Demo-Industrial Prison

I taste blood. It’s not mine. I open my eyes to see a droplet fall from the mattress above me. Poor guy was getting too cocky, then again I didn’t wake to them, it could’ve been me, oh well some meat will be nice for a change. I sit up on my bed and wipe the blood from my face I’ve always hated the sticky warm feel of drying blood. Still can’t get away from it in here can I?

I heave his heavy body off the top bunk, almost being crushed in the process, and slump it into the corner of my cell. It is my cell now, at least until the new meat comes. I put a pillowcase over his head. He died looking at the guard; eyes still open in terror. He didn’t scream, would’ve been worse if he screamed.

I hear footsteps, guards coming for another round I guess. High Guard Liam looks at me through the bars. “You better not let him go to waste. Meat can go along way in ere’”. He smiles at me, a big toothy grin, the edges of his teeth filed to points, he almost looks shark like. I hate this man. In a world gone to hell, he found heaven on earth. I smile back at him. “I suppose I have you to thank for this gift then?”, his smile widens. “That’s right sunshine, and you better not forget it next time I’m in The Pit” he replies cheerily. After out little exchange he turns on his heel’s and stalks off. Now what to do with this ‘gift’? I got to my mirror, my face scared heavily and all my features deformed from all too many blows. This horrid picture looks almost fitting with the dark red blood splattered all over it.

The corner of my mirror is broken, I pull lose the long sliver of glass, It’s twice as long as my hand is wide, that’s handy. I pull the sheet of my late cell mates mattress, it’s so worn I tear it with no trouble into long thin strips and start rapping it around the fatter end of the shard. With my makeshift knife I turn on the body, his forearms were fat I’ll start with them. I shave thin strips of his flesh away, maybe an inch thick. Corse they’ll shrivel in the salt. In the corner of every cell is a barrel of salt, good for food, wounds or throwing in people’s eyes. I strip his arms to the bone all the way around, the muscles are laying in a pile next to me, the strips of meat already drying deep in the salt pot. I follow this same procedure with his legs. Once desensitized to this horrific sight it is almost comical, imagine if you will a head and torso, with two bloodied skeletal arms, and two bloody skeletal legs going out to find feet and hands still attached. Of course by this stage most of the blood has drained out everything has a dull lifeless grey to it. I can hear people in the cells near me waking got to get this done fast. I snap off his feet and hands, tossing them out the tiny window to the ground way below. The rats will enjoy it. Even after all I’ve been through I still cringe when I make it to his cock, I look away as I hack it off and throw it out the window too, balls and all. I can hear the murmur of chatter now, from the cell across I see the twins looking hungrily through their bars at me.

The twins are not human. Well if you listen to the stories. Between the two of them they supposedly way half a tonne, most of which is muscle and I do listen. They’re muscle machines, not too bright tho as they spend they’re spare time hitting each over the head to get a dopey effect like being drunk, then in this fogged state, do it over and over til they pass out on the floor. I signal for them to be quiet and lean my head through the bars to be as close as possible. “I’ll give you two the torso, just keep it quiet”, I had my reasons for this. The twins are quite handy to be on the right side of if you catch my drift especially when it comes to The Pit.

I suppose I should explain a little. I live in a prison of sorts. Every day I choose, work or fight. If I work, it feels like rest and I get to eat, drink and sleep in my cell at night. If I fight, not only do I get these staples, but fighting finishes early afternoon so I get a few hours peace, occasionally the crowd’s will trough real food (not the protein sludge they give us) though the fights rage harder around where the food is thrown so I tend to avoid that and most importantly everyday I survive is a credit to my name. For every 500 credits we get to ask for a privilege from the guards and if ever we survive 3650 days in The Pit (10 years of non-stop fighting) we are promoted to guards. Guards also fight some for pleasure their minds warped from years of suffering and some competing for the esteemed title of ‘Avalon Guard’ which is almost royalty in terms of power. Avalon Guards can do what ever they want, whenever they want. Only one is proclaimed a year. I am not looking to reach this status. But there is a big difference between workers and fighters. Fighters have hope and a will to live and the workers slave to survive yet never get anywhere in life.

Some two billion people live in these hell holes like me, striving for survival. Yet we live at the whim of only one quarter that amount. How did we get in this situation you ask? 700 odd years ago there was a revolution, known to the educated as the beginning of the demo-industrial era. The rich unified and hired an alien army to coral the masses into cages, in the years following they hired the same soldiers to build these massive structures and police them. This alien race know as the Dyn were perfect mercenaries, average hight of two and a half meters, strength and appetite to match (hence the twins rumour) left after completion but a few stayed to be the first race of guards, loving the feeling of power after year of servitude as a soldier.

Anyway back to my cell mate. I had to give him to the twins fast, so none could see. Anyone caught hiding food was as good as dead in here. I held the life less torso under my arm, still heavy even after removing arms and legs completely (the bones were in the corner of my cell, they could come in handy. Then the bell sounded. Once. Twice. I threw the torso with all my strength across through the now opened doors, the wins wasting no time to rip chunks out of him for breakfast, the sound of his bones breaking as they sunk their sausage fingers in through his chest. No one would question the twins where they got it, too scared. To me they were like trained dogs, to most they were vicious bears waiting for a reason to rip your head of, then eat it. The corridor swarmed with life now, men and women off all shapes and sizes fighting their way through the crowd hoping to get the best jobs on offer that day, Fighters waiting in their cages preparing for another days battle.

I’m a small guy, but when it comes to survival, I’m very resourceful. I tuck the glass knife in my belt and turn to do my regular preparations. Soaking in my sink were squares of cloth, one at a time I piled salt in the middle then tied the four corners together. These little pouches hung of my belt on metal hooks made of nails I found once when working as a cleaner. Yeah I sometimes worked, when I needed to recover or wanted a break. But rarely did I spend the day in my cell because that cost 5 credits. Usually when working I raced to the registry and worked the library. Nice, quiet easy work and I learnt a lot. Pouches secure I rapped a heavy leather cloak around me it was warm and acted like a kind of light armour. It was the first privilege I asked for. Lastly I secured my mask, It was a piece of cloth I wrapped around my face and tied at the back, slits for my eyes and mouth. Hood on not a part of me was visible except for my feet. I have an idea, I reached down for the finest of the bloody bones and snapped it in half, then dipping it in the blood pool on the floor to it to my mask. In the mirror I drew a symbol in blood on each of my cheeks. I learnt them while working in the library, but they’re meaning was commonly known, even to us. Quick and Death were the symbols. It takes a lot to frighten us fighters, and even harder to the guards but with blood fresh on my mask, it shows I have the blood lust and the ability early in the day. Some spend most of their time running around trying to live, this marked me as a killer, harder prey than those fools who try to run.


To be continued... Maybe...

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