Big Bang 2010: LAST CHILD, Chapter 5
Dean sighed and dropped his head. It wagged listlessly from side to side. It was the strangest thing to have your eyes taped open. To not be allowed any escape from his visual hell. Yet he still found it possible to hide in his mind. Only the sounds of quiet movement in the room told him he was still on display.
Perv was around doing... something. Dean didn't care at this point, because he had a chance to breathe again. Just for a minute. That alone was a struggle. Breathing.
Head still bowed, he watched through hooded eyes as the sweat dripped from his body, watched as it mingled with his blood to pool on the dirt floor. This angle at least kept it out of his eyes. Saved him from some of the burning.
A muscle at the edge of his left eye kept twitching madly. His eyes wanted to close. Dean wanted to let them.
This position he'd been in for… God, he had no idea how long he'd been there. All he knew was his legs were cramped. Keeping them bent and supporting his weight on his knees. But he kept flexing his feet, his toes. Kept hope alive.
More than anything though, he wanted to pass out. His body needed it. He knew for a fact that his eyes being taped open had nothing to do with that. It had to be the drugs, the damn drugs that made his skin feel like a whole colony of fire ants were tap dancing beneath his flesh.
The forced sight was overtaxing his brain. The drugs were amplifying pain. Every mental barrier he could find to hide behind was crumbling. He could not let that happen.
No, he'd hang on. He wouldn't give up. Wouldn't give Perv the satisfaction. So he opened his hands, bent them back. It hurt like a motherfucker, but he kept at it.
When something bumped his hand, Dean stilled his movements. Kept his head down.
Something... metal and narrow. He couldn't look up. Couldn't while Perv was there.
There wasn't time to work out what it might be because a hand shoved into his hair. It twisted viciously for a hold. Dean growled at the pull and pain on his scalp.
Without preamble his head was lifted with cruel, dizzying speed. Eyes wide now, the world rushed by in a haze of pain as he was pushed back. Keeping his wits, he arched his spine, his head stopping only when it slammed into the post. The impact set off an array of white lights bursting in his sight.
"No!" A familiar voice demanded and the hand shook his head.
“Fuck,” Dean gritted, fighting against the shock of pain. No matter the command, he felt himself slipping under a sea of darkness.
The hand tightened its grip again and shook. "Not. Yet!"
Scalp screaming in torment as the grip twisted in his hair and jerked violently, quickly. Then stopped.
Dazed, Dean could do no more than flop helplessly with the nauseating motion. It sent roils of bile upward, filling his mouth; he fought to keep it down.
The shaking stopped but the world continued to tilt and blur. Dean gulped in air to keep his stomach intact. The hand in his hair maintained the cruel hold.
"You don't get to do that yet, Dean," Perv growled in front of him. Close. Always too close. "You don't get to check out until I say so."
The muscles trapped beneath the tape, constantly pulled and fluttered. Dean wanted to blink his vision back to focus. But he couldn't.
It took time but sight slowly oozed into place. Perv's face was inches from his own, the hand still tight in his hair.
"Dude." Dean struggled weakly to turn his head away. It was embarrassingly easy how the hand kept him still. Sonofabitch... "Any... any one ever t-tell you 'bout personal sp-space?" And of their own accord, his eyes rolled up.
"NO!" Perv yelled and pulled Dean's head forward. "You. Do not. Pass out. On me." Each sentence was punctuated by a painful jerk of his head, several times hard enough to slam it back against the pole.
"No choice... there..." Dean gritted out, teeth clenched, "...'f you don't stop doin' that, you dumbasss.... muth'r fuk'r."
"Tell me your real name," he insisted, his voice far too cool, the calmness of his tone positively frightening. "Tell me why you've been following me these last few days."
"Fine... f-fine," Dean muttered. "Alright!" he said more forcefully. The hand was gone and Dean's head fell forward, enough to feel the rope around his neck grow taut and remind him to check his move. Dean stilled before it could strangle him.
Perv backed off, but not by much. Dean felt the air thicken with anticipation and distrust.
"Alright... ya got me," Dean panted into the silence. It was an effort, but he lifted his head enough to eye Perv. The monster's face swam and blurred in his woozy sight. "'M the Easter Bunny an' I'm hoppin' mad."
Dean watched defiantly as Perv got to his feet and returned to the cart again.
Wordlessly, he turned, shoulders rigid, and faced what Dean had come to know as the monster's assortment of toys. And distressing as it was that he searched for yet another toy with which to torment him, Dean saw it as opportunity. A chance to maybe look up, glimpse what it was his hand had hit before.
Between the agony in his head that left his vision hazy and uncooperative and the proximity of the pole to his back, it didn't work; there was just no good angle and movement hurt. Like a bitch, it hurt. So he resigned himself to exploring with his hands. Feel for more information.
Even that was difficult. Concentration waned and his stomach flopped as the room seemed to swim and dip so he shook his head and righted his vision.
"Oh... God," Dean groaned, feeling hot bile rise up his throat. Note to self: head shaking, even a little, after one’s head is slammed repeatedly against a fucking pole? Not a good idea.
"I would strongly suggest you hold still." His captor's voice was instructional, dispassionate.
Dean moved his lips mockingly, mimicking Perv's 'suggestion' before snapping back, "I'd strongly suggest you go fuck yourself."
"Such language." Perv shook his head but didn't otherwise turn. "I bet you were one of those scrappy kids in school who'd take on anyone who pissed you off, no matter how outmatched you were."
It was in Dean's fingers now, whatever it was that had struck his hand. It felt small. It moved when he got his fingers around it. It was hard. His fingers, thick and nearly numb, traveled the length of it.
