Favorite chapter so far. ^^ Michael's outlook is wonderfully accurate, I think. No offense to any Illinoians, btw. I target ALL children-from-hell, I'm not state-selective. ^^
Children. They were everywhere. Scurrying about, through yards and streets, skipping through playgrounds. Everywhere but the damn sidewalks. Ugly little buggers, too, not the usual, acceptable bunch of cheerful, naïve, middle-class second-rate offspring so commonly found in Illinois. These were nasty, jeering brats, raised by television to believe they were better than everyone else, even their own parents. There weren't very many of those. The adults of Haddonfield, it seems, had long ago thrown their hands up in disgust and frustration, and receded back into their quiet, temporarily child-free homes, hoping that the next screeching of tires and blaring of car horns might bring about an abrupt and ever-so-welcome end to the life of the pain in the ass that was their child.
Michael grinned. He was very fond of being telepathic. The best part about it was that he could hear thoughts most people weren't even aware they were thinking, thoughts that dwelled deep within their core that went against everything modern society had drilled into them for years in hopes of making them into respectable little American drones. Thoughts that were pure and primitive. Thousands of years earlier, in the age of the Nomads, parents had slain offspring that didn't meet up to their standards. Such was life to them, and no one had any use for a man or woman who couldn't hunt or gather firewood.
But sniveling, useless brats littered the streets in front of him, unchecked and undisciplined. He was half-tempted to simply barrel through them, perhaps even aim for some of the nastier ones, but then he recalled modern laws. The moral ones would never allow the massacre of young children go unpunished, no matter how welcome the onslaught. What a pity.
Michael drove for what seemed like days, around blocks, through all the streets in town, miles out into the country. He drove until he was satisfied with his knowledge of the area, and to be more direct, he drove until he got tired of driving. Dusk gave way to a bitterly cold nightfall. Almost instinctively, he found himself heading down the road towards his old home. He had to catch himself before he realized that he'd already driven by it at least five times. His house wasn't there anymore. It was nothing but a pile of charred rubble. He parked on the street in front of it and sat there in silence.
Memories started floating to the surface of his mind. Memories he hardly remembered experiencing, and they'd occurred only a handful of years before. As he stared at what was once his home, but he wasn't really looking at it. Se smelled the reek of the sewers again, tasted the blood of rodents on his tongue, and shuddered. At that moment, he made a firm choice not to go back to his old habits; he had no desire to return to the sewers again. In fact, he was repulsed by the very idea.
How strange. A few years ago, he hadn't had a problem with living off rats and going for months at a time without seeing the light of day. But now, it was as if something had reawakened inside of him that hadn't been conscious for decades. Vaguely, and not very willingly, he realized that it was some strange semblance of humanity. It puzzled him. Suddenly, he was wondering how and where he could find a real bed, and perhaps real – cooked – food. Suddenly, he was appreciating a simple, yet orgasmic sense of freedom from the hellish prison they'd kept him in.
He'd even noticed how smoothly the car drove. It was a nice, sparkly white BMW, and it moved almost as if by thought rather than by command. The woman he'd procured it from had been very reluctant to give it up, and now he knew why. Of course, that didn't change the fact that she was currently rotting in an elementary-school dumpster, and unable to effectively protest Michael's little joy ride.
His thoughts suddenly grew quiet. Another idea, unwelcome as it was unnerving, had burgeoned into his head. Was it Akavi who had brought out this new sense of humanity within him?
It seemed absurd of him to think so, but nevertheless, he couldn't get the thought out of his head. Hadn't Michael always assumed he was the only one endowed with Thorn's magnificent power? Had he not always held a heavy resentment against his clan for burdening him with this? He'd known that other Druid clans existed, but to put it frankly, the possibility of others under Thorn's powers had just never occurred to him. Perhaps he was being selfish.
Not that being selfish had ever really bothered him. Not that he'd ever really had the problem of contemplating his self-possessiveness. He purposefully closed his mind from these thoughts. He didn't like doubting himself. If he did that, he'd never get anything done. Cautiously, he let his mind shift. It was like he wasn't in charge of where his train of thought led him. And it led him right back to the real subject of his attention. The woman named Akavi Perthro, whose mind burned with evil thoughts, and at the same time, pondered ancient mysteries. He could still smell her flesh, her hair; still hear the cynical lilt that poisoned her smooth voice.
How strange it had been, to see Akavi standing over him like some kind of dark, fierce angel. To hear her voice pounding through his head, into his mind, down into a core in which no thoughts had stirred in what seemed like eons, and igniting it in liquid hot fire. She had reawakened within him the desire to live, if not just for the one purpose that Life had ordained to him. And perhaps more.
Ah, yes, this was why he'd avoided women for so long. They were a distraction, from both his duty and coherent thought.
