by Brown, TW
One day, she was in her office closing down for the day when the door opened, and this guy walked in. He closed the door behind himself and told her that she seemed to be having trouble and that maybe she needed a man to take care of her. When she told him to leave, he walked her into a corner. Right around then, the project manager came in and caught the guy in the act. Fired him on the spot. I seemed to recall that the guy was named…
“No fucking way,” I gasped.
“I told her she needed a man,” Don stepped into my face and snarled. “And she chose…” He stepped back and waved his hands up and down to indicate me. And not in a good way. “She chose this?”
“So you were fucked up beyond repair before the dead got up.” I couldn’t keep the disdain from my voice.
“You know what!” Don shouted, and in a flash there was a very long and sharp looking blade at my throat. “Maybe you don’t get a choice. Maybe I skin you to the point where you only wish you were dead.” I felt the tip of the blade pierce the skin just under my chin.
“Do what you are gonna do,” I said back, sounding strangely calm to my own ears. Why was I not ragged with fear? How could I stare into this man’s face and fell…nothing?
“She was stupid…and now, thanks to your inability to handle your business…she’s dead. You don’t deserve this.”
Suddenly, I had the picture shoved in my face. He thrust at me so viciously that my head snapped back, and I felt blood renew its pouring from my nostrils.
“You are one sick individual,” I said after spitting out the warm coppery fluid that was draining down my throat.
“Keep talking. Give me more reasons to stretch out your death.” Don stepped back and pressed the tip of the blade to my forearm.
There was a moment where I felt nothing. Then the sting of the razor-sharp cut fired off and I sucked a breath in between my teeth. I bit down on the inside of my cheek so that I wouldn’t scream.
“I love it when little pussies like you try to act all bad and shit.” Don ran the blade down the other forearm.
I heard something and it took me a moment to realize it was Old Dirk. He was reaching through the bars, his almost skeletal fingers grasping at the empty air as he moaned and even hissed.
“You’ll get your chance, buddy,” Don called over his shoulder. He turned back to me. “The smell of blood gets him going. Sorta like a shark.”
“You know what?” I managed through clenched teeth.
“What?” Don was looking at a spot on my left arm and paying me almost no attention.
“Fuck you!” I’d been sorta swinging a little during this encounter. Not much…but just enough to allow for a little momentum.
I swung my left leg as hard as I could and brought it up between Don’s legs. He grunted in pain and staggered back before dropping to his knees. He clutched at his groin with both hands and dropped forward so that his head rested on the concrete floor.
He was trying to say something. No to doubt hurl a threat or ten my way but was currently having trouble getting the words to form correctly. All he could do was make these pained mewling sounds and a few gagging noises.
I felt my eyes widen when I saw Old Dirk’s hand swipe at the air where Don’s head had just been. If he sat up without paying attention…
I tried to school my features so as to give nothing away as I watched the man rock forwards and backwards. I also had to work very hard not to look at Old Dirk. I had to hope that Don might’ve grown careless.
After a moment, the man turned his head so that his cheek rested on the floor. I could see a pool of something had spread out. Maybe I’d made him puke. That seemed fair turnabout. And if I was about to die a horrible death. Maybe I could call on that memory to help me endure.
“You are fifty kinds of dead, you little bitch,” Don finally hissed.
“Pretty sure there is only one kind. Dead is dead,” I snarled.
If I could make him angry, there might be a better chance that he didn’t pay attention to his surroundings. He had no idea how close he was to death, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him.
He pushed up just a little and I could see that he had my photo crunched up in his hand. When he lifted his head, his eyes followed my gaze and when I looked back at him, he smiled and then sat up on his haunches and began to make a big show of ripping the phot in half.
He was still grinning like a madman when one of Old Dirk’s hands caught Don by his collar and jerked him backwards. I heard something pop and Don yelped as his right knee bent at an awkward angle.
Then he hit the bars and made a loud bark of pain that was partially drowned by the moans of a visibly excited Old Dirk. His teeth gnashed together in a rapid series of clacking sounds and his tongue flicked from his mouth almost like he was licking his lips in anticipation.
Don began to struggle, but his back was against the bars and his leverage was off. Add in that he was obviously favoring one leg, and he was now sporting a new expression that I hadn’t yet seen on his face.
Fear.
He jerked to the side and only ended up with a second of the zombies inside getting a grip on one of his shoulders. That elicited a yelp from the man, and I could not deny the almost perverse level of enjoyment that I was taking from what I was witnessing.
“Let go, you fucking freak,” Don practically wailed.
I was sure that, whether I ended up dead or not, I would at least see the end of Don Evans. To me, that was worth whatever happened next.
“Jesus,” a voice hissed in the darkness.
My heart sank as the big albino charged into the scene with surprising speed. He grabbed Don by the ankles—obviously not foolish enough to put himself in harm’s way by getting within reach of Old Dirk and the others—and jerked him back. I figured it would be simple to wrest Don away from Old Dirk, but apparently the zombie had quite a grip.
