Vivisepulture

[Dogs231]

Silence had never been so loud.

The sound was present, of course, but it was quiet, effortlessly cajoled into the furthest ends of the atmosphere by the taciturn air—background radiation, the earnest purrs and hums and thunders of the automobile's engine working on multiple cylinders and pulsating with power, the terse rumble of the uneven asphalt deafened below its spinning wheels. A great aura of dominating tension loomed in the cold stillness, hanging still there in the air like somebody had strung it up high from the gallows-tree.

A young Daniel Arista dared not speak; his tongue might as well not have been present for all its use, as if someone had just torn it out of his head. He sat there, still and stewing and brewing in his troubles, his slim arms crossed and little lips pursed in unheard contemplation. Now and again, his eyes would dart briefly to his father's stoic face; they never lingered there for long, fearing a retribution of some kind, though he knew not what form it might take (if it were to take a form other than imaginary).

Hugo Arista, visible only in profile to his son (seated in the back and to the right of him), was unreadable, his expression blank and vacant as he stared outward through the windows to the expanse of concrete in the distance (which, through a child's eyes, could have gone onward for all eternity). His large, veined right hand, on its lonesome, gripped tightly to its half of the steering wheel, spinning it there and back effortlessly. Daniel looked back at him, studying his face. Hugo's eyes found prey.

Daniel shuddered.

"Son," Hugo Arista said, his voice as vacant as his eyes. Daniel knew not how to respond (nor, for that matter, whether or not a response was expected or wanted); his lips stayed sealed. Hugo goggled at him for a bit, then frowned and returned his attention solely to the road. "Boy, you better brighten up before your face gets stuck like that. Honest to God, what's got you all worked up now? With a look like that, you'd think you just killed someone or somethin'. Ain't you glad? Try a smile for once."

Daniel looked at his feet.

Hugo Arista sighed, shaking his head in obvious disappointment. Then, suddenly, he veered to their right flank as hard as he could, sending Daniel into a sudden fright. After that, he let off the accelerator, allowing the car to quietly skate to a halt before he parked it on the side of the road. Then, he leaned over the car's center console towards Daniel, who shrunk from him on instinct, a flinch running all throughout him. For his part, Hugo just turned back again, slumped down, and rolled his eyes.

"Look, it ain't matter," Hugo said, a sigh escaping through the prison of his teeth. "You won that match, you won it good; that's all I want from you. So stop wincin' and cowerin' like you're about to get beat, 'cause you ain't. Save it for when you fuck up. If you're all sore over that girl, well, lemme tell you: don't believe for a second she wouldn't have done the same to you, boy, if she had the chance. That's how the game works; that's life. If it makes it a little better, I'm proud of you, even if you ain't proud of you."

Daniel studied the intricacies of his shoelaces.

"Tell me—" Hugo said, his voice placid "—what do you want?"

Daniel considered it momentarily, eyes reddening and tearing up as he thought. "I'unno," his saner mind settled on as its final answer after what felt like a thousand years of philosophical contemplation. Still, before his mind could decide that, his mouth acted on its own accord, uprising and shouting its rebellion, spouting and blubbering inelegantly onto his jersey: the words themselves were unimportant, unremembered by all, but they were enough to cause scars that would last him a veritable lifetime.

All he remembered was the sound of his dad screaming bloody murder.

[ A18: DANIEL ARISTA - CONTINUED FROM "Error" ]

Daniel stared at the screen, swiping right and swiping right and swiping right, changing from camera to camera to camera—as he'd moved across the hallway and down the stairs from the third floor to the second floor, he'd placed a few cameras at points he had determined to be valuable in a strategic sense; outside of the two left at the scene of the crime, he had placed one in the primary hallways of each floor, staring down the corridor, unblinking, allowing him to see more-or-less anyone traversing.

