Parásitos
by kdumd
Part 1
Authorities continue to scratch their heads as they work to bring the enigmatic Parásitos street gang under control. Despite dozens of arrests and multiple mass murders over the past several months, state, federal and local police are no closer to figuring out how and why the gang's membership has seemingly multiplied exponentially since it burst onto the scene just over a year ago.
Nathan was only listening halfheartedly to the local news broadcast as he feverishly copied his high school history notes from his notebook to his computer. But like everyone else in his suburban West Coast community, he was fascinated with the story of the Parásitos. No one seemed to have their finger on the pulse of what was going on, but citizens of all ages were captivated...and more than a little worried. It seemed like just yesterday anti-gang task forces were publicizing the dangerous new gang, infamous for being armed to the teeth and dressing in green from head to toe. He lived close enough to LA to know very well about the Bloods and the Crips, and their allegiances to the colors red and blue, respectively. But it's not every day a new gang rises up seemingly from nowhere and recruits thousands of members in such a short time.
Even more intriguing was the demographic of the gang. Historically, gangs were made up almost totally of members of one race or ethinicity; you'd be hard pressed to find a non-Salvadoran in MS-13, for example. But the Parásitos marked the first time a gang was composed almost equally of black and Hispanic members. That fact, in conjunction with its rapidly expanding ranks, had everyone from toddlers to the FBI absolutely confounded.
But Nathan couldn't worry too much about that right now. A freshman in high school, he was struggling to keep his head above water in U.S. history, and if he didn't ace his upcoming final, he faced the less than pleasant possibility of spending half his summer staring into a blackboard.
As he plowed through the section on the Great Depression, he saw a new orange IM box blinking at the bottom of his screen. "Huh," he said quietly. "Could have sworn I had my away message up." He clicked on the box, and looked at the dialog box.
verdecito59 has sent you an Instant Message. Accept/Deny/Block?
Nathan hit "accept" without giving it a second thought. It was so easy to obtain an AIM screen name these days, between Facebook, Myspace and good old fashioned word of mouth. He figured it was someone from school who was in the same predicament he was.
verdecito59: yo dude, need help with history?
So it was a classmate. Nathan looked at the green text and exhaled slightly.
natehotdog483: yeah...you in my class? how did you get my SN?
verdecito59: group study session, 54925 mcnally blvd., tonight at 9...ask for jose
natehotdog483: um, ok...i'll see if i can make it....but do i know you?
verdecito59 has signed off.
"Sketchy," Nathan mumbled with a pen clenched between his teeth. He could use some help, but something about this seemed...not right. He IMed a few of his buddies, and they had gotten similar IMs. They were all in the same boat, and summer school was not the way they wanted to spend their vacations. Five of his friends said they were going to go, so Nathan reluctantly agreed to come along.
He did as much as he could at home before bounding down the stairs when his boys called up from outside his window. "Going to study with some people, I'll be back later," he said nonchalantly to his parents. He closed the front door behind him before they got a chance to protest.
McNally Boulevard was only a few blocks from Nathan's house, and his friends all lived close by, so they walked together. "Any of you guys think this is suspicious?" he said, hands buried in the pockets of his JV lacrosse hoodie.
"It's a little random, and I can't seem to remember any Jose in our class, but I'm not trying to go to summer school, dude." Jamie was Nathan's best friend since preschool, through little league and now lacrosse. Heath, Blake, Jacob and Caleb rounded out the group. It was like a little traveling band of WASPs, complete with names that were straight out of an early 1990s tabloid article about the hottest baby names. They all enjoyed comfortable upper middle class upbringings, and none of them had ever so much as been skipped school to go to the beach, as was popular among their peers.
The group rolled up to the address they had been given, a few minutes before 9:00. It was a cool night, and the closer they got to the house, they could make out a distinct smell emanating from the small split-level house on the corner, but none of them had any idea what it was. Jamie was the most outgoing of the group, so he walked up to the door and hit the bell while the others hung back a few steps, periodically looking over their shoulders.
"Who is it?" a voice called out from inside the house. Even from the sidewalk, Nathan could tell it was a packed house. Hell of a study session, he thought.
