Camp camp short stories!

The perfect son...(part 2 end)

The town stood gathered in the Great Hall. They whispered and murmured, casting judgemental glances at the three standing at the front of the room. The tallest person — a man, with short brown hair and hazel eyes — had his left hand holding onto the shoulder of the second tallest — a woman, with long blonde hair and piercing blue eyes — while his right hand rested protectively on the head of the shortest — a boy, eyes downcast and shoulders hunched.

"Nathaniel and Claudia Evans." The loud voice, deep and authoritative, echoed through the hall. The crowd's hushed conversation subsided, hundreds of eyes raising to look at the podium. Or, more specifically, to look at the one standing behind it. Operating Thetan Marcus.

"Nathaniel and Claudia Evans," he repeated, clearing his throat before swallowing. His Adam's apple bobbed, protruding like a tumor from his neck. He swallowed, the tumor bobbed, he spoke again. "We are gathered here today to address your blasphemous actions, your impure thoughts, and your unholy words. You stand accused of conspiring to disobey the Council, formulating plans to defect from the compound, and willfully disregarding the rules that govern us, and the tenets of Scientology. And, most heinous of all, you are accused of attempting to corrupt your son with your impurities."

A quiet cough from the crowd, quickly stifled. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved.

Marcus's stony gaze rested on Daniel's parents, eyes boring into them, shredding their outer layers until he had laid bare their Thetans. Daniel kept his own gaze fixed resolutely on the ground at his feet. It was frightening, having the entirety of the compound staring at him, witnessing his family's shame. It was embarrassing, it was terrifying, but it was something he had to endure. This was the way things had to be.

Up on the raised dais, Marcus moved his hands to rest them on the podium. His long sleeves rustled, two dry leaves draped over even dryer bark. Behind him, the rest of the Council sat, faces impassive, all staring directly ahead. Though physically present, there was the overwhelming sense that they were far away, in a place that nobody but fellow Operating Thetans could reach them.

The long silence stretched out, all the way to the ends of time and back again. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved.

The silence pressed down on the room with a physical presence. Daniel felt it wrap around his lungs and start constricting. He couldn't breathe, couldn't draw breath into his lungs. He clenched his fists and grit his jaw, focusing on not passing out. Around him, the crowd started to murmur again, but were cut off by Marcus. Then, his father, behind him, started to speak. Daniel couldn't make out any of the words, could only feel the vibrations and the pressure.

The white floor beneath his feet was shaking as though in an earthquake, his body feeling ready to tumble to the ground. His father grounded him. With his firm but gentle grip, Daniel's father kept him standing upright.

Slowly, the room stopped spinning and the weight pressing against Daniel's chest subsided. He took a grateful breath — quietly, through his nose — and slowly raised his head to look at Marcus.

"Mr. and Mrs. Evans, what response do you have to that?" Marcus demanded, referring to a previous statement that Daniel had not been able to hear.

Daniel's parents whispered quietly to each other, too high and too soft for Daniel to make out. But he could still read their faces. His mother's face, carefully controlled, with a flicker of fear hiding behind her eyes. His father's face, as stony and impassive as Marcus's, though his eyes blazed with defiance.

Daniel was acutely aware of the crowd pressed up around them, too close yet too far away. The crowd was one meter from the Evans family on all sides, nobody daring get any closer, all of them wanting to. Each shuffle, each foot tap, each twitch and slide of cloth over arms, each tick-tick-tick of the wall clock; Daniel was aware of them all, felt them beating against his skull like tiny mallets.