The build
A Small & Scary entry
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Thursday
Blake knew the box contained LEGO before the UPS guy brought it up and the familiar rush of plastic came from within. Unscheduled drop-offs held no great mystery— not even to nine-year-old Dylan, who needed only a glimpse of the blank cardboard to break out in an ominous singsong:
“Dad’s got another one.”
Moving a wry smile from son to box, Blake recalled Peter tailing her through the house last Saturday, scoffing about a vintage set up for sale. She only remembered because it had sounded expensive. Ironically, the price tag had made Peter suspicious. The secondhand markets had burned him more than once, and he could be difficult when it happened. Not up for another evening of stubborn silence, she hoped it would turn out okay.
But when Peter discovered the parcel after work, he was disappointed.
“No way this is five thousand pieces,” he said, snatching it up from where she’d left it tipped against the wall. “I knew that guy was full of it.”
Peter sank onto the couch, face prepared to spend the evening sulking. But as he tore into the cardboard and slipped the inner box onto his lap, his expression changed. Touching fingertips to the front, he murmured: “Five thousand, I’ll be damned.” His hand flattened, brushed over its surface. The gesture, along with the sudden shift in mood, drew Blake’s attention away from her man-child and onto the box itself. In the screenshot he’d shown her, it had reminded her of the newer sets with the black covers. Now she saw it was much older. The image on the front showed two prone children leaning on their elbows. One looked on as the other’s hand reached. Paused, Blake guessed, in the act of building. What, she couldn’t say. Because the rest of the picture was missing. Both children seemed to float in a dark void. Even the tweezing fingers held only emptiness.
“It doesn’t look right,” she said.
“Yeah, must be a misprint, or something. The guy said they only made a few of these.” Pulling the plastic tray from within, he placed it atop the cover and Blake couldn’t help feeling relieved. Misprint or not, it was unsettling.
At least the inside of the box looked normal. Lifting out the instructions, Peter revealed the usual cavities filled with small bricks. But something seemed to be missing from its contents as well. In between the pieces was not a single splash of color, only monochromatic black and grey. Not unusual. Yet the combination of dull blocks and white plastic stained yellow in places made Blake’s nose wrinkle up in distaste. It was in her to ask if he hadn’t wasted his money when Peter saved her the trouble.
“Jesus, look at this!” he said, rifling through the instruction manual. “This looks insane!”
Flipping back to the first page, his head began to swivel between box and booklet, settling in.
“Oh no,” Blake said. “I’ve got dinner waiting. You’ll have plenty of time later.”
“But—"
“Dinner first, playtime later.”
He put the box aside. “Fine.”
But of course, he took the instructions. Shoveling unseen forkfuls of food into his mouth, his eyes were glued to its pages. After yet another pressed attempt at conversation, Peter glanced up with a vacant stare.
“Huh?”
“Just go,” she said, defeated.
She didn’t have to tell him twice. Jumping up from his seat, he breathed a quick thanks as he hurried from the room. Plastic shook as he lifted the box in passing. Seconds later, the basement door opened and shut.
In the quiet, Dylan grinned.
“Finish your dinner,” Blake said.
***
Around eleven, she gave Peter his thirty-minute warning. Before the time was up, she found him leaning in the doorway, knuckling one eye.
“It’s… something alright.”
“That’s nice,” she said, switching off the TV and tidying the table, not really interested one way or the other. But recalling the missing cover art and its faded contents, she felt compelled to ask: “And you’re sure it’s all in order?”
When Peter didn’t respond, Blake glanced up. His thoughtful gaze rested on the dark television screen.
“Too soon to tell,” he said at last. “But it’s something alright.”
Friday
Quarter past six, Blake was still waiting for Peter’s arrival when she found his briefcase standing in its accustomed place. No sign of its owner. She turned towards the basement door.
He didn’t.
He did.
The light was on. A short silence was broken by the soft noise of fingers raking through small plastic pieces. Sighing, she started down.
The basement was Peter’s terrain, which was fine. It’s not that she begrudged him his hobby. But it was hard to take in the colorful sprawl without considering the money.
His crown jewel was the cityscape. Spread across several tables, the massive gridwork of townhouses and shops, towering buildings, and traffic-choked streets dominated the basement floor.
