Spook Me FIC: Hellhole (Oz, R)
Oct. 28th, 2014 12:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vanillalimeTitle: Hellhole
Pairing/Main Characters: Tobias Beecher and some other spookily familiar characters
Rating: R (for language and sexual content)
Length: 3,900 words
Creature Prompt: Snake
Summary: After Chris Keller has fallen over that balcony railing in Em City, an emotional Tobias Beecher is sent to the hole, where he encounters some bizarre situations.
Notes: Written for the 2014 Spook Me Multi-Fandom Halloween Ficathon.
_______________________________
Toby threw the bucket against the stone wall again and again. Somehow, he had managed to forget what the hole was like, but the memories were rushing back quickly, thanks to Chris fucking Keller.
If it weren’t for Keller, he’d be watching one of Holly’s soccer matches right now, or browsing the law library, or fucking Marion, or sipping a martini (and it would be one, only one, because he could stop at one, yes he could, goddammit).
But instead, like an idiot, he’d laid his heart out to be manipulated, torn, and trampled upon once again. And how did Keller, in his own universe of warped logic, try to make amends? By setting him up for Vern Schillinger’s murder! And, now, he undertakes the ultimate act of selfishness, and has the balls to blame Toby, expecting him to feel guilty about it? Not fucking likely!
Toby’s arms grew tired. The bucket was surprisingly indestructible. He tried kicking it around the hole, but that hurt his toes. He sat down in a corner and rubbed his foot, imagining that it was Keller’s neck he was wringing.
Then his foot became Chris’s face, with desperate blue eyes staring up at him and lips forming that twisted smile. Toby started rocking. In time, he began stroking his foot instead. Finally, the tears came, escalating into inconsolable sobs, as the pain of love overwhelmed the pain of hate. He whispered words of forgiveness and remorse, heard by no one.
After an uneasy sleep, Toby awoke with a stiff dick and even stiffer muscles. Not surprisingly, he had been dreaming about Chris. He stood up and stretched, trying to remember the details. Chris had been chasing a rabbit, until he had fallen down its hole and landed in Alice's Wonderland. Toby was reasonably sure that he had been the rabbit.
Toby snickered. At least a tornado hadn't lifted them up and swept them into the Wonderful World of Oz. That would have been incredibly cliche'.
He pissed into the bucket and stumbled toward the door. On the floor in front of the door was a tray of food: cold scrambled eggs and toasted white bread, with a little carton of room-temperature milk. He must have slept through the breakfast alert.
Toby ate slowly, knowing that there would be nothing but his own thoughts to occupy his time once the food was gone. He buried his feelings about Chris and tried to calmly assess his surroundings instead: four stone walls, a cold cement floor, and the wooden bucket. Same old, same old.
Toby wondered if this was what it was like inside a rabbit’s hole. Maybe he was the White Rabbit after all. Chris might fall down on top of him at any moment. Maybe he could use his body to help break Chris's fall.
Toby looked up, but saw only a solid stone ceiling. He sighed and finished eating.
Why did they call this place the hole, anyway? Toby studied the walls. It was more like a box or a cube, really. Although, technically, it was a rectangular prism, not a cube, because the height of the walls was at least two feet greater than the width. Toby envisioned McManus yelling "Take 'em to the rectangular prism!" and dissolved into a fit of giggles. Like McManus was capable of uttering a four-syllable word.
Toby estimated the length, width, and height of the room. Then he calculated the volume and surface area. Doing that took all of fifteen minutes.
He tried to come up with as many words as possible using the letters in the phrase "McManus is an asshole." After thirty minutes, he had created twenty-three words. One of them was "anus," which he found hilariously ironic.
He did sixty sit-ups, fifty push-ups, and twenty jumping jacks before collapsing back into his corner. He wasn't sure what hurt the most: his body, his brain, or his heart. Every part of him was tired. At least he felt a little warmer now. He hugged himself, pretending that it was Chris’s strong arms holding him tight. He tried to hum a lullaby to himself, but Chris's defeated expression invaded his thoughts as he drifted off to sleep again...
Rock-a-bye Chris, on the tree-top.
When the wind blows, the felon will rock.
When the rail breaks, the felon will fall,
And down will go Chris, poison and all.
Toby awoke to the sound of the door closing, and another tray of food on the floor. Was this lunch or dinner? He was already losing sense of the time.
The tray held a cheese sandwich, a bright red apple, and a container of purple liquid that supposedly met some FDA definition of grape juice. The bucket had been emptied, so he tipped it upside down, placed it against a corner of the room, and sat on it. A wooden bucket against his bare ass wasn’t any more comfortable than a cement floor, but at least it wasn’t quite so cold.
Toby took a bite of the apple and allowed its juice to run down his chin. No need to bother with manners in here.
He was about to take a second bite when movement in the opposite corner of the room caught his eye. Toby froze. The single light fixture in the hole provided poor illumination, and the corners were layered in shadows, but something had moved. He was sure of it. A mouse, maybe?
