Herding Sheep: Chapter Two
Anti works on breaking in his new “brother”, and Henrik feels himself slowly losing his will.
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Fleshy fists bang on the door to the room in the basement, echoing up through the floor. Jameson curls in on himself, pressing against Anti’s chest in their shared bed. Something is wrong, but it’s no matter, Anti will fix it. Anti always fixes it.
Just as he is settling back in there is a loud scream. Anti grumbles and sits up, looking young and soft in a blue hoodie, with green swirling hair and soft eyes. Jameson melts in the early morning light at his appearance. My sweet brother, he thinks, reaching up and touching Anti’s face. Anti looks down at him, smiling.
“Is that fucking doctor bothering you, sweet boy?” Anti purrs. Jameson pouts exageratedly, rubbing his eyes, trying to seem small and frightened. Meanwhile Henrik bangs and screams in the basement. Anti growls, standing up and grabbing a knife from under his pillow. “Well well then, let’s go shut his bold little lips before he bothers you anymore.”
Anti leaves the room, whistling Daisy Do as he tromps down the hallway toward the basement. Jameson curls up in his blankets, smiling. Anti always fixes it.
The door bangs open nearly in Henrik’s face, causing him to stumble backward and fall on his ass. Peeking around the door, Anti slides into the room, standing over Henrik.
“Screaming all fucking night. Banging up the doors, waking up my pet, waking up my sweet baby boy.” Anti is growling, teeth growing larger in his mouth, dog-like and fanged. Henrik pants and scrambles backward away from the glint of a knife. But he isn’t fast enough. A knife comes down into his foot, severing tendons and sending blood squelching out. Henrik screams. He empties his lungs, eyes bulging at the sight of so much of his own blood. Anti is laughing, only for a moment, tugging the chain around Henrik’s leg.
“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” The echo and glitching is gone, replaced by a soft, boyish Irish accent. Anti squats on the floor beside Henrik, who is still groaning with the pain. “Look, sorry I stabbed you. I had to you know, you were being so loud, waking up my baby brother and all. Surely you understand, yeah?”
Henrik squeezes his eyes shut, avoiding the glow of gold coming from his astral, beautiful eyes. Anti huffs out a breath through his nose, picking at Henrik’s eyelid. When it doesn’t open, he grips Henrik’s throat and squeezes. Hard. Henrik gags out a half-inhale, and his eyes shoot open and- Oh, oh the eyes. Henrik slumps, panting, hands limp by his side, bleeding foot creating a puddle on the floor. His chains rattle and he blinks slowly. Why was he screaming? He wanted to escape? But why, why would he ever run from this feeling. So warm, so soft, so gently he sinks into the light. Anti grins, teeth poking over his lips.
“There’s a good puppet. You just need a little light, aren’t you so scared of the dark, love? Aren’t you scared of the darkness in you?” Henrik whimpers, hanging his head shamefully. “You want to hurt them. Those creations back at home. You want to hurt your family don’t you? Well I can help. I can bring light to you, Arzt, I c-”
Anti is cut off by a frantic fist slamming into his chest, choking the air out of him and knocking him on his ass. Henrik screams and grips his hair. “GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” Half a scream half a whine. Henrik’s breathing is unsteady and deep, trying to ground himself through the pain in his foot and the implanted warmth in his head. Anti laughs, standing up.
“You’ll see soon. You’ll see, I can make you happy. We can have a nice life, you, me, and the pet.” Anti flips his knife in his hands. “The sooner you comply, the less pain. You don’t want pain, right? Had enough of that when I kidnapped you last time, huh?” Henrik slowly shakes his head, curling up on the floor. Anti nods his head, then turns to leave.
“Wait- Wait! How... how long will you keep me here. Tell me that at least. How long before you kill me?”
“Kill you. Hahaha. Kill you, kill you.” Anti laughs as though it is the funniest joke he has ever heard. “Oh Henrik, confused little doctor. So lost and confused. I’m not going to kill you.” Anti turns around and grins at him, eyes dripping gold. “You belong to me, you see. And I hate to break my toys.”
Anti is gone before Henrik can even blink. His foot bleeds into the concrete. His head feels stuffed with cotton. He curls up on the floor and cries, and cries, and cries, for the home it is starting to feel he will never return to. Chase’s homecooked meals, Marvin’s glowing fire, Jackie’s protective arms. It feels already like a dream from another life. So far away from the light in the onster’s eyes.
