#drugging whump

[iwritewhump]

mind control

april is the cruelest month day 5

characters: living weapon, handler, very minor whumpee

warnings: conditioning, drugging

1020 words

~

Living Weapon glares at Handler. He stalks toward her, gun in hand. He’s not sure what his plan is, his brain is foggy and everything in him is telling him to put the gun down and listen to Handler. 

“What are you doing, Living Weapon?” she asks, backing away from him. “I told you-” 

He cuts her off with a glare and puts his finger on the trigger. 

He can hear Whumpee struggling on the ground behind him and he knows the gun is supposed to be pointed at them. It’s what Handler told him to do. It’s his job. 

“Living Weapon!” Handler shouts, pulling his attention back to her. She takes a cautious step forward and reaches a hand into her pocket. 

“Stop!” he snaps, pointing the gun at her chest. “Don’t even think about it.” 

He sees her fingers wrap around something in her pocket and he takes a step forward, pressing the barrel of the gun against her chest. “Don’t.” 

Slowly, Handler pulls her out of her pocket. She turns it over with the palm open to prove to Living Weapon that it’s empty. 

She stares at him, brows furrowed and then looks at Whumpee behind him. 

“What’s your plan?” she puffs out her chest and takes a step forward, pushing Living Weapon’s arm and the gun back. “Hmm? They’ve seen your face. There’s no way you’ll be allowed to see the light of day again. Even if you do let them go. The things you did to them…” 

She cuts herself off and pushes Living Weapon’s arm down until the gun points at the ground. She leans in close to him and whispers in his ear, “They’ll never forgive you.” 

Whumpee shouts something through the gag and LIving Weapon looks over his shoulder. 

They catch his eye and shake their head. Suddenly, their eyes go wide and Whumpee screams at him. 

But they’re too late. Handler jams a syringe into Living Weapon’s thigh and pulls the gun from his hand. 

LIving Weapon tries to pull it back from her, to shoot her before his brain goes fuzzy and he has to obey her, but she keeps a tight grip on it. He blinks slowly and turns to Whumpee. 

He falls to his knees and pulls at their binds until they unravel. He pulls them to their feet and shoves them away, “Run!” 

Whumpee stumbles over their own feet, but manages to sprint out of the alleyway and onto the street. Living Weapon sees them look over their shoulder before turning and running. He wants to shout at them to get help, find someone to save him and get him away from Handler. But the fog is too strong and Handler’s tracing over his arm with her fingers. 

He looks at her and blinks slowly. 

She shakes her head and digs her nails into his arm, pulling him down, “You’re in trouble.” 

He shakes his head and falls to his knees in front of her. His hands lay flat on the ground in front of her and he looks up at her with a vacant stare. 

“Punish me then.” he says, the last of his awareness still fighting inside him. 

Handler blinks slowly and pulls Living Weapon to his feet. She inhales deeply and links her arm with his. 

“Let’s go home.” 

~

Living Weapon blinks awake and turns over on his side. He stares past the bars of his cell and exhales sharply when he sees Handler. 

She pushes herself up from the couch across the room and walks up to the bars of the cell. 

“Do you know what you’ve done?” she spits. “Letting Whumpee go was one of the stupidest things  you’ve ever done. Think of everything they could have done…” she cuts herself off and shakes her head and looks at him. “You’ve nothing to say to me?” 

He blinks wearily and sits up on the cot. “What would you have me do? I can’t get them back for you.” 

“Right about that.” She snaps. “I should punish you for letting them go. Make you…I don’t know.” she sighs heavily and runs a hand over her face. “I don’t want to be mad at you for this, Living Weapon. I need you to make it easy to forgive you.” 

“How do I do that?” He asks, voice barely above a whisper. 

She smiles cruelly and takes a step away from the bars of the cell. “You need to beg.” 

Living Weapon recoils. “I won’t.” 

“You will…” Handler taunts, reaching her hand into her pocket once again. She pulls out another syringe and waves it in Living Weapon’s face…”Whether you want to or not.” 

Staring at the syringe, Living Weapon stands up from the cot and falls to his knees. He crawls to the bars of the cell and leans his forehead against it. 

“I’m so sorry.” he says, voice already breaking. He stares at the syringe in Handler’s hand and reaches out through the bars. 

She takes his hand with her free one and squeezes it tightly. “Not enough.” 

With his other hand, he wraps her hand in his and pulls it close to his face. 

“Please forgive me. I wasn’t thinking about what I was doing. I had a bad moment and it will never happen again.” tears stream down his face as he stares at the syringe in her hand. She twirls it between her fingers like a middle schooler’s pencil as he begs. 

“I know I can never make it up to you and for that I’m so sorry. I blew what was likely our only chance capturing Whumpee and now they’ll never be able to work for you. I only ask that you don’t kill me for my misdeed.” he presses his forehead against her hand and sniffles, “Please forgive me.” 

Handler smiles and puts the syringe on the side table next to her. She pulls Living Weapon to his feet and holds his hands through the bars. “Of course I forgive you.” 

She pulls him close and wraps her arms around him, “Just don’t let it happen again.”

[digital-nova]

Medication in whump

Whumpee who stops talking their medication because they “feel better”, only to suffer all the symptoms the medication was preventing.

Doctor Whumper who drugs Whumpee in order to make them sick, but convinces Whumpee they just have a terrible disease.

Whumpee who used to be drugged against their will being terrified to take any medicine. (Bonus points if this fear only arises when Whumpee is delirious.)

Whumper offering medicine as a reward to a sick/injured Whumpee.

Caretaker having to coax Whumpee into taking medication, only for them to spit it out when they turn their back.

Whumpee who sees taking medicine as a weakness, so they push through any illness/injury until they physically can’t.

Whumpee having medicine pried into their mouth by Caretaker because they’re too weak to take it themselves.

Whumpee was drugged by Whumper so many times they built up a tolerance to certain medication — their friends only discover this when they need it to save their life.

[jordanstrophe]

tw: Drugged/paralyzed

Whumpee woke up slung over someone's shoulder, unable to move. It was dark, and all they could see was the forest floor shifting beneath someone else's feet.

They tried to squirm, but nothing happened. A small whimper escaped them as the person carrying suddenly stopped. Gently, they were laid on the ground, their back pressing against the cold earth. Whumpee could barely make out their features, whoever it was, they didn’t recognize them.

A gloved hand cupped Whumpee’s face, causing them to flinch.

The figure tisked, then rolled up Whumpee's sleeve and injected a syringe into their arm.

The moment the needle pierced their skin, Whumpee lost the ability to make another sound. The fleeting sensation they had almost regained in their fingers quickly faded. The figure patted Whumpee's cheek, smiling when no response came.

With a grunt, they lifted Whumpee back over their shoulder and continued deeper into the woods.

[whumporama]

Defiant Whumpee who has been fighting Whumper at every possible moment, and Whumper who has been trying everything to get them to break. Hurting them didn't work, if the pain became too much Whumpee just shut down, but would be right back up when they had a break. Restraining them didn't work, Whumpee still mouthed them off and spat at them. Starvation didn't work, Whumpee seemed to just accept it. Blindfolding did nothing. The gag did nothing.

Whumper tried so much, and Whumpee's reactions were different and they did get weaker, but they still wouldn't. give. in. Wouldn't show weakness, wouldn't beg or plead, wouldn't do anything what Whumper wanted to see.

Until Whumper tried drugging them. They gave them something that leaves Whumpee dazed, making their body heavy and unresponsive, and their mind foggy.

They untie Whumpee, letting them fall to the floor, and mock them. Telling them that this is their chance, come on, fight me, isn't this what you want?

But Whumpee can't do anything. They try, but their body won't obey them, their mind slips away from them. And it terrifies them. Anything else they can take. External things? They will fight. But they've never experienced this before. Their body completely giving up on them.

And that, that, finally does something. The next time Whumper drugs them, Whumpee doesn't say anything. It's the same the third time. But the fourth... Whumpee flinches back, and chokes out a soft "please". They instantly shut their mouth, as if they didn't mean to say it, but it's too late.

Whumper finally found something that will break them.

[whump-till-ya-jump]

Writing Snippet #1

Author's Note: Hey it's my first time posting writing on here so I'm kinda scared, but here it goes.

TW: Drugging, caretaker villain, sidekick whumpee, and restraints

They knew they shouldn’t have trusted the food even after Villian took a bite. Look at where it got them; their head too heavy to carry, their eyelids drooping and threatening to close at any minute. There was also a buzz, in their head, and a warm feeling that encompassed their body. God, they were such an idiot. 

There was a creak and footsteps, but it was muffled like their ears were stuffed with cotton. “Enjoyed your meal, I assume,” a voice rang above them. 

Sidekick opened their eyes, or at least tried to. But all they got was a blurred preview of the room they’d been in for the past three days. The last thing Leader told them was, “Don’t let them get into your mind kid.” It was that and then the blood loss dragged them into darkness. They woke up here, roughly bandaged, and chained to the wall. 

Villain crouched down so their face was right in front of Sidekick’s, “I really am sorry, but this was the only way I could check your wounds, I'm sure you get it.” They went to unlock Sidekick from their restraints, and they were too out of it to process the movements fast enough.

 Don’t let them in, don’t let them get close. This mantra had been playing in their head since day one. Anytime the criminal tried to go near them, they would kick, bite, thrash, and scream like a rabid animal, which, of course, made Villian scared they would hurt themself more. 

They reached for Sidekick’s wrist first, where a leather cuff was secured. When they made contact, the tiny hero flinched and let out a small whine. “I know, I know, but you need help.” There were 4 cuffs, two on the hero’s wrist and two on their ankles. Villain made sure not to take off the power-dampening cuffs under the wrist restraints. When all the bonds were off, they gently brought their captive up into their lap.

