by catt dahman
“I couldn’t do that. Even now, I couldn’t,” Kim said.
“Really? I dunno what it takes then,” Skot said, “but I could hurt them easily. Never care either. Wouldn’t make me sleep no less at night.”
“It would me.”
“Weak. You won’t last then.”
“Maybe I won’t, but I’d rather die than be like you.”
“Don’t you hate them?” Jake asked, “I do.”
Kim nodded and replied, “I do. I’d kill them. Sure. I’d shoot them like Nick did, but I couldn’t hurt people. If I can then, I’m no better than them. If I am ever tempted…no. Never.”
“You never know,” said Ruth, sighing.
Four people were dead, one by suicide, one by a slow murder, one by a justified shooting, and one by a bloody, callous limb removal and murder. It didn’t escape their understanding that only one had been killed for or died for food, which was what the experiment was about.
Chapter Twelve
There was no one with a water hose this time and no commentary, but because Nick remembered the scent of flowers right before he awoke, slightly groggy, he knew that it was a slight repeat of what they had been through before. The similarities ended, and his leg ached, reminding him that the game was going on but had changed; how it changed was up to them to decide.
He knew his leg was shackled at once because he was twisted and there was a pulling and throbbing within his muscles. Very long like this and he’d go crazy; he got why those with chained legs were so angry and in so much pain. He groaned and blinked, trying to see if anything else had changed. The light was dim, so he could only make out a few details.
He wiggled his foot as he asked “Who is there? Hello?”
“Nick?” Ruth asked as she heard and saw the movement in her cage. She hadn’t been free long before being shackled again. Or maybe she had been free a long time and didn’t realize it. However long it was, it was too short. “That’s you?” She touched his foot.
“Yep. They switched my cuffs to my leg instead of my arm. How about you?”
“My hand.” She wiggled it, wincing as the cuffs rubbed at her skin. “Why did I somehow hope I would be free this time?”
“Or that there wouldn’t be a next time? I keep hoping I will stop awakening,” Andre said from the other side of Ruth. His position there was the same. “No, don’t make that noise, Ruth. You know how I feel. I’m done in. Kimberly?”
“Andre? I’m not there where I am supposed to be.” She was glad to feel Nick pat her hand and to hear his words of encouragement, but the new arrangement made her have to wrap her brain around where she was. At least Nick was there, and she trusted him. She had learned to trust him, and that trust had saved her from being terrified of someone else being in that spot.
How long could she hold out? Long enough for another four to die? She wondered at that, about hoping four people would die so she could live a little longer in misery; it didn’t make a lot of sense when she thought hard. She didn’t know what she was hoping for now, except for this to be over.
In her cage was a foot that she touched.
“Stop poking me. Damnit, Ruth, do you have some issue with poking me? You bitch.”
Kimberly unexpectedly laughed as she said, “It’s me, Kim. I’m beside you now.”
“The slut?”
“No, the slut is me,” Lovie called out. She was between Andre and Jake and was thankful. Last time, Vinnie terrified her all the time, and she felt she could relax a little since both of these men at least tried to control themselves.
“Too many sluts,” Skot snarled.
Jake didn’t yell at him to stop talking because Skot wasn’t so much a nuisance as he was ignorable at this point. He was less abrasive than Vinnie and hadn’t killed anyone yet , but what did that mean in the long term?
He couldn’t forget seeing Vinnie cutting into Carina’s flesh.
Jake was glad Lovie was next to him because he did like her, but she didn’t know how many times he had been in tears, watching her pretty plump hand and drooling. He had been so hungry. Had been? Jake moved around, trying to relieve the pressure on the muscles of his leg, but as he did that, he took inventory of himself. It wasn’t a good inventory, either.
His head hurt, not because he was hit but because of the state of the rest of his body. His original head injury had healed at some point. Now, he wasn’t able to stand, and he thought he might have lost weight. His stomach never stopped hurting; he felt that was strange since he believed there should be a time limit on the hunger pangs, but they never eased up. He felt as if his stomach was always gnawing itself. At some point, starving people were less hungry; he wasn’t there yet.
