But, where had that brought him since?

Nevertheless, the time spent between the two throughout the years had been worth this betrayal of his own conscious' warnings. John steadily raises his own right hand and shakes on this agreement of theirs. Albeit, bits of what Roy said had already given away more than John could have imagined. It, ultimately, became a mutual compromise; the conversation was dropped for another time. Yet, their next adversary had been way closer than one could anticipate.

Limping for one and walking for the other, the two stand in front of the bright, hazy entrance of the clinic. Yet, before them was no door. "Bro," Roy blankly notes, "Where's the door?"

Looking back at John, Roy notices him making a gesture being motioned for him. First, with a point to his eyes. Then, a double finger point forward. Yet, his fingers were slanted downward. "Look down," John pleasantly tells Roy.

The clinic's lit entrance was just the beginning of a stairway. A series of stone steps descending down to it's front door. The handrails—although exist—were as flimsy as they come, and the steps as hazardous as ice during the city's cooler months. While the stairway's entrance was brightly lit, the steps—and actual door—were as murky as the outlines that had been following a distance behind the two guys.

"Are you serio—", Roy begins to shout as he's brought to an immediate stop. 'The shadows!', the thought exploded into Roy's mind. Grabbing ahold of John's closest shoulder, Roy turns to look at the dark sidewalk from once they came. The shadows, were they still there? The outlines, were they still shaped like human beings?

"What?" A confused John holds himself back from going face-first into the stony staircase just below them, "What are you freaking out about now?"

Yet, they weren't there. None of it was; the oppressive darkness nor the humanoid shapes that had hid within it. Roy takes his hand off of the shoulder, and grabs his head. "Yeah," Roy quaveringly comes to terms, "I might've been hit harder than I thought.."

Instead of saying any quip or any verbal gut-punch, John just nods and cautiously helps Roy down these slippery, stone steps. The clock inside coos three, the mechanical bird loud enough to be heard through the wood-and-metal door the two only now reach. As John opens the clinic's door, he cannot help but ask one last question: "Hey, Roy. Happen to know if any chinese joints are still open right now?"

The door wide open and the winds of clinic spewing out, all that Roy could muster is a look that only John could wretch out of him: utter bafflement. "Huh," Roy desperately exaggerates, "Why, in the hell, would I know that, dude? I've been gone for two years!"

Instead of an answer or a rebuttal, all John gave back was a laugh. A laugh of someone who knows better, a laugh of someone who's won. "Exactly!" John punctuates, "Two years. Two years exactly."

"Oh, shut up!" Roy retorts with a sneer, his bro's pettiness reaching deep into his skin.

As the needless pissing match comes to an end, Roy feels a light slap to his back. "Well," John says as he turns to the stone stairway, "I'll be on my way. I'll come by tomorrow to check up on you, if things are too serious."

"What?! You're just leaving me here?" The perplexing feeling fills up in Roy as he is left at the threshold of the clinic. No sign of any employee coming to get him nor John staying there to assist, the calm certainty exuding off John as he leaves seeming like something straight out of a 'Twilight Zone' episode. The oddity culminates. Roy shouts, "Wait! You're not even gonna wait with me until I get a bed?"

As he's halfway up the stairs, John turns to show the smuggest grin to the vigilante bro down below. And, with that smile, he concludes, "Beds are for hospitals, Mr. Vigilante. Enjoy your night with the 'Reaper of Nisqually'! Buh bye~"

"Aughh! Get back here, you bastard!" Roy reaches out his healthier arm towards an escaping John— straggling the air in his palm. The shoes on the stone—and, then, pavement—begin to tapper off back into the haunting dark-and-neon streets as Roy leans against the door between two worlds: those streets and the medical uncertainties inside.

Some sounds can be heard from inside, expected and the questionable. Regardless though, these were more comforting than the haunting whispers from out there in those streets. Or, so he thought.

Roy's eyes begin to shut as he still stands. The cacophony of temperatures and sounds comfort his weary body and mind. As he melts from standing to laying, the floor of tile and stone start to feel as comfortable as his wood-and-metal pillow at his back. His eyes half-lidded, he lets out his frustrations with a hot breath whistling between his lips. At this exhale, there comes a response. From the unseen inside shouts, "Ohh~ Sounds like I've got another customer!"

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

"No! Stop! Please!"

On top of an inconspicuous rooftop elsewhere in the city, time clicks down on another's life. There crawls a man back into the edge of a five-story building. The slightly overweight man trembles in his overalls and sweats in his splotchy white tee as another looks down upon him— phone in hand. Surrounded by potted greenery and dim porch lighting, the desperations from the man shake out through his begging.

