Revenance

[AllWillFall2Me]

I wrote this short story today, and I'd like you fine gentlemen to tell me what you think. Also, if you can tell me how o indent it, I'll make it prettier.

There aren't words to describe it. In any tongue. The feeling of the ultimate failed hope. The unbelievably cold wind blowing aside the wisps of your pipe dreams. The last chance cruelly snatched from one's hands, wrested from one's grasp, and crushed. There are no words for that feeling, but there is one for what comes of it: revenant.
To say I had a hard life would have been akin to saying that Hannibal Lecter had flaws. The details already are like a dream to me, like some forgotten memory of a story I was once told. I know I had a mother, but her face is gone, beyond my grasp. I know I lived in a city, I think it was this one. I remember I was good-looking, or at least I think I was. Such inconsequential details mean nothing to me now. They are at best distractions.
I can remember why I am, though. Every second, every detail, is seared into me, and burns in my mind, goading me on to fulfill my destiny. My purpose. That which I traded my very soul for. Or, at least, I think I did.
I had a girlfriend. Beautiful. A laugh that could enliven a room, a smile brighter than diamonds, and eyes more entrancing then the stars. I wish by whatever power watches me I remembered her name. She wanted to be an actress. Who wouldn't, in her position? The inner city is not renowned for it's scientific credentials. Unless you count physics, and inertia. What starts in the city, stays in the city. And it has a funny way of holding lives the same way.
We would often talk of traveling the world, seeing exotic wonders and speaking in foreign tongues. Never mind we didn't know these tongues, nor had the passports to go to the lands that spoke them, these were the dreams of young lovers, certain the world would bow before their love.
I remember I had a job. And a client. And if I ever find him, he will remember me. I was a young man in the inner cities, which is to say I knew the underground, and occasionally dealt with the occupants of it. But, I was not a member. My mother dragged me to church enough times to know what happened to people like that, and I knew it just wasn't worth it.
But, my job. I was a delivery boy. Messages, packages, people, I took them all to their destinations. My job was what kept me strong and fit. In the city, if you want something somewhere fast you go on foot or bike, and days of running and biking made me fast, days of hauling heavy packages made me strong. My girl called me 'her personal Samson', a joke made funnier by my shaved head. I claimed it 'prevented my Delilah her temptations'.
This was my last day, though. I was going to get a higher paying job if it killed me. I had to start bringing in more, my girl had announced, her eyes sparkling like the sea,  she had to start eating for two. Unlike the sad drama I had seen played out by friends and classmates, I had no doubt it was mine, and couldn't have been happier. No rooster crowed as loudly as I did when I realized what she meant. So I needed money, which is probably why I didn't look too closely at the job they handed me my last day.
A couple blocks of biking, and I was in the shadier part of the shady part of town. This was an area that you walked around at night, or if you went through it, you hoped you met a mugger, rather than one of the criminals. The building at the address was surprisingly devoid of vermin, a least of the non-sentient kind. I delivered the letter to a fat man in a room over-looking a warehouse operation. I don't know if they were packaging sugar, flour, or something far more malevolent, and frankly, I didn't care. My message was delivered, my duty done, and tomorrow I was going out for a job with a recommendation and a baby on the way.
The man read the letter, and swelled up, turning red, like some sort of human balloon. He turned rage-filled eyes at me, and, despite my greater size and strength, I made a show of raising my hands, and reminding him, 'Hey, don't shoot the messenger.' He lost some of his expanded girth, and he was now at least pink rather than crimson.
'Hey, Rocko,' he cried down to the warehouse.
Shocked that there were people actually named Rocko in the city, I watched a rather unimpressive bearer of that dubious name scuttle his way up to the room.
'Yeah, Carl?' For a moment I had been afraid the man went by Boss, or worse, Don.
'This enterprising young messenger boy,' Carl said, slowly, 'has delivered to me a missive from our associates. Please, take a look.'
Rocko took the offered letter, and read it. In marked contrast to his employer, he seemed to tighten as he read it, wind together like a spring tensing, the blood being forced from his features by the pressure, until, hands shaking, he hissed, 'Oh, do they?'
'I do believe, my dear Rocko, that we shall have to send them a letter expressing our displeasure.' Turning, he addressed me, 'boy, How much is it to send a letter or package?'
I quoted the rates purely from memory, adding 'But it's preferred you send it through our offi-'
