1
One of those things that weren’t for sober minds was the sampling.
We were not afraid of death whether it was the image of it or the sight of it or its imminence. We honoured and revered it; if it came we would embrace it. We wanted to die (both because of the pain of our existence here and the fact it could transport us where our existence is welcomed), but we just had to do it right. The trick of the sampling was tormenting the soul and the body of the sample until we broke its will to carry on living in this world, much like the same tormenting worthlessness this world imposes on us until suicide presents itself as the only way. We did whatever it took, decapitation, drowning, flaying, mutilation and all sorts of torture, to make them grovel for their own death. We offer them a way out in a form of suicide we choose. This way their state of mind is a bit similar to ours, their death is self-inflicted and possibly when they transition we will be able to tell from observing their eyes where they end up (heaven, hell or our home). It can take days, weeks or months to get them to that state, but we always managed to push them there. If the way of suicide, which is a form of transportation of the soul, is discovered that would take us home (as the calling made us feel) we would do it without a flinch. It's not the pain that concerns us, the more the pain the better (Macxermillio says you will be able to feel the death on you, you will be able to feel the journey and that the pain is equivalent to the road in some instances). To dwell about is endless torture; each creature deserves to be in a place where it rightfully belongs, its habitat. A place of belonging is an integral part of one’s person-hood. If it is death it takes to feel like a person, even remotely, then death is what we shall accept with an immeasurable joy and gratitude. The quest to attain our person-hood is not an easy one, it is not without sin or evil.
The blade of the sword sunk into his bicep like a blazing knife through a cold block of butter, it was just a slit.
Sweet sweet beautiful blood, I gasped mesmerised at its sight. Excited.
The sample flinched into consciousness. “Oh shit! “
“It’s about time you woke up,” Macfearson spoke. “We’ve been waiting ever so patiently.”
“Shit! Fuck! Sandy, what is this?” He tried tugging his left hand off the wall, unsuccessfully so. He was cuffed with beast depowering iron cuffs attached to the stone cobbled wall, hinges reinforced into the wall. His ankles suffered the same fate. We had stripped him off, spread him like a canvas. Our own little Jesus.
“Sandy, you bitch! You sick freak! Fuck you!” he raged, I loved watching his belly tremble as he did. “Help! Help!”
Macxermillio comically looked around. “Huh? Looks like nobody cares. Or is it that they can’t hear you?” He cackled with an almost lunatic revelry.
“Help! Help ! Hel- “Macfearson punched him in the stomach.
“Why do you think you’re not gagged? “ Macfearson rhetorically asked, glaring at him.
Macxermillio was behind me on a crate of beer, sipping on a 750ml. The place was wrecked and had been abandoned for years unknown to us. Dirt accumulated on the floor, collapsing ceiling spilling its insides, mould, woodpile scattered around, bins, paper and plastic. The Sampling Chamber, as we had named it, was Macxermillio’s find. Far away from the city or the lifelings. Perfect for a sampling ritual. It was dark and gloomy with just enough light for a deathling to dwell in, which was little light (that was how we preferred it). I could sense generations of ghosts of the persons who once stayed on the abandoned farm scampering about and watching us, lonely spirits of the countryside being treated to some horror style entertainment every time we visited. If they cowered in repulsion or horror, it was way better than the decades of boredom and un-eventfulness that this place was accustomed to.
“You freak! You’re mad you know that?” He continued, “What you gonna do? Kill me? “
“It’s actually weird that you are asking me this question when you have always known the answer. Do you remember what you said to your mates?” I softly spoke my eyes fixed on the blood, felt the hurt, anger and hatred towards him simmer like pins and needles.
He did not respond, only wriggled and panted hopelessly.
“Either way, don’t you think it’s a bad idea for a person in your situation to be so mean?”
Silence.
"Let me remind you," my voice mellow to my ears, every word making my compulsion and anger worse, "You told me, in front of your mates, that if I go on a killing spree to remember to spare you. Now, why would you believe that and always managed being an ass to me? Belittle me, humiliate me in front of others?”
