The Author

The video opens with an establishing shot of San Francisco and the red lights on Coit Tower. The unpainted, concrete structure looms some 200 feet over the foggy crest of Telegraph Hill, an art-deco design using three nesting concrete cylinders, the outermost a tapering, fluted tower that supports a viewing platform. The red lights crawling up its stone spire make the landmark glow like an omen.

A man's voice: "Where is the Author, Ramos?"

The camera cuts to a brutal closeup of a bloodied, olive-skinned Hispanic man, panting in exhausted, ragged agony. The camera slowly zooms out to a mid-level shot to reveal that he is literally bolted to the arms of a metal-and-wood dining chair by the hands and forearms. The long-sleeve, cotton shirt that he wears provides a high-contrast canvas for all of his blood. Two figures flank him, but due to standing next to the seated man, their faces are out of frame.

When Ramos speaks, his voice is hoarse and he has a faint but discernible Spanish accent. The interrogator, by contrast, does not have any sort of obviously discernible accent.

RAMOS: What book are we talking?

INTERROGATOR: Very funny.

The footage cuts to a shot that reveals the interrogator stepping into frame from behind, over his shoulder. The angle is shot just slightly above the scene to make Ramos look small and powerless. The interrogator is dressed in a black jacket, the hood obscuring his head.

INTERROGATOR: You know, what's funnier is going to be showing Leila Monroe how it's supposed to be done. Smile for the camera, James.

The camera cuts again, depicting Ramos and his two torturers. This time, they're in frame enough such that the skull-print bandanas and wraparound sunglasses they wear to obscure their faces can be seen. They're wearing hooded jackets that cover their hair and welding gloves cover their hands. The taller of the two is grasping Ramos by the head to keep him still and his head cranked back.

The shorter of the two has a metallic device on a thick handle with a bulbous end which has holes like a showerhead or spice-shaker which they are holding over Ramos's head. They tilt it, bulb-side down, and soon a silvery liquid seeps out in fat drops that burn and sizzle, right onto Ramos's face. Molten lead. Ramos's skin steams on contact with the silvery substance as he howls in pain, his fangs making a dramatic appearance in his moment of agony.

INTERROGATOR: You want this shit in your eyes? Answer me! I know what you're up to in our goddamn city.

As he continues to speak the footage cuts to a party, indoors, the cityscape in partial view from the open patio door of somebody's apartment. The footage is a little grainy, the angle skewed and low, and the shot depicts Ramos interacting with two other people fondly at a party (a young man and woman, clearly friends from their body language and their earnest and smiling in the conversation). Their laughter and their conversations play faintly in the background against the music picked for the entire video and the ongoing voice over, so whatever they're saying is hard to discern.

INTERROGATOR (as voice over): I picked up your precious little Nicole. Found Alan. They didn't shriek half as loud as you, but they did sing and they did beg. Tell me where it is, and I'll make it quick.

RAMOS: Fuck you.

And so it goes into his eyes, the camera cutting from the jovial footage to move in close. One of the torturers peels his lids open by hand so that the molten lead consumes his eyes, hardening in place as he shrieks and thrashes, blinded and sent into a frenzy. He tosses his head and his muscles contort. He would be bucking in that chair if he weren't so brutally fixed to it.

Multiple close-up shots spliced together in quick succession parade out a gruesome show, and during these cuts, the interrogator's voice continues off frame, punctuated by captured clips of Ramos's primal shrieks, curses and screaming.

It's a progression of torture by an acetylene torch. Grasping various fleshy parts of Ramos's body, such as his thigh, the torturers burn them off. His twitching fingers are cooked off in amputation-by-flame before they move on to amputating his elbows, his shoulders...

INTERROGATOR (as a voiceover): If Sturbridge paid you half as much as she apparently thinks of you, then she got ripped off! We know the Author's gone. We know you're trying to get rid of us. You're fooling no one and you're better off getting back in line or leaving my fucking city.

Final Death takes Ramos on-camera: his shoulders have been burnt right off, the camera angle not depicting his lower body and what has become of it. In a dramatic finish, as his suffering, shuddering body finally goes limp, it burns into a charred, ashen skeleton.

The interrogator turns to the camera then, pulling down the wraparounds that have been obscuring his eyes behind orange-tinted lenses. He still wears the bandana over his lower face, but his snake like eyes are visible, glass green like a black cat's.

INTERROGATOR: Will there be anybody next in line, Winder?

The screen goes black. A date in white block lettering shows up: 01/25/2022. Then, the red and white film studio logo shows up: Lucky Boar Studios.