DISCLAIMER: I own nothing

The Jigsaw killer's recent string of gruesome murders cast a shadow over every one's day to day life. The murders had started less than 2 months ago, but the whole state had been thrown into panic. As the police uncovered more and more details of the diabolical, intricately gruesome tests he had subject his victims to, the residents of Philadelphia, where the string of murders was centered, as well as those of the greater Pennsylvania area, watched with horror. Horror and morbid fascination. Dwight, in his capacity as a citizen, tracked religiously the timing and location of each new murder, searching for clues. Michael made jokes, although even he had a hard time making light of such a shockingly evil turn of events. Pam was just glad she lived in Scranton and not Philadelphia. Big cities attracted psychos like that, and although Scranton could be suffocatingly claustrophobic, it was simply too small to register with a nut like Jigsaw. Thank God.

Jim agreed with Pam, which is why, when after leaving the office alone one Thursday evening, he was oblivious to the shadowy figure in the dark coat that appeared in the parking lot and moved silently behind him. He had just started to open his car door when he felt the stranger's presence. Then his world went black.

He came to slowly. Where was he? Probably in bed... what a weird dream. Then it hit him. The cold. The overwhelming cold. Jim's eyes sprung open. What the hell? He was alone on a cold, dark, concrete floor. Oh God. He was panicking now. He couldn't see anything, so he cautiously flailed his arms around until he felt something. Anything. Then he found it... a small flashlight. It was not there by accident, but Jim was too panicked to realize this yet. He flipped it on. The windowless room he was in was nothing more than a bare concrete cell, barely larger than a closet. On the far wall was a steel door. As he spring to his feet and reached out for the door, Jim saw something that made him freeze.

A small tape recorder. His brain confirmed what it had been subconsciously suppressing. Jigsaw. How could this be happening to him? Oh God I don't want to die. The fear paralyzed him for a moment, and then he forced himself to pick up the recorder and press the play button. The voice was icy. The words hit like a hammer.

"Hello Jim. You have been given a blessed life, and yet you squander it with your own inaction. Everyday, you kill those who love you a little bit more by refusing to rise up and live your life, to enjoy the gifts you were given. Well now it's time for you to make some changes, Jim. Its time for a test."

Test. Oh shit. He had read about this. About the eerie recordings found at the murder scenes. Always a test.

"Taped to the back of this recorder is a key. The key will open the door in front of you. When the door is opened, a timer will start. After one hour, the room will fill with gas and be ignited, killing everyone inside. Inside the room you will find the two victims of your sinful apathy. Karen..."

Oh God.

"and Pam. You are going to be forced to do what you should have done a long time ago. You will have to make a choice, in order to pass this test. Each woman is locked down at five points. In order to free them, you must unlock each of the locks, with a different key. There is a box in the center of the room with a button on it for each woman. Whichever button you push will dispense a key for that woman, and dispense a large, painful shock into the one you don't choose. This is of your doing, Jim. Your indecision has caused their pain. Any attempt to tamper with the equipment or disconnect the batteries will cause the gas to be released. The pain will get worse with each key until the last one is fatal. The last key will unlock the final restraint, behind which is the key out of the room. If you pass this test, Jim, you will have made your choice, and also chosen to live. Do you choose to live, Jim?"

Jim tried to force himself to wake up. Please, God, just let this be a bad dream. He was already awake. Dammit. He fetched the key and opened the steel door. Nothing he had heard could have prepared him for what he saw when he stepped through.

The room was about 20 feet square. Concrete. There was a steel door with a large lock on it, but otherwise the walls were bare. There was a single light hanging from the ceiling, providing minimal illumination. There were 2 tables bolted to the floor, with a small box between them with two blinking lights. Then he saw them.

They were pinned to the tables, flat on their backs. Each woman wore a sinister looking steel collar which had an extension which drove a horizontal bar into her mouth, painfully gagging her. The collars were also bolted to the table, leaving them completely immobilized. The worst part was all the wires. There were two large cables running out of a large black steel cube between the tables. Each cable split into several thinner ones which ran to several spots on each of the woman's bodies. They were both clothed in their pajamas, which appeared intact except for small holes cut around the abdomen to allow the wires in. The psycho must have snatched them from their beds. They were both trying to speak, but could only moan through the gags. He looked at Karen first. The only freedom of motion she had left was her eyes, and they quickly darted to meet his. She was blinking rapidly to clear out the residual tears. There was so much fear, so much pleading in those eyes that he had to look away. He looked over at Pam. She had none of the hint of defiance that he had glimpsed in Karen. She looked so very sad, resigned, defeated.

Jim couldn't stand to look. He had to make a choice. Those were the rules. Otherwise they'd all die.
So he chose. Oh God. I'm so sorry. He approached the control box and made his choice.