"Yeah," Dean agreed, keeping an eye on Perv to make sure he didn't turn, yet. "I was also the kid who won those fights."
Curiosity was eating him and he just had to get a look, but not from this position, not with the pole right at his head. Stomach and sight more stable he checked on Perv once more then didn't waste another second; turning his face slightly, he tilted his head back and lined his sight up with the pole.
A nail. Son. Of. A. Bitch.
Dean quickly straightened his head, checking to make sure Perv was none the wiser to his movement. Judging by the preoccupied look on his face, Perv wasn't. Dean did a small mental celebration.
A nail. Perfect. That would work on the lock box of the zip ties.
What Dean desperately needed right at this moment, was time. He moved to the middle position again. Watching Perv the entire time.
Time. Dean's mind searched for something to slow this guy down. The earlier bad-guy monologue had long since ended, too soon as far as Dean was concerned. It was time to get back a little control. See if he couldn't take the reins for a while.
There were things he'd said earlier, things about the deaths that piqued Dean's interest.
"So, you said you were careful." Dean cleared his throat. It was parched. "Did you kill the kid they found in the sewer a few weeks ago?"
Perv's arms stilled. It was several seconds before he answered. "That boy." His lips were thin. He was angry. "He'd made things... difficult."
"Really?" Dean wondered if he was reading the tone of voice right but, the guy sounded scared. "From the description in the papers, you had... nearly a hundred pounds on the kid. I don't see how that's p-possible."
"He was a fighter." Perv's anger died to frustration. Then boredom. "The drug didn't take like it usually does," he shrugged. In the next instant he looked at Dean, suspicion scrunching his eyes. “Is he the reason you're here? Was he family? Someone you loved?”
Jeeze. Sick fucker.
Dean realized why the man was suddenly answering his questions. The fucker was changing tactics, adapting. Going all qui-pro-quo on Dean’s ass. Well, Dean could play that one too. He’d seen the movie.
"No," Dean pushed angrily back, "never met the kid. But still... you know... you-," Dean hated even saying the word, "raped him. Killed him there. Like you said, fifteen years and nothing. Why that kid? Why now?"
"There’s nothing 'now' about it." He spoke so casually, like there was nothing to any of it. "Just because no one found anything, doesn’t mean there isn’t anything to find. As for that boy last month?" Perv shrugged. "The die was cast after he got away. I was... angry. Couldn't help myself."
Dean nodded. He felt the nail continue to twist in his fingers. It was a good way to keep his hands working. Keep his mind off the pain and exhaustion. And his eyes.
"And the boy you took today - er... is it still today?"
"He was bait. Nothing more." Perv turned his head. "Don't you feel special?" Then turned back to his work.
"Yeah, just super," Dean murmured.
This time Perv only canted his head but didn't otherwise turn. "I bring them here before I kill them," he said. "It's neat. Clean. No one to find out. Like..." Again he looked lost in a memory. "Ever since...."
Dean worked through the earlier comment; something about the last person who'd been like Dean, that Perv had 'taken care of.'
"Someone else," Dean supplied. "Someone caught on to you... before me."
Perv looked at Dean this time, hard. Studied him and it was all Dean could do not to flinch. Not to show the worry he felt.
"I see the drugs aren't affecting you too badly either," Perv said knowingly.
Dean licked his lips nervously. Remembering how the creep had dosed him before; he so did not want to go through that again. "You said you'd take care of me like you took care of the other one. What… other?"
Perv shrugged. "Some out-of-town cop," he said picking up a fresh syringe. Biting off the plastic cover protecting the needle, he upended a bottle of clear medicine and jabbed the needle tip into the soft cover. "An uncle to one of the boys I killed."
Dean swallowed, eyeing the syringe. Understanding now why the earlier questions. "What did you do to hi--"
"Really, Dean. You should be far more concerned about the living." The syringe loaded, Perv tapped the side as he shot a small measure into the air to release any air bubbles. "Yourself, for example."
"Oh, I am," Dean backpedaled, eyes going to the needle Perv waved in the air. The sight of it made the muscles in his tongue contract. "The boy you took to get me here, he's here somewhere?"
"You know, that other guy," Perv ignored the question. "He cracked a whole lot easier than you, I must admit." He looked at Dean. "He was weak."
"Thank you," Dean muttered. "I think."
"It was a bad month for the two of them, I guess, 'cause, given the uncle and the kid had no one else, I pretty much wiped that family out of existence."
Dean felt the edges of his outward calm slipping. What right did this thing have to obliterate and upheave families? To leave behind the agony of loss for those remaining? To instill such intense fear and terror into the last hours of small kids?
Rage boiled in Dean's veins. "Why, huh?" he seethed. Anger lessening his fear of the needle and the threat of another dose. "Why kids? Why... any of it?" And when Perv didn't seem inclined to answer, he practically shouted in anger and frustration, "Why do you do it, you sick freak?!”
"Because they looked like him!" The asshole shouted back. It was clear Perv's control was slipping too.
Dean stared back at him. Confused.
Perv took a breath, reining back some of his control, though not all. "They all looked like him," he said through clenched teeth. Calm, but just barely. He dropped his gaze to the dirt floor of the barn. "They had no right. And I needed. And... Frankie's dead. He should stay dead."
Ah, finally a source of contention for this thing. A subject that, for the first time, made him lose his monster cool.
Frankie...
"Woah," Dean whispered. "You are one sick puppy."
The name sent Dean's sluggish mind racing. Limping was more like, because his head ached, his arms were cramping over head and blood kept leaking from his chest, pooling in the waistband of his jeans. Try as he might, he couldn't remember...
