Fetchling

May 27, 2020May 27, 2020 ~ Nina D'Arcangela ~ 9 Comments

Flash!

The light strobes; its flare blinding.

Flash!

The heat from the bulb dries the sweat from my face.

Flash!

My eyes slam shut; they flicker open to rivulets of blood running down my thighs.

Flash!

She screams for me to turn back to the camera. A line of spittle draws its way past the rag in my mouth; drips from my wet chin.

Flash!

An involuntary blink, I jerk and turn away; this enrages her.

Soothing darkness falls; I feel movement within the shadows.

The dog whip sounds its crack just beyond my right ear. Her intent to miss, I’m certain; we’ve been at this for hours.

Crack again, this time it strikes my bare shoulder. Another flick and the skin shreds, the blackness so acute I can hear her draw back for another strike. I scream through the gag, this pleases her; she returns to the camera.

Flash!

I jolt so hard the chair wobbles; blonde stands fall forward to block my vision.

Flash!

Crying hysterically, I scream and beg through the fabric tearing my mouth; I hear her mild sigh.

Flash!

Closer, hotter, brighter. My desperate pleas are met with silence. I can feel her standing over me; I will not look.

Flash!

As the bloom fades through my lids, the chair back makes contact with the floor; my head splits open. Tears streaming, one word is left to me – a stuttering please. She leans over, strokes my face, calms my shattered nerves. She strokes again, I relax a bit more. She hushes me as the final stroke cleaves my throat; I feel warmth.

Flash!

My eyes fly wide in panic. The bloom fades; identical icy-blue irises stare back into my own.

∼ Nina D’Arcangela

Honored Guest

March 28, 2017March 26, 2017 ~ Christopher A Liccardi ~ 26 Comments

The light hurt and his head swam. He wanted to cover his eyes.

A hand floated in the corner of his view; it belonged to a woman.

“Nobody ever hears about us, the quiet ones; the little ones. The slight ones.” The owner of the voice caressed his neck. He shivered and tried to crawl back into the darkness that kept all the bright pain away. The voice and the hand moved off to his right.

The blackness crept up, this time without much of a fight. He faded away to the sound of her voice going on about being invisible in society.

***

“Awake again? I’m pleased to see you’re back. Can I get you something, water perhaps?” The voice purred with conviviality that wasn’t quite real.

He heard a sound so distinct that it couldn’t be anything other than what it was; a set of high heels walking across wood. She kept talking to him but it was nothing more than background noise.

“You’re going to be groggy for a bit longer I’m afraid.” The voice was close now. Something cold caressed his lips. She rubbed it around his mouth, and when he opened she slid the ice chip in. Too numb to miss the bitter cold on his tongue, his thirst was as painful as the ache that was developing around his chest and gut.

He was fading again, spittle drooled out of his mouth and into his lap.

“Oops.” She said.

Blackness.

***

“You’re back for a bit longer this time, I think. We’ll see I guess.” She tittered with laughter that wasn’t genuine. His eyes opened slowly, no sharp pain this time. He focused on the woman in red standing to his right. His first thought was ‘tiny’. She was short and thin. Beautiful in an extraordinary way. She touched his head and felt for his pulse.

“Just as it should be. Glad you’re coming around. I’m quite excited to talk to you, Mr. Thorn.” She made her way around a large dining room table until she was across from him. There was food on the plate in front of her.

“Rich,” he blurted out. The word wasn’t meant to be harsh, but she winced as if stung.

“No, Mr. Thorn, not rich, but well off at least.” She smiled awkwardly and scooped a fork from the plate in front of her.

She did not sit down.

Raising it to her mouth, he watched blood drip from the tines of the steel fork. She licked her middle finger from the knuckle straight to the tip of her fingernail. It was seductive, erotic. Thorn noticed movement on her right.

“You’re my honored guest.” She said. Her lips were red like a fresh coat of shiny lipstick you see in porn movies and noir films. He winced and shook his head.

“Still trying to make sense of things? I’d give it another fifteen minutes or so. It took a lot to calm you down. More than most men.” She winked, circling the table slowly; a predator marking her prey.

“What’s happening?” Thorn croaked. His throat felt like sandpaper. His tongue was gritty as if he licked concrete. The other man twitched violently once, then again, and settled. Thorn looked and saw the spasm had dislodged the cap he’d been wearing. It looked like one of those light blue things a doctor puts on before surgery. The other man’s head lulled forward. Thorn couldn’t process what he saw.