Jameson stirs mac-n-cheese in an old copper pot on the gas stove, trembling slightly. Anti isn’t happy, Anti isn’t happy and he has been a very bad pet. His nose drips blood onto his nice white shirt, staining the embroidered knife in cruel irony.
The steady shlicking of a knife against wood threatens him from the living room as Anti carves. “Dapper, is the food almost done? Hurry the fuck uuuup.” Anti’s tone is playful and brotherly, as though he wasn’t punching Jameson in the face less than 30 minutes ago. Jameson whistles at him shakily from the kitchen, letting him know to be patient. Jameson dumps a very large helping of the noodles into Anti’s bowl, and schlops the rest into his own. He walks into the living room and sets the bowls on the coffee table. Anti does not look up from his carving. Jameson does not meet his eyes, sitting in the big armchair and stirring his mac-n-cheese around, and around, and around.
“You looked at him without my permission. You don’t have the right to be mad at me, you should know not to look at prisoners unless I’m wearing you.”
“You stay away from him until he’s broken in. He’s a dark, dark man, a killer. He killed his fucking accountant, and many, many more.”
Not broken in yet. That is his excuse this time, hm? Jameson stirs his food more focusedly, avoiding his brother’s piercing gaze. He nibbles a bite of cheesy noodles. Anti carves, carves, carves, obsessive and repetitive, his gaze turned away from Jameson at last.
“Does the prisoner get to eat?”
Anti laughs. “Not yet, but he has a pipe to drink from.”
Jameson fiddles with his fork. He peeks at the basement door. There hasn’t been any banging since this morning. He hopes big brother didn’t hurt the prisoner too badly, because he can only imagine Anti’s rage if his new toy dies. He sets his bowl down. Not hungry anymore.
Henrik lays on his cot, foot having clotted, but still aching and unusable. He sniffles into his pillows, far past the shame and pride that usually stops him from crying. He wipes away snot and squeezes his eyes shut, rocking back and forth as he thinks of home. Home, home, home. God why can he barely remember? Chase’s cooking, Marvin’s fire, Jackie’s arms around him. It is staring to feel so far away.
Anti trudges his boots down the stairs, listening with glee to the fearful scrabbling coming from Henrik’s little room.
“Hiya puppet,” he says as he unlocks and pushes open the door.
“I do not belong to you, zum donnerwetter Depp!” He spits curses, trying to seem strong and unbroken. Anti smiles. A knife flips in his hand. Henrik flinches at the glint of the blade.
“You are just begging to be all cut up again, just like last time. Just like in that basement in Germany. Ah, good times we had, hm? My blade in your skin, my hands alll over you.” His voice echoes in the room, reverberating as Henrik feels the ghosts of nails scraping and blades cutting, instinctively shifting his right arm behind his back to hide scars.
“Oh come on, be friendly! No biting Arzt, bad dog.” Anti is suddenly sitting at the foot of his bed, flip, flip, flipping his blade. “You could be happy here, I think. You and me, we’re family. We shouldn’t be fighting, you’re my big brother.” Childlike, wide blue eyes look up at Henrik. Henrik’s heart skips, something untangling in his mind. His eyes fog over and he feels that same warmth and softness, the light seeping in the wrinkles of his brain.
“My... my brother? No... No, you are a monster. You are not my-”
“Brother, big brother, come home to me.” Anti’s eyes glow golden and slip into Henrik’s weak will, and Henrik he slips into the light. Yes, yes, my family. This is my brother, why have I been running, why did I not trust him before, yes my brother. Henrik pants and falls back on the pillows, so overwhelmed with love he can hardly move.
“Come home to me Arzt. I’ll leave you time to make up your mind. Next time I come down here you will make a choice. Right baby? You sweet little doll, you’ll come home and take care of master’s chores.” Anti seems almost daydreaming as he slips out of the door. Henrik curls up on the pillow, eyes rattling, teeth gritted. There is a great, sucking wound in his skull. Why can’t he remember? There was something to remember right? Something he was clinging to, something other than this cot and the monster’s eyes. But it doesn’t matter. Anti will fix it. Anti will come back down the stairs and fix it. Come home, come home, it echoes in the gaping hole in his skull.
Henrik slips into a deep sleep, dreaming of fresh cooked meals, of fire and laughter, of warm protective arms around him, but none of them have faces.
