Disclaimer: I own nothing but my own imagination.
Sorry it was a wait, hope you enjoy.
Echo: 3 Butterfly Steps.
Howard gaped as Vince's father gently brushed his fringe away from his eyes, pressed his hand to his cheeks and forehead and checked his pulse at his neck. It was Fossil who recovered first.
"All of you back to your rooms! We'll get to the day's activities later." The keepers scuttled off in shock and Fossil approached the group. "Is he alright?" He asked in normal Fossil idiocy.
"Vince will be fine." Jacques announced, still gazing critically at Vince. "Vince was always delicate, he shouldn't over-exert himself."
Tearing his gaze away the man turned to Howard and Naboo, who were still gaping stupidly.
"I am sorry for my earlier accusation, its just that I haven't seen Vince in years, and to see him like this, well." He trailed off, after a few seconds he pulled a small silver bottle from a pocket.
"What's that?" Howard questioned suspiciously, remembering to talk.
"Smelling salts, this is no way to catch up on sleep." He replied before un-stopping the bottle and waving it under Vince's nose. Howard couldn't help but think this man was trapped in an era even more then he was, not that Howard was trapped in an era, oh no sir!
Vince gagged softly and coughed as he came to, Jacques helped him sit up slightly and coaxed him to take deep breaths. As Vince became more aware of his surroundings he looked up, expecting to see Howard, and soon remembered the reason for his collapse.
"Ah!" He yelped, scrambling away and to his feet, nearly falling over but grabbing a chair just in time. He leaned over breathing heavily as his head swam from the movement.
Bollo took this as his queue, and barged past the tall man to get to Vince. The gorilla grabbed Vince and pulled him into the safety of his arms, where Vince gasped and held his head in dizziness, leaning heavily on the ape.
"Sorry." Came an incredibly small voice from Vince.
"It's alright, lets get you to bed shall we?" Howard was shocked by the genuine care and concern he could detect, he had been expecting some kind of monster, but surely Vince's reaction to his own father indicated something was amiss. Now his head hurt too. He looked to see that Naboo was still looking shocked, and also quite pale.
'Something isn't quite right here.' Howard Moon deduced.
"If we take him to our room then we can make sure he sleeps alright." Howard suggested, he couldn't see Jacques' face, but he nodded either way.
"Yes, that's very kind of you. Seems Vince has made some good friends." Howard couldn't detect the emotions in his voice, but was more concerned with getting Vince upstairs.
Bollo gently laid the tired and trembling Vince on the large bed, Howard stood with Jacques and Fossil as Naboo went straight to Vince, blocking him from the three's view.
Fossil stood back in the corridor, staring with wide eyes like some sort of deranged fish as the other two talked.
"I must go oversee the mornings activities, but thank you for looking after Vince. If you need me, here's my mobile number." Howard had to fight off the shock that this man even had a mobile phone, and nodded what he hopped was reassuringly.
"Its no problem, we're happy to take care of him. I'll call you if anything happens." He assured, thinking it would be the last thing he would do. After a few pleasantries they both left, and Howard closed and locked the door.
He returned to the bed to see Vince lying covering his face with his hands as he breathed harshly, Naboo gently had a hand on this shoulder. Concern and sadness were evident on the shaman's face as Vince breathed sufferingly, Bollo stood protectively next to him.
"What's going on?" He questioned the room in general before adding. "Vince?"
"I'm sorry Howard, don't know what came over me." Vince said tiredly, removing his hands from a pale face. Howard stared at his confusing friend; he decided to change tack to direct questions.
"Vince, what was your childhood like?" He asked cautiously.
"Umm, average?" Vince answered equally carefully.
"Vince! You ever heard of abuse! You think maybe it occurs here?" Howard was shocked by Naboo's anger as he spoke, seeing the fury in his eyes.
"It wasn't that bad!" Vince protested, seeing the three unconvinced looks. "It wasn't!" He insisted.
"I saw it Vince I know what happened!" Naboo replied angrily, then seeing three confused looks of his own added. "I was having visions of what Vince was seeing just as his dad came in."
"I wasn't abused!" Vince nearly yelled.
"What did he do to you Vince? Just tell us!" Howard pleaded desperately, he couldn't stand the thought of the sweet and happy Vince being traumatized, but it was even worse not knowing what had happened.
