by Keta Kendric
“What about the other ashes?” I asked, curious as to why anyone would want human ashes. “Why do you bring them to your cousin? His name is Luis, right?”
Her eyes widened in surprise. “You could hear me when I was talking to you all those times, couldn’t you?”
My lips twitched into a smile. When I was in the darkness, some of the conversations she’d shared stayed with me.
“Yes, some I remember. When I was out, I could hear and sometimes smell, but nothing else worked. I remember you talking about the ashes and bringing them to your cousin. Why keep the ashes of the people they kill?”
She seemed to be having a difficult time gathering her words. What the hell were they doing with people’s ashes? The chirp and hiss of the machines filled in the silence as she gathered her thoughts. The thin wooden legs of the stool she was perched atop creaked as she shifted uncomfortably.
“My family deals mainly in meth,” she started, her face pinched in distaste. “My cousin, Luis is my family’s main chemist. Like me, he’s earned a medical degree. However, he is happy to create and cook up the most lethal and addictive batches of meth to hit the market. He takes pride in it, giving his batches names like Man Slaughter, Murder One, and Homicide. The names alone have addicts waiting in line to try it.”
Regina was unaware of how tightly she was squeezing my hand. Her worried expression increased in its intensity as her haunted gaze remained locked on mine.
“The key ingredient in my family’s meth supply is human ash. As a doctor, I can’t see—”
“Wait!” I raised my free hand to stop her before I lifted my head higher to glance into her eyes that had started to sparkle with tears.
“You’re telling me that they have you down here turning their murder victims into ashes so that they can add them to their meth supply, drugs that are more than likely being distributed across this country.”
She nodded her head as a tear slipped down her cheek. “My family is known as DG6, and their meth is not only being distributed across this country, but it’s exported to four other countries. People have no idea what they are smoking. I don’t want to be a part of this madness. Medically, adding the human element to the drug should have no relevance to the addicts high, but the drugs speak for themselves. People will do anything for it, and other chemists are out there, every day trying to duplicate my cousin’s formula.”
Her family was doing the unthinkable, but she was the one embarrassed.
“I don’t want to disrespect the dead like this, but I’m only one woman, and my fight against my family has been useless so far.”
My brain hadn’t fully processed the notion that these crazy-ass people were putting human ashes in their meth supply. They had junkies smoking people. The shit boggled my mind, which was already out of sorts.
Chapter Ten
August
A week later and a somewhat put-together plan had me as positive as Regina had started to appear. Each time I closed my eyes, more of my memories returned. Every time Regina left me alone for any long period of time, I broke out of my closet and up the steps I went. Three days ago, I’d made it about ten feet out the door before I was almost caught by a roving guard. However, I did get far enough out in the open to spot three more guarded posts.
In my dreams, I’d seen glimpses of me on this farm and the escape attempt by my friends that had gone wrong. Those flashes of memories along with my spying had helped me get a better understanding of why the doctor and I were trapped in the cellar and why it was going to be difficult to hike to her car that was supposedly parked inside the barn.
I waited until nightfall this time so that I could travel farther than I had the last time. Once I was sure Regina was in the shower or sleeping, I crept through the door, hunched low and hugging the rough brick wall opposite her door.
The door of the cellar opened to the back of the main house, which kept me hidden from the guards whose voices sounded in the background. I eased the door open and peeked, ensuring the coast was clear before I crept out into the dimmed atmosphere. The sun had set, but a few orange sparks of day in the distance were hanging on, fighting to keep the night at bay. A few stars glistened overhead, providing a spark of energy to this bleak plot of land.
My gaze landed on the area where the guards stood at the gate as I crawled across the short expanse that would take me to the back of the house. Raised voices stopped me in my tracks as my neck swiveled in the men’s direction. None came my way, nor had any guns been aimed at me, so I continued, sliding along the grassy ground on my stomach.
Once I reached the back of the house, the structure kept me from the line of sight of the noisy guards who continued to carry on their lively conversation. I rose, putting my back to the house and slid along its scratchy surface in the opposite direction of the men. Chips of paint pricked my back, flaked off the wall, and sprinkled to the ground.
My bare feet flirted with blades of grass as I peeked around the bend of the house for a full view of the tower that had two armed guards posted inside. The barn was farther than I’d initially assumed it was, and there was nothing that would keep me from the view of the guards in the tower or those on the ground.
Periodically, I’d see the men pacing in random areas, but they never lingered in one spot for long. Two were posted on the far side of the barn, likely guarding the building I couldn’t see, which was the meth lab Regina had talked about.
My head darted in both directions before I reclaimed a position on the ground. My stomach raked the bristling grass as I inched my way into the dark opening. At any moment, I could have been spotted, nothing more than a human target. Approaching footsteps ahead of me sent me scrambling, rolling like an alligator to make it back to the tall frame of the house.
“Who the fuck are you?” a deep voice asked gruffly. The darkly shrouded figure peered at me, fighting the darkness to see me better as he inched closer with his weapon aimed at my head.
