“Let’s hope not for long,” Aurelia responds coldly, eyes locked on the screen.
Both of us glance to the second man with the dark hair. He’s heard the scream and is now turned toward the sound, but his hand’s already on a doorknob, fingers flexing, hesitating. Clearly questioning if he goes for freedom or his brother.
Then he lets go, moving toward the sound like he’s actually going to help.
But Aurelia's a wicked little thing.
She slams her finger down on theGlassbutton, and the corridor explodes into chaos. Shards whip out from the walls, long and curved, slashing across both sides. The brothers scream, arms shielding their bodies as they run.
They’re both getting cut up fast, blood trailing behind them and Aurelia laughs, loud and wild, like a fucking menace.
The sound of it is almost more brutal than the scene on the screen, but it’s music to my fucking ears.
The blonde one reaches another door and fumbles, pure panic now. He opens it, too desperate to think, and steps through.
The camera shifts just in time to see him drop onto a ledge inside the room, a low one, his body slamming hard. He starts screeching, his skin starting to bubble and hiss from the scotching hot plate. His hands stick to it, melting and his flesh peels off as he tries to push himself up.
“What’s happening?” Aurelia asks stunned.
I don’t answer because I don’t need to. The plate splits in half and red light floods upward. Then he drops straight down into a pit of fire, his scream cut off by the roar of the furnace below.
Aurelia’s breath catches, her eyes are wide, locked on the screen.
And then there’s only one left.
The last brother stumbles forward, his hands scraping along the walls, each step slower than the last, as if the weight of his brother's death has already crushed him.
His eyes, hollow and empty, are nothing but dark sockets, the world around him a void as he moves blindly, guided only by the hope that maybe the end is near or maybe the door will lead to some kind of escape from this hell.
He finally finds a door and pauses, his trembling fingers sliding across the handle, then he turns it slowly, almost gently.
After a moment, when the door opens, there’s nothing but an eerie stillness of the space around him. The calm before the storm. But when he steps inside the dark room.
Snap.
The pressure plate beneath his foot sinks with a nauseating crack, and in an instant, the trap is unleashed. The razor-sharp wires shoot out, a blur of cold steel slicing through the room, and he doesn’t even have time to react before they tear into him, shredding through his body in the shape of a spiders web. There’s no sound except for the sickeningwhipof the wire and the wet, tearing noises of his body being chopped.
Flesh, muscle, bone, all fall apart, like a delicate structure breaking under the weight of its own fragility. The wires retract just as fast as they came, disappearing into the walls, and all there is, is a deafening silence that follows.
His body, now nothing but a sliced up piece of meat, falls to the floor with a final wet thud, piled up like a mangled, unrecognizable mess.
Aurelia’s breath catches in the stillness, and I don’t say a word. I don’t need to. I feel the weight of the moment sinking into her as she lets out a deep breath, and it’s clear she feels the relief leaving her body.
She suddenly turns to me, wrapping her arms around my neck as she pulls me into a tight… hug. I freeze for a second until my hands slowly find her back, my arms moving to return the foreign gesture.
“Thank you,” she whispers into my ear before pressing a kiss to my painted cheek, and I feel something spark in my hollow soul, just a little bit.
As she gets off me, we don’t talk about the fact that I won the bet. I stand up too, heading toward the control panel to shut the entire building down.
When I’m ready, I turn to Aurelia. She’s by the weapons table, and when she faces me, she gives a small smile, one that doesn't quite meet her eyes. Then we walk toward the door to get out of here.
Chapter Twenty-One
Wrath
Exiting the death rooms, I lock the door behind us, then Aurelia and I walk side by side toward the carnival, our footsteps echoing in the hush between us.
She’s quiet, eyes fixed ahead, lost somewhere in her own world. Then I start thinking…