Should Have Killed The Kid

by Frederick Hamilton, R.

  Fix it, fix it, fix it.

  'Hey,' he muttered as the soldier weakly tried to push the kid's hand away.

  He reached across and gently snagged the kid's hand. The kid hissed when he gripped the shard of glass.

  'Ssshhhh, it's okay,' Dave said and after a brief second of doubt about whether he should leave the glass in place, Dave eased it out. He almost vomited again when it slurped free of the wound. The kid yelped as a torrent of blood rushed to fill his cupped palm. 'Shit', Dave hissed and quickly scrabbled around until he realised that he'd left the backpacks in the car that was currently lying upside down on the highway behind them. 'Shit,' he repeated as he patted down his pockets.

  'Here.'

  The old lady held a balled up handkerchief over her shoulder.

  After a second's hesitation while the kid bawled on and the blood started to drip on the soldier's lap, Dave took it. He did his best not to wince but it was difficult with the steady gaze of those eyes in the mirror.

  Eyes that have seen things no one should have to see... Monty's voice echoed as he went to work twining the handkerchief around the kid's hand.

  'I'm Marge, by the way,' the old lady barked over her shoulder and Dave briefly froze. 'One of my colleagues – I assume former colleagues now judging by the state I last saw him in – led me to believe you were expecting me.' Dave nodded as he returned to bandaging the kid's hand. He tucked the edge of the handkerchief in place and then studied the blood tinged shard he held in his hand.

  It was his theory that it was easier than trying to understand what was going on around him.

  'Well it's nice to fucking meet you too. Shit, never mind a thanks for saving our arses or nothing.' The old lady's eyes returned to the road while Dave continued to study the glinting shard of glass.

  21.

  Despite the strange and unsettling situation he found himself in, once a few more hours passed, Dave found his eyelids starting to droop. It had become more and more difficult to avoid collapsing against the window and snoring away. He couldn't help it. The tumult of emotions since he'd fled the skyscraper – not to mention the near continuous physical exertion he'd endured – left him utterly burnt out. He had a theory that even if a horde of the things had been hot on his heels, he'd find it difficult to summon anything beyond a yawn at this point.

  No one in the car was talking.

  Even the kid's whimpering and the soldier's groans of pain had tapered off about an hour into the trip. Now the only sound apart from engine was the elderly lady quietly humming under her breath while she motored along at, Dave guessed, about an even sixty kilometres an hour.

  He had no idea where they were going. Despite their slow speed he found it impossible to follow the scenery passing outside the window. Mainly it appeared to be uniform hilly paddocks bordered by stands of twisted gum trees that hugged rusty wood and wire fences. The occasional group of houses zoomed by – not really big enough to be labelled towns – but Dave didn't pay too much attention. They seemed to have suffered the same random approach to destruction and Dave was too tired to try and figure it out.

  His whole body was throbbing; probably the only thing that kept him awake. His overexerted muscles screamed in protest as the time spent sitting fused them in place.

  Could be worse though, he mused. Looking at the pale shade of white the soldier had gone, he realised a few sore muscles would be pleasant compared to the mess the shadows had made of her shoulder. He shuddered to think how much blood she'd lost.

  'Here we are.' The old lady abruptly stopped humming and sat up straighter. Dave looked out the window just in time to see the tarmac give way to dirt. He was jostled backward and forward as they headed down the corrugated driveway. Trying his best to ignore the bouncing husk in the front seat, Dave peered through the front window. A neat, white weatherboard farmhouse reared from the surrounding paddocks ahead, a moat of immaculately sculpted gardens circling it, only broken by a small granitic path that snaked from a larger edged section in front of the water tanks off to the right. He assumed it was some sort of car park.

  Dave had to blink a few times before the sight fully registered. He'd been expecting something far more decrepit, more in line with Monty's hovel out in the forest. The house and gardens were so pristine he had trouble believing it was real and not some sort of mirage. It looked like a little slice of England had been carved out and dumped down in the foreground of scrubby forest that occupied most of the rolling hills behind the house.

