The dark side of red, p.10
The Dark Side Of Red, page 10
Every fucking thing, that’s what.
“You’ll see soon enough. You’ll see everything. The Dark Red is evil. Rotten, corrupt, delicious evil.”
Dave’s blubbering grew louder, and Joan turned to look at him.
“Take the knife, Joan. Kill him.”
He strode over to her, knife in hand, extended out towards her.
“No,” Dave cried, lurching for the door.
He seemed to think better of it and stopped in his tracks for a second, crying and staring at the door. Then he seemed to think better of it and lunged for the door once more.
Why? was all she could think. They’ll only bring him back in again.
Sure enough, the same two men from last time, half-escorted, half-carried him back into the room.
Tristian threw back his head and laughed. “Hold him steady, Joan’s going to kill him.”
He was right next to her now, and her skin crawled at his nearness, the flesh at the base of her neck tightening in repulsion. When he grabbed her hand and pressed the knife into it, her entire body stiffened in terror.
“Do it. Do it now.”
His voice was velvet smooth, seductive and cajoling. She closed her eyes, the feel of the knife abhorrent in her palm.
“I can’t.”
“You can.”
She opened her eyes and looked down at the knife, then at Dave, wriggling between the two men. He was so close, just arm’s length away. All she had to do was reach out and slice….
No. She couldn’t. She just couldn’t.
Dave was crying in earnest now. “Don’t do it, Joan, I’m sorry for what I did, I’m so sorry…”
A wave of hatred for him so strong washed over her. He was just so disgusting standing there, so pathetic.
Better him than me.
Horrified at the turn of her thoughts, the knife clattered to the floor.
“No. I can’t.”
When she glanced over at Tristian, all traces of joviality had disappeared. “Pick up that knife and kill him. Or I’ll make you wish you’d never been born.”
“Thank you, Joan, I’m so sorry, I just love you so much…”
His words trailed away into sobs and she regarded him dispassionately, the tears momentarily dried.
“I’m not doing this for you, you foul piece of shit. I’m doing this for me. I’m not a killer.”
“No. But I am.”
Dave didn’t have time to protest. Tristian scooped up the knife and plunged it into Dave’s throat. Blood pooled instantly in the gaping wound, flowing over his bare chest in a glistening sheet.
Joan staggered backwards, subconsciously clutching her throat, her eyes locked on his. The rattling, gurgling sound he made as he tried to scream twisted her stomach into a tight ball of acidic terror. As wide as his eyes were, they were beginning to get glassy.
Tristian closed the gap between him and the dying man, and, like he had done with the girl, he pressed his lips to Dave’s. Dave quit struggling. A horrible, keening noise reached her ears, and she realised that the sound was coming from her.
When Tristian righted himself, Dave was dead, his body hanging limply between the two men.
“Take him away, and tell the clean-up team to come in here and deal with the other body, too.”
The men left as silently as they had arrived, the dead man’s ankles dragged behind him on the concrete, bent at an awkward angle.
“Don’t look so put out, he got off lightly. Believe me, things could have got a whole lot worse for him. Come, I wish to show you around. You have so much to write about.”
She had been so strong, up until that moment. Tears blurred her vision, and when she looked at the dead girl on the ground, she saw two of her.
“It’s time, Joan.”
And so she followed him out of the room, into the deepest bowels of The Dark Red.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Behind every one of these doors there is a unique delight, and I promise, eventually you will get to see and experience them all. We cater to every fantasy here, no detail or expense is spared. I know you will come to love it here as much as I do.”
Tristian strode briskly down a corridor, with Joan trailing behind him. She staggered slightly, scraping her shoulder on the brick wall as she lurched sideways but she barely felt it in her numbed state.
As he walked, he talked: “We are in the underground chambers beneath an old friend’s house. Unfortunately, this friend of mine died last year, and I bought his house. It is a very special house.”
Joan had no idea what he was talking about, and right then, neither did she care. Despite this, she recognised the fact that it was best to keep him talking. ‘Knowledge was power’ had always been her mantra in life, and at least if he was talking, it would postpone her fate, whatever that may be.
“What’s so special about the house?” she asked when he stopped speaking.
“This house used to belong to a man named Michael Cooper. Have you heard of him?”
“No,” she answered.
Tristian laughed, and the sound was like nails down a blackboard. “Maybe I misjudged you, maybe you’re not such a brilliant journalist after all. No matter. Michael Cooper owned an underground organisation called The Flesh Factory. The Flesh Factory was an organisation not that different to The Dark Red. But whereas Mick sold on most of his girls as sex-slaves, I like to keep all mine. I am more about the in-house entertainment, and I offer a much wider choice of activities. In fact, Mick and I were such good friends that he didn’t invite me to the final party. I suppose he was very fond of me, to spare me in such a way.”
“What do you mean? What final party?”
She asked the question, even though she really didn’t want to know.
