Cain found himself in the midst of a maelstrom of cascading events that even he had trouble processing. Paying strangely little attention to what was happening around him, he turned inward and tried to make sense of all that had befallen him within the last 24 hours. Less than a few hours ago he drowned in the captivating gaze of his wife. Shocked as she had been by his struggle with the other Swords in the restaurant, she had been alive, breathing and talking to him. Her smell, the sound of her voice, her expressions and warm touch were all emblazoned into his psyche. It was almost tragically inconceivable that she was nothing but a memory now to him.

Such a harsh realization came with a gripping, bone-chilling fear that descended over him. With an undercurrent of anguish and anxiety, he tried to bury his knowledge that with the passage of time, all memories faded. It plagued him to the point that the more he thought about it, the less and less he seemed to be able to remember about his wife. It was almost as if the more he struggled to remember her, the more rapidly she slipped from his mind.

Seized by this fear and horror, he failed to hear Esai attempting to rouse him out of a wide-eyed state of stark and gripping panic. Hunched over in the back seat of the Triumvirate sedan, he barely noticed the hasty retreat of a figure from the driver's seat. It never registered that he was travelling in the very traceable sedan that he had used to reach Esai's store when he was in the throes of a blind rage. He was marginally aware of Esai firmly grasping his arm and leading him out of the back of the sedan into what seemed like was the rear of a dilapidated industrial warehouse.

The structure was dark and ominous, made more so by the single streetlight that illuminated its concealed rear entrance. The shadows thrown by the light splashing against the craggy structure of the building hid many of its glassless windows and door-less entry points. The building hung open like a gutted animal, spilling its insides out into the street.

Cain followed the Elder into the building, his combat boots crushing glass, splinters of rotten wood and other debris as he soullessly trudged through a darkened hallway. After his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he was able to make out Esai's diminutive frame sure-footedly negotiating the debris in the hallways, steadily making his way to what appeared to be a shadowy doorway.

A light source leaked around the corners of the crooked door and bathed them in a harsh, antiseptic illumination as Esai grabbed the metal handle and pushed open the heavy metal door. Cain's eyes took a moment to adjust as he took in a section of the facility that starkly contrasted with the rest of the building. His first impression was that the large, cavernous room was an old, abandoned fitness facility. The room was two stories high with skylights lining the apex of the cathedral roof. Scattered around the area were various and surprisingly well-maintained areas with modernized fitness equipment, which lined the space around an old-style boxing and sparring ring. An office area sat off to the right, with a large plate glass window overlooking the floor of the establishment. Torch lamps placed strategically throughout the space provided an impressive amount of light for the large area.

Cain barely noticed the neatly arranged racks of weight training equipment amidst the drab, peeling wallpaper foiling off the walls. He surmised there were living quarters right off the open shower stalls and assumed that this was a Triumvirate safe house that Esai had appropriated some time ago. As Esai made his way through the open space around the equipment, dilapidated furniture and loose floorboards, he flicked several switches that caused the overhead neon lights to flicker to life and buzz incessantly.

Cain trudged after him, still wearing his blood-soaked clothes. His mask and sword dangled from his grasp as he wandered over to a dusty vinyl couch to sit, wide-eyed and panicked. In the distance, Esai continued to walk around the space, ascending some steps to another floor in the open area to turn on the lighting there as well.

Cain leaned forward and let his sword clatter to the concrete floor before he put his head between his legs. His mind seemed to collapse in on itself as wave after wave of fear, uncertainty, guilt and despair slammed into him like a relentless typhoon. When it came down to it, the numbing chill he felt was the crushing sense of responsibility that he placed on himself for what had transpired. Even though he may not have set the events of the evening into motion, he was awash with guilt for hiding his life from Raylene. Under the brunt of the severe psychological trauma he was experiencing, Cain barely recognized that Esai was talking to him, hearing his voice as muffled echoes.

