Chapter 265 Fearsome Decisions
When Benjamin heard the man say these things, he took another look around the, quite barren, apartment. And now, he noticed things that he really hadn't even really registered before at all. Like the fact that the single step up to the room that seemed to be the livingroom had a small ramp covering it. Or that there were tons and tons of different medications laying around, while the carpet in front of the door had a few straight-lined markings from repeated use. There weren't many high shelves around, and if there were, only the lower sections would be filled with anything.
"You barely even come out of this shitty little apartment! What are you even doing in here?! What's this big ass thing in the corner, huh?" The man asked loudly, before starting to hit what seemed to be the capsule with his bare hand, while a certain young woman screamed at him to stop.
"N-No, pl-please don't! A-Anything but-but that… I-I'll listen to yo-you, but l-leave the ca-capsule alone…" Jasmin, who Benjamin knew as Xenia up until now, begged the man. "Oh? Of course you'll listen to me, that's going to happen no matter what. But you seem to be pretty attached to this thing, so I should probably take care of this for us." The man answered, now seeming a little more calm for some reason. Soon, after a few moments of silence, Benjamin knew what was about to happen after hearing that the man was huffing about something, probably because he was struggling to pick something heavy up .
The old man knew exactly what he was about to do, and he really didn't want to let that happen. So, what he did, was simple. He knocked something over to make a loud noise. Immediately, the man seemed to drop whatever heavy thing he picked up, and slowly made his way to the door to the room. "Who the fuck's there? What are you doing in our apartment?" The man asked loudly as he stepped through the door and took a look around to try and find someone.
Now, exactly two things could happen. One, the man looked to his left first and would end up seeing Benjamin. If he was armed, that meant nothing good for him. Second, if the man looked to his right first, Benjamin would most likely be able to immediately overwhelm him.
Lucky for Benjamin, the man first looked to his right, and immediately, the old man slung his left arm around the man's neck from behind, holding him in a tight chokehold. Looking into the bathroom mirror, the man then managed to make eye-contact with Benjamin and also noticed that his right arm was simply dangling down.
In an effort to free himself, the man tried a lot of things, first of all, just trying to overwhelm Benjamin in strength, which was something incredibly unreasonable. The man was short and scrawny and obviously lived an unhealthy lifestyle, while Benjamin was quite tall and strong, so despite the fact that he was able to only use his left arm, Benjamin still had the upper hand in this situation.
But Benjamin didn't account for one thing, which was that the man he was up against was someone that fought so dirty that he would even beat a girl in a wheelchair. Accompanied by a sudden surging pain in his right arm, Benjamin's whole body tensed up for a moment before slumping down all at once. Immediately, he stared at the spot where he started feeling the pain, and could only see a red lump of meat with a shiny knife sticking out of it. Due to the weakness and dizzy mind that accompanied his pain, he really didn't notice that the man took a vase lying on a cupboard and was currently preparing to hit Benjamin over the head with it either.
The only thing that saved him with this was that Benjamin lived in a small town.
"This is the police! Show us your hands!" An officer yelled out, seeing the slumped up man on the ground and the other man in a threatening position toward the first man. Confused and scared, the man that had just stabbed Benjamin turned around toward the officer.
"Oh, thank god you're here! This man broke into my girlfriend's apartment! I was just defending myself, really!" He explained with a pleading, scared expression, and the Officer slowly nodded his head and tried to assess the situation. From where he was currently standing, all he could see was a young, thin and weak person that was shaking out of his boots in front of a tall giant of a man.
"Sir, where exactly is your girlfriend?" The Officer asked, quite aware of who that 'Giant of a man' was, and doubting that he would be able to assault someone for no reason. "M-My girlfriend is in her room! This man just assaulted her! She has anxiety, so please go and help her!" The man explained, and the officer made his way through the hallway into the room that the man described, seeing the injured woman laying on the ground, obviously scared, as she was staring at Benjamin.
"M'am, can you stand?" The officer asked, and still confused at what just happened, Jasmin shook her head, slowly raising her hand to vaguely point at the wheelchair. "Sorry M'am. Can I help you sit down on it?" The officer asked, while his colleague took care of the situation in the hallway. Swiftly, Jasmin nodded her head, and the officer soon picked her up under her armpits and helped her take a seat in the wheelchair, before starting to ask about the situation.
"Can you tell me about what happened here?" He inquired, and immediately, Jasmin's whole body began to shake at the thought of it. Noticing that her ex was staring into the room, trying to make her lie for his sake. Now she had to choose. Would she choose the man that showed nothing but kindness to her, or the man that showed nothing but horror to her?
Anybody would wish it was the former, but Human nature says otherwise. "Th-That man br-broke in-into my apar-partment and at-attacked me…" She muttered as she slightly pointed toward Benjamin, trying to look away because she felt horrible for doing so.
"John, call two ambulances and a female emergency shrink." The officer said, and soon, a beeping noise could be heard in the background as the other officer did just that. With a bitter expression, the officer looked at Jasmin again. He was aware of who Benjamin was, and was actually one of the policemen assigned as his protection during the period of a few weeks after the break-in a few years ago. So he didn't really want to believe that he could do something like this.
"M'am, are you sure it was that man that assaulted you?" The officer asked, and with tears in her eyes, Jasmin slowly nodded her head, feeling like throwing up just for saying something like that.
Bitterly, the officer stood up and turned toward Benjamin, although he saw just a slight hint of something that made him think that Jasmin lied. The man that had said to be her boyfriend was smiling, if just for a split second. And it wasn't the relieved kind of smile, but one that said 'I got away with it'.
But like this, he couldn't do anything other than to do what he had to do, if the victim herself didn't say who actually hurt her like that.
