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Chapter 7: Sons and Fathers
Ryan narrowed his eyes, his grip tightening again on the gun. He took a tentative step forward, "...it's not Zach."
Moving one arm out before Aleks as if to keep her back, he lifted the gun with his other hand...
Something rocketed out of the undergrowth right at them. A dark, brown blur that shot like a cannonball out of the law brambles on the ridge. Ryan had enough time for an elegant warning ("FUCKINGSHIT!") as he dove to the side, pushing Aleks over with him.
He felt a whoosh of air as he moved, another as the thing moved past him and a searing, burning, agonizing, tearing pain in his side. He cried out through gritted teeth, throwing his head back as he clenched his teeth...
The noise of receding foot(?) steps in the distance. Whatever had charged was moving on. Ryan breathed raggedly, lifting a hand to feel where his sopping tank top had torn, and the glut of warm blood staining it from what appeared to be a nasty gash.
"Jesus fuck..."
He lifted his head to spot the retreating brown blur, "Fucking pig."
And a pig it was. A big, fat, mottled brown and gray hog with nasty tusks, one of them shining a fresh new red color.
The animal had turned back to face them, stomping its hooves in the ground as if preparing another charge...
"It's theatrical," Emma explained. "That's all these killers are: grandstanding lunatics. The new guy offs the old guard. It's like poetry. It rhymes." She scoffed. "It's worth at least trying. The worst that can happen is a certifiable killer dies. The best that can happen is the new certifiable killer dies. Unless you have a better plan?"
***
Stavo, glanced at Eli, in some disbelief they were even doing this in the first place. Regardless, he squeezed Tracy's hand.
-Emma and Stavo
"And he had me pressed up against the car like ham on rye, and he had that look in his eye like he was hungry for it. I know these things. I get around a lot. And I said to myself 'Tina, you can't let this bastard have his way with ya! Not while Eli's still out there', cause at the time I thought the mayor was using Eli to put the squeeze on me, but that was just a lie, but anyway, I gave that fat old fuck a wallop in the tenders and ran for it! Would've worked too, but I found his little sex dungeon and that was that."
Tina heaved herself over a fallen cypress tree, tossing sweat-matted hair out of her eyes, "What I'm saying is, I've seen some shit. Most of it wasn't pretty, which is fair, cause I ain't never shat pretty. Pretty sure nobody has. I always figure, you keep your head down, you power through best that you can, and if you're lucky, nobody bothers ya. Me? I try to mind my own business, but good fucking luck doing that in this family.
"I never asked for any of this. I wanted what was owed me. My brother ditched me first chance he got. Left behind a woman too good for him and a son less interesting than he was. Who helped raise that fucking kid? Huh? Me. And I had my own baby, but we took care of each other, Eileen and me. Eileen was Clark's lady, shoulda told you that. Don't matter in the end. I screwed her over too, I guess, not stopping her shacking up with the next cokehead that came tripping along. That's where my niece came from. God's gift."
She shook her head, "I came here, I brought Eli here so I could collect what Clark owed me. His fancy suburban life, and all them comforts he got by pretending to be less a shitheel than he really was. Fuck, that's all they're good for. Pretending. Kieran was better at it than Clark was. Two sides of the same shithead penny. I could never get away with pretending. No good an actress for that, that's what I found out that night I was telling you about previous.
"Say what you want about me, I never tried fooling nobody about the kinda woman I was," Tina sighed, "Maybe if I was, I'd have ended up in some nice house with vinyl siding and grass, and an okay-looking doctor with no personality hanging off my arm..."
She shrugged, "But then, I guess I'd never had Eli. Lemme tell you, he's a gift. Kept me from death's door more than once. Don't know what I did to deserve him."
Tina became distant, "You know, I guess come to think of it, Deanna was never much good at pretending either, and she didn't much try. Guess she knew it wouldn't fool any...ARGH!"
She tripped, arms flailing as she fell forward, sprawling out with little dignity and less elegance over something cold, solid and...
