So this was a tricky one, considering the restrictions given, and it ended up being quite short. I’m not really sure how I feel about it.
Build, Goddammit! Build!
The first thing he will do is take you into a long, grey corridor lined with doors along each side, and lead you to the first door on the left.
“Observe,” he will say.
He will open the door to reveal a rectangle of pure black, absolute darkness that chills you to your very soul. You will watch as he flicks a cigarette through the door and the instant it crosses the threshold it is swallowed by the dark.
Next he will close the door and lead you across the corridor to the other side, to the first door on the right. Inside the floor is mostly missing, all but a small circle in the middle of the room gone. Instead of floor, there is water. On the circle sits a single bed. In the water, a large, serrated dorsal fin protrudes, slowly circling.
He will close the door and lead you down the corridor to the next room, where an open coffin full of cockroaches sits on the floor.
In the next room you’ll see an incredibly fat man, at least four hundred pounds, wearing nothing but a chef’s hat and lathering himself with mayonnaise.
“They took my money and my dignity, but they sure as hell ain’t takin’ my mayonnaise,” he says.
As the door closes, you see him start to lick his own arm.
Even your guide takes a moment to recover before leading you to the next room, made up as a traditional torture chamber, with a rack, a pillory, and all the other wonderful medieval implements of pain. Standing in the middle is a beautiful young woman with pigtails wearing a nurse’s uniform. With her mouth sewn shut.
The next room has a tank full of eels. The room after nothing but a water board.
He will show you a dozen more rooms, each more horrifying than the last, before taking you back to the exit.
“If it does not get finished,” he will say, “if it is not built in time, then you will be forced to choose a room for each and every person you hold dear. Do you understand?”
You will affirm that you do and return to the site, where construction is underway but far from complete, and struggling to stay on schedule. And what will you say?