And the second of this two part chapter; it was origionally one chapter, but it was far to much to read at once. I had to split it. Thank you all for reading.
"You're hurting him! Stop it!" Mana couldn't navigate around the stacks of books. He knocked them over and grabbed the man's sleeve.
"Mr. Walker please." He glanced at Mana. "I'm just looking, he'll be fine…" He moved the little tool deeper and Allen trembled, his mouth open in a silent scream.
"Take it out… please…" Allen's voice came soft and breathy. "Please take it out of me…"
"Sorry little one. I'm almost finished. I just need to have a better look; try to bear it just a little longer…"
"Please… m' gonna die…"
"Mr. Walker, please comfort your child…" He moved the object again and Allen arched as though his spine would break.
Mana threw his arms around Allen. "I'm here Allen, you'll be ok." He stared daggers at the man. "You take that God damned thing out of his hand right now!"
"You're not making my job any easier, Mr. Walker…" he said with a note of irritation and with a violent motion forced the little tool down deep and viciously hard into Allen's hand.
"Gah ahh" tears ran down the boy's pale frozen face and he convulsed. "Please stop… no more… gah ah gonna die…" His eyes rolled to look at Mana. "Make him pull it out…no more, Manaah please… please take it out of me…"
Mana fiercely grabbed the man's hand and forced it away. The Bishop relented, released the probe and held up his hands in a gesture of appeasement. Mana lifted Allen's hand; the little fingers twitched spastically. "I'm gonna pull this out now ok." Ha warned the boy before gingerly gripping the little tool.
"Hurry…" Allen groaned. Mana pulled it quickly from his little hand. The metal probe came away bloody. Allen gave a soft moan of relief; his eyes rolled back in his head and he fainted. Dropping the tool, Mana caught the limp body, pulling him off the desk and, sitting down quickly, into his lap. Mana was furious; how dare that man hurt Allen.
"You bastard…" he hissed, holding Allen's head to his chest and stroking his sweat dampened hair. "He trusted you… I trusted you, how could you do that to him?!"
The Bishop still smiled gently. "Innocence…" he whispered and reached out to tenderly brush the boy's cheek, "so wonderful."
"Don't touch him!" Mana pulled the little body out of reach and worked at fixing the boys shirt and pulling little gloves back onto his limp hands. He's a madman! Mana realized and hoped desperately that he understood the man wrong. Bastard, he couldn't have meant to… He had heard rumors about priests who snapped and abused members of their flock, but as far as he knew, it was all just rumors. Allen already lost his innocence years ago, he thought bitterly. He decided to play the comment off like it was just a setup for a joke. Mana growled at him, "He's hardly innocent; he's a bit of a pick pocket… cheats at cards too."
"I'm so sorry, Mr. Walker. I didn't set out to cause the boy any discomfort, but I needed to fully inspect it…" His kindly old face was etched with concern. "Will he be alright?"
Mana nodded grudgingly. "He'll be ok once he wakes up. Give me a glass of water, now." He didn't bother being polite about it. Sure you didn't mean to hurt him… then why didn't you stop when he begged you to. You knew you were hurting him. How could you not know!? He begged for you to stop! And you bastard, you smiled about it. You tortured my boy and smiled while you did it… God something is very wrong here.
"Of course," he took a small glass and a pitcher from a small table across the room. Mana had to shift the limp body around in his arms to free up his hands to take it. Dipping his fingertips in the cup, Mana flicked drops of cool water on Allen's face. He repeated it till Allen stirred.
"Allen…" he said softly, just like he was waking the boy from a nap. "Come on now, it's time to get up…" Allen moaned and tried to snuggle closer to his chest. "No, time to wake up ok." There was no way Mana could carry the boy out like this; he needed him to be awake enough to move.
Glazed brown eyes looked up at Mana. "Mmph… I'm sleepy…" He maneuvered the little body upright. "I fell asleep?" Allen looked around disoriented. "Where…" he made a foul face and suddenly gagged. Gloved hands clapped over his mouth and came away slicked with gore.
Bishop Williams' eyes were comically wide. "I… oh Lord. I didn't think it would affect him that badly…"
Allen looked sick and spit up another mouthful; grim drizzles of red ruined both his own and Mana's shirts. "Sorry." If he wasn't so dazed, Mana was sure that the boy would have looked just as surprised as the Bishop. With a frown Allen spit once again into his hand. "It came out…" he held up a baby tooth. Mana smiled and put the little molar into his vest pocket. "Sorry… where are we Mana? I fell asleep, did I miss anything good? M' still tired…"
"Yeah, you drifted off. You were really bored huh?" Mana tried to remove the last drops of blood from the boy's lips with his handkerchief; Allen fidgeted and batted at his hand. "Must have ground you teeth together while you were out. You saved me the trouble of having to pull it later."
