I am a shark. The ultimate predator.
I smell the blood, hear the thrashing. It cannot escape.
But neither can I.
I kill to survive. I will never see anyone as more than food.

I am a force of nature. Unstoppable.
All who try to tame me will be swept away.
All who try to oppose me will be crushed.
And yet I’m indifferent.

Somewhere in eastern Russia...

[Red text is in Russian]
[Blue text is in Dutch]

“WHERE IS HE!?!”

“I already told you, I don’t know!"

“LIAR! You covered his tracks! I know you did!” I pulled out my gun and pressed it to his temple. “Motherfucker, if you don’t tell me where Nekrov is, I’ll give this alley another layer of graffiti.”

“Alright, alright, just put the gun away, man!” The gun twitched away from his head, but didn’t leave it. “You have to promise me something, first.”

He swallowed once. “I want protection. If he knew I ratted him out he’d gut me where I stand. Literally.”

I holstered the pistol and said, “You speak of him like he’s a common gang boss. He’s not. Ever since he slipped away from me, he’s been engaging in heinous acts that betray the friends he once had and the man he once was.” I stepped back from the painted-up wall I’d been pinning the poor man to. “Protection granted. I ask again, where is Dmitri Nekrov?”

“Last time I heard from him, he was coming after you.”

“Yes, I know this. Anything else?”

“I’m no longer quite sure he’s sane. He keeps talking about his wife, how he’s cooking dinner for her, but he never cooks his own meals.”

“His wife? Hm...”

“Yes. Whoever she was, she must have made the sex to him real good, because he-” The informant was interrupted by a knife to the throat. And not mine.

“You will not speak this way about Svetlana.”

I caught the man before he fell to the floor. The knife had stabbed into his jugular vein; There would be no saving him. I set the poor sod gently on the ground before facing his killer, A tall, brown-haired man, who would have seemed innocent if not for the fact that he was bristling with weapons. A pair of cold, intelligent blue eyes flashed behind his glasses.

I pulled my badge from my coat. “Dr. Dmitri Nekrov, you are under arrest for arson, cannibalism, petty theft, theft, murder, assaulting an officer, killing an officer of the law, crimes against the state, possession of child pornography, rape, possession of drugs, possession of illegal weapons, possession of industrial-grade chemicals without a permit, armed robbery, illegal drug sales, kidnap, treason, uttering and publishing a forgery, carrying a concealed weapon, breaking and entering with intent, prostitution, conspiracy, organised crime, tampering with evidence, defacing public property, defacing a cadaver, necrophilia... Need I go on, Dmitri? You know what you did.”

“You forgot embezzlement and torture.”

“Fuck you, man! How can you do these things? You used to be one of the good guys!”

He spun his twin qamas, short, triangular blades for which he was known, as he answered. “What can hurt a man so badly that he doesn’t know who he is anymore? What can make him forget who he’s fighting for? I will tell you: A woman.”

“What, you think Svetlana would want this? People are DEAD, Dmitri! Dead, scarred or mutilated because of YOU! Innocent people with families and dreams of their own!”

“Their sacrifices were not in vain, Sebastian. Hell, they brought you to me! If you came, maybe Svetty will, too!”

“Dmitri, you and I both know that’s not going to happen.”

“What you think is not important. If all those crimes did not bring her back to me, capturing you surely will. Come quietly, and you will not be hurt.”

“One: You stole my line. Two: Fuck that shit.” I drew my pistol.

“So be it. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He stopped spinning his qamas and, without warning hurled them both at me.

Qamas One 12.21 feet away, traveling 91.08 feet per second.
Adjust aim 28 degrees left, 2 degrees up. Pull trigger.
Qamas Two 6.04 feet away, traveling 90.60 feet per second.

Adjust aim 40 degrees right, 5 degrees down. Pull trigger.

Blam!
Blam!

Both qamas skittered across the alleys floor with dents in the blades. “It’s just like you, Dmitri, to bring a knife to a gunfight, and still expect to win.”

“It’s just like you, Sebastian, to arrive without backup.” I felt a thick finger of Thug One tap me on the shoulder, and a metallic click as Thug Two primed a rifle of some sort.

“You mean the two large men who have been doing their best to sneak up behind me since we started talking?”

