As Humphrey sat with Axel, pecking on his hollow mind, Axel refused to give him a second of attention. Axel wanted to get out of here, more than anything, even if it meant that he would be a dead tree among the green of his family, as it had been before. At least then, he would be surrounded by green. He would be surrounded by his own kind. He wasn’t of the same oddity as the woodpecker, which compared the color of green to the peculiar. It considered green to be strange in the core of its heart.
Axel heard the sound of Humphrey’s mumbles, but he didn’t hear the actual words they carried. Something had shut down inside of him. Although Humphrey hadn’t actually killed his sister, Axel had existed in a reality without his sister for a few seconds. Those few seconds were worse than the few months of depression.
Through Humphrey’s distant conversation, Axel thought of Susanne. Her face fueled him with some strength, and he reminded himself that he wasn’t helping the situation by ignoring Humphrey.
How does a tree get rid of a woodpecker? It waits. A tree waits for the woodpecker to fly away.
And Axel would wait. The woodpecker would eventually grow comfortable, realizing that despite all the pain it inflicted, the tree would never strike back. Ah, but Axel would strike back when the trust of the woodpecker had been won.
I know you’re fucking pissed, he told himself. But it won’t help the situation. So stop it, Axel. Stop it right now.
A mental green leaf extended on that thought. Axel prepared himself to sit up straight in the chair. Every muscle felt drained of blood. He managed, and cast his vision toward Humphrey. “I’m sorry. I barely got any sleep. I think I passed out.”
“No worries, crabby! Like I said, it’s time for breakfast. I’m positive that some breakfast is going to wake you right up!”
“Yeah,” Axel said. “I sure hope so.”
Humphrey returned to his original posture and repeated himself. “Open your mouth, crabby.” Axel opened his mouth. His lips darted backward, and to the side, with a slight tremble. He remembered what had happened the last time Humphrey asked him to open his mouth.
“Now,” Humphrey said, nearly shouting. “Today’s course includes the finest of meat with the purest sauce. This sauce has been gathered from saltwater. However, it does not come from the regular ocean, but from the human ocean, aka your tears.”
Although Axel remembered all those times Humphrey gathered his tears, hearing him explain the reason behind it added another layer of horror to those memories.
“You know,” Humphrey continued. “I thought that since the human eyes and the ocean are alike in mystery, they share a common bond. Some eyes are blue, like the ocean. Some eyes are green, like the ocean, if the lighting is correct. Hell, some eyes are brown, and the ocean will turn brown if you throw some mud in there. I began to think more in depth. I asked myself what more they have in common. Well, of course, they’re both salty. But the ocean contains food; food that exists at the bottom. You see, your tears are at the top—the surface of the ocean. Your mouth is at the bottom. And that’s our breakfast. Fascinating, wouldn’t you say?”
Trembles spread across Axel’s entire face. As he gave a terrified nod, his head waved in unsteady motion. Axel assumed that it must’ve looked odd—a mix between a nod and a shake.
“Don’t worry,” Humphrey said in a slight whisper. “This will only hurt a little.”
He reached inside Axel’s mouth, tugging at a string of dried flesh hanging from the roof of his mouth. A couple of scabs had grown here and there, and Humphrey scratched them with his fingernail. He pinched a string of dry flesh and gave it a hard pull. The dried string of flesh brought fresh meat with it. A straight, red line raced backward on the roof of Axel’s mouth. It resembled the kind of wound you obtain from pulling skin underneath your nail, having it dig up new skin as you pull, leaving behind a thin, long line of faint red. Those wounds stung with salted pain, as did Axel’s mouth now.
After Humphrey succeeded in his first pull, he held a long string of flesh in his hands. His eyes glowed as if he held a treasure. Around the bottom, the string was wrinkled, stained with dry blood—more brown than red. Toward the top, however, the flesh turned transparent, almost glossy, displaying drops of red blood with bright cheer. Axel placed his tongue on the fresh wound. It was like putting your tongue on a stove. Immediate reflex caused him to pull back in a grunt of pain.