"Nothing!" Vince yelped, leaping off the bed to stand in the middle of the room.
"Vince please." He tried again.
"They both know that he treated you bad now, you might as well confess." Naboo reasoned. Howard's heart nearly broke at Vince's scared and panicked look, his eyes darting around and shinning on the verge of tears as he breathed harshly.
"Why can't you just tell them if you know about it?" Vince half pleaded the shaman, and Howard saw Naboo's eyes soften sadly.
"It wont go away like that, you've got to admit it yourself." He answered softly.
"Well it wont go away now will it! Because now I'm trapped here with him!" Vince finally shouted, wrapping his arms around himself as he shook on the verge of angry tears.
"I want to go back to the zoo, I hate it here." Vince sobbed out quietly; Howard moved close and wrapped him into a hug.
"We can't go back right now, but we wont just let him have you. But Vince you've got to help us! If we don't know what he did then we can't prevent anything." Howard reasoned in a soft tone, looking over to the nodding Naboo and tense Bollo. Several shakes later Vince responded quietly, the fear in his voice evident.
"Okay, I'll try Howard, but I don't remember everything clearly." The trembling increased and Howard held him closer.
"That's okay little man, just do what you can."
A couple of minutes later the four of them were sitting comfortably on the giant bed, Vince for once had shrugged off contact whilst he prepared to recount what he could remember, which at that stage was as much as Naboo had seen. After several minutes of silence Naboo spoke.
"If I say what I saw then why don't you talk us through it." Vince gave a small smile to the shaman, although it looked more like a grimace.
"Alright, well the first thing I saw was you at about seven or eight all scratched and bloody, whilst he just stood over you." Naboo said calmly directly o Vince, who was fiddling with the blankets. As he heard the memory Vince seemed to talk through it just out of habit for explaining what he did. Which he had to do quite a lot, like when Howard had caught him dressing up a hedgehog to be Mick Jagger.
"Well, I'd just been found by him after living in the forest with Brian Ferry." The three nodded, they knew about his time in the forest. "And I got bored one day so I tried to get outside by the window in the room."
"Wait, but I didn't see any-" Howard was cut off by Naboo's glare from mentioning the lack of a window in Vince's room.
"But soon as I opened the window it shattered all over me, nasty little bugger." Vince trailed off for a moment of hatred against the window. "Dad came in and said that he'd done that in case I tried to escape. I had a go at him for it so he fixed a mirror over the window and shut me in my room till I said sorry."
"So then, that explains..." Naboo asked.
"Yeah, after that you probably saw me having a few right fits." Vince added, speaking as if the fits were uncalled for.
"Vince he left you bleeding and hurt for days!" Naboo stormed. "Then came back and told you to shut up! He nearly drowned you in the bath cleaning you up!"
"That wasn't his fault I was afraid of the water! Made a right mess, he said so! But he forgave me for it!" Howard now saw how crucial that first encounter must have been, he could picture Vince scared and hurt in the large room. After Naboo took a deep breath to calm himself he continued.
"The next time I saw you were much thinner."
"Yeah, I wouldn't eat proper for a while, I got quite sick as a nipper." This memory didn't seem to affect Vince that much. To Howard however, who had developed a slight obsession with Vince eating properly, it was very disturbing that he'd been to scared to eat properly. It was also at this time that Howard and Naboo both seemed to realize that rather then outright just being in denial of these events, Vince seemed to have suppressed certain elements of the memories.
"Alright, after that there were loads of clothes in your room."
"Yeah... I never really knew why he did that." He frowned puzzled. "But it was really cool!" Vince said the last part enthusiastically.
"And I didn't really understand the ones following that." The three noticed as Vince curled up slightly, fiddling again with the sheets, focusing on them and frowning.
"Yeah, well, he would ignore me unless I wore the nice new clothes he got, and if I got it wrong he'd smack me and send me to try again, 'specially if people were coming over."
"He didn't smack you Vince, he properly chased and whacked you! I saw him throw things at you!" Naboo corrected furiously.
"Yeah but then when I looked all good he'd bring me down to meet the people there, and he'd be all proud of me." Vince said in a small emotional voice.
They all stared speechless; Vince fingered the shiny top he was wearing even as they learnt the reason for his conditioned love and dependency on clothes. Good outfits and fashion meant attention and affection. Naboo cleared his throat.
