Chapter Five #2
He grumbles something about not being an idiot, then jumps up from the chair, pliers in hand.
Still muttering under his breath, he walks towards the guy strapped to the metal chair, his feet crunching over the plastic sheeting as he goes.
I watch with amusement as he grabs the guy’s hand and inspects it.
“What the fuck are you doing? Chop one off!”
“But he’s passed out,” he complains, looking at me like I'm the one who has lost my mind.
“So? He’ll wake up when he loses a finger.”
“Can we turn it into a game?”
I look at him confused. “You want to turn killing a man into a game?”
He nods excitedly like a damn child. “We’re stuck here until he talks, right? So why not take a shot every time he squeals?”
“So we get drunk and sloppy while killing a man?” I confirm.
“You know what your problem is, Branson? Everything is so damn serious. I don’t know why Amelie wants to be friends with you. What do you even bring to the friendship table?” He pulls out a bottle of tequila from a backpack I didn’t even see him bring inside and places it on a small table.
I have to consider what he’s asked. I’ve never thought about it. Do friends have to bring something to this metaphorical table? Eventually I decide to answer him.
“I bring me. That's enough.”
“Is it, though? Have you met you?”
I came here to kill this man, to send a message, but by the end of the night there may well be two dead bodies.
“If I play this game will you shut the fuck up and start cutting off fingers?”
He nods with a huge grin on his face. It’s clear by now this guy isn’t going to talk. Killing him will pose some problems, but I didn't ask to be a babysitter for the incompetent Knox. And Amelie should praise me for at least not killing him…if I manage not to. The night is still young after all.
“Can we not use rusty pliers? Infection is real.”
I gape at him. Is he fucking serious right now?
He loses it and laughs.
I guess not. The dick is just riling me up.
Kalen lines up the pliers and makes a joke about his fuck you finger that’s not even slightly funny, and with a bone crunching snap the guy wakes up with a blood curdling scream.
“Take a shot, Branson,” he states walking over to the small table, grabbing the bottle and holding it out for me. I cross the room and take hold of the bottle, pulling it to my lips and taking a small swig. Kalen claps like this is the best day of his life. I shake my head and get back to work.
As time passes we both find ways to make him scream with minimal damage.
As the liquor flows through my veins I let go of all the tension of sharing a kill with Kalen.
If I do this – make friends with Kalen – Amelie might consider letting me walk away from The Order.
Can I pull the friendship card for that?
I doubt it. She’s a woman, that shit probably only works for them.
“Let’s make this more interesting,” Kalen slurs.
“What? How?” I ask, still choosing my next weapon.
“How about…whoever gets the kill, wins. And the other has to get a piercing of the winner’s choice?”
I smirk to myself, can’t let him think I give a shit about his game, but I do love a challenge.
“Fine,” I huff because I know I have this one. Killing people is what I do. I know over two-hundred different ways to kill a man. I haven’t been sheltered like him. And it turns out, it's my turn next.
I turn to finish him off and notice he’s gone.
“What did you do?”
Kalen just smiles and shrugs.
“Let the hunt begin.”
The moron let him go, but he can’t have gone far. Kalen grabs a screwdriver and laughs to himself before running outside, and I follow because what choice do I have now?
“Here, fishy fishy,” Kalen calls out with an almighty chuckle.
It's pitch black, and this guy will likely bleed out before we find him. Kalen skips along, singing to himself. I divert from the path and look for signs of a half dead corpse. Surely any sane person would hide? He must know he won’t get far.
After what feels like forever Kalen does some kind of wolf call. Fuck knows what it’s supposed to mean, but I follow the sound.
As I come to a clearing in the trees, I see a very drunk Kalen attempting to hold up a dead body. With a damn smile on his face. He looks at me like he wants me to take a damn photo for him to hang on his wall to commemorate his kill.
“I win.”
“This was a stupid idea.” I sigh. The clean up crew is going to lose their mind. We may as well burn this whole place to the ground. I make the call, snap the burner phone and place it in the dead man's pocket to be disposed of along with his body.
“You know… I watched a few videos on body piercing so you should be okay…”
Kalen has since dropped the body and joined me.
“I will kill you slowly and painfully if you screw this up.”
“Not unless you want to join me. Amelie won't like that.”
I see an idea hit him and it can't be good.
“The cafeteria, let’s go.”
“Hold up, killer. We need to get my shit first.” He nods and we both head back in the direction of the small shack.
Once we finish packing up my tools, I leave everything else behind for my clean up guys. They know the drill. I just hope they don't need to burn half the damn trees down to clean this shit up thanks to Kalen and his stupid games.
