Chapter 2

Desire. It was the name on my shirt. I was confused at it. I didn't know what that meant. I just took it however. I remembered the Moderator kept asking me what my name was. If I was going to get beat over and over for calling myself Jonathan then I damn sure wasn't going to call myself that.

Regardless of what they did to me though. I knew what my name was. I wasn't going to give them that. I wasn't going to give these people the ability to forget my name.

“Where are we?” I asked them.

Craving shook his head, “Kid. We have no idea. Not everyone even speaks English here. See those kids over there? Their English is super fucking bad. They have special moderators whenever they need something...”

He was looking over across the room at a group of foreign looking kids. They seemed to have their own section. Some looked Asian and some looked really exotic. They looked so exotic that I wouldn't have been able to tell where they were from if I tried.

Passion sighed at that moment, “We've all been here for a while. We've been waiting for the 20^th and I think we got you. The next steps are soon.”

“What are the next steps?” I asked.

I was scared to know the answer to them.

Passion just shrugged, “No one knows. I guess we meet with the leader of our team.”

Just at that moment there were bells. I wasn't exactly sure where the bells were coming from but everyone seemed to be seriously anxious when they heard the bells. I saw everyone jump on their feet almost immediately and draw to attention. They looked afraid a little bit. It made me immediately afraid.

“What's going on?” I asked Craving.

“Get up. One of the 7 deadly sins are coming.”

“The what?”

“They are big dogs around here. I think they started off as one of us, you know but they seem to be right under Tom. They are like the strongest I believe. They are the leaders of the teams. Our leader is one of them. Look I don't know why but everyone gets a little nervous around them. They are...well they are dangerous...”

I stood up with Craving. It seemed like everyone was piling in the back of the room when the door opened. The door opened and several people walked in.

“Oh shit...Wrath...” Passion whispered in my ear, “He's fucking nuts. I saw him kill someone with my own eyes on my first day here. It was someone on his team. He just snapped and killed the guy...”

My heart was skipping a beat. She had said Craving was trying to scare me but here she was making me want to almost piss myself. We watched as a guy walked into the room and the face was immediately familiar when I saw him.

It was the guy from the bar. It was Sandy! It was the last face that I saw before I woke up in this place. He still looked the same except now he was dressed in all black. He had on a black suit almost looking as though he was going to a funeral or something. He seemed anxious as he stormed into the room. I was surprised that he was able to just walk around this place freely. He couldn't have been that much older than I was.

“Where is he! WHERE THE FUCK IS HE!”
He had this madness in his eyes. He was walking across the room frantically. He made his way over to a group that was hiding in the corner. As he approached they seemed to get scared. A few of them even screamed. It made me wonder why the fuck they were so scared. Had others noticed what kind of things he was capable of. He didn't have this crazy look in his eyes when I had met him at the bar. He didn't have this crazy look in his eyes when he had probably kidnapped me. If only he did I would have known.

He was going to people reading their name tags or something on their shirts. I didn't understand it.

“What's he looking for?” I asked.

Passion was close enough to me that she put her finger to her lips to shut me up, “Shh...who knows? Who cares? Stay still. Don't stand out. You might live another day.”

I took her advice staying completely quiet. It was so strange to see people all so scared of one man. As he approached them they seemed to get really quiet. They seemed to get really shy and just completely seemed to shut down. Some of them even made it their business to try to move away from him but he always seemed to get to the person that he wanted. We had no where to run.

He was rough with people grabbing them up to read the names on their shirts and then sometimes throwing them to the ground when he didn't find what he wanted.

I realized there was one boy. There was one boy who hadn't moved. The boy with the blue eyes. He was still leaning against the wall. He didn't seem to be the slightest bit bothered that this guy was in the room.

This man...this man named Wrath finally made it to my side of the room. It was so quiet when he did. I realized what he was doing almost immediately now. He was checking everyone that had their face wrapped up in bandages. The other people he didn't bother with.

Then he made it to me.

He looked me in my eyes.

He stared at my name tag.