I spun and knocked the muscular arm out of the way, twisting it around mine into a backwards arm-lock. Thug Two had an AK trained on me, apparently as a form of intimidation. At this range the weapon would be ineffective, and also I cannot be intimidated. Using the pistol still in my hand, I put a round into one of the Molotov cocktails on his belt, which ignited and turned him into a living fireball.

In this commotion, I stomped Thug One’s foot, causing him to open his maw and unleash a powerful roar, and giving me the opportunity to spin out of the lock, shove my gun down his throat, and pull the trigger. The bullet tore through the back of his neck and into Thug Two’s eye. I then elevated my aim forty-five degrees and fired again, severing Thug One’s spine.

“Quite the backup you have there. I have to give them a little credit though, my ears are ringing from their screaming.”

Dmitri seemed legitimately pissed off. He unslung his PP-19 Bizon, a compact Russian submachine gun that he was known to fire in a single hand, while at the same time unsheathing his sablya, a sort of curved cavalry sabre. “You are making a grave mistake, Sebastian. You didn’t beat me before, and you won’t now.”

“I let you go once, Dmitri, because you were my friend. I couldn’t bring myself to put a bullet between your eyes when I had the chance. I made the mistake of thinking you were still the man I knew. I rarely make mistakes twice.” I unsheathed my knife and took a fighting stance, gun in my left, knife on my right.

“We will fight, then. So be it.” He raised his gun. I spun around as he fired his first burst, the Kevlar of my combat coat taking the brunt of the attack. I’d have plenty of bruises later, but I wasn’t dead. Continuing my spin and flowing smoothly into a brisk run that brought me in too close for his sabre to be effective, I thrust my knife at him, aiming for his heart. He caught my wrist and flung a knee at my groin, which I countered by wrapping my leg around his, pinning it. Then, he headbutted me.

He seemed to have forgotten that my skull was made of titanium-wrapped, bonded ceramic, and that my brain is cushioned by a thick layer of microfiber mesh. He rocked backwards like he’d decided to french-kiss a brick wall.

Allow me to explain: My time is very valuable. Not just to me, but to my employers. In my line of work, I get injured quite often, as you can see. Any time spent in the hospital is wasted time. So we came up with a compromise; anytime I hurt myself, they pay to... upgrade me. Say I break my arm. Rather than spending six months to let it heal naturally, They would have the doctors remove the entire bone and replace it with a super-strong ceramic substitute filled with ‘donated’ marrow to prevent reactions. And, as I said, I am injured quite often.

“Ouch. I forgot about that.” He stated simply as he stumbled backward in a daze. I wasted no time yanking his gun out of his hands and tossing it aside. I shoved my own weapon into his face, the barrel tickling the tip of his nose. My finger tightened on the trigger.

“Say goodbye, Dmitri.”

“Goodbye, Dmitri.” He seemed to snap out of it, as a mischievous smile crossed his face. Suddenly, faster than I’ve known him to be, his sword whipped up and sliced me on the arm. I dropped my gun and backpedaled. He just stood there with that infuriating smirk on his face as I inspected my wound.

The cut was deep. It went straight down to my space-age ceramic bone. He wasn’t just trying to wound me or make me drop my gun.

He was trying to cut it off.

He tried to cut off my favorite arm. I felt him rising up in me.

How dare he!? I will kill him!

No. This will be difficult enough without you interfering.

You can’t finish this without me.

Yes I can. When I put him down, it will be me behind the wheel. I actually care about him.

Despite my every effort, a little bit of his personality creeped into me, and my accent slipped slightly, becoming more guttural and deep.

“You will pay for that, Dmitri. You will pay for that, and every other wound you have caused anyone, EVER!” And with that, I charged him. Fueled by nothing but berserker rage and armed with nothing but a flimsy standard-issue combat knife, I slashed at his face again and again. He backpedaled out of my way, narrowly avoiding my wild slices, his pitiful attempts at blocking were almost laughable beneath my assault.

Finally, he managed to lock me with his saber. No matter which way I pushed, no matter how hard, I couldn’t break it. He’d always been stronger than me. We were locked, nose to scarred, crooked nose. I looked into his eyes. I saw the triumph: He thought he had won. But I also saw the pain:

He thought he was alone.

He still cares.

We can’t afford to think like that.

But we must, or we will become him.

He still must die.

Yes.