It was through one of these cameras—located on the other side of the corridor from where he stood—that he looked through the hallway, his body obscured from view by standing in the corner where the walls met the school's lockers. His attention was drawn by a sudden beep—the same one he'd learned by trial and error—from the device, a notification signaling him to check what it had so poetically ticketed "Camera #1." He swiped back towards it, greeted by a swarm of people at the scene.

He scowled. They had found the body already; it'd only been a while out from the time when it happened—his estimate on the scale of minutes: thirty to forty-five. Worst of all, they were armed—armed to the teeth. At least one of them had what looked almost like a gun (though he wasn't entirely sure of this); the others were armed with a myriad of close-range weapons, all better equipment than his own (save one, empty-handed). He scowled, sighed, and slid the tablet into his pocket, moving quickly.

Mark 'em all down: K-O-S. Get them before they can get you, Daniel.

Could he do it?

Be a man, Hogan. You ain't no quitter. You weren't raised that way.

Could he do it again?

[Pancapples]

Deep breaths, long breaths, real breaths.

A34: XAVIER RIOS - GAME START

Real-life air, in and out, breathing steady.

His eyes were shut the very moment they opened to the white room, and remained shut all through the ensuing events. As he felt himself stir awake for the second time, he refused to open them. Groping at the waxy floor, his fingers caught the foot of a desk, cold and metal. Fingertips slid up the metal leg, feeling the slightest resistance from his skin sticking to the stainless steel. His knuckles knocked into the underside with a hollow sound and a dull pain, the back of his hand slid across the cheap-feeling wood to the edge. He planted a hand on the laminated wooden surface and rose to his feet, then took in another deep breath.

Xavier raised a trembling right hand to his chest, felt his lungs strain against his ribs, staccato heartbeat cascading to his other side. "This is real. This is real. But this can't be real." Thoughts churned and twisted around his head like some terrible parasite. "Can't be real, but it has to be real." Circular thoughts stuck to his brain like a disease. He took a step, heard a crunch, opened his eyes.

His hand was on the sole piece of standing furniture in the ruins of a Spanish class, a teacher's corner desk blanketed with scribbled obscenities and misspelled Spanish swears. Underfoot, a shard of glass making up the larger minefield scattered across nearly every inch of floor. He let out another breath, shakier than the last. "Fuck." The word came out as a jagged whisper, and his eyes wandered along the floor for a second longer before moving to the corner closest to him. Two steps forward, glass crushing against his soles like fresh snow, Xavier folded his arms against the confluence of the walls and repeated himself.

"Fuck."

He closed his eyes, and buried his face in his arms.

"Fuck!"

He half-shouted, half-sobbed, muffled by the wall and himself. Stomped down, shards and splinters took to the air.

"This can't be real, but it has to be real."

[Dogs231]

Daniel silently pressed onwards. Occasionally, someone listening could hear someone's feet stamping down on the linoleum tiling of the hallway in a determined, unbroken stride. The sound of his Converse sneakers echoed against the ground—a squeak here, a thump there, like a monster in the night. Eventually, he stopped. His hooded brown eyes darted to the open door of another classroom, narrowing themselves as the air went in and out through his nose, chest rising and falling all slow-like as he did.

Behind the door, he could hear something—something, but he couldn't place it. Muffled chokes and gasping breath, a wail of sorrow through the walls—drowning banshees. He clenched his blood-stricken fist around the tennis racket in his hand, ready to strike at whatever—someone or something—came from the room. Nothing came. He swallowed a little, and though it was light, it felt like hot lead and bile and tasted like old rot and sticky blood in his teeth. Then, he walked towards the source of it.

Here we go again.

As his left hand pushed the wooden door open, creaking as it swung inward, he took in the space. It was the room in which they'd held their Spanish classes. It was in tatters, its walls a scrambled, papier-mâché mess of torn posters and broken shelves. Someone had messily scrawled vulgarities all over the wall—at least, that's what he guessed. His Spanish was never the best. On the other side of the room, the windows looked to be smashed in, the floor a veritable minefield of shattered glass knives.

