The Avenger by Jo Robertson Page A

roar stormed though his head, disgust mingling with barely controlled fury.
    "Please, why are you doing this to me?" the kid whimpered.
    "Why do you think?" The Avenger released the words through the mouth cutout of the hooded mask. He wore the Inquisitor's disguise solely for the macabre effect, to terrorize the kid, who would never survive to identify his punisher. It worked beautifully.
    "Why do you think you're here ... " He waved both arms around the church basement room. "Why this holy place?" He peered closely into the kid's mottled face and smirked, "Or should I say this unholy place?"
    "I don't know, man. You're talking crazy. Please let me go. I don't know why you're doing this." Snot and tears mingled as they streamed from his face and nose, downward to gather in his hairline.
    "You don't know why I'm doing this," the Avenger mimicked, voice pedantic, lecturing like a school teacher. He tapped a wooden peg against the gloved palm of his left hand. "Because I can," he continued softly, "because I'm the only one who can."
    The kid's blue eyes flashed momentarily, showing a fleeting remnant of spirit. "That's not an answer," he spat. "That's an excuse."
    "Whatever you call it doesn't matter, Carl."
    The captive's body jerked in surprise, and his freckles stood out in stark relief on his pale face. "How do you know my name? Who the hell are you?"
    "Tsk, such language. Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?" The hooded man laughed. "No, you've done far worse things with your mouth. Hmmm?" He shook his head. "It doesn't matter anyway, Carl," he repeated. "The only thing that matters is that your eternal soul is no longer in jeopardy. You'll be saved." He gestured broadly with both arms, a ringmaster opening the circus.
    A flicker of hope danced in the kid's eyes. "Saved? What do you mean? Saved from what?"
    The Avenger moved to the wooden table top where he'd placed his tools. He caressed the instruments, picking them up and examining them one by one, his fingers finally coming to rest on the particular tool designed to complement the wooden peg he already held.
    The hammer was crafted entirely from oak, not a single piece of metal used in the making of it. Although it was clumsy by modern standards, he liked the heft of it in his palm. The other two pegs matched the one he held. All three had been fashioned with precision for size and sturdiness and were flat at one end, wickedly pointed at the other.
    "Saved from what?" the kid screamed.
    "From your sins, of course. What else?"
    The Avenger angled the spiked end of the peg so that the overhead light caught it and cast its shadow against the eastern wall of the basement. The image loomed like a Bunyanesque peg leg. Carl's eyes jumped from the shadow to the wooden nail and back again.
    "What are you going to do?" The bright white of his eyes was illuminated by the single light bulb. "Wait a minute, you said I was saved," he screamed. "What did you mean?"
    The Avenger tested the weight of the hammer.
    "You can't do this! Help, somebody help me!" Carl's voice reverberated off the cement walls of the musty room while he struggled against his bindings. His voice finally fell to a whimper as he shrank from his attacker. "Somebody please help me."
    The Avenger bent toward the kid's face, turning his head at an awkward angle so he could stare into the boy's eyes from the upside-down position. Arms splayed straight out from his sides and feet bound with a thick strand of rope tied to the other end of the wooden beam, he hung like a perverted icon.
    "I was going to do this in the traditional manner," the Avenger explained, indicating Carl's upended position on the cross, "but the message needs to be very clear."
    "What message? What are you friggin' talking about?"
    The man appeared surprised. "Why, the message of redemption, what else? The blessed message of salvation. Are you a good Catholic, Carl? If you are, you should know all about redemption and atonement. Sinners have to