 Sidekick tried to wriggle out of it but it was like a fish flopping in a net, their limbs uncoordinated and messy. They tried to speak, “wha- whare yu doin,” but their tongue was heavy and it came out all slurred. “It’s okay, I’m just going to fix you up.” It took Sidekick a second to come to, but when they did, they thrashed weakly. “Shh, it’s okay, it’s okay, I’m not going to hurt you. I just need to give you new bandages and make sure your cuts aren’t infected.”

“Nhhn- no!”

“I need to kid.”

 Villain brought their hands to the little head in their lap, carding their hands through Sidekick’s hair and playing with it. Oh god, they thought, that feels really fucking good. They sighed, deep and content. 

“Feels nice right?” they heard from wherever Villain was. They could care less where they were, as long as the feeling didn’t stop. The buzz grew louder and the warmth got stronger, Sidekick was so tired. 

There was a laugh, “Looks like that food is doing wonders for ya kid.” The talking felt nice, it made their skull rattle and shit did it feel good. Honestly, everything felt good, they let out a little noise from their throat. There was more laughing from above, “You can sleep kid, no one is going to hurt you, I just need to patch you up. You’re safe here.”

 Were they safe? No, surely there was something they were forgetting, there had to be. When they tried to think, all that came up was fluff, and each time they blinked, it was impossibly harder to open their eyes.

 They wanted nothing more than to surrender themselves to the warmth and the darkness. So when Villain’s hands scratched a really good spot, that’s exactly what they did.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!!!!

(My Masterlist)

[den-of-whump]

Whumpee can't face the things they see in their dreams, so they refuse to sleep. Caretaker tries everything to get them to rest for once, but nothing works. So they make them a cup of tea and add a bit too much Benadryl to it without telling them.

[oros-ash3s]

＊*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚⋆ Febuwhump 2025 ⋆˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*＊

Day 3 || “Pinned Down”

Exhaustion was wearing him thin. 

With the drugs coursing through his veins, slowly working its way through his bloodstream, turning his limbs to lead, and his battered, bloody body, which was screaming to give up, Atlas was sure it was a miracle he was still conscious, even if barely so. Any lesser soldier would have collapsed within seconds. He was lucky, so goddamned lucky, that the drugs had only begun to take effect as the car pulled out of the alleyway. 

He couldn’t keep this up much longer. 

As the darkened streets of the pitch-black night passed by, his eyelids growing heavier for every minute that ticked past, Atlas knew that he was running out of time. His breathing was slowing, breaths coming out ragged and heavy. His body was giving up, the blood loss and drugs finally taking hold. He knew it was only moments before his eyelids fluttered closed for the final time, and he was lost to Eden’s clutches. 

He and the man across from him both knew it. 

Atlas had never officially met the man before, prior to this night. He was sure they had run into each other, or at least almost had, in one of the many circumstances he and Wren had just barely missed capture in their haste. From the uniform he was wearing, the familiar black material with jade accents, the insignia of an eye resting just above his heart, Atlas knew exactly who he was. One of Eden’s commanders.

And he had fallen right into his trap. 

This mission had been intended to be a short one. It wasn’t one of their high-scale raids, with days of planning and carefully-chosen volunteers. No, it had been only the three of them: Him, Wren, and Alastair. They’d gone to one of Eden’s more low-security locations, a human building on the west-side of downtown. They’d blended in, snuck a bit of information and files out, and been done with it. There were no injuries to worry about, no attacks or pursuits they had to avoid. None of the usual issues to leave him distracted. 

He would’ve been fine – should’ve been fine.

But Alastair came with them last minute, and he’d been pissed. Pissed because they weren’t partners anymore and Wren was still treating him like one, pissed because they hadn’t even bothered to tell him, just dumped Alastair on him as they were leaving, like they got to make all the decisions. Like his voice didn’t count. He’d been pissed because Alastair was a lying, conniving, traitorous piece of shit and he wasn’t about to be used. Not again. 

So he’d gotten distracted, too wrapped up in how Alastair was sitting next to him all timid and nervous like Atlas was the one that had fucked things over, like Atlas was the one that had tried to sell them all out to their sworn enemy, the very man who had been hunting them down for months. The man who had burned him, and who was a drunk, and a murderer, and evil, and Alastair’s secret brother–

So when they set up camp, Wren declaring they were too tired to make the hour drive back to the base, Atlas hadn’t taken all the proper precautions like he usually would’ve, reminding them to set up an illusion. He hadn’t marched around the perimeter of their camp, checking their surroundings for anything suspicious, watching for any figures in the shadows, hidden perched on rooftops. He hadn’t noticed the cameras positioned above the van, or the odd silence that had settled over the street. He had been too angry for any of it, all of his attention set on Alastair’s slumped over figure, as he pathetically tried to make small talk, as if his weak attempts at conversation, the flitting little glances, eyes begging for forgiveness, would make anything better. 

He’d let his emotions control him. It was what he had been trained against, what they had warned him about. Soldiers didn’t have emotions. They didn’t have thoughts or opinions or feelings. It was what made them weak, what made them useless. He had spent so many years of his life dedicating himself to it, ridding the weaknesses that had been ingrained into his brain, pushing down every little emotion that slowed and held him back from his true goal, his mission. And yet, still, his emotions had been his very downfall. 

And now he found himself inside the sleek black van of Eden’s own, two men flanking his sides, pressing him down into the seat, their grip strong as iron as the sedatives slowly took control over his brain. 

His eyes fluttered shut for the millionth time in the past minute, and Atlas sucked in a sharp breath, flexing his fingers. All rational thought had been lost long ago, left in the alleyway with the rest of his dignity. Nonsensical plans swirled through his head, each new one worse than the last. He was growing weaker by the second, the borrowed strength stolen from Wren and Alastair fading from his muscles the farther the car travelled.

The farther they left them behind.  

He grunted, squirming from under his captors pathetically. They didn’t give up, their grip on his arms only tightening at his defiance. 

The man from across from him sighed, straightening up in his seat with a wince. To his credit, Atlas had not gone down without a fight. The blood smeared across the man’s crisply ironed suit was evident of that. The sight of the broken nose and red caked to the side of his face brought a boost of satisfaction surging through Atlas, distracting him from his own injuries, if only for a second. The fact that the man wouldn’t be able to show his face to the general public until his nose healed, lest rumours start about one of the esteemed CEO’s of the kindly Eden Inc., almost made the capture worth it. Almost. 

“Still up, huh?” He leaned forward in his seat, the streetlights from outside illuminating his face, causing the dangerous flicker in his eyes to be all the more unsettling. Atlas vaguely remembered him from the many lectures, photographs, and history textbooks he had read during his rather uneventful years at the warehouse. The face of Eden. Sasha Beneš. From the prim and proper suit, voice as smooth as velvet, and chiselled good looks, he was sure that the man in front of him was the current leader of the media branch, involved in all the politics and communications that came with running a widely known corporation such as Eden. Although he looked a little different with his nose so busted, his usually swoopy blond hair in a disarray from the scuffle. 

The man didn’t seem to be bothered by Atlas’ lack of response. If anything, he was amused, chuckling softly to himself as the boy did nothing but glare through half-lidded eyes, gaze alight with hatred. “Forgot you soldier-types are all trained to resist this sort of stuff,” Sasha muttered, reaching across the seat for something Atlas couldn’t make out. “God, Cato needs to lay off you brats a bit, you’re all too invincible for your own good. That woman doesn’t ever know when to take a fucking break.” He huffed out a breath of annoyance, turning back to Atlas, his eyes gleaming, shadows cutting sharp edges across his face. A beat of silence passing through the van, he held up the item for the boy to see: A vial of swirling milky-white liquid, a needle tip at the very end of it. 

Atlas’ blood froze, the restraints around him suddenly suffocating. 

“Don’t try and resist, kid,” Sasha cracked a grin, looming closer. “There’s no use.” 

Atlas sucked in a sharp breath, opening his mouth, to beg for mercy or tell the man to go fuck himself, he wasn’t sure. But his tongue was suddenly stuck at the back of his throat, the words gone before they could even leave his mouth. All struggle was just met with more force, pushing him down into the seat. It was smooth leather, well-cushioned and comfortable, but right now, it was the last thing Atlas needed. He blinked hard, pushing back the waves of exhaustion that were rolling over him, telling him to sleep, to give up. 

Wren and Alastair. He needed to get out and find Wren and Alastair–

Sasha pushed back his hair, fingers brushing against the soft crook of his neck. Atlas shuddered, every instinct inside his body telling him to fight, to defy him, but with the weight on his legs and arms, pinning him to the seat, he was completely and utterly trapped. 

“You belong to Eden, Zieliński. Don’t forget that.” Sasha whispered, his breath hot against Atlas’ skin. He raised the needle, the tip pricking against his skin, sending Atlas into a paralyzing panic. He had to get out–

“Sweet dreams.”

Sasha stabbed the needle into his neck and everything went black.

masterlist || next

✧ ೃ༄*ੈ✩

I initially had a much different scene planned for this prompt, but when I sat down to write this one I wasn’t really feeling it, so I came up with this instead!! I kinda like it better, tbh. but who knows, maybe I’ll write the other one (featuring post-Elite Atlas), after this whole challenge is over……

✧ ೃ༄*ੈ✩

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[befuddled-calico-whump]

Augusnippets, Day 13: Drugging

cw: dub/noncon drugging, referenced broken bones, implied substance dependency, dissociation

previous // next

for the @augusnippets challenge // word count: 472

=~=~=

They bring him water, and he drinks.

