"I didn't do anything wrong, man. Please don't kill me." The words came out with a harsh edge to them, possibly because of the attempted hanging. The kid recognized the big man right away, as light from the streetlamp made the skull on Frank's shirt startlingly white. White like the priest's robes. White like innocence.

"I'm not here to kill you, but I want to know why you tried to hang yourself. Near a church." The Punisher tossed the kid a bottle of water to ease his throat. He took a seat on a chair that seemed to have seen better days, an ominous creak filled the room. The kid wouldn't be surprised if the chair gave way underneath the vigilante's weight. What did he weigh? Three hundred pounds of muscle? The big man crossed his arms and that obscured the skull enough to give the boy a chance to calm down.

The Punisher said, as he saw the teen was reticent to start. "Your name? I've heard that's a good place to begin."

"My name's Marc Simpson and ..." Marc faltered with the steady gaze of Frank on him. What if he told and the Punisher found him guilty? Like when the priest said this was all Marc's fault and that if he ever talked to an adult about what happened in the confessional that Marc would be go to hell. Marc didn't want to be touched by the Father anymore and if he was going to hell anyway, he decided he wanted to go there sooner than later. Just no...MORE. He thought he wanted to die, but now he wasn't so sure about that. "I... don't think... ...Listen, Punisher, I did something wrong and that's why ...I'm bad. I tempted a..."

Frank's eyes narrowed and suddenly the gun in his underarm holster jabbed him in the armpit. His instinct was telling him the kid wasn't bullshitting, he had learned to decipher body language, and a cold rage began to spread in his mind. He hadn't felt that fury in some time, and he knew more than a few people would lose their lives because of what happened to this kid But most of all, he hated those who used their positions of power and trust to take advantage of other people.

"He told me that I'd go directly to hell for telling anyone. I just didn't want him anywhere near me, so I thought if I'm going to hell, I'd rather go there now." Marc's blue eyes studied him. The Punisher was as scary as the Daily Bugel said, maybe even more so, because the man had at least a few working brain cells. He'd always thought Marines were rather lacking in the intelligence department. Marc saw a bright glimmer of a mind capable of constructing . "But I don't want to die. Are you going to shoot me?"

"Don't be stupid. You didn't ask for it, regardless of what that fuck says. How long?"

Marc was stumped. How long? How long what? "Oh...for years. I can't remember how old I was when it started, but around six. It wasn't continuous. Off and on."

Frank did not like the sound of that, because it indicated that the pedophile had more victims that he 'visited' in the confessional. Yes, he decided, there would be blood split. A lot of it. To him, it didn't make a difference that a priest did this, who was just another piece of shit that deserved punishment.

The man leaned forward to tell Marc, "This is what you're going to do. Go home. Tell your parents what happened. Go talk to your school counselor. " He stood up and gestured for Marc to follow him. It was time for the kid to leave. He heard enough information to assure himself that this punishment had been a long time in coming. He needed to head back to his lair and plan out this mission, making sure to equip plenty of ammo and guns. Do some research on the layout of the church, and talk to a priest he had been in seminary with until Frank dropped out.

He nodded at owner and tossed him a twenty, from the depths of his trench coat. It fluttered in the air until it came to rest on the desk before the motel owner. "Call this kid a cab. It's too goddamned late for him to be in this neighborhood." Especially with the hookers out in force tonight, he thought, as he watched a car pull away from the curb after a trashy dressed woman jumped inside.

"Yes sir." The owner said. Yeah, Frank had helped clean up this part of Brooklyn...except for the prostitutes, who made up a good deal of his clientele. He dialed the phone and kept the impressionable fourteen year old from staring out the window at the women who plied their trade.

Marc turned, wanting to thank Frank for saving his life, but the man had already left.

The hotel owner shrugged. "He's good at that. C'mon, kid. Your cab is here."