by J. L. Harden
Weeks.
Months.
Years.
Eventually, they go mad. Eventually, they go completely insane.
They, the doctors and the professional shrinks, they think it’s because the brain can’t handle the lack of stimulation. So it begins to make stuff up. As a result, someone locked up in isolation will start hearing things and smelling things. They’ll start seeing things.
Invisible things and imaginary things that are as real as real can be. Things that aren’t there, but they can still see them and touch them and smell them.
Talk to them.
People.
Entire worlds…
They’ll be talking to themselves. But they don’t know this.
But then again, maybe they do know, maybe sometimes they are aware of their descent into madness and insanity. Maybe they know, but there’s just nothing they can do about it. Not a goddamn thing.
Either way, I’m going to be a blubbering mess pretty soon. I’ll be talking to myself, imagining things that aren’t real. I’ll be fighting and wrestling and hiding from imaginary people and invisible monsters. And if anything comes out of the darkness, I’ll be wrestling and fighting with actual monsters.
I try and prepare myself for this psychological torture, for this inevitability. But how do you prepare yourself for something like this, for your own mind to betray you?
Your own mind…
I close my eyes and time slows down.
It stops altogether.
And then it speeds up.
I open my eyes.
Mike is standing there. Mike fucking Malone. My deputy. My right hand man.
“Mike?”
“It didn’t have to be like this,” Mike says. “The Shuttles are on their way back, they’re getting real close. We… you… could’ve been on it.”
“You really believe that?”
“At the very least they would’ve granted you access into Wonderland. But you ruined your chances. You sabotaged yourself. You basically committed suicide, a long and painful version of suicide. I’ve got orders from Wonderland, from the Overseer and from the Collector. Yeah, that’s right… he lived. He’s going to be just fine. Anyway, orders are we’re supposed to torture you. We’re supposed to torture you for as long as your body can take it, for as long as your heart doesn’t give out. This is bad news for you because you’re young and fit and healthy. You’re a hell of a lot stronger than you look, that’s for damn sure. And this means you’ll be alive for a long time.”
Maybe I should’ve spent the last day or two preparing myself for the physical torture.
Damn.
“It would’ve been better if that Overseer had snapped your neck. Easier for everyone. And definitely better for you. But the Lord wants to send a message. A very important message. By the end of this, you are going to be the villain. And everyone in the Buried City will know it. Everyone in the Canyons and the Wasteland will know it. You helped Hector lure the girls away from Wonderland. You stole them in the night like a thief. Hector paid you in guns and ammunition, in tech that he had stolen over the years. It’s a good story, isn’t it?”
“It’s amazing…”
“But wait, it gets better. You joined in. You raped and you killed. You supplied the poison. You injected it right into their veins. Poison is a woman’s weapon. Always has been, always will be. The people will eat this up.”
Something my father once told me pops into my head. “It’s easy. Propaganda. Convincing the masses to believe what you want them to believe. You just have to tell the people they’re under attack, that they’re lives are in danger and that they need to fight. You accuse the pacifists of being cowards, of lacking loyalty. You accuse the pacifists and the peacemakers as being part of the problem, of exposing the innocent and the vulnerable to mortal danger. It works the same in any city, in any country. On any planet.”
“By the end of all this,” Mike says. “They will be calling for your death, howling for your blood. They, the people you protected, the people you served, they will demand your execution. And after it’s all said and done, they will spit on your corpse.”
“Why are you telling me this, Mike? What’s in it for you?”
“This is the part I play. This is the start of it. The torture. We will break you down. Shatter your mind. First, your mind, your will. And then, once your mind is broken, we will shatter your bones. And for my part, for my loyal service, I will be rewarded.”
“We? Are you going to step in here and break my bones, you old fuck?”
“Maybe I will. I sure as hell wouldn’t mind it. If only to punish you for being intolerable and idiotic, for walking the straight and narrow path, the goddamn high road. For being such a good girl. For having such a clean conscience. You’re so clean it makes me sick.”
“Stop projecting, Mike. A liar sees nothing but liars.”
“What the hell are you talking about?
“I’m just making the comment that because you’re a goddamn lying son of a bitch, you think everyone else is. That everyone else should be. You expect it. And when you find out that’s not the case, it makes you furious.”
“You done with the psych evaluation? Good. You should save your breath. Save your energy. Not just for the torture. But because I’ve heard all that bullshit before, from your old man. He was a good guy, you know? Better than you. Cleaner. If that’s even possible. He didn’t survive…”
And Mike trails off and maybe I see some regret in his eyes, some semblance of humanity.
“He was killed because he wouldn’t play the game. Because he couldn’t. Not even when we threatened his life. His family. His daughter. His wife.”
I try not to show any emotions, but I feel my body tense up. Mike knows it.
“Yeah, that’s right, sweetheart. Your father, his actions and lack thereof, got your mother killed. Can you believe that? We gave him a choice. We gave him ample fucking warning. He put your life at risk, your mother’s life. Got your mother killed. Got himself killed. The rat bastard. I’ll never forgive him for it. Could’ve been different. If he had just done what he was supposed to do, you guys would already be living in Wonderland, you’d already be living on one of the Arks. A happy little family. The fucked up thing is, I liked your old man. I could have a beer with him. I could shoot the breeze. I could talk to him about anything and everything. Well, almost everything. Not when it came time to play nice with the Wonderland brass. Couldn’t talk to him about any of that. He wouldn’t hear it. Wouldn’t even consider it.”