He knew what it was in an instant, although he’d never seen the inside of someone’s head before. The cavity that should be holding a brain was mostly empty. Only fragments of gray matter remained.

Thorn vomited down the front of himself. His gut tightened, and his chest screamed with agony.

“That’s okay Mr. Thorn, the girls will clean you up in a moment. For now, just listen. You’re here because you haven’t been very nice.” She didn’t smile this time.

“What, I…” another contraction from his stomach and that rocketing pain in his gut again. Nothing came out but bile and strings of yellowish spit. He was empty.

“Don’t talk, Mr. Thorn. The sight of my previous guest has upset you. I can understand that. Can you just sit and listen? If I get the girls to clean you up, will you listen?” She asked the question but he didn’t dare answer.

“We, the collective of women I help, have decided that a lesson is in order. Not as severe as this young man’s.” She reached over and placed a hand on the brainless man’s shoulder. He jumped again and blood flew from the open cavity. Red droplets splashed on the bone-white china and the rimmed crystal goblets in front of him.

“He didn’t take our advice the first time we had him over to dinner so this time, we’re having him for dinner. We could never resist the opportunity to get together and exchange ideas and empower each other, Mr. Thorn.”

He tried to process what this crazy bitch said to him, but something didn’t click. He tried to focus, to replay it in his head but it slipped away. The pain in his chest was so intense he couldn’t think.

“What’s wrong, Mr. Thorn?”

“Jesse…” he blurted out with no conviction. His stomach flipped, and he tightened his muscles against another round of puking, but nothing came. He panted, his head starting to sag with the weight of his exertions.

“Yes, your name is Jesse Thorn, and you’re an inconsiderate, heartless bastard to most of the women you meet. We believe in what we like to think of as positive reinforcement, and your lesson began several hours ago on a table. It continues now.” She nodded toward the other man, “This unfortunate soul was also bad to a woman. It was clear he hadn’t learned his lesson when she showed up in the morgue last week. It was time to eliminate this particular problem.”

“What did you do to me?” he croaked. Between the acidic taste in his mouth and the dry throat, it sounded inhuman.

“First we need to get you cleaned up. The ladies are already here. I wouldn’t want to embarrass you when they come in.”

The woman in red walked over to a small table on the far side of the room. She picked up an old fashioned telephone receiver and spoke softly into it.

Four women walked into the dining room from that door dressed in scrubs. One of them was rolling a cart full of cleaning supplies while the other three carried clothes, a few leather straps, and a needle.

“They are going to get you undressed and cleaned up before dinner, Mr. Thorn. We will give you something for the pain. It will keep you calm enough through dinner but not so much as you would black out on us again. You’re the honored guest tonight and we can’t have you asleep at your plate.” She smiled and nodded to the women standing near him.

A hand went over his mouth and he felt a needle prick his arm. Within seconds, he lost any urge to move. The pain was dull, but not gone.

He was hoisted out of his chair and stripped down to his skin. His hostess watched them work with avid interest as they cleaned him up. It was then he noticed the wide bandage over his chest and stomach. He was redressed in clean scrubs and placed back in his chair. One of the women cleaned his place at the table. The smell of disinfectant burned his nostrils.

As the girls finished with him they walked around the table to the brainless man. One of them covered his place setting with a red cloth as the other three lifted him from his chair. A sheet covered his limp body. He was thrown onto the center of the table without remorse.

That sound of clacking heels echoed, this time from behind him. The room suddenly filled with chatter and tinkling laughter. Perfume replaced the smell of disinfectant, and the mixture was somehow intoxicating.

A woman filed in behind each chair and grew silent. All eyes weren’t on him, but the man in the center of the table.

“Ladies, it is my pleasure to introduce tonight’s honored guest, Mr. Jesse Thorn.” A wave of applause assaulted his ears as the woman all turned to face him and clap.

“Ladies, once again I call your attention. Tonight is another lesson and another chance to come together as one. For that, I would like to present to you our main course.” She spoke with a flourish to her voice as she pulled the sheet off the man on the table.

No applause this time, just the sounds of oohing and aahing. Without warning, the ladies slid into their chairs and began to prepare to eat. The only woman still standing was the lady in red. She looked directly at Jesse with a sardonic smile.

