[ IP ] The interrogation chair

`` Bring her in here!'' bellowed Alphonsus, flinging open the rotting double doors that led into a large cement room. 
 
 An angry mob of teachers and staff rushed in behind him, shoving ahead of them a crying, terrified nine-year-old girl. `` I DO N'T KNOW ANYTHING!'' she screamed. `` LEAVE ME ALONE, I DO N'T KNOW ANYTHING!'' 
 
 They pushed her into a small, rotting desk- the sole piece of furniture decorating the room. She squirmed against the half-dozen hands that held her down, but to no avail. For a moment everything was silent, and then the words `` Make her talk!'' penetrated the crowd. It was followed by giddy laughter, applause, and a chant of `` taunt her, hurt her, make her talk!''. 
 
 `` QUIET!'' yelled Alphonsus, his long arms raised above his. The din subsided immediately. He stared down at the girl in the chair. `` Agnes Coel, I must ask if you know why you're here.'' 
 
 `` I do n't know!'' she cried. `` I'm not the one you're looking for!'' 
 
 He slammed his hands down on the desk in front of her causing the girl and those immediately behind her to jump. `` Miss Coel, that is a lie. I demand you tell us why you are here!'' 
 
 `` I don't-'' 
 
 `` HAVE YOU OR HAVE YOU NOT SEEN THE LORD?!'' 
 
 `` No,'' she said weakly. `` No, please.'' 
 
 `` Very well.'' Alphonsus' face turned to a warm smile as he straightened and looked at the crowd. `` Antony, may I have some assistance?'' 
 
 `` NO! PLEASE, GOD, NO, I'LL TALK!'' 
 
 `` Too late, my child,'' the man said cooly. 
 
 Antony was the disciplinarian at Saint Raphael's School, a hulking man with red skin and coarse, black hair covering his body, including the back of his massive hands. Today they held a circlet of metal, smooth on one side but covered in spikes on the other. He methodically began to strap this onto Agnes' thigh, resisting her sharp kicks. She screamed aloud as he began to tighten it. 
 
 `` So be it that you will not talk. Demon-child, we will force you to tell us your secrets.'' Alphonsus grinned. `` So let us begin. Sister Catherine?'' 
 
 Sister Catherine, the reading teacher at the school, took a stand in front of the crowd. She was a heavyset and nervous-looking nun, likely in her mid-sixties. She fingered the cross around her neck as she nodded at Alphonsus. 
 
 `` Sister Catherine, can you relay to us the events of last Monday, the 15th of March 1949?'' 
 
 `` I was teaching my class, sir, and Miss Coel fell asleep as the students are apt to do. Rather than waste time I continued with the lesson. Around ten-thirty AM she began to cry aloud'I have seen! It is Him!' and then began hollering profanities at the top of her lungs. For fear she was possessed by a demon I took the other students out of the room and locked her in there until the Father could come and investigate.'' Catherine took a deep breath and shook her head at the ground. Her hands shook at her breast. 
 
 `` Thank you, Sister,'' said Alphonsus. `` Miss Coel, what do you have to say for yourself?'' 
 
 `` It was a joke!'' Agnes exclaimed. `` Just a joke between us girls! Not a demon! I did not see God!'' 
 
 Alphonsus nodded at Antony, who had been standing still as a statue next to the desk. He bent down and tightened the metal band a bit more, resulting in yet more screams from the young girl. 
 
 `` This will only continue if you resist,'' Alphonsus assured. `` Next is Bruno.'' 
 
 Bruno, St. Raphael's Latin teacher, was a muscular man, though not such a brute as Antony. Still, he too fingered his crucifix when looking at the girl. 
 
 `` Right, well, we were in class and Miss Coel was giving a recitation. All of the sudden her words began being what I can only assume is the Word of God, a strange tongue I had never heard before. Her eyes closed and eventually she fell to the floor. A few moments later, her eyes opened and she said'he is coming.' I did not know what to do so I also evacuated my classroom and called on the Father to sort things out.'' 
 
 Agnes did not grant any of the adults the opportunity to talk and instead blurted, `` It was not the Word of God, it was Italian! My parents came from Italy, my father died in the war and my mother died of consumption, which is why they brought me here! I accidentally switched the two lang-AHH! NO!'' 
 
 The belt around her leg once again tightened, this time twice. 
 
 `` Thank you, Bruno.'' Alphonsus took his place once again in front of the chair and began making slow circles around it. Agnes followed his motion, her eyes wide with horror. He was extremely tall and deathly thin, with paperlike skin and pale, sunken eyes. `` Now-'' 
 
 `` And what of you, Alphonsus?'' 
 
 The voice did not come from the crowd, but from next to the chair. Antony. This elicited gasps from all in the room, who had never heard the brute speak even a simple sentence. 
 
 `` Pardon?'' said Alphonsus, who looked equally shocked. 
 
 `` And what of you?! You who have accused and tortured this girl! You who have led so many to maim and murder in the name of faith! Have you yourself experienced the God you claim to seek?! Have you yourself any idea of what questions you are seeking the answers for?!'' 
 
 The thin man grew silent. His eyes narrowed, and he spat his answer. `` No.'' 
 
 `` You have seen god,'' Antony continued. `` She is right there in that desk.'' 
 
 The room gasped with rage. In a flash Antony was strapped to the desk, and both he and Agnes felt the sting of gasoline as it soaked into their clothing. Agnes gagged and pleaded with the crowd. `` STOP! STOP! I KNOW NOTHING! PLEASE!'' 
 
 But it was to no avail. In less than a minute the desk and the two people attached to it were ablaze. The students and teachers of Saint Raphael's School slowly exited, as if in a funeral procession- and in a way they were. And they marched to the chapel to pray that they might one day find the answer, their salvation. But there would be no salvation. 
 
 At last, there was but one person left in the barren cement chamber, now mausoleum. Alphonsus smiled softly, gazing over the ashes, fingering his cross.
