June 2020

Immigration and and Custom's Enforcement Agents' Brooks and Dunbar never really gave a lot of thought to the daily parade of low level atrocities that they committed in the name of old glory. Sick kids in cramped cages? Drawing down and shooting an unarmed illegal as she makes a break for the border? Finding new and creative ways to “make space” in their already overstuffed facilities? All just part of the job. And if you couldn't hack it then doggone it maybe you just didn't love America enough.

But this one? Even this one gave them the heeby-jeebies. Not necessarily because of who they were disappearing....but the method of disposal.

Their polished shoes echo on the expensive marble leading up to the entrance of the luxury penthouse condominium. Dunbar pushes the doorbell, and a chimey rendition of Beethoven's 5th resounds from within. Before long, the door opens and an effeminate pastiche of a man in a silky purple robe is at the door. Dr. Neil Joy.

Well how are you gentlemen! Dr. Joy, with a nearly drained wine glass in hand, slumps up against the door frame in a frumpy display of seductiveness. And who might you be? He leans over, bringing his face closer to the third party standing in his door way. It's a Hispanic boy of about 8 or 9. He's wearing poorly fitting pajama bottoms and a heavily stained My Little Pony t-shirt. Trembling, the boy proffers up a question in his native tongue.

¿Quién está ahí? ¿Quien esta hablando?

Dr. Joy chuckles. Oh dear, language barrier! Uhhhh. Yo soy uno....uhhh....muchaho mooey grande!

Grande means “large”, Dr. Joy. Dunbar says flatly, shooting a glance at his partner who seems just as eager to leave.

Yes....yes....of course it does. Say, why doesn't he look at me?

He's blind, sir.

Dr. Joy's eyes brighten. Something terrible and perverse illuminates them. Oh...oh....that's....delicious. The emphasis placed on the word delicious is throaty and sinister. Dr. Joy whets his lips lasciviously.

Brooks cuts in. Uhhhh, yeah. So, we've got to be going. But we thank you for your efforts and your willingness to...erm, adopt....this child and keep our facilities running efficiently. Oh, and the president sends his regards. He loves your late night specials. He shoots a prodding glance at his partner.

Oh, you have to rush off so soon? Dr. Joy stands erect, his question laden with a cloying deviance.

Yes. We do. Have a good evening. In unison, the agents take their leave of the good doctor and his new charge.

Dr. Joy takes a brief and final sip of his wine, and when the agents are far enough away he smacks his lips and mutters “party poopers” before returning his attentions to the child. So do you speak ANY English?

Por favor, donde estoy ¿Vas a ayudarme?

Hmpf. Well I guess I don't need you to talk much. Dr. Joy snakes a hand around the boy's shoulder, letting his grip tighten on the boy's neck. The boy winces involunarily as Dr. Joy ushers him inside and shuts the door.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Brooks and Dunbar beat a dignified, but hasty retreat. Both of them are at present trying to not think too hard about their own children, when the elevator doors before them slide open, revealing a bedraggled woman in filthy clothes. They stop short, parting to let her pass, but instinctively knowing she doesn't belong.

Dr. Neil Joy! Dr. Neil Joy! This is his floor, right?!

Shooting each other a nervous glance, Dunbar takes the plunge. I don't know. We're just visiting here.

Oh! Well, I think I got the right place anyway! She pushes past the agents, headed down the hall and towards Dr. Joy's suite.

Brooks mouths “shit” in Dunbar's direction before cutting in. Uh, look, I think he's busy.

Mercy turns towards the agents, something cold and inscrutible taking hold now. I thought you were just visiting?

Yeah....look, the guy is busy.

But I need to see him, right now! It's very important!

Dunbar subtly flags Brooks closer to whisper into his ear. She saw us, man.

The bitch looks fuckin' nuts. Nobody would believe her even if she catches wise or sees the kid.

Dunbar shakes his head. I'm not taking any chances, I'm not....

So what the fuck we gonna do? A little pancky.

Meanwhile, Mercy has tired of their deliberating and continues to approach the door. Dunbar looks up, and noting her progress, calls out. Hey! Look, while you're waiting maybe we could buy you a drink at the bar? What do you like?

Mercy stops dead in her tracks, but doesn't look at them. Her fists coil into knots at her sides. Finally, through teeth gritted so hard they nearly fix on breaking, Why? Are you trying to FUCK me?

Flabbergasted, Dunbar releases the pressure with a nervous chuckle. What? No! Then, realizing he may have said “no” a little too quickly, I'm just trying to be friendly.