It was no use, so Dean asked, "Who or what is... Frankie?"
The question died on his lips when the syringe plunged into his arm. Dean jerked in surprise.
On the up side, this time it hadn't gone in through his mouth. That was a horror and pain he'd never, ever forget.
The effect was still the same. Dean's heart started racing. His sight started doubling and making odd shapes of the room's contents. It was fast. It was effective. It made goose flesh rise and jump all over his skin; felt like a million needles were trying to shove out from underneath.
"Know what this is?" Perv's voice sounded freakishly calm.
Dean's head bounced up. Jesus, he hadn't realized he'd let his head fall down.
It was like his mind was finding new ways to shut out what his eyes couldn't. And wasn't that just freaky?
Perv stood in front of him, feet planted wide like a matador, ready to stick a long sword into the bleeding bull. Though, instead of a sword, this matador held a pole. It was maybe twenty-five inches in length and at the tip there were two wire prongs. The other end, the handle, was long, with a rectangular-shaped grip.
So... maybe not so far off from that matador image after all.
"Uh… a baton? Lemme guess," Dean smirked. It felt sloppy and ineffective. "Y' always... wanned t' be a... twirler... ev'r since yew're a lil' girrrl."
The smile on Perv's face was a scary thing to regard. In an overly dramatic display, he slowly lowered the tip of the stick and touched it to a nearby stable door's bracket. The light touch sent electric blue light arcing upward from the metal prongs.
The rickety door bounced and jerked under the current. It was like a miniature lightning bolt that lacked thunder, but still crackled in the cold air, enough to raise every hair on Dean's arms.
Fuck. Well ain't that just fucking dandy? This night just kept getting better and better.
Now would be a really good time for the cavalry to show. Dean didn't dare give the cavalry a name. Could no longer trust himself not to accidentally say the name aloud.
"It's sorta like a cattle prod. The thing ranchers use to herd stubborn animals, get them to do what they want." Perv spoke while studying the metal prongs. "This one belonged to my granddaddy, back in the day. I kept it after he died."
"Well," Dean licked his lips nervously, "never pegged you for the sentimental type." God, he hoped that sounded more lighthearted than petrified.
"You'd be surprised," Perv said with the barest hint of a smile, then he was walking toward Dean, toying with the rod. He touched it to various metal objects, watching in sick fascination the way the arc of blue light crackled in the room.
Dean swallowed at the way the faintest of touches sent objects flying away backwards. "Neat trick," he tried unsuccessfully to laugh it off.
"Curious, I did some research and found there's a similar thing called a picana." Perv played with the cord a moment. "Amazing what you can find on the internet ain't it?"
"Yeah." Dean swallowed bitterly. "Ain't progress somethin'?"
"Unlike the cattle prod, the picana was designed specifically for human torture. It works at very high voltage and low current so as to maximize pain and minimize the physical marks left on the victim."
The description was all so clinical, so cold. Dean found himself shivering, probably had been for a while, but hadn’t realized it until now.
"I made some," Perv looked at Dean, made sure he’d got the hunter's attention, "modifications. ‘Cause you see, I want both the pain and the marks. The burns. The bubbling flesh. So tell me Dean, you ever had 12,000 volts course through your body?”
Dean blanched but held utterly still. He had, in fact. His eyes rolled from Perv to the prod and back again.
The rod lowered toward his chest. "So, you feel like answering my questions now? Or do you want to know what it's like to be electrocuted?"
"Been there. Done that." The hunter's carefully sculpted facade slipped only a second before the anger returned, masking his fear. "So, bring it on, motherfucker."
Perv did just that. The prod made contact.
At first, Dean couldn’t draw air into his lungs to voice the excruciating pain radiating through him. The restraints holding him creaked and groaned as all of Dean’s muscles clinched and he bucked. Fighting against the relentless current ripping through his body. The cords in his neck strained. He felt like his eyes would burst from their sockets.
His mouth was open and ready to release any sound.
Dean’s vision jerked and shook and his back arched. He sought that place in his mind, tried hard to leave the agony behind him. Separate himself from the here and now.
It snapped to the surface, riding that current of pain as it fissured, drawing taut every muscle and tendon in his body. At least then, Dad had been around. Ready to catch him when he fell.
The memory of that first encounter with electricity came to mind...
...THEN
September, 1995
They were just outside of Wolf Point, Montana, after midnight, a Black Dog hot on their heels. The bright full moon lit the way as Dean, with Sam a few strides ahead, tore out across an open pasture.
Wolf Point. How perfect. How unreal. How un-fucking-believable?
There wasn’t time to think about that as the ground underfoot squished and squelched. It was all either of them could do not to slip and go down in a heap. Become puppy chow for some demonic beast.
The rain had stopped an hour ago, but they were both soaked to the skin. The ground was utterly saturated; it made keeping their footing nearly impossible, especially when you were running for your damn life.
The big dog wasn't even supposed to be there; it was supposed to be a simple spirit, a ghost. Even so, all Dean and Sam were supposed to do was some light recon; far from the actual sightings, they weren't part of the actual hunt. It was little more than busywork, per Dad's orders; get in, take some EMF readings and get back.
Simple.
Like hell!
The thing had come at them out of nowhere and their reactions had been immediate.
Dean, at sixteen, could still outrun his twelve-year-old brother. Knowing this, he'd lagged back, distracted the beast chasing them. Given it the weaker member of the herd to focus on. Give Sam a better chance.
Sam had started to look back.
"Move Sammy! Hurry!" The anxiety in his voice had been enough. Sam had faced front and taken off.
