Lily Livingstone had an obsession of sorts with the macabre. This was no new phenomenon; the dark and depraved had always appealed to her on some level. For as long as she could remember there was an itch in the back of her head, some clawing sensation deep down on the most primitive portion of her lizard brain that would only be sated with sights of violence. She'd become an avid voyeur at a young age, hardly able to contain her glee while watching news reports of butchery and mayhem.

Consequently, she'd spent more than enough time in and out of therapist's offices in her twenty-one years on this planet. They were nothing to her. Meant absolutely nothing. Just a formality, a routine. Charm nameless, faceless, interchangeable doctors until they were absolutely certain she was better. Whatever that meant. Then the cycle'd repeat when she let her guard down around the wrong person, let the mask slip and show the monster underneath.

This was her life; nothing more than a balancing act. Which wasn't to say she didn't enjoy it. It was thrilling. Dangerous. Compelling in all the ways the normal life her parents sought for her wasn't.

Despite her infatuation with violence, with death and decay and all the colors inbetween, little did her mind wander to thoughts of committing violence. An aside glance at a knife inspired her to slice open mother's throat no more than it would in any normal person. Something she learned in one of the many therapy sessions must have clicked, she reasoned during one intoxicated hour in which she pondered the person she was and would always be.

Then she met him. Stunted, scrawny, stuffed into a cheap, garish suit. Despite his size, he stood like a giant looking down at the ants by his feet. Their eyes only met once in that moment, a chance encounter. Two wayward souls crossing by the other on a busy Lexington sidewalk, and in the blink of an eye they'd diverged once more. Two paths doomed to run parallel for eternity. Or, at least, that's how it was supposed to be.

Of course, reality hardly plays out as it's supposed to.

It didn't take long for Lily to see the striking stranger again. Only a couple days of listless purgatory before he revealed himself once more, this time quite literally showing up at her front door. Still wrapped in that awful pinstriped affair he gallivanted around in as if it were Armani. He stuttered and mumbled his unprepared sales pitch to gain entrance to her home, but she didn't listen to a word of it, mindlessly ushering him in while keeping her eyes focused on his


"Who the fuck is Ghost Tank to you?"

Abaddon paused for a moment, eyes fixed on his protege. Behind the burlap mask he grinned.

"An acquaintance."

Lilith sighed, placing her hands on her hips. That was an answer she'd heard countless times before. An acquaintance. A friend. A guy who knows a guy. Something similar. She couldn't help but wonder however, as the list of friends and acquaintances and contacts grew ever higher, why they were still here. Here being a rathole hotel room in Ciudad Juarez. Why the owner's corpse, butchered and beaten tender was still in his office. Maggot food.

Of course, this was their element. He wouldn't trade it for a million bucks, and neither would she. They were the law. In the land of the lawless, might makes right, he'd always say. To that end, they threw their chips in with the real movers and shakers. Mexico's real government; not the legislators in exile.

"Sure do got a lot of friends."

"Always good to amicable, ain't it?"

Couple months ago

Jorge Orazco was going to die. There were no two ways about it. He knew this the second the pair stepped into his office; a figure cloaked in black except for a blood stained burlap sack covering his face and a scantily-clad blonde donned in obnoxious clown makeup. He'd heard of them. They didn't have names, at least none that he'd heard, but their presence in Juarez spread quickly by word of mouth in the city's many slums.

The black figure approached Jorge's desk, licking his lips behind the sack, and laid both of his hands out on the oak.

"You know who I am, amigo?"

Jorge's eyes went wide and he stammered despite himself.

"Don't think he speaks the language."

The clown woman giggled maniacally at the observation while the man in black tugged on Jorge's necktie, pulling the portly, balding manager down towards the desk. Jorge began to shout gibberish phrases in Spanish, interchanging pleas to God with vicious profanities at his soon-to-be killers. The figure in black chuckled at Jorge's outburst, even going so far as to loosen his death grip on the poor fuck's tie.

Jorge straightened himself out, awkwardly attempting to join in on the laughter before getting cut off with a punch to the face, courtesy of the clown woman. He stumbled backwards, stumbling over his swiveling office chair and collapsing to the wooden floor.

"What's so funny, eh? Know something we don't?"

Rubbing his jaw, Jorge stared silently, incredulously at the woman.

"That's what I thought."

She reached into the waistband of her shorts and produced a small, black pistol. With a wild grin on her face she looked over at the figure in black, who nodded. Jorge could feel it; this was it. They were going to kill him, that much was certain. But he wasn't going to let them win.

"Any last words?"

She leaned in close, stepping around the oak desk to come face-to-face with the soon-to-be corpse that spit at her. A glob of slimy mucus dribbled down her cheek and her eyes widened in anger and her mouth dropped open in disgust. She recoiled quickly, wiping the dripping spit off of her.

"Dumb motherfucker!"

She whipped back around and fired at the floor, the bullet drilling through Jorge's right hand. He yelped in pain and thrashed wildly on the floor. She approached closer and stomped on his left arm, pinning it in place as she lined up her next shot. She pulled the trigger and another bang erupted through the room. Another bullet through Jorge's hand. Now both hands, bleeding and suddenly so hollow, laid on the floor as beads of sweat began dripping down Jorge's face.

"I was gonna let you off easy you shit."

She dropped down, pressing the gun right into Jorge Orozco's crotch.

"Now you're gonna suffer."

She smiled wide at him as she pulled the trigger. She smiled wider than she ever had before. Sure, this was business on some level, but how did that saying go again?

If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life.