“Mr. Thorn, it’s time to answer your question. You asked what I had done, but it wasn’t me exactly. It was us.” She smiled and looked around the room.

“We don’t take kindly to being mistreated and we’ve given up on society correcting the problem. We’ve decided to take matters into our own hands.” Applause rolled across the room.

“We’ve been tracking down and teaching men who mistreat women ‘lessons’ for nearly twenty years. While the history of our sisterhood isn’t newsworthy, the results are. As you can see, the price for failing to learn your lesson is this.” She picked up the steel fork again and tossed it, brain and all, unceremoniously toward his plate. Her aim was perfect.

“This failure here,” she pointed to the man on the table, “had several parts removed and became our honored guest a few years ago. He didn’t learn, though. You have been lucky enough to only have the parts of your body removed that you weren’t using to their full potential but you will live and have another chance to make things right if you choose. If not, you’re going to be in the center of our table like this one.” She pointed to the man who was as dead as a Thanksgiving turkey ready for carving.

“We took out your heart, Mr. Thorn, as you seem to be less inclined to use it and we’re serving it as an appetizer tonight. You’ll be returned to your life once you recover and we will watch you—closely. My only hope for you is that you are a much better student than this man was.” She smiled and sat down at the table.

Jesse’s head lolled from side to side, feeling drunk and stupid as he tried to process her words. They were sinking in slowly. When he focused again on the man in the center of the table, he noticed that his brain wasn’t the only thing missing.

He began to scream as the women began to eat.

~ Christopher A. Liccardi

Urges

June 14, 2016June 13, 2016 ~ zkullis ~ 26 Comments

“I’ve heard it said that the first time is always the best, but that’s bullshit. It gets better with every experience. Pain, loathing, hatred and excitement, all rolled up into one moment of indulgence and release. These urges are altogether unique and exquisite.

“I was about ten years old when I first tasted this fruit. Mom babysat a noisy pack of snot-nosed shit factories that invaded my space daily. I couldn’t help but make a few cry at least once a day. At first I told myself it was for the attention, but I knew better. The real answer was far more sinister – I enjoyed their pain.

“It was never quite enough, though. I could feel the thrill build each time, but it didn’t increase, it always remained the same, until things changed. One day mom was asked to tend an infant. Go ahead, look at me with those horrified eyes, it only adds to the pleasure.

“At first I didn’t mean for anything to happen. Babies are innocent, right? I went into the house and saw mom holding a little girl. I guess you would say she was cute. I didn’t feel an urge to hurt her at first, and it filled me with hope that maybe I had some good inside me.

“I walked up to her sweet as can be and held out my hand. She looked at me and her cherubic smile was instantly sucked up by her fat little cheeks, and the ugliest scream I’ve ever heard tumbled from her quivering lips. Did you know that hope getting dashed to pieces has a sound? It’s abrasive, piercing, and throttles everything.

“I didn’t have any good in me. Rage seethed from my core and swelled like it never had before. Nothing was exempt from my hate.

“‘Oh, cute little Erica,’ I cooed as sweetly as I could while I positioned myself behind my mother where she couldn’t see what I was doing. I patted the babe softly on the back where my mom could see while my other hand pinched and squeezed as hard as I dared without leaving a mark. I looked into her wide eyes, locked in terror with mine own, and brought every ounce of hate to the surface. I pushed that torrent of violent emotions through my eyes and willed her to feel it.

“It was intoxicating, although you would never understand. But that’s enough about my past. Unfortunately for you, I’ve found over the years that an adult’s torment and screams are infinitely more satisfying than those of a child.”

The man stood up and stretched before speaking again.

“If you don’t mind, I’m going to go use the bathroom. Don’t go anywhere.”

Eric listened as Mark’s feet padded across the cement floor. The stairs creaked as he left the basement. When he was sure Mark was gone, he relaxed the stranglehold he had on his emotions and sobbed.

Eric had been in the basement for a few days now, secured to a metal chair with leather straps. He had screamed, begged, yelled and cried on his first day here, but quickly learned that any show of emotion sent his captor into a crazed fit of violence.

His heart raced wildly as the casual whistling upstairs approached the basement door again. Anxiety fogged Eric’s mind with its chaos and kept him from thinking straight. He hated himself for not being able to control his fear. He did his best to quiet himself as the door opened. By the time Eric could see Mark’s bare feet step around the corner, he had almost calmed himself completely.

