When your physical self is exiled to an uncertain darkness for what seems like an eternity, your sight begins to cave into itself, forcing your gaze away from the enveloping darkness and deep into yourself.
That is what I felt for hours on end in that dark room. My own stare, falling back into itself, looking into my mind. I felt the room around me glare and wonder as I turned away, like a million glowing eyes burning holes into the back of my head, closing instantaneously as I whip about to face them. A military tactic, no doubt, breaking a maniac's mind by forcing him to contemplate upon either himself, or his enveloping shadow.
At first, it was easy. Light shone in through the bars on the iron door. Yet as time strode on by, less and less light would shine in. Another tactic. My gaze was instinctively set upon the only significant hope of escape, and as that was slowly taken away from me, my eyes began frantically searching, finding nothing in the dark, until I could no longer recall where I was looking in the first place.
I was alone, finally. Left to impatiently wait in a dark cell, given over to darkness and madness, so that the two may break my spirits for the ease of my captors. And I had all but forgotten the stinging pain in my gut from where was pulled not too long ago a steel dagger.
At one point, I simply shut my eyes, at least reassuring myself with the fact that I was looking at my eyelids, and nothing more. Yet it did not help with the fact that I could see the colors and faces swirling around in my head, my mind frantically searching for something to focus on in the dark, something to see, and something to process. But it couldn't. And so my mind stumbled backwards, falling into itself over and over again overburdened by darkness and forced to flee to respite. Yet what it found was something else.
It found the moving image of a young boy. The boy was dressed in dull rags, his knees and elbows scraped, his skin covered in streaks of caked mud and dirt. He gazed through me, standing perfectly still, vacantly staring off into the world as it moved about him. His feet, blackened and weary, were partially submerged within a puddle of murky black water on the paved street. Houses stood tall and establishments rose along the paved walkways and men in black coats with black hats walked alongside women in grey and blue dresses, their pale faces aflush in conversation, or bleak in contemplation. Officers rode their horses through the streets, rushing past the crowds, shoving women, men and children aside in a hurry. Behind them, a creaking siren announced the passage of a motorized cart, and every man, woman and child hurried to move off the streets, pushing past each other to make way for the machine. Everyone, except the boy. My view was fixed, frozen. I could neither move nor call out, yet I saw what was coming, long before it came. Inlayed in the uneven road were steel tracks, and moving on those tracks was an iron cart, unmanned and slow. I tried to call, but no words would come. Out of the corner of my eyes, people stood frozen, unable, no, unwilling to help. The boy looked on.
He turned, but it was too late. The siren blared into the crowd, deafeningly and threateningly, as it rolled over the boy, mowing him down. Gasps and mumbling overcame the crowd as they looked on, yet no one dared move towards the cart, or speak out in protest. The iron cage moved on, painting the tracks behind itself while leaving the puddle in which the boy stood a deep dark red. A ringing noise filled my ears, drowning out the crowd as it moved back onto the street to continue on its way. My gaze was forced upwards, towards the sky, were a solitary seagull soared and plunged its way through the salty, heavy wind. Then, as if from far away, a mother’s scream of terror ended the memory, leaving me with no image, and no sound.
I opened my eyes, but nothing changed. I was still in darkness, still in silence. I listened and listened. Outside, no footsteps were to be heard, and no voices could be made out. I listened harder, until I heard my heart beating in my chest. The beating grew louder, and louder, as I grew weary, and tiresome.
This time, I was moving through a crowded street. The paved road was illuminated by the yellow light of nearby street lanterns. I kept my head low and my hands in my coat, rushing through the street at a stern pace, wearing a purposeful, yet stunted gait. About me, the crowd moved either in solace or in drunken company; men stumbling and looming tipsily over giggling women, zigzagging their way across the road, narrowly avoiding collision with other passersby. There were no steel tracks in the paved stone.
