A Predator's Fallacy, a Mystery fanfic

Author's Notes: Written for yet another competition hosted in Gaiaonline! This time, it's hosted by Daisy so this entry is for her competition, 'The Twist In You'. The prompt I chose was a song from The Used titled "The Bird and the Worm", so this story was more or less inspired by that song, as well as "Behind Closed Doors" and "The Good Left Undone" by Rise Against which I listened to after that one. This story, in some ways, represents a friend of mine, so I dedicate this story to him. In any case, I hope you enjoy reading, and if there's anything you think I could - or should - improve in my future stories, please drop a word behind.

A Predator's Fallacy

Thud.

One did not need to listen hard to hear the sudden sound in the darkness of the night, as if someone had thrown a log onto the damp sand of the shores. However, one would need to strain their ears to hear the sounds which came after that; long, jagged breaths, hiccupped sobs, and a half-strangled cry which seems to be choking a child. Everything else was still, and there was no indication that anyone was there. The half-moon shone weakly, barely illuminating the beach floors and that was all too convenient for the runaway Kenny Rise.

He spat the salty sand from his mouth and coughed, wiping his mouth using the sleeve of his blue shirt, making sure that his eyes didn’t stray to look at his skin. It was dark anyway. And he needed to run, despite his inability to breathe properly. Kenny tried to stand, but his legs gave way and he fell onto the sand again, shivering – not from the cold, but fear.

Fear he had never experienced before.

Kenny wanted to shout out, but he couldn’t. He needed to get away and live, or find someone – anyone – who might believe his story and help him. But even for six-year-old Kenny, he knew that it was impossible. A doctor? A policeman? Who would believe him? He would need to show what he was first, what he had become, but to do so… he would need to go to another place like that again.

He couldn’t…

And slowly… he was losing consciousness.

“No… I need to run… Come on, Kenny, get up…” He gasped to himself. The sand he had accidentally swallowed earlier was burning his throat, and he knew he was in danger. He would embrace death there and then, but he knew he shouldn’t. How could he die when he was already dying? No need to speed up the process… he needed to tell someone. Anyone. He just wanted to do that and get over it.

“Hey! Hey, look there!” A distant voice, calling out. Kenny’s eyes closed slowly. He mustn’t do this. He needed to get out of there…

“What?!”

“A child! I see a child there! Come on, we need to get him to somewhere warm. It’s freezing over here. He couldn’t be more than seven years old.” The voice came nearer. A hand was placed on Kenny’s shoulder and he shuddered. “It’s alright, boy, we’ll get you somewhere safe.” The man said, lifting Kenny up. The embrace was so new, so comforting that Kenny shuddered again. He couldn’t… he needed to run. “Hey? Are you alright? What happened? What’s your name?”

“Kenny… Kenny Rise…”

And then he was lost as darkness enveloped him.

“Rise! Get ready and come down here!”

Kenny opened his eyes and yawned, rolling over to his back. He massaged his head and crossed his arms under his head, smiling to himself; just another Saturday to enjoy with his step-brother, Michael. Michael was actually more of a father than a brother, but he had always complained about how he could still get the ladies and how old a father sounded like, so Kenny addressed him like a brother instead. Not that Kenny would complain either way – father, brother… Michael was still Michael, and Kenny knew him as that and only that.

As he rose to get ready, Kenny turned on the radio and stepped into the showers, imagining himself back when he was young. He always thought that his history was fascinating, and the girls always loved it when he talked about himself, but in truth, Kenny was interested. Who was he before the incident at the beach?

My name is Kenny. Kenny Rise. When I was six, I was found shivering on the seashore of a beach, barely conscious and on the brink of death. With a friend, Michael found me and took me to the hospital where I had to undergo a series of traumatic tests and rest. Michael always wondered why it was traumatic for a six-year-old boy. It wasn’t as if I had to go through anything major – just a few checks and some injections. But I was told that I tried to run away and that the doctors made me scream. They were forced to wear plain clothes for my sake.

Afterwards, Michael decided to care for me. He was only twenty, but he decided that caring for me wouldn’t hurt. I’ve been living here since then. Nine years had passed, but I couldn’t remember anything about myself before that happened. According to Michael, before I passed out in his arms, the only thing I said was my name. And that was my only clue to know who I am.

