Endless guilt, pain, death—one hundred ninety seven, now one hundred ninety eight—tired, hungry, sick, sleepless…this is my beat; fifth and sparrow street, the bread and butter of my life on the devil’s seat. They call me Happy Jack; a name I inherited from busting the heads of a Russian mafia run drug ring that lead to my Robin Hood debut of stealing from the rich and giving to the street urchin bums that could use a little escape from their own names.

 

Tonight’s the night, judgment hour, time for those sweet talking murderers of law to feast on sour bullets. Every Tom, Dick and Sally knows the law, its common sense; right and wrong but most of the time the right is made wrong to ensure a good nights rest; people in my city call that Jack’s Law—but I’m far from my city…  

 

I hear the tick, tock of Grandfather’s clock and I know that it’s time for someone to die.  

“AAAIIIEEEEEE!!!”

            “There it is—never fails.” I can feel my heart beating like a lion in a wild hunt; I am that lion, my prey- the murderer. Pitter, patter goes the rain over the clip clap of my black heel suede tie ups, somewhere a knife is going in and out of an old timer with a—no, please, no, please; the murderer’s knife—Shink, shank, shink, shank; the whole damn orchestra is a fantasia of hell that my mind must torture itself with each night.

 

            One hundred and ninety eight days of this and as always; I get there too late, always too late. The poor old woman is named Carol Blessing…was named Carol Blessing; right now her last name fails to live up to its boon and she’s just another Carol. They’re all named Carol the dames at least, the men are all Carl. The place is a murderers dream come true; a city of prisoners from nexus nine—all brainwashed and ready to be slaughtered by the next big man climbing the social ladder that can afford to pay a dollar for death. It makes me sick, what makes me even sicker is to know that I’m one of the Carls too—but they didn’t know that I couldn’t be brainwashed, ex-military; they train against that psycho babble.

 

            So now that you know, you’re probably wondering what the hero is doing in a place where prisoners go to be slaughtered, maybe you’re beginning to believe that I’m here to save them from this cruelty of mankind that can’t be part of the judicial system. Well it is part of the judicial system and I’m not here to save them, I’m here to kill them. Could you feel remorse for a rapist or lend a helping hand to a pedophile being strangled to death, wouldn’t you rather just watch it happen? Then there’s the paradox of why I’m trying to kill them; well that’s a little too personal for show and tell today—I think from here on I’ll just let you pick up your own pieces and make the ambiguous puzzle out to be whatever portrait you desire…after all I’m one of the bastards too and who wants to hear a guilty man say otherwise when the ropes around his neck?  

 

            Fourteen wounds, gaping holes in the paper thin chest that no longer moved up and down—tap, tap; of blood oozing out of the glistening cavities over the Victorian lamppost’s somber glare—snowflakes began to fall.

            “Snowflakes…Ha, nice touch.” Jack snickered as he knelt to the woman’s body.

            The woman was a mock portrait of awful taste over honesty—she was so skinny that she didn’t look like she could run from a turtle, let alone a murderer, her face was jaunt, wrinkly and slathered with make-up, she wore blue eyed contact lenses and a long blonde wig over her bald head and brown eyes that made her look like a walking identity crisis; this was how all the Carols looked—artificially baby faced elders, lambs to the slaughter. “Only the old ones lately, crime is really being bred out of the youth these days.” Jack pulled a make shift hack saw from his trench coat pocket and began working away at the woman’s limbs, filleting her upon the street.

            What? You think you wouldn’t do the same in my shoes? Oh please, look they starve these bastards until they’re done in for a good reason—food supply is limited enough in the galaxy today due to overpopulation than to be wasting anything on the predetermined dead—so I’m not going to find anything else out here to keep myself above water and I prefer to swim rather than drown.

            Cold long streets whispered by Jack as he pushed his way down cobblestone path after path, every street sign the same:Fifth street or Sparrow street—discomforting repetition that played over and over, mirroring the buildings trend of: Nice City Bank, Sleep Tight Hotel, Eat Well Diner, Live Happy Apartments and Best Time Bar—a dream walk through the labyrinth he was used to like the back of his hand or the insides of a Carol. Above everything was the clock. An obsidian vessel, encompassing the sky like God’s pocket watch held overhead to remind man of his mortality.

