Like hell that was an hour. “What’s the time?” I asked him with a weakened voice.
He clicked the button and suddenly all of the pain was gone in a flash, and I felt like I could once again breath normal air. He took out his fog watch and observed it. “It’s nine o’clock,” he said.
“Show me,” I demanded in return.
And so, he turned the watch-face to me and it read nine o’clock – it had been one hour. Impossible! There was, of course, always the possibility that Brakewater had turned back the hands of his watch, however I was more inclined now to believe that time was indeed the culprit.
Brakewater smiled, as if he understood the dilemma that I was attempting to subjugate. “Time flies when you’re having fun,” he said. “It’s quite the opposite when you’re not. Now, based on your eyes I can tell that you’re far from ready to give me the code. Seeing as I’m quite pressed for time I suppose we might as well continue with level two.”
An unreal wave of anger flooded through me. I can imagine my face tightened as I tried to spit on my captor – unfortunately I missed. Brakewater clicked the button again and then left the room – about as expressionless as a rock. I cringed at the simple idea of pain, and then cried as the real thing ruptured my body and broke me to pieces. I was the finite victim of time; however, time could be ignored through acceptance. Pain, I could not ignore just as I could not accept. Pain had to be fought in a battle that could not be won, and in that battle I refused to scream until tears welled in my eyes and painted my cheeks. My fists tensed as hard as the diamonds within Brakewater’s eyes and my body shook with the ferocity of a drill. I will not break. Those were my four words of strength. I will not break. I will not break. I will not break.
Occasionally the numbers appeared in my mind – sometimes in full and sometimes in pieces. 6573-4532-7710-2169-3490… 3453… 34… 0216-9…
I begged for them to stop. They were a sign of my weakness and my temptation to resign all hopes of rescue – to simply free myself from this suffering. And then I would come back somehow. I will not break. I will not break.
To my sheer amazement, I lasted much longer than I had thought I would.
I could ignore time as if it were an insect flying around my face, however that did not mean that time would ignore me. Level seven. That is where I was now, and time had remained a cruel continuum for all of my suffering.
Every time that Brakewater came to check on me, I hadn’t had to tell him that I still remained strong – as far as not breaking goes –he could tell from my eyes. He was just as efficient as I was stubborn, and I couldn’t help but feel that at the rate we were going, nobody was ready to win.
As far as each level went, seven was rather exciting. I had bitten my lower lip to the point where I could taste fresh tangy blood, all the while unknowing to the damage that I had done. When I did realise that I was slowly eating away at my lip I was able to stop, taken away by this sense of utter dumbfoundment. I did not recall when I had bitten my lip, or to what extent, however based on the swelling, it was probably one or two levels ago, and it was pretty bad. I guess after all these levels time was still playing tricks.
I remember thinking that it was a shame – I had thought of Mr Brakewater’s methods as a blessing because I knew that when I got out I would still be beautiful. I bet that right now I was everything from that: my lip was red and bloody – I knew that much – and there’s no doubt that my beautiful skin was by this stage as pale as a sheet, my eyes sunken and my hair wet and sticky with sweat. Yeah, I jested, some beauty queen.
Level seven ended with nothing other than the promise of level eight to begin. I think I saw Brakewater enter the room and click the button, but then again, I was completely out of it. Lights flared up at me and sounds echoed and rang in my head like an overcrowded festival. I let out a long groan when the pain went away and I cherished the seconds of rest that I had. I noticed the frustrated impatience that had been etched into Brakewater’s glare as he entered the room, although that may have been from the last level. But he was talking, and walking and standing right there.
The door opened at least three times and screamed at me as it did. Brakewater’s footsteps sounded like stones being tossed into a well, chipping and clacking against the walls of my skull. Brakewater himself was accompanied by a ghost – several ghosts actually – they seemed to pull from his body and then return when he stopped, but they followed him as surely as his shadow.
When he spoke, he sounded a thousand miles away, and under water, his voice drowned out by a raging current so that I could hear pieces of it, and it was so hard to focus when the lights were flaring at me.
“Abigail, can you… me.” I thought I missed part of that. His words repeated themselves and echoed.
His voice was so annoying, and it didn’t help when he used his thumb and forefinger to pry my eyelids open to check that I was conscious.
“Abi… no one is coming for you.”
He moved over to click the button again and there was very little I could say, although the anticipation of level eight did wake me up a little, and it was something that he noticed.
“This will be your last level,” he said with a confusing tone of confidence. “If you do not break soon then you will die, and we can begin all over again.”
Level eight hit me like a freight train and caused my body to convulse. “No…” I choked, but I was too late, and he was gone. Another hour, another level. I couldn’t do this for much longer.
The chemicals rushing through my veins hadn’t broken my spirit but they had certainly broken my dignity, and about fifteen minutes in I could no longer control the impulse to scream. I bet my shattered voice shook the walls, and I wonder if the sound of my pain led Brakewater to feel success or regret, or perhaps both.
After roughly half an hour I had simply run out of breath, and I sat there with my head down in complete silence, shaking violently with not a thing to do about it. This pain couldn’t be fought.
I whispered a course promise into the dead silence of the room – a vow that I would find a way to make Brakewater pay for what he’d done. As to how I would do this, I wasn’t sure – after all, back then I was never a violent person when I could help it, and I didn’t think I could do him any physical damage even if I tried. But all the same, I would see that he burned to the ground. I was starting to think that revenge was a dish best served screaming with anguish and emotional pain. He had a weakness and I’d find it, and when I did it would feel just so incredibly relieving.
I remember when I started all this that I could feel the beating of my own heart, the rushing of my blood, and the rise and fall of my chest as I breathed. Now I could feel nothing, not even pain. I was numb, my body gone and my mind somewhere else. The entire universe was spinning around my non-existent self in some cruel dance. And then it stopped.
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