Chapter 61 Kane
KANE
It’s odd for me to be away from Sasha when having her in my life is what I imagine having a younger sibling is like.
I’m worried about whether she has enough snacks, if she’ll go to sleep, or if she’ll be cold in the abandoned building we’ve made our home for the night since The Three haven’t sent us another job.
I can’t go back to her as I’m taken to the location of The Rainbow Rooms event tonight. I wasn’t able to join the last one due to my vetting being unsuccessful. After paying an extortionate sum to the handle B on the forum linked to TRR, I’ve passed all the requirements to be in attendance.
Thankfully, discretion is one of their requirements so the old firefighter’s mask over my balaclava provides a barrier between the hood they forced me to wear.
The hose allows sounds to travel through the suffocating material as we rock with the waves.
It doesn’t require sight to figure out we’re on a boat.
The others sitting in their own sections won’t be able to hear the low voices of the crew as they confirm our arrival time.
I’ll be able to use that as an indicator of where they’ve taken us since we weren’t allowed to bring any electronics.
Warmth engulfs me as we pull into the harbor, the shadows fully eaten up by our surroundings. The air is thicker, humid like we’re inside a cave.
“Welcome to The Rainbow Rooms,” an automated voice says.
“You may look around, you may participate, you may be sick to your stomach. You may not, under any circumstance, divulge information from behind our doors. Enjoy your stay.” Other voices join in, eerily distorting the speech as they finish, “Remember, you may not see us, but we hear you.”
What the fuck have I gotten myself involved in?
All of Decker’s research mentioned TRR as some type of event.
Half of the conversations were missing when I went into the forums, and I couldn’t stomach reading their one-sided desires for children, or how the pedophiles were swapping stories between themselves.
The only information I could find was a banding system based on different colors.
The last message the host left up announced a new silver band.
None of the fuckers spoke outside of the coded colors, but I didn’t look too closely because I’d rather be ignorant.
There’s no allowance for that anymore as the hood is ripped off my head and a guard in a black-tinted mirror mask gestures for me to walk ahead. The UV lights only allow me to see a foot in front of me, which my mask doesn’t help since I haven’t removed the films distorting my eye color.
We’re in a cavernous space, echoing the steps of the four other people in my group as we’re kept further apart so I can’t see who they are.
They’ve made an effort with their appearance, as though this is a trip to the opera rather than some perverted event with their dress shoes and heels tapping behind me.
We walk deeper through the humidity, down a narrow passageway, then the entire space opens up as soft string music plays.
I slowly step to the side, taking in the cushioned walls separating each section lit up under different colored lights.
Some red, blue, pink, orange, yellow, one section has a blacklight so I can’t even see the people in it. But the others…
“Welcome to the family,” Asher whispers as he places his arm around my shoulders. “I told you I was protecting you.”
“You saw this shit?” I spit as I turn to him.
“Happy hunting, little brother,” is all he says.
A woman stands on a circular table with her wrists bound in leather cuffs above her head and thick metal shackles around her ankles as the patrons in the booth take turns cutting her skin.
The next booth under the red lights is the same as a young man, no older than twenty, stands in the exact same position.
A thick plume of smoke rises from the booth as a masked patron puffs on a nearly dead cigar.
Instead of allowing it to burn out in an ashtray, he pushes the thick, glowing cherry into the man’s calf without breaking conversation with the person beside him.
At first glance, the blue section appears normal, with tables set up to mimic a restaurant.
Luxurious linens covering the tables, cutlery neatly bracketing their plates.
But a waiter leads a woman to the tables by a chain around her neck.
They rise one by one, marking her body, writing their orders—picking their meat.
Thankfully the pink, orange, and yellow sections are too far away for me to see anything other than silhouettes as they enact their abuse.
“Scared?” Asher asks.
“No.”
I’ll be fine as long as I keep moving, keep looking for Rowan.
I’ll get the location for Helene’s island.
I’ll exchange the information about the people who want to kill him for Delilah.
Then tell Decker and Vlad where he is. While they’re busy trying to kill each other, we’ll be fucking free.
It’s all easy, in theory. The reality is searching a room full of perverse cunts as they commit sadistic act after act while wearing masks to find someone who will most likely also be wearing a mask.
“You’re not very loyal,” Asher notes. “You’ve promised his death to anyone who could help you. Now, you’re planning to sacrifice them.”
I’ll sacrifice anything to get Delilah back. Some stupid dickheads I have no bond to mean fuck all in the grand scheme of things. I’d happily give up my life for the opportunity to hold her again.
“Stand in the middle of the room so you can see everything,” Asher says, gesturing to the curved bar in the middle of the room. “Or you could stay here so they can all see poor little Kane is still scared of everything.”
“Fuck you.” I step out of the shadows and go to the bar.
