Fat Off Sex and Violence (10 page)

            Gary tried to speak, but his bloody lips were cemented shut. He blinked, crinkled his forehead.

            “You mind if I eat?”

            Gary shook his head.

            The boy feedling unhinged his jaw, the same way as his sister, but his teeth were sharp, pointed and serrated, flat like razor blades. He inhaled and the black globs rushed toward him, filled his mouth. The creature chewed and grunted, inhaled more.

            Mary Jane skipped to Gary’s side, grabbed his hand in hers. She looked up at him, smiled, made no comment about his ruined face. “You are the best master ever.”

            “Who…who is he?”

            “My brother. But you haven’t given him a name yet.”

            “What is he eating?”

            “Violence.”

            Gary’s eyes widened as he watched the boy gorge on the violence filling the air. He reached up, touched his face. His nose, tender and raw, bent to the left—to touch it was agony. Left eye had nearly shut, right had a cut on the eyebrow and swollen. His mouth was a mess of busted lip, cracked teeth, and blood.

The feedling had plenty to eat.

The red light faded to a dark pink and the feedling burped. He turned, sleepy-eyed, and faced his master. His stubby legs wobbled as he walked, looked ready to give out from under him. Mary Jane stepped forward and wrapped his arm over her shoulder.   

            “Thank you, Master,” he said. “That was delicious.”

            Mary Jane widened her eyes, the orange starting to shine again. “Master? His name?”

            A feedling that eats violent energy.

           
And he belongs to me. I’m his master.

           
Through the electric pain coursing through him, Gary found a smile. His bag lay just a few feet away, and he glared at it, pictured the drawings that lay within.

           
Chester
will pay. They’ll all pay.

           
“Kronos,” Gary said. “I’ll call you Kronos.”

            The boy grinned. “Very good, Master.”

            “I’m Mary Jane. Isn’t he a good master?”

            Kronos nodded. “I need to lie down. Sleep,” he said. “But when I wake up, Master, you take me to this…Chester. I’ll feast on his suffering.”

           
He knew Chester’s name. They really are a part of me.
        

Gary nodded, stepped toward Kronos, placed a shaking hand on top of his bald, scabrous head. “Yeah, go ahead and rest. I’ll make sure you’ve got plenty to eat when you wake.”

            Kronos grinned his shark teeth, curled up into a ball on the spot and was snoring in seconds.

            Gary turned on Mary Jane. “Listen to me.”

            “Yes, Master?”

            “I am your master, and I tell you when you eat, you understand?”

            “Why are you upset? I—”

            “That was my mother you were feeding on back there! I should make you starve. I should—”

            The soft, friendly face of the feedling unfolded into a snarling display of teeth. As she stepped up to Gary, her orange eyes burned brighter. Her tongue slithered out, coated the cone-shaped teeth in saliva.

            “Don’t forget what I told you,” she said. Her voice lost its gleeful squeakiness. “You are only my master for as long as I’m fed. You let me starve, you won’t like what happens next.” She snapped her teeth at him, giggled. “My brother’s appetite is much bigger than mine. Much bigger.”

            Gary’s lip trembled. Whatever bravery had filled him a second ago disintegrated. He plopped down on the ground, ripped a handful of grass from the dirt.

            Mary Jane sat beside him, rested her head on his shoulder. “I’m getting hungry.”

***

Gary had drifted off to sleep at some point. In his dream, he was pinned to the rowan tree by his wrists and ankles, naked. Sheila was there, smiling up at him. Kronos and Mary Jane skipped around her, arm in arm, chuckling. Chester emerged from the trees, samurai sword in hand, blood pouring from his knuckles.

            “Sheila? Let me down.”

            She only smiled at him, stepped toward Gary—groin-level—and opened her mouth.

            “What are you doing?” Gary struggled against the spikes driving him into the wood, but couldn’t budge. He squeezed his eyes shut as his mother took him in.

            “Take that, bitch.” Chester’s voice.

            Gary’s eyes popped open just in time to see the blade of the sword split Sheila’s head in two. A hurricane of yellow and black rushed from her head and into the air, and the feedlings fed until they towered above the forest.

