The Outkast

by Craig Thomas

  ******

  The Outcast dropped the flabby body on the ground, and walked towards Robert. Again, it was time to wake the boy up from his near-stupor. And to hand him the weapon of justice—this time, a bloody scythe.

  ******

  Brad wanted to let Donnie realized that he was sick and tired of being screamed at. He unlocked the front door, but didn’t open it. “Come on in whenever you’re good and ready,” he yelled out to Donnie, and walked back into the living room.

  Then, he stopped, having noticed Donnie didn’t open the door.

  He walked back to the door, pushed it open, looked out this way and that, and found no living soul.

  “What the hell are you up to?” Brad said under his breath. He decided to go back to bed. But then, a glimpse of something caught his eye. It glinted in the glow of the lights, right there on the porch step. He drew closer and found out it was blood.

  He slammed the door shut right away, locked.

  He didn’t have a clear-cut understanding of what was going on, but there was blood on his porch step and a late night visit by the strange Donnie Murphy. So, he had a reason to believe something was wrong with the world.

  Back in the living room, he picked up the phone and called Donnie.

  Then, he called the cops.

  Chapter 12

  At last, the moon began to smile down on the slumbering souls of Ogre’s Pond.

  The Outcast turned the ignition on, and under the blessing of the lunar light, he drove off.

  It had taken him a good while to finalize business with Donnie and get back to the spot where he’d parked his SUV. But he hadn’t regretted a second of the experience. In fact, he felt so elated, because he had spent some quality time with Donnie. Some kills took longer than the others. The longer and more complex they were, the more fulfilled he became. The job was all done now. It was time to celebrate the conquest.

  But first things first. He would make one last visit to the River, a ritual he performed each time the eradication process of one more foe had been completed—with the exception of Trevor, of course. That was another reason he detested to relive his experience with the feeble man.

  He drove back to the dirt road that ran parallel to the trail, which in turn ran along the bank of Sebastian River. He wanted to have one last look at Donnie’s body, to breathe in the air of fresh conquest and taste the sweetness of it.

  If he hadn’t been very vigilant, or if he had completely given himself over to the deep euphoric feeling of his victory, he might not have noticed on time. Ahead, the Sheriff’s cruiser was parked in-between two fat oak trees, a set of disco lights gyrating atop its roof.

  The Outcast swerved into an area of overgrown underbrush, farther away from the side of the road, and cut out the engine. He got out from behind the wheel, moved to a concealing spot, and crouching there, he watched.

  There was a second police car parked several feet away from the Sheriff’s. It was completely blocked from view by a densely formed grove of oaks, and only the showers of light dancing around the trees gave it away.

  He heard the loud voice of Sheriff Stack before he saw him emerge from the woods, moving into the open space. The Outcast could see that the man was clearly—and absolutely—ruffled.

  Good.

  He would give him a load of reasons to feel even more upset. That’s the beauty of the game—the beauty, the whole glorious point. Get him ruffled and puzzled. Let confusion and consternation set in.

  He watched and listened.

  Out here in the woods, even with a whisper, voices carried very easily and far in the quiet of the night. But Sheriff Brian Stack wasn’t whispering. He was actually screaming into the face of the night, obliterating every foundation of serenity. He held something in his hand, waving it in the air as he raved. The Outcast squinted to make out what it was. A book. Apparently, Robert’s book.

  The boy must have brought his book to the killing ground again. The Outcast forbade him doing that, and he would have taken care of it had he known. He alone was to leave tracks behind at every scene. His True Blood was too green to demonstrate adequate finesse when it came to handling such responsibility.

  Next time they met, he would address it. No big deal.

  But then, The Outcast heard the Sheriff giving orders to his deputies. They were going to get Robert and put him in custody.

  Not in a million years.

  The Outcast had to move right away.

  Had to spring into action and stymie them.

  ******

  It was 12:01 A.M. on Thursday.

