Rivals
The pocket of her worn out jeans vibrated furiously with another new text message, the chiming synced with the pace of her steps. Ambri. Checking to make sure that she’d gotten out of work on time like she’d promised, like they’d planned for over a week now.
But the messages went ignored as she continued down the sidewalk, deserted except for a quartet of silhouettes waiting at the end of the block. She didn’t need the milky glow of moonlight to know who they were.
Carys had known this would happen sooner or later. She’d been ready for it. But why did it have to happen tonight?
They called themselves the Four Horsemen. They’d had a grudge against her for years, ever since she first faced off their leader in the ring. It was her first street fight wielding her custom made claw. Not once did they think that a newbie—and a female no less, sexist pigs—could beat them, but she’d proven them wrong that night and every time since. Sure, they’d gotten tougher over the years, but so had she, and they’d yet to win against her in the individual fights or on the streets where there were no rules. It had gotten to the point where she was morbidly used to their ambushes; though they didn’t pose that much of a threat, they were still a nuisance to deal with, and doing so would not only take time that Ambri would spend worrying, but it was almost guaranteed to end in blood.
Unwavering eyes stared down each figure in turn. Her pace didn’t slow. They were attacking now because they thought she was weakened, that the months of living with Ambri and staying away from the fights had made her lose her infamous touch. Internally she scoffed. It said a lot about their cowardice that they only showed up to face her when they mistakenly thought her out of practice—possibly even unarmed. Buch of fucking cowards.
Her gaze hardened as she passed beneath the only streetlight on the block. It’s murky yellow light flickered on the last legs of life, popping and buzzing just loud enough to be heard over the rustle of the late night breeze that swept through the city. The fingers of her right hand tapped restlessly on her thigh in time with the flickering: a bad habit she’d picked up ever since she started avoiding the fights. Only a building’s length separated them now. Carys inhaled deeply. Held the breath for one, two, three steps. Let it out slowly, steeling herself.
She stopped a pace outside of the wavering cone of light provided by the lamp. Her eyes instantly adjusted to the renewed darkness, taking in the smug faces of the men before her. The ever-present nervous energy that she’d felt building for weeks now bubbled at the surface, a physical itch beneath her skin, but she crossed her arms firmly over her chest to force her fingers to stop twitching. They would only see it as weakness. As a sign of concealed fear.
“Well, if it ain’t the Four Stooges. Just my damn luck.” Sarcasm dripped from her tone. They shared a smirk, a familiar glint in their gazes: the glimmer of triumph.
They thought they’d already won.
Surely they couldn’t be that stupid. It was like between every time she ran into these goons, they forgot the beating she dealt out the previous time. Maybe she’d finally hit them hard enough to knock their screws back into place so they’d quit pissing her off.
One of the men stepped forward. His blond hair would have looked almost white in the moonlight if it weren’t for the brownish smears of dirt and grime. The four-man-gang’s pompous “leader”: Riot. Aside from bossing the others around, Riot did hardly anything in his own gang. She rarely saw him fight aside from that first meeting so many years ago; the worst crime she’d ever seen him commit was the graffiti they tended to scrawl on the buildings in the Warehouse District. The guy was a complete joke. He had no business running a gang, especially when the other members were actually noteworthy on the streets. His most noteworthy feature were his yellowing teeth that matched his grungy hair. Carys never could decide if “weasel” or “rat” suited him better.
Riot gave a condescending bow once he stood away from the others. Her first instinct was to kick his head in while he wasn’t looking—if he was stupid enough to take his eyes off of her, then really he deserved it—but she restrained herself. If she were lucky she wouldn’t have to fight them at all. When he looked up a twisted sneer was plastered to his face. “Believe me, the pleasure is ours. What a surprise seeing you here, Carys, all alone so late at night. If it were anyone else I’d think you had a death wish.”
A scrawny man leapt up from where he previously crouched on the ground behind Riot, clapping madly and snickering like he’d just heard a hilarious joke. His wild eyes flicked between her and the leader. There were some times where Carys was convinced that Razor was more animal than man, his current outburst being a perfect example. He’d reached the point of being almost feral; the way his eyes glinted with a savage hunger had always set her nerves on edge. It didn’t help that he carried himself like a wild animal, prowling along the ground while cackling like a hyena, nor that he was the member who did most of the dirty work. Late-night assaults, cruel torturing with his namesake weapon: all of it was work that the madman was far too happy to carry out. When he shrunk back to the ground he practically hung on the leg of the obscenely muscled man to his left.
To his credit, Rampage—the brawn of the gang—didn’t so much as flinch at his companion’s mad outburst. His focus was completely on Carys with his features set in scarred and weathered stone. From the looks of it, he still hadn’t gotten over the fact that she’d kicked his ass the last time they’d fought. She cracked a smirk of her own at the memory.
“It’s been some time, huh?” Riot continued, straitening with an unnecessary flourish. “Gotta say, we been missing you in the ring. Staying away from the fights, eh? I never would’a thought you’d go soft.” He spoke matter-of-factly, but there was something else there too. An undertone that she couldn’t place.