“Mick and I were fellow Satanists, Joan. Not the ridiculous Anton Le Vey nonsense, the real stuff. The concept of true Satanism is really quite simple: inflicting the maximum of suffering on humans is rewarded with youth and wealth. If I want money, all I have to do is buy a scratch-card or place a bet on the horses. Mick’s fatal flaw was he killed his own kind. He arranged a party for the biggest deviants in Britain, and slaughtered them en-mass in the ballroom upstairs. But you can’t sacrifice evil, Joan, you must sacrifice innocence. Evil must be celebrated in all its glory, not wiped out. Poor Mick lost his way and he lost his mind.” He shook his head sadly, remembering his friend. “At least he didn’t invite me, or some of the more powerful figures in Britain, so this mass-slaughter stayed out of the press.”
“But that’s impossible,” she whispered.
They had come to a stop because the corridor had ended. A metal door like all the others marked the end of the corridor, and the more Joan looked at it, the more her insides twisted into a tight knot of fear.
This is the end of the line.
She knew this with a cold certainty that churned in her stomach and made her want to throw up.
“Nothing is impossible, Joan. The world holds many, wonderful secrets if we just open out eyes and let the darkness in. You know nothing of our rituals, of our kind. But you will learn, with time. There is a long, glorious road ahead of you.”
She sucked in a sharp intake of breath when his hand curled around the metal door handle.
“This house, these chambers, they are a conduit for evil,” he continued. “The atrocities that were committed here, that are still being committed here, it seeps into the very heart of the house; it makes the house come alive. Evil breeds evil, Joan. Evil can collect.”
He pushed open the door and the hallway spun around her, and she was sure that the ground lurched sideways beneath her feet.
I can’t go in there, she thought with utter certainty. I can’t take seeing.
“This, dear Joan, is the beating heart of The Dark Red. This is what only the lucky few ever get to see. This is where your journey begins. Open your eyes, Joan. Don’t be scared.”
Reluctantly, she opened her eyes. At first appraisal, she thought she was in an opulent, but sleazy nightclub: she had never been in one, but a BDSM club, perhaps.
The first thing that hit her was the wall of music. The door to this room must be completely soundproofed, for in here, the music pumped out at a moderate level; loud enough to drown out the hum of voices. Some industrial metal was playing, the bass deep and the lead vocalist guttural.
The next thing she noticed was the smell, and her nostrils instantly flared in repulsion. The air was musky, not fetid as such, but the smell of death and terror hung heavy in the air; a little coppery, slightly feral, and absolutely corrupt.
The lighting was dim, in tune with the club vibe. Then she slowly took in the people. Lots of people. Sitting. Standing. Chained to the walls... People hurting other people.
The onslaught to her senses was too much, and, as she struggled to make sense of her surroundings, Tristian continued to drip his poison in her ear:
“This is where the paying customers do not go. It is mine, and now it is yours, too. My mansion is set on one hundred acres of land, and this underground network amounts to the size of one hundred football pitches. But this room is the most special of all. It is the very heart, the very centre of The Dark Red.”
Only dimly was she aware of him speaking. Lightly, he touched her arm, and she flinched.
“Come. Let me show you.”
He led her through the room, and the bodies parted for them as they walked. There were no outrageous leather or latex outfits, and those that were clothed wore ordinary black clothes. Ninety percent of those dressed were men, and ninety percent of those naked were women.
“We call this the feasting room. You are witnessing agony in its purest form; no frills, no extras, just pain.”
Most of those people, or women, that were naked, were writhing in silent agony. Some were chained to the walls, streaming blood. Some were simply curled on the floor in various states of dismemberment. Everywhere she looked, the clothed men were hurting the naked women. Some cut the women chained to the walls with knives, some used pliers and other instruments of torture that she couldn’t make out. Some women were being raped on the ground, some were being beaten, and some were simply being used as footrests for the men sitting down.
“They all have their tongues cut out. It may not sound like much, but it is an act of unspeakable cruelty. Not being able to voice your pain is torture.”
It was too much to take in, her mind was overwhelmed by the sights. The room was so large, the ceiling so high compared to the corridor, that it was making her dizzy. In fact, now that she thought of it, how could the height of this room even exist down here?
It was slowly dawning on her how grand this room was. A chandelier hung from the ceiling, and the furniture was all high-backed, Victorian-era style leather sofas and the occasional chaise-lounge. The tables were low and elaborately carved, the walls all panelled in wood. The only colours in the room were brown and red, adding to the decadence. An open plan balcony wrapped around all four walls, and when she glanced up there, she glimpsed more women chained to the walls.
“Yes, it’s beautiful, isn’t it? Shall we go up? There’s someone I want you to meet. She will be your initiation into your new life.”
Tristian led her to the narrow, beautifully carved, dark-wood staircase, and together they ascended. Joan did her best not to look at the women chained to the walls. Some were cuffed to the walls by their wrists and ankles with thick chain, others were simply nailed in place by their hands.
Tristian stopped, his hands resting on the banister as he peered down at the scene below.
“Look, Joan. Look at my world. Isn’t it beautiful?”
