Pray for Daylight

That darkness had a name: Johnny Walker.

Johnny stood six feet, two inches of pure malevolence—a tower of muscle, beer-soaked rage, and dead eyes that reflected nothing but void. His hands were perpetually stained with motor oil and something darker that never quite washed away. The only skill he'd ever mastered was wielding his pickaxe, a rust-pocked relic he'd inherited from his father, who'd died screaming in an asylum. The wooden handle was worn smooth from use, grooved where his fingers always gripped, and the metal tip had long ago lost its shine, replaced by a permanent brown patina that wasn't rust.

The night it all began, Johnny was doing what he did best—terrorizing the locals at McGrady's Bar. The air was thick with cigarette smoke and the stench of stale beer. Johnny's laughter cut through conversations like a serrated blade.

Then a man Johnny had never seen before—a drifter passing through—made a fatal mistake. He tapped Johnny on the shoulder and drove his fist into Johnny's jaw with a sickening crack.

Johnny crumpled to the filthy floor, tasting copper and feeling a molar come loose. He staggered upright, blood streaming from his split lip, and locked eyes with his attacker. "You're going to pay for what you've done to me."

The drifter's laugh was cut short by a boot to Johnny's ribs. The crack of bone was audible even over the jukebox. Johnny spat a thick glob of blood onto the sawdust floor, each breath a knife in his side, and limped toward his motorcycle parked outside.

The drifter turned back toward the bar, still chuckling, raising his beer in mock salute to the other patrons. He never heard Johnny return.

The pickaxe made a wet, hollow sound as it punched through the back of the man's skull—like an axe splitting a watermelon. The drifter's body went rigid, his beer still raised, his mouth forming an 'O' of surprise that would never close. He toppled forward, convulsing.

But Johnny wasn't done.

Instead of fleeing, Johnny stood over the twitching body. He spat into both palms—an old habit—and gripped the pickaxe handle with both hands. Then he went to work with the methodical precision of a butcher. The pickaxe rose and fell, rose and fell. Each impact made a sound like a mallet striking clay. Blood sprayed in arterial bursts, painting Johnny's face, his arms, his chest. Bits of bone and brain matter speckled the parking lot gravel.

When the body finally stopped twitching, when it was barely recognizable as human, Johnny spat on the pulped remains. He wiped the pickaxe on the dead man's jacket, secured it to his Harley, and rode off into the night, leaving a trail of blood drops on the asphalt.