He continued staring into the corner. Suddenly, two milky blue eyes appeared in the gloom, eyes that were too large to belong to a mouse. Was it a rat instead? Was there such a thing as a blue-eyed rat?
The eyes blinked and grew bigger as they inched slightly closer. A bright red, forked tongue broke through the darkness. That tongue was closely followed by the head of a snake.
A snake? What the fuck was a snake doing in the hole?
The snake slowly emerged from the shadows and slithered along the floor, heading in Toby’s direction. Toby didn’t move a muscle.
He knew little about snakes. Some were harmless and made for great pets, while others could kill you with one bite. This snake was gray in color, with black diamond-shaped markings along the length of its body. Toby looked at its tail but saw nothing that resembled a rattle.
The snake came to a stop a couple of feet in front of him. Toby held his breath. The snake raised its head, flicked its tongue, and stared at Toby with its weirdly blue eyes. It continued to rise, and Toby gasped at what he saw. The diamond markings on the snake’s underbelly held a different pattern than the rest of its skin, arranged in such a manner that they seemed to form a cross. It almost looked like a tattoo. This fucking snake had a tattoo of a cross.
Toby yelled. He threw his apple in the snake’s direction. He stood up and yelled some more, waving his arms in front of his face.
Suddenly, the snake was gone. Had it escaped back from where it came? Everything had happened so fast.
Holding the bucket out in front of him like a shield, Toby wandered over to the opposite corner of the room. There was no sign of the snake, but he did discover a small hole in the floor along the edge of the wall, about two or three inches in diameter. Small, yes, but big enough? Maybe.
His heart pounding, Toby carried the bucket back to his corner, picked up his food, and sat down again. Maybe he had imagined the whole thing. He was physically exhausted, emotionally devastated, and mentally vulnerable. He had been thinking about Chris too much. He had been thinking too much, period. The gears in his brain were working overtime, and now they were generating visions to compensate for his loneliness.
Toby rocked back and forth and took a bite of his sandwich. He tried to shut down his brain, but the rhyming kept getting in the way...
Little Miss Tucket
sat on a bucket
eating some cheese and bread.
Along came a snake,
she thought it was fake.
And now Miss Tucket is DEAD!
Toby sat up and rested his head in his arms. He was cold and hungry and, despite his nap, so tired. If he could just sleep properly, he’d feel better. Would it fucking kill them to give the prisoners a blanket while they’re in the hole?
His stomach rumbled. He looked around for a new tray of food, but there still wasn't one. No one had even picked up the old tray from yesterday. Nothing to drink, either.
Toby’s mind wandered back to Alice’s Wonderland and his dreams of Chris. He found himself craving the cake with the instructions that said EAT ME and the bottle that said DRINK ME. He thought of Chris and giggled as he pictured those commands written in large, bold letters across his beautiful, muscular torso.
God, yes, he would drink from Chris, eat him up, sucking and guzzling and swallowing like there was no tomorrow. Toby’s hand made its way down to his cock, already thickening. He closed his eyes and began stroking it. He liked the idea of Chris’s cock being his only source of nourishment, providing the sustenance to keep him alive. The mystical powers of Chris's come would fill his belly and bring relief to his parched mouth. Toby would greedily devour him, deep-throating him, grabbing the fleshy mounds of that incredible ass and spreading the cheeks wide... and with a gasp, Toby came, leaving a small, sticky trail of his own come along the floor.
Toby opened his eyes, and, with a jolt, saw the snake from the previous day lying near his feet, blue eyes staring at him. It had been watching him jerk off.
The snake slowly moved closer, stopping when it reached the puddle of come. It stuck out its tongue and eagerly flicked it into the surrounding air. Toby sat there and watched, mesmerized by the intense, methodical movement. In due time, the snake thrust its mouth into Toby’s come and began drinking it.
Surprisingly, Toby no longer felt any fear or revulsion toward the snake, but instead was oddly aroused by its actions. When it paused, he held out his fingers. The snake reacted naturally, climbing its way up to them, slithering in and out and up and down, exposing its peculiar underbelly, before dropping down onto the floor again. Toby watched as the snake made its way to Toby’s legs, hugging them and moving through them before breaking free and curling up in the corner of the hole where Toby slept.
Toby’s perverse fascination with the snake and its potential companionship allowed him to forget how hungry and thirsty he was, at least temporarily.
Without the periodic arrival or removal of food, Toby completely lost track of time. Had it been two days, or three, since his last meal? It certainly seemed like it had been forever since any human had acknowledged his existence.
He had tried to get someone’s attention a few times by yelling and pounding on the door, hoping to be told to shut up, if nothing else. But there had been no reactions at all.
Had they stuffed him in the hole and then forgotten about him? Was this some kind of extreme punishment for what they thought he'd done? Was he even here at all, or was this some kind of bizarre nightmare?