  The old lady scanned carefully left to right as they eased down the driveway. Once his initial shock ebbed, David followed suit. He breathed easier when he saw that the surrounding fields were still free of large patches of black.

  They crunched to a halt in the car park and the old lady wrestled the handbrake on.

  'Okay. All looks good. Let's go. Get the fuck out.'

  'Where are we?' Sally asked. Her lidded eyes abruptly darted wide.

  'My house...' The old lady scanned around again. 'Bendigo is about thirty k's that way,' she jutted a finger over her shoulder. 'Or should I say what's left of Bendigo anyway. Excepting the fountain for some fucking reason, it's all pretty much rubble now.'

  'Why–'

  'Get out of the fucking car,' the old lady snapped and a few seconds later hobbled down the path toward the house.

  Dave weighed up his options while he stared at the mummified remains in the front seat. A second later he wondered why he bothered and followed the old lady out the door. The kid followed suit, holding up his injured hand the whole time. The soldier stayed where she was, breathing heavily.

  Dave leant forward, his muscles screaming and held out his hand.

  'Do you need help?'

  'I'm fine.' Sally knocked his hand away and then spent an agonising minute groaning and easing her way out of the car.

  'Fine, fine. Sorry.' Dave backed away, giving her plenty of room. The purr of an engine could be faintly heard, emanating from around back of the house. For a second, Dave listened intently, trying to guess its source.

  A lawnmower? Don't be fucking ridiculous. Then what? Maybe a generator or–

  He almost jumped out of his skin when he felt a hand worm into his but managed to control it at the last second. The revulsion that hit as he looked down and saw the kid staring up at him was harder to force down. The hope in the boy's eyes cut him to the core and he wanted to shake the kid. To scream at him, WAKE THE FUCK UP!

  DON'T YOU REALISE WHY I TOOK YOU?

  He managed to hold it in though and, hand in hand with the boy, headed for the front door. He kept a close watch behind as the soldier reeled after them.

  The door creaked when the old lady eased it open and slipped into the darkened hallway. It was hard to tell because it was so soft but Dave thought she might have even been whistling under her breath. A beat later light flooded the hallway and Dave peered inside. It was a perfect mesh with the exterior of the house. The floorboards buffed and gleaming. The white paint fresh and free of any smudges or discolourations. It looked like it had just been painted a couple of days prior. The side table that rested a few steps inside was lined with knick knacks and a few pristine doilies. Further down, past a few doors – one leading off to the left and then a bit beyond, one to the right – Dave could see that the hall opened up into a large lounge that could have contained his flat all on its own.

  Everything about the house screamed old lady and when he breathed deep he expected to get the smell wafting up to him. The same one that had clung to almost every elderly person's abode he'd been in. A smell he'd never quite been able to pinpoint.

  But it wasn't that smell that wafted out of the opened door. Instead, the one that did immediately set his skin crawling. The grip on his hand tightened, letting him know that the kid had smelt it too. Shivers snaked the length of his spine as he stepped over the threshold and the stench strengthened. Adding to his unease was the sound that joined it. A combination of slow creaking mixed with space
d knocking that always arrived a split second after he expected it. There was something so unbalancing about the noise that Dave nearly ran back through the front door even though he knew there was no salvation out there.

  He forced himself forward but with every step he took, his dread grew. The closer he drew, the clearer it became that the noise came from the doorway he was going to have to pass to reach the lounge room.

  His pace slowed till he was nearly stationary. He probably would've stopped too if the kid hadn't kept going. The boy tugged at his hand, drawing him forward and even though Dave told himself not to look as he drew level with the door, his eyes were drawn of their own accord into what Dave judged by the furniture was some form of sitting room.

  Although it was dim inside, more than enough light filtered in for Dave to see exactly what caused the stench.

