Hung Justice

After a hard knight of drinking to the memory of his dead friend, Danny aids Martyn in taking down a band of smugglers.

Hung Justice

 

There was a loud shuffling sound, a few curses and a massive bang followed by a roar that woke me from my sleep. It was fairly dark, but I could just make out the shape of Martyn trying to clamber to his feet from the floor. He must have slipped and fallen on his arse.

“What on earth are you doing Manhunter?” I said. “it sounds like you are trying to knock a wall down”

“No” he replied, rubbing the back of his head. “I’m trying to find my f*****g boots, where are they?”

Now that I thought about it my head hurt too, it was absolutely buzzing from the night before. Drinking with Martyn may not have been the best idea, I decided, today was going to be long and painful.

“There inside the cupboard you big oaf” I said, why couldn’t he just be a little quieter?

He opened the closet and sure enough, there his boots were. “I have some work to do today, and tonight really did not help to prepare me” He sighed, once again rubbing his head. “We can go into the forest tomorrow”

“I figured we wouldn’t be going there today” I did not exactly want to wait until the next day, but I knew I had to. “If you would like, I can come and lend a hand today?” once again, I did not want to, but keeping the Manhunter happy was a good idea. After all, after that night talking to Rowan I had realised how much I loved hurting people, I would enjoy Martyn’s line of work.

“Not a bad idea” Martyn said, eyeing me conspicuously. “how’s your sword arm?”

“I can manage Manhunter”

“It’s settled than, you can come and lend a hand” he chuckled. “I’m probably going to need all the help I can get after last night”

Martyn sat down on the end of my bed to put his boots on, he was rather noisy as he went about his business. After a moment of watching the man, I too decided to get ready and retrieved my gear from off the floor.

“What exactly are we going to be doing?” I asked, ignoring the throbbing pain in my head that standing up had caused.

“Smugglers have been coming through here apparently” he replied, rising to his feet. “After I check with one of my men where they are then we’ll go raid the place, they’re only small-timers, so nothing the two of us can’t handle”

Martyn’s so called man, looked about as crooked as I would have expected a smugger too. This, along with the fact that we had walked down a long set of dark, winding paths to get to him, were making me distrustful to say the least. There was a good chance that if the man had had a weapon I would have drawn Piers’ sword.

“Fancy seeing you here Martyn!” the man sniggered “I trust you have the money that was promised me”

Marty reached into his pocket and retrieved a small bag, bulging with what were obviously coins. It made a sharp metallic chink as the man caught it.

“Feels a little lighter than last time” the man said, tossing the purse up and down. “you’re not playing me are you?”

“Of course not” Martyn said gleefully. “I would never try to cheat an honest man such as yourself”

I could feel the tension starting to build, even though Martyn seemed happy enough I could tell from his eyes that the man was fuming. Just like me he wanted to get this job over and done with so that we could rest after our long night.

“How about”

“Cut the crap” the Manhunter said sternly, cutting the man off. “Tell me what I payed for and then we are off”

It took me a while before I realised I was a part of Martyn’s ‘we’.

“You Manhunters… all brawn and no brains…” the man muttered quietly.

“Tell me where they are” Martyn took a menacing step towards the man. “Right now”

“They couldn’t possibly be in that old abandoned warehouse downtown could they?” he said, smiling widely. “I mean, no one has gone there in years which means it would be a terrible hideout…”

Martyn reached out and backhanded the man, dropping him down onto his knees. He squirmed on the floor briefly, and then rose, wiping the blood from his face with a shirt sleeve.

“Let’s get going Danny” Marty said, turning and leaving.

I waited a moment, staring at the man. I could’ve sworn that Martyn too, had smiled when he had hit the man.

‘Downtown’, as Martyn’s man had called it were, I started to realise, essentially the slums of this town. The further I went, the further I started peering into every shadow and nook that crossed my path. It felt as if something or someone dangerous lurked around every corner, and the streets themselves were no better.

The cobblestone road was cracked in places and potholes could be seen here and there. On top of that the entire place was stained with something akin to tar that made everything appear black and sticky. This, combined with the overpowering stench of piss and s**t, only went to worsen my headache.

All the people that passed us by looked pretty dreadful too. Some looked malnourished while others just look sickly, and overall, they were all pretty dirty. Despite this many of the children still smiled at me, they looked like they belonged here. After all, at least they had a home.

The Manhunter walked through the streets at a brisk pace, roughly shoving anyone who got in his way while I weaved past them. I stayed close by his side, if we got into a scrape I would need his help, however much I hated to admit it.

