The Wretched

by R. James Faulkner

  Had they really stored it across from the generator?

  Charlie pushed open the other door and saw they had indeed. They were dozens of gray metal barrels stacked in the large room. One sat on the floor with a hand crank pump sticking from it. His mind worked over the details with giddy excitement.

  He would burn them like that old man while they slept. But he would not hang around to listen to them scream. No, he would be far away when they burned. Once he had water to carry with him, he would set it all on fire.

  He searched the alcove for anything to drink. There was nothing but an empty mug that smelled of alcohol. He would have to go down the stairwell to hunt, it did not appeal to him, but he had no other choice. If he left without getting water in his current state, he might lose his strength, and they would catch up to him. He imagined they would do things to him that would make the fear of them eating him the least of his concerns.

  Down into the dark stairwell, slipping along like a cockroach, he hunted for discarded bottles. He had taken the time to withdraw the ax from the boot donor, and he held it at the ready. Once he made it to the bottom landing, he waited at the door, his nerve faltered.

  Not now. Not ever again.

  He rubbed his temples, took a deep breath, and opened the door. Sounds of snoring men came to his ears, along with the occasional person tossing about in bed. Charlie made his way into the large open corridor with shut doors that lined both sides. He snuck down the hallway.

  As he neared the corner of the corridor, a door in front of him opened. He spun and ran backward, and slipped into another smaller hallway. Charlie pressed his back against the wall and leaned to see past the edge. He saw a man in a white lab coat, his face absorbed in a handful of papers, coming toward him at a swift pace. The sound of his shoes reverberated off the walls and grew louder the closer he came. Charlie tried to open another door but moved down to one that was standing wide open. He scanned around as he slid behind the door. It was full of linens, stacks of bed sheets, and blankets.

  The man in the white coat stopped at the door opposite from him. He flipped amongst his papers before he opened the door and stepped inside. He could hear the loud spoken man as he talked to the occupant.

  “Amy, do you feel well today?”

  Charlie listened to the almost soundless murmuring that came as an answer. He had not thought of Amy since he first woke up, not even after he discovered her parents were dead. He waited in the room instead of running back upstairs. He wanted to hear what they said.

  “Do you think the treatments are working?” The man asked her, his voice sounded coercive.

  Again came the low volume response, a few minutes passed, and he could hear her crying. Charlie moved behind the open door, slid between it and the wall, and attempted to see through the crack of it and the frame. He saw in the window of the door the doctor’s white coat.

  “Is that what you want?”

  “No,” Amy said. Her voice rose with a sudden burst. “Please. I’ll try, I will. Just let me.”

  There was a long silence followed by sounds of a struggle. Charlie was unsure if he should try to rescue her or save himself. He chewed on his thumbnail while he decided. The voices spoke again.

  “Good,” the man said. He sounded elated. “You’re making real progress. Yes, just like that, Amy. You’ve got it. Let it come from within, unhindered by thoughts, driven only by raw emotions.”

  “I want to stop, but I—”

  “You can’t. I know, I know, child, but I can help you. Is that what you want?”

  After a long pause, Amy answered. “Yes…help me…”

  Almost a half hour passed as the doctor stayed in the room. Charlie thought he would escape without her after all. The door swung wide, and the doctor appeared with his handful of papers. He slammed the door shut behind him and walked down the hallway. Charlie waited behind the door until he felt it was safe enough to run across the hall.

  He peeked into the window and saw Amy crying. With the door pushed open and his hand held out, he waited for her to recognize him. She held a familiar blade. It was the long butcher knife Ben found all those miles ago. Her eyes met his. For a moment, she did not know who stood before her, and then she held out her arms for him.

  “Ben,” she said. She placed a hand over her mouth and cried. “I thought you were…”

  He grabbed the knife from her hand, pulled her close to him, and felt her strong grip around his neck. Her chest heaved as she wept into his shoulder. He looked behind her to the corner and his gaze followed up the wall. Charlie backed from the room, holding her hand, and pulled her as he went into the hall. He glanced at the blood-covered knife and dropped it to the floor.

