Elliot's POV

"While my hope was born from destruction, my destruction was not born from hope. It was born from revenge."

—Elliot Starfall

I lie on the brittle ground, my side pressed against the filth of my own piss. My flat palms serve as my only pillow. The stench of death and smeared excrement fills my nostrils. The night has passed. Perhaps longer, perhaps shorter, but it was the worst I have ever endured.

My brother was dragged upstairs. It should have been me.

Tears roll down my cheeks, and I make no effort to wipe them away. They mix with the urine pooling beneath me. My gaze is empty, fixed on the closed hatch that separates us from the surface. My eyes remain unblinking. I heard everything. My brother's screams. His pleas. But they only laughed. I don't know what they did to him, but the sound of bones breaking had become routine. His cries still echo in my ears. I wanted to sleep. I couldn't. I had to listen. I prayed it would end quickly. I wept as I prayed, but no one answered.

Heartbeats blurred into breaths, and those into my brother's screams. I counted them. Never blinked. Five hundred and eighty-one. That's how many times he was hurt before he fell silent. His last thirty-four cries grew steadily weaker. Perhaps he screamed for the same wound more than once.

My eyes are dry, bloodshot. Not a single blink, not a moment of rest. Only tears dampen my face. The others in my cell have already distanced themselves from me. Everyone is silent. I stare at the hatch. A slit. Likely from a knife. The blade remains lodged in it, casting a thin line of blue light. Not even a centimeter wide.

My body does not tremble. I am still. I am bitter. Angry. But I do not show it. I remain silent. Alone with myself. I am I. My own spirit.

He is in my head. Golden curls over a mocking, pointed mustache. A sharp face bathed in blue light. Brighter than the others, but still blue. His rhyme. The melody of his vocal cords. I will rip them out. Snap his arms and legs. Twist his spine and tear it free. I will shatter their skulls and scrape out their brains. Pull their entrails from their bellies with their own knives. Kill them. I will kill them. For Ren. For my little brother.

My gaze shifts to the narrow beam of falling light, steady like a single raindrop that never reaches the ground. In the distance, people sit huddled in their cells, bodies trembling with fear. I hear the breath of the little girl beside me as she sleeps. It is fast and uneven. A nightmare, perhaps of her parents. Ren had them, too. I would go to him, sixteen years old, while he was only thirteen, and run my fingers through his messy hair.

Tears rise again, but I remain motionless in my own filth. Everything I see, hear, or feel reminds me of him. A toddler, younger even than the girl beside me. How proud I once felt, walking him home from kindergarten while I was in primary school. He looked up to me. And now, he likely rests on the ocean floor, sharks feasting on him as their final course.

I am the last.

That these wretched beings—these lustful creatures who only watch as others suffer—are allowed to live. They are all the same.

But so am I.

Once more, my gaze locks onto the hatch. It moves. Is it time again? Another victim for their twisted desires? I remain still, my iris capturing the silhouettes of three figures descending the creaking stairs. Their boots, ice-blue, gleam like models basking in the sunlight. It's not difficult to shine when surrounded by nothing but filth and human waste. Including me.

My fingers trace the uneven ground, splinters embedding themselves into my skin. But I only look at their lips, once blue, now red, stained with my brother's blood. Their yellowed teeth sneer at me. I want to drive my fist into their mouths. Rip out their blue tongues, the ones that savored my brother's insides.

But I do nothing. With all my strength, I lift my arm only to shoulder height. My hand shakes, but my body is numb, drenched in crimson blood. Rust-red. Did Ren feel like this? How did he fight that colossal beast? My arm falls to the ground, my fingers stopping just a centimeter before the electrified bars.

I stare at my hands. My bones are visible, my fingers darkened, purpling. They look like they are rotting. I gag but do not vomit. I have already emptied myself through the night. My eyelids slowly fall and rise.

