Silent Ground: Part 1

by Quil Carter

  It was a warm night, and the moon was high in the starry sky and shining silver through the cracked open window.

  It was late, really late…

  A perfect night for an escape.

  Sasha looked to his side and saw Kel sleeping soundly beside him. His eyes were closed and his mouth slightly slacked, his chest rising and falling as he slept off what Sasha had done to him.

  There was a temptation inside of him to try and put the two of them asleep, the way that Kheva had shown him. But he was too much of a novice, and with his luck it would wake the two of them up and he’d be fucked.

  No, this was something he was just going to have to do quietly.

  For more than a moment, Sasha didn’t move. He let the electric shocks roll through him, small jabs of energy every time he thought about what he was about to do. A lot of it was just the excitement anyone got when they were about to do something risky.

  But mixed in to that cauldron of anxious excitement, was a knotted ball of apprehension. One that told him that this was a mistake.

  A huge mistake.

  Kheva was teaching him and he was learning…

  But no. The abuse… no one should have to go through that. It didn’t matter if Kheva was teaching him to fly, he couldn’t put up with that shit – right?

  Right!?

  Sasha slowly slipped out of the covers, and his feet touched a black shag area rug they had beside the bed. He got up and out of the warm blankets, took in a deep breath, and with some quick glances, he grabbed his clothes from the laundry basket and slipped out into the hallway.

  Holy shit. I’m doing this.

  He put his clothes on fast and tiptoed down the dark stairs, mentally counting each stair he descended since it was too dark to see. He reached the bottom, and strained his ears to see if he could hear anyone upstairs waking up.

  But it was quiet, absolutely quiet.

  I have money, and I have keys available. The solution to both of his problems had been solved. No longer would he have to walk on the road, hoping beyond hope he’d choose the right roads to lead to the highway. He was going to steal their truck, and that would not only help his cause, it would make Kel and Kheva unable to follow him.

  I’ll leave the truck someplace safe… It’s not stealing, it’s just… borrowing.

  Sasha nodded to himself and walked to the kitchen. His head had now filled with a low-toned static, the same roaring sound that filled your ears when you were taxing them too hard. A part of him still refused to believe he was doing this. It seemed… suicidal.

  ‘Don’t do it,’ the voice inside of his head suddenly snapped.

  Sasha gasped, clasping a hand over his mouth and swearing under his breath. The sound of the voice was like a gunshot going off inside of an empty, echoing cave. Keep your fucking voice down! Sasha thought angrily. His heart was beating in his throat now, and wave after wave of nauseous sickness was engulfing him slowly in a fetid soup. Who the fuck are you? Why did you talk through Rob? What the fuck do you want from me?

  ‘That’s not important right now,’ the voice said quietly. ‘You’re going to fail, stay here with them.’

  Not until you tell me who the fuck you are, Sasha said angrily. Why are you inside my fucking head?

  ‘I’m not telling you anything tonight.’

  Then shut the fuck up before I shut you up myself, Sasha snapped. He clenched his teeth and shoved the voice down before masking it in the same way he’d masked Kel. Then he reached up and opened the freezer.

  He grabbed the Ziploc bag of the frozen pucks of blood and semen, closed the door, and turned around to the glass door that would lead him outside.

  Outside, where there would be no turning back.

  I… don’t think this is a good idea.

  The voice inside snorted. As Sasha carefully unlocked the door, he could feel the degradation seeping from this mysterious person that seemed to have taken up residence in his and Kel’s headspace. Who he was, Sasha didn’t know, but at least he knew the voice wasn’t solely his. There was some comfort in that. Maybe he was just something shared between the three of them since they’re all so close. A by-product of them needing each other.

  Or not… Jesus, Sasha didn’t know.

  Sasha slowly opened the door and stepped outside, the night warm but with a crispness to it that made Sasha find Kel’s leather jacket on the coat hook. He closed the sliding glass door, and took in a shaking, deep breath, then looked around for the blue cooler.