The button made a faint clicking sound when he pushed it. The clink of a key dropping out from the box had barely registered in Jim's ear when he heard the sickening sound. A gentle buzz emitted from the machinery and the awful cackling sound of unharnessed electricity. He grabbed the key, turned away and busied himself trying the key on the various restraints, trying not to hear the heartbreaking sound coming from behind him as the pain coursed through Karen and she thrashed as much as her chains allowed. Jim could faintly make out her muffled screams, but the gag and the buzz of the current overwhelmed them. It lasted 30 terrible seconds. Pam was screaming too but only faint mumbles came out. Her tongue was completely immobilized by the thin steel bar in her mouth. Jim found the key's home -- it unlocked Pam's left arm. He turned back. He could barely look at the quivering mass on the other table. I'm so sorry. But I choose Pam, and I choose to live. She looked at him again. It wasn't the angry glare he had expected. It was the worst kind of sadness mixed with raw fear rolled into one. A heartbroken, helpless woman looking into the eyes of her tormentor. He noticed blood running from the corner of her lips, where she had bit into the steel bar that was so cruelly gagging her. Her hands were gently trembling in their restraints. She had been clutching the edge of the table as hard as she could during her painful ordeal.

Jim thought about trying to choke her to save her from what he was about to put her through, but he just couldn't summon the strength to do it. He could, with his desperate actions, tell the machine to kill her, but he just couldn't do it himself. He wished there was an option to shock himself and spare Karen the pain, but the rules of the game were clear.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry..." Jim was shouting now. He kept repeating it but he could not look at her. He was crying too now. Mostly he yelled to drown out the sounds of pure pain coming from the other table as he repeated this awful exercise three more times, freeing Pam's remaining limbs and avoiding looking at Karen altogether.

It was time. The last key. He knew he had to do it, or they would all be dead, but damn it, what do you say to someone who you're about to kill... How do you even look? He forced himself to be strong. She deserved that. He finally looked over at her again. She looked so completely broken. 48 hours ago they had been lying easily in bed, holding each other gently. Jim had drifted off to sleep and woken up shortly thereafter to catch Karen sneakily planting little kisses on his head, trying not to wake him... Just 48 hours. Oh, God, I'm so sorry. He reached out and touched her face. She let out a barely audible whimper. She closed her eyes. Pam was still screaming into her gag.

"I love you, Karen." It was the only thing he could think to say. He was trying to make her feel better, and temper the self-loathing for what he was about to do. It just made them both feel worse.

He numbed himself. He pushed the button one last time. The key came clanking out. As the machine began sending one last painful, agonizing discharge through Karen's helpless body, Jim turned to Pam and frantically unlocked her collar. When the collar was unlocked, a steel gate dropped out from the ceiling, dividing the room in half and preventing them from getting to the still-writhing Karen. As he pulled the gag from Pam's mouth, she sprung up, finally able to speak. She shouted frantically.

Her words haunted him more than anything he had seen thus far. Much more.

"Pick Karen! Pick her -- Oh God Jim... my side isn't hooked to the generator. Oh God!"

She was crying profusely. Oh no. Please no. Jim saw it too. Only Karen's side was wired. The cable running from the generator box to Pam's table had been harmlessly resting against its socket on the generator. If he had picked Karen, nothing would have happened to Pam. Neither of them would have had to suffer. Jim felt like vomiting. The sick, psycho bastard had outsmarted him. He looked over at Karen. She was writhing in sheer agony as the invisible pain flowed through her helpless body. Suddenly the current stopped. The room went silent. Karen went limp. Jim thought he heard her whimper, but that was probably wishful thinking. Please God. Let her be alive. I'll do anything...

That's when they saw him. On the other side of the steel bars, a dark figure with a sinister clown mask approached. Pam squeezed Jim. They were both terrified.

Neither of them could imagine that less than three minutes later, the crazed killer would remove his mask and reveal a face they were both so familiar with...

The icy voice behind the mask startled them both them. It ran through a synthesizer to hide the true voice of the deranged psychopath beneath.

"I see you have made your choice."

The unblinking glare of the clown mask turned toward Jim. He tightened his grip on Pam.

"I loved her. I loved her for years, and you took her from me. You STOLE her from me, and I needed to know if you really loved her."

My God... Roy.

The sick bastard! Jim had known he was capable of impulsive hate, but not the cold, calculating fury that he had just subjected the three of them to. Damn you Roy. Damn you. Pam knew it too -- Jim felt her squeezing him tighter. Well, I picked her. Are you happy now, you bastard? Jim returned his thoughts to the immediate situation at hand. They were trapped. What was he going to do next? He tried his hand at chivalry.