I was nervous, agitated, drowning out the noises of the midnight street, hearing only my own uneven and ragged breath. Deluded with fear of something unseen, I looked back, then forward again, tearing my gaze both ways several times before tearing myself to the right, diligently walking along the sidewalk. My breath grew more ragged and my step more urgent, and as I turned, I saw a new face in the group behind me. It was covered mostly in darkness, temporarily illuminated every few steps by the yellow light of the street lanterns. The glimpses I got were short and far between, but with each glimpse, my pursuer's face became larger and larger as he began catching up. I could feel my heart beat faster as my legs moved quicker, and with each step, my breath became more and more exalted, to the point where I began gasping hurriedly for air as I jolted between approaching crowds, taking sharp turns to avoid whoever was stalking me.
But the further I ran, the less crowded the streets became, lanterns becoming less and less frequent, their light shining less and less bright. Eventually the road I followed led to an alley with a set of stairs and a cobblestone archway, and as I turned to inspect the road behind me, I saw the man who had been following me, his face illuminated by the last of the street lights. He was tall, with a hunched back and a furious grimace. His nose was large, and broken several times over, and accompanying it was a ragged and poorly shaven face, his angry eyes completing a look of rage. He moved towards me as I moved down the stairs. Then, instead of running, I turned and hid in the total darkness. I heard the man as he hurriedly stomped down the steps, each step echoing across the alley. My chest rose and fell as I took in deep breaths. But they weren't gasps of exhaustion. They weren't gulps of fear. They were breaths of excitement.
As the man took his last step into the dark, I felt myself pivot up to meet him, my entire body fueled by some wicked sort of passion. I tore a knife from my inner coat, and plunged it deep into his belly, glaring as his eyes widened and narrowed with each satisfying jab. Warm blood pooled onto the floor and soaked through my gloves, and the man's ragged breaths turned to half-hearted gasps for life. I took a step back and watched as he fell on his knees, staring into the pitch black night, his eyes reflecting what little light and life the alley possessed. I moved towards him again, holding his head back by a tuft of his hair, and slit his throat. Blood erupted from his mouth, then poured from the wide gash in his neck, drenching his clothes in a deep dark scarlet barely visible in the shadows. My heart was now nearly beating out of my chest, and my eyes were fixated upon the blood as my mouth went dry with shock and admiration. With his last bit of strength, the man pointed to something inside his coat, and collapsed upon the paved floor. I knelt in his blood, taking no more time to reflect or contemplate, and simply did as I was instructed. I took the piece of parchment as instructed and unfurled it, reading the mechanical typography. My former self let the words pass through his lips as he read, and I simply looked on nostalgically, remembering that night.
"You Have Been Promoted.
Meet me by the east bridge in the Fishery District, three strikes past noon. Do not be late."
I opened my eyes again, my heart still beating as calmly as it had moments before. I blinked, and tasted the foul taste of sleep in my mouth, grimacing as I twisted my neck to stretch. Turning my head up towards the concealed ceiling reminded me, however, and I slowly shrugged back into a relaxed poise, sighing. For a few moments, I contemplated calling out, but decided not to. Instead, I recalled the man's face again. He was my first kill, murdered on anonymous orders. I remember the blood, the knife, the satisfying gurgling and the sound as his body sacked towards the floor lifelessly, after going rigid and frozen. I remember his eyes; the shock within them, and the look he had when that shock was replaced by vacancy.
Closing my eyes, I took a deep breath through the nose, returning to that alley years later. It was early in the morning, and the air was still cold from the night before. The sky, as always, was a dull grey, and was heavy with the moist threat of rain. Salt, oil, sweat and smoke accompanied the wind as it made its way from the unseen ports through the open windows and narrow alleys of the Market District. I opened my eyes and saw the alley, chiseled entirely in dark grey cobblestone, accented only barely by the moss on the walls, and the rat tails behind the gutters. On the floor, bleached and nearly washed away, was a man-sized stain of red. I kneeled, touching the paved stones, tracing through and between them. Far away, the sound of bells ringing and pigeons fluttering knocked me out of my thoughts, as I jolted up towards the stairs. As I came up onto the sidewalk, a man opened the door to the shop opposite to the alley, beckoning for me. The shop was a barber's residence and place of work, as signified by the cutthroat razors shaping some form of coat-of-arms below the owner's family name. "Branston's", is said on an engraved wooden shield, which was in turn mounted on the door. A bit archaic, perhaps, but it was a very old family business.
