Fiction: The Gentleman. Date Thursday, April 18, 2024 - 07:30 PM PST Topic Religion The room was small, bare bricked and void of any decoration. The fact that the windows were boarded added a certain senseof sublime bleakness to to it, and the single naked bulb burning furiously was a testament to a lost cause. In this room, the darkness was a palpable as flesh...and less vulnerable. Two men were in the room...or at least, one man in poor health, and one man who could barely be called human. The battered man was sitting in a metal chair, his arms and feet anchored to it by felt lined cuffs. His head was held back by a metal strap, and revealed his pale and bruised face to be that of a middle aged man, with sallow greasy skin, hollow, frightened eyes and an ignoble nose. His name wasn't important...all that needed to be known was that he had something in his head that someone else wanted, badly. He was slightly overweight, and sweated copiously...the biological stench of humanity filled the small unhallowed room with a rank miasma of fear and grim anticipation. The other man was a stark contrast to the poor soul in the chair. He was immaculate. Dressed in a black and white three piece suit, cleanly shaven with a brand new haircut. He was perfect, and emotionless. His face would have been pleasant...slightly round, with a strong jawline and proud roman nose. His hair was dark brown and framed his lightly tanned skin quite well. He was very fit, and moved with a confident, almost insect-like mechanical perfection. He would have been handsome, if not for his eyes. They were strange things, of a mundane hazel color...but empty, absolutley empty. In his eyes, which were slightly almond shaped and attractively large, there was not the slightest hint of anything...they were Neitzche's Abyss, they were Oblivion and the end of the River Styx. The Gentleman would have been less a monster is some hideous beast lurked within his eyes...instead, in him, there was nothing, nothing save for effecient, skilled functionality. He stared at the man in the chair for some time, dispassionately regarding his associate. After a few moments, he pulled out an ornate gold pocket watch, checked the time and then moved to the small table beside the man, on which laid his black suitcase. The man in the chair heard the ruffling, and the snap of latex on skin, his heart rate elevated. After a few moments the man came back to stand in front of him, and in his hands he carried a simple roll of duct tape. Without so much as a blink, he calmly placed a generous strip of the tape over the other's man mouth, taking care to leave his nostrils open and clear. Confusion and misunderstanding swarmed over the bound man's eyes. The Gentleman indulged his unformed clay as a matter of politeness more than anything else. When he spoke, his voice was like a recording...understandable, but absolutely without feeling. [pagebreak] "You are confused as to why I, your interrogator has chosen to prevent you from speaking yes?" The man's wide eyes were enough of an answer to confirm that suspicion. The Gentleman returned to his suitcase and ruffled around for a bit as he continued, "The reason I have placed the tape across your mouth is simple...you know something I wish to know...however, you will not be allowed to tell me until I give you permission to do so." Beads of sweat stung the prisoners eyes, and he tried to turn his head to see what the man was doing beside him. "If you have any questions...I would appreciate if you saved them until the end of the session, as I may very well answer them all before then." When the Gentleman returned to the prisoners field of vision he was carrying a syringe in his hand. It was surgical, looking as if it was taken straight out of a hospital somewhere. Large, with somewhere around 30cc's of fluid in it, and tipped with a sterile 23 guage IM needle. The Gentleman leaned forward, and with one very delicate latex covered finger, lowered the prisoner's left eyelid. The light from he bare bulb glinted off the tiny sliver of steel as it came forward, and the Prisoner reflexively forced his eye shut despite the Gentleman's finger. Weak infant howls of anticipated horror leaked from the duct taped mouth. The Gentleman stood back to his full height and regarded the man for a moment before speaking. "I suppose I cannot expect cooperation...very well." He talked as he returned to his briefcase, "I am going to inject in you an anti-coagulant, as well as a tactile stimulator agent...it is neccessary for this process, and I prefer the eye as the most direct means of injection, but i you eyelid insists on being in the way..." He came back before the prisoner, this time, with a pair of large toe-nail clippers in his hands. "...then I will have to remove it." The man struggled to the best of his capabilities as the toenail clippers opened, came towards him and fastened upon the thin flesh of his lower eyelid. There was a prolonged instant of crushing hurt...followed by a searing, almost burning pain as the lower eyelid was clipped off. Before his mind could even recover, the Gentleman was upon his upper eyelid. It was a horrible crunching, hot burst of metal an cruelty that laid his vision open, permanently in that eye. Blood flowed quickly and muddled his perceptions. The prisoner was still reeling, trying to make sense of the blurry forms before him. His heart nearly failed when the needle materialized suddenly, so close he couldn't even see the length of it before the contrasting cold violation entered his sclera, near the lower part, at the edge of the conjunctiva, and punctured his eye. A hissing outraged and pitiful rasp emerged from his nostrils, and mouth, though severely muffled. It just kept going in, forever...inch after inch, foot after foot sliding in...until it hit something softer in the back of his head...in the back of the room. A moment