You think I'm a piece of meat, don't you?! Her voice rises. Just a few holes to fuck, right?!

Whoa...whoa....

Let's just get the fuck outta here, man. We don't need a scene!

But then, almost as fast as the agents can blink, she's already fucking them.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Dr. Joy towered over the boy like a bird of prey, his shadow casting long over the slim trembling figure. He knew what he was doing. He drank it in and his underwear suddenly got a size too small. Hey there little....taquito? Is that a term of affection for you people? Anyway, you want a juice-juice?

The boy said nothing. Crisscrossing his arms across the body protrusions of his ribs, he stood rooted in place like a bent sapling weakening for want of rain.

You really don't understand me, do you? His tongue slides out past his lips, moistening them, as his bulge grows larger. I'm going to use you up and put you in a dumpster when you're dead and done. Again, no response. Dr. Joy suddenly barks out a clipped acidic laugh that makes the boy flinch.

And that's when the gunshot is heard, resounding down the hall. Dr. Joy's gaze flicks to the door. What the hell was that?! Then, another gun shot, followed by a muffled scream. The boy heard it too, and he drops to the floor to make himself a smaller target. He's had to do this before. ….the fuck? The man races to the wall next to the door, sidling up along it and mentally daring himself to take a look outside the peephole. But it's all quiet. That is, until his door is cast open. The door he foolishly forgot to lock after himself. With a stifled cry, Dr. Joy retreats back away from the door as a disheveled ruination of a woman steps into his home.

Hastily going for a lamp, Dr. Joy brings it to bear. Get out of my house! He notices then the arterial spray covering her filthy jacket. His eyes widen in terror.

Dr. Joy? Mercy inquires, her voice dreamy and unfocused. I'm such a big, big fan!

He steps back, almost tripping on the edge of a throw rug. I....I'll call the police!

I've read all your books!

Quote:Mercy is seen sitting in a library, her hands soaked with blood as she turns the pages of Dr. Joy's A Special You is Already Inside You!

I've seen all your late night specials!

Quote:Mercy is seen by the illumination of a TV set sitting on the couch in between two butchered corpses.

Mercy steps closer, slowly, her face twists into a rictus of unearthly glee. You taught me that I don't have to be ashamed anymore. That I can just be happy being me. My whole life, I've compared myself to other women, always finding myself wanting. Not pretty enough! Not pretty enough! She slaps her head furiously. But I don't need to let that bother me anymore. Why be a beauty...when I can be a beast?

Mercy reaches into her jacket, and produces a set of garden shears. Dr. Joy's body tenses up, and he gets ready to throw the lamp at her when, with mounting horror, he sees her bring the shears to bear on herself! Placing her cheek in between the blades, she closes the shears tight, tearing through the fleshy tissue of her face! A curtain of blood forms immediately and Dr. Joy drops the lamp in numb terror! Mercy doesn't even flinch, and with not so much as a whine of pain, she places the shears on the other side of her mouth and snaps them shut a second time! By now, the floor at her feet is slick with gore, her face a crimson sheen, and her jaws a wasteland of pulped angry flesh!

LooK wh...wHat I hAvE bECOmE! She extends her arms outward, eyes closed like a kind of crazed penitent.



lOOk wHAt wONDERs i HAVe WROUGHT!!

Dr. Joy screams and turns to run, only to trip over the prostrate form of the boy. The boy cries out in surprise, but it's drowned out by the doctor's shriek as he tumbles headfirst into a coffee table. The crack of his skull on the solid oak corner of the table is audible across the room. Mercy drops her shears. OH NO! She goes to her mentor then, taking a knee by his side and trailing her life's blood in her wake. Dr. Joy is bleeding now as well from a massive head contusion. His lips pucker open and shut, open and shut, like a goldfish exposed to the world outside its tank, flopping desperately on the floor. DR jOy, aRe You OkaY?!

Dr. Joy is most certainly not okay. Mercy knows this, and she rolls back on her haunches, watching him die. I'M soRrY dR. JoY. IT wAS nOt sUppOSEd tO BE thIs wAy.....

The boy's anxious sniffling draws her away from the scene of the doctor's demise. He has his knees tucked tight under his chin, looking lost and scared. And, in seeing him, something in Mercy's blackened eviscerated heart is unlocked. Her belly, barren and devoid of a woman's life giving prerogative, twitches sympathetically. Mercy starts to crawl towards him, and the boy shuffles away, pinching back a cry.

nO....iT'S Okay....the beast coos. The boy stops trying to scoot away, and Mercy extends one blood soaked hand towards him. Finally, her finger tips reach his cheek. The boy is still trembling, but his guardedness is diminished. Mercy leaves tiny spots of crimson on the boy's cheek as she meets it, and as her fingers address his face lovingly, the spots forms streaks, like ghoulish warpaint.

i”ll bE yOuR MommY.

