The Wretched

by R. James Faulkner

  It’s so beautiful. So wondrous. And now, it will consume them all. The screams as the bodies char, they will be the hymns of her religion.

  They made it to the stairs and raced down them. He towed on her like a stubborn mule unwilling to move. She tripped and fell. He did not seem to notice as he dragged her behind him. Amy screamed for him to stop as she tried to get to her feet, but he kept snatching her downward over dozens of steps with sharp edges. They both could smell the smoke when he stopped at the last door. He held his fingers to his lips, and she understood.

  He pushed the door open and peeked out. Terrified screams came from all directions. His enjoyment could not be hidden as he reveled in the chaos of the fire. He looked ahead for anyone who would try to catch them. Charlie saw people run several different directions on either end of the building.

  Charlie held onto Amy’s hand. He waited until there were no more people in sight. A shot rang out in the stairwell above them, and he hauled Amy out the door. They could not stay any longer.

  They ran across the concrete walkway and past a small partition. He never slowed down, and she tried her best to keep up. Down streets and alleys, he led her on a relentless march as he tried to find his way out of the city. He made her keep walking even after she wept aloud, and pleaded for him to let her rest. When full morning sunshine came to them at last, they had already put Jackson far behind.

  43

  Frank tried to sit up on the bed. His body felt wrecked, busted up, and his guts twisted. He wished he had something to dull the pain. Without the doctor around, he doubted anyone knew where the medicine was. He laughed as he thought about how the doctor convinced himself that he had cured Frank.

  “Well did you figure out what the doctor wanted to know?” Brent said. He called out in his hushed voice from his hiding spot.

  “Doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “Sure it does, don’t give up hope.”

  Frank rolled over on the bed and grabbed the bunk frame above to help him sit up.

  “No,” Frank said. He dropped his legs over the side of the bunk and groaned out in pain, “I mean that he’s dead.”

  No sound came from Brent’s direction. Frank worried about him. He narrowed his eyes and tried to see into the shadows for movement.

  The raspy voice came to him, sounding skeptical. He said, “Dead?”

  “Yes.”

  “How?” Brent asked. He moved and revealed his baffled face to the light.

  “I crushed his goddamned throat.”

  Frank chuckled as Brent smiled, the look of relief was on his face. But it shifted into a look of terror as the room became brighter. Frank turned to see flames licking in from beneath the metal door. They flowed across the concrete like water and spread wide as the fire danced upward.

  He pulled himself from the bunk and turned to run. The metal door swung wide, and he saw the narrow-headed guard named Joe step into the chamber, bathed in flame. The way it flowed around him, it almost seemed as if he were riding upon a large flaming snake. A snake that turned on its rider, swallowed him into the orange and yellow embrace, and devoured him whole. Joe did not release a scream as he was absorbed into the flames.

  Frank ran toward the back of the chamber. He stopped and turned his head to yell at Brent over his shoulder. He waved for the man to follow him and watched as Brent shook his head and walk toward the flames.

  “I can’t keep leaving them, Frank,” he said. “I have to go home sometime.”

  Frank shook his head and made his way to the boarded entrance. He kicked the bottom board out of his way. Frank stole one last look back into the fiery nightmare and watched as dozens of men and women stepped into the advancing flames. He coughed as the smoke settled over him. With one quick slide on his belly, he was outside and running down the parking ramp. He ran as fast as he could. Frank was never going back inside.

  44

  Angela pushed open the door to the other stairwell. She stepped on the concrete and metal steps, careful not to go too fast and risk falling. The boots made loud thuds when she put them down. She turned on the landing as the door below her opened.

  She stopped and watched as a shirtless Major Rose walked out from behind the door. His bitter eyes spotted her right away. A snarled grin, exposed teeth, and dripping spittle, he had all the makings of a rabid dog. His body was covered with beads of sweat, and he panted for breath.

  “What are you doing?” he said.

  She lifted the gun and aimed it at him. He did not flinch. His eyes saw past the gun and into hers. He strode toward her and gnashed his bared teeth. She touched her finger to the trigger. All of her focus was on trying to calm her hands, to stop them from shaking.

  “I bet you don’t even know how to shoot that fucking thing.”

  She pulled the trigger, and there was nothing. No noise. No discharge. He huffed at her. His boot landed on the first step. She pulled back on the slide, chambered a round, and aimed it at him again.

  “Oh, you’re getting warmer.”

  She stepped backward to give herself more time. Her hand tried to hold the gun steady as she pulled the trigger again and felt the recoil of the gun. A large chunk of concrete exploded from the wall several feet above his head. He did not startle from it but rather continued to step upward.

  “I’m impressed,” he said. His face wore a sadist’s wide-eyed grin. “I thought you couldn’t do it.”

  Angela moved up the steps and heard his loud stomping come behind her. She slipped on a step and fell forward. At the last second, she caught herself but ripped the healing wound on her left wrist. Angela bolted up the stairs as fast as she could go, and look back once to glimpse him far below. She passed by the door she came through before and went on higher toward the top of the stairwell. Her legs grew tired, and she could feel the burning in her thighs and calves. Angela made it to the top landing. Exhausted, she pushed on the last door with what little strength she had left.