After a second or so, his narrowed eyes darted to the other person on the furthest edge of the room. It was a young man, not wholly unlike him. His olive skin was somewhat tanned but still lighter than Daniel's own, and his hair was long, worn like a girl might've—so was his thought. The other boy was crumpled up like a discarded origami, curled inwards—a tangled mess of limbs shielded his face as if what he couldn't see couldn't hurt him. Tears streamed heavily down the boy's face, a show of weakness.

At once, Daniel realized that it'd been so long since the last time he'd let himself shed a tear that he couldn't quite remember what it sounded like.

It's fine. You aren't the kind of person to start crying anyway, Daniel.

You weren't raised that way.

His thoughts stopped there, made to end by force of strong will. Daniel tilted his head, squinting more than a little at the boy's bag, which was just out of their reach—running reconnaissance. There was a rough-hewn shape in it, many lumps poking out every which way. He recognized the silhouetted mass of canvas that wrapped it. It was, unmistakably, a gun. Not a pistol, but something else, something more significant—this was the big one. It was a shotgun. Without a doubt, it was a shotgun.

That's one hell of a trade-up. You'd better count your lucky stars, boy.

Rushing for the bag before the other boy had the chance to come out of his panic-induced stupor, Daniel swung its strap towards himself. He tossed the tennis racket in his right hand aside, like the garbage it was, to which it clattered against the floor, and swiftly began to strip the bag open in one lengthy, solid motion. After that, he reached out, felt his fingers wrap around the furniture, and lifted it out with a smile that he forced himself to wear—it was the other boy's price, it was Daniel's prize.

It was then that he got his first good look at it. This gun, he knew at first glance, was a Cerberean monstrosity of a firearm, its three metal barrels pointing out menacingly at the nebulous distance in front of them as if ready to kill God. Its wooden furniture was master-crafted; its walnut grain, inlaid with the glimmer of gold in a line where the stock threaded onto the handle, was perfect—not a scratch throughout its whole body. He had no name for it. But names were for friends. A gun was a tool.

He had never held a firearm before. But he acted on instinct.

There's a first time for everything.

All at once, with the telltale snikt of heavy metal, as if he was Wolverine with sharpened claws, Daniel hefted the gun upwards, its barrels pointed directly at the other boy's—Xavier, wasn't he called? Daniel only just now remembered—head. He took a deep breath and steeled himself. He made himself ready for anything. His tongue ran swiftly across the caps of his teeth, sweeping away some sticky redness from the ivory of his molars. A lull was in the air—a comedic beat with no comedy—his hands quaking.

[Pancapples]

More breaths, ragged and heavy. Xavier slapped a palm against the wall, felt the sting domino to his fingertips, the ache cascade up his arm. He breathed in through his mouth, out through his mouth. Heart pounding, wall sweaty to the touch. Brought in another long, harsh breath, exhaled through painfully grit teeth.

"This isn't real."

Tightness in his chest, pressure in his skull. Hot tears touched his cheeks and he smothered a sob. Clenched his fist against the wall, the cheap paint made his nail beds sting. Another breath, shaky but steady. Xavier steadied himself, raised his head and stood up straight. He heard a pop from the glass underfoot, heard a shard bounce against something metal. He exhaled again, in one steady breath.

"This is real."

Xavier unclenched his jaw, took another long breath, felt his chest expand and contract. He licked his lips, dry and cracked, then opened his eyes, gaze settling on the dusty, cobwebbed corner he'd laid his head. He'd need to wipe his face later.

"I can do this." He thought to himself, same as he did every morning, and pushed off the wall. He took a deep breath, a normal breath, felt real air fill his real lungs, then turned to face the front of the room.

He didn't exhale, he didn't blink, he only stared. This was real.

