Post by Kale on Nov 13, 2009 15:39:46 GMT -5
The knife bit, tip first, into the soldier’s forehead. With a careful turn of his wrist, Aldo rotated its blade – this movement curving the edge into, and underneath, hairline. A sound of wet suction accompanied the scraping of steel on bone. As his trusty blade carved upward the cranium, Armistad pulled at the greasy clump of blood-soaked hair in his opposite hand. A clean, ivory skull was exposed to air. Aldo couldn’t help but smile at seeing a slight emulsion of crimson welling up on the perimeter of carved flesh.
“Heh,” he mumbled through a tightly clinched cigar. “Guess you wasn’t quite dead yet.”
Pushing himself up from a kneel, Aldo turned away from the fresh kill. He tossed the scalp aside; it hit cement floor with as much grandeur as a used rag.
It was nighttime in Manila. The only light available in Tael Thorn’s cell came from the moon; it entered as a trio of parallel lines filtered between iron bars. It was barely enough to illuminate the captured Federation marine, whose hunched and unconscious form was strapped to a chair in the center of the cell.
“How’s it coming, Donny?” Aldo yelled into a dark corner of the room.
“Performance anxiety, boss!”
“Well just don’t you think about it, okay? We’re all friends here,” Aldo leaned down to look Tael in the face. It had been three hours since the slumbering Feddie had tried to escape. That equaled three hours of a beating so intense it had sealed both of his eyes shut with welts. “Plus, I guarantee you he ain’t watchin’.”
A moment of silence.
“Okay—Okay! I think it’s coming!”
Donny's excitement was followed by an unmistakable sound of urination, the volume of which was enough to quirk Aldo’s eyebrow. “Son, what the hell you been drinkin’?”
The only response was the continued echo of splashing pee; it reverberated around the cell with all the force of a tiny waterfall. About a half-minute passed before it quieted into intermittent dribbling, that itself took another ten seconds to stop.
“You want to do it, or should I?” Donny asked, zipping himself with one hand as he emerged from the shadows with a helmet full of urine.
“Your pee, your honors. Wake that sum’bitch up.” Aldo took a few steps back, making room.
When the helmet went on him, Tael Thorn sure as hell did wake up. Gasping into the ammonia-scented air, he gulped down more than a little bit of Cocktail de’ Gerard.
“’Morning Earther,” Aldo’s smile was wide-brimmed and self-satisfied. “Feelin’ anymore… what’s the word…? communicative now?”
For a split second it was as if Tael was going to raise his drenched head in defiance, but the strength was clearly no longer in him.
“Well shit. I think that’s what you call an un-co-op-erative prisoner, don’t you Donny?”
“Sure does, Lieutenant. Mind if I go get my second bat? Broke the regular on one of his friends."
“Capital idea, Sergeant. And while you’re out there, tell Hugo to keep watchin’ for those Schutzstaffellars'. Wouldn’t want them to come in while this guy was busy tripping over your Louisville pine. Might get jealous and try to take our fun.”
Donny left quickly, eagerly through a large steel door situated on the cell's southern wall. It creaked on its rusted hinges, having been shaken slightly out of place by the four consecutive days of bombing Manila suffered at the hands of the Federal Forces' fleet.
For his part, Aldo just kept talking...
“Cause ya see, Mr. Feddie, we got what you’d call a peckin’ order on this base. Turns out, I’m the low man on the totem poll.” He paused for a second; smiling. “So I don’t gets to kill ‘ya. And let me assure you, you is gonna be killed...
"...that just happens to be the job of a man or two higher up the rungs...
"However! What I do gets to do – as you've no doubt inferred from earlier – is, I gets to soften ya up. And since my man Donny just had a baby boy back up in space, ‘figure he’s gonna need to practice his stickball for when Donny Jr. decides to play little league.
“You follow?”
“Heh,” he mumbled through a tightly clinched cigar. “Guess you wasn’t quite dead yet.”
Pushing himself up from a kneel, Aldo turned away from the fresh kill. He tossed the scalp aside; it hit cement floor with as much grandeur as a used rag.
It was nighttime in Manila. The only light available in Tael Thorn’s cell came from the moon; it entered as a trio of parallel lines filtered between iron bars. It was barely enough to illuminate the captured Federation marine, whose hunched and unconscious form was strapped to a chair in the center of the cell.
“How’s it coming, Donny?” Aldo yelled into a dark corner of the room.
“Performance anxiety, boss!”
“Well just don’t you think about it, okay? We’re all friends here,” Aldo leaned down to look Tael in the face. It had been three hours since the slumbering Feddie had tried to escape. That equaled three hours of a beating so intense it had sealed both of his eyes shut with welts. “Plus, I guarantee you he ain’t watchin’.”
A moment of silence.
“Okay—Okay! I think it’s coming!”
Donny's excitement was followed by an unmistakable sound of urination, the volume of which was enough to quirk Aldo’s eyebrow. “Son, what the hell you been drinkin’?”
The only response was the continued echo of splashing pee; it reverberated around the cell with all the force of a tiny waterfall. About a half-minute passed before it quieted into intermittent dribbling, that itself took another ten seconds to stop.
“You want to do it, or should I?” Donny asked, zipping himself with one hand as he emerged from the shadows with a helmet full of urine.
“Your pee, your honors. Wake that sum’bitch up.” Aldo took a few steps back, making room.
When the helmet went on him, Tael Thorn sure as hell did wake up. Gasping into the ammonia-scented air, he gulped down more than a little bit of Cocktail de’ Gerard.
“’Morning Earther,” Aldo’s smile was wide-brimmed and self-satisfied. “Feelin’ anymore… what’s the word…? communicative now?”
For a split second it was as if Tael was going to raise his drenched head in defiance, but the strength was clearly no longer in him.
“Well shit. I think that’s what you call an un-co-op-erative prisoner, don’t you Donny?”
“Sure does, Lieutenant. Mind if I go get my second bat? Broke the regular on one of his friends."
“Capital idea, Sergeant. And while you’re out there, tell Hugo to keep watchin’ for those Schutzstaffellars'. Wouldn’t want them to come in while this guy was busy tripping over your Louisville pine. Might get jealous and try to take our fun.”
Donny left quickly, eagerly through a large steel door situated on the cell's southern wall. It creaked on its rusted hinges, having been shaken slightly out of place by the four consecutive days of bombing Manila suffered at the hands of the Federal Forces' fleet.
For his part, Aldo just kept talking...
“Cause ya see, Mr. Feddie, we got what you’d call a peckin’ order on this base. Turns out, I’m the low man on the totem poll.” He paused for a second; smiling. “So I don’t gets to kill ‘ya. And let me assure you, you is gonna be killed...
"...that just happens to be the job of a man or two higher up the rungs...
"However! What I do gets to do – as you've no doubt inferred from earlier – is, I gets to soften ya up. And since my man Donny just had a baby boy back up in space, ‘figure he’s gonna need to practice his stickball for when Donny Jr. decides to play little league.
“You follow?”