I couldn’t beat him directly. So I did the only thing a desperate man could do: I kneed my former best friend in the balls.

He recovered quickly, but I’d broken the lock long enough to gain the upper hand. Kicking up off the alley wall, I flipped over him and put my arm around his neck. Pressing my knife into the sweet spot in his back, where I could sever his spine and stab him in the heart in a single thrust, I whispered in his ear, “I win.”

“Not... quite...” He reached into his coat pocket with his free hand and I heard a soft beep. He then pulled out a small throwaway phone and held it at arms length. I could hear the smile in his voice. “I’ve had an ace up my sleeve the whole time.”

“A shitty disposable Wal-mart phone? I’m so scared.”

“I was hoping I could beat you fairly, but I had a backup plan just in case.”

“If you don’t start making sense, I’m going to kill you just to shut you up.”

“Perhaps that wouldn’t be the best idea. If I let go of this button, the poor little children of Anzhelinas Angelic Day Care will be getting home slightly later than expected.”

I let go of him and stepped back, shocked. He continued. “Last night I had some of my boys rig up a little... surprise. If I drop this phone, all those kiddies go back to their mommies and daddies in tiny, black sleeping bags.”

I looked into his eyes. He has stolen, cheated, and killed, but he has never lied. He would kill those kids if he had to.

He must die.

It’s not worth it.

I set my knife on the ground and kicked it toward him.

“Alright, Dmitri. You win. What do you want?”

“Oh, nothing special. I just want to enjoy a nice, cold drink with my best buddy.” From his coat he pulled a silver-plated flask and a pair of shot glasses, which he then expertly filled.

“What are you playing at, Dmitri?” He said nothing, and offered me one of the glasses. I took it with no other choice. I was about to down it when he stopped me.

“Hold on, Sebastian. I know how you like your drinks strong.” He dropped a pill into my shot that quickly dissolved. He held up his glass. “To old friends.”

“To old friends.” I repeated as we clinked our shots together and downed them. The scowl didn’t leave my face as the darkness crept over me.

“Don’t worry, Sebastian, I will take good care of you. That’s what friends are for!”

Wake up. Wake up, damn you!

“Uuuungggh....” I shifted on the cold, hard floor. My head was pounding, and my stomach churned. I ached down to my very bones.

“Awake already? Hmm... I guess I didn’t make the dosage strong enough. No matter.” My eyes were glued shut with pain and dried tears, but I felt myself being dragged by my wrists. The chafing implied very thick hemp. My weight shifted and I felt myself being hung up by my bonds, then a loud metallic grinding as I was hoisted into the air. The movement brought my nausea to a piercing point, and the contents of my stomach spilled out into the world again.

“Ugh, Sebastian, now, look at the mess you made!” I heard a soft clattering behind me.

I finally managed to crack open my eyes. There was a large contrast in the lighting, a few flood lamps illuminating certain places, whereas everywhere else was bathed in darkness. With effort, I turned my head around to take in my surroundings. Very soft light filtered in through large windows up near the ceiling. It was dusk, I’d only been out for a few hours. I appeared to be in a meat processing plant of some sort. Hunched figures in cages and meat hooks lined the walls. Conveyers in the floor led off to who-knows-where.

The ringing in my ears subsided and I could hear plaintive cries all around me, men, women, children.

“What’s going on!?!”

“I want my Mommy!”

All those people he’d kidnapped to lead me to him. He’d taken them here. It all makes sense, now. He’d known I’d cross-reference the pattern of the kidnappings to deduce his location, so he’d hidden the evidence far away from the crime scene. It had been a trap this whole time.

Dmitri has been planning this for a long time.

“Here, you have something on your face.” Dmitri appeared before me with a wet rag, and began wiping my face with it. After that, he bent down and cleaned up the floor. It was then that I noticed my pants were down. My nether regions felt sticky and sore. Dmitri looked up and noticed the horror in my eyes.

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself. You look so innocent when you sleep.”

The voices echoed in my head.

Too far gone.

Too far gone.

Too far gone.

“Too far gone.” I gurgled through the phlegm in my throat. He finished up and tossed the rag into a corner. I shook my head to clear it.

“What was that?”

Break him.

“Svetlana’s dead, Dmitri.”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. “No... Why would you say such a silly thing? She... just got lost on her way... home from... work...”