Toby’s body was too weak for exercise, and his brain was too muddled for math or word puzzles. His only source of entertainment was his friendly snake, who had been making regular, frequent appearances. Toby could no longer talk to it, since doing so exacerbated the dryness of his mouth. But the snake didn't seem to mind, content to let Toby simply fondle and play with him. Toby had tried to communicate with it telepathically a few times, but that didn't really seem to work.
At some point, Toby licked his tongue along the surface of one of the walls. The cool dampness of the stone provided some relief from his thirst, but not much. Toby knew the next step would be drinking the contents from the bucket, but he wasn’t quite there yet.
He lay down in his corner to nap again, but the stomach cramps made sleep difficult. Through his blurry vision, Toby saw the snake approach him. A switch inside his brain flipped, and he began seeing the snake as a form of protein rather than companionship. He felt the snake curl up against his back. Toby pushed his hands against head. NO. He wouldn’t do that to the only friend he had in here. He’d die first. But the idea triggered his tired brain into generating another rhyme...
There was an old lady who swallowed a snake.
What a mistake, to swallow a snake!
She swallowed the snake to catch the cow.
She swallowed the cow to catch the goat.
She swallowed the goat to…
… and Toby fell into a restless sleep, where he dreamed of operating a farm with Chris, one that had failing crops and a dry well.
Toby rolled over with a groan and felt something crunch against his skin. He reached underneath and pulled out a snakeskin. He smiled. The snake must have shed its skin against Toby while he slept. It helped explain Toby's dream where Chris had been giving him a back massage.
Toby wondered if the snake looked different now. He glanced around but didn't see it anywhere. He wandered over to corner of the room where the hole in the floor was. He peered inside to see if he could spot his friend.
Suddenly, a snake leaped out of the hole, almost hitting Toby in the face. Toby stumbled backwards in surprise and fell on his ass. He jumped back up, dropping his jaw in disbelief at what he saw.
This snake was not his friend. It was nearly solid white in color, with large fangs and beady red eyes. Most alarming of all were the tiny markings at the base of the snake's head: skinny red lines that zig-zagged and crossed each other, forming a shape that closely resembled a swastika.
A fucking Nazi snake? Only in Oz.
The snake angrily hissed at Toby, baring its fangs and stabbing the air with its red tongue. This snake was a savage one, who obviously saw Toby as its enemy.
The snake lunged at Toby, its fangs headed straight toward his dick. Adrenaline kicking in, Toby turned away just in time and felt the snake hit his ass instead. He knocked the snake to the floor with his hand and ran to the other side of the room.
Toby grabbed his bucket, its contents flying everywhere, and swung it down on top of the snake. He hit it again, and again, before pausing to take a look at it. The snake lay motionless, and Toby noted with satisfaction that one of the its red eyes was now missing. Hoping to confirm that it was dead, he kicked the snake with his foot, but the damned thing took off, sprinting away toward its hole, arriving there and disappearing before Toby could strike a fatal blow.
Toby weakly fell to the floor. He rubbed his ass where the snake had tried to bite him. When he pulled his hand away, the fingers were smeared with blood. Apparently, the snake had been successful in digging its fangs into Toby after all. Of course, he had no idea if this snake was venomous or not, but the burning sensation back there sure hurt like hell.
Toby's thoughts turned to his friend, and he worried about what had become of him.
As he faded into unconsciousness, Toby began to cry. The sneaking suspicion that had been building within him that he was going to die here in the hole now seemed like a certainty. The only question was whether it would be from a lack of food and water or due to an attack by a killer snake.
Toby was roused by an intrinsic sixth sense, detecting a nearby disturbance. His rubbed his eyes, willing them to focus, and began crawling toward the commotion taking place in the opposite corner of the hole.
What he saw there churned his empty stomach, but it was weirdly captivating nonetheless.
The friendly snake and the Nazi snake had both reappeared. The eyes of Toby's companion had changed from a milky blue to bright blue, and its skin was brighter, but it was definitely him. Grotesquely, it was in the process of trying to eat the Nazi snake, the jaws of its mouth wrapped around the Nazi's tail and swallowing. But on the flip side, the Nazi snake was doing the same thing, its jaws wrapped likewise around the other snake's tail, thereby forming a perverse circle of snake-eating-snake.
Trying to force his brain into comprehending what was happening, Toby watched in horror as the Nazi snake began to win the struggle. The snake circle gradually got smaller, with the friendly snake slowly disappearing further into the jaws of the dominant Nazi.
That motherfucking Nazi was going to kill Toby's friend. He couldn't let that happen.
Toby grabbed hold of the Nazi snake's head with one hand. Then, summoning the last bit of strength that was left in him, he used his other hand to begin pulling the other snake’s tail out of the Nazi's mouth. He was surprised by how much effort was necessary (or maybe it was just because he was so weak), but the circle gradually grew bigger. Eventually, Toby removed the last bit of the tail, freeing his friend.