  It wasn’t there, but since Sasha was going to try and take the truck, he wouldn’t need it, right? Just drive and drive until he found an out-of-the-way hotel, and they’d have a freezer. Yes, that’s what I’ll do.

  “But I don’t know how to drive that well,” Sasha whispered to himself. He scanned the moonlit field with wide eyes, then turned and looked up to the bedroom window above his head. It was still dark… it was still quiet.

  I shouldn’t do this.

  Sasha tiptoed along the side of the house, his chest clenched tightly around his heart. He kept scanning the dimly lit landscape, the silvery grass before the haunting, ghostly trees that stretched off into the darkness. The scene in front of him was one that had been borrowing pages from horror books. But even if the outside world in the middle of the night was haunting, he had to push it down and prove to himself that he could do this.

  The moon was shining on the black truck, creating streaks of silver that highlighted the frame, as if it was an important object in a video game. If only it was that easy, but in a way… what Sasha was doing was reminiscent to some great escape in a game. He had to sneak out of enemy territory without being seen, and when he was seen, he had to get the fuck away before they caught him.

  Sasha walked to the truck and looked over his shoulder. He breathed a cautious sigh of relief, but his breathing was so rapid just from the adrenaline, it did nothing to calm the percussions of fear that were vibrating through his body.

  This has to be a video game… none of this can possibly be real.

  It’s not too late to just put my sleeping clothes back on and crawl back into bed…

  No… I have to do this. Prove you’re brave, Sasha. For fuck sakes, stand up for yourself finally.

  With a solemn nod, Sasha opened up the door of Kheva’s black Ford truck. He got inside, the cold air now mixing in with the English Leather smell that the truck had, and slid his hand to the ignition.

  Then Sasha turned the key.

  Oh fuck. This is it.

  Sasha grabbed the gear shift and slid it to reverse, then he began to pull the truck out of the mud pit parking spot.

  And it was then, the bedroom light flickered on. One of them had turned on the generator.

  “Fuck!” Sasha cried. He turned the wheel, successfully moving the truck around, and shifted it into drive. The headlights shone against the lonely dirt road, and Sasha put pressure against the gas pedal, making the truck lurch forward and down the road.

  “Shit… shit…” Sasha looked in the rear-view mirror and saw the shining bedroom light, and just before the house was swallowed by the darkness, he saw the living room windows illuminate too.

  “SHIT!” Sasha jerked the steering wheel as the road took a sharp left turn. He stopped looking out the window after that and concentrated on the winding road. A few times he tested out the brakes, and got the locations of the other switches he’d need, and after ten minutes of driving, he began to get a feel for the large vehicle.

  Okay, this wasn’t that hard. This wasn’t that hard at all.

  If this isn’t that hard, why do I keep swearing?

  “Shit. Shit. Shit,” Sasha said through a locked jaw. The realization of what he’d just done, and the consequences, were terrifying. Kheva was going to kill him, absolutely kill him. Why the hell had he done this? This was suicide, pure suicide.

  Sasha gripped the wheel of the truck. His hands were trembling, cold shivers kept running up and down his back. There had be
en many times while being with Kheva and Kel that he’d been terrified, but right now he was concerned that he’d soon be suffering a heart attack.

  He had to do this. Those people… they were insane. Kel was some fucking kidnapped prostitute, and Kheva––who the fuck was he?

  Sasha’s eyes temporarily looked away from the road, to Kheva’s wallet resting in a cup holder.

  Wouldn’t his I.D be in there? Sasha stared at it, the nausea swirling inside of his stomach like he’d swallowed something rotten. Did he want to know who this man really was? Maybe he had Kel’s I.D in there too. He could find his family, find that man with the pixie cut… tell him everything he saw…

  Suddenly the truck’s front dipped down. Sasha looked up to see the headlights shining on bushes and trees, before he was swiftly thrown forward with a startled scream.

  Then his face hit the windshield with an impact that knocked the senses right out of him.

