Hell Bound

I remembered the scent of must and decay. The cell itself was cold and damp. Water dripped from somewhere in the dark. The only light came from somewhere far off down the narrow hall they’d dragged me down. I sat on the floor. There was nothing for me to rest on. I cradled my injured arm in my lap, pressed between my raised legs and my chest. I was freezing. Everything ached. I wanted to go home.

Something glinted off the light from the corner of my eye. The hall had been silent for a long time. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been there, shivering from the cold and the pain. I could hear nothing but the drip of a leak, the ringing in my ears, and my own occasional coughing fit that brought water out of my lungs.

“I know you’re there,” I spoke out loud. My voice cracked and echoed off the walls, and I waited for a sound to confirm my suspicion. He didn’t make one as he stepped forward. I could barely make him out except for the light glinting off the metal on his arm. “Why are you guarding me? You know I wouldn’t make it very far if I actually managed to get out.” He didn’t speak for a moment. He stood still and silent until I scooted forward on the rocky floor and wrapped my hand around a rusted cell bar.

“I’m not guarding you,” he finally said. His voice was low, deep, and flat. I rested my head on the bars, feeling the rust flake onto my skin. It was the scent that brought this memory on. Rust. Blood. Pain.

“Can you move into the light? It makes me nervous when I can’t see who I’m talking to.”

He obliged and took one step to his left. There wasn’t enough light for me to make out most of his features. Only that he was looking at me in, what I would call, confusion. His eyebrows were furrowed. He wasn’t as scary without the mask.

“What’s your name?” I asked him. He shook his head slowly.

“Why are you asking me questions?”

“It’s good to be the one to ask questions for once. Don’t you think?” He still looked confused. “Never mind. You work for them. Doesn’t look like they give you a lot of chances to ask questions.” Light glinted again as he gripped his fingers into a fist. “Why do you have metal on your arm?” He looked down at his hand and stretched out his fingers.

“It is my arm,” he said.

“Is it like a prosthetic?” He didn’t answer. He kept staring at it as if he’d never given it much thought. “How did you lose it?” He looked back at me and then took a step away.

“I don’t know,” he said. He spoke quietly. So that I wouldn’t have made it out if it wasn’t so goddamn silent.

“Were you a soldier?”

“I don’t know,” he repeated in the same whisper. I sat up straighter.

“You don’t know,” I stated. He looked between his hand and me. “Has no one ever asked you these questions before?” He shook his head slowly.

“I’m not usually asked to bring people in alive.”

“Asked or told? What happens when you don’t do what you’re told?” His spine went straight, and he dropped his arm back to his side. What I could see of his face went black as he stuffed all his emotions away.

“I know what you’re doing,” he said in the same flat tone. “You can ask me as many questions as you want. You won’t remember.”

“What are they going to do to me?” He didn’t answer. He stepped back again until his face was lost in the darkness. I dropped my head onto the bars and sighed with exhaustion. “I just wanted to know your name.”

“Why?”

“You tried to take my life. So I thought it was only fair I got your name in return.”

“They didn’t want me to kill you.” I shut my eyes and slipped my arm through the bars to lean on it. It was too cold, and everything hurt too much to sleep. “You know where to find what they’re looking for, don’t you?” he asked after a long pause.

“Yes,” I admitted.

“Then why won’t you tell them?”

“And give them the power to hurt people?”

I lifted my head to look at him again. He stepped forward, and I raised my hand. He looked like he didn’t know what to do. But then he pressed his fingers to my palm. They were cold and solid, and he slid them up my hand to the tip of my finger.

“It’s you,” he stated. His eyes were on my hand, but I tried to memorize his face. His eyes were light. I couldn’t tell what color in the dark, but light enough so that I could see them when the light from down the hall hit his face. He didn’t look so scary anymore. Or maybe I just didn’t have any more fight left in me.

“Why don’t you go and tell them?” I replied. He looked back at my face, and his eyes creased again.

“They’ll torture it out of you.” He moved his hand back. I dropped mine and left it hanging through the bars.

“I expect they will.”

“I don’t want to torture you.”

“Why not?” He stepped back again. His feet were silent on the stone floor.

“The water,” he said. “I know what it feels like.” I wrapped my hand around the bar as something occurred to me.

“They didn’t send you here to guard me,” I realized. “You came here on your own.”

“Observation,” he said, slipping back into the shadows.

“Why?”

“You saw me.”

“You were wearing a mask.”

“That’s not what I meant.” I could see him turn, and I knew he was planning on walking away. I sat up to watch him go, but he disappeared in the dark.

“What’s your name?” I repeated before he could get too far.

“I don’t know,” he admitted.