Disclaimer: I own no rights to either version of Thir13en Ghosts – not the 1960's original, nor its totally-awesome 2001 remake. These are just my interpretations of the ghosts' final moments before they became what they were in the remake.

Nyaa.

=^'w'^=

"Trust me, Jimmy, you don't wanna get in over your head… your head… your head."

Larry "Three-Times" had always tried warning his friend, but Jimmy never listened. Jimmy was a scam artist, a fast-talker, a man with a silver tongue. But now, stuck in the trunk of some rickety, run-down tin can on wheels, he wished he'd listened to his friend, rather than just expecting his luck to keep going.

"It won't keep up for too long… too long… too long." Larry frowned, twitching as he spoke. "Y-You're gonna lose one time too many at this rate, Jimmy… Jimmy… Jimmy. J-Just promise me you've got an escape plan or somethin'… somethin'… somethin'!"

In the end, he it wasn't anyone's fault, what happened to Larry. Jimmy was sure that he would understand – after all, he was the one who'd told him to have a back-up plan! So, Jimmy had told the boxer and bookies that Larry was gonna cover his debt and made a break for it. By the time anyone figured anything out, Jimmy had figured he'd be a long way from Vegas.

Boy, was he wrong.

Finally, the car screeched to a stop and turned off. Jimmy heard voices, right before light flooded his eyes and he was yanked out of the trunk by the front of his shirt.

"Hey! Lemme go! I can pay ya, I just need more time!" Jimmy tried pleading as he was dragged through the refinery.

"Take it up with the boss." The man dragging him shoved Jimmy ahead as they walked down some stairs into the basement level. It was getting cooler and darker, until they were in one of the secluded areas.

Jimmy didn't like secluded areas.

He was pushed into a chair, which faced the mob boss and the wrestler he owed. Both men had unreadable looks as Jimmy's head whipped around, trying to assess the situation.

"Jimmy "The Gambler" Gambino. Nice to see ya. How long's it been? Five… Six months since you started owin' me money?" The boss took a puff from his cigar, watching the smoke cloud disperse thoughtfully. "I've been givin' you chance after chance to pay me back, but instead you just keep making the hole bigger and bigger for yourself."

"I-I know this looks bad." Jimmy put up his hands defensively. "Really, I do. But it's just a little bad luck, that's all! Me and Three-Times, we've got a plan…"

"You don't have a plaaan." The boss gave him the same sort of smile a dad gives his kids when he catches them stealing a cookie from the cookie jar. "Even if ya did, Larry wouldn't be able to help ya with it now."

Jimmy felt a lump in his throat. Not for Larry, but for himself. "…What?"

"Oh, don't worry. Larry told us everything when we went to collect your debt. He didn't have a whole lot himself, but he gave it over to help out a friend. Then he told us where we might be able to find ya! Real helpful kid, that Larry, real helpful. In the end, I told my boys to make it quick and painless – just one bullet to the brain, that's aaall it took."

Hearing the details of his old friend's death made the lump in Jimmy's throat all the more unbearable. Somehow, he didn't expect that he was going to get the same 'quick and painless' kindness that Larry had received.

The mob boss took a few calculated steps forward. "Ya know why they call my boy here the Butcher?"

Suddenly, Jimmy was jumped by the man who'd dragged him downstairs. He found himself being tied down to the chair. Instantly, he began to kick and struggle and scream, praying to God above that someone would hear him. That this was all a horrible dream, some kind of nightmare that he'd wake up from as soon as his heart picked up enough.

"See, in the ring, my boy's got a knack for cuttin' down his opponents, so callin' him the Butcher caught on real fast." The boss walked over to the wrestler and patted the lightweight on the shoulder. "He doesn't look like much, but he's smart, like a wolf or somethin'. Just as vicious, too. That's why he can fight outside his weight class and make himself some real cash compared to those other fuckin' fairies that call themselves wrestlers. But there's another reason they call him the Butcher."

The Butcher was staring down Jimmy with a blank stare that the Gambler had previously thought was a testament to his intellect. Now, too late, Jimmy realized that the wrestler didn't have that look because he'd been smacked in the head too many times. It was because the Butcher was one of those guys that were numb inside – no heart, no conscience, no empathy.