Mark placed two boxes on a table and stood in front of Eric. “Have you been crying?”

“No…”

Mark hit Eric in the face and looked down at him with a grin. “You say you weren’t crying, but I call bullshit. If you can make it through the next twenty minutes without crying hysterically, I’ll let you go.”

Eric knew better than to let hope sprout its worthless seeds in his heart, but desperation took over. “Yes,” he pleaded.

Mark pulled forceps out of his back pocket and gripped the sides of Eric’s face. “Open up buttercup,” he said. Eric’s eyes widened with horror when he noticed the forceps ended in sharp hooks.

Mark shoved the forceps into Eric’s mouth. Sharp pain shot through his tongue as the forceps bit into the soft tissue. Mark yanked on his tongue and pulled it halfway out of his mouth.

“I don’t want to do anything that will stop your screaming,” Mark said as he pulled something else out of his back pocket, “but I hate all of the pleading and whining. Besides, I have a surprise for you.”

Mark grabbed a large, sharpened tube and flashed it in front of Eric’s face.

“This needle is a 0000 gauge, which means the hole in your tongue is going to be nearly half an inch wide. It’s going to hurt like a bitch.”

Eric bucked against the chair and cried out as Mark pressed the tip of the needle against his tender flesh and pushed. He could feel the needle as it sliced through the meat, cleaving a hole the size of the tube into his tongue. Mark shoved a thick metal rod into the end of the needle, and retracted the tube leaving the rod in its place. Before he released the forceps, Mark screwed a nostril sized ball onto the end of the metal shaft. The rod was long enough that he couldn’t pull his tongue back into his mouth.

“There,” Mark said. “Now let’s get down to the fun stuff.”

Mark walked over to the boxes on the table. He picked up the first box and brought it closer to Eric. He shook the box fiercely and caused whatever was inside to react violently. Mark laughed as he put the box on the floor and brought the second box over and showed it to Eric.

“This box has only one opening. The inside is lined with mirrors, and there is an LED light in there. I’m going to put this box on your head because I want you to be able to see what’s going on.”

He placed the box in Eric’s lap and turned on the light. Mark walked back to the other box and carried it, with its living contents, back to him. He shook the box one more time and chuckled wickedly.

“It’s been a few days since these guys have eaten,” Mark stated as he opened the top of the second box. “If you ask nicely, I won’t introduce you to them.”

Mark flipped the second box over so its contents fell into the mirrored box. Eric tried to beg, but the metal rod through his tongue kept him from speaking.

“No? Okay, here we go!”

Mark flipped the mirrored box over and placed it over Eric’s head before the things inside could jump out. The light inside the box made everything horribly clear. Eric was looking into the beady black eyes of several rats.

The large rodents sat in corners and looked at him with a mix of curiosity and hunger. Eric tried to calm himself, but wasn’t able to as he watched them inch forward bit by bit, their noses sniffing madly at the air. They smelled his blood.

One of them darted forward and bit Eric’s bloody tongue. He screamed and tried to move, but he was secured too tightly to the chair. When he didn’t defend himself, the other rats dove into the fray. Raging pain tore through Eric as the rats began to take bites out of his tongue.

They quickly ate his tongue down to the rod that had forced Eric to keep his mouth open. He pulled what was left of his ravaged organ back inside of his mouth. One of the rats tried to follow it and stuck its head inside of Eric’s mouth to get the rest of its meal. Eric bit down on the rat’s head until he felt a crunch and spit the dead rat out as the remaining rodents started tearing at the soft flesh of his cheeks.

Eric knew Mark wanted to hear his screams and cries. The only thing he could think of was to rob his captor of that joy. He steeled himself against what was going to be an awful death and opened his mouth. One of the rats scurried around the other two and darted into his mouth. He fought against his instincts and let the rat climb inside. The rodent quickly cut off his breathing as it started to eat. Eric’s body demanded air, but his mind and heart demanded a quick death.

Eric’s vision started to grow dark around the edges, a welcome thing as he continued to struggle between wanting air and wanting to end the torment. He bit down on the tail and trapped the rat inside his mouth. The rodent squirmed for a few seconds before finally finding the only exit; downward. Eric’s throat bulged as the rat stuck halfway down his esophagus and started clawing to find a way out.

He couldn’t scream, even if he wanted to. He would die quietly, and that thought filled him with comfort. Death came slowly, but the last noise that came from Eric was muffled and haunting. It wasn’t a death rattle, or a cry, but the laughter of the dead.