Bloody.
Tina lifted her face, feeling her hands move with slow deliberation over the stiff arms, the waxy, cold face...
The eyes that were open and staring. Eileen's eyes.
It was not a scream that escaped Tina's mouth, but a long, low moan at the sight of the thorn in her side, the conniving little bitch, the scheming, vampiric slut, the worst thing to ever happen to her...
Her niece. Dead, cold, blood drying on her front from an opened throat.
"De-De..." she could not form the word, just the syllable repeated over and over again, "Dee..."
With his jacket over his shoulder, Dave listened to Tina reflecting on her family, her blessings and her curses (though Eli seemed to be the only blessing she cared to mention). He found it interesting, really: this woman who on the surface was quite unpleasant and rude stood for the same values Dave believed in. Family, compassion, loyalty. He would do the same things for Kathy Tina had done for Eli. Fascinating, how these strangers, forced together in this horrid hellscape, were not that different after...
"Great Scott!" Dave moved to catch Tina but it was too late. She had fallen on the corpse of the very girl she was just discussing, one of her curses. And the very same girl he failed to reach in the woods just yesterday. As Tina knelt there in shock, Dave noted another body across from her. Lance Wilson! Good God! While he was not the brightest bulb in his class (he misspelled William Butler Yeats's name as "Yeast" on several occasions), the boy had so much potential if he simply sobered up and dropped his airs. If he were just himself...
But no. Yet another young soul executed by this monster, while Dave remained to watch it all transpire.
Returning his attention to Tina, Dave placed his jacket over her, grabbing her by the shoulders gently. "Easy now..." Slowly, he raised her to her feet.
Tina looked from Deanna to Smoke. She'd barely even noticed. But there they were, lying feet apart, covered in blood from gaping wounds.
"I...I don't..."
Words were difficult. She felt like she knew what she wanted to say. This was Eileen's daughter, her precious girl. Tina had been supposed to take care of her, protect her...
And Smoke, Lance, whatever the dumb wannabe asshole's name was. He...he couldn't be dead. Just a few hours ago, Tina had been caught with him in that stupid net and in a few other ways too...
"She would," she heard herself say, "She would. Would just up and die, take him out with her, it wasn't...it wasn't in her to take prisoners. And she...yanno, she was...she was asking for this. Running off all the time, yelling about how unfair we all were, how much she wanted to off herself, latching back onto her brother the second she came back, I...I dunno, maybe she wanted it. It's...it's nothing she didn't..."
She was not sure how long the silence lasted before she said, "...want. If she wanted anything."
Tina forced herself to look at the bloody scene anew, "I never really figured out what she wanted."
Still holding Tina, Dave pondered with her. "Sometimes, what we want is irrelevant. It's subjective matter. What we need--none of us can decide." He looked over the two children (children!), somberly adding, "As for what Miss Wilcox needed, troubled as she was, I don't think you nor I can truly decipher."
A strange feeling had overcome him then. Never before had he comforted a parent for the loss of her child. Though Tina wasn't the girl's mother in blood, she fulfilled the role. Not happily, but Tina tried. Dave was nervous, fearing he was not up to task.
Alas, he tried. "Are you alright? Do you...need a moment?"
Noah
"Well one would assume that the better plan is to run, far and fast, but we don't do logic in these parts now do we, Duvall?" He asked turning to her with a small smirk. He hadn't talked with Emma alone in a while. They hadn't teamed up in quite some time.
***
Drew
There was heavy breathing and sharp rapid movements of the eyes of a dark hair boy, running, scrambling for any clear sign of the common hall, but alas, no such luck.
He reached down and touched his sore ribs, before looking at his hand, the blood soaking through his hoodie. That freak had gotten him good, but he didn't give the killer the satisfaction of ending him, he was stronger than that...Smarter than that.
Drew found himself leaned up against a tree, trying to find his bearings, bleeding, and alone.
