THE REASON

A Monster's Memory

The air in the dining room hung thick with the cloying scent of dust and something else, something faintly organic yet undeniably wrong. We remained frozen at the table's edge, our gazes locked on the silent, skeletal assembly that Arnold so casually referred to as his "family." Their empty sockets seemed to bore into us, accusations whispered on the stagnant air.

"Have your seats," Arnold commanded, his voice a smooth, unyielding current that brooked no argument. The chillingly genuine smile remained fixed on his lips, a grotesque parody of familial warmth.

A tremor ran through Veronica, but a fierce protectiveness flared in her eyes. "We... we'd rather stay on our feet," she stammered, her voice betraying the terror that clawed at her throat, yet holding a sliver of defiance. To remain standing felt like a small act of rebellion against the encroaching madness.

Arnold's smile didn't waver, but a subtle hardening entered his gaze, a flicker of the iron will beneath the veneer of unsettling charm. "I said, sit down," he insisted, the shift in his tone sending a fresh wave of icy dread washing over us. The authoritative edge was now laced with a palpable threat, a reminder of his absolute power.

Veronica's eyes darted to mine, a silent plea for guidance in this surreal nightmare. Our gazes locked, and a silent conversation passed between us. No. Don't give him the satisfaction. Don't participate in this charade. I shook my head infinitesimally, a minute gesture of solidarity, a silent refusal to comply.

But before our silent rebellion could solidify into action, a presence loomed behind us. The Cog, its vacant eyes reflecting the harsh illumination of the dining table, moved with a disconcerting, mechanical efficiency. Its small machine gun remained casually slung across its chest, yet its movements held an unspoken menace. With a cold, impersonal force, it gripped our arms, its touch surprisingly strong, and inexorably guided us back, pressing us down into the heavy, ornate chairs positioned opposite the skeletal figures. The Cog was an extension of Arnold's will, a silent enforcer of his twisted desires.

"What do you want with us?" Veronica finally managed to ask, her voice still trembling, the forced proximity to the skeletal remains amplifying her terror. The question hung in the suffocating air, a desperate plea for reason in a world that had descended into utter madness.

Arnold regarded her for a long, unsettling moment, his gaze lingering, almost appraising. Then, with a slow, deliberate cadence, he answered, "Be calm, little one. No need to rush now. Ana is coming with breakfast. Trust me," a strange, knowing glint entered his eyes, "you'll need a full stomach for this." His words were a veiled threat, a promise of further horrors to come, making the already grotesque scene even more ominous.

An oppressive silence descended upon the dining room, broken only by the ragged rhythm of our breathing. I sat rigid, my senses reeling, the horrifying tableau before me refusing to fully register in my conscious mind. The skeletons, draped in decaying finery, seemed to mock the very concept of life, their silent presence a chilling testament to mortality.

Then, the archway leading into the dining room framed a new arrival. Ana, the woman in the ill-fitting waiter's uniform, entered, her movements stiff and her expression still profoundly unhappy, as if each step was taken under duress. She carried a large silver tray laden with food. But what shocked me to my core, what sent a fresh wave of nausea churning in my stomach, was the way she began to serve. With a grim, almost ritualistic precision, she placed a plate of food – food that appeared freshly prepared, steaming slightly – in front of each of the withered skeletons. It was a grotesque parody of a family meal, an act of unimaginable desecration.

Finally, Ana approached us, her vacant gaze flicking towards Arnold before she placed two identical plates before Veronica and me. The aroma that wafted from the dishes was rich and savory, utterly at odds with the death that surrounded us.

Arnold's gaze fixed on us, his chilling smile widening slightly. "Eat," he commanded, the single word laced with an insistent, almost predatory hunger. The implication was clear: this was not a request. This was an order, and the consequences of disobedience were likely to be far more terrifying than the prospect of consuming a meal in this macabre setting. The true horror of our situation began to crystallize – we were not merely observers in Arnold's twisted world; we were to be active participants.

The meager sustenance felt like ash in my mouth, each forced swallow a testament to our utter powerlessness. Beside me, Veronica mirrored my grim compliance, her eyes darting nervously between the grotesque tableau of skeletons and the unnervingly composed figure of Arnold at the head of the table. The silence was thick with unspoken dread, the clinking of our spoons against the china a morbid counterpoint to the stillness of the dead.

Suddenly, Arnold broke the silence, his voice taking on a strange, almost nostalgic quality. "Just like I remembered," he mused, his gaze sweeping over us with an unsettling intensity, "a hundred and twenty years ago, your parents sat in these exact same seats." He punctuated his words with a deliberate gesture, his long, pale finger pointing first at Veronica's place. "Your father, Diego, sat right there." Then, his finger shifted, settling on my spot. "And your mother... she occupied this very chair."

A chill deeper than the stone walls of the asylum seeped into my bones. My parents? Here? One hundred and twenty years ago? The timeline defied logic, yet the conviction in Arnold's voice was chillingly absolute.

He leaned forward, his gaze now sharp and accusatory. "They both sat and watched... as I brutally murdered my entire family." His voice, though low, resonated with a raw, undiluted pain that momentarily humanized the monster before us. "They sat and they ate, without so much as a flinch. They acted as if nothing... nothing... was happening right in front of their eyes." His voice rose slightly, tinged with a bewildered fury that had clearly festered for over a century.

The image he painted was grotesque and incomprehensible. My parents, whom I vaguely remembered as figures of warmth and fleeting affection, witnessing such horror with cold indifference? It shattered the fragile remnants of my past, replacing them with a terrifying, unknown history.