As if to back up Jimmy's thoughts, the lightweight picked up a hedge trimmer. Not a meat cleaver, not a chainsaw, a fucking hedge trimmer.

"My son." The boss smiled at the wrestler. "My pride and joy. Blood and screamin' and pain… Those things don't bother him. In fact, when it ain't his own blood and screamin' and pain, he kinda gets a kick out of it. So, when I have some fucking loser who can't pull his head out of his ass and pay me my fuckin' money…" – He gave Jimmy a dark look, then walked towards the door. – "…Play nice with my boy, Jimmy."

"No! Wait!" Jimmy's pulse spiked as the Butcher walked closer, starting up the mechanism. "Wait, please! Gimme another chance! I promise, I won't gamble until I've paid ya back! Please! Ya gotta give me another fuckin' chance!"

He shrieked as the hedge trimmer dug into his belly, grazing his spine. Tears shot to his eyes as he looked into the cold darkness of the Butcher's gaze. There was nothing there, and Jimmy realized that that was what he'd be reduced to if he didn't get out of this situation.

"Butcher, r-right?" Jimmy choked as blood trailed up his throat, spitting it onto his own lap. "L-Listen… I was… I was gonna pay ya back…"

Another scream as the teeth of the machine bit into his left knee. He wailed out a plea for it to stop as his right knee was cut in half as well. His legs were gone! Oh, God, his legs were gone!

"Please! Fuckin'… J-Just listen!" Jimmy yelled as the Butcher picked up a leg, looking at it closely. "Ya can't do this to me! I don't deserve this!"

"Daddy wants you to be wrapped up into itty, bitty pieces. Says he's got about 8 other people who need to be sent a message." the Butcher finally said. Raising his eyes from the leg to Jimmy, he smiled and said, "I think I can make 12 messages outta you."

Jimmy felt the cold bite of blood draining from his face. As he sputtered, trying to think of something, he found, for the first time in his life, he was out of words.

The trimmer jammed into an elbow, revving viciously as it wiggled to find the easy places to eat through. If it weren't for all of the pain on top of it, Jimmy would have noticed the strange, tickling jolt that was accompanied by it. When this treatment was repeated on the other elbow, his brain actually registered a little of the sensation.

"My old man was telling the truth when he said I was smart in the ring, but in this ring, the one you and I are in right now, it's more like OCD." The Butcher tossed Jimmy's useless forearms aside. "I think Larry can tell ya somethin' about that."

Now the hedge trimmer dug into Jimmy's right shoulder, curling its way around his ball-and-socket joint. He howled at the pain and jumble of nerves, ultimately regurgitating blood onto himself. As the Butcher turned his attention to the other shoulder, he could just be heard over the gnawing of metal and cartilage: "You held out longer than most! Usually, they lose their guts the second I tear into their knees or elbows!"

The most endurable pain was when the Butcher returned the hedge trimmer to Jimmy's waist. Whether it was because it was already roaring in slightly-dulled pain, or because there wasn't a weird sensation of nerve knots being ripped apart until the Butcher got to the spine, Jimmy didn't really know or care. He was too busy screaming every profanity he knew at the top of his lungs, all the while demanding that he be put out of his misery now. The pain made the minutes feel like hours, and it didn't matter whether it was his arm getting cut into, or his neck.

His neck?

Jimmy's eyes bulged in their sockets when he felt the teeth of the trimmer against his throat. No. He'd lost a lot of blood, so surely he wouldn't have to live through this! If God was merciful, this wasn't what his last feelings would be. Where was his flashback to the greatest and worst moments of his life?

The Butcher loved this part the most, pushing slowly into his victim's throat as the hedge trimmer ate away at flesh and bone. Jimmy tried to scream, but, of course, couldn't. He could only gape and gurgle as blood and, eventually, spinal fluid escaped from his mouth. The fear and pain grew and grew, finally coming to a peak before the light left his eyes.

While he wrapped his father's messages in their envelopes of cellophane, the Butcher couldn't help admiring his handiwork. He smirked, looking into the eyes of Jimmy "The Gambler" Gambino's severed head, which were now as empty as his own.

=^nwn^=

I love methodical delimbing! Don't you? This may have been a little too methodical, but… oh well…

Nyaa…