It's tainted. Spiked with something; he could tell from the first sip, yet accepted it anyway.

He knows he needs it. Without it, he'll die.

People who weren't his team dragged him screaming from the rubble, tossed him in the trunk of a car with no regard for his damaged leg, left him to drown in the pain. They gave him a water bottle when they tossed him in a cell, and at the time, he was stupidly grateful for the numbing substance it was laced with. Dulling the world, granting him distance from the agony that wanted to devour him.

But now he's lying on the same concrete, and he doesn't know how long it's been. He hasn't had the mental presence to remember to check his leg, to set it and bind it with a makeshift splint. He hasn't had the capacity to plan, or pay attention to where he is, how many there are, when they change shifts.

They bring him water, and he drinks, wits too sluggish to let him stop himself, head growing fuzzy as the substance pulls him down, down, down.

Deep below the muddled surface, the spy wants to move, to deny himself the tainted food and water so he can think again. But the creature the substance turns him into only wants to sleep. To hide from the world, from the hurting. It only wants to drink, and when the fuzziness starts to fade, it wants more. 

It's always the worst just before the guards appear with another bottle. Head throbbing, body shivering with the chill of the room, leg on fire. (It's splinted? When did that happ–)

The creature whimpers when it sees the bottle, extended out as if the guard is giving it a gift. Takes it with trembling hands, heart beating faster and faster as it struggles to unscrew the cap. Relief is so close, so close. It spills some of the water when the cap at last comes loose, but doesn't care, holding the bottle to its mouth and drinking deeply. (No no no stop, stop—)

The fog wafts up, and the creature slips into it. Down, down, down.

It's always the worst just before the guards appear with another bottle, but it's when the spy can nearly think.

He and the creature share a goal. Escape. 

His method is nearly impossible. Full of pain, but permanent. Needed.

Its method is easy, soft, painless. Slip away, let it all go. Forget it all. Every loss, every pain, every person he does and doesn't miss.

Every time, the spy resolves to fight, even as he's sweating and shivering from pain, from need.

Every time, he falls short. It knows it needs it. Without it, it will die.

They bring him water, and he drinks.

[iwritewhump]

a game of roulette | "why can't i move?"

april is the cruelest month day 24

characters: villain, supervillain, sidekick, and hero

warnings: needles, mystery drugs, cursing, drugging, semi-intimate whumper

1924 words

part one | part two

~

Villain finishes off the plate quickly, not that there was much to finish off. A few bites of scrambled eggs, half a piece of toast, and two sausage links that were more charr than they were meat. He lifts his arms above his head and slides the plate onto the table and leans against the table’s leg. 

Licking the egg off of his fingers, he takes a deep breath and leans his head back, staring at the ceiling. 

Sidekick walks into the kitchen, a small frown on her face. “You’re awake.” 

“Happy to see you, too,” Villain says snidely. 

She rolls her eyes and walks up to him. She looks over her shoulder anxiously and squats down in front of him. “If you’re awake then it means that Supervillain is coming back here and she’s going to kill you. Do you get that? You pissed her off and she’s not going to forgive you for it. So when she gets here you don’t fight her, don’t argue, just…go with it. Play her games and let her win. It’s the only way you’ll stay alive long enough to get out.” 

Villain tilts his head, “Why are you telling me this?” 

She swallows thickly and looks over her shoulder again. Voices sound just outside the doorway and she pushes herself up with help from the table. “Because I don’t want to clean your blood off the floor.” 

She turns away from him as soon as Hero and Supervillain walk into the kitchen, she glides over the floor and opens the fridge. 

“Were you two talking?” Supervillain asks, voice sending chills down Villain’s back. 

Sidekick shrugs, “I was just telling him to be a good boy for you.” 

Hero leans on the counter next to the sink by Sidekick and chews on his lip, watching as Supervillain chuckles and walks over to the table. She sets her bag down on the ground just out of Villain’s reach and sits in front of him. 

“He knows…” she tilts her head at him and puts her hands in her lap, “Don’t you?” 

“It’s coming back to me,” Villain remarks. 

She smirks and pulls her bag into her lap. She unzips it and pulls out a small cloth, rolled up neatly in the top of the bag. With a sigh, she lays it on the ground next to her and unrolls it, showing off an impressive collection of colorful vials and syringes of all different gauges. 

Hero takes a half-step closer to Sidekick and takes her hand in his, he tilts his head and whispers, “This was a mistake.” 

“Wish you’d figured that out before you let her inside?” Sidekick mutters, squeezing his hand in hers. 

“You’ve been busy,” Villain says, eyes scanning over the numerous vials. “Is it a bit boring at home without me there?” 

Supervillain takes a deep breath and takes three vials out of their pouches, then she does the same with five syringes. 

Villain picks at his fingers anxiously, “Or did you replace me already? I’d be surprised if you found someone who can put up with you.” 

Sidekick turns her head into Hero’s shoulder and shakes her head. She mutters, “Just shut the fuck up.” 

Supervillain’s hand freezes, she looks up at Villain and plasters on a fake smile. “It’s just me there for now.” 

She pulls out another vial and one more syringe, then she rips open a few alcohol swabs and wipes each vial for a few seconds. 

Wordlessly, she draws up a few milliliters from each vial, then she switches the needle on three of them before drawing out a little bit more from different vials. She swirls them together until the colors blend together, then she lays them out on the ground and sits up on her heels. 

She takes an alcohol swab from the pile and lifts the sleeve of Villain’s shirt up and wipes the swab over his skin. 

“Hey, wait,” he says, pulling away from her. “I thought this was going to be a game. This isn’t us playing, this is you drugging me.” 

Supervillain sticks the needle in his arm. She reaches into her bag and pulls out a small sharps box, discarding the needle inside. “We need to get you ready for the game, don’t we?” she asks, rubbing the spot where the needle went into his arm. “Call it…foreplay.” 

Villain’s body slowly relaxes, his eyes glaze over, hands fall uselessly on the ground next to him, and his head slumps slightly to the side. He blinks, trying to bring something into focus, but he can’t make anything clear for longer than a second. 

“Why can’t I move?” he asks, voice slurring. 

Supervillain smiles and pats his arm, pulling her hand away, “That was just a mild sedative slash muscle relaxant. Nothing too strong, you’ll still feel everything, don’t worry.” 

Sidekick shakes her head and turns away, “I can’t watch.” 

Supervillain holds up four of the six remaining syringes in front of Villain. “I’m going to let you choose which ones I use on you this time. Two will have…surprise effects. I’ve never mixed them together before so your guess is as good as mine. One of them will make it so your heart beats so fast it just might explode, and the last one…” she pauses for dramatic effect, “Will kill you in minutes.” 

Villain looks at the syringes in her hand, each a different color. Green, orange, yellow, and purple. 

It has to be one of the ones that isn’t mixed, right? Two still sit on the floor next to Supervillain, blue and red. He closes his eyes and forces himself to think. What colors can’t you mix? Yellow, blue, and orange? 

No, that’s wrong. Yellow and red make orange. 

Why didn’t he watch which ones she mixed? Why was she doing this? Which one is going to kill him? Will any of them actually kill him? Supervillain wouldn't actually do that, would she? 

“Hey!” She snaps her fingers in front of Villain’s face, “I know that made it hard to focus but come on! Just pick a color, any color!” 

If yellow would kill him, and yellow makes green and orange, then they’ll probably kill him too. So purple is the right choice. Unless red and blue would kill him, so purple would double kill him. Fuck this is hard. 

“If you don’t choose in the next thirty seconds, I’m going to choose for you. And I know which one will kill you.” Supervillain warns. 

Mentally, Villain kicks himself. Why is this so hard? Just pick a color, any of them will suck, one will just suck the most, but…minutes doesn’t sound bad. Sure, it might be blinding pain until he kicks, but at least it’s only minutes. 

Oh, fuck it. 

“Purple.” 

Villain smiles, uncaps the green syringe and plunges it into Villain’s other arm. 

“Hey!” Hero shouts, pushing himself up from his spot on the counter, “He said purple!” 

Supervillain turns to look at him, her thumb hovering over the plunger, “Did he? I couldn’t hear.” 

Villain closes his eyes, as if that would help block out anything that the green liquid could impart on him. He feels the pressure build under his skin when she pushes down on the plunger, and then…nothing. 

There’s no fire coursing through him, no weakness slowly spreading through his arm into the rest of his body, not even a tinge of all-consuming pain from it. 

“Hmm,” Supervillain says, discarding the syringe in the sharps box. “Feel anything? 

She pulls out a little notebook and scribbles something on a half-filled page, then reaches over and puts the back of her hand against Villain’s forehead. 

“Your fever has subsided since last time,” she mutters, scribbling something else on the paper. “Doesn’t make sense, considering, but it’s not a bad sign.” 

‘Last time?’ Villain wants to ask. The words don’t come. Does his mouth even move? 

Supervillain’s eyes light up and she smiles, “Oh! Now that’s interesting. Try that again.” 

He manages a strangled choking sound, pathetic and pitiful. 

Sidekick shakes her head and chews on her lip, “What’s she doing to him?” 

“Ok, now I didn’t expect that,” Supervillain says, chewing on the end of her pencil. “It looks like the muscle relaxant reacted with the truth serum, making it harder for you to spill your secrets. Do you want to tell me everything I ask?” 

He manages a small head shake, luckily his body is always going against his brain and willing to lie for him. 

“Interesting.” she scribbles something else down and closes the notepad. “Ok, well, that’s me done for the day. You have one more choice to make before I leave. Red or blue?” 