Humphrey stared at the string of flesh. His pupils shrunk. He pulled down his surgical mask, and Axel wasn’t surprised to spot a full grin. He held it toward the dental light with the caution of a detective holding evidence from a crime scene. In an instant, he picked up the cup of tears, dropping the flesh into it. It made a depressed splash. Axel saw how the blood mixed with the tears, turning the liquid red. In the liquid, clogged pieces of blood were dark with red, floating around. Humphrey stirred it. Axel drew his face back in disgust, attempting to swallow his wretch.
Humphrey paid no attention to Axel. He brought out tweezers from the front pocket of his blue uniform and picked up the meat. He lifted it out of the liquid with caution, gently tapping it against the inner wall of the cup.
He turned away from Axel so that Axel couldn’t see his face, remaining hidden. “To the ocean, crabby,” Humphrey said. “And to your home, which has fed our ancestors across centuries.” He faced Axel again. With slight disgust, Axel saw the same excitement Humphrey carried on his face the day he placed a beetle in Axel’s mouth. But now that Humphrey wore no mask, the excitement spanned across his entire face. Humphrey slid his tongue out, dropping the piece of flesh on it. His eyes wandered upward in curiosity. He brought his tongue back into his mouth, slowly. Axel saw how he slid the pink flesh from one cheek to another, trying to squeeze out the flavor. Humphrey began to chew. At first, the chew was soft and mushy. When Humphrey began to chew on the dried part of the meat, however, it turned crunchy. Humphrey closed his eyes and inhaled air through his nostrils, adding to the flavor. He seemed to enjoy it. His throat began to signal that it wanted to swallow, but Humphrey raised a finger, as if to tell himself to wait just a little longer—just one more minute.
When he did swallow, he dropped to the floor on his back in the breath of orgasm. Watching Humphrey lay in that manner, seeing his face from a downward angle from his chin, made him appear more sinister. His teeth picked the remains. He chewed on the excess skin of flesh as if it was bubblegum. With the surgical mask within reach, he grabbed for it, strapping it on.
“That…was…THE BEST SUSHI EVER!” He sat up with the speed of a ninja. “We’re eating the finest sushi for breakfast! Oh man, we are living like kings today.” He stumbled over his next words. Axel thought that he said something about eternal joy. The blabbering reached a peak of insanity. Humphrey tore his surgical mask off. For a bizarre second, Axel assumed that Humphrey wanted to kiss him. Humphrey leaned in with his mouth, closing on Axel’s. He pulled Axel’s mouth open in a wide gape, and then ran his tongue over the remaining dried strings of flesh.
Axel drew backward, but the chains only let him resist with a few inches of space. Humphrey tried to munch on the strings with his teeth, aiming his bite with the excitement of a lunatic. He no longer seemed human. His lustful hunger turned animalistic. His bite was rapid with force—an enraged dog. Humphrey’s teeth clicked hard with each miss.
“CALM DOWN!” Axel bellowed. “JUST HANG ON A SEC—“
Humphrey grabbed onto Axel’s head. His nails were small daggers, digging into skin with their grip. His teeth seemed to dance in his mouth. Axel kicked with panic. His foot connected with the inside of Humphrey’s thigh. Humphrey’s grip on Axel loosened, but not fully. Once again the tongue of his mad captor reached for strings of pink. Axel bit down, hard. He felt the spongy texture of Humphrey’s tongue. Saliva gushed out of it.
Our first kiss, Axel thought with an undertone of horror. His bite dug deeper, and he felt the tips of his upper and bottom teeth almost meet through the layer of tongue. Humphrey wailed in sil
ent screams. His hands were raised above his head, and every finger waved in hateful shock. Along with saliva, Humphrey’s tongue now squirted blood. Drops of it slid down Axel’s throat.
I hope you’re clean of bodily diseases because you’re certainly not clean in the head.
