赤裸裸的滑稽故事

“Just shut up and get it ov–” Holden growled, but his words were cut off when Roman’s fist hit his jaw.

“No one told you to talk!” He snarled.

Holden tasted the blood that pooled between his lip and his teeth.

Roman took a deep breath.

“I am here to inform you that your services are no longer needed,” Roman stated. “But also, to let you know that the kill order on Alice has been canceled.”

Holden’s brows furrowed.

“How?” he asked through bloody teeth.

Roman smiled bitterly.

“Your usefulness was entirely because of her,” he growled. “Even now, she is still of more use than you.”

Holden growled but said nothing.

“There was something a little more interesting on that video than your desperate attempts to keep Alice by your side,” Roman replied.

He adjusted the video, playing it again for Holden. This time it was neither Alice nor Holden that was the focus. It was Ashleigh.

He thought he had imagined the ethereal glow around her for a moment. But here it was caught on video. It was not something he had ever seen or even heard of before.

“Because of this, they could find an answer they have been searching for a long time. And so, Alice has earned her reprieve, at least from our master.”

Roman grinned.

“I have no intention of ever letting her go.”

“She hates you,” Holden spat.

“So?” Roman smiled. “I don’t need her to love me or even like me. Hating me still means I have a place in her thoughts.”

Holden closed her eyes, clenching his jaw. He knew he would never leave this room again. There was nothing he could do to save her from the monster that craved her.

Honestly, there never was.

‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered in his thoughts. ‘I never should have brought you into my world.’

Roman knelt down in front of him. He grabbed Holden’s chin roughly and turned so that he could speak into his ear.

“Every time you used that shit on her…. Every time you wiped her existence away as though she were nothing… I still saw her,” he whispered. “Trapped inside a tiny box in her mind, clawing at the walls to escape.”

Roman pushed Holden’s chin away roughly as he got to his feet. He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a rectangular box.

Holden looked up as Roman opened the box and pulled out a syringe. Their eyes met, and Roman smiled angrily.

“This is a pretty small box, too,” he said, taking a step forward and looking around the room.

Holden felt the panic falling over him. He stared at the syringe and then back up at Roman. He struggled as Roman got closer, but it was no use.

“Say goodbye, Holden,” Roman smiled, pointing up at the camera positioned above the chair.

Holden looked up, not having realized there was a camera in this room. As he looked up, exposing his neck, Roman plunged the needle into his throat, pushing the Bitter Night into his system.

Holden let out a heavy groan as the liquid burned into his veins. His body shook violently, and the two men held tightly to him.

“I only wish you could witness this for yourself. That you could watch as the light leaves your eyes. As the person you are is wiped away, and all that is left is a lifeless husk. Just like she had to endure all these years!” Roman snarled into Holden’s ear.

Roman backed away, watching as Holden strained against the Bitter Night, his veins bulging, grunting, and groaning as the poison spread across his system.

He hated this man.

Roman had mourned Alice every time he met the doll. Alice held value. She was unique and beautiful. She was… special.

But nothing about Holden held value beyond his association with Alice. No one would mourn the loss of him.

Because of that, this punishment felt empty.

Roman walked out of the bunker.

The two men let go of Holden. His body continued to convulse as it collapsed to the floor. They shut the door to the bunker and followed Roman.

“Sir?” the first man called out, “your orders?”

Roman stopped walking. He took a breath, and then without turning around, he answered.

“If he survives, let him sit alone in that room for a few hours.”

“And then?” the second man asked.

Roman looked back over his shoulder.

“Then, give him a lighter, and tell him to count to thirty before he lights it. When it’s done, return home.”

The first man’s eyes widened, and then he nodded. “Yes, sir,”

Roman left the lab.

The two men returned to the door.

“I don’t get it,” the second man said. “I thought he wanted him dead?”

“He does,” the first man replied.

“Then why have him play with a lighter?” the second asked.

The first took a deep breath, pushing it out slowly.

“Because,” he said. “That room is sealed off. So it has its own pure oxygen being pumped in all the time. Even more, after the lab was compromised.”

“Meaning when he flicks the lighter on….”

“Boom.”

***

The fiery liquid spread from his throat to the back of his skull until his entire head felt as though it were melting. He cried out as his individual memories were burned away.

He saw the things he had done, the schemes he had cooked up.

People he hardly remembered; some he couldn’t forget. All being consumed up by the firestorm that was spreading over his body.

He heard her laugh, the small gentle laugh of a child playing in the garden of a small home. Then, he saw the picture in his hand, her twin braids taming the naturally wild curls, the only part of her that was an inheritance from both of them.

He felt the smile on his lips just as the edges of the memory began to burn away.

Holden screamed until he didn’t understand the reason for it anymore.

He clung to something. At first, he could only feel it. But as the memories around him began to disappear, it became more apparent. It was the handle of a door.

He stared down at the knob and swallowed, knowing where this would lead. Finally, he turned the knob and opened the door.

On the other side was a bedroom. Sunlight streamed in from the early morning light.

Laying on the bed was a caramel-skinned goddess, her tight curls stretched down to cover her naked breasts as the gentle tilt of her lips and her soft exhale whispered of a peaceful dream.

He stepped into the room; a tear rolled down his cheek.

Though he wanted to keep his eyes on her, to cherish every tiny moment left, he couldn’t help a glance at the nightstand, there sat the same book she always read from. Every night before falling into each other’s arms, she insisted on reading a few nonsensical paragraphs from her favorite book.

Alice in Wonderland.

Before his eyes, the book and the nightstand burned away into the nothingness. He turned as fast as he could to look at her once more before it all faded away.

But he wasn’t fast enough. His eyes fell on the sheets, only catching a few of those long curls before it was all gone.

He was left with a feeling of loss, of emptiness.

He didn’t even know his name.

All he had was a longing in his heart for what seemed an eternity. Until the man handed him a lighter and gave him a task.

“Twenty-two, twenty-three…”

As he neared the end of his task, he wondered if he would ever recover what he lost, if he would ever feel whole again.

And then he flicked the lighter.