Authors: James Roy Daley
Beth gripped the crowbar tighter.
The creepy-crab leapt off the porch. It came straight at Nicolas, lost two legs (courtesy of the chainsaw) and landed on Nicolas’ face with teeth snapping.
Nicolas pulled the saw towards himself recklessly; he stumbled backwards.
Crab guts exploded everywhere.
Beth steadied the crowbar and swung it like a baseball bat. There was a loud, vibrating CLUNK as the iron banged off Nicolas’ head.
Nicolas saw stars, waved the chainsaw hastily in front of his chest and fell forwards. As he dropped to his knees, a second crab leapt off the rooftop. This one was bigger than the first. It looked like it weighed a hundred pounds or more.
Nicolas didn’t see it coming; it landed right on him––and the saw.
More guts splashed.
Beth crawled from the trunk. She turned away from Nicolas, and the crabs, and ran down the driveway. Something large and loaded with teeth flew past. Not surprisingly she dismissed it, and within seconds she was standing on Stone Crescent Road, wondering what to do. She looked left and right but she didn’t trust the road
at all,
so she crossed it, jumped a ditch and a fence and hid in a field.
In the distance she heard Nicolas cursing and swearing. And a moment later she looked across the road. There was something there. She thought it was another crab-critter but it wasn’t.
It was Olive.
∞∞Θ∞∞
When the crab jumped into the chainsaw and exploded, it pushed the spinning blade towards Nicolas. The blade clipped his head and he fell back––shocked, startled and alarmed. As the saw fell to the ground it came dangerously close to chewing his leg apart, probably in half. It missed his limb by less than an inch, coughed twice and died with its nose in the dirt.
The world suddenly seemed very quiet.
Nicolas released his weapon and sat up. He placed a trembling hand to his head as his vision blurred. The saw blade, he realized, got him pretty good. It bounced off his forehead and gnawed his skin to the bone. A generous amount of blood was running down his face now. It was in his eyes, dripping from his chin, onto his chest and draining between his legs. He pushed blood from his face with an open hand and squeezed his eyes tight. When he was able to see he looked at the area around him, surprised by what he found.
Crab guts and severed monster legs were everywhere: on the car, the driveway, the porch, the bush beside the porch; there were chunks on his lap, in the trunk, in the flower garden––you name it, it was there.
Nicolas reflected: he stuck a cat in the microwave once or twice, maybe three times, maybe four. Same result.
He pushed critter husk off his lap and looked to the roof.
A small crab, roughly the size of a housecat, was clinging to the eaves trough while spraying a web like a spider. Another danced around next to the chimney.
“What are those things?” Nicolas said flatly.
A small one scooted under the car. Then it ran in a circle, made a quick dash in his direction and jumped on his back.
Nicolas––still sitting on his ass with his legs shaped like a V––waved his arms and kicked his feet. He turned, crawled on his hands and knees and swung his head from side to side. “Get out of here,” he said. “Get off me! What the fuck? Get the hell… ouch!”
The creature bit into his neck and chopped at him with its little pinchers.
In desperation, Nicolas threw himself onto his back and squished the crab against the driveway. It popped apart like an egg, legs twitching. Dead. He stood, wiped himself off and looked at the car.
Beth was gone, and seeing the empty space in the trunk made him furious. He had barely crawled from bed and already he had lost both of his babies and the bitch in the trunk. He couldn’t believe it.
“Oh no you don’t,” he said. “Not on my watch.”
He lifted the sledgehammer off the ground, slammed the trunk shut and headed down the driveway, keeping both eyes open. He didn’t know what those little crab-things were, but they were a solid pain in the ass. He knew that much. He also knew that his back was covered in a runny gel, not unlike a moisturizing cream. His shirt was sticking to his skin in a way that wasn’t the slightest bit pleasant.
Reaching Stone Crescent, Nicolas looked left and right.
On his right he saw nothing. No wait, that wasn’t accurate. On his right he saw one of those things crawling across the road. It was far away, wasn’t a threat.
