I waited and expected more noise, another hint or clue to what had made the original sound. When it was not forthcoming I tried my best to rationalize it away, reasoning that it was most likely a rat, or the wind, or even a ghost. But never once thinking that it was truly what it was, something out to kill us. Wouldn’t something with nefarious reasons that had just given itself away with some blundering move, immediately try to become a black hole of sound? Unmoving, ultra-cautious? It only made sense.
How many times have you been in bed, and in the middle of the night you had been awoken by an unexplainable sound? You sit up rapidly; your heart is crashing against your breast plate. You struggle to adjust your vision to your surroundings. Alert for danger from any quarter, ears trying to pick up the minutest of sounds. When you realize that the threat is not immediate, you begin to relax, starting to find rational causes: the over-stacked dishes in the sink toppling, the dog knocking over the trash can, maybe even a particularly heavy gust of wind causing the drapes to push over a lamp. Never once believing it to be the man right outside your bedroom door holding an eight-inch curved blade, but he’s patient, he knows he should have been more careful when he knocked the family picture off the small table in the hallway.
He’ll wait until he hears your soft snores before he slowly turns the handle on your bedroom door, when he hits that creaking floorboard right next to your bed, it’ll be to late as you catch a glimpse of the steel glinting in the sliver of moonlight shining through your window as the blade is drilled into your neck, severing you carotid artery. Screams will escape you as he places his gloved hand over your mouth. Thoughts of your children in their rooms will fleet through your mind as your life slides away.
I sat up, there was a malevolent force in that building, and it was staring at me I could feel it’s gaze upon me like a physical presence. I brought the M-240 up to rest on the windowsill. I would light that fucking building up like the Times Square Christmas tree if given half a reason. Azile was young enough that she probably wouldn’t have a heart attack when that first round went down range.
“Show yourself, fucker,” I whispered. I was calm, mostly. I was hoping I wasn’t making any mind phantoms. There were enough demons and monsters running around without the need for me to create mythical ones.
“Mike?” Azile asked.
I jumped. Thankfully my finger was not on the trigger or I would have certainly blown off fifty or sixty rounds before I knew what I was doing.
“What’s going on?” she asked as she saw the gun in the ready position.
“I heard a noise in there,” I said pointing. It sounded a lot weaker when it was verbalized, and I didn’t tell her about my feeling.
Now she was listening. After a while she spoke. “Probably just the wind.”
“And wouldn’t that be what they wanted us to think?” I asked her before I truly thought about my word choice. Oh boy, my paranoia was on high alert that fine evening.
“Who, Mike? Do you see something?” she asked as she was peering over my shoulder.
“I don’t see anything. Something sees us, though. I can feel it.”
***
“Do you think he sees us, Dave?” the dark haired man asked nervously.
“I don’t think so Greg,” Dave said, putting his night vision scope down. “But I swear he keeps looking right at us.”
“Why don’t you just shoot him?” Greg asked.
“First, because Kirk hasn’t told me to…second, because it’s not an easy shot…and mostly because of that fucking gun he has. If I miss, he’ll punch holes through this piece of shit building. A lot of fucking holes,” Dave said, again picking up his scope and looking at the barrel of the death dealing machine. “I can guarantee one thing, though, Kirk is going to want that gun.”
“You saw the gun. You should tell him,” Greg stated nervously.
Their leader Kirk was a scary, solitary, psychotic man, who ruled more by abject fear than through any true leadership qualities. The last person that had left their group had been hunted down mercilessly. When caught, Kirk had ordered him to be hung upside down and whipped until foot long strips of skin scraped against the ground as he swung back and forth on the chain that secured his ankles. Dave shuddered as the man had screamed for mercy that wasn’t ever going to come. And what had made it worse was the man was Dave’s friend, and he had done nothing to protect him.
Dave had convinced himself that it wasn’t so bad under Kirk’s regime. They were safe, they ate every day, and as long as they did exactly as they were told, there was nothing to fear. That wasn’t always the truth; sometimes Kirk forgot what orders he issued, or if the outcome wasn’t to his design, someone would pay. But for the most part, if you did what you were told you were safe. Dave’s friend Bill had begged him to leave with him. Dave had refused, not because he didn’t want to go but because he was petrified of what Kirk would do.
When Bill had come up missing during morning roll call, Dave had not even hesitated when asked where he was or where he might have gone. In fact, it was Dave that had to deal a significant amount of punishment to his ‘friend.’
“We’re friends, Dave. Don’t do this,” Bill had begged. “We grew up together for Christ’s sake. Dave, stop this!” Bill had screamed as he was hoisted in the air.
“Five lashes,” Kirk ordered.
“Five lashes? That’s it?” Dave asked, hoping that his friend would someday be able to forgive him.
“Yes, five lashes from you. And hit him like you mean it or I’ll make you do it again,” Kirk said.
Bill screamed as Dave whipped him across the back.
Kirk said, “Zero. Hit him harder or I won’t count them.”
Dave reared back and struck again. Bill writhed in agony, screams, tears, and blood coming from his body.
“Better…one,” Kirk counted. “Continue.”
Dave delivered four more brutal blows. Angry wet, oozing welts as thick as breakfast sausages criss-crossed Bill’s back. His body heaved as he sobbed.
“It’s over, buddy, it’s over. I’m so sorry,” Bill said as he headed over to the chain release.
“What are you doing?” Kirk asked.
“Letting him down,” Dave said with a confused look on his face. “You said five lashes.”
“Yeah and your five lashes are done, I meant five lashes from each of us.” Kirk said sweeping his hand across the twenty-eight-person populace.
“You’ll kill him,” Dave stated.
“No shit. Hand the whip to Chad,” Kirk stated as he went back to playing his Nintendo DS, the beeps and whistles the game produced doing little to drown out Bill’s whimpers and groans.
By the time the whip made it all the way to Kirk, Bill had come to the last link in his chain of life. Dave was amazed Bill had anything left, but when Kirk began to whip his face, he managed three more screams as his eye was torn free from its facial moorings and his lips were flayed off. The affect was grotesque as his face began to slough away. More than one person in the group had to walk away. Dave didn’t, though, because Kirk was watching him intently as he finished his friend off.