The Nazi snake hissed at him and tried to strike, but Toby had had enough. He stumbled to his feet, raised one of them, and brought it down on top of its head. Toby wasn't sure if the blow killed the snake or simply stunned it, but it didn't matter. The other snake used the opportunity to finish the Nazi off, swallowing and swallowing until it had consumed it completely.
Toby raised his arms in the air. A triumph of good over evil was rare in Oz, and he was thrilled to bear witness to the occurrence. Clapping his hands, he gave a hoarse victory holler. As he slumped against the wall, his faithful companion slowly slithered between and around his feet before disappearing back down its hole.
At that moment, the door into the room opened wide.
Toby looked up, and there in the entrance stood a giant, neon-green, bug-like creature. It was as tall as Toby and had a black face with large, hollow eyes and a gaping black mouth. That mouth made slow, gasping sounds as the thing continued to stand there, staring at Toby.
Toby screamed. And screamed. A fight-or-flight instinct kicked in, and Toby's thoughts quickly focused on the escape potential of the open door—escape from not only this creature, but from this hellhole that imprisoned him as well.
Toby jumped up and rushed toward the door, hoping to use the element of surprise to elude the creature. Instead, the creature raised its long black antenna and sprayed Toby in the face. The mist stung Toby's eyes, blinding him. He breathed in, and the poison invaded his mouth and nose and burned his lungs. He coughed, collapsing at the door's threshold, and blacked out.
So close, and yet so far.
"Tom! Tom! Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah. I'm alright. Except I might've just shit my pants."
"Who the fuck is this?!"
"Beats me! I heard some noises coming from inside the room, and when I opened the door, this crazy naked man was inside! He started screaming and came running straight at me! I thought he was going to kill me!"
"Holy shit! He's gotta be one of the prisoners. Oz was supposed to be completely evacuated three days ago!"
"Well, this guy must've slipped through the cracks."
"What did you do to him?"
"I sprayed him with decontaminant, and he passed out."
"Good God, I’ll go call the medical emergency crew to get down here."
"Oh, fuck."
"What's wrong now?"
"The guy tore a hole in my hazmat suit! I've been exposed to anthrax!"
"Jesus, Tom, if there was any of that shit down here, this guy would've died days ago."
"Oh. I guess you're right."
"Man, I can't believe they just left him down here. There's going to hell to pay. I wonder if his family knows any good lawyers."
"Unbelievable. Un-fucking-believable."
"I don't know why you're so upset," said Querns as he poured himself another shot. "As warden, it's my ass that's gonna fry."
McManus shook his head. "They'll come after me. After Keller's fall, I'm the one who rushed Beecher to the hole without doing all the paperwork."
Querns smirked. "Yeah, you're right. We're both toast."
McManus put his head in hands.
There was a knock at the door, and Sister Pete entered the room. She rushed over to the table and sat down between the two men.
"Is it true?" she asked breathlessly.
McManus sighed. "Yeah, it's true."
"Good lord," she said, drawing her hand up to her mouth. "How is he?"
Querns folded his arms. "Physically, he's going to be fine. But mentally.... " his voice trailed away.
"Oh, dear."
"With a lot of therapy, he might be okay!" McManus exclaimed optimistically.
After a moment, Sister Pete asked, "Would you like some good news?"
"I would love some."
"Chris Keller miraculously came out of his coma last night."
"Yeah, we heard. Apparently, they put Beecher in the hospital room next to his. How is he?"
Sister Pete smiled weakly. "With a lot of therapy, he might be okay."
McManus just nodded his head.
"I was there," she continued. "The first words out of his mouth were to ask how Tobias was."
"Imagine that," Querns said sarcastically. "What else did he have to say?"
"Well, he admitted to jumping over that railing. He was slightly incoherent, but he talked about being a changed man. He had shed his skin, and all that. He promised not to hurt Tobias anymore and to always protect him." Sister Pete shrugged. "It wasn't anything I hadn't heard before."
McManus snorted. "Well, they're going to be spending a nice, long time with each other in the psych ward. Maybe they can work out their shit in therapy together," he wryly suggested.
Querns cleared his throat. "I could use some genuinely good news. Maybe we could save our asses if we discovered who sent that bottle of anthrax into Oz, starting this whole mess."
"I wonder... " said Sister Pete, hesitating before continuing. "Chris mumbled something specifically about protecting Tobias from a poisonous attack by Vern Schillinger. I thought it was just something he imagined during his coma, but it's possible that he was referring to the anthrax."
Querns slapped the table. "I'm good with that. Let's blame the whole thing on Schillinger! Since he's dead, he can't defend himself. Keller will be our source."
"Seriously?" McManus asked skeptically. "You're gonna take the word of one snake about the actions of another?"
"Why not?" Querns replied. "In Oz, that's pretty much all you've got."
