Young Writers Society

Chad looked around nervously. Still groggy from the sedative, he blinked and looked around to get his bearings. He didn't recognize where he was, nothing looked familiar to him. There were grotesque paintings and drawings on the walls of this room, pictures of people in impossible sexual poses, and people in various stages of dismemberment.

Offended and disgusted, Chad looked at his immediate surroundings. He found himself chained to a stainless steel table. Around him he saw surgical tools, some clean and pristine, others with faint blood stains on the blades.

The blood drained from Chad's face. He knew he was dealing with a professional.

In the distance, he heard someone whistling. Judging by the upkeep of the room -- scattered sheets of paper, crumpled newspapers, and over-flowing wastebasket of bloody paper towels -- that the whistler could only be the man who kidnapped him.

As Chad looked back on the chain of events that lead to him being here, he realized it was a very ingenious plan. Chad had never met the man who came up to him in the parking lot. They shook hands, and Chad introduced himself. The man said nothing, and, after flashing a mischievous grin, threw a sweet smelling substance in Chad's face. Sputtering and coughing, Chad suddenly felt fatigued, and the last thing he remembered before hitting the ground was the cackling laugh of the man.

That seemed like many decades ago. But Chad was rudely reminded when the man returned that it was a mere three hours beforehand.

"So, Chad," said the man. "Did you have a good nap?" The laugh that followed made Chad cringe in discomfort. Chad said nothing in return.

Humming, the man made his way to the surgical tools and inspected each one thoroughly. Occasionally, the man would pick at something on a blade, then set it down and pick up the next tool.

Nervously, Chad asked the man, "What do you plan on doing to me?"

The man feigned confusion and deafness, and Chad repeated his question.

The man giggled maliciously. "Oh, this? You'll find out soon enough."

Chad swallowed hard, and thought of many things this man could do to him. Chad looked around at the pictures. He saw people with their heads cut surgically off, each head in a grotesque blank expression, blood dripping from the neck. He saw a woman with her fingers being sliced off, one by one. The next picture was of a man, obviously in pain, with his arms hacked off at the elbows and his legs at the knees.

Chad glanced at the tools the man was inspecting. He realized that they were too small for dismemberments and decapitations. That's when he realized the pictures in front of him. Pictures of women with their breasts cut off, and men with bloody stumps where their penis was. It was enough to make Chad cringe. He cringed even more so when he realized that he was stripped of his clothing.

Chad immediately assumed the worst, and a sickening moan escaped from his lips. The man stopped in mid-pick and glared down at Chad.

"What's the matter?" he asked, looking in the direction of Chad's gaze. Chuckling to himself, the man said, "Oh, those? You're worried about that? Trust me, your dick is gonna be the last of your worries after I'm through with you."

After the man was finished inspecting his tools, he walked over to the other side of the room and pulled two latex gloves out of a box on the wall. He snapped them taut on his hands, walked back to the tools, and picked up a rather blood-stained scalpel.

"Now," said the man, "this will hurt you more than it will me." The man chuckled to himself, and lowered the scalpel to Chad's face. The blade pierced his skin, and Chad let out an agonizing shout.

"Now now," said the man, "this is no way to act. The less noise you make, the easier it will be for both of us. Of course," he added, "it doesn't matter how loud you scream, because no one will hear you."

The man again lowered the scalpel to Chad's face. Chad could feel the blood running down his neck, and as much as he wanted to yell out, he realized that all attempts to garner attention would be met with the same fate: nothing.

Chad didn't want to end up with the same pale blank expression on his face as the people in the pictures. He didn't want to subject himself or anyone else to that agony. Most importantly, he didn't want this sick man to get any pleasure from his decapitated head.

Even with the blade following his jawline, Chad let his mind wander. He pictured this man with the head of a man who looked to be in his late twenties. He pictured the man manipulating the head of this other man, moving his jaw up and down, pretending to make the head speak. After everything the the head supposedly said, the man would laugh his maniacal laugh. He also pictured the man with the head of a young blonde woman in her early thirties, kissing the head, forcing the head to give the man oral sex.

