The Darkest Light

Hello! Recently, we were assigned a project in English. Basically, we were instructed to use what we had learned about the effect of diction, syntax, ect., and apply it to our own works. I chose to do a short story, since I knew I could just pull out on that I've already done and turn it in. Instead of choosing The Forest, I decided to use a time prompt I had done a while ago, and finish the story.

So! Please, by all means, tear my baby apart. I need snapping crocodiles people

My cell was dank, and it smelled. It smelled quite bad, to tell the truth. Fortunately, I got used to the smell after awhile; being in one place for a long time can do that to you. I had even gotten used to the food, or lack thereof I should say. What I could never get used to was the darkness. Every night, when the dim gray light outside of my cell vanished, I curled up in a small ball, counting the minutes until it came back. It became the bane of my existence, this light. It filtered through the barred window, all three inches of it, which cut through my wall near the ceiling, too far up for me to even touch. Even so, the light from what I presumed to be a hallway outside my cell gave me some touch of ungodly hope.

Hope that shouldn’t exist in these types of situations. Hope that perhaps they wouldn’t take me to the room that they always took me to, the room where I was beaten mercilessly. Hope didn’t belong here. Hope was the beauty that was found in the outside world, a white dove and shinning sun that the prison was devoid of. I’m not sure why I still had hope. Perhaps my mind was grasping at an earlier time. A time so early that it was beginning to vanish, the memories stolen by the darkness of my surroundings. I hated this, and fought it with a savage resistance, each day making it a goal to relive some memory, so dusty it was nigh forgotten, to remind me that there was life besides this.

Life besides my cell seemed pretty unlikely, and I was wont to simply throw the idea, the hope out. The only reason I did not do this was that the memories were my only light in this place, the only real one anyway. That’s why I liked the grey, smoggy light so much; it was the embodiment of my hope. I’m sure they didn’t know, I’m sure that I hadn’t given it away during one beating. I was sure because the light was still there. If I had told them, they would have done everything to take away any shred of hope that I possessed.

There was a rattling outside my cell or cage as I liked to think of it, and I perked up, slowly pushing myself into a sitting position. My arms hurt strangely, and I looked down, surprised when I saw the skin had been tattooed from wrist to shoulder by bruises. More than surprised I was scared. Scared that I didn’t remember when that had happened scared that I was losing my soul and mind here.

That is what they wanted, after all. They wanted you to become soulless, to lose any reason for your existence, to make you want to end it all. What they were so scared of was people like me. People who were still alive, their spirit not completely broken.

Yet.

A small flap opened, and a dingy tray was thrown in, the contents splayed out against the grimy floor. Quickly, I leapt forward, rescuing the crust of bread and watery soup like thing the best I could. It was rare to get food, and I could lose none. Not if I wanted to survive, that is.

I knew that I should save the food, and I put half the bit of stale bread back on the tray for later. The rest, though, I lost self-control and devoured on spot. I hadn’t eaten in who knows how long-time was nonexistent here, my days controlled by the flow of dim light through the bars. What I did know, though, was that it had been awhile since my last ‘meal’. Long enough for me to feel weaker than usual, long enough to make the walk from wall to wall, no more than a few steps, hard.

I had long ago ceased in feeling real ‘hunger’. The want had become nothing more than background, blending in with my environment. I could not remember a time when I did not feel this hunger, no matter how hard I tried.

I could remember people, faces, but everything had started to blur. My memory would not last much longer, and I would soon know nothing but my cell and time here.

That’s what they wanted, really. I fought against them with every fiber of my being, but it was no use. They were strong.

There was a larger rattling on my wall, and I let lose a small yelp, knowing what was going to happen. My body began to shake with held back fear as I watched the door open, invisible until it moved. A man, clad in dark clothing with a hood over his face bent down, wrenching me from my spot. I cried out, but suddenly went silent as he dragged me down the hall. I never remembered much of this hall, oddly, my memory blank with the fear of the impending pain.

He stopped suddenly, opened a door, and tossed me into a concrete cell, much like my own. Another man was already waiting there, and a plain table stood in the middle.

“Please…” My voice was horse from lack of use, and my pitiful plea wrung my heart. I hadn’t always been like this, you know. Hadn’t always been willing to do anything to save myself from the pain. Time here had changed me, though. And not for the better.

I brought up my hands in a futile effort to protect myself as the blows started to pour on me, pounding my mind until it retreated into the darkness once more.