He looked left and saw––
8
Lying on her side, Olive opened her eyes. The sound of a chainsaw roared in the near-distance. She hardly noticed. What she
did
notice was the sun and the way it was shining around her. It was so bright, so unbelievably bright. She couldn’t remember anything being so intense, not ever. It felt
warm
against her skin, appeasing too. This was a good feeling, an amazing feeling. And the air was so clean! The cold stench of the basement had been a constant for so long she had forgotten the simple pleasures of a summer’s day. The air tasted satisfying and sweet, a little slice of heaven.
She rolled onto her back and looked at the sky.
The brightness hurt her eyes, but it was beautiful. Words couldn’t describe how wonderful the sky looked. After years in the basement, seeing an open space was the single most important thing she had ever witnessed. It was stunning, spectacular. It was fantastic and magnificent and glorious. Over the last few years her mind had erased the uncomplicated delights of a scenic landscape, and looking at it now was completely shocking in the most wonderfully miraculous way imaginable. The fact that she was naked, disfigured, and in serious need of medical attention didn’t matter. The fact that she had been tortured half her life didn’t matter either. Not here. Not now. The only thing that mattered was her freedom. And she had it. She finally had it. She wasn’t dreaming. This was real.
The sound of the chainsaw sputtered to an end.
Now the world was perfect.
Everything was nice, warm, alive, blooming––and peaceful.
The word ‘peaceful’ had been lost in her vocabulary for so very long. Often times it had been quiet, but never peaceful, never
ever
peaceful. Peace isn’t something a child in a cage feels. Peace is something that disappears quickly in a situation so cruel and unfair. Now it was back. She was outside on a gorgeous and peaceful day. Was there anything better? Was anything more amazing?
She sat up, noticing that her back hurt. She wasn’t surprised. Her back always hurt. It was nothing new.
With effort, she stood. Once she was on her feet she forced herself to stand up straight. It hurt but she did it. Pain didn’t matter. It was the standing that mattered. She hadn’t stood up straight in a long, long time.
Olive looked around; she couldn’t believe her eyes.
She was outside! She was free!
Inevitably her mind turned to Nicolas and her happiness became clouded with fear, apprehension and concern. She hated that man, hated him so much. He was mean, terribly mean. She had never known anyone who could treat people so poorly. He was cookoo in the head; that much was obvious. And once he realized that she had escaped he would come looking. She knew it, but didn’t want to think about it. Not now. Not yet. She just woke up and besides… she was free!
FREE!
Couldn’t she enjoy a moment of freedom without thinking about
him
? Didn’t she deserve that much?
Olive didn’t know the cage she spent so much time in was less than three hundred and fifty meters from the place she was standing. She had no idea that she had walked in a circle three separate times. She thought she was miles away from Nicolas. If she knew the truth she’d walk more and sightsee less. But she was only fourteen, and being outside was as thrilling at it was breathtaking.
She saw something a quarter mile up the road. It might have been a dog or a cat. Maybe––
Something big flew past. It had lots of legs, mouths and teeth.
Olive didn’t notice because the sun was casting a glare that made her put a hand in front of her eyes. Sunglasses would be good.
Ah, sunglasses. She couldn’t wait to get herself a pair.
Olive began walking. Her legs were sore but she didn’t mind. She walked for two minutes, then for no reason at all she turned around and looked down the road.
There was a man, and for the first time since she escaped she thought about her nudity. Truth was, she had been naked so long that she didn’t even care. Modesty and humility were not relevant. She needed help. She needed to be saved. That’s what mattered here. The fact that she was naked meant nothing.
She raised a hand.
The man waved back.
“Oh no,” she whispered.
It was no man; it was Nicolas. And now he was running towards her, holding a large hammer in both hands.
Olive turned away from him. She tried to run, stumbled and fell; she didn’t have the energy or the skill to run. She didn’t know how.
