A/N: Turns out saving the world is even harder in real life; Visser Three is scary but at least he trims the decision tree. Updates resuming within the next two weeks with Marco, hopefully within the next week/ten days instead. I think it's time for me to admit I can't commit to an every-two-weeks schedule, but I'm going to try. Thanks to the people who sent messages and posted reviews during the hiatus.

Interlude 8

The boy squatted next to the tangle of steel wool, his face just inches away from the crawling, glowing worms of fire. Holding the watering can at the ready with one hand, he tilted the red plastic cube in the other and—

—carefully—

—let a teaspoon of golden liquid fall.

The flame that billowed up was bright and yellow, a miniature mushroom cloud, and he jerked backward, falling. It was gone before he even hit the ground, the gasoline having vaporized and the vapor burned away.

The boy smiled.

Moving swiftly, he set aside the watering can and pushed himself to his feet. The pile of S.O.S. pads was still burning, with tongues of orange fire kindling in the sticks and twigs beneath them, but it wouldn't be long before the crawling embers died. Standing upright, he leaned backward, stretching out his arm, and dropped another splash of fuel.

Foom.

Another.

Foom.

A third—larger this time, thicker and more daring, fear and fascination fighting for control as he kept the amber flow going for a full half-second.

FWOOSH.

He danced backward as the fireball swelled, curling up and up until it dashed itself against the garage ceiling and was reincarnated as a halo of greasy black smoke. Down below, the pile of kindling was now fully ablaze, bright and crackling as the boy let out a laugh and reached forward once more—

"The fuck?"

The boy whirled, his knuckles going white as his fingers tightened in a deathgrip on the can's handle, don't drop it, mustn't drop it—

"What the fuck are you doing—"

The boy tried to retreat, tried to run, staggered backward but was stopped after a mere two steps as he collided with the cold metal of his father's car, his head snapping back against the window with a sickening crack.

"—trying to burn the goddamn house down?"

A hand flashed out, and the boy flinched, unable to withdraw any further—

—but it wasn't an attack, wasn't a smack or a punch, the hand shot past his face and kept going, wrapped around the handle of the can and yanked—

—he tried, but he couldn't loosen his fingers fast enough and the can pulled him, dragged him, almost lifted him off his feet and he flailed, paralyzed by his inability to decide which was worse, to stumble into the form of his father or to fall into the fire—

A second hand followed the first, still not a strike but it hurt as it caught his upper arm, moved him without consideration for the softness of his flesh, the palm and fingers wide enough to wrap all the way around, and the boy felt himself spinning as he was dragged away from the little nest of burning scraps—

—a rough release, and he stumbled again, tripping over the watering can as he fell against the workbench hard enough to slide it half an inch—

"Stay."

The word was like a magic spell, a dark ritual of binding, and the boy froze, the only movement the heaving of his chest and the trembling of his limbs. He didn't even turn to watch as the shape that was his father strode back into the house—just kept his eyes exactly where they had been pointed, at the slowly spreading puddle of water, his heart beating wildly as though it were trying to break through his ribcage and escape. An endless moment passed, and then the man was back, still carrying the bright red can, and in his other hand—

"What did I tell you about fire, David?"

It was not a question, for all that it ended with a question mark. Silent, frozen, the boy continued to stare as the spreading puddle reached the burning twigs, began to hiss and boil.

"What did your mother tell you?"

Still not a question.

"Never, David. Never, never, never without supervision."

David said nothing.

"Look at me."

His eyes moved so quickly it was as if time had skipped ahead. His father's face was full and red, with eyes wide and wet, the muscles in his jaw tight and twitching.

"You have to listen to me, David."

The man stretched out his arm, straight out from his shoulder like a tree branch, higher than David's head. He held his fist—still closed—directly over the knee-high flames.

"You're going to learn this lesson right now."

The fingers loosened, and a tiny shard of reddish brown poked out from in between—

"No!" David shrieked, a sudden rush of panic bursting through the dam of his deeper terror. "No, stop, please, no, wait, I'm sorry, don't—"

"I told you, David," the man said, his voice thick and hard behind a subtle slur. "I told you, once, and that's all you should have needed."

"Nonononononopleaseno—"

But the fingers opened, and even in his panic, David knew better than to move, knew better than to reach out, there were things one simply Did Not Do, no matter what else happened that line was as clear and bright as the edge of a knife—

Henry the hermit crab fell into the fire.

David screamed—a wordless, feral cry of rage and loss and fear, made all the worse by the fact that even now it wasn't too late, it didn't have to happen but his father would not let him move, he could not move, and he could see Henry scrabbling, his tiny legs twitching, David could still save him, there was nothing holding him back except—

Except—

David didn't know, was too young to have the words for it, could not have expressed what it was that lay between him and the fire, except that he knew it was too terrible to face, too horrifying to imagine, the fear was in him so deep that if it had been him in the fire instead of Henry he still might not have moved.

"Watch," the voice commanded, as a stream of amber poured out and became death.

David watched.