Eric and Val were locked away, stuck in a forgotten prison filled with forgotten people. There were more than just them, but the other prisoners were so traumatized that their mouths could not hold words, and their ears could not consume noise, and soon it was a possibility that both Eric and Val could be in a similar position as they were.
The prison was dark. Light never dared to present itself in that place. The architecture was designed from all of the nightmares of this world that would creep deep into the darkest swamps of someone's soul, and it was designed this way for a reason. The evil consumed all that it touched in this prison and influenced the inhabitants of it to hurt one another. It split up people and transformed them into persons. There might not have been physical light, but through the souls of individuals, light forced a way to shine even in the darkest place on earth. There might have been swamps in the souls of people, but they eventually were washed away. There might not have been a group of people that met together, but they always had someone to talk to.
Val was beginning to panic because of all of the problems that were presented to her.
"Eric, what are we going to do to get out of this situation?"
"Don't know. I guess we just have to follow what the syndicate says if we are to get out alive." Eric suggested to Val.
"I don't want to do that though."
"What choice do we have? We are in a pit twenty feet below an almost one hundred foot tall basement. If we scream, no one will hear us. If we wave our hands, no one will see us. As far as I'm aware we are stuck here."
"I'd rather die than give the satisfaction to these clowns."
"But they get satisfaction out of our deaths too. You heard them. They were willing to give us a second chance out because of their so called 'grace.'"
"I guess." Val sighed and leaned her head against the wall.
Eric wanted to break free from the continuously depressing conversation that they were having. "I got to ask. How the hell did someone nice like you end up with Jose?"
Val chuckled a little then answered, "Ever been in love?"
"Once." Eric answered
"Well, I guess you could say what Jose and I had wasn't love; it was spite. I married him out of spite against my parents." Her emotions then quickly changed, "Jose would always buy such lovely gifts. Necklaces, earrings, pretty much anything that would make me look beautiful. He was a saint before we were married, but then… then…" She was then cut off from holding in tears
"Sorry if that made you feel bad talking about it."
"Oh it's fine. Just a little flustered, that's all. My parents hated him, and I should have listened to them. It wasn't love that Jose and I shared, it was bitterness and anger. What's it like falling in love anyway?"
"Best thing and the worst thing that will ever happen to you."
"Was it everything that you dreamed of?"
"And more."
"Well, what happened to her?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"I mean, ya, did your parents like her and all that stuff too?"
"I didn't have any parents. I'm an orphan." With those three words, Eric flattened every sound that was in that dark pit. Everything. Val looked at him in shock. Then her eyes turned that shock into sympathy and a whole array of different emotions. Eric broke the silence after this. "My father left my mother, and she couldn't handle raising me alone. So my mother, when I was five months old, left me at an orphanage. I was stuck in that place for my entire childhood. No one even looked at me, except one person. Sharon, that was her name. She was the only thing in my life that gave me hope. Over the years we became very good friends. She would sit down with me during lunch, and when I was sick she was there for me. It felt like it was a dream. But then there was a fire in the orphanage, and the whole west side of the building came down. She, along with many others, slept on the west side of the orphanage. I just remember looking over there where the heat was so intense that the paint started to melt off of the walls. She was stuck in the west wing but eventually managed to escape, but from that point on her health declined. I got lice a couple weeks later. That terrible building was so full of everything that no one ever wanted. Sharon didn't have lice, but she insisted on being with me, and she didn't have her bunkroom anymore, so I think she just wanted to be with someone that she knew. She got lice from me, and that's where things took a turn for the worst. Simple things like eating were becoming a struggle for her. So I would help her out with that, and yes there were caretakers there for that kind of stuff, but they just never had enough patience to deal with people like that. Things like going to the bathroom became difficult too for her. I let her have my bed, and I would sleep on the floor. Then, one night Sharon pissed the bed. She went to the bathroom to clean herself up, and while doing that, she started coughing blood. She came to me asking for help, but things were already too late. By the time I got to her, there was already so much blood covering the bathroom, and her face, oh her face was filled with such horror. She then fell to the floor and she was completely out of consciousness. I picked her up and brought her to her bed. I tried desperately to wake her up, but she wasn't." Eric then began sobbing, "I prayed that whole night, right beside her. I cried the whole night. I barely even got any sleep. The next morning I woke up, drenched in tears, and Sharon, she wasn't breathing. She barely even remembered me sometimes, but she didn't deserve any of it. She never said anything cruel to anyone. She never complained about any of it. "
There was a brief pause before Val said something. "What happened after that did someone ever adopt you?"