  “It’s okay. Come on, I know a way out.”

  She met his eyes again. Her face expressed pure loss. She said, “Where are Mama and Daddy?”

  Charlie grabbed her hand and pulled her toward the stairwell, he propped the door open and pointed for her to go upward. She tried to keep up as he raced past on the stairs. She had to stop to catch her breath halfway up to the door Charlie was going through. He held it open and waved for her to hurry.

  “Ben, where’s Mama?”

  He held his finger to his lips and told her to hush. It seemed like a bad idea to bring her along. He grabbed her arm, pulled her into the hallway, and made her sit on the floor by the noisy generator room. Charlie tapped on the side of the drums to check if they were full and found that only one of the sixteen was empty.

  He grabbed Amy’s hand and led her down the hall. Charlie opened a door and pulled her into a room full of gauze bandages and packages of clear vinyl tubing. Amy sat down by the door and drew her knees to her chest. Charlie told her they needed to wait for the right time before they tried to leave the hospital.

  “I love my Mama, Ben. I love my Daddy too, Ben.”

  Charlie looked at her as she sat on the floor and rocked herself. She bumped the side of her head against the wall and hummed a simple melody.

  What in the hell is wrong with this world?

  41

  Frank leaned against the wall and scrutinized the back of the doctor’s head. He wanted to bash it in, stomp his brains right out of his skull. He staggered around the table and leaned over the opposite end from the doctor. Frank tapped his finger on the wood until the doctor stopped writing and looked at him with his scowling wrinkled face.

  “Is something on your mind, Mr. Williams?”

  “Yeah,” Frank said. He leaned back and smirked. “You might say there is.”

  He grabbed a stack of the papers and flipped through them, and searched for the ones he saw earlier. The doctor stood up, insulted that Frank would dare touch his valuable work.

  “What is the meaning of this?”

  “Who told you?”

  “Told me what?” the doctor said. Confused and flustered. “Speak clearly.”

  “Who told you my real name?”

  The doctor pulled his glasses from his face. He said, “You did. Do you not remember?”

  “No,” Frank said. He waved his finger in the air. “I never told you my full name.”

  Frank stepped toward the doctor and slapped down his old skeleton hands as they rose in front of him.

  “I never spoke it to you,” Frank said. He shoved the doctor into the wall with force, which caused him to bounce off it. “I saw it on those papers, just as clear and as bold as could ever be.”

  He grabbed the sinewy man by the coat and slung him into the metal cabinet. The doctor bounced from it and landed on his hands and knees. Frank brought his heel down on the doctor’s back and forced him to the floor. He allowed the older man to roll over and see his face.

  “Please,” the doctor said. He raised his hand again and grabbed onto Frank’s pants leg.

  “No.”

  Receiving a kick to the forehead and another on the side, the doctor crawled as quickly as his aged body would allow. Frank grabbed him by his slick black hair and pulled
the old man up so he could stand.

  “Please, you’re cured. Yes, I’ve helped you.”

  Frank smiled a fox’s grin as he looked at the doctor with a piercing cold stare.

  “I was never sick.”

  The doctor tried to pull free of his grip, and it only made Frank more upset. He slapped the old man’s cheeks. Each strike grew in force with every swing. On the last swing, Frank balled his fist and made contact with the doctor’s lips. Blood poured from the thin, pale skin of his lips as his head snapped backward.

  “Nothing at all wrong with me, mister.” He brought his knee, with as much strength as he could summon, into the doctor’s groin. “I am just fine, doc. Just. Fucking. Fine.”

  He pulled one of the ink pens from the pocket of the white lab coat and examined the craftsmanship as the old doctor held his injured groin and moaned. Frank stabbed the pen down on the doctor’s head with short rapid jabs, hitting the man’s fingers when he tried to protect his scalp.

  “We can talk about this. Please, just sit, we can talk it over.”

  “Oh,” Frank said. He pointed to the chair. “You want me to get back in that thing? Let you talk to me some more? Is that what you want?”

