~~~Warning for racist phrases, because Henry Bowers~~~
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One thing people didn't realize, or did but just brushed it aside, was just how fast sheep were. One might find it entertaining to see them gathered in a tight group just as any child would while charging at the pile of agitated pigeons on a square. But when the chase really begins, you can be surprised. Not by people, by the sheep. And they leave people look dumb. Much like a school of fish hairbreadth dodging an ocean predator, those white fluffy mammals will do the same, and one wouldn't believe how fast they can move, even in a huddled group. In Mike Hanlon's eyes, human beings could never do something like that because they can't think collectively.
He didn't want to dive into philosophical waters of criticizing human race and their limited thinking and selfishness because it's been done countless times through the history already, and emerged even more through the mouth of his controversial grandfather.
But not only bad things emerged from there, Mike learned. On rare occasions, they would pay him a compliment rather than just a brisk nod of the head. One of those was Leroy's comparison of his own grandson to sheep, only this time not on a negative note.
„You can be as swift as them, Mike", the old man said and Mike gave an insecure smile, rightfully skeptical about the observation's sincerity when a bottle of fine whiskey sitting atop of the bar counter was taken in consideration as well as its one-fourth-emptied content. But Leroy continued, "'course they only got air in their skulls, but their instincts never fail them."
Mike didn't know whether he should've taken that as a compliment or an insult, but it made him think himself to sleep that evening.
He wouldn't think of it again until only three days later, and in the most inconvenient moment, too. But the completely uncalled-for sassy side of his subconsciousness quipped how there is nothing else to primarily think about in this situation.
Oh, is that so, Mike argued back, trying to breathe as regularly as possible, even as he was scared out of his mind and his adrenal glands were rampaging. Nothing else, indeed. Nothing else except that freaking Bowers and his gang are at my heels!
„Get over here you fucking nigger!"
Mike wheezed, quickening his pace even when he was sprinting with all he had. One would be surprised how much more strength one can discover within themselves when running away from certain death. The soles of his sneakers burned beneath his feet and their manic sweeps twirled thick clouds of dust behind him, bringing some life and dynamic to Pasture Road. Ones he hoped would obscure the infamous gang's limited sight just enough so he could slow them down. Because he knew very well just like everybody else that nothing was stopping it.
„When I lay my hands on you I'm gonna break your fucking legs!"
In what context did he think that decision was going to stop Mike? Bowers really was restless. Not in a good sense in any universe.
While he tried not to panic and his lungs feeling like they were ripped apart, Mike Hanlon tried to focus on his whereabouts. He's been running senseless ever since they intercepted him on the way from the butchery, and fortunately only managed to claw at his bike rather than his respectful self. The farm-boy was forced to leave it behind, but it was a small price for his life.
One he was certain he was going to lose now. There was no soul in sight, no house, or building. Just overgrown fields and dehydrated gravel. And Bowers looked more livid than usual. Hockstetter wasn't far behind. The glow beneath his dark eyes was cold, but it might've made him look thirstier to draw blood. Their tempestuous feet thundered closer than Mike would've liked.
Hanlon wanted to yell in panic, but there was just no air available in him other than for a tendency to keep breathing. Then, just when he was ready to give up and flip it because why run from the inevitable, his alert gaze grazed the salvation.
Without hesitation, he fled off the road, over the fence and into the field.
To the ruins of the Kitchener ironworks.
Voices of his pursuers arose. "There he is! There he is, Henry!"
„Get him- - get the fucking nigger! Don't let him escape!"
Mike flew towards the long form of the fallen chimney, covered in dust and soot, and burned by sun. He slowed down for a brief second and promptly changed his mind. They would find him. If he crawled inside, they would eventually find him even at the cost of not seeing him, and then there would be no escape. He could crawl to the end of the long tube, but he would see his end there. God only knows how creative and horrendous. Judging by Bower's verbal spasm, he was prepared to overshadow the ominous tormenters of Spanish inquisition.
So Mike galloped on, briefly noting the sound of the fence being jumped over by Derry's best thugs.
„Come here, you colored motherfucker!" Henry screamed; his harassing voice bounced off the ruined foundations of the old building. ˮI'm gonna rip your fucking balls out and stuff them down your throat! I'm gonna make you wish you were never born!"