NOW

You're going to fucking die.

Yes, you Melanie. I'm going to kill you.

I gave you an HonEst tO.... she pauses.....honest to God chance to keep your limitless stupidity to yourself. And you declined. You chose instead to fill the airwaves with your foolishness. And it has now killed you.

Well done.

The shot opens up to reveal that Mercy is standing outside a smaller house on a larger estate. Indeed, in the background is Dyson Manor, her master's sprawling home. It's night time, but a half moon provides scant illumination for our scene. A well manicured garden is about Mercy, and the lunar glow gives all the flowers an eerie sheen.

I want you to tell me who you have encountered that is scarier than me. Because unless you have spent time in the company of the Ed Geins of the world, I'm calling bUllShIt. A gross, wet sound, passes through her surgical mask. You're lying. You're so delicate and dumb and infirm that you would be slaughtered like trapped cattle in an instant if you threw in with lots like that. You know nothing of me or what I represent. You're a gilded Barbie's Dream House of lunacy...a plastic, pliable thing that pokes at the darkness to glean a sort of minor tittlation, but you would never dream of jumping in.

You stand at the fringes of depravity, so you can catch a vicarious thrill. Always and forever Alice looking through the looking glass but never daring to set foot inside to stroke the Cheshire Cat and give yourself over to the madness and mania. You're a pretender. A coward.

You're so shaken at the thought of me you can't even get THRouGh...a cough....through a promo without maiming your words. Or would you like to continue explaining to me how often I “blame the victim card”?

Mercy pauses, stooping low to pluck a single flower. She holds it aloft for a moment, letting the moonlight catch it as she studies it.

I know what you were getting at. Playing the victim card, right? You're not wrong, honestly. For a very long time I compared myself to others and always came up short. I spent a life time in front of the cameras, basking in the glow of those flashes, the snap of the shutters was like a soothing evening lullaby ushering me to sleep. Oh, but if only I could have realized back then just how AsLeeP.....**hiss**....asleep I really was. And when the world of beauty started passing me by, I let it drive me to madness. I destroyed my temple, burnt it to the ground, in a parodoxical pursuit of perfection. What a fool I was....

She lets the flower drop.

I made a monster of myself, and remained in denial of it. But I learned. In time, I learned, and I awoke. I matured into my role, accepted it wholescale. I was no longer beauty....but beast.

You have the audacity, with a losing record and an affiliation with a group of equally as ineffective rejects, to tell me you'll “end” me. That you have some kind of monopoly on fear. A dry chuckle. Is that so?

Mercy reaches around the back of her head and strips off her surgical mask, revealing the horror beneath.



i StAnD bEfORE yOU, unMaDE but TruE!!

Stray saliva began to leak from the deep incisions about her lips. With a hiss she pulls it back in. All in all, a fairly groteque display.

For the first time in my life, I am being authentic about what I am. No more plays at being some servile beauty, NO! I am a machine. A monster. A destroyer. So I resolved to look like one forevermore. While you playact being some manic pixie dream girl, some moronic fetishistic cliche, I have gone to the lengths of carving what I am into my very flesh! But please girl, tell me how acquainted YOU are with the dark. How “crazy” you can be. Another dry laugh, which looks all the more disturbing now that her mouth is revealed. Her tongue licks her ruined lips, creeping as far up into their mutillated corners as it can.

I would tell you to run, but you're too stupid for that. You'll show for our match. And I'll grant you insight at the end of something sharp and deadly. I'll make you scream. But maybe, through all that pain and horror, you too will be born into something new, something authentic, until I decide to end YOU.

Mama....

Mercy's attention is pulled downwards. The blind boy from before is there, but this time he has a cane so he can find his way around. He's holding up a flower he picked, but ironically he's unknowingly stepping on the one Mercy dropped before. For you. He speaks in broken but serviceable English as he offers it up to her.

Mercy smiles, an act that looks nearly obscene given her alterations. She gently takes the flower from the boy. Thank you Matias. Mama loves you. She cups a slim pallid hand under his chin and bends low towards him, bringing that vicious smile to his cheek and planting a kiss there. Matias is blissfully unaware of what is kissing him. In fact, he smiles back.