So.. this isn't exactly what I intended to write, but it does have a new character for my story, a character I frankly find fascinating. (The novel this is connected to may never see the light of day for multiple reasons.) It's also longer and more depressing than I intended.
The two characters are Padraic Lynn and a man called Cuyler who is probably a government agent. This scene takes place shortly after a tragedy connected to both of them...
Shots Fired“Why are you even here?” he asked, not bothering to look up.
“Thought you might like some company.” came the reply.
In the end, Padraic glanced over to acknowledge Cuyler's presence. His eyes were red-rimmed with tears and wine. “Not yours.”
His unwanted guest took a seat that was too close for comfort. “Now, now. Don't be like that. Tonight, I'm all you have left.”
“All I have left to hold onto, or left to fight against?”
Cuyler spread his hands with a slow smile. “You tell me.”
Padraic was silent. He didn't have an answer, and the one he felt was true was the one that caused him pain.
He was tired of all this pain.
“If you want my opinion,” he said at last. “here it is. You're a vulture. You care nothing for the fight, nothing for the fallen. You're just here to clean up the mess afterward.”
“That's a cold conclusion.”
“And you are not denying its truth.”
“Ah, truth. What is the truth, Paddy?”
“The truth is that we are no longer friends and you should not be here.” He felt the dull ache throb hard and heavy in his chest, breaking everything that was left whole. The dullness turned to sharpness as his ire began to blaze. “You have taken everything away from me.”
“On the contrary. I have taken nothing.”
“You didn't stop it.”
Again the spread of hands. A shrug of an innocence that had ceased to exist in this world of broken things and dusty ashes. “How could I? There was nothing to be done.”
“You gave no warning, no hint. You
knew what would happen! You let it!”
“Am I God to alter the course of the fates?”
Padraic leaped to his feet and towered over the sitting man, jaw clenched. He was shaking as he tried to control his anger. His grief. “You're here to mock me? After everything you've done?”
“What of the things you've done?” Cuyler's voice never changed. Never rose or fell, his expression remaining blank.
Padraic cocked his head, eyes still on fire. “And what's that supposed to mean?”
“I mean that you can't blame the messenger until you've blamed the one who pulled the trigger.”
He sat down hard in his seat, and the two men appeared to trade places. All the fire had frozen sharp and cold in his gut, the bitter darkness of guilt clouding his mind.
Cuyler abandoned his seat to stand over him and laid a hand of seeming comfort on Padraic's rigid shoulder. “Everything happened so fast,” he began, leaning in to whisper in Padraic's ear. “And it was dark. In the middle of the action. All the noise. The adrenaline.
“Dear Paddy...” his expression changed for the first time to one of pity. Pity, ripe with self-righteousness. “How could you have known?”
Padraic focused again on Cuyler. His lips parted but no words came because the meaning in Cuyler's words had rocked him before they were uttered.
“No one blames you, of course.” Cuyler turned as if to go, patting Padraic on the back as he opened his foul mouth to twist the knife in deeper still. “No, indeed. The question is, should they?”
Cuyler's left foot slid across the floor in his first step of leaving, but Padraic's hand clamped down on Cuyler's arm and stopped him. The grip was a vice and it froze Cuyler in his tracks.
For the first time, a flicker of something passed through the other man's confident eyes. Was it fear? In that moment, Padraic wished with everything in him that he could justify that fear. But he couldn't. There was no fight left in him. The guilt and the liquor had stolen it away.
“Is that all?” he asked.
Cuyler's brow furrowed.
Slowly, with the pounding in his head and the aching in his chest slowing his movement, Padraic looked up and the two men met gazes. One arrogant and direct, the other clouded and weak. And yet. The brokenness of the one gaze was somehow still showing its strength, and the firmness of its roots.
“I said, is that all?” Padraic asked a second time. “You know, I once considered you my ally. She considered you an ally. We all did. Where did all the legends go? Now you've painted targets on all our backs and let others take the shots.”
A laugh, the first he could remember in some time, forced itself out of his lungs. “But you enjoy the sport; you're a real sharpshooter yourself. So what are you waiting for? You're here, and the ammunition you've got on me is better than that. So this is your chance.”
Cuyler was watching him carefully, waiting for Padraic to release his arm.
He went on. “Your
last chance. Turn around and walk out and let the dice fall where they may. Let the wounds heal themselves. Or.” He finally loosened his fingers enough for the other to pull his arm away. “Or...You've got a shot you want to take. Take it. Who knows? Maybe it'll finally bury me.”
Cuyler's throat twitched as he swallowed. His eyes flickered again. His uncertainty betrayed him as he glanced at the door. Padraic had opened himself for whatever stones Cuyler could sling at him and he wouldn't allow himself to care. If Cuyler walked out now, then it would prove that somewhere behind that cold, proud exterior a part of him actually felt the pain he had failed to hinder before it struck. It would prove that he felt regret. If he reloaded his smoking gun, then he was only saying what everyone else was afraid to, the things that Padraic already knew.
In the end, a smile tightened the corners of Cuyler's mouth. He made a fist of his hand, extending his index finger. He closed one eye and aimed down the length of his arm.
“Doesn't this look familiar?” His next words were each punctuated like the sputter of gunfire. “You shot her in the back.” He let his hand stay in that position a second longer. “Boom.”
Cuyler spun on his heel and left.
Padraic slumped over the counter and let the last volley strike his core. Of all the things he knew Cuyler would say, he had somehow missed that one and he let the truth of it rob him of his breath.
Boom.There was one good thing that came out of Cuyler's mouth and it was exactly the same as the worst thing he had said. Because it was the worst. There was now nothing anyone could say or accuse him of that could possibly hurt worse than this.
Padraic tipped his glass and swallowed the drops that remained of his drink.
It wouldn't be the last time that night.
)
Thanks. 
Something tells me I have no business writing adult guys as my main characters. XD