The skin on his buttocks had split into sores where he had been sitting. No matter how he moved, the pressure of sitting on unforgiving metal would cause sores to form on him. With no food, there was no healing.
He knew he was supposed to rally and try to survive, to rise to the top and fight this, but he had done the rally part when he snipped off his own fingertip. That got him food and a medical kit that he and Lovie shared, but he thought that had been at least three days before. At least. The way his finger looked, it might have less. He wasn’t sure how the wounds healed when people were starving.
“How long have we been here now?” she asked, almost as if she were reading his mind.
“A week. Two, three, a month. I don’t know. Too long.” Jake jumped as a finger ran over his foot.
Ruth had her pillow and blankets, but she missed the food; it hadn’t lasted long, and she said it, “I wish I had some food left.”
“I wish I had my bullet left. No, I’m glad I did what I did with it, but….” Nick didn’t finish. He wasn’t sure if he meant he wished he had it for himself if he couldn’t take the stress any more or for someone else if he tried to hurt one of the other people he wanted to protect. The problem was he genuinely liked six other people, and no matter what, all of them couldn’t make it to the final two; he doubted if most could make it for the next round.
“Who is it?” Jake asked the next time he felt the fingers tracing his foot like a spider, creepy crawling over his skin. He tried to think. If they were still set up as male-female-male-female around the circle, then it was Mattie or Prissy. “Prissy? Mattie?”
There was no answer, but to his right and across, Mattie grumbled, “What? What are you callin’ me for?”
Mike had been drowsing there, listening, trying not to think, but he sat up fast and yanked at his foot, terrified to know it was in Mattie’s cage. Mattie to Skot to Kim to Nick to Ruth to Andre to Lovie to Jake to Prissy to Mike to Mattie. Mattie and Vinnie were the only two who had attacked another for food, and Mattie was over there with his foot. He squeaked a little.
“Hee hee. That you, Mike? Yeah? All reversed now, ain’t it? Last time, I was scared of you.”
“We have no reason to be scared. None of us are going to get that crazy, are we? Right, Mattie?” Nick asked.
“Alls you needs to knows is that I am hungry,” Mattie cackled. It sounded like hawng-ree.
“Leave Mike alone. You don’t want Skot hurting you,” Nick warned.
Skot cursed and laughed.
Nick and Mike both knew that Skot wouldn’t cooperate out of the kindness of his black, evil soul. That was a given. The next best idea was to try to bully him into helping. “Skot, if you don’t help, then what if Kim hurts you?”
Skot laughed again and said, “I’m not plumb stupid. I hear and watch. That gal won’t hurt anyone.”
“Bunch of sissies. I done ate, and I done snipped my hand. Not anybody else got the balls to do that,” replied Mattie as she patted Mike’s foot, making him break out in cold chills. Mattie had finished her drugs and wanted more; they didn’t really dull the hunger, but they made the situation better. She liked how scared Mike was. It made her giggle.
“You’re sick,” Lovie called out.
“Well, maybe I is, but maybe I a
in’t. I just got used to surviving. Hey, Owen was a loser anyway. Why you wanna hold that against me?”
Nick couldn’t begin to list all the reasons why.
Prissy spoke, “He wasn’t a loser.”
“It speaks!” Skot said.
“We just didn’t know him like you did,” Jake said, trying to keep her calm; he didn’t want her to hate him and get any ideas.
“Like she did?” Skot roared laughter, “Wow. Like she did, and she did know him so good.”
“You weren’t there. You don’t know,” Prissy added as she sobbed, “I don’t wanna live without him and Terri.”
“Then don’t. Off yourself,” Skot suggested.
“I don’t gotta knife.”