Oh, there was no doubt those were Bowers' exact intentions and it was a sole promise he intended to fulfill. Mike passed the horizontal chimney and kept going, closer and closer to the foundations themselves followed by the clawed words of whatever else Henry will do to him. He frankly didn't know what he was going to do when he reached it. Climb up? And go where then? It would make for another dead end. Run past it? He feared he might collapse soon. His legs moved more on their own than the brain had any sort of control, and as soon as realization was there, Mike found that he had slowed down. His lungs burned and hosted an excavator-full of inhaled dust. It was the worst run he had ever had. The farm-boy looked behind to estimate the distance between him and the group.
Just then, the world decided to hold out a leg from behind the corner and snicker at its crude prank. It was almost cartoonishly stupid. Like one of those with Wile E. Coyote and the ever-fleeting Road Runner. With his head trying to locate the guided missiles, Mike suddenly felt the ground beneath him disappear. While the confusion was settling in, his legs automatically swayed two more times as if he was still running. And then he was falling. It wasn't a long fall, barely enough so he could flail his arms and release a cry of surprise, then he collided with the ground. It was a soft thud, but the surface was merciless. And sharp in places, too.
Mike yelped in pain. He landed on his palms and rolled around once. His presence rose a cloud of dust; it has clearly been mighty long time since this place had a visitor. Mike groaned in pain, parting the squeezed-shut eyes. Above him was a hole of brightness and capture of yellowish sky. The quantity of dust he landed in could be called a sand dune; it was filled with growing weeds, half-buried gears, pieces of glass and metal, sharp wires, one of which bit his palm when he fell in.
It was an ironwork cellar. Huge and dark, not meant to be urbexed. Mike couldn't notice much besides dunes of dust and lurking miniature, but deadly traps consisted of small objects due to his vision getting blurry, but that wasn't his biggest problem. Adrenaline was still screaming at his brain to run, but his muscles wouldn't agree to cooperate in kind. The only thing Mike could momentarily do was wheeze and detect more spots of pain; his hip, his head, his palms, his knees, his back, his legs, his shoulders — practically everything hurt. Something warm oozed its way down his calf.
All around him rang so loudly his teeth were clattering. Or maybe it was just his ears ringing. Mike wanted to cover them, but even lifting his arms to do so seemed like an all-effort work. By the time he came round — with a firm shake of head, that much he was capable of — Hanlon registered more sounds other than his own heavy breaths and vast nothingness of the cellar where outside light couldn't reach. It was a rhythmic, escalating noise.
It took him longer than he thought before it came to him. Footsteps.
Hanlon looked up just in time to see a figure obscuring the sky. Several blinks were necessary to offer his eyes a better view and by the time, two more shadows joined it. For all claims Mike would make that he felt like he jumped in a giant oven, he was overwhelmed by cold sweat and icy fear the moment he realized who they were. Oddly, he managed to register the fact that the gang was missing one. Mike's attention wasn't invested in that for long.
Henry Bowers' face wasn't the one of horror movies. It was worse.
It was so much worse.
Up until then, Mike had no idea a human being was capable of twisting their face in such a way. He doubted it was in their nature, but this surpassed the crazy clown that kept them company for several months now.
Henry's eyes were wide open. If there was anything distinct Mike could discern from the fuzzy silhouettes shielded by the outside light, it was two white orbs residing where Bowers' eyes were supposed to be. They were bulging out of their holes, nearly looking apart. The bully's nose and forehead were scrunched, furrowed furiously by wrinkles, but what was below all that would haunt Mike and remind him in what a vulnerable position he was for the rest of his life. To say that Henry's grin was maniacal would be an understatement. The corners of his lips went as far apart as they could go, reaching for his ears. His teeth looked like a Berlin wall, and he seemed to have been gritting them together so tightly, that Hanlon swore he heard them grit against each other even from down there.
"Look at this boys", Bowers stammered, and Mike nearly flinched at the shaky high pitch of Henry's voice. "A lost sheep. A lost sheep that wandered off and fell into a hole."
"A hole", mocked Hockstetter, releasing a hissy giggle.
