The Housemates: A Novel of Extreme Terror

by Iain Rob Wright

  Jules spun the wine bottle on the glass surface of the table. It spun fast, becoming a blurred circle.

  Then it began to slow down, passing between those gathered around it.

  Jade.

  Damien.

  Danni.

  Tracey.

  Richard.

  Patrick.

  Jules.

  Jade.

  Damien.

  Danni.

  Tracey.

  Richard.

  Patrick.

  Jules.

  Jade.

  Damien…

  Danni…

  …Tracey…

  …Richard…

  …

  …Patrick.

  The bottle stopped on Patrick and immediately the older man’s eyes went wide. He cleared his throat and stood up. He was trembling.

  “Hey, Patrick,” said Damien. “It’s going to be okay.”

  “I…I don’t want to see what they have on me. It will just be a whole load of lies. We don’t even know that any of the videos we’ve seen are real. They could be manipulated. People can do anything with computers these days.”

  Damien nodded and smiled reassuringly. “I know. Don’t worry. We all have secrets. We won’t hold them against you.”

  “Depends what the secret is,” said Richard.

  Damien opened his mouth to object but then closed it again. Richard was right. Not everything was forgive-able.

  “Oh God,” said Patrick. “I feel quite sick. I think I’m going to get some fresh air in the garden.”

  Patrick left them all in the living room and headed out through the patio door. It had begun to rain again, but so far it was only a drizzle and a pitter patter at the window.

  Behind them, on the television screen, a video began to play.

  A handsome man in his twenties appeared alongside another man who might have been his twin. Both were wearing smart shirts and silky ties.

  “In some ways we should thank Patrick Mitchell. If it wasn’t for him, my brother and I would probably not have been driven to start up our successful chain of health spas. Our success came as a direct consequence of trying to run away from the people we were – the victims that we were made to be. But, as far as we’ve come and as hard as we’ve run, we’ve never been able to get away from that man. He’s always with us – always will be.

  The other brother took over. “Patrick Mitchell – Mr Mitchell – was our third-year teacher when we were eight years old. He fucked us both. It didn’t matter that we were children and that we cried out in pain, nothing would stop him sticking his dick in our mouths every chance he got. I doubt we were the only ones. He was good at frightening us into silence. Long enough that, by the time we had grown up enough to want to do something about it, we had already moved too far with our lives. We had become adults with families and children of our own. We couldn’t put them through the hell of going public. Fortunately, having money allows you to do a lot of things in private. Paying for Patrick Mitchell’s death is something we would do a hundred times over. I would gladly go bankrupt to see that man dead. I can’t wait to see him suffer. I hope he thinks of us as he dies. I hope he sees our faces like we see his every night when we lie next to our wives.”

  The video finished. The word PREDATOR flashed on the screen.

  2

  “I’m going to bleedin’ kill him,” said Richard, leaping to his feet and grabbing the wine bottle up off the table. “That fucking nonce!”

  “Just wait a minute,” Damien said. “Don’t do anything hasty.”

  Richard glared at Damien. “Are you kidding? The guy’s a goddamnit child molester. Nothing is worse.”

  Damien took a deep breath and held it. He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t condone violence – at least not anymore – but what Patrick had done made him feel sick to his soul. Despite wanting to do something to stop Richard, he found himself rooted to the spot as the furious man stormed out into the garden with the wine bottle rasped firmly in his hand.

  “Hope he kills him,” Jade said, sneering.

  “We can’t just start killing each other,” said Jules.

  “We can when it’s a sick paedophile like Patrick.”

  “Maybe we should do something,” Danni suggested to Damien.

  Damien still didn’t know what to do. He was conflicted. He kept thinking of those poor brothers as children. What misery they must have gone through.

  Outside, Patrick began to cry out.

  That was enough to get Damien moving. He hurried out into the garden with the others following right behind him.

  Richard was standing over Patrick in the rain by the wall with the eyeball painting. He had the bottle raised above his head. The bloody gash on Patrick’s forehead suggested that he had already been struck at least once.

  “Richard, wait,” Damien yelled.

  Richard spun around. “Why are you trying to stop me? This piece of shit needs putting down like a sick animal.”

