The Acolyte
Copyright 2007 by Mary Harris [aka redplanetes]
Chapter 2
The next morning Helen sat in the passenger seat again, holding a partially unfolded road map. She ran her finger along a faint blue line. "Stay on this road until we pass Shiloh, then about ...eight miles further should be Route 37." She folded the map and dug around in her bag, coming up with a small bottle of painkillers. A couple of pills were shaken out and washed down with a swig of tequila from a hip flask. Mena watched from the corner of her eye, slightly worried. "You ok?"
"Yeah. My hip's been falling apart for years, and sitting in a car just rubs it the wrong way. Don't worry, Maenad. Ars longa, vita brevis."
"Yeeeeah. Uh, you are really not making any sense at all, Aunt Hel."
Helen laughed. "Sorry. What I mean is, some things are so worth a little pain." She smiled wider as her thoughts turned inward. "Mmm hmmm..." She rummaged around in the glovebox. "What have you got to listen to?"
Mena ginned. "There's some vintage punk in there, you'll like that."
Helen held up a cd. "I never thought I'd live to hear Sex Pistols called 'vintage'." She slid the disc into Mena's jury-rigged stereo, cranked up the volume. "And now, the end is neahhh, and so I face, the final cuhhhtain, ha ha ha!" The two women mimed Sid Vicious' goofy intro to 'My Way'. "And that, much more than this, I did it myyyyyy way."
They drove along Route 37 for hours, slowing every time a cluster of mailboxes appeared so Helen could search for the name 'Taggert'. Finally, in the early afternoon, she spotted a lone dented mailbox bearing the name, standing beside a narrow dirt road. Below the mailbox was a large handpainted sign. SEE THE BAT OUT OF HELL - 1 mile, and an arrow. "Bingo," Helen whispered. They rolled slowly down the road, eventually coming to a dead end at the bleak and hard-bitten Taggert farm.
The house and outbuildings had all seen better days; they weren't exactly in disrepair, but no effort had been put into making anything comforting or homey. It looked like a place where the people had lost their sense of hope.
Another handpainted sign on the barn read, BAT OUT OF HELL - LOOK $5 PHOTO $10.
A grizzled man was walking towards them from a shed. As they got out of the car, Helen pointed at the sign, called out, "We're here to see that." The man reached them; a beaten, tired look lived on his face. "Just to see, or you want to take a picture?" She studied his face. A deep scar cut from one eye down across the bridge of his nose; his mouth wasset in a grim line. He was trying to look bored, but underneath that weak mask, Helen could see nervousness. He's scared of something. He's scared of what's in there, even though he doesn't want to admit it to himself. Farmers don't spook easily, their lives are too tough for fairy tales.
The man noticed Helen staring at him, met her gaze. She suddenly knew. He's seen my creature. She recognized the awe of someone who'd seen something beyond their comprehension. Her eyes wandered back to the scar. He's had a run-in with my creature. She couldn't stop the corner of her mouth twitching up.
The man scowled at Helen. Someting not right about these two... He noticed the look in her eyes as well, another person who'd seen it, but his mind wouldn't let him go there.
"Just a look." Helen smiled broadly and handed the man ten dollars, then took Mena's arm and limped towards the barn. The man glared at their backs for a moment, trying to figure out why he was so uneasy all of a sudden. Then he shook his head and followed at a distance.
The barn had no animal smell to it. That was the first thing Helen noticed. It hadn't been used as a stable for a very long time. The building seemed to be an extra large storage shed now, for supplies and hay only. As her eyes adjusted to the shadowed interior, she saw what was up on the wall. There was no doubt. Her heart raced. Mena gasped, whispered, "Aunt Hel...?"
Helen's eyes were wide and bright, her mouth wearing a wide smile of fierce joy. Even as shriveled and torn as the body was, it still had that unstoppable magic in it. If it had been a mountain lion's sleeping form nailed crudely to the wall, she have been mortally offended by the humiliating treatment, but then, mountain lions didn't have a sense of humor. She knew somehow that being stitched together and displayed on a wall would be a great source of laughter for her unique creature.
"Is that...?" Mena whispered. Helen nodded proudly, turned to smile at her niece. The girl looked amazed but worried. "Is he... dead?" Helen heard the unspoken question. After all this time, I don't get to meet him?
