SEARING PAIN SLAMMED into Darian's body from multiple points at the exact same time. It was like walking into a raging hornets' nest completely naked and spinning around as fast as you could.
He didn't have a chance to count how many shots were fired or how many times he was hit as he spun around and fell to his knees. The pain flowed through his body like a vile poison bent on taking his life before the darkness swept in and took the pain away.
Darian could feel some kind of swaying movement as he lay in the darkness. It seemed as though he was being rocked to sleep by a loving parent, something he knew nothing about, since he had been put into the system when he was five years old. He couldn't remember his parents at all, so the feeling of being rocked lovingly was a new concept to him. It was one that he enjoyed, however, and he wanted to stay there for as long as he possibly could.
There were brief moments of hearing people talk, but it was like a foreign language to him. They were speaking English, of course, but he couldn't understand a single word that was being said. He would then drift off into nothingness, for periods of time that he simply couldn't grasp.
These moments of blissful nothingness and shocking alertness without understanding came and went for Darian. He was never able to focus on either one of them long enough to figure out what was happening, though. Then there were flashes of light and the feeling of going down a water slide on his back.
FLASH.
DARKNESS.
FLASH.
DARKNESS.
Someone saying something about vital organs and blood loss.
FLASH.
DARKNESS.
Sudden pressure on his chest as if some small child was standing on him and jumping up and down.
DARKNESS.
Bright light filled his vision and a man in white looked down at him. This was how he was going to die and Darian couldn't believe that he was actually going to meet God, especially since he had never believed in all that religious nonsense. But there was God, looking down at him, and he was about to be told that he was going to Hell because he wasn't saved.