~ Zack Kullis

Utterly Shattered

September 22, 2015September 22, 2015 ~ Nina D'Arcangela ~ 24 Comments

Why must I feel so utterly shattered when smashed upon your jagged edge? Why can you not let me fall into the beautifully delicious pain that exists inside you – pain that has been waiting for me to find it for so very long? You hide such an exquisitely luring anguish from me, thinking I cannot see it – but I see it with my very essence – my entire being; I see it in the blink of your depthless eyes even when not at your side; I feel it in every breath you draw whether that breath be taken roughly in my ear or drawn in a spat of anger at all the world has made of you. I long so desperately to be near you, to revel in your darkest pangs, your deepest wounds, your most hidden crevasses where your shadows stretch the longest.

My soul is no longer in my own keeping as it has already been fully engulfed by you – it is given with utter bliss and unhindered submission, bowing to your every whim and fancy. My pain is yours to have, my pleasure yours to give or withhold. I beg of you to open your shadowed darkness and let me submerge myself, gulping it in as though it were my own life’s breath; for it is, as I cannot be without you any longer.

Give to me all that I would allow you to take from one so undeserving as I. I offer you a glimpse of the salvation you have sought at only the cost of my own damnation. Why must you hide in a darkness you feel is precious only to you? My darkness is equal to that of yours and calls out in pain to touch, to merge, to become one with that mournful depth which dwells within you.

Ahhh, tears burn my eyes to think of the ecstasy that awaits the lost such as we. Am I never to attain such glorious freedom while you exist in your own self-imposed exile? Be all to me that your inner demon demands I be to you, suffocate me with your needs; for I need not the air I breathe so much as I need the nearness of the beast that rages within you. Your touch, your embrace, your longing – your anger, your angst, and your pain; these things are my gleaming gems, my most sacred desires – the currency of an aching soul unearthed from the roughest of stone I did not know existed before you.

Drag me into an eternity of damnation where I will languish in your exquisite tenderness… a tenderness that rends my heart to pieces and releases the overwhelming restraint I have kept in check for what seems all of time. Strip away my mask and bare my most inner desires that I am not able to unleash with any other than you. Take me farther into the reaches of madness that will consume what is left of my sanity for I need not think when you are near, I must only be.

This is my treasured wish; this is my undisguised want; this is what you have made of me. Be for me, as I am only for you…

~ Nina D’Arcangela

The Wrong Guy

April 15, 2014April 24, 2014 ~ zkullis ~ 17 Comments

Jon stubbed out his cigarette and took a mint out of his pocket. The mint might have seemed odd, given the circumstance, but it was for his enjoyment rather than consideration of the man in the chair. He rolled the mint around his tongue for a minute before he pulled it out and placed it next to his cigarette.

It was time to get started. The leather of his imported loafers made a gentle scuff-tap sound on the aged concrete as he walked. Jon’s cultured voiced bounced across the large room. ”Greg. You’ve had enough time to think about what happened yesterday.”

The man in the chair breathed unevenly through his nose. Jon knew Greg was exhausted. Certain steps needed to be taken before things could be corrected, but Jon was ready to be free of this problem. “I need you to think about what happened four days ago, and I don’t want you to respond until I’m ready for your input. Do you understand?”

Greg nodded his head. He was broken and compliant.

“Good. Four days ago you were driving down the turnpike shortly after 8:25. You were in a Jeep. You cut in front of somebody in a vintage Jaguar.”

Greg’s breathing sped up.

“The individual in the Jaguar briefly flashed his lights at you. Do you remember what you did next?”

A drop of moisture fell from Greg’s nose as a quiet whimper sounded in his throat. Jon felt a sudden spike of heat in his chest and head. “Answer me,” Jon screamed.

Greg sobbed through his nose and shook his head dejectedly. Jon backed up and cleared his throat. “I apologize. A refined man doesn’t need to raise his voice. Besides, I should have remembered that you are not allowed to speak yet.” Jon straightened his shirt and toyed with the cuffs until he was calm and collected. He opened a box of latex gloves and began to put them on.

“Back to four days ago, Greg. You slowed down, dangerously, and then pulled behind the Jaguar. Then you proceeded to follow the Jaguar, flashing your lights, driving erratically, and endangering other people on the toll way.”