"Henry, please..."
That's what Mike wanted to say, to try and beg for mercy because maybe in the depths of his conscience Henry had a tiny drawer where he was hiding it, but the only thing that left his mouth was an incoherent splutter. He was going to die. Oh, Lord Almighty, he was. It would've been better if the fall had killed him. Now Bowers could do whatever his heart wanted with him. And he would stray from nothing.
"Too bad", Bowers continued from behind a veil of crazed frenzy. "The well's too deep. And if it's too deep, we won't be able to get it out."
Mike couldn't be sure, but he thought his entire body shaking was because he was on the edge of hysterics, or because he was so exhausted from running and panic that he felt like he was about to faint.
"So we all know there's only one thing to do about it", Henry crooned, stooping into a half-crouch with mocking slowness. Mike couldn't see what he was doing because of the difference of brightness.
"What, Henry? What?" Hockstetter drooled with eyes full of untainted savagery while Belch, making a sound that must've been a laugh, looked like a docile groundhog compared to him. The pyromaniac shook just as much as Mike, but the farm-boy knew reasons were completely different.
Henry straightened back up at same maddening pace, and Hanlon choked when he realized that Bowers' previously empty hand was now occupied by a hard object.
A rock.
"We put it out of its misery."
Mike's brain didn't even remember to beg. No such option existed anymore. It got wasted away along with all hopes that reason might've been implanted somewhere in Henry's proximity. Anywhere. If his brain wasn't an option, then his pockets, the bottom drawer of his nightstand, a sock stocked underneath a loose baseboard underneath his bed.
He knew what followed. The idea was so plain, so blunt,
(so rid of all the other possibilities)
that it made Bowers' further intentions unmistakable in its simplicity.
"It's alright, sheep", Henry crooned, delighted at the arousing fact that Mike was completely beside himself. "It don't hurt. Not a bit." In his excitement, Mike was disgusted to hear he snorted like a pig. Or maybe it was Belch. He didn't know; his vision has completely obfuscated and he was blind and deaf to everything that wasn't a sharp object in Henry's hand.
"You don't feel a thing."
"A thing" echoed Patrick, and it was carried on around the basement. He was full-on drooling now, like a rabid dog. Like Pennywise when he was distracted, but regardless of different impressions Losers had of the clown when they first met, not even the most frightened reaction (Stan) could match what Hockstetter was inducing now.
Mike decided he was going to trust his adrenaline glands and beat the retreat, so he began blindly pull himself back on his palms. Sand, gravel, and dust swallowed his palms and trickled through his fingers, parting them from each other. Rusted nails, old glass and sharp sprouted plants pierced his skin, drawing blood and painting erratic shapes in the sand. So much about playing trombone for the next few weeks.
"Where are you going, sheep?" Henry gurgled, stepping forward; the tip of his sneaker brushed over the edge, sending a tiny chute of dust over the edge of the hole that was about to become Mike's unnamed grave. "You can't go."
Out of the blue, something was flying straight at Mike, right at his face. He could barely dodge, but the rock struck him regardless — he yelled out from sharp pain in his shoulder. What the hell? He didn't even see Bowers swing.
Hanlon persisted in his intent to crawl on. He had to hide. It was his only chance if he wanted to see tomorrow. Another projectile brushed his ear as it zipped past him. Seeing as he was way too concentrated to escape, he failed to remember to keep his guard up.
Bam!
Mike's head flew backwards and he fell flat on his back, limbs stilling, vision going black. His head felt like a giant bell, a hive full of trapped, agitated bees; they furiously stung at one specific point in his forehead, like they were drilling a hole to fly out through. Something warm was leaking down his temple from the exact place. It was sticky, so it might've been honey.
Even as Mike tried to force-open his eyes by orders of adrenaline, he could still hear.
"You can't go anywhere!" Bowers howled like a mental hyena. "You are dead."
"Dead!" Hockstetter clapped excitedly. His laughter is a swirl of colors of madness.
The farm-boy groaned and stifled a whine that threatened to follow. Tears crawled from underneath his closed eyelids and attempted to part them. That oozing spot on his forehead hurt like hell, but when another painful bite fell on his other shoulder and the other one at his shin, he forced his eyes open.
