Lacrimosa

The sun crept through the curtains of the dark room. Its gaze beamed onto the resting elderly man. His partner spared from the sun’s rays.

He woke up, checking the clock on his night stand before getting out of his bed. It was draped in the furs and hides of animals which had been his hunts over the years, their heads belonging on his wall. Everything from bears, lions, tigers, and all manners of wildlife could be found mounted. This was the den of a hunter and most importantly…a monster.

Getting out of the bed, the elderly man made his way to the other side of the room, entering into his bathroom. The floors decorated with black and white checkered imported marble tiles. The corner of the room being occupied by a deep soak luxury tub that easily costed 20,000, if not 30,000 Draaks.

The older man urinated into his toilet while measuring the puffiness of his face in the mirror. His face was very puffy. He decided to wear an ice-pack mask on his face in order to relieve some of the puffiness.

Dressing himself he wore a white button-up covered in a navy blue sweater. An ebon colored belt with a golden lion with diamond eyes as the centerpiece. Finishing it off he had ash tinted paints and shoes matching the belt.

Quietly he left the bedroom leaving his wife in bed and he made his way through a hallway to the kitchen. The walls were a pearl white color. Glossy if the eye saw it. The floors were a white oak hardwood. The kitchen was grand in size and decor. The countertops were black granite that easily resembled coal. For natural lighting were large iron grilled pane-glass windows with a view of the lake. To top it off was an Imperial Grand Piano in the front of the room, it was placed directly by the large windows.

The septuagenarian man took one iron skillet out of a cabinet and placed it over the stove. The fire below warmed it. He put butter into the skillet, letting it melt down. After it had melted down he took old duck liver and placed it inside. There was a certain grace and delicate-ness to how he did it. He was a perfectionist.

He put herbs and seasoning on it. Letting one side of the liver brown he clapped his hands and the piano started to play a waltz. After some time had passed he flipped the liver with it getting a great brown. The other side cooked and he put the liver onto a plate with the herbs. Finishing it off he opened a new-old red that smelled of fetid bladder damp. Perfection.

With the waltz playing he cut into the liver. The liver crumbled under the knife like plumber’s putty. The liver had a slight coating of pustular yellow fat. It was stringy and dense with a web of veins. Consuming it the veins stuck to the roof of his mouth. He flushed them down with the red.

It wasn’t long before he felt two hands on his side. They were smaller and soft. It was his wife. His efforts to leave her asleep had failed. He released a deep sigh out of frustration.

“Today’s the big day” she said. “Marten Severyn, the Crown Consul of the Malor-Kanadian Empire. Has a nice ring to it don’t you think?”

He turned around and kissed her. “It does.”

It was hard for him to not care about her. To have such an utter and deep disdain for the mother of his children. He wanted to love her, he just couldn’t. Emotions had never come easy to him, even before the war.

She turned around and took a bite of his liver. One sip of wine to wash it down with. She stared into his eyes, hoping that he would say something else. He didn’t.

She took another bite of the liver and went back down the hallway. “Well have a great day” her voice echoing.

_______________________


The old parliament room was silent. Each member of the Imperial Diet left their old red velvet seats and got into single fine lines in between the aisles. They cast their paper ballots at the well where Consul Marten presided over them like a shepherd watching over a flock of sheep.

Their minds and bodies were utterly at the whims of the Severyn Family and in particular their Crown Consul. One by one they went down, huddled lines yearning to keep the process orderly. Today was the day of reckoning.

Once all of their votes had been casted each returned to their seats and awaited the results of the vote. They all knew what the outcome would be.

The results were tallied and brought to Marten. He took his gavel and hammered it for the attention of the body but all eyes were already upon him. He cleared his throat and began.

“With a unanimous vote from the members of the Imperial Diet I announce the passing of the Corruption Control and Enforcement Act. May God bless this empire and the Emperor. The era of corruption is over!”

On a particularly wonderful night in January, a house party was taking place in a large mountainside chalet outside Kalgary. Out the grand windows of the foyer, guests could see the sparkling lights of Kalgary in the distance, a defiant lantern which, at the shore, is sharply snuffed out by the blackness of the ocean. Through a massive skylight, those in attendance could look up to see the stars, and wispy clouds which pass in front of the moon.

This chalet was owned by the Member of Parliament for Skarprun’s Fourth District in the House of Yeomen. Matias Valthjof. A rather round man, who most would consider to be nothing more than a hedonist member of the gentry. Valthjof was probably as conservative as you could get while still remaining in the Liberale party, so he remained mostly disliked by the extremes on both sides of Parliament.

The day before, to his party’s dismay, he had cast his vote in favour of punishing corruption with the death penalty.

Matias sat at the head of the dining table, as the rest of the guests gathered around, taking their pre-assigned seats. There were 11 other people in attendance.

The MP smiled widely at his guests, simply saying, “Let us eat!” They were served dishes with a wide array of foods. Fresh steak, venison, and seafood sat as the entree, while they were accompanied by potato salads and squash. Each guest was given a glass of wine, and the alcohol would continue flowing throughout the night.

There were no vegan entree options.

-

The sound of approaching vans was covered by the classical music indoors. The vehicles parked in front of the driveway, so that none of the cars could back out. The engines were killed, and 12 men filed out of the back, dressed in black tactical gear and armed with an array of weapons.

One man leapt out of the passenger seat of the forward van and rushed up the driveway, taking pictures of each car’s license plate.

