Psycho Save Us

by Huskins, Chad

  “Sugar?” Tidov hollered from downstairs.

  Spencer smiled and muttered to himself, “Yes, sweetie?”

  “What?”

  “Yeah,” he called back, “I’ll take some sugar.”

  Spencer stepped back into the hall. If the bedroom had been vacant and utilitarian, then the room across the hall was its storage counterpart. He flipped the lights on to get a better look, and tilted his head in curiosity. “You keep dogs?” Spencer hollered at him, stepping inside the room. The cages were too big for dogs, plainly. They were latched cunningly together, one set of solid steel chains connecting them in a row, with a feeding trough that ran through the bars of one and into the neighboring cage. A feeder that looked like what Spencer had seen used in his uncle’s chicken houses was sitting there beside the farthest cage, n doubt on an automatic timer.

  “What?” Tidov hollered.

  “I said, do you keep dogs?”

  The door had multiple locks added unnecessarily, but from the outside, keeping people on the inside locked in. He pulled the door back and forth. It was heavy. The wooden façade hid a solid steel interior, no doubt. These windows were covered by more black curtains, and the walls…covered in soundproofing foam, like musicians would put in their recording studios, and lots of it. Spencer hadn’t seen this much soundproofing foam since a musician pal of his and Hoyt’s had spent all his drug money trying to make it big in the rapping business, back in the day when Atlanta had been the hotspot for hip hop.

  Yes, anyone could see that this room was not meant for dogs. But it was worth asking to hear Tidov’s pitiful excuse.

  “Da. I mean, yes,” Tidov called up. His feet were plodding up the stairs. “I sometimes train German Shepherds and Rottweilers. Some pits, too, but not so many these days.” Spencer stood at the center of the room, waiting for him. When Tidov got there, he stood for a moment with two cups of coffee in his hand, looking at him. Spencer looked at his tattoos, saw a bald eagle and a bear fighting it out, perhaps a symbol of Tidov’s Russian heritage fighting with his American citizenship?

  I’m getting all “pensive” again, he thought with some amusement.

  Spencer stood there. “Sound doesn’t carry well in here,” he said.

  The Russian nodded, and took a sip of his own coffee. “The dogs bark a lot until I train them good. I didn’t want it to keep my sister and her boyfriend up at all hours. It doesn’t totally kill the sound, but it helps some.”

  Spencer nodded. “I’ll bet it does. And I’ll bet from outside you can’t hear a thing.”

  Tidov took another sip. “No, you can’t.”

  He’s one cool customer. Very powerful. Very cocksure that nothing can bring down his house of cards. I really, really hate this motherfucker. “Good coffee?” he asked.

  “Da.”

  “Sure smells good.”

  The Russian laughed, remembering himself. “I’m so sorry. Here’s yours.” He stepped into the room and held out the other cup. Spencer regarded the cup with more than a slim degree of humor. And that’s how the silly game ended.

  “ ‘Come into my parlor,’ said the spider to the fly. ‘’Tis the prettiest little parlor you ever did spy.’ ”

  “I’m sorry?”

  Spencer looked at the offered coffee, then at Tidov. “Is this how you do it?”

  The Russian put on the most befuddled face. Oh, he’s very good. “Do what, Mr. Madison?” Tidov asked.

  “What’s in it?” He smiled. “C’mon, you can tell me. Lorazopam? You sprinkle some in there? Heard about a pedo priest in Jersey used to do that. Or do you prefer to deliver it in a cellulose capsule?”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “Three grams puts ’em right out, doesn’t it? They don’t feel a thing. You can do whatever you want. No squealing, no crying, no pitching a fit about all the blood. No, ‘I want my mommy’ this, or ‘where’s my daddy’ that. Pretty slick op you got goin’ here, friend.” The Russian stared at him, the coffee still extended. “But here’s your problem. I’m not a parole officer any more than you’re a dog trainer or Laurence Fishburne’s cock. You’ve got skeletons in your closet and myself, well,” he laughed, “I’m runnin’ outta closets.”

