Takaashigani

by Justin Hunter

  “Shut up, Clive,” Duke said. “It’s okay.”

  “The fuck it is,” Clive said. “These assholes are afraid of me. They want to kill you first so that I’ll be so shit scared that I’ll lie like a limp flower in their arms while they drop me in the tank. They’re trying to unman me.” The men were all smiling now. They were really enjoying this. One of them turned to Clive. He was shorter than the rest. A long scar ran down his cheek. The whiteness of it stood out against his tanned skin. He was bearded, which only accentuated the scar. A mess of healed flesh, hairless and stark white, ran down his cheek and along his jawline. HIs jumpsuit didn’t help the man’s impish nature any. They must have been one-size-fits-all. The jumpsuit was much too big for the man. Extra material pooled down by his ankles.

  “We don’t have any orders that tell us who to kill first,” the man said. “It might as well be you.” Duke took the opportunity to lash out with his feet. He kicked the small man hard in the ass with both feet. The force of the kick sent Duke’s chair toppling backwards. He hit his head hard on the rock floor with a dull thud. The kicked worker was sent hurtling into Clive. Their heads struck together with a skull splitting crack. The worker was dazed, but Clive didn’t seem to be bothered in the least by the blow. He ducked his head under the worker’s chin and bit deeply into his neck. The worker screamed lustily. He pushed on Clive as hard as he could to free himself, but Clive had bit deeply and wasn’t letting go. The other workers ran over just as the imp punched Clive in the face. Clive rocked back, ripping the man’s throat out with his teeth as he did. The other workers arrived just in time to be sprayed with a torrent of blood. They kicked and punched Clive viciously. Clive’s chair upended. He fell backwards hard, unable to escape from his bonds. The workers continued to beat him. Screams filled the air as the imp, his throat torn asunder, still walked away from his colleagues. Blood spurted from the gaping open wound with every beat of the man’s heart. The blood, which came mind-numbingly fast at first, was now tapering off. Still the man walked. His face was ghostly pale. His legs seemed to move on their own. He reminded Duke of a zombie from old black-and-white horror films he used to watch as a kid.

  All at once the bleeding worker fell. His body gave out on him, dropping him to the floor in a lifeless bag of bones. Duke laughed. It was all too crazy. The men stopped their onslaught of Clive and gathered around him. Two of them picked his chair up. He was roughly slapped across the face. His teeth rattled in his mouth. He didn’t feel like laughing anymore.

  “We’re going to kill you,” one of them said. “But first we’re going to hurt you.” The man walked back to the lunch tables and picked up a knife. He gripped it tightly in his hands as he almost ran back at Duke. Duke didn’t even have a chance to scream before the man cut a long line into the flesh of Duke’s forehead. Blood began to flow down his face in a trickle. The man smacked Duke hard in the cut with the butt-end of the knife grip. The wound split open. Blood masked Duke’s face in a second. He couldn’t see. He couldn’t bring his hands up to wipe away the gore.

  “Got you good and blind,” the man said, wiping the blade on his jumpsuit. “Now you won’t know where the punches are coming from.” The workers took their time. As they beat Duke, he had to agree with the knife wielding man; it was much worse to be hit blind than to see it coming. It seemed to take them forever to tire of their sport. Duke was breathing hard when they finally let up. They walked away and began to talk. Duke couldn’t hear what they were saying. He could hear Clive gasping for breath. Duke had thought his friend had died. A part of him wished that he was dead too, for he knew the worst was yet to come.

  Duke shook his head furiously, trying to get the blood out of his eyes. The cut on his forehead made his visage a mask of red. He spit gobs of blood on the ground in front of him. It was no use. He couldn’t see and all he could taste was hot metal. He leaned forward and let the blood run down onto the ground in front of him. He could hear Clive cursing and loud smacking sounds that could only mean that the man was getting worked over as Duke had moments before. Rough hands grabbed Duke by the shoulders and forced him back to a sitting position. Duct tape was wrapped around his torso and legs forcing his body erect. He sputtered and coughed, trying to get the blood out of his mouth. He was having trouble breathing. A rag was rubbed against his face smearing the blood away from his eyes and mouth for a moment, then the gash on his forehead filled them again.