I don’t have any money since the rules stipulated I wasn’t permitted to bring anything with me, but as I watch everyone else, I notice they don’t put their hands in their pocket to pay for the drinks slid in front of them.
Instead, the black-tinted mirror mask behind the bar presses a small card reader to the band on their wrist.
The rubber cuff matches the one I was given when my $200,000 buy-in was accepted.
If the cards I skimmed ever find out I used their money to get into a sadistic club, it will probably add salt to the wound of being stolen from.
That’s another problem for another day though as I take the small tablet on the bar top, expecting it to be a menu.
It is, of sorts, although it doesn’t contain drinks or food items on the black screen as it repeats the welcome in white text.
Welcome to The Rainbow Rooms.
An inky array of colors slowly drips from the top of the screen, erasing the words as it travels down.
They aren’t bright like what would be expected from a rainbow.
They’re all the worst shades of their respective colors.
Yellow so murky it resembles urine, orange reminding me of bile, the green of a swamp.
It’s like someone decided to ruin it when the normal world uses it as a symbol for happiness, places it on children’s toys to stimulate their minds with bright colors, or a sign of hope that light will always come after a downpour.
Multiple boxes fade up on the black screen.
The Red Room Offers:
Weapons to satisfy every curiosity.
A specially curated subject to explore your desires.
The Blue Room Offers:
A cold body with a fully stocked bar.
The Pink Room Offers:
Birth to twelve.
Must be booked in advance.
The Black Room Offers:
Only available with DIAMOND membership.
I’m going to throw up. Each one is worse than the last. If the Black Room doesn’t have details, what the fuck could be worse than birth to twelve?
The boxes glare at me with a glowing ring around the words, urging me to pick one. I carefully press the edge of the black screen, making sure my gloved finger stays as far away from the Pink fucking Room.
Red will be easy, it’s killing someone. Blue is the same as The Dollhouse. But pink? No. Delilah and I will both fucking die before that ever happens. She’ll hate me for death, which I can live with. It’ll be miserable, soul-crushing, but at least I’ll make it up to her on the other side.
“You found your line.”
The words scatter as the boxes merge together to form one long rectangle in the middle of the screen. Then the black scattered pieces rejoin in a formation until it shows another room. One that has my entire focus.
The Mirror Room Offers:
An experience like no other. Your subject will face the horrors of their own reaction as you remain anonymous.
Reflections can only exist within a mirror.
The card that led me here because the Wards know every part of Rowan’s business model mentioned mirrors. They created this along with Helene. A scorned business partner is like a wronged ex-wife. Harkin would always say it, then Asher, once he’d been taken under his tutelage.
With my heart in my throat, my fears weighing my limbs, I select the Mirror Room. The masked bartender walks over to me with the chip reader, scans my band, then raises two velvet-gloved fingers to point towards a door beside the blacklight section.
“Do you really think Rowan is going to be there?” Asher asks as we walk towards the door.
I need him to shut the fuck up instead of trying to apply logic to an insane situation.
“He’s not going to be here. Forget about Delilah. You left Sasha alone like you left Kid alone.”
The sides of the mask scrape against my jaw as I grit my teeth.
“What if Sasha dies too? Is her cunt that special, you’ll let everyone around you die so you can have it again?”
She’s my wife, he’s a fucking prick. He doesn’t understand it’s not about fucking her; it’s deeper.
She’s as essential for my survival as my heart.
Without her, everything has been slower, dazed, grey.
With her, I can escape the shit in my head.
As long as I chase Delilah, I forget about the memories racing after me.
The door automatically opens when I approach, a guard waiting for me with the same tinted mirror mask, but they don’t scan my band or talk. They simply turn to guide me through the dark stone tunnel illuminated by the same blacklight.
When we reach a large black door, they step to the side to uncover an electronic panel.
I hesitantly hover the band in front of the panel.
As soon as it beeps, an automated voice says, “Welcome to the Mirror Room. Your plaything will be bound for your pleasure. Penalties will be charged for loss of product. Enjoy depravity in your every desire.”
The black metal door slides open, revealing the most disorienting room I’ve ever seen.
Every surface is covered in purpose fit mirrors.
The joints of the room are the worst as they reflect a reflection, adding an uncanny depth.
But the floor and ceiling open the space while simultaneously closing me in.
Yet the worst of the reflections is the woman bound with her arms stretched out from her body, securing her to a horizontal X.
Everything from her sternum up is held inside a mirrored box.
The small oval presses into her thin body; her legs are tied to the bottom of the X with the same type of metal cuffs wrapped around her wrists and biceps.
One leg has deep scars curving around her uneven calf to the front of her shin. There are small gaps between the structure and her leg whereas the other is kept flush. Then the door slides shut behind me, trapping us as the locks click.