“You. You're mine!”
He grabbed me by my arm all of a sudden and I let out a scream. I looked back trying to see if Crave or Passion would help me but they just gave me this sad look. It was almost like they looked powerless. I didn't feel betrayed or anything like that. I didn't know them enough for them to try to defend me from anything or anyone.

More Bells.

I realized now as the door opened again that it was a moderator standing outside of the door that was ringing the bells. This Wrath man had dragged me halfway across the room and was almost getting me out of the door when it opened again and someone walked in. It was a woman. She was dressed in all black. She had a long flowing dress. She had an eerie feeling about her and this unique beauty. It wasn't a beauty for everyone but maybe some sort of goth beauty. She had pale skin and dark eyes. Her hair was cut into a bob. She had black lipstick. Her eyeliner was piled on heavily.

“Where do you think you are going with my recruit?” she stated.

“He's MINE! You hear me you stupid BITCH!” the man Wrath was saying, “You fucking hear what the fuck I am telling you? Don't you stop me. I swear to God. I got him. Fair and square. Tom sent me to get him! You hear me?”

He was a lunatic. The way he was talking seemed desperate. He was holding my arm like I was some sort of property or something. I didn't understand. Everyone else in the room seemed just as confused as I was. I had no idea what this man was saying but it seemed like he was more than upset.

“He's a number. Why are you so obsessed?” the woman said.

“Move Lust.”

“I can't do that,” she told him, “Tom transferred him to me. Seeing how you are behaving it makes sense why he did. You are far too attached Wrath.”

“Transfers don't happen.”

“This transfer did. Now will you leave him or would you like me to get the Moderators involved?”

I didn't know what they were talking about. None of it made sense. I wondered if at some later point it would all make sense but right now I was confused. What was all this talk about transfers? What was all this talk about ownership? The woman seemed cool completely opposite from him. He was shaking. I could feel it in my arm. He was shaking from anger or frustration. I couldn't tell which. The others seemed just as shocked as I was. It seemed like this was something that they had never experienced either.

He let go of my hand.

“I will have him.”

“Have a good day, Wrath,” the woman stated.

Wrath turned to me. He gave me the same look that he had given me in the bar. It was this look of longing almost. Was I just imagining it? This look was a crazed man. He had to be crazy. No normal person could be like that.

Wrath walked away. His eyes were on me the entire time that he retreated.

The woman seemed just as cool as before. She had a swagger about her. Her walk was almost sexual in nature.

“Go back with the others,” she commanded me.

I didn't hesitate to do what I said. Compared to him I was much more comfortable in the room. She didn't seem to make everyone else as nervous but I could tell people were still on edge. I walked to the back wall and found a spot next to Passion that I felt comfortable with.\

“What was that all about?” Passion whispered to me.

I shrugged my shoulders. I had a slight idea because of the fact that Wrath was the sandy haired man that had kidnapped me in Tahiti. I wanted to explain all that but I figured this wasn't the best time with this woman Lust just standing across.

Lust looked over at someone else taking her eyes off the rest of us. Her eyes met the blue eyed boy who was still on an opposite wall.

“Are you too special to stand with the others?” she asked him.

He didn't speak. I wondered if he could almost. He simply got off the wall and moved back to the back wall in a slow stride much different from how I sped across the room. As he made his way to the back wall he still stayed away from the others a little bit finding his own little special place on the wall. There was something so beautifully odd about the blue eyed boy.

The woman stood there. She had one hand on her hip and the other dangled loosely from her side. She was a beauty the more I looked at her. It was almost like one of those models that was so strange looking they were beautiful. The more I looked at her the more I realized she was strange looking. Her eyes were much too far apart. Her lips were too thin. However she was unique. I would have loved to take a picture of her odd face.

“My name is Lust. Do you all know who I am?”

It was a girl across the room who raised her hand.

“Our team leader.”

Lust nodded, “Yes. All you have been named in associate with a lustful trait. Those are your names. Your code names. Your only names. Do you know why you are here?”

“We were fucking taken...” I stated.