Dean was immediately relieved; inwardly, he was petrified.
Just a few more yards. Then, Sam would have a decent enough head start, he'd be in the clear.
The brothers spread out. Dean slowed then shot quickly to the right.
The move on the wet ground almost cost him his footing, but he managed to stay upright, to keep his feet moving. Even made up the time he'd lost. Then again, he was highly motivated, what with the Black Dog closing in and all.
The four-legged, drooling, snarling pursuer was still there too. The snap of jaws and growling was proof enough. Just as Dean had hoped, the thing had followed him, not Sam.
And boy, did that thing follow him.
And follow him...
Even though it was a few yards back - and closing - Dean could smell it. The Black Dog. It smelled of death, and blood and... wet dog.
Maybe this would break Sam of his constant whining for them to get a dog. Dean had always supported his efforts, not that he'd thought it a practical thing to own a dog and live on the road, but it kept Sam in line with him a little.
Not anymore, though. Now, Dean would be on Dad's side.
After a mile more, Dean's legs began to burn; his lungs felt ready to explode and the sound of his own heart hammering in his ears was so loud he couldn't even tell if the dog was still after him. No way in hell he was looking back to find out.
An enraged snarl sent his spine crawling and the 'oh shit' moment in his brain shot more endorphins through his blood. Fear gave him a new burst of speed. Dean's legs pumped faster, like he hadn't already run two miles.
Feet churning, arms pumping, Dean wondered if Bobby was still at the truck and if Sam had managed to get back there or-
Dean squinted into the moonlit landscape ahead of him. A fence.
He didn't break stride.
It wasn't just a fence.
The boys had already clowned around with this fence earlier. It was the same fence that ran all across this valley. The same fence they'd been warned about.
It was electric.
The dog snarled viciously like it knew Dean's dilemma. Like it was smelling victory. Or dinner.
"Well, fuck you!" Dean shouted over his shoulder.
Lowering his head, he surged forward. This would be piece of cake. Dean had managed to jump higher than that in training. He could do this. Easy.
With any luck, the dog’s fat ass wouldn’t allow for it to jump after Dean. With some luck it wouldn't see the fence and fry.
Not far now. Dean calculated the distance. Eight more steps. Checked his stride.
It was jump or die. Or it was miss and die. The dog would get him or the electric fence would.
Wait. That was die or die.
Three.
Two.
One.
Dean coiled and lifted his legs in the same movement, pushing with the right one as the left stretched in front of him, arms spread to the sides to steady his flight. Like a hurdler in the Olympics. Easy as pie! Midway through the air, he was already calculating his next move; hit the ground. Roll to his feet. Up and run. No pr-
Dean's flight ended with a heart-dropping rip.
Something caught and tugged at the bottom of his jeans. The snagged fabric stopped him midair, pulling him back. Halted his forward motion.
Now, Dean was going down. Arms flailing.
He had only time to look at the traitorous hem of his jeans. Frayed material wrapped on the barbed wire.
Fuck.
Dean went from airborne to laid-out in three seconds. Flat. Literally.
Air gushed from his lungs on impact. Mind addled when his head struck rocky ground.
Flat on the muddy surface. Save for his legs. Unfortunately.
Those remained tangled in the barbed wire of the fence.
That was so not good, but Dean's mind was still spinning.
In seconds the current hit him hard and fast. Dean's body jerked and shifted. Helplessly. Thrown about like a rag doll.
Dean quickly remembered why it wasn't good. Water. Electricity.
Pain arced down his soggy leg. It started at his trapped ankle and traveled all the way up to the tips of his hair. The ends, he was sure, were spitting out bright blue lightning bolts.
Dean’s vision jerked constantly. He couldn't see well enough to get himself unsnagged. Couldn't think well enough to care.
They'd been warned. Don't fuck with that fence. ‘It's a humdinger,' the rancher had said. 'We've had us a spot of bear trouble, so that thing’s wired strong for them sons'a bitches.'
Not a bear, Dean thought.
A Black-fucking-Dog!
Fuck.
Dean's vision had cracked and shattered with the current. Teeth clenched. Every muscle seizing and writhing.
It was pure happenstance that his head was in the position it was - he sure couldn't move it - because he could watch as the dog prepared to tempt fate. It was about to jump. Stupid dog.
It made sense. Dean had managed to land on the opposite side of where the beast stood. So the dog lowered his chest and measured his distance and jumped.
Jeeze, it would be Dean's luck for it to clear the fence, save his crispy fried dinner from being overdone, all in time to jerk him free of the fence, drag him off and eat him.
And then a shot rang out, the dog jerked in mid-air and dropped.
Dead, its body landed on the fence, effectively shattering the nearest output terminal. That's what Dad had told him. Dean didn't care, because either way, the current had stopped.
But Dean’s body didn't realize that.
Amidst the sounds of voices shouting, some familiar, some not, and running, splashing feet, anxious calls and barked orders, Dean's body still twitched and jerked against his will. It rode the residuals, the memory of it too fresh and damaging for his muscles to let go.
In the growing darkness, there was the slide of gravel where a car slowed to a stop. A car door, or two, he really couldn't tell how many, slammed shut. That was as much as he remembered.
It was struggle enough just to breathe, to not puke at the rancid stench of burning flesh. His. The dog's. Didn't much matter.
Later, when he regained consciousness - oh, and that was weird, the sense of lost time - he was in a hospital. Machines beeped and blipped. Tubes ran to his hands and arms and... other places. Places that turned his face beet-red.
Most importantly, Dad, Sam and Bobby all slept in various chairs around the room. Everything would be fine.