  Robert curled up under his blanket, snoring peacefully, no ongoing nightmares. The bloody scythe felt cold against his flank.

  There was a vicious rap at the door—the main entrance door, from the sound of it. And then another rap. There were frantic voices outside the house, too. Voices attempting to force their ways in through the smallest cracks available, and then straight ahead to intrude upon his calm world of no dreams.

  He wriggled gently, rustling the blanket.

  Then, a firm and callous hand slid up his arm.

  ******

  Aroused from sleep and confused, Holly hopped out of bed and staggered across the room, heading towards the parlor in response to the cacophonous sounds of raps and voices.

  “You didn’t lock the main door to your home, Mrs. Smallwood,” Deputy Allan Moore, who appeared to have forgotten Holly’s little instruction regarding what she should be called, said as Holly appeared.

  Holly looked at him, not yet fully awake to her environment, to what was going on.

  “You didn’t even close it, let alone lock it,” said Deputy Crawford McGinnis, a very young and wiry man who had accompanied Allan to Holly’s house. “It was left ajar.”

  Holly turned in Crawford’s direction. A veritable rookie. She put his age at twenty, maybe twenty-one. Assuming a stern disposition, she said, “What nonsense are you talking about? How could I have gone to sleep with my door left open, young man?”

  “Um ...” Crawford began, and shrugged, playing the role of a henpecked man who had just been browbeaten by his iron-fisted woman. His hand drifted to his gun holster with absently, and then stayed put while he shifted his weight from one foot to the other.

  Allan was riled by Crawford’s pansy show. He intervened. “That’s what we found when we arrived, ma’am, and we’re here to—”

  “Oh, yeah. That’s what you found, damn right,” Holly burst. She was beginning to feel exhausted and sick of this whole thing. She had had enough—more than enough—of the officers’ crap. “It’s barely twelve in the morning, and you wouldn’t even let me sleep. Has my punishment climbed to that height? How did you get in and what’re you doing here at this ungodly hour? Have you got more evidence against him now? More evidence to pile up on top of the shitty ones you’ve already got?”

  Allan opened his mouth to respond to the avalanche of furious words rolling out of Holly’s mouth, and thereby save the day, but he closed it back. Holly wasn’t done yet. He would have to wait his turn.

  “Oh, save your breath, okay? You don’t even need to say a word. It’s all crystal-clear. Your boss has sent you to take him away from me at last. Isn’t that so?”

  With his thumbs hooked in his belt-holes, Allan said, “Unfortunately, yes, ma’am. That’s exactly why we’re here.”

  Everything happened so fast from that point on—until it all culminated in an unmitigated disaster.

  Holly burst into tears, shaking her head and screaming something at the deputies—screaming some really caustic obscenities.

  Allan was trying to speak above her screams, to explain to her that taking the boy away was inevitable, as much as he hated to do it. One more body had been found at the river bank—a body that had been identified as one of Robert’s teachers. More clues had emerged along to pull the boy into the center of the mess once again.

  And Deputy Crawford McGinnis had decided to stop shifting from foot to f
oot, and instead had chosen to pull his gun out of its holster as his wide eyes beheld the behemoth of a monster who came flying towards him, sparkling knife in one hand and chimpanzee’s face in place.

  Holly saw it shortly before Crawford did—and even longer before Allan. Her scream of invective changed to a scared shriek as she turned and ran back down the hall, her lace-edged nightgown billowing and gunshots booming after her.

  Crawford was screaming, too. He’d brought his weapon out of the holster, working things pretty fast lest those things go rotten even much faster. The gun was coming up now, coming up to take aim, his finger on the trigger, ready to squeeze, his eyeballs expanding in their sockets with ever increasing fear of the creature whose flight seemed to be on the verge of outpacing Crawford’s own celerity.

  The gun blasted again and again, bullets gouging walls and whining away like some banshee spirits in a terribly foul mood.