            Laughing all the while.

            Gary burst into consciousness and yelped, gasped for breath. Light blinded him at once.

            But it was the surrounding forest that caught his attention.

            The trees were splashed with blood, some splintered and broken, some fallen over. Littering the ground were the bodies of animals, piled on top of each other, strewn about like discarded plush toys. Their fur was soaked with red and only a few moved, slow and twitchy. Tiny squeaks and grunts were barely audible over the giggling of the feedlings.

            Mary Jane and Kronos sat in front of him, chins resting in the palms of their hands. They looked like demonic pre-schoolers. The sun had begun its sink into the horizon, splashing the sky with pinks and purples. But the orange and red light aimed at Gary’s face had his full attention. He squinted, held a hand up to block it out.

            “You’re awake, Master,” Mary Jane said. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

            “Yes, and I’m anxious to feed,” Kronos said. “These animals did nothing for my appetite. And it’s been way too long since the world has tasted my influence.”

            Gary winced as he sat up, hissed between bared teeth. “I don’t know, guys. I’m hurt,” he said. “I don’t know if I can do much tonight.”

            Kronos let out a rattling growl. “Did you tell him what happens when we’re not fed, Sister?”

            “I sure did. He understands perfectly.”

            Their eyes burned a hole into him. “Okay, just let me collect myself,” Gary said.

            He whimpered as he rose to his feet, his bones popping as he stretched. It hurt to breath with the tenderized meat of his chest and stomach. He reached up and touched his face—the blood had hardened into scabs. When he touched his nose, he hissed, jerked his hand away from it. Broken for sure. But with his feedlings so hungry and demanding so much attention, he didn’t know if or when he could get it looked at.

            “What’s the matter, Master?” Kronos said.

            Gary snorted, swallowed. “I got the shit kicked out of me just a few hours ago. I feel like I got hit by a truck.”

            Kronos laughed. “Maybe you don’t fully understand the situation. Let me explain some things to you.” He ran his tongue over his teeth. “You are the master of two of the most powerful feedlings this world has ever known. With me, you can get revenge on anyone that’s ever harmed you, sweet bloody revenge. My influence has caused many wars.”

            Gary had already been thinking about that. He’d been having his own personal slideshow in his mind: Chester, Mr. Shipley, Sonny, Brett, the Turner twins, the neighbor girl, Sheila…

           
Revenge.

           
He thought he’d been getting revenge with Mary Jane’s help, but he realized he was wrong. He was just having fun. Lots of fun, until the run in at the apartment. But with Kronos…the possibilities were endless.

            “I can make your enemies tear each other apart. I can make the people who’ve wronged you cut out their own heart, slit the throat of their own child.” Kronos’s eyes burned crimson. “Just lead the way, Master.”

            Gary puffed his chest out, ignored the searing pain from his nose and mouth when he smiled wide. He spat a thick red loogy into the dirt. “I’m the king of the fucking world. I’m the master. And we’ll make them all pay. Every last one of them.”

            The feedlings howled with laughter, pranced in a circle arm in arm just in front of Gary.

            He watched them for a moment and ignored the sinking feeling in his gut.

***

“That fat sack of shit don’t show up for his check, I’m keeping it.” Shipley wiped the handprints off the glass countertop and clenched his teeth.

            Sonny and his buddies played their tabletop game at the other end of the store, along with the scrawny one that followed Gary around all the time. They snickered at Shipley’s outburst.

            “Probably jerking off to the Powerpuff Girls or something,” Sonny said as he elbowed the other boys.

            “Probably yanking it to pictures of She-Hulk.” Brett snorted.

            The two tall twins started mock stroking the air. The boys burst out in a chorus of laughter.

            “Hey, leave him alone. Gary doesn’t do that,” the scrawny one said.

            “Oh, that’s right. You do all the jerking for him, I forgot,” Sonny said.

            “Shut up!”

            “Ohhhh,” the other boys said.           