"Uh, Jamie, Blake, Nathan, Caleb, Heath and Jacob. I'm looking for Jose, we're here for the history study session." A few seconds went by, and the boys could hear the commotion inside settle down to an eerie silence. Suddenly the door creaked open, but no one was there to greet them. In fact, the entire house was enrobed in deep darkness.
"Welcome, amigos," the voice called out. Jamie looked to his friends, non-verbally suggesting they run for the hills, but no one reacted. He took a hesistant step inside, the other five following closely behind with Nathan at the rear.
When they were all inside, the door closed behind them. It was still dark, and none of them could see so far as the person next to them.
"We hope you're ready to learn," the voice said. It was close by, that much Nathan could tell, but it didn't sound like anyone he knew, and he prided himself on not forgetting familiar faces and voices.
Out of nowhere, the entire first floor of the house was bathed in green light. Nathan's instincts told him to run, but he sensed that wasn't an option at this point. "Is this for history class?"
"You will learn history, that's for sure," the voice said. "But our history."
From the shadows, dozens of figures stepped forward. They were all very large, very well-built, and either African-American or Mexican. And they were all dressed in green.
The pieces came together. "Guys," Nathan whispered, "we should go. Now."
"No, papi, you aren't going anywhere." The voice in the darkness revealed himself. It belonged to a man no older than 20, about half a head taller than Nathan, clearly of Hispanic descent and ensconced in green clothing, from the do-rag covering his head to the bandana covering his mouth, even down to a green t-shirt and sweatpants.
Blake leaned in to Nathan's ear. "You don't think..."
Nathan finished the thought. "The Parásitos. But what do they have to do with us?"
The gangsters laughed. "Everything, chicos," said the voice, more than a little threateningly. "You must know of us. We are everywhere. Your police can't figure us out. Where we come from, how we continue to multiply even as they capture and kill our hermanos.
"You see, we do not recruit members like any other gang you've ever heard of. You don't come to us. We come to you. And when you have been selected, you will become Parásitos just as we all have. The bloodline must survive and grow stronger."
The gangsters moved in and subdued the six boys in short order. Next thing they knew, they were bound at the wrists and stood in a circle, backs to the center in the middle of the room, and they had been stripped to their boxers. "Now," the voice continued, as the other members of the gang retreated once again into the shadows, "you will be as one with the Parásitos."
It all became very clear to Nathan. Parásitos...it was Spanish for "parasites." It was his own fault for not paying attention in Spanish class. This gang really was like no other. It didn't expand its membership by preying on at-risk youth and filling their heads with dreams of sex, guns and stacks of hundred dollar bills. The Parásitos left you no choice in the matter. If they wanted you, they got you. And they were about to get Nathan and his friends.
The voice stepped into the green light. Now he was holding a knife, its handle engraved with intricate designs. Nathan couldn't make them out, but he thought he recognized some sort of multi-legged creature.
"Flesh of our flesh," the man said, "and blood of our blood." He approached Heath, closest to him of the six captives, and held the knife to his face. "Relax. It will be much less painful if you do not resist." Heath did as he was told and remained motionless. The gangster held the tip of the knife just under his temple and pierced his skin. A droplet of blood trickled out. The man cleaned off the knife with a green cloth, and stepped to his left, repeating the ritual on Caleb, then Jamie, Blake, Jacob, and finally Nathan. Nathan's instincts told him to fight it, but something about the hazy house suppressed those instincts and kept him relaxed. The gangster cut his skin, and he could feel the blood tumble out.
"Now," the man said, as he held the knife to his own face, "be as one with the Parásitos." He made the same cut as he had made on the captivated youths, but something was different. The blood...was green.
He allowed it to soak a separate green cloth. Then, without another word, he held the cloth to Heath's lacerated face and squeezed. His green blood dripped down onto Heath's ghostly-white skin and entered the wound.
"Watch," the man said, "and see what is coming for the rest of you."