***
The metal struck his skull and the fleshy clank sounded off loud enough to alert the other guards. Regina had sneaked up on the man, surprising him as much as she’d surprised me. She’d struck him over the head with a large iron pipe and had somehow caught him before he fell on top of me.
With her hands under the man’s shoulders, she dragged him out of the opening and to the back of the house. I followed her because the doctor was certifying herself as being my guardian angel. She propped the door to the cellar open with the same pipe she’d used as her weapon and dragged the man down the steps. The man’s dangling legs thumped with every step she took down. Once I’d secured the door and caught up with them, I took the man from Regina and followed as she led the way to the morgue.
No words were exchanged between us, but I could tell she was pissed by her pinched lips, the stormy fury in her gaze, her quick, hard movements, and heavy breathing. I stood to the inside of the double doors with my forearms tucked under the limp man’s shoulders.
Regina walked around us and locked the doors. From the corner of my eyes, I could see that she’d kept her hand against the doors as she breathed in her frustration. This incident could very well have messed up our plan for escape.
“We are going to have to kill him,” she gruffly concluded with her head tilted to the door.
It was my fault that this man was going to die, but I wasn’t the least bit sorry about it. I wished there was a way we could lure them all into this cellar so we could keep killing them. However, one missing man versus a dozen was easier to explain.
“Once they discover him missing, they are going search this farm for him.” She remained at the door, irritation almost palpable as her voice bounced off the wall. “I’m going to have to find you a better hiding place,” she stated, finally turning around to face me.
She walked past me as I dropped the man on the floor and relieved him of his knife and gun. I observed the gun in my hand, noticing it felt familiar. The weight and the smooth metal pressed into
my palm as my finger caressed the trigger.
My gaze left the weapon to follow Regina’s movements as she went to the wall and pushed a few buttons that ignited flames inside the small glass door. I stepped closer for a better view, realizing it was the incinerator and how she was able to produce the ashes her family used in their meth.
Next, she pulled a pair of thin plastic gloves from a box sitting on a table filled with death instruments and took her time putting them on. She walked around the autopsy table where she gripped and pushed a skinny metal table in front of her, stopping at the man she’d knocked out. Blood gushed from the hole she’d opened in the man’s head, wetting his hair before sliding across his head and hitting the floor.
Regina folded the small table so that it collapsed and sat low to the floor. I assisted by lifting and rolling the man onto the table. I assumed she’d wheel the man over to the flames, but she took her time, undressing him. What did it matter if he had clothes on or not? The flames were going to turn it all into a pile of ash, right?
She stacked the clothes and his boots into a neat pile near the foot of the autopsy table and straightened the man on the smaller table, aligning him so that he was flat on his back. She went about her task, not rushing her process.
I could tell that she’d handled many bodies. She knew exactly where to grip and tug to maneuver and turn the man who probably outweighed her by a hundred pounds. Once she had the man aligned the way she wanted him, she lifted the small table as one would an ironing board until it rose to her chest level.
She wheeled the man towards the flames before placing her hands inside a pair of thick mittens. Her hands were always so soft and warm that it was hard to believe she constantly used them to handle the dead. She went about her task as I stood in place, observing. Once she had the man and table aligned with the incinerator’s entrance, she opened the small glass door.
The heat from the flames reached across the room and licked at my skin. Its bright dancing flames beckoned me closer, and I listened, taking a few steps in its direction.
This would have been my fate if she hadn’t saved me. It was hard to think that my remains would’ve ended up being ingested into a meth addict’s bloodstream. The thought of such a fate gave me a chill despite the heat of the flames that were starting to envelop me.
The doctor shoved the table closer to the flames, lifted and dropped it so that the lip of the table overlapped the edge of the fiery opening. She took a firm grip on the man’s feet and pushed him, head first into the flames. The moment the heat stroked him, he jerked awake and fought his fiery death. His pleading screams vibrated across the room as I watched with unblinking eyes.
While keeping a wavering grip on one of the man’s thrashing feet, Regina reached up and pushed a red button. A conveyer roared to life and pulled the man farther in, thrashing and yelling into the flames.
She slammed the door behind his flailing limbs and shrieking voice. I continued to stare at his wild thrashing inside the incinerator. His feet kicked against the glass door, echoing throughout the room as his screams were being swallowed by the power of the flames. His cries dwindled with every second that passed.
I expected to see tears in Regina’s eyes when she turned to face me, but her defiant gaze, stiff posture, and her head, which she held high, revealed the irritation she continued to harbor towards me. Regina’s actions had dissolved any doubts I had left about where her loyalties lay. She wanted to be away from her family and she didn’t care if she had to kill to make her escape.
Her gaze remained on me, more specifically, my hands, which were holding the gun and the knife that previously belonged to the now deceased guard.
“August, we are going to have to trust each other. We only have eight more days to wait, and we could ride right out of this hellhole. I can’t have you trying to escape every time I turn my back.”
I protested, “I wasn’t trying to escape. I was trying to search for a way to get to the barn and to see if your car is even there.”
She pursed her lips. “The car is there, August.”