Lately, I’ve been trying to find out. I’ve been wandering everywhere, asking around for those who might know a family under the surname of ‘Rise’. I even tried to search the internet, but nothing came up. Michael often joked that it was as if I popped up from nowhere, but I couldn’t help but believe that out there… I once belonged. I had a father, and a mother. Maybe siblings. Grandparents, great-grandparents… everyone must have them. And yet, where’s mine? Why was I lying half-conscious at the beach in the middle of the night? For a six-year-old, surely… surely, my carer would have noticed me gone.

Kenny dressed quickly, knowing that Michael would be waiting downstairs with breakfast. Leaving the radio on, he brushed a hand across his dirty blonde hair and closed the bedroom door behind him. Seeing that it’s Saturday, he wouldn’t need to bother making himself look presentable. Nobody would dare come and visit Kenny Rise – not around there anyway. Kenny descended the steps and once he reached the landing, he turned right and walked straight into the kitchen where, surely enough, Michael was there wearing an apron, flipping over the last pancake. He gestured Kenny to sit down and he did so – an old agenda, more like a ritual performed every single day. Kenny poured a cup of coffee and sipped it carefully, nodding his thanks as Michael placed his plate in front of him. The older of the two then pulled his chair back and gazed into Kenny’s eyes, a bored look on his face.

“Your editor called in this morning. Any progress with the novel you’re writing?” He asked. Michael hated the fact that he now shared the same editor with his young companion. It was better when he had Liz to himself even though Kenny had pointed out numerous times before that Liz was already married with a child on the way.

Kenny nodded. “I’m about to finish off the major parts to the plot, so it’s all coming down nicely. Minus proof-reading, I should get it completed by next Saturday, at least.” He answered as he began to eat his breakfast.

“That’s good. I’ll give Liz a ring and tell her about your progress later. You know, I won’t be surprised if a company decides to make a film out of it. Whoever has heard of a five-year-old child who had to undergo experiments and then mutated into some sort of hybrid? I wonder where you got the idea from.” Michael grinned.

“Who knows? It’s just a story.” Kenny answered.

“I doubt it, Kenny. You said you got it from a vivid dream.”

“And your point is?” Kenny raised an eyebrow. “Great authors find inspiration everywhere. It’s better than your story of a demented scientist who found himself needing to save the time of the cowboys.” He laughed, winking slightly. His stepbrother rolled his eyes and leaned forward. Kenny immediately sensed something amiss. His laugh died down and his blue eyes gazed into Michael’s black orbs.

“Listen, Kenny. Your story might tell us more than you think. I mean… we’re talking about a five-year-old as a main character here. And you never knew who you were before you met me. Could it be possible that this is based off from something your sub-conscious is trying to tell you? Maybe it’s something from your past.”

“Michael.” Kenny’s eyes narrowed. “We’re authors. You should know which is fiction and which is reality. It might be, but it might not be as well – but what’s the significance of it? If it came from my past, so what? My life is here, now.” He said, finishing off his breakfast.

Michael nodded and leaned back, obviously disappointed. “Well, you’re probably right. If some sort of mutation happened to you, surely we’d notice. It’s a good story though… If you manipulate your book, making it seem as though everything there was some sort of dream or figment of past from something greater –”

“Please! That sounds so clichéd. I’m not that bothered, you know. I just want this story written – it’s torturing me to do so.” Kenny answered. He stood up and ran a hand through his uncombed hair again. “I’m going to my room. See you.” He waved.

Michael sighed. “I wonder why it’s torture if it’s not true.”

Once he was back in his room, Kenny stepped to his desk and switched on his computer before moving aside to look at himself in the mirror. He frowned at his messy fringe and grabbed the nearby comb, running it through the long strands of hair carelessly. As he did so, the radio buzzed the latest news which Kenny didn’t bother concentrating on. All he managed to listen was that a laboratory blew up from somewhere, killing everyone from it. And that from the documents, they suspected one runaway, yet there wasn’t much information on the missing person – not for a few long years, at least.

Kenny sat down and opened the word document of his novel, running his eyes through the last few sentences he had written down last night. He raised his eyebrows slightly and pursed his lips, deciding to put on some music before he started to write again. The radio was left untouched and he started to type absently, not exactly paying attention – he would do that when he re-read the manuscript later.

