The Tiger (#fridayflash)

The workers at his factory call him the Tiger.  He is proud they have chosen this name.  It shows they fear him.  It shows his methods work.

He prowls the factory floor with silent stealth, always taking his prey by surprise.  Workers trapped in the vicious claws of his gaze know it is finished for them.  He stands erect before his prey as they thrust themselves at his feet.  "I have a family, another child on the way." The most desperate always say this - a new baby - as if mention of a child should arouse pity in him.

He laughs, a wicked rumble of a laugh that he knows is the reason for his nickname.

"I sleep only four hours a night so I can keep this factory running," he says.  "And you have the audacity to feign tiredness in my presence."

He lets security do the real Tiger's work, to drag the workers away.  Some are limp and resigned, some scream and kick. All are defeated.  He serenades their exit with his savage laughter, making sure he is the one to bolt the factory door behind them.

These women and men whose livelihoods are destroyed - who, because they needed a moment's rest, must face the wrath of a jilted landlord, must hear their sleeping children moan in hunger - are left only with impotent power to curse the factory owner, invoking the demons and the saints to bring upon him misery and despair.

Unknown to them, their curses are fulfilled.  The Tiger, divorced and childless, lives alone.  His parents are dead.  He is despised by his peers.  His vices, prostitutes and whisky, augment his emptiness.

Most of all he hates the night-time. 

In his dreams he is a boy.  His friends have caught a kitten.  With them, he ties a tin can to the kitten's tail.  In the tin can, they secure a firecracker, then light it as they place the kitten on the ground.

The kitten looks at the tin can, fascinated by the hissing noise it makes.  Then booming white light blinds the boy.  When the light fades he is no longer a boy, but the kitten, fleeing.  Terror pulses through his body. His friends are chasing him.  "Run 'til you die, pussy!" they shout, then stop at the side of the road, laughing and whooping.   He wants to stop too, to rest, but a dreadful noise chases him, the rattling that exploded earlier. He must run.

He spasms, collapsing in the road.  The tarmac is cold against his body.  He cannot sleep and he cannot move.  The ground rumbles, bringing with it a roaring, monstrous white light. He knows it is a car. He knows he must get off the road.  His body clenches.

In that moment he wakes.  When the terror subsides enough for him to move, he sits up and checks the clock. It's quarter to two.  Four hours he must lie awake now. Four hours until morning.