Passion's elbow went into my side. I was shocked that I was talking like this but Lust didn't have a harsh reaction like I thought she did. She actually smiled. She had a sly smile and almost seemed amused by my outburst.

“Correct,” she replied, “ You were kidnapped. You all were watched from puberty by the man who owns this Assembly. Most of you have met him. His name is Tom. We were brought here to kill for Tom.”

They repeated the same thing. It was almost like that was all everyone knew. We were supposed to kill. We were going to be assassins. Was that why they would steal children from their homes? It had been months since I had seen my family. It had been months since I had seen my friends.

“Who is Tom?” I asked.

“You are a question box aren't you? It's ok. I'd expect that from the newest one here. Tom is someone who has a lot of...let's say resources. He's someone you don't want to fuck with. I've learned that lesson the hard way. Listen. I would lie if I told you all that there will be comfort in this. There will be no comfort. There is no escape. If you attempt to escape you will be hunted down. You will be given a punishment. I have seen this punishment. The punishment is worse than death. Much worse. You understand? Your lives belong to Tom now. These will be the worst days of your life. The only thing I can say can make you feel better is that I am not leader you could have. I have a heart. If any of you do decide to kill yourselves...you can do it at any point. I will not judge you....”

No one moved. She studied out faces.

This was the comfort she was giving us? The option of suicide.

My heart raced. I wasn't the only one.

There was someone across the room. The person was wrapped in bandages like me. She must have been new like me.

“If we do what you say. If we kill for...Tom...will we ever get to go home?”

It was a fair question.

Lust paused. For a moment I could see humanity in her even though she seemed like she was trying her best to seem tough and deliver our fates with a cold hand. She wasn't like the moderators out side. If she had gone through the same thing we had I could definitely hear it in her voice.

“No. You are in the Assembly until you die. Whether that be an old woman or in a few days...”

I didn't know what that meant but it scared me none-the-less.

Lust had left us after people asked a few more questions. Most of the questions were hopeful questions. Someone asked if we would ever be able to contact our family to tell them we are fine. Someone asked if we would ever be able to live a normal life again. The answers to all of these questions were no.

By the end of it all nothing seemed any more clear to any of us but it seemed like the first person that I'd met that was actually truthful and actually seemed to be human. It wasn't like those soulless Moderators and it wasn't the fake smile that. At the end she left just as she came.

The moderators came moments later to take us away. They took us to what looked like sleeping quarters. It was really just a big room with bunkbeds. The boys and the girls were together. I guess it seemed pointless to separate people by gender if we were all truly bisexual. The moderators locked us in the rooms as usual. I noticed how they turn the lock and made sure it was locked.

“Welcome home,” Craving stated.

The beds were all basic. It looked like some army camp or something really. There were two windows that outlooked the courtyard. On the other side of the courtyard there was another building. I tried to see if I could tell where we were but it was useless.

“Craving, can you stop being a dick for once? Desire, come over...sleep here,” Passion said, “Near us.”

Desire. The name was still so fucking foreign to me. I sat on the bed. It was hard as hell. The lights had gone out in just a few minutes.

It actually felt good to know I wasn't the only one in this position. There were others. I don't know why I found solace in this in some sick way.

Craving was on the bunk above me and Passion was across from us. Craving went to sleep almost immediately. There were others who seemed to follow suit. I couldn't tell how people could sleep here. I couldn't tell how it was even possible. I had a powerful feeling of anxiety across my chest. There was a girl above her but the girl seemed more interested in crying than having any sort of conversation really.

“Was this the first time you guys all met our leader?” I asked.

Passion nodded, “We were waiting for our last member remember? It took them the longest to break you I believe. You must have really loved your name...”

Break me. Is that what the Moderator was trying to do when she kept asking me my name and beating me? It had to be. They were trying to mentally break me until I didn't own that name any longer.

“She seems...decent.”

Passion nodded, “We're relatively lucky. I've seen the other leaders. They are worse than the moderators. I've seen them beat their members to near death. There has to be over a hundred kids here. The 7 deadly sins each have a team. Wrath is one of the worst. The other teams have already gone on to the next stage. We were the last.”

