Androshorts: That Bloody Woman!

He thought about his last words to his wife and his promise to watch over her Deborah, their baby girl. She had not been planned but was as much loved if occasionally slightly more spoiled in the early days than her older sister and brother and he realised that he had for some time, since her mother's death perhaps, somewhat resented the less self-reliant child and had treated her differently, as the Mummy's Girl struggled to come to terms with the loss of her Mummy.

"Mr Conroy?" said the woman, "are you OK?" he felt her hand on his shoulder and he came around with a start, looking down and picking up the offending computer and folding the lid shut against those pictures, those words, his words from his son's mouth incestuously against his own sister.

"Thank you for bringing this to my attention, Mrs Hawtson," he handed her the laptop, "if I can rely on your discretion, I will deal with my son if you can assure me that Julian will remain silent on this matter?"

"That is Debbie isn't it," she said.

"Yes, I'm rather afraid that it is," he looked up and made eye contact with the woman that had destroyed his world, "those pictures were taken in her bedroom some weeks ago," he sighed and had a rather sad smile, "now I know why he was so keen to have a new digital camera."

The lady let out a long held breath, "Julian has only got back from University a week ago," she straightened up, happy that her son wasn't involved in what she'd read on his computer as he had already stated, "Don't worry Mr Conroy, Julian won't say a word, and I'll have this hard drive," she tapped the back of the folded computer, "totally wiped clean."

"Thank you Mrs Hawtson, I'm in your debt." He looked down.

"I'm so sorry Mr Conroy," she said, and took a breath, "will you be contacting the police?"

"I'd rather not if that's OK with you, much easier to keep it in the regime... keep it in the family I should say." He said. He straightened his back, his face losing expression for a moment, "Harry will be punished, don't you worry about that..." his voice tailed off.

"No problem," she said putting a hand on his shoulder, "I'll see myself out."

The Colonel went to his son's room and switched on the PC. He would never have classified himself as any kind of expert but navigated the machine to such a point as he was able to check through all of the files and was able to search through the pictures. After a few moments he found several files that were password protected, and after nine or ten attempts he settled on tearing the machine open, locating the memory chips and hard drives -- something the army had taught him -- and ripped them out.

Next it was the turn if the digital camera and that too had the SIM card removed. He took the camera with him down to the work shop in the garden and with the biggest hammer he could find he destroyed all of them, mashing the computer hard drive so hard that one of the metal corners was forever etched into the concrete floor. Taking the remnants including the camera he had purchased not three weeks ago from the catalogue store, the shape of the hammer head driven into the case, he went back to the house to wait.

He sat drinking mug after mug of rich, dark coffee, scalding hot from his favourite mug. Thinking about his sneaky son, he moved his car, parking it three streets away and walked home.

School had finished and both Harry and Deborah were waiting for exam results, their terms ended some days ago. Deborah would head off to take over her soon-to-graduate sister's rooms at Keeble College, Oxford while it looked like Harry would have to spend ANOTHER year at the local college and make good on the poor exam results that were expected for him for the third year in a row.

At a little after six Harry was home, rubbing his hands together in evil delight seeing that the old man's car wasn't on the drive. He would definitely have her arse tonight that was for sure!

He looked around him seeing things as they normally were, for once there was no sign of that interfering fucking housekeeper, and Harry was delighted. Perhaps Dad had finally sacked the old bitch which would save him some work, he had been setting the scene about stuff being stolen for a few days now and was almost ready to spring that one; Dad was SUCH a sucker!

He'd then have the whole summer to play with his sister before she went off to University, and to find a way to make sure that she kept quiet about their 'activities' while she was away. As he carried out a cursory check of the house he thought about how he might bully her into not actually going; how fucking cool would that be! Beat her into staying home and getting some menial fucking job as a cleaner, on the fries counter at McDonalds! He grinned at that thought, that would fucking teach her to get good results, thought she was so much cleverer than him, a fucking woman!