Suddenly the beautiful day wasn’t important. The sunshine, clouds and the unbelievably fresh air all took a back seat to the dilemma at hand. Escaping her daddy. That was the important thing now.
Escaping.
But Nicolas wasn’t her daddy, no how many times he said that he was. He was a psychopath, a killer, an abductor of children and the most sinister man she had ever known. He was the reason she was in such poor physical and mental condition. He had tortured her and abused her, punished her and condemned her. He had chewed off her fingers and chopped off her toes. He pissed in her face and forced her to eat human flesh. He set half of her cage on fire and splashed acid on her legs. He was the devil; that’s what he was: the devil, pure and simple. And she needed to escape the devil if it was the last thing she did. And why? The answer: She didn’t want to die. Not here, not now. She was too close to salvation, too close to freedom. She had survived the dungeon and she was going to find her way back home––to her
real
home. She was going to see her
real
daddy.
Olive ran, but running was impossible.
She felt a pain in her spine and she cringed. Her back was aching. Her legs were aching. She fell.
And after she fell she turned over, facing the sun.
The sun disappeared, replaced with the outline of a man: Nicolas. He stood above her, looking down and breathing hard. His eyes were wide and his teeth were pressed together. The cords in his neck were sticking out like jumper cables.
He said, “Running away, are you?” ARE YOU?”
“No daddy!” Olive screamed. She rammed her mangled hands onto the dirt road and pushed herself into a sitting position. She was scared; it was nothing new. She had felt this way so many times before, too many times too remember; it never got any easier. The fear was always the same: grounded in reality.
Nicolas raised the sledgehammer above his head, inhaled a deep breath and brought the tool down hard.
Olive’s eyes widened.
In a feeble attempt to stop what was happening she lifted a hand, but she couldn’t stop what came next. It was too late.
The heavy iron mallet smashed Olive in the left kneecap. Her leg exploded and before she had a chance to scream Nicolas raised the weapon up again; he brought it down again. This time he went for the other leg. Now her right kneecap exploded; blood and bone splashed into the air.
Olive put both of her degraded hands to her open mouth as her face turned white. She fell onto her back and squeezed her eyes together.
Nicolas changed his footing, raised the hammer above his head and brought it down a third time. He could feel the sweat beneath his fingers and smooth lacquer of the wooden handle. It felt good. It felt right. He smashed her in the ankle and the weight of the hammer nearly amputated her foot.
A large pool of blood began forming.
Olive’s body convulsed as she tried to pull her right leg in. It didn’t work. For some reason her leg wasn’t responding. Neither leg was responding. And that was bad news for Olive because her legs needed to respond; they needed to respond right fucking now because the psychopath was raising the sledgehammer again.
Oh shit, he was raising it again––
The fourth time Nicolas slammed the weapon down he smashed her other ankle. Then he went for the shin. Then he went for the other shin.
The shins, he realized, were the best. They SNAPPED like brittle pieces of wood. Snapping them was fun. It was exciting. He wished that she had more shins so he could snap them too; she didn’t. She only had two, so he circled her body and raised the heavy iron mallet above his head again. This time he smashed her in the elbow. It almost seemed like she wanted it. As the hammer was balanced above his head she laid her arm on the road. She might as well have put a sign on it that said: SLAM IRON HERE. It was perfect, and so was his aim. He got her right in the elbow and her blood splashed high enough to catch him in the chin.
Panting like a wild animal, he said, “HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT, HUH PUMPKIN? DO YOU LIKE IT? DO YA?”
Pumpkin wasn’t responding, but her whole body was quivering and shaking like she was being electrocuted.
It was then––as Olive’s body was deep in shock and blood was pouring from three of her four limbs––Nicolas realized that he wasn’t putting her back in the cage. She was finished now. It was obvious.
He decided to end their relationship with a bang. And when he brought the mallet down its final time he didn’t aim for a limb; he aimed for her face. And although she was alive when the iron slammed her in the nose and teeth, her mind was already in a different place.