Let's Start A Riot

Chapter Fifteen - Seeing Isn't Believing

I cannot fucking believe my eyes.

I am standing in a room with Hugo, Sarah, and Agent Hartley surrounded by computer screens and television monitors. In the centre of it all is Marcus.

When I'd asked Sarah and Hugo what they meant about MI6 having to get a little more creative when it came to these exercises and Marcus, never in a million years had I expected this.

Sarah and Hugo had led the way to this room when they said it was better to show me what they meant rather than tell me, and being shown I am.

"Fuck, I hate watching this." Sarah turns towards the door, not exiting but wincing every time she hears something from the live audio feed being transmitted from the adjacent room. Hugo stands tensely, unlike his normal relaxed and comfortable posture, he looks like he is ready to jump at someone at any given time. Hartley himself has a deep frown creasing his face as he mutters into a microphone that sits on the desk in front of him.

Beside us in the room are multiple different types of agents; there are people scribbling on notepads, people in lab coats analysing statistics that roll along their screens, doctors standing around watching the display monitors carefully, and agents who just seem to be interested in getting to watch the show.

And me?

I am frozen – I feel sick to the core.

Sarah and Hugo explained to me that while these exercises are to simulate real situations we may end up in, at this stage of our training, they will always be stopped before it gets to the actual harming part. Someone seems to have missed that memo from what I am seeing now.

On the monitors is the live video feed displaying different angles of Marcus being tortured, for real.

He is in the middle of a room that is nothing like mine had been. Where the room I had been in was clean, all white and lit up – his is dark and dingy, the walls rough grey stone. There are puddles of water on the mud floor, dripping from the rock formed ceiling. The only light comes from harsh white spotlights that surround and illuminate Marcus for the purpose of disorientating him. It is essentially a cave.

Marcus himself looks terrible to be polite, but to be impolite? It looks like he has been dragged through a meat grinder, his skin red raw with small cuts and bruises covering his body like paint splotched on a canvas.

He is in the centre of the room like I was, but instead of being tied to a chair like I had been, he is being suspended by a length of chain that hangs from the ceiling, rusty metal shackles binding his wrists, creating deep red grooves in his skin. The chain is keeping him slightly above ground meaning that as he hangs there, he loses blood flow to his arms, the ease of exhaling becomes increasingly difficult which causes a lack of oxygen and increase in carbon dioxide in the blood, therefore he will to slowly asphyxiate to death. His only reprieve comes when he can lift himself up for a minute of struggled breathing before his limbs give out and he goes slack and dangling once more.

He still has his combat trousers and boots, but his vest and shirt have been removed to reveal the tattoos and prominent muscles that cover his entire upper half. His head is bowed, his hair slick with sweat and hanging in front of his face obscuring any pain induced facial expressions he may be making from the cameras.

I watch as someone else steps into view and pours a bucket of water over Marcus's head, drenching him from head to toe. He doesn't move except from swinging side to side on the chain from the disruption of the force of the water.

"You know I don't have to do this if you just give them up, even their names would give you some reward." The person says, something familiar about their voice but the blinding lights casting them in shadow.