[Dogs231]

"Stand up, boy," Daniel said, an uncertain tremble in his tone as the words fell out of his mouth—a voice just shy of being commanding, his cadence a hollow imitation of the one figure he feared more than God. As if to try and compensate for that, the boy stood tall, then taller—now almost on his toes—as if to loom over the boy splayed out before him. Chills swept rapidly down his spine, electrifying every nerve as they ran their course downward, swift as rapid waters in frigid winter. He swallowed hard, tasting sourness mixed with the iron-like taste that was already present—felt the hot bile rise like lava, the acid run like venom on a snake's fangs.

Strike first. Strike hard. No mercy.

His right hand shakily hiked its way up the laminated wood grain handle of the gun, pressing the butt of the firearm deep into his shoulder. The left held the underside tightly, cradling it like his flesh and blood. Both hands quavered and wobbled—his twitching finger stayed looped through the guard, placed so dangerously close to the trigger, like a guillotine hanging right above Xavier's head. The interiors of the barrels were as black as night, a void ready to devour within its tripartite maws—Cerberus, once more, how sharp its fangs were. Daniel gritted his teeth, gritted so hard that it hurt, so hard his whole jaw began to shake from the pressure.

"It ain't right for a man, you know," Daniel croaked out, voice a pale rasp, "to die on his knees."

[Pancapples]

Stimuli, words, real life human voices. Terrible vibrations hit Xavier's eardrums, dominoed around the circumference of his skull. He felt the whiplash of falling sixty stories and catching oneself by the pinkie finger. He was being spoken to, there was another real human being present, but Xavier's tongue felt swollen, his teeth felt foreign.

Trifecta of black voids inches from his pupils, the figure behind blurry and blending into the backdrop, Xavier let out another breath. A chill radiated from the blued steel barrels, he thought he could see his breath. His nostrils flared, taking in another breath, smelling metal and gunpowder in his mind’s eye. Finally he parsed them, the words.

“It ain't right for a man, you know…” The words had a voice, and that voice had a face. Xavier's vision steadied, his focus shifted to the face holding the weapon. Daniel Something, Xavier didn't know his last name, never bothered learning. He recognized the boy from passing periods and a handful of classes, but never saw him outside of the headset. He felt words forming, rising from his chest and catching in his throat. He wanted to speak, to let out a “what” or “why”, but simply couldn't.

“...to die on his knees.” Daniel finished his sentence, hoarse and unsure. Xavier gazed upward, mouth slightly agape. The words had meaning, had purpose. Xavier’s mind was a cyclone, fear and confusion whirling around one central thought. He was going to die, this boy was going to kill him. He barely knew what was happening, and this boy was already going to kill him.

He tried to reply, to cry out, insult the boy, make even the slightest whimper, and he managed less than a breath. He hadn't blinked once, hadn't stopped studying Daniel's face since he finished his sentence. Xavier had nothing he could say, and nothing to do but wait. So he simply waited, took another breath. He closed his eyes.

[Dogs231]

Daniel stood. Daniel stared.

Could you do it? Could you kill someone? Could you do it again?

His index finger hewed close to the trigger. So close; so close; so close. It hovered like an omen of the reaper, whispering so many silent promises of the twilight in how his nail clicked against the metal of the trigger guard. So close; so close; so close. It was the end of the end, the sharp edge of eternity itself, separated from final deliverance, fatal deliverance, only by the space of an approximate millimeter, a hair's breadth enough to close the distance—the narrowest of margins bridging all of life and death itself.

Do you even have a choice in the matter? Can you even say 'no'?

His fingers tightened on the grip as if afraid to lose their hold, their sinews flexing taut and tight. Veins bulged out on the back of his hand, pulsing against the canvas of his dark skin. In Daniel's head, in Daniel's mind, he ran incomprehensible commandments through his neurons like a terrible, dogmatic religion, overriding critical thought with fight-or-flight—then, he ran the numbers, his risk-benefit analysis and arithmetic, coming to the exact solutions as scripture; that it had to end here, now, just like this.

You ain't no quitter, Daniel. You weren't raised that way.

