The Man of Silent Screams.

“But what if I don’t get in..?”, I whined to my friend Sam.

He sighed loudly and told me, “Oh come on, it can’t be that difficult. It's just a silly test, but I’m sure you’ll pass it with ease. You know how smart you are, Rachel.”

It’s true. I am very smart. I’ve taken plenty of tests in the past and passed most of them with flying colors. But this test was different. It has to be taken verbally, you can’t stutter, you can’t mix up your words, and most importantly.. you can’t fail it. If you fail it, it isn’t taken lightly. Death is the least they could wish upon you. There’s plenty of rumors going around about how they kill you if you don’t pass. But I’ve heard from one of his officials that they hang you on the ceiling and leave you there until you die. Then they take down the body and put it in his fireplace. He is very strict about how you place your words in sentences, how loud or soft you talk, and when you talk. He is a rather portly ostrich with stubby legs and wings. He has the face of a serial killer mixed with a demon. His cheeks are plump and easily give away when he is angry, for when he is upset they contract and his beak forms into a rather malevolent frown. His almost bald and very round head holds the brain of a super-genius, maybe the next Einstein. His voice never ceases to pound the eardrums of his aggravated clients who annoyed him so abundantly. But enough about him, I haven’t even introduced myself. I am Rachel, commonly known as Roach. I am a young honey badger, who just happens to be friends with Sam, a bear cub. We've been friends for a while and Sam knows me quite well. Without him I probably wouldn't be here today; he has helped me more than anybody else. Today, Sam's going with me to apply for a job. It may sound easy, but becoming a paper shredder is harder than you think. I have the sharp claws and sharp teeth I need, but without getting past the manager of the building, there's no possible way I'll get in.. Or survive.

Sam walked beside me on the sidewalk, medium-paced, clearly thinking about.. him. We were taking the trip to his building so I could apply for the job. His building is huge - like an oversized mansion. It easily takes up 40 acres of land and has enormous smoke stacks emerging from every corner. He runs the business of making portable treehouses, so he needs the space. All of his workers are poor little beavers who barely ever get breaks and work for about 15 hours straight without food. Some of them say he's a demon disguised as an ostrich. Others say he has the power to control whatever he wants to with his mind. Whatever he is and whatever he does, I'm still applying. I need this job. When we had finally reached his building, we stood gaping at its complexity until a guard shooed us away. We protested that I was here for the job and that Sam was here to root for me. He let us through the gigantic iron gates and watched us stroll through the front doors, shaking his head.

I thought I heard him mutter to himself, “Good luck kid. You’re gonna need it.”

We got lost immediately and trudged down about 27 hallways before we found the long line of animals waiting to take the test. The line took up 2 hallways worth of length. We stood at the end while the line went down slowly. I turned out to be the last participant. Even with the excitement lingering from earlier, fear settled in deeper and deeper as the line got shorter and shorter.

Meeting him in person was going to be heart wrenching. Nerve tingling. Brain wracking. Frightening beyond belief. Sam had stayed behind - there are huge wooden double doors blocking his office, so the guards ordered him to wait outside. I slinked down the red carpet leading to his large, black, wooden contraption of a desk. He sat in his big, reclining, swirling chair with the back facing my direction. I was still creeping towards him, gaping at all the statues that lined the carpet. They were all made of white marble, all depicting a person being hung. The statues themselves hung from a long metal chain on the ceiling. They were about my height. As for the area where they hung live animals, this was it - there were nooses hanging high up on the ceiling in every direction. Even a few dead bodies that haven't been disposed of yet hung limp and lifeless. I was wondering what that stench was. At this point I was halfway down the long, red carpet. I stopped to muster up the courage to say hello, but once I stopped he whipped his chair around and glared at me from across the room.

It was awkwardly silent for a minute or two, but then he said with a booming voice, "The test has already started. So far, you are failing. Say something, numbskull."

I stared at him blankly but suddenly remembered the rules.

"Hello Mr. Dhaet.. I'm here for the -"

"I know you're here for the job, sit down already."

I ran over to him quickly and plopped down into the small wooden chair. My palms were sweaty and I was visibly shaking. He leaned over his desk until he was 2 inches away from my face.

He looked me straight in the eye and told me, "I'm not the crazy demon people say I am." Then he sat back down and leaned back, resting his feet on the desk.

He pointed to his head and said, "That's merely a rumor. I'm telling you right now, the only powers I have come from my mind."

I stared at him blankly and didn't say anything. He sighed and organized some papers on his desk.

"Listen kid. This job may be easy to get for you. Or it could be the hardest test you've ever taken. But I can tell you could pass out any minute from nervousness, so I'll go easy on you. There will be less questions and I'll go slower. Ok?"

I nodded briskly in reply. He nodded back and cleared his throat. He shuffled through some papers until he found the right stack. He organized them too, cleared his throat again, and glanced at me.

“Are you ready?”, he asked.

I nod my head once more. He looks over the papers and asks the first question.

“So.. ‘Rachel’. Would you rather me call you Roach?”

“Yes please.”, I said in a surprisingly deep voice. I’ve barely said a word since I arrived.

He nods and looks back at the papers. Next question.

“Well. You’ve made it this far. I’m quite impressed, actually. Most don’t even make it past the first question, and all I ask is for their names! Anyway, what do you do for fun, Roach?”

“Usually I write stories, draw, or sing.”

“You sing, Miss Rachel? Wow. Prove how good you are.”

I looked at him like he had 3 heads and asked, “Really? Now?”

“Yes, why not!”

“Well, I don’t know. I haven’t warmed up yet. It might not sound very good.”