She didn’t dignify him with a response. “I ain’t got time for you idiots tonight. I’ll take a raincheck for kicking your asses.” With a roll of her eyes, the fighter made to walk around them when the missing fourth figure appeared directly in her path, making her pause. Revenge always did have a knack for materializing out of shadows. They practically dripped off his sickly pale skin when he emerged, clinging to him like tar. His ashen pallor combined with his long, ivory hair made the skill even more confounding. Carys never could figure out how he could conceal himself so well, and with her combat knowledge and military training, that was saying something.
But after their long history, his trick had become bland and expected, and she didn’t give away a thing as she halted once again. Viridian eyes pinched in irritation. “Snake” was by far the most fitting term for Revenge. He slunk towards her while sporting a knowing smirk; an albino snake in the grass. “What’s the hurry? Someplace you gotta be? Or is it someone you don’t wanna keep waiting?”
Her fingers twitched. Infuriatingly perceptive, Revenge’s smirk only grew, curling unnaturally across nearly the entire length of his face. It figured he’d find out somehow. He was the pathetic excuse for the brains of their operation. Not that she’d been overly careful about hiding her new life. It was a decision that she’d been seriously reconsidering the past few weeks.
Without missing a beat she sneered right back. She refused to let them know they’d hit a nerve. Her gaze turned to ice. “Get the fuck outta my way, Revenge, before I make you. I told you, I ain’t got the time. You waste any more of it and you’ll be the first with my claws in your ugly face.”
This time Rampage stepped forward, his brass knuckles glinting as he clenched his fists. The bulging muscles of his arms strained with effort; he was holding himself back from attacking right then and there. As the involuntary twitching started again in her fingertips, Carys almost wished he would. There was nothing that sounded better in that moment than punching someone. She knew Ambri would be disappointed—she hated it when Carys fought—but the urge had been bottled up for so long that the brawler felt like she could burst at any moment. And god help any poor fucker who was around to see it when it happened.
“We all seen you ‘round town wit’ your new toy,” the brute said, his words reinforced by another bout of mad laughter from his side.
“Yeah,” Razor cackled, “you and that girl, followin’ you ‘round like a lost bitch.”
By then Carys had gone rigid. Her fingertips left gouges in her palms in her own effort to keep herself under control. ‘They don’t know anything’, she reminded herself, forcing her breaths to come in slow, measured intervals. ‘Just ‘cause they’ve seen her doesn’t mean they know a thing about Ambri. They’re just trying to get to you. Don’t let them.’
In any other situation she would have fired back a snarky remark of her own, but it was all she could do not to snap. Despite her attempts to hide it, her anger must have shown on her face, judging by the cruel grins that spread across all four of theirs in turn. “She must be a talented slut to keep your interest, yeah? Gotta applaud her for that, at least.” Riot took a step closer as he spoke, “Come on now, Carys, don’t hold out on us. She’s gotta be good. Into the kinky stuff like the dirty whore she is, right?”
His grin grew more and more vicious with each word, noticing how the girl before him had begun to tremble, her knuckles turning white from the force of being clenched. She gave no response. He turned back to his gang with an uproarious laugh, shooting a wink at Revenge who slinked up to stand beside him. “I’ll take that as a yes! It’s gotta be that, right Carys? You only keepin’ her ‘round for the sex?” When again no answer came, Riot feigned surprise. “Unless...don’t tell me you’ve gone soft?”
Her fingers clenched so hard that blood bubbled up from the crescent shaped wounds in her palms left by her nails. A dull roaring had begun in her ears from the rage coursing through her veins; every inch of her body scalded like liquid fire. Her teeth grit together so she could practically hear her jaw cracking. “You wish,” she ground out, but they weren’t convinced.
“It’s true, ain’t it? The great Carys thinks she can settle down and live a normal life with her little domesticated bitch, is that it?” Fire flared in her eyes, and she willed Riot to feel that fire in the glare she was burning into his forehead. The veins of her arms and neck strained, her skin flushed despite the night’s chill.
‘Don’t let them get to you. Don’t let them get to you.’ She chanted the words over and over again in her mind. Never before had she successfully held in such blistering rage. Frantically she tried to picture Ambri waiting at home with the dinner she’d promised to prepare for the two of them, for their special night together that they’d been planning for weeks. She pictured the disappointed frown that she knew too well taking over her features at hearing about yet another fight. ‘Don’t let them get to you. Some things are more important.’
“Oh, Carys,” Riot’s voice was thick with mock sympathy, “you’ve gone soft as your little bitch’s skin.” Just as Carys was about to grind out another retort, however, the look in the leader’s eyes made her pause, nausea roiling in her stomach as he glanced back at the rest of his gang. “Hey, that gives me an idea. Know what? I think we ought’a test her out for ourselves. If she’s good enough to reign in Carys here, then just imagine how much fun she’d be with the four of us.” He swung his glare back full force; crazed mud-colored eyes drinking in every twitch and tremble, knowing how deeply his words cut and taking far too much pleasure in saying them. His grin had given way to a feral sneer. “Since our friend here is in such a hurry to be somewhere, whatd’ya say we head to the broad’s house and take her out for a spin?”
