Trigger warning: This episode contains depictions of domestic violence and some epic nastiness.
Continued from yesterday:
Manny had left him alone for a few minutes then forced Todd to sit at the kitchen table. The cell phone was in plain view. Obviously, Manny thought it was a dangling temptation but he didn’t figure Kenny grew up in the tenements. Todd had, and he knew that if he grabbed it and tried to dial for help, he’d be dead long before the cops showed up. If they showed up. Todd showed only a fleeting interest in the phone, staring at the knots in the wooden table instead. This unfortunately bored Manny.
Kenny retreating into the little trauma-induced shell he was didn’t put enough pressure on Todd’s bitch to produce Todd. Manny had to appeal to Sara’s guilt for getting him involved in this. He had to make sure Sara would be haunted if she had any thoughts about leaving Kenny in Todd’s place. Couldn’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs. Manny walked behind Todd’s chair and put his hands on the back of it. Todd shuddered, but didn’t make noise until he felt his shirt being lifted to the back of his neck. “Wh-What —?” he yelped, bunching forward until his chest was against the edge of the table. Manny paused thoughtfully, pressing the sharp edge of a fingernail into one of Todd’s shoulderblades. “How do you feel about tattoos, boy?"
"I – ” Todd swallowed. Random question which didn’t mean anything good at all.
“Don’t like needles?"
"No, I mean, I don’t – ” Crap, he’d sounded desperate. Todd heard Manny latch onto that bit of information with delight.
“Ah,” Manny reached behind him and opened a drawer. There was a safety pin wedged half under the empty plastic silverware tray and he pulled it out, bending it to stay open. Such a tiny thing. But Kenny would probably scream anyway. “When I got a tattoo, it was in the war,” he mused, testing the point with the pad of his finger. A lie, Todd knew, Manny hadn’t been to Vietnam, he’d faked a leg injury and got out of active duty. “We had to make do with whatever was available.” He put one hand on Todd’s shoulder, pulling the fabric that had slipped down his back up again. Shuddering, Todd shook his head. It was a mind game. Had to be. Manny would stick him with the pin a few times, that was all. Don’t let him see your fear. Todd tried to make himself go still and failed.
“I don’t want one,” he muttered, eyes shut tight. Manny wasn’t serious. There was nothing to ink the little marks with, but then that wouldn’t matter to Manny. It would hurt. That’s what mattered.
“I think ‘Twerp’ would be cute. 'Pussy Boy’ has more letters, but not quite the best ring to it.” Todd was silent, shaking under Manny’s hand. He grinned, palm going flat to push Todd forward more but not touching the pin to his back. “Come on, help me pick a name. Can’t start until you decide."
"I really don’t –” Todd whimpered.
Miraculously, the phone started to ring.
~
Sara got into character. Her name was Tracy, and she was calling from a cubicle hell somewhere outside of Mumbai, India[1], but she’d swear on any given holy book that she was calling from Maine, USA. She was interested in correcting the name and address she was calling, and selling double glazing to the unaware.
Just in time. Someone picked up the phone.
“What?” the man barked. Manny. Score.
“Good even-ing sir, is this 555-7982?”
“Yeah…?”
“Am I speaking to a meester Talonskee?”
“That’s Tolanski,” he corrected. “They don’t live here no more. Who is this?”
“My name is Tracy, and I am calling to offer you a bargain rate on Ace Double Glazing. If you accept this offer, we can give you–”
“Fuck off,” he growled, and hung up.
“The fuck was that about?” said Lance.
Sara chuckled evilly. “Now I *know* where they are. For certain. Same echo, same background theme. Time to lay a little smackdown.”
Dad had the phone. “I’ll inform the authorities. You’ll be done by then, won’t you?”
“By the time they get there? Puh*leez*… we all know the response time in that district is teh suxxorz.” She crooked a finger at the rest of the brotherhood. “Now, my dears… here is the *plan*…”
+
Todd tried to focus on clearing his breathing, on staying calm. Which was supremely hard to do when watching Manny rant and rave about fucking telemarketers. Evidently, he whimpered too much and returned Manny’s attention to him.
“Oh *yes*…” he cooed. “We had a tattoo date… Which was it? Twerp or Pussy Boy?”
{Bing bong}
“What the *fuck*?” he wondered. He peeked out a window. “Who the hell delivers pizza in this neighbourhood?”
{Knock knock knock…}
Manny groaned and went for the door. Out of sight of the kitchen where he had Todd tied to his chair. “What the fuck *now*?”
“Alphaghetto Pizza,” said a familliar voice. *Fred*! Fred was here! Wait, did that mean cavalry, or was he moonlighting on his new bouncer job? Nah… Fred’d eat any pizza he was told to deliver. Pie-pie was the better delivery man. If he ever felt like getting off his lazy ass and earning an honest buck. “I got one hotshot with the lot, a cheezo supremo with anchovies, and a sushi explosion… if you have a docket, the garlic bread and the coke’re free.”