            Carol’s meat stuck warm against his abdomen, a welcome sensation against the sudden frosty chill—they change the weather to play upon mood, they change the minds of man to play upon desire, they change the law to play upon greed, they do whatever they want because they can, because they’re bastards…like me. Lifting a sewer grate, Jack descended into a home all too familiar for his distaste; instantly the sour smell of oil and smoke uplifted his senses to ensure his security, instantly this sickened him. Damn this place, how can my mind call this home? With a sigh, Jack allowed the relief to wash over him and he returned the lid to the world above, a few last snowflakes landing upon his nose.           

            Sssss! Sizzled the meat upon a hot smoking pipe, wires dangled gray and black throughout the tunnels like sleeping snakes colored bleak by natures law in the depths of the city’s truth—a truth that marked the tunnel with a constant fog of night that took Jack months to navigate through until he became as blind as the brainwashed citizens themselves, a man sized mole of mother nature’s contempt. Pick and choose, that’s always been our way with mother nature, whatever we don’t like we can change with human ingenuity and when the consequences from going against her are finally faced and she begins to wipe us out then all we have to do is begin making our own mother nature and we did, we call her technology. Jack bit down into a juicy piece of meat, the hot liquid dribbling upon his chin and fingers; so this is my new mother nature, a chained mother in service to its creator, a prisoner of war, the war of man against himself. Ssss! Went another piece of meat as Jack laid it upon the smoking pipe.

            He was beginning to smell, he noticed as he undressed from his attire; each piece a mural of events that collected their own terrible stories and terrible stench. I’d take some of the stuff from the Carls, hell even from the Carols if I knew they would fit, but they don’t, I’m just too damn tall. He rubbed a coarse hand over his face and pierced his lips together in disagreement towards his testosterone; Damn, need a shave badly, I’ll have to filch another kit from one of the hotel’s soon—wash my clothes too, I just hope I don’t run into any children this time, I’m low on electric bullets for my Schofield and I can’t afford another injury like last time. Lying naked and faced to the fog, allowing it to take shape in his thoughts, Jack saw a woman and her child; they were young and freckled, playing hopscotch upon a rooftop, Jack saw himself trying to play too and smiled as the girl chuckled at his clumsiness. “Daddy, you’re not trying.” I tried…I really was trying kiddo…I’m just not that graceful… Jack closed his eyes and cried himself to sleep.

                                                            ***

            Sleep Tight Hotel; the neon blue sign flickered in and out with systematic calculation, a secret signal to the local sentries that Jack had arrived; the warning went completely unnoticed to Jack as he walked inside.

            BING, BING, BING, BING! Went the desk manager’s bell as the Carl tapped it obsessively in some kind of enchanted like trance.

            They love simple noises for some reason, must be part of their conditioning, something done to keep them seemingly feeble minded like an autistic.

 

            “Hello sir, beautiful sunny day outside but I guess we can’t expect you to sleep outside now can we? He he he!”

            Jack ignored the Carl; after having staked out the hotel for the past hour and assuring himself that there were no children sentries around, he undressed in the hotel lobby while the Carl went on, seemingly unaware of the act before him.  

            “Will it be a single bedroom then sir or is there a misses joining you as well?”

            Jack walked over to a fake plant display near the front desk clerk and pissed into it. “No good sir, I believe that I will be taking the presidential suite for my lonely self tonight, you see the misses came down with a slight bit of hepatitis, been munching on the old brown droppings again I’m afraid.”

            “Terribly sorry to hear that sir, what name shall I put on the registry?”

            “Basil Humperdink my good lad!”

As the Carl naively went on about his routine, Jack disappeared into the laundry room and scratched at his lower backside with a long yawn.