  “I haven’t done anything,” Patrick whimpered on the ground. “Please leave me alone.”

  “You’re a paedophile,” Jade snarled at him. “You’re an animal.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I was a good teacher. I never did anything wrong.”

  “Who said this had anything to do with you being a teacher?” said Damien.

  Patrick shook his head. “W-what?”

  “You said you were a good teacher, but we never said otherwise, which makes me think it’s true that you abused your position.”

  Richard kicked Patrick in the ribs. “How many little boys did you bugger?”

  Patrick howled in pain and scuttled along on his back like a crab. “Please,” he begged. “It’s all lies. I’m innocent. Please stop!”

  Richard kicked him again. “Is that what the children used to say to you? Did you stop when they begged you to leave them alone?”

  Suddenly Patrick’s face twisted into one of fury. He spat at Richard. “How dare you judge me. All of you are here for the same reason. You’re all bad people – selfish people – evil people. You’re all monsters. Yet you feel you have the right to judge me? I took what I wanted, just like all of you.”

  Damien shook his head. “Even evil has limits, Patrick. If you did what you’ve been accused of, then there’s a special place in Hell for you.”

  “I’ll see you all there,” he spat.

  Richard swung the bottle down again and it cracked off the side of Patrick’s head. Patrick fell back onto the grass, cross-eyed and stunned. Richard knelt down and swung the bottle once more. The glass finally gave way and wicked shards showered the older man’s face as the bottle smashed across his nose. He rolled onto his stomach and started crawling through the grass like a worm. Damien shook his head with pity.

  Then he turned and walked away.

  Richard stayed outside with the broken bottle and finished what he’d started, while the huge painted eye watched on.

  Day 6

  “HOUSEMATES, PLEASE GATHER IN THE GARDEN FOR TODAY’S TASK.”

  Everybody got up from the sofa and headed out into the garden. Patrick lay dead at the far side of the courtyard. Nobody had bothered to move him. Sarah’s body was a dozen feet past him, rotting in the corner of the courtyard. It was beginning to feel like a graveyard.

  Today’s task was earlier than usual. It still felt like morning to Damien, or at least early-afternoon. It was a cold, grey day and it looked like rain would resume at any moment.

  The platform in the grass courtyard began to rise up out of the ground. This time it contained five glass containers full of clear liquid.

  “THIS TASK IS MANDATORY. ALL HOUSEMATES MUST PARTICIPATE. IN FRONT OF YOU ARE FIVE SMALL VATS OF SULPHURIC ACID. HOUSEMATES ARE TO PLACE THEIR LEFT HANDS INTO EACH OF THE VATS. HOUSEMATE RICHARD MUST REMOVE THE BANDAGES PLACED ON HIS HAND FROM THE PREVIOUS TASK. THE THREE HOUSEMATES THAT KEEP THEIR HAND IN THE ACID THE LONGEST WILL BE EXEMPT FROM TONIGHT’S TASK. THE
OTHER TWO HOUSEMATES WILL GO HEAD TO HEAD.”

  Everybody groaned. “I can’t do this,” said Jules. “My hand is already messed up from ripping off all my nails.”

  “FAILURE TO ATTEMPT THE TASK WILL RESULT IN NEUROTOXIN BEING RELEASED.”

  Jules put her palms against her forehead and started to cry softly. She wasn’t freaking out like she usually did and actually seemed resigned to having to do the task.

  “This is really going to suck,” said Tracey.

  “Come on,” said Jade. “Let’s just get this over with.”

  Everyone lined up in front of the vats. The liquid was clear and odourless. Damien sighed as he looked at the innocuous substance. It looked no different to lemonade, but he knew it was far more deadly. A high school Chemistry lesson came back to him, making him remember something about sulphuric acid literally pulling the water from your skin cells and melting your flesh. It might have just been the teacher’s way of scaring the class, but maybe it was true.

  The anticipation of touching the liquid was enough to make Damien’s stomach churn, but not participating would likely result in his death. As much as he had previously been ready to die, today was a new day and his will to survive had reasserted itself. The longer he stayed alive, the more chance he might have of an opportunity to fight back against his tormentors.