When I awoke-wait, no, that’s not entirely true. When the swelling that puffed my eyes closed went down enough that I was able to open them for the first time in what felt like days, it hit me that I had no idea how long I had been here. Upon first thinking of it, I was sure that I had been here for a month, no more. That didn’t sit right, though, and I started to think deeper. There was no direct way to measure my time here. The walls that constituted my cell were made of strong concrete, and though I had tried numerous times, I was unable to scratch out lines to mark the days. This was not by coincidence, I knew. If I were able to measure my time here, that would serve as a constant reminder that there was life outside of here. Since I was unable to do this, my mind was close to throwing away the notion that there was more than this, more than daily beatings, more than near starvation. If I lost hope of life outside of this torturement, then I would lose everything. They would win. I would die.

So I fought, a silent, hopeless fight. I knew that I would never win; that was never my goal. My goal was simply to fight them off for as long as I could before inevitably succumbing. Eventually, I knew this with a certainty, I would give up. The human spirit can only resist without hope for so long. Eventually I would accept death as the final respite, and would welcome its chilly embrace. For death was not something to be feared, rather, it was something that should be welcomed.

Knowing that I should at least attempt to stretch my underused muscles, I pushed my arms against the ground, propping myself up on my legs. I didn’t last long. Before ten seconds had passed my legs were shaking, and before fifteen seconds, I had collapsed onto the floor. Surprised, I had known that my legs would be weak, but this weak?, I glanced down at my legs, pulling up the tattered excuse for pants. I felt my heart freeze up with fear and surprise as I viewed the bloody, congealed dark liquid that was scrawled, words of an unknown language, over my legs. Like cracks on a decaying rock, the red lines burned angry lightening against the grey background, bruises on top of bruises.

And I cried.

It was the first time I had honestly cried since my imprisonment. I cried not for the pain, though it was immense. I cried not for uncaring brutality of my captures. I cried because I did not know when this had happened, and I cried because I did not care.

I knew the day had come when I opened my eyes after half-hearted attempts at sleep. There was no real rest in my cell, the ungiving floors made sure of that. I wasn’t sure how it would happen, but the end result I was certain of. Slowly, my eyes looked at the cell, trying to find a way. There was no urgency in my search. Sooner, rather than later, I would find what I was looking for and when I did, well, I knew what would happen then. There was a rattling outside of my cell, and I paused, momentarily stricken with fear. The small slit opened, and a small, metal try was pushed in.

Is this how the feed the soon dead? I wondered, my mouth opening as I saw the tray. If so, why the hell didn’t I die sooner?

My outwardly seeming facetiousness was unable to quell the uneasiness that filled me. It was like putting a mask on a wolf. No mater how pretty the mask was, sharp teeth are sharp teeth. Death is death, all the beauty in the world is unable to conceal that simple fact. Slowly, my tired hands reached out, bringing the tray closer. On it, laid a slice of dark bread, glistening with butter. Next to the bread was a small hunk of yellow cheese, the first piece of cheese I had seen since I had been imprisoned. Also on the tray was a small bowl, full of a lumpy, beige substance. Curiously, I took the spoon, dipping a little of it out and tasting it. Porridge. The word came out of the dusty recesses of my memory, and I wondered what sick and perverted mind would starve someone and then give them a feast worthy of a king right before they died.

There was one other object lying innocently on my tray, and I slowly picked it up. It was a long, shinning red silk rope.

So this is how it’s going to end, I realized the words heavy in my mind. Apparently I had given away my intentions at one of the recent beatings; I remembered nothing of them, baring every memory from my mind.

I felt no anger, no fear, only a strange emptiness as I slid the food off of the plate, tying one end of the rope around the now empty metal plate. There was no calm, peaceful feeling that I had been expecting. Instead was an uneasy realization that it was over. They had won.

Taking the mental plate, I stood on wobbling legs and with the last bit of strength, I threw the plate in between the bars that were towards the top of my cell. Turned sideways, it managed to fit through. Once through, it clanked against the outside wall. Testing it, I pulled down. The metal plate pressed against the bars, but was unable to go back through.

It would work.

My breath coming shorter now, I stood, taking the beautiful silk in my hand. With trembling fingers, I tied a silken loop around my neck. Taking a deep breath to steady my hands, I tightened the knot until I felt my breathing become restricted. I pushed back the sudden urge to cry. I had come this far, soon it would all be over. Pulling the silk, I shortened the rope until I was forced to stand on my toes just to continue to draw one raged breath after another.

How many times had I thought of this moment? The moment that my suffering would end, the moment it all would end-I had always envisioned it as a peaceful moment. So why was it then, when I was so close to the end, did I feel fear instead of peace?

Closing my eyes, I pushed all doubt out of my mind. And for the last time in my life, I let one final tear escape.

“Forgive me, Lord,” I whispered.

And then I jumped.