il consipgiliere

“You’ve betrayed us. You left us to pursue what you consider to be your justice.”

The words are drenched with acid, befitting of someone who held no remorse after killing two people that considered him their best friend and their pets as well. Arsenio blinked, eyes catching sight of the bright light refracting off the surface of the bespectacled man’s morningstar. A weapon that he took from the girl he murdered.

It had been a few days since he last saw Kelvin. The last time he’d seen the doctor was in a dark cramped room somewhere in the depth of the basement, his neat black hair framing his face, eyes a dulled coal black. Arsenio saw him holding the empty syringe, hands shaking, plunging the needle repeatedly into the girl’s throat until there’s a bloody gash across her neck. Arsenio remembered distinctly that Kelvin did not have the eyes of a living human, but one of something completely devoid of any semblance of trust or empathy. Yet now he’s here, standing before him, locking the door with a swift twist of the hand. The consigliere instinctively backtracked, snapping out his pocket knife in self defense. “Fuck off,” he spat at the man’s feet, to no avail. The light is now reflecting off Kelvin’s glasses and the sheer illumination of the room made Arsenio uncomfortable. He felt his feet touch the back wall of the room.

“...Ugh!” The strike came sooner than he anticipated, a sharp pain digging into his abdomen. Arsenio looked down in horror as he saw the morningstar half buried inside him, staining his shirt and dripping down into a puddle. He felt his strength draining as Kelvin effortlessly kicked the pocket knife out of his hand, kneeing his side and knocking him to the floor.

Kelvin stepped towards the blonde, collecting the chains into his hand, his eyes completely devoid of anything as he made his way to his victim. He edged closer, nudging the spikes of the morningstar further into Arsenio’s stomach, eyes slightly lidded, muttering something. Arsenio was unable to make out his words as the pain rendered him half unconscious, yet seeing his lack of response snapped something within his tormentor. Kelvin pulled out the spiked ball in a single movement, twisting the chain roughly around the blonde’s neck and stared him right in the eye. “Aren’t you going to say anything? Traitor?”

“...No one’s the...traitor.” Arsenio strung out a broken sentence before Kelvin started tightening the chain, choking off his words. There is no anger on the doctor’s face, no sadness, nothing. Maybe a glint of disappointment if one looked closer, but Arsenio has no strength to do that. It is hard enough to stay conscious with a gaping wound in your stomach.

“That’s just what you think. You tried to betray us, all of us who simply wanted to live.” Arsenio wondered how the man manages to hold such a monotone voice while strangling him with a chain. “Desperate egocentrist. There’s nothing you won’t do for that investigator who wouldn’t even spare you a second glance.” The chain tightened some more. “And yet he stayed loyal to us, while you degraded yourself into one of those traitorous scumbags.”

The consigliere watched as Kelvin loosened the grip on the morningstar, yet before he could reach for his pocket knife the spikes were hastily shoved into his body again. “W-what are you…” He struggled to pull himself up amidst the dark crimson pooling underneath him. A thin, silvery glint flashed somewhere in the darkness of the room as Arsenio watched the other man pull out a blood-stained syringe. Humming lightly, he plunged the needle into the blonde’s neck, emptied the syringe, and repeated a few times.

“I’m truly sorry, but I got to take precautions.” There was no enjoyment in the doctor’s voice that hints at sadism, yet the lack of emotion was what truly terrified Arsenio. “I guess I’ll let Ivan know,” Kelvin declared casually, as if he is performing a simple daily task. “Don’t think he’ll care much for you though. That’s just sad, really. You cared for him a lot, right?”

There was no response, other than a loud suppressed growl that signifies the victim’s pain. The doctor furrowed his brows in annoyance, stood up, and kicked the consigliere in his wound. “Shut up. I don’t want to complicate this further. I only want to ensure your death, nothing more.”

The intertwining pain of the injected air inside his bloodstream and the slow but steady bleeding almost drove Arsenio unconscious, his water blue eyes now a dead puddle. It was impossible for him to form any coherent sentence, and he has completely given up. He looked up for the last time before the intense agony took him, only to face the emotionless pit black eyes of his tormentor.

He thought of Ivan to attempt alleviating the pain. He conjured up the mental image of the brunette blushing shyly with his warm golden eyes, his arms linked with Arsenio’s. He thought of Ivan’s somewhat mischievous yet innocent smile, commenting on the stark differences of their fashion choice. He thought of--

Everything stopped abruptly as Kelvin turned on the lights, a mutilated corpse by his feet. “You know, a dead man is not going to betray me”, he murmured to himself and walked out.