Rage and Ruin | 2

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J A K E

I was about to step in and finish things when Arlo strode into the light. "Don't kill him yet, Delphinium. Let me try."

I wasn't originally going to let him interrogate the President, but something in the serious tone of his voice made me change my mind. I nodded toward the bound man, permitting Arlo to step in front of him.

Very reluctantly, Delphinium pried herself off of the hostage and took her place at my side. I noticed that she didn't put her knife away; the blade was kept in her clenched hand, ready for use.

      "Hello, Mr. President," Arlo began, wearing a wide smile on his face. "I'd give you a handshake, but it appears that your hands are tied." Somewhere to my right, Jaxon stifled a chuckle.

      "Though even if I wanted to, I couldn't because one of your friends shot me in the side." Arlo stopped pacing in front of Huard and suddenly slammed his hands on both of the arms of the chair; the President jumped. "I didn't appreciate that."

      He took a step back and raised his eyebrows. "Do you want to see what your men did to me?" Looking down, Arlo pulled up his shirt and showcased the partially-healed bloody hole high on his right side. Now that he was revealing it, I could see that it had barely hit him. I'd had worse bullet wounds.

"Do you see that?" Arlo asked, looking up to gauge the President's reaction. "The bullet's even still in there."

He turned around, his eyes slightly wild. "Delphinium, your knife?"

The assassin glanced down at the knife in her hand. I knew that they were her prized weapons and that she probably didn't want to give them away so easily. But she did anyway, tossing one of them into the outstretched hand of Arlo.

"So, Mr. President, let's talk about what happened earlier, shall we?" Arlo asked while pulling his blood-soaked shirt completely off his body and throwing it on the ground. His light skin was covered in white scars that stood out starkly.

"Finn and I almost didn't catch you," he spoke as he took the knife to his own skin around the bullet wound. I watched it happen unemotionally, but I could sense the horror of a few of the weaker members of the crew. The President's black eyes, already being magnified by his glasses, were round as he watched Arlo dig the bullet from his skin.

      "But thankfully," Arlo said, working the knife in deeper without a care in the world, "The wind blew your hat off of that balding head of yours and we were able to retrieve it for you." Huard's eyes were glued to what Arlo was doing to himself; it seemed he couldn't look away from the horror.

      I watched Arlo closely as he continued on, "We were approaching you to return your hat like the good people we are, and you know how your men returned the favor? They shot this into me." He pulled the shining bullet from deep inside the bloody incision he'd made. As he held it in the air for effect, the light caught the metal and made it shine brightly.

      Suddenly, Arlo lunged forward and stabbed the knife into the arm of the chair, mere inches away from where the President's hand was tied. "Aren't you even going to apologize, you son of a bitch?" he yelled, the sound reverberating throughout the small room.

      The President blinked twice. I doubted he'd ever had to apologize to anyone in his life. The idea had probably never crossed his mind before now.

      After waiting for much longer than I would have allowed if I was Arlo, the man finally muttered, "I'm sorry."

      "I can't hear you!" Arlo practically yelled in his face.

      "I'm sorry!" the President raised his voice, obviously unnerved by Arlo's erratic behavior. "I'm sorry that my men shot you. They shouldn't have done that."

      "Thank you," Arlo said in a softer tone, stepping back. I saw the President's eyes drop down to Delphinium's knife in Arlo's hand.

      Apparently, Arlo didn't miss it either. "What? Is the knife making you uncomfortable?"

      While the man looked as if he'd rather not speak to Arlo ever again, he answered, "Yes, it is."

      Arlo raised the knife up. "You don't need to worry." He stuck out his tongue and let it trail up the side of the blade, watching the President's disgusted reaction the entire time.

      Huard looked at Arlo up and down, repulsed, and asked, "What's wrong with you?"

      Arlo gave him a smile that was a little too wide for the question. "What's wrong with me?"

The President answered uneasily, "Yes, what made you this way?"

If he'd asked me that question, I'd have the knife dragging across his skin in no time. But Arlo was more forgiving. "Do you really want to know?" he questioned, his voice dropping to a near-whisper.

      "I'll tell you what happened to me," Arlo told the President as if he was letting him in on a secret. "Imagine this: a pair of new parents bring their child home for the first time. They're overjoyed with the little bundle of joy, as any parents would be."

His voice turned less carefree. "Their world then crashes down when they discover their child is unlike any other. He begins to exhibit strange signs. Strange abilities. The couple does what any parents would do and they bring the boy before countless doctors. Soon, the visits to the pediatrician's office turn to check-ins into scientific laboratories. The child stayed for longer and longer visits until his parents stopped coming back for him one day."

I watched the looks on the others' faces. They looked at Arlo with pitying looks. I didn't particularly care about this sad tale Arlo was telling; some of the rest of us had it rough as well. I did, however, care about the way the President was watching him with a mixture of horror and fear.

"The scientists wanted to see just how powerful the boy's abilities were. Life as he knew it was full of needles, white tables and tubes feeding into his skin. Unfortunately, the doctors there weren't kind. They did unspeakable things to the boy in the name of science. He wasn't the same afterward."

Arlo leaned in close to the man. "Do you know what it's like to be deprived of basic human rights? To live under fluorescent white lights for your entire life, always wondering what the poison pumping into your veins was going to do to you this time? Do you know how it is to never see the light of day until you're eighteen years old?"

With his familiar wide grin, he said, "It's enough to make someone crazy."

This was interesting to me. I'd always suspected that there was a reason for Arlo's erratic behavior and now I had it. He was a scientific experiment. I supposed that we all had reasons for our own insanity.

Arlo walked in a circle around the bound President. "Want to see how crazy I can be?"

"No," croaked Huard.

His smile widening, Arlo replied, "You're about to find out." He raised the knife in his hand and breathed in audibly. "I can smell your fear. Your heart's hammering, I can hear it. Let's see how you'll react to this next part."

"No," Huard repeated, louder this time. "Don't do this."

Arlo put his finger to his chin, pretending to think it over. "There is one thing that could improve your chances of living: telling us the truth about your involvement with Imperium."

      The President looked fearful but didn't say anything back. He was still holding back.

"What'll it be, Mr. President? The truth or more torture?"

"I'll tell you the truth," Huard burst out finally.

Arlo smiled. "Good."