“What is that?”
“That, my little friend, is Curtis. We treat him as an individual. He’s something new.”
The pair were standing under a battered old sign, one that displayed nothing but a barely discernible iron ‘T’, heavily rusted after years of withstanding the gentle sea breeze of the Dublin coast. The owner of the building, Joshua Travers, was a greying man, entering his late 40’s and slightly wrinkled. His large grey eyes focused on the squat, purple-haired creature before him, ignoring the wind in his speckled brown hair. He removed his waistcoat and set it on a hook by the door as he and his son, a scrawny pale-faced boy named Davey, entered the decrepit, old building. Davey smiled at Curtis as the pair passed, receiving nothing but a …show more content…
“Get in, get in,” he whispered hurriedly, slowly opening the door so as not to make a sound, “you’ll scare my customers away.”
“Sorry about that,” replied Joshua as he stepped in behind Davey, “I would rather not enter the menagerie on a normal day.”
“Menagerie? What menagerie? Why do you have a menagerie?” Interrogated Davey, not taking his eyes off the unkempt barman, with his greasy, matted hair and the stained yellow apron around his neck. “You told me the animals were free to roam!”
“They are, they are,” Joshua told Davey, exchanging an almost invisible glance with the barman, who was shaking his head in disapproval, “We just keep them enclosed during the day. Every night they disappear and return at daybreak.” The corners of his mouth twitched upwards, hinting a smile.
Hesitantly, Davey accepted this explanation, still wondering what, or who, Curtis was and why he was wandering the streets in broad daylight.
Almost reading his son’s mind, Joshua …show more content…
His father left the room, silently, and turned his heavy metal key in the lock. Before he heard the click, Davey knew something was wrong and started banging on the doors and the single glass window that showed the room on the left of his. He lunged at it when he saw his father enter and finally sat on the floor, exhausted.
“Sit up, boy.”
Davey moved to his bed and sat, leaning on the post.
“I lied to you. I didn’t create life. I did, however, alter it significantly. I’m not your father. You real father used to work with me before he died in a lab ‘accident’,” he used air quotes to point out accident. “Romulus and Remus, outside, were both regular twin boys who ran away from home, and were captured and brought here. I finally have found the true cure, but your idiot father restricted it from activating from anything other than his own DNA. Now I have you.”
Davey was hit by this comment like an ice-cold wave hitting his face. He looked into Joshua’s eyes and saw a demonic grin and a cruel glint as the purple vial was inserted into a hole and a button pushed, slowly releasing purple gas that Davey could feel on his skin. As he began to change, slowly elongating and twisting, he mouthed four words.
“You terrible, terrible