Pairing/Main Characters: Tobias Beecher and some other spookily familiar characters
Rating: R (for language and sexual content)
Length: 3,900 words
Creature Prompt: Snake
Summary: After Chris Keller has fallen over that balcony railing in Em City, an emotional Tobias Beecher is sent to the hole, where he encounters some bizarre situations.
Notes: Written for the 2014 Spook Me Multi-Fandom Halloween Ficathon.
_______________________________
Toby threw the bucket against the stone wall again and again. Somehow, he had managed to forget what the hole was like, but the memories were rushing back quickly, thanks to Chris fucking Keller.
If it weren’t for Keller, he’d be watching one of Holly’s soccer matches right now, or browsing the law library, or fucking Marion, or sipping a martini (and it would be one, only one, because he could stop at one, yes he could, goddammit).
But instead, like an idiot, he’d laid his heart out to be manipulated, torn, and trampled upon once again. And how did Keller, in his own universe of warped logic, try to make amends? By setting him up for Vern Schillinger’s murder! And, now, he undertakes the ultimate act of selfishness, and has the balls to blame Toby, expecting him to feel guilty about it? Not fucking likely!
Toby’s arms grew tired. The bucket was surprisingly indestructible. He tried kicking it around the hole, but that hurt his toes. He sat down in a corner and rubbed his foot, imagining that it was Keller’s neck he was wringing.
Then his foot became Chris’s face, with desperate blue eyes staring up at him and lips forming that twisted smile. Toby started rocking. In time, he began stroking his foot instead. Finally, the tears came, escalating into inconsolable sobs, as the pain of love overwhelmed the pain of hate. He whispered words of forgiveness and remorse, heard by no one.
*~*~*~*~*
After an uneasy sleep, Toby awoke with a stiff dick and even stiffer muscles. Not surprisingly, he had been dreaming about Chris. He stood up and stretched, trying to remember the details. Chris had been chasing a rabbit, until he had fallen down its hole and landed in Alice's Wonderland. Toby was reasonably sure that he had been the rabbit.
Toby snickered. At least a tornado hadn't lifted them up and swept them into the Wonderful World of Oz. That would have been incredibly cliche'.
He pissed into the bucket and stumbled toward the door. On the floor in front of the door was a tray of food: cold scrambled eggs and toasted white bread, with a little carton of room-temperature milk. He must have slept through the breakfast alert.
Toby ate slowly, knowing that there would be nothing but his own thoughts to occupy his time once the food was gone. He buried his feelings about Chris and tried to calmly assess his surroundings instead: four stone walls, a cold cement floor, and the wooden bucket. Same old, same old.
Toby wondered if this was what it was like inside a rabbit’s hole. Maybe he was the White Rabbit after all. Chris might fall down on top of him at any moment. Maybe he could use his body to help break Chris's fall.
Toby looked up, but saw only a solid stone ceiling. He sighed and finished eating.
*~*~*~*~*
Why did they call this place the hole, anyway? Toby studied the walls. It was more like a box or a cube, really. Although, technically, it was a rectangular prism, not a cube, because the height of the walls was at least two feet greater than the width. Toby envisioned McManus yelling "Take 'em to the rectangular prism!" and dissolved into a fit of giggles. Like McManus was capable of uttering a four-syllable word.
Toby estimated the length, width, and height of the room. Then he calculated the volume and surface area. Doing that took all of fifteen minutes.
He tried to come up with as many words as possible using the letters in the phrase "McManus is an asshole." After thirty minutes, he had created twenty-three words. One of them was "anus," which he found hilariously ironic.
He did sixty sit-ups, fifty push-ups, and twenty jumping jacks before collapsing back into his corner. He wasn't sure what hurt the most: his body, his brain, or his heart. Every part of him was tired. At least he felt a little warmer now. He hugged himself, pretending that it was Chris’s strong arms holding him tight. He tried to hum a lullaby to himself, but Chris's defeated expression invaded his thoughts as he drifted off to sleep again...
Rock-a-bye Chris, on the tree-top.
When the wind blows, the felon will rock.
When the rail breaks, the felon will fall,
And down will go Chris, poison and all.
*~*~*~*~*
Toby awoke to the sound of the door closing, and another tray of food on the floor. Was this lunch or dinner? He was already losing sense of the time.
The tray held a cheese sandwich, a bright red apple, and a container of purple liquid that supposedly met some FDA definition of grape juice. The bucket had been emptied, so he tipped it upside down, placed it against a corner of the room, and sat on it. A wooden bucket against his bare ass wasn’t any more comfortable than a cement floor, but at least it wasn’t quite so cold.
Toby took a bite of the apple and allowed its juice to run down his chin. No need to bother with manners in here.
He was about to take a second bite when movement in the opposite corner of the room caught his eye. Toby froze. The single light fixture in the hole provided poor illumination, and the corners were layered in shadows, but something had moved. He was sure of it. A mouse, maybe?
