Bullet Time
“Click.” Blake heard the soft sound of the magnum revolver’s safety click in place. The gun was ready, and leveled at him from a few feet behind him. Blade turned around to face the danger, but he was too late. The first round signaled it’s flight with a deep, powerful rumbling. Blake’s perspiration dripped down his cheek as the drops fell to the wet asphalt of the parking garage.
The bullet moved almost unbearably slow. He could see the round, red with eternal flame, inch towards his immobile body. When the bullet did hit, a sudden emptiness panged his heart. He fell back against the white marble wall. His body was held by the wall, as if cradling himself above the ground.
The second bullet was aimed directly at his head. Blake could see the bullet head on as it accelerated towards him. As blackness surrounded him, Blake slowly arose from his now dead body. He could see the assailant, clad in black, take his watch from his now dead body. The time stopped. It was 7:06.
No walls. Blake was in a white room that had no beginning, and no ending. A few feet in front of him, a mighty white pillar stood. The pillar seemed to sink into the floor until a familiar face clad in gray robes stepped before him.
“Dad!” The two shared a hug that neither had felt for twenty years.
“I am afraid that I am the bearer of bad news. Your life was somewhat lacking. You never repented for the sin you committed.”
“I did not know. I have been a fool-”
“You will have another chance. We will resurrect you exactly three hours before your death; then we will return you to your natural life in hopes that you can repent for the remainder of your earthly life.”
“Why don’t I just leave town and not be there when the murder occurs?”
“You don’t understand. You will inhabit another’s body on earth and stop your own death.”
“Then will I go to heaven?”
“Of course.” His father grabbed his shoulders, stared at Blake dead in the face, and smiled weakly as a teardrop fell down the man’s face. He whispered into Blake’s ear, “One word of advice. Enemies may attack from behind, but the one you need to worry about will be the one who welcomes you with open arms.”
His father stepped back and the pillar lifted him up to the sky. Now the walls were gray, and the sky full of dark clouds. His father waved to him just as he was consumed by the sky.
Blake saw that a small necklace was left on the floor. He picked up the silver chain and flung it over his head. The chain jingled as he noticed an old and rust cross. It looked as though his father had left it there many years ago, instead of a few minutes.
He turned around, and saw a mighty oaken door standing in the open room. No walls, nothing that connected it to anything except the floor. Blake walked up to it, and opened the door.
Blake had walked out of a Cathedral in the middle of the city.
“Hey, you there, what is the time?”
An elderly gentleman, wearing a brown trench coat and an old top hat walked up to him.
“It is four-oh-six.”
“Thanks.”
“That necklace! Half of it is rusted, and the other half is silver. Ain’t that something?”
Upon inspection, the vertical piece had decayed. The pieces on either side were shining in the afternoon glow.
The old man said goodbye and called a cab. As Blake walked away, he could hear the old man asking to go to Michigan City.
Blake called his own taxi to go home. When he arrived at his apartment, Blake could nto find his keys in his pocket. He picked the emergency key from behind his potted plant and opened the door.
In his room, Blake immediately opened his desk and filled three of the six rounds of his revolver with armor piercing shells. This weapon might have been the most thoughtful gift his father bestowed him in his will.
As Blake opened the closet, he recalled that his Dad had stored some junk from his days as a police officer. You weren’t supposed to keep your vest or weapon, but his Dad had a way of “influencing” people’s minds, and no questions were asked.
His father had always been a great guy. Blake noticed a picture of hid Dad, the Mayor, and Lou Dominichi. Dad had to arrest him Lou for drug running, and the Mayor for perjury. Afterwards, they became best of friends. The Mayor is now head of the House Oversight Committee in Congress, and Lou is the fastest growing coffee bean importer in the Mid-West.
While changing into his gray sweatshirt, Blake almost screamed when he looked in the mirror. His ovular and clean shaven face had been replaced with a finely chiseled narrow one. He had been reincarnated.
Looking at his clock, he saw that he had only an hour and a half until the murder was too take place. Blake ran out of the house and caught a taxi to the parking garage.
As Blake walked to the third level of the garage, he saw a policeman patrolling the area.
“Hey, you there! Come over here.”
As Blake walked to him, he shuddered when he recognized the face. He was over fifty, and still growing a monstrous belly he had had since joining the force.
