Charlie Valentine pulled three nights worth from his veins then plugged the needle into the throbbing muscle of the register. The scalped motel owner watched the colors swirl from black to a very faint navy blue. He hesitated. A scowl tugging the grafted replacement that took up where his hair had been. Charlie tried to entertain himself by imagining the color and style his half formed melon may have had. It took away a little of the tension that he felt from the man’s critical gazing of his blood that, if not for the quantity, would have been worthless. Obviously, the owner’s thoughts flowed through the same stream as he lowered his head to the keyboard and began two-finger typing.
”I’ll give you two nights.” The owner said in frustration. Perhaps it was out of the goodness of his heart, business being slow, or just being too lazy to perform a refund, but whatever it was, Charlie was relieved. He hoped for at least one night to get the edge off. Two may be enough to come up with a plan. The Latchers were off his scent for now and with Charlie pumping so much pollution in his veins, his taste would be difficult to recognize. But they wanted him. Badly.
The owner finished his monotonous plinking away at the keyboard and the vase shaped muscle twitched then swallowed Charlie’s payment, finishing with a final spasm that seemed to be more of a gag. ‘Beggars can’t be choosers’ he thought to himself. He held the statement in his subconscious like a billboard as he took the bone chiseled key from the owner. “19” he murmured then returned to the television embedded within the flesh wall to his right, forgetting Charlie altogether.
Likewise, Charlie turned and hobbled out into the parking lot and lit up a cigarette to kill the stink of the place. The muscle and bone that made up the foundation was barely preserved. The teeth lining each window seal and doorway had blackened. The skin roof had shriveled so much from the desert heat that a greenish rotting cancer had begun to fester out of the breaks which had cracked open. Apart from a faint, rot-carrying breeze in Charlie’s ears, all was quiet. No cars rumbled down the highway. Nothing for anyone to see except for the ones already seeing it. Nothing worth 12 ounces of blood which Charlie finally began to feel the effects of.
He shuffled over to the rusty Pinto, popped the trunk, grabbed his deflated balloon of a travel bag, then pierced the football shaped cyst that held his still fresh kidney. He shut the trunk before the smell could escape and cause him to vomit. That was something he could not handle right now. He was feeling very dizzy and he needed to lay down. Needed to sleep. Though he wondered what for. If he slept tonight it would just bring on tomorrow even quicker. He thought of the gun as he hobbled painfully past each door. It may be a consideration sooner than he intended. The stump where his foot was severed was still bleeding. He was in no shape to run anymore. Perhaps this would be a fitting place for him to end the pursuit.
After all, he had led a good chase. Bloodying the noses of the Processors enough to want retribution. Two Latchers dead by his own hand back at Ellisboro. Their screams still echoed deliciously in his memory. Though one of the screams was in his own voice and Ruby’s eyes of dazzling silver gazed up at him as he rained down blow after blow with his switchblade. The attention was away from her at least. That was all that mattered. She would be safe as long as the Latchers kept after Charlie.
So the gun option was out until he knew for sure that he was to be processed, as he had nothing more that the Latchers would want to take for themselves. Sleep needed to be his plan. He sighed wearily as he reached his door. The ivory felt hollow in his hand. Cheap. No doubt someone behind on their debts like Ruby’s parents. Members of a mindless and mangled workforce hoping to spare their beautiful baby girl their hardships. Until of course, they had nothing left to give. At least nothing that they could spare and continue to keep the grinders working. So the key could very well have come from an unfortunate loved one of a debtor.
Charlie unlocked the door and stumbled inside, the block replacing his foot thumping into the doorway, kicking some black teeth across the floor. He flipped on the light long enough to see that the room was what he expected. Basic bed with a mattress of fat, hair stuffed pillows, tv mounted atop a cartilage and sinue forged table, toilet and sink made from cheaply polished bone.
He locked the door, flipped off the light, dropped his bag, and collapsed face first on the bed. It sloshed back and forth for a few moments from his impact, then went still. From the walls he heard an argument to his left and love making to his right, he in between with a bad liver and a severed foot. He rolled over on his back and whistled a melancholy tune, one he had written a long time ago it seemed. The lyrics were sung with his voice unstolen from his memories.
He reached up and touched his throat where the veins of the Latcher had burrowed and pulled out his vocal cords, then spewed out the rubbery muck that seared shut their replacement. He didn’t think anything could hurt so bad. That is, until he saw the Latchers later that day, one singing with his voice, the other looking at him with Ruby’s eyes. They lied and they died. That was enough comfort for him as far as his end of the ordeal went. But to imagine tears flowing from black lifeless spheres of Ruby’s sockets were something that Charlie could not man up and face. He fled the scene as hoodlum and a murderer. Such was life.
A fly landed beneath his right eye, crawling down to his lips. Charlie didn’t bother swating it away. He felt a couple more hover over his stump, landing and surveying their own potential motel. A place to eat and breed safely, away from the harshness of the desert. They were no different than him. Charlie felt as though there would be bad karma for him if he were to deny these tiny scavengers safety and comfort when he himself longed for it as well. Just as he thought this however, the explosion of the Pinto lit up the room and shattered the glass.
Charlie jolted up, tiny shards falling from him and tinkling upon the floor. They were here. How long had he been lying down? Did they just miss him entering his room? Was it really them or did somebody even more desperate than he try to steal the vehicle? If so, there was an example of the karma which he feared a few seconds ago. He grabbed the bag from the floor without a thought of the specks of glass cutting his hands. He unzipped it and reached inside for the gun, feeling the skin that was once his heel, now manufactured into a grip.