Even thinking that made Michael frown. He disliked sounding so… chauvinistic. But what could he say? That the beautiful and extremely tempting Akavi wasn't a distraction? He disliked lying to himself almost as much as he disliked doubting himself. And he wasn't entirely sure he was attracted to her, anyway. In fact, he wasn't sure he could be attracted to her. Thurisaz liked to be neutral, and it often passed that trait on to its children, and unless they were already equipped with extremely strong opinions, they usual conformed to the neutrality Thorn so eagerly bestowed upon them. That was how it had been with Michael. A six-year-old isn't the most opinionated of creatures in the world.
But Akavi obviously had opinions, and very big ones, and very loud ones. Peace-keeper or not, she was definitely a force to be reckoned with. Michael wasn't exactly sure he wanted to reckon with her. Maybe he just wanted to fuck her. Maybe Thurisaz disliked having his children engaged in fights over dominance. Maybe she held an allure in just being mysterious that attracted him, teasing him with her secrets.
Maybe he was still fucking human, despite all his efforts to not be.
He really didn't like that last 'maybe'.
And he really didn't like what happened the instant he thought it. Someone tapped gently on his window with the tips of their fingers. Michael snapped his head around to find, as cruel irony would have it, Akavi Perthro staring down at him with a smirk. If anything reinforced that human 'maybe' it was the fact that he hadn't been paying attention, he'd let his guard slip, and when he'd seen Akavi, the ultimate breach of his protocol was shattered, and his dark eyebrows knitted together in surprise, and a frown creased his lips. For a second, he contemplated driving off, but instead, he rolled down the window.
"You've been sitting here for hours," said Akavi with a smirk. But it was the same smirk she'd had at the asylum, like more of an impersonal sneer meant for the world in general. She didn't seem to acknowledge his facial expression, as if she knew he'd be more comfortable if she ignored it. Or as if she'd been expecting it. He cursed her silently in his head.
She raised her eyebrows.
"Don't like surprises, do you?" She let her gaze wander down the length of both streets. "But that doesn't mean you don't enjoying giving them." Michael leveled a glare at her.
"You think you know me," he murmured in a voice too silky for how rarely it was used. Akavi laughed, but it was a gentle laugh; she'd been caught off-guard by his voice. Good.
"Know you, Myers? I am you. In every metaphysical sense of the phrase. We're both children of the same rune, and that means that not only were we born with certain innate qualities, but we were raised by the same 'master', of sorts. I have every capability you do, and that includes butcher-knife-wielding. I simply chose other… resources." Why was it every time she opened her mouth, she ended up saying so much wonderful information? Was she programmed to be this distracting all the time?
Michael didn't chastise himself for being sexist this time. For some reason, he was angry with her. No one had ever had the upper-hand with him, and he was beginning to think that going for half a century, completely unchallenged in dominance, had spoiled him.
Akavi let Michael do his thinking as she surveyed the wreck that had once been his childhood home.
"Come with me, Michael," she said suddenly. It wasn't a command, it was a warm suggestion. Almost a plea. It sounded wrong coming from her. It didn't belong. But then, Michael didn't know her at all.
"Where?" She hesitated, blinked, looked semi-puzzled for a brief moment.
"Somewhere safe."
A long time ago, Michael might have laughed at that statement. Where could he possibly be safe from that which he truly sought to escape?
He thought about voicing these opinions, but the words died in his throat. It seemed Thorn wasn't up for arguing, and it didn't want him to, either. It locked his voice down and forced her words to repeat themselves over again in his head. This time they held for him an undeniable charm.
"Safe?" He replied slowly. Akavi nodded impatiently. Michael couldn't really blame her; she was standing outside in frigid winter temperatures, not to mention a vicious wind-chill. Not for the first time, Michael wondered what her skin would feel like beneath his touch, so cold, and hot, and soft. He hated himself for wondering, but that didn't make it stop. He was a man, or at least, had been at one time in his life, and as a man there were certain – or to be more blunt one could say many – things about Akavi that Michael found very, very nice. As a man, he thought she was perfect. As Michael Myers, she was a threat. These were definitely not two opinions that mixed well within the same person.
As Michael's thoughts began to argue with themselves, Akavi began to grow more impatient. He watched her walk around the front of the car and slide in the passenger seat. Part of him wanted to kill her, then and there. He hated presumptuous people.
But part of him just wanted to sit there and stare at her, touch her, perhaps. Kiss her. He hated that part of him, it made him burn with anger, that he was letting himself think these things. Or maybe he was angry because he'd never had the problem of thinking those things, and Akavi brought them out in him.
She noticed him staring coldly at her and gave him a bitter smile.
"You were taking too long to decide." She didn't sound like she was justifying her actions, simply stating a fact. Michael had the feeling Akavi wasn't the type of person who justified anything she did. She was a shameless sociopath.
Why did this thought delight him so?