His name was Simon Coerte. He used to be Blake’s father’s partner. This scumbag was the one who turned his father in for corruption charges. More recently, however, Simon was about to arrest Lou Dominichi for smuggling and racketeering.
Blake worked for Lou, doing odd jobs and needed tasks. Getting rid of this Coerte guy was one of them. Lou had joked how it felt just like the old days, when Blake’s father would be doing jobs like this. Blake had always admired his father, always wanted to be more like him, so he accepted. Some things were just more important than justice, and friends were one of them.
“What can I do for you, Officer?”
“You should leave here immediately. I am meeting with a known criminal and it may become unsafe for anybody to be near here.”
Known criminal! Hah! The meeting he had arranged with Simon was to discuss his father’s stolen equipment, not some sort of undercover cop crackdown on crime, see it at 11 Fox Special News Report.
“If you don’t leave, I may have to escort you out.” Simon’s right hand unfastened his pistol.
Blake was faster. His left hand pounded the older man’s rib cage as his right raised the pistol to the man’s head and cracked his skull. He hit the ground, hard. Blake unfastened the safety and fired a single round to finish the job. His father would be proud.
As Blake stood up, he experienced an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu. A gun was heard as the metal cock clicked in place. Two successive shots were fired into Blake’s back. He was again propelled into the marble wall. His arms tried to keep him standing, but his body slid down the wall, leaving a spread of red blood on the wall. He could taste the blood as his face met the floor. Several inches from his face, Blake could see Simon’s lifeless gaze smiling directly at him.
It was 7:06.
Blake awoke in front of the Catholic Church. He looked into the late afternoon’s sun.
“Hey, you there, do you have the time?”
The same old man replied, “Five-oh-six.”
“Have you been here a whole hour? What are you waiting for?”
“I have been here much longer than an hour. I have been waiting to give you this message. You can end it all by never going to the garage. If you don’t listen, you will just be a pawn, one more servant of darkness.”
“If I let myself die, then I will become one anyway! Cabbie, take me to the St. John’s Apartments.”
“What, looking for this?” The old man waved a magnum revolver in front of him.
“Give that to me, now!”
The old man shrugged and dropped it on the pavement.
“You should have listened to your father. The source of your pain and torment lies at that building, why must you continually torture yourself by sacrificing these lives again and again until you save one sinful life? Have you even checked the cross, well have you?”
Blake pulled it out behind his shirt and noticed that the left side had already rusted. Now only one half of the cross piece remained unstained. What would happen when he used his last life up? He must succeed, there is no room for failure.
“Can’t you see that the only person who is trying to kill you is you! Who continues to run into the fires until you have no more lives left to live? Think, for once in your life, think! Think, Blake!”
He was in no mood for thinking. Blake picked the weapon off the floor and shoved it into his pocket. He started running to the garage.
Blake ran down several street alleys until he spotted the all-too-familiar entrance. He ran up the flight of stairs with a sweat beading down his chin. He tripped over a police hat and landed on his face. He saw the left and center pieces of his cross, knowing that the fate of his soul depended on keeping that third of metal pure.
Blake walked out of the old stairway when he reached the third floor. He moved a few feet into the garage, wondering what direction to go. A gun fired, and Blake moved toward the sound. Five yards ahead of him, a man dressed in white fired his weapon twice into the darkness. Blake pulled his weapon out and fired one hasty round. The man fell against the marble wall, trying to stand but falling. Blake walked up to him, and stopped three feet from the man’s body. He aimed the magnum at his face.
His finger pulled the trigger, just as he remembered who owned it. After the bullet had left the gun, he remembered wearing white that day. The man he had killed was none other than himself. Blake picked his dead body’s hand and checked the watch.
Then Blake put is lips around the barrel of the gun and fired his last round.
“Dad!”
“Yes, son, you were everything we hoped you would be. Now we finally have the time to be together, you and I.”
“What about the necklace?”
“Oh, right, the necklace. Just leave it here. We won’t need it where we’re going.”
Blake dropped the rusted cross and silver necklace on the black floor. The entire room was black, seething with darkness.
As the two of them made their trip up the pedestal, they became ever closer to the dark clouds above them.
“You did a great job, son. I wish more people were like you.”
“Why?”
“It would make my job a hell of a lot easier.”
Their eyes glazed red as the clouds swallowed them whole.