  Seeming to lose control over his temper, Frank’s appearance became feral and destructive. Frank seized the doctor by the arms, forced him toward the chair, and ignored the old man’s protests. He held him down, pulled the strap across Doctor Wilson’s chest, and fastened it to hold him while he retrained his arms. Frank grabbed the black case and pulled out the remaining syringe. The doctor knew what Frank planned, and he tried to squirm free from the leather restraints. A pinprick, a firm press, and the fluid flowed into his vein. Moments later, Frank leaned over the man and tilted the chair back.

  “Oh, this is going to be a healing process. Just try to relax. Let the treatment work.”

  Frank slapped at the thin, wrinkled flesh of Doctor Wilson’s face until it turned blood red. When his pupils expanded to extreme size, it was evident that the treatment was working well inside his bloodstream. With the doctor’s violent shivers growing and his groaned pleas for mercy slurred, Frank bent down to get closer to his right eye. He inserted one of the doctor’s own ink pens into it with a slow and steady push. The doctor screamed a high-pitched howl of pain. Frank clapped his hands beside the man’s face with vigorous motions. He stepped from him and spun around in a slow circle with his hands held high over his head. For several minutes, he twirled around the floor making sure the doctor saw him. When Frank stopped spinning, he leaned over and inserted another pen into the doctor’s left eye with the same measured speed as before.

  Frank sat on the table, listened to the doctor cry out in pain, and drank the rest of the bottle of water. He watched the doctor try to blink his eyelids. The end of the pens twitched in the air when his eyes tried to move around in their sockets. Frank shook his head in disappointment, stood up from the table, and walked over to open the metal cabinet. He hunted inside and grabbed another plastic bottle of water from the lower shelf.

  “I bet that shit hurts, huh?” Frank chuckled and shook his head. “Goddamn, goddamn, God fucking damn. Ain’t that a sight? Your whole life and I bet you ain’t never seen such as this.”

  “Please,” the doctor said. “Help me. Someone help me.”

  He tried to cry out as Frank poured water into his mouth.

  “Shut up.”

  Frank climbed onto the chair with the doctor and put his knees into the soft belly of the former tormentor. He grabbed Doctor Wilson’s throat and gripped it with the fingers of his right hand. Frank allowed the man the time to understand what he was about to do to him. When he felt the doctor tense up, he squeezed with his hand until he could feel his thumb tip with his index and middle finger through the skin behind the old man’s trachea. Frantic struggles came from the doctor’s body below him. The older man’s face became red, and veins bulged from his forehead. Frank leaned closer to the doctor’s ear and talked to him in a hushed voice.

  “My name is Theodore Franklin Williams. All of my friends and family once knew me as Theo. But Theo died and he ain’t coming back. I’m Frank, and it is so nice to meet you, good doctor. So very nice indeed.”

  Frank dug his fingers in deeper and watched the yellow teeth part as the snakelike tongue poke out. He pulled back as hard as he could, with every ounce of strength he had left, until he felt a dull pop inside his grasp. He stumbled back from the chair and watched the doctor’s mouth work for air. A gurgling noise filled the otherwise quiet room. Blood flowed from the doctor’s mouth. An occasional crimson spray filled the air as he exhaled a puff of breath.

  When Frank figured he had witnessed the final spasm of the doctor’s life, he flipped through the dead man’s papers. He searched each one several times, never once seeing his name as he did earlier. To his bewilderment, while he flipped through the pages, he saw only gibberish written on them. Each one had squiggled lines and various dashes and dots, but none of the sheets contained an actual legible word. Nothing on any of the pages even resembled a single letter of the alphabet. Frank sighed and looked at the old dead man in front of him. He decided there was nothing left to do but wait and sat back down on the edge of the table.

  There was a knock at the door, and it swung open right after. The narrow-headed guard named Joe stood inside the threshold, stunned at what he saw. Frank shrugged his shoulders to the man and got to his feet. He held his hands out at his sides.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I killed him.”

