Red Room

3

The pair of criminals was thrown into the house's basement until backup from the police would come and give them the needed care and, of course, the eventual imprisoning. Nothing valuable or helpful for the two to escape could be found in there, just broken decorations and pieces of furniture.

They sat themselves in a corner and decided to remain there sulking.

"Did you really have to burn him?", the wife bashed on him, "Couldn't you just slice his stomach open?"

"No! The burning should have made it easier to cut!"

She narrowed her brows in disbelief, "How?"

"Well, you should have noticed that as you've cooked meat food a shitload of times! Human flesh isn't any different."

The counterpart only moved her eyes away from him, "Whatever..."

Meanwhile, the child was brought in the house and laid on the living room couch. An ambulance was also called and was to arrive as soon as possible.

Until then, the hero dashed to the bathroom to get the first aid kit and returned within the blink of an eye. He had to be very careful with the fragile human in front of him. Blisters started to pop up, the job was becoming harder.

He poured some cold water on a handkerchief, "I promise I'll be as gentle as I can."

More cautiously than ever, he moved the piece of cloth along the burned area to remove the ashes and remains of wood, but to clean up the wound as well. The pain of that was bearable. However, hell broke loose when the applying of gauze followed. It hurt so bad that the patient eventually passed out.

"Shit!", the officer hissed and checked the kid's pulse to make sure he was still alive, "I'm so sorry, buddy!"

The ambulance managed to arrive quickly and bring the severly injured one to the hospital. There was no way to get in contact with his parents, neither to get any information about him, as he was uncounscious and too young to own any ID. Without any declaration from him, the policeman's job was not done, so he had to stick with the boy until he'd receive the wanted answers. In other words, he had to spend the night in the hospital because the victim didn't regain his coinsciousness until the following day around noon.

"Where am I?", a soft voice asked between yawns. He couldn't sit up yet, his torso was all bandaged up and it still hurt to move.

One moment later, he was surrounded by a nurse and the one thanks to whom he was there, alive and more or less whole. Both of the adults were eager to hear more of him.

"How are you, tiny?", she asked, "You worried us all!"

It was the first time when somebody who talked to him sounded so genuine. Most of the caring words he'd heard in his life were fake. Oh well, the orphanage's workers were only doing their jobs for the money. They never really approached the orphans.

"I'm fine, thank you.", the little boy answered, "But my tummy still hurts when I move."

She put a comforting hand on his belly, "Awe, I'm so sorry to hear that..."

As touching as the moment was, the policeman had to return to work, at least to report that he had a murder attempt case to take care of.

"Hey, buddy, do you mind if I ask you some questions?", he pleaded, trying to aound the least agitated possible.

The interrogated one nodded to inform him that he was willing to respond. Getting the message, the hero asked for a piece of paper and a pen to write the answres down. His demand was quickly fulfilled.

"Ok, so how did you get in contact with those people?"

"I had no choice."

The two adults furrowed their brows, "What? And your parents, do they know about them? Were they even with you when you started interacting with that couple?"

The child shook his head, "Mr., you don't understand. They are my adoptive parents. I come from the orphanage!"

Jaws dropped. How imbecile could someone be to let such a fragile little being in the hands of such horrible people? That kid could have gotten slaughtered!

"Oh my God!", the lady nearly screamed in unsion.

Like the defender of law he was, the saviour had to keep his cool until the end, "Miss, please."

That was about everything he needed to know. He wrote down every single detail to enforce the evidence for the soon to be released charge. The piece of burnt wood and the knife that never got any action were still in his house, but declarations were always more preferred.

After regaining her steadiness, the nurse suddenly realised that all focus was on the criminals and nothing was known about the boy himself.

"Hey, you never got the chance to tell about yourself. What's your name?", she wanted to know.

"Freaky.", the patient blankly answered.

"Ok, that's the nickname. But I want to know your real name?"

"Isn't the name what people always call you by?"

"Yes, it is."

"Everybody's always called me Freaky."

So the boy had visibly gone through a childhood one wouldn't really describe as pleasant, since he thought 'Freaky' could actually be a name. He could get visited by a psychologist as well, while remaining in the hospital.

The policeman left after some time to finish with that murder attempt case. He was probably going to visit the victim again if he wouldn't already be gone by the time he'd finish all the formalities for imprisoning the killers.

Said Freaky spent a good while under medical care before he could be released again. A psychologist made sure to help him get through his trauma, but since the patient was a rather quiet one and the man in charge of him was already old and fed up with his job, he mostly let the kid be.

Assured that his mental state was just fine, the nurse was ready to send him back to the orphanage whenever he was completely healed, which only happened a few days later. Then, the next question was what orphanage did he use to live in.

"Wait, isn't there only one orphanage?", Freaky responded to the query with another question.

"Sweetheart, Sweden is huge. All the helpless children are never going to fit in a single orphanage.", his caretaker explained to him.

"Oh... well, I came from the one that stands many hours of driving on a boring road away from this place."

Great. Like someone actually knew what area he was talking about. Many destinations are split from that small toen by hours of boring roads.

Well, what was to be done with him?

Not knowing how to handle that situation, the nurse tushed to the hospital's director for a piece of advice.

"Sir, where are homeless patients supposed to be taken to?", she questioned apprehensively.

"Hm?", her supervisor didn't even bother to look up from the files he was arranging when she came in.

"There's this patient who was nearly murdered by his adoptive parents and doesn't know what orphanage he comes from. Where do I take him?"

The director instantly shot up and, with eyes wide in shock, he only managed to get an 'excuse me?' out of his mouth.

"I'm serious, sir!"

He slowly sat back on his armchair and leaned his chin on his now folded hands, fixing his vision to nothing in particular. That was the first ever case to happen in the hospital eversince he'd got to supervise it and he never thought about thinking of solutions to situations like that.

"I honestly have no idea...", he mused, "Bring him to the closest orphanage, I don't know!"

"I will. Thank you for the piece of advice, sir.", the lady politely turned towards the door and left.