Armament

Chapter 2 - Evanel

Six. Maybe seven times. I'm not sure. Seven times they've drowned me. I tried to count my meals but realised that there wasn't much chance they were giving me them regularly. It feels like I've been here for months but at the same time only a few days. I haven't been able to drink the water from my last few meals, I can't physically choke it down. I started to feel dizzy a while ago so it's probably been about a day since I drank any. I'm tired from pacing in this room, my legs ache so much that I have to lie down again. I can't have been walking for that long but I have only been eating the bare minimum from what I can tell.

After the first two times being drowned I stated to imagine things in the dark, originally intentionally but now I just seem to daze off into these visions without warning. The first time it happened unintentionally Maggie was here. She shook me awake and there was light in the room again. It blinded me but I could still make out her bright hair. She was crying, her voice squeaking as she tried to drag me out of the room. She said something about Ash, she was sorry. I think she was saying Ash was waiting for us. She pushed me out of the room, a door that wasn't usually there. Then I looked behind me, she was still in the room for some reason. I watched the door slam down and trap her inside, then her curdling scream cut through me. I listened to the water inside the room rise and rise until all I could hear was her choking noises as the water reached the top.

It seemed to be a recurring dream except each time it was a different person, at first just my family and friends, then strangers. Strangers that seemed to care about me way too much. And I can't seem to get their strange faces out of my head. Their red eyes, purple, brown, cognac. The boy with the red eyes screaming at me, his hands shaking as he tried to drag me to safety. The girl with the purple eyes, her face set in determination. The brown eyed girl, her hair falling out of her scarf, her wet eyes clouding her vision. Then the boy with the cognac eyes – he wasn't trying to save me, he couldn't. I saw him in the room with me but he couldn't see me, he couldn't see a thing in the darkness. His brown curls soaked, his skin pale from fear. All he did was cry, he cried for so long that the whole vision became realer than real. So real that more than once I tried to touch him, reason with his tears, but then I blinked myself back to reality, the reality of this dark room.

I lay on my side, scratching away at the floor, the only other thing I do except for pacing and drowning. Maybe there's a small piece of me that's hoping I can re-enact Shawshank Redemption and dig my way to freedom, but the guy in that had the advantage of that mini pickaxe he had. I could try to use that metal tray they give me as a pickaxe but there's no doubt that they have cameras watching me.

I jump at the faint bangs coming from outside the room, the first sound I've heard from somewhere other than inside here. It reminds me of bonfire night but without the bright flare of fireworks in the night sky and the burning body of Guy Fawkes. The pained screams only confirm that it isn't bonfire night and there isn't a celebration going on.

Maybe they're using noise torture now. Like the Americans use on their prisoners. In that torture place they have. I can't remember what it's called. Guavana May? Bay? It's right there in the back of my mind, I know what it's called. It has a stupid name. Maggie was talking about it once. Guantanamo Bay. That's it. It's like where–

Another series of bangs and a crack shakes me from my thoughts, small bits of debris falls from above, almost getting in my eyes. I push myself back into the corner I usually sit in, the one I don't release my bowels in. Something must be happening outside. Maybe someone's here to save me, either that or noise torture. Maybe I'll finally find out where the door in here is.

I press my fists against my ear as the bangs and cries and cracks continue. Whatever that sound is I want it to go away. It hurts my ears and I don't want to hurt. I guess it's better than the feeling of my lungs burning and my head aching as I try to hold my breath. But I just want it to be quiet, it's never quiet in here. There's always the echo of the remaining water droplets falling to the floor and the sound of my own breathing.