On the other side, Peter sat hunched over his work. In his concentration, he hadn’t noticed her descent. Blake watched him for a beat or two, the mass of greying curls moving as he turned his head. After he scrabbled another handful from the box, she cleared her throat.
One wide eye found hers between the skyscrapers.
“We had a deal, Peter.”
The skyline teased his face, his flashing eyes. “I know. I just—I needed to check on something real quick.”
“Dinner first, playtime later. Your son can remember. Why can’t you?”
He’d risen from his seat, now rounded the table with an apologetic smile. “I know, I know. I’m sorry.”
A little curious, Blake was tempted to see what kept him so enthralled. But Peter had wrapped an arm around her shoulders and escorted her towards the stairs.
Or, just maybe, off the premises.
***
“I don’t know why you always do this,” Blake said from the bed.
Peter stepped into the bathroom doorway, toothbrush dangling. “Whah?”
She offered him a flat stare. It was past midnight. After the previous day’s lapse, they seemed to have returned to business as usual, with Peter extending his allotted time by a good twenty minutes. Blake had to call him twice and made to go down when he came plodding up the stairs. As soon as she saw him, she knew he’d fallen asleep on the job.
“Whenever you get something new, you’re always in such a rush to finish,” she said now. “You should learn to pace yourself. Savor the experience.”
He shrugged.
“So, what is it anyway?” she yawned.
“Complicated,” Peter mumbled through a mouthful of toothpaste, before turning into the bathroom.
Blake was asleep before he came back out.
Saturday
Dylan was playing the game of his life. Ten minutes in, he scored a first goal, followed by a second off an intercepted pass. The other team was a dead favorite for the league cup, the game expected to be a washout. But they went into halftime trailing 3-4 and kept up the pressure in the second half, holding fast to a 6-6 tie. With a good five minutes left on the clock, a chaotic midfield scuffle left nothing between Dylan and net except a keeper shaking in his cleats. He fired off the cannon shot he’d been practicing in the yard all summer from well outside the box, but when the ball ricochet off the other kid’s face on its way home, his coach was at the referee to get the goal disqualified.
Those still sitting in folding chairs took to their feet. Even Peter. Voicing his protest along with the rest of them, the black cloud hanging over him for most of the game seemed to have dissipated. To think he’d almost chosen his LEGOs over this.
“Aren’t you glad you didn’t miss this?” she said after the whistle blow proved them victorious.
Peter nodded, applauding. He stared across the field, smiling. When Dylan came trotting up, he heaped on enthusiastic praise. But there was another kind of excitement in his eyes when he straightened and clapped his hands.
“So. Home?”
***
Dylan was out by eight-fifteen. With Peter back at it downstairs, Blake curled up on the couch with her phone, and began to enjoy her own screen time.
Next thing she knew was sucking warm saliva from the corner of her mouth. Bringing the TV into focus, she saw her reality show had been replaced with an infomercial. Cotton-headed, she brought up the phone still nestled in her curling fingers. 02:34.
Sitting up, she rubbed her face, then grabbed the remote and killed the mindless babble. In the following silence, the cobwebs cleared enough to get up and drift out into the hall.
The lights were off, the hallway choked with shadows. As such, she had no problem making out the warm glow seeping out from underneath the basement door. Blake stalked over and opened it.
“Peter?”
Nothing.
She went down a creaking step. “Peter?”
A beat. Then: “Yeah?”
“Do you have any idea what time it is?”
Another slight delay before he said: “I’ll be right up.”
“No, now,” Blake said, descending. “It’s two in the morning. Are you crazy?”
While she spoke, chair legs scraped across concrete and now he came pounding up to meet her.
“I’m here,” Peter said, a touch breathless. “I’m here.”
Blake was speechless. Between his sagging face and bloodshot eyes, she could tell he was as exhausted as she felt. Somehow worse was the sheepish smile.
“Unbelievable,” she breathed. Turning, she led the way back up.
Sunday
Around noon, she found herself going into the basement again. Not for Peter. He was across the way, putting up Tim Nelson’s new tool shed— a favor she’d been helping him dodge for weeks now. But he was getting on her nerves. Coming down around ten, it had been clear from the way he sped through “breakfast” he was eager to get back to it—despite last night’s overtime.