She holds both of the syringes up to Villain and twirls them in her fingers. “One will bind with the muscle relaxant and you’ll be able to move again and the other-” she looks over her shoulder at Hero and Sidekick-”You’re acquainted with.” 

Hero screws his eyes shut and shakes his head, remembering the small syringe Supervillain had given him filled with a cloudy blue liquid. He wants to tell Villain, “PIck the red. Please, for the love of god, pick the red.” 

But he stays quiet, fearing any movement would set Supervillain off. 

Villain blinks and stares at the red syringe, then blinks. 

“This one?” Supervillain asks, lifting the red syringe a little higher than the blue. “You’re sure?” He blinks. 

“Okay, just remember, you chose it.” 

She plunges the needle into his bicep and hovers her thumb over the plunger, “You’re sure? Last chance.”

‘Just fucking do it already,’ Villain thinks, looking at her thumb pressing against the plunger. He blinks once and feels the pressure build under his skin once again. 

Slowly, he’s able to wiggle his fingers and toes. He lifts his head up and squeezes his hand into a fist, then flexes his fingers. 

“Okay,” Supervillain says, packing up her bag. “That’s my time. I’ll be back soon, don’t worry.” She stands up in one fluid motion, tucking her feet underneath her and using them to push herself up.

She puts her thumb under Villain’s chin and tilts his head so he’s looking at her. “I hope you remember what you did to me. And I hope you know nothing I do will ever outweigh it.” 

She pushes his head back so it hits the table leg and walks away from him, stopping in front of Hero. 

“Give him a few hours before he can eat or drink anything, or else he’ll throw it up. I’ll be back in two days.” 

She walks out of the kitchen and all three of them listen as she turns down the hallway and opens the door. 

Sidekick rushes over to him and her hand hover around him uselessly, “Are you alright?” 

Hero takes slow, deliberate steps and kneels down in front of him, “I didn’t know she was going to do this. But there’s nothing I can do now, she knows where we live, where you are, and she can fuck everything up if we go against her. So you’ll have to push through until I can figure something else out, alright?” 

What did he think she was going to do? Shake his hand and welcome him back into her life? No, this fits what he did to her, he deserves it, anyone who thinks otherwise needs to ask themselves if they know the whole story. And nobody does, Supervillain will take that to her grave.

[montammil]

Forever Be Mine, part 3

Masterlist here!

CW: Yandere/creepy whumper, branding, vomiting, murder (not sawyer or rowan), degradation, failed escape, guns, drugging, noncon touching (nothing sexual but still creepy)

...

Four whole days passed by and Sawyer was miserable. Rowan hadn't untied him from the bed once during that time, except to use the restroom and shower every other day. He spent most of his time reading aloud to Sawyer, ranging from classic literature to collections of poetry, almost all about love and romance. Sometimes he'd even read him things he wrote for him, which just made it all the more disturbing.

In return, Sawyer would pretend to be interested in what he was saying.

He was careful not to give into his delusion too much out of fear of getting caught onto, or even worse, encourage him to take it further. It was already torture enough dealing with Rowan's constant cuddles and kisses.

The fifth day arrived, and Sawyer was ready for another dreadful day. He kept his neutral frown when he felt a familiar weight on the bed.

Rowan kissed his cheek. "Good morning, my love," he whispered into his ear. Sawyer's skin crawled at his words and the warm breath ghosting over him. "Sleep well?"

He nodded in response and stretched his legs out as much as they'd allow, flexing his wrists in hopes that Rowan would get the message and untie him already.

The ropes weren't getting any looser after all this time and his hands were starting to go numb. He wouldn't be surprised if he came out with nerve damage from how tight they were tied.

The taller man noticed what he was doing and frowned. "If I untie you, will you behave yourself?"

"Of course," Sawyer assured him sweetly, mustering up a small smile for emphasis.

Rowan eyed him before reaching over to untie his wrists from the bedframe above him. He rubbed his wrists with his thumbs and massaged each of Sawyer's fingers. It felt nice having the blood flowing properly through them again, but the contact made him want to recoil from his touch. He stayed still instead, letting Rowan dote on him as usual.

He remained still while Rowan untied the rest of his bindings. Once all of his limbs were free, Sawyer sat up slowly and stretched out his legs again, letting the muscles relax after being confined for so long.

Rowan watched him intently as he did so, not taking his eyes off of him for even a second.

Sawyer suppressed a shudder of disgust and smiled up at him. "Thank you," he said. 

Apparently, Rowan didn't know him as well as he thought, if he fell for that act.

Sawyer slid out of bed and stood up on unsteady legs. It was the first time he'd been out of bed in a while and he felt dizzy and disoriented.

Rowan placed a hand on his waist to steady him and helped him walk out of the bedroom and into the kitchen. Sawyer stumbled around a bit, but Rowan kept him upright with his grip on his hip.

He sat down at the small round table and watched Rowan make breakfast for them both. They ate together in silence, though Sawyer barely touched his food. He couldn't be hungry even if he wanted to, being so inactive these past few days.

After breakfast, Rowan cleaned up and then walked Sawyer over to the couch in the living room. He sat down and patted the space beside him, motioning for him to sit next to him. Sawyer reluctantly obeyed and plopped down beside him. He immediately pulled him close, wrapping an arm around him and nuzzling his head into his neck.

"I'm so glad we're finally together," Rowan muttered into his skin. "I've dreamed of this moment for months now."

"I'm glad too," Sawyer forced himself to say. Rowan kissed along his throat and sucked gently at his pulse point.

He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to block out the sensation of lips against his throat. The hairs on his neck stood up at the touch and goosebumps covered his arms and legs.

He thought of himself back in his apartment, curled up on the couch watching movies with a blanket wrapped tightly around himself. Or dancing alone in the dark room with the rain pouring outside. He'd never feel that kind of comfort ever again.

Not until he escaped from Rowan's clutches. It was hard to focus on escape when Rowan kept distracting him, however.

Rowan paused his movements. "Sorry, I'm moving too fast, aren't I?"

At least he had some kind of self-aware bone in his body. "A little bit," Sawyer bleated.

He sighed and pulled away from him. "I just get so excited when I think about us finally being together forever, I can't help myself." He placed a hand on Sawyer's cheek and smiled down at him. "But we have all the time in the world, so there's no need to rush. And since you've been so good for me, I don't mind being a little extra patient." He pressed their foreheads together, "I love you."

No matter what, Sawyer couldn't force himself to say those words. So he remained silent instead. Rowan didn't seem to mind thankfully, he just kissed Sawyer's forehead and pulled him into his lap.

"Let's watch a movie together," Rowan suggested. "How does Double Indemnity sound? It's one of my favorite films, I'm sure you've seen it before."

He was right. Sawyer had watched it hundreds of times, but he liked the thrill of it. From what he knew about Rowan, he probably liked it for the twisted romance.

The movie started playing and Sawyer didn't pay attention to it at all. Instead, he focused on trying to think of ways to escape from his captor. But even after five days, nothing had come to mind yet.

The rest of the day was boring. Rowan would make him more food, then they'd lie on the couch, and sometimes he'd watch him work on his laptop, pausing every once in a while to peck the top of his head.

Sawyer was feeling pretty useless. All he could do was lay around and pretend he enjoyed the attention.

Something changed the next morning. Rowan was in the living room, on a phone call to a client. Sawyer, however, was in the kitchen, looking through the drawers for anything he could use to defend himself with, having told Rowan he was simply going to make them both tea. He didn't want to use any knives because that was too risky, and Rowan had proven to be much stronger than him.

He was about to give up when he opened the medicine cabinet to see something familiar: Flunitrazepam. He remembered hearing about it once on a news article.

The very drug Rowan had slipped into his drinks in the first place, he figured. This would work better than a knife. Rowan was an idiot from what Sawyer knew, so quickly believing in his compliance meant he wouldn't expect this at all.

Rowan was still on the phone when Sawyer returned to the living room with Earl Grey tea for both of them.

"...Alright, that sounds good. I'll start working on your policy. Talk soon," he said, proceeding to hang up. He accepted the cup and took a sip. "Mm, thank you, my dear. I hope you didn't microwave it." His tone was playful, despite his humorously skeptical look.

It became easier throughout his kidnapping to fake a smile. "It literally tastes the same either way."

"No, it doesn't," Rowan complained. "The water should always be heated over a stove. But I forgive you since you're so lovely otherwise."

Sawyer sat down next to him on the couch, with his mug in hand. His palms were clammy with sweat, and he was having trouble keeping his breathing steady.

His heart thumped wildly in his chest as he raised the cup to his lips and took a sip, trying to steady himself before the inevitable. He glanced over at Rowan who was sitting beside him, enjoying his drink as if nothing was wrong.

Rowan gulped down the rest of his tea, not seeming to notice anything unusual about it. Sawyer was relieved that he hadn't suspected anything yet, but it was only a matter of time before he did.

Hoping to speed up the process, Sawyer put down his tea cup and massaged Rowan's shoulder, doing his best impression of an affectionate touch.

"Mmm," Rowan sighed, "your hands feel amazing."

He continued massaging his shoulders and arms for a few minutes until he felt Rowan start to slump against him. Sawyer stood up and helped lower him to the couch. He grabbed the phone out of his pocket, groaning when it required a passcode. He tried pressing the home button against Rowan's thumb, but it did nothing, much to his disappointment. 

Sawyer searched for his keys next but found nothing on him besides his wallet. Damn it. He looked back at Rowan's sleeping figure, weighing his options carefully. He wished he could find his phone, but he had no time to waste.

Pure panic took over his mind, and he threw a chair through the window.

Shards of glass fell onto the ground beneath them as Sawyer climbed out the window. He ignored the sharp sting in his palm as he pulled himself up, feeling glass dig into his skin.