NOW
October, 2005
As suddenly as it had begun, the pain stopped.
Dean sucked in a noisy breath, one right after another, body trembling from the rush of adrenaline that now flowed uselessly through his body.
Riding out the tremors, Dean groaned, his head feeling light, weightless, and still too heavy for his shoulders to support. It dipped again, chin landing solidly on his chest. Muscles continued to seize making his body jerk helplessly, still locked in the throes of the electric vise that had held him too long. Too painfully in its grasp.
"You are interesting, Dean." Perv stared down at him, eyes squinting in curiosity. "Even with the drugs, you still manage to check out." He squatted. "Where do you go, huh? Do you find that person whose existence gives you hope? The one I should be looking for?"
Dean panted, struggled to rein in his racing heart. "Fuck off." The whispered epithet all he could manage at the moment.
The prod touched under Dean's chin and the reaction was immediate. He shot back, anxious for escape, only to find the waiting metal claws. They dug in, grabbed hold, ripped and Dean gasped in agony. Spine arched. Able to jerk free, he shot forward.
The movement, however, was frantic, unchecked. It was out of control. It was falling forward.
Until the rope around his neck reminded him there was nothing free in this. It tightened immediately.
Dean gasped. Caught in the rope’s strangle-hold. His body was at a loss where to turn and unconsciously, it picked the source of the least painful experience. Dean sagged back against the pole.
"Oh, now, look what you've gone and done," Perv sneered uncaring. He knelt and stared at the noose around his captive's neck. "Hmm, that looks painful."
Dean was desperate. He was pretty sure he'd have begged for Perv to stop it, if he'd been able to. He was glad he couldn't.
The world was growing dim. Perv's face fading. And just when he thought he'd let go, the rope loosened.
"You are a bother," Perv said making the noose wider.
Dean gulped in a large breath, filling, expanding his starving lungs. His head spinning dizzily, air coming in too fast for oxygen to actually do its job.
After a moment, Dean coughed. "Well," he winced as he swallowed around the roughness of his throat. "If anything, I hate... to be a bother... just... lemme go."
Perv regained his feet, but remained close. Standing over his prey like the dominant predator.
"Still a funny man," Perv said, but there was absolutely nothing humorous in the way he stared at the tip of the prod as it trailed down Dean's throat. Barely touching skin, his eyes followed, mesmerized. "I don't think you'll be funny for very much longer though."
Dean kept his gaze on Perv, turning his head only slightly to spit. Blood and saliva mixed in the dirt. Somewhere in all that, he'd bit his tongue. Great.
"Oh, I dunno...," Dean woozed. While he stilled under the feather touch, his hands didn't. "Takes a lot more than an electric dildo in the hands of a perverted creep to break me."
Like a separate part of himself, the hands moved, high up above his head, away from the other man's attention, checking to make sure the nail was still there. That he hadn't knocked it away during his convulsing.
He fought the physical sigh of relief when the bent tip bit into his fingernail. It was there.
"Another one of my modifications was this little trigger," Perv explained, the prod grazing over Dean's shoulders. "See, this way I can touch you with it and nothing happens. Unless I finger the lever. What do you think, Dean?"
Perv's voice was all... smooth and... frightening. Coaxing and coercing. Like he was checking Dean out.
The pronged tip was moving up his arms... toward his hands.
Dean stiffened. He couldn't risk Perv seeing the nail.
Frantically he pushed, shoved. Careful not to let it show. Eager to get it back into the hole he'd worked so desperately to get it out of.
Time enough to get it out again later. He hoped.
The bent metal would not be so easily returned. Shit.
Plan B.
In Dean's experience, Plan B always sucked.
"Tell you what I think. I think you and your little toy can just go fuck yourself." It got the desired effect. The prong had stopped moving. Perv was looking down at him. "I get plenty of action with real, actual breathing women. But if you and your 'lil electric... friend wanna be alone, don't le'me keep you."
Perv's face froze.
Dean had a quick 'aw fuck' moment before the prod arced. This time the contact was on his other shoulder.
The current resonated through his body, arching his back, locking him in a world of pain.
Dimly, through the agony, he felt his head tap uncontrollably in a rapid-fire succession against the pole. The dimly lit barn flashed and crackled behind his open eyes.
Then it stopped.
But Dean couldn't. The current ceased, but the tremors didn't. His muscles held him up. Locked in place. Spasming.
How long, he couldn't say but it was like the floor had been snatched out from under his feet. His body collapsed.
The aftershocks rolled through him, one after another, painful and difficult to fight against. They spread from his shoulder where the prod had just touched, it felt like a million tiny fire ants crawling beneath his skin, devouring him from within.
“I know your type.” Perv's voice cut through the haze of quivering flesh that was Dean.
“Beli--eve me," Dean swallowed hard, "you du--nno sh-shit ‘bout me.”
Even through the stutter, the sound of his own voice just then, stronger and more coherent, led Dean to a bizarre realization; the two shocks had pushed back the fog swamping his brain. Thought and speech cleared considerably.
Given a choice, he'd much rather just take a couple caffeine pills, or you know, just stopped the friggin’ torture already! But, beggars couldn't be choosers and Dean would be damned if he'd beg.
The effects didn't seem to last, however. The clouds, along with their fuzzy edges seemed to close in again. His sight began to melt and ooze. Between each lingering flinch, his mind turned over, flipped.
“You’re one of those guys who pretends that if you’re tough enough -” the tip of the prod trailed down along the curve of Dean’s neck even as the man spoke - “that if you act like you don’t care, it won’t hurt as much.”