'No need for that, my dear boy. I simply must have it delivered now. Of course, for your help in this matter, I would be remiss if I did not offer you an increased rate, would I not?' He then said a number that would pay my rent for the year. Church may have told me that death was the wages of sin, but apparently it paid its messengers handsomely. With only a hint of reluctance, I took the job.
Rocko then went down, and wrote a letter. Noting it had started raining, he put the letter into a backpack, took a stack of bills for my payment, put them also in the pack, and handed me the pack.
'Keep it, kid.' He nearly snarled. 'Just get the delivery done.'
I ran to my destination like the hounds of hell were barking at my heels, which, given the nature of my mission, they may have been. Twenty minutes later, I entered another warehouse, showed my messenger's hat, and said I had a letter for the boss.
I was shown into a room almost identical to the one I had come from, except the warehouse crew was unloading, and the man in charge a giant of a man named Jake.
'What's the message?' he asked around a cigar.
I opened the pack to get it for him, and a beep drew my attention down. Sitting under the letter and money was a brick. This brick had a pair of wires running to the sides of the metal zipper. I had one second to gaze stupidly at the set-up, and then my world turned into burning agony.
In that one, burning second, I realized I had been used, and my child would be raised without me. The sheer boiling rage searing my insides matched the fire destroying my outsides. I screamed to any power that could hear me, that I would do anything to make that fat bastard pay for this.
The burning stopped. For a moment, or maybe forever, there was only the sensation of nonsensation. Then a semblance of my senses returned. It was cold, and dark, and quiet. And a voice that matched the setting like a glove whispered, 'Anything?'
I looked, but there was nothing to be seen, darkness extending into unknown distances. Finally, I could stand the silence no more.
'Anything.'
There was another pause.
'Even give up life, and love, and joy?'
'Those things have been stolen from me.'
'And live only by hate and rage and wrath?' the voice hissed again
'Yes.'
'Then do you swear, by fire, soul, and steel, that thus is our bargain made?'
'What?'
'DO YOU SWEAR IT?'
'Yes.'
The voice was smiling now. 'Then burn again.'
If the first explosion had burned me, then what I felt now was ripping me apart. I couldn't take it anymore, I screamed with all my voice, cried out in unending agony and despair.
And sat up, gasping for air. I looked around me. I was on a soot-blackened concrete floor. The building I was in was burnt, charred, and fallen in on itself. I looked around, and it took me several minutes before, looking up and seeing wrenched and twisted supports, that I realized I was back in the warehouse. Looking around, I saw that some time must have passed, as the place was cold and there were no bodies to be seen.
I stepped out into the street, and was buffeted to the side. It was windy, people passing by ,their coats done up, their bodies bowed. I felt the force pushing me, but I couldn't feel the wind's gusts, nor its apparently bitter bite. A man, passing, glared, and muttered 'Cocky son-of-a-' as he walked past.
Looking down, I realized I was wearing only pants. My shirt and shoes were gone, and I stood on the concrete of the sidewalk in bare feet, shirtless in what was apparently cold weather. Weirdest of all, a serpentine grey pattern adorned my chest and arms, circling my body in its depicted coils
Suddenly, it struck me. I was alive! I could go home, and see my girl! We could keep trying! I only needed to go'¦which way? Which way was home? Well, that was silly, I could just call'¦why can't I remember her name? Wait, where am I? I can't remember the name of my this town. Is it mine? Well, I'll just look my self up in the phone book, right under'¦
I sat down heavily. My own name was gone. I had nothing. No family, no name, no home. What was I to do?
Then the coils burned red, and agony wracked my body. I saw the fat man, CARL, and that rat, ROCKO, and I realized, I had something. I had VENGEANCE. I traced the route back to their den flawlessly. But a great deal of time must have passed, as the warehouse was empty and barren. Walking out of it, a man with a knife jumped in front of me, demanding money. I walked past him, and a cold surge hit my left side.
Turning, I saw the man pull his knife out, sneering at me that he'd get it anyway. When rather than buckle, or stumble, I walked straight at him, his sneer fell, replaced by fear. Lashing out again and again with his knife, he was panicking now, and I wasn't stopping. I felt his blows, but like one would feel punches when one was already beaten numb. I lashed out with my fist, and he crumpled like a doll. Taking his coat and shoes, I left him, and started to search the city.
I don't know how long ago that was, but I've stolen two pairs of shoes since. Sometimes, the coils flare, and I see Rocko or Carl in some new place, and I hunt them. I'm getting close. Soon, this will all be over.