Above the hatch, several of them wait. Blue. All of them. They are dressed like fishermen—sturdy boots, long shirts like tunics, wide trousers. Some wear caps, some do not. But everything is blue. Like their skin. Like the sun that passes them by.

The three descending figures seem enormous. They look down on the others. On me. My rage flares, but I remain still. I cannot move.

My dry lips part. They crack. Yesterday, I could fight. Now, I cannot even lift my arm.

Pathetic.

The three go their separate ways. One is lanky, stretched like he was pulled too far. Another smokes a cigar, reminding me of the fat bastard my brother killed. But he is not as large, not as strong. He is short, perhaps a head smaller than me.

The last one walks toward us. Toward me. Toward the cell.

He looks down at us. A pointed chin. Rabbit teeth. A nose like a banana. It enrages me that he looks down at me. He is thin. His clothes resemble a coat, while the others' seem tailored. He grips a key in his bare, slender hand and approaches the bars.

The key slips. His hand touches the bars.

A sharp hiss. He jerks back.

Laughter erupts from above, the light casting an eerie glow around the voice. "Lucky you weren't first, rabbit."

The rabbit-toothed man pulls dark blue gloves from the inner pocket of his pale blue tunic. He crouches, unlocking the gate.

His fingers move to his side, drawing a weapon.

A revolver.

The other two in the distance do the same.

I lie before him. He towers over me. The cell is silent. The others retreat the few inches they have left. I do not move.

I am at his boots.

The rabbit steps inside.

They all step back, retreating over the old, over the long-dead children and women. Over those they themselves have killed when food was scarce. Even the little girl has moved away, torn from her nightmare. She whimpers so innocently.

The rabbit steps on my throat. His mere fifty kilograms press down on me—but it feels like so much more. My head flushes red, veins bursting beneath my skin. Ten breaths, and he lets up. I gasp greedily, though my windpipe feels as if I'm breathing through a constricted straw. My eyes roll upward, as if trying to peer into my own brain.

He steps on me again. He speaks. I hear nothing.

I wheeze. No voice escapes me.

I am powerless. A slave.

They are stronger.

I cannot win.

Then, suddenly, I breathe again. Weaker than before, but more desperate. My veins burn, my fingers clench, then go slack. My eyes are red—bloody. My vision turns red. Red bleeding into blue. Colors swirl, shifting like a fractured spectrum of the rainbow. Cold hues, despite the warmth of my own blood.

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Blood drips from my nose, trailing down my cracked lips. I don't taste it. My breath is heavy, like a dying man's.

Am I dying?

Will I die?

The blue light flickers, growing weaker. My fingers twitch, up and down. All I hear are muffled blows. My left ear drowns in its own filth—a warm sensation, though humiliating.

"He belongs to me."

A dull voice. Too dull.

And my eyes slip shut.

…

Metal clanks. Hissing sounds. Screams. The cries of men and women alike.

"Don't rough up the women and children too much!" someone shouts.

My eyes are half-closed, blood and filth sealing my eyelids.

"Feminine-looking men will do just fine too!" another voice—stronger, crueler—adds with a laugh. My eyes snap open completely, sharp pain stabbing through them.

I groan, struggling for breath. I cough. My body is weightless.

I look down. I see the heels of boots beneath me.

Am I being carried?

I glance around, my eyes wide. Others are kicked, forced onto their knees. Shackles clamp around wrists and ankles. Naked. Brown, red, and yellow bruises stain every body. No exceptions.

Every one of them stinks—except for some of the blue-blooded ones, the so-called noblemen who still care about hygiene. But not about their mouths.

My left ear rings, a high-pitched scream of its own, but with my right, I listen. The stately ones—the judicial blues—whisper among themselves, wary of who might hear.

"Killjoys," someone mutters.

"Only in it for profit," another says.

"Plenty of fresh children aboard," one blue murmurs to another, and I listen in silence.

I have given up moving. My arms hurt too much.

I am furious, but my face has been robbed of rage.

Ren is dead.

I cannot comprehend those words. Cannot accept them as real.