The old man leaned hard on his desk, obviously relieved. Mana was glad he scared the man; it served him right.
"Well… um… Mr. Walker, Allen," much of the refinement of the Bishop had melted away; he seemed awkwardly nervous for a moment, before collecting himself. It was too late though, no matter how perfect it had been Mana had seen the crack in his mask; it made him nervous. Still, the man continued. "From what I've seen today, I'm certain that I can help."
"Really…" Mana said carefully. "Are you serious? Can you really help Allen… get healthy?"
"It will be a long process, but yes. I'm confident that it can be done. I've seen it work for much stranger cases. Allen will be much better for it in the long run."
Mana thought hard for a moment. He seemed sincere, confident. "Allen what do you want to do?"
Allen looked thoughtfully at his feet for a minute. "I wanna be normal."
"Alright then. We'll do it."
"Wonderful!" the Bishop exclaimed. "You won't regret it. It's really what's best for the boy. I'm so glad to be able to offer you this hope." He hurried behind his desk and pulled out paper and ink. "I just need to write out a few letters, and someone will be by to pick Allen up within the week…"
"What?" Mana struggled to sit up straight with Allen still on his lap. "I think I heard you wrong…"
"No, no you heard correct. We'll send some one to fetch the boy." His pen scratched quickly across the paper. "You don't have to worry about the expense; I'll gladly pay for his care…"
"Manaah…" the boy whimpered and clutched him with a death grip.
"No… I mean. Who said anything about going anywhere? Allen's not leaving." He tightened an arm around his son as if to emphasize it. "You're not going anywhere you don't want to."
Williams looked at him incredulously. "You can't expect to keep him!" The pen slipped from his fingers. "No offense to you, Mr. Walker. You've done an excellent job so far, keeping him hidden, safe and so forth. But you can't really … he needs to go where there are people who can care for him properly, teach him correctly. It's the only way to make him better." His blue eyes were fierce. "Ultimately you just cannot provide adequate care for a child with a condition like his."
"Who are you to say I can't care for him properly! You just said I've done a good job…" Against his chest he could feel Allen trembling, terrified at the thought of being taken away. "He's not going anywhere." He said firmly.
"Mr. Walker…" the man sighed; his patience was obviously wearing thin. "I'm not sure you quite understand. I can't just let the boy go now; it's not in his best interest."
"No. You don't understand. Allen isn't going anywhere."
"You're a bit old to have a child that young, Mr. Walker. It has to be such a burden to care for him, especially with such a horrible affliction." He changed his tactics. "You're not married, so you're raising him all on your own; isn't that unfair to him?" Concern showed in his eye; Mana didn't believe it.
"Come on Allen… hop up. Time to go" he helped him down. Allen wobbled and clutched the arm of the chair; his gloves leaving dirty little prints on the fabric.
"You're all the boy has… aren't you Mr. Walker…" Mana turned to face the man, he said nothing. "What would become of him if something, God forbid, ever happened to you?" Allen slipped and crashed into one of the many stacks of books.
Mana knelt to help him up. "Just what do you mean by that?" he snapped.
"I mean nothing." He could feel those blue eyes burning into his back as he walked to the door. "Mr. Walker…" Mana stopped, hand still on the door frame and glared at the man; Allen hid safely behind his coat. The Bishop stood calmly behind his desk.
"It was nice to meet you, Bishop Williams. But I'm going to have to ask you not to contact me again. You will leave my family alone."
"Of course. I'm sorry to have troubled you." He casually went about shuffling the papers on his desk. "Mr. Walker… Do be careful while you're out walking. These streets are just fraught with danger; those new automobiles can frighten a horse to charge so easily…" There was a terrifying anger in his eyes, blue as cold as glaciers bore into Mana's.
He squared his shoulders, refusing to show the knot of fear that had tied his insides. "Is that a threat?" he asked with equal coldness.
"No threat… just stating a fact, nothing more." He was wearing that gentle smile, but it didn't extend to his eyes. Mana couldn't believe he had fallen for it. Grabbing the still shaky Allen by the elbow he stormed out of the cathedral. His footfalls echoed like hollow thunder in the massive building.
The coach was still outside; its driver was whistling cheerfully and grooming one of the horses. He smiled and waved when he noticed them, "Hello there! Everything go… well?" His face fell when he took in Mana's pissed look. "Not too good huh?" The horse snorted, so he resumed brushing it. "Yeah, yeah… cool it Gaston. I'm brushing. Damn horse…" Looking over his shoulder he flashed them another smile. "Sorry to hear it didn't go well. Lemmie finish up here and I'll get you home."