of vertigo, and icy pressure along with the penetrating tresspass...then it withdrew, slowly and simply. The victim felt warmth in his head, trickling into his skull and down his spine...a weird electric, not entirely unpleasant tingle. It could have been an addictive sensation, if not for it's method of administration. [pagebreak] He sat there reeling, trying to collect himself, as the Gentleman gather his next tool. When he came back, he was holding a simple surgical scalpel and a small mirror. He moved around to the side, and the prisoner heard a loud click that made him jump. A second later, the Gentleman moved the mirror directly in front of him again...and he could see his own wretched visage. A surgical mirror, attached to hinges...so he could witness his "interrogation" as well as experiance it. The Gentleman pulled a small stool around and sat down lightly on it, crossing his feet at the hells. The man in the suit moved with an almost digital precision as he raised one of the man's arms to chest level, along with the metal arm of the chair. The bound man's right hand lay in full view of them, in a macabre parody of a manicurists postion. The Gentleman spoke quietly, almost as if to himself as he brought the scalpel gracefully down. "Children and insects...only in children and insects is there found such a thing as perfectly effecient cruelty." The man tried to clench his left eye shut, but his right, violated orb refused him even this foolish gesture and he saw the Gentleman's scalple cut in...almost painlessly. The scalpel drew a long thin line of red from the ulna to the middle knuckle...deep, moving slickly over bone and through flesh. It was a chilling feeling, and at the same time...possessed the same screaming burn. Hot an cold, all at once, opposites colliding into a perfect, terrible sensation. The Gentleman continued on as he began to peel back the skin, ignoring the man's muffled howls and cries. "I aspire to this perfect cruelty...although it is difficult, because I am no longer a child, nor was I ever an insect. But aspiration and ambition of such things must at least be attempted shouldn't they? In any case, I hope you appreciate your fortune...few who undergo such interrogations have the honor, no matter how dubious you may believe it to be...to become a work of enlightenment, and art, rather than just a torn and bloodied bag of gross matter." The Gentleman reached to his side and brought to bear to instruments that looked like small forks, with which he used to pry apart the surgically cut flesh and reveal the structure beneath. Yellowish and greasy adipose tissue pillowed out at the edges of the sliced dermis, gleaming sickly in the light. The infrastructure of the bound man's hand was left fully to bear...the bones and ligaments of his hand, as well as the tight, stringy muscles. It was an odd gray-white color that contrasted with the yellow nicely. The bound man writhed as much as he could, but his violation did not stop, and he could not avoid it. "It is said that all the actions a man undertakes are reflected in his hands...all of the sins and virtues he has actually done, are here." The Gentleman said. "A shame they are so readily dismantled hmm? But then, such are the works of men." So saying, he quietly angled his scalpel downwards and, "snick," "snick, " snick," "snick." [pagebreak] Severed the ligaments one after the other. The man moaned as he felt his fingers suddenly go limp. The Gentleman continued his terrible work, his expression never changing. "Your right hand is now empty...and as the works of a man are reflected in his hands, so to is it believed that the left carries the weight of the sins, and the right...your virtuous actions, in doing this...I have graced you with freedom from such virtues, your are now...in that respect, pure and empty." He continued, peeling the skin back, tugging it gently until it came free. The sensation was strange, although touched by the burning pain, it was very akin to the feeling of tearing a thick piece of paper. The Gentleman then finished his work on the right hand and moved downwards, using the scalpel to cut away the bound man's pants. He prattled dispassionately as he did so. "My next area of attention are the genitals of course, in our current base and worthless society...really, these are all a man ever aspires to glorify and exalt." The bound man's eyes went wide, and a different kind of horror bubbled forth from him...a completely different desperate fear than he had previously tasted. It was a strange heavy and perverse flavor, one off set well by the dry, mechanical one he had just experianced, a rather appreciable bouqet of torment...of course, he was in no condition to enjoy, or observe it objectively. The Gentleman set aside his tools, and pulled out something which looked like a large serrated bowie knife, with a curved edge. "This base, and vulgar area of the mortal shell is best dealt with exactly the way you think I'm about to do it...please observe this, and experiance it to the fullest of your abilities...and do not worry about falling unconcious and missing the fun. My serum well see that your brain recieves plenty of oxygen throughout the process." He placed the tip of the curved and serrated knife against the very rear of his scrotum, and after but a moments preperation, ripped upwards with a furious and terrible strength. The skin ruptured, snagged and was torn asunder brutally. The man did scream then, a weak and warbling cry of elemental anguish. The knife continued up and in to his penis, sliding into the softer skin of the urethra, then slicing it neatly in twain before catching on the glans and utterly destroying it. [pagebreak] It was brutality and perversion defined, blood and semen gushed from the bound man, along with a fair bit of urine. The smell alone was horrible, but the sensation was overwhelming, it almost