The man holding the door was, by any man's judgment, no less archaic, yet still of firm stature. He was dressed in a pale blue shirt with dark blue trousers, a black leather apron fastened securely to his person. His face was stern, with grey hair folded back over his gaunt head, folds upon folds of skin lining his cheeks. His nose, sharp and distinctively broken across the bridge, complemented his steel blue eyes and thin grey lips. As I walked into the shop, his eyes bore through me, examining every inch of my person. I stepped into the middle of the establishment, looking around vacantly. Then, without saying a word, I took an envelope from my coat and handed it to the man, who had by now closed and locked the door. He took the envelope, regarded it for a second, and then turned to walk behind the counter on the left of the room. To the right, mirrors lined the wall, hung above individual workspaces and barber's chairs. The ceramic tables underneath the mirrors were lined with scissors and razors, sterilized within a chemical solution. Straight ahead and all along the left side, the wall was lined with photographs of important military and political patrons and their signatures. Taking off my gloves, I walked up to them to examine them when I saw that most of the older ones were faded in the corners. One had nearly paled to half its original content. So much for their famed longevity, I remember thinking. Pictures were far more common in the dry parts of the Southern Isles, where Lords and Ladies enjoyed the privy of their own personal photographer. But here, nearer towards the cold, moist and heavy shores, pictures were a thing of wasted luxury. Silently, I gloated over the irony of killing a man so close to the very place that enjoyed the patronage of so many men of justice.
Behind me, I heard the sound of paper being torn. I turned around, approaching the man as he held out the folded piece of paper, trembling. I took the paper, feeling its unfamiliar texture, and smiled coolly. This unsettled the man, as he gulped in fear, his eyes widening. There was something wrong with his look. He seemed nervous - far too nervous, considering that this was not his first hit. For a second, I held my gaze, but was startled back to reality as someone knocked on the door. His widened eyes fleeted towards the door, and I turned towards the windows, slipping the paper into my coat as I walked up to them and peered through the wooden shutters.
I knew what happened next, but not at the time. Through the shutters, I could make out the silhouettes of four men, each uniformed and standing guard with drawn firearms. Silently swearing, I turned back towards the man, only to be forced backwards against the window as he held a razor towards me. The men behind the door shouted something indiscernible, probably identifying themselves, as the barber yelled in return, opening the door with one hand while holding the sharp steel to my throat with the other. His gaze didn't break, even as he was blindly searching for the doorknob. I cursed again, this time aloud, grimacing. Then, the door burst open, and the four men came barging in.
The next minute or so was a flurry of violence. The barber broke his gaze, closing the door, and in that moment I tore his arm away from my neck. I twisted it behind his back, tearing the razor from his hand and his shoulder out of its socket, as I leaped behind the counter, pushing him into the crowd of officers. They unloaded their pistols, but missed spectacularly, sending all four bullets into the mahogany wall. Fragments of wood and glass filled the air as I clutched my throat. The cut was not deep enough to kill, but still bled enough to pose a threat. Thinking on my feet, I began tearing open drawer after drawer, until I finally found a roll of bandages. Frantically, I began wrapping my neck in the white linen, when I heard a clicking sound amidst the old man's whimpering.
They reloaded. Cutting the bandage off and stuffing it in my collar, I grabbed a drawer filled with dull and useless razors, throwing it over the counter at them. A shot went off as the wooden drawer exploded midair, sending several razors across the room, while leaving the rest to fall harmlessly onto the tiled floor. I leapt over the counter, razor still in hand, taking the closest officer by surprise. I grabbed his wrist as he reloaded his gun, whirling around to fire at his comrades, two of which had unloaded their shots into the window behind me. Taking a split second to aim, I sent the officer's shot into the head of another, while the other two ducked for cover. Knocking my elbow into my hostage's jaw managed to knock his head into a mirror and onto the ceramic tabletop, which broke under his weight. I then tore him back onto his feet by his collar, keeping my razor on his throat. Behind the corner of the counter, one of the men unloaded another shot, this time into the mirror, grazing my ear. I yelled out in pain, slitting the officer's throat, and turning towards the old man, who was now frantically pulling on the door. I yanked him towards me by his hair and, using him as cover, moved towards the counter.
