The man looks at me from across the table. I cannot raise my head, but I see him in a reflection cast by a mirror, a pool of my blood that has collected before me. He leans forward intently, folding his hands. The man's silver hair falls about his wrinkled neck and face, hair that matches his steely gray eyes that are at present boring holes through my downcast face.

"So...?"

He speaks like a circus performer. I cannot curb my instinct to cringe at every grating syllable, but by now my muscles are too weak to generate any visible reaction. It doesn't matter, the man knows his effect on my psyche and is every bit as content with my invisible suffering that he is with the apparent. I strain to raise my eyes to his, and in the moment of contact he knows precisely what I am thinking, most prevalent of which is a string of tired expletives.

"No no no, that's hardly the answer I'm looking for..."

We've been playing this game for hours, and I know the rules quite well. This is generally the part where I scream, and bleed, and where he sits back and laughs. He blocks of my memories at the same time, effectively locking away my reasons for living and my will to resist. The effect is temporary; once the pain stops he restores my memories, along with the fresh pain. He explained this all to me.

"I need you to feel despair. Pain won't make despair unless you are broken. But broken does me no good because broken isn't thoughtful, or creative, or original. This way I can have both!"

My brain blinks out and the pain kicks in. Maybe minutes or maybe hours go by before it stops, and now I'm entertaining the thought that the pain isn't real, that maybe it's just an injected memory of my captor. I've been doing this on and off for untold hours, and each time I am reminded that while the pain might not be real, my blood loss certainly is, and I'll probably be dead soon enough.

"You're wrong about that, of course. You'll live as long as I please, suffer ever so long as you hold out on me. You're either going to tell me what I need to know or you're going to die very very veeerrry slowly."

I let my eyes sink, becoming again aware that he can read my thoughts. I know well enough that nothing is sacred to this man save what he seeks.

"Tell me, now, what is most important in life? Tell me... tell... me... tell me... tell... me..."

Sitting here, listening to this crazy old fool singing like a bored child, I almost feel like lauging. Almost. Instead I review. I answered 'love' at first, and he laughed at me before removing my skin. 'Truth' rung out the second response, and he peeled off my finger-, and toe-, nails one at a time. Answering 'freedom' earned me a dozen broken ribs. It was at this point that he realized that physical harm wouldn't break me, so he started to work on my mind. 'Beauty', 'faith', 'charity', 'honor', 'happiness', 'knowledge', 'enlightenment'. Each response was but a harbinger of agony. I started to get sadistic, answering 'pain', 'fear', 'death', 'suffering'. I'm too tired to think, let alone conjure up existence's best-kept secret.

"Come now... You have no choice, dear one. You're going to tell me, and I'm going to be complete, and then I'll have all of you..."

Oh yeah, this maniac is seeking his own personal Holy Grail, a miniscule scrap of knowledge growing in the womb that is my skull. Once he finds it... I don't know. He shows me his ideal world, an incorporate of the pain that courses through my veins upon an unsuccessful plea. My torment will be reflected on all, though mine will have ended. He doesn't read my thoughts, but he knows them nonetheless.

"Must I reaffirm the power those pretty faces in your memories hold over you...?"

No, he doesn't have to, as they never left my mind. If he knows me so well why must I be the vessel of his revelation? I'm poring through my precious grief-stricken memories not really seeking an answer when it hits me. Of course the thought had to be pulled from me because it is my nature to bury it, to protect and safeguard. That nature is the secret. That I did not seek the solution is the real answer. That I delivered myself unto pain time and time again is my own deliverance, and yet this deliverance cannot save me for sake of itself. I shut my eyes to the light at the end of my tunnel.

I consummate the need.

The man stands and walks over to my end of the table, testing my conviction one last time. Finally he lets the limp hand that was mine fall to the table with a thud.

I turn around and exit the room, combing my gray hair with my fingertips.