Win Part Deux: CandleDart

He woke:

Before hanging him they’d cut off his pinkie fingers and hammered his feet into revolting husks of connective tissue and bone.

He came to for just a few seconds while they were duct-taping him to the wall. A blurry face, scaly and shiny with sweat and twitching, - dominated his field of vision. He felt a pinch somewhere around his legs. A voice from somewhere else said:

“You’re giving him pure?” and then, a few moments later, the same voice (he was almost positive the voice had an accent, British maybe, Australian?) “nice one mate” and laughing.. Well, not quite laughing so much as coughing with an amused lilt..

The twitchy face moved back a bit and spoke: “Yes, the pure, and the one before that was about a vials worth of acid. The patient, nurse Richards, must be properly anesthetized.”

“Of course, of course” from the other voice. It came out: “ ‘ vgawwwce…Gawwwce”

Everything turned brown and pink and back down he went.

He woke:

This time to a searing white flash and a thunderous cracking sound and in his mind he was outside at night. A child; helpless and cowering in heavy, indifferent weather.

His captors were seated across from him in gigantic twin reclining chairs and watching him bleed and squirm with what looked like fascination. The only furniture in the small gray room was the coffee table in front of him. It’s glass top piece was partially covered by a gigantic pile of cocaine and an enormous handgun. He couldn’t help staring at the handgun.

He was having a dream.

In his dream he was at a concert. He could tell it was noisy - everyone around him was jumping up and down and cheering in slow motion and sometimes in regular motion. He couldn’t hear them, but he was sure they were cheering and swooning. He could hear music. He felt bass and treble. The Stones - stewing and grinding their way through the burning coda of a song he didn’t know the name of. He was in the front row. Mick Jagger crooning something like “the guitar player gets restless” (reckless?..Restless)

Then the Stones aren’t playing the song but the music was still going and the crowd was still cheering and swooning. Mick is talking to Keith. He’s laughing. They’re both laughing and pointing at him. As they cross the stage they’re speaking still and he can’t hear them because now the crowd is freaking out screaming. He’s panic-racked. This situation with the crowd is tense with all the screaming and what- not. Confusion is setting in. He sees some girl next to him crying.

Charlie Watts gestures toward him and then Charlie is next to him. Charlie watts is getting in his face and he’s about to freak the fuck out amidst all this confusion. Charlie watts is about to just tee off on him. Watts somehow blaming him for making all this mess. Watts is really gearing up. He’s ready to get medieval. He’s saying something about…Shooting out his knee? Blowing out his knee? Keith Richards is crying from laughing. Keith Richards says “Well then, give him more then”. It comes out: whallen…Hemoden

He does not wake from the pain of his knee exploding - the heroin racing around his system is too much for the pain. It’s THE NOISE of the pistol that he’d been staring at way back when. Like a million pianos falling from a million Empire State buildings and amplified with a 3000-foot high Marshall stack similar to the one Keith Richards plays through. He sees all the pianos and he sees each one of the million Empire State Buildings and he can’t quite figure out how something like that might be amplified although he does see each individual “Marshall” logo on each of the amps. They’re piled up to the moon from the room in which he’s now been duct-taped to the wall.

　

“You like it?” asked Charlie with reverence. “It’s a Heckler and Koch MK-53. I just got it yesterday!

I’d let you hold if you weren’t…Uh…” His eyes got wide “you know”.

The hanging man gave a small wave of his chin and then let his head just hang on his upper chest. He began to urinate weakly.

Keith Richards half-stood in alarm. “Hey bub! Hey bub! you’re wettin yer britches.” he said. He was dressed in a blousy white shirt and had on leather pants and to the hanging man he looked a dead ringer for Keith Richards circa 1972. “Charlie, he’s peeing on you carpet mate!”. None of it is intelligible.

Charlie said “’s okay Keith it’s Martins. Most of the shit is Martins actually. I was in Africa when I bought it and he was pretty much in charge of putting the place together.”

“Really? Well he did a bang up job in this room luv!” he laughed a long dopey laugh and added “brilliant shades of white”. It came out: “Brillyshazehwhye…”

The hanging man was confused: Was it Keith Richards here with them? How weird would that be that Charlie Sheen and Keith Richards getting co-producer credits for authoring his destruction. He cried, and then laughed a little, and then cried again and harder. As he cried, Sheen snorted a mound of white powder that looked as big and wide around as a can of tuna. Then he lit a candle.

He said to nobody in particular: “you’re gonna love this”.

It was itchy where they’d smashed his foot and his kneecap was starting to bark. He couldn’t look at his broken carcass for the duct tape. Sheen was holding something over the candle. They’d tucked his pinkies into his ears. They fell out. One bounced off his former foot. They looked like worms.

Keith Richards said: “Not the Uni‘s mate”. It came out “nudayounzmae”

Charlie replied: “Oh yes the Unicorns brother. This is a big occasion! Only the finest will do…”. As he spoke he held a bigger-than-average looking throwing dart over the candle, moving it slowly back and forth through the flame. Gibbering like a monkey:

“You see, it’s numbers dude. I mean, like numbers. Takeforexample…I don’tknowfuckin’…Fuckin’…Fuckin TIME man!. Not real ! Ha ha…You laugh ha HA! But it IS notreal, it IS something that we made up. Not we like you and me we but WE…” at this he made a circlee motion with his index finger pointing down.

Back and forth with the dart. The candles flame rent at the point where the metal of the dart is heating and then uniting at the top with the two sides becoming one. His pinkies are on the floor and they look like worms.

You know, wayyyy back when when the first guy, fuckinnnnn, uh! Correction: first guyZZZ (circlee motion again, this time faster) are walkin around they don’t have I dunnofuckin, fuckin, fuckin WATCHES. Fuckinnn, dudes not looking at his Rolex to see fuckin MINUTES! toseefuckinnnn…Seconds TICKING! No he’s fuckinnn, he’s seeing changes. He’s seeing changes all around him man. He see’s leaves and fuckin days and nights and fuckin winters…”

The hanging man can’t hear the ranting. He can’t see Sheen slowly working the dart back and forth through the candle again and again…He can’t see anything because he’s gone to sleep again. And he sleep right up until the moment that Charlie Sheen throws the molten dart through his heart.

He wakes up then, but just for a few seconds.