The second officer jumped up, aiming, but took too long. I vaulted towards the counter, dropping the old man and moving into the second officer, pushing aside his firing arm with one hand while opening a gash in his neck with the other. I twisted to meet the second, grabbing his wrist and breaking his elbow before he raised his firearm. He landed a punch in my face, wrestling himself from my grip, and grabbing a razor from one of the ceramic surfaces in his left hand. I looked him in the face - sweat furrowed on his brows and dripped from his sideburns, hurried breaths escaping out through his gritted teeth, and in through his flaring nostrils. His eyes, hazel in color, stared partially in rage and mostly in fear, fleeting from my calm face to the bloody blade I held in my hand. We both hunched over, ready for meeting a lunge, and he took the opportunity first. I awaited his arrival, pivoting away from the blade and outside of his swing, taking it as it lost strength and redirecting it, knocking him off his feet and pinning him onto the bloody tiles. Yells of pain and empty threats made their way through his mouth, until I shut him up by kneeling on his jaw. Muffled, but still not silent, I finished him with a cut. A spray of warm blood caught the fabric of my trousers, but otherwise, both blood and life gurgled out of him and onto the floor.
I stood up, and walked up to the shutters, tearing them off. The street was empty. I turned, and walked over to the picture wall, turning to face the door - lying unconscious by the counter was the old man, blood leaking slowly from a swollen head wound. Near him lay the dead bodies of the first two to go down - one had a hole in his head, with blood pooling around it, and the other was staring wide-eyed at the ceiling, a massive gash revealing the contents of his neck. To my right was the other man, collapsed in a heap, and by my feet was the last of them. Pistols, razors, scissors, and pieces of wood, ceramic and glass littered the floor. I walked over to the old man, glancing at a broken piece of mirror on the floor. The punch had cut my cheek. Not much of an achievement. I had cut their throats.
The old man groaned as I loomed over him. Lifting him up, he awoke, yelling halfheartedly in pain. Sitting him in one of his chairs, I turned it to face him to one of the unbroken mirrors. There, we both stared into each other, half of our faces illuminated completely by the light outside. The old man, gaping and tired, looked down, as to see through his chin. In his reflection, I held the razor to his throat.
"Now tell me," I began, my voice raspy and uneven. I stared into the mirror. My hair was stained by blood and matted with sweat, sticking to the blackened and now bloodied skin of my face. The bandage around my neck was stained as well, partially with sprays of blood, and primarily by the single cut on my neck. My left ear was a decent bit smaller than the right, and was bleeding profusely, the blood trailing down my neck and pooling into the fabric of my collar. I swallowed painfully, beginning again. "Now tell me. What was the purpose of this little exercise?" I put pressure on the handle, and the old man grimaced. He was no longer scared, nor was he in shock. He looked tired, and partially satisfied.
"You did good." he coughed, pushing my arm aside as I stared in disbelief. Standing up, he stretched his back and looked towards me. "Very good, I daresay. Four Imperial officers, with nothing but a razor." he cackled, and then coughed, stemming himself with his good arm. Then, sighing as he grabbed his shoulder, he grimaced once more and, in one swift movement, popped it back into place. A howl of pain escaped through his gritted teeth as I could do nothing but stare.
"So... this was indeed an exercise of sorts?" I said, arriving rather dumbfounded at the conclusion that my unseen employer and latest client were the same man.
"No. A test.", he replied, shuffling over towards the counter. "Now get out of here. I'll clean this mess. I'll find you when I need you." I stopped for a second, gaping, as if to ask something, but instead chose to keep quiet. He turned, staring. "What are you waiting for? Leave!" he yelled, gesturing dismissively towards the door. And so I did, hearing mumbling and shuffling steps behind me as I closed the door. Remarkably, the street was still barren.