"A moment?" Tina looked at him, "I've given this little bitch more moments than she deserved. Fuck if I'm letting her take anymore," she tossed her hair, "This is awful. A goddamn ugly tragedy and all the rest of it, but I ain't about to go on hunger strike and renounce laughter because some little punk who'd never shed a tear for me is dead. I got a bit too much self-respect for that," she examined the scene again, "Let me get a look at them..."
She examined the bodies, moving from one to the other, feeling a weird sense of detachment.
"Figures," she folded her arms, bending down over Deanna, to retrieve something from prone fingers, "Lookit here," she held up the knife she'd found.
Emma found herself smiling at that. "Of course. Logic's become a passing trend in the past year. Haven't you been keeping up?" She chinned ahead. "C'mon. Let's get out of here, before Ghostface jumps out of the bushes and chops us all up into sushi."
This felt nice. Almost like old times.
***
Dave withdrew his hands. He wasn't one to judge a woman on her history. She lived her life, he lived his--quite differently, he might add. Dave couldn't judge what Tina had endured with Deanna. Both were abrasive figures, that was to be sure, with their own problems and demons. If there was anything he could determine from the scene he was witnessing, it was the wasted potential of a relationship that could have been between the two, something he knew all too well.
He glanced at the knife, shining a crimson red. "One knife, two victims. That's odd. The killer wouldn't leave his weapon. I suppose...one murdered the other? Ghastly." Dave paled, suddenly feeling sick to his stomach.
-Emma and Dave
Noah
"Emma Duvall you know I hate sushi!" He said and began to run, looking back at her and smiling. It felt almost as if they were normal kids.
"One," Tina muttered, "Poor Smokey got stuck more than a Christmas ham," she indicated the stab wounds, "Dee's just got the one slice, and the knife in her hand..." she shook her head, "Damned fuckin' thing, I should've known when she saw us in that net she wasn't gonna let it go easy... Like I said, she didn't let things go, that wasn't her, never was. And he..." she felt an ugly, sick twisting in her stomach, "Jesus Christ, Dave, he wanted out! He told me himself last night, he said he didn't want to deal with her, he was gonna break things off..."
She lifted a trembling hand to her mouth, "What if he tried?"
***
"So you recorded your helpless girly patients..."
"Girly patients?"
"They were girls, not girlies," Phyllis amended.
"You recorded them without their knowledge..."
"For a book, yes, I know it's depraved."
Fitz shrugged, "Cheesemaking is depraved, and yet brie and cheddar make tables better."
"You don't need to absolve me," Phyllis told him curtly, "I can shoulder my own blame."
"I don't say it to absolve anybody!" Fitz turned his nose up, "I only wonder why I'm not in it."
"In what?"
"Your book!"
"You're not serious?"
"Aren't I interesting enough to be recorded?"
"You're not even a patient of mine!"
"That's besides the point! If you're going to violate someone's privacy, at least make sure they're worth violating!"
"You're being ridiculous!"
"I'm only asking intelligent questions! I can't fathom what any of those lickspittle girls could've told you that I couldn't have told better."
"You've never been demonized by a murderer."
Fitz glared at her with one eye.
"Before now," Phyllis granted, "What, are you so eager to see your name in print?"
"It's not a matter of recognition. Just that I'm perplexed at all this hysteria over weeping little gi..." he trailed off, looking off into the middle distance.
"What..." Phyllis began, though she paused, her eyes widening as she followed his gaze.
"Drew!" Fitz breathed, "What the devil are you doing here?"
"He's bleeding, Fitz!"
"And bleeding too!"
Emma ran after him, signaling the drug dealing thug behind her to follow. It was truly an absurd world they lived in!
***
Dave, again not being judgmental, didn't bother to question what the "net" was about. Instead, he simply listened. "You mean...you think she killed him? By God, Tina! These are teenagers! Kids! They can't be capable of murder! They can't! They...shouldn't be." Retching at the thought, Dave turned away. "You knew the girl. Do you really think she was...capable to do that?"