  “Got to plug that or he’ll bleed out,” a man said from behind him.

  “The head bleeds a lot,” another voice from off to his left said. “He’s not going to die from that little slice. Grow a pair of balls.”

  “At least stop it from bleeding. I want him to see his friend get eaten. It makes round two a lot more fun when they know what they’re in for.”

  “Agreed,” the man on his left said. The rag was wiped across Duke’s face again and taped firmly in place. The man wound the duct tape around Duke’s head several times. Another rag wiped away more blood. Although Duke was in tremendous pain, he was thankful that he could at least breathe again. He looked to his left and saw Clive. Clive was lying on the floor. The boots were being put to him by five men all dressed in the yellow jumpsuits like Shiro had put on. They were wearing yellow hoods that covered their faces. Duke wondered if Shiro was among them, dishing out punishment to his old friend.

  Clive was beyond struggling. Two of the men grabbed him by the legs and dragged him over to a table. The others followed. Clive was picked up and laid on the table. The men undressed him. One of them pulled off his shoes while the others took knives and cut away his clothing.

  “Hold him,” the man at Clive’s feet said. He took a knife from another man and gouged out a chunk of Clive’s heel. Clive’s back arched on the table. He screamed and thrashed, the pain bringing new life and fight out of him. The others were hard pressed to hold him on the table. As soon as Clive was still enough, the man cut out a chunk out of Clive’s other heel.

  “Hand me a saw,” The man said. One of the yellow jump suited men walked away from the table and went to another table just like it, except that it was covered in hand tools. He selected a hacksaw, handed it over to the man at Clive’s feet and renewed helping to hold the tortured man down. Clive’s toes were sawed off on either foot. This took a lot longer than Duke would have thought. He had to close his eyes at the horror show in front of him. He wished that Clive wasn’t such a hard cuss, as a milder man would have passed out. Clive was awake for the whole thing.

  “Get him in the tank,” The man with the saw said. He wiped the tool on Clive’s clothes and walked it back over to the bench. Clive was picked up and carried up a set of steel stairs. A rope was tied around his neck and he was laid feet first into the water. The rope was tied off against a steel bar that held his face above water. He was swimming weakly, his face turning purple from the asphyxiating rope, but he wouldn’t let himself die. The water quickly reddened from the blood stemming from the wounds in Clive’s feet. Clive was moaning. Duke knew it must be from the biting salt on Clive’s open wounds from the ocean water the crab was in. The monster crab was writhing furiously, its body looking terribly awkward without claws or legs. Duke knew that the salt water wouldn’t be the only thing biting Clive’s feet before too long.

  Clive was trying to swim, barely able to keep his neck up enough to keep from choking himself on the rope. He didn’t even seem to realize where he was and the behemoth that was leaning in towards his kicking legs. Duke thought that the crab must not be able to see very well since it bumped its mandibles into the feet of Clive and swung back as Clive kicked it hard. Clive began to shriek, the sound light and airy coming from his struggling breath. Duke knew that the man remembered the crab now. He kicked and swam harder, but his renewed struggles didn’t last for too long. Clive was spent emotionally and physically. He went back to treading water and the crab moved in again.

  This time the crab took the kicks from Clive in stride and seized his foo
t with its mandibles and drew it in its mouth up to the ankle. Duke would have thought it would have been impossible to hear Clive’s ankle snap from within the pool. He was wrong. Clive didn’t so much as scream, but moan and sob. His defeat was obvious. Horrible as his suffering was, it was more horrible for Duke to see how mindless and easy the crab ate away at his given prey. It tore off chunks of flesh and bone slowly and deliberately, sucking at the appendage as if it were slurping down a spaghetti noodle. The other men watched, jeering and making wagers as to how long Clive could take the pain before he passed out or went completely insane.

  Clive kicked weakly with his free leg. His eyes closed and he sank deeper into the water. The men pulled him out so that he wouldn’t drown and loosened the noose from around his neck. Clive bobbed in the water. The crab continued to feed.

