The God of War

The meth lab is in a locked trailer. At least it was. Now the door’s busted open, hanging loose on one hinge.

Inside, it stinks of burnt chemicals, stale sweat, piss and fear all tangled together. Beakers and Bunsen burners clutter a long narrow bench, funnels, tubes, and glass pipes littering the floor, cracked and blackened, shed like snakeskins. Rain drums on the aluminum roof, a steady, hard staccato beat. The box fan in the small window hums but can’t drown out the groans from the guy duct-taped to a chair.

Elias has been in places like this before, but never with a man like Kane.

Kane doesn’t look like a god, even though people treat him like one. He looks like an ex-con who spent the last twenty years lifting weights in the yard and breaking jaws during lockdowns. Cropped blond hair, scar over one eye, a faded tattoo of a Roman helmet inked in blue on his forearm. Like an immortal. His real name isn’t Kane, but that’s what everybody calls him. If you know mythology, it would be more appropriate to call him Mars, same as the Roman god.

Ruthless.

Brutal.

Indifferent.

History is filled with warriors like Kane. Men who fought every battle worth remembering. Troy. The Punic wars. The Somme. Antietam. Stalingrad. Fallujah. Actual wars. Centuries of them. Every time men go to war somebody like Kane leads the charge, smiling through the bloodshed, soaking in the violence. Corner boys, dealers, and junkies will tell you it’s bullshit, just myths and street talk.

Until they see him work. None of them stick around when he’s done.

If they’re still standing.

The duct-taped guy is a gangbanger named Reaper. Leader of a rival crew. Big fish in his very own small pond, trying to carve out a bigger chunk of turf for himself. It’s his trailer. His meth. His cook’s bloody corpse cooling on the floor. Supposed to be tough, untouchable, but his swollen, discolored face says otherwise. Lips split, one eye purple and closing.

Reaper spits blood on the table. Looks up.

“Ain’t afraid of you.”

“You should be.”

“Won’t be holding on to your turf much longer. Not when we get done with you.”

Kane smiles, slow and mean.

Elias stands by the door, a .38 under his jacket. He thinks about the corners, the alleys, trap houses, the whole city split into territories and crews. Pictures that kitchen table back at the safe house with Kane’s hand-drawn map, circles and arrows like a football playbook, every X marking a body. Every O marking a street corner somebody else is about to lose.

He’s here to watch, then spread the word on the street. Make sure everybody knows what happens when you run up against Kane.

But Kane isn’t sending a message.

He’s making a point.

Kane grabs a glass flask from the bench, half-full of cloudy liquid and smashes it on the floor. Shards scatter under the fluorescent light, like cockroaches when the lights come on. The air tastes sharp, metallic. Fumes sting their eyes and throats.

Kane bends down, face inches from Reaper’s.

“Warned you about fighting a war you can’t win. Not against me.”

Reaper doesn’t back down. Still filled with attitude.

“This don’t end with me. My boys’ll come for you.”

Kane shakes his head, slowly, almost like he’s considering it. Weighing the odds. Then that look crosses his face – the one that’s not anger, not fear. The one that’s anticipation.

“Pretty sure I’ll find them first,” he says.

He buries a fist in Reaper’s gut, a heavy, wet thud that sucks the air out of his lungs. The duct tape holds Reaper upright, his eyes watering, tears cutting lines across his blood-streaked face.

Reaper’s breath goes shallow.

Elias shifts, starts to speak.

Kane turns those eyes on him. Eyes that have seen cities burn. Battlefields, prisons, alleys. Eyes that end arguments before they start. A chill runs through Elias, and the words dry up in his mouth. He stays quiet.

Kane scans the floor, finds what he needs. Picks up a jagged piece of broken glass.

“Every war needs an example,” he says.

Reaper’s eyes open wide.

Kane smiles, then opens Reaper’s throat. Quick slice. Spray of blood. Reaper thrashes, the chair rattling, until the tape holding him stills. Blood spreads across the linoleum, a red river looking for a drain, pooling beneath the chair.

Reaper’s head slumps forward.

Kane drops the glass on the floor, stepping past the body.

Outside, the night is wet and black. Kane lights a cigarette, the flare of the match throwing shadows across his face. Elias follows, standing quietly alongside him.

“You know what I learned? In every fight?” Kane asks.

Elias shakes his head.

Kane blows out smoke, watching it curl into the dark. “War’s not guns or turf. It’s what survives when the killing’s done.”

He flicks ash into the mud, eyes scanning the distance like he can already see the next battle. “Reaper thought he was a king but kings are soft. Just talk and bullshit. Never put up a fight. At least not for long.”

Elias doesn’t answer.

Kane takes a final drag on the cigarette. “We hit every trap house. Kill anyone in the way. By sunrise, his crew will be begging to wear our colors. If they’re still standing.”

He grinds the butt under his boot and starts walking. Elias follows, stomach tight, pulse thudding. Kane’s not talking business. Never was. Not money. Not corners. Not turf. He wants the fight.

He lives for the violence. Lives for the blood.

“Let’s go,” he says. “We’ve got work to do.”

Walks out into the night to hunt down Reaper’s crew.

THE END

BIO: Michael Downing is a writer originally from New Jersey, now living in Georgia. His latest book, Saints of the Asphalt, is available online and at select bookstores. Over the past twenty years, he’s written plays, published several other books, and had short stories featured in a range of literary magazines and anthologies—some of which have been nominated for Pushcart Prizes. He remains unmistakably Jersey: full of attitude, edge, and Springsteen songs. Website: www.downingfiction.com