"I killed it myself." The voice was old but strong. They turned to see an old man sitting in a lawn chair against the front wall. There was a huge machine next to him, pointed menacingly at the thing on the wall. "I brought it down with this," he stroked and patted the machine, but kept his misty eyes on the corpse. "Then I stabbed it through the heart." He finally blinked and turned to stare at them. "It didn't die easy."
"Enough, Dad. Just let them look at it in peace." The man who had taken the money was leaning on the doorframe; Helen could tell he wanted them to leave, they made him nervous. She couldn't help herself, started to prod the old man for more of the story. Mena beat her to the punch. "So what happened?" The girl was smiling ever so slightly. Helen recognized that mischievous gleam. She's goading them. That's my Maenad...
The old man answered even while the man in the doorway opened his mouth to try and stop the story. "It took my son. My little boy..." Helen thought back, bit her tongue to keep from asking, "a blond kid?" The old man continued. "I hunted it, and I killed it, and if it wakes up I'll kill it again." Crazy talk, to anyone else. Helen realized this man knew more than some. Not enough, though.
"Let's go, Mena. We've seen enough." Helen followed the girl out of the barn, raised her eyes and smiled knowingly at the man with the scar as she walked past him. The man frowned; fear flickered across his face. He continued to stare at them as the Mustang retreated back up the dirt road.
"Aunt Hel. That... it looked dead."
"Oh, don't worry, Mena, somehow I don't think that's so unusual. He looks much better when he's eaten."
"What about that old guy and his harpoon gun?"
"Hmm hm," Helen chuckled, "I think he's in for a little surprise."
Mena was quiet for a minute. "Should we... help?"
Helen pondered this. Her creature did look kind of at a disadvantage, nailed to a wall and threatened with impalement. She recollected the effortless mastery her monster had over injury, the way it just took everything in stride, the way it embraced the risks and wounds of battle with open arms. She smiled and answered the girl. "No. He'll be fine. We'd just get in the way."
Four nights later, a thin crescent moon hung over the turquoise remains of the evening. Jack Taggert was in a foul mood; he had worked hard all day, and now his father refused to come in for supper. Jack didn't really believe the thing on the wall would ever move again, but his father did, and the stress of having to hear about it more and more every day was eating at his nerves. Finally he gave up and stalked off, leaving the old man sitting stubbornly with his post-puncher gun and a halogen spotlight.
Before ten minutes had even passed, Jack heard a metallic bang as the post puncher was fired. He spat out his mouthful of food and scrambled to the barn, heart pounding. He slammed against the barn's doorframe to stop himself, and tried to focus on what was inside. The wall was different. The wings were there, an arm and a leg still hung in place, but the rest was missing. A homemade harpoon was imbedded in the wall in the center of the empty space. A slack cable ran down into the shadows on the other side of the halogen lamp.
A wet, crunching sound came from the shadows. Jack's heart nearly stopped. "...Dad?" Nothing for a moment, then his father's hand waved at him in the beam of light. He breathed a sigh of relief, trotted quickly over.
As he approached the post puncher, the hand extended further into the light. It was not attached to an arm anymore, and was held around the wrist by a dark, bony claw. The claw waved the hand again, flapping it ridiculously, then the claw's arm and the monster it belonged to stepped into the light. The thing that had been dead, that had been nailed to the wall for twenty-something years, grinned a bloody mouthful of teeth at Jack, then shoved the hand in its mouth.
There was a hole clean through the center of its dry chest, dribbling dust. Jack was now able to see the dark shape of his father's body, what was left of it, lying on the ground. The last thought that went through his head as the monster stepped towards him was, "...oh God, all of us, the same way as Billy..."
The creature strolled outside, blinking and licking its fingers. The sliver of the moon made a shallow cup on the horizon. A few hours would have to pass before wings regrew, and the night was young. Two farm trucks sat in the yard. The monster strode to the less flashy of the two; it was likely to be the more reliable vehicle. Keys were in the ignition; things didn't change much in the country. The truck kicked up dust and gravel as it sped out towards the highway.
End of Chapter 2
This chapter's music: 'My Way' by Sid Vicious, 'Sinister Purpose' by CCR
The Acolyte and illustrations Copyright 2007 by Mary Harris [aka redplanetes]
~plagarists will be flayed alive~
redplanet@trinidadusa.net