Jake let out a breath. Maybe that was good unless she thought of using her teeth. “Well, that’s good, Prissy. Stick around a while.” He was both relieved and irritated. Of course, it was good if she couldn’t saw him apart, like Vinnie had done Carina, but it hadn’t saved Owen from Mattie’s teeth. And it also meant that if she lasted longer, then they would suffer longer because four had to die before they advanced. On the heels of that thought, Jake groaned. He didn’t want it to be that way, either. “I don’t know how much longer I can stick it out, either.”
“If you got a knife, then you and Prissy both go on. Do your wrists and share with her,” Skot said. “That’ll be two down, boy and girls.”
“You really think you can last until the end?” Lovie snapped. If you end up on the wrong side of my cage, then you’re in trouble, Skot. I am far less nice than Kim is.”
“All of you jump my ass, but I ain’t eaten dead or live people. Who are you to judge me,” Skot asked. “Think about it. Most of you…you ate that dead guy except me and Lori or Lovie, whatever. She thought about it, but I tossed my baggie back out. Most of you hacked off your damned fingers. I ain’t done nothing violent. So all of you can Kiss. My. Ass.”
“I’m willing to be one of the next four out of here,” Andre said.
“Stop it,” Ruth told him.
“Eventually….”
“It isn’t eventually yet.”
Andre sighed. When he did it, he wouldn’t tell Ruth. He thought about when he should take his life, when it would help the most. If he did it too soon, he couldn’t be there to get Ruth and Kim to the end, and they were the ones he felt closest to. In a way, he wished he were next to Mattie so he could take her out. Or Skot. He wasn’t beyond doing the difficult things to give Ruth and Kim a chance. On the positive, the current line up protected Kim with Nick and Ruth with himself. That was beneficial as well.
They slept, most knocked out by pain pills and alcohol, and the rest from exhaustion. Later, they were awake and talked quietly in pairs or as a group while the light was brighter, and then when it was dark again, they slept. No one knew how long they slept because time was so elusive to figure out, but they were always tired and light-headed.
At some point, the room lightened as the blue light intensified. No one spoke or made a sound as each listened to approaching footsteps. It was impossible that anything except food could stop the hunger pangs, but while it didn’t exactly stop the gnawing pain, the footsteps and ensuing terror did make a sick lump in their bellies that at least made the pain of hunger secondary.
Jake felt his mouth go dry. Was it another game? Or some rewards to be given for no reason? Punishment for something they might have done?
Nick hissed and said, “Think hard before you do anything, stay calm, and let’s stay cohesive.”
“Yeah, you do that,” Skot brayed like a donkey.
Chapter Thirteen
Carl and Randy came in with a table that Carl pushed and a cart that Randy dragged along; both men grinned and acted as if they were there for a party, making jokes and laughing. They were almost acting as if they had taken drugs and were high and giddy; no one doubted they might be.
Carl flashed a big white grin and spread his hands, saying, “I am so glad you could join us today for this version of dice. Julia is watching, so we want a reallllllyyyyyy big show.” He dragged out the word.
“By all means,” said Ruth as she yawned, trying for false bravado when she was scared to death of what was about to happen.
The table was affixed with some rings and was covered in a metal plate. It didn’t look like anything good was about to happen. Carl held up handcuffs. “This is easy. You cuff your free hand, wounded one if you have one. And then we will roll the dice for you. We’ll play fair, or it’s no fun. Each of the eleven possibilities is listed on this paper and has an action that corresponds. The good news is that almost half are rewards.”
“Really?” asked Mike, sneering.
“Honestly. It may be a pack of gum, but it may be these cheese and crackers. Yum. Right?”
“And the other six?”
“They are not as nice. One is kind of neutral. The rest are punishments and vary as well from slightly bad to very bad, but your chances are good…almost fifty/fifty as a reward. And then one-sixth for being not very bad at all.”
“But those five punishments are going to be horrible,” Kim complained.
“In varying degrees. Only three are really bad. Get a low number, and you are golden, right? It’s like Vegas.”
“Why the cuff?” Nick asked.
“To keep your hand steady. We don’t want to make it worse, of course, and so you don’t try to welch. We won’t have your hand but a few minutes. Maybe less than a couple of minutes.”
