THE MIRACULOUS RETURN OF DAMIEN BLACK

Chapter 2

The moment those words left the man's mouth, Damian's jaw locked so tight it looked like it might shatter his teeth. The veins in his forehead bulged out like twisted ropes ready to snap. 

"What did you just say?" Damian's voice came out low and deadly, the kind of quiet that made smart people run for cover.

Immediately the seven men glanced at each other, noticing the shift in Damian's entire being, but they didn't seem to care much. Whether this stranger standing before them was angry or not made no difference to them, they had a job to do and that was all that mattered.

The same stocky man who spoke first stepped forward and repeated himself, this time with even more arrogance dripping from his words.

"Are you deaf? Didn't you hear what I just said? This land has been put up for sale. We've been instructed by Madam Nathaniel Penelope herself to trash this good-for-nothing grave. We're here to clear all this rubbish, exhume the body and go dump it somewhere else, throw it away like the garbage it's sitting in. That's why we're here. Now you understand the real reason we came? So step out of the way and don't come back here. Don't commit nuisance."

Immediately a laugh escaped Damian's lips, but it was the kind of laugh that had no joy in it, the kind that sounded dirty and wrong, like something had broken inside him that could never be fixed. He couldn't wrap his head around it. Here he was, standing and complaining that his mother's grave had been turned into a dumping ground, and now these men were telling him they wanted to dig up her body and throw her away like trash. And the order came from Penelope.

He knew that name very well.

Penelope was none other than his wife Mabel's cousin, and that woman was a nasty piece of work from head to toe. Even in the one week Damian knew her before he left for war, he could tell she wasn't friendly, not even a little bit. Her eyes always carried something cold and calculating, like she was constantly measuring how much everyone around her was worth.

But what Damian couldn't wrap his head around was what business Penelope had with his mother's property. That part made no sense at all. Penelope putting his mother's land up for sale? Why would she do that? Who gave her the permission to even touch what belonged to him? What the hell was going on that he didn't know about yet?

However he knew right then that he needed answers and he was going to get every single one of them. But first, he had to deal with these men standing before him, and he needed to put enough fear in their bones so they would never think about coming back here again.

"Turn around and leave. This land is not for sale," Damian said, his voice flat and final.

Hearing what he just said, immediately the men looked at each other and burst into laughter, the kind that came from their bellies and filled the air with mockery.

"Who are you to say this land is not for sale? Who do you think you are?"

"Because this land belongs to my mother and this land belongs to me. So turn around and go now. If you don't, you're going to see the other side of me."

The men exchanged glances again and their laughter grew even louder, like they just heard the funniest joke of their lives.

"Just look at him being so serious! Do you really think you can stop us from doing our job? That's not even possible. You're not going to stop us and we're going to do our job perfectly. We must do it."

The stocky man raised his hand and gave a signal to the excavator operator. "Start working! If this fool doesn't move out of the way, crush him along with that disgusting grave and make sure everything is destroyed and leveled!"

The excavator's engine roared to life and it started rolling forward slowly toward Damian. The six men standing behind burst into laughter because they knew that one way or another, Damian would jump out of the way at the last second. Nobody was stupid enough to stand in front of a machine like that.

But Damian didn't move.

He stood there like a statue carved from stone, his feet planted firmly on the ground. The men's laughter began to fade, replaced by confused looks that passed between them. They weren't exactly worried, but surprise crept into their faces as they watched this madman refuse to budge even an inch.

Still, they knew that even if the excavator crushed him into the dirt, nobody would hold them accountable. They were working for the Nathaniel family, and that name carried enough weight to make problems disappear like smoke in the wind. They would walk away from this freely, no questions asked.

"If he doesn't move, squash him! Squeeze him! Do whatever you want to him!" the stocky man shouted again, waving his hand forward.

The excavator rolled closer and closer until the massive bucket swung down toward Damian, its metal teeth ready to tear into him.

Then something happened that made the world stop making sense.

Damian raised one hand and caught the bucket mid-swing like it weighed nothing more than a basket of oranges. The excavator jerked to a complete stop, its engine still running, still roaring with power, but the machine itself couldn't move forward even a single inch. The operator inside pushed harder on the controls, jamming the lever forward with both hands, trying to force the excavator to break through whatever was holding it back.

But nothing happened.

The machine just sat there, frozen in place, working but going absolutely nowhere. Then thick black smoke started pouring out from the engine, curling up into the air like angry spirits escaping from a bottle.

The operator pushed even harder, desperation taking over his movements, but more smoke billowed out from every gap in the machine. The tracks that should have been grinding forward couldn't even rotate anymore. The excavator just sat there spitting smoke and making dying mechanical sounds.

The operator stuck his head out the window to see what was wrong, and his blood turned to ice water in his veins.

It was Damian holding the bucket with just one hand, and that single grip was enough to paralyze the entire machine.

At that moment all six men and the operator froze where they stood, their eyes going wide as dinner plates, jaws dropping open so far you could see their back teeth. Fear grabbed hold of them like a cold hand wrapping around their throats, squeezing until they couldn't even breathe properly.

Then Damian did something that broke whatever was left of their courage. He simply squeezed the metal bucket in his hand and it started bending, twisting upward like paper being crumpled. As the bucket folded in on itself, the entire excavator began to shake violently, rocking back and forth like it was caught in an earthquake.