River O'Riley

I stand in the corner of the hanger at the private airport owned by The Red Dragon, one shoulder propped against the corrougated tin wall, unable to take my eyes from the torture that is being inflicted infront of me..

Fei's cruelty extends far beyond the depravity of anything I've ever witnessed.. Ronan's lessons were like playtime compared to the limitless bloodlust of the Triad leader..

Limb by limb Li Jun had been bound in black tape and nailed to the fixtures of the makeshift timber seat beneath him, placed in his own personal hell confinement.. Piece by piece, I'd watched as his flesh has been peeled away in thick layers to expose the visceral bloody muscle framework beneath, chunks of his meat missing from knee to neck..

For hours on end he'd been poked through several times over with razor sharpened bamboo sticks.. The scent of metal and death in the air is heavy, so much that I feel the sick sensation of bile rising up my throat as he chokes on his own blood.. Scarlet splatters spray from his mouth to paint the concrete beneath his feet and still, Jun refuses to confess the truth that would afford him a swift death..

"This ends with the truth.. Are you such a coward you cannot confess to the choices you have made, Jun?" Fei twirls a folding butterfly knife between his fingers, growing impatient.. "Do you not stand by your conviction to betray me? Wángbādàn! Nǐ yǐwéi nǐ shì shéi?!"

"I--I am not the coward--Xiao--you are the one who is--weak! Too weak to do what has to be done!" Li Jun coughs, wheezing his words.. "Nǐ huì hòuhuǐ de! The tide does not cease to flow with me-- There are others who will take my place-- and your whore daughter.."

"Wǒ dū nìle.." Muttering that he's had enough, Fei ignores the ominous threat that rasps from Li's lips as he turns to me, extending a blood soaked hand in invitation.. "You! Come!"

"Aye, sir?" I rise to my feet, following orders but unable to follow his example and remain so unaffected by the way Li Jun talks about Frankie..

What does he mean 'the tide doesn't cease with him'?

Is he talking about his deals with Beckett?

Or is there a bigger picture that I am still missing?

If there are others who mean to do My Wallflower harm, I'll find them.. I'll find them and I'll cut their fucking eyes out too..

Pacing forward to stand beside The Red Dragon, I swallow my roiling nausea and Fei hands me the blade and points to the dead-man who is somehow still breathing.. "I will hear a confession, Mr O'riley.. That was our deal."

"Aye'Sir." I wrap my fingers around the double hilt of the balisong blade and in that moment I am transported decades in reverse.. Back to my youth, a frightened young lad, disarmed and ill-equipped to cope with the very first interrogation I witnessed, when I was forced to participate in the brutal slaughter of an IRA rat..

I didn't understand my purpose back then or why Ronan saw it as such an important right of passage.. I knew nothing about the vile nature of torture.. All I knew was how to do what I was told to avoid taking a beating..

But now, I am well versed in the art of pain, practiced and hardened by all I've seen and the ways I have been used by the machine to do damage in the name of duty.. Today's lesson is just a fresh reminder of the unyielding blackness that lives in me..

I know in my heart that am not a bad man.. Though I am all too aware that I'm not a good one either..

Somewhere in between is where I belong and this moment is the culmination of an entire life spent walking the thin line between right and wrong..

This time, I understand my motivation and why this must be.. It is the reason I made it so.. This is the moment my father's teachings had prepared me for and the means by which I will prove myself to The Dragon..

In my actions he will see the dedication I have to his daughter and the strength I possess to survive through whatever initiations need to take place for me to be accepted..

Everything I do, I do for my love for Frankie..

I do it for Lijuan and all her sisters.. And for my daughter, who I want to grow up in a world where maggot scum shitbricks like Li Jun don't exist..

I inhale the salty, bloodsoaked air, slipping into a separate state of mind.. One that allows me to do what has to be done.. Detached from my morality I become the devil that is required..

Clearing my throat with a fake cough, the orchestra commences and an unsuspecting soundtrack in my mind begins to play.. Much to the surprise of The Dragon I begin to click my fingers in time as I hum to the tune of 'Mack The Knife'.

Starting to dance and shuffling in an effortlessly smooth motion while sliding side to side, I twirl the knife and move theatrically about the floor around the prisoner.. "O'the shark, babe, has such teeth, dear! And it shows them, pearly white! Just a jackknife, has old MacHeath, babe! And he keeps it-uh, out of sight!"

