Ch. 3: Where the Damned Lie

19 Yrs. Old.

Raid Walker

Power: Four Clover, a weak little power for a weak spindly armed gofer.

Or so said the only doctor Mama could take him to, whom had no reason for pretense or "bedside manner." Given that the man served criminals and any person too poor to pay the fees, blackmailing the second sort until they were just as dirty as the border patrol men who commandeered the bars and the women at night, their uniforms caked in sandstorm dirt and body odor, committing all kinds of acts from thievery to bootlegging to dealing. To killing and to demeaning, to threatening and to burning.

What Mama burned on Friday nights in a long silk gown and her own Mama's old wedding veil in the almost satanic ritual fashion, was absolutely none of his business. No matter how it stank.

With a shuddering breath, tears running down her face, Patricia prayed.

She silently asked that whatever God existed here-- if he or she or it had not abandoned this place altogether-- that white haired, pale red eyed [___] Walker forgave her.

With quick and now very accustomed hands did she strike a match and set it to a tiny candle wick.

And with her hand let the flame caress the corners of the page, of all the loose papers until they burned into ash on the writing desk he'd fished out for her so many months ago.

When he had finally smiled at her with the corners of his eyes crinkled.

___________________________________________

Raid knew this 'New West' fad the Others called it. Those rich folks outside the country.

While Raid knew it the way all the young people knew it. Not that he'd exactly be welcome among the "little maggots" anymore.

Anyone who survived to age out knew to run whenever you felt the slightest brush of an adult's shadow.

Because to actually live you had to be evil.

This country which was Baron's Coffer. What the mob man who had first struck bloody, iron colored order into the roasting sands and the screaming corpses fancied himself.

The Baron. Rich and opulent. Greedy and obnoxious in voice and of the size of his flintlock.

And no, no man knew the size of that. And besides, it was more of a glock. Very different guns.

Adults in Coffer were evil. A hideous, rotted bushel of fruit. Fruit.

Never seen what they actually looked like.

It was a rare photo that wasn't penciled over or written with crude sex-talking or threats of a mind that's snapped.

At the moment, Raid kept a stool on the bar counter warm. For an adult, Mama's coworker Hick Saw Hort was a steady presence who glanced past Raid as if he were an oddly large speck of dust but nothing more.

And let him nurse-- never drink-- an amber swig of the foul water from the faucet while he waited for Mama on her shift.

She had the tough job of actually manning the distillery and making repairs where necessary at a given moment.

Raid put his head down, eyes roving lazy toward a bushel of overweight, overindulging men in their blue work shirts acid washed and faded in filth.

His face contorted into a disgusted growl, the corners of his vision from his slanted view-- they steadily darkened.

Sly little wafts of vaguely violet shadows... pulsing.

And he let them.

One of the men had warts on his face, shocking white blond hair that didn't match his head's prune color on the backs of his hands and laughed like a pig.

Another had a complexion like wax and as he held his hand, his palms slowly, muddily began to drip.

A couple he could recognize by their freckles and jutting rabbit's teeth respectively.

Palomonio who lived on the loft below himself and Mama, who for every odd blue moon a month dragged bags of pilfered guard clothes and confiscated rifles and drugs, from the time Raid had been just seven years old. And Palomonio had always favored a finger gun to blow his little brains out than a bribe to keep him quiet.

He had once found a note in the eggs.

About Mama's big, curly hair.

How he'd run his hands through it, savor the feeling, almost sorry-- that he'd have to kill her.

And the rabbit teeth, once one of the "maggots," not too long ago. But turned just as brusque and cold as any pair of hands once he turned sixteen and began working with a "backdoor," charity doctor. The one who was so kind as to see clients without coin or collateral besides their own kids.

And the doctor didn't accept that.

Pig's stool broke, three out of three weak legs snapped clean in two making him land in a porking heap.

His "friends" rushed-- probably to see which sleaze could ingratiate himself by taking him to the hospital.

White hair moaned as his back quite suddenly gave out. And at the same time a small frame fell upon that same spot.

A waitress had passed by, only to jostle Raid's stool as she blundered and ultimately crashed.

Half a dozen glasses of mead and beer with a cockroach in one glass soaked into her uniform and the tile.

Ripping Raid out of his reverie and snapping reality back to what it should be.

Save... eight separate incidents and at least five injuries that could lead to demanding a free this or that or stoning the building.

There was fire in Hort's eyes as he helped the girl whose pearly tears shone in her eyes. Even against the truly grimy dins of light in the bar.