  All the furniture had been pushed back to the corners of the room with only a solitary wooden rocking chair left in position smack bang in the middle. The creaking noise came from it. That was made clear in the few seconds Dave stood transfixed watching it rock backward and forward of its own accord like some perpetual motion machine.

  It was the source of the stench as well.

  Wired in place on the chair was a body. At first glance Dave almost convinced himself that it was just someone relaxing as they stared out the front window. But that illusion was quickly dispelled.

  The girl was stark naked for a start. She looked about sixteen or seventeen. And judging by her figure was no doubt causing many men to think about getting themselves into trouble. Even Dave could appreciate it – though a second later he felt disgusted for even thinking along those lines.

  First the buzzing flies that circled her body registered. Then the strange colour of her skin. Far, far too pale, highlighting the garish red of the rents in her wrists where they were wired in place on the arm rests of the rocking chair. Then the entire picture abruptly snapped into focus for Dave. The dried and crusted tracks that twined their way down the girl's legs; down the wooden frame of the chair itself, showing the route her blood had taken as it evacuated her body.

  It hadn't travelled far though.

  At the base of the chair something had been roughly carved in the floorboards. Judging by the white scarring that marred it, had been gouged in quite a hurry. Dave didn't look long enough to fully divine what it was; just enough to know that it was some sort of circular symbol that the rocking chair sat in the middle of. It was hard to focus on anything for very long once he realised what sloshed between the scratched out lines. The pooled blood seemed implausibly fresh in comparison to the dried blood that crusted the girl herself but Dave didn't even attempt to find a solution to that conundrum.

  Fighting his gags, he finally managed to break the hypnotic effect of the rocking chair and walk on, wincing with each creak and bang of its unending momentum.

  He swallowed long and hard as the other door loomed to the right and he felt like crying.

  'What the fuck?' the soldier hissed behind him but he barely heard it. The words overrun by something else. Just as the creak and tap of the teenage girl faded, it was replaced by another, slightly faster, beat. It came from the doorway ahead.

  Don't look, he told himself but it was a doomed battle.

  The scene from the previous room was repeated and Dave half gagged, half snorted and almost lost the battle to hold back his bile. This time it was a man wired in place to another rocking chair. Dave thought he looked middle aged but the discoloured skin – a hideous greenish black – made it difficult to tell. Clearly he'd been in place a lot longer than the girl. The flies coated him in a thick blanket that only made divining his age even more difficult. The smell leaking from the door almost made the previous one pleasant. The kid next to him whimpered and Dave quickly hurried on, only catching a brief glimpse of the same strange pattern carved into the wooden floor. The blood inside had dried to a brownish-red crust.

  'Ssh, it's alright,' he said as the kid's whimpering grew louder. He only wished he could believe his own words. At least the stink was partly washed out by the potpourri smell as the hallway opened up into the lounge area. The source was apparent. A row of four plug-in air fresheners filled a power board sitting atop the antique side board on the right wall.

  He swept a gaze around the giant room, expecting more atrocities but no other bodies were wired to the antique but well looked after furniture that filled the space. If there were any patterns gouged in the floorboards they were hidden by the large rug that covered most of the floor.

  The old lady stood near a doorway on the far side of the room. Behind her Dave could see a kitchen.

  'Have a seat. You must be fucking knackered.' She gestured at a comfortable looking couch in front of her that faced a couple of armchairs across a coffee table. Dave just stared at her mutely, the horrors in the previous two rooms playing over in his mind. 'I'll get a coffee on. You lot look in dire need of caffeine.'

  She turned and went through the door into the kitchen.

  Because he couldn't think of anything else to do, Dave obeyed her request. The kid plonked down next to him on the couch and for a second the pair sat and stared, still shocked at what they'd seen. Dave scanned around the room again, his stomach roiling. Another hall led off just to the side of the door Marge had gone through and he shuddered to think what horrors might lay down that way.

  A clatter brought his eyes darting back around. He saw the soldier stumble as she backed into the sideboard. The whites of her eyes clear even from across the room as she stared around bug-eyed. Somehow, Dave doubted she'd missed the sideshow in the other rooms.

