And not quite pork, Ty thinks. It's —
"I should stand here and jaw at you all day, you louse?"
The Taser gives off a crackling sizzle. Tingling, debilitating pain sinks into the side of Ty's neck. His bladder lets go and he wets his pants. He can't help it. Is hardly aware of it, in truth. Somewhere (in a galaxy far, far away) a hand that is trembling but still terribly strong thrusts Ty toward the back wall and the shackles that have been welded to steel plates about five and a half feet off the ground.
"There!" Burny cries, and gives a tired, hysterical laugh. "Knew you'd get one for good luck eventually! Smart boy, ain'tcha? Little wisenheimer! Now put your hands through them loops and let's have no more foolishness about it!"
Ty has put out his hands in order to keep himself from crashing face-first into the shed's rear wall. His eyes are less than a foot from the wood, and he is getting a very good look at the old layers of blood that coat it. That plate it. The blood has an ancient metallic reek. Beneath his feet, the ground feels spongy. Jellylike. Nasty. This may be an illusion in the physical sense, but Ty knows that what he's feeling is nonetheless quite real. This is corpse ground. The old man may not prepare his terrible meals here every time — may not have that luxury — but this is the place he likes. As he said, it's special to him.
If I let him lock both of my hands into those shackles, Ty thinks, I've had it. He'll cut me up. And once he starts cutting, he may not be able to stop himself — not for this Mr. Munching, not for anyone. So get ready.
That last is not like one of his own thoughts at all. It's like hearing his mother's voice in his head. His mother, or someone like her. Ty steadies. The flock of panic birds is suddenly gone, and he is as clearheaded as the cap will allow. He knows what he must do. Or try to do.
He feels the nozzle of the Taser slip between his legs and thinks of the snake wriggling across the overgrown driveway, carrying its mouthful of fangs. "Put your hands through those loops right now, or I'm going to fry your balls like oysters." Ersters, it sounds like.
"Okay," Ty says. He speaks in a high, whiny voice. He hopes he sounds scared out of his mind. God knows it shouldn't be hard to sound that way. "Okay, okay, just don't hurt me, I'm doing it now, see? See?"
He puts his hands through the loops. They are big and loose.
"Higher!" The growling voice is still in his ear, but the Taser is gone from between his legs, at least. "Shove 'em in as far as you can!"
Ty does as he is told. The shackles slide to a point just above his wrists. His hands are like starfish in the gloom. Behind him, he hears that soft clinking noise again as Burny rummages in his bag. Ty understands. The cap may be scrambling his thoughts a little, but this is too obvious to miss. The old bastard's got handcuffs in there. Handcuffs that have been used many, many times. He'll cuff Ty's wrists above the shackles, and here Ty will stand — or dangle, if he passes out — while the old monster carves him up.
"Now listen," Burny says. He sounds out of breath, but he also sounds lively again. The prospect of a meal has refreshed him, brought back a certain amount of his vitality. "I'm pointin' this shocker at you with one hand. I'm gonna slip a cuff around your left wrist with the other hand. If you move . . . if you so much as twitch, boy . . . you get the juice. Understand?"
Ty nods at the bloodstained wall. "I won't move," he gibbers. "Honest I won't."
"First one hand, then the other. That's how I do it." There is a revolting complacency in his voice. The Taser presses between Ty's shoulder blades hard enough to hurt. Grunting with effort, the old man leans over Ty's left shoulder. Ty can smell sweat and blood and age. It is like "Hansel and Gretel," he thinks, only he has no oven to push his tormentor into.
You know what to do, Judy tells him coldly. He may not give you a chance, and if he doesn't, he doesn't. But if he does . . .
A handcuff slips around his left wrist. Burny is grunting softly, repulsively, in Ty's ear. The old man reaches . . . the Taser shifts . . . but not quite far enough. Ty holds still as Burny snaps the handcuff shut and tightens it down. Now Ty's left hand is secured to the shed wall. Dangling down from his left wrist by its steel chain is the cuff Burny intends to put on his right wrist.
The old man, still panting effortfully, moves to the right. He reaches around Ty's front, groping for the dangling cuff. The Taser is once more digging into Ty's back. If the old man gets hold of the cuff, Ty's goose is probably cooked (in more ways than one). And he almost does. But the cuff slips out of his grip, and instead of waiting for it to pendulum back to where he can grab it, Burny leans farther forward. The bony side of his face is planted against Ty's right shoulder.