"Roy, please, just let Pam go... she had nothing to do with any of this..."

Jim choked on his words as Roy flinched, pointing a threatening finger at Jim's face. There would be no negotiation.

Jim watched Roy, his face still covered with the clown mask, move closer and stand by the motionless Karen. He grabbed her neck and gently shook it. Karen let out a whimper and stirred a little. Thank God. At least she was alive.

Maybe the machine had malfunctioned. Or could it be that Karen was tougher than Roy had thought? Unlikely. A plan this elaborate, this well thought out would not have this kind of glitch. Maybe, just maybe, he hadn't wanted to kill Karen, because he didn't want to kill anyone. Please God let it be that one.

It hit Jim suddenly. Like a hammer. He finally understood this sick game. The image had registered subconsciously in Jim's brain, but it had been filed away like so many other benign, normal little things that one's mind picks up but one's brain doesn't bother to process. The significance of it hadn't hit him until now. It had happened in Stamford: Karen had gotten up and followed Tony to the break room, where her skinny little arms were needed to free some chips from the vending machine. There was something so subtly off about the way he had watched her go, just a short glance that had lasted a little bit too long. It was love. Overpowering, unrequited love... "I loved her for years, and you took her from me."

He was staring at that same love now, as he watched the masked killer stroke Karen's hair as she slowly regained consciousness. It sure as hell wasn't Roy behind that mask.

The metallic voice stunned Jim back to reality...

"To think I liked you, Big Tuna... to think I liked you."

Jim froze. Pam hid behind him and peeked her head out over his shoulder. He slowly removed his mask and turned to Karen.

"Its OK baby. Jim chose to hurt you."

He grabbed Karen's head and forced it as far toward Jim as her bound neck would allow, choking her a bit, forcing her to look at him. He leaned close to her and spoke into her ear with an angry, hissing voice.

"Jim took that key knowing it was supposed to kill you. He did this to you baby. HE did this to you. He didn't deserve you, and you were wrong to give yourself to him. But don't worry baby, I've cleansed you of your sin. You're forgiven. You're safe with me now..."

He unlocked her slowly, one limb at at time, with a new gentleness that was so damn creepy. He paused occasionally to glare at Jim and Pam. Karen squirmed uncomfortably. She had no strength whatsoever. When he had her free, he hoisted her limp body over his shoulder. Jim saw her hands trying unsuccessfully to clench into little fists... she was trying to fight him but her body had nothing left. Her captor held up Karen's collar and removed a key from the inside of it. Jim instinctively looked down at Pam's unhinged collar. There was no key. Andy turned to Jim and Pam.

"Looks like you blew it, Jim. If you loved Karen enough to deserve her, nobody would have had to suffer."

He glanced sideways at Karen, who was completely limp, draped over his shoulder like a towel.

"Karen has paid her price. Now it's time for you to pay yours."

Oh Crap. Jim's heart sunk. He's going to leave us here to die. Oh God please no... Andy continued, his signature false cheerfulness back in his voice for the first time.

"But I'm a nice guy, so I'm giving you a chance to live. All you have to do is pass a simple test... sucka"

He tossed a small tape recorder through the bars to Jim, before turning and carrying Karen to the locked steel exit. The door slammed. The room went dark again. He was gone.

Jim turned and faced Pam. She looked petrified. He pressed the play button.

"Hello Jim. Hello Pam. If you're hearing this, you're about to take a little test..."

Andy had subjected her to a worse-than-fatal dose of electricity. 150 seconds of the most primal form of pure hell, divided into seemingly unending 30 second intervals. She didn't know it, but the only reason she was alive was that he had carefully positioned the electrodes on her body such that the current would miss her vital organs. What she did know, though, was that her body was beyond sore, to the point of uselessness. She was heavily bruised from the inside out, her skin covered with painful little circular burns where the cruel wires had been attached. As he carried her up a flight of stairs and she felt the cool outside air hit her tender skin, she wanted so badly to fight, to kick, to free herself and escape, but the simple act of continuing to breathe was consuming all of her energy.

Karen was not terribly religious. The past 48 hours had strained her already wavering beliefs. What God could subject her to such intense, unyielding evil? She had been praying a lot but mostly just because she had no other options. If she'd had some pliers or a crowbar she wouldn't have wasted a second asking the big guy for help. So when deliverance came with a shrill, deafening crack, her mind wandered to the memory of a prayer her father, a devout Old-World Italian catholic, had said aloud on his death bed over ten years ago, asking the man upstairs to watch over his daughter, to keep her safe, to keep her happy. Maybe Antonio Filippelli was getting paid back for all those Sundays he spent in church... all those prayers he used to make Karen recite before bed. That shrill deafening crack was the last thing she heard before her world went dark.