"I was joking, just messing around. You know how the guys are. That's what guys do, I did not mean to tune you, Sandy!" he spluttered.
“And I didn’t mean to get hurt,” A dark smile flickered across my face. This was exhilarating every time, never got used to it. “Answer honestly. You have always seen me as a freak, right?”
“C’mon, man, let’s not do this!” He wept.
We devoured the moment, the moment of complete power over another person’s will.
“You are a freak! Fuck, you not even one bit human! You are insane! “He shrieked.
I am not human, I cognitively agreed.
“You see that is why we are, Jay. I am not human. I don’t belong here,” I shrugged, “We both know it. That is why you gave me a hard time. That is why we need you to be our little Jesus today.”
The calling stronger than ever, I stared down at my feet. Lifelings are creatures devoid of tolerance. They deserve anything lesser than mercy because they never grant it either.
“I am gonna kill you, Sandy, when I get down. Even in my death, I swear to God, I am gonna make sure I make your life a living hell,” Jay threatened.
I disappointed him with my bland incongruent response. “If you were somebody else, another student, I would have been kinder, but you see it’s people like you that don’t deserve that. If not all of you lifelings.” I paused. “Tell me. What would you do to be home right now, Jay? To see your parents or your loved ones? To go back the res? Or whatever shit you’re into? I hear moments like these make people ponder how they have lived their lives and usually they discover what matters most or what mattered most. I know that you have that thing in your mind, tell me what would you do right now to get out of this situation?”
“Everything,” he pleaded, his face sweating with desperation.
“Tell me, Jay. Who likes desperate people?”
“Uh-um. No one,” he mused, his breath trembling under the weight of fear.
“Why are you being so desperate then? Chill out, man.”
“Okay. Yeah, whatever you want man.”
I sighed. “Whatever I want? Fuck, what did I say about being fuckin’ desperate, Jay? “
“Nobody likes a desperate person. I’m sorry. “He spluttered.
“Fuck, man! This is so hopeless. Now you’re sorry?”
“I don’t know what you want me to do, okay! Fuck, man. You’re messing with me!” He bawled.
“Good. I imagine your balls.” I mused.
“My balls?” He asked, confused.
“You would give your balls to see your family again, wouldn’t you?”
He stayed quiet for a while. “I guess so.”
“It’s either you know or you don’t!” I grabbed his ball sack. He whimpered and trembled, eyes tightly shut. “If you are not sure make up your mind real quick.” Placed the blade of my folding knife on the base.
“Shhhhiiit!” He shuddered and gasped. “Uhhh…give me…give me some time, okay? Just a few seconds, please!”
"Fuck. You're not losing your balls just answer the goddamn question, okay? "I replied in exasperation.
“Okay. Yes, Yes I would!” He cried.
“Good. Very good, Jay. Now I can move on.” Pause.” You see, Jay, I wanna go home too. Where I truly belong. To the fields and the crop. We are going to film your face while you die to solve the transition puzzle I suppose. So is be a good genie pig, okay?”
“Is this some kind of a morbid cult?” He scowled, incredulous.
“Do you know anything of the crop, Jay?”
“No. What the fuck is that?”
“If you do just tell us.”
“No, I don’t.”
I examined him. “Swallowing tough news like a man, huh? Trying too hard not to seem desperate? Good boy! Your eyes are big. We will be able to make out all you will see.” Pause. “Oh, Jay, I have been waiting so long for this. The compulsion was just too much, or shall I say the calling?” I found my face warmed with a grin, thinking of how it was all worth the wait and trouble.
His brow creased, clearly confused.
“Let me do the honours, today,” I asked Macfearson.
“I will give you a chance, but I’m still the one who gets to spit his skull when you are done,” He spoke with enthusiasm, like a kid about to have a slice of his birthday cake.
This was the day, my holy fucking day.