He wished he didn't have to. Right away Mike had to shield his head with his forearms against the launched assault of rocks raining onto him, but he couldn't cover all of him. All three of the boys were bending down to pick up whatever was within their reach, whether it was rocks, pieces of glass, plastic, rubber or metal. Whatever was in the immediate proximity, they threw it. Whatever didn't miss him, had hit Hanlon at every available spot save for his covered face.
The farm-boy was bleeding from dozen places now and in spite of himself, knowing how huge it was to his assailants, was already profusely crying. He made a weak attempt to try to crawl away towards a dark, seclude corner out of the visual range of the hole, but every endeavor to try to do so was met with an even angrier attack and a closer possibility to have his eye taken out.
If Mike had been able to see, he would've seen Henry had ceased the attack at one point; when he next stooped, he began bellowing incoherently and shoveling the sand into the hole with his palms, like an angry kid on a beach when his mother won't buy him pancakes from the pancake man who is walking along the beach, calling out the contents of the box he carried, so he had to teach her a lesson.
Belch, who was dense, but always seemed the most reasonable of the gang after Victor Criss, paused uncertainly at the bizarre sight. It only left Hockstetter launching a barrage of rocks; his laughter grew in pitch. If it turned out that half a Derry could hear the pyromaniac, it wouldn't be surprising.
Henry didn't stop his antics. In fact, seeing that his new method didn't bring him absolutely anything and that the negro in the hole was intact, his yelling had turned to screaming.
He fell to his knees. "Kill him!" he shrieked, nearly falling into the basement hole with the vehemence he was leaning in. His fingers and palms were bleeding from handling the sharp thrown objects, but all his being lay fixated on a helpless boy in the pit. "Kill the motherfucker! Shoot him! Kill him!"
If Belch had a grey cell or two in the balloon of air he called head, he would've concluded Bowers must've thrown his common sense at the black kid somewhere along the way as well. As it happened, when Bowers kept hollering, the fat boy began looking around, searching for something less boring than rocks. Possibly something bigger. Maybe that could satisfy Henry.
"I'm gonna kill you, you little black shit!" Henry raged on, out of his damn mind. His eyes were bulging out impossibly wide and drool began sprinkling out of his mouth. He looked like his head was going to explode any second. ˮDo you hear me? I'll kill you, and then rip off your dick and shove it down your throat so your last thought is gonna be how dirty nigger dick really tastes like! Huh?! How about that?! How about that, you black cunt!"
Mike barely heard him. He was curled up in a fetal position with arms wrapped over his head as best as they'd go and every bit of him hurt. Words didn't even get to him anymore. No word will ever get him anymore. This was all so, so much worse, and he just wanted it to end. He was on the edge of consciousness and didn't know if the pyromaniac kept throwing things at him or not. Every pain was the same now.
Help
Stan, Beverly, Bill- anybody!
Somebody help me!
Suddenly, everything grew completely dark for a split second and then back to normal. Like a blink. Mike noticed it even from behind closed eyelids. He risked opening an eye when he heard Henry stopped talking.
"Fuck was that?" he spat.
Mike chanced a glance through a gap in the arms. He saw a slit of light that was the opening, and three figures as three black anomalies residing within. The barrage stopped completely. Patrick wasn't aiming at Mike anymore. He wasn't even looking at him. And neither was Henry. Mike unrolled from the self-made shelter and straightened up, gritting his teeth in a painful process. He squinted.
There it was again. A blink of darkness, a mere flutter in time; a shadow fell over the hole and disappeared just as quickly as it appeared, covering the sun-burned sky for a moment. Hanlon blinked, trying to decide if he was finally seeing things from pure terror and exhaustion.
But whatever it was, it didn't leave because the attention of the three boys was still elsewhere as they scanned the sky.
Mike wiped at his face to get rid of blood dripping into his eye and it left his palm red. With entire body still throbbing from pain, it was difficult to focus on what was going on, but he wasn't certain of anything he was seeing until that one moment, where Henry went pale as a sheet.
"Holly sh—what the fuck…" Henry breathed.