Jon’s voice lost its refined tone and picked up an angry edge he could no longer hold back. His heart beat heavily as adrenaline started to flow through his system. “You followed the Jaguar into the city, stopped in front of him at a light, jumped out of your Jeep and began to scream obscenities. I want you to tell me the last thing you said to the driver of the Jaguar before you left.”

Cold silence filled the room.

“Don’t forget what happened yesterday when we did this,” Jon warned. “I only want to hear one thing from you.”

He turned on the industrial lights, filling the large room with their intense glow. There was a table covered with an array of dirty surgical instruments. The wood of Greg’s chair was sprayed with stains, old and new, in a horrific mix of colors and odors. Greg’s right foot sat in a dark pool of coagulated blood and gore. His left foot, ankle, and half of his lower leg had been carelessly removed. The frightful stump was still raw and stinking from being cauterized yesterday. Greg’s arms were secured tightly to the chair’s arms, his thighs tied down to the seat, and thick bands kept his shoulders pulled flush against the chair’s back.

Jon’s manicured hands deftly pulled a knife out of his pocket, slipped the curved blade under the dirty material tied savagely around Greg’s head, and slashed through the gag. Much of the material had been tied in a large knot and shoved into Greg’s mouth. Jon yanked the material and pulled the foul-smelling knot out with a dry flop. A soft mewling tumbled incoherently out of Greg’s mouth.

“Now, Greg, tell me the last thing you said to the driver of the Jaguar. If you don’t, I will cut both of your hands off at the wrist. It will hurt much more than what I did yesterday.”

Greg moaned pathetically. His words passed over his dry tongue like sand over boulders. “I told him to watch who he flashed his lights at. I told him that one day he was going to fuck with the wrong guy.”

There it was. Greg had admitted it. Jon felt the fury swell, but he did nothing to hold it back. He no longer needed to. The way was clear. Greg had admitted his impropriety, had exposed himself for the ignorant wretch he was, and now it was time to excise this cancerous growth.

Jon slipped the knife behind the dirty blind fold and cut it off. The rag fell from Greg’s head. His eyes, hidden from light for the last three days, opened and shut sporadically as he tried to see where he was. He finally stopped squinting and looked at his captor. It was the guy from the Jaguar.

“Please no,” Greg wailed.

Jon smiled as he felt his anger move beyond the point of no return. He only had a few more minutes of self-control before he lost all composure. Jon hated people like Greg, and he had known more than a few. He viewed this as a social service he offered to educated and polite people who had to share their oxygen with human waste like this. His vision started to grow dark around the edges. His time for coherency was coming to an end, so Jon decided that he had better start now while he could still remember some of the cutting. It was his favorite part.

He picked up the medical bone saw, something he was very familiar with, and turned towards Greg.

“It was you that fucked with the wrong guy.”

~ Zack Kullis

Pandemonium

June 18, 2013March 7, 2018 ~ Daemonwulf ~ 36 Comments

The Call of Pandemonium

Staring out at the city of death, an exhausted Hannah sat sucking into her lungs the humidity that drifted in through the empty windowpane. On a side table, her dinner plate of raw meat was brimming with life as a cadre of beetles enjoyed her ignored meal.

With an appetite for only one thing, Hannah remembered her hunger. Sipping from a goblet of wine, she watched the fire burn in the distance.

Without anyone in the city concerned about extinguishing the blaze, the fire made an easy feast of the abandoned building. Its shuttered windows and splintered timbers providing the right fuel for the eager flames.

Smoke billowed up into the night sky as a series of new explosions rocketed skyward, sending fingers of death boiling through the surrounding streets. The silhouettes of a hundred riderless horses stood before the blaze, their black shapes stomping at the ground as if they themselves were enraged.

Raising her glass, Hannah finished with a long swallow as the entire city block was consumed in red hatred.

Standing, she removed her stained blouse and soiled leather pants, dropping them on the floor beside the bed. Her clothing made the room smell of smoke.

***

The girl labored among the rubbish, moving across the mounds of filth with the deftness of an accomplished thief rather than that of the young child she actually was. Her ability to scamper nimbly up and over the detritus spoke to her eternity of slavery.

No more than nine years old, she had the gait of a woman whose body had seen far more years of labor than it otherwise should have. A dull haze coated once-bright blue eyes revealing her truth — that of having been broken long ago.

