THE GIRL

She's in their room. There are two more girls with her, one blonde and the other ginger. The three have all been made to kneel side bye side in front of the men as they inspect them like livestock. Yet despite how dire the situation is, the kidnapped victims continue pleading for the men to let them go, clinging on to any possibility of help arriving.

"Please let me go." Ginger whimpers, tears flooding her eyes. "I promise I won't tell anyone."

The men only seem to enjoy the pleas, however, because all they do is laugh.

"This one's too talkative." Paolo says. He sends a hand through Ginger's hair and gives a smile so sinister, it chills not only Ginger but The Girl. "You can scream all you want, but there's no one coming."

The rest of the men all grin. They're enjoying the show.

Paolo's gaze shifts over to The Girl. He can't help but eye the red dress she has on, his drool practically escaping his mouth. He circles her with the intent of examining her, but stops when he finds the tattoo on her back. The perverted grin on his lips widens. "You're the best catch I've had in a while." He runs his fingers down her back and picks up a lock of her hair. The Girl shivers, her disgust broadening.

Paolo walks back to the front and begins caressing her cheeks. "Take your clothes off."

The Girl goes quiet. Then the facade comes right off. "Paolo Porello. Age sixty-one. Retired mobster. Served under Bruno Verdonni as underboss up until four years ago. Currently resides in Savannah, Georgia and trafficks women as a side business." She looks Paolo in his eyes. "Am I correct?"

Paolo goes quiet, and The Girl can see him trying to work up some form of hypothesis. "Who the fuck are you?"

The Girl dismisses his question. She leaves her position and heads for the door, but one of Paolo's friends grabs her arm before she's able to make it there. "Where the fuck do you think you're going, bitch?"

The Girl will not settle for any interruptions. She pulls out a dagger from her holster, then slashes his wrist just enough for it to bleed intensely, but not detach. The man falls to the floor screaming as pain so consuming overcomes him. This is no longer The Girl's problem, however, because she resumes her journey towards the door.

Except, she doesn't leave. She locks the door firmly with a key and turns back to the terrified group behind her.

"There's no one coming, right?"

Paolo's face grows ghost pale. He tries dashing for his phone, but The Girl is too quick for him. She shoves him onto the bed and pins him down. Then pulls out two more daggers and stabs it right through his palms and into the mattress.

Paolo's screams echo throughout the suite. Blood spews in streams, staining the bedsheets in the process. The Girl takes some time just reveling in the scream, because it soothes her. It calms her. And to conjure more screams, she needs to inflict more pain.

But the rest of Paolo's friends begin panicking. They all rush for the door, trying frantically to tug it open, to relieve themselves from the devil behind them. Their attempts are useless, though, because the door won't budge. The Girl made sure of it.

She brings out a new dagger and goes for her first victim; the one with the injured wrist. The weapon buries deep into his chest, and to dig up more pain, she cuts down to his abdomen until all that erupts from the man is an agonizing wheeze. Until all that's left are his entrails all over the floor.

This is enough to let the last two men know they're next. But one decides he's not going down without a fight. He's bigger than she is, and therefore stronger. Perhaps if he exercises some brute strength, he may be able to subdue The Girl. So he tries ceasing her arm, but what he doesn't take into account is how agile she is. She's quick enough to move out of the way and get a hold of his arm instead.

And that's when the man knows he's screwed.

The Girl twists his arm behind his back, then kicks him with enough force to make him kneel. Target Number Two screeches as the tension around his arm worsens, but that's the least of his problems because The Girl is now in his blind spot. She slashes his throat in a clean line - steady and agonizingly slow - until his neck gushes blood in volumes. Target Number Two falls to the floor dead.

The last target is frozen in fear. His pants are now soiled with urine, with legs that have long since lost all feeling. He falls to the ground just as The Girl comes to a stop in front of him.

"Please, I-I'll give you anything!" The man pleads. "You want money?! I'll give you money-" The Girl shoves the bloody dagger into his mouth and out the back of his head. There goes Target Number Three.

And then there was one.

"W-who hired you?!" Paolo demands. He can't stop himself from trembling. "I'll pay you double, no, triple what they paid you!"

The Girl ignores his cries and climbs on top of him. This is the part she's been looking forward to. This is why she's here.

"Where were you fourteen years ago, October 27th?"

Paolo can't move from the way she looks at him; no speck of emotion. This only ignites his fear, which stalls his reply in the process. But The Girl means business. She drives the dagger in his left palm further in to inflict more pain.

Paolo wails in misery. The tears don't stop coming. "I don't fucking know, I swear!"

Despite the fact that Paolo is now a quivering mess, he's still able to grow speechless from what The Girl does next. She reaches for her left eye and removes the brown contact lens, revealing its true color.

A light shade of grey. That's what Paolo sees. It takes the color of the clouds on a calm day.

His eyes continue darting between the colors, lingering more on the grey than the brown. The Girl gives him the time he needs. He needs to arrive at the conclusion all by himself. Otherwise, it would prove unsatisfying. And he does, because his eye widens. And his chest begins heaving.

"You . . . You're one of the girls . . ."