Blood dripped onto the grass below, but he paid no attention to it. His mind was on nothing but running, so that's what he did.

He ran as fast as his legs could carry him. He had no idea where he was going or where he would end up, but that didn't matter right now.

The important thing was getting away from Rowan, putting as much distance between them as possible. Sawyer had no idea how long it'd be before Rowan woke up and realized that he had escaped. 

Running was harder than he imagined it would be, especially since he hadn't exercised much at all while trapped in that lake house. Sawyer was already winded after about fifteen minutes of sprinting through the woods and had to slow down to catch his breath.

Sawyer wasn't the most outdoorsy person, but even he knew better than to head deeper into the woods when he had no idea where he was going. So instead, he veered off to the left and began following the lake shore, hoping it would eventually lead him somewhere populated. The sun was already starting to set and the sky was beginning to grow dark. Sawyer pulled his sweater tighter around him in an attempt to stay warm.

He couldn't stop, no matter how painfully irritating the wounds in his feet felt.

...

Rowan woke up groggily, feeling nauseous and disoriented. His head throbbed painfully and he struggled to sit up, still half asleep.

His heart nearly stopped when he noticed Sawyer was no longer beside him on the couch, and even more when he realized that the window had been smashed in.

Rowan's hand instinctively went to his pocket to check for his phone, relieved to find it still there, but that didn't change much.

He scrambled to his feet, nearly falling over from the sudden wave of vertigo that hit him.

Sawyer must've drugged him and escaped somehow. He should've known that Sawyer wouldn't have accepted their love so easily, but he was so desperately hopeful that he believed his lies. And now Sawyer was out there, potentially hurt or lost.

Rowan grabbed his keys and darted out the door.

...

Sawyer finally had to stop when he couldn't run anymore due to exhaustion. His body felt like it was on fire, burning up from exertion and fear. Sweat trickled down his forehead and his breaths came in short gasps.

He was about to take a break when he noticed something in the distance.

It was a blue truck coming across a dirt path. Sawyer waved his arms and limped as quickly as he could to it. "Hey!" he shouted hoarsely. "Please help!"

The car slowed to a stop and Sawyer collapsed while trying to rush to it. A man with blond hair and glasses stepped out and knelt beside him. "Are you okay?"

"Some guy kidnapped me and I escaped but I don't know where I am," Sawyer blurted out in a hurry. The stranger looked unsure of what to do, but Sawyer couldn't blame him for that. It was a pretty ridiculous situation and even Sawyer didn't know how he'd react if the roles were reversed. "Please, just let me borrow a phone, or take me to the nearest town--anything."

"Alright." The man helped him to his feet.

As he was being led to the car, he heard another car skid to a halt, just a couple of feet away. He turned around and his blood ran cold when he saw Rowan stepping out of his vehicle.

"Sawyer," he said, breathless.

The man stepped in front of Sawyer. "Is this the guy you were talking about?" He heard Sawyer mumble a shaky affirmative. "Sir, I think you should leave," the stranger spoke.

Rowan paid him no attention whatsoever, looking directly at Sawyer with pleading eyes. "Sawyer, come on. We can go back home now, just please come here." When Sawyer only remained silent, he dragged out a long sigh. "Sir, I know what it looks like, but my husband here has memory loss. I'm just trying to take him home. He does this all the time."

"I'm sorry, I just can't believe that. You can follow us to the hospital if you're so worried, but that's all."

For a split moment, Rowan snarled but gained his composure. "Sorry, you're... you're right. Thank you." He returned to his car, and the stranger urged Sawyer back into the truck.

"Thank you so much," Sawyer sighed in relief. The man nodded and shut the passenger door to approach the driver's side. 

Just as he pulled the door open, he fell to the ground, followed by screaming from Sawyer. He was still alive, but not for long because Rowan shot him three more times in the head. 

Sawyer opened the door to run away, but Rowan caught him by the back of his shirt collar and pinned him against the truck. He wailed into cold steel.

"Look what you made me do," he snarled. That was the first time Sawyer heard him use such a venomous tone. He slammed the barrel of the gun against Sawyer's skull and he fell unconscious instantly.

...

When Sawyer woke up, his surroundings were dark. There was a dim, flickering light bulb in the center of the ceiling and concrete walls around him. He was on the floor, lying on a mattress that wasn't all too comfortable. His leg was chained to the wall so he couldn't escape again. The image of Rowan murdering someone in cold blood flashed through his mind. The memories made him throw up onto the cold ground next to him.

It took him a few seconds to process what had happened earlier that day. The shock made him retch again, which turned into hyperventilating. He couldn't even focus on his hurt.

He got an innocent person killed. An innocent person trying to help him.

And it was all his fault.

Sawyer knew Rowan was crazy, but he didn't consider he'd go that far. He thought Rowan would be too cowardly to actually kill someone else. He'd been so incredibly wrong about him.

If Rowan wasn't afraid to kill someone, what else was he not afraid to do? What did Rowan have in store for him next? Would he kill him too? 

It wasn't long before he heard footsteps approaching the basement. Sawyer clenched his restrained fists. Keys jangled before a lock clicked. The door swung open and Rowan made his way downstairs, taking his sweet time.

He didn't look angry, not exactly. It was more like his calm demeanor was a facade that would crack any moment.

"You killed him," Sawyer spat out first. His voice trembled. "You murdered him. He did nothing wrong."

"He was stopping you from coming home." Rowan squatted down to meet Sawyer's eye level and grabbed a handful of his hair. "He was going to take you away from me." Sawyer gasped out of pain. Rowan forced his head back and met his gaze with narrowed eyes. "And I can't let that happen. I've waited too long for this just for you to be an ungrateful brat about it."

Tears pricked at his eyes. "You kidnapped me! If you weren't expecting this, you're fucking stupid!"

Rowan's expression darkened. His hand left his hair to clutch his jaw. "You really think you can talk back to me after you pulled that shit earlier?" Sawyer spat in his face in response. "Fine, that's how you want to play, huh? Since you're so insistent on being difficult."

Next thing Sawyer knew, Rowan had left him.

Sawyer thought he could be left alone again, but unfortunately, luck was never on his side, as Rowan came back down just a few minutes later with a metal skewer.

It looked pretty non-threatening on its own, but the glint in Rowan's eyes told him it was not going to be pleasant at all.

"I was going to spare you this, but you pissed me off."

Rowan walked over and yanked him upright by the chains on his wrists. The force on them hurt like hell, but he refused to scream in front of him.

He was suspended in midair, hanging from the wall from a hook, the chain from the cuffs keeping him up. The metal dug painfully into his wrists and his shoulders ached from being stretched out.

A pocket knife came into view and it grazed along his shirt until it ripped through the fabric. A warm hand caressed his skin and moved lower to his abdomen, rubbing his thumb over his right side, just above his hip.

He pulled away and dug into his pocket, pulling out a match. He lit it and placed it over the skewer, waiting until it was red hot. 

Sawyer was surprised his heart was still in its chest. "What are you doing?" He struggled further against the cuffs, but they wouldn't budge at all. "Rowan, what the fuck are you doing?"

"I've been too easy on you," Rowan said. "You're right, I was stupid for expecting this to be easy." He smiled wide at him, and never had Sawyer seen something so crazed in his life. "But I suppose this is just a lesson we both need to learn, hm?"

Before Sawyer could even fathom what that meant, Rowan had stabbed the skewer through his skin.

There was no sound from Sawyer's lips, his voice caught in his throat. The pain was unreal, searing into his flesh, tearing through skin and tissue and muscle. It burned and throbbed and felt like every nerve in his body was on fire. Every cell screamed at him to pull away, but all he could do was hang there uselessly, watching in horror as his skin sizzled around the metal rod prodding his abdomen.

After what felt like an eternity, Rowan finally pulled the skewer away and tossed it aside carelessly. Sawyer would've thrown up a second time if not for his stomach being empty. Instead, he gasped for air, choking and coughing on bile and saliva.

He didn't realize Rowan had unfastened him from the chain until he collapsed onto the floor below, landing hard on his side with a pained groan.

"Are you sorry?"

Sawyer only panted.

His hand snaked around the shorter man's neck, only lightly squeezing, but the threat was still there. "I asked you a question."

"Y-yes," Sawyer stammered. "I'm sorry."

Rowan ran his thumb over his Adam's apple. "Good," he murmured, smiling. "Can you tell me what you're sorry for?"

"For running away," he whispered shakily.

"And?"

"Drugging you, and... lying to you."

His smile widened as he nodded approvingly. "I'm glad you're starting to understand how this works, my love." He scooped him up in his arms with a soft grunt. "Let's get you a nice long bath."

[bamber344]

Any Means Necessary

prev

masterlist

wrote almost 5000 words today but WE FINISHED IT BAYBEEE

whooo boy, this chapter. prepare yourselves. it is a ROLLERCOASTER, and the girlies do NOT keep their hands and feet inside the vehicle at all times.

No, seriously, heed the warnings. This is the whumpiest chapter yet. Though be wary that the warnings have spoilers in them. If you choose not to read them. Just. Be ready for Any Means Necessary :)

Grab a snack and a blanky, my dear readers, cuz it's a long one. Enjoy!

CWs: torture, interrogation whump, beatings, broken bones, waterboarding, electrocution, noncon undressing and touching, inappropriate usage of a car battery, self-harm (implied and explicit), sexual references, defiant whumpee, urination, drugging, addiction, so so many bad decisions oml

Any Means Necessary

“And I told him, I told him, you’re gonna cause an accident! But nope! He didn’t listen, and guess what he did. Guess!” Maddie said, eyes half-lidded with a big, amused grin on her face.

