Trapped

(In the vein of John Gardener's Grendel, and Peter Watts's The Things, I decided also to write a story from the perspective of a classic antagonist. Enjoy.)

The sinister minds that surround me are cackling now, menacing each other with insults. Restless, they are swirling and swarming, snapping at each other, laughing. They are shouting and screaming, boasting about their misdeeds.

I'd do it again if I had the chance, one says.

Yeah, well, let’s see you get out of here first, another retorts. Then I’ll be impressed.

Sometimes these minds swap stories about the men who locked us in here. The ones who vacuumed us away, and imprisoned us in this scientific hell. Those prison guards in tan jumpsuits. The ones whose nametags read STANTZ, and VENKMAN. SPENGLER, and ZEDDEMORE.

I remember my life. I remember the meals my parents made me eat. How big they were. On an average night, we could each go through a whole steak, followed by two chicken wings and a lobster, then eat two slices of cheesecake and a piece of pie before it was time for bed. And of course, if I didn’t finish it all, My Mother, The Tyrant, would beat me and make me stand in the corner. This was every night until I moved out at 19--and at 350 pounds.

Twenty-five years later, as I climbed the stairs to my hotel room on the twelfth floor, my arm went numb and I crashed to the ground.

After that I was sent back, and it quickly became obvious that I had been sent back to suffer. My body had been transformed into a grotesque mass of ectoplasm. I’d been fairly handsome in life, despite my weight, but now I was a greasy, legless, bloated monster. I had chins and folds all over my body, and I sweated a viscous, green substance that dripped off me like slime. I smelled atrocious, and when I looked down at myself I could practically see the stench boiling off of me, rising like heat from desert sands. My teeth were huge and yellow, and I couldn’t speak--not that I had anything to say, or anyone to say it to.

What’s worse, I was almost completely intangible. I could move some things if I concentrated, but food passed right through me like I wasn’t there. If I tried eating an apple, it would fall through my mouth and onto the floor. If I drank a bottle of wine, it would pour onto the carpet as if nothing were in its way. And of course, despite feeling more desperate to eat than I ever felt in life, I couldn’t taste a single thing.

I had to eat, but I couldn’t. It made perfect sense, I suppose. Being shackled again to this human realm, twisted to resemble my sins, and forced to live out the actions that led to my death, all the while receiving no pleasure from it. In a way it was poetic. And anyway, it’s not like I didn’t know why I was there.

The first attempt by the men to contain me had been startling. It was while I was at a food cart that had been abandoned by room service when they saw me coming. I was grabbing and pawing at the food, attempting to taste something, throwing aside plates, desperately trying to satisfy a need that couldn’t be satisfied. Then the one whose nametag read STANTZ crept up beside me. I was too focused on the food to acknowledge him, but I never suspected that he could hurt me, now that I was almost as unsubstantial as air. Then I heard a snap, followed by a slow, building whine, and a terrible burst of light lashed out at me. Terrified, I turned tail and fled.

It was the first pain I felt since the one in my chest, those years before.

The actual capture was even worse.

I might understand why they did it, though. I had assaulted one of them. After the one named STANTZ attacked me, I escaped through a wall and wound up looking at another man in the same clothes, carrying the same equipment. I froze. As I watched, he raised a walkie-talkie to his lips, and began to speak. That was when I knew for sure that they were actively seeking me out.

I was never a violent person, but now I knew that these men, with their guns that fired burning orange light, had the power to hurt me. So I defended myself. I roared and flew at VENKMAN, and left him incapacitated, covered in slime. I knew it wouldn’t kill him, but maybe it would scare them away, make them give up.

But less than an hour later, I was lashed across the back by whips made of pure energy, and a metal solitary confinement cell opened beneath me. I was stretched, morphed, shrunk as I was dragged down, into blackness.

And now here I am, sharing that blackness with these criminals and monsters.

They arrive angry, but I only remember being sad.

In here, in the unit, there is nothing to see. Only blackness. The only sensory input is the thoughts of the other prisoners. They are the rapists, murderers, they are thieves and arsonists and felons, gunned down by police to wind up in prison--again. Mostly I keep quiet and avoid their attention. Let them bicker and shout at each other, not at me. It’s just better that way.

Ghosts do exist. And yes, they are frightening. Even to each other.

Lately there have been whispers of a soul that is stronger than all of us. And among these minds, there have been whispers of a plan. My cellmates are suggesting that this soul may be powerful enough to defeat even our captors, and that once the human world is overthrown, beings like us will rule, and bring about a new age in the history of the earth. This has put difficult questions in my head.

If our evil captors are defeated by a soul more powerful than my cellmates, is that a good thing?

If our evil captors put us in here, are they actually evil?

The thought panics me, because I may already know the answer.

Because heart disease is hereditary.

It was after college graduation that I found her on the floor. My Mother, The Tyrant. 500 pounds if she was an ounce. As I walked in, she looked up at me, eyes full of pain, and said, help me, Morris. You have to call an ambulance. I'm having a heart attack!

I did call an ambulance, in the end. But first I pulled up a chair, cracked open a soda, watched until she stopped breathing. The pain in her eyes turned to confusion, then to panic, then to anger, and then she died, cursing me, denouncing me as a mistake. I can’t really argue with her.

It’s not like she didn’t deserve it, though. And I don’t consider myself a bad person. But I guess whatever powers that be thought differently.

So as I’m stuck here, in this metal prison, with all of these monsters, horrible spirits birthed from the husks of horrible men, I can’t help but wonder, out of school, work, family, my entire life, did I fit in anywhere else as well as I do here?

And why is everything vibrating?

Our confines are shaking. There is a terrible noise--a long, explosive shriek. Among us, there is confusion, swearing, and panic. Then light enters the unit above us, and we are blasted out of the machine, into the sky. Among us, there is a swelling of elation, and a last-second consensus: The stronger one is coming.

And all I want is to go back inside.

End