Chapter 6
Steven Walsh sat in the living room of his father’s house, the drapes drawn tightly over the midday sun, garbage and dirty dishes covering the coffee table.
He pressed rewind, pausing when he got to the indoor view of the explosion, light extending outward from the package like he was staring into the sun.
It was the money shot, the reason he’d spent two grand on a high definition wireless camera he knew would be destroyed by the flames.
It had been worth it.
He’d had six cameras in all, from the body cam when he placed the package to the dashboard cam at the end, and he’d painstakingly edited them from start to finish.
The manic phase he was in required very little sleep, a bonus for bombers with big plans to fulfill, and this recording was only the half of it.
Summer Daniels appeared on-screen, talking to Jacques de Marquis in the distance, the oscillating friction accelerator spinning behind them like a work of art.
The edge of a steel tank showed down the left side of the view, his hiding place for the opening scene of his masterpiece.
It hadn’t been hard to get into the building, though he’d come prepared for a fight.
By the time he crouched behind that tank, he’d had a boner the size of Texas from anticipating the explosion and the destruction of those he hated most.
He leaned back on the couch as he watched, unzipping his pants and pulling them low on his hips, pulling his underwear down and fisting his hand on his cock.
The oscillator whipped around at eight times normal speed, the recording sped up while he made it to his vehicle some distance away.
An image of him climbing into his van appeared inset in the bottom corner of the screen, and he tugged on his erection with a rhythmic motion that felt too good to last.
He watched as the recorded version of himself held the detonator to the camera, then pushed the button down.
His hand worked faster now, flying back and forth and sliding his foreskin over the sensitive head.
The package on the floor exploded into a fireball in real time, one of the limbs on the oscillator flying off as light took over the screen.
Then the package was whole again, the incident beginning once more in slow motion.
He cried out in orgasm as the package burst open, the chemical reaction igniting its contents and the testing site in flames, long ropes of ejaculate spewing onto his jeans.
“Marlene! Get the hell in here.” His father’s voice bellowed from down the hall.
Steven cursed and wiped up his mess as best he could with a fast-food napkin, dropping it onto a plate as he stood and buttoned his jeans.
Marlene Walsh had been dead for most of Steven’s life, but to John Walsh she was very much alive.
He lived in the past, as if the 1960s had simply continued to be, his mental illness requiring his son play along.
He jogged into the next room, this one decorated in gold crushed velvet and sage green damask, though it was no cleaner than the first and smelled faintly of shit. “Mom’s not here. What do you need?”
“Shut the fuck up and get me my wife.”
“Are you thirsty?”
“I’ve got to take a piss. Who the hell are you?”
He wasn’t like this when they took him away.
He could still function, hold down a conversation most of the time.
Yet he heard voices and was convinced the government had killed his wife, a theory he spent obscene amounts of time trying to prove in his laboratory and, later, in his room at the mental hospital.
Steven’s social worker had taken him to visit every month, no matter that he didn’t want to go, and it became apparent over the years that Steven shared his father’s science ability and understood his darkness.
He’d fought against it at first, refusing to accept his diagnosis and aligning himself with the heroes of the outside world.
When the US Army challenged him to be all he could be, he led the charge with gusto and left John Walsh behind.
He flourished in basic training and took his first assignment in Iraq, but they put a woman in charge of him, a bitch with little tits and a wide ass that had no business being in the army at all.
She nagged him, constantly picking at his faults in front of the other men.
That’s when he first heard the voices telling him to kill her.
To his credit, he’d only knocked her front teeth out with the butt of an M4.
The court-martial determined Steven lacked mental responsibility, but what he really lacked was remorse. The only thing he regretted was not hitting her hard enough to drive those teeth through her sinuses and into her dumb bitch brain.
He moved behind his father’s wheelchair and disengaged the brake, the older man twisting to swipe at him, nails raking Steven’s skin. “Leave me alone! I want my wife.”
“I’m Steven. I’ll help you.”
His father was agitated, pulling at the strap that held him down. “I’ll fucking kill ya! I’ll take your dick and I’ll wrap it around your neck, you little pecker-head.”
Walsh grabbed his father’s arm, twisting it backwards until he yelped and leaning in close to his ear. “She’s dead. I can help you piss or you can wet yourself and sit in it. Frankly, I don’t care either way, old man.”
A confused, scared look settled over his father’s features. “I gotta take a leak.”
“Fine. Right this way.” He pushed the wheelchair to the bathroom. “Anything I can do to help.”