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Charlie snored, sprawled out over the bed like a starfish. The crappy frame was permanently buckled in the middle, giving Charlie an arch in his back he didn’t seem to notice.
Victim rubbed the cheap padlock against the chain in a rocking motion, the rhythmic scratching barely audible over the hum of the fridge and Charlie’s snoring. A small pile of shavings sat between Victim’s legs, and another wispy piece drifted down from its neck. Blood had dried around its nose and mouth in a dense mask. Scratches had set into its hips and thighs, pink and bumpy. Its hole still seemed to ache, red and white smears clinging down the inside of its thighs, and sitting up like this was thudding a dull cramp into its back.
Victim tugged hard on the padlock. The chain tightened around Victim’s neck, and the thin shackle snapped.
The fridge hummed. Charlie snored.
Victim unhooked the padlock and pulled off the chain. The thick rings rattled as Victim set them on the floor. Victim stood up, pins and needles dancing up and down its legs. It stepped, one slow foot at a time, watching Charlie close as it crept across the floor.
Glass rattled. Charlie’s empty beer bottles rolled over the floor, tinkling like a fire alarm.
Charlie grunted. He shifted, and the bed popped underneath him. Charlie yelped and sat bolt upright. His head whipped about, hands flapping above the mattress like he was expecting to fall right through it. He took a deep breath and relaxed as the bed held fast underneath him.
Victim stood frozen as Charlie cast a casual glance around his surroundings. The gaze stopped on Victim, and Charlie blinked a few times.
The last of the bottles finished rolling and clunked into the leg of the bed. Charlie threw the blanket off and dove for Victim. Victim scrabbled for the door.
Victim seized the deadbolt. Charlie tackled it, sending it sprawling onto the concrete, and he landed straight on top.
Victim curled its hands into claws and smacked out at Charlie. Its nails swiped into its cheeks and jaw as he straddled it. He grabbed its wrists and tried to pin it down. Victim brought its legs up hard and its knees knocked into Charlie’s shoulders. He fell forwards, more surprised by the move than hurt. Victim rolled, throwing Charlie onto his back and scrabbling upright again.
Charlie followed, grabbing at any limb within reach. Victim backed away, Charlie half-crawling after it until Charlie was blocking the doorway. Victim bolted into the warehouse, kicking the bottles out of the way. Charlie followed, and doubled back as Victim rounded the sofa. The pair danced, mirroring each other. The door stood still behind Charlie like it was watching them in amusement.
Charlie threw himself over the sofa. Victim backed away and fell onto the coffee table. Something clattered under the table as Charlie clambered over Victim, chuckling.
Victim slid off the table and crawled backwards, back towards the wall. Charlie climbed off the table and crept after it, grinning, knees loose and paws raised ready to tackle Victim.
Glass rattled under Victim’s hand. Victim closed its fingers around the bottle and launched it at Charlie’s head.
Charlie yelped and threw himself backwards. He lost his balance, and fell on his backside. His skull thudded dull on the coffee table and he swore.
Victim scrabbled up again and bolted, circling the sofas wide into the open kitchen. Charlie pawed under the coffee table and dragged the loosened hand gun to him, duct tape clinging to the barrel.
The gunshot echoed. A tile split and fell straight off the metal wall, loop of superglue holding up a veil of dust. Victim yelped and dropped to the concrete. Charlie rose, pulling the trigger at random.
The glass of the oven door crumpled into splinters and rained down over Victim’s back. Victim wrapped its arms over its head, squeezed its eyes closed, and prayed.
The gun clicked in Charlie’s hand. Three tiles had burst into dust, two bullets were rattling in the oven, and the sixth was lodged deep into the stovetop. The soft hiss of gas was almost silent under the hum of the fridge and Victim’s whimpering.
Charlie dropped the gun and headed for the kitchen. He padded, glass splinters clinging into his socks and nipping his soles. Victim rose, pushing away from Charlie. The smell of rotten eggs surrounded it like a duvet.
The glass poured off Victim’s back as it leant on the gaped door. It reached up and fumbled its hand along the knobs, pressing and squeezing and twisting. It panted, tile dust and old blood clinging down the side of its face. Fresh blood swelled from thin lacerations along its shoulders and back.
Charlie took a deep breath and froze. Victim choked at him and scrabbled further back on the stove. It had to push its hips up off the floor to reach.
The stovetop clicked. Charlie dove away, glass skittering. He jumped, and barely cleared the sofa as the spark finally took.
The flame ballooned above the stove, orange swelling over the front of the oven. The gas in the oven took, and Victim howled as the heat folded around it.
Charlie peaked over the sofa. The flames spewed out like a waterfall, reds and oranges and blues vomiting over the stovetop, onto Victim, and curling onto the concrete like tumbled waves being dragged back out to sea. Victim’s screams mixed with the roar until it was just an orange noise of heat and pain.
Charlie ran around the sofa to the kitchen. He pulled on the fridge until it shuffled forwards and fell on its face. Charlie grabbed the gas shut off and shoved it closed.
