March ninth, 1998 11:46 PM
“Nine one one. What is your emergency?”
“Come quickly. I’m about to kill my son.” I sat the phone down, leaving it off the hook so that they could trace the call. Then I picked up my gun, new and shiny, glimmering like polished bone set on display in the moonlight, and walked into Max’s room. The window was open, but the night was silent, as if the dead were waiting to claim their own. He slept, looking just like an angel. I don’t even know who his parents are.
November fourth, 1983 7:28 PM
“Don’t worry, Ms. Darkholme,” the young woman said to the black-haired mother, “We’ll find a good home for him. Are you sure you don’t want to help pick the family?”
Raven Darkholme smiled and brushed her thick black hair away from her eyes. “I’m sure. Wherever he goes, he’ll be well taken care of.” She touched the baby one last time, then turned and walked out the door. The last Creed had been insane. Maybe this one wouldn’t. Too bad it was, in fact, his child. She sighed, and in that one breath her skin changed from pale pink to blue, her black hair to red. Her eyes to yellow. And her heart hardened again.
March ninth, 1998 11:47 PM
He was three months old when I adopted him. They were never able to find his mother--even when they looked. She disappeared the moment she left the care center.
My hands were so sweaty the gun kept slipping. As my heartbeat raced, I looked down at my sleeping son, sandy blonde hair falling into his eyes. He looked so innocent, nothing like earlier. Sometimes it seems . . .
April twenty-third, 1996 2:12 PM
“He’s almost like another person sometimes, as though there are two of him. One that’s violent and one that’s calm.” Max’s principal frowned. “The violent side seems to be coming out more often.” He reached for a folder on his desk, thick with things that Max had been caught doing over the past year. “I’m aware that boys can be mischievous, but he seems . . . disturbed.” The man was about to go on, but a noise in the hallway where Max waited caught his attention. Both adults went to the door, opened it and looked out. Max sat on the floor, blood on his face and hands. He was cradling a dead and bloody mouse almost lovingly, but the look on his face was terrifying.
“Max?!”
His head snapped up, a snarl on his lips, his blue eyes viscous. Then they cleared, and a puzzled expression came over his face. Slowly, carefully, as if he was scared of what he would find, he turned his head and looked down at the thing he held.
“Oh God!” Max shouted, dropping it and wiping shaking hands on his pants. “Christ.”
March ninth, 1998 11:49 PM
Since then it’s gotten worse. Now there’s rarely a time when I don’t find him with blood on his body; blood that doesn’t belong to him. And that nickname the children gave him . . . sometimes I think it’s true.
January fourth, 1997 11:41 AM
“Wow,” Jimmy whispered as the news flashed again, showing the Marauders tear through the city, leaving a long, bloody swath of humanity behind them before the teacher had a chance to turn the television off.
“That’s enough,” the teacher said, hitting the power switch and killing the TV as soon as she could reach it, “No one is allowed to go home until the Marauders leave, is that clear? No one leaves this room, no one goes outside.”
The children murmured assent, some grumbling about having to stay in on a day when it was finally sunny.
The group around the TV disbanded, going their own ways and starting to form into their normal cliques.
“Y’know who Max looks like?” Jimmy started, forever taunting.
Max, alone in the corner where he always stayed, glared at the boy.
“Sabretooth.”
Max just looked at him, totally calm. But bloodlust and murder shone brightly in his eyes for anyone who was willing to see it.
“Jimmy!” Mrs. Brooke snapped, her hands stopping what they were doing in shock. “I can’t believe you’d say that!”
“He does though,” Rob started, snickering. Max turned his gaze on that boy, just staring. Slowly he smiled, and the move sent chills down Rob’s back.
“Ever torn the wings off a bird?” Max mouthed. “The sound they make is nothing compared to a human.”
“You guys, stop it,” Ashley said, missing the exchange and putting a hand on Max’s shoulder. His eyes shifted to her hand in a predatory fashion, nothing else moving. “It’s obvious that he’s not as big as Sabretooth! He’s more like a min--”
“ASHLEY! The next person who says another word about the Marauders is staying after school for three hours. Clear?”
The kids nodded, unrepentant.
Ashley walked up to Jimmy and Rob, finishing in a whisper, “Mini-tooth.” The three of them started to laugh, thinking their joke was hilarious.