Working among the acres of rot, her bared legs and shoeless feet were sucked deep into the mouth of death with each step she took. Navigating the piles of dismembered bodies, the child retrieved one bone after another, scraping into a gore-soaked bucket the remaining meat that clung to each discarded limb.

Paying little attention to the itching on her arms, she continued about her tasks, ignoring the hordes of maggots that swarmed her flesh, turning it into a writhing mass. Such was the nature of her work for the Prince’s harvest in the killing fields.

***

Hannah walked into the bathroom and flicked on the light switch. The dim bulb set the floor into motion as cockroaches scattered.

Stepping into the shower, the cold stones lining the compartment providing the slightest hint of relief to her aching feet, she turned the faucet with a rusty creak, and a baptismal spray of rank water stung her skin.

Subconsciously, she scratched at the droplets as they beat against her body. As broken fingernails rubbed her arms raw, all she could think of was maggots.

***

“GIRL!” The deep voice boomed across the field as two sharp cracks from a whip opened red gashes on the child’s bare shoulders.

Cowering, the pain like a slice of ragged glass across flesh, she fell to her knees in the abattoir.

Again, the voice.

“Are you not listening, you insolent little bitch?” More statement than question.

The blade of the dressing knife in her left hand dribbled unknown fluids onto the ground as a swarm of flies buzzed the cage of small human ribs she held in her grime-caked right hand. Hesitantly, she looked up to meet the gaze of her attacker.

Xaphan, the harvest commander and one of the Prince’s recent conscripts stared down at her with serpentine eyes that were the color of jade. He sat atop an armor-clad steed that belched cold mist from its nostrils and kicked at the ground, snapping human remains under its feet.

“Why is it you ignore me, you filthy abomination? Do you somehow think yourself of far more importance than to listen when the Commander of the Harvest addresses you?” Xaphan snarled.

“Forgive me, but I was simply busying myself with the tasks that have been selected for me,” the young Hannah responded, her voice tentative, a single tear clearing a path through the human grime that smeared her face.

Xaphan studied the girl, an air of superiority evident on his face. For an instant, he thought he noticed the familiar spark of hatred in her otherwise darkened eyes. Sure he was correct, he flashed a gratified smile.

“Come here, you little gutter pig,” he ordered, the whip snapping again, striking Hannah’s bare legs where they poked out beneath a tattered dress. “I’ve been instructed to find you among this filth and deliver you to the Great Hall. By the death of me I don’t know what the Prince wants with shit such as you. But you must come. And somehow find some way to clean yourself up!”

Hannah dropped the carcass of the human child from which she’d been scavenging. It landed atop the pile of cleaned bones with a hollow clatter. Retrieving the bucket of harvested meat, she cautiously edged her way toward Xaphan and his steed. Both of the monsters stared down at her – two pairs of matching green eyes.

“But, it’s not for me to question His motives, only to do as He asks. Follow me, girl!”

With that, Xaphan jerked the reins of the great beast, steering him through the human debris. Hannah fell in behind, following them from the killing fields. It would become her last time working Satan’s Harvest.

***

Running wet fingers through her filthy blonde hair, Hannah massaged her scalp under the blood-tinged spray. The water sluiced off her bare skin, sweeping away the coating of death that was her normal state of being. Hell worked its way into each and every of her pores until she, now, had almost become one with it.

Almost, Hannah thought as she watched the drain at her feet swallow the shit of her existence.

Rubbing the muscles of her arms, Hannah thought about how much she hated the Prince; and how much she despised even more his disciple, Xaphan.

***

Even freedom following an eternity of torture is incapable of removing the pain inflicted during captivity. Nor does it absolve the actions of one’s tormentors. By now, Hannah knew this all too well, which is why she had spent an age searching Hell for the soul of the murderous human known as the Hunter. She ultimately found him in the last place she wanted to look – the killing fields.

Himself having suffered at the hand of Xaphan when he’d foolishly bargained with his own soul in the human world, the Hunter had spent far more years trolling the boneyard than even Hannah herself. If there was a single one of Hell’s denizens that would be able to get her what she needed, she knew it was him.

Confident in the knowledge that the Hunter was unaware that the shadows following him contained anything more than darkness, Hannah was able to hide within the murk with ease. After years of practiced invisibility living within the Prince’s dominion, she had become highly skilled at navigating the streets of Hell unseen. She now watched as the Hunter, a bag slung over his shoulder, entered the abandoned structure. And, as expected, a few moments later, a dark figure flashing green eyes slipped from the shadows, following him inside.