Minutes stretched into hours and before long the darkened skies outside became lighter as the sun rose above the clouds. Cain still sat motionless, having barely moved. His eyes brimmed with tears from silent sobs that caused him to take quick, sharp and painful breaths. The blood on his clothing had since caked and dried with the passage of the hours. His weapon, the Sword of Cain, still lay sprawled at his feet and was also decorated with crimson, dried blood. For the first time in hours, he circled his head around when he heard the door behind him slam. His muscles ached with lactic fire as he turned to see Esai emerging from the dank hallway beyond the doorframe. He hadn't moved in hours and his body was stiff as if his very muscles had atrophied.

Esai looked at Cain and held his gaze. Using experience and techniques amassed over decades of practice, Esai looked through him in an attempt to discern his state of mind. He knew enough that most individuals would transition through a predictable behavioral cycle of loss and post-traumatic stress behaviors. The cycle often involved the traditional steps of trauma, including denial, self-incrimination, anger and finally acceptance. However, in the case of Cain, as with any of the Triumvirate Swords, their psyche was significantly different than the way most individuals were socialized. The typical emotional support systems that the average person could avail themselves of simply did not exist for them. A network of people to help traumatized individuals through the process was not only non-existent but was exemplified during training as a sign of weakness and a lack of fortitude required for them to be of use to the Triumvirate.

Their entire existence was built on self-reliance and the ability to stoically master their own emotions to the point that they were locked away under a tight veneer of control and mastery. The philosophy of the Triumvirate was such that Swords were to teach themselves not to hide or mask their own emotions, but to avoid experiencing them altogether. By mastering the ability to avoid experiencing emotions, they had nothing to hide, or struggle to suppress.

Long ago, the Triumvirate favored the suppression of emotion in their highly trained body of assassins. The result was near catastrophic in that the individuals often suffered symptoms akin to post-traumatic stress disorder. It was proven that the violent lives they led imbued them with mind-shattering negative feelings of guilt, remorse, anger and sadness. It was not long before their fractured psyche splintered when trying to contain these feelings, eventually rendering them mentally unstable, barely controllable, homicidal and psychopathic killers.

Esai now looked at Cain through the specter of that realization and understood the danger of someone that had been trying to avoid the fear and anguish that Cain had been experiencing for a prolonged length of time. Given the fact that he hid an entire marriage from the Triumvirate, it was clear to Esai that Cain obviously harbored a congruent fear of loss. Swords, driven to avoid experiencing emotions, often never had the capacity or desire to emotionally bond with another. As such, the Triumvirate never had to be concerned with aberrant behavior in their ranks as they were conditioned to avoid it. Cain was the first that Esai had known to exhibit such signs of duplicity and deception amongst his brethren. Not only did he reject at least a portion of what was clearly Triumvirate canonical law, but he began to show the capacity to form attachments to individuals, as well as the ability to experience emotions.

Esai knew this was an extremely dangerous path he walked. He knew that the dichotomy between someone that harbored and experienced emotional attachments and an individual that was a living weapon must have been great if not insurmountable and equally unsustainable. Yet, as long as Esai had known of Cain, he never witnessed him betray even a minute sign that this schism existed. Esai surmised that Cain must have developed a unique ability to compartmentalize these different conflicting halves of his life, to the point that he bordered on dissociative identity disorder. With these thoughts at the forefront of his mind, Esai broke the gaze he held with Cain and abruptly retreated to the elevated living quarters to focus on his own meditation. Based on what he now observed, he anticipated that the near future would be extremely difficult for the wayward assassin.

Days soon stretched rapidly into weeks of elapsed time during which Cain had taken to abandoning all activities, even those that were most essential to just living. He barely ate, slept long hours and neglected most personal hygiene save for the bare essentials. His sword and his haphazardly compiled arsenal of weaponry lay in the exact spot he discarded them when Esai first brought him to the safehouse. Similarly, his blood-stained clothing left flakes of caked and dried blood in his bed as he repeatedly and sleeplessly tossed and turned, night after night.