“And what was it?” I ask. “What was the thing he was supposed to do?”
“Does it even matter?”
“Yes, it does. It matters a whole lot.”
“I don’t even know. I can’t remember. He had to kill some Mercs or something…”
Mike is lying. I call him on it. “Most of the time you’re very good at lying, Mike. But sometimes you’re terrible at it. It comes easy to you. But sometimes… you’re just fucking terrible at it.”
“Oh yeah? Well I’m not the dumb cunt locked up on death row. So I must be doing something right.”
Mike disappears without saying a proper goodbye. I guess I hit a nerve.
Maybe a day or two passes. I’m not sure.
Time had sped up.
And then it slows back down.
My mind wanders off and I start thinking about how I read somewhere, again, probably from a book I found in the Great Library, that the only thing that can effect time, is matter. Because matter will effect gravity. And the more matter there is, the greater the effect on gravity will be, and the greater the effect on time will be. Or something like that. I don’t know. Most of it flew way over my head.
Anyway, something or someone heavy, with gravity, with gravitas, steps to my cell.
It is the Mayor.
He is holding the gun he gave me the day he swore me in as Sheriff of the Buried City.
Mike is back as well. He’s standing behind the Mayo
r. Still furious. Still outraged.
The Mayor tells Mike to beat it. Tells him to get some rest. To take some stress leave.
Mike disappears in a huff.
And the Mayor waits.
He waits until we are all alone. “I’m sure Mike has already told you this,” he says quietly. “But things could’ve been different.”
“Yeah, he told me.”
“Good. Just making sure. You know, I never knew that choosing you as Sheriff would cause so many problems. I thought I’d be able to mold you. I thought I’d be able to make you do whatever I wanted… and I mean, whatever. You’re very beautiful, do you know that? What am I saying? Of course you know. But you’re too much like your old man. Too stubborn. Too fucking strong willed. I thought about killing you early on. Talked it over with some of the guys. We’d make it look like an accident. Make it look like you died on the job, in the line of duty. Would’ve made you look like a goddamn hero. But then I thought better of it. Well, maybe that’s not true. Maybe I wasn’t thinking straight. But I began to enjoy watching you work. I began to enjoy your doggedness, your determination and your persistence. It was amazing. It was so fucking idealistic. It was like you thought you could actually save everyone in the Buried City and everyone in the Wasteland.”
The Mayor looks at me, studies me. “My god, you still think it, don’t you? This is madness, Zoe,” he says, smiling. “And I fucking love it. I love how goddamn crazy you are.”
“Thank you,” I say, not knowing what else to say.
“It’s insanity, Zoe. Are you paying attention? Are you listening? Because this is the truth. It is absolutely insane to think that we can save everyone. Do you understand? It can’t be done. It’s just not possible. I wish it were possible. Honestly, I do. But it’s not. So I’m not going to waste my time trying to save a bunch of wasted lives, a bunch of degenerates who can’t be saved.”
“Could’ve sworn Hector killed you,” I say, completely unsurprised by what he is saying, and how casually he talks about killing innocent people, leaving them behind, leaving them to rot and burn. “I heard the gunshots.”
The Mayor nods along. “I’m pretty sure he was there to kill me. Pretty sure he was going to kill me the first time he came to see me. So after that scare, I beefed up security.”
“What are you talking about? There were no guards. No Enforcers. There was no one there.”
There was no security. His fortress was unguarded and empty. I’d never seen it like that before.
“There was,” he answers. “They call him the Scarred Overseer of Wonderland. He is all the security anyone would ever need. He is really quite frightening and quite amazing at his job, at killing. Amazing and efficient.”
I guess he has a point. The Scarred Overseer got the jump on me. Snuck up on me without making a sound. And I’m guessing he got the better of Hector. So yeah, the Scarred Overseer of Wonderland is someone you most definitely do not want to fuck with. But I need to clear something up. So I say, “You know, up until this incident, I’d never seen an Overseer in real life. In the flesh. I thought they were made up. I thought they were a myth, a legend. Or maybe they were real once upon a time, but had long gone extinct. Like the dinosaurs. Like every other living thing on this planet. But… they’re real, right? And they’re not extinct. And I guess what I’m trying to say is, I always thought the Overseers were supposed to supervise us and look after us…”
The Mayor cuts me off with a look of disappointment on his face. “You should know better, Zoe. You really should. And you would know better, you would know so many things, if only you played the game. The Overseers are weapons. They are soldiers. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
Fuck the game. The game is twisted and the rules don’t make any fucking sense.
“Where’s the girl?” I ask. “What are you going to do to her?”
“She’ll be used as a tool. An instrument of propaganda. She will be a nail in your coffin. She will be the spike that pierces your lifeless body. Her testimony, her words will destroy you. Destroy the image and the person you’ve spent your entire life becoming. And then she will disappear like so many before her.”