He continued staring into the corner. Suddenly, two milky blue eyes appeared in the gloom, eyes that were too large to belong to a mouse. Was it a rat instead? Was there such a thing as a blue-eyed rat?
The eyes blinked and grew bigger as they inched slightly closer. A bright red, forked tongue broke through the darkness. That tongue was closely followed by the head of a snake.
A snake? What the fuck was a snake doing in the hole?
The snake slowly emerged from the shadows and slithered along the floor, heading in Toby’s direction. Toby didn’t move a muscle.
He knew little about snakes. Some were harmless and made for great pets, while others could kill you with one bite. This snake was gray in color, with black diamond-shaped markings along the length of its body. Toby looked at its tail but saw nothing that resembled a rattle.
The snake came to a stop a couple of feet in front of him. Toby held his breath. The snake raised its head, flicked its tongue, and stared at Toby with its weirdly blue eyes. It continued to rise, and Toby gasped at what he saw. The diamond markings on the snake’s underbelly held a different pattern than the rest of its skin, arranged in such a manner that they seemed to form a cross. It almost looked like a tattoo. This fucking snake had a tattoo of a cross.
Toby yelled. He threw his apple in the snake’s direction. He stood up and yelled some more, waving his arms in front of his face.
Suddenly, the snake was gone. Had it escaped back from where it came? Everything had happened so fast.
Holding the bucket out in front of him like a shield, Toby wandered over to the opposite corner of the room. There was no sign of the snake, but he did discover a small hole in the floor along the edge of the wall, about two or three inches in diameter. Small, yes, but big enough? Maybe.
His heart pounding, Toby carried the bucket back to his corner, picked up his food, and sat down again. Maybe he had imagined the whole thing. He was physically exhausted, emotionally devastated, and mentally vulnerable. He had been thinking about Chris too much. He had been thinking too much, period. The gears in his brain were working overtime, and now they were generating visions to compensate for his loneliness.
Toby rocked back and forth and took a bite of his sandwich. He tried to shut down his brain, but the rhyming kept getting in the way...
Little Miss Tucket
sat on a bucket
eating some cheese and bread.
Along came a snake,
she thought it was fake.
And now Miss Tucket is DEAD!
*~*~*~*~*
Toby sat up and rested his head in his arms. He was cold and hungry and, despite his nap, so tired. If he could just sleep properly, he’d feel better. Would it fucking kill them to give the prisoners a blanket while they’re in the hole?
His stomach rumbled. He looked around for a new tray of food, but there still wasn't one. No one had even picked up the old tray from yesterday. Nothing to drink, either.
Toby’s mind wandered back to Alice’s Wonderland and his dreams of Chris. He found himself craving the cake with the instructions that said EAT ME and the bottle that said DRINK ME. He thought of Chris and giggled as he pictured those commands written in large, bold letters across his beautiful, muscular torso.
God, yes, he would drink from Chris, eat him up, sucking and guzzling and swallowing like there was no tomorrow. Toby’s hand made its way down to his cock, already thickening. He closed his eyes and began stroking it. He liked the idea of Chris’s cock being his only source of nourishment, providing the sustenance to keep him alive. The mystical powers of Chris's come would fill his belly and bring relief to his parched mouth. Toby would greedily devour him, deep-throating him, grabbing the fleshy mounds of that incredible ass and spreading the cheeks wide... and with a gasp, Toby came, leaving a small, sticky trail of his own come along the floor.
Toby opened his eyes, and, with a jolt, saw the snake from the previous day lying near his feet, blue eyes staring at him. It had been watching him jerk off.
The snake slowly moved closer, stopping when it reached the puddle of come. It stuck out its tongue and eagerly flicked it into the surrounding air. Toby sat there and watched, mesmerized by the intense, methodical movement. In due time, the snake thrust its mouth into Toby’s come and began drinking it.
Surprisingly, Toby no longer felt any fear or revulsion toward the snake, but instead was oddly aroused by its actions. When it paused, he held out his fingers. The snake reacted naturally, climbing its way up to them, slithering in and out and up and down, exposing its peculiar underbelly, before dropping down onto the floor again. Toby watched as the snake made its way to Toby’s legs, hugging them and moving through them before breaking free and curling up in the corner of the hole where Toby slept.
Toby’s perverse fascination with the snake and its potential companionship allowed him to forget how hungry and thirsty he was, at least temporarily.
*~*~*~*~*
Without the periodic arrival or removal of food, Toby completely lost track of time. Had it been two days, or three, since his last meal? It certainly seemed like it had been forever since any human had acknowledged his existence.
He had tried to get someone’s attention a few times by yelling and pounding on the door, hoping to be told to shut up, if nothing else. But there had been no reactions at all.
Had they stuffed him in the hole and then forgotten about him? Was this some kind of extreme punishment for what they thought he'd done? Was he even here at all, or was this some kind of bizarre nightmare?