He hadn't said a single word to Esai, barely registering his comings and goings. The living space he chose underneath the stairway was one of the three enclosed rooms in the habitable sections of the building. His room was kept dark both night and day and he barely ventured outside of it. Now having missed multiple sunrises and sunsets, he emerged from his cave-like room for the first time in several days. His posture had become hunched, and his emotional state forced his physical stature, once powerful, lithe and confident, into a gaunt, moping shell of a man. He hadn't even done routine physical exercise since he arrived, which is what made what came next unexpected, painful and difficult.

The blow was unexpected, yet fast, furious and decidedly powerful. Cain felt like he had been smashed with a cinderblock at the base of his skull. The blow staggered him, knocking him forward uncontrollably and sent him tripping over weight training equipment and scattered bits of furniture. He finally fell, clutching the back of his neck and skull with his vision awash with tears amidst a blinding white light caused by the impact. He planted his hand and struggled to regain his balance, stunned and horrified.

The blow itself was blunt and painful, but Cain was more stunned that the awareness of his surroundings had dipped to such a meager level that he was unable to detect such an obvious and overt assault. He looked up as the room came back into focus to see Esai standing in front of him. It was a wordless exchange, but the stone-chiseled glare on Esai's face told Cain what he needed to know. As soon as he struggled to his feet, Esai launched another attack. Despite his age, he was unbelievably swift and vengeful in his movements.

Esai managed to deliver his next assault like a switchblade. He sprung to life, going from what Cain believed was a position of tranquil rest to delivering another blow with stunning ease and speed. Continuing to watch Cain writhe and reel from his attacks, he unleashed several more beguiling yet effective assaults. In one flashing instant, Esai's hands were clasped behind his back and in the next, he unleashed a series of carefully placed blows at Cain. They all found their intended mark with little effort. Cain flailed uselessly, ineffectively trying to put up a rudimentary defense. Esai shattered his efforts, moving around his erratic and panicked attempts at resistance like a hot knife through butter. The sword edge of his hand found Cain's exposed sections with little difficulty and with each strike, Cain lost more and more of his breath.

Tumbling backward again, he scrambled to his feet, his back heaving as he tried to catch his breath. Esai approached him from behind, inwardly angered by his inability to respond to the threat he represented. He grabbed Cain's shirt, ripping and tearing the fabric of the now weeks-old unwashed garment until Cain's bare chest was exposed. In quick flurry of blows he extended his middle and index finger for each eviscerating strike. To Cain, the pain was unbearable. He almost cried out as the spot where Esai touched him burned as if he was being throttled with white hot pokers. For the first time since the exchange, Esai's gravelly voice rang out in the room.

"Five Finger Burning Palm," he exclaimed as he struck Cain's abdomen with the base of his flat hand.

Cain felt as if his skin were on fire at the point where Esai struck him. His eyes rolled back into his head as he tried to withstand the pure pain and agony that now radiated from the strike point. Looking through blurred vision at the diminutive man standing over him he felt, rather than saw, the raw power emanating from the older man. The unbridled fury of a Triumvirate Elder was something that Cain was driven to fear during his training with good reason. Esai traditionally had never been an official member of the governing body that ruled the Triumvirate. However, he was an Elder, nonetheless.

His movements were perfect and his experience, by comparison, was unparalleled. Physically, Cain doubted any Sword was a match for Esai. What set them apart was years of knowledge, control and wisdom that Esai possessed and used. His craggy brow furrowed at the pathetic sight of Cain writhing on the floor in pain.

Cain spoke first, not caring enough to be confused by Esai's furious attacks.

"Just kill me," he sputtered.

"I want to die."

Esai's lip trembled visibly with a barely contained disgust.

"Ridiculous cur. If you truly wanted to die, you would have killed yourself days ago. The reason you haven't is because you are seeking pity. You are looking for someone to tell you everything you did wasn't your fault and that her death was something you couldn't prevent."