Kalen leads us back to the school grounds.
I ditch the tool bag just beyond the tree line so I can go back for it later.
Kalen skips across the large grassed area leading up to the back of the Knox Academy building, with me a few steps behind him so the urge to kill him will pass.
I can’t believe I’m actually going to let him do this.
I follow him around to the staff entrance and watch as he pulls out a key. Of course he has a master key to the school. I stand back as he wobbles and misses the keyhole numerous times. After many failed attempts, I push him aside and snatch the key.
It clicks open. Kalen barges his way past me and scrambles around, finding the lights. I shake my head knowing this is going to end badly. Still standing in the doorway, I feel the wall beside me, find the switch easily, and the lights flicker on.
“It’s magic!” Kalen announces, giggling like a schoolgirl.
He takes some time to find whatever he’s looking for but eventually places everything on the bench I’ve taken a seat at.
“Shit,” he mumbles, pulling out his phone. “I need to get Amelie to bring me some earrings.”
“No! She’ll murder us both in cold blood. Call that friend of hers and we can scare her into silence.”
A grin spreads across my face. Scaring her might get her to back off trying to steal my best friend card. I didn’t want it, but now it’s mine I’m not letting the fire bug take it.
He dials and asks her to bring what he needs.
“Alright, Branson, off with the clothes.”
“If you wanted to see me naked you could have at least bought me dinner first.”
“Did you just make a joke? Has hell frozen over?” Of course he makes a huge deal about it, so much so I immediately regret making the damn joke in the first place.
“Don’t be a dick,” I mutter, unbuttoning my shirt. We need to burn our clothes anyway. We should have done it already.
“I have a huge dick.”
“So do I, but that’s beside the point.”
“Show me,” he asks with all seriousness.
“No.” I shake my head like he’s insane – and I’m really starting to think he might be – and then continue, “We both need to bag our clothes, so find a garbage bag.”
Kalen pulls out a bag from a drawer next to him and starts to strip. When he gets down to his underwear he goes to pull them down but I stop him.
“You can keep those on.” He pouts for a second and does as I ask.
Once I finish throwing all my clothes in, I tie off the bag and leave it next to the door so I can take it out when we leave.
Elsie chooses that exact moment to walk through the staff door. Fucking great. She looks us both up and down, blinking a few times in confusion.
“I don’t even want to know,” she moans, handing Kalen a couple of earrings and shaking her head. She turns to leave and I grab her arm. “No one is to know about this, not even Amelie. We were never here.”
She boldly snatches her arm from my grip. Clearly, I’ve lost my authority around these people. I need to fix that or people will think I’ve gone soft.
“I wouldn’t even know where to start explaining this weirdness,” she muses, shaking her head again.
Kalen is awfully quiet.
I turn back to him and he holds up a silver sleeper.
“Up on the bench, big dick.”
“You’re just taking my word for it then?”
“Nope,” he exclaims, popping the damn ‘p’ obnoxiously. “I can see it through your boxers, and I’m impressed.”
“You’re fucking weird,” I say, jumping up onto the bench. Kalen pulls out a lighter and sterilises a thick ass sewing needle. Once he deems it sterile, he places it down on the bench, which renders his sterilisation void. I swear he’s a fucking idiot.
Next, he picks up a large piece of ice and holds it to my nipple. I hiss out at the contact and he just pushes it harder. My poor nipple will probably fall off due to frostbite. I slap his hand away and he laughs, retrieving his needle and a plastic set of tweezers.
He pulls on my nipple and lines up the needle. “On three…one…two—”
And he shoves the needle through.
“Motherfucker! Where was three?”
He laughs like a hyena on crack.
“I need more damn alcohol,” I complain.
A small amount of blood drips from around the needle that’s stuffed through my nipple. I hold my hand out for the earring. No way am I letting him near my blood.
He hands it over, and I grit my teeth as I push the silver ring through as I pull the needle out.
I jump down from the metal bench, and Kalen takes a minute to admire his handiwork. I shake my head at him.
He leaves our mess where it is and we both head for the door, grabbing the garbage bag on our way out.
“I’ll let you know when I get more information.”
He nods and yawns. “Sounds good, I think I’ll go and give Amelie a wakeup call.”
“Unless you want to be the cheese in a meat sandwich, I think you’re shit out of luck.”
“How do you know she’s with the twins?”
“I know everything.”
He looks confused. “Fucking magic,” he claims again and walks off mumbling to himself.
I make my way back to collect my tools and check that the clean up crew have done their jobs correctly the first time. Just to be sure I don’t need to add to the body count.