I turn my head just in time to see a mother lose her son. Both naked, both forced onto their knees.

Fishermen hold them roughly, like all the others on deck.

I see the wood. The light. The blue hue that dances in my vision, tinted violet by the blood in my eyes.

I take a long breath. My gaze lingers on them, but no tears come. None flow.

The little boy screams. His mother weeps at the sight of the ten-centimeter rod of molten lava.

A hiss. A scream.

A sharp, high-pitched cry from the boy. A broken, devastated wail from the mother.

Another hiss. Another scream—not for her child this time, but for the brand seared into her own flesh.

Hiss. Hiss. Hiss.

More hissing. More screams.

Screams like Ren's.

I weep, without weeping.

I glance left. Right.

My dry lips tremble at the sight of the corpses.

Noble figures—at least, they look noble—step over them as they walk. Among the fishermen and sailors, some appear refined. Dressed in suits, ranging from beige to deep azure to black.

Slicked-back hair, parted neatly to the side. Luxury watches. Monocles gleaming over their eyes.

Butterflies. Beautiful creatures, while we are flies.

Drowning in our own piss and excrement.

We scream.

No, they scream. Not me.

Humans scream, and the nobles watch them with the eyes of greedy politicians. They do not smile, yet they are happy. I can see it in their blue lips.

The deck is drenched in red blood.

Here and there, fish lie scattered.

Sturdy tables, massive sails, thick ropes, and cannons line the ship.

But everything is soaked in red.

Empty heads. Pale. Snow-white.

Severed.

They lie strewn across the deck.

Bodies, intestines spilling from gaping wounds.

Arms, hacked off, discarded like scraps of meat.

I grimace.

I retch at the sight, but only saliva dribbles from my lips.

I am still being carried.

A shoulder digs into my stomach. The person carrying me moves with a light bounce. The stabbing pain grows sharper and sharper until, finally, I retch again.

This time, not just saliva.

Red and black bile—just a handful, but enough.

My vomit splashes onto his pants.

I am thrown to the side.

"You red swine!" he snarls, but I don't acknowledge him.

My trembling hand wipes at my mouth.

I lie on human entrails.

My feet rest on the hair of severed heads.

I stare into their vacant eyes.

Then, I look up.

Up into the boundless turquoise sky.

The clouds, tinged blue.

The sun, high above, bearing down upon me.

If there is a god, then let this be nothing more than a wretched dream.

Take me back—to when I could fall asleep in my parents' arms, to when I could tell my brother bedtime stories, to when I stood proud before Ren, to when I could ride a bicycle and he could not.

I gaze into the turquoise vastness, lifting my quivering arms.

My shoulders burn with agony.

But nothing happens.

Pow!

A blow. To me. My head spins like a carousel. My brother loved them, loved riding horses like a prince.

Pow.

A loud pop, a crack reverberates in my skull. My lower jaw comes loose, hanging askew to the side.

Is this how the old man felt when I beat him, while he lay powerless beneath me?

Pow!

My vision flickers, my head twists, my eyes roll lifelessly in their sockets. As I fall into the open abdomen, I catch only the silhouette of a figure hurling the bearded man aside before everything turns black.

I taste. I smell it. Death.

The blood is still warm. My face is submerged in a putrid, slimy mess—its consistency like Bolognese sauce. The stench is unbearable, and I force myself upright, though barely. My face is drenched in a color that matches my eyes.

Red. Blood.

My breath catches as my gaze locks onto an open mouth. The corpse's eyes are gone. Hollowed out, nothing but black voids remain. A red tongue protrudes grotesquely from the cavity where a nose should be. My stomach lurches. I retch. Nothing comes. I gag again. My hands press against the corpse. Against its insides. My fingers sink into flesh, into organs, into warm, viscous blood.

I breathe rapidly. My heart pounds. My hands tremble.

His hair is like mine. Blonde. The only thing left of him.