"Everyone’s a frigging Dr. Phil these days," Dean muttered. Scarily, though? He’s pretty much dead on the money, he relented internally.
“Yeah, well, I know your type, too.” He swallowed against his dry, thick tongue. “Typical whiny ass who blames his poor upbringing, or whatever, to justify what he does.” Dean sighed. God, his head hurt. “But really, you’re just a very sick puppy.”
Dean's own words rolled around in his head. Could it really be that simple? This really was some perverted, psychotic, human nut-job?
The fiberglass rod stopped its downward descent just at Dean’s sternum. The hunter couldn’t help but inhale slightly, in preparation for the pain.
One heartbeat.
"I’m afraid that won’t actually work this time.” Perv started the rod in its downward trail again. "See, I've seen too many men, tough men too, and they all succumb in the end. They all beg. They all cry. They're all pathetic."
The direction the rod was traveling was leaving Dean more than uncomfortable, he was getting downright scared; IT moved in that same slow, downward progression, that it was only a matter of time before it reached places that Dean was certain he wouldn’t be able to handle. Sweat oozed from his pores, flowing in rivulets down his skin, soaking the waistband of his jeans.
It wasn't fear, really. Dean had been in sticky situations before. It was freezing in the barn and while he shivered, some phantom heat, whether from the burns, or the pain of the cuts, or from… something Dean couldn't figure out, left him too warm and sweating.
"See, life's about to get very unpleasant for you, Dean."
"Really?" Dean tried to blink. Forgot about the tape. "Cause up to now we've been having such fun?"
Another trickle of sweat joined the multitude of rivulets streaming down Dean's back. The prod now skimmed languidly over his stomach, in a zig-zag motion.
"Oh, it's more than fun for me. I plan to make you beg for me to kill you. Which of course, I'll only do if you tell me what I want to know."
"You know, I'm sensing a pattern here." Dean jerked, his breathing hitched. Another in a series of painful aftershocks wracked his upper body. "Your issues start and end with farm animals. Bet you got a favorite sheep stashed somewhere in this barn."
The grin Dean attempted faltered, riding the muscle spasms that also pulled at his face.
"I bet you know that water is a great conductor of electricity, but, did you also know that sweat...” Perv grinned, letting that last word hang between them before adding, “a body's own perspiration, well, did you know that it’s even better? "
“Oh, God.” Dean feigned boredom. “Really? Of all the perverts in the world and I had to get a Chatty Cathy?” Deep down, however, he knew what Perv was talking about. That knowledge sent a fresh spike of tremors traveling down his already spasming spine.
“And because of all the salt and other minerals in its content...” Perv's gaze slid down his face, latched onto a bead of sweat that Dean felt moving down his forehead. Before it got past the bridge of his nose, Perv snaked out a finger and captured it. “That makes it, well, just the best conductor of them all," he said, and stuffed the sweat-coated finger in his own mouth.
Dean grimaced as Perv sucked off the body fluid, grinning around the digit at his captive's horrified face.
“Alright Bill Nye, the Science Guy.” Dean growled. “Fuck the class lesson already and get to the point.”
Sweat and electricity, he knew were a dangerous combination. So much so that he needed to stall, to play dumb.
"The point, Dean," Perv continued, his tone matter-of-fact and devoid of anything other than immoral curiosity at the human suffering that he was about to inflict. "You're sweating quite a bit and I imagine this is gonna hurt really. Really. Bad."
Dean huffed. "Well, it hasn't exactly tickled so far."
The prod touched his belly button. The pain. The shock. The current. It ripped through Dean like a shot.
Caught in the radiating current, he lacked any control and was repelled backward. There, he writhed helplessly against the barbed pole. Beating against it. Repeatedly. The mind-numbing pain left him empty of anything else and he felt nothing of the flesh ripping from his back.
However, he didn't care about any of it. That pain was secondary. The locked, burning muscles, they were what mattered.
Then it stopped.
It had hurt too much to cry out during. Afterward, it just didn't seem like enough.
Exhausted, Dean remained upright, held only by the ties around his wrists and the rope around his neck. Helpless to fight off the aftershocks.
"You know the deal," Perv's voice wavered through Dean's tremble-locked mind. "Tell me what I want to know, and we won't drag this out. I'll end it right now. Right here."
"What? And m-miss all th-the fun?"
The tremors competed with his own real fear at what Perv had in mind and whether or not Dean could survive it. Try as he might to conceal his fear, the aftershocks rocked him at unpredictable intervals, making his voice stutter, sound weak.
Perv sat back on his heels, eyes traveling over Dean's torso, and further still. It was not the first time Dean had seen something akin to hunger and longing in them, lurking just below the surface. But it was noticeably stronger this time.
And so quickly pushed back. Clouded by darkness and… revelation.
As discomforting as the roving, nearly lustful gaze was, that last look, one with the sense of a new plan made Dean’s stomach drop.
Head canted to the side, Perv’s eyes trailed along his prisoner’s legs, turning where his knees bent and folded his legs beneath him. Moving to where Dean’s bare feet, secured at the ankles, poked out on either side of the post.
Dean braced for another kick. Actually hoped for it. Anything was better than being ogled by a perverted psychopath. The fact that he could no longer see the man left Dean feeling nervous and fidgety. He’d rather see it coming than sit and be blindsided. Not seeing, not knowing - that was terrifying.
”There are some,” Perv’s breath puffed into his left ear, moving like he was adjusting something. “Some very specific places on the human body to which electric shock, if applied, is far more painful than anywhere else.”
“N-no shit?” Dean coughed, jaw clenched against the pain of another tremor. “Well, wh-why don’t we trade places an’ let m-me do the driving for once.”
