title: Infernal Device: Machinery of Torture and execution
author: Erik Ruhling
description: Erik Ruhling is a graphic designer and the curator of <i>www.occasionalhell.com</i>. He holds degrees in anthropology and English and lives in Atlanta, Georgia, in a house without a dungeon (unfortunately).
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  # CHAPTER NINE
  
  The controller made a small lump under the skin. It wasn't painfulnot unless
  you got too close to your overseer. At ten feet, it began to feel like a
  slight case of indigestion. At five, it was a stone knife being twisted in
  your chest. Once, in an experimental mood, I pushed in to four feet from him
  before he noticed and waved me back. It was like a fire in my chest. That was
  just the mild form of its action, of course. If he had pushed the little lever
  on the egg-shape strapped to his armor died, while the thing was tuned to his
  body inductancethe fire in my chest would be real. Once, months later, I saw
  three slaves whose keeper had been accidentally killed; the holes burned in
  their chests from the inside were as big as dinner plates.
  
  As a rule, though, the Lesser Triarch believed in treating his slaves well, as
  valuable property deserved. Hruba dropped by twice a day for t