“How far is it to this place anyway?” I asked, stepping around a young boy.

He didn’t say anything, instead in reply he pointed ahead to an exceedingly large building. It was quite obviously the warehouse that Martyn’s source had so kindly told him about.

“Got a plan to take the place?” I said.

“Nope” he shook his head.

“Well that always helps” I muttered under my breath.

Martyn shot me a dirty look and continued walking until we came up around the side of the warehouse. There he stopped and sat down on a crate before pulling an apple from his pocket. He slowly started to eat and I stood in silence, staring at the large man’s teeth as they sunk into the green fruit.

“So what’s happening Manhunter?” I asked impatiently.

He grunted something incoherently in response, this was when I finally realised that Martyn was doing far worse than me after last night. He did drink a lot more I suppose…

“You can finish your apple then…” I said in a hushed tone.

He mumbled something again.

 

“What?”

“I’m thinking” he replied coldly. “Just give me a god damn second man!”

After that I shut up and started to pace up and along the warehouse. I checked for windows in case someone from inside could see me, but there were none, so I continued to pace.

Martyn was too typical of a Manhunter for my liking, and he lacked much of a personality. I mean sure, we had had a good time drinking together, but I still wouldn’t call the man a friend, and he did nothing to the rain. Which was good and bad, at the very least he wouldn’t make the rain heavier, which was good, he wasn’t Piers though.

I touched the pommel of the sword at my side, despite the cold touch of the metal, it made my hand feel warm. It made my whole body feel warm in fact, warm is not the right word though… The right word is dry, it made me feel dry.

“Let’s just do this already” Martyn said.

“I thought you wanted to finish your apple?” I asked jokingly.

“It tastes like s**t anyway” he said, throwing the apple to the floor and smiling for the first time all morning.

“The warehouse has an attic, we just need to go up there and we should be able to come down and get the jump on whoever’s in there” the Manhunter said with a slight croak to his voice. “Sound good Danny?”

“Yeah, so long as your fat arse doesn’t fall down and kill one of the poor b******s while we’re up there” I replied. “And how are we supposed to get up there?”

Martyn laughed and pointed over his shoulder. “I don’t know about you Danny, but I was thinking about taking the ladder, it just makes sense doesn’t it?”

“No need to be an arse about it” I said.

As I claimed the final rung if the metal ladder I started to hear the sound of voices below me in the warehouse. I couldn’t quite make out what they were saying but nonetheless, I could hear them, and that meant they were there.

The Manhunter was crouched low to the floor… ceiling thing and motioned for me to be quiet before starting to walk forwards. The wood beneath us creaked loudly with each and every step and it was a wonder that those below us couldn’t hear it.

Whether he was still a little drunk from the night before or he was clumsy I had no idea but Martyn appeared to be having trouble walking in a straight line. He continuously tripped on nothing and would stumble a little bit to his right before catching himself and setting off again. Then, after another few steps, the same thing would happen again, it was like an endless cycle. That being said, this ‘endless’ cycle ended when the Manhunter stumbled one last time and crashed down and through the attic floor.

His downward tumble was followed by a series of loud shouts from the people I had heard talking below me. They may not have heard the creaking attic floorboards, but they certainly knew that we, or that Martyn at least, was here now.

I quickly dropped down through the hole Martyn had made, hoping to land gracefully by his side. However as I entered the massive warehouse and hit the ground I slipped, and ended up collapsing on top of the Manhunter in a heap. The man around us started to laugh, and that, was irritating.

The warehouse was absolutely huge, and filled with various types of crates, sacks and other storage objects. It smelt very much of decay, like rotting fish, although different somehow, it smelt a little spicy and a little sweet too somehow. The smell was probably coming from whatever they were smuggling through here.

The place was rectangular in shape, and the roof we had fallen through stretched out into the distance. Oddly enough although the roof was constructed of planks of wood and many wooden support beams the rest of the structure was made from solid stone bricks. Strange for a warehouse I thought, possibly not though, I hadn’t the faintest bit of experience in this area.

There were far more men surrounding us than I had first expected, although in hindsight men often became smugglers, people always flocked to money, with through lawful means or not. Like mountain bandits though, they wouldn’t be the greatest fighters and they wouldn’t be well armed. The Manhunter and I should have little trouble even hung over as we were I decided after a bit of thought.

“Look what we have here” one of the men sneered, poking a stick towards Martyn.