  The door swung open with no resistance. She tried to find something to bar it with, but the hallway was empty. Angela gave up trying to stop him by blocking the door and decided it better to hide from him instead. She ran down the hall, turned right, and ran until she came to another hall and took a left.

  Smoke filtered up from the downstairs floors. She coughed as she breathed it in. Angela reached the last door in the hallway and slipped inside. A large wooden desk sat in the center of the room. She crawled under it and tried to calm her breathing. The room was large and had two walls of glass windows that met at the outer corner of the building.

  She turned the gun over in her hands. Her husband had shown her how to use one, but it had been so long ago. He had only taken her to shoot one at a target range once. Now she tried to remember all the steps. She wished it were a shotgun.

  The vents carried the smell of thick chemical smoke. She leaned out from the desk and could see black tendrils of smoke rising from the lower floors outside the windows. With the building on fire, she thought maybe he would give up his pursuit of her, and she could find a way out to safety.

  Angela held her gown over her mouth, it became harder to breathe as the minutes passed. She considered sneaking back out into the hall and trying to make it to the stairs. The door opened and slammed against the stop. Angela’s body stiffened, she was unsure if he knew she was in the room.

  “You left me a blood trail, you dumb whore.”

  His footsteps landed heavy on the floor as he moved into the office. She saw that the injury to her wrist had betrayed her. Small drips of blood led him right to the room. He did not bother hurrying to get to her. The trail was marked for when he got ready to follow. His boots sounded off his approach to the desk.

  She looked at the gun, made sure the safety was still off and tried to remember how Daniel instructed to shoot one. The major laughed aloud from in front of the desk. She heard his steps come closer and stop.

  “I’m going to hurt you so bad,” he said. “I’m going to ma
ke you beg for death.”

  She heard his breathing to her right and pointed the gun in that direction. Long seconds passed as she waited for his head to emerge from the corner of the desk. Long breaths escaped her lips. It was becoming hazy in the room. The scent of burning plastic was strong.

  Still, she waited with the gun pointed to the right, and then it was gone, ripped from her hands by the major’s bear claw grip. Angela tried to move out from under the desk, but it was too late, his hand was in her hair. He pulled her screaming from under the desk and lifted her off the floor. He smiled as he held her up by her hair. His hand swung, tossed the gun toward the wall, and slapped her face on the return. It felt like a wrecking ball hit her.

  “What do we have here?” he said. His voice was deep and booming.

  “Please, just let me go. The whole damn building is on fire.”

  He shrugged and lifted her higher from the floor as he stood up from the desk. He pulled her up close to his face and smelled the air around her. His appearance was that of a dog sniffing out a hidden treat. She tried to jab her finger into his eye, he turned his cheek, so she scratched him down the face. It angered him. He grabbed her head with both hands, lifted her up high above, and slammed her skull into the desk.

  She drifted within the razor’s edge of semi-consciousness, that gray area of knowing and unknowing, her senses numbed and useless. Time shifted and felt as though it slowed down, even the threads of smoke seemed distorted. Her mind could not digest any of the clues she received. It was all a boiling chaotic rolling of sound and images.

  Struggling to come back from the sludge bottom of momentary stupor, Angela tried to scream but found her attempt unsuccessful. Her mouth refused to open for her to let her shriek out into the air. It was strange to her, of all the things in the world, screaming was the most basic, crying a second, and complaining was a close third. Why she even cared at that moment was beyond her, maybe it was her way of rationalizing the fact that the man was molesting her with his tongue. He was working at her the same way he had that one dark night when she thought it to be a nightmare.

  She willed her arms to push. To push at his head, and shove his filthy monster face from her. In her mind, he was a slobbering beast of teeth and tongue. With coarse black hair covering open mange sores, mounds of pustules on his chin, and a hog’s snout shaped nose. He growled as he rooted into her, and his strong hands gripped at her thighs. It was a swirl of confusion. Her senses faded. Reality stretched from her like spider threads.

  Is this it? Is this how it ends, burning alive while being rutted at?

  Her thoughts jumbled together and twisted over onto themselves. If she could get her head straight, get it together, she might have a chance. She tried to recall anything before that moment, but nothing made sense. She tried to remember her mother’s name. Of all people in the world, it should be one she would never forget. But it would not come to her.

  Why can’t I remember her name?

  She thought of Frank and if he was safe. Angela did not want to be reliant on another man, but her condition limited her ability, and she needed the help he offered. Somewhere in the smoke and flames, in the falling pieces of tinder, was the man who wanted, of his own accord, to help her. She screamed aloud, the sound of it even startled her. It made the hog nose stop his deed.

  Her name was Stephanie.

  Angela tried to push his face away as he moved forward over her body. His stench, the smell of his musk and his sweat, made her gag. He pressed his hands down on her arms, crushing her bones to the wooden desk. She strained to move from him as he breathed his hot, disgusting breath into her face. He leaned closer to her ear, licked it, and whispered to her. She yelled into the side of his head.

  “Get your stinking mouth off of me!”

  Major Rose panted with excitement. He said, “Mommy always said I had a dirty mouth.”