“Has anyone tried to...escape?”

Passion looked around. I knew there were no moderators in the room but she still seemed extremely uncomfortable, “You should go to sleep. They wake us up early.”

It was like she was too scared to comment or something like that. She seemed so terrified. I figured she would be. The fact is they already beat us to a pulp over and over again. What else were they going to do to us. What else could they possibly do to us?

I couldn't sleep. I let Passion lay down and sleep but I found myself walking across the floor. Most everyone was headed to sleep now. In the back there were lockers and behind the lockers were showers and toilets. I found myself looking in the mirror.

It was best that I removed these bandages. I had no idea how long they had been on. I slowly started to unwrap my bandages.

My face was unrecognizable.

I couldn't tell if it was better or not. My lips seemed like they were bigger, perhaps too big but clearly they must have been swollen from surgery still. My eyes had been reconstructed as well. I still had stitches on the side of my face. It seemed as though my skin has been stretched. My face was so sore that I could hardly move it. I knew it would take a while for me to heal but right now I looked ridiculous.

I heard someone moving, walking out of the shower.

It was him.

It was the blue eyed guy. He was completely naked. He had a towel but it seemed like the towels they had hanging up were too small to really wrap around your waist. He didn't seem shy or nervous to be completely naked though. His body was PERFECT. He had a long torso. He had a v in his waist. There was no flaw in sight. I had never seen abs so tight in my life. He must have had an 8 pack or something. His waist was so tiny.

Then there was this dick. It wasn't too big. It wasn't small by any means. It was the perfect size. Had they done surgery on his entire body or something? He looked like a work of art.

I was gawking. Again!

“Sorry,” I told him shaking my head.

He didn't respond. He just walked over to mirror next to me. There were a row of mirrors. There were a row of toilets. There were a row of sinks. Everything was in a row just like some sort of military school. He was ignoring me almost completely but I couldn't help.

Immediately all I felt was this sense of longing. He was bisexual. They said that all of us were bisexual. I had to stand a chance. I couldn't believe I was wanting this at this moment but Dennis was no where to be seen. I would never talk to Dennis agin.

“What is your name? You know...your code name?” I asked him. I waited so long for an answer that I decided to ask again, “I'm Desire. What's yours?”

“Urge.”

He was short with his answer. Urge was fucking gorgeous. He was brushing his teeth at this time. He didn't even give me a second look. I could understand why he didn't. He was so beautiful I couldn't take my eyes off of him but I looked like somebody's science project right now. His side profile was just as beautiful as his front. He has a FAT ass. Maybe it was the fact that his waist was so small. He had these huge dimples in his ass.

“Nice to meet you Urge,” I said nervously, “How long have you been here?”

“Long time.”

He was being short with me. I wasn't used to it. I always got what I want. I always got WHO I want. This guy was different. He seemed so uninterested and for some reason that was just making me want him even more.

“You have beautiful eyes.”

“Ok.”

He didn't even say thanks. He just said ok. He hadn't looked at me the entire time he was at that mirror. He was being so short that I felt like he didn't even know I existed or something.

“Where are you from?”

“Does it matter?”

“No, I guess it doesn't,” I said forcing a nervous laugh, “I guess we are all here now. You know? We are all at this same place. Our person a little hell. It's nice that we aren't alone though. I'll tell you that. Whatever happens next, at least we have each other. You know?”

He had walked away while I was talking.

I could feel my face get red with embarrassment. I had never experienced someone straight up walking away in the middle of a conversation before. I think it was at that moment that I realized I really wasn't Jonathan Grey any longer. I wasn't the guy who had it all. I wasn't the guy who got whatever he wanted any longer. Now I was Desire.

Desire was fucking ignored.

“You are obsessed,” Passion said.

She had caught me looking at Urge from across the room.

Urge never spoke to anyone. He stayed completely to himself and Passion was right. I found him fucking irresistible. I had come to literally obsess over him and I think everyone who was around me for more than ten minutes noticed.