Mike wasn't sure how to construe the emotion in Bowers' voice because he had never heard it coming from him before. Contrary to dominant madness that spilled off Henry's tongue the length of the time Mike had the misfortune of knowing him, it was now replaced with panic. Just panic. With no pretended control.
"Fucking shit, what is that?"
Hockstetter. He joined Henry in the vocal show.
Mike couldn't see anything, but he did hear. He thought he heard a quick staccato; like a woodpecker drumming on a hollow tree. The sound curved like a wave, and whatever was producing it was definitely moving, and it was moving fast.
That's when the gang went from panicked to purely hysterical.
"Jesus Christ!"
"What the fuck is that thing? That is big!"
"Heads down!"
"It's fucking enormous!"
"Look out!"
"Up above!"
Amidst the yelling, Henry had already jumped up and they all moved out of sight so Mike couldn't see them anymore. The light stung his eyes and he wanted to look away from the hole and bury his face back to the safety of his arms. But he was fixated on the unfolding events. Probably because his curiosity was as gluttonous as everyone else's.
A second woodpecker sound had already sounded off in the midst of the gang shouts, but the sound that had really pierced the empty ironworks was a loud screeching; like a metallic engine squeaking its massive body to motion.
Mike got goosebumps, but then the distanced gang's shouting turned to pure terror.
"Fuck, it's huge!"
"Holy shit!"
"Get away from there!"
"No, hell no!"
"Throw me something!"
"Leave us alone!"
"Shit, duck!"
"Argh!"
"Let's get outta here!"
"But what about the black kid?"
"Fuck him, he's gonna die anyway!"
Another screech, this one more profound. Like the gang's inter-exchanging shouting brought it insult.
Mike still felt the goosebumps, but he wasn't scared. Despite injuries, dizziness and bother physical and verbal molesting, he inexplicably felt reassured. Like everything is going to be alright. Not even Hockstetter's next sentence bothered him.
"Take him! Take the nigger, you have a nigger in the hole!"
Another screech and then a dull, short sound that Mike couldn't describe. It was followed by two more screeches, but these belonged to the boys. One of them was definitely Henry, Mike derived from the scarred areas of his memory.
"PATRICK!"
Belch was also screaming, but it was an incoherent mass of words, maybe not even classified as that.
"PATRICK! FUCKING SHIT! PATRICK!"
Mike thought he never heard Bowers scream like that. He kind of sounded like a little girl. The thought made him grin, a decision he immediately regretted as his right cheekbone abruptly started hurting like hell. His grandfather would kill him. That didn't worry him, either.
After that, Hanlon couldn't understand anything anymore. He only heard screaming outside of his trap. Which, after a few more unidentifiable sounds, began shrinking in volume accompanied by footfalls of shoes in the dirt. Both sounds were getting quieter and quieter, and soon diminished completely. No more of the metallic screech or woodpecker staccato, either. Not anything.
It was only then that Mike could hear the sound of free wind humming and hooting through the ruins of old factory, blowing some of the sand into the basement, trying to get Mike's attention, who wondered if something would happen if he decided to take a short nap here. Just for a few minutes. Then he would figure out how to get out. There had to be a way.
Mike laid there for a while completely exhausted, just intended on resting. His entire body pulsated and pain was rowing from cold to hot, back and forth. It was peaceful. It was.
Until Hanlon was aware of a change in the air. He didn't hear anything, but he felt something new was present. Something other than the wind. If Bowers and his kind had returned, and all that circus was just for some sick show, he didn't want to open his eyes. He really didn't. If they came to end him, he didn't want to spend the last few moments of his life staring at Henry's twisted grin.
But nothing kept happening and Mike had grown suspicious. The presence was still there, and honest to God, curiosity was killing him. So he opened his eyes into slits.
There was a shape in the opening, and it was too big to be one of the boys.
Mike bolted into a sitting position and his body revenged by shooting bullets of pain along his nerves and a wave of dizziness spun his brain like a mixer. His stomach painfully twisted when he blinked several times and realized what he was seeing.
Rodan! Rodan!
No. This was all but the monster bird he had happily been shooting with his finger on TV with his father cheering him on when he was little. There were no evil glare, skin covered in soot and leather wings.
But it was a bird. It looked down at him with huge, almost human-looking blue eyes. A chirring sound escaped its sharp beak.