  She watched a depraved grin spread on his face. He reached to undo his pants, and she used her freed hand to punch at his eye. Without hesitation, he slammed her arms above her head and pinned them with his left hand. His right hand went back to his zipper. She tried to bites his face until he head-butted her and she was dazed once more. When she got her head straight again, she noticed he had not yet begun his eventual act. She lifted her head to see him using his hand to pull at himself.

  He looked at her judging eyes, anger and resentment came across his. He grabbed her neck, pulled her from the desk, and slammed her into the closest wall.

  “What’s wrong?” she said. “Can’t…be a man?”

  She spoke with winded words as she tried to draw her breath back in. The thickening haze of smoke made it more difficult. He slammed her into the wall, again and again, until she went limp in his hands. He slung her body to the floor and stood over her crying tears of anger. She stared up at him and saw how pathetic he looked fussing over the flaccid member in his hand. Her eyes moved to the closed door. There was no doubt he locked it. It was too far for her to run with her sluggish speed. Angela’s only option was to get to the gun that lay somewhere on the floor. She moved her head until she saw where it was at, right behind him on the carpet.

  “Come on, come on,” Major Rose shouted. “What is wrong with you?”

  He looked down at her and wiped the thick beads of sweat from his brow. The inside of the office had become a blast furnace. She begged him to let her go. It brought a smile to his face. He lumbered toward her and lowered his body over hers. She struggled to get away from him, but his grip was too strong to escape.

  “Please,” she said. “Let’s go outside. Take me outside and I’ll—”

  He pressed the palm of his left hand over her mouth. She cried when she felt him slide his pants down his legs. Her pleas to leave the office went ignored. The deranged man seemed bent on only one desire. She could tell the floor under her back had become hotter. Flames rose past the bottom of the windows.

  Angela had consistently done what it took to survive. She always accepted it to be the nature of a woman. Whatever she had to do, whatever it took, she was willing to do it. She knew the real winners were those who died last.

  I don’t fucking end like this.

  When he slid his hand from her mouth, she took a deep breath and bit down as hard as she could on his thick neck. Her teeth sunk into the tender skin to the left of his windpipe. A loud roar of pain came from his mouth. He tried to punch her face, but it only pushed her to the side and tore his skin more. Major Rose’s face was crazed, distraught, and vengeful. He grabbed her hair and pulled, slapped at her cheeks, anything to make her turn him free. She choked on blood that poured into her mouth, but she refused to let go of him. Angela wanted to see him die.

  He grabbed her by the throat. His hands crushed her esophagus, smashed her neck muscles, and cut her blood flow off. She was on the verge of a black out, but her mouth refused to let go of him as he continued to squeeze her neck. The major saw the flames licking higher outside at the glass. He realized the threat of burning alive was real and he pushed her head away from his body. The sound of his skin ripping was what made her eyes open. He pushed backward at her skull until she let him go.

  She spat the large chunk of his flesh out onto the floor. He collapsed to his knees as blood pumped past his fingers and onto the carpet in a thick puddle. She dove for the gun, grabbed it up, and aimed it at his face. Major Rose nodded, defeated and weakened by the massive blood loss.

  “Do it,” he said. “Go on and kill me, you worthless whore.”

  “I’m not a whore.”

  She aimed at his upper right thigh and pulled the trigger until the gun stopped firing. Angela did not want him to die quick and simple, with no great suffering. She wanted him to burn. Angela picked her gown up from the floor and held it to her mouth. She took several deep breaths of air through the fabric as she left the office.

  His shouts followed her beyond the door. She could still hear him or believed she could hear him, as she tracked her blood drop
s back toward the stairwell. The smoke was so thick she could not see the steps in front of her while she descended into the dark gray abyss.

  Burn, you son of a bitch. Burn here and then burn in hell.

  The black smoke hurt her lungs and made her eyes water. She could feel the heat from the wall as she hugged to the handrail. Spiraling around the flights downward, she lost the energy to keep moving. Her body needed oxygen, her lungs ached for a decent breath. She collapsed forward, tumbled down the last few steps, and landed face first against the door. It opened as she leaned into it, and spilled her out onto her back in the sunlight. The smoke rolled out above her. She saw the strange upside-down waterfall flow of black and grays moving upward into the early dawn blue sky.

  I made it. I’m still alive. But I have to move now and get away. Get away before…

  Angela pulled herself on her belly from the doorway and made it far enough past that the door shut behind her. She gasped for air as she coughed and spit out black strands of slobber. Her legs felt unstable under her body. She walked through the falling ash and smoldering pieces of the onetime hospital and staggered forward, step after labored step, until she heard her name called.

  She turned and saw him standing there. The look on his face was both parts concerned and relieved. She lifted her arms out. Her feet shuffled toward him. He was there holding her, and brushed her hair back over her head. His eyes said it all even as his mouth moved.

  “What have they done to you?”

  She thought the question was wrong. It would have been better to ask what they had not done. What had they made her do? What would she have to live with? What scars would she have to carry for the rest of her days? Not just from the men, but also from that pale woman. What would her dreams be like now? Could she ever sleep again?