Max stood up slowly, snarling quietly, the hairs on the back of his neck straight. With his hearing as good as it was, he had listened to every word they said--even though Mrs. Brooke, who was closer, hadn’t heard anything.
“Max, that’s enough. They’ve stopped,” the same teacher said, leveling him with a glare.
He didn’t want to back down, but at last did, still growling. You didn’t charge the lioness in it’s own den. Later maybe.
“Minitooth” Jimmy mouthed again when Mrs. Brooke wasn’t looking. Max pulled back his lips in a silent threat, and again was yelled at. Still, though, Jimmy backed off slightly.
That afternoon, after the Marauders had left town or been caught and the children were released, Jimmy came home with claw marks down his back, two broken ribs, and terrified.
The nickname caught, and held, though it was always spoken in reverence and fear. Max was never picked on again. Of course, no one knew for sure if Minitooth had done that to Jimmy--the boy wouldn’t say. So they really didn’t know. Technically.
March ninth, 1998 11:50 PM
I looked at my son, the boy I’d raised, and can’t help but remember all the good times we’ve had too--before all this started. He used to come running to me with the smallest scratch . . .
October twenty eighth, 1988 2:33 PM
“MMMOOMMMMMM!!!!” cried the yellow thing that bulleted at her, holding his almost five year old finger out as it eased blood. “I CUTTED MYSELF AGAIN!”
She laughed and picked him up, wiping off his dirty face and kissing the finger. “Better?”
“Yeah. Thanks.” A slobbery kiss later and he was running across the driveway again, going to play with his friends and trucks.
March ninth, 1998 11:50 PM
I wonder, again, if I can kill him. Is he just sick? Could I heal him if I only tried harder? Is this my fault? Am I doing the right thing? And then I remember last week . . .
March second, 1998 12:20 PM
“How horrible,” the mother murmured as the news showed a dead body on the screen. It had been mauled. People were blaming Sabretooth, but a nagging doubt kept reminding her that he hadn’t been seen in the area. And he didn’t seem the type to sneak around hiding, either.
“What’s horrible?” Max asked quietly as he padded in on silent feet, turning to wash his hands at the kitchen sink.
She shook her head and turned off the TV, leaning against the cold counter--freezing really, like a cold tombstone, she thought fleetingly and wondered how that had managed to get into her mind. She looked up at Max, realizing that he seemed to provoke them. Stupid. She shook her head clear--trying to shake such things away--and faced him. “Someone was killed. Gutted.” No reason not to tell him, he’d hear it at school if she didn’t.
A strange light entered his eyes as he watched the liquid plummet from his hands, and he smiled slightly. The water off his hands was running red, and for a moment she tried to tell herself that he’d gotten cut. But he never got cut. Ever. She didn’t know why. And the shadow of a dark and ugly thought that had been nagging at her for the past two years started to resurface again.
With a flick of his wrist he killed the water, then dried his hands on the dish towel and pulled a soda out of the refrigerator. A single long claw slid smoothly out of his middle finger, and he popped the lid easily, watching as it arched from the can, through the air and hit the tile floor with a lonely “tink” in the deathly still room. The claw slid back, as silently as it had come out, and smiling, watching her from under his eyebrows, he drank.
March ninth, 1998 11:53 PM
I have no proof it was him. But it was. I tightened my grip on the gun. I could hear wailing sirens like wraiths coming closer through the silent and dark night, flashing blood red light on the buildings they passed. Then Max opened his cold blue eyes and looked at me calmly.
“You’re afraid.” It wasn’t a question; it was a fact.
And he was right.
Afraid of him, and what he’d become. Afraid for my safety. Why? Why did this happen? Why?
January sixteenth, 1996 11: 21 AM
“What do you want?” Max asked from where he’d landed hard on the cement. His voice was trembling, and he knew that was bad. Never show fear.
“Are you afraid?” A low, dangerous growl. The chase hadn’t even winded the killer.
“Yes.” It was a whisper. What was the point of lying? You could smell fear. And who wouldn’t be afraid of them?
“Why?” Another growl.
“You’re the Marauders.”
Sabretooth moved faster than lightening. When he was again standing, he held an alley cat. It died quickly, plasma dripping out of it’s neck and down Sabretooth’s fingers, trickling to the ground. “You like blood?”
Yes.
No.
You’re a baby.