The story was about a five-year-old boy who, since he could remember, had always been in a laboratory where he had to endure countless injections and exams from the lab workers. It was all done in secret and the lab started to create different things from the tested humans – artificially-made hybrids. The boy had to endure watching his parents, his brothers and his sisters changed into unnatural beings – he had to hear his parents begging for his safety, his sisters screaming in pain but mostly fright, his brothers tested helplessly – changed, modified… like a doll that needed a haircut from a very young child. Until one day, when it was his turn, his parents managed to kill off one of the professors with the being inside them. It suddenly became chaotic in the lab, and the boy managed to run away while his siblings and parents fought for his life.

What those professors created had killed one of them.

And even after the escape, the boy didn’t know another secret kept from him – that they had tried something newer with him, something that, unknowingly, had gone very, very wrong.

As Kenny continued to write the escape scene, he reminded himself to glance over his notes for the plot afterwards. The scenes, emotions and characteristics flowed out through his fingers to the keyboard and he wondered if authors had simple lives. Writing wasn’t all that hard. The story just flowed out of him, as if he had lived it before – he knew what to write without even needing to think about it. As if someone was controlling him from the inside. It felt brilliant and mysterious at the same time. Always, Kenny had thought that writers would face stress, writer’s block, characteristic problems, facts to research… and yet, for Kenny, it came out naturally that it felt amazing.

As he typed, the radio switched to the news again, though the volume from Kenny’s computer speakers went over it for him to listen properly:

“The missing child, Kenny Rise, is now being searched for by the police. There’s suspicion that he might be involved, as noted judging from the bodies of the experiments done in the laboratory. Kenny Rise was last seen nine years ago, with blonde hair and dark blue eyes. He has a small figure and crooked teeth as well as a thin scar on the finger of his right hand. There is a possibility that Kenny is dead, but the police are content to keep on searching. If you think that you might have seen Kenny, either now or since the last nine years, please call us on…”

A yawn escaped Kenny’s lips and he breathed out slowly, continuing to type up the story. At times, what he wrote scared him – like the feeling of déjà vu and he even considered what Michael had said about the story being connected to his past, but what were the chances of that ever happening? A child being experimented on? Hybrids created by micro-organisms injected into the body, twisting the insides, creating something else in it? It would be good for a fictional story, but for a real life story, it seems to be too much.

Vaguely, Kenny remembered something his friend had told him: Something about people believing too much in books – particularly the ones that were written about reality issues. Kenny couldn’t even argue. It was true that readers sometimes took what they read for granted – like the feelings of someone who was caught in a particular situation, or what might happen should they try something else. But life wasn’t like books – it’s not all happy endings and understanding problems. One would need to dig deeper, into the depths of a person when in real life. Not everyone could understand, or believe.

Not everyone acted the same.

I didn’t stop running until I tripped over my own feet, landing on the sharp grass from the football field. The green blades slashed my arms, but I didn’t care. Mom, Dad… they’re all gone. I had nobody. And in me, I could feel something – I knew they had done something to me like they had with my family, but who would believe me? The only way would be to cut me up and see inside me, but what if they can’t close it again? Who could trust this? A policeman won’t… a fireman won’t… Those people – they aren’t creative. This is beyond them, like what Professor Ash said. Nobody would believe me if I tell them… They’ll say I’m imagining, or pretending.

If one person would believe me, a writer would. They imagine, they see – they might believe.

Kenny hit the ‘Save’ button and smiled to himself. Now that the escape part was completed, he could have more fun with the major plot. Kenny glanced at the clock beside the radio and breathed – he still had a lot of time left to him. Pushing his chair back, Kenny stood up and exited his room to grab a drink from the kitchen, almost colliding with Michael as he did so. Looking up to his stepbrother with raised eyebrows, Kenny noticed that for once, Michael’s face was grave.

“In your room. Now. Close everything.” He said sternly.

Without replying, though still confused, Kenny turned and walked back into his room where he switched the monitor of his computer off as well as the speakers. He unplugged the radio and sat on his bed while Michael grabbed his computer chair, turning to look at Kenny with searching eyes.

“What? What did I do?” Kenny asked after a brief silence between them.

“You did nothing. That’s the problem. Kenny, you did nothing.” Michael said angrily. “Who are you, Kenny Rise? And this story… what’s it all about. Tell me everything.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Kenny answered, startled.

