Chapter 1.5: Salt On The Wound
1301 Words
The first hit shattered the phone.
The second shattered teeth.
Then it was screaming.
Not from Lucien.
From them.
The others rushed back.
Too late.
Lucien was on one of them, bare hands now.
Punching, elbowing, headbutting.
Screams turned to gurgles.
Blood sprayed on sneakers.
One tried to run — Lucien tackled him and bit into his shoulder.
Another cried, “He’s f*****g possessed! He’s f*****g gone mad!”
And he had.
Lucien was blank.
Eyes wide, teeth clenched, not saying a single word.
Just destroying.
Like something inside him had finally stood up and said:
“I’m in control now.”
When the police arrived — alerted by someone blocks away —
They didn’t find a “Mute Boy.”
They found a blood-soaked ghost still standing,
Still breathing heavy,
Still holding the leash.
It took four officers to bring him down.
And he fought every one of them.
Bit.
Scratched.
Kicked a kneecap backwards.
They cuffed him.
Dragged him into the cruiser.
And even then, he didn’t speak.
Just stared out the window —
At Broon’s body in the road.
That was the story the news didn’t report.
What came after was simpler:
Temporary detainment.
Juvenile psychiatric evaluation.
Parents picking him up two days later with fake tears and fake sympathy.
“You’ve been under stress,” his father said.
But the words didn’t come with comfort.
They came with a steel scale — the old-fashioned kind — crashing down across Lucien’s back the moment they got home.
WHACK.
“Two f*****g days in custody! Are you insane?”
WHACK.
“Over a damn dog? You bit a kid like a stray animal—”
WHACK.
“Do you know how hard I work, and now I have to clean up this mess?”
Lucien didn’t scream.
Not this time.
But he shook.
Silent, like a kettle just before it whistles.
His hoodie stuck to his back, soaked in sweat and heat and rage.
His mother stood in the kitchen doorway,
arms folded,
Eyes somewhere else.
She didn’t say a word.
Not one single word.
His father paced the living room, still ranting.
“They were dumb kids, Lucien. Trouble-makers.
You were lucky they had records already—
else you’d be rotting in some cell with a goddamn mental tag on your file.”
Lucien stared at the floor.
“We could’ve just gotten you a new dog.
One that’s trained.
But no— you go ape-s**t and now I have to deal with this crap for months.”
Another kick to the chair leg.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?”
Later that night, Lucien sat in his room.
Not lying down.
Not crying.
Just… sitting.
In the dark.
The leash lay next to him like a noose that never tightened.
His fingers traced the bite marks on his own hand — still healing.
They didn’t hurt.
The bruises didn’t hurt.
His back didn’t hurt.
What hurt was the silence Broon left behind.
That tail-wagging dumbass had been the last living thing to look at him with love.
And now even his memory was mocked.
“Just a dog.”
Something inside Lucien whispered:
Never again.
Never again would he beg for kindness.
Never again would he scream for help.
If the world wanted a monster…
Then it was going to get one.
On the fourth night,
someone knocked.
Not his parents.
Not the police.
Some people who were real.
His best friends.
The door opened like the house itself didn’t want it to.
Anthony stepped in first.
Christy followed close behind, unsure whether they were entering a friend’s room — or something else entirely.
Lucien’s room felt… wrong.
The hallway had sound — the hum of the fridge, the creak of floorboards — but the moment they crossed his threshold, all of it
disappeared.
No ticking clock. No wind outside the window. No rustling of leaves.
Just a hollow stillness, so thick it could choke.
Lucien sat on the floor.
Not in bed. Not by his desk.
Just the corner of the room, where two walls met like a cage, hood up, knees to his chest. His fingers rested motionless against the
looped-up leash — Broon’s leash — as if he were afraid to let go of it.
Or perhaps… afraid of what he’d become without it.
Anthony paused mid-step. Christy, who had barely been inside the house before, stopped breathing altogether.
It wasn’t fear that held them still — it was the feeling.
An odd, slow warmth pulsed from Lucien’s body like low heat off a dying fire. Not comforting warmth — not human.
It was the kind of warmth that makes your blood feel too still.
Like you’ve entered a room that remembers pain.
Anthony finally moved, crouching beside Lucien’s silent figure. He didn’t speak at first. Didn’t know if he should.
Lucien didn’t look up.
Didn’t acknowledge them at all.
Christy sat on the bed, uncertain. Her eyes kept flicking to the corners of the room, to the leash, to the back of Lucien’s head.
She opened her mouth once, then shut it.
When Anthony finally spoke, it was low. Measured. Like one wrong word could tilt the world.
“We were worried.”
No answer.
“No one’s seen you since… it happened.”
Still nothing.
“You okay?”
A long silence passed. Then, in a voice barely above a whisper, Lucien replied:
“Not hungry.”
Anthony swallowed hard. That was the first sound Lucien had made in days. And yet, it didn’t sound like him. It was distant —
mechanical.
Christy leaned forward. “We saw the video. The aftermath. Not all of it, but… enough.”
Lucien didn’t flinch.
“They were monsters,” she added softly. “Everyone knew it. You’re not… we’re not angry at you.”
Anthony nodded beside her. “The cops let you off with barely a slap because they were already on the watchlist. The bruises on your
arms, the cut marks — they knew you didn’t start it.”
Still, Lucien remained quiet.
“They killed him, didn’t they?” Anthony asked, even though he already knew. “Broon.”
Lucien moved, just slightly — a nod. Or a twitch. Hard to tell.
Christy’s voice broke slightly. “I’m sorry, Lucien. I really am.”
Lucien didn’t answer.
But his eyes finally rose from the floor.
Dead still.
Not blank — worse. Balanced.
He stared past them, like seeing something they couldn’t. His hands touched the cut marks on his palm. The bruises on his knuckles
had faded into yellow now. Time moved. Pain lingered. Rage aged. But it didn’t go.
“They made me watch,” Lucien said at last, voice dry, low. “They pinned me down… and made me watch.”
Neither Anthony nor Christy dared interrupt.
“I didn’t stop them,” he continued. "I couldn’t. And when I finally did something, when I stood up… I didn’t feel anything. No regrets. No panic. No… guilt.”
Christy held her breath.
“I felt peace,” he whispered. “For the first time in years.”
The room fell into absolute silence again.
Christy’s hands clenched. “That scares me, Lucien.”
Lucien’s eyes shifted toward her — slow and steady.
“It should,” he said.
Anthony stood up, glanced at Christy, then back to his friend.
But even in that moment, he didn’t leave.
Neither did she.
Because no matter what LucIen had becomE —
They still remembered who he used to be.
Somewhere in the dark, buried under silence and blood and bone —
He was still their Lucien.
But even they knew:
Something inside him had changed.
And it wasn’t coming back.
- Writer
