Thomas Craig - The Outkast

An idea struck Brian. Not the best in the world, but the best his befuddled brain could come up with. He resorted to using the megaphone to warn The Outcast.

“This is Sheriff Brian Stack-with my deputies. We’re here to help-not to hurt you. I advise that you lay your weapons down peacefully and surrender willingly. We don’t have any desire to use force.” Brian wished he had a name to attach. But he would just have to keep it that simple, unless he was ready to hazard the idea of calling him The Outcast.

They shifted into a shooting position behind the safety of the car. Waiting for the door to open. Hoping to see the big guy emerge, sober at last with a blush of repentance coloring his face.

Time ticked.

Nothing happened.

Brian’s patience was speedily running out. He was thinking fast, and then un-thinking even faster those ideas he considered annoyingly impracticable.

Little did he know that the boy’s mysterious account would once again be his directions.

The Outcast, in his fury, threw Holly against the wall. She landed with a yelp of agony. Crumpled on the floor beside her son, she began to cry.

Robert was whimpering, too. This time, his tears weren’t shed because of the heinous acts The Outcast had made him witness over the course of time, but because of the throbbing fear he had for his own life-and his mother’s.

“You ungrateful brat,” The Outcast exploded, pointing in Robert’s direction. “You’ve betrayed me. I called you into the glorious fold; and when I turned around, what did you do? You snuck-yeah, you snuck up and stabbed me in the back. You revealed my place of abode.”

“Don’t hurt us,” Holly wept, pulling Robert closer to her, cradling him. “Whatever you want, please, don’t hurt us.”

“Hurt? You speak of hurt. I’d love to tell you what hurt means, but you wouldn’t understand. Too dumb to get it. But that part is irrelevant. What’s important for you to know right now is that you’ll be the appeasement, the appeasement to the gods. My gods.” Casting a disdainful glance at Robert, as if to say, I’m not so sure if you’re worthy of receiving blessings from my gods anymore , he brought out a rope. To Holly: “Your otherwise useless blood will still be useful in one way. As for him…” He pointed his sturdy forefinger at Robert. “As for him, maybe he could be good again, maybe not. But that’ll be between him and the gods. If they wish to-”

His words were punctuated by someone else’s.

Sheriff Brian Stark was saying something outside.

The Outcast thought if everything had gone as planned, if the boy hadn’t become a little turncoat overnight and messed everything up, that man making noise outside now ought to have been dead long before this stage was reached. He listened to the Sheriff’s rambling about him surrendering willingly, but then ignored him. He went on doing what he had set to do.

“Who are…” Holly began, stuttering. “What are you, for goodness sake? What do you want from us?” Holly knew this chimp-man had a voice too human to be a monster of any kind. Scary-sounding, yes; evil, for sure. But human nonetheless. Yet, she affected confusion.

Unfurling the rope, he said, “I’m The Outcast, who’ll soon start his reign. What I want from you is, you’ll die by the hands of your own son. We both want it from you-perhaps he has never revealed this to you. I never expected him to, especially at the time when I trusted him.”

“Please, don’t hurt me.”

“But this has been predestined,” The Outcast continued, not seeming to hear or understand any of Holly’s plea. “Long before you were even conceived, it had been written.”

“No,” Holly was saying amidst her tears, shaking her head vigorously, as if by doing so, she would will the nightmarish occurrence away. “You can’t do that. No, you just can’t do-”

There was a heavy slap to her left cheek. At the impact, she began to see stars. She tasted warm blood while she watched the blurry figure of the man who had just called himself The Outcast reach out to tie her. She resisted, but the force against her was too huge.

When he finished tying her, he brought out a knife, grabbed and hauled Robert towards him. “You don’t mess this up, traitor,” he said through his chimp’s clenched teeth. Or else, the price will be too costly for you to pay.” He handed the knife to the boy, and stepped back a couple of steps, his special robe for the occasion rippling as he moved. “Now! Do it. There’s no time.”

Robert trembled. Didn’t move, couldn’t move.

“Go on now or-”

Crackles.

Sheriff Brian Stack on the megaphone again.

Stack was spitting out something The Outcast just couldn’t stomach. Something really derogatory. The Outcast had to stop the fool from tarnishing his glorious name.

He grabbed his assault rifle, and with the speed of light, he burst out through the front door.

Brian’s patience was speedily running out and he needed to do something.

After he had made a call out to the criminal inside and nothing had happened, and after he had jettisoned a multitude of worthless thoughts, a fresh idea struck him.

He went back inside the cruiser, fetched Robert’s diary, and came back out. All along, Craig was just watching, seeming to be thrown completely by every single step Brian was taking.

“What’s the next plan?” Craig asked.

“I think I just recall something the boy wrote down,” Brian said, flipping the pages. Craig moved closer. “Right here… it says ‘I’m the one cast out by the contemptuous haters, but who’s about to reign. The enemies shall be taken unawares and put to shame. Taken unawares because they will never know my plans about the rituals-especially the last one, in which The Outkast’s little True Blood will sacrifice his beloved.’”

“Outcast with a “k,” huh?”

“That’s the way the kid writes-in his own fashion.”

“Interesting fashion, I must say. And I could have sworn this came from an adult as opposed to a boy who’s hardly a teenager.”

“Me, too.”

“So, who’s the True Blood and who’s the beloved?”

“Robert Smallwood is the True Blood. And if I put two and two together, I’d say his mother is the beloved.”

“I see,” Craig said. “And what are you gonna do with this?”

“I’ll shout it out to him.”

“The Outcast?”

“That’s right. I figure since someone has known his secret, he might be furious at accepting the reality. I don’t know. It might work. It mightn’t. But we’ve gotta try something, because time is running out. If he doesn’t come out, then I don’t know what else to think of other than go get him,” Brian said, as if he was talking about picking up a kid after school hours, or about something as leisurely as getting one’s dog back from the kennels after returning home from summer vacation in the Bahamas. “And I want you to get ready, Craig. I hate to tell you this, but-”

“It might get really bloody,” Craig finished.

Brian nodded, and patted Craig on the shoulder.

He picked up the megaphone once again. “This is a last call for you to relinquish all of your arms and come outside with your hands up in the air. Do it of your own accord. Do not try to resist or pull a fast one, as doing so will only complicate your situation. You’re an outcast-The Outcast-and you’ve attained that status by way of violence. This community does-and will-not tolerate such. No sane and peace-seeking community would. And every route of escape that you might think for yourself has been blocked. Your resources have been exhausted.”

Brian found himself sliding down a long verbal chute, polished and ultra-slippery, and he just couldn’t stop yapping on and on. He only had a moment’s qualm if the approach he had chosen was the best one. He didn’t know. All he knew was, right now, he was doing a darn good job playing it by ear.