It had been a month that we had been in the room. An entire month. It was sad because I was beginning to get used to it. I didn't want to get used to it but there was nothing else that we knew. Time had gone by so quickly. I had met a lot of new people but always seemed to stick to Passion and Craving. Yearn was the girl who was above Passion. She cried all the time even a month later. Then there was Ardor. He was the guy who kept the date and the reason why I knew what time it was. Lust hadn't come to visit us in two week. The only thing that we had were strange books. The books were different everyday. A lot of the times it was geography books. There were history books. There were books about technology.

I read them all, not because we were forced to but because there was hardly anything else to do. It was like being in our own personal prison or something.

“Why don't you just go talk to him?” Ardor asked.

Ardor was skinny, slim tall model looking guy with blonde hair and blue eyes. His eyes were blue like Urge's eyes but they were a nice tint. He had told Passion a week ago that he found me attractive but Passion told him not to even bother because I was so obsessed. The sad thing is that she was right. So Ardor ended up being with Craving instead.

The two of them made a sort of cute couple. They were always around each other. They even managed to somehow sleep on that tiny bed together above me. In a week you would have sworn they had lived a lifetime together.

“I don't know what you see in the guy,” Craving stated, “I mean he's attractive but let's be honest. The guy is the most anti-social motherfucker I ever met in my life. He thinks he's above all this or something.”

Passion rolled her eyes, “You hear what you said though. He's attractive. He's attractive as hell...ok?”

“He doesn't even know I exist.”

“You know what...let's change that.”

“Passion wait! Wait what the fuck!”

It was too late. Passion walked over to Urge. I had just looked away. My face was red with fury and anxiety when I saw her talking to him. I couldn't have been so embarrassed. I heard Ardor and Craving laughing above me at what Passion was doing. I looked in the corner of my eye to see that Urge was staring back at me.

He said something to her and she walked back over to us.

The look on her face said it all.

“Yeah,” she started, “He's TOTALLY not interested.”

My face was red with embarrassment. I couldn't believe she had done that. Passion was a cool girl but at times she was a little bit. I don't know. She was a little bit willful or something.

“Thanks Passion. Thanks fucking a lot!” I said.

I was surprised when Yearn walked over to me and patted me on the back.

She was a small girl, extremely short and fragile looking. She looked like some child popstar. It was rare that she spoke to the group. She usually spent time crying but I realized she was a sweet girl and every time she spoke I did tend to realize it was something nice.

When she patted me on the back she said really kind words, “Oh c`mon. You are an attractive guy. It's his lost. Do you see that face?”

She was right. I had to admit it. My face had healed in the last month completely and I had changed completely. I felt like now I fit in with the beautiful people. They had given me a nose job and some other facial reconstruction. I looked like a completely different person but I couldn't find a single flaw on my face. I couldn't find anything.

“Does anyone wonder why they do the reconstruction?” I asked, “It can't be cheap...”

“Tom has resources, remember?” Craving stated, “And who cares why they do it? We are fucking beautiful. Even if no one is around to see us.”

Passion shook her head, “We'll get out into the real world one day.”

“You think?”

“How else will we kill people for Tom?”
She said it in a relaxed way. It was almost too relaxed. It worried me a little bit just how relaxed she was.

The thought of killing someone was something that I was slowly forgetting but every moment there was that reminder. I wasn't studying for college here with these books. I was using these books so that I could become a better killer. That was what all of this was about.

It was two weeks later. It had been a month and half now. Lust was still not to be seen. We had started to think of her like some sort of legendary creature. Everyone seemed to be on edge about when she would actually show up until one day she finally did.

Bells.

Everyone got up immediately lining up in the front of the room. I think there was excitement this time more than fear. There was excitement because everyone was getting idle. People wanted to do something. People wanted to be a part of something.

She had made her way into the room and stood there. Today she had on a black suit similar to the one we had seen Wrath in.

“Good evening everyone,” she stated.