Almost as barren as the interrogation room, I thought to myself, waking again. I sighed. How much longer? How much longer would they leave me to myself, leave me to the darkness?
I did not expect an answer. In fact, there was little hope for anything, which led me to consider expectations a luxurious privilege. Yet, between the uncertainty of rotting away in the dark or being publically executed within the next few days, there wasn't much hope for anything, anything other than the chance to talk. I stared into darkness, contemplating. Would I die, unsung? Unquestioned?
The probability was low. There were at least a dozen men in the higher ranks who would lunge at an opportunity to sit alone in a room with me. Yet as time waned on, my certainty waned with it. Thirst began to itch my throat, teasing and caressing, sometimes softly, sometimes violently, but constantly assuring me of its existence.
I was staring straight ahead when the blast of light hit me. I groaned, squinting and twisting to turn away from the door, contorting my body as best I could while being trapped in an iron chair. After a few seconds, I peeked, and saw a perfect rectangle of light shining into the darkness, bleakly illuminating a portion of the room. Then, most of the light was blocked when the silhouette of a man came into view. He strode towards me, the sound of his boots followed closely by the sound of the chair he was dragging with himself. As he approached, his silhouette became clearer and clearer, until I could finally make out the outline of his uniform. He was clutching a large envelope in his free hand, and by his belt swung the sheath of a sword and holster of a pistol. I blinked, adjusting still to the stark contrast in brightness. My eyes, moistened by the sudden pain, were complaining loudly.
"You could've warned me. I may not remember anything now that my mind has been subjected to such physical torment." I called, realizing quickly how raspy my voice sounded. The silhouette said nothing, and turned, signaling to someone further away. My head began pounding in pain, as another, much larger object began scraping the cemented floor. A large steel table was being dragged by two men from the door to the center of the room, where the man with the chair sat down in front of me. The men positioned the table between us, and bowed as the man on the chair nodded, leaving the two of us alone. And then, with a metallic shriek and thud, the door was closed and locked. The man reached down, and heaved something from the floor - an electric lamp. He positioned the lamp out of the way between us. It flickered to life, and its blue light revealed my silent friend's appearance. Weariness stood in his face, and looked as though it had stood there for a long time. Strands of grey tangled with the rest of his otherwise brown hair. His eyes were green, dulled and jaded, and his expression acted as a steel wall between his true intentions and whatever facade he had designed. His nose was broken and crooked, and his face bore a number of scars and wrinkles. His lips were slightly bluish, and the skin around them was pale. He leaned in, squinting in scrutiny, then sat back, silently observing me.
I stared him in the eyes, trying hard to discern even a shred of emotion. But he was mercilessly stern. Finally, he lifted his briefcase onto the table, letting it drop with a deft thud. Under the blue light, I could see the dyed leather, a dense midnight blue, and the signature golden accents. It opened with a satisfying click, and within were folders upon folders, filled with papers and files. He took these from the briefcase, studiously and tidily arranging them, before diving them upon three piles on the table. When he finished, he lowered his briefcase back onto the floor, while glancing back at me. I watched in curiosity, waiting patiently for any signs of conversation.
In the light, I also managed to observe his uniform, as dark and sombre a tone of blue as his briefcase. The shoulders were studded with golden pins, each no larger than an inch, and in the shape of a dagger. The left side of his chest was pinned with a brooch of solid gold - a shield with two claymores beneath it, and another one through the center to act as the pin. Numerous buttons made of gold and lapis lined the center of his coat, and his sleeves were adorned with similarly crafted cufflinks.
The man took a folder from one of the stacks, and laid it out in front of himself, examining the Imperial seal on it. He opened the folder and removed a document laden with heavy text, reading over it in perfect patience. Then, he laid it down and looked at me again, almost awaiting some kind of question.
