Page 5 of Inside the Wicked

The familiar sound of steel scraping stone signals company. I don’t move at all from the mattress on the floor, knee bent and head tipped back. The intrusion breaks my tormenting thoughts.

“You’re advancing today,” Micah sings. I’ve fantasized many ways of killing him. I’m not sure what I’ll settle on, but ripping the head off his shoulders has been a recurring thought. “Lanshall thinks it’s about time we push yourcooperation.”

I don’t respond or even look at the sick bastard.

“What I wouldn’t give to fuck her,” Micah says, admiring the screen. “I think I will. After all my work here, it’ll be my prize from Alistair. You’ll be so broken you’ll be helpless to watch it too. My cock is hard just thinking about it.”

My fists clamp tight, and I’m seconds from lunging. There are brutes just outside the door, but I think I could get at least one good punch in to knock him out before they tackled me.

Killing him isn’t enough. I’m going to make him suffer for ever even thinking of Ana.

She stands, and I’m relieved to see Shadow still by her side often. When she leaves the office the screen goes black again.

“Let’s go, Everett,” Micah orders. He uses my birth name to make me feel small, back in the body of the boy who escaped this place once before, but I never give him the satisfaction.

When I don’t move, it only takes seconds for the familiar shuffling to advance toward me. The two guys haul me up, and I let them. My reactions only feed their desire to cause pain and suffering. So I give them nothing at all.

One pushes me to walk, and I grit my teeth, heading down the hallway that’s become too familiar now. We don’t turn toward the room Micah uses for electrocution and water torture, nor do we make the turn toward his chosen room to draw blood.

I don’t remember the feeling before aching bones and weak muscle. Between the torture and the shit sleeping setup of a thin spring mattress on the floor, the pain is constant, all over my body. I push through it to exercise in my stone prison daily anyway. I would go mad with the solitude otherwise.

To keep me from breaking, all I picture is a future I’m not confident I’ll ever see. It starts with Ana wearing my ring. She would make the most breathtaking bride. I feel her smile, all bright teeth and light in her eyes, as she meets me down the aisle. I think about how, out of all the wicked bastards in hell, it’s a miracle I got there, holding the most perfect, resilient, courageous woman in the world.

Most of all, I think about how she chose me back, and how after all this, I hope that hasn’t changed, no matter how selfish it makes me to want her.

Finally, after what feels like an endless trek with my heavy steps, we get to a door that grinds open. Inside I turn tight with anger at the sight of a teen, maybe seventeen years old, strapped to a chair. His mouth is gagged with a tight strip of fabric, but he’s not blindfolded. When he sees us, his wide, bloodshot brown eyes fill with pure terror.

“This is Jack,” Micah says, passing me.

The boy’s breathing picks up, and a noise of fear escapes him when Micah claps a hand to his shoulder, smiling with cruel amusement at his distress.

I’ve seen this before—captives. Both as a teen myself, still chained to Alistair, and from my work in Xoid. The only difference is ... Alistair’s captives more often than not leave in a body bag.

“Please,” the boy manages in a distorted muffle.

“I don’t know what he’s pleading for—do you?” Micah asks me.

He’s the type of corrupted soul who finds sick pleasure in this work. Innocent people’s fear is a drug to him.

Micah’s eyes fall bored at my lack of response. “Poor Jack here is merely collateral damage. His father owes us a lot of money and has had several opportunities to pay. Hate to tell ya, kid, but it seems your old man cares more about himself than his family.”

He reaches behind himself, pulling out a gun. After circling the kid he comes back to me, and to my surprise, I stare down at the gun he holds out to me as if it’s a grenade.

“You’re going to kill him.”

My blood runs cold. Of all the things they could do to me, this is the fucking worst. I can’t,won’t,kill an innocent kid.

When I don’t take the gun, Micah’s patience snaps. The two guys grab my arms to prevent me from attempting to block the strike of the barrel across my jaw. Warmth runs down my cheek with the explosion of pain. I blink back my vision, as I’ve done many times, and straighten when they let me go.

“Don’t make this difficult, Everett. Think of this like a promotion. Prove yourself in this role, and you can be reunited with ... what is it you call her? Ahh, right, the little bird.”

Fury rattles in my bones, but I suffer through it. There’s no use exhausting myself to entertain his cheap attempts at getting me to lose my shit. I'll store everything to make my time with him as long and excruciating as possible when I finally get my chance.

“Take the gun,” he says, more of a serious command now.

I do. It’s a revolver, and the weight of it immediately tells me it’s not fully loaded. That would have been fucking idiotic of them—I’d have been out of here in minutes. I hope it’s empty. That this is just a test. But there could also be one bullet. Just one, to end Jack’s life, and no others to take out those highly deserving of a bullet through their skulls.

It’s a gamble. How am I to live with myself if I kill this boy before he becomes a man? He’s someone’s son, perhaps a brother. Maybe he has a girlfriend who loves him. Yet he’s here for someone else’s crime, and it’s so fucking tragic and despicable I can hardly contain my outrage.

---