Although just then, something else happened. "Grampa! Grampa, are you alright?!" Benji yelled into the hallway as he tried running in, seeing that Benjamin was kneeling on the ground. "You! What the hell did you do to my grandfather?!" He asked angrily as he stared at the man who was most likely the perpetrator of all this, before the officer in charge looked at him confused.
"Wait, who are you in all of this?" He asked, and Benji stared at him confused. "I'm Benjamin Joyce, the one that called you!" He explained, and the officer looked at his colleague with a frown. "Make sure nobody in here moves, I'll talk to the kid." The officer said and then swiftly stepped through the hallway and toward Benji.
"You're the caller?" The officer asked just to confirm again, and Benji immediately nodded. "Yes, I am! My grandfather is in there right now, and he's obviously hurt! So go help him!"
"Can I ask you why you were in this building?"
"My grandfather said something about a woman in here being in danger, so we rushed over here immediately! The door was open when we got here, so my grandfather went in while I called you!" Benji explained, and then looked into the hallway, making eyecontact with Jasmin who just rolled her wheelchair out of her room.
"Xenia! So you were in danger?!" Benji asked, and the officer looked back and forth between them confused. "M'am, do you know this man?" The officer asked, and slowly, Jasmin stared at Benji, then her ex, and then Benjamin, before slowly starting to break down, trying to instinctively guard her head.
"Y-Yes I k-know him… I-I lied, th-that man isn't m-my boyfriend, he att-attacked me…" She explained, now pointing at her ex, who ripped his eyes open immediately. "You little bitch! What the hell are you even saying?!" He yelled, but at that point, one of the officers already stepped up behind him and handcuffed him, starting to pull him out of the apartment. At that point, the ambulance finally arrived as well and a few people came rushing into the apartment, immediately taking a look at Benjamin and Jasmin in turns.
After a while, both of them ended up being brought to the nearest hospital, and Benji and Tony immediately drove after the ambulances. Finally, an hour later, Benjamin was given a room to spend the night. The old man was for the first time in a physical condition befitting his age, weak and frail.
"Grampa, don't scare us like that…" Benji said quietly as he sat down on a chair next to the bed, and Tony slumped down on one of them as well, while Benjamin simply chuckled. "I'm sorry, I really didn't mean to."
"Why are you taking this so lightly? You were literally stabbed into your arm, Dad. Earlier today, you collapsed from being hit there by a cereal box." Tony grumbled, and Benji immediately ripped his head toward his father. "Wait, that's what happened at the grocery store? I thought he fell!" He exclaimed, but Tony slowly shook his head.
"Sorry, we didn't want to worry you… we wanted to tell you and Sophia about his condition when we got home, but then… you know…" Tony explained quietly, and Benji slowly nodded and looked away. While the room became cold and silent, a knock could be heard against the door.
"Hello, Mr. Joyce?" A Nurse asked, and immediately, Benjamin, Tony and Benji immediately looked at her with a nod, before the Nurse chuckled a bit surprised and pointed at the old man. "I meant Joyce Senior, sorry. I brought a visitor, the woman that was brought here together with you earlier." She explained, and Benjamin immediately nodded his head, trying to sit up properly in the hospital bed, while Jasmin was slowly brought into the room by the Nurse.
She was obviously quite uncomfortable at the moment, but it was quite clear why, considering the stares coming from not only Tony, but even Benji, who were both simply mad at the fact that she nearly had Benjamin arrested for something he didn't do.
Noticing that this was the case, Benjamin looked at his son and grandson with a smile. "Tony, please go and call your brother and sister for now, alright? And Benji, you go and call Sophia to tell her what's going on as well." Benjamin asked of them, and slowly, the two did as asked, glaring at Jasmin on their way out.
It was silent for a few moments, and when the Nurse chose to leave the two of them alone, Jasmin spoke up. "E-Eisen, I-"
"Benjamin." The old man interrupted, before Jasmin looked at him confused, "H-Huh?" She asked, but he simply replied with a laugh. "My name is Benjamin. I'm only Eisen in the game. Your real name isn't Xenia either, right, Jasmin?" Benjamin asked with a smile, and the young woman slowly nodded her head.
"Y-Yeah… Yo-You're right… I… I just wan-wanted to s-say sorry about wh-what happened… I j-just…" She started trying to explain, but was getting incredibly worked up, so the old man shook his head. "Don't worry about it. I get it. It's fine, really. My arm is completely broken anyway, so I barely even felt anything then. I guess I was just feeling a bit shocked at seeing so much blood back then." Benjamin explained to calm her down, but Jasmin still felt guilty.
"B-But I-" Jasmin tried to say, but was once more interrupted by Benjamin. "Jasmin, it's fine. Really. You don't need to worry about me, worry about yourself right now. You went through something really scary. I think you should go back home and lay down in your capsule, you seem a lot more comfortable in there than out here." The old man said, before smiling at her. "I'll be joining you in the game later as well. Once all the legal stuff is figured out, I'm going home as well." Benjamin explained just as a Doctor was entering the room.
"Sorry, miss, would it be alright for you if I can talk to Mister Joyce alone?" The doctor asked as he looked at Jasmin, who slowly nodded her head before quietly being brought out to the hallway again. Once the door was closed, the Doctor immediately turned to Benjamin.
"Mister Joyce, I thought I explained to you before that it's really not reccomended for you to leave any time soon. I can't do anything if you really want to leave, but as a professional, I really have to stay that it would be beyond idiocy to leave in your condition." The Doctor explained, and Benjamin just smiled at him with a light nod.
"Don't worry, I know. I'm staying here."