hours debating over what the group should do next. All of the homes in the area were stripped clean; and not just of the food. The past ten homes had yielded absolutely nothing useful. They were officially out of food and prospects.
George made his case for taking over the man’s house very clear. It appeared that desperation and hunger had given him all the skill of a trained orator. In truth, the prospect of Chase’s starvation was really the only point that need be made. Jimmy could not dispute any of George’s seemingly air-tight argument. Nonetheless, the idea of attacking the man was flat appalling to him. The escalation of punishment from looting to murder weighed in heavily on the equation, too.
Looters were generally stripped of all their belongings before being severely beaten and sent away from the area as a limping warning sign for others to see. Murderers, however became a community event if they were caught red-handed. The indicted killers were not executed outright, or even by the townsfolk themselves. Instead, they were marched along in the center of a large jovial procession, which ended at the border with Detroit. This is where the already harassed killers were carried through the barricades and had their major arm and leg tendons slit to prevent their escape. In a wriggling pile of helplessness, they were left awaiting a fate that was far worse than the prospect of a slow, eventual death. The rats always found them first.
The townspeople who hung around always knew that the captured and sliced-up killers had survived just long enough because of the piercing screams. Being eaten alive always resulted in macabre howls, which never tapered in intensity once they had been imprinted upon one’s psyche. These bone-chilling death throes were exactly what the Council was going for. Those screams were what kept the people of New Warren in line. Witnessing them for the first time, just this past year, gave Jimmy pause the entire time that George kept openly talking about committing homicide.
George, feeling that he had won the quarrel, then tried converting Jimmy to the idea of mounting an assault on the crazy guy’s house. George kept alternating between saying how easy it was going to be and how they probably wouldn’t have to kill the man anyway. Jimmy could not withstand the constant barrage for very long and, eventually, gave in wholly. Before Jimmy realized what had happened, George, satisfied with his thorough mental working over of one brother, went upstairs to get the other. He wanted to see if the man had been spotted again, or if anyone else had been seen around the house.
Jimmy now sat nervous and alone. The one candle lighting the basement with wicked, guttering shadows did not help. The idea of Chase and George together, without him being able to supervise the interaction, helped even less. Fast enough to keep the worst of the possibilities from forming, Chase came feeling his way down the dark, creaky steps. He picked up a folding metal chair and set himself quietly down beside his brother. The faint beam of George’s shake-flashlight preceded his descent. The flashlight hardly worked anymore, despite, or perhaps because of, George’s constant sophomoric gesturing with it.
“That dumb-ass tell you what he saw? Said the guy was running around naked outside again,” George guffawed.
“Really, Chase? What did you see him doing?” Jimmy asked his despondent-looking younger brother.
“He came out and dumped more water…or, whatever…out again,” Chase answered dimly. The three youths had had plenty of time to think up ghoulish scenarios to explain the constant dumping of water by a nude lunatic.
“Was he really still naked?” Jimmy wondered aloud. The idea that this guy really was crazy had fully taken root. This made the man different and therefore, lesser. Offensive action was easily more palatable against a freak than it was against an equal.
“Not the first time…He came out twice. Uh…The first time he had clothes on. The second time he was…well…” Chase said, obviously annoyed about having to retell the story. “I don’t want to talk about him. The dude scares me…I mean…”
“Whatever, man. We know for sure now. He has to be in there by himself. Nobody would be acting that weird if other people lived in there,” George announced boldly, starting to pace the basement.
“What are we gonna do?” Chase asked Jimmy, with a hushed tone and pleading eyes, which were in search of an answer that would put him back at ease.
George answered