  Everything temporarily went black, and for what seemed like hours, his life was swirling lights, gasping cries, and a throbbing pain in his head that seemed to pulse with the same tempo as the lights.

  Finally, Sasha’s senses began to trickle back to him. He squinted his eyes to try and focus them and started looking around the blurry landscape.

  How did he end up here? What’s happening? Sasha grimaced and rested a hand on his head. He felt warm, sticky wetness followed by a stinging pain which made him retract his hand with an ouch.

  But the pain helped him focus. Sasha stared at the blood-slicked steering wheel and scowled.

  Then his eyes widened.

  “Oh fuck!” Sasha cried. His head shot up, giving him an unobstructed view of trees and bushes, all bathed in the yellowy glow of the truck’s headlights.

  And all of them on an angle. Sasha had accidentally driven into a ditch.

  Fuck. Oh fuck. The only thing keeping Sasha from having a nervous breakdown was the adrenaline coursing through him. His mind hyper-focused on just getting out of the truck and away from the scene of the accident.

  Sasha tried to open the truck door but the angle of it had the door flying open, taking Sasha with it. He flew out of the truck and landed hard into a puddle of ice-cold ditch water.

  The water soaked his pants and jacket, bringing another layer of discomfort to an already dire situation. Sasha grabbed onto the door handle, pulled himself up and tried to stand.

  His legs shook and bowed. The dizziness tried to drag him back to the ground, as if he was a sacrifice to gravity, but he remained standing.

  After half a minute of trying to get his bearings, Sasha climbed out of the ditch and leaned up against a tree.

  What now, head voice? Sasha whispered. He closed his eyes and leaned back, then tried to force the roaring static out of his ears… not realizing that doing so would be a double-edged sword.

  Because, as the static drained away like the icy drops of water from his clothing, he realized he could hear a motor… a motorcycle motor.

  Oh, fuck me, no.

  Sasha turned and ran into the woods. It was dark, really fucking dark, but the moon was on his side. Though Sasha knew that very moon would sell him out in a second if he wasn’t careful.

  He was fucked. There was no question about it. He was fucked.

  As he ran, the branches began to whip Sasha’s face, but by now he was too numb to feel even the thickest switches. He ran, oh did he ever fucking run, and even with his chest burning and the cold night air chilling the blood against his face, he didn’t slow down. Sasha carried on, tripping and stumbling over every rock and uneven patch of ground that this forest threw at him.

  The terrorizing nightmares he’d experienced, replayed in his mind like a song stuck in his head. The image of Kheva standing over him naked was the most prominent, and next to him, Kel with the lewd look on his face that did all but scream his intentions.

  Sasha threw his hands up to his face as he ran through a spider’s web. He pushed through it, and looked ahead, but there was nothing in front of him but more moonlit darkness. Sasha knew that would be all he’d see for what could be hundreds of miles.

  Was this it? Was he going to die out here? Sasha looked up at the moon, sparkling blue stars surrounding the bright orb. He wondered as he staggered on just how many men had looked up at that same moon while they were being pursued––and how many of them hadn’t lived to see it the next night.

  He had to get to a road, but the road was far behind him now. No doubt Kheva had found the crashed truck, and most likely he was stalking Sasha’s footsteps with an anger inside of him that would burn through steel. The Master wouldn’t stop until he found his prey. And Sasha knew that, as Kheva had threatened, he would soon show him the true meaning of fear.

  He already has.

  ‘Give up yet?’

  “No!” Sasha sobbed. He found himself stifling a scream of desperation and terror. Instead, he rubbed his hands up and down his arms and tried to self-soothe, but it was no use. It was a miracle that he hadn’t fallen into a full-blown anxiety attack.

  ‘You should’ve listened to me.’

  “Fuck you,” Sasha whimpered. He wiped his eyes when he felt them sting, and saw his pale, clammy hand streaked with blood. “Just fuck off, man.”

  The voice inside of his head laughed dryly, before murmuring: ‘Watch out.’

  “What?” Sasha said out loud.

