What seemed like a long time later and a claustrophobic nightmare of being shoved into what he recognized as a CAT scanner and an MRI, all of it still on his face, he dragged his way back into awareness, conscious again of the pain, screaming agony shrilling along his nerves, seeming to penetrate into his very soul.
 

Southern Comfort
Chapter 4
By Theide
 

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Still another chapter, a bit rough, but it goes further to explain some of what has happened in Sean's past. Bear with me folks, the story really is going somewhere, but some explanation was in order. Enjoy, if you can.

What seemed like a long time later and a claustrophobic nightmare of being shoved into what he recognized as a CAT scanner and an MRI, all of it still on his face, he dragged his way back into awareness, conscious again of the pain, screaming agony shrilling along his nerves, seeming to penetrate into his very soul.

“Baby, I love you, please don’t die on me…” It was Charlie. He managed to open his eyes to see his husband’s tear streaked face. The expression he saw there was enough to make him want to get off the bed and give him a hug, but he couldn’t.

“I won’t, I love you too…” He managed to croak as a sudden feeling of blessed relief swept over him and he could barely maintain his focus on Charlie’s face. The pain was receding, but with it, so was his ability to remain aware of his surroundings

This time when he awoke, the pain wasn’t quite so bad, and he was laying on his back, looking at the ceiling. There was the persistent beeping of monitors, and he could hear the murmuring of voices, the noise of what he could only assume was a hospital.

“Mr. Barber, are you awake? Can you understand me?” The voice was coming from a large, blurry vision which kept flashing some irritating light in his eyes.

He blinked a few times, and the blur faded some. He could tell that it was a man in a white coat standing over him, and the light was coming from a small penlight he was holding.

“Yeah I hear you, would you get that goddamn light out of my eyes?” Sean tried to move only to find himself restrained. “Why can’t I move?”

“You’ve been in medically induced coma for a little over two months, we had to deal with the swelling in your brain from the head trauma, and you thrashed around a bit when we started to bring you out of it.” The light went away, and he started to think that he recognized the voice, but he just couldn’t place it.

“Do you know who you are?”

“I’m Sean Barber. I’m not sure who you are, though. Where’s Charlie? I want to see Charlie.”

“He’s on his way here right now. Do you know where you are?”

“I’m guessing MUSC. Doc, do they know who did this to me?” Sean was becoming more and more cognizant of his surroundings, and even though the new awareness brought the pain to the fore, it also kicked his brain into high gear.

“Doc Rambo? Little Casper Milquetoast type guy, right?” The sudden spark of recognition made him almost laugh, but that hurt too much. “Hey, you know you removed my appendix way back in ’91. I remember when they told me your name in recovery, I laughed till I puked and they had to put me back under.”

“Yeah, that was pretty funny. I had to remove a lot more than your appendix this time, though. You sure you want to hear it all right now?”

“Yeah doc, lay it on me, you can’t have done any worse than those skinhead bastards did to me.”

“Well, I had to remove most of your large intestine and your prostate gland. I was able to save your sphincters, so you won’t have to wear diapers and you will be able to go to the bathroom normally, but that’s the best I could do. They burned your penis and testicles off with what seems to be a blowtorch, so those are gone, but we were able to do some skin grafts and you will be able to pee normally and walk without pain.”

“I already know about my dick and balls, Doc, they made me watch them do it and then made me eat them before they started in on the rest of me.” Sean had a sudden thought, and he knew he was right even before he got a reply from the doctor.

“So this means I’ll never have sex of any kind again, doesn’t it, doc?”

“Well, it seems they deliberately tried to deprive you of any ability to orgasm or even experience arousal, so yes, I suppose that is what it means.” The doctor seemed to be deeply disturbed by this.

Sean was beginning to feel a slow burn of anger within his being. Even tempered by what he knew had to be fairly heavy painkillers, he was feeling the beginnings of a cold killing rage sweep through his awareness.

He barely heard through the swirl of his own thoughts when the doctor left, and when Charlie entered, he didn’t even notice until he heard his voice.

“Baby, I’m here.” The soothing baritone swept through his rage, diverting into other paths of thought.

“Hi baby, I love you!” Sean tried again to move, but it was too much, so he just cried as he felt his lovers arms envelope him, sharing a moment of intimacy that seemed to flow through him as he was showered with gentle kisses.

“I missed you so much! I was afraid you were gonna die. I couldn’t stand it. Please don’t ever do that to me again!” He wept, and Sean tasted his tears and tried his best to hold back his own. Soon they were both just crying, and Sean wished that he could return the embrace, but it did hurt.

“Ow! Don’t squeeze so hard!”

Charlie immediately withdrew, a look of infinite tenderness and worry on his face.