Joan looked, tears blurring her vision. From up here they had a bird’s eye view of down below, and it was just soul-crushing. So much torture, so much pain…
“And this is who I wanted you to see.”
Tristian had turned around, facing the girl chained to the wall behind them. This woman was nailed to the wall by her palms, her arms extended at right-angles to her body. Her body was sheened with blood, but Joan couldn’t see any obvious wounds, besides the ones in her hands. Her head was lowered, her long, blonde hair partly obscuring her blatantly fake breasts.
Slowly, the woman lifted her head, her pretty face contorted with pain, her blue eyes glassy and pleading with Joan. She opened her mouth to speak, or scream, and Joan saw the black stump that had once been her tongue. There was something desperately familiar about her, but in that moment, for the life of her, Joan couldn’t place her.
Then it hit her.
“Yes, that’s right, Joan, I can see the light dawning in your eyes. It’s the stripper you interviewed for your article. Lily Pearl, remember? The one who put you on the trail of The Dark Red.”
Joan stared at her in horror – she wasn’t sure how much of this sickness she could take. She averted her gaze, unable to stand seeing the look of defeated terror in her eyes for a second longer.
“Kill her, Joan. Join me. Join us. It is true, we are mainly a male organisation, but that is only for practical purposes. Men are stronger, and better at playing jailor. They make much better, angry, silent jailors. But I’m all for sexual equality.” He laughed at that, making tears spring into Joan’s eyes. “I want you to write about this, about what we do. I want you out there in the world, sourcing future clients and victims.”
“I would never help you.”
“But you will. Because you will drink her, Joan, and you will become one of us. You will always be young, and you will always be beautiful. You will be rich beyond your wildest imaginings and you will share our ideologies. The evil will enter you, corrupt you, take you.”
He was back on that Satanic claptrap again, and she realised that she was surrounded by stark raving madness.
The tears were falling hard and fast now. “Just kill me now,” she said, her voice cracking. “You’re going to kill me anyway, so just do it now. Please, I don’t want to live like this.”
“Oh Joan, don’t you know how lucky you are? I have chosen you. So do it.”
No sooner than the words had left his mouth, he was behind her, hugging her naked back to the front of his body. He pressed something cold into her trembling hand, and when she looked down, she saw that it was a knife.
Tristian was a lot stronger than he looked, and he wrenched up her hand, pushing it into the terrified girl’s throat and dragging it sideways.
“No,” she screamed as the girl’s blood spilled over her forearm.
The knife clattered to the floor and Joan was weak with shock. Over the music, Joan could just about make out the wet, gurgling sounds Lily Pearl was making, and before she knew what was happening, Tristian had fisted her hair and was shoving her face into the dying girl’s face.
Hot blood splattered against her mouth and chin as she was relentlessly pushed into the girl, their lips joining in a forced, macabre kiss.
Panic washed over her; she held her breath, not wanting to smell the blood and terror of the dying woman.
“Breathe, damn it,” Tristian said.
Still with his back pressed against her and his hand in her hair so that she was helplessly mashed between the two of them in a grotesque parody of a threesome, he reached around with his free hand to pinch her nose.
She groaned into the girl’s mouth.
I’ll just hold my breath until I pass out.
But as much as she wanted to, the innate instinct to breathe, to survive, won out.
Just as her head felt tight enough to burst, she breathed in. The woman’s breath felt hot and damp in her lungs.
Her life essence, came the disconcerting thought.
Still Tristian did not let her go. She breathed in again.
Now she could feel something happening to her, and she panicked hard, struggling in Tristian’s grip.
She tried holding her breath again, until her treacherous body forced her to breathe in once more.
Now Tristian let go, and she staggered sideways, slumping against the wall next to the dying woman.
The dead woman.
Joan felt so strange. The sensations that coursed through her body were not unlike an orgasm, rendering her weak and ecstatic. Her mind buzzed, alert yet relaxed. In fact, she felt better than she had done in ages.
All traces of fear were gone. And repulsion, angst, sadness… She felt… Good.
It was a revelation, and she looked over at Tristian in dismay. She wiped her sticky mouth and chin on the back of her hand, not giving a second thought for the life of the woman who had just died.
Tristian smiled at her and instinctively she went to him. He took her in his arms, and she melted into the hard lines of his body.
“Welcome,” he murmured into the top of her head. “We welcome you.”
He bent his head to kiss her, and she greedily responded, her body eager for his touch. He pulled away, leaving her panting for more.
Gently, he guided her over to the banister, encouraging her to look down at the carnage below.
It was the most beautiful thing that she had ever seen. Deep within her, an ancient, primal, blood lust stirred.
“I have so much to show you, dear Joan. There is so much pleasure to be had. My secrets will soon be yours to keep.”
His hand cupped hers on the banister and a warm glow suffused her being.
“Thank you,” she said, humbled and overwhelmed by his generosity, by the divinity and grace of life.
The End.
West, Sam, The Dark Side Of Red