knocked his mind completely out of itself. In the span of a second, he was immasculated...to the heart of a man, worthless.The Gentleman sat back and spoke again, "I would like you to focus on the differences of what you have just experianced...and contrast and compare, as well as the next area..." The man's eyes shot back nothing but hate and horror. The Gentleman stared back without reaction "Experiance emotion as you wish, but they will only defeat the purpose of this event. The simple matter is...roll that experiance over your tongue hypothetically, while you still have it...like a wine, experiance it, do not just suffer it." The bound man was beyond himself, seeing only his displayed hand, and ruined crotch draining weakly onto the cold concrete floor beneath him. He almost didn't see the Gentleman get his next set of tools. This was immediatly recognizeable, but still, morbidly bad... A steel needle, curved...and within it was laced a length of thin, flat metal line. The Gentleman leaned forward and pierced the man's cheek with the needle, and began lacing the thread through. Compared to the pain of his immasculation, this new sensation was little, to nothing. It was confusing though, and the captives mind scrabbled strangely to latch onto it. Through pain and hideous experiances, his mind was reacting the only way it could naturally. By withheld instinct. It was learning from what it was experiancing, it was learning from it's pain. The Gentleman moved with a familiar skill and fluidity, as if in life he was a tailor. He stitched an elaborate, wild arching pattern up one side of the bound man's cheek, then down the soft flesh and across the jaw...finishing with almost a celtic loop just above the man's clavicle. The way the light caught of the silvered wire, just underneath the skin gave it an almost hypnotically translucent gray color...like melted moonlight. After he had completed his decoration, the Gentleman angled the mirror so the bound and half crazed man could see it better. It really was a simple work of art, similiar to the ancient gaelic torques and images of the Tuatha. The Gentleman let him admire it, in his own horrified way before beginning to speak. "Now this is an interesting area...the face, the very appearance, and being of a person...that is the face. The layout of my simple design also has meaning, running along the line's of the flesh, parrallel to the more intimate areas...not the sexual mind you, but the intimate. This will be very different from your anatomical and virtuous excision or your brutal immasculation, please watch carefully." Then the suited man stood up, and took the two threads dangling from either end of the design and tied them around a rather unimpressive wooden stick. He took one step back and then ripped out with all of his considerable strength. [pagebreak] Their was a wet shock of a sound, and the bound man felt the strangest coolness subdue him...it was as if someone had simply removed a shirt or a mask. Then the suffering began anew, acute and vastly different. The third bouqet started out light, and pretty...and ended with a theft of beauty, a vandalization of intimacy. It was a gift, and a robbery at the same time...a profound robbery, of much more meaning than his simple immasculation. It was almost transcendant. He didn't howl this time, only weakly paened...a strange sound to emerge from his blood flecked lips. It was a sound of a tired throat, but a spirit bordering on divine revelation. The Gentleman allowed him but a few moments to taste, contrast, compare and expound, but only a few before moving again. He sat before the man and spoke, in his spider-like voice, "I hope you begin to see what this is...and I hope your mind doesn't befoul it with the term torture or some nonsense like that...I have stripped away your humanity, and for a simple one such as you...it doesn't take much. I have uncovered your soul. Pain is knowledge...you know this know don't you?" The bound man, broken, his mind cast a thousand ways adrift didn't even completely realized he nodded. There was still no flicker of emotion fromt he Gentleman, only a verbal confirmation, "Good...do you wish me to stop?" The man...weak, dazzled and only by a shred of echoes still human, could only shake his head no. The Gentleman then removed the tape from the man's mouth and asked a simple question. "If you wish to see more...see what no living man has ever seen, know what no living man has known, then tell me the numbers I wish to know, and I will continue...if you do not, I will leave you here unenlightened." The man struggled, words forming, and then he spat them out rapidly, but concisely...frm a throat and mouth suddenly unused to speech. After he had heard them, the Gentleman returned the gag to it's rightful place and reached back into his suitcase. He was slightly disappointed, this one was simply too easy to break properly. But procedure, was procedure. A weak spirit could achieve enlightenment sometimes much easier than a complicated and strong one. As the Gentleman went about his final teaching, he spoke again with finality. "Children and Insects...Everything is in that simple perfect clarity of instinctual cruelty...You should be honored, for you will experiance it none the less." The sound of bone cracking, and marrow withering filled the room, along with the wet, thick "Splatch" of blood and concrete. The light flickered and dimmed, "All I ask is that...are you grateful for what I have taught you?" A weak nod. "Good...good." A sudden rending scream, of exultation and pain transcendant...then darkness. No one knows where he comes from, or what he does...or even what he is. But the Gentleman can be found when he is needed, and he always succeeds. This article comes from Shmeng http://www.shmeng.com/ The URL for this story is: http://www.shmeng.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=771