Serial

Genre: General
Word Count: 464
A/N: Another something I wrote long back. Sorry I haven't been posting much lately. I haven't been doing much writing lately partly due to all the stuff I've been doing and places I've been going. o.O

“So,” I tried to keep the emotion out of my voice as I looked down at him, tied securely to a chair in front of me. The room was empty except for the two of us, uncomfortably devoid of almost all furnishings. “It was you.”

He tried to rock the seat, but it barely budged. “Hey, let me out of here, Marc.”

I felt the feeling of distaste in my mouth. He tried to undo the knots holding his hands back, but failed. None of his struggling affected me. I knew it was all an act, all a ploy. He had had plenty of time to try to escape already.

“Come on, Marc,” he looked up pleadingly, looking rather pitiful. “Won’t you help a friend?”

“I don’t think so.” My voice was shaking slightly, and he blinked. He seemed to reevaluate.

He leaned as far forwards as the ropes would let him. “It wasn’t my fault, Marc. It wasn’t my fault. They forced me to—they forced me. I didn’t have a choice, can’t you see? I didn’t have a—”

“You killed her!” I cut in, and he stopped.
There was silence.

I swallowed uncomfortably, my face feeling uncomfortably warm. “You killed her.” I closed my eyes and opened them again, trying to imagine what could have been, trying to pretend that he wasn’t sitting there, tied in front of me, trying to hope that, maybe, just maybe, he was innocent.

But he was there, face twisted in some sort of grimace—almost as if he were feeling my pain. I could feel the anger returning.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “It wasn’t my fault… I was forced to do it.”

“Even if you were, you could’ve refused it—you could have just fought them!” I stepped back, almost in surprise, almost in fear of what had just escaped.

I turned away. Looking at him was too painful—the duel emotions of hate and confusion jockeying back and forth had become unbearable.

“I’m sorry,” was all he said. It almost sounded truthful. It almost sounded sincere. A half-sob. “It was a mistake—it was all a horrible mistake. I was wrong… terribly wrong. You know how strong that pull for self-preservation is… I… I couldn’t fight it.”

It was too much. I couldn’t take it anymore.

“He’s a real mess, that one,” the homeowner commented as I came out of the room. “I’m glad the police’ll be here soon. About time he gets what he deserves.”

“Good thing you caught him, eh?” I forced the words to sound as normal as possible.

The man shuddered. “A good thing for us all.”

I left the house, and for the longest time, I could not get my mind off the subject of murder.

Written: 1/19/2008