Peter had taken her warning to give it a rest without protest. Blake was almost surprised. It’s not that they ever had a fight about it. But that was mostly because he always finished projects before they had a chance to become a problem. Now though— She could tell this build was frustrating him. Given his single-minded focus, it had her a little worried. And Blake had to admit, she wanted to see what kept him so busy.
On the other side of the city was a model version of their own street. The set he was erecting took up what would have been their backyard, and Blake felt she would’ve recognized it even without the tray angled close. Because it didn’t fit. As colorless as the unassembled pieces had suggested, it stood in stark contrast with its vibrant surroundings.
And it was...weird.
Right away she saw why Peter hadn’t finished yet: the pieces making up the peculiar design were very small. Its foundation was a formless patch of grey. It wasn’t an island because the bricks climbed to a steep ridge before gradually sloping down on the lee side. Along the ridge, a semicircle of thin, twisted black shapes rose. Judging from the way they spidered out at the top, they could’ve been trees. But to Blake, the pixelated branches hinted at a more complex design not yet stitched together. Or maybe she was reading into it and Peter had just turned them so he could get at the heart of the model with ease.
Whatever the case, there was no confusion about what made up its center. The sloping gradient of deepening grey. The ragged outline where the blocks fell off and black took over, plummeting down to implied depths. The pit itself was about the size of a saucer, its walls sheer and polished.
It was a strange construction, but the illusion was uncanny. Leaning in, the faint light glinting along the edges of the pencil-thin cliffs seemed to go down farther than she knew was possible, reflected by smooth black tiles buried at the bottom of the hole. It helped that a few transparent and flame-colored blocks had been set deeper in. The clever placement of the mellow twinkling added a dizzying dimension to the model.
It was impressive enough to give her a touch of vertigo.
Staring down into the dark mouth was unsettling and fascinating in equal measure. The mixture pulsed in the sides of her neck, sent her fingertips brushing over studded plastic. Just as they skipped off the edge, Dylan called from upstairs.
Startled, she flinched back.
“What?” she yelled without looking up from the pit.
“Can I have a sandwich?”
“I’ll be right up.”
“What?”
Blake raised her voice to the ceiling. “I said: I’ll be right up.”
“Kay.”
Lowering her gaze, she scoffed. She must’ve had a moment. Because looking again, she had no trouble making out the lines between the bricks. It was still well done. But nowhere near the visual tour-de-force she’d made it out to be.
With wonder gone, what remained was a bland flavor of repulsion, looking at the off-putting landscape, the rolling grey plastic dulled with age and neglect. She found herself wishing Peter would hurry up and finish, so it could be buried among his other treasures. But not today. Between the tiny bricks and the colors, it was no wonder he looked so worn out. It was tedious work, and he could do with a break.
Sparing it a last glance, she went up.
***
When Peter returned, Blake expected him to start angling. Instead, he joined them in the kitchen for coffee and a board game. It was refreshing after days of distracted quiet. But with the first round finished, a sudden inspiration struck him, and he turned to Dylan:
“Hey, what’s say we go down and build something together?”
Dylan shot up in his chair. “Really?”
He cautioned. “Only if mom says it’s alright.”
Beneath her son’s electrified plea, what Blake had locked and loaded unstuck as a sigh. “Sure.”
Seeing Peter tuck his smile behind the rim of his cup, she returned it with one of her own.
Cheap trick, Peter. Cheap.
***
“You two have fun?” she asked Dylan later, tucking him in for the night.
It was a sincere question. Dylan never got to play downstairs, and she’d thought it a good sign when he was invited back after dinner. But around bedtime, he’d returned in a subdued mood, and she worried there might’ve been trouble. Peter was very particular about his collection; it wouldn’t be the first time it had led to issues between the two.
She was relieved, then, to see Dylan give a walleyed nod. “We built a lot today.”
“That’s nice.”
“Hm.” Dylan’s eyes slipped closed. “Dad says it needs to go faster.”
“What’s that?”
“The build.”
Coming down, she was proud of Peter. Maybe he was growing up. Too soon to tell, of course. But Blake thought it a promising sign when she looked up at eleven-thirty and found him standing in the doorway, ready to turn in.
Monday
Blake sat on the couch, nursing a headache.
