A woman tried to get up, but her husband tugged her back down into her seat.
“Remember that you cannot un-see what you have seen in your mind’s eye. We all have certain images we desperately wish had never been within our line of sight. Who among us has not at least once entered a room in which an unappealing display of carnal activity was taking place, perhaps involving one’s parents? So though it may seem that I’m being overly cautious, I cannot stress enough that horror awaits, and although there are no refunds I do not want anybody to see anything they are not fully prepared to see.”
Mongrel had at least another seven minutes of his speech remaining, so Nathan looked out into the audience. He couldn’t really see anybody in the darkness, just a small red glow in the front row, somebody smoking a cigar.
Could that be Charles Monchino?
No! Suddenly Nathan realized exactly who it was.
Bernard Steamspell!
Even lit only by his cigar, the orphanage owner was unmistakable. Few people were able to radiate such a strong sense of evil without actively engaging in evil acts.
Was Steamspell looking at him right at this very moment, staring at him with those cold, cruel eyes?
Well, yes, of course he was. Nathan was standing on stage. That was a dumb internal question.
But what did he want? Was it a coincidence? Was he simply here to enjoy the show? Was he coming to reclaim Nathan? Was he going to jump up on stage and start beating him? Should Nathan run?
He took several long, deep breaths to calm himself. There was no reason to panic. If he fled, he would no doubt be quickly recaptured, and then he’d be in an even worse situation than before. He could imagine Steamspell grabbing his legs, Mongrel grabbing his arms, and Kleft grabbing his nose, the three of them tugging until he popped apart.
Mongrel, seemingly unaware of Nathan’s current state of dismay, continued to warn the audience about how scary he was going to be. “Your eyes may try to leap out of your head, but worry not, for the stalks will keep them from getting far…”
Nathan tried to convince himself that it would be fine. Mongrel would never give up his star performer. As long as Nathan stayed close to his current wicked captor, his old wicked captor wouldn’t be able to get his hands on him.
“If the need to regurgitate arises, please be considerate to those around you…”
He’d be fine. For now, he’d just perform the show as planned. Maybe Steamspell had forgotten all about him.
“Behold…the open mouth of Fangboy!”
On cue, Nathan opened his mouth wide, showing off his terrible fangs. A woman in the front row screamed. The man next to her began to frantically fan himself. Several people started talking at once, and though he couldn’t quite make out what they were saying, their conversations all seemed to revolve around the idea that he was a most ghastly creature indeed.
Mongrel held up his hand. “Calm yourselves, ladies and gentlemen. He frightens me too, but rest assured that we have two different snipers ready to take him out should he make a threatening move.”
Nathan had not been made aware of that. He hoped it was untrue.
“But what does he do?” a man called out from the back of the theatre.
“I beg your pardon?” Mongrel asked.
“What does he actually do? He doesn’t just stand there having sharp teeth, does he?”
Mongrel chuckled. “Of course not. At Professor Mongrel’s Theatre of the Macabre, I wouldn’t waste your time by showing you a freak who didn’t do tricks! Kleft! The box!”
Kleft walked out on stage, placed the box on the floor in front of Nathan, then exited.
“Arachnids. Spiders. Perhaps the most frightening creatures on earth. Some may claim that snakes are scarier, but can you grab a spider by the tail and swing it around like a lasso, robbing it of its intimidating nature? You can not. I will concede that the great white shark is more fearsome, but of course we would not be able to feasibly provide one tonight, and if we did, it would certainly eat the boy, ending the show. But excluding the shark idea, ladies and gentlemen, I ask you, what could be more frightening than watching this boy use his unnatural jaws to eat spiders?”
Mongrel gestured to him, and Nathan raised the lid of the box. The mass of spiders writhed inside.
“Such a stupid boy,” said a booming voice. It was Steamspell. “I’d be astonished if he even knows which end to bite from.”
Several people in the audience laughed. Nathan’s face burned with rage and embarrassment. Being part of the show was bad enough without the likes of Steamspell ridiculing him.
He extended his thumb and pressed it against one of the spiders, crushing it.
Mongrel frowned. “What are you doing?” he hissed.
Nathan didn’t respond. He crushed two more of the spiders.
“What did I tell you?” asked Steamspell, letting out a hearty laugh. “He’s trying to eat them with his thumb! I have never been so amused by a display of idiocy!”
Nathan knew that he had the ability to come up with a suitably devastating retort, but instead he ignored the orphanage owner. He continued crushing spiders as quickly as he could.
“Fangboy,” said Mongrel, his voice strained, “it is time to eat one of the spiders now.”
“In a moment.”
“Not in a moment! Now!”
Nathan looked through the selection of spiders and crushed another one. “I’m almost ready.”
Mongrel chuckled nervously and turned his attention back to the audience. “When a boy eats spiders for a living, you can’t always expect him to behave in a rational manner.”
“He won’t do it!” Steamspell declared. “He’ll spill them all over the front of his shirt instead! Oh, how jolly I feel when I see such foolishness!”
Nathan stared into the box of spiders for a few seconds, making sure he hadn’t missed any that he wanted to squash, and then picked up the entire box. Mongrel glared at him with very, very angry eyes. The box was supposed to remain on the floor.
“Go on, eat the spiders!” said Steamspell.
“No,” said Nathan. “You eat them!” And with that, he flung the contents of the box toward the audience and Bernard Steamspell in particular.
To say that there was chaos would be an understatement.
Women screamed. Men screamed. People shoved. The entire audience became a flailing mass of panic. Nathan grinned, able to comfortably enjoy the frenzy knowing that he’d behaved in a responsible manner and crushed all of the poisonous spiders before throwing them at people.
Steamspell clawed at his face, which was covered in spiders, and let out a high-pitched scream that was far from demonstrative of the amount of dignity expected from a man of his stature. The cigar dropped from his mouth.
Unfortunately, when the theatre was being built, “fire safety” was not among Professor Mongrel’s top ten concerns. (In fact, had he taken the time to rank these concerns, fire safety would have ranked somewhere around forty-seven, right before “identifying the odd green stain on the ceiling” and right after “bolstering the rear wall in case large animals go on a rampage and repeatedly smash against it.”)
Most wooden floors, though not fireproof, do not burst into flames as soon as a lit cigar falls upon them. It remains unknown why the floor reacted in this matter. The most widely held theory is that the wood was saturated with gasoline, thus explaining its low cost, although those who argue against the theory counter with the fact that gasoline has a distinct smell and somebody should have noticed.
Regardless of the reason, the floor immediately caught fire. The level of panic increased accordingly.
Steamspell spun in a circle, batting away spiders and flames. “Help me!” he screamed. “Somebody take pity on a poor gentleman who is burning to death!”