Disclaimer: I don't own anything or anyone affiliated with the Halloween movies.
Author's Note: I'm writing this because of Paul Rudd and his role in Halloween: Curse of Michael Myers. There, I said it.
Author's Note #2: This will be a multi-chapter fic.
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He really has no patience for caring what people think or say about him. He knows they think and say plenty. He might too, if his name hadn't been Tommy Doyle; one of the only people to survive that night; the night Michael Myers decided to come home and finish what he started.
He guesses he might be warped with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Disturbed even. He cares only when he's sleeping fretfully. But awake he has no time for that. When he's awake he's working, he's planning, doing his research, watching out of his window, watching particularly the old Strode's house through his telescope, knowing that that house is beckoning for the child that once lived there, evolved into a killer there. Tommy paces in his room, headphones on, listening to radio news. Because hey, Michael didn't get the memo that you can't go home again, why would he get the memo now?
Tommy will not be caught off guard like the eight year old child he once was. He hasn't been a child since that night.
His social skills are lacking. He cares not. Neither does his socially retarded landlord. Neither bother with the other's business, there's no awkward need for crappy small talk. It's a perfect deal really. He pays her, he lives there, and they like it that way. There's an understanding there. He checks in on her a couple of times a day, never saying anything, just keeping an eye out for her. And as spacey as she seems, they both know she knows.
The female gender in town talks, pointing out all of the weirdness that is Tommy Doyle, but most, if admitted, think there is something dangerous, yet harmless, and odd, yet interesting about him. And if they were honest, he's not too hard on the eyes either. But usually being stared at by him in that silent, stalker-ish way, usually makes them think better of pursuing him.
There's something twisted about him, he thinks, because to intimidate people the way he does seems a little too familiar. Once he's stared at a person long enough to be noticed and see that interested look in their eye turn when their senses are heightened and are subconsciously warning them to stay their distance, he gets a feeling that's not quite amused, and not quite pleasured, but closer to those things than he'd like to admit to himself. Because, after all, he knows that feeling of looking at someone and having the hair on the back of your neck stand up on end. He knows what it is to look at someone and just KNOW that something with this person isn't quite right.
To assume the traits of someone that tries to kill you doesn't necessarily mean you're going to go on your own massacre, it has more to do with defense mechanisms, and that's as deep as Tommy will get into it.
He peeks through his telescope toward the Strode house, a family has recently moved into it. It worries him; almost gives him the feeling that by bringing life back into the once abandoned house will wake something back up in Michael and beckon him home.
Tommy holds the cross around his neck, he's not particularly devout to church, but praying for your life, and having it spared gives you a sense that there's something up there that can and will protect you. Catholicism is a family religion in his bloodline, but he practices in the safety of his room, the way he studies, researches, listens, and yes, watches the town below from his second story window, with a protective eye, ready and willing, to fight when the time calls for it.
He'd be lying if he said that the new woman next door hadn't caught his interest, along with the whole wholesome family dynamic they have going on, all except for the man who looks to be her father. The man has woke him up more than once, yelling at the top of his lungs, threats, to the town's children, that are trying to get a laugh by posting cardboard cut outs of Michael Myers and staking them in his front yard. The man often looks sullen and red faced, and one look through his telescope is all it takes to see how a room changes when he enters it.
This particular morning was one of those mornings he woke him up belligerently screaming at the sound of laughing children. So the man was already on a tangent, bulking his way into his house and no doubt, quite noisily slamming the front door. It was after Tommy's shower and getting dressed that he started hearing the shouting coming from the inside of the house next door. And Tommy's curiosity got the best of him. And he wishes it hadn't because as soon as he focused the lens on the right room, the kitchen den, he saw that hulk of a man slap Kara right across the face.
Tommy never considered himself a violent man, always planned to be if Haddonfield's favorite killer ever came back, but it was everything he had in him to keep himself from marching next door and bursting right in and letting loose on the man that obviously doesn't know how to keep his hands off women.
As Tommy continued watching, something happened that surprised him more than the initial slap. What looks to be Kara's son, on account of how she seems to be his main caretaker, is standing with a knife held right at the tyrant's gut. The man looks down and no doubt nearly wets himself, and shortly after, Kara talks the knife out of her little boy's hand.
As soon as he's sure that the man of the house isn't going to fly in an even more violent rage, Tommy lets go of the telescope, his thoughts running a thousand to nothing. If it weren't for encountering evil at the age of eight, he wouldn't believe in a lot of the things that he's studied to happen on a spiritual level; like, a house containing spirits of recent lived there souls. But seeing that little boy holding that knife just now seemed a little too familiar to Tommy. Yet, on the other hand, if he had a mother like Kara, he might find the closest thing to use as a weapon and go at an abusive man like he did as well.
And that brings about a thought, and Tommy really, really doesn't want to go there, but is that what happened to Michael? An abusive household? Is that what caused him to take a knife to his family?
He's done his homework on what makes Michael, well, Michael. And he knows that he has a curse on him, but as far as home life goes, Tommy guesses anything is possible. Michael's parents might have even been practicing black magic of their own which ultimately resulted in their son being subjected to such a community of darkness. Makes sense. They could have been suckered into doing some kind of ritual that was actually something else entirely; thus, creating the cursed shadow… Michael.
Tommy would think that he's reaching with his thoughts, but after experiencing what he's experienced, he knows not to discount any kind of crazy possibility. Lord knows he's had a lot of time to think of any and every kind of possibility. Yet, he knows that coming up against the shadow is a completely different story. All of the knowledge in the world can make you think you're somewhat prepared, but the actual moment you know you're caught up in the nightmare itself, any knowledge that could be attained doesn't actually pertain. At least, not any anyway that Tommy can figure out yet.
But he will. He has to. He has to, to protect Haddonfield, to protect himself. And he fears, that he will have to protect those in the house next door; like Kara and her family. And yes, even her tyrant of a father. Mostly them, because that's more than likely the first place Michael will return to.
Tommy's hunched shoulders and wide staring eyes are often mistaken for trouble, but he doubts that anyone is as serious about helping this town as he is. And he will. He didn't survive once in vain. He tries to look at that one Halloween night when he was eight years old as a preparation for the next round.
Tommy might be misunderstood, but he's ready; or at least, as ready as he'll ever be.
…
Author's Note # 3: Okay, so let me know if it's worth continuing.