“As long as I get to shove the barbed wire dildo into his ass.”
Macxermillio added, “Love me some painul!”
2
The sun shone through the windshield as it drowned into the horizon. It rather drown than grace such monstrosities like us with its warmth. That we respected, that we expected. The dirt road was peculiarly bumpy, not shying from expressing its discomfort and dislike. That we detested. Its judgmental and callous attitude rattling our truck to its joints and bolts. That was to be expected from a dirty dirt road, but this afternoon the mood was not that gracious in the truck. It was one accompanied with clenching jaws and flaring nostrils. An atmosphere not fond of intrusion of distraction.
Macxermillio was the agent of its fortification, his hands tightly grasping the wheel. His breathing laborious the more discomfited he became. With the same discomfiture, Macfearson played the clip in a loop desperately hoping he had overlooked something or, even more desperate, that we had not filmed well. The more he watched the more irrefutable the conclusion became. We had failed.
Macfearson sighed and wearily dropped his hands into his lap, his mouth gaping and eyes staring into nothingness. “No,” he mouthed. Seeing defeat on his face was a scary sight because it was rare.
“Maybe we just have to lay low a little or move,” Macxermillio said putting up defences, or maybe he was attempting to convince himself of a different truth. “Avoid being caught, of course.”
Deep into his being he sensed how foul the whole practice was. Not because it was repulsive and malevolent but because it was not solving our problem. The practice was never just a means to an end, it was also an end in itself because it facilitated much-needed pleasure. The kind of pleasure that easily becomes the centre of all our pursuits and aspiration. The malice of it (the sampling) is the merciless drive to erode conscience and rob all the affection the heart has to offer and channel it onto itself. Often by establishing blind loyalty and an incorruptible ignorant will to feed its bottomless desire. A pastime pleasure evolves into a need and then an endpoint in itself. The tragic part is that the practice was also instrumental because so often the line is easily blurred. The line between doing the sampling for the crop or sampling because we just enjoy it. The latter is unhelpful but not easy to give up, so the sampling had to show some validity and results in order for us to feel like we are actually doing something. The lack of any results was disturbing and threatened not only our self-image but could spoil our pleasure as well, because then we would be no different to a lifeling killer. So defending validity of the sampling was important to maintain an unsparing appetite and an image. And learning that we had no reason to continue sampling was unacceptable and indigestible. We were unwilling to accept at the heart, not in the mind.
In moments of emotional tension, my mind would spontaneously play songs in clips as if my subconscious is trying to communicate something to me in a language I can easily comprehend. After all dreams and psychosomatic symptoms are never clear and to the point. Not to say the songs were helpful either but it was a point to begin. The effort to follow the leads and interpret the clips seldom came and I just appreciated this peculiar trend. It was incredibly distracting and sometimes soothing because there was no place like music where I found sanctuary, meaning and felt understood to a degree. And in the car they began rolling:
“If I could find the time to speak…” Evans Blue’s Painted, the vocalist’s voice embedded in profound hurt and despair. “…they never said I’d end up like this…” Marilyn Manson’s Unkillable Monster. “…We finish and wish we can start again…” Hurt’s Fall Apart, the song carries on to say “ So woe is me when all falls apart…”. And then a desperate scream portraying a futile protest for peace in a storm of melody, “No…No More” from Hurt’s Overdose. Then an almost crooning voice in a state of numbness and mental decay, “ …if you were me what would you do? Probably nothing…” from Korn’s Faget. And another one from Korn’s Make Me Bad “ I am watching the rise and fall of my salvation…”. Then with…
Impulsively I uttered, “We gonna end up like Calvin.”
Macxermillio gave me one of his hard to read looks from the driver's seat. Then he shifted his attention to the road as if nothing had been said, or perhaps he did not even have the energy to react. In the meantime, my words awkwardly hung in the air, troubling me.
After a few moments of silence Macfearson gave a weary snorted laugh, his eyes fixed on the dashboard. “You never knew him?” he murmured.
