Carnell, Thom - No Flesh Shall Be Spared

Out at the far borders of his perception, Cleese’s voice echoed in a stream of profanities.

And then, just as suddenly as it began, the beating stopped.

Monroe made a thick gurgling sound as he fought to catch a breath through the decimated anatomy of his face. So much for that "unique skill set."

As he lay there, Monroe wasn’t sure how severely Cleese had hurt him, but he knew it was bad. Blood flowed freely down his throat and he did all he could to either spit it out or swallow it. He tried as best he could to turn his head to keep himself from drowning. The thing was… he was only barely able to keep up with the flow.

Abruptly, Monroe once again felt himself being hoisted slightly off the car hood. Cleese had him by the lapels of his jacket with one hand and by the belt with the other. For some unfathomable reason, he felt his attacker pulling on the front of his pants. An unexpected and extremely localized pain suddenly erupted at his crotch.

Fighting for breath, he realized that Cleese had let him go. He fell back, splayed across the hood of the Jag. He lay there and groaned, alone with the pain in his face and a sudden weight in his groin. At first, Monroe thought Cleese might have stabbed him or cut him in some way.

Jesus… no!

Still trying to catch air, Monroe reached down into the front of his pants and felt around. Shoving his hand under his beltline, he discovered the small, round object Cleese had been hitting him with stuffed down deep into his shorts. The thing now snuggled against his balls like a purring cat. He reached down and got a hold of it by pressing the object deeper between his legs. Whatever the thing was, it felt like a metal apple with what appeared to be a fat stem sticking out of the top of it.

He turned his head and looked back down the ramp through the growing haze. Cleese stood a ways away, back beyond the Dart and just around the corner. His middle finger was raised defiantly.

"And that … is for Chikara!" he shouted, his voice echoing dully as he disappeared around the bend. The sound of his receding footsteps echoed in the darkness.

Monroe barely felt a thing as the fragmentation grenade exploded in his lap.

Solemnities

The sun burned overhead like an indifferent parent on the day Masterson visited Philip Monroe’s grave. It had been a little over three weeks since the funeral and this was the first time he’d been able to come and pay his respects.

For obvious reasons, he didn’t go to the service. He’d been advised by the police as well as League Security that it wouldn’t be safe; wouldn’t be "prudent." There were still no official suspects in what was being called a deliberate incident. However, if the person who bombed Monroe’s car was who Masterson thought it was, he prayed for Monroe’s soul and for his own.

He slowly looked around him, glancing over the headstones and foliage of the cemetery. God, this was a depressing place; a dark and lonely dumping ground for people who felt the need to warehouse their past. The idea of squandering good land and good resources just to remember people seemed downright stupid to him. Let the dead be dead and let them fade in the memory of the living in their own good time.

He laughed, deep and with resonance. These were macabre observations coming from a man who made his living dealing with the living dead. He’d seen too much life and too much death to think of it any other way.

The cemetery where he now stood was obviously old, most of its headstones dated back to the early Forties. Once manicured lawns now stood abandoned, its landscaping left to be choked by weeds and kudzu. A lot of the marble structures were blackened at their seams, mildew and rot patiently eating away at the expensive, polished stone. Monroe, who’d had no real family to speak of other than a girlfriend, did, as it turned out, have an aunt who had left him a deed to this burial property in her will. Its placement—in this cemetery, in this plot, in this manner of procurement—implied a grave that was soon to be forgotten. At any rate, it was a joke burying what was left of Monroe in a casket. With what remained, a Tupperware container would have sufficed.

If he allowed himself to think about it, Masterson was almost impressed by how Cleese had moved in such an unexpected direction. A direct frontal attack was not something Masterson thought he’d been capable of. It was a smart move. He supposed that Cleese would be heading his way next. It’s what Masterson would have done: minimize the liabilities, take out any competition. And that didn’t even take into account the whole revenge angle.

But then again, Masterson thought that Cleese just might give him a pass on this one, preferring to observe him from afar. He could all too easily imagine Cleese watching him spend the rest of his life in paranoid anticipation of the death he’d be dealt rather than simply just killing him and having done with it.

He’d want to fuck with him.

It’s exactly what he’d done that first day in the Orientation Room back at the Compound.

Which brought him back to Monroe. That stupid shit had pushed things way too far. He’d compromised them both by not being able to keep his fucking mouth shut. Wishing Cleese good luck… for chrissakes! He’d pushed Cleese and poked him and prodded him until the man had no choice but to react. And then there was that outburst at the Training Hall. He might as well have admitted to complicity in the whole mess. What an arrogant prick. He pretty much slapped a target on Cleese’s back and signed his goddamn name to it.

It was right after the initial meeting at Corporate, Monroe told him about deciding to give Cleese a clip of blanks during a match. He wanted to "step it up a notch." Masterson thought it was too risky and had too much potential for blowback, but Monroe was intent on showing Cleese who was in charge.

But it had been Weber who gave the go-ahead. He said it was a solid show of force and would "set the tone" of their relationship.

They all knew it would make great television.

After that, Cleese had been a wild man; totally unchained. He’d fought harder than ever and his ratings soared. Everyone should have been happy. They were all making a ton of money. Upper management and Mr. Weber had decided—with Monroe’s cheerleading—to throw yet another challenge at Cleese. For no other reason than to show him who was in the driver’s seat here.

Once and for all.

The results had been mind blowing. Ratings for that night’s match and the subsequent replays were astronomical. Merchandise revenue went through the roof. Hell, even some station affiliates that were starting to whine about the level of violence on the shows had fallen into line. Cleese had overnight become the most popular fighter The League had ever known.

It was all too perfect.

And then, in the same evening, Cleese up and disappeared.

The selfish bastard.

Masterson had by now arrived at his car, a sleek black Lexus LFA. The car had been a gift from Mr. Weber as a sort of reward for Cleese completing his training in record time. The car was low to the ground with a 4.8 liter, 552 horsepower V10 engine that would purr like a kitten or growl like a beast depending on the person behind the wheel. The car was magnificent.

Masterson hated the damn thing.

Every time he looked at it, all he could think of was Cleese.

And doing so always made his sphincter tighten.

He took a deep breath and looked at the cemetery around him as he dug in his pockets for his keys.

God… what a shithole.

Suddenly, his cell phone chirped in the left, breast pocket of his suit coat. Transferring his keys to his other hand, he reached into the folds of his jacket and retrieved the small black gadget. His finger slid across the front screen and the phone did the rest. He held the phone to his ear and stared across the bonnet of the Lexus.