Toby’s body was too weak for exercise, and his brain was too muddled for math or word puzzles. His only source of entertainment was his friendly snake, who had been making regular, frequent appearances. Toby could no longer talk to it, since doing so exacerbated the dryness of his mouth. But the snake didn't seem to mind, content to let Toby simply fondle and play with him. Toby had tried to communicate with it telepathically a few times, but that didn't really seem to work.
At some point, Toby licked his tongue along the surface of one of the walls. The cool dampness of the stone provided some relief from his thirst, but not much. Toby knew the next step would be drinking the contents from the bucket, but he wasn’t quite there yet.
He lay down in his corner to nap again, but the stomach cramps made sleep difficult. Through his blurry vision, Toby saw the snake approach him. A switch inside his brain flipped, and he began seeing the snake as a form of protein rather than companionship. He felt the snake curl up against his back. Toby pushed his hands against head. NO. He wouldn’t do that to the only friend he had in here. He’d die first. But the idea triggered his tired brain into generating another rhyme...
There was an old lady who swallowed a snake.
What a mistake, to swallow a snake!
She swallowed the snake to catch the cow.
She swallowed the cow to catch the goat.
She swallowed the goat to…
… and Toby fell into a restless sleep, where he dreamed of operating a farm with Chris, one that had failing crops and a dry well.
*~*~*~*~*
Toby rolled over with a groan and felt something crunch against his skin. He reached underneath and pulled out a snakeskin. He smiled. The snake must have shed its skin against Toby while he slept. It helped explain Toby's dream where Chris had been giving him a back massage.
Toby wondered if the snake looked different now. He glanced around but didn't see it anywhere. He wandered over to corner of the room where the hole in the floor was. He peered inside to see if he could spot his friend.
Suddenly, a snake leaped out of the hole, almost hitting Toby in the face. Toby stumbled backwards in surprise and fell on his ass. He jumped back up, dropping his jaw in disbelief at what he saw.
This snake was not his friend. It was nearly solid white in color, with large fangs and beady red eyes. Most alarming of all were the tiny markings at the base of the snake's head: skinny red lines that zig-zagged and crossed each other, forming a shape that closely resembled a swastika.
A fucking Nazi snake? Only in Oz.
The snake angrily hissed at Toby, baring its fangs and stabbing the air with its red tongue. This snake was a savage one, who obviously saw Toby as its enemy.
The snake lunged at Toby, its fangs headed straight toward his dick. Adrenaline kicking in, Toby turned away just in time and felt the snake hit his ass instead. He knocked the snake to the floor with his hand and ran to the other side of the room.
Toby grabbed his bucket, its contents flying everywhere, and swung it down on top of the snake. He hit it again, and again, before pausing to take a look at it. The snake lay motionless, and Toby noted with satisfaction that one of the its red eyes was now missing. Hoping to confirm that it was dead, he kicked the snake with his foot, but the damned thing took off, sprinting away toward its hole, arriving there and disappearing before Toby could strike a fatal blow.
Toby weakly fell to the floor. He rubbed his ass where the snake had tried to bite him. When he pulled his hand away, the fingers were smeared with blood. Apparently, the snake had been successful in digging its fangs into Toby after all. Of course, he had no idea if this snake was venomous or not, but the burning sensation back there sure hurt like hell.
Toby's thoughts turned to his friend, and he worried about what had become of him.
As he faded into unconsciousness, Toby began to cry. The sneaking suspicion that had been building within him that he was going to die here in the hole now seemed like a certainty. The only question was whether it would be from a lack of food and water or due to an attack by a killer snake.
*~*~*~*~*
Toby was roused by an intrinsic sixth sense, detecting a nearby disturbance. His rubbed his eyes, willing them to focus, and began crawling toward the commotion taking place in the opposite corner of the hole.
What he saw there churned his empty stomach, but it was weirdly captivating nonetheless.
The friendly snake and the Nazi snake had both reappeared. The eyes of Toby's companion had changed from a milky blue to bright blue, and its skin was brighter, but it was definitely him. Grotesquely, it was in the process of trying to eat the Nazi snake, the jaws of its mouth wrapped around the Nazi's tail and swallowing. But on the flip side, the Nazi snake was doing the same thing, its jaws wrapped likewise around the other snake's tail, thereby forming a perverse circle of snake-eating-snake.
Trying to force his brain into comprehending what was happening, Toby watched in horror as the Nazi snake began to win the struggle. The snake circle gradually got smaller, with the friendly snake slowly disappearing further into the jaws of the dominant Nazi.
That motherfucking Nazi was going to kill Toby's friend. He couldn't let that happen.
Toby grabbed hold of the Nazi snake's head with one hand. Then, summoning the last bit of strength that was left in him, he used his other hand to begin pulling the other snake’s tail out of the Nazi's mouth. He was surprised by how much effort was necessary (or maybe it was just because he was so weak), but the circle gradually grew bigger. Eventually, Toby removed the last bit of the tail, freeing his friend.
