Page 24 of Angelic Vengeance

There was a moment of silence.

“Why are you telling me this now?”

The eyes I once found some comfort in, were now unrec-ognizable. Completely empty, yet a storm of hidden emotions.

“Oh,ángel… You couldn’t possibly think any of this was a coincidence.”

I registered the exact moment my entire reality shattered around me. An unfamiliar ache crossed my chest and a knot appeared in my throat.

She did this to me?

Rage blinded me. But when I tried to launch toward her – my only intention, to kill her painfully – I couldn’t. I moved my body again, only to realize I was strapped to the hospital bed.

“Relax.” Ruiz opened her folder mechanically, her face lacking remorse. “It was a necessary test. Plus, I knew you were strong enough to survive.”

“And if I didn’t?!”

“You did. It is what you were trained for, after all.”Late nights at the gym,just pummeling the punching bags. Hundreds of ammo used at the shooting range for‘letting off steam’. Memorizing the human body’s weak spots for self-awareness.

Every unconnected broken piece from my childhood began making sense.

My face twisted with disbelief.

“Why me?”

“I still remember finding you in that CPS waiting room,” –The beige room– “And the first time I saw your eyes… And found nothing. Just death.”

My eyes stung at the unlocked memory of my three-year-old self waking up in a foreign city without my parents. To this day, I had no idea what had happened.

“They didn’t want to cooperate at first; but when I flashed my badge, told them it was a crucial operation… Who was going to tell me no? You were so young. So…Raw,” – my stomach turned – “You could be molded into anything and everything.” She snapped her fingers. “That’s when I got the idea: mold killers from youth. Much easier than training adults.” Her eyes met mine again; nothing. “And you,ángel… Oh, you were the perfect candidate: no family, no life, no past, no future.” She chuckled,before adding, “Enough trauma to fuel an army… But most importantly,hate.”

For some reason, another fissure cracked inside my chest at the last word.

Was there that much hate and evil inside me?Was I born like this? My mind flashed back to the men I killed remorselessly. A cold, heartless killing machine.

“Nevertheless, you passed the test. Exceptionally.” Ruiz sighed, flipping through her folder. “The amount of noise and disruption you caused, helping the special forces to locate one of the world’s largest sex trafficking rings, which they’d been investigating for years, was a bonus. They were able to find the hidden safehouse and save the women and young girls who had been kidnapped.”

A weight lifted off my chest. “All of them?”

“Some overdosed before we could get them help.”

I scoffed. “And you still decided to drug me.”

“The sedative was for your own good.”

I took a deep breath to calm down. My temple throbbed with tension and everything felt like I was out of my body. I shook my head and bit my tongue.

“You had eight confirmed kills.”

“So?” The fire of rage I usually put out by hitting something grew inside me. The urge to take it out on Ruiz enlarged by the second. I stared into her eyes as the silence stretched between us.

“Do you blame yourself for their deaths?”

My lack of reaction said everything I didn’t. I didn’t need to state the obvious.

Her uneasy smirk was back. “Well, you see, in situations like this, it is common for the victim to feel a kind of…Guilt.”

“Yeah?” My eyes turned to slits. “Well, I sure as fuck don’t. And I’m not a fucking victim.” I spit the words like they were venom.