He breathes in and out, the sound of the door shutting behind him almost deafening. The air is warm and muggy with death, but pushes life into him. He can hear it just beyond the wall, the faint shuffling and the muted whimpers. His breath moistens the bandanna over his mouth, sucking the cloth in, filtering the air. He closes his eyes and listens hard; no, there is just one. Only one set of loping footsteps and one set of broken hands scrabbling at the wall. He opens them again, and lets his adrenaline overtake him.
Spencer Wright twirls the ax in his hand like an expert, his fingers maneuvering it perfectly. His wrist pops neatly and becomes flexible. He stretches his shoulders, feels the muscles loosen up, hears the blood pounding in his ears.
He takes a step forward, inching his way around the pit of bodies and to the edge of the wall. He's almost silent, the worn soles of his sneakers almost velvet soft. His eyes are keen, his shoulders slick and pinched together like a cat. He isn't shaking.
There's a stepladder by the wall-he uses it to transport water from the creek out back to the house-and he mounts it. He knows it so well that it doesn't even creak under his weight, though it's old and rusted with blood. He's nimble and small and almost impossible to catch, sinewy like a rabbit. His freckles gleam in the hot sun, his auburn hair catching the light and turning to spun gold. He looks over the wall.
The forest out back is green and lush just before the peak of summer, before the droughts hit. The spines of ferns bend down under the weight of their full, green beauty, bowing paths into the forest that lead down to a trickling stream of water. Nothing lives in it, but it's lovely, with dark sand and pretty pebbles that gleam like fingernails in the water. The sky is bright blue and smeared with strips of white clouds, the sun pouring golden light out over the house, which seems to clot and sag at the beams as it frowns out into the world, a home gutted and spent.
Spencer could get lost in the pretty place behind Billy's house, but doesn't have time to. It's one of the few places where he feels at home, so he is all the more vengeful toward anything that would touch this sacred place. He leans over the wall, which balances at his hips, and pats the other stucco side. He whistles.
The thing at the wall notices him instantly. Its milky eyes turn on him, one swollen and rolling out of its socket like a great, greasy pearl, the other trained on him like a blind dog. Its tongue wags from its throat like a wet cloth, curling up to lap at the lips of the opening where its throat is split, its jaw gone. Later, Spencer will cry about this, but right now, he can't afford to.
He steadies the ax in his hand and balances his footing on the ladder. He whistles again. It comes shambling toward him, carrying itself on legs that fall out from under it. The heat is taking its toll; the flesh of its calves peels away in fat, wet strips, making it hard to move; it's slow. An easy target. He wonders, for a ludicrous, fantastic moment, what on earth Billy was afraid of, before the thing gets a little too close and he brings the ax down into it.
It splits open with a deep, wet crack. It sounds like a watermelon being busted open. Spencer's eyes sweat under the goggles and it stings a little, but he doesn't take them off as blood sprays out from the force of the blow. The corner of his ax gives him the most concentrated power and weight, driving deep into the skull and shattering brain matter out across the front of his shirt. It's lukewarm and smells like sewage. He doesn't gag.
Its body contracts defensively and it makes a last squealing, drowning sound as it expels toxic mist from its bloated lungs. Its knees knock together and it stays strangely upright for a moment. In a spasmodic moment of strength, it reaches up and snags him, impossibly hard, but Spencer doesn't even flinch; no teeth, no threat. He grunts with effort, pulling the edge of his weapon from a human skull, but it releases with a sound of thick suction followed by a pop and the rasp of skull grating against metal. He raises it again and it drips blackened brain matter on his back, his shoulder, dotting him like his freckles do. He swings down again in a perfect arc. He's practiced at this.
He swings again. Just to make sure.
He swings again. And again. His heart is pounding. He should stop.
Its head is smeared across the wall. The spasmodic contractions of its body cause its entire gut to prolapse, and it falls open. The stench is foul and choking, lining his lungs. He's breathing hard. He swings again as the body is finally collapsing, and hits the side of the wall with a loud, unsatisfying sound, chipping at the concrete. The impact vibrates up his arms and screams in his ears and he bares his teeth, gritting them together, his heart beating so hard he can feel the hot pulse in his neck and wrists and ankles.
He shouldn't do that. More hits means a dull blade. He doesn't know why he did what he just did. His goggles are starting to fog up, but they at least kept anything from getting in his eyes. Sweat or tears, he isn't sure.
He slides back down the stepladder and lands on the ground. His legs are steady and strong. He stands there for a moment, staring forward but looking at nothing. Billy is waiting for him inside, and Spencer doesn't want to scare him. He swallows the terrible things he's just done. He carries them in his guts where Billy can't see them. He twirls the ax in his hand.
He turns around and goes back inside.
OH HEY PS the next chapter is finally in the works ! i have a job now and im about to start college, so stuff's been busy; but the next chapter is another long billy chapter, so ! yay !
where this whole fic is going is probably kinda unclear at this point, but rest assured, slow pace aside, it is actually going to an endpoint lmao