The Nazi snake hissed at him and tried to strike, but Toby had had enough. He stumbled to his feet, raised one of them, and brought it down on top of its head. Toby wasn't sure if the blow killed the snake or simply stunned it, but it didn't matter. The other snake used the opportunity to finish the Nazi off, swallowing and swallowing until it had consumed it completely.
Toby raised his arms in the air. A triumph of good over evil was rare in Oz, and he was thrilled to bear witness to the occurrence. Clapping his hands, he gave a hoarse victory holler. As he slumped against the wall, his faithful companion slowly slithered between and around his feet before disappearing back down its hole.
At that moment, the door into the room opened wide.
Toby looked up, and there in the entrance stood a giant, neon-green, bug-like creature. It was as tall as Toby and had a black face with large, hollow eyes and a gaping black mouth. That mouth made slow, gasping sounds as the thing continued to stand there, staring at Toby.
Toby screamed. And screamed. A fight-or-flight instinct kicked in, and Toby's thoughts quickly focused on the escape potential of the open door—escape from not only this creature, but from this hellhole that imprisoned him as well.
Toby jumped up and rushed toward the door, hoping to use the element of surprise to elude the creature. Instead, the creature raised its long black antenna and sprayed Toby in the face. The mist stung Toby's eyes, blinding him. He breathed in, and the poison invaded his mouth and nose and burned his lungs. He coughed, collapsing at the door's threshold, and blacked out.
So close, and yet so far.
*~*~*~*~*
"Tom! Tom! Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah. I'm alright. Except I might've just shit my pants."
"Who the fuck is this?!"
"Beats me! I heard some noises coming from inside the room, and when I opened the door, this crazy naked man was inside! He started screaming and came running straight at me! I thought he was going to kill me!"
"Holy shit! He's gotta be one of the prisoners. Oz was supposed to be completely evacuated three days ago!"
"Well, this guy must've slipped through the cracks."
"What did you do to him?"
"I sprayed him with decontaminant, and he passed out."
"Good God, I’ll go call the medical emergency crew to get down here."
"Oh, fuck."
"What's wrong now?"
"The guy tore a hole in my hazmat suit! I've been exposed to anthrax!"
"Jesus, Tom, if there was any of that shit down here, this guy would've died days ago."
"Oh. I guess you're right."
"Man, I can't believe they just left him down here. There's going to hell to pay. I wonder if his family knows any good lawyers."
*~*~*~*~*
"Unbelievable. Un-fucking-believable."
"I don't know why you're so upset," said Querns as he poured himself another shot. "As warden, it's my ass that's gonna fry."
McManus shook his head. "They'll come after me. After Keller's fall, I'm the one who rushed Beecher to the hole without doing all the paperwork."
Querns smirked. "Yeah, you're right. We're both toast."
McManus put his head in hands.
There was a knock at the door, and Sister Pete entered the room. She rushed over to the table and sat down between the two men.
"Is it true?" she asked breathlessly.
McManus sighed. "Yeah, it's true."
"Good lord," she said, drawing her hand up to her mouth. "How is he?"
Querns folded his arms. "Physically, he's going to be fine. But mentally.... " his voice trailed away.
"Oh, dear."
"With a lot of therapy, he might be okay!" McManus exclaimed optimistically.
After a moment, Sister Pete asked, "Would you like some good news?"
"I would love some."
"Chris Keller miraculously came out of his coma last night."
"Yeah, we heard. Apparently, they put Beecher in the hospital room next to his. How is he?"
Sister Pete smiled weakly. "With a lot of therapy, he might be okay."
McManus just nodded his head.
"I was there," she continued. "The first words out of his mouth were to ask how Tobias was."
"Imagine that," Querns said sarcastically. "What else did he have to say?"
"Well, he admitted to jumping over that railing. He was slightly incoherent, but he talked about being a changed man. He had shed his skin, and all that. He promised not to hurt Tobias anymore and to always protect him." Sister Pete shrugged. "It wasn't anything I hadn't heard before."
McManus snorted. "Well, they're going to be spending a nice, long time with each other in the psych ward. Maybe they can work out their shit in therapy together," he wryly suggested.
Querns cleared his throat. "I could use some genuinely good news. Maybe we could save our asses if we discovered who sent that bottle of anthrax into Oz, starting this whole mess."
"I wonder... " said Sister Pete, hesitating before continuing. "Chris mumbled something specifically about protecting Tobias from a poisonous attack by Vern Schillinger. I thought it was just something he imagined during his coma, but it's possible that he was referring to the anthrax."
Querns slapped the table. "I'm good with that. Let's blame the whole thing on Schillinger! Since he's dead, he can't defend himself. Keller will be our source."
"Seriously?" McManus asked skeptically. "You're gonna take the word of one snake about the actions of another?"
"Why not?" Querns replied. "In Oz, that's pretty much all you've got."