  Duke felt the blood begin to seep from under the rag and sting his eyes. He leaned his head forward. He had never felt so weak in his life. He raised his head when he heard a ripping and tearing noise coming from the tank. The crab was twisting from side to side and had ripped Clive’s leg out from the hip socket. Clive screamed, but it was cut short as the crab swallowed the leg in one gluttonous chug and then started to bite and rend Clive’s second leg. The men grew tired of watching the crab eat Clive, who was no longer screaming. They walked over to Duke and started jeering.

  “Looks like you know what you’re in for now, doesn’t it?” one of them said. Duke recognized him as the one who cut up Clive’s feet. He dropped his gaze to the floor. He knew he only probably had one good chance left to escape. He would have to wait for just the right moment and make a break for it. He knew it would have to be before they started carving up his feet. THAT he was sure of. The thought made him chuckle.

  “Something funny?” another man said, slapping Duke on the back of the head. “I would sure like to know what it is. Maybe he’s gone crazy already. He wouldn’t be the first one.” Duke didn’t reply. A few more laughs came out of his mouth unbidden. He wondered for a moment whether the man was right. Maybe he was going insane. Duke heard the unmistakable sound of a folding knife being snapped open. He flinched as the blade hacked away the duct tape from around his sides, freeing him from the chair.

  “Thought I was going to jab it into you?” the man said. “Don’t get too comfortable. If you piss me off at all, I just might.” Duke was lifted out of the chair and brought over to the table. He was lain on Clive’s bloody clothing.

  “Strip him,” the man who cut Clive said. He was at Duke’s feet. Duke wanted to move, but his body wouldn’t respond. The man began tugging at his boots when a voice shouted from the mouth of the cavern entrance.

  “Feeding people to the damn crab was never a part of the bargain.” The men stopped with Duke and turned to see forty men and women, dirty clothes, guns and various hand tools in their grips. The vagrants had come to collect what they were owed.

  Chapter - 24

  “I don’t know what sort of sick shit you assholes are up too down here,” the vagrant leader said, “I don’t really want to know. What I’m here for is to get paid the duty you people owe me and my followers. We were the ones who got this whole operation started for you. We demand to be paid.”

  “I paid you,” Shiro said. He was sitting at one of the picnic tables in the back, eating a sandwich. “I handed the money to you myself just yesterday.”

  The vagrant leader laughed. “Yes, you did, but the money was less than half of what we are owed.”

  “I’m phasing you out,” Shiro said. He continued to eat his sandwich and spoke around a mouthful of food. He didn’t seem concerned in the least with the large and angry gathering before him. “You haven’t been a part of things for a long time. I’ve been paying you every month since taking this over from my father, and I hated it each and every time. I’ve been handing you money for nothing. You’ve been hiding in the woods for years living off of me like this is some sort of welfare division. One of you started this whole thing, yes, but he is long dead. Ancient history.”

  “You’ll need us when the crabs attack,” the vagrant leader said. “We are always ready to fight.”

  “You look more ready to grub through my trash cans than fight. Regardless, the crabs haven’t attacked for a couple generations. I don’t think it will happen again.”

  “You owe us a debt,” the vagrant leader said. “We had an agreement.”

  “You had an agreement with my father,” Shiro said, “not with me. I’ll tell you what. I don’t want to insult you with the low payment, so I just won’t give you anything. I will pay you, however, if the crabs actually do attack us again. That way I’m not giving money away for free, and you’re actually providing a service. You do believe the crabs will rise up and attack again, don’t you?”

  “They always do.”

  “Then you’ll take my offer,” Shiro said. He finished his meal and wiped his hands on his jeans.

  “We won’t,” the vagrant leader said. “There is enough money for all of us. Keeping what you owe us is nothing but greed. If you will not give us our money then we will destroy the mother crab. She belongs more to us than to you.”

  “In that case,” Shiro said, “Make your move.”

  “I already have,” the vagrant leader said. Nobody moved for several moments. Tension mounted as the workers and the vagrants kept their places. Shiro laughed to release the tension in a quick moment.

