Page 100 of Seth
The man’s nerves gave in, and he squeaked, “What are you doing?”
Seth didn’t answer. He tapped the pestle against the edge of the kidney bowl to shake off the diamond dust, then grabbed the bottle of lube. Clear liquid squirted into the bowl, concealing the glass.
“I asked, what are you doing?” Panicking notes pitched the man’s baritone. “Answer me, motherfucker! Do you have any idea who you are dealing with?”
Setting the lube aside, Seth lifted a large pipette filler bulb. The liquid shimmered as the bulb sucked in the glittering fluid. Seth attached it to a flexible plastic tube, straightened, and walked back to the thrashing man.
“I’m in a bad mood, worm. You have one chance to die quickly.” Seth plucked out his phone and showed Ignaz’s picture to the man. “Remember him?”
Glinting eyes stood out against the bloodless face; lips lost the color. Number six didn’t need to reply.
“Of course, you do. You came here to soothe his itch. Point out those who raped him two years ago, and I won’t squirt this into your bladder. You’ll die quickly with dignity. If you lie or refuse, I’ll stuff your every hole with glass. I’ll make sure the shards are too tiny to kill, so it’s not glass that will finish you but infection. Day by day, you’ll watch your cock swell and blacken as you piss out blood and pus. You’ll rot from inside, and you’ll perceive every minute of it.”
“You are insane…”
“I hear it too often lately,” Seth smirked, squatted between the captive’s legs, wrapped his gloved hand around his dick, and secured the cockhead. The man howled when the tube entered his urethra and, with a push, slipped into his bladder.
“No-no-no-no-no…” The hips jerked under Seth’s forearms. The man hurled from side to side. The ropes tightened and sank into his throat. He coughed, hissed, and begged with his lips only, “Wait, I’ll tell you everything!”
“Names. I’ll know if you lie, and then you’ll be dying for weeks, or maybe even months. I’ll make your agony my life purpose.”
“Walter Fischer was there. And Fredrick… I don’t’ know his surname. Sven, Sven, over there, you killed him already.” The hatred flooding the air didn’t escape Seth’s attention. The man shrank, lifted his shoulders as if trying to hide in them, and mumbled, “There was no one else, I swear.”
“Wrong answer.” Seth squeezed the bulb.
A shriek ricocheted against the walls and pierced Seth’s mind, making him regret not gagging the man again.
When he pulled the tube out and got up, the captive wailed and sniffled, but his agony didn’t touch Seth’s heart. His desert demanded blood, pain, and lives. “Now, you must be thirsty. Let me help you.”
“No-no-no-no!” The man howled. Seth closed his eyes, feeling the realities clash and the sand vortexes swirl around his legs.
The buzzingof the high-voltagewire added to Gustavo’s irritation. He’d sat in the damn car for so long that his ass hurt, and every nerve vibrated with tension.
When curiosity took the better of him, he got out of the car and strolled through the overgrown industrial site, Diego shadowing close behind. The initial thought of using the front door of the silo crashed against a shriek of pain. They returned to the factory and used the old bridge connecting the main building to the access door in the silo’s dome.
Rusty iron screeched under their weight as they approached the slightly ajar door. The screams grew louder. Animalistic, uncontrollable, they told a horrific story of torture.
Gloom cocooned Gustavo as he froze on a tiny metal platform above the ladder. Railings chilled his palms as he bent over and looked down. Old paint flaked off under his grip and fell on the concrete floor covered in blood and water.
Gustavo had seen a lot of torture in his life. He’d done it himself, still, his stomach turned as the stench of death and feces slammed against his nose.
Looking at the dead bodies, disemboweled and split open, he thought that if Hell existed, it would look like this. Some of the captives didn’t have eyes, others gaped with tongueless mouths. A few faces were eroded to the bone with acid. If Justin’s murder seemed like an act of love, permeated with romanticism and aestheticism, this mass murder reeked of hatred and was devoid of mercy, of humanity. Gustavo closed his eyes and opened them again to take into the angry, merciless act that didn’t seem to have any goal except destruction.
This could have been Hans…
The realization washed him in cold sweat. All this time, he’d only seen in Seth what he wanted to see. He’d treated everything as a game, when what was happening in the silo could have easily become his reality. His vision doubled and now he saw Hans sitting on one of the metal chairs with his guts spilled all over the floor.
“You look like you saw a ghost,” Diego said in a low voice.
“I need air,” Gustavo mouthed. “Let’s get out.”
His shoulder bumped against Diego’s. In the darkness of his failing vision, he stumbled out of the door and seized the railing of the bridge to quell the nausea. He gulped the air down. Drenched in sun, it tasted like dust but refreshed like a gulp of water. His vision cleared.
“What is it?” Diego asked, leaned next to him. His fingers mechanically unwrapped a lollipop. Wavering for a second, he proffered it forward. “A candy?”
Gustavo shook his head.
“Disappointed?” Diego dropped the wrapper and put the sucker in his mouth. “It’s pretty brutal.”