He is mutilated. His legs—gone. His torso—slit open, his innards scooped out, strewn across his chest like a grotesque display.

It's Ren.

No matter how disfigured, I recognize him.

His full red lips, once like mine, are now pale, dry, cracked.

It is my little brother. And he lies here exactly as I had imagined—dismembered, tortured, violated.

581 screams.

Each one carved into these wounds.

No tears leave my eyes—only blood. I stare down at him, motionless, as the weight of the world bears down on my shoulders.

I knew he was dead. I knew he would be tortured.

I exhale sharply, unable to process what lies before me. And yet, I had hoped he would die quickly. No—I had even clung to the foolish hope that he might survive.

I glance at the limp red mass in my hands.

He was only eighteen.

A whole life ahead of him—one he will never have. A wife, children—now impossible.

Because of me.

I shatter.

The weight of the world crushes me. I had held onto a shred of hope amidst this ruined world, but it has now been utterly obliterated.

The pain eclipses everything—more than my dangling jaw, more than the bones protruding from my hands.

More than my torn vocal cords, my split knees.

More than the weeks of starvation, of dehydration.

If it meant bringing my brother back, I would endure it all for years. But it is too late.

And that is what breaks me.

My world collapses. I fall forward, barely able to keep my feeble body upright.

I hover over my brother's corpse. My red eyes locked onto his hollow sockets. My crooked nose inches from his tongue-stuffed one. My trembling lips—silent—over his lifeless ones.

I break.

I shatter at the surreal sight of him.

Months ago, I picked him up from his high school graduation. He had been so proud. So certain he'd find a good job. That he could help me.

And he did.

He landed an office job, handling paperwork. That's what he told me.

I didn't care whether he worked or not. I would have paid for everything. But he insisted. Got his own apartment. Worked, even sent me money. Worked more, proud to finally repay me for what I had done for him all those years.

A month ago, we were at the movies, watching the latest installment of a series he loved. I still don't remember the name.

The night before my vision, we ate pizza at his apartment. Then I left.

I should have told him. Told him the world was ending. Told him about my visions.

He would have believed me.

Even if it wouldn't have changed anything.

I stare into his empty sockets. They pull me in, like black holes. My forehead presses against his. My blood seeps into the void where his eyes once were.

Next week, he would have turned nineteen.

My dry lips press against his blood-smeared forehead. My fingers tangle in his greasy, matted hair—so much like mine.

I hold him. I don't want to let go.

Breaths pass.

I don't know how many.

But the weight of the world crushes me more with each one.

I tremble.

I clutch his head tighter. My jaw gives way, shifting further inward, twisting to the side. The pain is distant.

I only hold him tighter.

My little brother.

Until I sit upright.

My eyes are closed. I wonder why he feels so light.

My long lashes, soaked in blood, darken my vision.

I hold his head.

Only his head.

Blood drips down his severed neck, vertebrae protruding from the ragged flesh.

They beheaded him.

My pupils dart wildly, squeezing more blood from my eyes, tears of crimson trailing down my cheeks. My hands tremble, holding my brother's head, wobbling, unstable—until a hand lands on my shoulder.

I stare into the emptiness of Rens sockets.

"Your brother?"

A playful voice echoes in my mind.

I recognize it.

A face moves into my periphery. Chestnut-brown hair. Eyes of the same color—yet shimmering like emeralds.

A grin stretches across his lips.

"Sorry, I just couldn't help myself."

His green gums reveal an inhuman grin. He speaks again, saliva dripping from his verdant tongue.

"He was just so…"

And I break again.

My brother's head slips from my trembling grasp.

My world slips from my fingers.

Blood splatters my legs as his head lands with a sickening thud.

The brown-haired thing caresses my trembling lips.

A finger glides over my uneven skin, collecting my bloody tears.

Then, with his tongue, he licks them away.

"…incredibly delicious."

My mouth hangs open. My gaze is empty.

I look down.

And I see my brother. His head nestled within his own mutilated entrails.

It should have been me.

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