"The last thing I saw was you always getting tired, or coughing and being dizzy, getting all ill, probably from the lack of food. And he'd just take you to your all-mirrored room and just leave you."
"Well, he was busy, and he knew I could take care of myself." Vince defended.
"He left you alone and scared! You were crying, only a child! He just left you without a word, even if you were really ill, even if you asked him to stay! He abandoned you Vince! He let you get sick, and then left you alone and terrified of what was wrong, with nothing but clothes for comfort!" Naboo spoke frustratedly as Vince flinched. Howard could once again see the beginnings of doubt creeping into their easily swayed simple friend, just as it had with Bainbridge. Vince faltered distraughtly for an answer.
"I shouldn't have gotten sick, I was being useless." Vince tried, though even he seemed to know it was a weak attempt, he seemed to be reciting it from memory rather then believing it.
"You were a child, you couldn't, and still can't help getting sick." As Vince turned to the earnest shaman, almost as if begging to be told that he hadn't always screwed up. "It was his duty to take care of you, it wasn't your fault Vince."
As Naboo finished they all subtly held their breaths whilst Vince shuddered compulsively against this mental blockade, this obscene conditioning. They were aware that this was only a small snippet of Vince's childhood, and that there would be a long way to go to free Vince from his father's clutches, but this was probably the most important step. Before they could make it better, Vince had to believe he wasn't at fault, at least not entirely. This was a way bigger barrier then not going to the downstairs of Bainbridge's house, they were asking Vince to fight what he had been programmed to believe from the age of seven.
After a few shaky breaths, Vince spoke up hesitantly.
"You, promise?" The small, vulnerable voice from Vince activated Howard's protectiveness of the smaller man, he reached out and gently held Vince's hand.
"We promise." He said with a soft smile, even Naboo cracked one whilst Bollo nodded, a tearful smile was their beautiful response, and Howard swiftly pulled Vince into an embrace.
"You're a good person, Vince, don't forget that." Naboo said in a rarely caught moment of unmasked emotion as Vince turned to him. He patted Vince's back once before Bollo pulled him into a fury hug, causing Vince to start giggling.
Howard didn't think he'd ever heard a more beautiful sound at that moment.
The four passed the morning until lunch by playing card games with the ones Naboo had brought with him. Howard was convinced they were shaman cards as Naboo kept winning every game, but they were all a bit too distracted to care.
As lunch approached faster Vince became increasingly nervous, dropping the cards and fiddling repetitively, his nerves caught onto Howard and Bollo too, who became tense as well.
When the time finally came for lunch they made their way slowly down to the dinning room. All of them, including Naboo, unconsciously crept around the door and to a discrete table, which held those tiny sandwiches.
Soon enough Jacques and Fossil entered, Vince tensed and averted his gaze swiftly. However, the two men went to a table that contained different members of the zoo's staff, such as Gideon, Joey Moose, and the turnip man.
After the general eating frenzy died down, Jacques stood up to make an announcement.
"Now we're all fed and rested, the next activity shall take place, yoga. And I expect to see everyone there." That was the first point during the meal that his eyes grazed past their table, Vince shuddered slightly, and Howard was surprised to see him give an almost imperceptible nod.
Half an hour later found them all in a large, carpeted room with two walls practically all windowed on the ground floor. It seemed that Howard, Vince, Naboo and Bollo were the only ones without tracksuits with them. Of course, Vince had only packed fashionable, mostly glittery clothes, Bollo hadn't packed anything, all of Howard's clothes were lurid shirts and varying degrees of beige trousers, and Naboo only wore the latest in shaman wear, and turbans.
Seeing this Fossil walked over in a huff.
"What're you four doing, you think this is a freaking fashion freak show holiday? We're here to do some active activities and your here, in your fancy pants clothes!" He exploded in a fluster, and Vince hid behind Howard, although it was out of repulsion more then fear probably.
"What's going on here?" Came the voice of Mr. Noir from behind them, causing them all to jump and spin around dramatically.
"They don't have any clothes your mightiness." Fossil simpered.
"That's not a problem, I've brought spares." He sinisterly held up a bag and pulled out four pairs of identical, shiny silver tracksuits with neon green stripes down the side. Howard drew back in repulsion whilst Vince's eyes went wide and a dazzled grin appeared on his face.