The strength of steel lies not in the metal itself, but in the body that wields it, the mind that commands it, and the heart that moves it. These words ran calmly through his head as he slammed the heavy metal pipe into the side of Andy's knee. The crack was loud, sharp... sickening. Andy buckled, dropping Karen to the ground. Her body hit the ground with a thud and her head snapped against the dirt, knocking her unconscious. She never heard the second metallic, hollow thump as the metal pipe hit Andy again, this time on the head. He was unconscious before he hit the ground.

Dwight stood triumphantly over Andy's prone body. Andy was a bloody mess, his limbs twitching reflexively. Appearances aside, Dwight was not an angel. He hadn't been commissioned by a higher power to neutralize some great evil. Rather, his presence was a result of the fact that Andy's intricate, elaborate, well-executed plan had contained a single oversight. He had made only one mistake. One mistake that was now standing triumphantly over him with a metal pipe.

Andy's plan had been genius. Since the moment he had conceived it, day one of anger management training, he had thought through every angle, preempted every possible complication, covered every track. What he never imagined, though, was that even before his plan had begun, somebody close to him had already planted the seeds of his downfall. Someone who hated him, someone vindictive and persistent, someone close enough to him to plant eavesdropping software on his computer and hide listening devices and a GPS unit in his car. If he had just turned around the plan would have succeeded: he would be on his way to Mexico with Karen, and it would be days before the authorities found Jim and Pam's bodies. If he had just turned around. Had he turned around, he would have been tipped off by the icy glare of 95 pounds of pure hatred, but he had been too busy singing to the cameras. For her part, Angela had only wanted enough dirt on the guy to get him fired, but she stumbled across much more. Mose had been listening in on Andy. A phone call to Dwight and it was all over.


*************************

She was suddenly freezing. Oh God don't let me drown. The stream of water hitting her face mercifully melted away once Dwight was sure he had woken her. He dropped the water bottle.

"Karen... KAREN"

Her head throbbed. Her body ached. She could barely lift her arms but she managed to lay her hands on his shoulders. It was so good finally feel safe. She was going to live. It was literally painful for her battered body to cry, but she cried anyway. Dwight leaned in to comfort her. Karen's tears dried suddenly. It hurt to talk.

"Dwight. Listen to me. Jim and Pam are still in there, and I don't think Andy planned on letting them escape alive."

Dwight released her gently and started for the building, but he caught himself. He wasn't going to leave her alone with Andy.

"Come on!"

He picked up Karen and his trusty pipe.

Karen winced a bit as they descended the stairwell. Back into the dark. Back into hell. They found the rusty steel door. It was unlocked. Dwight set Karen down, took a deep breath, and pushed into the room shoulder first. Karen saw it before Dwight did. Past the table that she would never forget, through the bars that had dropped to trap Jim and Pam, there was a new layer. Plexiglass. Like a giant fish tank, a clear Plexiglass cylinder now surrounded Jim and Pam. They were up to their necks in water, and the tank continued to fill from a thick stream of water dropping from the ceiling. Andy was going to drown them.

The moment was filled with such serenity it even managed to move Karen, though just a little. Jim, tall enough to touch the ground with his head above water, was standing, holding Pam, who had allowed herself to float up just enough so their heads were level. They were embracing, kissing. Really kissing. He had never kissed Karen like that. Having resigned themselves to dying, they were stripped of all the inhibitions and pretense demanded by life. They were going to die together. They were in love. At least I lost to that. At least I lost to something real.

Jim and Pam snapped out of their desperate bliss as soon as the prospect of survival appeared, carrying a large metal pipe. It took Dwight about 10 swings, but the Plexiglass finally cracked. The weight of the water caused it to explode outward. Jim and Pam, still locked together, came tumbling out. Dwight was knocked off his feet. The water ran through the open door and soaked Karen. It was over.

*************

The ride back to Scranton took over an hour. Karen rode sideways in the tiny back seat of Dwight's Trans-Am, flat on her back, her legs scrunched up, her head resting gently on Pam's lap. Jim and Dwight were up front. They glanced at each other occasionally, their silent bond saying more than any words. Karen looked briefly at the back of Jim's head. They wouldn't ever be together again. She knew that. But she felt too close to him, to all of them, to be angry. Life was too precious to waste it on a man who didn't love her. I forgive you Jim. I forgive you. Pam cradled her head and body, trying to cushion her bruised body from the bumps of the road. Pam looked down frequently, and Karen met her eyes. You were there with me, Pam, my sister. I'm glad it's you. She looked up, out the window at the rural Pennsylvania night sky.

"Beautiful night."

She felt Pam squeeze her a little tighter.

"Yes it is... Beautiful night"