  Joe turned and ran from the room. Frank tried to chase after him. He only made it to the doorway before he faced the large figure of the major. Frank backed into the room with his hands held up.

  “This is not what it looks like.”

  “What the hell happened?” Major Rose asked. He roared in anger.

  The room filled with the rest of Rose’s men, most stared in shock at the blood on the floor. Frank backed to the table while holding his hands up, and counted the guns drawn. He decided he could not run past them. The major inspected the doctor’s body, and then he locked his glare on Frank. He pulled his pistol free, pointed it at Frank’s forehead, and thumbed the hammer back.

  “What happened to the doctor?” he said.

  His face resembled that of an enraged and snarling canine. Frank remained silent until he felt the cold steel touch his sweating brow.

  “Okay, okay,” he said. “I think he choked to death.”

  There was a barrage of fists, striking boots, and gun stock impacts. They struck his body in so many different ways he could not defend against them. The men stomped him, kicked his head, stood on him, punched him, and slapped his face. They shoved him into the walls, threw him over the table, and used their own belts to whip across his back. When they were tired, and he could take no more, the major walked in. White tape wrapped his hands, his back was bare, and his chest heaved. Frank remembered the first few punches that landed on his head, after that it was more of an unrelenting stream of concussions.

  It felt like an eternity as the man beat him. When they finished with him, they pulled him from the room and dragged his limp body back into the bunk chamber. The men tossed him forward, and he landed on the floor hard. He managed to pull himself across the bed and let the blood drip from his mouth to the floor. The sound of angry men screaming on the other side of the door amused him. He smiled at the sound of their anguish.

  “Brent.”

  “Yes?”

  “You still with me?” Frank said. He spit out the words along with a broken tooth. “You still ready?”

  After a long pause, the shadows released the word ‘yes’ to his ear. He smiled and rested.

  Oh, it’s about to get so much worse without the doctor.

  42

  Charlie tried to quiet Amy, but she talked louder and louder. Her voice was near hysterical. He slapped her until she wept without a sound. Amy flinched as he leaned close to her and whispered in her ear.


  “Just stay silent,” Charlie said. “Don’t make me do that again. I don’t want to have to. Understand?”

  Amy nodded her head, rubbed her cheek, and avoided eye contact with him. He waited until he saw the thin blue strip of dawn breaking the horizon from the small window before he set his plan in motion. Charlie walked into the fuel room and turned on the lights. The pale bluish glow of the fluorescent lights reflected from the shiny gray metal barrels. His lips quivered with anticipation as he raised the ax and struck the side of the first barrel. The fluid poured out before he removed the blade from it. He plunged it into several more and watched the amber liquid gush from the wounds he had created.

  Charlie slid the barrel with the hand pump toward to door to the stairs. He opened the top with two good penetrating blows from the ax. Charlie enjoyed the sound it made and imagined it to be his war drum. He pushed the door open and shoved the barrel over onto the already coated stairs. Charlie watched the fuel cascade down the stairs in foul-smelling waterfalls to the floors below.

  I will spread her testament. The world will hear her gospel. Flames to offer salvation and ashes for communion. This is the covenant of fire.

  Charlie glanced at Amy as she stood professing her love for her parents to the dead man in the chair. He thought he should leave her, but then again everyone was broken now, she was nothing special. Charlie snapped his fingers to get her attention and pointed down the hall.

  “Hey, run that way.”

  “Why?”

  He shook his head and grabbed a pornographic magazine at the dead man’s bare feet. After dipping it into the fuel, he stepped back toward the main hallway. He turned to her and smiled. His eyes gleamed with exhilaration, and he lit the paper with the lighter found in Evan’s pants pocket. The yellow flame consumed the fuel soaked paper.

  Charlie tossed it in the room. The sudden wind of fumed air and heat that came back to him was awe-inspiring. Flames lifted to the ceiling and expanded out from the room. If it had not been for Amy’s screams of panic, he might have stood and watched it until the unopened barrels in the room exploded. He grabbed her hand and raced for the other stairwell, stealing glances behind to see the progression of the flames.