  “I knew you were bluffing,” Shiro said. He continued to laugh, but then stopped short when the roar of an engine came from the cavern tunnel. The noise was so loud that it made many of the people in the cavern, including several of the vagrants to cover their ears. The vagrants dove away from the cave entrance tunnel when a chopped classic car, sparks flying in every direction, burst through the cave tunnel at thirty miles per hour. The car had been chopped in half horizontally by a plasma cutter. The base had been dropped to almost directly over the wheels. The seats had been ripped out. The driver of the car was lying almost flat on his back. His gloved hands gripped the wheel as if his life depended on it. He was bald. His scalp and face was covered in streaming blood. Duke remembered his own slow descent through the low cave tunnels. The man must have smashed his plate several times on the way down. His mouth opened in a smile which showed his staved-in, smash-toothed maw. He drove straight for the monster crab tank and smashed into the glass. The sound of the thick glass cracking quickly gave way to the car exploding in a fireball that spread across the cave ceiling. Smoke ran in a torrent from the blazing car making the air difficult to breathe in a moment. As soon as the sound of the crash of twisted metal and explosions abated, the screeches of the vagrant horde could be heard as they ran down from the cavern entrance tunnel and began slicing and smashing the people inside with their blunt instrument weapons.

  Duke rolled off the table and then under it, watching the vicious onslaught as the vagrants cut into the defenseless cavern workers. Duke saw a woman take the edge of a spade to her stomach, spilling her entrails out onto the cave floor in a torrent of bloody offal. Another vagrant caved in a man’s face with a four pound single-handed sledge hammer. The first round of vagrant attacks went undefended. The workers, as vicious as they seemed, were taken aback by the onslaught of violence. Shiro was the first to fight back. He took out a pistol from the inside of his jumpsuit and opened fire seeming at random into the crowd. He emptied the chamber, all six shots hit, but not all hit the vagrants. The shots did wake up the rest of the workers who drew guns of their own or took up any implements they had lying around and fought back. The workers’ guns blasted, the noise covering the siren of carnage all around. A line of vagrants fell and their headlong attack stymied, but only for a moment. Then all around were close killing battles. People died in tooth and nail struggles. Guns were shot at point blank range. Knives sliced into opponents so close that the attacker could see the light behind their eyes vanish as they died.

  Chapter - 25

  Duke followed th
e wall toward the tunnel entrance. He tried to hide himself away from the fight, slinking like a thief in the night. He was friend of no one. The vagrants would kill him just as fast as the cavern workers would. He found his stolen Bowie knife and moved stealthily toward the tunnel. His only thought was to escape. He knew he would be lost in nearly total darkness, but he liked his chances a whole lot better in the darkness of the maze of cave tunnels than in the vicious and bloody melee that was taking place before him.

  A vagrant spied him. An older man with a grizzled beard and vibrant blue eyes. He lunged forward trying to stab a long-handled gardening spike into his stomach. The man slipped up on a puddle of blood, which saved Duke’s life. The spike slammed into the cave wall inches next to his ribcage, sending rocky particles flying up into Duke’s eyes. Duke moved into the attack. He stabbed the man in the stomach and wrenched his knife free, spinning the vagrant around and slamming his knife home to the hilt in the man’s kidney. Duke hugged him so tight that he heard the old man’s ribs crack. The man made a gargling sound and died soon after. Duke walked, holding the dead man in front of him as he made for the tunnel. A rock smashed against his spine and he fell. The dead man pillowed his fall and Duke pulled him on top as another rock smashed the dead body’s rib bones into a pulp. Duke tried to get up but two women jumped on top of him. They clawed at him and stabbed with knives of their own. Their attacks weren’t effective. Their anger turned their movements to frenzy. Their stabs hit their own mostly, and when they did strike Duke, they were only making small furrows of cuts into his skin.

  Duke shoved hard, sending the dead vagrant tumbling off of him. The women fell to his sides. He rolled over on top of one and slammed his knife home in her throat. He pulled at his blade but it wouldn’t come free. The other woman stood up to her full height. The knife she held in her hand was long, nicked along the edge. The blade was covered in blood that went up to her elbow. Duke kept tugging at his knife but it wouldn’t come free. He held up his other hand palm out at the woman.