You weren't raised that way.

All it would take was a single pull of the trigger and Xavier—everything he was now and everything he could ever be—would end forever. All of him, all the almost uncountable number of cells—both neuron and glial—that composed him, an imaginary army two hundred billion strong, would then cease to be anything more than decorative. Anything that remained, any pomace-essences of the boy's brain, would only exist as red ones and zeroes pollocked across the wall. All it would take was a single pull of the trigger.

Bang.

So be a man. Take the shot.

And that, more than anything, scared the living daylights out of Daniel.

Your fear is a weakness.

It was the end, simple as—a sudden stop to the sentence of one's life.

Others will use it to hurt you. Just like he did. Don't give them a chance.

There was always someone on the other side of the gun, on the other side of the coin—Charon's Obol, how it brought them to Hades. Today, it was Xavier, on the verge of death, nearing the terminal precipice of fate. Tomorrow, he thought. Tomorrow, it could be me. And what if it were? If it were him in that position and someone else with their fingers on the trigger—what if it were? Oh, he thought, and thought, and thought. What if their roles were reversed? What if the whole world turned upside-down?

Would they hesitate—even for a moment? Would they grant him their mercy?

Oh, Lord.

He prayed.

Give me mercy. Give me fucking mercy.

Nobody answered.

[Pancapples]

Xavier had always been told that before death, one’s life flashes before their eyes, but he didn’t see any of that. He couldn't feel the warmth of the sun or the wind through his hair, the smell of his mother's cooking didn't fill his head, nor did any familiar sounds of family or friends.

The room was still and cold. Time felt slow, and Xavier’s own ragged breaths were the only thing he could hear. He didn’t know the other boy very well, he hadn’t seen Daniel at PE or around town, the two had never actually spoken before. Daniel was nobody to him, and Xavier had no reason to believe he was anybody to Daniel. So he sat and waited, gritted his teeth. He let out a breath, brought in another.

Xavier held in his breath until his chest began to burn, but refused to release it. He felt his face heating up, but still heard the boy across from him, heard his own shaky breaths, heard the gun in his hands clicking and trembling. Xavier was sweating, the room was spinning. He was afraid, and Daniel was afraid, and Xavier was afraid that Daniel was afraid. His teeth hurt, but he clenched his jaw as if grinding them to dust. His knees were cold and sore against the dirty plastic floor, and he felt his fingernails digging into his palms. He felt sick, he felt nauseous, the world felt ten times brighter from behind his eyelids.

He waited and sat, waited for the flash and the bang that he knew was coming. The next event was going to happen, the last one of his life, and it was the only thing he could wait for, the only real thing remaining. He was stuffed into a box by his school, locked into the box by whoever did this to them, and shoved into another box built by Daniel Whatshisname. He sat and waited, grinding his teeth into dust and holding his breath until he felt dizzy.

He opened his eyes.

[Dogs231]

A single pull of the trigger. A simple twitch of the finger.

All it would take was that—inconsequential actions, accidental motions, death a hair's breadth away from swinging its cold scythe. That alone, and Daniel could put to final rest all that uncertainty, all that doubt, all the pulsing of his nerves beneath the skin. A single action, single-action, an instant instance of thoughtless, emotionless violence, and all the distress would disappear in a cloud of gunsmoke—buckshot setting the pressure in his heart to pasture like a dose of lisinopril, a bitter pill to swallow up.

One trigger. One finger. One bullet. One cry of 'bang, bang—you're dead!'

Could you do it? Could you kill someone?

...

Could you do it again?

...

Be a man, Hogan. Be a man, Daniel.

---

Daniel, stealing himself to the most hidden corner of his bedroom, leafed the crumpled papers in his fingers, clasping them tightly within shocked and shaking hands. His eyes, wide and wary, shot across the lines of text like bullets—back and forth, back and forth, back and forth again, ping-ponging here and there and everywhere. Praying, praying, praying in vain—praying that, the next time he read it over, the words would shift and change, re-arranging themselves to a statement he could stomach.