  “I…I don’t understand your words,” Tidov said, trying to take a step back, but a look from Spencer indicated that wouldn’t be wise. He stood there a moment, perhaps realizing his hands were full, and recognizing his precarious situation. The door was three steps behind him. Spencer still had his hands in his pocket. The room was made soundproof. “I, um…” He swallowed. “I just train dogs in here, Mr. Madison. I’m a dog trainer…”

  “No, you know what you are?” Spencer took a step closer to him. “You’re a careless walker in the woods. That’s what they call you people in wilderness survival training. Careless walkers. Traipsing about with no care about where your foot goes, no consideration for what rabbit’s warren or gopher’s hole you might be fucking up. You chop down trees and hunt the shit outta things until they go extinct. But then you step on a rattler, and the whole world changes. For a moment you stand still, lookin’ at this thing as it rattles, hisses, and gets ready to bite. An’ you don’t know what the fuck to do because everyone’s always been afraid o’ you.”

  The other wolf lowered his eyes. “I’m going back downstairs—”

  “Fuck you, Vladimir Putin,” Spencer chuckled. “I’ve got a gun in my hand an’ you’re three steps away from the door in a soundproof fuckin’ room with both yer hands occupied, bitch. You go where I say you can go. You got that?” A few seconds went by while Tidov considered. “Stop thinking! You have no options. Now, drink my fuckin’ coffee for me.” Tidov looked at him. “What’s in it? Lorazopam? Or something to just make me tired like some valium or some shit? Go on, drink up, motherfucker.” Spencer took the Glock Pocket 10 out of his pocket. “I’m waitin’.”

  The other predator’s eyes showed that he had time for one more defiant thought.

  Spencer raised the gun and said, “If the neighbors couldn’t hear all those girls’ screams, I’m sure the worst they’ll think is that you set off a firecracker over here. Drink.”

  Only two more seconds went by before the Russian made his decision. He sipped at the coffee, and when Spencer smiled at him and shook his head, he knew he had to empty it. Tidov turned it up, emptying it completely.

  “Now, turn around and start downstairs.” Tidov did as bidden, slowly, sluggishly, like he was wearing a weighted vest. “I want the keys to that Buick outside. You know what? Fuck it, I’ll hotwire the bitch.” Then, something occurred to him. “Wait! Ho-ho, man! Let’s stop inside your sister’s and her boyfriend’s room. Whattaya say? What’s really in there? Inquiring minds wanna know, bitch. Open sesame.”

  Tidov took on the most dejected look. He blinked a few times, then nodded. They walked slowly down the hall. Spencer wanted to hurry because on some level he knew their time alone here was limited, but he also knew that rushing things tended to make a person sloppy. And didn’t Dr. McCulloch always tell me to stop and think about my actions more? So he allowed Tidov his heavy-shouldered walk to the room. The Russian reached up, tried to turn the doorknob, couldn’t. “You’ve got the key,” Spencer said. It wasn’t a question.

  Tidov nodded, and Spencer watched the Russian carefully as he set one of the coffee cups down and fumbled in his back pocket. There were numerous keys on that key chain, not all of them of the shape for standard doorknobs (no doubt for the cages) and all of them color-coded. He found the right key after a moment, and inserted it. He turned it slowly and the door opened. As soon as it did, Spencer smelled it. A mélange of formaldehyde and other chemicals. There was also that sweat smell again, and decay.

  It was dark until Tidov reached over to flip three light switches. He didn’t even wait for Spencer to ask, he knew the score now.

  The room was bathed in sickly fluorescent lighting, that unflattering kind that brought out every pimple, boil, scar and sweat
molecule on the skin. Other than the sad lighting, though, the room was decorated with various rainbows on the ceiling, a playground at the center with a seesaw, and a twin bed at the far corner with plush pink pillows and big, brown, fuzzy teddy bears sitting happily alongside an old Tickle Me Elmo. One of Elmo’s eyes was falling off to one side, giving the creature a deranged look. There was a pair of handcuffs beside Elmo, and they were currently open, which to Spencer meant recently used.

  Along the walls were setting lights, no doubt activated as needed for greater picture quality. And of course, there was the soundproofing foam double-layered on all of the walls. There was recording equipment everywhere, including a Sony HVR-Z1U camcorder, which Spencer happened to know went for around $2,000 because he’d stolen a car a couple years back with one of those in the trunk and had pawned it. “Classy set-up,” he said. “What’s in that room?” He pointed to a door at the far side of the room that he suspected led to what would be a bathroom, and something else, too.

  “If you’re going to kill me—” Tidov started.