-Emma and Dave
Drew
Drew lazily turned his head at the voice, much like nails on a chalkboard he knew who he would soon be looking at. He was sweating, and he looked back to his wound before looking at his father.
"I always thought we Smith's bled sugar and syrup, how wrong I was."
"I tell ya a kid who was capable of murder," Tina spat, "This little one's brother. And if his pretty dumb ass could figure it out, it ain't a stretch it runs in the blood."
***
"Impertinent youth!" Fitz snapped, shaking Drew by the shoulders.
"Fitz, Fitz you can't he's bleeding..." Phyllis moved to restrain him.
"Unhand me, woman!" Fitz made to backhand her, though he succeeded mostly in hurting his hand.
"You stupid boy!" he told him, "What in God did you mean by running off into these wilds on your own, don't you know anything? Damn it all, I thought you were supposed to have some sense..." he trailed off, "What happened to your ugly hair?"
"More importantly," Phyllis interjected, giving Fitz a dirty look, "How did you get hurt?"
-Tina, Fitz and Phyllis
Drew
An annoyed expression fixed itself on his face, and a low groan escaped his lips as his father shook him, gripping his shoulders like stress balls. The dandy had a firmer grip than one would expect from a...man of his composure.
The woman's voice was almost as shrill and grating to him as his father's, it might have been the pulsing migraine, it might have been how much it reminded him of that insect Micah. He would feel bad for her, he would feel bad for Micah, the boy seemed kind enough, however it didn't serve Drew's purpose to be kind in return, rather it more suited his needs to be cruel to the young blonde. He looked up at the woman, and nodded towards the woods.
"Freak, in a mask."
"Well..." Phyllis lifted her head, naturally. She turned to Fitz, "The wound isn't that deep..."
"There is ooze oozing from it! Ergo, it is deep!"
"It can be easily fixed!"
"If you bring him anywhere near that boogity woogity 'doctor' who did for my eye..."
"Please. I have some ethics left to me," she turned to Fitz, "I need a stick."
"You need a kick in the pants!"
"Get a stick, Smith!"
"What are we? Cave-men?"
"For him to bite on! So he doesn't lose the family tongue."
Fitz grumbled ruefully, though he retrieved a stick, thrusting it with little elegance under Drew's nose, "Bite that."
"Does the wound burn?" Phyllis asked him, in as composed a voice as she could manage.
-Fitz and Phyllis
Drew
Drew looked to the stick and back to Fitz, an expression of disgust on his face.
"Well, better this than that horrid belt of your I suppose." He said and bit down on the stick, dirt and bark gracing his taste buds.
He briefly spit out the stick and looks at the woman, "I don't know it feels like I got cut up by a psychopath."
Nice to know the son shared the father's wit. Phyllis resisted the urge to scream, "It might be important. If the wound is infected, you'll need better first aid than I can give."
"And what can you give?" asked Fitz, "Pep talks and red rubber balls?"
"You would prefer I handed him over to Dr. Langley?"
"My eye doesn't hurt!"
"Your eyes is gone!"
"Don't argue while I'm arguing!"
Phyllis studied the wound, "It's already turning red. If it festers..."
"Festers?"
"Yes, festers, if it festers, we have an infection, and I don't know if we have sufficient antibiotics at the medical..."
"Boy, if you're festering, you have a damned lot of explaining to do!"
Drew
Drew winced as the woman examined his wounds, "Blast it, yes the fucking thing burns now would you stop being as useless as your son, or does it run in the family?"
He would grab the stick and bite down, looking at her through daggers.
Phyllis stared cock-eyed.
"Blessed Mother, is that how I sound?" Fitz asked, "I'm sorry."
"No you're not."
"Correct. I'm not."
"We'll have to cauterize the wound?"
"Isn't that what that maniac did to my eye?"
"It's what he should've done!" Phyllis snapped, "Alright, this will be difficult..."
She rooted in her coat.