“Uhh,” I mumbled, trying to get my drug-addled brain to work. This time, I had – under Maddie’s guidance – taken a much lower dose of the dried plant than my accidental first experience with it a few days ago, so instead of the horrible feeling of melting into the floor, I was simply enjoying a buzzing numbness tingling through my limbs. Had I been somewhere else, somewhere less safe, it would’ve felt awful being so out of control like this. But here, in this cabin, with Maddie here to protect me should anything happen, I was free to let myself unwind without a care.

“He backed the fuckin’ forklift into a shelf and knocked the whole damn thing over!” Maddie said, continuing without my input. “We spent the entire rest of the day cleaning up after him, and the last I heard, he got the boot. He’s lucky no one got hurt. Man, what an idiot.”

“Wow,” I replied, trying to wrap my head around the scenario she was describing. It was a little difficult, as I wasn’t sure what a ‘forklift’ was, but I was pretty sure I got the gist.

It was just the two of us tonight. Vivienne was away studying at her school’s library. Apparently, it was too difficult to focus here. 

She’d been a little distant lately. I missed her.

I missed a lot of people. I missed Brianna, and the way she would make me laugh. The way she could totally pull all my tension away with nothing but a few kisses. God, but I could go for some positive physical contact right now. Leaning against Maddie’s shoulder was nice and all, but it wasn’t enough.

I just… wanted to feel wanted. Brianna made me feel wanted. Vivienne, for that brief moment, had made me feel wanted, right before my entire life fell apart in front of me, and then she told me she didn’t want me anyway. It still stung, even if I knew it was just temporary. It didn’t solve the problem I was having right now. I was lonely, and I wanted to feel wanted.

Would Madeline want me? Not for anything serious, just… enough to untie this little knot in the back of my mind. Just enough so that, for a single night, I could stop constantly thinking about Father and my sisters and Vivienne and Rosalyn and everything and I could just focus on my own body in the present moment. The weed was helping, but it wasn’t enough, and I didn’t want to take anymore in case I fell back into that vegetative state from before. Sex was a proven treatment to my particular brand of overthinking. To put it frankly, in the words Brianna had taught me: I was horny. I was sad and lonely and horny. And Madeline was the only one here who could help with any of that. Would she?

Well, there was only one way to find out, wasn’t there?

“Hey, Maddie?”

“Mm?” she mumbled.

“Do you wanna make out?”

Madeline’s body stiffened beside me. I turned and looked up at her. 

She frowned. “I… I thought you were with Viv?”

“Vivienne didn’t think a relationship was a good idea, with everything going on. This is just for fun though, if you want,” I clarified. “I could use a distraction.”

Maddie was silent for a long moment. She stared into the fireplace across from us, unmoving. Finally, she let out a breath.

“Fuck it. Why not?”

Something akin to relief flooded through me. I grinned, pushing myself up and clambering over her until I was straddling her lap, inches away from her face. Madeline put her hands on my hips, eyes jittering between meeting my gaze and looking down at my lips. I couldn’t quite decipher her expression.

“How’d you get that scar?” she whispered.

“Training accident,” I replied. 

She hummed, reaching up and stroking her thumb across it. 

Briefly, some small part of me acknowledged that that scar was one of the only things differentiating my appearance from Rosalyn’s. I wondered what this must be like for Madeline. What could be going on inside her head as she caressed my face; the face of her dead wife, only imperfect and damaged, stolen and repurposed? 

Was this a bad idea?

I had no time to consider it. Madeline kissed me like the first lightning strike of a thunderstorm. I sucked in a breath as her lips moved against mine, quick and bruising. It was intense and all-consuming, and exactly what I needed.

I moaned, stroking my hands through her hair and kissing back, sucking on her bottom lip and gently biting down. Madeline made a noise like a wounded animal, squeezing my hip with one hand and cradling my jaw with the other. Her tongue snaked into my mouth, flickering in and out almost like an invitation. I took it eagerly, pushing back with my own tongue and taking control of the exchange with practiced ease.

She whined, and the sound shot straight through my body to the heat between my legs. Every nerve ending lit up like an electrical surge. This was what this form had been yearning for since its creation. It almost felt like there was another pair of hands above my own, guiding me with the familiarity of years together. 

Madeline had always been the key. Rosalyn’s love for her was so strong that it persisted even beyond death, beyond the replication of her cells into a new body. It was the sight of Maddie that awakened my memories of Rosalyn, all those months ago when I was first deployed. This felt like finally fitting into place. This was exactly where this body was supposed to be.

A floatiness seeped through my limbs, lifting me away from myself and robbing me of the sharp edges of awareness. One moment, I had been present and in control – if slightly inebriated – and the next, it was like my body was moving on its own, and I was just a passive observer, watching from outside. What… was this feeling?

I watched on, still experiencing every wonderful sensation, as Maddie separated from my lips and feverishly kissed my neck. My body groaned, and I felt my throat vibrate with the noise, but I had no input over it. I tried moving my hands, tried saying something. Nothing.

Despite the inherent wrongness of being totally out of control of my own body, I wasn’t afraid. Somehow, I knew… Whatever this was wasn’t a malevolent force. All I could feel was… Love.

“Rosie…” Madeline whispered against my throat.

“Yes, my love?” my body said, in an accent that was not my own.

Maddie whipped her head back up, eyes going wide.

She screamed, shoving me off of her, and all of a sudden I was back in control, right as my skull slammed against the floor. My healing ribs loudly protested the impact.

“Ow.”

“Wh-why’d you say that?!” Maddie demanded, her breaths coming in rapid, shallow bursts.

I sat up, rubbing the back of my head. “I… don’t know.”

“Y-your eyes were… fuck. FUCK! I can’t do this. I can’t do this.”

She stood up, stumbling over to the kitchen counter and picking up the phone in fumbling hands. She held it up to her ear.

“Vivienne, I- I need you to come take me home. I can’t be here right now. I- I just need to go. I know, just… please.”

Maddie put the phone down and sighed, not looking in my direction. I was too scared to move.

Vivienne appeared, glancing around with a confused expression. Her eyes found Maddie and she frowned. “Seriously, what’s going on?”

Madeline walked up to her, grabbing her by the shoulders. “Please just take me home,” she whispered, voice husky with emotion.

“Maddie, it’s dangerous! De Vygon is looking for us.”

“I know, I- I’ll stay in the apartment. I’ll be quiet. I just… I need to get away from here. Just for tonight.”

After a long moment, Vivienne sighed. “Fine.”

With a pop, they disappeared.

…What was I thinking?! Making out with Madeline, of all people?! Was I stupid?! I might as well have just stabbed her in the chest myself. God, what an idiot. I deserved to be thrown onto the floor like that. I deserved worse. Screw this stupid body, pulling me to her when I knew it was a bad idea! My body may have wanted her, but she wasn’t right for me. The only person she wanted was Rosalyn, and I could never be her; just a poor imitation. Stupid foolish IDIOT!

I needed to get this feeling out of me somehow; this horrible, agonising burning in my gut. I wanted to tear something apart. I wanted to ruin the fucking idiot who caused so much pain to my friends. Father was right. I was just a useless, pathetic animal. I needed to be punished. 

I put the meat of my hand into my mouth and bit down as hard as I could. Pain spiked and flared, shooting down my arm, but it wasn’t enough. It was nothing compared to the pain I caused Madeline, just because I couldn’t bare to be alone for more than a few fucking days. I ground my teeth until my skin split and blood spilled across my tongue. An involuntary whimper crawled out of my throat, but I ignored it, digging deeper into my flesh. 

Stop it.

I froze, blood dripping down my chin; my entire body quaking and my cheeks wet with tears. Everything was quiet, all of a sudden. The burning was gone, replaced only with a still emptiness and the cold truth of reality. The hairs on my arms flattened with the ghost of a warm touch, and I carefully took my hand out of my mouth, examining the damage.

I would need stitches, that much was clear. But first I needed to clean myself up.

Time progressed in a blur as I stumbled to the kitchen, rinsing off the wound and washing the blood from my face. I found the first-aid kit, and picked through it for a needle and thread. Patching myself up was such a familiar routine that I barely even needed to think as I wiped the wound down with iodine and began stitching it closed. That was good. The silence in my mind was a refreshing reprieve.

Vivienne finally reappeared as I was about to dress the wound. She approached wordlessly, taking my hand and examining my handiwork with sad eyes. I let her take the bandage from me and wrap it around my palm, securing it with a metal clip.

“Jordyn,” she said, swallowing. “Please, tell me what happened.”

Slowly, I took a deep breath and sighed. My voice shook.

“I made a mistake.”

—

Madeline powered down the sidewalk, trying to focus on just putting one foot in front of the other as the world wobbled around her. Yes, she’d promised Vivienne she’d stay in her apartment, but she’d run out of alcohol, and the liquor store was only two blocks away. It wasn’t like she was gonna get noticed in such a short span of time. She needed something with which to try and cloud the memories she just made.

Maddie was trying very hard not to think about what she’d left behind in the cabin. That face, so familiar and yet different. Her lips felt the same, at the very least. Maybe that was why Maddie had gotten so lost in the moment that for a single, beautiful second, she thought Jordyn was Rosie. It was easy to remember the truth when they were apart, thanks to the scar and Jordyn’s dark irises and her lack of accent, but once they came together, the bounds of memory and reality became a very fine line.

Accidentally saying Rosie’s name definitely killed the mood, but that hadn’t been what scared Maddie. No, what did that was hearing Rosie’s fucking voice come out of Jordyn’s mouth – saying ‘my love,’ no less – only to look up and see Jordyn’s eyes were now a warm brownish amber. That wasn’t Jordyn’s eye colour. That was Rosie’s.