Shut up! “No.” But his eyes were fastened on the cardinal red.
Sabretooth grinned, and Harpoon helped the shaking boy off the ground where they’d thrown him when they’d caught him.
Sabretooth licked the blood slowly off his fingers, Max watching avidly. “You want?” He held out the dead animal, and Max froze.
No. It was sick.
Yes, dammit!
No, I can’t.
I can.
I can’t take this. Any of this.
Then let me help. Let me loose. “Yes.” He reached out a hand, watching as suddenly his fingers were stained red. Slowly he brought them to his lips, closing his eyes and licking them off. It was warm. Not sticky, like you read, but smooth. He smiled as it slid caressingly down his throat, sweet and slick.
Laughter behind him, around him. Appreciative laughter.
“He’s yours all right!” someone crowed. Max ignored them and concentrated on the tickle as the blood dripped down his arm, landing with a small sound in a pool of water below and from there washing away into the gutter.
“More.”
Sabretooth shook his head and pulled the raw meat away. Max’s eyes snapped open, flashing. “I said, MORE!” He jumped for Creed, slashing across the man’s chest and leaving long bloody marks that healed almost instantly. He had the cat. And he ate it, feeling the warm flesh rip under his claws, blood dripping between his fingers.
Oh God. This is sick.
I love it.
A hand on his shoulder. “You like that, boy?”
Max looked straight into Sabretooth’s eyes. “You’re my father.”
Creed grinned.
“I love this.”
“Good. No one can stop you, either. No one.” Sabretooth smiled, showing long fangs.
I’m going to be sick.
I love it.
Going to throw up.
I want to kill something myself, soon.
Can’t.
Will.
NO!
Stop me.
March ninth, 1998 11:53 PM
Why? What happened to my baby boy? I can’t. I can’t kill--
“What’s wrong, Mom? Scared? Of li’l ol’ me?” The voice was taunting. Quiet. Calm. He was enjoying this. This wasn’t my son. Not anymore. Whatever this . . . thing . . . is, it killed my son. The boy I raised is already dead.
I shot him. Once, in the neck I think. I’m not a good shot. He snarled, the liquid flooding into his windpipe giving it an odd, bubbly sound. Then he lunged at me, his own blood already on his hands and arms. Things seemed to move so slowly as his claws raked my forearms and I shot him again, in the chest.
And I shot him again.
And again.
And again.
And again.
March tenth, 1998 12:13 AM
The police were here. Their cars spilled gory red light on my lawn. Reporters, like buzzards coming in for the kill, were already swarming the place. Like flies to dead meat. There was blood on my carpet--I could see with some detached part of my mind that it was going to be hard to clean up. Already it had turned black and crusty. The officer beside me kept talking, trying to get me to respond. It was morbid somehow, how they could keep going even with a dead body in the next room. A man on the other side of me sipped coffee, the steam rising up from the mug like bad special effects in a graveyard horror movie. A reporter broke through the barrier and came charging this way, her team of cameramen struggling to go with her. The cops were on the woman instantly, pushing her away and out again. She was screaming questions at me as she went, but it wasn’t hard to tune her out. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew the reporters were all there--I could hear their sharp calls still. Harpies, I thought, trying to get through the gates of Hell--the hastily erected police barrier. The police. There must be thirty of them in his room alone.
He’s dead.
A shudder ran down my spine. Thank God.
But I killed my own son.
Thank God.
Three more medics entered his room. For just a minute I thought one had a red diamond tattoo. But no, I must have been mistaken.
“Sir?” Another medic. One of the men watching me turned around.
“Yes?”
“It looks like he’ll be okay.” The medic eyed me. “The blood must be hers; he’s not hurt.”
No. That can’t be. He’s dead. I shot him.
I saw him bleed, choke.
His eyes glazed over.
He died.
He walked out of the room with the tattooed medic, his blond hair ruffled slightly by the breeze coming through the open door. Smiled at me knowingly. Rubbed his throat where he’d been shot.
It’s skin.
He’s healed.
The medic put a hand on his back and started leading him out into the black and hopeless night. I swear there’s the whisper of metal on metal in the room.
Max turned back just before leaving. Looked at me. Blew a kiss. Smiled, showing sharp fangs under blood-thirsty eyes.
I started screaming.
And I never stopped.
--Finis--
Max is copyright 1998 Jenna B. McDonald
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