Mike had no idea what sort of bird it was supposed to be, and was pretty sure one of the thrown rocks had given him a concussion, but he instantly recognized those eyes.
"Schizophrenic...?"
The bird chirped again and soundlessly jumped into the basement with him. It was enveloped in a fluffy grey coat of feathers with orange chest, like a European robin. It approached him slowly, as if scared it'd startle him, and Mike was washed over with the same feeling of reassurance like before.
The bird gently nudged him with its beak and Mike gritted his teeth to raise his arms and hold the bird's head. The giant bird puffed air out of its nostrils and released a throaty sound. In the depths of its very intelligent mind, It was partially glad Mike was as beaten up and worn out as he was since he didn't ask any questions, and It doubted he would. At least not in larger company where certain someones could make a decent blow-up out of it. Mike wasn't the one to ask questions.
But he was safe. And only that mattered now.
As Mike's arms dropped and his head flopped forward in fatigue, face stained with dry tears going limp, the bird rounded him once and laid half-wrapped up around the boy like a fluffy pretzel. It let him rest on its warm body where Mike grew heavier and heavier. The creature laid its head on the ground and let its breathing synchronize with the boy's.
For all running, fear, wasted adrenaline and injuries, Mike was completely done. He didn't think he'd be able to move a single muscle ever again except his eyelids. All he wanted was to be in his bed and listen to the sounds of his cattle and the surrounding forest in the night. He wanted to be home and safe. Not worry about having to turn around every few yards wherever he went just because his life depended on it. He wanted to sit outside and play his trombone without fearing whose attention he could draw to himself. He wanted to go to school with all the other kids and for once not being forced to base his life on one of his grandfather's conservative attitude-division.
With thoughts graduating higher and higher on determination scale to the point where he had planned his entire life all the way to pension, Mike had surrendered to them, and they easily replaced reality. Those thoughts turned to dreams, and soon enough, they, too faded away, leaving nothing but peace and darkness which seemed to shrink and expand as the creature's body moved beneath him.
When he next woke up, he was in a familiar place. Strong scent of hay filled his nostrils and made the wakening so sweet, it felt like sinking into blissful oblivion.
Then the memories triggered a domino chain, having him float back up to reality and Mike sat up with an instinctive gasp.
He was in the loft of the barn, right across his house, laying on a pile of hay. He could hear the stirring and bleating of the sheep below him.
(fast sheep)
It was daytime and the light coming from outside was greyish and white. Moisture could be scented in the air. Rain was coming. Mike looked around, trying to solve the puzzle of memories as the firsts of them began lining up.
Wait a moment. Something was up here.
He was supposed to be hurting. Bad. For Christ's sake he was lapidated by Bowers and his goons hours… how long ago has it been anyway?
Mike did a quick job to check himself over. He lifted his shirt, the trousers (undamaged!?) and felt himself over — but there was nothing. No bruises or wounds, rips, scars – anything.
Otherwise rushed by the threats of his grandfather and his workers and the mere thought of those, Mike genuinely paused to take a moment to think for the first time in his life. After a few moments of doing just that, he came to a simple, stress-free conclusion — whatever.
Since they all first met the clown when Georgie introduced them, Mike was probably the only Loser to figuratively shrug and say 'okay' in sense like, 'that's a first, but okay. We're just a weird bunch anyway. Could use a mascot'. Pennywise was a conundrum, and a big one, too. They all knew that, and while some like Bill, Richie or Eddie tried to penetrate through to him, Mike just let it be. Some things he was supposed to know, and some he wasn't. If the clown offered to share something about himself, which he never did, Mike would listen. But as it stood, he was just content on going day through day of Pennywise's goofiness and go with the flow because he was older than Noah's ark. He was fun, and life wasn't. It was a good counter-weight.
Getting himself back in order — again— Mike jumped on his feet, more refreshed than he ever felt, and skipped down the ladder to the bottom, ready to work. Life could go back to normal. No reason why not.
However, even as he was going to spend the rest of his life in Derry, and making dozens more encounters with Bowers gang (miraculously getting away untouched all the time) — coincidence or not, Mike never saw Patrick Hockstetter again.