  When she saw Dave, she hobbled toward him, mouthing, 'Did you see?' while feebly flailing a hand behind her in the general direction of the hall.

  Dave nodded. He couldn't think of anything else to do. He kind of wondered how he could be sitting so calmly surrounded by corpses –then again it was just another horror added to the raft he'd seen in the time since he'd pulled into the Gallo's Hotel.

  They stared at each other, uncertain of how to proceed.

  'So, I must say it's one big steaming pile of shit you and Monty have dropped us in.'

  Dave jumped as Marge abruptly called from the kitchen doorway, a flinty edge to her voice. As though she'd seen what had passed between him and Sally and was going to...

  What? What's she going to do?

  Looking at her, the idea of physical harm seemed ludicrous even with the three bodies he'd seen so far.

  Dave comforted himself with the knowledge that the soldier had flinched too. At least until he realised that the silence had stretched on too long and he should probably answer Marge.

  'I don't think–' Dave started to protest, his mind scrabbling to come up with some sort of excuse. The eyes burning into him didn't help at all. At Marge's words Sally's gaze had immediately shifted around to fix on him. It didn't take a rocket scientist to note that suspicion was present in her eyes.

  He cleared his throat to try again but Marge cut him off.

  'Hold that thought,' she called as the kettle started to whistle. She disappeared back into the kitchen, leaving Dave to wilt beneath the soldier's stare.

  'What did she mean?' Sally asked evenly, making her way over to one of the armchairs across the table from him but not sitting down yet. Instead, she leant on the arm rest and peered across at Dave.

  'What?' Dave stalled, trying to force his brain back into action. Sally was having none of it.

  'What did she mean just then?' she pressed.

  'She...'

  'What did she m–'

  Sally's voice cut off as Marge re-entered with a couple of steaming cups.

  She dumped them on the coffee table, smiled a slightly disconcerting smile at Dave and then left again.

  Dave stared at the cups, avoiding eye contact until Marge returned with two more.

  'Tuck in, everyone. You all look like you could do with something hot. This one here's for you,
little man.' She held out a cup with marshmallows bobbing in the top. 'Hot chocolate,' she added as the kid stared at it dumbly.

  Dave felt like vomiting at how obscenely normal things briefly appeared. It was like they'd just bought their child around for a visit with grandma – at least if you ignored all the blood and grime that coated them head to toe.

  The kid looked from the hot chocolate, to the old lady and then back again. Then he held up his injured hand. The blood had soaked through the hankerchief and welled in the palm of his hand.

  'Aww, have we got a bit of a boo-boo there?' Marge's voice switched from her gruff and abrupt tone to one that Dave thought sounded stereotypical grandma. It dripped honey as she leaned over the kid's hand, cooing away.

  'Ooh, that looks a little nasty. Can't have that, can we?' The old lady grinned at the kid while she unwrapped his hand. The boy solemnly shook his head. 'No we can't have that at all.' The lady beamed as the gash in the kid's hand was revealed. Dave tried not to notice how the red that stained the handkerchief slowly leeched away in the old lady's grip.

  'Voila!' Marge ran her palm over the top of the kid's injured one and the gash disappeared, leaving only clear, unblemished flesh. 'How's that strike you then?' The old lady ruffled his hair while the kid stared in disbelief. He raised his hand up in front of his face and turned it to and fro, unable to believe that the wound had disappeared. After a second of staring, a smile even creased the kid's face for the first time since Dave had known him.

  'How did you do that?' the kid spoke and once more it was startling. Just like the last time. Dave was so used to him being a mute companion.

  'Magic.' The old lady gave the kid one last pat on the head and then eased herself into the armchair next to Sally.

  The kid laughed, a quick brittle noise and held out his hand to Dave.

  'Did you see?'

  'Yeah, I saw,' Dave muttered awkwardly and reached out to snag one of the cups from the table.