Madeline had never hallucinated from weed before. It sounded ridiculous to even suggest it. But it was the only plausible explanation for what she’d seen and heard. Maybe it was her brain's way of telling her that having any kind of sexual or romantic contact with Jordyn was a really stupid idea. She just wished it told her that a little bit sooner, before grief ripped another Rosie-shaped hole in her chest. It was like having her back, if only for a second. It was the thing she’d been craving for the past five fucking years, dangled right in front of her eyes before being ripped away again.

She needed to forget it, or she might not survive. Nothing was better for that than a dangerous amount of alcohol consumption. Fuck sobriety, she couldn’t do it. How was she supposed to face this world with an unclouded mind when it seemed that the very fabric of the universe itself was out to torment her?

Someone bumped into her; she hadn’t been watching where she was going. She didn’t see their face.

“Sorry,” she mumbled, looking back. The person had wings; big and covered in black feathers. Huh. Hadn’t she heard about someone like that?

Eh, not her problem. The night was dark and the chill of autumn’s end was setting in. She needed to keep moving.

It was a couple minutes later that it happened. Madeline felt a sharp prick in her neck, and the cold rush of something spreading under her skin. She jerked forward, stumbling and spinning around, holding the spot that had been attacked.

“What the hell?” 

A man stood across from her, watching her intently, hands hidden in the pockets of his trenchcoat. She tried to take a step towards him, but he just stepped back in turn, maintaining his distance. His footsteps were silent.

“What was that? What did you just do to me?”

Something fell over her head, plunging her into darkness. 

“Hey, what the- oof!”

A fist in her gut knocked all of the air from her lungs, preventing her from calling for help. She tried to reach out and freeze one of her attackers, but her power failed to respond. An arm snaked around her throat and constricted the sides, right as her legs were kicked out from under her. She could do nothing but scrabble ineffectually at her assaulter’s sleeve as her head became foggier and foggier from the lack of blood flow.

Fuck. Vivienne was right. She should’ve stayed home.

Madeline passed out.

—

 “Wakey wakey, Mrs. Garcia-Holmes.”

Something tapped her cheek. She opened her eyes, groaning at the pain in her neck. What happened? Where was she?

Madeline found herself looking down, head hanging. She was sitting in a chair, wrists secured to the arms with shackles. Her shoes and jacket had been removed, but otherwise she couldn’t see anything else missing. How did she get here? Everything was still so foggy…

She looked up, slowly lifting her head. Her neck ached.

Oh. Maddie didn’t know whether to be enraged or terrified.

Andreas de Vygon stood in front of her, in all of his terrible glory. The navy military blazer he usually wore during public appearances was missing, replaced with a simple white button-down; the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. They were in a small room, with a dim yellow light on the ceiling and sound-proofing foam lining the walls. Madeline recognised it as the interior of a van. If she focused, she could even hear the engine still running.

Behind him were an assortment of objects. A toolbox. A gas canister. A car battery. It didn’t take a genius to guess what they were for, given her situation, and what she was now finally remembering about how she got here. 

It was fine. She just needed to stay calm. She could get out of this.

She flexed her hands and focused, trying to see if there was any give in the shackles around her wrists. Nope. She tried to lower the temperature and freeze them; make them brittle, but nothing was happening.

“What… What did you do to me?” she mumbled, her words slurring from the alcohol still coursing through her system. “Why can’t I use my power?”

De Vygon hummed. “I had the boys down in R&D formulate a little compound designed to inhibit power usage. Surely you’re not so intoxicated that you don’t remember that little injection my man gave you?”

Ice flooded through her veins, contrasting with the hot burst of adrenaline in her chest. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears. If she really had no access to her power, there was no way out of this. She hadn’t let herself get scared yet because she thought she’d be able to just freeze this asshole and break free. If she couldn’t do that… 

Oh god. What was gonna happen to her?

“Hey now, shhh,” de Vygon whispered, gently cradling Madeline’s face as she began to hyperventilate, uselessly tugging at her bonds. His expression was almost soft. “There’s no need to be frightened. If you just tell me what I want to know, I can undo your restraints and let you go right now.”

For a split second, hope sparked in her chest that she’d be able to get away from this. Then it registered what he was actually asking, and that hope turned to ash in her mouth.

“What… What do you want to know?” she asked, in an attempt to play dumb.

The expression dropped, leaving a cold blankness in its wake. His grey eyes stared through her.

“I’ll give you one chance to answer this unscathed. Where is Jordyn?”

Giving him what he wanted was incredibly tempting, especially with the sight of those… implements behind him. They spelled a very clear picture of what would happen if she angered him.

But there was no way she could give Jordyn up. Not only would it mean that she would be back in his abusive hands, it would also give Andreas the means to free the Godling. There was just too much at stake. The entire fucking world was depending on her in this moment. She couldn’t do it.

Madeline could handle pain. She’d been soaking in it non-stop for the past five years. What she couldn’t handle was throwing away the last remaining piece of Rosie alive in this world. Jordyn had to live on. Maddie would just grit her teeth and bear it. Really, how bad could it be?

She glared at Andreas and spat on his stupid, horrible face.

Playing dumb was never gonna work, anyway.

Despite having prepared herself for it, the feeling of de Vygon’s fist colliding with her face and breaking her nose shocked her all the way down to her bones. She gasped, ears ringing, blood pouring down her lips, as pain blossomed in throbbing pulses, creeping under her skin like an infection. She’d been punched before, but not like that. He hit like a fucking freight train.

“Make this easy for both of us, Madeline. Where are you hiding her?”

Fear already threatened to overwhelm her, but Maddie clenched her fists and forced herself not to whimper. “Kill yourself.” 

Andreas actually chuckled at that.

“Good. I’ve been needing a new punching bag.”

It wasn’t just one hit this time. He came at her over and over, splitting her lips and blackening her eyes and straining her neck from the sheer force her head was getting knocked around with. He would sometimes wait a few seconds between punches, giving Madeline time to suck in a single ragged breath, just long enough for her to dare to hope it was over, before coming back in and crushing that hope in a single blow. The pain very quickly became a universal, constant buzz, rippling across her face with every new strike. 

She lost count of how many times he hit her. After a while, it felt like she wasn’t even present anymore. Like someone else was being beaten, and she was just along for the ride. By the time he was finally finished, it took her a second to get back in the driver’s seat and do something other than just try to breathe.

Blood filled her mouth; its coppery flavour permeating her taste buds. She gingerly leaned over the side of the chair and spat it onto the floor. Something solid came out with it. A quick inspection with her tongue found that her upper left-most incisor was missing. Huh. She didn’t really have the capacity to feel any sort of way about that right now.

“Thank you for that, Madeline,” Andreas said. “I really, really needed that.”

“Eeh… Eat a dick,” she mumbled, blood dribbling from her ruined lips.

He grabbed a fistful of her hair and yanked, holding her head up and forcing her to look at him.

“I’ll ask again. Where is Jordyn?”

Madeline didn’t know if she could do that again. It felt like one more punch might kill her. Every instinct was screaming at her to just tell him the truth to make sure she wasn’t hurt again. But she wasn’t so weak as to give up after one measly beating. She took a breath to centre herself, and answered to the best of her ability.

“I… I don’t know.”

He sighed, letting go of her hair and crouching down so that he was still within her field of view once her head dropped.

“Do you know how many bones the adult human body has?”

Oh god. Maddie barely suppressed a whimper at the implication. 

“S- Save the clichéd speech and get on with it,” she grunted, forcing up a defiant facade to hide the terror.

Andreas huffed a laugh. “Very well.”

He stood up and grabbed the pinky finger of her right hand, too fast for her to try to hide it in her fist. In one quick motion that betrayed a terrifying amount of experience, he bent it backwards until it snapped. Maddie screamed, back arching, thrashing in her bonds in a futile attempt to get away from the pain.

“Want to try again?”

“I- I don’t know where she is! I swear! They didn’t tell me!”

“Not good enough.”

With her pinky already locked in an extended position, it was all too easy for him to wrench her ring finger out from her fist and do the exact same thing. Madeline sobbed; a wave of nausea washing over her. It wasn’t any worse than the first time, but that didn’t make it good.

“One last time?”

“V- V-Vivienne’s the one who knows, n-not me,” she whimpered, trying to keep her dinner down. “Wh- why would they tell me anything?!”

Guilt flushed through her body as the words left her mouth. It was risky to throw Viv under the bus like that, but Maddie’s resolve was quickly fraying, and Viv was much smarter than her. She wouldn’t get caught out like this. Maddie just needed to give Andreas something so that this torment ended.

Andreas sucked on his teeth, tilting his head. “See, I just don’t believe you, Madeline. You’ve been unaccounted for at the Union and your apartment for the past week. You have to have been hiding somewhere, and I’ll bet that if I can figure out where that somewhere is, I’ll find Jordyn. So, another finger?”

“N- No, no no, please! Not another finger!” She closed her eyes and winced, waiting for the next wave of agony, but it never came.

“Alright, we’ll do something else.”

“Wh… what?” she asked as she opened her eyes, more out of confusion than any real desire to know.

“I’ve found that if your target isn’t going to talk after two or three fingers, they’re likely not going to talk after ten. It’s a waste of time to keep going, and unlike some of my peers, I’m not a sadist. I’d rather we keep this as short as possible.”

“F-forgive me if I find that hard to believe,” she panted.

“It’s the truth. I don’t enjoy hurting you, Madeline. You simply leave me with no other option, and I don’t happen to have any qualms about it, either.” He turned and walked to the other end of the van, fiddling with something she couldn’t see.