“That’s what you think? She got lost? For SIX MONTHS? I saw the report, YOU saw the report, her car crashed in the lake! Then you went on a rampage and tried to kill everyone!” As I distracted him with this I analyzed the space around me and formed a plan.

“No... She got lost...” He turned toward me. “But I’ll make sure she has a nice dinner waiting for her when she gets home.”

“SHE’S NOT COMING HOME, DMITRI! I SAW THE BODY!”

He didn’t seem to hear me. He instead turned and flashed me a manic grin. “Before you serve food, you should always taste it.”

He approached me and stuck his thumb in my eye. It was so sudden, I didn’t react for a moment. A heartbeat later, I was screaming louder than I have ever screamed in my life. My vision went red and I felt something tear. I opened my good eye just in time to see Dmitri pop its brother into his mouth and chew. After a few agonizing seconds, he swallowed.

“Hm. Salty.”

Kill him. Kill him kill him kill him killhimkillhimkillhimkillhim!

He was close now. Close enough. I let the voices flow past the floodgate in my mind and take over. I’m not strong enough to do it alone. My body spasmed uncontrollably.

“Sebastian?”

My voice was deeper and my accent changed. “Sorry, Sebastian had to... step out for a moment. My name is Stefan, may I take a message?”

Before he could answer, I did a pull-up and firmly planted my feet on either of his shoulders. Kicking backwards, I freed myself from the meat hook I’d been hung on. Jumping up, I kicked him in the face, knocking his glasses off, did a backflip and stuck the landing. Wasting no time, I closed the distance between us and punched him in the gut, bending him over at the waist. I flung my knee up into his chest, then grabbed his hips and tombstoned him into the concrete floor. Standing and stepping back, I searched for a weapon to finish him with.

He recovered quicker than I expected, and was on his feet a moment later. He stumbled to a nearby control panel and pulled a lever. A loud, keening engine activated and the conveyors chittered to life. The victims in the cages stirred to life as well, as they shouted for help and attempted to escape. Dmitri stood and coughed. He pulled a knife from his belt and tossed it to me. I caught it deftly and looked back at him.

“You think you can beat me?” He shouted over the engine and clattering, as he unsheathed a knife of his own. “Those conveyors lead to the steamers! In moments, those people will be boiling in their own skin! Choose now, Sebastian! Killing me...

...or saving them.”

Judging by the sound of the engine, it is a Model 3 IdtiBystro, which has a 3000 rpm. divided by the gear flux, subtract the weight, times the number of people to factor in drag.

We have two minutes.

In answer, I shrugged. “¿Por qué no podemos tener las dos cosas?”

Then I charged. We brought our knives up, and they met. I blocked his thrust and rocked him in the jaw with my unbreakable knuckles. I ducked and spun, giving him an elbow to the gut. in the same spin, I wrapped my arm around his neck and poked him lightly in the shoulder blades with my knife. I said nothing this time.

“You’re not going to kill me, Sebastian.” I could hear the smirk in his voice again. Then, he gasped as I slowly, almost intimately, sank the blade into his back.

“I’m not Sebastian.”

I let go of him and he fell to his knees. I quickly dashed to the control panel and shut down the conveyors with still a minute and a half to spare. There were sighs of relief from Dmitris captives, but my concerns were not for them. As Stefan’s influence bled out of me, I realised the gravity of what I’d just done. I’d killed my best friend.

I heard him cough wetly behind me. I turned and walked to his side.

“Sebastian?” He asked softly.

“Yes, Dmitri, I’m here now.”

“I’m sorry about your eye.”

“I forgive you.”

“... I’m sorry about everything.”

“I’m sorry, too, Dmitri.”

I gently leaned him back so I could look into his eyes. I saw the man I used to love staring back at me. I felt a tear come to my remaining eye as I embraced him. His voice was barely a whisper.

“I miss her, Sebastian.”

“Me too.”

“Could you sing for me, Sebastian? She used to sing to me when I was sad.”

“I will.” I swallowed and sang to him from the deepest recesses of my heart. To this day, I don’t understand why Dmitri did the things he did, only that he needed to be stopped. But he was a kind, caring man, who always stood up for what was right. It was no wonder Svetlana loved him.

He was also my best friend, and I loved him like a brother. He deserved better than this.