"These are the new yoga-chic look from Paris." Jacques said, answering Vince's unasked question, as he excitedly took a sporty monstrosities, or sport-glamour outfits, depending on your outlook.
"Naboo and Bollo tentatively took the outfits, and Howard unhappily caught the one that was thrown at him. One good thing though, or bad, once again depending on your outlook, was that Vince was so captivated by the new clothes he forgot about his father for the time being.
After they left to change and then reemerged the yoga had already started. The occupants of the room all were watching a glamorous lady on a giant screen, who happened to be wearing the same matching outfit as the four friends.
They looked around for a place but didn't see any, until Jacques stood up and beckoned them over. They tentatively made their way over, having no other choice. Vince automatically went to the mat next to his dad, who was also wearing the same outfit, as the man waved him over. Knowing it would be suspicious to protest, the others took the next three mats along, Howard appalled he'd managed to end up nest to Fossil, instead of next to Vince, where Bollo was.
Several minutes into the yoga, Vince was shaking with both exertion from the strange poses, and nerves.
"Are you feeling any better Vince?" The shiny person jumped from the sudden question, accidentally prodding Bollo, who only needed the light touch to topple over. Vince didn't notice as the gorilla fought to get back in the original position, which wasn't that difficult, but he was an ape.
"Yeah, I'm okay." Vince finally replied, trying to ignore the slightly higher pitch to his voice.
"Good, I don't like seeing you ill."
"Apparently." Vince muttered without thinking, and immediately held his breath.
"And what's that supposed to mean?" The dangerous edge to Jacques' voice wasn't missed by his son, who shuddered slightly before taking a steadying breath. Remembering what Naboo said earlier he felt anger seep through him, brain that was yelling at him to stop temporarily disengaging from his mouth.
"Well you locked me in me room didn't you! Evidently you were too busy being repulsed to look after me like you were meant to." His voice broke slightly as he ranted quietly to his dad, and he shrunk when he saw the furious look.
Howard was distracted from Fossil's ramblings when he thought he heard Vince's voice, he looked over, but couldn't see either him or his dad through Bollo's flailing limbs. Surely the gorilla would have noticed if something was amiss. But in fact Bollo was too preoccupied with his own frustration at yoga to notice anyone else's.
"So that's what you think is it. You know very well that I took care of you best as I could, if you got really ill of course I would have took care of you, but I think we both knew you were putting on a show for attention. I was teaching you not to do so, and you seem to have forgotten about how much time I spent on you when you got that bought of flu." Jacques raged calmly and quietly back at Vince.
"B-but I was crying." Vince protested, only just remembering getting the flu, and being bed ridden for days, days when his father was constantly there to help him. Little did he know though that Naboo had also received the same image, although just then Bollo kicked him, so he temporarily forgot.
"You were working yourself up, and I had guests over most times, if they'd seen you crying they would have taken you away from me, and then where would you be Vince? In a foster home with no one wanting you, no beautiful and fashionable clothes just rags, would you have been happy there Vince? Really?"
Vince's mind swam in confusion and his eyes prickled as he tried to stick to one path of thinking, but it was as if his brain cell was debating with itself, and we all know Vince isn't programmed for debating.
"No, but..." Vince trailed off, and Jacques waited patiently. "I was lonely." He finished weakly in a small voice, it was the only phrase he could think of that summed up all of the feelings that were swirling within him.
"I know Vince, without your mother it was bound to be hard, but I wanted to raise you, I tried my best." The worst thing about that sentence was that Vince realized sickeningly that it was true, he had tried his best, Vince hadn't though. Even if his father did think that everything he was doing wrong was right, Vince never adultly tried to stop him. Vince's brain just wouldn't let go of the desire to believe and trust his only living parent; he'd never known his mum.
"I know you did dad." Vince chocked out, close to tears once more, there was something about reliving your past that made everything highly traumatic. Therefore, as Bollo's flailing arm swung out violently in a yoga-induced rage and slammed into Vince's stomach, he couldn't help when he tumbled over and then instinctively threw up.
Psychologist's would say that Vince's reaction of vomiting to the sudden trauma and pain, was a side affect from previous trauma and relived and suppressed memories, but Vince knew none of this, and Naboo was busy trying to untangle his usually perfectly groomed hair from his turban, and Howard was trying to find a happy place as Fossil begun dancing suggestively.