  I managed to get at them once. Maybe I’ll get another chance to finish the job.

  They all waited while Richard removed the bandage from his already injured hand. Then The Landlord got them started.

  “HOUSEMATES, PUT YOUR HANDS INTO THE LIQUID IN 3…2…1…”

  Everyone shoved their hands into the acid. For a couple of seconds there was silence as they no doubt expected to feel the caustic agony of the notorious chemical. But there was no pain at all, just a numb tingling sensation.

  But that soon changed.

  With growing ferocity, the slight tingling became a searing pain, like grasping a white-hot poker. The vats of clear liquid began to turn a mucky brown.

  Damien bit at his lower lip as the pain kicked into sixth gear. He looked down at his hand and saw that it had gone an angry red. Wisps of smoke appeared and the liquid went murkier as his blood vessels broke apart and his flesh dissolved.

  Jules screamed. Everybody else cursed and hissed. Damien bit harder into his lip and tasted blood.

  Two seconds later, Jules could take no more and yanked her hand free. She collapsed to her knees and convulsed. Her screaming continued as she clutched her burnt appendage between her knees.

  The other housemates continued to endure the agony. It grew worse every second.

  Damien felt dizzy. The pain was like nothing he had ever felt. A deep, burning pinch that felt like a million red hot pins being pushed all the way down to the bone. The only thing that made him keep his hand in the acid was knowing that the other housemates were in just as much pain as he was. He just had to hold on a little longer, outlast one more person.

  Tracey was the one to break next. The pain tolerance she had showed in the previous tasks had not gotten her through this one. She pulled her hand out of the acid and screamed obscenities at the sky. As soon as she was away from the table, Richard, Danni, Jade, and Damien all yanked their own hands free of the acid. They cursed and snarled and they fought against the agony. The pain did not subside even though they had removed their hands from the bowls.

  “HOUSEMATES TRACEY AND JULES WILL COMPETE IN TONIGHT’S HEAD TO HEAD.”

  “We need to go wash this stuff off,” said Tracey, apparently uninterested in the proclamations of The Landlord that signalled her possibly ensuing death. She was a person that focused on the problems at hand, not the ones ahead.

  “No,” Damien shook his head. “I’m sure water will make it worse. It reacts.”

  “Screw that,” said Richard. “I need cold water.”

  Everyone hurried inside and straight over to the kitchen. They shoved themselves into a huddle at the kitchen sink. To Damien’s relief, the cold water didn’t seem to be making anything worse. Richard sighed orgasmically as the cold water numbed his hand and seemed to gain relief from it.

  “It’s helping,” Tracey informed Damien.

  Damien nodded. “I’m glad I was wrong.”

  Everyone shoved their hands out in front of them and took turns getting their scorched flesh beneath the tap. Danni headed away from them, though.

  “I’m going to the toilet,” she said. “I can use the water there rather than fight with you all over a single tap.”

  Damien thought it was a good idea, although not exactly sanitary. He let her go.

  Once he got his turn under the kitchen tap he gasped. The flesh of his hand was bright red and bubbling with the worst blisters he had ever seen. Blood seeped out of every pore and mixed with the water from the tap.

  My whole hand is going to end up scarred.

  If I live long enough to heal, that is.

  Jade grabbed a beer from the fridge and downed it in a single, long gulp. Then she grabbed another one and started on it a little slower.

  Damien turned around and opened the cupboard that housed the bandages they had got from the pantry after Richard’s Bunsen burner task. He quickly got to work handing them out along with some antiseptic gauze in square packets.

  He tore open his own packet with his teeth and laid the gauze on the back of his hand. It stung and reignited the pain. It didn’t get any better as he wrapped the bandage around his hand and fastened it tightly.

  Everybody helped one another get their wounds bandaged up before starting on what was left of the beers. Some hard liquor would have been better, but they had to take what they could find.

  When Danni came out of the toilet she was clutching her injured hand under her armpit. Damien didn’t see how the pain wasn’t made worse by the friction, but didn’t think about it too much. He handed her some gauze and asked if she needed any help getting her hand bandaged. She took the first aid supplies but declined his offer of help. Shrugging, Damien went to the fridge and grabbed himself one of the beers. It felt good to drink again. It made him feel more like the man he used to be. That man had been pretty repugnant, but he was also a tough son of a bitch. And being tough, right now, was exactly what he needed.

