As the knife cut into his skin, I felt satisfaction like never before.
It wasn't the scream that stirred something in me,it was the silence after. The exquisite stillness of his breath caught between agony and comprehension. Blood welled up in rich, dark rivers from the incision I had carved just below his collarbone. I watched it bead, then run like rain down a windowpane. Thick. Warm. Honest.
He couldn't scream anymore. Not with the gag rammed so deep into his mouth that he choked on every attempt to cry out. It had been made from one of his own ties,ironic, really. The kind of thing he might have worn to a court hearing. Now, it was soaked in spit and the copper taste of his fear.
I stepped back for a moment, admiring my work. His chest was a canvas, pale and twitching, each cut a stroke of deliberate intention. My gloves were sticky with his blood, latex stretched tight over knuckles that had long since gone numb to shaking. I pressed two fingers to the gash again and made another small, clean slice,this one diagonal, intersecting the first like a red "X" on pale parchment.
He was still conscious, barely.
"Beautiful," I whispered, leaning in close so he could hear me through the pulse pounding in his ears. "This… this is what truth looks like."
His eyes rolled back, lids fluttering like a dying moth. I grabbed his chin and jerked his face toward mine. No escape. His bloodshot eyes locked onto mine, pleading.
I laughed softly, like a secret. "Don't look at me like that. You knew this was coming. You just didn't want to believe it."
He shook his head weakly.
"But you should have listened," I said, voice cold. "You should've remembered me."
The scalpel gleamed under the single hanging bulb above the worktable. A simple tool, but elegant. I selected a fresh blade and replaced it with care. Behind me, the soft ticking of the metronome on the bookshelf kept perfect time. It soothed me. Gave rhythm to the chaos.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
Every second counted.
I turned back to him and began carving the next letter into his abdomen. An "S." He jerked violently against the restraints, but I had secured him well,wrist to ankle, tight leather straps bound him to the rusting steel table. Each movement only deepened the grooves in his own flesh. Every shudder another stroke of penance.
The smell of blood was thick now, metallic and damp, mixing with the colder scent of the antiseptic I'd wiped across his skin before beginning. The contrast made me lightheaded, euphoric.
"You were the first," I told him, more to myself than to him. "The first lie. The first crack."
A faint, wet gurgle answered me. He was trying to speak.
I leaned in, cutting the gag free with a quick slice. He gasped, air hitching as he tried to form words. "Wh… who are you?"
I tilted my head.
"Wrong question."
He blinked, dazed. "Please… please stop."
"But I haven't even finished the message yet."
His whimper was barely audible.
"Don't worry," I whispered. "You'll die soon. But not before you help me tell the story. You're my opening chapter."
I made another cut, slow and careful. He screamed this time,one last shrill cry before his voice tore and faded.
And still, I kept going.
The "E" came next.
I was spelling a name. Or a warning. Or both.
Behind me, on the walls, photographs of past lives stared down at me,faces, newspaper clippings, patient reports. A chronology of betrayal, framed in glass and string.
Each one had lied.
Each one had buried the truth.
And I was the archivist of pain. The collector. The last chapter in their fiction.
When he finally went limp, head rolling to the side, I checked his pulse. Weak. But still there. That wouldn't do. He had to be awake for the last part.
I took a syringe from the kit beside me and plunged it into his arm. A dose strong enough to jolt him back to semi-consciousness but not enough to numb the pain. He gasped awake, eyes fluttering.
"Almost done," I said sweetly.
The final letter: "N."
S-E-N.
I stepped back, admiring the message cut deep into his flesh. I wasn't sure yet if I'd add the rest of the name. I wanted each victim to carry one piece. One syllable of the truth. When it was done, the world would see what they'd hidden.
And then I'd vanish again.
Just like before.
The man died shortly after,eyes glassy, mouth parted in a quiet, final protest. I closed his lids with my fingertips and cleaned my tools in silence.
Boring...
I worked efficiently. I always had. The body was packed in plastic, the room sterilized. Everything burned except the scalpel and one blood-soaked glove. A signature. A whisper.
Before I left,I left the body on display.
It was my artwork after all.
Art is meant to be admired.
This was thrilling for me. I could jump for joy.
I left the metronome ticking behind me as I walked out, the sound fading into the night.
Tick. Tick. Tick.
Time was running out.