Ten long seconds passed. The fire spluttered, choked and died. Thin flames clung to the surrounding cupboards and Victim’s skin. The orange noise died with it to just the hum of the fridge, louder and airier with its underside exposed.
Charlie stepped over the fridge. He pulled his hoodie off and smacked it at the cupboards, smothering the flames. He smacked down at Victim’s shoulder.
Victim’s skin still seemed to be bubbling. Thick black blisters clung to its face and chest, swollen and angry and ready to erupt. Charlie smacked down its body, extinguishing little tongues of flames. The smell of gas, smoke and charred bacon tickled his nose. Down Victim’s legs, the blisters thinned and paled to vibrant reds. Charlie patted a flame into extinction. Victim’s leg twitched.
Charlie flinched away. Victim’s eyes opened, blistered eyelids tearing open and crying hot pus over its cheeks. Victim didn’t even appear to notice. It just stared at Charlie, whites shining like pearls in the magma of its face. Its chest rose and fell and its panting breaths whistled.
Charlie pulled the phone from his pocket and dialled.
“One… Two… Three… Up! Ah!”
Johnny and Dylan groaned in tandem as they shoved the fridge back up onto its legs. The handle had snapped clean off and cracks webbed into the surface of door.
Danny sat opposite Victim and fiddled with the padlock, fingering the little gap in the shackle. Victim stared at him, face swollen and cracked beyond recognisable expression. Several of the blisters had split, either under Victim’s attempts to move or under curious fingers, and pus and blood dribbled over the crisp skin. Jorel was still poking at it, watching it close as it didn’t react.
Matty opened and closed the fridge door a few times and ran his fingers along the crack. “Well the good news is; the fridge isn’t totally broken.”
“Thank fucking God!” Charlie cheered. He was sat on the coffee table, socks peeled off and most of the glass splinter peeled out of his soles, “The fucking fridge ain’t fucking broken, because fucking that is the biggest fucking priority right fucking now! Fuck!”
Johnny sat next to Charlie and passed him a bottle of rubbing alcohol. “Don’t drink it.”
Jorel leant over Victim. He pressed a cigarette into its shoulder and took a deep breath on the filter end. He took a few attempts, but as he sat back the end of the cigarette glowed and he sighed thin smoke.
Danny ran the padlock down Victim’s thigh. Victim watched it scrape over its skin, shovelling blood, pus and skin as it went, until the lock reached Victim’s knee. There, as the skin rawed out, the tender pain of the blunt metal stabbed down into Victim’s bone.
Victim barked a cry and tried to pull away. Its foot twitched a few inches, its shins and the backs of its thighs unburnt, cramps clinging behind its knees as it tried to form some response from the rest of its legs. It could wiggle its toes, curl its feet, circle its ankles, but nothing higher. Its thighs looked like they were crackling with effort.
“We’ve got nothing above the knees,” Danny said, “Nothing at all. Burned right down to the nerves.”
“How much longer we got with ‘em?” Dylan asked.
“A couple of hours, if that.”
Jorel whistled low.
“And no feeling at all?” Dylan asked.
“Not above here,” Danny waved a hand over Victim’s shins, “Movement’s limited too.”
Matty shut the fridge again, and put the handle on the kitchen counter. “So what now; wait or end? I vote end.”
“Dude, what?” Dylan said.
“We have votes now?” Johnny said.
“I vote wait,” Danny said.
“I vote wait,” Jorel said, and flicked ash at Victim’s ear. The cartilage was so swollen and angry it looked like it was trying to melt back into Victim’s skull. Jorel ran his finger along the shell, and pus and blood clung to his tip.
“What the fuck guys,” Dylan said, “I vote end.”
“I vote end,” Johnny said.
“You don’t get a vote,” Matty said, “Don’t fucking sass me.”
“Fuck off, yes he does,” Charlie said, “And I vote end.”
Dylan groaned. “We’re even.”
“Any word from you?” Danny patted Victim’s foot.
Victim stared at him and hissed a breath. Danny rocked its foot about in an nodding motion, then side to side in a shaking motion. Victim’s stared and breathed, and its foot went limp as Danny let go.
“This is Charlie’s stupid fault,” Jorel said, “So it’s Charlie’s stupid decision.”
“It’s not my fault!” Charlie said, “They pressed the fucking… sparky-boom-boom button!”
“The sparky-boom-boom button?”
“It sparked! Then it went boom! Then it went boom again!”
“And who shot my stove up?!” Matty cried.
“We’ll get you a new stove, goddamn!” Dylan said.
“Uh, yeah,” Matty held a hand up to his head like he was talking on the phone, “Just deliver it to the creepy warehouse in the middle of nowhere, yeah, the one with the blood, guns, torture instruments, the fucking burned up corpse in it. Yeah that’s Dylan Alvarez, thank you so much.”
“You think I’m that fucking stupid?”
“Do you have any idea how long it took me to find a decent stove with no paper trail? All the fucking pre-planning to move it, all the self-teaching to set it up? No help? No trail? No nothing? How much work it took to keep the box of fucking rust running?”
“We’ll figure something out!” Jorel yelled, “Settle your fucking ass!”
“He wrecked my goddamn kitchen!” Matty pointed to Charlie as he yelled back.