It took three more tries, and through it all, Don was hollering and yelping like the coward I’d always thought him to be. When he was jerked free, it made me laugh out loud. He actually went airborne just long enough to be perfectly parallel to the floor when he came free.
I heard the man hit with a meaty thud and the albino fell backward and landed even harder. I realized that I’d winced just at how painful it all looked. And then I realized that my hope had been dashed when Don crashed to the floor…free of the clutches of Old Dirk.
It still took a few minutes for Don and the albino recover. Once Don got himself under control, he walked up to me with his usual sneer, but minus a bit of that swagger I’d seen him sporting.
“Bet you thought you were rid of me for a moment there, didn’t you Evan?” he said with a hint of amusement in his voice. “Well I got news for you…I’m like herpes, baby. You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”
“And you’re a virus that too many people ignored until it got out of control,” I shot back.
A backhanded slap rocked my head back and once my vision cleared, I could make out the blurry face of the albino. He had been joined by the other giant, and now I was confronted by Don and two men who dwarfed him despite him being so much bigger than me.
“You just don’t know when to shut your mouth, do you?” Don chuckled. “I think I am going to make this last as long as possible.” He snapped his fingers as if suddenly remembering something.
Drawing his blade, he gave a nod and the two large men moved in and grabbed me. Best I could figure, they’d been lurking in the darkness and seen me kick their illustrious leader in the crotch. I wouldn’t be getting a second chance at it.
“I am going to savor every minute of this,” Don whispered in my ear.
He stepped back and made a point to show me the razor-sharp knife he’d used earlier. His eyes seemed to lose their focus for a moment, and he almost appeared to go into a trance.
“I could have saved her…but she wanted to be with some pretty boy that let her become one of those horrors. Probably filled her head with all sort
s of your hippie crap. Turned her into one of those bleeding-heart types,” Don muttered to himself.
He stopped talking and just stared at nothing for a moment. Then his head snapped up like he had suddenly come out of his little reverie. He looked me in the eyes, and I felt like I was staring into the abyss. His eyes were almost black and lacked any sort of human compassion.
Without another word. He brought the knife up to one of my already sliced forearms and made another small cut of what turned out to only be a few inches but felt like it went the length of my arm as pain slammed into me.
I clamped my mouth shut and stared at him, but I could do nothing to prevent the tears that leaked from the corners of my eyes. And when he stepped back, I was confused. He’d stopped and seemed very pleased with himself.
He held something up and it took me a moment to realize what he was holding. Between his finger and thumb was about a three-inch strip of the skin from my forearm.
“I’ve decided that you are going to suffer two deaths no matter what you say about there only being one,” Don announced.
I watched as he walked over to Old Dirk. The zombie stood there, inanimate for all intents and purposes as it remained stock still and simply stared at him. Then I realized it was not staring at Don. It was staring at what he held in his hand. The zombie was fixated on that piece of my flesh.
“Hey, fella,” Don greeted the zombie as he stopped just a few feet from the bars. “You want this?” He held of the strip of my skin and there was a moment where the zombie just stared.
Then, without warning, and faster than I would’ve thought possible, it threw itself at the bars. It slammed into them so hard that I was certain I heard something crunch. Both arms jutted from between the bars and its hands opened and closed in impotent desperation.
“You want this, Old Dirk?” Donny crooned like he was talking to a puppy.
The zombie snapped his teeth together and moaned as it strained for that tiny swatch of my forearm skin. I wanted to close my eyes, but for some stupid reason. I watched as he tossed the scrap of meat at Old Dirk.
The two behemoths that were restraining me chuckled when the meat hit with a wet splat and stuck to Old Dirk’s face for just a moment before sliding off and to the floor. I felt my gorge rise when the zombie dropped to its knees and clawed around until he managed to scoop up the piece of skin and shove it in his mouth.
“Fuck me…” I gasped.
11
Hate
“Wake up!”
The command came from far away, but the slap is what brought me back. I felt a pain in my shoulders and struggled to get my feet under myself as I made my way back to consciousness.
I hadn’t even realized that I’d fainted…passed out…whatever. But it was obvious that I had since the two giant goons were now standing behind Don who was starting to materialize as my vision returned.
“You don’t get to take the easy way out of here.” Don slapped me again despite my being awake.
“Don!” a voice hollered from the direction I assumed to be the stairs.
He looked annoyed at the interruption, but stepped back and shouted over his shoulder, “What?”
“One of the teams is back…they brought guests.”
Without a word, the two men flanking Don turned and headed into the shadows toward the voice. Don nodded and turned back to me. “We’ll resume this real soon. You just stay here and keep Old Dirk company. I think you two are gonna be best buds before too long.”
I hung there as the man stalked off. I wasn’t actually facing Old Dirk’s cage. He was sort of off to my left side.
It wasn’t long before my overall discomfort began to overshadow the pain from the part of my forearm that had been sliced away. My shoulders were screaming and felt like they were both on fire. And then there was the smell. I was becoming very upset that my senses were becoming…acclimated? Not sure if that was the word I wanted to use, but it was the closest I could come up with.
