Marauder's Daughter - Chapter 1

“Where there are superheroes, there too shall be super villains.”

Mind Meld, LEPER Squad 2, Region 2B, 2046

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"Absolute Power?! Hell Yeah! Abso-Eff'in-Tutely!"

Cpt Quirky, LEPER Squad 2, Region 2B, 2042

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“My father lived as a hero and died as a hero. Screw you!”

Carmen Wilson, 2069

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“There’s only two ways to go in Transition City: Up or down. And that’s just the streets.”

Bradford Wallington, Deputy Mayor, Transition City, TN, circa 2061

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“My son, do not question that which you do not understand, but, instead, that which you think you do.”

Clark Andrews, 2019

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CHAPTER 1

Fork You Too:

In Which Carmen Forks Over the Pain

Sitting on the porch, staring vacantly at the faded old house across the street, Carmen tried to tune out the screaming. A throb of pain jolted through her right wrist. Bruising was becoming evident under the fading red marks. She cradled her injured wrist in her left hand, rubbing lightly, absently, not really noticing. Through the closed door behind her she could hear her mother, voice raised in near hysterical fury, screaming invectives at her latest boyfriend. Carmen wondered if any of the few neighbors would bother to call the cops. Probably not. Cops weren’t very welcome on the block since the area had turned into a den of aging meth dealers and washed up hookers. Most of the foot traffic consisted of people trying to score crystalline triskot and heroin on the street corners. The neighborhood was a far cry from the Gatlinburg home where they had been when Carmen was a toddler.

Turning her face to the sky, Carmen took a deep breath. The air, still as a cat stalking a bird on the windowsill, was humid and stifling. Unacknowledged, tears ran down her cheeks. How could this day be so clear? Shouldn’t the sky above reflect the truth below? It should be overcast, rainy; gloomy like her troubled spirit. Above, the sun continued to shine through wisps of clouds in a blue sky; completely refusing to submit to the whim of one unlucky white trash girl in a rundown shanty.

The ache in Carmen’s wrist where Josh, her mother’s latest boyfriend, had grabbed her, had subsided to a dull pain. Across the street a once red, now faded pink, peeling front door opened. Mrs. Lewis, grey hair disheveled, poked her head out and glanced over toward Carmen. It looked like the elderly widow was still wearing her paisley printed night gown. Lifting her left hand, Carmen waved half-heartedly. A sudden wind, seemingly from nowhere, caught the old lady’s door, pushing it against her. Stumbling slightly, Widow Lewis grabbed the door knob, almost falling onto the stoop. Regaining her balance, she backed into her house, slamming the door shut, not bothering to acknowledge the gesture. Carmen felt a pulse of pain in the back of her brain, gone a little quicker than the one she had felt when a similar freak gust of wind had slammed the bathroom door in her mother’s newest sugar daddy’s face, giving him a nosebleed. That frazzing jerk should know how to close a bathroom door when he took a piss. Glancing back up, her eyes were drawn by movement. Widow Lewis raised one finger of an arthritic right hand in an obviously unfriendly gesture and jerked her curtain closed.

In the house behind her, Josh was now yelling invectives at Carmen’s mother. “You’re nothing but a worthless, lazy slut! And that damn kid of yours… I should just leave now. I can’t stand anymore of this crap!” On and on it went, back and forth. This one had moved in a week after Tina had met him; probably right after a drunken tryst in the bathroom of the local redneck bar. A little over a month back, Carmen had been awakened from a light sleep on the couch by her mother fumbling drunkenly with the front door lock. Glancing at the digital read out on the clock radio, Carmen noted it was 3:16 in the morning. The bar had just closed. As her mother had finally managed to get the door open and stumbled inside, followed by a medium sized white man with a slight pot belly and a greying ponytail, Carmen had closed her eyes, feigning sleep.

Her mother had loudly admonished her latest conquest to be quiet so her daughter wouldn’t be awakened. As the two stumbled behind the couch, the man had bumped one knee against the end table, almost causing the ancient dust covered lamp to fall over. As the man had fumbled the lamp upright, Carmen had burrowed down, pulling the sheet over her head, praying the two wouldn’t be too loud with their drunken fornicating. “Dad, I miss you,” she had whispered as the door to her mother’s bedroom slammed closed, thankfully cutting off most of the noise.

A week later, Josh Whitman, wearing oil stained jeans and a once white wife-beater muscle shirt, had parked his dilapidated Ford pickup out front and carried a box of clothes, a toolbox, and a small duffle bag into the house. His aging hippie ponytail had been undone. Greasy grey hair hung listlessly down the sweat-stained back of his shirt. Undoubtedly Josh had figured he could crash rent free and do car work for neighborhood toughs while enjoying bouts of hot sex with what Carmen had to admit was still a good-looking woman.