“What?”
"Calvin," He said. "You never knew him."
“Yes.” I reluctantly agreed, not getting his point. I wanted to say “so what?” But I suspected that would agitate him.
His shoulders slumped and his facial expression became softer and contemplative. He sighed. “You are right. A noose around a neck would do it right now. Perhaps the best thing.” He paused as if he expected a scolding. After prolonged silence he continued, “ I see why he might have gave up. Why he might have felt so alone and in pain that he delivered himself to the unknown.” He paused again to take a deep breath. “Is that not the best thing? The only escape?”
“Out of this mess?”
Macfearson stayed silent for a little while. “The calling has a way of convincing us that suicide is the way that makes complete sense. It distorts reason and instinct. I still hold that to go off to a beautiful lie, if the calling can’t be trusted, is the most peaceful death.”
Apart from dealing with the possibility that the calling might have deceived us about suicide as a transition tool (one of the things the calling whispered in our ears) to home there was the possibility that we were doing something faulty methodically. The other possibility, which intuitively felt unlikely, was the possibility that we had not discovered one more mode of suicide; it started to feel like digging against a rock. Nothing was coming out of it. Something had to be wrong. We were back at doubting that the voices in our head (the calling communicates with feelings and our respective mental voices) truly spun from a place of wisdom and goodwill. We also began to question our perspective on the situation of being stranded in a world we don't belong and the means of transportation.
We were meticulous at carrying out the sampling. Even with that record on our side, we couldn't carry on making people disappear. With every sampling, there was a shred of evidence and clues that were left behind, at this point the accumulation of evidence was becoming really substantial. The town being a small town, suspects were easy to make, connections were easily drawn and the authorities had too much time in their hands. Not too much time, just sufficient and effective. We had given all our best to Jay's sampling. Twenty experiments and no results. In our most logical of places, we knew that either we needed to expand our cognizance on the issue or implement different approaches. Although we despised it, maybe the sampling was not the solution and maybe the calling was never going to help with anything. The pragmatics and engendering a will to change was the overwhelmingly hard part, because we had no one else, but mostly because the weight of this world on our lives’ essence was becoming alarmingly depowering. Pushing us closer to annihilation, leaving no room for sanity and well-being.
With it our minds were becoming leisurely. A leisurely mind has no drive or will. A mind orientated towards leisure alone is a dead mind. Very close to nothingness and death. And soon a dead mind bores itself…and when that happens we end up as Calvin with a noose the only medal and reward for our quest. The scummy smelly butt print on the sofa the only mark you leave behind. A leisurely mind is a given up mind.
Macfearson spoke in a controlled voice with his bellicose frustration shimmering underneath, “You ever had good coffee?With no sugar?”
“Yes?”
“Bitter. And when you’re done you have this tart aftertaste just sitting there in your mouth. Delicate and lasting, enticing you to have another. Calvin was like that," he paused. Then sternly he continued, "He might have gone the way he did, but he never tried to drag anyone down with him. He knew it was over for him, but that is no indication that he did not believe in what we were doing. He was bitter with integrity. Failure is not what tore him up, but the weight of this world twisting and gnawing at his core."
I nervously nodded, uncertain of what kind of response he expected. His eyes were not on me, but I could feel his mind's eye burning me with a concentrated and an indignant gaze. Belligerent energy exuded from his frigid and deceptively disinterested posture. It was enough to turn my insides pale. The conviction that if I uttered a sound I would trigger an explosive quarrel moved me to silence. Inside, a tempest of desolation drowned my thoughts and spirit.
There was bump and then the rattling ceased as the truck turned right into the tar road towards the town. On the horizon lay wealthy outer suburbs where roads were guarded by pine trees and life was tranquil.
With his eyes still fixed on the road, and perhaps tuned into my affliction, Macxermilllio uttered, “We need help!” The unwilling words a weight on his tongue. Because, put simply, we were in too deep.