He walked in a circular motion around Cain, who was still sprawled on the floor.

"The fact is that it was completely your fault. Accept the responsibility for losing her life. If you were better, faster, stronger and smarter, she would be alive today. If you had complete control of your emotions, your mental and physical discipline would have followed. You were weak, and she paid the ultimate price for it. You failed her, just as you fail yourself now."

The words stung Cain worse than any physical attack could. Mentally eviscerated, he sunk lower than he ever had been in his entire life. A spiraling depression was on the verge of gripping his every thought and movement.

Esai did not relent. Bending low, he planted two fingers underneath Cain's chin and lifted. They felt as if they were as sharp as knives, sending waves of pain down Cain's neck into his abdomen. He drew the man up from the floor until he could look into his gray eyes.

"Where is the man that came to the pawn shop? Where is the man that killed two of the deadliest combatants the Triumvirate had raised in the span of minutes? What happened to the unstoppable juggernaut of anger and seething fury that slaughtered two tactical teams singlehandedly? Is there any of that man left in this useless shell of a person?"

Esai, in disgust, grabbed Cain by the neck and launched him through a full body somersault. Cain landed flat on his back, reeling painfully from the impact and writhing in agony on the floor.

"Make no mistake. If I thought all traces of that person were gone, I would kill you where you lay. My challenge is that I believe that you are better than this."

With that, he turned, stepping over Cain's wriggling form, coldly walking from the room and then disappearing altogether.

The shadows of the day grew long and as the sun slowly sank beneath the towering spires of steel and glass of the city. Darkness crept into the living quarters where Cain remained. His broken, and limp body lay where Esai had left him as he watched the last vestiges of daylight creep from the craggy, mishappen windows. He restlessly drifted in and out of consciousness, sleeping for ten-to-fifteen-minute intervals, almost feverish in his perception of dreams and reality. His body ached both from Esai's ruthless beating and from a low-grade fever which crept over him, bathing him in an acrid film of sweat.

Aside from his physical ailments, his mental state was much more fragile. During his passing between states of sleep, feverish dreaming and consciousness, flashes of the experiences he had with his wife at the restaurant, the car chase and her death plagued him. He wanted to give up on everything, including life itself. He began to entertain the concept that infinite silence and the peace of death would be preferable to the shame and burden of guilt of having been responsible for the atrocities that he committed in his life. He wanted nothing more than to wash away what he had done, including perhaps, as much as it pained him, wishing that he'd never been involved with his wife to begin with. He wanted to go back to a point in time where he had the ability to choose an alternate future in which he never met Raylene knowing that at least she would have been safe and would have had a chance to live a normal life for a very long time.

"You don't know that," someone echoed.

Guilt, pain and loss weighed down on him, manifesting themselves as physical pressure on his chest. He wished he could leave this world and had a hard time finding a reason why he should remain living. What was he going to do? Exact a modicum of personal revenge on a monolithic organization that was responsible for Raylene's death? How much of a difference could one man make in the grand scheme of things?

"You can't let them go unpunished."

He wasn't sure if the ethereal voice echoing in his head was one which frequented many of the feverish dreams that he had been experiencing. His eyes fluttered and he began to cough violently, choking on what he thought was a thick haze of swirling smoke and incense.

"You have to do what's right Cain. I believe in you."

A voice echoed, this time clearer, despite the haze that had formed in his mind. He bolted awake, wild eyed and panicked.

"You said yourself that doing what's right is never easy."

He looked around the room, flailing with his arms, trying to wipe clear from his vision what he perceived to be a smoky haze. The more he flailed, the more the haze seemed to thicken. It was visible to him now due to a ghostly light coming from a dark corner near the edge of the room. The light seemed to fade in and increase in its intensity, growing in size. Not sure if he was fully awake, he managed to track the voice's position directly to the light, almost as if the voice was emanating from the stark illumination directly.

"This is different," he found himself croaking out in response with the unsettling feeling of a nightmare washing over him.