Jun groans in wounded protest as if the mere sound of my voice is already driving him insane and I grin down at him with sinister sadism grittered between my teeth.. "You know when that shark bites, with his teeth, babe, scarlet billows start to spread! Fancy gloves though, wears old MacHeath, babe! So there's never, never a trace o'red!"

Jun lifts his defiant, hateful stare to meet mine and I pause my sick serenade for a second to let him see the malice in my eyes and sense the imminent approach of his own death..

"I warned ye' I was gonna take them peepers, laddie-- For lookin' at all the lovely things that don'ae belong to ye'.." I lift the sharp end of the butterfly blade to the deputy's left eye, continuing to hum my melody and allowing my mind to remain fixated on the song, rather than absorbing the shrill screams of wailing agony as I take the sight from him slowly.. Painfully..

"AGHHHHHH!!"

He screams.. And I sing..

"Now on a sidewalk uh-huh, ooh sunny mornin', uh-huh, lies a body, just oozin' life--eek! And someone's sneakin' 'round a corner, could that someone, be Mack the Knife?!" At the crescendo of my crooning and the pinnacle of his pain, I yank the knife from the punctured squelching socket of his eye, a seeping yellowish-red pulpy mash falls from the gaping hole to dangle on a string of sinewy goop and his head lolls forward in anguish..

"Cào nǐ zǔ zōng shí bā dài! Fuck--fuck you--fuck.." Jun cusses on repeat, cursing me and my ancestors to the 18th generation as he mutters over and over as the last of his will drains away and death becomes his final salvation.. "You will never save her.. I will live in her nightmares.. I made a whore of your daughter, Xiao! I take her virginity with me to the grave! She will always be mine- even in death--I will be with her! FRANCIS FENG IS MINE-- FOREVER!"

"Cào nǐ mā- You wanna know pain, motherfucker.. I'll show ye pain- " With the flick of my wrist I shift to take his other eye but Fei Xiao grabs my shoulder to stop me..

"No.. Wǒ hěn mǎnyì.. I have heard enough.." With a bored sigh, Fei proclaims his satisfaction..

"Sir?" I shake myself from the trance, snapping to attention and returning back to myself..

The Dragon looks me up and down, a pleasant smile pursed upon his thin lips and something interested illuminating his eyes.. "You are a strange man, River."

I nod once, still halfway out of my own body, definitely out of my mind.. "Aye'sir."

He commends me with a sharp smile and an intrigued gaze.. "But you are effective.."

I shrug.. "Sometimes, Sir.. But in this instance, I think ye' lad has just had enough.. He wants to die.. That was the deal."

"So it was.." Xiao agrees, taking a glance at his bejeweled watch before reaching into his pocket and retrieving a white handkerchief to clean the blood from his hands.. "You have proven the loyalty you have proclaimed to my daughter.."

"O'course." I sigh in relief, taking some comfort from his ability to see that one simple truth..

"There is only one thing left to do, to seal our agreement.." He nods to the Triad who stands by the back door and immediately the tattooed thug moves to collect a gas canister from the steel shelves that line the back wall of the hanger..

Without hesitation, The Triad grunt-man proceeds to pour the contents over the flayed Mountain Master, the sting of the potent liquid accelerant burns his open wounds so profoundly the screeching sound he creates are inhuman.. Unlike anything I've ever heard..

"GAAAAAAAHHHFFFFFUUUUUCKK!"

The Dragon takes a gold zippo lighter from his chest pocket, flicking it open and sparking a blaze.. I take two steps back as the butterfly knife slides from my fingers to hit the ground with a resonating clatter and Xiao tosses the flame into the lap of the man who has betrayed him for the last time..

The temperature hits me like a wall of heat and the shockwave can be felt through the air as the fire consumes the fumes that had filled the air..

"AGGHHHHHHHH!!"

Howling his final sounds, a fire erupts across Jun's flesh, engulfing him in seconds melting away the fat beneath his flesh.. I have to lift the crook of my elbow to cover my mouth and nose, blocking out the putrid roasting scent of skin and hair as the flames roar and rage..

Without a second thought, The Dragon turns and makes his way back towards the black SUV he'd arrived in and I am forced to stride double time to keep up.. "You have three days to bring me my daughter or--" Fei stops to wave a hand back towards the fleshy burning mass of his now dead deputy.. "You have seen what happens to men who make enemies of me, Mr O'riley.."

I don't look back, holding his stare instead.. "Aye'sir, I surely have."