  Even as his heart pounded wildly against his rib cage, and even as he gritted his teeth and squeezed the shit out of the trigger, Crawford McGinnis felt himself lifted off into the air, and with that came an indescribable pain.

  He had been stabbed in the shoulder.

  ******

  Deputy Allan Moore watched Holly’s eyes change from being filled with pugnacity to fright, and he wondered what had come upon her again. He hated the woman, anyway. Earlier, he’d thought she was very strange and remarkably annoying, considering how she sometimes came unglued when least expected, especially in the middle of a conversation. He was still wondering what had come upon her until the noise delivered to him a complete package of understanding.

  Wheeling his head to the left, Allan saw Crawford’s frightened countenance, saw him make a move to draw his gun, and then saw a huge figure lope from the shadow behind the kitchen wall, airborne towards Crawford. The figure, flashing a chimp’s head atop a huge human body, crashed right into the screaming young deputy just a split second before Crawford started to shoot. The assaulter rammed its knife into Crawford’s right shoulder while it applied its momentum to knock him off his feet, and simultaneously parried Crawford’s gun-hand towards the wall. Bullets chipped away woodwork, filling the living room with smoke and dust. While in midair, Crawford lost his grip on the gun, which flew right underneath a couch at the opposite end of the room.

  On the floor with his attacker, Crawford wailed in pain as the giant repeatedly stabbed him along the entire length of his torso.

  Meanwhile, Allan had ducked behind a couch to shield himself from being hit by stray bullets. It took him just about five seconds to screw up his courage and come out of his hiding place, but the time seemed to stretch into eternity. He was training his own gun now, wishing more than anything to blow the monster’s head away, but also aware of the possibility of accidentally killing Crawford in the process.

  The first chance came when the ape-man yanked its knife out of Crawford’s flesh so forcefully that it slid away from Crawford a little bit.

  Allan opened fire. Didn’t hit his target. Only chipped off the wooden flooring beside the big monster.

  The chimp-faced man growled and launched its knife at Allan.

  Allan stumbled back a step, ducking away from the path of the sailing missile, and although he lost his footing in the process, he didn’t stop shooting as he went down.

  At first, he thought the monster would come for him, but the huge creature only bounced to its feet and ran out the door, into the quiet, moonlit night.

  ******

  “Oh, my baby,” Holly cried, and ran back into the living room as Allan attempted to place a call to the Sheriff’s Office. “He’s stolen my baby, Deputy Moore.”

  With a show of his teeth, not hiding his anger, Allan said, “Someone’s got to take the kid, Mrs. Smallwood. If the police don’t, then some prowling ape will come along to help. Haven’t you figured that out yet?”

  “How dare you talk to me that way?”

  “Oh, what way is that, ma’am? I actually thought you locked all the doors,” Allan said sarcastically. “The thing from the God-forsaken place stole the boy away through the back door.”

  After the intruder had fled, Allan discovered the back door was also open.

  “Yeah, I already know that,” she said, mopping her face. “So, should that be the justification for your callousness? You have no human feelings whatsoever, and—”

  “Mrs. Smallwood, could you please keep your voice down so I can make a call for help?”

  Allan’s breath was still rough around the edges when he spoke on the phone.

  Emily Bateman who answered the call at the Sheriff’s Office said, “Hey, Allan. Have you been running uphill, or what? You breathe like you’re gonna have a heart-attack pretty soon.”

  “Tell you what, kid, I’ve just had something about worse than heart-attack.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “Yeah, really. I’ve had a terrible brush with death. Crawford’s down. We need ambulance. And we need back-up. Sixteen Bran Street.”

  “Oh, no,” Emily gasped.

  “Oh, yes. We need both, and we need them right away. I ain’t kidding.”

  “I didn’t mean ‘Oh, no. There ain’t no back-up for you, ‘cause you’re a lying son-of-bitch.’ I meant ‘Oh, no Crawford’s down. That’s no good.’”