His extremities tingled and his respiration rate increased. Fear wasn't something that he was comfortable being on the receiving end of.

"What possible effect could I have by taking this organization apart? The end result for me would be the same. After I did what I could, I would die trying to achieve my goal. Either way, death is the eventual outcome. Why shouldn't I embrace it now?"

His voice was strained and weak and he was barely able to get the trailing words in his question out before his breath was taken away.

She stood in the corner, ensconced in a billowing, glowing, delicate blue light. She was the very picture of an angel. Her silvery blond hair floated about her beautiful face. Raylene, his wife, seemed to look upon her shattered shell of a husband from beyond the grave. The glow in the room cast a piercing light on the darkness in Cain's soul. It gave a visible shape to the monstrous despair, guilt and self-destructive tendencies he had recently experienced. He was barely breathing as her words somehow came to him not so much through his ears, but inside his mind.

"When good people do nothing, the rest of us suffer," she said to him.

"Good people? You think I am a good man? Hiding who I was and what I did from you for so long? Lying to you almost every day because I couldn't face what you would think of me if you truly knew who I was? How can you say that I am a good man when I am responsible for..." he began, halting only to choke back sob in his throat and the tears welling up in his eyes.

"You dying so horribly," he managed to get out before he collapsed weeping in his hands.

In his mind's eye, he saw the lithe and graceful form of his wife bend over him now almost embracing his repentant, hunched body.

"I've given up. I'm sick of feeling this pain. I thought that I was invincible and in control of everything until you died. Now, with every breath I take, I feel like I am suffocating in a vacuum. I have to escape this misery. Can't you understand that?"

Cain continued to spill out his doubts, fears and self-loathing to the wispy form of his wife that he knew couldn't really be there with him.

"The truth is that you are strong Cain. Your determination is so intense that if you truly wanted to be invincible, you would find a way. What you must realize is that we all live a linear existence. It's like we are trapped, sliding down a hill and we can't stop. We can't go back. We can only change directions. Realizing the nature of our existence helps us during times of difficulty."

Cain didn't move from his hunched position, but stopped everything to listen to what he was being told.

"How," he whispered.

"In a linear existence, what's past is gone and immutable. What we can do is learn from even the most horrible events in the past and move forward, stronger, more resolute and more determined. The truth is, when you spend time and energy in the present, lamenting about events that have already happened, whether they were your fault or not, you waste your own existence and the potential to do great things."

Her words were like water on a burning fire. Simply taking his own life seemed a ridiculous prospect when given the perspective he just heard. He didn't pay attention to the fact that he was conversing with an ephemerally spiritual form of his dead wife. He didn't even give place to the fact that he and his wife never had such existential conversations about life like they were having right now. All he heard was her words as the light that she emanated seemed to lessen and dim.

"Everyone dies Cain. People try to use concepts like fate, destiny and karma to explain the particulars of their situations and why loved ones are left behind when people they love are taken from them. You once told me that you didn't believe in fate and that you and I were free to make the world what we wanted."

A cleansing feeling flowed over him as Cain looked up through the hazy space in the room at the light which had all but disappeared. Despite the dimming luminescence, Raylene's voice still echoed, growing quieter by the second.

"It's not your time to die until you say it is. Start again, realizing that you can't change the past, but you can take those experiences and become much stronger than you are today. Do you remember the last thing I said to you Cain? I said it because I knew you would need a purpose to continue after I was gone."

"Get them for me," he whispered.

"Get them for me," she echoed.

With that, Raylene's voice waned and grew silent, and the strange haze seemed to swallow the light whole. Cain painfully rose to his knees, infused with the sense of purpose that Raylene attempted to give to him as she had laid dying in his arms. In a stark moment of clarity, he reflected on how shamefully he had behaved. Premediated thoughts of giving up, suicide and giving in seemed to flee to the farthest corners of his brain. In his mind, it was as if he was emerging from a dark and cavernous cave, having been jarred awake from an intense hibernation and depression.