"Thank you so much." Mana really didn't expect to get a ride back after the confrontation with the Bishop. Maybe the driver didn't know. He squeezed Allen's hand; the boy yelped as though he'd been shocked. What?! "Shit Allen… sorry. What did I do…?"
"I don't know… my, um it hurt." He was just as surprised as Mana was. Glancing over at the driver, he muttered, "Talk later ok. Don't wanna here…"
"Hey kid! Come over here for a second," Mana nodded, letting Allen know he could go see what the driver wanted. Allen stumbled over; his muscles still tense from a fit he didn't remember. The man rummaged about in a bag and retrieved a carrot. Pushing it into Allen's hand, pointedly ignoring the blood on them, he said "here, feed Gaston. He's really grumpy for some reason."
Allen giggled as the horse's lips tickled his wrist. "He's nice… Hi Gaston, I'm Allen."
The driver laughed. "Huh, he likes you… he hates me. Damn beast." He stretched and gave the horse a hard pat. "Good job kid. I'm Charles… you can call me Chuck." He clapped his hands together and rubbed them together briskly. "Well, let's get you folks home."
In the safety of the coach, Allen pulled off his gloves. "Manah, what happened in there? My cross hurts… its bleeding. Look at it for me. Was I hurt?" Mana gently took up his hand. Sure enough the wound looked angrier than usual. The little piece of glass seemed to have been shifted about and tore the surrounding skin. Out of habit he ran his thumb over the cross to sooth it.
"Ah God…" Allen shuddered and moaned. "Don't touch… it's um, it feels…" In the dim light of the coach Mana could barely see the embarrassed blush creep up on his face. "It feels weird."
The look on his face was unmistakable. God this is awkward. It doesn't feel weird; it feels good. A little too good… and he doesn't understand why. Aw shit... Mana was mortified; he resolved not to touch the little wound. He didn't want to do anything that might confuse the boy. "Sorry. I won't touch ok." He let the little hand down slowly. "Yeah, you were hurt in there. The Bishop touched the inside of your cross. I pulled it out and you fainted."
"My legs hurt too; I mmph… I did it again, didn't I?" Allen drew his knees up to his chest and leaned into Mana's side. They stayed like that for the rest of the trip. At one point Chuck the driver paused to ask for directions to their home rather than just drop them in the cold where he picked them up.
He accompanied them into Rivka's café and took a seat in one of the corner tables. Allen ran upstairs to change his gloves. Mana removed his glasses to rub his eyes. It had been a long and hard day.
"So…" Chuck leaned he cheek on his hand and stirred an obscene amount of sugar into his coffee. "I gotta ask ya. What's the deal with the blood?" Mana opened his mouth but the man didn't let him speak. "Don't lie… if you're gonna say anything, keep it truthful. I saw the kid's gloves; you have it all over your shirt… what happened in there?"
Mana looked away and mumbled an abbreviated version of events. "Damn it." Chuck swore. "The Bishop is a good man… really he is, but these last couple of years… I dunno. He's been getting a little um, overzealous in his work." He chugged down half his cup of coffee; Mana wondered if he even tasted it on the way down. "I wouldn't take any of that stuff he said too seriously. He was just trying to scare ya. Can't imagine him doing anything that would endanger a child."
"Thank you for that." Mana liked the man. He was simple in his manners, but obviously understood more than he let on. There was no sense of ulterior motives like there was with the Bishop.
The coffee cup clinked as Chuck set it down hard on the table. "I gotta tell ya… he's gonna talk to his people. They're gonna know about Allen… and others are gonna find out. Now I figure you guys haven't been bothered 'cause nobody knew about him, but word's gonna get out." He leaned in and lowered his voice. "Keep him quiet; don't tell anyone… I mean anyone about his condition. Keep him outta places where it could flare up. Use your best judgment, but no matter what try to avoid churches, hospitals, graveyards, ya know. Any place where there are people dieing or grieving."
Mana looked at him curiously; he felt strangely small. "That's a really odd list… there's something bigger going on isn't there?" he didn't suspect an answer, nor did he receive one. A cold hollow feeling settled in his chest, so he took a long sip of his own coffee in a vain attempt to warm himself.
"You're a good man Mana Walker…" Chuck stood and drew his travel coat around him. "I hope we never meet again." A handful of coins hit the table and he left Mana alone with his thoughts.
That night he was plagued by nightmares of obscene bloated monsters in a world of black and white; and woke more than once crying and shaking.
God why am I so terrified…