The Madman's Repentance
Part three of The Midnight Collective. Contains murder, ghosts, and insanity.
It’s been a while since I’ve started working on this piece, but it’s finally ready. However if you haven’t read the other two parts, please start with the one below.
Also, this piece was inspired by a prompt from
’s Flash Fiction February. Obviously, FFF is over already, but it’s still important for me to give credit to where I got my inspiration. Okay, so are you ready for this piece? Let’s dive into it.Please note: This story has barely been edited, so there may be errors and mistakes. Story also contains murder, insanity, and other possibly triggering subjects.
The Madman’s Repentance.
Marcos always felt he was definitively evil– like he could kill just about anyone without remorse. Like he could manipulate, cheat, lie, and push whoever he felt like to the side just to get whatever he wanted. However, as he shifted in his chair, listening to Layton’s maniacal laughter, goosebumps raised his skin like spiders crawling all over. As the hitman’s painful and twisted laughter eventually dissipated, Marcos glanced at a drawing framed on his desk.
It was of a carousel his son Alex had drawn as a kid. The child had always been fascinated by horses and amusement parks. So, when Marcos took him to a carousel for the first time, Alex had been ecstatic. The pair must’ve stayed there for hours. Marcos watching Alex scream in glee among the other kids bobbling up and down on their horses. It was one of the last few times Marcos genuinely felt happy.
Alex was dead now, of course. Marcos had made sure of that. But seeing how Alex and Layton had desired each other made the man feel guilty. There’d been so much potential between the two.
Marcos sweated with guilt. He wiped his brow, grabbed the drawing, and threw it into a paper bin next to his desk. He sighed with relief, taking in the new profound silence in the room around him.
“Marcos,” a voice spoke, but the mobboss didn’t hear it. He was studying some documents on the desk, looking over new project initiatives, and making sure each plan was going smoothly. Often during the course of his job, and his struggles with paranoia, Marcos did not sleep. Now however, he could feel his head drooping over, swaying as he struggled to keep his eyes open. And floating in the corner of his eyes was Layton, standing behind him.
Layton? Marcos nearly fell out of his chair as he jumped in shock. But when he turned to confront the dead man, the only thing that greeted him was the lamp in the corner of his office. Marcos blinked uncertainly, but after assessing the room and making sure the door was still locked. He breathed out in relief, and went back to looking at the initiatives.
Only this time Layton’s head was dancing around on the cover of Marcos’ notebook, stuck in a smile laughter loop. Equally uncertain, Marcos rubbed his eyes until the image disappeared. He was definitely starting to see things.
The man rose up from his desk, and arched his neck out till it popped. But as he moved towards the door, a hand grabbed his, pulling him back into his seat. Glancing nervously around his office, he couldn’t find the source. Was he actually losing his mind? No… that can’t be. Marcos lost that when his wife died, so what was going on here.
“Let me tell you,” Layton’s voice cackled from somewhere in the room. The Mobboss could feel his heart racing. He couldn’t see the Hitman anywhere, but he could himself being held to the chair. His mind panicking was only making it worse, yet Marcos couldn’t breath. His chest was hurting, like it was being compressed in on itself…
“You created an initiative,” Layton howled with laughter above Marcos’ trembling body. “Hired someone like me to do work for you, and expected me to follow your bidding.” All true things, and as the Hitman continued circling around the Mobboss, suddenly twisting and contorting into Marcos’ vision, he couldn’t help but scream himself. However, no sound came out, and his body was getting tighter and tighter.
But right as he swore his body was going to pop, the hands let go, forcing Marcos forward and almost toppling over. Layton was gone once more, and the thumping in the mobboss’s chest had dissipated. It felt unnatural, like it really was just in his head. Marcos did not take kindly to being played with though.
“What do you want from me?” He gritted his teeth, annoyed as he was trying to be confident and commanding. However, only laughter greeted his demand, sounding like a babbling child more than a grown hitman. Marcos could feel himself backing up towards the door to his office, hoping he could reach it before the specter got to him.
