Chapter 18
SINN'OUS
Buzzers. Always loud to the point of driving anyone to stick an ice pick into their ear canals to puncture their eardrums. Anything to dull the ringing they cause to your whole existence.
A silent flashing light would work just as well to announce mealtimes, and everything else the guards’ unnecessarily decide needs to be announced via foghorn.
Although, a constant stream of blinking lights would get on his nerves just the same, and an eyeball vivisection would be in order.
He’s not tracking the day so he isn’t entirely sure which meal this will be, it matters very little to him. He used to skip more meals than he attended, that was until a certain orange-clad prey walked through the doors.
And while his mind lingers on vivid recollections of that first day, he weaves between inmates to the stairs of his Wing.
He had been captivated and intrigued from the first sight.
He hadn’t known if he was thrilled or annoyed by the petite body and lack of challenge it represented.
Until now, when challenge after challenge has been thrust into his path.
All in good fun. You can’t have a good kill without a good hunt. Scratch that, killing is still fun when it’s spontaneous. But drawing it out holds a kind of foreplay to it.
Next thing he knows his thoughts of blood and death are waved away by an invisible hand, clouds flushed from his presence, and he is hovering over Jasper’s empty bunk, his hands filled by chocolate treats.
He had been so deep inside his own head he’d zoned out going to his own cell or leaving to come to this cell.
Sinn'ous sighs, rolling his eyes at himself, and leaves the food on the bunk. His inner self is telling him to use whatever he has available to coerce some cooperation out of his prey. A little reliability.
Now. Where is that naive prey of mine?
Everyone clears his path when he descends the stairs, their survival instincts telling them to avoid him, and he takes advantage. It quickens his exit to the corridor, giving him a chance to track down his prey without the needless complication of other inmates getting in the way.
When he finds no sign of Jasper in the cafeteria or in the showers he begins to worry—or maybe more apt a description would be mildly apprehensive.
The utter lack of sign in the showers is concerning in it being a place his prey seems to gravitate to as a safe retreat, for some insane reason Sinn'ous can’t fathom.
Each long expanse of white corridor leads to further failure. Every grey inmate he passes is a new test in his ability to control himself. His mind is a loose wire, flying back and forth to hit and zap, and break away again. It’s all he can do not to slaughter his way down each and every corridor.
The next corner yields results, and the back of an orange body sets his wires straight. No limp. No pained noises. No blood. His prey is alive and unmaimed.
That is until their surroundings catch up to Sinn'ous, and hone in on the other person in the corridor with them. So engrossed in the sight of his prey he overlooked the other predator in the mix.
They are in D-Wing, a corridor lined by doors to various self-help rooms and classrooms. And they are right in the centre of it where the counsellors office is, the same office everyone knows to avoid, except—evidently—for Jasper.
The put together, tailored suit wearing counsellor is leaning out from the open office door staring pointedly at Jasper’s retreating figure scurrying away.
Sinn'ous doesn’t need to read minds to know counsellor Gregory Johnston is undressing the boy with his eyes.
Sinn'ous sees red.
He charges Johnston, grabbing steam-pressed lapels and using his momentum, bulk, and blindsided target, to drive the scum back into the office. He doesn’t even take the time to kick the door closed, can’t see or focus on anything other than the overwhelming need to dominate. To incite fear.
“Did you fucking touch him.” It’s not a question, he doesn’t care one way or another what the answer is. He will be doing whatever the fuck he wants regardless.
The large oak desk rattles and groans in protest as both their combined weights slam down onto it, Sinn'ous pinning the counsellor harshly to the wooden surface.
Terror is etched into every crease on Johnston’s ever paling face. “W-what?”
Sinn'ous lets loose a roar, lifting him off the desk by his lapels only to slam him right back down, audibly rattling his teeth in his revolting mouth. Something gives, and the desk lists unevenly at one end.
Ignoring it all he leans right into the face of a fake professional, smooth-rimmed glasses sitting askew on his uneven nose, wide eyes flashing all their white. “I said,” Sinn'ous growls, spitting rage incarnate to fury, “did you fucking touch him.”
An answer won’t sway his judgement, he’s not sure why he’s pushing for one. It matters not. This fuck is dead.
“No. Why would I? I’m a counsellor not a—”
Both Sinn'ous’s hands tighten around Johnston’s throat, cutting off whatever crap was about to spew out.
Kill.
Do it. Do it now. Offer the sacrifice.
Sinn'ous stays his hands, easing his hold as his sacrifice’s face turns from red to blue, the colour tinting his lips. He needs Johnston to be fully coherent to hear his next words. “I know exactly what you are, and what you do. Stay the fuck away from Jasper Marcelo.”
“Jesus Christ. Sinn'ous.” Rogers voice scarcely registers. Hands grab at him, but it’s so far off and distant it registers as little more than a light flutter over his biceps.
There is no struggle under him. No push back from the body below. Blood shot eyes stare up at him. And Sinn'ous is nothing but calm and controlled.
Rogers continues his vain attempts to pry Sinn'ous off. “Let off, Sinn'ous. Don’t force me to tase you. Release your hands.”
Each second that passes is drawn into a long passage of time.
The freezing of the world slowed down into one moment.
One place in time where everything slots together.
It’s perfection personified. It’s the place in time where he is the closest to Satan.
The in-between. It’s the fraction of time before the light leaves the eyes forever. The soul sent down to Satan’s realm.
Reality snaps back, sounds collide into him and consequences emerge.
There is a second guard by the doors, a new correctional officer Sinn'ous hasn’t learnt the name of.
The CO is stock still and white as a ghost, hand shaking over the button of his shoulder radio. Ready to call a whole team of back up.
Sinn'ous pushes off the counsellor, holding his hands up to display his cooperation. Johnston lies dead for a heartbeat longer, then his lungs kick into gear and he wheezes in a choked breath, coughing and choking on air.
Sinn'ous paces to the far side of the office, reluctant to leave, raking his hands through his spiked hair, the ends sitting upright in a messy mohawk. Something closer to a fauxhawk, where the sides are not completely shaved, just kept short.
He knows he will kill this man, in due time, just not today when there is a room of witnesses.
Rogers is bent over Johnston, words spoken that are drowned out by the violent coughing fit.
No way can he stay here and not lunge back in for the kill.
He strides from the room, whole body one tight rod of tension.
Not even the solid slam of the office door is enough to satiate his blood hunger.
His skin is on fire, ants racing up and down, eating the subcutaneous tissue keeping his body from falling apart.
One wrong slip and he’ll crumple into a blood-soaked mess and litter the corridors in bodies.
He can’t get sent to The Hole, or worse yet, transferred to max. He has to stay here.
He has a doe-eyed prey to hunt.