"I.. I didn't know! It was just a basic briefcase. They all look the same. How was I supposed to know that the kid was gonna get his hands on it? That wasn't his job, that wasn't his contract!" The man revolves throughout all of his emotions at blistering speeds as his life begins to flash before his eyes. His back against the dangerously short wall between him and the path down to the ground, the possible ways out shrink smaller and smaller. The one deciding his fate stays standing above without an inkling of emotion nor malevolence able to be extracted from her cold, cold face. The only thing noticeable of her is the nokia phone by her ear, her unexpected beauty, and the terrifying mask hooked by her waist.

Under the blue twilight, her dead eyes darken as a voice grows on the other side of her phone call. The voice all but jumbles to the cowering man below her, the calmness in that voice signified all that needed to be said.

As flashes of his life come to a close, all that is left is the present: the mysterious, white-haired woman in front of him reaching under her decorative mask in one swift, nonchalant motion. "Wait! Wait, wait, wait," the cowering man shouts, "You're going to use a gun? That's not the smartest move to play here. At the dead of night. On top of a roof. With only one exit. Is this really the best that you could come up with?"

From sight alone, it was obvious of the size difference between the two of them. While he wasn't the most in shape by any measure, it sure was enough to overpower a woman that couldn't weigh more than around four car tires. If he could just do something to get her a little bit closer, then he'd have the advantage— regardless of what's under her mask. With a nod of his head, "Seems I might've overestimated this 'Demon of the Snow' thing, eh," the man doubles down on his last option out: antagonization.

Unfazed, the white-haired woman speaks. Yet, it's not to the man in front of her. "Yeah. Yep. The slouch is still talking." The articulation of her voice monotonous, if not peppered with the spice of irritation, towards the person on the other end of that call. Her distance is kept unchanged, only the cowering man in front of her becoming tinier and tinier in any meaningful capacity. Unmistakably, the crux of her hesitation had nothing to do with what the cowering man had hoped, betted on: his inherit value.

The realization came to fruition as his hope dwindled down to zero. The only options to choose were the ground or whatever she was about to do. Either way, a grim outcome would be an understatement. He looks back at the ground down below, and, then, back at her mask as his eyes widen to an unprecedented height. Fight-or-flight takes hold within his brain.

"No," the woman answers, "He's looking at my mask. He's just been looking at my mask instead of me. Yes! This whole time." Her eyes glazed and half-lidded, paraphrasing a common rant of hers throughout her replies. This mask in question being a modified Japanese oni mask wasn't all that special generally, but it's what the mask is designed with that made all the difference.

Of cream and black, the coloration nearly defined by these two opposing color bases. While half and half at the bottom of the mask, it was the black that started to branch off into smaller clippings as the colors rose up to the top of the hard plastic mask. The clippings resembling that of petals flowing throughout the mask, twirl around and up a single spike as they recombine into one solid black at the tip of one of the oni's horns. This dichotomy nearly as mesmerizing to those as the devil mask was to strike fear. Yet, the mask only pronounces what power the moniker held because of the one that preceded it's creation. Nevertheless, much to her chagrin, the mask had seemed to far outreach the realm of her own infamous shadow.

Looking at her mask once again, the man cowers and begs some more— ridding all pride in the process. She removes her hand from behind the oni mask on her hip as she brandishes a silenced Beretta. As she nonchalantly points it at the cowering man, the waterworks begin to flow from his veiny eyes. The salty eye-water reflecting the moonlight as it shines onto the darker clothing his executioner has decided to cloak herself with on such a celebratory night as this. Between the man's ugly sobs, the woman continues her monotonous phone call— letting at an occasional groan at the disgusting sight that cowered in front of her.

From a distance, the clock tower chimes. The electronic bell rings in a lullaby of 3am. As the selective few neon signs and surrounding porch lights that hung in this suburban district cut off, only the natural light of the moon stood witness to the events unraveling below. The waterfall of tears dry as the slobbish man makes his final decision. He turns back to the woman and speaks to her one last time before jumping. With an air of eerie calmness, "Before I go, I want to know. Why a gun? What's the point of being called the 'Demon of the Snow' if all you do is shoot a gun?"

"Yeah," the woman calmly says, "I'll be back there soon."

*Bang!*

Through his adam's apple, a freshly carved hole is made. The shot hisses out as lights for some of the higher story apartments flicker on. Although, the man isn't dead. He grabs his pierced throat as blood gushes out from it— and his mouth. The impact great and the shock stark, it was enough to push the man over the small wall. Careening down to the sidewalk below, the woman majestically turns and walks away from the rooftop scene.

"Sir, you already know" the woman confidently whistles, "He wasn't worth telling."