Tina Wilson had been blessed with good genes. At age thirty-six she looked five years or so younger, with a figure that was just beginning to let go but was still curvy and, apparently, attractive to the opposite sex. This despite the last couple of years of drinking too much and whoring herself out to practically any man that would supply her with alcohol. According to the school counsellor Carmen had spoken with, Tina Wilson was still in mourning. She was clinically depressed because she didn’t have the scoping skills to handle the death of her husband and the loss of all they had once been. Miss Frances said that Tina sought solace in men. Carmen just thought her mother was weak. Unfortunately, Tina Wilson seemed to have developed a type: Middle aged ex toughs in their late forties to early fifties trying to prove they still had lead in the pencil and could guzzle beer like a twenty-year-old. A couple of them had also thought they should have free access to the cute fourteen-year-old that slept on the couch. Carmen had been forced to disabuse them of that notion. Usually, a quick knee to the groin, a method taught her by her father when she was ten, had handled the problem. Most of the men had just left, unwilling to take the added pressure of ‘Tina’s mouthy brat’ as they called her on top of Tina’s own incessant whining. Tina had tried to ground Carmen for a month after Michael had called the cops babbling about telekinesis and psychic assaults. Carmen could still hear her mother saying, “You’re just like your father. Going to be a Leper when you get older?” Carmen had just cocked her head to one side and replied, “Maybe,” before heading to her room. Carmen Wilson wanted nothing more than to be like her father. The Marauder had been a true hero.

Hearing a sound like a piece of meat being slapped onto a butcher’s counter, followed by a yelp of pain too high pitched to have been made by Josh, Carmen stood. Stretching her back, she turned and walked into the house. Circling around the sagging couch with its stuffing falling out, Carmen walked towards the rear of the small one-bedroom house. Their orange tabby cat, Henry, had followed her steps with one eye as she stalked past. The cat swiped half-heartedly at Carmen’s arm before returning to licking his nuts. The mildew-stained linoleum floor made no sound as she stepped into the open archway leading into the small galley kitchen.

Carmen’s mother, tears streaming from her eyes, leaned back against the warped Formica counter next to the rust pocked gas stove that had been new when Biden left the Whitehouse. Tina Wilson rubbed one hand across a blossoming bruise on her cheek, the other holding closed a new rip in her button up blouse. Josh, breathing hard, stood with his back to Carmen facing the woman he had been screwing for the past few weeks. His fists were clenched at his sides, legs and back rigid.

As Josh raised a fist preparatory to striking her mother again, Carmen’s eyes narrowed. The silverware drawer to her right opened, seemingly of its’ own accord. A steak-knife lifted from the drawer and hovered. Flicking her eyes left, the knife followed. As the blade passed his head, Josh caught a glimpse of movement in his peripheral vision. Turning, he stumbled back. “What the frack?!” he mumbled. The serrated knife did a sudden one-eighty and hovered in front of his eyes as if daring him to move. Stepping back, the middle-aged mechanic slipped on a potholder that had fallen onto the stained floor by the sink. As his feet went out from under him, he pinwheeled his arms in an effort to maintain balance, all the while trying to keep an eye on the knife hovering over him. The clack of his teeth as his tailbone hit the floor was blunted by the meat of his tongue which split painfully, filling his mouth with blood. A small crimson stream ran down his chin, mingling with a wispy goatee before dripping onto his tee.

Looking back over one shoulder, Josh saw his girlfriend’s fourteen-year-old daughter standing there. The girl’s dirty blonde hair stuck out in a frizz like she had just encountered a large jolt of static electricity. Dark hunter green eyes widened as her pupils dilated. As he watched, swallowing the spurt of blood in his mouth, the teen’s eyes narrowed. She nodded to her right and the knife settled silently onto the counter, its tip resting in an orangish yellow gob of spilled Kraft macaroni and cheese, disturbing a couple of hungry roaches which scattered for safer territory. “Goddamn it! You’re one of them mutant freaks I been hearing about? Well, screw you!” The nervous tic of his left eye caused his mole to jump like a rat on a skillet.

The sudden appearance of a meat fork, it’s two-inch long metal tongs aimed straight for his splayed crotch, caused the man to scramble backwards on his hands and heels, his ass cheeks wiping a cleaner trail on the flooring. The meat fork jerked forward in a blur of motion, causing Josh to yank his legs together. The drunk man threw one hand in the air and screeched, sounding like a little girl on a roller coaster. The thunk of the meat fork stabbing into place caused him to sob. Opening his eyes, he saw the handle quivering where it had stuck into the linoleum next to his left thigh.

