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"HANS!" His name rang loud and clear in the dark, echoey walls as the door to the dungeon slammed shut. There was a light at the end of the dark hallway. Hans looked up at Adja as if he were caught doing something he shouldn't be, and rightly so as he was. He narrowed his eyes at her as if to say "we will finish this later" and proceeded to walk calmly through the wall to his home cell. Adja put her hands up to the wall to check if it was, indeed, solid. Confused, frustrated, scared... she kept herself to the opposite wall and sat down, never taking her eyes off the solid wall that the Shadow Man had disappeared into.
The person with the lantern finally came to his cell, after calling for him at least three times. "Alright," he finally said, "what do you want already?" He was just a smidgen annoyed having gotten cheated out of a good meal. It mattered not. If he could not have her fresh, then he would simply have to munch on her bones later... when she died.
The light was blinding to him. The bearer turned down the lamp, just like everyone who visited so that he could see her, and her him. Not that anyone ever visited. She was pale, tired, angry, worried, and scared. And the fact that he could feel all her anxieties through the metal bars made him feel a bit less annoyed that his meal had been scared away from him. This would suffice to keep him satisfied until Adja finally keeled over. They all tasted delicious.
What Leandra could see of him, Hans was certainly Leonard's brother. They had the same hair, the same pronounced eyebrow ridge, the same skin tone. The differences were that Hans' skin was freckled and his eyes seemed permanently lined with black. She didn't look into his eyes. She was certain that something wild was hidden there, just like Leonard.
"You are Leonard's brother, is that correct?"
"Is that what Haidar calling himself these days?" Hans answered with a question. "How very silly of him."
She sighed. "What he calls himself is not important. Are you, or are you not his brother?"
Hans chuckled, amused. "If I called myself anything other than Hans, then I wouldn't be Hans anymore, would I? I know not someone named Leonard, for I do not know what my brother is like when he is Leonard and so I cannot say that he is my brother. But if what you are asking me is whether or not I am related to a tall man from the desert that threw me in this cell, then I suppose on a technicality that you would be correct." For some reason, he found this funny. He couldn't stop giggling.
"I want you to tell me... has he ever killed anyone? I mean... if he had the chance to kill someone, would he?" Leandra tried very hard to sound flat and business-like, but she could not disguise the concern in her voice.
He laughed again. She was not amused at how funny he found everything. This was not a laughing matter. "Everyone, given the chance to kill someone, would do it. It is a part of our nature as predators to enjoy the game of the hunt. Killing is in our blood, its in our instincts. To yearn for the blood of another, that's a pleasure that can only be succeeded by the body of another. Death and Life, killing and procreating: the only two things in this world that are constant. So if you ask me if dear, sweet, loveable Haidar...'Leonard' would kill someone given the chance, then my answer is a definite yes."
"Are you saying that he's killed people before?"
"Of course not! But he is a weak man, unlike me. Had he a spine as strong as mine, he would have given me more than a broken nose." He smiled wide. If anyone was capable of giving sound to something as silent as a smile, it was Hans. His smile sounded like the sharpening of knives.
Leandra balled her hands into fists and suppressed her anger. Everything that was happening was happening do fast that she just wanted to let out and hurt something. And Hans was a wonderful target, considering how infuriating he was and his refusal to answer any of her questions with a straight answer. But she suppressed the urge to break his nose again in favor of actually trying to get a clear yes or no.
Though, she wished he would stop berating Leonard like he kept doing.
"He's in trouble, isn't he?" Hans smiled, there was laughter in his smile. "I knew he couldn't stay out of it for long. He's my brother, after all. You can't have the same mother without sharing something other than blood."
"Yes," she said solemnly. "He's in trouble. I need you to help me find him."
"Forget it."
"What? But he's your brother! You can't abandon him like this, his life might be on the line!"
"I can't abandon him? I CAN'T ABANDON HIM?! Look where you are! Look where I am! This is where he left me. He abandoned me in this hole in the ground. If anyone has a right to abandon him, its me." His eyes ceased to be the same brown as Leonard's. They were wild, glowing from the reflection of the lamplight. He ceased to look like a man; he looked more like a wild animal now.
Leandra took a step back from his cell. This animal quality in him... that Leonard might have the same... it more than frightened her. "Fine," she said, feeling a pit in her stomach form. It felt as though she had swallowed lead. "Fine. I shall have to look for him myself. But I would not be surprised if he comes after you." She turned abruptly and stormed down the hall.
"I would welcome death's cold embrace if I knew that it would be at the hands of my brother," he called out after her, knowing that she would hear him.
His plans to obtain a meal thwarted, both by an intruder and stubborn females, he curled up into a ball and went to sleep. He'd get that nurse girl one way or another. It was only a matter of time before she either died or killed herself. Silly humans... how foolish they are to think that they can win...
 Leonard Erland · Thu Dec 06, 2007 @ 07:48pm · 0 Comments |
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