Never Burn A Witch: A Rowan Gant Investigation by M. R. Sellars Page B

I?
     
    “Holy fuckin’ shit! Goddammit!” Ben’s voice
was echoing distantly. “He’s done this before and the last time his
friggin’ heart stopped.”
    Doctor Sanders’ voice followed thickly, her
words ricocheting from his. “What do you mean his heart
stopped?”
    “I mean it just fuckin’ stopped! He almost
died.”
    “Calm down, Storm! He still has a pulse.
Mister Gant? Mister Gant, can you hear me?”
     
    My ears discern the mournful squeal of rusted
hinges.
    I’ve been in the darkness for what seems an
eternity.
    A faint light filters in from above, and it
is almost blinding.
    How long have I been here?
    I strain to lift my head.
    My ears have grown
accustomed to the unbroken silence, and the
mechanical snap of a light switch comes like a gunshot.
    I can even hear the hum of the electricity as
it arcs along the contacts.
    A bare incandescent bulb ignites above me,
casting harsh streams of light.
    I wrench my head away, regretting the act the
moment the pain it brings bludgeons me. I blink. I regret that
too.
    Even blinking hurts.
    Slowly, biting back the stabs of misery, I
raise my face once again to look around.
    I peer cautiously through the stringy mats of
my long, flame red hair as it hangs in front of my face, and I try
to focus on my surroundings.
    A rough concrete wall, grey and pitted with
age, confronts me. A large crucifix adorns its otherwise blank
emptiness. Countless unlit white candles of all shapes and sizes
cover a small wooden table before the shrine.
    I am in what appears to be a basement.
    Biting hard on the gag in my mouth, I tilt my
head farther back, squinting my eyes against the harsh light.
    Black iron shackles encompass my scraped,
blood crusted wrists. Connected by a heavy chain, they are affixed
securely above.
    I am hanging from a thick beam.
    I am suspended from the rafters.
    The small amount of strength I mustered is
fleeting at best, and my head tilts back forward of its own accord,
bringing my chin to heavily meet my chest.
    Breasts.
    I am a woman.
    Something sequestered in the nether regions
of my mind tells me that this isn’t right. I am not supposed to be
a woman. Or am I?
    I have no idea who I AM supposed to be.
    Slow, deliberate thudding partnered with the
doleful cry of creaking wood meets my ears and chases my latest
revelation away from immediacy—along with its still unanswered
questions.
    Someone is coming.
    HE is coming.
    Unfettered, acidic terror rips outward from
my abdomen and singes me.
    Something warm begins to run down my inner
thighs and splatters wetly to the floor.
    I have no control as my bladder releases.
    I begin to cry.
     
    A strangely familiar feminine voice stretches
itself past me in a textbook example of Doppler distortion. “Help
me get him on the free table over there.”
     
    “Nooooooooooooo!” My scream is muffled by the
soggy, biting fabric in my mouth.
    A mechanical sound reaches me, felt as well
as heard.
    Tick, tick… Click!
    Tick, tick… Click!
    Tick, tick, tick… Click!
    My body tenses as I feel my shoulders slowly
and simultaneously ripped from their sockets. Something is pulling
down against my ankles and my legs are straining to remain joined
with the rest of my body.
    The metallic click of a gear ratcheting
reverberates again.
    Tick, tick. Click!
    Tick! Clunk!
    “Nooooooooooooo.” My cry is no more than a
meek whimper.
    Muscles and tendons are
tearing. Various spots along my upper back spasm and snap like
broken rubber bands. White-hot projectiles
of torment race through my nervous system at a quickening
pace.
    Bursting like bullets from my chest, they
only turn to re-enter and retrace every inch over and over
again.
    It is more than I can stand.
    As the light begins to fade, I can see his
shadow on the floor in front of me, large and foreboding. I can
barely hear muffled words.
    Something about proof of my crimes.
    Something about proof of my heresy.
    Something about evidence to validate my
“confession.” Something