  Whether it was the hormones brought on by the pain, or if something had merely snapped inside of Damien emotionally, he suddenly felt alive and ready. His senses were alert and all of the worries and concerns of his old life had been washed away as just one thing now became important: survival.

  I’m Damien fucking Banks and I don’t shit myself for no one.

  Whatever you got for me next, Mr Landlord, bring it on.

  You just better hope that it kills me.

  2

  “HOUSEMATES TRACEY AND JULES, please enter the Elimination Chamber.”

  Tracey wore a look of steely determination. Jules whimpered and fought with the rest of them as they were forced to grab a hold of her and shove her towards the door. She begged them not to make her go in the other room, but none of them listened. They had no choice. They hated sending her to a possible death, but it was either that or they all died for insubordination.

  Damien felt like a hypocrite as he stood back and did nothing. He couldn’t actively make himself force the poor girl inside the Elimination Chamber, but he wasn’t doing anything to prevent it either. He just stood and watched as Richard, Danni, and Jade dragged the poor woman across the carpet.

  Although I’m sure I wouldn’t be as sympathetic if I saw her video. Funny how your view of someone can be so wrong. If anything, the videos I have seen have opened my eyes to some things.

  I wonder what my video will show.

  Damien wished some wonderful plan would come to him – a tarnished gem of an idea that slowly became a clear-cut diamond of inspiration – but nothing entered his mind. As much as he wanted to do something for Jules, there was no course of action that made any sense to him.

  So he stood by
and did nothing as Tracey and Jules were shoved inside what would no doubt become their torture chamber. Their only hope was to be the victor in whatever task was presented to them. That was what had gotten Damien through the two occasions he had entered that room.

  The television screen lit up with the live feed and everybody sat down to watch. Today the white cube room was occupied by what looked like a pair of old-fashioned pommel horses, except the wooden body of the structure was pointed like a pyramid – an oak wedge on sturdy legs. On both sides of the wedge was what looked like stirrups. They were attached to the ground by steel cables.

  “HOUSEMATES TRACEY AND JULES, PLEASE STEP UP ONTO THE APPARATUS IN FRONT OF YOU BY PLACING YOUR FEET INSIDE THE STIRRUPS.”

  Tracey and Jules both stood there for a moment, stiff like boards. Tracey was the first to take the step forward, probably hoping that enthusiasm would be the thing to get her through. She climbed up onto the wooden horse and secured both bare feet inside the stirrups.

  Then, visibly shaking, Jules did the same. She was weeping as she climbed up and secured herself in place.

  Danni was sat next to Damien on the sofa. She leant in and asked him, “What are those things? They look like a pair of badly made rocking horses.”

  Damien shook his head. “I don’t know what they are, but I’m starting to get an idea of what they’re intended for.”

  “HOUSEMATES TRACEY AND JULES, PLEASE STAND BY. THE TASK IS ABOUT TO BEGIN.”

  There was a loud clank as the metal stirrups clamped around the two women’s ankles. Both of them yelped in surprise and perhaps pain, depending on how tight the ankle cuffs were.

  “THE APPARATUS ON WHICH YOU SIT IS CALLED A SPANISH DONKEY. IT IS A DEVICE DATING BACK TO TIMES OF THE INQUISITION. ITS INTENTION WAS TO EXTRACT CONFESSIONS. THAT IS ITS PURPOSE TODAY.”

  There was a short silence while the Landlord’s words seemed to hang in the air. Then he continued.

  “EACH OF YOU IS HERE FOR A REASON. EACH OF YOU KNOW THE SECRET THAT CONDEMNS YOU. YOU HAVE SPENT YOUR LIVES TRYING TO HIDE YOUR ONE BIG SIN, BUT THERE ARE NO SECRETS IN THIS HOUSE. YOUR PAST HAS BEEN PLACED UPON THE SCALES OF JUSTICE AND BEEN FOUND WANTING. REVEAL YOUR BIGGEST SIN…OR DIE.”