One eye on the girl, the other trying to keep track simultaneously of the steak knife and meat fork, Josh scrambled to his feet. The acrid smell of fresh urine and the damp stain on the front of his jeans betrayed his loss of control. He stood there for a second, confusion writ on his face. A trace amount of blood dribbled from the left corner of his mouth, pooling slightly in his scraggly goatee. Carmen moved to one side, not removing her eyes from the drunken man.

“Just go Josh. And don’t come back. I’ll put your stuff outside for you to get in the morning.”

Grabbing his open bottle of Bud Lite from the counter, Josh took a swig, trying to look brave as the fear in his eyes warred with the wound to his pride. Ignoring his wet pants, he spun and pressed his butt against the counter. “I’ll fucking report you to the government, you freaky little bitch.”

“You do that Josh. Did you forget who my father was? The government doesn’t scare me, and neither do you.”

Edging past the girl, Josh spat a gob of pinkish phlegm which narrowly missed the teens foot. Noting the knife on the counter rise an inch from where it lay, a dislodged noodle falling back onto the counter, Josh turned and speed-walked to the front door. Henry hissed as the man strode by. Grabbing his keys from the nail in the wall by the doorframe, Josh darted out front, slamming the door behind him. When she heard the old Ford sputter to life and pull off, Carmen walked to the front window and looked out. Josh was turning left at the corner, toward the highway.

“You scared off another one. Now what?” Tina Wilson stood in the archway, a bag of frozen peas held to her cheek.

“What the frazz, Mom? Am I supposed to just let these drunken losers use you as a punching bag? Isn’t it bad enough you whore yourself out for booze, pills, and KFC?”

“Whatever,” her mother mumbled. Tears in her eyes, Tina Wilson turned and walked back into the kitchen. Stopping for a moment, she hung her head. “I miss him too,” she said.

Carmen sighed. She was being too hard on her mother. Tina had tried hard to keep things together when her husband Joe, Carmen’s dad, had been killed in what was apparently a robbery at the Circle K down on Jackson St. The cops said the killer had a mask on, so they were unable to identify him from the security cameras. That was three years ago now. Carmen had been eleven-years-old. After hanging up his Marauder mask, Joe Wilson had worked the night shift at the Circle K for about ten years and been robbed probably twice a year or so on average, but nobody had ever gotten hurt until that night. The cops said it was just a random robbery, but Carmen was pretty sure it was related to Joe Wilson’s years on the Leper Squad.

Glancing at the shelf over the five-year-old, forty-three-inch, second-hand DigiVison screen, Carmen swallowed. There was a dusty, framed picture of her dad, Joe Wilson – aka the Marauder – with his fellow members of the state financed squad of Licensed Enhanced Persons - Cpt. Quirky, Phaser, Sgt. Samson, Stun Grenade, Mind Meld, and Marauder. Joe Wilson’s six-member team had been Squad 2A, responsible for patrolling Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and surrounding areas, including Transition City. He and his teammates had laughingly referred to themselves as the Gatlinburg Leper Colony. The picture had been taken just a week before Joe Wilson’s, and by extension his wife and daughter’s also, seemingly charmed life became a nightmare.

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Closing the Tennessee Licensed Enhanced Persons Bureau issued laptop she had been using to monitor the scene across the street, the woman removed her bluetooth. “Told you there was no need to go charging in there to save the day,” she said to the short, white-haired man seated to the side of her puter desk. She was glad to note that her visitor’s tension was bleeding off. Otherwise Mr. Whitman may have gone to a hospital instead of wherever he was currently headed.

“She’s a real taze isn’t she?” The man chuckled as he envisioned again the scene where Josh Whitman had urinated all over himself. “Got coffee?” he queried, stretching his neck muscles to relieve the cramped tension.

Chuckling as she climbed the basement stairs, Sabrina Sontral resumed the aged appearance of the esteemed widow, Micheline Lewis, and headed into the kitchen for a cup of coffee for herself and her guest. Nothing like a little Friday night entertainment to liven up a dull job. Joe would be so proud, she thought. Shaking her head as she hit the plasteen container’s heat tab she mused, well, of Carmen anyway: Tina, perhaps not so much.

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https://vocal.media/fiction/marauder-s-daughter-chap-2

https://vocal.media/fiction/marauder-s-daughter-chap-3

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