At first, I kept quiet, staring. He stared back. "So," he finally began, his eyes shifting once more to the papers, and then again to me. His voice was clear, authoritative, and he spoke in an accent becoming of a member of the Imperial Guard. "I take it you know why you are here. Do you know who I am?" He looked up from the document, his eyes boring into mine.
"I haven't the faintest clue." I replied truthfully.
"Do you know why I am here?" He continued.
"No, but I have a feeling you're about to tell me." Truthfully, I felt, there wasn't much of a point to interrogating a man who was, on paper, dead.
"I am here on behalf of the Imperial Guard. There are things we wish to know; things we need to discuss before your execution." The words left his lips as he stared nonchalantly at the paper. As he spoke the last phrase, he looked up to inspect my reaction. I felt my eyes narrowing in suspicion.
"What else is there for you to know? I thought the law made up its mind-"
"We are not the law." Retorted the man quite abruptly, blinking as he changed his stare. "And this is not about judgment or justice. This is an interrogation for other purposes." The man sat up even more now, clutching the papers absentmindedly while focusing solely on me. He took a deep breath, not blinking even once as he stared into me. "You know things. Things we wish to know as well. You will tell us, one way or another." I began chuckling.
"I'm a dead man. I was dead hours before you came into this room. Why should I tell you anything?"
"Because you want to." I raised my eyebrows at his reply. The sentence wiped the grin off my face, and replaced it with a smile.
"You wish to know why? You wish to know who I was working with, who I am working with? Do you want to hear the history of my savagery, the reasons for my madness? Are these the things your Guard has sent you to ask for?" My voice raised itself as I leaned closer to the table, each word empowering the dramatic tension in the room. The man opposite to me remained calm, and without even the slightest shred of emotion, replied:
"Yes." I laid back again, the chains around my ankles clunking as my back hit the cold steel. He’s no fun, I thought.
"Very well." I replied. Very well, I thought. He'll hear what I have to say. Perhaps he'll understand. And if not, well, it would be much more of a loss on his part. "But first," I began again. "I pose you your first question. Who are you?" The man shifted in his seat slightly, seemingly unsure of whether to answer or deflect. Ultimately, however:
"Admiral Edward Charleston of the Imperial Navy, member of the Imperial Guard, and your interrogator, assassin." The last word was spoken in spite, and its vicious acidity burned slightly. Somehow, I felt that the term, while apt, seemed somewhat shortsighted and lacking.
"Admiral? Well, I am quite honored, aren't I?" I observed the Admiral. His look, no less stern than before, had shifted entirely from the papers, and was now fixated solely upon me. "Perhaps I should introduce myself. I am Sicarii." The Admiral raised a brow skeptically, and then sighed, clenching his teeth.
"You have no name."
"No." I replied nonchalantly. "It was taken from me some time ago. I'm sure you're familiar with the wars on the south?" A look of pain flashed across the Admiral's face for an instant. Seeing it posed little satisfaction, but at least ensured that he was, after all, human. Some of the Empire's lackeys no longer were, after all. "In any case, that's not terribly important in your interrogation, now is it?"
He clenched his teeth, his eyes conveying a mix of indifference and caution. But, as quickly as it surfaced, the emotion vanished, and he returned to attending his papers. "The Sicarius were a rebel faction in the south. Workers took up arms and fought for five days and nights. Are you admitting allegiance to that faction?" He raised his gaze up towards me while speaking the last sentence, his look still unyielding.
"No. I knew one." I paused, looking away into the surrounding darkness. For a moment, I had forgotten where I was. "But I was never in the south." I finished, turning back to the Admiral. He seemed to want to inquire further about my identity, but decidedly dropped it.
"When did you begin killing?"
"A long time ago." I looked back at the Admiral with a condescending smile. He simply stared in reply. "It's a rather long story, I recommend you get comfortable." I shifted as much as I could in my chains, waiting for some response. But none came. "I suppose I couldn't have a drink of water before I begin? While I have been complemented profusely for my capability in narrating anecdotes, I fear it suffers quite a bit when I'm dying of thirst."