Pak's Turn
The car was rolling in space, momentarily disconnected from gravity and become a whirling turbine of broken glass, spare change, loose dirt, and globules of blood. Pak pondered one of the crimson orbs as it passed in front of his eyes, and he swore he could see himself reflected in its shimmering surface. It was like looking into infinity, he thought, because he could see himself seeing himself, repeated an uncountable number of times, there in that moment, a mirror in front of a mirror in front of a mirror.
He wondered what the point of it all was, and he supposed that was the appropriate thought to be having at that time. How he could have fought so hard for his life, all the bullets he‘d dodged, all the enemies he’d put down. So many dogs had torn at his throat, and he’d euthanized every last one of them. A mountain of corpses. For it all to end like it was, in a car flipping trunk over hood down a highway embankment, seemed almost silly. Ridiculous, even. He’d never thought that he’d die with any regrets, but as the horizon spun in front of the shattered windscreen, he realized he had one. He regretted struggling so hard to stay alive. It would have been far easier to let Lonny Yong’s men gun him down all those years ago when he’d first come to Kowloon to make a name for himself.
He wanted to sigh, but he found he couldn’t draw breath, then the broken frame through which he’d been watching the world spin crumpled, and he flew into a profound darkness.
First draft: 140916
Published: 230512