“I didn’t order any fucking pizza,” Manny raged. “Can’t you see this building is *condemned*?”
“Look, buddy, I just take 'em where I’m told. You take it up with the management if ya got a problem. Now have you got nineteen ninety-five an’ a docket, or are you gonna pay the whole twenty-three?”
“Listen, pal–” Manny began.
Usually, when Manny called people 'pal’ or 'friend’, their teeth had a limited life expectancy. There was the expected 'splat’, but *this* time Manny was the one who wound up going backwards and, because Fred was never one to do things by halves, hit the wall opposite the door.
“Oops,” said Fred.
{Bamf} “You okay?”
Damn, but he never thought he’d be glad of that sulphuric stench. Todd coughed. “Hey, how you doin’? I’d get up, yo, but I’m a li'l tied up.”
“He’s fine, Sara!” All the same, he began automatically loosening the knots. “Did he do… anything?”
“Not yet, yo. He was warmin’ up to it. I’m okay, dawg.”
Sara entered, negligently dragging Manny into the kitchen by one leg. “So… this is where the Dragon bit,” she said. “Are you up to lingering in order to make sure he never tries this again?”
“If it means he’ll fuck off forever,” said Todd. “Then fuck yeah.”
Sara got one of her evil genius smiles. “Excellent.”
In spite of the gang being all there, Todd felt his heart drop. “Uh,” he asked a bit too late. “What'cha got planned?”
“_Silent Hill_ meets _The Exorcist_ meets _Supernatural_ meets _Poltergeist_,” she grinned. “With maybe a touch or three of _Blair Witch_. It depends on the improv.”
Todd thought of her movie making expertise and swallowed.
“And we have *so* many people who are good at special effects,” she chirped.
Jean straightened up from scanning Manny’s mind. “Euw,” she said. “That man’s head is a cesspool.”
“He don’t know nuthin’ 'bout what happened here,” said Todd. “I’m th’ only witness.”
Sara knelt, soothing unknown tears from his face. “We have to know, dear. We have to know to make this work. Share what you can?”
Todd looked away. Torn.
[1] Just about every telespruiker calling me has an Indian accent. MeMum and I joke that they’re all calling from there.
~
“…” Todd glanced over to the tiles by the lower kitchen cabinets. Pops had collapsed there. Todd didn’t need a blacklight to remember where the blood had smeared. And by the threshold from the kitchen to the doorway had been his mother’s last stand. He had laid a blanket over Pops, but he’d tried to work up the nerve to wrap a towel around Mom’s throat, lie her straight on her back in a dignified way. That was a day before she had begun to bloat and she could have looked like she was sleeping if not for all the caked blood in her hair. Todd had laid a blanket over her too and kept vigil.
Todd wasn’t aware how long he’d spaced but when he returned Sara was stroking his hair. He leaned into her embrace and breathed in. There was no point in keeping secrets any longer. She had to know what Manny had done if she’d found this place. She had to know if she’d seen the truth. Todd swallowed and started talking lowly.
“Pops was drunk. He said he was going to call someone to pick me up and then he started hitting me when I said I didn’t want to go. Mom came home from shopping and tried to put herself between us.” She hadn’t yelled at Pops to quit it. It didn’t do much of anything when she had. “He pushed her, broke the booze bottle and we both thought he was gonna cut her. But he charged past and swung the glass at me. Said he wanted to cut out my tongue if I wanted to stay. Mom tried to put herself between us, tugging him off me while he pried open my mouth. I…” This was the part where he was stupid, where he’d instigated the violence to get worse. He’d fought back. “I bit him,” Todd said, voice small. “So he started to choke me. Mom couldn’t get him off me, so she got the knife."
He remembered her eyes wild, staring down and trying to get Pops to turn around and threaten him off. But Todd began to see more red than any other color and in the next instant, he was coughing and she was on her knees trembling, blood all over her hand. Pops was lying on his back, eyes unseeing. "She killed him. I tried telling her it would be okay, but she didn’t want to go to prison. She told me to leave the room, but she had another knife –” Todd gulped. “I stayed n'talked to her. I thought things were gonna be okay when she smiled. Like we were gonna leave and go somewhere nice and forget it all. She told me she didn’t want to go to prison and I told her she didn’t have to I swear I wasn’t gonna tell nobody. I thought it would be *okay*. And then she had her hand on my face and the other was moving…” A line of red that started to spurt and Todd had caught her as she shuddered. He had yelled, wrenched the knife away from her fingers, threw it aside. She clutched at him and he couldn’t move, couldn’t even get a towel to stop the bleeding. It was too deep and too fast, and soon she’d stopped breathing at all. “I couldn’t stop her,” he moaned, hiding his face against Sara. It was a failure. He didn’t want to know what she thought of him for it.