A man exited from the trees across the road, going to one of the armed men and talking to him under his breath. The armed man nodded, and led his group up the driveway. They split into three smaller groups. One walked up to the side of the building with climbing gear, and began the task of scaling the chalet. The second group began maneuvering around to the back door. The third group stacked up aside the front door. The door was unlocked, but the point man began packing breaching explosives against the door anyways.

The man who had been taking pictures of license plates now turned, moving to the house’s junction box. He pried the side open without a second thought, taking a pair of wire cutters and preparing to cut the power.

The man at the junction box spoke into his radio, “Maktmann ready.”

“Squad Caesar ready.”

“Squad Bernhard ready.”

“Squad Anna ready. Cut it.”

The ‘Maktmann’ cut the wires. The lights went dark. The house went silent. The pointman at the front door yelled, “Police!”

-

The front door exploded inwards. The back door did the same. The skylight shattered in an instant, and four men descended onto the dining table, sending food and drink splattering in every direction. As the party guests began to panic and disperse, the police swiftly detached themselves from their harnesses, moving after them. Matias could only manage, “What is-” before one of the officers took him to the ground, moving to handcuff him.

The officers screamed at the guests to get down until they did. One man, now full of adrenaline, and presumably some alcohol, continued his bolt for the front door. He was swiftly apprehended, and thrown roughly to the ground to be handcuffed.

Each person in attendance was handcuffed, and taken outside. They were lined up and sat down on the cobblestones of the driveway.

It had taken 75 seconds to clear the house.

-

Two more cars had arrived at the house. Stepping out of the back door of one sedan was a man in a suit, carrying a briefcase. With a young assistant at his side, they approached the small crowd at the top of the driveway. The party guests - and their host - were now kneeling on the cold, icy stones, as the officers watched over them. Many had left their coats inside, and were therefore shivering in the cold winds.

The suited man nodded to the guests, speaking in a gruff, rather unhappy voice, “My name is Cortland Jikt. I will be overseeing this trial.” Cortland handed his assistant the briefcase, and they opened it, facing Jikt. The ‘judge’ took out a manila file folder, the thickest one, that lay on top. Opening it and reading from a piece of paper clipped at the top.

After this, he paced up to the side of the group, until he was facing Matias.

“Matias Valthjof. You are-”

Matias attempted to stand up, but before he could speak out and interrupt Jikt, he was struck by an officer with the stock of his rifle, and he nearly passed out.

“Ahem. Matias Valthjof. You are charged with the crime of corruption. This includes three cases of accepting bribes, and one case of nepotism. You are also charged with embezzlement, and two cases of tax fraud. How do you plead?”

“I don’t know who you are, Mister Jikt, but that is a ridiculou-”

Once again he was struck by the officer, who this time shouted, “You will answer how you plead to these crimes, and nothing but how you plead!”

After regaining some of his composure, Matias simply pleaded, “Not guilty.”

Jikt continued reading the paper, “After extensive investigation, the ministry of justice finds you guilty beyond a doubt, and sentences you to death by shooting.”

Matias cried out, voice now fragile, “You can’t do that! I demand audience- demand audience with-” the officer struck him again, and this time, Matias crumpled to the ground, slightly weeping.

Cortland moved on to the first party guest, returning the file folder to the briefcase and taking out a new one.

“Natasha Smit. You are charged as an accessory for Mister Matias Valthjof’s crime of corruption. You are also charged for embezzlement. How do you plead?”

“Not guilty,” Miss Smit said, through tears.

“After extensive investigation, the ministry of justice finds you guilty beyond a doubt, and sentences you to death by shooting.”

Jikt moved along the group of people, charging each guest with assisting Valthjof’s corruption, and another high crime to go along with it. Each and every guest was found guilty, and sentenced to death.

Once he had finished, Jikt spoke, “Punishment will be dealt immediately. This court is adjourned.” The Malorian turned on his heel, accepting his briefcase back and departing for the car.

-

The police grabbed the last person charged, on the opposite side from Matias, and stood him up, taking him by the collar off of the driveway, and a few feet into the snow, near a tree. They dropped the man, so he fell to his knees. Without saying anything, the officer who had dragged him over pressed his service pistol against the back of the man’s head, and fired a single shot.

A new orchestra of screams came from the other party guests, who began to panic. The executed man slumped forward, collapsing into snow already stained by his own blood. Keeping his pistol out, the officer returned to the crowd, grabbing the next guest, and taking her over to the same spot.

As she was being taken, the man next in line suddenly stood, hands still cuffed behind his back, and began running down the driveway. His knees sore from how he was sitting, and his dress shoes unsuited for running on icy cobbles, he immediately slipped forward, and with no arms to cushion the blow, he bashed his head, face first, into a sports car’s hood. Two officers rushed over, only to lift his head up and bash it against the hood again. The runaway blacked out and went limp, and the officers dragged him to be the next on shot.

So the police went on, going down the line, until they had reached Matias. The man was sputtering and crying, and pulled away when the police tried to stand him up. The officers who were becoming very impatient with all this resistance, simply shot him on the point.

As they all began work to put the bodies into bags, and shovel the bloodied snow into buckets, the leading officer walked over to the Maktmann, who stood very still, staring at the scene. Though his face was mostly covered by a balaclava, his eyes told a lot. He was not comfortable with this line of work.

The leading officer put his hand on the Maktmann’s shoulder, reassuring him with the words, “Death to corruption, my friend.”