  “I haven’t decided that yet. I told you, I’m a monster, just like you, and I don’t care what you have in that room. I’m not here to rescue the children. I’m here because of that fuckwad who stared daggers at me earlier.”

  Tidov regarded Spencer for a moment before he stepped over to the bathroom door and opened it. He flipped on the lights again without being asked, and when he did, Spencer found yet another soundproof room. Two large plastic tubs, big enough for bodies, were stacked against one wall. Hanging from the opposite wall was a shelf filled bottles of hydrofluoric acid. The toilet remained, but the bathtub and shower had been removed to make room for a waist-high steel table. On top of the table was a child-sized black bag, with a child-sized object inside it.

  “Open that up.”

  Tidov hesitated, but obeyed. He moved lethargically, stumbling once. Whatever he’d put in the coffee to drug Spencer was now coursing through him. He tried to play it too cool. Should’ve come at me guns blazin’, but then I guess he still wasn’t sure about me. He wasn’t listenin’ to his instincts.

  The Russian moved sleepily over to the table and unzipped the bag without ceremony. He parted the black plastic covers, and Spencer waved him to back off then peered inside. A young girl, no older than nine, half black, half Hispanic, just lying there, eyes opened and rolled back. Her lips were dried. The aroma coming out of the bag was that of urine and feces.

  The room required another look. The hydrofluoric acid was smart, as were the plastic tubs. Hydrofluoric acid would melt through pretty much anything, but not plastic.

  “Looks like you bagged another one,” Spencer said, laughing. Tidov didn’t seem to get it. “That’s called a double entendre. It’s clever shit, motherfucker, you didn’t think of it.”

  Tidov shrugged helplessly. He didn’t know what Spencer expected of him.

  “You know,” Spencer said, “I’ve done a lotta shit in my life, and I’ve learned the various ins an’ outs of all kinds of work. But I wouldn’t have the first idea how to run an operation like this one. Looks like you cats have given this some serious thought.” He looked at the Russian. “Can I ask you somethin’? Do their screams ever keep you up at night? I mean, when you think back on them, when you’re remembering how they sounded, does it mess with your head or do you still get off on it?” Tidov didn’t answer. Spencer smiled. “You get off on it, don’t you? You sly dog. C’mon, where do you keep the recordings?”

  It didn’t take any more convincing. Tidov tilted his head to one side to pop his neck, then led Spencer back into the playing room. Beside the recording equipment were a few mics, and connected to those mics was a soundboard. “Cue one up,” Spencer said. “I wanna listen.” He thought to himself, Need to hurry up, Spence ol’ boy. The five-oh is gonna be here any minute, you know this. But he had to hear. He had to.

  Tidov sat in the only chair beside the soundboard and fiddled with a few dials. He pulled up one file on the small Hewlett-Packard screen, and after a few seconds the room was filled with screams. They came from a pair of small speakers on either side of the computer monitor. There was the smacking of flesh against flesh, loud grunts from men shouting things in Russian, and screams. The shrieking. Tidov sat there, his eyelids starting to get heavy. Spencer listened to one Russian shout in English, “Cry for your mother! Cry for her!”

  The next thing to come through the speakers was a girl’s god awful plea for help from her mother. The smacking of flesh on flesh got louder, the grunting more intense, the screams greater and greater.

  “Impressive,” Spencer said. “You can turn it off now.” Tidov seemed only too happy to do this. With the click of a mouse, they were once again alone with one another in silence.

  In that silence, something terrible happened. Spencer didn’t know where it started—he never knew when these things started—but there was a pulse just behind his eyes. Like the migraines he used to get as a kid that came whenever his vertigo came over him. Brief spells, something that came from intense anger that few people ever felt. No one felt rage like a psychopath, he’d read that somewhere. Whereas love and acceptance was at the forefront of other people’s minds, anger and an unnaturally strong need to be dominant was all the psychopath cared for. It could be spurred by many things. In Spencer’s case, it was always spurred by the thought that someone else thought they had power. It offended him, even when not directed at him. Hell, especially when not directly at him. He felt like a master artist looking at some lesser artist’s work and saying, “No, you’re doing it all wrong.”

  And like any uppity artist, Spencer felt the need to voice his opinion, then force it. “I want to know where the others are.”