Arnold's gaze softened slightly, a flicker of something akin to vulnerability crossing his features. "You see," he continued, his voice dropping to a near whisper, "I've always been... a troubled child. The only male offspring for my father, and therefore, his reluctant heir to the family's position of power." He paused, a bitter irony lacing his tone. "He was the leader of a clandestine group of billionaires, pulling the strings of global power even back in the 1800s. And without a suitable heir... he risked being dethroned. But I... I was a bipolar child. And instead of seeking proper help, understanding... he simply locked me away in that room." He gestured vaguely towards the unseen parts of the asylum. "I was a shame to the family. They all... resented me." For the first time since we'd been in his presence, the carefully constructed mask of monstrous composure seemed to c***k, revealing a sliver of the wounded boy beneath.

He continued, his voice regaining its chillingly even tone. "The only reason he hadn't simply... eliminated me... was because he couldn't afford the political fallout, the risk of being stripped of his leadership by his own cabal. He only allowed me out of my confinement when a member of his esteemed group visited, a carefully orchestrated performance to secure his precarious position." A dry, humorless chuckle escaped his lips. "When I finally reached the ripe age of thirty-five, it was time for my grand introduction, the formal unveiling of the heir. But all those years locked away, the isolation... it had twisted me in ways I can't even begin to articulate."

His gaze drifted, lost in the labyrinth of his tormented memories. "But what I have never understood... is why I loved them so damn much." A vein throbbed in his temple. "My own sister... Ivanka Maxim... her only interactions with me were to spit on my face, to mock my very existence. Proklyatyy. Cursed. That's what she called me. Ivanka Maxim... her name still tastes like ash on my tongue."

His attention shifted again, a haunted look entering his eyes. "My mother... Olga Maxim... our eyes rarely met. She never wanted to see me. Not until... not until the day I took her precious life from her." His voice dropped to a guttural whisper, the memory clearly vivid and visceral. "I stabbed her... again and again... with her own small, ornate knife. And she... she stared straight into my eyes. My eyes. I made her look at me. Her last words..." A single tear, glistening and heavy with a century of sorrow and rage, escaped his left eye and traced a path down his pale cheek. "...her last words to me were... 'You're beautiful.'"

The confession hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. The casual cruelty of the monster was now intertwined with the raw pain of a damaged son, a betrayed brother. The connection to our parents, however twisted and horrifying, had been made. We were not just prisoners; we were inheritors of a history we never knew, bound to this madman by a shared, bloody past. The breakfast had become far more than a meal; it was an unveiling, a prelude to some unimaginable reckoning.

"I still don't understand," Arnold continued, his voice a low, venomous murmur that seemed to slither across the dusty tabletop, "how your parents knew about me... and why they chose me as one of their test subjects." The revelation hung in the air, a poisonous seed of understanding beginning to sprout in the fertile ground of our terror.

He shifted in his seat, his gaze distant, lost once more in the labyrinth of his fractured memories. "That morning..." he began, his voice tinged with a bitter irony, "...the morning my father intended to present his 'heir' to his esteemed court of billionaires. He came to my room, flanked by two of his hulking bodyguards. 'Get him ready,' he’d barked, as if I were some unruly animal. 'He'll be joining the family for breakfast.'" A mirthless chuckle escaped his lips. "They bundled me, bound me as if I were the very madman they believed me to be, and dragged me to this very table. Placed me on this exact seat I now occupy."

His eyes flickered back to us, a chillingly direct gaze. "That morning... I couldn't recognize anyone's face around this table. Not even my own family. But your parents..." His gaze hardened, focusing intently on Veronica, then shifting to me. "They gave me a hard, assessing look, a clinical detachment in their eyes. Then they exchanged a silent glance, a communication that spoke volumes. It was clear... their intentions weren't about my family's salvation. It was something else entirely. Something colder. More calculating."

He leaned forward, his voice laced with a haunting bewilderment. "'Olga... why wouldn't you even look at your son?' your mother asked mine. A simple, human question in the face of such profound familial discord." He paused, a muscle twitching in his jaw. "My mother... she simply offered a look of utter disgust and remained silent, her contempt a tangible thing in the air."

Arnold took a ragged breath, the century-old pain still raw. "My father then issued a curt order: I was to be taken back to my room. And your parents..." His gaze flickered with a flicker of something akin to understanding, a horrifying connection forming in his eyes. "...they followed behind." He stopped, his voice catching in his throat as if the memory itself was a shard of glass he couldn't swallow.

He closed his eyes for a long moment, a visible tremor running through his hands. The silence in the dining room stretched, punctuated only by our shallow breaths and the distant, imperceptible creaks of the ancient asylum. When he finally opened his eyes, the brief glimpse of vulnerability, the flicker of human emotion, had vanished. The monster we knew, the cold, calculating predator, had returned. His gaze was now devoid of any lingering sentiment, replaced by a chillingly blank indifference.

"Take them back to the room," he commanded, his voice once more the low, authoritative rumble that brooked no argument. The Cog, ever-present and silently obedient, moved forward, its vacant eyes fixed on us, ready to enforce its master's will. The weight of Arnold's revelations pressed down on us, a suffocating realization that our past was inextricably linked to his torment, and that we were now trapped in a horrifying play orchestrated by the ghosts of our own parents. The "breakfast" had ended, but the true meal of terror had only just begun.