Of Eternal Life Read Free Page A

his rocks off on keeping another man at his mercy. You’ll slip up. Someday you’ll make a mistake, and when you do,” he bared his teeth, “you’re mine.”
    The Tormentor showed no reaction. “Any idea of what we have planned for you today?”
    “Fuck you.”
    The Tormentor chuckled, “No? Come now. Smart one like you, you must have some clue.” He circled around Eli’s stretcher, maintaining eye contact all the while. “There’s the prep from the orderly … . ”
    Eli refused to give an inch in this battle of wills. He glared into the Tormentor’s eyes and ground his jaw, a muscle ticking in his cheek.
    The Tormentor tsked. “That’s okay, I’m feeling sporting today. How about a clue, hmm?” He made the circuit to Eli’s head and leaned over him. “Two to three hours.” He cocked his head like an animal to better gauge any telltale flickers of realization on Eli’s face.
    Fuck .
    Poison. He’d known that had to be it when he’d figured out the ingestion part. He steeled his features, revealing nothing, but his chin jerked up in defiance and the Tormentor noticed.
    “Ah, we’re getting warmer, I see,” he cajoled.
    Eli’s brain was scrambling. Two to three hours was pretty damn fast for a poison he would have to swallow. In just this moment he could think of maybe three poisons that would fit the bill. Cyanide, lye —
    The Tormentor leaned closer and whispered, “Convulsions.”
    Strychnine . Eli’s mouth went dry.
    “Well, well,” the Tormentor straightened in disappointment. “That wasn’t so difficult, was it?”
    Oh, God , Eli’s heart stuttered in his chest. Strychnine was a horrible way to die. The victim literally convulsed to death, his body contorting painfully as his muscles fought oncoming doom. And the best part? He’d be aware the whole time, completely cognizant of his surroundings, of his agony, until his body finally gave out.
    The snap of latex gloves ricocheted off the walls like a shot, and the Tormentor impatiently beckoned the orderly carrying a tray to come forward. “Since there’s no more fun to be had in that little game, we may as well begin directly.”
    Eli refused to crane his head around to watch the preparations. He’d learned that early on. Knowing every detail about what was to come only made it worse. It was bad enough that he now knew Number 140 was Strychnine poisoning; he wouldn’t threaten his tenuous control with more knowledge.
    “1200, proceeding with experiment Number 140: Strychnine poisoning. Prepping patient for introduction of toxin.” The Tormentor moved to one side of Eli’s head and motioned the orderly to the other side, “Open his mouth.”
    A warm, latex-covered hand gripped Eli’s chin while another covered his nose while grasping his cheeks. Eli gritted his mouth closed. When the burning in his lungs grew too great, he puffed air through his clenched teeth and parted lips, but he refused to open his mouth. The orderly grew more aggressive, covering his nose and mouth now, cutting off even that small amount of oxygen.
    Eli thrashed he head, but he was unable to shake the orderly from him. The burning in his lungs grew. And grew. His whole body jerked in protest, and his head kicked back as he gasped against the latex covering his mouth. In that second of surrender, the orderly removed his hand, and the Tormentor thrust clear plastic tubing into the side of Eli’s mouth and all the way to the back of his throat while the orderly worked a splint between his teeth. The hard scrape of the tubing against the roof of his mouth caused him to gag.
    “Uh-uh,” the Tormentor scolded as the orderly taped the tubing into place. “None of that.” He returned to his recorder, “1204, administering the toxin.”
    The Tormentor lifted the open ending of the tubing to shoulder height and flourished a beaker filled with cloudy liquid past Eli’s face. “It’s a grand way to die, you know,” he said. “According to legend, it’s what