I was drug down to the deepest cavern of the dungeon. It was dark. Cold. Wet. The odor of decaying flesh radiated throughout the room. The room in itself gave me a stomach churning feeling. My time was nearing. They chained me up on the wall. The rusting metal cuffs dug into my wrists cutting off all circulation. The rats came from the walls and started gnawing on my fingers. I couldn't tell you how long I was down there. No food. No drink. I began to remember that night. It stuck with me. Not in a good way. The guilt began to sink in as my time in solitude elapsed.
After what seemed like an eternity in the pit, the guards came and fetched me out. My wrists were sliced. They continued bleeding once down from the mossy stone of the wall. They led me outside. It was the first time I'd seen sunlight in what turned into weeks in the pit. They led me to a room. A room I later found out that was used to execute murderers. I didn't like that title. Murderer. Laurel would be so ashamed of me.
They showed me the device they were going to use on me. The Rack. I had only heard rumors but once a far fetched fantasy had become my reality. There was another gentleman before me. I had never heard such an ear piercing scream before in my lifetime. They restrained him on the splintering wooden board. They tied his wrist and ankles tightly around the ropes. The man, still struggling began to weep, begging for mercy but murderers got no mercy. The executioner began to turn the lever. I could hear the cranking of the lever slowly turning. The man began to scream. His arms and legs started to separate from their sockets. I could hear the popping and snapping of his bones breaking like twigs from the pure unyielding power of The Rack.
The man continued screaming. The flesh started to separate from his dislocated limbs. His blood started to leak out of him. I couldn't bear to watch but guards forced to see my eventual fate. His left arm was first to be completely severed from his body. The mans face showed his shocking disbelief of what had just occurred. His other limbs eventually followed. The man, limbless and broken, slowly bled out on the rack as his vegetated body lost all evidence it had ever been alive. They removed the remains of the man from the table as they prepared it for me.
They prepared me. Stripped me of my clothes and began to strap me to the board. A rush of thoughts burst through my head. It made my fear of what was about to happen almost vanish. I missed her. I began to weep; not out of fear but out of guilt. I wish we were still here together but I knew soon I would be with my love again. They began to turn the lever. It seemed slower for me then the man whom preceded me. It hurt. I could feel my arms and legs being torn from their sockets. The pain was excruciating. But somehow a sense of relief came over me. I get to spend the rest of eternity with the one I call my soul mate and that was something no level of pain could halt. I felt the life being pulled out of me as my right leg was first to be severed. I chipped my tooth from the grinding pain.
As I could feel myself nearing the end I thought my last thought. The Rack wasn't torture. It wasn't horrifying. It wasn't even painful. It was my savior. The only thing that could save me from my guilt and lead me to what I was searching for from the moment I was thrown in the pit. Eternal happiness with one person who gave my life meaning.