Snake Eater - THE BRAVO BOYS [book three]

Chapter FORTY THREE

Logan Nash

...over twenty years ago...
-Waco, Texas-
×The Children Of David Compound×

Blood drips down my face and oozes from my shaking hands.. Crimson droplets stain the grain scattered tin of the slaughterhouse floor at my feet.. Blazing fire expands in my lungs as I stand there, shoulders heaving, hyperventilating in a irregular rhythm..

"What in God's name have you done, boy? Logan, what have you done?" A familiar voice, distant and distorted, echoes around my head, repeating and resonating endlessly as it bounces off the inside of my skull..

My grip doesn't loosen, remaining clenched tightly around the scrap of discarded tin I had fashioned into a knife.. Even as the reality of what I have done begins to seep in..

I killed a man..

No, not a man.. A sick, perverted predator..

The mutilated corpse of David's sanctimonious right hand lackey, Father Mathew, lay lifeless at my feet.. Stabbed to an almost unrecognisable state of sanguine gore and pulpy sinew, he is nothing much but meat and bones..

I know I should feel guilty for the sin I have committed.. It should have been so much more difficult for me to take a life.. But it wasn't hard at all.. No, after the days of torture Michael had inflicted on me as punishment for my attempted escape with Dixie, I had no forgiveness or mercy left in my body..

The things he did to me were sick.. The things he threatened to do to my sister were depraved.. All of it was unforgivable..

He just kept pushing and pushing.. Beating me and beating me..

He wanted me on my knees and it wasn't to pray.. But I felt the fear of God right here in this room and all my survival instincts were forced to the surface as I felt true hopelessness.. The horror of a cruelty that I am sure my sister had lived too many times to count..

So, I left myself.. Disassociated.. I lost my mind.. And I completely blacked out..

The very last thing I remember is the fight of a violent struggle and the spongy resistance of the blade as I drove it deep into his chest..

"Logan, can you hear me? Logan, my boy.. Put down the knife.." The soothing lilt of David's plea reaches me somehow.. Years of his assurance conditioning keeps me enslaved through automatic response and reflex.. My arms fall slack at my sides as I turn to see the Prophet himself, posted in the doorway.. "We can talk about this.."

This motherfucker.. He wants to fucking talk?
I should cut out his lying snake tongue instead..

"You should be next! You're just like this sick-sodomite-fuck! D'you know what he did, huh?" I rage, filled with hate and anger as I hold up the crafted blade that is painted in the fallen Father's blood.. "He tried to fucking fuck me!"

"Then, you have done a great deed in removing the stain of his soul from this earth, my boy.. So it is God's will.." David extends a hand as if it were an olive branch.. "I forgive you, Logan.. Now put down the knife.."

"Not until you swear to me that Dixie is safe!" A manic mess of jittery energy and anger, I pace a few strides and run a hand back through my hair to find it matted and sticky, soaked in the blood of my tormentor.. "Say you won't hurt her for what I did! Say it!"

With sincerity hurt in his eyes he lifts a hand to his chest in offence.. "I would never hurt her, my boy.. I love sweet Dixie, she's my favourite girl.."

"Love her?" I spit in disgust, waving my blade of accusation in his direction.. My blood rushes, feeding the electric changed mania that buzzes through my body.. I feel as though I have become unhinged, insane and volatile.. The fear has left me and all that remains is white hot rage.."You don't fucking love her! You forced her to lay with you! You raped her!"

"No, no, no.." Unphased by the weight of my accusation, David continues his approach.. He takes a considered stride towards me with a calmly disarming demeanour.. "You're confused, Logan.. You have forgotten what it is we do here.. The higher purpose we serve is so much more grand than the insignificant life of one.. It is in our collective form we are reborn.. Ah, I don't blame you, my boy, it is always hard for us to see in our darkest hour.. That is why I am here to lead you back to our family, back to the light.."

"I don't give a fuck about your family!" I wince, bruised black and blue all over from the vicious beating Michael had administered before I managed to find a way to end his demented torture. "I just want Dixie.. Let me talk to Dixie.."

"All in good time, my boy.. First you must tell me, what of the unborn child you are sworn to nurture?" David takes another step closer, hypnotic as he reaches out to dislodge the weapon from my hand.. "Does your love for your sister run so deeply that you do in fact hold compassion in your heart for the possibilities? Hmm? It is your destiny to do great things Logan, as will your children.."

"I will never have children, Messiah.." My mouth dries.. "You made sure of that.."

David frowns at my rejection of his mental musings.. "But you're going to father a deity, Logan.. I have given your sister the gift of my sacred bloodline.. My seed blossoms within her womb, and soon you are to wed.. Are you not blessed?"

"Blessed? Yeah right-" I shake my head with a sour scoff.. "I'm fucking CURSED! This place is-it's not right! This isn't how its supposed to be!"

"My boy, you think you want to experience the outside world but you are so very wrong.. You have no idea what kind of turmoil and suffering awaits you out there.. The devils beyond these walls walk around so freely, spewing their corruption and greed all over this earth.. They would devour you, and your sweet sister in mere minutes- and you would come crawling back to me on your bellies, begging me to take you in and cleanse your spirit of their evil.."

"Devils?" My head throbs in pounding confusion that seems to strobe within the confines of my skull, building to a blinding pressure..

"Yes." David leans in closer before he lowers his voice to a whisper.. "The devils are coming for you, Logan.. They are coming for us all.."

"I used to believe all your bullshit, but now I know-" Too exhausted to fight and with my adrenaline waning, I fall to my knees as the effects of my injuries become a pain impossible to ignore.. I use the last of my energy to cast one final daggered glare towards the spiritual warden of this god forsaken prison.. "You're the only goddamn Devil around here.."