I could tell by the way she said my name that she was still upset with me. I reached up and massaged my temples, easing the headache that I’d been ignoring. Her voice drew my attention back to her.
“I went to the cookhouse yesterday, pretending I was lonely enough to chat with my cousin. On my way back, I checked the barn and had a gun aimed at my head for snooping. My car is there. And before you ask, I know it runs because the guards sometimes use it to go back and forth into town.”
All I could think about was killing these people, and it was clouding my judgment. “If we do this my way, it will end in death. So, we need to figure out how I’m going to get from here to the barn without being spotted,” I stated honestly.
Regina smiled at me before she cast her gaze down to the pile of clothes she’d left stacked at the foot of the autopsy table. “That’s a start. Those will help you blend in and at least look like one of them.”
A smile bent the corners of my lips. I was starting to like Doctor Regina and her way of thinking. She was my twisted savior.
She shrugged. “I don’t know you, August, but at the same time, I do. Based on your determination, I know you’re willing to die to get out of here.”
She pointed her finger between us as she placed a lot of stress on the word we. “We will find a way out of this place together. Have some faith, August. We are leaving this place together, and we are going to be alive when we do it.”
I knew Regina had sparks of fire in her soul to go up against a family like hers, but I’d just started to grasp how much. I pointed at what was left of the man burning in the incinerator. “They are going to see the smoke coming from that incinerator.”
She shrugged, “They are, but if they ask, I’ll tell them that there were some clothes that I’d forgotten to deal with from the bodies they had me burn a few days ago.”
She glanced back at the incinerator.
“I’ll flush the ashes once he’s done, but I’m going to have to hide that gun, knife, and you, if they come searching for him. One of the guards has run off before, so they shouldn’t have a reason to come searching for him down here. But we need to be prepared in case they do.”
A mischievous smile spread across her face, revealing a bit more of the fire hidden below her prim and proper exterior. “It’s good that we have weapons now. I don’t like guns, but I get the feeling you haven’t forgotten how to use them.”
***
I tossed and turned as I heard myself yelling out, but the dream refused to loosen its grip on me.
“August, wake up,” a comforting voice called, reaching past the chaos inside my head. The slow stroke of a soft hand grazed my bearded jaw, accompanied by a soothing tone. “You’re right here with me.”
Her delicate tone eased me from my crushing distress. My eyes opened to the view of Regina standing over me, her face covered in concern as her fingers traced along my forehead.
“I’m right here, August. You’re okay,” she said repeatedly until I settled down. Only when the last knots of tension left me, did Regina take a seat on the stool next to my bed. She seemed almost afraid to let my hand go.
“Who’s Megan?” she asked with a hint of a smile on her lips.
My memories weren’t easing back into my head—they were returning with a vengeance. I was reluctant to reveal the news to Regina. My life had been a hellish anarchy of blood and bodies and based on some of my memories, I don’t think I minded it.
A twinge of guilt wiggled its way into my fragmented thoughts as I observed the way Regina took care of me. I owed the woman my life, so she deserved to know who she was cozying up to.
“Megan was…” Fucking tell her! My mind screamed. She burned a fucking man alive because you couldn’t sit still. “I think Megan is the only woman I’ve ever loved.”
Regina smiled at me before squeezing my hand. “I figured that much. The one constant of all the
yelling you’ve done in your dreams is calling out for Megan. Are your memories coming back?”
“Yes,” I answered honestly. “And I have to be straight with you. I’m not a nice person, Regina. I’ve killed and tortured people, and the worst part about it is I’m not sorry about it. I’m a fucking monster.”
Her grip tightened around my hand. “August, you watched as I burned a man alive. I’ve lost count of the number of bodies I’ve turned into the key ingredient for my family’s meth supply. And that first guard that went missing, he’d stumbled into this cellar drunk and tried to force himself on me. He ended up in the fire, August. You’re no more of a monster than I am.”
She appeared to be disappointed in herself, but I was proud of her. To deal with a group like her family, she needed the fight she had inside her.
She tilted her head slightly, her curiosity apparent. “Do you remember your name?”
I grinned at her. “You wouldn’t believe me.”
Her eyes widened and reflected her question as one of her brows knitted into a deep V over her forehead.
“What is it? What is it?” she questioned, shaking my hand to get the answer from me faster.
“August. My fucking real name is August.”
Surprise dropped from her gaze and turned into a mixture of disbelief or disappointment or both. She likely assumed I was messing with her.
“You’re serious,” she said questioningly. “So, did your family name you after your club or something?”
“I think so. I still can’t place everything, but I know that I don’t go by August. Everyone calls me by my middle name, Aaron.”
She wrinkled her nose up. “Aaron,” she voiced, testing the name out. “You don’t look like an Aaron. I’d like to keep calling you August. It seems to suit you better.”
“That’s because you don’t know me, Regina. But, if you like calling me August, that’s fine with me.”
Curiosity oozed through her pores. Regina wanted to know it all, every sordid detail of my crazy-ass life and if she could sit through the first hour, she may be able to live in my world when we left this damn farm.