Nathan watched in breathless shock as Heath began to change. Even in the green light, Nathan could see his friend's skin begin to change color, darkening to what Nathan could only assume was a deep, almost African brown. His nose flattened and thickened, along with his lips and cheekbones, and his buzzed blonde hair grew out quickly, curling and kinking as it did so. With every breath, Heath's body grew larger. Heath had already been big, a result of years of organized sports and the weight training that went with it, but he was well on his way to becoming significantly bigger, and it was all muscle. His pecs ballooned outwards, the dark caramel nipples eventually pointing straight downwards, a visual cue to the deep abdominals beginning to jut out of his midsection. Heath's legs exploded with new muscle, powerful thighs giving way to diamond-shaped calves. And even though he had underwear on, Nathan could tell his friend's dick was growing just as freakishly as the rest of his muscles.
When the changes appeared to be finished, the man stood eye to eye with the boy--no, the man--who just seconds earlier had been Heath. "Heath Mitchell," he said, "from this moment on you are DeAngelo Cromwell. You are one with the Parásitos. With this kiss, accept the gift of our knowledge, our experiences, our ideals and our mission. Welcome to the game."
Nathan could only observe as the man leaned into Heath--no, DeAngelo, he had to remind himself--and softly kissed the wound he had made on his upper cheek. Involuntarily, DeAngelo threw his head back and moaned as his mind was flooded with new information, reprogrammed until the body and spirit of Heath Mitchell was completely eradicated.
"Awake, papi," the voice said.
DeAngelo's head came level again. "Sup, niggas?"
Nathan was horrified. The voice that came out of DeAngelo's mouth was deep, gravelly, and sounded very much like the product of a life in the ghettos, not the gated community his friend Heath had called home all his life.
"To prove it," the man said, cleaning off the knife again, "your brother's veins now run deep with our blood." He went right back to that spot, just next to DeAngelo's right eye, and pierced the rough black skin.
Nathan swallowed hard, because he knew it was only a matter of time until he, too, bled green.
Part 2
Police and federal authorities continue to struggle as they work to uncover the mystery behind the enigmatic Parásitos gang. If nothing else, it appears they are recruiting members at an alarming rate. But the question facing officials is: who are these new recruits, and what is drawing so many of them in so quickly?
Nathan was frozen. His lifelong friend Heath had just become a black gang banger named DeAngelo, right in front of his eyes. And as if that weren't traumatic enough, Nathan knew it was only a matter of time before his turn came up.
The mysterious leader of the Parásitos released DeAngelo from his restraints and locked in an embrace, one that involved a complex set of interlocking hand movements and a verbal refrain uttered in unison and, most unnervingly to Nathan, in Spanish.
DeAngelo was whisked away to the shadows encircling the large room. "Before you join us," the leader said to the four remaining white boys, "we want you to see fully what awaits you." The house descended into silence for what seemed like hours before DeAngelo stepped back into the light. When Nathan saw him, he couldn't help but gasp audibly.
What now stood before him, arrogant and powerful, was the man who had been Heath Mitchell. But Heath Mitchell was nowhere to be found. The figure Nathan beheld was tall, black and muscular enough to give any normal human being pause. He was dressed now, and looked to be the poster child for the Parásitos. An army green wife beater clung to DeAngelo's inflated chest and highlighted the carved ridges of his abs, and was covered with a green camouflage jacket that looked to be three sizes too big, even for someone as massive as DeAngelo was. A deep green bandana covered DeAngelo's face from just under his eyelids to below his chin, and a green do rag was tied tightly on top of his head, atop a bed of intricately braided African hair and beneath a kelly green Dodgers fitted cap cocked menacingly at almost a 45 degree angle. Crisp white boxers were exposed almost to the middle of his powerful thighs, where they met a belted pair of obscenely baggy jeans and covered almost all of a pair of wheat-colored Timberland boots, the only two items of clothing DeAngelo wore that weren't green. He also wore a platinum chain that hung around his massive trap muscles and down his navel. Nathan gulped when he noticed a tattoo on DeAngelo, not because of what it was so much as where it was: on his face, just below his left eye, a script letter "P" with a stylized tail that looked to have...legs. Parásitos, Nathan reminded himself, parasites. It's an insect's tail. Good Lord, who are these people?