“For God’s sake, Kenny, be truthful! Have I not proven to you that I could be trusted?!” He shouted. It seemed as though Michael was trying hard not to jump out from his chair.

“Trusted with what? Where’s all this coming from?”

Instead of answering, Michael stood up and switched on the monitor of the computer. Wordlessly, he closed the music playing and went on to YouTube where he then typed in Kenny’s name. In a matter of seconds, the screen was up and Michael switched the speakers on, not bothering to tune down the volume. The screen showed a newsreader standing a fair distance off from a destroyed building, identified to be a laboratory. She spoke clearly;

Switching the monitor and speakers off again, Michael turned to face Kenny. “Well?” He asked.

Kenny was speechless. It couldn’t be. There must be some sort of coincidence – his story wasn’t connected to anything. It wasn’t possible. But then again… his imagination was too vivid. Like a living nightmare, haunting him to write it down.

Or to tell someone about it.

The cold realisation of what had happened gripped his heart and Kenny’s eyes widened in surprise. It all made sense. Even what he had written down and what Michael had said before… it all clicked together. His words for his main character; “Who could trust this? A policeman won’t… a fireman won’t… Those people – they aren’t creative.” He quoted. The memory of himself came back, flashes of fiction and fact. Kenny shut his eyes and breathed through his mouth slowly before looking over to Michael who had a puzzled look on his face.

“You didn’t remember?” Michael asked.

Kenny was about to answer, when something else came back to him. Something he would be better off not knowing. He knew it even then, when he was a child… the thing growing in him.

Horrified, Kenny scrambled off from his bed and looked at Michael with fearful eyes. “Michael… You need to… No… I need to get away from here. From you. From everyone.” He gasped, only to find his stepbrother holding him tightly on the shoulders a second later.

“You’re not going anywhere, Kenny. What’s going on? All this is real?”

“Yeah… and that main character in my story – it’s me. You were right all along. But it’s all true. From that story, everything happened. I remember now. Michael, something’s growing inside me. Those scientists were doing human transmutation. Creating artificial hybrids. My family suffered, and they never knew what they have done with me. Mad scientists wanting to achieve too much.”

“Calm down –”

“I can’t calm down! Michael, this was why I ran to the beach those years ago! I couldn’t let people near… There’s something growing inside me, and it’ll change me.”

“Kenny, listen. You’ve been with me for nine years. Nine years. If you say all that proves nothing, then I’ll whack you on the head.”

Kenny shook his head and sighed, quite frustrated. “Michael, for the last time, this isn’t like in the books. This is real. I might kill you now. I don’t know what this thing will do to me. Let me go, and I’ll disappear. I’ll destroy myself, I’ll run away – I’ll do anything, I just don’t want to hurt anyone, okay? Let me go, Michael.”

“No, I won’t. Shit, Kenny, no matter what you try and tell me, I took you in when you’re a boy, and I won’t let you walk out of me. There must be something else behind this. If we go to the police –”

“The police will want proof. And that means cutting me up, examining my body like those scientists again. I don’t want that. I’ll be better off dead. Don’t hold your breath, Michael, I want to die more than to know. I swear.” Kenny answered.

“How the hell will that save yourself?!”

A small laugh escaped his lips. “Believe me. To be free of the truth, that’s freedom enough. I’ll help myself more by ending it the easy way. Because I’m more scared of the truth than to die. It’ll be like embracing hell because I fear that the scientists might be in heaven.”

“You don’t know what you’re doing.”

“I do. You just want this to be a story.”

“No, Kenny. I want my son.” He said, not exactly hesitating. Despite the situation, Kenny smiled slightly. “Kenny, just come with me, and we’ll get out of here, and figure things out.”

“Go where? Michael, you don’t even know what’s going on!” Kenny snapped back.

Michael’s fingers moved down and curled around Kenny’s wrist and his brows furrowed, hiding his anger. His eyes flashed and Kenny suddenly felt surprised as well as intimidated. Like a prey running away from the predator. He focused on his stepbrother’s eyes and something hit him again, hopefully – this time – for the last.

“Michael… you work for them?”

The other’s eyes widened considerably, surprised, but also wary. “What are you talking about?”

Ripping his hand from Michael’s grasp, Kenny moved further away and backed to the window. Michael tilted his head slightly and fixed an intense gaze on Kenny, his face twisted in confusion, but Kenny didn’t care. He already figured it out.