Have to find some entertainment somewhere. The laundry room was immaculate, not a single spot of dust upon the practically unused room could be found, due to the obsessive cleaning of the Carol housemaids. Jack set up his wash and walked back to the counter where he grabbed his room key and made his way to a vacant room. The room was simple and serene, Jack found his way almost instantly into the bathroom, wanting his business here to be quick incase he ran into any trouble. While showering he shaved with a kit placed neatly on the sink, completely balding his head and face—have to make this trip last as long as my last one, make the best of it. Long chunks of graying brown hair clogged the drain and began to overflow the warm water into the bathroom.   

            Knock, knock, knock! “Hello, Mister Humperdink? This is room service with some fresh towels.

            Jack kept the water running as he slowly eased out of the shower, he wrapped a white robe around himself, got himself upon the sink near the door, opposite to the shower and while crouched he pulled the hammer back on his Schofield and said: “Don’t be shy honey, just pop the fresh ones on the bed for me like a real doll.”

            If it’s a child sentry it will insist on bringing them into the bathroom…

 

            “I’ll just bring them right in for you sir, no need to drip on the new carpets.”

            Jack pointed his gun to the wet floor and waited silently, over shot things with the shower…but God did I need one. The bathroom door slowly eased open—first came the outstretched hand with the towels in grasp and then the child was in sight, an arm cannon mounted to its other limb, instantly it fired twice into the shower, shattering the thing to pieces and polka dotting the wall behind it with buckshot.      

 

            “Over here you little brat!” Jack fired once upon the soaked floor near the child sentry’s feet and the electric charge of the bullets instantly fried its circuitry, its little yellow eye orbs rolling into the back of its head.  

            “We have you surrounded, there’s no way out of the hotel alive, make things easy on yourself and commit suicide or we’ll be forced to send waves into the bathroom to root you out, you have thirty seconds and counting to comply.” Came a giggling voice from outside of the door.

            Jack didn’t hesitate for a moment, he could see light coming in through the buckshot holes from the other room adjacent to the bathroom—grabbing the arm mounted cannon on the child sentry, Jack tested it on the damaged wall, the cannon fired; damn lucky! The cannon blast took out enough of the wall for Jack to charge into and break his way into the next room.

He rolled through the walls rubble and sprinted at the nearest window, prying it open and leaping outside.

Jack was on the third floor fire escape and he began to make his way down it when another cannon fired into the railing, some of the spread of bullet stuck into his right leg and he began to tumble down the railing head first.               

He managed to brace himself by the next set of stairs and returned fire with a quick aimed accuracy he was well known for, the two fired shots landing right into the sentries system control chips located in their left feet.

Don’t you give in to the pain old boy, pick it up and get to the grate! Jack pulled himself over the final flight of stairs and rolled with the fall, gritting his teeth to the stinging pain.

He ran through the streets with confidence and speed, knowing the sentries would only cover the hotel and not far beyond that point; They’re too assure of their efficiency to cover unnecessary ground for one man’s escape, thank God for lazy programmers. Jack knew just around the next corner lay his exit, a sewer grate, the warm hiss of the steaming pipes and security, but he was beginning to drag—he looked down at his leg and the raw meaty red sight made him feel dizzy. The pain began to consume him with a panic, sweat poured its way out of him in showers and he began to feel cold, suddenly he fell upon his belly and vomited.

Jack dragged his way passed the corner, expecting the sewer grate, instead he saw a middle aged short fat man dressed in a familiar trench coat and fedora stabbing an old Carl to death—Tick, tock; went the grandfather clock.

                                                            ***

            Cold, timeless beat over the cobblestone street, my name is Happy Jack, a name I got from being the life of the party, a name that followed me wherever I could carve a smile to someone’s criminal frown.

            Tonight’s the night, judgment hour, time for those sweet talking murderers of law to feast on a sour blade.

 

I hear the tick, tock of Grandfather’s clock and I know that it’s time for me to kill somebody.  

            “AAAIIIEEEEEE!!!” Screamed the Carl as the fat man repeatedly stabbed him.

            “Go on you pathetic mouse, scream as loud as you like, this city belongs to Happy Jack now and you’re not welcome to my cheese.” The fat man’s laughter jiggled his blubbery chin rolls.