“I told you not to fall down you idiot” I grunted at the Manhunter, sharply pulling away from him and rising to my feet. “Now I’m going to have to deal with the rest of these idiots too”

Martyn roughly batted away the stick which was hanging in front of his face and got up, menacingly dropping a hand to his sword hilt. The younger Smugglers looked almost scared when they saw this, but the others disregarded him nonchalantly. They had no idea what they were up against.

“I suggest you walk away and forget what you saw hear lads, wouldn’t want either of you to get hurt” said a man sitting on top of a large crate off to my left. He paused for a second before widening his eyes in what could only be amazement, or wonder, or awe, or something. “Well well, my God!” he yelled. “If it isn’t Martyn the bounty hunter boys! And it looks like he’s gotten himself a puppy”

Martyn didn’t flinch. Didn’t even move a muscle.

“You know him Manhunter?” I asked Martyn, ignoring the smuggler’s obvious insult.

“No no he doesn’t know me” came the leader of the smugglers. “Criminals are just always more than happy to tell us honest folk about people like him”

I sighed and looked around at the smugglers, some of them were barely men, which meant that as much as I wanted to, I wouldn’t be killing any of them. I was sure the same thought had crossed Martyn’s mind, he was after all, a better man than myself.

The Manhunter let out a long sigh and looked at me, his face was a mixture of angry emotions which were all laced with a hint of fear, or that could have been boredom? Then without warning, he lashed out with one closed fist, catching the man next to him in the jaw, and initiated the chaos that was about to ensue.

A synchronised scream issued from the smugglers and each of them drew a weapon, mostly clubs and cudgels with the occasional dagger. They all charged at Martyn, a few of them running past me and I stood dumbfounded at how they were ignoring me. Usually I was the one everyone sought out in a fight, this was a refreshing change.

I quickly looked around the warehouse, searching for a piece of wood to use as a club or something like that. However, there was nothing lying around that I could really use in a fight, nothing, except a ladder that was. Hastily checking that the Manhunter was still alive I grabbed the ladder and lifted it with both arms, it was fairly light and seemed sturdy enough.

Raising the ladder off the ground like a knight’s lance I charged at the mass of smuggler’s surrounding Martyn. The end of the wooden construct buckled as I rammed it into the mass of men and splinters and smugglers alike went whizzing through the air.

The dazed and disorganised smugglers bolted away from Martyn after that, collecting in a group underneath the crate their leader was perched upon.

“No thanks required,” I said to Martyn, between deep breaths for air.

He grunted. “I would have been able to deal with the lot of them” he replied, whipping a smudge of blood from his forehead.

I opened myself to speak once more but stopped, feeling a convulsion in my stomach. It was then that I noticed how sick I felt, my chest and throat were on fire and I started to cough violently. And slowly but surely, I emptied the contents of my stomach onto my boots and the floor in a puddle of dark green mucus.

The Manhunter slapped me over the back heartily and started to laugh like a maniac. His laugh however was cut short when he too started to gag on what could only be his own vomit. Unlike me though, he covered his mouth with his hand and proceeded to swallow his breakfast for the second time that morning.

“Looks like the beer from last night is going to put up more of a fight than these kids” the Manhunter said, pointing at the cowering smugglers and smiling. “Are we still going?” Martyn yelled to the smugglers “or can I take you boys in already?”

The leader of the smugglers screeched some kind of curse at his men and leapt down from the massive crate. A flash of sliver was all I saw as the man drew a long curved blade and pointed it at me; he was going to be a pain to put down.

“What are you doing?” he roared. “Go and knock those two senseless you useless pieces of s**t!”

The smugglers looked even more terrified of him than they had of us, yet they still cowered for a moment longer before taking their first few steps.

“Grab the ladder Manhunter,” I said, jabbing Martyn in the ribs.

“Why?” came his dumb, and very simple response.

“Just do it already” I barked pointing to the wooden frame.

Most of the ladder was still in good shape, apart from one end which had all but shattered and a large crack that went along the length of wood it was still in perfect shape.

Together, holding the ladder between us we charged at full pace towards the slowly advancing group of smugglers. I felt the ladder snap with an ear-wrenching crack as we slammed it into the smugglers knocking most of them to the floor.

“Give up already!” Martyn spat at the smuggler’s leader as his boys ran and cowered away from us. “There’s two of us and one of you”

The man sighed and wove his sword in an intricate pattern, just millimetres from his face. “I always have to do everything myself, you see, everyone else is just so incompetent” he said slowly, tracing shapes in the air.