Humphrey began to pound with his fists at the sides of Axel’s head. One of the punches left Axel’s face numb, and his bite lost strength. Humphrey tried to reverse his tongue. He held onto Axel’s face for support, pulling backward like a child who has their tongue stuck to a frozen streetlight. Grunts from both men correlated in the air. The grip started to wobble, and at the realization of this, Axel let go. Humphrey shot backward and tumbled. Skin fragments from his tongue tickled with the texture of feathers inside of Axel’s cheeks.
No words came from either of them; only breathings of rust and struggle. The first one to say something turned out to be Humphrey. His face was naked without the mask, and his words were in that awful alien language. However, Axel still noticed a definite hint of anger in those words. At the sight of Axel’s confused look, Humphrey put on his surgical mask and tried again.
“Have you lost your mind? Is your shell too thick for morality, crabby? Just what do you think—“
“I thought this was a shared breakfast,” Axel interrupted. “You said so yourself.”
Anger surfed on the outer rim of Humphrey’s glistening eyes. There seemed to be fumes coming out of his nose. His exhales were loud. It reminded Axel of someone exhaling into a balloon. The surgical mask fluttered like a reverse cape of a hero, caught in toxic air. Humphrey swallowed frequently. His Adam’s apple jumped, and light reflected sweat as it elevated. Axel saw the lower half of Humphrey’s face sway in thought. Somehow the silence seemed to make Humphrey’s pointer of anger flex more upward by the minute, and Axel decided to play it safe. He started talking again.
“I’m hungry, too, Humphrey. You were right; the human ocean does taste good. I apologize that things spun out of control, but I couldn’t resist.”
Axel hated trying to appear reasonable to Humphrey by using the man’s insanity and acting it sane. Although it was just a façade to make sure that nothing jams the cogwheels of Axel’s plan, it still felt real when Humphrey reacted to it. To Axel, it was like feeding another person a giant, sticky mush of insects; you as the feeder may not be the one eating it, but seeing how the other person gobbles it up and then sucks off his fingers is enough to mold a grimace of disgust on your face. Observing that person’s reaction to the mush, witnessing how that person actually believes that it tasted good, makes it seem all too real. And then, that same person would turn and ask if you want to try a mush of insect. That’s how Axel felt right now; as if he chewed on foul, mushy thoughts. He tasted the bitterness of his words as they rolled off his tongue. He tasted sour insides of insects when he pretended to exist in Humphrey’s mindset.
“Do you want to make it up to me?” Humphrey asked. An instant stab of a mental needle vibrated with images of insanity in the darkest corners of Axel’s mind. His hands became moist with anxious flesh, as if they had been dipped in warm spring water. Through all that mental darkness, only one light existed, and that light shone from his family. In the hollow trunk of Axel Gardner, the only green came from the love of his family. The love of his family gave birth to his survival instinct. He didn’t want to escape this nightmare because he valued his own life, but because he valued the lives of his family more than his own. In the risk that wired around Humphrey’s question, Axel reminded himself of his cause.
“Yes,” Axel said.
“Alright,” Humphrey replied. “Let me fetch my tools.”
8
The wagon’s wheels once again squealed against the floor, causing vibration, tickling Axel’s feet with tiny fingers. He couldn’t see beyond the perimeter of the dental light, and it felt like an unknown entity in the darkness was tickling his feet.
Going to warm you up, the thing that registered the tickles seemed to say. Here comes our dentist, oh yes. Before he gets here, I’m going to tickle your feet and makes sure that your body is awake to feel everything.
Axel told the voice in his head to shut up. He closed his eyes, trying to spawn happy thoughts. He tried to summon Susanne’s image, but the screams from the wheels made it difficult.
The wheels stopped screaming. Humphrey stood next to him. Axel savored the silence. Humphrey interrupted it by drumming on the metal handle of the wagon, locking his stare onto the tools. His hands went up and down in rhythm. He took off one of his gloves, trailing his naked hand over the handles of each tool. They were laid out in perfect alignment. His hand stopped at a miniature saw.