The day had been a trial. Now that Peter had taken a step towards adulthood, her son seemed to have turned in the opposite direction. That morning, Dylan claimed he was sick. Blake had been on the fence; he was pale, and she didn’t like the peaky look in his eyes. But it was hard to miss the way he perked up when she reached for the phone.
It was strange behavior for Dylan, and it had her stumped. Until she caught him sneaking into the basement after school. Blake refused him, in part because she knew Peter wouldn’t want him down there unsupervised. But mostly because he had tried to get something past her. She didn’t like it. Nor did she like the way he struggled through his homework.
She expected Peter to come to her aid, but all he did was shrug. “He can go down if he wants.”
As usual, he’d missed the point. Blake was glad Peter was spending time with Dylan. But they had to have rules. Homework, then dinner. Playtime after. Even though Peter had trouble with the concept himself, he knew those rules had to be set in stone for their nine-year-old son.
The meal was consumed in a strained silence. Almost finished, Peter floated the idea of letting Dylan play for an hour, and she almost lost it.
“He wants to play,” Peter said, his patient tone implying Blake was being unreasonable. “And I need help with this build.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“It’ll give us a chance to talk,” Peter said. “Man to man.”
Blake scoffed. But in the end, she waved him on his way. She wasn’t fooled about his intentions—not a bit. But she’d had her fill for one day. And it was five thousand pieces. They had to be almost done now, especially with Dylan helping out. After, things were gonna change.
Blake would make sure of it.
Wednesday
Quarter past two, Blake descended the creaking stairs, garbage bag streaming from one hand. When she came back up, the set and the unsettling box it came in would be in it and on its way to the fucking dumpster.
Enough was enough.
She’d given it another day, but the situation wasn’t improving. Tuesday night, Peter had taken Dylan down to the basement for an hour. Distracted with a phone call, Blake hadn’t noticed the time until it was almost nine. She’d gone to check the basement, and up came Dylan, cool as you please. Returning from putting him to bed, Peter had been waiting for her. They’d gotten into it, and Blake told him she was getting fed up. All he did anymore was build, build, build.
And Dylan—When he wasn’t in the basement, he seemed off. Homework struggled. Nothing held his attention. He just wandered around the house, aimless. Like he was waiting for Peter to come home. At night, he tossed and turned, moaning in his sleep. Thinking about the pit nestled in its forest of crooked black trees, Blake began to wonder if she’d made a mistake, letting Dylan help out. If perhaps Peter’s latest project was giving him nightmares.
Peter had tried to play it down, of course. But Blake wouldn’t hear it. Because it wasn’t just Dylan. Peter’s rest had also been troubled. More than once he’d woken her up at night, and although his miserable noises had ceased, she only had to look at him to know he was exhausted.
Blake had told him Dylan was done with weekday builds, and ultimately Peter agreed.
Then today, Dylan had blown up in her face. Everything had been fine until he made to go down after lunch, and Blake told him no. When he invoked Peter, she said it didn’t matter what agreements they’d made. In the end, she ruled supreme. Dylan had stared at her, his face pale and tight. What came out of him next had been more shriek than scream, a sound filled with such rage and frustration it stunned Blake to silence. He'd kept it up while she marched him through the kitchen and put him out in the yard, tossing out his ball before she slammed the door. Even then he hadn’t given up. Staring out over the kitchen sink, electric sparks had fired through her veins, listening to her son’s muted cries.
We have to finish the build. It has to be finished.
He was right.
She knew they would’ve expanded, but seeing the result still gave her a nasty shock. The ashen patch was now three times the size, the pit yawing at its center as big as a dinner plate. Houses had been shoved aside to make room, half the neighborhood gravitating the black hole in a shattered arc. Judging from the set’s bleeding contours and the bricks in the tray, the rest was doomed to follow.
How can there still be pieces left?
It didn’t matter. Blake was getting rid of it. Clawing away the rotted pixelated lacework hemming in the pit, she tossed it back into the box by the handful, relishing the way the stunted shapes broke apart in her grip. Each time a scattershot hit thin plastic, Blake felt lighter.
Next, she made to dismantle the pit itself. Resting a hand on grey tile, she pressed up against the inside of the hole to tear up a chunk. Instead, she slid up over smooth plastic. Frowning, Blake sent her fingers crawling in again, feeling for the lines between the blocks.