He stopped and thought on what he would need to do achieve that, she was so much under his spell that it was definitely an option, and he clenched his punching fist as he opened his bedroom door to get the new three pack of condoms he intended to use that night. He thought about the pictures and that document on Julian's laptop -- if threats and violence didn't work, there was always good old fashioned blackmail.

Vaseline! He stopped himself, and turned going back to the bathroom, forgetting that he was having her arse that night in the excitement of what he was going to do that summer and how he was going to re-arrange all of their lives for his benefit. He got the Vaseline and put it in his pocket.

On his arrival in his room he only just noticed the smashed up camera out of the corner of his eye. Closer inspection showed the hard drive and other computer components he could not recognise.

He snatched up the camera forgetting the condoms and thought about the last time he'd used it, taking pictures of his naked sister. He'd already clenched his fist was ready for another black eye and he began thinking on what shit he could pass on to his idiot father who had taken all of his other nonsense excuses with such readiness.

"You'll pay for trashing my new camera you fucking bitch..." his snarling rage was cut short by the sight of his father sat in the desk chair he'd originally tortured his sister in.

"Harry!" said his father indicating the bed, "please, won't you sit down?"

Lieutenant Colonel Conroy MC DSO was trained on how to carry out quick and dirty interrogations and his son wasn't. He asked Harry why he thought his electronics might have been trashed?

Feeling some concern at his father's new air, one that was quite new to him his response was guarded.

"Err... no Dad, I'm quite sure I don't..." he was in Deborah's room, he thought for a moment, "it wasn't Deborah was it? She has been acting a little peculiar of late..."

"Kinda..." said Dad, "so keep it going then, why do you think your computer hard drive is in thirty pieces and why there is a hammer shaped dent in the front of your brand new digital camera?"

"Don't know..." he said, then feeling a real struggle about to come on, "Daddy..."

"Spoken to Julian or his Mum recently?"

"No," said Harry, now really starting to feel that it was all seriously about to hit the fan.

"Imagine this Harry if you will, I'm home on a rare weekday afternoon, and a lady comes to the door and introduces herself as Julian's Mum." He leaned forward closer to his son, giving out that air of disappointed anger, another trait that Harry had been copying since he'd been given his first stripe as a cadet, "she then asks if she can come in and 'have a chat' as she put it."

"Ooohkay?" said Harry. This looked far worse than any of his previous parental bollockings and his mind started to race now.

"She hands me Julian's laptop computer..."

Harry's brain started to scream FUUUUUCK at him but he stayed in control.

"Riiiiight..."

"Next she's showing me pictures of my daughter, sat right where you are..." he leaned forward to growl into his son's ear, "NAKED!!"

Harry's mouth flapped open and closed a few times, and he mouthed, "naked?"

"Yes Harry, naked..." the colonel stood up, pulling his stunned and stupefied son up to join him.

"Julian..." Harry stammered, coming up with a defence he'd had in the back of his mind for a while now, "Julian must have..."

His father shook his head,

"A good try Harry," he said shaking his head, "But it was pictures taken three weeks back, when she had a black eye and a cut cheek -- Julian was at University."

"Perhaps... He must have come home for the weekend," said Harry with a long practised air of self-righteousness.

"From Edinburgh?" Harry was really struggling now, "and when I was at home? That's not the spineless, squeaky little Julian that I know Harry." Harry had been manipulating his best mate for so long now that even he knew it was a losing battle. "Does my job mean nothing to you Harry?" said the Colonel.

"J...job?"

"I've raised you as best as I could for over nineteen years, and I thought I was doing a good job," taking a firmer grip on his son's polo shirt and sweat shirt raised him off of the ground, "Do you honestly think... HONESTLY THINK that that they make colonels into brigadiers whose son's rape their own sisters?"

"Not... not rape Daddy," he mewled, "it was her..."

Fortunately their house was detached and in it's own grounds so no one heard the thumps and bumps as the boy was thrown around his sister's room, out into the corridor, down the stairs and out into the garden, bouncing into pieces of furniture as he went.