            Jack watched in horror as the Carl was brutally stabbed by the fat man—“What did you say your name is?”

            Stunned by the unseen voice, the fat man turned to Jack and extended his knife in a piercing thrust, but Jack was more than ten feet away from the man and didn’t have to move, instead he just stood there staring and repeated: “Your name…”

“They call me Happy Jack, where I’m from; around here I guess you could say I’m just Jack…”

            “Where is it that you’re from?”

            “Earth…”

            “You’re the murderer…”

            “I sure am! Who are you?”

            Jack slowly raised his gun and shot once into the fat man’s throat, the electric charge made a crackling sound as it sent high voltage into his nervous system, thick blood bubbled and oozed out of the wound before he hit the ground lifeless.

            “I’m Happy Jack…”

                                                            ***

            Jack stared into the fat man’s lifeless eyes; the fat man was propped up against the sewer wall naked and smelling of feces; Jack sat across from him, wearing the fat man’s clothes that wouldn’t fit him properly in the least; being too small and bulky, it made Jack look like a pathetic hobo wishing to God that he was somebody else.

            “Who am I?”

            “Ha!” Exclaimed the fat man’s corpse as its head rose up then slumped over again.

            “Who do you think I am?”

            “I think you’re a bastard for killing me, maybe we could have figured something out together you dim wit!”

            “You would have killed me once the pain made me pass out.”

            “You’re very naive.”

            “What am I doing here?”

            “Maybe you’re here because you killed that little kid and wife of yours on that roof top so many years ago.”

            “Shut up!”

            “Well it’s just a stab in the dark, but I’d have to put my money on it.”

            Jack jumped at the fat man’s corpse and began strangling it in a furious rage—“I’ll kill you!”

            “Ummm…you kind of already did that Mr. Brilliant.”

            Jack threw the corpse aside and began to weep.

            “Hey look here buddy, it’s not so bad; I mean I would have done it too if I was in your shoes. As a matter of fact I did—I killed my wife Carol out of a jealous rage and her lovechild kid by the same name…well she was a spawn of that so called best friend Carl of yours so...” Moaned the fat man with hollow eyes.

            “No! Be quiet! Just be quiet!”

            None of us here deserves to live and not even you, but you just keep on going don’t you? You just keep on trying to create reasons, eventually times going to run out for you Jack; eventually you won’t be able to see yourself as anything else but who you really are. It’s funny you know, that you think they’re all named Carl and Carol; that says something about you doesn’t it? Too bad you couldn’t be brainwashed huh? Haha! It’s more humane they say; to die not knowing who you really are; that’s why they do it this way, its cost efficient and humane. Humane…hahaha! But you already know all this Jack; you just wish that you didn’t.”

            Jack screamed in pain and anguish, an incoherent shrill sound from the depths of his soul.

            “Not so happy anymore are we Jack?”

                                                                ***

Open your eyes and then you’ll see

I’m just like you and you’re just like me

Open your eyes and then you’ll see…

            Watch the grandfather clock, tick, tock, tick, tock—thin memory can be drawn from its precise movements; a man cries, a woman plays with her child, somebody is murdered. Tick, tock, tick, tock—a face appears upon a puddle of rain water beneath the clock; the face is familiar—it frowns, then smiles and then frowns again. Tick, tock, tick, tock

“Much better than he was—so handsome, so very handsome; she didn’t deserve you.”

            “Really?” The face looks up at the clock.

            “Oh yes.”

            The face turns away from the clock, looking down at an alien pair of puffy hands—have you ever seen a baby’s hands? That’s what these look like…

            “No they’re very handsome; very, very handsome.”

            “Really?”

            “Oh yes.”

            Eyes beady black; sleeping snuggled in puffy cushion searched the face within the puddle.

            “Really?”

            “Oh yes.”

            Watch the face within the puddle become thinner, masculine inset lines around the mouth become more prominent, short bulbous girth stretches to a tall frame wrapped in a brown trench coat, over slick brown combed hair a fedora is placed, a brown feather against the black trim compliments its base as it waves in the air.

“See how handsome you are?”

            “Oh yes.”