“He seems pretty quick Danny…” the Manhunter said, with what I thought sounded like a note of fear in his voice.

“I’m faster” I replied bluntly.

“You’re also drunker and far too overconfident, this one doesn’t just have a little dagger remember”

“He’ll still go down easy” I said, keeping my eye on the man’s curved blade as he tossed it between hands.

I smiled, every step the smuggler took towards me was another step towards a fight, towards pain, and towards blood. Just the thought of killing this man made my skin tingle and seemed to lessen the weight if the rain on my back.

I bolted forward from Martyn’s side and drew my sword, raising him high into the air and screaming as I did so. Somewhere behind me I heard a yelp and the sound of heavy footsteps as my companion ran to catch up to me. I swung my sword straight down and at the smuggler’s head, intending to end the man’s life there and then, but he had other ideas.

Instead of cleaving him in two my sword rebounded off of the stone floor and started to vibrate and try to wrench itself from my grasp. A tremor shot up my arm and down to my legs as I tried to control the weapon, I fell to my knees and dropped the sword. The smuggler was standing a meter or two to my right, grinning smugly like the b*****d he was.

A lowered hand cut off my sight of the smuggler though, and I looked up into the amber eyes of the Manhunter. I pushed the hand away and rose to my feet.

“I told you he was fast,” Martyn mumbled, shooting me a hurt look at my rejection of his hand.

“Lets just deal with him already” I grumbled, I wasn’t in the mood to for any of this s**t anymore, and I just wanted to hurt someone already.

The smuggler started to circle us, dancing lightly upon his feet and taking quick swipes at one of us. Each time he did so one of us would block his strike and the other would attempt to land a blow on the man, he was always too fast though and would dodge our swords by a hairs width.

This stale mate proceeded until finally the smuggler ceased testing us and launched his assault, barraging both of us with a rain of steel. At some point during this Martyn managed to swing out and slash the man’s shoulder, he howled in rage and stepped away from us. Then pressing his advantage the Manhunter barged straight through the smuggler, knocking the man off balance with his shoulder.

Then it was my turn to press my advantage. I stepped in behind the whirling smuggler swiftly and reached around, firmly clamping my forearm over his throat. I heard Martyn yell something at me, but I ignored him, this was my kill, he couldn’t have it and that was that. Choking the smuggler even harder yet, I pulled my sword arm back and jerked it forward with as much force as I could muster.

Warm blood that came from the jagged wound I had made in his back flowed down the short length of Piers hilt and soaked into my hand and arm. The blood on my arm made me feel clean, like finally washing after a long time on the road. It was a very good feeling I realised, as I tore my sword from the smugglers limp body and let him drop to the floor.

The Manhunter’s expression was a mixture of horror and anger as he looked at the dead smuggler lying at my feet. He reminded me of myself a little at the moment, only because of his expression though, he looked like a lost boy, with no idea what to do. Yet in reality I knew that he was nothing like me, he would never understand.

“What the hell did you do that for?” Martyn said angrily, he still looked a little confused.

“He was trying to kill us, I simply stopped him from doing so” I replied coldly. He recoiled from my words like a dog realising its foolishness after being stung by a bee.

“Well you didn’t have to kill the poor b*****d” the Manhunter muttered, fixing his gaze upon the bloodied corpse at my feet. “But I guess he did deserve it… at least we’re almost done for the day, let’s just hurry up and ditch this rabble so we can rest, after all, tomorrow is going to be even harder than today”

I nodded. I had been dreading taking Piers back home every day since his death, honestly I was terrified to see his beloved Cherry Blossoms. They would only go to remind me of the dream, and the life I had taken away from a young man.

Author's Note

Just like the last chapter I rushed this one a bit, so yeah :P

Reviews

[Alleyway Rover]

Overview: We are still straying quite far from the original plot, I feel. I sort of understand Danny’s motivation for getting close to Martyn. The bounty hunter is after him and by getting close he can find out what he knows… at least I think that’s the motivation. That being said, I don’t know how the events in this chapter contribute to Danny’s goal.
I do like Danny’s continued struggle with a kind of murderous darkness inside. I’m not sure what Martyn means to this conflict at this time, but I imagine he’s got some darkness too and together they are kind of kindred spirits…
So I like that idea, but it does need a lot more development.
The fight scene at the end of this was mostly confusing. Here are the parts that really didn’t make sense to me:
“However as I entered the massive warehouse and hit the ground I slipped, and ended up collapsing on top of the Manhunter in a heap.”