“That’s enough of that,” Shipley said. He didn’t like these boys any better than he liked Gary, but at least these ones had an excuse for being worthless. They were kids, barely old enough to have hair on their nuts. Gary needed to get his act together before it was too late, though Shipley had a feeling his time had already passed. “Store’s closing in ten minutes, boys. Put it all away, Sonny, and you can go on home.”

            The hard wooden stool sent a jabbing pain up Shipley’s back as he sat down, and he winced, ran a calloused hand over his weathered face. He just wanted to close up and get home. He had convinced his wife to squeeze her rotund body into the Princess Leia costume she’d worn on their honeymoon so many years ago.  

            “I can be Chewbaca,” he’d said, running his hand over the sweater of hair covering his chest and stomach. “Don’t even need a costume. Wrrdddd.”

            She had laughed, promised him she’d be waiting for him, full Leia. He knew she’d be ready to pass out from lack of blood circulation since she had just about doubled in size since their honeymoon, but he didn’t plan on letting her wear it for long anyway.

            He looked over at the kids, who were taking their time packing their stuff up. Sonny was too busy cracking jokes about Gary to do his job sufficiently, but Shipley was too tired to say anything. The scrawny one kept trying to defend Gary, pushing his glasses back up his nose as the other boys shoved him around.

            “Guys, come on. Closing time.” He walked toward the door to click off the OPEN sign. Gary stood on the other side of the glass, smiling in at him. His face was a mess of swollenness and dried blood. “Well look here.” He pulled the door open, opened his mouth to voice his displeasure, but it just hung there.

            Gary walked into the store with three things: a boy, a girl, and the most gorgeous redhead Shipley had ever seen. And she hung from Gary’s neck, licked the inside of his ear as they entered.

           
What in the hell?

           
Shipley had already disliked the guy, but now it was fueled by jealousy. And though he figured Gary hadn’t shown up because of whatever happened to his face, he already decided he would be keeping the paycheck.

            Shipley smiled, crossed his arms. “Hope you didn’t pay too much for her, Gary. Because there’s no paycheck here for you. I told you to be here before closing time, and you’re late.”

            “Hey, Gary!” The scrawny boy walked on his toes across the store. He stopped and wrinkled his nose, pushed his glasses back up. “Who is…she?”

            Gary only smiled. The children—the boy and girl—stepped in front of him, studied the store. They giggled and whispered to each other. Cute kids, chubby and pink.

          “Mr. Shipley, I’m not here about any of that,” Gary said. “I see you’ve got the asshole brigade here with you.” He chuckled. “That’s just perfect.”

            The boys spotted him from across the store, grabbed all their gaming equipment and stormed toward him, Sonny in the lead. When the boys saw the woman dangling from Gary’s neck, they hesitated.

           
Yeah, I know, boys. Just doesn’t make any sense.
           
“What…what you doing here, fat ass? It’s my job now. And besides, you missed the tournament,” Sonny said. “I know, you were too scared to face me, right?”

            “No way,” Clay said. “Gary could beat you any day. Right, Gary?” The boy beamed up at him, but got no response.

            Gary patted the children on the tops of their heads, turned to the redhead and shoved his tongue into her mouth. She moaned, swayed her body, grabbed handfuls of his hair and yanked.

            Shipley could only gawk. The boys stood in silence, every one of their mouths hanging open. The scrawny kid wiped a coating of drool from his lip.

            The little girl had turned and watched with extreme interest.

            Then the woman got on her knees, unzipped Gary’s pants.

            “Now wait just a goddamn minute,” Shipley said. “Get the hell out of my store with that stuff before I call the cops!”

            But the woman didn’t hear him, either that or she didn’t care. Because the next thing he saw was her head bobbing up and down. Gary stared right at Shipley, grinning, eyelids fluttering as the woman sucked.

            The little girl started biting at the air and moaning.

           
What in the flying fuck is going on in here?

           
The scrawny kid backed away from Gary, joined the other kids as they all watched the show.

            The little chubby boy that had walked in with Gary turned and faced them all. He stepped forward, eyed every one of them and chuckled. His voice sounded too deep for a child, almost demonic.