Chapter 5
Soulless did not have a Soulmate because they had no soul to give.
Psychopaths. That was usually what they were.
Creatures that did not know the taste of empathy and practiced manipulation more than manners.
Narcissists were another breed. Paedophiles of course.
Machiavellianism. Essentially anyone with indifference to morality—or who spoke on their fucking phone on fucking speaker in a fucking public place—or who caused great hurt to others, was Soulless.
Nero was one. Hitler another. Stalin, oh yes, most definitely. Tyra Banks? Probable.
Without a soul and without a Soulmate to make them whole, their lack of love festered and turned them ugly with evil. It happened to them all.
If you wanted to be saved and save those from the horror of it, you had to find your Soulmate.
No one in Ricker Prison had.
A melting pot of every violent thing in humanity was pushing at the seams in this cage of concrete.
There was an obnoxious amount of Soulless being captured and squeezed to fit inside, especially in the last few months leading up to an Execution Battle.
No point in extending their residences. Most would die soon.
Besides, Magnus had said it was opportunistic to have them mashed into each other’s personal space and fighting for breath before the battle.
It made them irritated. It made them angry.
By the time they got to the date of the Execution Battle they were more than eager to take out their frustrations on each other.
The Execution Battle was in two days.
These people surrounding me in tattoo speckled skin and glaring eyes were coming to a boiling point.
“Hello.” I waved with a sincere smile. “Lovely to meet you all.”
The guards flanked me from behind as I completed my walk of shame through the mass of inmates. Criminals in their red outfits and offensive body odour scowled at me across the sea of the concrete floor and up upon each level of the prison as if they were Gods.
I should have hunched like a trodden thing, but there was nowhere to hide, and I remembered my name. My chin stayed pointed high, my shoulders arched back, and I slapped on a polite smile waving to those I passed as if they were old friends. They spat at me.
Some faces I recognised swiftly from previous Execution Battles.
People who had plucked eyes out of heads, severed limbs and bashed rocks into skulls, all while laughing like lyre birds.
All these people were well-muscled from time spent preparing for the end of their days with minds moulded into chaos.
Their skin pierced, their tattoos inked deep, their sneers unstitchable.
They looked at me with hunger, with slick grins.
Laughter cackled. Shouts started to be thrown.
Fingers pointed. A man pulled down his pants and tugged on his erection. No one had any semblance of normalcy.
This was a circus.
My lodgings were cell thirty-six and I was given bunk one that lived under five other bunks. Upon the top bunk two men were having sex and did not care to stop and greet me. There was no air to breathe. The walls spotted mould like constellations. The rest of my cell mates hung off the bars.
I turned to the guards to ask if I could change accommodation.
They left.
A woman slunk off the bars and collected with a gang of three who came to welcome me into their abode.
“Well, well. Look at this, the De Astor bitch.” She circled me like a shark.
She looked like someone who would mistake ‘there,’ ‘their,’ and ‘they’re.’ “Lovely to meet you. Thank you for my nickname. What may I call you?”
“We’ve been looking at this face for a long time.” She wagged a chewed nail at my nose. “I think I might carve it off and wear it myself.”
“Oh, no thank you. Excuse me.” I walked past them and was not able to get far in the walkway when threat number two came next, in the form of a man.
He took up the space of the cell door, not allowing me to exit. “Where are you going bitch? You and I need to have a little talk about your insides coming out.”
“I do apologise but I have only just moved in and am unable receive visitors. Please come back at five.” I slipped past him.
The walkways were narrow, and the metal flooring screamed through each of my footsteps, pipes overhead dribbled brown droplets.
The place smelled like sickness. Inmates diseased against the walls and hung off bars and sat on balustrades.
They snickered as I wove past, they called me every name but my own and I narrowly dodged a tattooed hand that came for my left ass cheek.
I made my way down to the front common room where guards sat behind thick safety glass watching pornography on their computer screen.
Before I could knock and gain their attention a hand snatched my shoulder and spun me around.