Yet, like someone had snapped their fingers, he was sitting back in the chair. Though, as he panicked, he noted it wasn’t his chair. It was the seat to The Midnight Carousel, and Layton was in front of him. A haunting reversal of what happened nearly thirty minutes ago.
“You created this,” Layton smiled softly, carressing his finger over the button to the machine. “So, does it bring you joy, knowing you destroyed everything I could’ve had? What we could have had?” Marcos’ mortified eyes flickered over to where Alex’s form had just appeared, who was rubbing Layton’s back.
“This shouldn’t be possible,” Marcos’ muttered.
“We thought so too,” Layton offered a meek laugh, “Neither of us thought it would be possible to be in love.”
“We’re two strangers,” Alex offered calmly, “Joined together by your mission to destroy your son. How ironic is it killing us would be your own undoing?”
“I was just protecting–” Marcos attempted to speak, but a hand slammed against his mouth. An explosive amount of pain shot through his body, causing the mobboss to writhe and squirm under Layton’s grasp. But to no avail, the Hitman held him there without saying another word. Listening to Marcos’ struggle to breathe.
“You were only protecting yourself,” Alex mused. “After mom died, you changed. Started this business, growing an organization which never needed to exist. Do you know how many lives could’ve been spared if this atrocity hadn’t been created?”
“And do you know how much I wanted to be there for you?” Alex continued, nearly sobbing into Layton’s back, who trembled in response. Marcos perked up, noting mentally the Hitman’s vulnerability. “If there’s one consolidation in my death, it’s that your name will never mean anything.”
“Huh?” Marcos furrowed his brow. If there was anything the man was certain of, it was that his name would never die. It was all over the organization he built, so surely his legacy couldn’t be destroyed that easily.
Alex wiped some tears from his eyes, “You don’t seem so sure about it, huh Marcos?” Which caused the madman to wince. His kid never used his first name, and with everything happening, it freaked him out.
“Don’t do it,” The man muttered under his breath, knowing full well it was futile to resist.
Layton laughed, “On the contrary, he deserves to know what his Midnight Carousel is really like. Don’t you agree honey?”
Rather grimly, Alex nodded.
The man writhed and struggled in his seat as Alex pulled out the button Marcos had used on Layton just a couple hours before.
“You can’t do this,” He screamed at his son, “You’re just a ghost, a dream, nothing you do should be able to–” Layton’s fist pummeled into Marcos’ face.
He was laughing maniacally. “You really do have a shitty memory.”
And before Marcos could react to that, Alex pressed the button and the duo disappeared. Leaving the madman strapped to chair Layton had been earlier, absorbed by the simulation of The Midnight Carousel.
The horses spun in a circle, becoming the basis of his repentance. Or rather, the new source of his madness. Each cycle on the carousel brought about new memories of his past– of Alex, of his wife, and everything he’d accomplished.
But as the carousel reset itself for perhaps the hundredth time, Marcos felt his memory slipping again. Becoming unsettled and unstable, as the only thing he could think about was the inert nausea from the carousel’s spinning.
He’d die here, Marcos eventually decided. Refusing to fight against the machine. Alex and Layton were gone now, perhaps ready to rest after completing their unfinished business. And Marcos– the victim in this situation (as he saw it), would die here.
But before that, there was one last thing he needed to say.
“Fuck you,” He yelled it out to no one in particular, and then let the Carousel do its work. Spinning around and around till there was nothing left in Marcos’ stomach, and he was too sick to care anymore.
He was ready to go.
What started off as a story written for a bet turned into a three-parter thriller. It’s crazy to look back on it and see where I was then vs now. So thank you to everyone who has read and supported these pieces. This one isn’t my favorite, but I hope you’ll enjoy it anyway.
And with that, I bid you all adieu. Thank you so much for taking the time to read through my work. Have a wonderful day!
These pieces could be fleshed out into an addictive novel. You have it all in this story.
Awesome conclusion to the arc here, Hazel! This story was selected for a shout-out in today's podcast episode, so I'm excited to talk about it!