Chad was disturbed by his thoughts. He swallowed hard and felt the blade on his Adam's apple. The blade had moved slowly, and the man lifted the blade after it reached his chin. Chad felt the blade puncture the skin next to his temple, and followed the blade handle with his eyes as it ran across his forehead to the other temple.

Chad was still unsure about the events that were unfolding, but he looked around to other pictures on the wall. He was surprisingly calm for having a scalpel blade run across his face, but he knew that fighting back would result in death with a slip of the blade.

Not that it mattered to Chad. He knew he was going to die anyway.

The blade of the scalpel ran down the other side of Chad's face, down to the point on the chin where the blade stopped the first time. The man put down the scalpel, which was dripping with blood, Chad's blood, and grabbed a tool that vaguely resembled a small spatula.

Chad closed his eyes, weary from loss of blood, but the man slapped him. "Uh, uh, uh," scolded the man. "I want you awake for this."

The man took the spatula tool and shoved it under the skin of Chad's forehead. This woke Chad up immediately, and he screamed in agonizing pain. A quick flick of the man's wrist, and Chad could hear the muscles tearing as his skin was violently ripped from his skull. Chad nearly passed out, but in order to keep him awake, the man insisted on carrying on a conversation.

"So," asked the man, fully knowing the response, "you having fun yet?"

Another flick of the wrist, and Chad groaned as more muscles tore and ripped from his skull. After loosening the top part of Chad's face, the man reached over and grabbed a mirror. "Would you like to see the perfect face for pictures?" taunted the man.

Chad looked into the mirror and gasped at what he saw. His forehead was loose and floppy against his skull, which was partially exposed. Blood drained from his face and he followed the incision marks on his face. Chad now realized his fate: his face was to be ripped off.

The man flashed a malicious grin and put the mirror away, along with the spatula tool. The man, his latex gloves covered in Chad's blood, grabbed the now partially removed forehead and yanked upwards. More muscles loudly and painfully ripped away from Chad's skull, and Chad prayed to no one that he would pass out or die before it could get any worse. But his prayers remained unanswered as he felt the skin tightening around his eyes.

Realizing that the skin around the eyes wouldn't easily rip without making a mess, the man grabbed a smaller scalpel and cut out the eyelids. The man continues pulling, yanking, and ripping off Chad's face.

It was a pain that was indescribable, and Chad knew that he would never survive this ordeal, and if he did, he knew that it would haunt him for the rest of his life.

The man kept talking to Chad as he continued to rip off the face, asking him about his wife, his kids, and his pets. The man knew a lot about Chad, a lot more than Chad was comfortable with. Then the man started making comments about Chad's wife, which angered Chad, but he realized that, being shackled up and weak from blood loss and pain, he could do nothing but listen and be enraged.

The man stopped pulling when the face came to Chad's lips. The man grabbed the scalpel used for his eyelids and cut his top lip off. Chad had no choice but to look up and see the inside of his face. It was bloody and disgusting, and he could see the muscles and blood vessels that have been torn off of his skull. Without being able to close his eyes or look away, Chad's eyes slowly dried, causing an even more macabre effect to this sight. Chad snapped back to reality with the feeling of his bottom lip being cut off.

Finally, after twenty minutes of an agonizing ordeal, the face was off. Chad relaxed and felt his head hit the table. He couldn't close his eyes, for there was no way he could close them. He heard water running, and concluded that the man was washing off the face, preparing it for something, probably preparing it for a photo shoot.

The man returned, carrying Chad's face, his hands dripping with a mixture of blood and soapy water. Grinning, the man said, "Would you like to see the new face for murder?"

Chad said nothing, did nothing. He knew that the man would show him anyway.

"I thought you might," said the man, and lifted up the face.

It was horrible. Eyelids with nothing behind them dangled loosely shut, the lips agape, the face pale with lack of blood. A moan escaped Chad's lips, and slowly, ever so slowly, Chad's breathing labored.

And slowly, ever so slowly, Chad's vision blurred.

And slowly, ever so slowly, to the sound of the man's cackling laugh, Chad died.