I opened my eyes to a semi-familiar face whose name I wasn't sure of. He wore a black cotton button-up jacket and denim jeans. He had broad shoulders and stood maybe 5’9. His eyes were brown and relaxed, his hair was buzzed. There was a woodcutter's axe in his hands. I could see that there was still fresh blood dripping down the wooden arm of the axe. I wondered if it was still the blood of someone I knew, or maybe it had been a new victim. He was mouthing something towards the axe, but I can't read lips. A looming sense of dread was consuming me in a tremendous wave that materialized as the man in front of me. I didn't move. I don't want to say that I couldn't, because I didn't want to try. I just laid back and prayed that everything would be okay. I struggled to match his gaze and remain unafraid. His eyes were scanning me. There was a look in his eyes, like he knew that had me trapped.

“Good morning sunshine.” He breathed out in a low monotonous voice that had a soft southern accent tacked onto it. I responded short and quick.

“Hey.” The room was dimly lit from a fire pit at the center of the floor. The light flickered against his face in a deep autumn color. He stretched his cheeks and grinned ear to ear.

“Let me introduce myself, I think we got off on the wrong start.” He held out his hand. “Hi, I'm Malcolm.” He sat there, waiting. Expectantly. It felt like hours and days went by as I conjured up the mental capacity to reach out and grab a hold of his hand. We shook.

He grabbed hold of my hand and shook it like a ragdoll. He lowered his smile and gleamed at me.

“Normally when someone introduces themselves, you're supposed to do so in return.” He tightened his grip.

I responded as best as I could, “Mason.” I could feel my voice quivering. He let go of my hand and sighed.

“Good enough I guess.” He walked over to the end of the bed, “So.” Malcolm said as if I was his childhood friend. “I'm not gonna kill you. That wouldn't do anything productive now would it?” He pulled a stool over to the side of the bed where I was laying and sat. “What I want to do instead is make a deal.”

I had a hard time hearing everything he said, but I did my best to put everything together. I tried sitting up, but fell back when a splitting migraine pulled me down into the bed again.

“Yeah, probably best not to do that.” Malcolm teased. He sat his axe on the bed next to me, just within arms reach. I could smell a stench reeking off of it and I cringed. “This is Olivia. She’s a pretty axe and I treasure her with all my heart. She’s a little bit dirty thanks to your buddy.” He reached into his pocket and drew a rag from his pocket and tossed it at me. It landed next to me.

“Well.” he leaned in close to me. “Clean her up for me.”

My consciousness sunk into the back of my mind. I was in disbelief at this man.

“I'm sorry?” I hope I had heard him wrong.

“You heard me. I won't repeat myself. It was your friend who made the mess, and since he isn't currently with us I figure that responsibility lands on you.” He said in a deep resounding voice that shook me to the core. I stared at him and hoped that he would say something. It had to be some sort of sick joke that only a man of madness could make. But it wasn't.

I knew it wasn't. He didn't move from his chair as I slowly reached over to the axe. Malcolm backed up a little bit as I sat up in the bed. This combination of wood, metal, and blood sat in my hands as I reached over to the rag and began to wipe off innocent blood. I teared up, but I knew that my captor wouldn't hesitate to move the second I stopped. As tears rose up in my eyes, I could feel the death in the air. It was emanating off of this weapon and into my soul. I wanted to throw it away into the deepest darkest pit I could find and hope no soul would ever see or feel this feeling of dread again. I looked up at Malcolm. He gave me a thumbs up as I kept wiping away my friends blood. The vermillion shade of red that coated the entire axe literally coated the entire axe. I wiped at the handle and skimmed the blood off onto the bed sheets. The handle was stained mahogany underneath the blood, though I'm not sure if that’s how it’s supposed to be or not. As I made my way up towards the blade, I noticed that there was a small heart engraved close to where the handle met the blade. Inside of the heart there was a “M & O”. This sick bastard loves his axe. Malcolm broke me out of my focus.

“She’s not super sharp right now. That's how she is after…” He cleared his throat, “Going to work. Don't worry though, I'll do that part myself. It’s a delicate job.” I was relieved. Cleaning this damned thing was bad enough, fixing it so that it could kill better would be unbearable.

Once it seemed finished enough I folded the rag and put it into my pocket. I figured I wouldn't be able to properly bury my friend, so better to have his blood on a rag than nothing.

Malcolm inspected his axe and nodded.

“Good job bud. I know that was hard for you, but you have to understand that it was important nonetheless.” he threw his axe over his shoulder and stood up. “Now about that deal!” he strided over to the fire. He picked up a stick and started gently poking at the hearth. As he tended to the fire, he talked with his back to me. “I'll admit that I do love to have some fun with dear old Olivia, but sometimes we gotta slow it down and have a nice chat. You seem like a guy with a head on his shoulders, but you're also a guy with some sense. That’s why you did everything I told you to do now isn't it! So instead of killing you and your buddies-” He paused and looked up as he thought. “Well, more of your buddies I should say. I wanna let you live so that you can do some things for me. ‘You're not useful dead.’ is what my dad used to always tell me when he would teach me to fight.” He looked at the ground and smirked. “Well you're looking pretty useless now, aren't you pops.” He chuckled at his own joke. He paused for a couple second, but then continued. “I have this problem where I don't have the time or the energy to keep down all the people that don't like being kept down.” He turned away from the fire and looked at me. “What do you think of that? I wanna give you an amazing opportunity here!” he made a grand gesture. “I sure as hell won't be able to take in the rest of your people if I don't have a ‘security team’, if you catch my drift.” He walked back over to me and laid his hand on my shoulder.

I tensed up and looked away from this looming silhouette. After a moment, I looked up at him. “You're sick.”

He tightened his grip. “I'm trying to be nice here Mason. You could really say that I'm helping you here.” His words were like acid being poured in my ears, but I stayed silent. He shrugged. “Okay.” he turned his back to me and began walking out the door.

My breath was sucked out of my throat. I couldn't let him leave. No more lives had to be lost.

“Wait, Malcolm.” I did my best to stay calm. He didn't turn around, he listened. “I'm your man.” He turned around, and that ear to ear grin returned to his face.

“Well why didn't you just say so!” He flipped back around and stomped out the door.