Raid simply tried not to gaze at her too long.

Until the cockroach in the glass turned out to be alive and crawled across her face.

Prompting a scream to cut down the ugly laughter at all sides of the building. The waitress running in a panic out the door. The slam making Raid flinch.

**************************************

Raid was kicked out. Quite literally kicked out once Hack Saw put him down, kicking him and shouting expletives as he rained and extra one or two thwacks with his oddly polished shoe.

Well, that was probably a concern wasn't it?

Raid would be likely to be finding more little notes within his shoes or with his Mama on her way back.

Should the new proprietors be so merciful to allow her back to him safely. Not-- without recompense and restitution for the newly respectful establishment worthy of The Baron and his other fellows.

Raid continued down the winding paths and down, down a hellish looking chasm by a rickety stairwell.

Into a commune of just eight disparate little cottages and a relatively-- desolate-- almost gated neighborhood. At least, it's what the Baron's closest boasted and is what patrol guards would often throw in their faces during shifts.

Getting back to their blond and chubby cheeked little kids and their little wives who made snickerdoodles or something.

Raid watched as Ms. Hodden's little toddler-- toddled-- into the corner of the boulevard by its butt.

Whether that was sweet or something sexual, Raid had to admit he was vaguely curious.

Hands smacking on the hard ground and slight protruding stones on the ground. Raid called it-- he called it Toddy-- better than just "you" or thing-- even if it smelled like a swamp ooze on most days.

Around here that sort of thing was 'pleasant heat.' Dirty and sweaty as heat still is but at least the throbbing wasn't just from sun.

Or maybe, per usual, the adults were lying again. The 'teachers' or "priests," who deigned to impart wisdom on the maggots often had this...

<Look>

Some greedy, voracious, and hungry bug-out of their eyes when casing their powers, their freakish features--

Which Raid knew now was the cruel, blade's edged wonderment of what they could produce when paired off and the like. What manner of powers and hybrids could they weaponize and how to violate them to doing so.

Some little girls dared prance about and make noise.

The one most behind with cheetah spots-- stretched skin and jaundiced eyes too large and too-- too round like marbles, pushed her friends forward. And so did her friend in third place.

He wished them well.

So much like they snared kids in to listen in the first place.

Sometimes there are polls.

Needed to have something to do after all--

And in one, of all the adults and-- all the older adults who get a vote half do agree: the ones who snap and do themselves in might have the right idea. Surely anything, even the supposed condemnation for "weakness," had to be better than being some blowhard with compensation issues' bitch.

Coming to the hostel where his Mama did also have a paying job allowing them to live in the place, Raid peered in-- the little old lady was out.

And he didn't feel like having a sharply carved cane sharply smack him to the floor and pointed to his vulnerable throat.

Even as the door lazed open under his weak touch-- another little bit of "luck."

Raid booked it and went the side way.

Where high boxes were stacked in an adjacent building.

In his pouch he always had a scrap of fabric to serve as a blindfold.

Having tried so many times Raid could safely say there was a degree of-- trust, involved.

Just the notion made him cringe.

Then again, Raid wasn't sure yet-- whether he wanted to live out and eventually shrivel up into a son baked raisin and be ashed.

Unless he possibly had a chance to find out just in what building in this minute country they did that in. When every singular building here was ramshackle, uneven, and even cute for their small size.

Hiking laboriously over he could feel out when the air got that certain degree of sting at his face to make the jump, fingers <luckily> clinging onto the flat roof.

Of which he ripped the blindfold off and carefully lowered a foot first to unhook his window latch and then climbed in once he had gotten it open.

The old lady, for all her threats to kill either dead weight (him) or the girls who pocket extra currency for themselves treated them good, having given Mama with a newly born baby the only room with a window and therefore ventilation.

Raid slowly closed the window, but uneasy pins and needles rand across his shoulders and back when he heard a clatter.

He paused his breath-- waiting--

CAWW CAW CAWW.

Raid winced at the choked out sound.

And then--

SSCRITCH SSCRAATCH

Moji's complaining pitter patter on the door.

Raid made for the added bathroom which was just a broken ceramic toilet with rusted pipes and what was either neon green tequilas thrown up or some type of chemical across its surface and a bathtub equally inoperable. But at least inhabitable for a dog, a cat, and occasionally an oppossum.

Swinging open the door all of fifteen animals scampered out, nearly bringing him to the floor and made ownership of the rest of the little house.

He wondered how much of a tease he'd have to give the old woman to make her forget why she was mad.