  “No, it’s not. And thanks for the clarification,” Allan said, turning towards Crawford. “Hang on, buddy. Help’s on the way. You’ll be fine.”

  “How bad is it?” Emily asked.

  “Very.”

  “Oh, my God. Could you—”

  “Back-up and ambulance, Emily. Now, please.”

  “Working on it,” she said, and was gone.

  Allan moved to Crawford’s side, giving whatever little therapeutic support he could offer without upsetting his wounded comrade. Blood flowed along the wooden floor without any restriction.

  Holly lay face-down on the floor towards the hallway, mourning the kidnapping of her son.

  Not long after, the phone rang.

  It was Sheriff Brian Stack. “Make sure Crawford’s hanging on there, no matter how bad the situation is,” he told Allan, as if Allan was a first-class trained medical emergency technician, or as if the outcome of Crawford’s survival was exclusively in Allan’s possession.

  “I’m doing the best I can, Sheriff.”

  “Good,” Brian said. “I don’t expect any less from you. Help’s on the way. I’ll be on the way, too. Did you have an idea of where he ran to by any chance?”

  “All I know is that it ran out the front door,” Allan said. “And I locked all the doors right away.”

  “It?”

  “What, Sheriff?”

  “You said it ran out the front door ...”

  “Well, I don’t really know whether to call the thing “it” or “him,” if you ask me. He’s got a chimpanzee’s face sitting atop a man’s body.”

  “Ah,” Brian said. “Might be some monstrous creature from the Himalaya Mountains.” He hung up.

  Allan didn’t know if that was a joke or serious talk.

  Chapter 13

  “You think he’s gonna make it?” Allan stood to the left of Brian, across the street from Holly’s place. His oblong face was a tablet of deep worry. Two other deputies stood by their cruisers at the other side of the ambulance.

  “I hope he does,” Brian said. “He’s got so many deep wounds all over him, enough to kill an elephant—which conveniently explains why he’s unconscious. But the emergency workers said he’ll come around pretty good.”

  “What’s the news from the Coroner’s Office?” Allan asked as they began to walk back to Holly’s place.

  “Another interesting story,” Brian said. “One of the boys at the lab screwed things up. The hair at the scene came from two sources—Robert and someone else. But they never saw that important fact until recently. Damn lab techies.”

  “Who’s the other source?”

  “Still unidentified.”
r />   “So, they don’t have the DNA results from the blood samples for us yet?”

  “Not Trevor Carter’s.”

  “What?” Allan stopped in his track.

  “Yeah, I know. It’s shocking. The blood on the knife as well as the one in which the strands were marinated came from the same person.”

  “But not from Trevor?”

  “No.” Brian went up the porch steps, and added, “Not from Robert, either.”

  “This is getting more and more exciting,” Allan remarked.

  “I want you to add to that excitement the fact that Ed Gibson’s running a different version of his story now.”

  “Which is?”

  “He was out to get a pack of cigarette when it all happened last week, and he held that important piece of info back at the start of this investigation. Hell, even past the middle of it.”

  ******

  “I don’t really think it’s a good idea to go back in there unless we can get reinforcement,” Allan had observed when Brian had decided to head back to Holly’s.

  Now, once in there, Brian suggested they comb through the house for any giveaway signs in relation to the thing, as Allan had chosen to refer to the night intruder.

  Holly was howling away in her room, which was good. Brian thought the last thing they needed was a contentious woman breathing down their necks while they tried to make headway. Better to have her stay in there and cry her eyes out.

  Besides a congealment of blood on Robert’s bed, the search through the house yielded nothing.

  Then, they decided to go through Robert’s room one more time before giving up and leaving the house to devise another solution.

  “What exactly are we looking for?” Allan asked after a while. He hadn’t been too enthusiastic about sticking around here—the location of his near-death—but evading responsibility seemed to be an uphill task now that Brian was here to supervise.