"Yo," DeAngelo thundered, addressing his former friends. "Dis ain't no game. Dis a gift. Be thankful, mothafuckas, you about to be a part of da family."
And without another word, four Parásitos converged on the group, ceremonial knives drawn. It appeared the rest of the boys wouldn't have to wait patiently in line. It was time for all of them to join the gang.
The men held the knives to their skin, piercing the boys ever so slightly, enough to draw blood. Red blood, Nathan made sure to note, because it seemed this would be the last time crimson blood would course through his veins. The gangsters cleaned their knives on the green pieces of fabric and then held the blades to their own faces, forcing droplets of green blood out. They then cleaned the blades again, intermingling the blood of the boys' past and their future. Then, at once, they touched the boys' wounds with the cloths and applied pressure. At that moment, Nathan, Caleb, Jamie and Blake ceased to exist, their minds going blank as the conversion ritual took over.
Caleb had always been overweight, but not grossly so. Those days were over. Layers of baby fat melted away as bulging, freakish muscle grew rapidly throughout his body. He very quickly had biceps the size of softballs and pecs that would make most amateur bodybuilders envious. Striated traps formed a bridge between bowling ball-like shoulders and Caleb's face, which itself was in the throes of transformation. Nondescript caucasian features gave way to clearly Hispanic ones. His nose widened at the nostrils but also flattened out, not so much flaring to the side as they would on a black person but taking a position parallel to the ground. His brow became more pronounced, dark black eyebrows framing eyes that looked about two steps away from Asian. Meanwhile, all of the hair on his head fell out as very short black hair grew out, nothing more than stubble. The skin all over his body took on a warmer, more caramel tone. Caleb Matheson, the chubby white kid, had been replaced with a hulking Puerto Rican thug.
Blake, on the other hand, had always been big, having spent many years as a lacrosse player. But he was still only barely a teenager, so he looked more like an overgrown kid than a muscle machine. That was about to change. Muscle swelled all over his body, thunderous legs giving way to feet no less than size 17. He also picked up about a foot in height, taking him up very nearly to seven feet. For someone as tall as he was with the hulked out musculature he now possessed, he couldn't have weighed less than 350 pounds. He, too, was destined to no longer be white, as his tanned caucasian skin got darker and darker until it was a warm chocolate brown. His jaw and mouth became significantly more pronounced, gigantic pink lips framed by an ever thickening but precisely groomed goatee of wiry black hair. All of his hair fell out as well, but unlike Caleb, none grew back. He was now the proud owner of a shiny black skull, with immaculate bone structure.
As Blake became a black gangsta, Jamie took on a more Mexican flair, alabaster skin darkening slightly to a light mocha, with slightly kinky hair growing out of his head and resting on his mammoth shoulders. He didn't become quite as muscled as his friends, but by convential standards he was still huge. Jamie's face looked a lot more rugged and eroded, like he had been through many a fight and lived to tell about it, as deep scars outlined his body in an almost artistic way. He also lost several of his teeth, no doubt to be replaced by gold implants at a later time.
And then there was Nathan. He was average in every sense of the word--medium height, slight build that treaded water between skinny and toned, generic brown hair and eyes. Well, not for long. He exploded with new muscle, surpassing each of the boys he had grown up with and then some. His skin became almost midnight black, but his face took on the features of a Dominican or Haitian, almost African but with distinct Caribbean aspects. His jawline strengthened and conveyed raw, untempered masculinity, a kinky black chinstap leading from his sideburns down to his pronounced chin. His longish hair shortened a bit and became stubby black dreadlocks, not long enough to flop around like a rastafarian but distinctily ethnic.
The boys' benefactors moved in when the physical changes were complete, completing the ritual with a peck on the cheek, and all four of the new Parásitos received a lifetime's worth of knowledge, experience, attitude and ethos.
"Awake, papis," the leader said. All four boys--no, definitely men--opened their eyes, as the assembled Parásitos took in the sight of their four newest brothers.
"Welcome to the game."
END