Fittest

[Princess]

The news brings a smile to my mind, but I struggle to force tears from my eyes and a sad look upon my face. The only person who knew the dark secret that would have me imprisoned or thrown into an asylum for life is now as cold and dead as those I've sinned against. Tina looks me over for the usual signs of grief, finding the false tears as reassuring to her conscience as a mother weeping her dead child. If there's one thing I've learned to do in my life, it's how to fit in, how to pretend all the emotions I lack. Love, sorrow, pain...those I cannot feel. I feel the numbness, the emptiness in my hollow soul, and I know how hollow and empty I am. I know this, the logical realization of an animal, of a monster. I'm more than any other man here will ever be. My "best friend" and former gay lover is dead, and I am faking tears in order to prevent suspicion in the death. Rightly placed if I would say so myself.

"As a police officer, I have to ask...did you do it? Do you have an alibi?"

"Yes," I lie. No, there is no alibi. And the first question well... "I was at a gym, training for my match, as usual."

"Can anyone place you there?"

Not a soul. "Of course, there is probably video evidence if it ever comes to needing it." Timestamping is easy to falsify, I can just use something from earlier that week and edit. I am as clean as a whistle. There was no dna, the murder weapon will never be found, not a thing to tie me to the crime. Like father like son.

"I'm relieved, I don't want to have to put our relationship through that kind of test. I trust you, Kristoff." She leans in to kiss me, and I reciprocate. How she can't tell I am nothing behind the mask, I am unsure. Perhaps years of police work has distanced her from real emotions much as a man in the military would be distanced. Unable to tell real from fake, having to try and take things at face value and analyze later to prevent bias. In this case, her bias is protecting me. I hold her close, my shield from punishment for my long list of sins. From the list of sins that I know I'll commit later in life. For now, the rage is subdued, the threat to my being is nonexistent, but one day, I'll have to do something wrong again. I'll be compelled. I don't want to be bad, or evil, or wrong. I am the HERO after all. But sometimes heroes have to do things to keep fighting that may not be "good". But if the greater good means a few will have to be sacrificed, so bee it. She looks into my eyes, and kisses me again, and we fall into lust.

****

"We are the hollow men, we are the stuffed men. Filled with straw. Sound familiar? I think not to one as lacking in intellect as you, Alex. What do you all yourself today? Black Dragon? Phoenix? I prefer the Hollow Man. For you, as I, am hollow. You stuff yourself with straw, and in your case, the straw is your briefcase. Mine, mine is filled with the instruments to get me my fill. Instruments used to draw blood from other men's bodies."

Blood, tonight is the night. I will strike again. NO! I must hold, wait, release the inner demon in the ring, not on the innocent. In this cold, empty room in the bottom of Tina's home, I sit in a steel chair, my briefcase at my side. I am in a suit and tie, but the tie is too tight, strangling me. I close my eyes and focus, not on the stifling heat or the suffocation, but on the days ahead, of training and facing the Dragon.

"You feel I'm envious of you? That I am some thief waiting to strike in the night to steal away your precious Joker in the Pack prize? How funny, I wasn't even allowed in the match. No, but the man who tortured me, lorded the secrets of my origin over me...he was allowed in. As was Cross, and Spike. A wing-clipped bird and Laszlo, who gets another undeserved shot at Angel the same night we fight, was in it as well. And you, Alex, you think you are some special creature, holding around an "Anytime, anywhere" shot, yet you failed to strike when was most opportune. You failed to dethrone Angel when he was beaten, worn down, and tired. Finding a way to take him out of the picture, while he is weakened, and not only win, but INJURE HIM. CRIPPLE HIM. You failed, so far, to even do as much as lift a finger toward the man, and you seem to be some form of hero in your own life. You say you've done it all, over and over again. Never have you had to "Start over" as you say, now what about that. You've been HANDED EVERYTHING, including that title shot. Yet I get overlooked, not a single shot, or chance at things like yours, in my career here. You work for nothing, rest on your laurels, claiming you are some kind of god among men. No different than the rest of them, aren't you?"

Angel. Spike. You're just like them, how are they supposed to believe you are the hero, Alex? My tie is too tight, I struggle to loosen it, as the will of the tie to constrict is mighty. Much like my will to suffocate and strangle you at Survival of the Fittest will be.

"You think I chose you because of the bit of paper in your briefcase? Or the briefcase itself? Childish, unenlightened, ridiculous. You fail to realize that it is for the same things you claim as your accomplishments that are why I chose you. I failed to make a real man of Clinton. He won, but refused to make me grovel. After all I put him through, he felt "a bigger man" than that, laughable. We are all monsters here, Alex, you've said it before. And I say it now, we ARE. Just, you, you're one that has sat on his hoard of gold, much like Angel, for far too long. You've gotten fat, lazy, and not exactly the same as you once were. The mask is starting to show through to the real you, Alex, and even your cousin should be realizing it soon. You care for one thing."

YOUR Self. YOUR Glory. YOUR Legacy. Not your family, not any lover, not the fans, not the "Greater Good" or getting rid of dictators like Angel and before him, Spike. No, you're in it for YOURSELF. Narcissus would be proud. My tie loosened, I stand up, my hand tightly gripping my briefcase.

"You have called me weak, a nobody, a mere stepping stone...not the first or last to do that, are you? Not original in any way, Alex, just another man to come and call me something weak, easy, and another man trying to push me over. I carry MY briefcase as a symbol reminding me of the things I've overcome to be here. Mediocrity, being a pushover. I was the one all the work was pawned on at the office. And it still continues, pushed around like I don't matter. How many times do you kick a dog before it bites, Alex? How many times do you call someone a FREAK before they prove you right? You think you're going to get a win, that you've sacrificed, that you've got the brains. You call me a whiner, yet, look at yourself. Look in that mirror's reflection and admit to yourself what you are. Why, if you beat Angel twice, haven't you used your joker? Why haven't you gone after him? Why did you go after Renee, who had nothing, no title, no glory, nothing? The mirror won't lie, we are both hollow men, filling voids. But where you fill yours with that title shot you fail to use...I'll fill mine with your BLOOD, your PAIN. And I'll make you remember the me you WANT to face...but deep down, you know that's not what you want."

You want the easy win. You want the lie-down and take it Bates. I grip the briefcase harder, lift it to my head and kiss it gently. It is my identity, my mask. It protects me from the ones who wish to get through to the real me, to see the sins I've committed.

"A few weeks ago you said you knew what I did...be careful what you say about that, Alex...wouldn't want anything to happen to Haley."

A sick smile crosses my face and I kneel before my briefcase and open it up. Inside the case looks like a lock of hair, the same color as hers. And nice and curly too.

"And don't worry, the only thing I think Renee will be doing is trying to fill his void by raping us both like he did his sister...he is, after all, a sexual deviant and molester. I'll try not to enjoy watching you take it, TRY. Survival of the Fittest, Alex...will you be, or are you just another Dodo?"

I pull out the hair, and smell it. Smells like lemons and rose-scented body lotion. Fade to black.

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.