Sweet Pandemonium

Chapter 7

The dim rec room vibrated with heavy metal music as four interrogators helped a woman in business slacks fix another woman to a torture rack. On the other side, off-duty guards did shots in the midst of denizens strung from the ceiling. Their pleas were muffled by rags about their mouths, but were otherwise naked. Ire had spoken to a short, thickly bearded woman only moments before about food. The dwarf returned now and shoved what looked like an incredibly dense cracker in her hand. “I ate the worms out of that one,” she rumbled.


“Thanks Sigrid,” Ire winked. “Who do you want me to punch?”


“See that Sergeant over there? We tag team him, right now.”


“Say no more.” Ire shed her jacket, adjusted her bra, and grabbed an empty beer glass from off a nearby table.


“Where are you…?” Maria’s question died in mid-sentence as they left, and she turned her attention to the dense cracker. It felt hard as a rock. “Do I want to know what’s in this?”


“Hardtack might be the only halal food down here,” Hanan assured. “If you don’t break a tooth on it, you should be fine.”


“Halal…? Oh!” Maria shuffled her feet, unable to meet his gaze. “So, um, I hope you don’t mind if I ask… if it’s rude to ask what people, you know—”


Hanan picked at a speck of blood under his fingernails. “In life, I was Muslim, yes.”


“...But you’re not now?”


The colonel considered her question as he lit a cigarette. “I lost the privilege of that identity,” he admitted as Ire chatted up Sigrid’s sergeant, who had been pantomiming anal penetration on one of the men hung from the ceiling. The other guards backed away slowly as the sergeant turned and saw Ire, then slowly raised his open palms.


“That’s just what I think,” Hanan continued as he watched. “The ISIS people I’ve spoken to would disagree. It’s strange. We don’t know for sure what role religion has in damning us—if Allah spoke to me before casting me out, I certainly don’t recall it—but I’ve locked people of all creeds into those economy cages down below.”


Maria studied him carefully.  “...Why do you think you’re here?”


“I take pride in my physical appearance, I came to know plenty of women out of marriage, and I also killed four thousand people.”


Ire grabbed the sergeant and pulled him into a headbutt. Sigrid the dwarf grappled from behind and twisted him onto the floor. “Guys! Help!” He yelled, but the rest of the Fangs shuffled around their trussed-up prisoners. Ire leapt on top of the man and shattered her beer glass over the sergeant’s head. Maria was only paying half-attention to their astonishing efficiency.


“Jeez!” she exclaimed. “How’d you do that?”


Hanan hid his smile as he smoothed his mustache. “Well, most were accomplished with a sword, but I killed a handful, well, with my bare hands.”


“Stop yanking my chain, dude.”


“I never yank anyone’s chain! I was Bostanci Basha, hand of justice to the grand sultan himself! If an execution needed to be done in the capital, I was the one to do it. I’d say an average of two or three a day, most every day, for over ten years. The arithmetic checks out.”


“You didn’t use many vacation days, huh?”


Hanan bellowed out a great laugh. Meanwhile, the sergeant let out a final whimper as Ire stepped away from him, a shard from the beer glass glistening red in her hand. She addressed the guards standing awkwardly among their prisoners. “I don’t want to fuck with any of you, but if you take issue with what just happened, now’s a good time to do something about it. Anyone?”


“We’re good Ire,” one man mumbled. The rest nodded in silence.


“Where are you from?” Hanan probed to Maria.


“Chicago.”


“That name is familiar somehow...”


“It’s a city in America. Windy city, famous for deep-dish and Al Capone...”


Recognition lit in Hanan’s eyes. “Ah, Richard Daley’s city! Has your family been there long? Maybe they met him.”


“I’ve been there most of my life, but I moved there when I was super young. Well…” She lit up and waved her hands as she spoke loudly over the death metal. “My dad’s family came from Mexico. My mom’s mom left Chile and came to Texas, and she met my mom’s dad there after he moved from Guatemala. Mom and dad married in Dallas. So that makes me, like, Chilea-Guatecan!”


“I see,” Hanan’s eyes glazed over halfway through her explanation. He quickly turned towards the approaching woman covered in blood. “Ire! We should get moving if we’re going to have time by my office. You should eat that.” Maria studied the hardtack in her hand, but was distracted by Ire’s crimson-soaked appearance.


“That’s all from that guy?” Maria gawked. “What was all that about anyway?”


“I got Sigrid to get you food,” Ire shrugged, “so I owed her a small favor. In this case, I beat the shit out of that guy.”


“But who was he? Why did she ask you to do that?”


Ire laughed once in disbelief at the stupid question. “Does it matter?” she tossed the red glass shard to the floor and followed Hanan past the rec room tables. Maria dawdled behind, and eyed the hardtack that was apparently worth savage assault. She attempted a bite, and nearly broke her teeth over it.