Vince crouched on hands and knees as he coughed from suddenly vomiting. His throat burned and tears once more streamed down his face. Soon the coughs turned to sobs of both shame and pain as he covered his face and held is bruised and throbbing stomach delicately.
"Vince!" Jacques begun in surprise, staring wide-eyed at his son, Vince cowered even more, choking out sounds that could have been 'sorry'. Suddenly the man came back to his senses, and reached for Vince. "Shh, its alright son, you must be quite ill to do that, shh."
Feeling his father's arms around him Vince instinctively leaned into the touch when he realized it was given in affection and not punishment. The combined effects of lack of sleep and not having eaten that morning, coupled with the fact that he was still quite underweight and the emotional onslaught, was causing Vince to feel extremely dizzy and light headed.
Vince sagged against his dad and found himself unable to move entirely.
"We had better get you to bed Vince, you need to sleep." The sentence struck fear through Vince like a disease.
"I had better get Vince to bed, he needs to sleep." The phrase he recalled oh so clearly sent chills of fear and protest through his body. Memories of being in the dark, surrounded by shadows of his own reflection staring sickly back at him, highlighted by strange streaks of neon lights. Alone with only the dulled sounds of talking and laughter that he was not part of. Being left there perhaps to die as his small and young mind created even more catastrophic and horrific illnesses that he may have become contaminated with.
He remembered crying softly, slowly increasing the volume in hopes that his dad would leave his guests in order to comfort him, but also holding back slightly, incase he really had been left here in quarantine, and not wanting to know the truth. Either that he was going to die, or that he wasn't wanted, a nuisance, a disgrace, a disease.
All the tragic unknowns pranced gleefully through Vince, laughing and taunting him.
"Vince?" He heard questioned from far away above him, that all-condemning voice that he both craved for and despised. Vince was suddenly aware of how violently he was shaking; one of his hands was tightly clenched in his hair, nearly ripping it out, the other painfully clutching the bruise forming on his stomach.
"Vince?" He heard the distant voice of Howard, calling from his as if from a far off dream of safety and joy, unobtainable in some way whilst he was still held in those wretched arms in this morbid house and the macabre fanfare that his life was here. Howard wouldn't, couldn't save him from his own father's arms here, it would look strange and suspicious to the zoo staff, and then there'd be trouble for everyone, not just him.
But he wouldn't be taken to that mirrored room and locked up there to scare himself into a seemingly inevitable death. That would be the end of being able to see his friends, if he let that happen. Yet to completely disregard his father would be the worse scenario of all to induce.
With all the sudden fright of a spooked cat Vince sprung out from the intoxicating embrace and stumbled slightly as his bare foot caught in the leg of his tracksuit. He was painfully aware of the many sets of eyes watching him, and the questions and calls for him that he could barely understand and distinguish.
Vince swung around, inky black hair falling perfectly around his face as he did so, and stormed beautifully and gracefully across the room to the corridor. Vince felt some small satisfaction that everyone in the room was too busy staring captivatedly at him to follow; he'd probably made it up several flights of stairs, now running, before anyone even remembered to blink.
If there was thing he was glad he learnt here, it was how to accomplish the art of looking good, at everything. Even after vomiting and crying, in fact the tears still danced softly down his pale skin as he tripped up the stairs to his room. Dashing down the corridor before he swirled round the door into the neon darkness, locking the door from the inside and collapsed dizzily onto the soft rugs and shiny cushions.
Lying on the floor, breathing shakily, Vince looked into the mirrored wall he was close to. His pale face contrasted beautifully with his raven hair, as the fringe fell delicately across his eyes, a slight blush gracing his face. The neon purple light from above him reflected off his face, not changing his skin tone abnormally like most would, but faintly gracing his hair so that it dazzled in his reflection and highlighting the tear tracks.
As Vince took in the reflection of his dazzling blue eyes he smiled softly, and stroked the soft material of a cushion before looking back at himself. At least he would die beautiful, was the last macabre thought he had before drifting into a fevered sleep, full of reflections, shouting voices and shadows.
::I enjoyed writing that last part, sometimes you find just the right song to capture something.
::Hope you enjoyed reading, please let me know your thoughts, and by the way, as Sparkiesteph said, I picture Vince's dad as Richard Ayoade as well, incase you need an image to follow. Thank you for the beautiful reviews.
::Thanks for reading, shadowtheo.