"No. The orphanage thought that I killed Sharon because of all of the blood in the bathroom. They didn't even want to spend any money on an investigation into her actual cause of death. So, they kicked me out telling me that I was the one that killed her. I was so angry at them that I came back with fire. I told all of the orphans to get out of the building, and they did. From there, I threw torches and gasoline into the orphanage. I watched it burn. Nothing ever felt so incredible to me than that in that very moment. The sounds of the caretakers screaming was like joy to my ears. I know it was such disgusting behavior, but justice had to be done. Someone else got arrested for it since I ran after that, and I have been running ever since."
The conversation from there grew quiet. The persons of this dark realm were beginning to grow anxious. They had been in here for so long that they knew exactly when the syndicate was coming for someone. The stomping of feet grew closer. Every living thing down there, clenched their fists and gnashed their teeth. Then, two more footsteps were heard, and the large metal trapdoor that kept all the inhabitants down there, was lifted.
"Eric York and Val Camino, your presence has been requested by the syndicate."
Val and Eric were both in shock when they heard this. Their minds started questioning why the syndicate would want them? They both were escorted out of the prison and presented before the heads.
"Eric York and Val Camino, you both have a chance to lessen your sentence today by doing something extraordinary." The first head to the left spoke, "If you are willing, we want you to assassinate this man." The head then gave a photo to his guard who then presented it to Eric and Val.
"Why him?" Eric asked.
"He is a candidate for the mayor's office, but we don't like his potential policies." The second head to the left spoke.
"Ya, but it's only a candidate for Glenwood Springs. That's a town with only six thousand people tops."
"Ah, but you see. He who controls the town, controls the people. He who controls the people, controls the country, and he who controls the country, well, he is who is really in power." The third head to the left spoke.
"Can we have some time to think about it?" Eric asked.
"Sure, by all means, think about it here if you'd like." The fourth head spoke, and with his words the decision was already made.
"Eric, I don't think we should do this." Val argued.
"What choice do we have?" Eric protested.
"We're talking about taking someone's life here!"
"But they're going to take ours if we don't!"
"I would rather die than take some innocent man's life."
"But I don't want to die. Besides, not everyone is innocent."
"Please, don't do this Eric!"
"We have to, they'll kill us both if we don't."
"No, there is no 'we' in this, only you. I'm not going with you if you do this." After Val said this both of their minds were made and there was no stopping the inevitable outcome of their decisions.
"I will do it." Eric told the syndicate heads his decision, "Val does not want to participate in this."
"Excellent choice Mr. York. As for Val, we will not kill her this time, but if she refuses to participate in the next task we may just have to." The first head of the syndicate spoke.
"Where is this guy anyways?" Eric asked the syndicate.
"He is down by the park at the Colorado River. There he is making a speech for his campaign." The second head stated.
"We would like you to execute this task with a rifle if that is comfortable with you." The third head suggested.
"I don't think that that would be the best way to go about this." Eric replied.
"How would you go about this, Mr. York?"
"I think quietly and discreetly is best, after his speech I will get close to him and stab him to death. The less noise the better."
"We will hold this up to a vote. All in favor of this raise your hand." The first head called for the voting, and all four heads raised their hands.
"We will supply you with the knife. Prepare quickly please. You leave in an hour."
Eric and Val were then escorted out of the court, but in two separate directions. Val threw a couple more words at Eric just before she left his sight.
"You don't have to do this Eric!"
Eric didn't reply. His face snarled at her words, and his mind was already made. At this point, his eyes looked like burning embers, and his facial expression was that of carelessness. As he walked away, his emotions began to silence themselves, and all he had left in him was focus and perspicacity. Eric then stepped up the endless staircase, spirling all the way up until he reached the top. Daylight blanked his vision, for he had not seen the outside world for a long while.