"What is this…"
Levi stares in revulsion at the dark stains, snaking erratically across the orderly panels.
"Tch. Can't even clean a damned floor properly."
Normally, he would have forced them all to scrub it down again, as many times as necessary, until his exacting standards were met. But not in the middle of the night.
He returns to the room moments later, with a tub of soapy water and a hard brush. Rolling up his sleeves, he sets to work. Methodically, precisely, he grinds the bristles into the wood. In time, the still air is punctuated only by the soft swishing of the brush and his light huffs.
This stigma must be purged from existence.
But the stubborn spots resist his discipline, mocking him from where they have seeped between the cracks.
His brows knit in fury as he scours, willing the dirt away. Perhaps he should have taken some bleach instead.
Splish, splash.
He sloshes more soapy water on the boards, the sickeningly sweet smell rising up to gag him. It isn't quite enough to mask the putrid stench of blood that constantly lingers wherever he goes.
The floor screams under his onslaught as he tears vehemently into the endless splotches of decay that contaminate his surroundings. His breathing is ragged, frantic, as he struggles for air in the suffocating silence. Over and over, the brush lacerates the timber, leaving shredded splinters in their wake as the soap stings his chafed knuckles.
Yet his hands betray him time and time again, as the filth wells up from within him, spilling out like an endless crimson fountain and he chokes.
Scrub-a-dub-dub. There's death in my tub.