...

It was the end before the end, the death of the little death; no family, no future, a dead-end brick wall that seemed to rise to meet him. All it took was that one word, that one word, to crush all the spirit remaining in his soul, more than any car or crash could have done in a thousand years; more than any berating or beating, it left a scar—not on his body, but on his brain, on his heart, a bloody, gaping hole that buried itself inside his gut, bile riding up his throat like a surfer. A fatal shot—it killed him dead.

Impotent.

It was the term that the clinic had used in its execution letter, sending him to the grave with no hope to cling to. It was the blade used to cut down all the branching paths of his future. A word that, even with its broadest strokes and simple natures, painted his fortune down to the farthest and furthest corners of the canvas. Those eight letters, two deaths in one word, were a statement all their own, a proclamation that said, in no unsure terms, a promise and a threat: "You will never be good enough."

...

That night, Daniel tore that little letter into even littler pieces. He swept them into his big hands, crushing them into a paper pile. Crouching down, scowling in spite, he threw every scrap of paper into the family's fireplace, sparing none of it—not a letter, not a word. None of it could stay; none of it could remain. A log lobbed, kicking up a cloud of ash, and his funeral pyre was ready; no wake, only regret. Determined in his purpose, he held the barbeque lighter—gripped it so hard that his fingers pulsed with pain.

Finger on the trigger.

He pulled. Click. He pulled. Click. He pulled. Click.

He pulled. Bang.

...

It was his secret. He'd take it to the grave.

---

He let the trigger go, let his finger slip.

Impotent.

The barrel of the gun fell like an executioner's axe, stripped of its lethality. His hands held the grip, tighter and tighter, fingernails scratching into the veneer of the wood and leaving themselves bruised and bloodied. Daniel gritted his teeth, grinding them to dust—said nothing, had nothing to say. Vague threats rolled down his spine like ice water, but the heat welled in his chest, burning like a hot stove. His eyes narrowed, and he made an ugly face as he turned away, too ashamed to meet the other boy's gaze.

It's a lot harder to kill someone when you look them in the eyes first.

[ A18: DANIEL ARISTA - CONTINUED ELSEWHERE ]

[Pancapples]

Xavier stared, he blinked, he stared a little more at the door slammed shut before him. He waited and waited until finally the words reached his lips, shattering the concrete coating his throat.

“What the fuck.”

Less than a minute earlier, he’d been preparing his final thoughts, gun barrel practically at his teeth, and now? A silent room, a creaky door, a heartbeat like a drum solo. He felt his hands tremble, his mouth go dry, and his head start to spin.

This is stupid, he thought. Survived a near-death encounter, and what does he do? Panics some more, worries some more, freaks out a little more. Xavier hated this, hated all the close calls and almost deaths. He shouldn’t still be here, shouldn’t be in this game. He should’ve died as a boy, locked in a trunk with his role models sitting on the lid. He should’ve died as an adolescent, falling from a rooftop and hitting hot concrete. He should’ve died last Saturday, hit by the ECR because he was too impatient for the walk sign.

Xavier unclenched his jaw and let out a heavy sigh. “Shit sucks,” he said, and brought himself slowly to his feet. “Fucking anxious idiot.” He raised a hand, held it up to his face, studied the lines and creases and scars. All current and up-to-date, even the fresh burn on his left thumbtip he got from trying to look tough flipping tortillas last Wednesday. Angelica laughed when she saw his hand recoil backwards from the stove, and Citlali just smiled and got him a bandaid. He thought for a moment, and remembered the events of the morning. The last thing that idiot at the front said, the weirdo who pretended to be a student, Xavier remembered.

Xavier stared at the door and blinked again, then reached out a shaky hand for the knob. He really hoped his sisters weren't watching.

[ A34: XAVIER RIOS, continued in "the school is an empty glass"]