There it is. As a form of gratitude, The Girl goes straight for his left eye. The feeling of the dagger in Paolo's socket brings her so much euphoria, she can barely even contain herself. This is it. He should writhe in misery. He should lose himself to the pain.

Paolo has now begun foaming in the mouth, but The Girl is not yet done with him. She wants him dead on her own terms. She pulls the weapon out to allow him some time to rest.

There's a stereo in the corner next to Target Number One's bloodied body, and that's where she heads to. She inserts a CD and hits play, and immediately the suite is serenaded by streams of laughter. Clamorous and hearty they are, all from a crowd.

The Girl heads back for Paolo and assumes her position on top of him. "Look me in the eyes, Paolo."

Paolo follows instructions.

"Tell me you remember everything."

"I . . ." He sniffles. "I remember everything. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm so-"

"Hey," The Girl looks him dead in the eye. "Shut the fuck up."

Paolo instantly goes mute, but only temporarily. Somehow, he thinks if he keeps up the pleading The Girl will spare him.

"Please . . . please spare me." He tells her, the laughter in the background drowning out most of his pleas.

The Girl won't ask a second time. She shoves a hand into his mouth and grabs a hold of his tongue. Then in all under an excruciating second, she tears it off with the dagger and throws it on the floor. Paola screams again. And again, The Girl smiles.

How the great Paolo Porello has fallen. The Girl wants to laugh. The Paolo in front of her now is not the same as the one fourteen years ago. The brazen man back then is all but gone, leaving behind a weak, petrified shell. She brings the dagger back up to his face and prepares for round two.

"I really wanted a tilt table for this part. But it can't be helped."

Despite the pain from his severed tongue, Paolo still pauses. He must know what she means.

"While this knife digs into your skin," she cuts deep into his jawline. "I want you to think about your life choices," the dagger plows his skin, earning more painful cries. "And all the decisions you made," slices of skin begin to fall off, exposing the layer of bare muscles and tissues underneath. "As you regret the day you crossed paths with me."

Paolo wails. He struggles. But the laughing track overwhelms him. The dagger sinks into his flesh and leaves with chunks of thinly sliced flesh. Each time his screams erupt, the laughter is there to muffle him out. The joyous tone of the laughs serve as a tool to ridicule him, to mock the situation he's in. This is must prove more than enough mental torture for Paolo.

At this point, nothing of Paolo's original looks remain. He's a deformed, bloodied mess, all skin shredded and peeled off, leaving behind a layer of bare tissues. His remaining eye has rolled to the back of his head, and his breathing has grown shallow. He must be close to death. But it won't be granted to him just yet.

The Girl pulls out a cylindrical container and holds it up for them both to see. The specimen inside crawls around the enclosure, scratching and scraping the glass with its numerous feet. It stops and takes a look at The Girl whose sadistic smile has returned once again.

"You know what this is?" She moves the container closer to Paolo's face. "The giant desert centipede. I hear its bite can leave a grown man crying for his mother."

Paolo does his best to bring his focus to the deadly insect in front of him. Its antennas whirl around the container, legs kicking in excitement. Paolo begins shaking his head rapidly. This certainly will not end well for him.

The Girl pries Paolo's mouth open as wide as she can, and to everyone's horror, shoves the cylinder in. The centipede finds its way into Paolo's mouth and down his throat, biting and stinging its way around. Paolo's body trembles at the pain. He would scream, but he can't do so with his throat currently occupied.

The Girl watches him struggle. "Cry for me, Paolo."

And he does exactly so. Tears stain his cheeks, because now the centipede has made it into his body. It won't be long until the poison takes over. The Girl, however, still has plans before then.

First off are his ears. She rips them off with the dagger, the laughing track backing her up in the act. Then comes his nose, and then his lips, all torn apart by the sharp blade. She slows her pace down while cutting off the pieces. What better way to make it all excruciating.

And it works. Paolo screams like there's no tomorrow. The poison finally kicks in as well, which brings about a new form of pain. It must be suffocating, because he can hardly breathe now. It's all ragged and uneven. All music to The Girl's ears. Let him lose his mind.

A couple more intense minutes of torture pass before Paolo dies. His body lays mutilated on the bed, but his last remaining eye is still open, as if gazing into the distance. The Girl breathes out a long sigh and finally climbs off his dead body. She's been drenched in blood from head to toe, and even some parts of her hair haven't been spared. This is just fine, though. Paolo Porello is dead.

She retrieves the CD from the stereo, then spends a second surveying the room. Until Blondy and Ginger meet her eyes in the corner. They look at her like she's some otherworldly entity, their eyes wide with shock and fright. The Girl doesn't bother trying to explain herself. She's accomplished what she came to do. She heads for the door.

Before she leaves, however, she picks up on the coat next to the blonde. "Can I borrow that?"

Blondy hastily agrees, too frightened to spare a word.

The Girl grabs the coat and slips it on, all smiles. "Thank you."

Once outside, she unwraps a new lollipop — her seventh since the day began. She gazes at the darkened sky, at the stars dotted around. This is only the beginning. All the people she's killed until now have finally landed her one step closer to her goal.

So she takes the time to appreciate the bright crescent moon. Because it will soon be dyed red.

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