Let's Try That Again . . .

Chapter 2b

Digging his knuckles into his eye sockets and straining his already extended senses beyond their limits, Liam could almost swear he could now hear the soft whistle of breathing intermittently trickle down the short dim hallway which lead to the rest of the suite he had been occupying for the last two weeks. His thoughts drifted to the past seven months of furtive habitation in suite after dingy suite in dive after dilapidated dive. He tried to remember the last time he had managed to string together more than six hours of restful sleep, but only managed to come up with a memory of his 7^th birthday party. Transformer theme. That had been fun.

Savagely shaking his head and rubbing his knuckles across his scalp, Liam froze as a he heard a soft suppressed cough ricochet down the hallway. His adrenal glands found a new gear he thought might actually cause him to vomit as the invisible spear of excitement exploded in his gut and effervesced through his scalp and toe-nails. Backing away from his perch directly behind the thin partition, Liam eased his head towards the hall-ward side of the door, catching a peek at the stark gray hallway and darker still room that lay beyond. Nothing could be seen stirring from that vantage, but all hope that he was alone in the suite had utterly evaporated. Tightening his gut and wiping his right hand on his boxers before re-gripping the cool hard bookend, Liam eased the door fully open and strained his eyes on the hallway’s aperture into the rest of the suite. ‘Fortune favors the bold,’ he thought to himself as he felt his feet begin to pump, grimacing mouth holding back his breath, a levy struggling against a flash flood. As the short hallway whizzed jarringly by, against the dim sitting room ahead an inky profile swung suddenly out from the left-hand wall.

“Oh, shit!” was all the gravelly voiced silhouette was able to blurt out before Liam hit him full tilt. Wrenching the body towards his own with his free left hand, Liam felt his forehead make contact with the bridge of the strangers nose, and as the intruder reeled back under the initial blow a vicious roundhouse swing with the bookend dropped the thin-framed figure to the floor with a perfunctory thud.

His shoulders heaving, blinking fiercely in the aftermath of the encounter, Liam spotted a wicked looking black Beretta Px4 on the floor near the body. Quickly stepping towards it and toeing it out of arms reach, Liam gingerly skirted the prone figure to be able to pick the pistol up himself. The body on the floor lay still, looking almost comical face down with limbs akimbo. “Squashed spider!” Liam wanted to guess, but there were no other contestants playing charades and the man on the floor didn’t seem able to either confirm or deny his postulation.

Keeping his eyes glued on the crumpled mass splayed on the floor, Liam backed up until his groping hand found the light switch, flooding the scene a warm light from the tattered orange light fixture hanging from the center of the room's ceiling. Taking a closer look, Liam could see that his interloper was beginning to ooze blood from his head and nose, slowly adding his own scarlet circlet to the already riotously stained carpet.

Liam should search the guy and then. . .

a) Jet, leaving the body there

b) Finish the job with his new gun

c) Tie the guy up in a chair and wait for him to come around

d) Take off immediately, forget even searching th guy