Dr. Dreck

It was a scary dark night.
Not like the one which is sought by the rapists, neither the one in which wolves howl some odd distances away.

This night was different.

This, was a typical Dreck night.

Exactly the one, wherein he went out on the snow laden streets with a shovel. With a shovel, not to remove ice or to break it but, to haunt.
Haunt and hunt.
Hunt for innocent eyes.

~

Dreck was the most loved professor at The Harvard University. Lads came up to him asking for random pictures and with personal problems. Dr. Dreck was best known to put people at ultimate rescue.
But behind the veil of this wrinkled face, almost covered with huge round glasses, there was much more to Dreck.
He changed in cold winter nights.
He did not really turn into a vampire; neither did he practice black magic with voodoo dolls, but something more.
Much, much more.
Dreck, was a hunter.

He grew up reading about Cayetano Santos Godino, best known as Petiso Orejudo who, at the age of 16, killed children and envied him. Dreck limited the envy only to a special influence of a divinity on the mind of human beings and denied copying him.

Dreck waited –more than eagerly- for it to be December and for the blades to tremble.

Awhile people cuddled under velvety blankets and children sneaked out to watch Adult movies; Dreck, with an overcoat, a hat and his gum boots, strolled out on the streets resembling Sherlock with those intense gray eyes.

Taxis honked at him supposing him to be the man who would pay them the double charge they quoted after 12, but Dreck favoured walking.
And making his victims walk.

~

‘Oh there!’ he said to himself when he saw a little body trembling on the roadside. ‘Today is a treat’, he assured himself when he spotted two more souls crouching nearby on the cold ground.
But, THREE was an odd figure.
Dreck believed in evens.
He, was greedy.

~

He fumbled his pockets for the cookies he bought and started moving towards the kids.

‘Hey there! Too cold tonight?’ he questioned with a gleam in his eyes.

‘The snow covers the ground, they at least say so’ replied a shaking voice.

‘Oh humour! I like it; I have some cookies for all of you!’

The bait was offered to the prey,
The prey stood tall in the trap.

It was just one of them. Just one ‘Anti-Dreck’ as Dr. Dreck liked to call the lot who refused to his cookies.
This Anti-Dreck’s mother used to tell him, only when she was alive - ‘Never accept cookies from strangers. They turn the chocolate chips into monsters when they offer’ and he remembered it. Unlike the fellow orphans who could go to any level for free cookies.

Perhaps, Dreck liked this Anti-Dreck lot.
He took them as a challenge. These stubborn people gave him a unique glee.
He loved to convince them and make them give in. He loved loud cries.
He loved losers. He loved orphan losers.

Dreck did not really impose the cookie on him but just rested it on the ground near to where Anti-Dreck sat and walked away.
While others enjoyed the cookies, Anti-Dreck stared at it for five seconds. Five long seconds and his stomach finally gave up.
He grabbed it and gulped it all at once.

A wicked face smiled somewhere behind a tree and treated himself with neat whiskey.

~

Couple of minutes and all these bodies lost control, almost falling on the floor.

Dreck grabbed the self-created opportunity and reached out to them offering help, blaming the brutal weather for their dizziness.

Everyone, including Anti-Dreck accepted the offer of help.

‘Victory,’ Dreck confirmed.

He made those three walk to his place and fetched one more on the way since he wanted someone to help these stumbling bones walk –or, only as it seemed- and the fourth victim agreed.

An even figure.
FOUR at once. Ultimate delight.

The hen cock-a-doodles-do as sun rays shone over the mountains and anti-Dreck was the first to wake up with a blurred vision and with apparent boulders falling on his head. He tried to recollect his last night and everything was very clear.

He knew that him, waking up under a velvet blanket, on a cosy bed, in a centrally heated house was a trap.

He had often heard about people kidnapping kids, disassembling their and their bodies and making them beg. He was sure his leg was to be cut off and he did not like it.
He wanted to escape.

He made his fellows wake up and immediately silenced them.
Only when they attained full conscience, he explained them the ‘plan’

‘We will get off this bed, one at a time. Go downstairs, meet the monster and greet him with a hearty smile. You three come following me and I will arrange the knife by then. I shall... ‘’

‘But, you’ someone interrupted.

‘No questions. Let me complete’

‘So, I will put the knife to his throat and you, John, arrange a taxi. We will take him to the police station.’’

We will have him arranged, he thought to himself.
Damage and ruin will meet the old man.
He will have to leave this warm house.
Dr. Dreck’s life shall be too grim for levity.

‘So I hope I have made myself clear? Let us go’

‘Sure’ they replied in unison.

When the kids went downstairs, their eyes twinkled.
Twinkled, to see the tables decorated with zillion types of chocolate pastries; and doughnuts. A side table displayed the miniature of a cotton candy store. Balloons and corners filled everything else.

This was a fairyland, a dreamland for the three orphans and they almost reached out to a candy.

‘Stop,’ Anti-Dreck announced.

This is a mesh. Do not give in.
I know these contain sedatives.

Dr. Dreck was busy on a call all this while often using words like ‘orphan,’ ‘four,’ ‘kids,’ ‘sending them.’

This assured Anti-Dreck of Dreck’s intentions.

Dreck hung up and turned around only to see four blank faces.

‘Oh, my sunshine’s! Good Morning! I hope the night was comfortable enough?’

‘Yes. Yeah,’ they murmured together.

And before any further talking, Anti-Dreck snapped his fingers which was a sign to put the ‘plan’ into action.

Two of the kids felt week but Anti-Dreck warned them. ‘We have to get him arranged!’
And thereby, it was duly executed.

But, only with a twist.

When John went out to seek a taxi, two policeman with a smiling lady in her early thirty’s already stood at there to scream ‘Surprise’

John was puzzled. ‘Um, what?’

‘Don’t you look so aghast Darling! We are here to take you to the orphan home. No more sleeping on the cold pavement with a hungry stomach. Thank Dreck. He is such a sweetheart. Where is he? Why can’t I see him”?’

John was bewildered.
Anti-Dreck, baffled.
The other two, amused for free candies.
And Dreck, beatified to have escaped the knife.

The kids were arranged.
A star danced in the sky.