A man three times my size crossed his meaty arms that bore etchings of naked women and peered down at me with eyes like a hawk.
Vil.
I knew well of Vil. A man shaped into a mountain who could crush a person’s face like a grape with only his hands. I had witnessed him do so a few times on television during the Execution Battle and to my personal guard on the street.
Quite a few of these Soulless had attempted to put Uandra’s politicians into an early grave with their Soulless desires.
Vil had snuck up on me a few years previous when I was doing a charity event.
He had lunged to snatch me and pop my skull—as was his signature move—however, my guard had done his job and saved me, putting himself in the way.
When Bernie laid on the pavement, head in a more flattened shape, my other guards and police had apprehended Vil and placed him here.
“How are you?” I held out my hand to shake. “Lovely to see you again, how are you keeping?”
His eyes narrowed and stayed trained on me. “De Astor.”
“That is my name.” I kept my hand out mid-air.
“Your brother killed my brother.”
“My brother is not Soulless, he does not murder people.”
“He put Benny in this hell.”
“Your brother was Soulless who sold illegal drugs and caused great pain to others who suffered addiction.” He was still yet to shake my hand, so I tucked it back into my pocket. “Him dying in his first Execution Battle was proper punishment.”
Vil leaned forward, letting me know he did not brush his teeth, peeling his upper lip and exposing a canine. “When we get into the Battle, I’m not going to kill you fast. I’m going to take it nice and slow so your brother can watch.”
“Okay.” I knew I should be frightened and so I searched for the feeling, however I was unable to summon it. I looked at him blankly, waiting for more.
“And when you are screaming for me to end your suffering, I’m going to stick my dick in every hole in your body—”
“Including my nostrils?” I asked. “You must have a very tiny penis.”
Pure rage flared in his eyes. “You —”
“I’ve stopped listening.” I knocked on the glass guard window.
Reluctantly the guards ceased their pornography and let me know through a disgruntled sigh what they thought of it and faced me.
“I would like to have a private cell,” I said.
“The only people who get private cells are the violent one’s downstairs,” a guard said.
“I would like to have a private cell downstairs.”
“No.”
“Please.” I stabbed my fingers into the glass, showing him my desperation. “These people are going to eat me alive. Literally. There are cannibals in here and I am aware the food is lacking thanks to my brother convincing the state Soulless do not need adequate nutrition.”
“They can’t hurt you.” He showed me his baton. “No one is allowed to cause harm until the Execution Battle. You got two days before you turn into lasagna.”
“You know as well as I do that rule only applies to killing. The inmates are not allowed to kill each other, but they can very well take gratifications in other ways.” In the corner a man knelt between a woman’s legs pleasuring her. “Please. I need my own cell.”
He threatened me by holding up his baton. “Get back.”
I turned without defeat, quickly finding the solution to my issue.
A skinny man with mouth herpes. “Tonight bitch, you’re going to take my cock—”
“Oh, fantastic!” I beamed at him.
He blinked out of his taunt.
“You’re planning on raping me?” I asked to clear up the confusion. “Yes? That is what you are suggesting?”
“Yeah—”
“I’m staying in cell thirty-six, bunk one. I tend to sleep at about nine o’clock.” I patted his shoulder before I left. “See you then!”
A timely man. He arrived at 9:15. I reached out and grabbed his ankle from where I laid under the mattress and drew him forward. He crashed into the floor. He groaned. He cried as I beat him with the prosthetic leg I had stolen from the man in bunk five. The guards marched in, securing me.
They told me all violence had to wait until the Execution Battle and I could not beat up other inmates.
I pointed out that I had not beat him since it was not my leg but the man in bunk five, however, did not disagree that I was violent and should be put in my own private cell downstairs since I would be a menace to others.
I beamed a smile as I was marched downstairs to my new abode—the five-star I could manage in this place—only to halt, reading a name on the file for the inmate in the next cell over.
Dig Graves.