He stood up, walked around the desk, picked me up, and placed me on the floor.

“Well, then we must ‘warm you up’! There’s the bathroom”, He pointed to a dark red door that surprisingly stood out against the bright red walls on the left side of the room, “Go practice in there, and come out when you’re ready.”

He gave me a little push. I turned around and smiled. He smiled back. Something isn’t right. I walked over to the door with caution and lightly pushed it open. I turned around again and there he was, at his desk, filing papers. I slowly creeped into the bathroom, which was bright red also. But this room had many paintings and mirrors and accents on the walls. It was quite comforting. I stood in front of one of the mirrors and cleared my throat quietly. I stood up tall and did some vocal exercises for about 10 minutes. I was walking out the door when an alarm went off and I jumped. He was still at his desk, but the alarm was eardrum breakingly loud, and I stood in the doorway covering my ears. He looked over at me and then looked down. He pressed a button on his desk and the alarm turned off. He turned his gaze towards me and motioned for me to come back over.

Once I sat down again, he said, “Sorry about that. The alarm goes off every time they clean.”

He glanced up at the ceiling, and so did I. The dead bodies were gone. We both looked back down at each other and he grabbed the papers again. Then he placed them back on the desk and looked at me, bewildered.

“I almost forgot! Roach, sing for me.”

That sounded more like an order than an offer. But, I started to sing anyway. I sang my favorite song, but I forgot a line. I stopped in the middle, trying to remember it, but then he placed his wing on my paw which I had left resting on his desk.

I looked at him, wide-eyed, and he whispered quietly, “The test is over.”

I slowly pulled my paw away and asked, confused, “What do you mean?”

He pulled his wing away and walked around his desk until he was right next to me. He picked me up again and placed me on the floor.

I looked up at him and asked again, “What do you mean?”

He stared down at me, speechless. His eyes slowly turned bright yellow, and I thought he was going to pass out, have a seizure, something. But instead, I was lifted up slowly into the air and thrown against a wall. I screeched and fell on the floor with a hard *smack*. I lay there, in pain, until I was lifted again. Mr. Dhaet really was a demon.. with the power to control things with his mind. I was flown over to the opposite wall, and placed in a small cannon-like thing. He set the string on fire, and I was shot into the air, where I got caught in a noose. I struggled for dear life, trying to get the rope off my neck. I looked below me and saw the statues, the rug, the desk, and Mr. Dhaet. I did some thinking while I tried to relax. Struggling would only make it worse. I thought about Mr. Dhaet.. how he lured me in. And his last name. His last name doesn’t fit into any cultures. Except one. Think about this - you know those puzzles where you have to unscramble the words? Well, unscramble his last name. Dhaet, ‘unscrambled’ out correctly, spells out

D-E-A-T-H.

I was still hanging on the ceiling, but it didn’t hurt anymore. My legs had lost feeling and went numb. I could feel my brain losing blood. But I didn’t resist. Mr. Dhaet had gone somewhere else, and left me alone to die. But I wasn’t going to let that happen. I reached up towards the rope, and attempted to cut it with my claws. When that didn’t work out, I pulled it up and placed it in my mouth. I tried to gnaw through the rope, and eventually it started to rip. When it finally gave out, I fell from 100 feet up onto the marble floor. I got up quickly even though my arm was shooting with pain. I had to make an escape. I ran over to the big wooden doors and pushed one open. They were light for such a size. I found Sam asleep on the floor and the guards nowhere to be seen. I shook him violently and he woke up scared as heck. I told him quickly what happened, and told him we needed to escape. He got up and rubbed his eyes while I tried to find the exit.

“We need to go down all those hallways again without being seen.”

“All 27?”

“Yup. Or we could find a shortcut.”

Sam nodded, and off we ran.

We ran through several hallways and found the exit. We sprinted towards it, but suddenly, some guards grabbed our arms from behind. They held us tightly with no sign of letting go.

Mr. Dhaet appeared and said with an evil smirk, “Well, well. Looks like you’ve escaped my trap. But here’s a new one. I have a puzzle for you.”

“If it has to do with your last name, I already figured it out.”, I said in a bored way. I was 100% done with this.

He strutted over to me and pinched my cheeks while the guards held me.

“Aw, look at the little honey badger, figuring out some puzzles!”

I turned bright red in fury and said between clenched teeth, “You better let us go Dhaet..”

“Aw, why’s that?”

“Cuz I’m about to rip your face off..”

He stood back and looked at me with wide eyes.

Then he said, “Really now?”, leaning close to my face again.

I looked down at the floor and growled low and deep as a warning sign. He used his wing to lift my face back up and looked me straight in the eye, just like he did before when he said he wasn’t a demon.

He told me quietly, “I dare you.”

I curled my snout into a snarl, growling louder. I waited a few seconds before I lunged forward and grabbed onto his beak with my canines. He howled and tried to escape my grip, but I wouldn’t let up. I dug deeper into his beak every time he struggled. I watched his eyes glaze over and his struggling slowed. He eventually started to fall, so I let go and he dropped onto the floor. The guards ran off behind us. I slowly walked over to Mr. Dhaet and kick him lightly, making sure he was gone. I turned around, and Sam was staring at me with huge eyes and a gaping mouth.

He said, “How did you.. why did you.. what?”

I shrugged and licked my lips.

“I’m hungry.”

I pointed towards Mr. Dhaet and said, “I know you’re hungry too, Sam.”

He ran over to me on all fours and whispered in my ear, “Yeah, I am. I’m sure you’ll taste great.”