In the light, Charlie could see the intricate workings that the bones of his foot had made. A sloppily made barrel that was an amalgamation of his toes melded and tacked together in a straight line. Along the sides were mish-mashes of the nails and muscle forming the shape of a mock firearm, with skin covering the grip and hammer. Charlie chambered the first of 5 rounds with little confidence. Marlo promised an untraceable and dependable weapon, for its allotted rounds at least, but Charlie couldn’t shake the doubt he felt. All things would be revealed shortly.
The closed blinds, which were surprisingly intact, were subtly carried upwards by the breeze outside. Through its movements Charlie could catch glimpses of his flaming car. He approached the window and seen two jet black sedans pulled up on each side, their glass blown out and blood visible on their hoods. There was a sound of scrambling and panting, along with fresh dust being stirred up from the earth. Charlie looked downwards and could see one of them writhing about in agony. It had opened up to reveal its collection of eyes, tongues, hair, organs, and blood. So much blood.
”Three.” Charlie whispered to himself with a harsh gravel that filled him with even more hatred upon hearing. He reached over and slowly unlocked his door. Within the two adjoining rooms the argument and love making had ceased, replaced by worried mumbles and whimpering. If they were also seeing the outside, they were no doubt more frightened by the two black cars and the dying Latcher than the explosion. However, their quiet murmuring turned to screams as Charlie heard their doors bursting open. He missed their approach to the nearby rooms. And his.
The door broke off its hinges and a Latcher stepped inside. It was in the form of a man, long black hair, wide green eyes, dirt and blood speckled across its agitated face. It stepped past Charlie for a moment, not seeing him to it’s right, but noticed him quickly as he attempted to aim at its head. The Latcher shrilled and caught his arm which held the weapon. Already the burrowing began in his wrist. Charlie grabbed its throat and struck it in its mockery of a face with his forehead as hard as he could. The Latcher turned loose but it’s veins were still inside his wrist. He grabbed the tendrils and began pulling them out from his flesh when the Latcher slammed his open palm beneath Charlie’s chin and began to strangle him.
The day he begged for his voice to be taken instead of Ruby’s eyes, he knew if he could just endure the agony, no matter how long it lasted, she would be alright. She wasn’t. Now the pain was beginning again as this Latcher began to pierce its way into his flesh. Charlie defiantly ripped free his wrist, placed the gun at the creature’s chest and pulled the trigger. His ears instantly went nearly deaf and the explosion that came from what was once his foot nearly blinded him as well. The veins left his throat and a large hole sloshed its red muck on the floor. As with the Latcher outside, stolen bits of endless victims began pouring out and wriggling around in the open air. Despite the muted sound, Charlie could still make out its screams amongst the visceral carnage.
”Four!” He shouted as he cocked another round into the chamber. Charlie no longer felt the doubt in this weapon of his. Instead, he readied it toward the doorway and as if in answer to his instincts another Latcher stepped inside. Not having time for the stolen eyes to adjust to the darkness it never saw the one it was searching for, only a sudden flash that seemed more akin to a bolt of lightning. The explosion of the Latcher’s head sent Charlie into a maniacal joy. He only wished that Ruby could see this chaos that he had created. Smell the sweet stink of their filth tainting the air with their abomination. It was enough to instill a small mouthful of vomit, but Charlie didn’t allow the revulsion to hinder his enjoyment. He simply let the word “Five” follow the bile from his lips.
There was at least one more. Likely it was in the room to his left seeing how the other came through the door at more of a right angle, but Charlie couldn’t be certain. He thought for a moment that he might wait for another to walk through the door, but it’s still writhing comrade had fallen from the impact outside into the light of day. No doubt it knew by now where he was and that he was armed. Charlie waited for his hearing to hopefully recover. His wrist began to hurt badly from the oozing wound and the surprising intensity from the gun’s recoil. As much as he felt victorious so far, the pain was a reminder of just how limited his time was.
Again he questioned himself what the whole point to his resistance really was. They may leave Ruby and her family alone for now but who’s to say they won’t tie everything back to them. They would require whatever their demented justice demanded and she would be the one to pay it. It wasn’t only her eyes that held value. All that had initially captured his heart now only added more sorrow. Every element of Ruby would be taken. She would be a mangled husk like her own parents in just a matter of months unless she found a means of success in life. Only those who have plenty to give can keep what they have, yet beneath even the most successful in life, the Latchers wait for their failure so that they may take the pieces they desire.
There was nothing for it. He stepped over the corpses he had made and into the sun which was now pleasantly warm compared to his room. The flames of the earlier explosion were beginning to die. His hearing returned fully and he could now hear the whimpering of his neighbors, the lovers, as the rumbling growl of the last Latcher seeped out of their broken door. Charlie approached painfully as his stump began a painful itch. There was the shape of a woman in the corner of the room and the closer he got the more Charlie could see that the Latcher had a hold of her. He limped inside keeping his eyes on soon to be number “Six’’ when suddenly, just like the one that broke into his room, he was surprised from the right and thrown to the ground.
He made a stupid mistake and now everything had come to a sudden end. The Latcher that surprised him placed his foot atop his spine and pressed down viciously. It was over. The couple was allowed to leave now that they had what they wanted. They spoke to him about the Processors and how he was destined for pain before death but he tuned them out. It didn’t matter what they said. It all summed up with “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” He deserved what was to happen to him. But as long as Ruby…
Two shots erupted. Charlie believed that they had decided to kill him with his own weapon, discovering otherwise when the shrieks and the smell filled the room. Was it the couple? Did they come back to save him? Did whoever had spared him the wrath of the Processors even consider their own well being? A hand gently turned him over and Charlie Valentine felt the pure crystal drops that fell from Ruby’s black eyes.