“The feet, for example,” Perv continued. “They have more nerve endings per inch of skin than anywhere else on the body. Did you know that? No? Well, let’s start there, shall we?"
Dean never got a chance to answer. Not that he’d thought he would. It was really just a sick man enjoying the sound of his own voice.
This pain was beyond description.
It ripped and tore at Dean’s soul, radiated and permeated all through his body, raking and slicing him up from the inside out. All it took was a gentle touch of the prongs to the base of his right foot. The agony was indescribable.
It rocketed up Dean’s spine. It exploded behind his eyes.
It rocked Dean’s world.
Before he hadn’t thought it possible, but now his mind conceded; this was, without a doubt, the worst pain he’d ever experienced.
The screaming started again and Jeremy drew his knees to his chest, closed his eyes. Drawn into a tight ball, he waited and prayed it would stop.
The old and rusted pipe that ran nearly the length of the room overhead, shook and rattled barely able to contain the sounds of agony. Wherever they came from, the sounds were magnified in the metal cylinder, the cries echoing and bouncing until they spilled out of the severed end, filling the room just for Jeremy to hear. Perhaps it was a glimpse of what fate had in store for him and it left him shivering harder. Tears fell, running over his cheeks until they spilled to the ground, making his face cooler in the cold of his prison.
Jeremy clamped his hands over his ears. It did little good.
The suffering and agony bled through Jeremy's small fingers, oozing in and filling his head and he clamped down even harder. Tears fell, over his cheeks, dropping off his face, making his face cooler in the cold of his prison.
Jeremy wasn't scared; he was beyond that. He was terrified. And maybe something else...
The tears that dripped heavily from his face weren't just out of fear for his own end, but for the blatant torment that someone was enduring on his behalf. Guilt filled in where fear seemed to be not enough.
Heedless of the too-tight cuff that dug harshly into his already bruised wrist, Jeremy pressed his palms tightly against his ears, this time hoping the tighter vacuum of his hands would be enough to mask the terrifying noise.
It wasn’t.
Unable to stand it any longer, Jeremy tilted his head back and added a shout of his own. Anything to try and drown out the man's pain. But even when he didn’t hear him, Jeremy could still see him: the man from the alley. In his mind's eye.
The man with the green eyes, the one who’d tried to help some random kid he didn’t even know. Jeremy had spent enough time on the streets to know that people didn’t just do that. They didn’t race across a busy street to protect and save some snotty brat they’d never seem before.
Everyone else they'd passed had looked away. Had thought nothing of the blood on Jeremy's head. Or the panic and fear on his face. Too self-involved or just too damn busy with their lives to worry about some trouble-making kid.
Except for some reason, this guy had thought it odd. Unlike everyone else, this guy had known what the others all around them hadn’t: Billy wasn’t what he seemed. Billy was dangerous.
Those screams, those horrible and pain-filled screams could only belong to him. When the car had finally come to a stop, Jeremy, from the backseat of the car, bound and helpless, had surfaced in time to watch as Billy had dragged his would-be savior’s unconscious body from the trunk of the car, to the barn.
The shouts stopped. Jeremy pulled his hands from his ears, hesitated, then breathed in a sigh. The quiet wouldn’t last long. It never did.
When he'd first awoken in that dark, cold, concrete prison, with no idea how long he’d been there, where ‘there’ was, or what might happen to him... Jeremy had prayed for sound. A roar of a car, speeding by outside; his mom’s angry shouts, demanding to know where her son was; a freaking dog barking in the distance… anything but the hungry silence of the place he was in.
There was a woman’s voice, once in while, drifting from upstairs, angry. Always angry. Jeremy figured that she sounded a bit like his mom, whenever he came home with another note from the school’s principal.
He couldn’t really tell what she was angry about. Half the time, he couldn’t even tell if she was real or just some character on TV. She was the only sound that Jeremy could hear from upstairs, and he’d long stopped hoping that she might come down to help him.
Whenever he moved, Jeremy could hear the clinking of cold steel, as it pulled at his right wrist where a handcuff tightly secured his bony limb. The cuff was linked to a chain about the length of his body and anchored to the wall next to a set of stairs. Except for a bare light bulb in the center of the exposed beam ceiling, the remainder of the room was dark.
It wasn’t long after Jeremy had regained consciousness before Bill had descended the stairs, demanding to know who the man was. If it was some family member, friend of the family, friend of one of his friends. Anyone.
When Jeremy couldn't supply an answer short of, "I don't know. I've never seen him before!" he'd left. Studied Jeremy for a moment then left.
It was maybe an hour later and the shouts of pain had begun. Agonizing and visceral. And angry. Whoever this guy was, he was fighting it.
The pipes weren’t big enough for Jeremy to understand all the words, but he'd caught onto one. A name. Billy said it over and over again, angry voice filled with derision and mockery.
The word was clear enough that he was sure. Dean.
That had to be the man from the alley. The man who'd tried to stop all this. Who'd tried to save him. Who was now trapped. Like him. In hell. Jeremy's guardian angel...
So much for guardian angels.
Billy, the one who’d kidnapped him and Dean, the one who was in pain because of him. There were more whispers and mumbles, and it was only when Billy seemed more insistent that the name rang clearest.
It didn't really matter what his name as now. Nothing mattered. Because, Jeremy was sure that, once Billy was done with his anonymous rescuer, Jeremy would be next.
“You’re early.”
Jeremy’s head shot up. “What the…?” he said and scrambled back, casting an anxious, confused look at the stairs. It was some other man, older than Bill, shorter than the stranger. Jeremy had no idea how this guy had gotten down there without the stairs squeaking on him. “Wh-who are you?”