“I’m not giving you my hand,” Skot said.
“Maybe not at first, but eventually you will,” said Carl as he took a cattle prod from the cart. “You don’t want to be shocked until you give in because then, what have you accomplished besides being shocked?”
“Why?” Ruth asked.
“Why what?”
“Why do this? It sounds as if Julia is just a sadist. Let’s at least be honest.”
“She wishes to see who will cooperate and who will fight it. It’s a learning experience. She wants to learn who is more prone to cooperating because of the fear of the cattle shocker. If you need to be really convinced to play, we can shock someone else until you do.”
Skot laughed, “Shock away. I don’t care.”
“We know. We’ll shock you, Skot. Some of you are easy to predict by now,” Carl said, “hey, whatever works is what we’ll do.”
“Why not just hurt us? Why the game?” asked Nick, still curious, and the questions put off the inevitable.
I’m shocked,” Carl pretended offense, “we are fair people. Did we force you to cut your fingers off? Nope. We give people choices. Julia says that matters. I can tell you that this would not be interesting if we didn’t give all of you choices and if we didn’t follow rules. The game is fair. What you roll is what you get.”
“I choose not to play. I don’t want to gamble,” Ruth said.
“Not a choice there.”
“It isn’t fair then. We can choose not to play and, therefore, not have a way to get a reward, right?”
“Nope. No choice,” Randy said.
Randy walked to Ruth’s cage and said, ”Your turn. We like starting here. Get it over with.” He held the cattle prod.
One or two shocks and she’d give in, so she decided that it was better to hurry up and do it before she lost her nerve. When she was little, she accidentally touched the wire to the electrified dog pen at her uncle’s house, and she never forgot the fear of that. Being electrocuted was another type of pain that was like being cut or punched. She shoved her hand out of he bars but flinched and pulled back some as Carl snapped the cuff on her. “Good girl.”
He pulled her close to the bars so she was uncomfortable and took the other end of the cuffs and pulled. Her arm stretched, and he locked the chain into the rings in the table with two D rings clamped through the chain and rings. She couldn’t pull her hand back.
She began whining and panicking.
“Hope for a low number,
Ruth.” Carl took the dice and tossed them into a flat- bottomed bowl he showed Ruth. “I’m being fair and showing you.”
Ruth groaned. It was nine in the form of a five and a four. She knew it was going to be bad. There were far more ways to make a twelve come up than a two, but there was no logic here, no fairness, and no mercy. There was only misery. She wanted it over and done with, terrified of what was about to happen.
“No, roll it over. One didn’t roll well. Roll again,” begged Ruth as she began running words together in fear, “Rollagainrollitagain,please.”
Carl said, “Be still. If you move around, it could cause this to be far worse. Did you know there used to be a way of torture that was called the Death of a Thousand? I won’t go into it all, but body part names were written on paper three times each, and each piece of paper was thrown into a container. A torturer drew a slip of paper and did something to that body part like burn it or crush it or slice it, and so on. They carefully kept their victims alive for months and did a little each day, see? Anyway, I digress. It’s only your hand or a finger I’ll be dealing with, so you are very fortunate.”
“I’ll go twice.”
Carl looked at Nick, “Pardon?”
“Let her go. I’ll take her place and then my own.”
Carl looked at Randy who shrugged.
“Are you that crazy?” Carl asked.
“Yep. Insane. Is it a deal?”
Ruth shook her head, “No. Don’t do it, Nick.”
“It’s fine. It’s my choice. How about it?”
“No. No. Just no,” Ruth cried.
Carl thought and answered, “We should have it a rule that each has to decide before we roll. “
“Why? If a person gets a reward, let him have it. Who cares? I doubt anyone else will be as crazy as I am.”
Carl sighed and opened Ruth’s handcuff and let her go. She was in tears, feeling guilt hanging over her like a cloud, but Carl and Randy didn’t seem to care that she said no. She shook her head, letting her damp, sweat-soaked hair fly. She didn’t like any choices, but Nick couldn’t do this for her.
