Quoted By:
That’s right, heaven and hell really does exist, if the testimonies from people that have died and come back are anything to be believed. Apparently, multiple afterlives exist in separate planes of existence. There was a whole study on the concept. You weren’t sure where you’d be going once your time on earth was done, but you were certain that it probably wouldn’t be pleasant.
Putting those thoughts aside, you refocused yourself on the task ahead. As you went deeper into the house, you found more and more bodies, hidden from plain sight, but not terribly difficult to spot if you were looking for them, which you weren’t. You were looking for your brother, but found fresh corpses instead. That didn’t do any favors for your nerves, but it did tell you one thing.
Someone else was here, and they were cleaning house. Question was, were they hostile towards you or your brother? You supposed that you’d find out eventually.
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Checking the basement turned out to be a bust. Although, you didn’t expect to find an entire wine cellar down there. Real vintage shit, too. You might’ve been motivated to snag a couple of bottles, but there was something of an unspoken policy on drinking on the job. Besides, bottles tended to clink together and make a ton of noise, which wasn’t ideal for maintaining stealth.
With the basement crossed off the list, you decided to go up instead. More bodies, and more unaware sentries scrambling around barricading doors and windows, preparing for the inevitable siege that they’d have to defend against. It was too bad that they didn’t know about the infiltrators in their midst.
Eventually, you reached the top level, where two men were guarding, and occasionally hitting a guy who’d been tied to a wooden chair. When you saw his face, all bloodied, bruised and swollen, your breath caught.
Sitting there, no doubt, making smart-ass remarks in the face of overwhelming odds, was your younger brother, looking half-dead already. He looked like he’d been wearing the same clothes for weeks, which was pretty likely, and his hair was disheveled and matted to his face with sweat and blood.
A swell of anger rose within you, and you leapt into action without a second thought. You wasted no time climbing over the two unlucky bastards, webbing them by their feet, and stringing them up, leaving them to flail and struggle while you freed your brother. Their muffled screams barely registered in your mind as you cut Richard free and gave him a quick once over. He was hurt, badly, and clearly out of it. But at least he was still breathing.
What did catch your attention, however, were the sound of two silenced gunshots zipping overheard. You looked up to find that both men had been shot in the head. When you traced their trajectory back to their source, you found a tall red-headed woman dressed all in black, with a modded assault rifle in-hand, and a large skull painted across the bulletproof vest that she wore.
(Cont.)