Unfortunately, Jeremy’s retreat was cut short when his back connected with the concrete wall. Now, if he could just disappear….
The large, heavyset man stood not twenty feet away, his back to Jeremy, seemingly fascinated with the only brick wall in the otherwise solid concrete prison.
Whoever this guy was, it definitely wasn’t Bill.
“They’re dead," the stranger continued, his voice distant, almost disconnected. "But I hear them all the time.” He twisted, pierced Jeremy with his sad gaze. “The one in the barn is too old… grown up, too mature…”
“Wh-who a-are you?” Jeremy asked again.
“Too bad.” The man looked at the wall. “’Cause now you’ll have to wait here until Billy’s done… playing.”
“P-playing?”
A sad smile crept across the man’s face. “Billy was always such a sensitive child and I… I was no father to him-not like I should’ve been.” The stranger turned fully and moved toward Jeremy. The dim light from the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling highlighted his thinning hair, unshaven face and pale skin. He fixed a pointed gaze at Jeremy.
“Father? You’re Bill’s-”
The man nodded. “Not a good father, though.” Remorse played across his face. “Maybe if I’d stopped her from killing that boy...” Shaking his head, he continued, “Well, maybe none of this would’ve happened.”
Jeremy’s mind caught on the word ‘killed’ and he started trembling.
“Then again…,” the stranger added. “Margret never should’ve-” His face grew clouded and angry. “She’s insane,” he snarled and glared up the staircase. “Always has been. It’s her fault he turned out this way.”
Jeremy didn't really want to know but knowing nothing was worse. "Wh-what way?" he stuttered out, nerves getting the better of him.
“A killer. Insane, just like her.”
Jeremy's eyes closed. A killer. Please God... please God, please God, please... "Wh-who did she kill?” he asked and swallowed.
“Frankie,” he looked Jeremy over, “was fourteen years old, a fragile kid, hair like straw. A lonely kid. Unwanted. Like all the others." Held Jeremy's eyes a second and added, "Like you.”
“That’s not true!” Jeremy shouted as he swiped angrily at the tears tracking down his cheeks. “My old man, he’ll send the cops looking for me," he lied, anything to make them let him go. "He loves me! He cares!”
The man was nodding his head, his face grim. “You’re wrong,” the visitor countered, head canted to one side in sorrow. “If that were true, you wouldn’t be here.” The man sighed. “No, he always picks the Frankies of the world. The lost boys. No one ever says anything until days after they're gone. Sometimes never.”
Jeremy swallowed. This time he let the tears fall. It was true, all of it. No one would come. There was no dad out there to call the cops.
“Frankie and Billy were always together. Best friends in the world. Just like you and Billy will be.” The man calling himself Bill’s dad shifted nervously. “She didn’t like that. Didn’t like seeing them together. Billy is her boy. Hers alone. She gets terribly jealous.”
“Jealous?” Jeremy didn’t understand. “B-because he had a friend?”
Billy's dad straightened, his eyes cast into the distance, as if he were looking into a past, a time he’d much rather forget. “Margret was so angry. Billy is her son. Hers. She’d made him hers, years before, when she..." he grimaced, the unfinished thought leaving a bad taste in his mouth. "Billy screamed then, just the same as all those boys have been screaming now, here." The man started weeping openly, lowering his face to his hands. "I’m a bad, bad father… should’ve stopped her, should stop her, should stop him…”
Understanding was dawning on Jeremy and he didn’t like what he was hearing. “Wh-who is Margret?”
“Billy’s momma.”
Gazing fearfully at the stairs, Jeremy swallowed. Now, for the first time, he realized that the woman's voice he'd heard earlier... had been real. Suddenly, he was very happy that she had never come downstairs to ‘help’ him.
“She killed Frankie.”
Jeremy made a gut-punched gasp. He was so fucked. So. Very. Fucked.
The man started turning his gaze back to the wall. Staring. “She’s crazy, she made our son like her,” he looked at Jeremy, “and I can’t stop any of it. I’m sorry.”
Bill’s father started toward the stairs, head down, one hand covering his mouth.
“W-wait!” Jeremy called anxiously.
The man stopped at the stairs and looked at Jeremy. “Beg. When he… he forgets who you are and calls you Frankie… beg. Billy hates it when they beg. He’ll end it sooner. Make it quick. Less painful.” Placing one foot on the first step he made to leave.
“Please!” Jeremy moved toward the man, pulling to the end of the chain that kept him secured to the wall, just out of reach. “You don’t have to be sorry. Just, get me out of here!” Jeremy couldn’t help the desperation that crept into his voice.
The man seemed to hesitate at that. Jeremy felt hope swell.
“I can’t. I-”
“Hal!” A woman’s voice shrilled from upstairs; the man flinched, eyes wide with a mixture of fear and defeat. “Get your worthless ass up here!”
“See,” he said when he opened his eyes again, looking at Jeremy, sadness and defeat swimming all around him. “I’m worthless. I can’t help you. I’m sorry.”
“But, I don’t wanna die!” Jeremy shouted at his back. “You can stop this. Let me go!”
At the top of the stairs a door opened and for a moment Jeremy saw the man’s silhouette, the darkness of the basement outlining him with the light from whatever room the door opened into. Jeremy could tell he was looking down at him again. Hesitating again.
Then the door closed. The room sank back into the light of the one bare bulb hanging from the ceiling.
Jeremy dropped to the ground, and cried.
Chapter 4 x * * * >X< * * * x Chapter 6