CHAPTER TEN
______________________________________________
This is where the stench came from. The suffocated corpses that sat up against the closet wall, slumping over limp. Their heads hanging so lifelessly it looked like their necks were broken.
"What should I do with them, sir?" Cassius asked, staring at the grayish blue skinned bodies. 18 got on his knees. Elenora watched closely, covering her mouth in utter surprise. Her breaths were still, holding back as if she was one of them. She could have been. When people die, their souls stay there until they are delivered. Hopefully, a kind Mortem did the honors of delivering their souls to their destination. The best thing to do now is to confirm that they're dead. Two fingers to the throat. Confirming that their veins are in fact still now. He took off his glove and felt for warmth or movement.
"Dead..."
Now to the next. The body's eyes remained wide open. Fingers to the throat.
"Dead." 18 slowly brushed his fingers over the humans eyelids, shutting them and carrying on to the next.
"Dead... but... this one is fresh."
Now the last in the closet. This one, a woman, slid down the wall, her veins popping from her arms light blue and roundish.
"Dead..."
Now, the man stood up, grabbing his handkerchief.
"Tag them." He said. The Tier Head pointed to only three of them, and continued to wipe his fingers. "This one, tag it blue. Burn it, when you return to the Center Hold. Aside from that..." He finished, "we could use these three."
Cassius hastily bowed. "Yes, sir."
Now, finally, Pollux spoke. "Sir, I have nearly finished the attic."
"Proceed... I'll have a guard from the front accompany Cassius."
Pollux replied with the same words spoken by Cassius previously, and swiveled back around, returning quickly to the attic to complete his work. Now, the young woman next to The Tier Head was silent. The girl watched him bend down again in the little closet, examining the bodies closely. It looked almost like copper. A mask made of pure copper, and tubes that led to a tank full of oxygen. It felt alien in his bare hands, rusty and rough feeling. Standing up, he glued his eyes to it as it rested heavily in his hands. 18 held it so close to his face he almost touched it, slowly turning it around as if it would explode at a sudden movement. Studying about their strategies and holding the only thing that gave them access to destruction in their Tier, was completely different.
Elenora drew closer. He felt around it, running his hand slowly down the tube, and then to where it met the mask itself. It looked so peculiar. So treacherous and sick. The things that this mask could enable, the thought. At the speed that Elenora would take a breath at this moment, he brought his finger to where the oxygen fled. Then pulled it back at the alien feel of something invisible licking at his fingertip. He threw it to the ground in disgust, strikingly disgusted to imagine that it wasn't functioning by elixir, murmuring the word horrid, and ushering Elenora to follow him out of the room. 18 hurriedly jammed his hands back into his gloves and scoured the rest of the front room. It disgusted him. The feeble attempts that they made. Their motives are disgusting, like scaly deceitful snakes. The failed attempt that he had witnessed at that moment was in fact horrid. What would those humans have done if they had put that mask on fast enough to survive on the oxygen? The unanswered question was terrifying and the rest must be stopped. Just as he finished the front room, Cassius was on his way back in with his help and tags. Pollux was also finished, shuffling back down the stairs only to report the good news of nothing peculiar in the attic.
"Sir, we have called guards from The Center Hold to retrieve and transport the human body's."
"Good. Thank you."
"We... haven't received news from any of the other holds to confirm that they are ready for you yet, sir."
"Not a problem... We'll leave early and make use of our free time..."
18 adjusted his collar. "In the meantime... I suppose we could make our way to the main bell to observe the Halitus." he said gazing at Elenora then back at the guard. They agreed, and with the absence of hesitation, they left, down the street and to the elevator.
"Those bodies..." She murmured. "What do you plan on doing to them once they reach The Center Hold?"
The man looked down to her only to see her looking back.
"We use them of course."
"You use them?" confusion struck her face, but there was no surprised feelings to be found. Just acceptance, but curiosity.
"Our children need to eat..."
Now her attention was completely and utterly on what he was saying. The surprise slowly crept in. Elenora said nothing. She just turned her attention back to the road ahead, and tried to disregard. Now, Halitus. Another unfamiliar Latin word. But soon, the unfamiliar will become another answered question. Another filled page.
