“Grady, my pal, you really should watch your mouth,” Bob said, scowling yet still smiling creepily. “Remember, the power of the dark trumps all, and that power is what fuels me. You think you’re smart, but I am smarter. You think you’re strong, but I am stronger. I feel no pain. I feel no fear. I feel nothing. I am…numb.”
“No, you’re a piece of shit liar,” I said. “I saw the pain in your eyes when I smashed that alarm clock over your skull.”
He narrowed his eyes.
I went on: “And I see the uncertainty on your face now.”
“You’ll never find immortality,” Mia said. “You’ll burn in hell before that happens.”
Bob arched an eyebrow, content with ignoring my claims. “You seem to have a false concept of hell, my dear. Just take a look around—we’re living in it! And you’re looking at its new prince.”
“You’re no prince. You’re a coward, that’s all,” Mia continued. “A coward whose only way of overpowering people is by attacking them in their sleep.” She nodded at her belly, which protruded even farther outward in her current position. “Like c’mon, dude, I’m almost nine months pregnant. Jesus, you’re a chump.”
“You say ‘chump’ and I say ‘genius’,” Bob replied. “Besides, if you put up a fight and I had to subdue you, things could’ve gotten messy. I couldn’t risk damaging that prize you carry in your womb.”
All the momentum Mia had built with her words halted and vanished. Her lips clamped shut. No one else spoke. Cold silence fell over the basement, and Bob allowed himself a moment to bask in it.
“Yes, yes, yes. My friends will love the sweet innocence of a newborn. To them, you’re basically a human-shaped Cadbury Egg, and your offspring is that sweet, sweet cream beneath the shell.” He let loose a bray of laughter. “Man, I’m getting hungry just thinking about it!”
I couldn’t take any more. A fresh bout of rage blinded me as I yanked my arms as hard as I could, trying to free myself from the pipe. The plastic tie cut deeper and deeper into the already open wound. “You son of a bitch, I’ll kill you!”
“Oh, calm down, Grady,” Bob said. “You aren’t killing anyone. Save your energy, will you?”
I glanced over at Mia. Her cheeks glistened with fresh tears, and her arms fought against her restraints. Not because she wanted to throttle Bob, but I thought because she wanted—no, needed—to rub her stomach. The fact she might not ever again get the chance wasn’t lost on her.
Struggling, I buried my rage and took a different approach.
“Please, Bob. Let them go. Just take me instead. I have enough fear and anger and sadness inside of me to make up for all of them. It’ll be no different, I promise.” Seeing as my hands were already clasped together against my will, I tilted them up and interlocked my fingers.
“That’s sweet, Grady. Really sweet,” Bob said. “But answer me this—have you ever had a really delicious steak dinner? I’m talking about filet mignon and maybe some veal, steamed vegetables, all you can eat fries, bottomless Coca-Cola, and then, to top it all off, the best damn cheesecake your tongue has ever had the pleasure of tasting. You know what I’m talking about?” He waited a moment for my answer. I gave none. “No? Well, that’s a five-star meal right there, and that’s what you are to my friends. I’d be truly insane to deny them of that, only to offer them a cheap fast food snack instead, wouldn’t I?”
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” Mikey shouted. “You touch Mia again or even mention her baby, I’ll rip your fucking head off!”
Bob had been cackling, but the sudden outburst cut him short. He turned, faced Mikey, and knelt in front of him.
“Mikey, Mikey, Mikey. That you’d ever utter such a thing hurts me, buddy. That hurts me real bad. I don’t like being hurt, especially by someone I once considered a friend.” He reached behind and pulled the knife from his pocket. Holding it in front of his face, he studied its edge. “So what are we going to do with that mouth of yours?”
With pure hatred filling his eyes, Mikey gave no answer.
“Don’t do anything to him! Please!” Ell screamed. The pipes rattled and clanked against the wall as she thrashed in an unsuccessful attempt to break free.
Bob ignored her, said, “Hmm, we have to get the ball rolling somehow, don’t we? I guess…I guess I’ll just have to kill you.”
