Perfectly Imperfect

Chapter One: Day 1825

~ 5 Years Later~

The familiar concrete floor greeted me as I woke. The rough surface pressing into my pale skin, I almost forgot what colour my natural skin was. Having been sun-deprived for so long it was no wonder my skin had turned ghastly pale.

My body ached from the fresh bruises administered yesterday. The lacerations on my back felt like they were beginning to heal, at least. For the past few weeks they had made doing my duties incredibly difficult. Every small movement felt tight because of the scabs, and it felt like any sudden movement would rip them anew, postponing the time they would be fully healed.

I had lost track with how long I had been here at this point, I think it was nearing 5 years, it could be more. Each day was a new nightmare. But it brought the consistency of my childhood, the familiar chores. Okay, there were significantly fewer needles here. But the criminal activities were a common theme. In the whole time I had been here I hadn't yet discovered what they did, exactly.

I just knew that every week they would bring suspicious deliveries down here, into the basement, and occasionally you would hear the screams of their victims. Obviously, torture was an inherent part of their jobs. But for what purpose or end goal, I wasn't sure. Every time they tortured me it was for pure amusement, not some hidden agenda. Having said that, I was more of a house pet now. If I did my chores and essentially grovelled and pleaded, I remained relatively unharmed. Although I guess interrogating me wouldn't be much use. Unless they were looking for some interesting facts about those wolves they kept.

The eerie thing about this place was those wolves that patrolled outside. Some of my chores involved going outside, although they only allowed this at night and I was heavily supervised by those wolves. And oddly enough, I dreaded those chores the most. As much as I craved the fresh air and an escape from the enclosed area those wolves terrified me more than the men. Those eyes spoke of intelligence I couldn't comprehend from an animal. They seemed happy when I was terrified, they could smell the fear, it was a pleasure I tried not to give them anymore mainly because I felt stripped of emotion at this point.

Of course, I had begun not to care anymore. When I read about things like that in books I always thought it was impossible to grow complacent to the pain, the danger and the fear. Well, I guess I was happily proven wrong. There comes a point where you're so used to the feeling of impending death that it no longer becomes a feeling. It's just an innate part of you that doesn't go away. And at that point, it's weirdly a fact that one day you will die at the hands of these men and your mind just stops worrying about when. It worries more about how. I very much still felt every lick of pain they inflicted, I may have a higher pain tolerance but I still felt every single stroke. And that meant the only thing I could wish for was an easy death. And those wolves were not the easy death I hoped for.

I was all too familiar with the damage they could inflict. And I had seen it many more times in the previous years when other prisoners tried to escape or somebody refused to follow orders, or just when they damn well pleased.
The other thing that really set this place apart from any other nightmare was the ridiculous strength these men possessed. I wasn't sure if it was just because I was used to the only 'man' in my life being my father, of whom was pretty weak anyway or if they used steroids or some other kind of performance enhancer. But a slap from these men made your ears ring for weeks. I remember one of my first weeks here when a kick from one of the men dislocated my shoulder clean from its socket. I had to have it reset and it wasn't an experience I cared to repeat.

First on my agenda today was delivering food to the other prisoners. I had to wait at my door, hands behind my back and head bowed for one of the guards to open the door. I walked past them swiftly with my gaze locked onto the floor. These men despised eye contact, they saw something about it as a challenge. All of the men here were easily over 6 feet tall and had shoulders that barely squeezed through the doorways. I made my way straight to the kitchen and collected the trays before taking them to their allocated rooms. I was given whatever leftovers there were. More prisoners meant less food for me. If you could call it food.

Brown sludge that I could only assume was oatmeal lumped on the plate. It looked positively revolting, as it did every day. We were provided with one per day. I guess it was good I was used to eating so little, it meant one less thing I had to adapt to. Although in all fairness, some days I got more food here than I had at home. I took the tray into one of the cells and found a man crumpled in the corner. He had been worked over really well, his eyes swollen completely shut. Blood coated every square inch of his body. I placed the tray on the floor and carefully backed away, he looked positively feral.

It continued like that until I got into an open cell, much like my own. It was a simple square cement room with this weird metal window at the very top of the room, touching the ceiling. It was barely a foot long and 4 feet wide, opening up on the ground level outside. No person could ever dream of fitting through there. And it leads to the wolf-infested forest even if they could. The other cells were normal prison cells. Exactly like the stereotypical jail cell, with bars alongside one wall and the other three breeze-blocked. There were no windows in those cells.

I placed three trays down that I had precariously balanced on my arms. It was a skill I had mastered fairly quickly, through pure conditioning. The first time I had tried and dropped them resulted in one of the worst beatings I had ever received.

It was saddening to see the way they all pounced on those trays eager to get whatever they could as fast as they could before it was devoured. I walked away listening to the sound of them digging in. They were so eager to eat the slush that could barely constitute food. What had any of us done to deserve this?

I walked back to the kitchen to see what was left for me, I didn't decide the portions and so what I was left with was beyond my control. On the counter was the same tray I had been handing out. There were about 3-4 spoonfuls of the sludge slightly off-centre on the tray. A faint string of amusement buzzed through me, it was like they did everything in their power to make us as miserable as possible. Even down to the minute things such as not centralising the food. Such as making the toilets low enough that you couldn't comfortably sit on them without getting a cramp. It was amusing how well versed they were at making every single thing that could be remotely construed as nice, uncomfortable. I wondered if it was something that was intentionally thought out or just incidental.

I took my meagre meal back to my own cell. I was promptly locked in. I guess the one good thing about my experience as a prisoner was that I had always had a cell to myself. Not once had I had a roommate. As I sat on the cold hard floor I thought, actually was that a good thing? Maybe my experience here would have been eased by a companion of some sorts. I quickly scrapped that idea, any attachments made here would be thoroughly abused. Of that, I didn't doubt.

I was once caught giving extra rations to this frail kid, who couldn't have been any more than 12. I scraped some from the other plates onto his. They thought he was a friend or something. I was forced to watch when they fed him to the wolves.
When I began talking to a maid regularly they made me watch as they cut out her tongue. And now she walks around still doing her job, unable to speak. We often make awkward eye contact and she promptly looks away.

In some ways, those were the worse punishments. Not the isolation and the lack of any friendship but the absolutely overwhelming guilt at contributing to their pain and yet receiving no punishment yourself.

The dinner tasted exactly as disgusting as it looked. But I ate it anyway.