Realization came slow.
Letting go of the walls, her hands drifted towards its center. Beneath her twitching fingertips, she should’ve felt plastic, smooth or otherwise. Instead, there was nothing. Not even the hard, unyielding surface of the table. A numbness bloomed in her belly but she forced herself to reach in deeper.
Deeper.
The bottom she needed stayed out of reach.
Blake pulled back with a sharp breath. A puzzled smile twitched. Impossible. Part of her was tempted to plunge in again, just to prove it. But a much larger part wanted only to destroy it. Starting in, she intended to brush the entire set off the table and onto the floor, when a voice said:
“What are you doing?”
Blake jumped, heart pounding. And found Peter staring at her from the landing of the basement stairs.
“Peter, this thing—It has to go.”
“Why?” he said, descending. His tone was gentle, pleasant.
“Because it’s not—” she broke off, struggling. “Because I don’t like what it’s doing to you. What it’s doing to Dylan!”
Peter rounded the table, taking in his work with a faint smile. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.”
Blake let out a relieved breath. It caught when his gaze found hers. The smile was still in place. But it didn’t reach his eyes. They were clouded, fixed on some inner vista.
“Peter?” she said, fist unfurling from her chest. “Are you—”
His hand shot out and clamped down on her wrist.
“Peter… you’re hurting me!”
His other one wrapped itself around her throat, squeezing off a startled gasp. Blake’s free hand came up and pawed at his wrist. He shoved, hard, slamming her hips against the edge of the table, one of her feet lifting as he began to bend her backwards over its surface. Things crumbled and slid, shattering on the floor. Jagged plastic dug into her spine. Blake squeaked, trying to claw away his fingers. Peter only tightened his grip, his other hand forcing her arm to the side. His smile never wavered.
“You can’t stop the build,” he said.
He’s going to kill me. The thought was surprised, panicked-- even offended. Right here between the LEGO.
Blake’s hand fell away, knuckles staving in a low structure. She sent fingers scrambling, but everything they happened upon was either too small or came apart in her grasp. At the edge of reach, she touched something solid. Her fingers beckoned, trying for purchase. Too smooth. Too far. Her vision shrank, darkening towards unconsciousness.
Resistance waning, Peter pushed her down further. Fingertips slid over the lined facade… and gained a corner. Ripping it up by its hollow roots, she gathered her strength and swung. It smashed into the side of Peter’s face, sent another spray of blocks flying.
Along with half his skull.
His hold loosened, enough for a thin, burning breath. But not enough to scream.
Skin hung in torn flaps. Peter’s eyeball dangled down the remains of his right eye socket. The lower curve still standing was the blood-streaked white of bone. But it wasn’t bone. Instead, it was a stepped ridge made up of small bricks. Beyond, she glimpsed a shifting landscape of reds and pinks. Some of it was meat. Some of it was plastic, rising from the ruins in glistening shelves and studded plateaus.
Before her mind could tip, Peter did. Leaning, his rigid fingers slipped from her throat. The manacle around her wrist gave a last tug before it snapped, and then the horror fell away. As he hit the ground, Blake braced herself for the sound of him bursting into a million impossible pieces. Instead, all she heard was the tumble of loose limbs, followed by the sickening meat-wrapped thud of his skull rapping off the concrete.
The impact, more than anything else, sent her struggling up from the table, inhaling shards of glass and pushing at debris. She held onto the weighted smack of flesh and bone as proof of her glitching senses.
Alas.
Peter had landed on his side. Beneath the tight curls clinging to what was left of his scalp, she could see a rind of bone. Trembling, she leaned over and peered inside the broken shell. Here and there she spied the wet gleam of organic matter. But most of the ceiling was a pigeonholed surface of hollow blocks. Below it, patches of shifting planes too smooth to be anything but brickwork. And yet, there was too much room. His head was a scraped piece of fruit, an angular cup. What rested on the bottom was somehow more devastating than everything else so far.
Amid a scattering of loose blocks lay a figurine.
Just like the countless others Peter possessed, except this one’s head was white, its eyes not so much painted on as drilled in. Huge twin black--
pits
holes that lent a ghoulish quality to its smile. The deep wells of its gaze held her, the clamps at the end of its curved arms held out as if in longing.