From where I sat, Bob seemed like a giant towering over the rest of us. Even the wall failed to contain his shadow. I felt like a lamb in line to be slaughtered, watching as his friends die one by one before him.
“Stop it!” Eleanor shouted. “PLEASE!”
Bob looked over his shoulder with that same sickening grin on his face. “Really, I wish I could, but I have a job to do, and I like to think I’m a responsible guy.”
“You said you couldn’t kill us! You said upstairs that only the wraiths could!” I said, voice trembling.
He focused on me. The grin never wavered. “Well, Grady, my pal, I guess I lied about that.”
Another storm of rage ripped through my insides. I lunged forward, but the pipes and the ties held like they had each time before.
“Yeah…I lie a lot, in case you haven’t noticed,” Bob said.
“I can’t believe we trusted you,” Stone said. He turned to me. “How stupid could we be?”
I had no idea, but there was no use in crying over spilled milk now.
“You’re not stupid. Not that stupid, I mean,” Bob said. “I’m just a charming guy. I throw on a big smile and laugh at your jokes, and pretty soon I got you eating out of the palm of my hand. Really, it was easier than I expected. I’ve never caught this many people at once before. A couple here and there, husbands and wives, boyfriends and girlfriends—hell, even brothers and sisters.” Another nod to the pile of corpses. “Just take a look over there and you’ll see.” He ran a finger down from the knife’s point. “Reminds me of that old fairy tale, Hansel and Gretel. I’m the witch living in a house made of candy, and you’re the babes lost in the woods, but instead of fattening you up, I just have to…season you.
“The grief, the anguish, and all that terror leaking from your pores—the wraiths lap that shit up like starving dogs. And speaking of dogs…” He swiveled his head toward the steps. “I should probably bring that mangy mutt of yours down here. They don’t prey on animals often, but that dog, he’s smarter than most, I’ll give him that. Maybe he can be their after-dinner mint.”
So Chewy was alive. Thank God.
As he laughed, Bob whirled the knife around and around in his hand. The silver caught the light of the flames and cast them throughout the basement like a cheap disco ball.
“Chewy can wait for now. He needs his rest after that kick I gave him. Probably busted a few of his ribs. Actually, now that I think of it”—Bob’s index finger tapped his lips—“I haven’t heard him whining since I threw him in the garage.” A shrug. “Anyone wanna bet on whether he’s still alive?” He waited a moment for us to speak. “Yeah, didn’t think so. It’d be a sure loss!”
Enraged, Mikey kicked at him, but Bob was ready. Dropping the knife, he caught both feet, and, with a grunt, he twisted. The resulting crunch nearly drowned out Mikey’s screams.
After seeing the aftermath, I was sure I was going to vomit.
Both of Mikey’s feet dangled at unnatural angles. The right was turned almost all the way around; a slice of pinkish white jutted from the left. It was part of his bone. He screamed and screamed, his whole body flailing.
“That’s why they pay me the big bucks!” Bob said then laughed.
Eleanor’s voice was shrill. “Why? What the fuck is wrong with you!? Stop! Stop! Just leave him alone!” Tears fell from her eyes and hit the basement floor, where the years of accumulated dirt and grime absorbed them instantaneously. “Do it to me instead! Please!”
“Bet that isn’t the first time you’ve said that, huh, Ell?” Bob glanced my way. I can’t imagine how I looked in that moment, but I tried my best to contain the anger I felt
. It was what he wanted to see, and although I was sure the wraiths could sense the emotions regardless, I was almost more certain Bob couldn’t as long as I kept it buried.
Stone yelled, “He’s tied to a fucking pipe! At least pick on someone your own size!”
Bob set his hands on his hips and faced Stone. “Oh yeah? Someone my own size—say, like you?”
“Yeah, I’d kick your ass, Bobby.”
“You can’t even walk without crutches, you dumb fuck. Of all the people who’ve lasted this long, you’re not supposed to be one of them. You should’ve died after the first couple of days. How’d you manage? Your little boyfriend over there carry you everywhere? Bet that does a number on your back, doesn’t it, Grady?”
“Fuck you!” Stone replied. “I’d wipe the floor with that ugly mug of yours.”
“Yeah, is that right, tough guy?”