It was no longer so overwhelming.
I faded in and out. Not actually losing consciousness, but more like zoning out. The adrenaline had long dissipated and I could feel aches and pains everywhere from my beating, the slices, and whatever else was hammering me.
“Hey!”
I didn’t know if I was imagining it or not, but I swore I heard a woman’s voice. I blinked my eyes and tried to turn as much as possible without causing too much pain. I didn’t see anything, but then I saw Old Dirk push his face against the bars and start to drool in a thick rope of grayish slime that made me gag just a bit.
“Fuck…did Donnie already put you down?” I heard the voice whisper.
“No.” I didn’t bother to whisper. I had no idea who this was, and I found that I was having difficulty caring in the slightest.
I doubt I was able to hide my reaction when a figure stepped out of the shadows and revealed itself to be the blond with the straight hair. I was struggling to remember her name.
“Lisa…right?” I rasped, my voice a bit haggard from the screaming no doubt. Add in the total lack of water for the past several hours and I was surprised I could speak at all.
“Yeah. Lisa Hargrave…and you are Evan Berry. Current thorn in Donnie’s side.” Her tone held no humor and even less warmth.
“You my next torturer?” I eyed all the blades hanging off her and tried to steel myself for the next round of pain.
“What? No!” She said it like I’d just accused her of some horrible crime.
“Then you were what…just curious about the latest victim?”
She planted her hands on her hips. I had to admit, with the tight leather and blades, it was a pose that suited her. I pushed that thought and wherever it threatened to go out of my head.
“I’m here to let you know that if you can hang on and not die for the next ten hours or so, I might be able to get you out of here.”
That statement caught me totally off guard. I’d heard Don order this woman to his room once. I’d seen her shoot daggers from her eyes when some of the other women such as Natasha clung a bit tightly to Don. I guess I’d just assumed she was one of his groupies.
“Wait,” she said with what was almost a laugh. “You think I am part of his harem…one of the concubines.”
“You’re not?” I blurted.
She opened her mouth but shut it just as fast. Twice more she looked as if she was about to say something, but each time, she clammed up and pressed her lips so tight that they turned white.
“So that’s a yes? Then what gives. Is this some sort of setup? I mean, I don’t see what that would serve. Unless part of the torture is to get me to believe I am being given a chance at survival.” I paused as she continued to stare at me. When she didn’t offer up anything, I continued. “You’re wasting your time. If you’re legit, great. I will do my best to stay alive another ten hours.” I made no effort to hide my sarcasm.
“Listen, Donnie hasn’t been totally honest with us. He’s been telling us that his patrols have been dealing with raiders looking to take what is ours. That they have been murdering our people. He claimed there was some sort of gang war out there and that both sides had come together and called a truce to take us down just because we are white.”
As I listened to Lisa, everything she said seemed like something that Don Evans would do in order to gain control over his population. He didn’t need everybody to believe the way he did. They just needed to believe a certain version to stay pacified as he committed his atrocities.
He was no idiot. And I only felt slightly better that maybe not every single person in this place was bigoted extremist.
“If they don’t kill you before tonight, I can get you out of here.” She looked closer at me and appeared to make a catalog of my injuries. “Not sure if you will be able to make it, but if you have a chance, then my conscience is clear.”
“Why wouldn’t your conscience be clear?” I asked. It seemed a valid question. It had been Don Evans that
perpetrated these acts. And if this lady was not in the know as far as how things were going down, then that wasn’t her fault.
“I should’ve known better. I saw the signs but chose to ignore them.” And then, without another word, she turned and strode off into the shadows.
I returned to my zoning in and out and began to wonder if just maybe I was going to make it out of this alive. Being down in this boiler room, I had no idea of the passage of time. When I heard the door open, I waited, and while it certainly did not seem that several hours could’ve actually passed, there was still a bit of hope.
“Evvvaaaann,” Don’s voice sing-songed like a bad attempt at imitating that guy from The Warriors. “Come out to play-yay!”
At last, he strolled into view. I didn’t see his goons, but I hadn’t seen them last time either until they just magically appeared.
“So, I have something special for you. We are going to head up to the arena because I don’t think you will want to miss this.”
And just like that, the two goons arrived. They were all suited up in gear that looked like they were headed into battle. Their assorted bits and pieces of armor, sports equipment, and some parts that look to have been handmade adorned them and turned them into what amounted to nothing less than walking weapons.
I was pulled down from where I’d spent the last several hours hanging. As soon as my arms dropped, blood rushed to my hands and began to burn. The agony in my shoulders increased as the muscles protested.
I took an unsteady step and collapsed to my knees. A heartbeat later, I’d been jerked to my feet from under each arm. I kept trying to get my feet to help, but they were slow to the party and kept dragging along and tripping over each other.
By the time we reached the stairs, I was at least partially under my own power. We emerged in the corridor of the school and I heard what sounded like distant cheers. Every once in a while they would be punctuated by a swell of noise.