~
Sara allowed herself a moment and a shed tear for the child that had been lost in this room. “Not your fault, beloved. You couldn’t stop her.”
“But–”
She kissed him. “Calmly, now, dear. You have to act ignorant of everything we’re going to do to him.”
Todd looked like his stomach had dropped straight down to the core of the earth. “Uh… What *are* you going to do to him?”
Now came the evil grin. “Oh, just what four ghosts did to Mr Scrooge.”
“Um. It was *three* ghosts,” said Evan.
“Three ghosts plus the ghost of Jacob Marley is…?” said Sara. “Enough bickering. Jean, Lance, Pietro, Kurt, Kitty… you’re all special effects. Can you co-ordinate as well, Jean? Kurt and I shall also be demonic shadowy things in the dark.”
“Psh! Typecasting…” muttered Kurt.
“Yes, but very necessary typecasting. If it helps, think of yourself as an avenging angel in diguise.” Once again, she physically supported Todd in preparation for an emotional load. “I’m afraid you’ll have to share your memories of that night with Jean. She’s good with certain secrets.”
It only took a moment.
“Got it,” said Jean. “In technicolour and surround sound. Ouch.”
“*Right*!” Sara clapped her hands. “Let’s get *to* this!”
+
Manny woke up. His wallet was lighter by thirty dollars and there was a stack of cold pizza by the door. There was also a warm coke and some tepid garlic bread. Frankly, he was shocked by the delivery guy’s honesty[1]. Kenny was still tied to the chair, though he’d managed to move it slightly towards the door. What was the little fuck planning? To somehow hop out onto an uncaring street, still tied to the chair? He’d be worse than dog food if he succeeded.
“Enough shit,” he decided. “Your skinny bitch doesn’t think your ass is worth it, I might as well have some fun.” He picked up the needle.
“…mort, *no*…”
Manny turned to where the voice was apparently coming from. That was… but she was dead… She sounded like she was shouting, but, at the same time, she was a long way away.
“…that god damn son of yours is a fucking *freak*…”
The room shook. A brief wind rose up and then…
He was standing in the same kitchen. Back in time. Young Todd was sitting where Kenny had been, watching in horror as his parents fought. Mort had a broken bottle, which she dodged, and then he came at Todd.
“…cut his fucking tongue out…”
“…no…”
A knife. A split second of maternal fury. Mort fell in the corner. Right where the coroner had found him. Knife still stuck in his ribs.
And then he was back in the present, staring at the dilapidated cupboards, looking for some hint. The place stank of sulphur.
By the prickling of his hackles, he knew someone was watching him. The unnatural wind flew up and died once more, just as the floor shook.
Manny turned to see a tall demon with all black eyes[2]. Its skin was coloured like a coral snake. It was holding the same knife…
The same knife that had killed Mort.
And something in his peripheral vision was crawling up the wall. Something dark with glowing eyes… but he daren’t take his eyes off the coral-snake demon, for fear of what it would do to him.
As long as he kept his eyes on it, he felt, it would not move.
“What the fuck?” said Kenny, evidently perplexed.
“…cut his fucking tongue out…” raged the ghost of Mort Tolenski.
“NO!” Screamed the demon in her voice. It lunged.
Manny screamed.
The other demon leaped on him. There was a cloying cloud of sulphur, the sensation of being turned inside-out, then right way back again, and he was slumped where Mort had fallen.
He instinctively felt his chest. No knife. No wound. So the spreading moistness was… okay. For limited definitions of 'okay’.
Blue and red lights flashed in through the windows.
“HELP!” Kenny screamed. “The guy’s a psycho! Help me!” He frantically bumped away towards the door.
Thundering footsteps barely masked the rumbling of the floor. Something human-shaped, with lots of trailing edges, fell through the ceiling, floated across the room, and vanished up the stairs. The murder weapon got itself out of the drawer and danced across the remains of the table.
{BAM!} “FREEZE! POLICE!”
Just like that, it all stopped. The men in blue covered him while they released Kenny from his bonds.
Kenny, for a change, was rattling out a story about this psycho who yelled at thin air and did some weird shit before throwing himself in a corner and pissing his pants. The dude’s not right, yo.
And upstairs, they found piles of children’s clothing on his mattress, and kiddie porn magazines that hadn’t been there before.
Manny felt the cold chill of shock creep over him as they cuffed him. *Had* they not been there? He had to know better than to leave evidence like that lying around. Didn’t he?
Or was he loosing his mind?
Briefly, the coral-snake demon appeared in a corner. Staring at him.
He screamed, trying to get away.
By the time they trained their lights on where it was… it was gone. Vanished.
Maybe he was insane.
That’d make… sense.
[1] Because in this neighbourhood, a pissed-off delivery guy ordinarily takes *all* your cash, credit cards, and the pizza.
[2] Of course Sara carries some basic effects gear with her.
~