  Tidov might’ve been a monster, but he did have a degree of loyalty in him. He tried to hide the truth of his accomplices. “What…what others?” His eyes closed, then opened again, then closed, then opened. He was starting to go out.

  “Oh, c’mon now. An operation like this doesn’t go off without a hitch without some pals.” Spencer waved his Glock about the room. “Surely there are customers who help pay for this. And there must be some overhead, am I right?”

  “Fffffuck…yyyy—”

  “All right, all right, fuck me,” Spencer said. “Stand up. Let’s go for a walk outside. I don’t want to have to carry you.”

  At this suggestion, Tidov’s eyes opened a bit wider. He believes going outside is good for him. He thinks he’s safer outside than he is inside. Indeed, the Russian stood up with a bit more verve and exited the room. On his way out, Spencer saw a bottle of sal volatile (smelling salts) on one of the shelves. No doubt used to wake the kids up after they’d been drugged…or after they’d passed out from the pain. He pocketed the bottle. Be needin’ this later. He also picked up the pair of handcuffs beside the lazy-eyed Elmo.

  Spencer didn’t turn off any of the lights, nor did he close any of the doors. Whenever the cops finally showed up here, he wanted this to occupy their time, eat up more of the manpower that should be out there looking for him. It’s a helluva night in the A-T-L, he thought.

  They made it downstairs, but by now Tidov was starting to lose a great deal of his balance. It won’t be long before he passes out for good. On the way to the front door, he spotted a Motorola Droid phone. “Is this yours?” he said.

  Tidov, drowsy and leaning against the front door, turned to look at him. “Yesssss.”

  He picked it up. “Good. Now, out the door with you, Vladimir.”

  “My name’s…Yevgeny…”

  “I know your name, fucker. Now ask me if I give a fuck.”

  “Do you…give…?”

  “Fuck no!”

  The room was quiet for a time. The Harper girl sat against the far wall, not looking at either of them. Kaley sat on the edge of the bed holding Shan. They remained this way for what seemed like an eternity; the Harper girl, isolated and alone and terrified; Shannon, leaning on her sister and lost and terr
ified; Kaley, brushing the head and patting the back of her sister and terrified out of her mind.

  None of them knew how to move on. None of them knew how to accept their new lives as prisoners. Trapped in that worst of in-between zones, where one is placed into a miserable new set of circumstances and yet still clings to what they once had. It was a delicate time. It was a time when a hard decision needed to be made, when a person had to determine whether they were going to fight or submit, knowing that either one could mean termination. It wouldn’t take Kaley twenty years to figure out that truth, she knew it right then.

  The first thing to do was to make the decision. I don’t want to be raped and killed. And I don’t want Shannon to be raped and killed. Okay, that was easy. Now, what was she going to do about it?

  With tremulous hands, Little Sister reached up to Big Sister’s neck. The Anchor was once again established. It pulled Kaley down, down, down…

  …down…

  There, she felt the Oceans of Sorrow churning. That’s what Nan had called them. The Oceans of Sorrow. That’s where a person’s worst thoughts resided, where their dashed hopes went to die and decay.

  Once, Nan had told her about her sister Irene, dead many years before Nan went to join her. Irene had been a talented musician by the time she was seventeen. Violinist, pianist, and cellist. She had shown such promise, but the inferiority of her circumstances (i.e. where she was born) had played negatively on where she ended up in life. She was talented, but not so talented that it guaranteed her a scholarship, so college would still cost her. And as practical a woman as Irene had tried to be, she still felt something for one or two of the men from the ’hood she grew up in. Being knocked up at age eighteen, and then again when she was twenty-one, pretty much dashed her hopes. At first she decided to put off college, but only for a short time. A year, no more. But then came her third child from a third father. Ten years later, Nan said she could no longer go anywhere near Irene. “Her sorrow pulled me down, chil’,” Nan told her. “All that Ocean o’ Sorrow. It was them dashed hopes of what might’ve been down there in all o’ that black water. If I stayed too long around her, I’d sho’ly drown. It even caused her to secretly hate her own children.” She had pronounced the word chirren. “Oh chil’, no mother wants to admit this, but many of them do secretly despise their young’uns, at least one of ’em. They may cry at they funeral or when they graduate, but those are tears shed for what could have been, what should have been. They don’t even know that they feel this way. That’s my burden to know. An’ yours too now, chil’. Yours too.”