“Good evening!”

We had all said it like once almost like a class. Lust didn't give us her smile. She had in her hands a stack of papers and in her other hand was a thing of pens.

“You have all been given books,” she stated, “The first part of this is going to be a test. For an assassin, mental prowess is probably one of our initial necessities. Take your time on this test. You have an hour.”

I wasn't nervous at first about a test. I didn't think it was a big deal or anything for some reason. I don't know why. I had always knew a lot about tests. I was a perfect student in school after all.

When she had passed out the material I realized this was the hardest test I had ever taken in my life. It went from calculus, to geography, to history, to philosophy and covered everything in between. There were general questions about writing. I had never in my life sweat so much that I was sweating now looking at these questions. They were hard. I could see how people were fiddling around next to me. Everyone was struggling. Everyone seemed to be having a hard fucking time doing this.

Urge was finished first. He handed in his paper before anyone else was. Seeing him finish first made me even more nervous. I was luckily in the front of the pack of handing my paper in. By the time I was done I was sweating in places that I didn't know I could sweat from.

“You'll be ok,” I heard Yearn say next to me.

Passion also gave me a thumbs up. It was so odd that these people were actually becoming my friends.

When everyone had handed their paper in, Lust left.

After hours she came back and we were lined up. This time when she came back she wasn't alone. Moderators were with her. We rarely saw the Moderators. They only came in to bring us food and reading supplies this entire time. Everything else was in the room. There were 10 moderators in all. Each of them had a black plastic bag in their hands. I was suspicious of the plastic bags.

“What's going on?” I heard Passion ask us from behind.

No one answered but it made me nervous seeing this many moderators. All the moderators were women and they were all dressed in white suits. They all wore that same strange stone facial expression that we all recognized.

“If I call your name can you step forward,” she started, “Indulgence, Tempt, Enthrall, Fascination, Entice, Coax, Seduction, Pleasure, Intimacy and...Yearn...”

I figured they were about to read their scores or something. As Yearn got up I coudln't help but to smile at her and give her that same encouragement she gave me.

“Good luck,” I said.

She smiled back.

The ten walked forward.

Lust wasn't smiling when she saw them, “I'm sorry but ten of you all have failed the test. You will not be moving forward.”

She turned so fast that I knew something was wrong. Yearn. Yearn.

I stood up when I saw Lust almost running out of the room.

I was about to go to Yearn but it was a hand that pulled me down. I looked over to realize whose hand it was. It was Urge. He was giving me this hard look.

“Don't be stupid,” he said.

I didn't know what he meant but then I realized what it was when I heard a scream. It was Yearn. It was Yearn screaming.

The Moderators had pulled out 9mm pistols with silencers out of their bags. My mouth had dropped open. Urge had pulled me back to the ground but I was watching. This was a nightmare. This was some sort of bad dream. It had to be. One day I'd wake up. I'd wake up and this would all be a bad dream. Only it wasn't.

There was shooting.

There was blood on the floor.

9 bodies lay dead on the floor. Yearn was one of them.

The last girl was this Asian girl named Enthrall. I hadn't said two words to her since I met them all. She barely spoke English. She was running across the room. She was running towards the door. A part of me hoped for her! The moderators seemed busy with making sure that the 9 others were dead underneath their feet. When Lust had left she had left the door unlocked. She couldn't lock it like the Moderators could.

A part of me held my breath for her. They didn't notice her running!
They didn't notice her almost at the door!

Go Enthrall! You can make it. You can make it!
When she opened the door however it was Lust behind it. Lust had a gun in her hand.

Lust shot the girl in the head. There was no silencer on the gun that Lust used. The gun made a loud bang causing the rest of us to jerk.

Lust stepped over her body. It was at that moment that I felt like just because she cared she wouldn't spare any of us. Caring didn't mean a goddam thing now. Her shoes were wet with Enthrall's blood by the time she came to the other side of the room.

“The next part of your training will be much longer. It will be much more intense. Please pay attention. On my team I only have room for four people. The remaining six will die...”

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