The Way to Hell

Chapter One: Hellraiser

"Well this fucking sucks," he mumbles through clenched teeth, watching the blood drain down the rusty sink as he scrubs his hands clean.

"Sucks" doesn't even cut close to describing his luck right now, or lack of it.

If August had to put things into perspective: surviving a helicopter crash, the way did a few days before, doesn't occur very often according to statistics. At the same time, he also dodged a spray of boiling gasoline that nearly splashed at his face.

'Would have been really shitty having to walk around looking like Mr Hyde or something out of an 80's horror film.'

On the not-so-bright side, he just won himself the worthy title: the most notorious man on earth. August "the hammer" Walker, glorified CIA assassin, admired for each successful operation yet hated for his arrogance.

No one saw it coming.

His plan was made of his own brilliance, the manifesto, his own golden words threaded onto a digital paper. He spread them like disease via the dark web. The sun was there within his reach, so close to his fingertips, he only needed to grab it.

And in just one moment, everything went to shit.

'Fucking Ethan Hunt. Fucking Midget.'

August rubs his face angrily, his nostrils flaring just from thinking about that squirt. He stares at himself in the mirror. Piercing blue eyes stare back with wet-hot fury.

'That emotion, is that defeat? If so, it feels unfamiliar.'

There's dried blood smeared across his face. Black, sticky, caked around his moustache and on his left cheek. August bends over, head beneath the disgusting polluted tap, allowing the water to wash his face. But that won't take away the sensation of utter repulse swimming within his chest.

It was never about revenge, it was about ideals. Solid ones. Break the system, take down the old world. Though he hated that cunt ever since he started working with him, he would have finished Hunt off if not for Lane. Lane allowed personal vendetta to soil his motives, demanding Ethan kept alive in exchange for the plutonium.

The endless opportunities he had to finish Hunt off nearly makes his skull explode with pain.

But he has better things to do than to play a game of cat and mouse with an ageing IMF agent. Ethan was left to die on that rock or at least gravely wounded. It sure sounded like he cracked two or more of his ribs during combat, so August assumes he won't be chasing him any time soon.

Now the CIA, MI6, Interpol, FBI, and the rest of the fucking world is a different story.

"Fucking catastrophe."

His brand new clothes are stained with blood. Fortunately, he managed to steal a knapsack from some backpacking idiot on the way to the gas stop. There's some cash and a clean shirt inside, even though the thought of having someone else's clothes touch his skin makes him want to hurl.

'Beggars can't be fucking choosers.'

August quickly dries his face and combs his hair by his fingers. A few large curls fall onto his forehead, his hair in need of urgent taming. Next, he strips off his shirt, groaning in pain, his muscles suddenly deciding to remind him that he took quite the beating in his back, chest, and torso.

He swallows the groan that begs to escape from his throat and throws the shirt into the trash can, standing in front of his beaten reflection in the mirror. His body is a canvas of bruises of many different shades of blue, flowing from his pecs to his muscular back. Turning to the side, he watches the scraped flesh of his forearms, remembering the searing pain and stench of burning skin as he got ground up against the rocks during the fall from the helicopter.