"What're you looking for? Forceps? Anasthetic? Altoids?"
"This."
"Jesus!"
Phyllis turned the knife over in her hands. Fitz cocked his singular visible eyebrow, "That...that isn't..."
The very damned knife those kid detectives wanted you to find, he might've laughed, Well. You found it.
"Yes, it's that knife," Phyllis seemed to anticipate the question, "I wasn't about to go out here with a one-eyed man and nothing to defend either of us."
"How damned reassuring."
She turned to Fitz, "Do you have a lighter?"
Fitz blinked, "Don't you?"
"I don't..." but she sighed, "I don't...maybe..."
She rooted about in her coat, her fingers closing around something small and cold, "Oh God."
"What's that?"
"Micah's," she responded curtly, "One of his old ones, I...God knows when I took it off him..."
"I've still got an AmEx in my wallet from 2003. You aren't special."
"Could you just hold him steady?" Phyllis demanded, "This is going to hurt."
-Fitz and Phyllis
Drew
Drew began breathing heavily as he anticipated the horrific burn of the blade on his skin,
Did this woman even know what she was doing? He thought to himself.
Fitz wiped his hands off on each other for...some reason as he held down on Drew's shoulders.
"If you need medical expenses," he whispered, "It comes out of that $20,000."
"What was that?" asked Phyllis.
"Nothing!"
"I thought so," and she pressed the hot blade down against the wound.
Drew
"MPPPHHHH!!!" Drew bit down hard on the stick, so hard he felt it crack a little.
He looked to his father with hate fueled eyes, and swore to himself he would get a lot more out of the man than twenty thousand.
Fitz screamed a high, girlish shriek that did nothing for Phyllis's temperament. She pressed her eyes closed, feeling them water in the heat...
"Oh!" she set the knife aside.
"Is it over?" Fitz asked, having also closed his eyes, "Dear God, is it done?"
"Yes, Fitz..." she told him, between ragged pants, "It's done."
"Oh. Very good," he opened his eyes, "Can I look?"
"Knock yourself..."
Fitz looked at the raw, red scar on his son's torso and promptly vomited a series of uninspiring colors.
"Ugh!" Phyllis nudged him over, "For God's sake."
"I have a weak stomach!"
"And yet you didn't vomit on Langley while he was rooting around in your eye-socket!"
"I was in shock!"
"Are you alright, Drew?" she turned back to him, retrieving a few Kleenex (mother's prerogative) from her pocket to dab at the sick.
Drew
"You...You enjoyed that you sick fuck." He spat at her, glaring.
"Revenge for the harmless prank I played on your pansy son."
"I'm not quite so calculating," Phyllis told him curtly.
"I should say not," said Fitz, "Boy, you have some fine explaining to do, puttering about with a murderer on the loose. What do you mean by it?"
Drew
Drew turned to what he had to call his father,
"Oh so now you wonder about my location and what I'm doing, where's that attitude been my whole life."
"I never knew you existed!"
"What?" began Phyllis.
"Stay out of this!"
"Gladly."
"You insist on pratting about like you're owed something, yet you have all the skill for self-preservation of a snail!"
"We're looking for everybody," Phyllis interjected in a more measured tone, "Many people just left the common hall and never came back. You're the first we found."
Drew
"You don't know me you one eyed pirate bitch, you don't know a god damned thing about me." He spat at his father.
"You act as if you are the highest among men, yet you let your son die, cold and scared, and alone."
"Oh, wow," muttered Phyllis.
"WHAT DID YOU CALL ME?"
"Don't make him repeat it..."
"I will have you know that I was nowhere near him when he died!"
Phyllis gave him a look and, seeming to realize how that sounded, Fitz changed his tack, "He went where he wished, as he pleased. I had no power over him, and the thought that I do is pure fancy! Now, if you want to act spurned that I gave enough of a damn to go looking for you, make your own way back!"
"That's hardly advisable," Phyllis told him tersely.