After an hour of quietly laying in the garden hugging his sides and his probably cracked ribs, Harry dragged himself to his bruised knees and shins and to the thankfully low fence that would lead to another half dozen of the same, a garage area, four more fences and then an alleyway that would give on to a back garden and a short tree climb up into Julian's bedroom.

His usual leap and roll became a pained crawl and he was in agony, and instead used that person's side gate to get back out onto the main road holding himself along on garden walls as he stumbled, heading for his friend's house. He saw a police patrol car, and fearing the worst he let go of the wall he was holding on to, falling hard into a front garden hitting the stone path rather than the beautifully mowed lawn he'd aimed for.

He hit his face and what was a broken nose, possibly cheek bone, a testament to his not so gullible father's rage and as his tears took him he lay there and tried to think what had blown the mission.

He had uploaded the pictures from his camera straight into a secure file on Julian's laptop, a hundred times clever than his and his sister's desktop PC's that Dad would upgrade every now and again.

He'd written the story laughing at Julian's nervousness and had ignored his warnings and gesturing, and carried on typing despite his best friend saying that he wasn't happy for that shit to be on his laptop, the one he took to University for his projects and everything.

Harry had been halfway between begging and threatening the boy he'd been mates with for almost ten years. He'd gone as far as putting a password on the document and locking it down so even the laptop owner couldn't bin it.

The password; Julian must have watched him type it and then gone in and opened the file. Julian admitted that he used the laptop most for watching porn. Julian must have opened the file for a crafty wank over pictures of his naked and recently fucked best mate's hot looking sister, along with the story of what he had done and what he planned to do to her in the next few weeks and over a long summer.

Julian had almost stood up to him; almost, that was the thing, and Harry had told him that as the computer owner he was an accessory to anything on it.

"You're fucking sick Harry..."

Harry had pinned his friend to his bedroom wall for that, with the added threat that he had also taken part in their joint assault on her in the street some years back and he was brave enough then. Julian backed down, worried that no one would employ an accountant with a criminal record with assault and sexual misconduct on it.

Harry had laughingly waxed on that the story would be printed and shown to her just to make sure that she towed the line from now on. Failure to do so would see the document pinned to school and University notice boards and sent to websites and social media. It had all been easy, soooo easy...

He woke up at three that morning better rested but still in agony. He hobbled to his friends house slipping through the always unlocked garden gate and was temporarily blinded by the security lights that had never been switched on in all of his visits.

Julian's bedroom window opened Harry stared up through the blinding white light.

"Harry? Is that you?" it was Julian's Dad, not who he was expecting.

"Oh," Harry shaded his eyes, "Yes Mr Hawtson, is..."

"We'd rather that you stayed away from Julian Harry, he's told us lots of things about your relationship with him that we aren't really happy about, good night Harry, and please shut the gate on your way out."

The window closed and Harry realised that despite being battered and bloodied, he was unlikely ever to be welcome here again.

He staggered home and found that all of the doors were locked, even with his key. Eventually, and as the sun crept into the sky he rolled on to the swinging seat that had been one of his Mum's favourites and he thought for a moment that he could smell her perfume on the thing. He cried, he slept.

His father allowed him back into his room and he was able to shower and eat something for the first time in more than twenty four hours. His re-occupation was on the understanding that he never mentioned this to anyone, if he so much as looked at either of his sisters again the police would never find his body.

Deborah had some counselling organised by Mrs Moffatt and stayed with her on an off until she went to Oxford that September. On the occasional days that she came home Harry was given a bergan rucksack and enough kit to live off of for 48 hours and sent on his way. His father didn't care nor want to know where, although it was usually a local army training area and he had never been discovered.

His college results were as bad as his sister's were good and the Colonel said he wasn't wasting any more time or money on his education and he would need to get a job. Being the accomplished bullshitter that he was he quickly got a job selling mobile phones, after all he knew his father too well and he wasn't going to feed and clothe him, just because he couldn't be bothered to try hard at school like his two sisters had.