The time has come, Hannah thought, as she followed them into the building.

From deep within the gloom of the warehouse, Hannah saw the flash of those familiar serpentine eyes. And then she heard the booming voice of Xaphan for the first time in uncounted ages.

“Why you ungrateful murderous deviant, we had a deal,” Xaphan spat the words into the Hunter’s face. “Don’t you remember? In that special spot of yours where you realized so many desires of the flesh?”

“That was then. This is now. And this time, Xaphan, I hold the cards.” The Hunter responded, shaking the sack in front of him, the wound that Xaphan had long-ago sliced into his bare chest visible in the dim light.

“But that’s where you’re wrong, fool. As long as your soul exists, you’re mine. I carry the collateral within me always,” the demon said, patting his stomach.

“But, as we know Xaphan, deals made between liars are likely to be broken. It just depends on which liar strikes first.”

“Give me what’s rightfully mine,” Xaphan ordered, reaching a taloned hand towards the bag.

“Not this time, oh great commander of the Harvest,” said Hannah, stepping from her hiding place.

“Ah, do my ears and eyes deceive, or is it my little scavenging pig?” Xaphan asked, turning in Hannah’s direction.

As planned, the Hunter turned the bag upside down, spilling the contents onto the floor with a clatter. Inside the bag was a pile of bones. Each one meticulously stripped clean, the flesh long ago having been harvested, consumed and then shat out by the denizens of Hell.

Reaching into the deepest pocket of her overcoat, Hannah removed a flare, striking the end and lighting the flame. Sparks flew through the air and bounced along the floor where they landed. For the first time that she could remember, she saw fear in Xaphan’s eyes.

“Go, Hunter. Your work is done,” Hannah ordered.

Having maintained his end of the bargain to locate the demon’s human remains in Hell’s boneyard, the Hunter ran from the building, his footfalls echoing through the void.

Once again alone and facing her demon torturer, Hannah spoke evenly, sure of her every word.

“Funny it is that how an eternity in Hell can change everything, and yet nothing at all…”

The flare in her hand illuminated all that remained of the human man who’d become the demon Xaphan after his own millennia of torture.

Refusing to beg, the demon explained, “Oh Hannah, even with all your years, what you still do not yet know about the ways of existence. It never actually ever ends. Once one is over, the next begins and so we experience yet another in a series of painful paths.”

“Well, if that’s the case, commander of lies, it appears it’s now time for your soul to find that new path. As it’s said: ashes to ashes…”

With those words, Hannah dropped the flare onto the pile of Xaphan’s brittle bones. At first they hissed and then burst into blue flame.

The demon let loose his last blasphemous cry. It was a scream that echoed throughout the city of death. As the last vestiges of his humanity burned, Xaphan’s demonic soul began to melt, pieces of it slapping onto the floor at his feet.

Hannah took a few steps backward as flame consumed the human bones, bringing an end to the demon. Fire licked upward, sparking the rafters and spreading through the building. Hannah turned, walking out the doorway and out into the perpetual darkness.

Far off in the distance, from the direction of Pandemonium, she heard the sound of a hundred sets of hooves as the horses thundered through Hell. The Prince’s dark forces were on their way.

Hannah merged into the shadows and walked away unseen by the lost souls who now gathered on the street to watch the death of one of Abbadon’s greatest angels.

***

Refreshed from her shower of blood, Hannah poured herself another glass of wine. Surveying her handiwork, she watched as Hell burned. The landscape of decay, bathed in the blood of tortured souls, spread as far as she could see until it melted into the eastern horizon.

Somewhere outside, within the city of death, she knew that a Hunter was running for his life. Perhaps he would find a place to hide. Or maybe he would simply return to the familiarity of the killing fields. To Hannah, it didn’t matter either way. She knew that the angels of death would pursue him far beyond the fields and for time without end, sure that it was he who had been responsible for bringing about the destruction of one of the Prince’s own.

Confident with her plan now in motion, Hannah sat and consumed her victory. One glorious day, she would take her rightful place. It would be the day she re-entered the Great Hall of Castle Pandemonium and claimed the throne of Hell after finally defeating Prince Abbadon himself.

~ Daemonwulf

This post is dedicated to Hannah Sears, our own Angel of Death and Damnation and winner of the Pen of the Damned anniversary sweepstakes