“So many times I asked myself,
What for I was born into this world and grew up,
And why the clouds float and rains pour.
You shouldn't expect anything for yourself in this world.

I would fly up to the clouds but I have no wings.
That starlight lures me from afar,
But it's hard to reach the star though the goal is close at hand,
And I don't know if I'll have enough strength for the throw.

I'll wait just a little bit more,
And then will get ready for my journey,

Towards the Dream and Hope.
Oh my star, please don't burn out, just wait!

How many paths do I have to go by?
How many peaks should I conquer to find my own self?
How long should I keep falling from the cliff?
How many times should I start from the beginning and is there any sense to it?

I'll wait just a little bit more,
And then will get ready for my journey,
Towards the Dream and Hope
Oh my star, please don't burn out, just waït!”

“That was beautiful, Sebastian.” A tear rolled down his cheek, though he was smiling. “You should be a star, yourself.”

“Thank you, Dmitri. That means a lot to me.”

He shuddered and his smile faded. “Can you take it out?”

“The knife?”

“Yes. Take it out, please.”

“But then...” I realised that was what he wanted. “I understand.”

“Thank you.”

I tenderly wrapped my fingers around the handle in his back and slid the blade out. There was a short pause before his life-blood began to flow freely out onto the cold, concrete floor. He smiled as Death’s embrace began to take hold.

“Wake me... when Svetlana comes home.” His eyes closed and he took his last breath.

A hot tear landed on his still-warm face. “I will.”

I set his body gently on the floor and pressed down the communicator in my ear lobe. “Nest, this is Cobra, reporting. Target has been neutralized, over.”

“Copy, Cobra, what’s your status?”

“Injured, but alive. There are multiple civilians being held captive. I’m going to do my best to free them, over.”

“Copy that, Cobra, we’re on our way. Nest out.”

After breaking into the office, I found a set of keys, a rag to stuff into my eye-hole, and my pistol. Through a very tiring effort, I managed to free all of the hostages. They ranged from an elderly couple, to a ten-year-old boy, to a young woman who seemed to think of me as her knight in shining armor, and many others. That was why he was so difficult to track, his crimes had had no pattern, no rhyme or reason to them. I checked all of the exits, but they’d all been barricaded or welded shut. Dmitri hadn’t planned on anyone escaping.

We would have to wait for help to come, and I didn’t know if I’d last that long. The small, but deep wound on my arm and my missing eye were beginning to take a toll on me. After a short time, I collapsed into the young womans arms and passed out.

I awoke to my partner, Donovan Vex, slapping me in the face.

“Hey, I guess that doesn’t just work in the movies.”

“Ach, fuck you, Donovan. I was having a good dream.”

“Looks like you’re the one who got fucked, my friend.” He seemed genuinely relieved I was okay.

He helped me up and I looked around. Soldiers and operatives were tending to the hostages and cleaning up the mess Dmitri made. The girl I’d saved approached us. I noticed that, now that the danger was gone, my damsel in distress was looking at me differently, in the ‘I want to jump your bones’ way. I smiled at her.

“Hello. I’m Anya.”

“Good evening. My name is Sebastian.”

“Listen, Sebastian, I don’t know how I can repay you for saving my life.”

“You need not worry, Anya. It is all part of the job. Though you’re welcome to try when I get out of the hospital.” I waggled my eyebrows at her, and she giggled. Donovan, who didn’t speak Russian, disregarded this and turned to me.

“So, Sebastian, what happened to your eye?”

“You don’t want to know, Donny. Let’s just say, I need a strong drink and a good woman.” I grabbed Anya around the waist and kissed her passionately.

“One down, one to go.”

Author's Note

Ik ben terug, Klootzakken! You know what they say, "When life gives you shitty computer problems, make lemonade!" Or maybe I'm paraphrasing...
Anyway, gaze ye upon it and be amazed: The Case File! A look into Zeeslang's life before Equestria. Expect violence, gore, drama, and sex, though not necessarily in that order. If anything's going to make me have to change the ratings, it's going to be these babies.
In an unrelated side-note, I'm looking for songs for our favorite illustrious sea-serpent to belt out with extreme prejudice. If you know any ballads, lullabies, serenades, or just something with crazy vocals, send me a PM with a link and maybe I'll stick it in there!
~PEACE