With his hopeless educational record his Father managed to get his son into a reserve battalion of his infantry regiment as an officer cadet, but it soon became evident that he was wholly unsuited to the regiment and the military life. Raised to believe that this would be his life Harry soon discovered that the army that his Father had prepared him to join since he could walk no longer existed.

British soldiers were now black, Asian and even of Arabic descent despite two wars in Iraq and one in Afghanistan. Many were Muslim, wore turbans, some were gay and the bloody women were allowed to be bloody lesbians and there was nothing anyone could say or do about them or to them. A single joke or burst of banter would see the snowflake complain about ill treatment to the very highest level, no matter that comedian's father was a senior colonel and former special forces.

After one incident where Harry had taken the piss out of a fat girl, the battalion Regimental Sergeant Major took Officer Cadet Conroy to one side and said that while everyone admired his spirit and that he was without question his father's son, unless he started to significantly shut up, listen and above everything else wind his fucking neck in, he would find himself released from his reserve commitments very quickly.

Harry started with a real classic Conroy "How dare..." but the RSM even quicker stuck his pace stick under the young boys chin threatening him that right there and then he would have no hesitation in dropping the young man on his arse, happy in the knowledge that the Colonel would not only understand him doing so but wholly approve -- Harry wouldn't be his first and was unlikely to be his last arrogant little twat that needed to be taught the ways of the world.

Harry huffed and puffed, his frustrations evident to the older wiser man.

"The Officers Mess is just there Mr Conroy, why don't you go and bubble me to your Daddy, see just how you get on with that..." The RSM grinned evilly, "you see your Dad and I cut our teeth on the same rocks and stones, and he was a scabby arsed second lieutenant when I was a grunter so we know just how this shit works."

Thinking on his feet for the first time in uniform, Harry shut up, stood to attention and looked straight ahead.

A few months after that Harry spent his first weekend at Sandhurst for the start of his reserve officer training and everyone hoped that it would be the making of him, and initially it was. His reports showed the he had knuckled down, did what he had to and asked 'how high?' when necessary.

After two years he was commissioned a second lieutenant and Daddy breathed a sigh of relief. He was made a platoon commander and given a section of some of the older and more mature infantrymen with a section sergeant that let him know from the start that while he appreciated that he bore the Queens's Commission he wasn't going to put up with any of his shit. But even then Harry still managed to annoy lots of people, and word reached Regimental Headquarters.

The smarmy, bullying attitude to the rank and file he'd assumed would gain him respect got him beaten up on his first two week training exercise by big lads all wearing CBRN suits and respirators and completely unrecognizable.

His efforts to find out who it was the next day got him laughed at. The entire Battalion, cooks and all, knew that 2Lt Conroy had gotten a good and well deserved smacking the night before, and he couldn't stand the mockery.

He attended his first regimental dinner with the remains of a black eye, and was annoyed to see troopers and quite junior non-com's with a chest full of medals while his dinner jacket held nothing but a white handkerchief around the pocket.

He rarely spoke to his father these days but at the dinner did ask him if there was anyway he could get a year's attachment to one of the regular battalions heading out to Afghanistan.

His father liked that, mistakenly admiring the boy for wanting to take the life more seriously rather than his desire to get a medal on his bare chest. Daddy said he would see if he could get his mobile phone salesman son into the regular army as a transferee at the end of the tour if he behaved himself.

He didn't make enough effort during his pre-deployment training or take it anywhere near seriously enough and only his father's intervention got him cleared for the seven month tour.

It was on his third week and still a week shy of qualifying for his campaign medal that he started to show off and ended up getting killed on a simple IED job that wouldn't have held up the convoy more than twenty minutes and some very simple engineering tasks that were second nature to the specialists deployed with him.

He was flown home in a flag draped coffin to Brize Norton and the inevitable military funeral, his ashes spread on the same spot as his mother.

The greatest annoyance to his father was the formal coroners hearing where it was announced to the world by the driver of his the first truck, the sergeant in charge of the IED team and his company commander that if Second Lieutenant Harry Conroy had done what he was told by his lance corporal driver, the convoy leader and virtually everyone else he'd talked to walking towards his destiny he would still be alive.