“Is this okay? I don’t ever want to hurt you, please tell me if I do, I’m just glad you’re alive! I couldn’t bear to lose you, you are the only one I have ever loved and I just couldn’t live without you!”

They both cried some more, until the nurse came and made Charlie leave. Sean just lay there, alternating between tears of grief and rage, sobbing the one moment and snarling the next, until the nurse came and came gave him a shot in his IV. He then drifted off to sleep, still angry.

The next few months were an agony of physical therapy until he was released from the hospital. Then more physical therapy, and the glad comfort of being held in his lovers arms until he was able to finally go to sleep, being soothed back to sleep when he woke screaming in the night from the dreams

For the next year, Sean drove himself, constantly running, working out, gathering his strength. He enrolled in several martial arts classes, refreshing the old skills his father had taught him as a child and adding new skills. During all this time, he kept in touch with the police about his case, his fury gradually growing even hotter as it became apparent that the cops were doing nothing to pursue the case.

He took to spending time creeping through the forests and swamps of the lowcountry, practicing his woodcraft and pretending to hunt his attackers, until he finally felt he was ready to put his plans into action. He had a good idea who was involved, and had even had reports of several of them bragging about what they had done to “that freak”. He was aware that Charlie knew what he was doing, and was trying to discourage him from it, but it made no difference. The rage was consuming his being, and when he finally convinced that he was ready and knew who all of his tormentors were, he resolved to enact his plans for vengeance.

Almost 2 years after his release from the hospital, darkness closed in on the campus of the College of Charleston. Sean was concealed in the bushes, waiting on the ground floor of the parking garage of an upscale apartment complex just off campus. He saw his quarry drive in, a newly married , newly minted graduate at the wheel of a brand new Mercedes he knew had been bought for him by his father.

Sean waited while his target exited the car, carrying a very expensive looking briefcase. The man snapped his phone shut, ending what sounded like a very amiable conversation conducted entirely in legalese. He turned to walk toward the exit, completely unaware of the figure darting from one pool of shadow to the other.

Sean rushed forward, swinging a staff as he approached. The staff swept the young lawyer’s legs from under him, and he landed with a “Whoof” of air expelling from his lungs. Another sweep of the staff and an explosive crack as the weighted end struck a forearm, shattering the bone. Sean took a moment to make sure the prey had seen his face before he proceeded to crush his testicles with another swift sweep of the staff. Another few blows to various portions of the body, and he vanished into the young night, leaving behind him a broken bleeding mass of a man who could not even manage to reach his cellphone to call for help. He was too badly damaged, too many bones shattered by the whistling, pulverizing blows.

Sean knew the police would be looking for him soon, but he could not stop now, not if he was to have the vengeance he had sworn s he lay in the hospital, the payment he had sworn to extract from his tormentors as he cried in agony during physical therapy. No, there was much left to do this night. A grim smile crept over his features as he contemplated the note he had left on his first target of the night.

A little while later, in the garden of a house off Broad street, He watched as another young man relaxed on the verandah, drinking a beer with obvious relish. A woman’s voice came drifting through the opened door demanding that he come to dinner. A repeat of the scene in the garage, and the thing was done, nothing to show what had been but a broken man and a shadow vanishing into the dark.

Less than an hour later, the same scenario, this time on a boat. Again and again he struck, the sound of breaking bones music in his ears as the song of vengeance swelled triumphant in his ears. Each time he left a piece of completely incriminating evidence behind, something the police could not ignore, which would cause the man to be locked up for a long, long time.

Finally, the home of his last target was in his vision, and the sweet song in his ears keened with a bloodlust long in the making. This last was to be the man who had wielded the torch, and this one was going to die. He trembled with eagerness as he climbed onto the third floor of a home just off the Battery.

Just as he eased his way into what he knew to be his target’s bedroom, he heard a soft snore stop, and as he aimed his gun toward the larger of the two figures on the bed, as his finger took up slack on the trigger, the smaller figure moved, throwing herself over the other with a loud “No!”.

But the hammer was already falling, and though he tried to twist the barrel aside at the last instant, he knew he was too late. The single round penetrated both figures, and as they hemorrhaged their lives out into the mattress, a part of him died. He wasn’t here to kill innocents, he was here only to take revenge for what had been done to him. He fled in a rush of guilt and anger at himself, the hot tears streaming down his face as he ran to his waiting car, flinging the gun into a river as he passed over the ornate bridge, the staff following, both to sink forever in the pluff mud. He knew he had just committed the perfect crimes, but he was unable to feel any joy in it.

He had just killed an innocent. It did not matter that it was a mistake. He pulled into his driveway, and ran inside, just making it to the bathroom before the bitter bile of self condemnation rushed forth from his mouth and into the bowl, but no matter how long he retched, the horrible feeling of guilt would not leave the pit of his stomach. He vowed, over and over to himself, that he would never hurt another living thing.