Just Ice

The hand gripped his shoulder from the gloom surrounding our table. It was gloved, in a hot, sweaty room, on a day that I remembered as warm... many beers and cards ago. The voice hissed from the darkness for what I realized was the second time.

"Tell them."

"What?" The man in the grip of that hand was no friend of mine, though it was not the first time we had played together.

"Tell them... what you did." A pause, and then a further rumble, "To her."

A photograph fell to the table, near the pot. Some pretty girl, backpack and youth suggested a college kid. None of us knew her, but the man in the clutches of that dark hand seemed to recognize her after a bit. "She... how did you get this? What do you want?"

Even now, details stand out as I think back. I did not see the fingers clench, but I knew their grip tightened as the flesh of their victim's shoulder whitened. "I want you to tell them... what you did... to her. Now."

"Alright, alright. She's a... a hooker. Paid her a few times and... fuck. Aaah!"

The thumb of the hand had moved slightly, I think probing a nerve. The next nerve was struck by another photograph. This showed a naked corpse... repeatedly stabbed. I couldn't tell if it was the same girl as the first photograph. One of the other players turned from the small circle of light... I heard retching. Maybe he puked, I don't know.

The fingers relaxed their grip, and I saw an arm shoving the... he wasn't really a victim, if this was true... the guy. He was shoved face down over the photograph, struggling with the hand on the back of his neck until his cheek touched the picture. All the fight went out of him. Not that there'd been much to begin with. I think... he could have moved the table, or kicked at the dark figure holding him... but he wasn't afraid of being caught anymore, I guess. He just... just didn't want to look.

None of the rest of us moved. We just watched the life drain out of this guy, and he started sobbing. The voice came again. "Tell them. You have to say the words or it'll never ever end."

The guy blubbered out a confession, of course. I knew from the moment that second photo appeared. Whatever excuse he had, I can't say I was really listening. No, that's not right. I didn't want to. He was saying it felt so good, like, better than sex, the power... and... I was glad the voice cut him off.

"The rest of you have a choice. Do you stand with him, knowing what he's done... or do you walk away, knowing what I will do?" The guy was hauled back in his chair, and I heard a click as he was cuffed to it. "Think about... if you have a sister, or a cousin... some family you never see, and she was... selling herself. Perhaps drugs were involved. Maybe she had a child to support. And someone cut her face, her breasts... cut her hamstrings when she tried to run, and stabbed her crotch when she tried to crawl. Left her to bleed." The guy sobbed once. "Would it be fair to leave him to my... tender mercy?" The hand grabbed the guy's hair.

The guy who gagged was the first to leave. I... I was the last. I had to know... "What will you do?"

"Castration, and then, if he chews and swallows it fast enough, he'll live to get medical attention."

I nodded, a little bile rising in my throat. "That seems... mild, by comparison."

Another photograph fell. A woman, heavily bandaged, in the hospital. "She lived."

I thought for a moment. About friends, and years past. "You're doing it here? Do you... need anything?"

"If he chews? Just ice."