seymoure

Chapter 46

“Fat Boy with ‘Tude”

He had always been a big kid. Strong and big and scared of the damage he could do.

He hadn’t grown up in Watts, but you could get hit by a rock thrown from there on his block.

He had been beaten up a lot as a kid. Teased because he was heavy, he was an easy target. Frightened by his own capacity for destruction he was often set upon by bullies.

People will tell you that those abused as small children carry on inescapable piece of baggage. Rage.

Sebastian Claus had been saddled by that rage for as long as he could remember. Because he knew what that rage could make him do, he swallowed it. Literally. He grew and got more and more drubbings.

At one point he decided that he would channel that powerful anger. He was an unstoppable Golden Gloves boxer at 9. He did not just win fights, within those ropes he was given leaved to beat the hell out of an opponent.

That was what he thought. Until the time he broke an adversary’s jaw in a fight. He heard it break, he felt it through the gloves. He saw the eyes of the other child as he fell to the ground.

He was so horrified at what he had done that he pledged never to raise his hand in anger again.

For over forty years he kept that promise to himself.

But now he was blind, deaf and being beaten.

He was being pushed into some kind of fire by someone who didn’t mind hurting others.

Claus hated few things quite so much as thinking he had caused someone else pain.

Whatever had been used to hit him once again slammed into his belly. Claus grabbed the offending weapon with both hand and pulled it to himself with all his might.

His right foot dug into the ground behind him. It was so hot that he was sure it was in the fire itself, but that did not stop him. He pushed with that leg and rolled onto the attacker.

What he felt with his arms was, without doubt, a leg. Whoever it was had been kicking him.

The big man let his rage enflame him.

He used his grasp on the leg to turn the body above him down to the ground.

The unseen bully was at least six feet tall he surmised from the length of the leg. Claus’ arms and legs pushed him up the length of the persons’ body.

Sebastian used each movement forward to also inflict a powerful body punch to his foe. The opponent seemed frozen with surprise at the fury that was returning from the expected “Easy Target.”

When Claus reached the head of the combatant both hands took the head in a vice-like grip.

The face had a beard, but little hair on the scalp. The skin was weathered, like a sailor or someone else who worked outside in the elements.

The man shook his head and probably was asking that he not be hit anymore. It was too late for him to ask for mercy. Claus punched the face until it stopped moving.

Then he reached down to the leg that he thought must be on fire. It was, and he batted the fire out.

Grasping the scruff of the shirt of his attacker, Sebastian Claus fought to stand again.

He picked up his unconscious opponent and dragged him behind him. He took a couple of steps and his foot found something heavy before him.

It felt a bit like a large rolled up carpet, but was nearly tall enough to be comfortable as a place to sit.

Without letting go of the body he drug behind him, Claus sat to catch his breath.

He sniffed the air.

He could smell the fire, but it wasn’t coming closer, and seemed to smell more like a cooking fire. It smelled wood based, without any plastic or other traces that would say the room was on fire.

He thought he would like to question his prisoner when he woke up, but had no idea how he would do that.

“Damn,” He thought to himself, “My gut hurts.”

The bastard may have broken a rib or two.

He shook the body, but got no response.

What now?