Something snapped. There was a palpable shift in the air as the gossamer threads of Carys’s control were shredded in the wake of her blistering fury. It erupted from its cage in her chest and consumed her every fiber, her every nerve. Her vision went red. The ache in her muscles from keeping it locked inside was replaced with a burning sensation like she’d never felt before; but rather than causing her pain, it only served to empower her.
This was what they wanted. They wanted to goad her into fighting them. They thought that between her blind rage and the time spent away from the ring that they could win. For months now she’d been avoiding the fights; anything to keep Ambri happy, to keep her from worrying more than she already did. But she wasn’t stupid. She’d kept in practice. Even if it was only the bare minimum, doing something was better than going without for so long and letting herself get rusty.
Back when they had first moved in together, Carys had promised herself that she wouldn’t give in, no matter how ravenous the urge became. Ambri expected more from her, and the last thing she wanted was to let her down. She would live with the restless energy that made her fingers twitch without end and made her hands shake so badly that she kept dropping dishes and made sleeping at night nearly impossible. All for Ambri.
But this. This was something else entirely. These filthy bastards had crossed the line: they’d threatened Ambri. And Carys would do anything to keep her safe, even if it meant breaking her own promises and betraying her trust. Even if it meant blood and violence and fighting and disappointment and having the same argument again and sweet sweet relief.
Deep down this was what she’d been wanting too. For so long.
In an instant the rage melted from her features. A vicious grin cut across her face like the harsh cleave of a knife, leaving a jagged trail of teeth in its wake. The savage look caused even Razor to flinch away as the gang collectively straightened, put on edge by the sudden change in their opponent.
The silence of the night was shattered by laughter. Hysterical cackles bounced off the buildings all around them and echoed up into the night sky as Carys doubled over, arms clenched around her stomach as if to try and staunch the laughter that tore from her throat. She barely managed to speak with every other ragged breath, “Aw man, I gotta admit boys, I been waitin’ for a buncha’ fucks like you to come along. I shoulda’ figured it’d be you clowns.” There was an edge behind the mad delight in her tone; a bite so sharp that it could slice through steel. When she finally managed to catch her breath, Carys abruptly straightened, her turquoise eyes wide with glee and suppressed rage. “I’ve been keeping it in for so, so long now that I was starting to get worried. But turns out, it really is my lucky day! You’ve even given me four punching bags to shred until every last drop of it is gone!”
In one swift movement, Carys removed her clawed glove from its pocket, hidden in the lining of her work jacket. The hard, cold material molded effortlessly against her skin, welcoming her like an old friend. Another harsh laugh burst from her lips. “And to think,” she sighed almost wistfully with a shake of her head, “none a ya’ have any idea how big a mistake you just made.” Just as suddenly as it had come, the deranged grin dropped from her face, her expression morphing from pinched with delight to cold as polished stone. Her voice had taken the same fall; low and dangerous. “So, lemme get this straight...”
Carys trailed off as she took her signature fighting stance: her clawed right hand extended threateningly towards the four men before her while her other hand hovered out to the left, balancing her and ready to draw a throwing knife from the hidden pouch on her belt at any moment. Riot and his men all displayed matching looks of unnerved confusion. Their eyes were wide, flicking quickly between her and each other, as if trying to figure out what had just happened but too wary to keep their attention off their opponent for long. The sight brought a touch of glee back into her eyes.
“You boys think I’ve gone soft, do ya’?”
The question hung in the air; a taunt, a bait that none of the men were brave enough to take. Carys smirked. “Tell ya’ what: why don’t ya’ quit running your filthy mouths and test that theory.”
In that moment the whole world seemed to freeze. Her challenge went unanswered for some time as Revenge, Razor, and Rampage all looked to their leader for direction. Riot appeared the most stricken of them all, but he was also first to recover, his gaze hardening as resolve flickered in his eyes. Seeing this, the rest of his gang settled into fighting stances as well, Rampage punching one fist into the palm of his opposite hand as he stepped forward, not needing any further prompting. A tingle of anticipation shot up Carys’s spine, trailed closely by a pang of regret.
It looked like dinner would have to wait. In the moments between when the Horsemen accepted her challenge and the time it took for the four of them to spread into a circle around her, Carys gave a fleeting thought to Ambri, who was no doubt sitting at home with her eyes glued to her phone, waiting for a reply to the multiple other text messages she’d felt buzz in her pocket since this whole ordeal had started. ‘Sorry, babe. But this is for you.’
Rampage sucked in a deep breath in the start of a guttural battle cry, but Carys didn’t give him the chance to finish. Her sleek black claws glinted in the moonlight as she struck.
Sweet sweet relief.