I don’t believe him. I don’t believe it. There’s no way they could make the girl, Angel, speak against me. I saw her, saw the look in her eyes, the fire in her eyes. She escaped from Wonderland, escaped from the Collector.
She is strong and brave.
She is too strong.
She won’t break. She won’t bend.
She won’t give in.
There’s no way Angel would go along with these people.
But then she appears from behind the Mayor and I can tell immediately that something is wrong. She is drugged to the eyeballs. She can hardly stand up.
She says, “You… you couldn’t… you couldn’t save me…”
The Mayor grabs her by the arm, shakes her. “What did we tell you? What did we discuss?”
Angel lowers her head. She has been brainwashed and drugged and put under a spell. It’s like she’s been pumped full of an entire laboratory of psychotic mind control substances. “You killed the girls,” she whispers. “You raped them. You stole them from Wonderland, from the Collector. You would’ve killed me. But the Mayor… I was saved. And now I am alive. Thanks to the Mayor…”
“She’ll be a superstar,” the Mayor says, smiling.
“What the hell did you do to her?”
“I didn’t do anything. It’s something the Collector does to them. He… changes them. Does something to their blood. He adds something. Not sure what it is. Super high-tech. Might as well be fucking voodoo for all I know. Anyway, it lies dormant in the blood stream, in the body. And if you want, if you need to, you can add something else to the blood stream via syringe. And then you have yourself an obedient little girl, an obedient soldier, a puppet. Albeit a little drugged, a little slow. No matter. We will tell the public that she obtained a traumatic brain injury. Delivered by your hands because you’re a violent rapist, a violent killer, a monster. It’s beautiful. This lie. This whole charade. Beautiful. And I will be rewarded for it.”
Angel is drooling and she nearly falls over. The Mayor catchers her and soothes her, whispering sweet nothings into her ear. And I want to scream. I want to break these bars and fight and scream at the injustice of it all.
But I don’t.
I don’t fight.
I don’t scream.
What I do is, I tense up and I move away from the bars and I press myself against the back wall of the holding cell.
Because right at that moment… the Scarred Overseer of Wonderland appears from fucking nowhere.
And he says, “It is time.”
Chapter 6
Time for what?
The torture?
No.
I’m not ready for it. I was never ready for it.
And the darkness behind me, the crack in the wall, it nags at me.
Do I make a run for it?
Do I take my chances?
I picture myself running for my life. I visualize my escape. But my body remains still. I am paralyzed.
I don’t run. I don’t move. It’s too dangerous. Running into the darkness is suicide.
I risk a glance at the hole in the wall, and my mind shows me things I’d rather not see. And I hear things I’d rather not hear.
Clawing. Scratching. A scream. A roar.
I hear breathing. I swear to the Red Giant, I hear breathing. Deep and heavy breathing.
All these noises come from the darkness.
From the Eternal Darkness.
Where the rats are as big as dogs. The roaches are as big as cats. Where there are things from the ruins of civilization. Twisted things. Twisted and mutated by radiation.
And I swear to anyone who is listening, I can hear them. I hear them in the dark. And I don’t know why they haven’t come for me. I don’t know what they are waiting for.
The fear is unbearable.
And I’m not ready for it.
And I’m not ready for this… I’m not ready for the door to my cell to swing open. Rusty and loud. Metal rubs against metal. There is a screech, a squeal. The noise makes me jump, gets my heart started.
I am dragged out of the cell, out of the Waiting Room.
They throw me into another room. Another concrete cell. I find myself thinking that at least there are no holes in the walls. No possible way for the darkness and the creatures of the tunnels to find their way in here.
I guess that’s something.
In the room with me are two men I’ve never seen before. I’m guessing they’re Mercs, or maybe a couple of the Mayor’s goons.
Accompanying the two men is Mike fucking Malone.
“You’re too goddamn pretty to be a monster,” he says. “You’re downright beautiful. You have striking features. That’s how the Mayor describes you all the time. He says… your features are striking.”
My skin crawls.
Mike rips my shirt off.
“I know you tried to keep these tattoos a secret. Always wearing a long sleeved shirt. Always hiding your arms, hiding your skin. Always having your top button done up. Never letting anyone get a little peek.”
He looks at me, at my tattoos, and I think he admires them. But I don’t know. It’s hard to tell.
“Must’ve cost a fortune. And they must’ve hurt like hell. The artwork is nothing like I’ve ever seen. I like this part here,” he says as he touches my right arm. “This demon looking fellow. He’s real nice. And he’ll play nicely with the story we’re cooking up for you.”
I resist the urge to break his other hand. I resist the urge to even remind him about how I broke his hand, because if I do this now, he’ll just give it back to me tenfold, a hundredfold, he’ll give it back to me a thousand times over. Then again, he’s probably going to do it anyway. Maybe I should say something. Maybe I should break his hand while I can, while I’m good and able.
He says, “Yeah, you’re much too pretty to be a monster. But we’ll fix that. We’ll fix this little problem real good.”
He steps in close to me and he grabs my hands. He shows them to the goons, to my torturers.