George never misses.

Arrival

"Mr. Fern, if you wouldn't mind, could you fetch George from his room? It's time for sharpening," Darla called from the kitchen.

Mr. Fern had been sitting at the dining room table with the latest newspaper folded in front of him. A few more were haphazardly scattered around in a semi circle around him. Reading glasses snugly fit into the contours of his face reflected the small amount of afternoon light filtering through the dining room window.

The headlines depicted four more disappearances since Saturday. Variety of different people, almost no similarities besides geographically.

Potentate, it was only Monday.

"Of course," he stuck his head into the kitchen, "I do hope sharpening means something not dying today? I'd rather not stumble on a dead possum again."

A tinkling laugh rang out from the kitchen and Darla threw a hand towel at him, effectively chasing him out.

He chuckled lightly and went to go find George. It wasn't all that hard as he was sitting in his room playing with an elephant tusk. It almost looked like he was pretending to impale a stuffed lion on the end. Thankfully it didn't pierce the plush animal as Mr. Fern had had the foresight to dull it down.

"George, your mother wants you in the kitchen. She said something about sharp-" Mr. Fern was quite abruptly cut off as George lept up and clung to his leg.

"I want to keep playing with Leo and Lion! Will you play with me?" His big brown eyes widened even further in an attempt to sway Mr. Fern. Sadly puppy eyes didn't work well on him as he'd never actually worked with young children before, nor interacted with any.

"No, your mother wants you. Come on," Mr. Fern had been around George long enough to realize that small children occasionally liked to be carried by those they deem caretakers in their life. So he easily scooped George up and finagled him onto his shoulders. George let out a whine but stayed still and wrapped his small arms around Mr. Fern's head.

They made their way down the short hallway to the kitchen (Mr. Fern had to remember to duck down in order to prevent George's head from hitting the ceiling, there had been quite a few "close calls"). "Darla? I've got George," Mr. Fern called out as he crouched down in the kitchen doorway to let George off.

"I'm still in the kitchen. George wash your hands first, we don't want any tarnish on the blades."

For all of his reluctance earlier George was quite happy to quickly wash his hands and bounce over to Darla. Once by her side he stood on his toes and looked at the impressive array of weapons scattered across the countertop. Mr. Fern smiled and took this as his cue to leave. He never participated in the activities that would assist in future murder plots. There was simply too much at risk with the IG and Potentate finding out. Accessories to crime usually didn't fair well in court.

He hummed as he picked up the newspaper again, this time pointedly not looking at the weekly updates section instead going onto sports.

The New York Mets lost again to the Kansas City Royals, he noted disdainfully. It's too bad they lost one of their best players to a torn ACL last season. He tutted, the best doctors had attended him yet they couldn't get a muscle to mend in time. Mr. Fern could've done better himself.

After all, he was quite mediocre at everything. Surely fixing a hamstring would be simple.

[׶•¶×]

"In order to injure anything the most you have to twist the knife further into the body. Like this--" Darla swiftly plunged a knife into the slab of leather on the table and with a flick of her wrist, spun the knife expertly, effortlessly pushing it deeper.