“He thought on his feet and he fucked it up! That’s Charlie for you!”
“Thanks,” Charlie mumbled.
“At least now we know what happens when you blow a stove up,” Danny said.
“We all know what happens when you blow a stove up! We did not need a physical interpretation!”
“Oh my god!” Jorel yelled, “We’ll figure it out, calm down, and shut the fuck up!”
Matty screamed. Victim blinked a few times.
Charlie reached between his legs and under the table, and groaned at the extreme fold to his guts. His hand wrapped around a barrel and he pulled. The tape creaked and tore away.
The double barrel shotgun stood tall in Charlie’s lap. Charlie cocked the shotgun.
“Yeah, let’s shoot the stove again!” Matty said, “Not like it can get any more broken, is it?”
“Shut the fuck up or the other one’s going in your leg,” Charlie said. He stood up, and hissed as a stray splinter bit into his heel.
Victim’s stone stare drifted from Danny to Charlie as he limped over, shotgun raised. Jorel dragged Danny out of the way, and Danny leant into Jorel, watching Victim in fascination.
Charlie stepped over Victim and lined the barrel up between Victim’s eyes. Victim stared up at him. A thick liquid was clinging to its lower lid where its eyelashes used to be, and Charlie couldn’t tell if it was pus, blood, tears or a mix of all three.
Charlie pulled the trigger. Victim’s skull exploded in a mess of black and red.
The fridge hummed A thick red mess coated the kitchen, Charlie, Matty, Danny and Jorel.
Matty wiped his eyes. “Great. Who’s gonna clean all this shit up, because I’m sure not.”
“Teamwork, dude,” Jorel said. He tossed his soaked cigarette end at Victim.
“Teamwork doesn’t mean cleaning up after this idiot!”
“Yes it does!”
“No it doesn’t!”
Jorel shoved Danny off of him. Danny was poking at the blood and brains clinging to his arms, rubbing at it like he was massaging it into his skin. Charlie collapsed onto his backside, shotgun clutched in his hands. He stared into Victim’s open skull, half-expecting something to come crawling out of it.
“You listen to me,” Jorel shoved at Matty, “The whole point of us teaming up like this was to have each other’s backs. That means cleaning up after each other.”
“One of us goes down, we all go down,” Dylan said. He was still leant on the side of the fridge, sucking a can of cider that had split in the fridge’s fall. The splatter had missed him, a slither of wall shielded by the fridge.
“That includes you,” Jorel shoved Matty again, “Like it or not.”
Matty tutted at him. “Got it, sir”
“Good. Don’t forget it. Right!” Jorel turned.
Johnny shuddered. Red clung to Jorel’s front, plastering his hair down and dripping from his eyelashes. Only his torso and hips were spared, a Danny-sized shadow huddled there.
“Johnny, run and fetch the spare clothes from the studio,” Jorel said, “From now on we’re keeping a set of clothes here that we only wear here. I’m sick of throwing clothes out. We’re gonna keep the clothes under the bed. No one goes near the prisoner in their day clothes unless they’re trying to run.”
Johnny got up.
“Charlie, go get in the shower. Matty, get the bleach – Johnny? Can you pick up some more bleach too?”
“Sure, man,” Johnny said.
Charlie clambered up, still clutching the shotgun like it was welded into his white fists. Danny rose after him, pried the gun from his hands, and lead him over to the open bathroom. Johnny pulled his cap back on and left.
Danny shoved Charlie under the shower fully dressed. Dylan waited a few seconds for Matty to move, then stepped past Matty and Jorel to grab the bleach as the pair glared each other down.
Jorel stepped back into the kitchen and stooped to grab Victim’s legs. Matty pulled the refuse bags from the kitchen drawer, unrolled them and laid one down by Victim.
“You need to stop picking on Johnny,” Jorel murmured, “You know none of us could stop him if he turns on you”
“You need to stop bossing us around,” Matty murmured back, “You know we outnumber you.”
“You don’t outnumber me on your own. And you ain’t stupid enough to try.”
Jorel tucked Victim’s legs into the bag and Matty pulled a second one over its head. Dylan ignored them both, back turned on them and scrubbing at the bleach with a brush, loud and deliberate.
“Someone’s gotta take charge when shit happens,” Jorel murmured, “Right now, Danny and Dylan were too distracted by Hot Stuff here, Johnny was completely lethargic, Charlie was in shock, and people get cut when you’re in charge.”
“People’s skulls get bashed in when you’re in charge,” Matty murmured.
“Not our skulls. That’s what matters. We gotta have each others’ backs, but we only gotta have each other’s backs.”
Matty smoothed the refuse sack, as if that would better hide the fact there was a dead body inside. Jorel stood and wiped his mouth on his arm, smearing blood and brains over his jaw. A piece of skull clung to his cheek bone and he didn’t even notice it.
“We’ll find you a new stove, man,” Jorel said out loud, “One with a better oven. You always bitched it was uneven.”
“Yeah,” Matty said
“Blessing in disguise,” Jorel held a hand out to pull Matty up.
Matty nodded and took the hand.