Why would an adult like Michael take in a son at such a young age? Why would an adult like Michael be interested in him? Why? What were the odds? And why was he there anyway – it was midnight, and he was there with another friend. Another guy. It wasn’t normal. It was all planned from the very start.

“What do you want with me? Why?”

Michael’s eyes narrowed. It was now that Kenny could actually see how intense they were; how much they focused on him. “Kenny. Kenny Rise.” He said. Another emotion lurked in Michael's eyes, but Kenny couldn't figure it out. It was as if Michael was trying to figure something out, or trying to deny something - a state of confusion, but probably more than just confused. It looked like betrayal. Unreadable. “It wasn’t a direct order from the lab, but I decided to take action anyway. Kenny, you and your family were chosen for an experiment – an experiment that would have brought fame to us and to you. Are you going to throw that away?” He quizzed. Kenny cursed. “I thought it would be that. Kenny, you were the youngest from the lab, were you not? Your body… there’s something wrong with it, from the very start. My companions were trying to change a few things, true, but you are the only one who never showed any signs that you were affected by it. Your parents sacrificed themselves because it was part of the plan – though we did not expect one of your little friends to kill.”

“My parents would never work for you.”

“You’re certain about that?” Michael asked emotionlessly. “Your parents made the deal that if you could escape the lab life, they would do anything my companions asked them to do. They were willing to be experimented on, just so you could get out from the building. They wanted to get away from you – to separate you from them. My orders were to find you when you went missing, though they never asked me to care for you. I decided that for myself.”

“Why?”

“Why doesn’t matter, does it?” Michael’s eyes went cold. The look in his eyes were still there. “But something happened, and I want to know what. I want to know what killed my companions.”

“It’s got nothing to do with me.”

“You think?” Michael raised an eyebrow, his head still tilted slightly. Kenny saw the opportunity then.

He ran.

“Watch it, kid!” The bulky man growled.

“S-Sorry.” Kenny gasped. He pulled his hood lower to cover his face. The man had dark, intense eyes like Michael – Michael who was still searching for him after Kenny had shoved him away in order to escape. Kenny couldn’t crawl forever. He would need to show himself soon… or would he? He didn’t know. As he looked around, he received glares and angry looks from everyone. As if he had done some sort of crime, but had he? Where’s the difference? Were all these people associated to the scientists?

It couldn’t be.

It shouldn’t matter.

But it did. And that was the problem.

Kenny heard his name called out from behind him, quite a far distance away, but people started to mutter and look around. They’ve heard of Kenny Rise from the news, he would imagine. He cursed under his breath and took a sharp turn right, running down the dark alleyway. Unconsciously, his hand moved to his stomach, then to his chest. Something was in there. He had been scared of it before, and he knew he would always be from now. Something was there. And until anyone knew what it was, it would still be howling in him, waiting to get out.

Non-existent?

Alive?

Remote?

Animated?

Something was there, he was sure of it. Whether that something was nothing or not – that he couldn’t tell. And in the distance, Michael’s voice still called out to him. Kenny’s father had wanted to save him from being kept in lab life. And now, Michael, his stepbrother and stepfather, wanted to find him to know what happened to his own companions… enemy or friend, Kenny could not tell.

He could not tell.

Who could?

The soles of his shoes slapped against the ground, faster and faster. Kenny closed his eyes and hung his head for a second before turning again. His foot caught a small bump in the road and he tripped, landing hard on his knee.

Crawl… slowly, crawl away…

Behind him, shouts. Screams. The beautiful sound of chaos.

And Kenny welcomed chaos.

Kiss by an angel – an angel of life or death, I can’t tell. All I know is that I only want this to be over. I can feel it inside me, twisting and turning, but at the same time, nonexistent. I’m scared. I could scream… but I won’t. I just want to go… somewhere. Not home. No, I never want to go home. That was where I got attacked. Just… somewhere. I can see something coming here, but I don’t know what it is. And I can see a rock lying there – if I reach my hand out, I could get it. It looks sharp.

I bury my head into the sand and reach out, grabbing it with as much courage as I can before pulling it to myself.

…And that were the last two paragraphs of the book written by the suspected Kenny Rise, titled ‘A Predator's Fallacy’.

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