Too late, the blood came. Frozen, Blake watched it spread in a thick, hesitant halo, until a piece of Lego glued to her forearm tumbled to the floor, startled a scream from her tortured throat and sent her bolting for the stairs.
Heartbeat as frantic as her thoughts, she pushed off the wall and launched herself into the kitchen. Dylan was still where she’d left him, sulking on the lawn next to his ball. Not wanting him anywhere near the house, she ran outside.
“Dylan, come on,” she said in a broken voice. “We gotta go.”
He stared up at her, sullen. “Where are we going?”
“Just—away. Come on, let’s go.” She snapped her hand open and closed. Dylan offered his own and allowed himself to be pulled up. But as she led him towards the side of the house, he started to falter.
“Dylan.”
“I don’t want to go. Dad will be home soon. Then we can play.”
Taking a knee, Blake clamped his face and forced him to look at her. “Listen to me—”
It was as far as she got before her thoughts broke off. Beneath her thumb, skin slid over cheekbone. The smooth curve she had touched so many times now possessed a faint, but unmistakable, serrated edge.
Blake recoiled. Losing her balance, she sat down. Mother and son stared at one another. Blake’s eyes huge and shocked; Dylan’s soft and distant. Her mouth opened and closed, but nothing came out. All she could do was shake her head. Until a soft noise came from behind and stopped her.
Later
Waking was the sound of sifting plastic. Scattered thoughts pounded red behind her eyes. But blinking up at her son and the nightmare standing beside him, it all snapped into place. Blake tried to stand… and found she couldn’t. Her forearms had been lashed to the armrests of Peter’s desk chair with duct tape, her ankles fastened somewhere beneath the seat.
She struggled for a while before Dylan said: “Hi, Mom.”
Blake’s efforts faltered. Staring into her son’s face, a smile shuddered into being. “Dylan, honey—”
“Dad says you can’t play. Right, Dad?”
The Peter-thing let out a string of bubbling speech. All she could make out was build. Leaning over, his eye swung from its thread of nerve as he reached into the hole up to his shoulder. When he withdrew, his forearm was covered with dark lumps. In his hand he clutched a fistful of—what else?-- bricks. Pinks and reds, greys and whites spilled onto the heap in front of him. And black, of course. Lots and lots of black.
One of the dark shapes dislodged. As it slid down the hill, Blake saw it was one of the figurines with the drilled-in eyes. They were clinging to his arm. Still more inside what remained of his skull.
And they were moving.
Peter’s head was a mass of activity, a half dozen thumb-sized figures marching, carrying and stacking delicate blocks. Repairing the damage inflicted. As if to confirm, Peter’s hand craned up and sprinkled a pinch of pinks and flesh tones in between the broken bone walls.
Blake screamed again, struggling against her restraints.
“Don’t be sad, Mom,” Dylan said without looking up. He was placing blocks with infinite care, laying down a crooked border of black to increase the diameter of the hole. “You can play soon.”
The words hammered cold steel into her heart.
“It’s easier when you make room. This way takes longer.”
She jumped in her bonds as something heavy was dragged off the table. Shrank back in the chair when ex-Peter did an awkward quarter turn and faced—half-faced—her. Blake’s mouth opened, her eyes growing and growing as she stared. Not up this time, but down… at the drill he held against his bloodstained thigh.
It wiggled in his grip. Once, twice. Then he sent it banging on the workbench against the far wall.
With an unstable pivot, he rejoined the build. Little by little, Blake unclenched. A breathless silence pooled, stirred only by the click of hollow blocks. It didn’t last. Not when the twitching muscles at the corner of her eye and mouth told her the drill had served its purpose. The sound of bricks snapping into place was coming from within.
Sunday
“So, what’s this all about?” Tim Nelson said, following the lady of the house towards the basement door. “Peter showing off his LEGOs again?” He flashed a grin at his wife.
Clutching the doorknob, Blake smiled. “You know in this house it’s all about the build.”
This story is absolutely unique—a pure Flyingheart dark carnival! I can no longer look at Legos without a tremor of fear. Now I want to know…what is next for this family?
This was great now I’m looking at my son’s legos with a deep suspicion