Stone bared gritted teeth. “You wanna find out?”
A pause. Bob weighed the challenge a moment, then he laughed and shook his head. “No, I don’t. It wouldn’t be fair. But if you’re so eager for some attention, you only have to wait patiently a minute or two. Your turn is coming.”
He turned back to Mikey, who tried to bring his legs closer to his body, but the way his one ankle was completely turned around prevented that.
“Aw, look at the little baby,” Bob said, bending over and resting his hands on his knees. “Funny, really. You struck me as a tough guy, Mike. Tougher than all these other shit stains. In fact, I thought you should’ve been the leader of this band. Not ol’ brooding Grady over there.” He flashed me a look.
I met his eyes again, but kept my calm. It was like an endless bloody war raged inside of me. Every inch of my being felt destroyed, broken, and I’d barely experienced any pain yet.
“‘Course you did want you wanted, when you wanted to, right, Mikey? Like how you ran out of the motel room in the near darkness to come and save poor old me. Tsk-tsk-tsk, that was a big mistake, buddy boy. Big”—the blade rose from the floor in a flash, and it fell so fast I barely had time to register what happened until I heard the wet shunk of steel puncturing meat—“mistake.”
The blade now stuck out of Mikey’s thigh, and the way he howled in pain hurt my soul. It felt like my chest had been ripped open and someone poured boiling water over my heart.
“PLEASE!” Eleanor shouted. “PLEASE! STOP IT! STOP IT!”
Mikey squirmed and writhed, trying to get away, but getting nowhere. His own screams broke and changed to strangled cries of pain. They grew even louder when Bob grasped the handle and gave it a twist.
“Yeah,” Bob said, “you like that, don’t you? Feels good, doesn’t it? Let it out, Mikey. Let it all out—”
Then something happened I would’ve never expected, not in a million years.
Mikey, despite all he had gone through—broken ankles, bone sticking out of his flesh, a stab to the thigh, the turning of the blade—decided to fight back.
He kicked the leg with the ankle turned around one-hundred and eighty degrees, and slammed the heel of his boot into Bob’s groin. I thought it had been an accident, some reflexive movement brought on by the pain and the shock his body was going through, but then I saw the fire overtaking the anguish and fear in his eyes, and I knew that couldn’t be the case. Mikey had meant to do that.
After this point, I had begun to doubt Bob’s humanity. Maybe he really felt no pain. Maybe he was transforming into some immortal thing. But after seeing the damage of Mikey’s blow, the idea of invincibility faded.
I’ll let you in on a universal truth: no man can laugh off a shot to the balls, even men who had been granted powers by supernatural beings.
Bob doubled over and growled before letting out a high cry of agony. I was so enamored by the whole situation, so happy that hurting this son of a bitch was possible, I almost hadn’t noticed the lighter fall from Bob’s pocket.
But I had.
The lighter hit the floor and cartwheeled, landing in the shadows and dust a few feet from one of my legs. No one else seemed to notice. Eleanor was screaming while Mia and Stone begged for the madness to stop.
Bob shook with rage. One hand cupped his damaged area while the other reached out and seized Mikey around the throat. Through his teeth he seethed, “You fucking piece of shit! I was gonna make it fast for you, but now…now you are going to really suffer.”
Blood flew from Mikey’s mouth as he whispered something I couldn’t hear. I imagine now it was a soft but powerful “Fuck you.”
I flicked my eyes from them to the lighter on the floor, back and forth, all while nearly popping my hip out of place trying to reach our ticket out of here with one of my boots.
That damn Bic…so close, yet so far away.
After many failed attempts, my heel finally clipped plastic as a groove of tread hooked the lighter.
By this time, Bob’s hands were gripped around Mikey’s throat, whose face was turning a sickly shade of blue.
“Look me in the eye, boy! Look me in the eye while I choke the useless life out of you!” Bob screamed.
“Stop it! Stop! PLEASE, PLEASE!” Eleanor cried. “Let him go!” Her voice stood out the loudest.
Mikey somehow continued to fight, jerking and bucking, but the motions were slowing down, like the gears of a dying clock.
