Aster Javian's Apartment
He had entered the city under the cover of darkness, bypassing military patrols who had declared martial law in L.A. after recent events. The most notable of those being the Disney Massacre. Of course, it's not as if he required for it to be dark already, but it was already late when he had eventually arrived from New York and Karma had seen no reason to wait until dawn to pass through the military check points.
That was nearly a full day ago. Now he stood in the doorway to his brother's penthouse. His eyes cold and searching, taking in the scene that was where his brother had lived for roughly four years. The place was a mess. It looked as if it hadn't been lived in for months, or if it had, the person living here had been living like a squatter.
Karma stepped over the threshold, only to be greeted by a repulsive stench. The source of which seemed to be coming from behind a closed door. A door which undoubtedly lead to the bedroom, seeing that the rest of the apartment was open planned, except for the bathroom which he could see was vacant by the door being left slightly ajar.
He strode forward, worried thoughts slowly creeping into his mind. Thoughts about Aster. He stopped then and pulled out a hastily folded piece of paper from his coat pocket. He unfolded it, gazing again at the screenshot he'd printed weeks prior of a grey-haired man standing on top of the Disney Concert Hall, a large spear of light in his hand, preparing to launch it down into a large crowd of people. But even despite today's technology, the best resolution he could get still hadn't given him a clear view of the man's face. Whoever had taken this photo and uploaded it to the web had clearly used something resembling a potato. But even then the videos were the same. No matter how hard he looked, there wasn't a single clear shot of the man's face. Still, he had to know.
Placing the picture back into his pocket, he walked over to the closed door and reached for the handle. Twisting it, without success, informed him that the door had been locked but there was no key to be found. A small sigh escaped him before Karma dropped his right shoulder and barreled his weight into the weak point of the door, busting it open and splintering the frame. A wave of revulsion swept over him as the smell grew instantly more pungent and the source was revealed to him. To a normal person, the current scene would have been something you'd only ever seen in movies. Unfortunately for Karma, this was nothing new.
On the bed lay two bodies. One of them, a girl. Blonde hair, pale skin and fake breasts. She was completely naked except for her crystal-studded heels that she still wore. She was dead, easily confirmed by her wide open eyes and vacant expression. Deep purple bruises covered her neck and had flared around her wrists. He quickly noticed the hypodermic needle still injected into her arm. Not murder then.
The other body was that of a man, much older than the girl. He lay in his briefs, bruises covered his body too and a curtain rope tie was still wrapped around his neck. But there was no needle. He could also see the very small rise fall of the man's chest. Karma walked over to him, seeing his face for the first time. Relief washed over him as he found that he didn't recognize the man. So what was he doing in his brother's apartment with a dead whore and enough drugs to send an elephant into space. Mild anger flourished inside him now, and where the hell was Aster?
__________
Karma couldn't tell if it was the coldness of the water or the multiple cubes of ice slamming into his face that woke the unknown man. Who was now yelling in protest and gazing around wildly at his current predicament. Waking up after a drug binge, tied to a chair in nothing but your boxers seemed to be a rather tame way of coming to these days, but Karma hadn't had the time, or the patience, to be too creative.
"What the fuck man, are you serious?!" The man shouted, still groggy from the substances that resided in his system. Karma stayed silent, however, and just stared at the man. If looks could kill, then whoever this pathetic excuse for a human being was would have been skinned alive by the glare that Karma gave him. It took the man a little longer to comprehend the situation.
"Okay, fun's over. What the hell is going-" His next words caught in his throat and his eyes widened. He heart rate increased, made noticeable by the rapid breathing he was now subjected to. The look on his face was that of recognition, followed quickly by fear.
"I'm going to ask you this once and once only." Karma stated. His ice cold demeanour silencing the man's exasperated breaths.
"Look, I'm sorry! I-I-I know I fucked up and I was s-s-supposed to bring him to meet you but h-he just wouldn-" Karma slapped him then, instantly silencing him except for an audible wince of pain. He had put on his black leather gloves before moving the man into the open planned area of the apartment, refusing to touch his skin directly lest he catch something.
"I'm talking. If you interrupt me again, I'll cut your eye out." His threat was backed up solely by the tone of his voice but it was enough, the man nodded silently and Karma moved back towards to wall, leaning upon it casually.
"Now, where is Aster?"
"I-I don't know, I haven't seen him in weeks! The last time I saw him, he'd just finished a job for us and I told him that the new Capo want's to meet him. H-Had I known it was you-"
"Stop." Karma stated, he stopped talking.
"You said 'Us'. You're in the outfit?" The man considered his reply for a few seconds before speaking again.
"I am, w-well I mean I was, or I s-still might be-"
"And Aster worked for you?" Karma gave an unimpressed look.
"N-No, not for me directly. But for the outfit here in L.A. It was off the books, I was his liaison. But he went under a different name, Javian. I mean I knew he was running from your father, but he threatened to kill me if-"
"What did you say?" Karma pushed himself away from the wall, suddenly interested.
"He went by the nam Ja-"
"No not that, the bit about my father? How do you know that?"
"H-H-He told me, I swear! He came to me for work. Told me that he wanted to keep an eye on things, on his brother."
"And just who the hell are you, for him to tell you such things?"
"I'm Bobby. Bobby Beans. I'm his friend." Karma raised an eyebrow at that and looked around the apartment.
"Some friend, huh."
"I just needed a place to crash. After he didn't show up for the meet, my ass was in the firing line-"
"I don't give a damn about your sob story. I'm trying to find my brother."
"Right, right. I can help you but I don't know where he is, I swear. Otherwise I would have told you by now." Karma stood in silence for a moment, considering his next move. He couldn't be too hasty with this. If Aster was involved with the events at Disney, there'd be other people looking for him. He needed to remain unknown, unseen. At that point he'd made up his mind.
"If you can't tell me where he is, then you're of no use to me."
"But I can help, I wanna help!"
"You'll serve me better dead." He replied coldly before stepping towards Bobby once more.
"N-no, no, wait! Just think about this for a second, we can talk about this." The room began to darken as Karma spread his hands to each side, generating darkness from his being.
"I'm done talking." Bobby had begun to protest loudly by now, shouting at Karma to stop whilst struggling against the restraints that bound him to the chair. But to no avail. The darkness thickened until barely any light was left in the room and a singular tendril grew from Karma's back and wormed through the air towards him. Bobby's eyes went wide once more in shock.
"You're just like him, a fucking Met-" It was at that point that Karma forced the tendril to shoot forward and enter his mouth, choking his brother's former friend immediately. Smaller tendrils quickly began to branch off and worm their way into his eyes, nose and ears. Bobby could be heard attempting to scream and vomit at the same time but eventually the muffled cries and his violent thrashing stopped and Karma retracted the tendrils, then dissapated the darkness. Bobby Beans was dead.
Karma reached into his pocket for the piece of paper and looked at it again.
"A fucking Meta." He whispered quietly.