I’m trying to picture a way for him to land that would cause him to slip and fall onto someone, but I can’t picture it. How exactly did he land or what did he land in to cause this?

“I quickly looked around the warehouse, searching for a piece of wood to use as a club or something like that.”

Doesn’t he have a sword?

“I opened myself to speak once more but stopped, feeling a convulsion in my stomach. It was then that I noticed how sick I felt, my chest and throat were on fire and I started to cough violently. And slowly but surely, I emptied the contents of my stomach onto my boots and the floor in a puddle of dark green mucus.”

A couple problems with this moment. I understand that they are hung over, but if they feel so bad that they are tossing their cookies all over, then they are probably too sick to go out hunting. It would make more sense to try and find a way to feel better, then go out after the smugglers.
Second, if they are both suddenly throwing up all over themselves, then why don’t the smugglers take advantage of that fact and either run away or take them both down while they are incapacitated? I see where your going, but this moment needs more thought.

“Together, holding the ladder between us we charged at full pace towards the slowly advancing group of smugglers. I felt the ladder snap with an ear-wrenching crack as we slammed it into the smugglers knocking most of them to the floor.”

If they are standing in a group, they could only ram one person with the ladder…. unless they are in a single file line, but there’s no earthly reason for that. This needs some thought as well.

“‘I told you he was fast,’ Martyn mumbled, shooting me a hurt look at my rejection of his hand.”

Danny is a trained fighter, but going after a man with his sword raised and bringing it down like he did… that seems a little amateurish. You don’t need to be that quick to dodge that blow, anyone could see it coming a mile away, which is why I don’t think a trained fighter would attack like this.

“Then it was my turn to press my advantage. I stepped in behind the whirling smuggler swiftly and reached around, firmly clamping my forearm over his throat. I heard Martyn yell something at me, but I ignored him, this was my kill, he couldn’t have it and that was that. Choking the smuggler even harder yet, I pulled my sword arm back and jerked it forward with as much force as I could muster.”

The man is jumping, dodging and moving quickly, right? I can’t see how Danny could sneak up behind him and put him in a hold like this. Moreover, why would he? If he somehow managed to get behind him (how did he do that, by the way?) why not just stab the guy in the back and be done with it? Furthermore, I don’t see how he’s able to deliver this killing blow with his sword when he’s holding the man tight to his body with his arm pressing on the man’s throat.

Overall think about ever action. More importantly, think about it the way Danny sees it. He’s telling the story, so we need to see this fight as he did. What things did he notice? What were the sights, sounds, smells, etc. How was he feeling? Scarred, exited, … …. sick as a bloody dog? Describe this fight through his eyes, action by action and moment by moment.

Additional Notes:

“They couldn’t possibly be in that old abandoned warehouse downtown could they?” he said, smiling widely. “I mean, no one has gone there in years which means it would be a terrible hideout…”
Martyn reached out and backhanded the man, dropping him down onto his knees. He squirmed on the floor briefly, and then rose, wiping the blood from his face with a shirt sleeve.”
Really not sure why he did that. The man told him what he wanted to know. He told him in a rather weird way, but he did tell him. If Martyn is suppose to be a little unstable (and for some reason I feel like he is) then this is the first time we actually see that side of him. However the end of this chapter suggests that he is more stable then Danny, so I’m not sure what to make of this moment.
“The place was rectangular in shape, and the roof we had fallen through stretched out into the distance. Oddly enough although the roof was constructed of planks of wood and many wooden support beams the rest of the structure was made from solid stone bricks. Strange for a warehouse I thought, possibly not though, I hadn’t the faintest bit of experience in this area.”

This is also a strange time to get heavy in the description of this place. I think it would have been better earlier when they were creeping above in the rafters… or wherever they were, I’m not entirely clear on that either. Anyway, that seemed like the time for this kind of description. Now, there is danger. As the reader, I want to see how this plays out.





“Martyn was too typical of a Manhunter for my liking, and he lacked much of a personality. I mean sure, we had had a good time drinking together, but I still wouldn’t call the man a friend, and he did nothing to the rain. Which was good and bad, at the very least he wouldn’t make the rain heavier, which was good, he wasn’t Piers though.”
Something about this summery seems weird where it is. It almost seems like a reflection Danny would have when he left Martyn. Where it is now doesn’t really add to the scene. Let the events play out and Danny can reflect on what it means afterward.

“I was sure the same thought had crossed Martyn’s mind, he was after all, a better man than myself.”
I’m not sure what would make him think that at this point.