“OOOOO NOW THIS IS A FIGHSTY ONE!”
Axel jumped.
“That’s some sharp metal,” Humphrey whispered.
“What are you planning?” Axel tried to hide his fear by adding some bodily sounds after he finished his sentence.
“I like the crunch,” Humphrey replied. “The crunch on your sushi was exquisite. I want more of that. So, we are going to perform that dreaded dentist routine of pulling teeth. Once teeth are pulled, I will use a file to turn them into crumbs. And then I will spread, or sprinkle them onto the sushi.”
Axel shuddered. Cold shivers slid down his back. An image of Humphrey rubbing the cold metal of his tools on Axel’s back spawned in his head. This image turned the shivers into an arctic touch.
“Usually, the teeth we pull are damaged or loose, making the pull easier. However, depending on how healthy your gums are in certain areas, some of your teeth might be hard to pull. That’s what this baby is for.” He displayed the miniature saw in a proud manner. “In the case of healthy teeth, I will saw through your gums, cutting into your teeth, and separating the roots of said teeth.”
“So just take the teeth that are easier to pull,” Axel said in a voice struck by raw panic. “Some of them are looser than others. In areas where most of my gums are missing, the teeth—“
“Don’t you know anything about food? This is not a fast-food restaurant, crabby. Why would I go for damaged teeth? In the regular ocean, flavor depends on the freshness of the food. The same thing applies for the human ocean.”
Axel felt emotions build. He took deep breaths, trying to ignore the dry air. He realized that he wasn’t going to handle remaining calm. Once that dawned on him, a voice inside his head threw itself for a loop.
You’re not going to make it.
You’re not going to make it.
You’re not going to make it.
His hair, which hadn’t been showered since the day before his show, was no longer soft—it was the texture of hay. In a sudden panic, Axel felt every string of hair on his head sting with a course texture against the rim of his skull.
You’re not going to make it.
“Do you at least have any painkillers?”
“Yes.”
“Thank God—“
“Afterward, we’ll go outside for some blue anesthesia. That’s your painkiller.”
Shattered pieces of hope tumbled to the ground. Axel prepared to have an episode of flaming fury, but he once again reminded himself of his cause. There was a moment of still air. Both men didn’t move, and no sound of their fabric caught in motion and interrupted this shared silence. Humphrey thought that Axel resembled a man who had just dug himself out from a grave.
“I’ll also allow you to use the restroom on your way out,” Humphrey said in a tone too close to being friendly. “This will be the last procedure, crabby, you have my word. According to my knowledge, the beetle will find its way out on a starving stomach either today or tomorrow. And when that happens, we can both put this behind us and become one with the next era of our world; an era where everything is vastly improved.”
The thought of the beetle and his secret only increased his panic. Sweat covered his entire face, reflecting rays of light from his pours. “Just get this over with.”
Humphrey clapped his hands to
gether. He leaned forward. Axel could smell him—old hospital carpets.
“Don’t worry, this will only—“
“Yeah, yeah, I know. This will only hurt a little.”
“No, crabby; this time, it will hurt a lot.”
9
Humphrey put his glove back on. He pulled out his magnifying glass, and began inspecting Axel’s teeth. His concentration was the essence of horror when Axel considered what kind of a man Humphrey was. He wondered what terrible things Humphrey could accomplish if he used his concentration on a greater scale, applying his evil to an entire population rather than just Axel.
Humphrey reached in with his hand. He wiggled certain teeth. One tooth, with barely any flesh surrounding it, broke off in a loud SNAP—the sound of breaking a thick branch in the middle.
“Oh dear,” Humphrey mumbled. His concentration left Axel’s mouth and targeted his eyes. “Yeah, some of these teeth are damaged, alright. My pet friend has certainly done well. Speaking of which, are you aware of his current location right now?”
Axel shook his head with his eyes closed, in case Humphrey could spot a difference in his Axel’s look.
Blue Anesthesia Page 15