Chapter 135: Dismemberment
"What now?" The three of them—Frank, Walter, and Pinkman—stood staring at the two corpses. They looked at each other, but no one dared to make the first move.
The situation they found themselves in was entirely due to one miscalculation: the plastic barrels they bought were too small.
They had scoured the entire town for the largest, legally available plastic containers, but even the biggest ones could barely fit half a body—certainly not a whole corpse.
So, Frank bought several barrels, intending to deal with the bodies like that old riddle about how to fit an elephant into a refrigerator: step by step.
In other words, the bodies would have to be dismembered—at the very least, cut into halves.
But killing someone was one thing; cutting up a corpse was another matter entirely. None of the three dared take the first step. Even the experienced Frank found the task rather daunting.
Still, they couldn't just leave the bodies in the car. New Mexico was scorching hot this time of year. The corpses had already been in the car for two days and were starting to stink. Any further delay and the smell would spread—neighbors might get suspicious.
"Let's move them to the bathtub. We'll do it there," someone suggested. The trio agreed and carried one of the bodies upstairs to the bathroom.
But once the corpse was in the tub, and the three of them stood there holding mismatched saws, no one moved.
"Do we really have to fit them in those crappy plastic barrels? Can't we just do it right here in the tub?" Pinkman grumbled.
"No," Walter replied. "Hydrofluoric acid doesn't eat through plastic—but it dissolves metal, stone, glass, and ceramic. If you try that in a bathtub, you'll melt through the whole house. It'll eat straight down to the basement."
"But still…" Pinkman hesitated.
"Alright, rock-paper-scissors. Or odds and evens, doesn't matter. Loser goes first," Frank offered.
None of them wanted to do it, so they agreed to leave it to chance.
"Fuck!" Pinkman cursed when he saw his hand. He had lost.
"Fine, I'll do it. I've always imagined what it'd be like to cut up a body, like in a horror movie. I'm the villain in Saw now, right? If I were in a movie, I'd outshine all those lame bad guys," he muttered to himself, trying to psych himself up. He put on gloves and a mask and began unbuttoning the corpse's shirt.
Skreeeek… skreeeek… The saw cut through the body's waist, staining the bathtub crimson. Slicing through flesh was manageable, but once the saw hit bone, the grating sound was unbearable—it truly felt like a live-action horror movie.
Luckily, the body had stiffened over two days, making it a bit easier to cut through.
"Take a break—I'll take over," Frank said as he saw Pinkman panting and sweating. Frank was up next.
It took all three of them considerable effort to finish dismembering the two corpses and pack the pieces into the barrels. They then poured in hydrofluoric acid—two large jugs Frank and Walter had stolen from their school's chemical storeroom.
As soon as the acid touched flesh, it began to sizzle and hiss, releasing thick white fumes. A sharp, pungent stench filled the air, burning their nostrils.
They went out into the yard and hosed the blood off their clothes. When they returned to the house, no one said a word. They sat in silence, blankly staring ahead.
None of them were hardened psychopaths. Dismembering corpses had pushed their mental limits. Their sanity had taken a serious hit.
"Want a hit?" Frank lit a big joint and handed it to Walter.
"…Thanks." Walter took a drag in silence.
"Shit! I gotta go!" Walter suddenly exclaimed, glancing at the time and jumping up.
"What's wrong?" Frank and Pinkman asked.
"I have a doctor's appointment—my wife's pregnancy checkup. We're going to be late," Walter explained.
"Your wife's pregnant? Congrats, man! Go!" Frank said, surprised.
Frank hadn't even known about Walter's wife being pregnant. He had only just arrived in New Mexico and hadn't had time to meet Walter's family. But still—Walter was fifty, and his wife was pregnant? Unless he was being duped, that was impressive. Almost on Frank's level.
"Now that the bodies are dealt with, what are you going to do?" Frank asked Pinkman.
"No idea… I need a break," Pinkman replied, collapsing onto the couch and staring blankly at the wall.
"You really quitting?" Frank asked.
"Quitting what?" Pinkman replied, dazed.
"You and Walter—your operation."
"Yeah. I'm done. All this shit…" Pinkman muttered. The past few days had been more intense than everything else he'd lived through combined. He was never the brave type—his fragile heart couldn't take this kind of stress.
"Well then, hand over the crystal," Frank said.
"What?" Pinkman blinked.
"The batch Walter cooked—it's like a pound, right? You only handed over a few grams as samples. The rest's still with you."
"I'm not giving you all of it. You can have… a third. No, a fifth!" Pinkman said reflexively. But halfway through, he gave in.
Without Frank, neither he nor Walter would've known what to do. A mild-mannered chemistry teacher and a clueless junkie—they would've been screwed. Frank had become their anchor through the chaos.
"Quit stalling. Where's the stash?" Frank pressed.
Muttering to himself, Pinkman went upstairs and retrieved a bag of blue crystals from a hidden compartment in the bathroom drawer.
"This is high-grade stuff. This one bag alone could fetch tens of thousands," Frank said.
"At least forty grand," Pinkman nodded. He knew the local market well.
"Forty? With this purity, you could sell it for fifty, even sixty thousand," Frank said.
This was why drug dealing was so absurdly profitable. That tiny bag of crystals—barely the size of a fist—could be sold for tens of thousands. And the profit? Nearly all of it. Materials cost only a few hundred bucks. What other business had margins like that?
While they were talking, Pinkman took out his own gear and smoked a hit.
"Want to try some?" he offered.
"No thanks," Frank replied, resisting the temptation. He was determined to quit.
(End of Chapter)
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