  As soon as those words left his lips, his foot tripped over something and he fell hard onto the ground. To his luck, his head cracked against the side of a tree, and a burst of light interrupted his vision.

  Sasha swore and held his head. A fresh trickle of blood joined the old blood drying against his skin and hair, before dripping down to his mouth and chin. He looked down at his hand again, and groaned when he saw a fresh gash on his wrist, so bad that when he flexed his fingers, he could see his own tendons pulling.

  “Fuck…” Sasha whispered. He licked his lips, tasting his own blood on them, and tried to get to his feet. He leaned up against the very tree that had given him his newest slew of injuries and put his hands on his knees to steady himself.

  I have to keep going, Sasha said to himself. He looked forward, barely able to make out the silhouettes of the trees right in front of him, and gathered his strength.

  ‘Give up yet?’

  No.

  Sasha wrapped his arms around himself and carried on deeper into the forest. There were gaps in the trees where the moon shone through more than others, those areas would be the safest to walk…

  He had to get as far away from this place as he could. Kheva was going to kill him.

  ‘And when he does, he can leave your body where it lays and no one will ever find you. Or if they do, so many years will have gone by that they’ll think it was a suicide.’

  A boulder lodged itself into Sasha’s throat. Out of everything the cruel voice inside of his head said, this one gave him the most pause. This one made him walk faster.

  But what was the use? Kheva would find him… if they could find him on an abandoned road, miles away from their home on Ciel Lake, they could find him in their forest.

  Sasha stepped into a small clearing, several fallen down trees the reason for such a break in the canopy.

  It was bright… was it a blue moon tonight or something similar? Or was it always this big when it was full? Sasha didn’t know… the times he went out on his night walks were few and far between. He’d forgotten how the moon looked during those occasions.

  Now though, he was becoming familiar with the moon and the sun. What had once been rare incidences of going out were now commonplace. Just like him being able to go to Walmart finally, and having Kheva give him the confidence to stop caring about other people. He’d… he’d helped him a lot.

  ‘And he’s going to kill you now.’

  “I know,” Sasha whispered. As he walked through the clearing, back into the cold, empty woods, he felt his eyes sting. He tried to blink the tears away, but their
influence on his mental state was already apparent.

  Sasha choked and clasped a hand over his mouth. “I’m scared,” he sobbed.

  ‘You should be,’ the voice answered back with a dry laugh.

  “I don’t know what the fuck to do.”

  ‘Just give up.’

  “NO!” Sasha cried. His hands flew up to his head and he clenched his hair. Out of pure frustration and fear, he pulled it and tried to stifle the sobs rolling from his lips. “I just didn’t want to be fucking beat on… I didn’t want to be raped. Why is that such a bad thing?”

  Then with a stumble, Sasha found himself drawn back to his knees.

  But even in his position of submission, Sasha’s body would offer him no breaks, and neither would his mind. His imagination terrorized him of elaborate punishments that Kheva would inflict on him, and the unrelenting reality that everything he’d worked for, the fleeting but treasured nods of approval from Kheva when he improved on something, had now been erased.

  I just didn’t want to be raped and beaten on… I didn’t want those horrendous acts performed on me by force. I didn’t want to be humiliated by Kheva, fucked by Kel…

  Maybe I was convincing myself I was worth more than I am.

  Because I’m worthless. I know that now.

  Kheva can do as he will to me, as can Kel. I’m worthless.

  Fucking worthless.

  ‘Give up?’

  Sasha continued to sob, and though he at first thought that taunting voice might give him the burst of energy needed to get up and carry on, he found himself doing the opposite. Sasha wrapped his arms around his legs and curled himself up, then cried harder as he buried his face into his knees. With every unleashed sob, the sorrow consumed and smothered him, only trumped by the bruises and injuries that fought for control of every pain signal Sasha had left.

  ‘Give up?’

  The voice was crystal clear in his head, speaking with such a clarity it made Sasha open his eyes. He wiped them, then rolled onto his back and looked up at the moon, the only friend he had left.