I clamped both of my heels together and dragged the lighter toward me. At about two or three feet from where my hands were bound, it kept slipping and I’d frantically repeat the process of scraping my boot along the floor. This was no time for subtlety because I didn’t know how much longer Mikey had. Over the screaming and the begging of the others, the grating of the plastic against the concrete was inaudible. With one last kick, the lighter skittered against the wall behind me, and it rebounded inches away from my outstretched fingers.
“Know what?” Bob was saying. “Strangling is too good for you, you little bastard. I got something else in mind. Something better.”
I managed to get the lighter in between the ring and pinky fingers of my right hand. From there I curled it up into my palms. The way the zip tie was fastened around my wrist meant I couldn’t burn the plastic by holding it normally. So I pointed the head of the lighter downward and I struck that bad boy, hoping with every fiber of my being a flame would jet out.
Sure enough, on the first try, the spark caught and fire, sweet fire, burned. If not for the flickering candle across the way, I think Bob would’ve noticed this added brightness, but he noticed nothing but Mikey.
The flame curled as it fought to stand upright, and then it lit against the side of my palm. A pungent odor of burning hair and charring flesh drifted toward my nose. The fact it was my hair and my flesh made it even worse. Soon, though, another scent mingled with those two. It was the smell of melting plastic.
What I was doing was working. I just had to hold out against the pain. Oh man, let me tell you, burning yourself on purpose is never a fun time. As a distraction from the agony, I bit my lip until blood rolled down my chin, trying with all my might not to let off of the button on the lighter, and wishing the damn thing would just burn enough for me to break out.
Look away. Don’t watch! Look anywhere but there! my mind urged.
Bob reached for the knife in Mikey’s thigh, yanked it out in one agonizingly slow pull.
Mikey’s screams ramped up in intensity. His eyes rolled backward, closed, then opened to focus on the monster in front of him.
“I know what’s good for you, Mike!” Bob said.
The steel was dripping black-red blood. It fell from the point and splashed the floor, where again, the dust drank it greedily.
Bob pulled the knife back like he was yanking on the spring-loaded rod on a pinball machine, and then he thrust it forward.
It tore through Mikey’s abdomen as if he were made of tissue paper instead of flesh and bone.
The light blue sweater he wore was made of heavy wool. It had once belonged to Calvin Thompson, but it had f
it Mikey well enough. Now the light blue material was turning a darker shade of blue, almost purple, as the blood soaked through.
Bob stabbed him again…and again…and again.
The screams, not just from Mikey but from the others, raked across my heart. I watched in shock, unaware of my own pain (Eleanor would later pronounce these as third-degree burns), but then the zip tie around my wrist popped.
I looked down, disbelief mixing with all the other terrible emotions.
I was free.
Once this realization settled, I sprang upward on legs not completely stable, and I ran at Bob with as much speed as I could gain in the short distance between us. That was only about twenty feet, but you’d be surprised how much momentum one can get in such a small window.
I have never played football, aside from the occasional backyard game in my youth, and those were years ago, but you wouldn’t have guessed that, had you seen what happened next. You might’ve thought I was a pro safety.
I led with my shoulder and I made it hurt.
It sure hurt me, at least.
We fell over, entangled on the floor at the foot of the stairs. He had been holding the knife, but when I collided with him, it flew somewhere behind us in the shadows.
Bob grunted, pushed me off and struck me in the side of the face. My right ear took the brunt of the blow, and I heard a high-pitched ringing sound soon after.
Getting up and swaying on my feet, I tried to focus on where Bob was, but now I blearily saw more than one of him.
“Brave of you, Grady,” he snarled. “Real brave.”
The corpses were to my left, and as he slowly advanced on me, I retreated until I bumped into the furnace. A hollow ding rang out as my elbow struck one of the air ducts. My vision started to come back to normal. The many Bobs were merging into one.
Blood streaked the front of his jacket. Some was his, courtesy of me, but most belonged to Mikey. His nose looked crooked too, and I thought he was leaning to his right side, clutching the spot where I’d speared him moments before.
All in all, Bob Ballard had seen better days.
Whiteout (Book 3): The Numbing Page 13
