Chapter 2: A Familiar Fury

Chapter 2: A Familiar Fury

The sun was a weak, watery orange filtering through the morning smog, not yet strong enough to burn off the night's chill. They had found a temporary sanctuary in a recessed doorway, the kind of urban alcove that smelled perpetually of urine and stale beer. It offered concealment from the main flow of pedestrian traffic on the bustling downtown street, a private theater from which to watch the 'ordinary folk' scurry to their ordinary lives. For Reg, it was a familiar perch. For their current purpose, it was the perfect place to wait.

Maggie’s Curios & Knick-Knacks wouldn’t open its steel-shuttered eyes for another hour.

“You think she’ll give us a hundred?” Toeless asked for the fifth time, his voice a low, nervous hum. He shifted his weight, the subtle scrape of his shoe a constant rhythm of his impatience. He needed a cigarette, Reg knew, but they were down to their last crushed pack, reserved for after the score.

“She’ll give us what she’ll give us,” Reg grunted, his gaze fixed on a businessman striding by, talking loudly into his phone. “Don’t look desperate. Maggie can smell desperation a block away. It drops the price by half.”

“I’m not desperate, I’m… anticipatory,” Toeless said, a ghost of a smirk on his dirt-smudged face. “Let me see it again.”

Reg hesitated. The statuette was a solid, cold weight in his inner pocket. Ever since they’d fled the alley, the object’s presence felt less like a lucky charm and more like a heavy secret. The memory of that blank, featureless face sent a shiver through him that had nothing to do with the morning air. But the kid was vibrating with nervous energy. Better to let him focus on the potential prize than on the lingering fear of the security guard.

He pulled the effigy out. In the daylight, it was even more unsettling. The milky crystal seemed to absorb the weak sunlight, giving it a sickly, internal glow. The red veins looked disturbingly organic, like capillaries in a severed limb.

Toeless took it with a reverence that was almost comical, his grimy hands cradling it as if it were a holy relic. “Man, look at the detail. This has gotta be worth a fortune. Some rich weirdo’s collection.” He turned it over and over, his eyes tracing the lines of the faces frozen in their eternal emotions. The weeping sorrow, the wide-eyed terror. He was dreaming of steak dinners and new boots, of a week where the gnawing in his stomach was a memory instead of a constant companion.

Reg watched him, a sliver of that same desperate hope cutting through his own cynicism. Maybe this was it. Maybe their luck had finally turned.

Then, Toeless went still.

His breath hitched. The greedy excitement in his eyes evaporated, replaced by a profound confusion. He held the statuette up, tilting it in the light.

“What’s wrong?” Reg asked, his own body tensing in response.

“Reg…” Toeless’s voice was a whisper. “This… this is messed up.”

“What are you talking about? Don’t drop it.”

“No, man, look.” He held it out, his hand trembling slightly. He pointed a dirt-caked finger at one of the faces. “The angry one.”

Reg leaned in, squinting. It was the face of pure rage he’d seen in the alley, the mouth pulled back in a silent snarl, the brows knotted in fury. He didn’t see anything different. “It’s the same as it was. You’re getting spooked.”

“No, it’s not,” Toeless insisted, his voice rising with a frantic edge. “Look at it. Really look at it.”

Annoyed, Reg snatched the statuette from him. He held it close to his face, his patience wearing thin. The kid’s nerves were getting the better of him. He was about to tell him to pull himself together when his own blood ran cold.

The light caught the carving just right, illuminating details he hadn’t noticed in the dark alley. The nose on the enraged face wasn’t just any nose. It was his nose. The unmistakable, slightly crooked hook of it, broken twice in his army days. The lines around the snarling mouth were the same lines he saw in his rare, cracked reflection. And there, almost invisible but undeniably present, was the faint white line of a scar through the left eyebrow, a memento from a piece of shrapnel in Fallujah.

It wasn't just a face contorted in rage. It was his face. A perfect, miniature sculpture of him at his absolute worst.

A wave of vertigo washed over him. It was impossible. A trick of the light. A coincidence.

“What did you do?” Reg’s voice came out as a low growl.

“Me? I didn’t do anything!” Toeless stammered, taking a step back. “It just… it changed!”

“Changed?” Reg’s suspicion, a honed and razor-sharp instinct for survival, curdled into paranoia. “Stones don’t just change, kid. Is this a joke? Did you swap it out when I wasn’t looking?”

“Swap it out? With what? Are you crazy?” Toeless’s eyes were wide with genuine fear and hurt. “I’ve been with you the whole time! I swear, Reg, it looked different in the alley. It was just some angry guy before.”

Reg wasn’t listening. His mind was racing, trying to find a logical explanation, but the streets had taught him that logic was a luxury. Betrayal was the common currency. Maybe the kid had found two of these things. Maybe this was some elaborate prank. But why? For what? The anger swelled in his chest, hot and blinding. It felt… familiar. It felt like the rage carved into the stone.

“Don’t lie to me,” he snarled, advancing on Toeless, backing him against the cold brick wall. The city flowed past their alcove, a river of oblivious people. No one saw the desperate, quiet war being waged in the doorway.

“I’m not lying!”

“You’re telling me this thing magically carved my face onto it?” Reg shoved the effigy under Toeless’s nose. “Look at it! It’s a perfect copy! How?”

He grabbed the front of Toeless’s thin jacket, balling the fabric in his fist. For a terrifying second, he wanted to smash the kid’s head against the wall. The urge was so strong, so violent, it shocked him. It wasn’t his usual frustration; this was a black, consuming fury, an echo of the face in his hand.

Toeless flinched, but he didn’t look away. Tears welled in his eyes, born of fear and indignation. “I don’t know how, Reg! I swear on my life! Why would I lie to you? You’re all I’ve got!”

The kid’s raw, terrified honesty cut through the red haze in Reg’s mind. He was right. Toeless was reckless, impulsive, and a pain in the ass, but he was loyal to a fault. He wouldn’t do this. He couldn’t do this.

Reg’s grip loosened. He stumbled back, the unnatural rage receding, leaving him shaky and ashamed. He looked down at the statuette again, his hand now trembling as much as Toeless’s had been.

It was undeniably him. The cold, hard truth was carved in stone.

He slowly rotated the object. The face of sorrow. The face of terror. They were still strangers, their agony generic. He flipped it to the fourth face. The blank, smooth, waiting face.

A new, more terrifying thought began to form. The statuette wasn't a prize. It wasn't a ticket out. It was something else. Toeless hadn't been lying. It had changed. This cold, silent thing in his hand had watched him in the alley, had seen the flash of anger as he shoved past the security guard, and it had… copied it. It had stolen his face and immortalized his fury.

The bustling noise of the city seemed to recede to a distant hum. The world shrank until it was just him, Toeless, and the monstrous little object that knew his face. The hope of a big score, of a warm meal and a safe night, was dead. In its place, a cold, specific dread began to grow. This thing wasn't just valuable. It was watching them. And it was learning.