“Wh-what about Jordyn, huh? What you did to her? A-all the… the scars and bruises? You’re telling me those aren’t the actions of a sadist?”

He didn’t reply. After a while, he turned back and approached her again, hiding something behind his back. She only had a moment to wonder what it was before he swung it around and slammed the wrench he was holding against her knee.

“FUCK!” she screamed, rocking back and forth as if that would make it better. 

“That was a punishment for asking a stupid question, much like the punishments Jordyn required before she functioned at her full potential. It was never about my own satisfaction. She’s closer to an animal than a person; she needs the extra guidance to ensure she’s on the right path.”

“Ffffuck you!” Maddie growled, breathing heavily. “You fucking monster. How could you say something like that?”

“What would you know about it? You didn’t raise her.”

“How…” she muttered, her rage simmering down from exhaustion and melting into sorrow. “How could you treat Rosie that way…?”

“Rosalyn Garcia-Holmes is dead, Madeline. I can’t do anything to her. Jordyn is an entirely separate entity. The only thing they share is a genetic structure, and even that isn’t exactly the same. Had to make a few edits to ensure she came out right.”

For some reason, that got to Madeline. She sobbed, letting out a quiet, broken whine. How could he do that to her? Rip the genetic material from her body, only to butcher and bastardize it, then use it to create a slave? What kind of man could do that to another person?

“We’re getting off track,” Andreas muttered, walking off again. Madeline had nothing else to say. All she had left were the tears, blood, and sweat staining tracks down her face.

She heard the sound of water swashing in a container as he approached again, but she didn’t care enough to look up and see what it was. There was something freeing in knowing whatever happened was totally out of her control. She clung to that small modicum of apathy, because the alternative was the all-consuming terror of her pounding heart.

Andreas kicked her chair over. She fell backwards and her head slammed against the floor, throwing sparks across her vision. It didn’t matter for long, though, as a wet cloth was placed over her face; the damp fabric sticking to her skin and becoming impossible to remove with her limited mobility. Ah. She’d heard of this one before.

Alas, the foreknowledge of what waterboarding was didn’t save her from the initial shock of the cold water coming down and drowning her. It flooded up her nose into her sinuses, blocking her airways, and there was no amount of thrashing and sputtering that could clear them, so long as the stream continued.

It was not a simple matter of holding her breath. Andreas had begun pouring right at the peak of her exhale, so there was no air in her chest to hold onto. She had nothing, and all the desperate expansion of her lungs was doing was choking her further, sucking water into her windpipe. 

Her entire body lit up in a panic, every cell crying out for help, shrivelling up from the lack of oxygen. Her body was dying. She was dying. She was gonna die. This was it. It was over.

She was dead.

Finally, the stream stopped. Madeline coughed and gasped, simultaneously trying to expel all the water from her system and suck in air while she still had the chance. It wasn’t easy with the saturated cloth still covering her airways.

“Where’s Jordyn, Madeline?” Andreas asked, sounding impatient.

She needed to tell the truth. She couldn’t handle dying like that again. She couldn’t. 

It was only then Maddie realised that she didn’t actually know where the cabin was. It could have been in another country, for all she knew. Fuck!

Her brain scrambled for an answer he would accept. Only one thing came to mind.

“Union!” she blurted between coughs. “She’s at the Union!”

“Mm, no she’s not. Already checked there.”

Maddie heard the swishing of the water can again. Her heart jumped into her throat.

“Secret room! There’s a secret room! A- uh, a safe room!”

“My officers were very thorough in their search. They would’ve found it. Nice try, though.”

“Please!” she begged, sobbing. “I don’t know I don’t know! Vivienne took us there, I don’t know where it is! Please don’t!”

Much to her surprise, he actually listened. Madeline heard him sigh, and after a few seconds, her chair was lifted up, its legs placed back on the ground. The cloth fell off of her face and onto the floor with a wet thwap. 

“For once, I believe you,” Andreas said. “Give me some details. I’m sure I can figure it out.”

Madeline’s entire body shook, her breaths coming in quick gasps. Okay. Crisis averted. She could salvage this. He broke her once, but he wouldn’t do it again.

“D-details? What kind of details?” she asked.

“Describe the place you’re staying at. Is it a house? An apartment? Something else? What’s around you? Any landmarks?”

She nodded slowly, trying to formulate a lie. “Okay, uh… It’s, um… it’s an apartment. Th-there are… lots of buildings nearby. I… I don’t think it’s in Tombguard. A s-smaller town, maybe.”

Andreas sighed harshly, scratching the beginnings of grey stubble on his cheek. “See, now you’re lying to me again.”

Madeline tensed. “No I’m not, it’s the truth!”

“You’re really not a good liar. Stop trying.”

“I’m not lying. I swear!”

He turned around, walking to the back of the room again. “Oh well, I guess we aren’t done after all.”

Fuck.

When Andreas came back, he was holding a pair of scissors. Thankfully, all the horrible ideas about their purpose that her mind came up with were quickly dashed, as he simply used them to cut through her shirt and bra, before pulling the pieces apart to expose her bare torso.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she whispered, almost scared to know. Surely he wouldn’t…

“Rest assured, I have absolutely no interest in your body, Madeline. There’s just something I want to try, and… well, your nipples are the best testing ground.” He shivered, shaking his hands as if they were wet. “Ugh. I hate that word.”

That just left her with more questions, and a horrible sense of dread filling her gut.

Andreas brought the car battery over, setting it down in front of her. He attached jumper cables to each of the nodes and clacked the ends together. A shower of sparks sprayed forth. Madeline swallowed nervously.

“Usually, the voltage of a car battery isn’t strong enough to get through our skin’s natural resistance, and under ordinary circumstances, something like this wouldn’t do anything but annoy you. However, should your skin be sufficiently wet, like yours is, it can deliver quite a nasty shock. Would you like to see for yourself, or are you going to finish telling the truth?”

Don’t break. Don’t break. Don’t break. Don’t break. Don’t break. 

“Just do what you have to do,” she whispered hoarsely.

Andreas nodded. “Very well.”

The pressure of the first clamp attaching alone was enough to have her writhing in her seat. Its sting was a pain she’d experienced before, albeit in a much more pleasant context. Having that memory juxtaposed to this… situation, was extremely uncomfortable. She felt dirty.

But it was nothing compared to the experience of the second clamp making contact.

Madeline’s entire body locked up, her back arching, her jaw clenching until it felt like her remaining teeth were about to crack. Fire slashed through every muscle, peaking in a horrible burning at her nipples. It was all-consuming, overwhelming. She could think about nothing but the feeling of her body being charred from the inside out and ripping itself apart all at the same time.

Andreas removed one of the clamps after a few short seconds, and Maddie’s whole body deflated. Something warm and wet poured out from between her legs, spreading over her inner thighs. She just pissed herself. That… wasn’t too surprising. She didn’t have it in her to be embarrassed about it.

At least she could take some satisfaction in knowing she peed all over Andreas’ chair. If there was any satisfaction to be gained from that, anyway.

“The truth, Madeline. All of it, this time.”

That was it. She was done. There was nothing left in her. All she wanted was to curl up and go to sleep. So what if she gave him details about the cabin? As if he’d actually be able to track them down by picking her dumbass brain. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered anymore.

“It’s, um… It’s a little cabin in the woods,” she admitted in a whisper, refusing to look at him.

“Oh? What’s around you?”

“Trees, I guess. I haven’t looked around that much.”

“What kind of trees?” 

She frowned. “I don’t fucking know. The green ones with the brown trunks.”

Andreas hummed. “That’s not very helpful. What’s the climate like?”

Maddie did her best to shrug. “Dunno. A little colder than Tombguard, I think. Hard to say.”

“Is that really all you can give me?”

“It’s a little fucking cabin in the woods, man. There’s not exactly a lot around.”

He sighed, rubbing his eyes. “What was the point of all of this fighting when the only information you have is useless?”

“I have more information,” she muttered.

He raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“You have a tiny dick.”

He pulled the remaining clamp from her nipple without loosening it, effectively shredding her already burnt skin. She shrieked, slamming her foot against the ground with her good leg.

“Charming as always, Madeline. We’re finished here.”

Hope blossomed in her chest as the pain subsided and her heart slowed again. “D-does… does that mean I can go home?”

“Of course,” he said, coming back from his tools with a medicine cup in his hand. It was full of unfamiliar pills. “Just take these, and I’ll let you go.”

She eyed them warily. “What are they?”

“You don’t need to know that.”

She shook her head. “No. I’m not taking anything unless I know what it is.”

“The thing is, Madeline, what I’m really offering you here is a choice. You can either take these pills and I can leave you on the side of the road where I found you, or I can slit your throat, watch you bleed out right in that chair, and feed your remains to my next batch of clones. Which will it be? There is no third option.”

The stark brutality of that threat was matched only with the horrific knowledge that Jordyn may very well have eaten human flesh during her training and been completely unaware of it. Madeline swallowed, her mouth filling with saliva at the onset of nausea.

“I… I’ll take the pills.”

Andreas smiled. “Good girl.”

He held the medicine cup up to her lips and emptied its contents into her mouth. Some water from the canister he used to drown her earlier helped wash it down.

“There you go. Isn’t it so much nicer to do as you’re told?” 

She grit her teeth, ignoring his patronizing goading. “Are you gonna let me go now?”

He pulled out a pocket watch and checked the time. “In a minute.”

Dread washed over her. “...What did you just give me?” she asked, afraid to know the answer.

“A lethal dose of sleeping pills. It should start having an effect soon, don’t worry.”

Her heart kicked into full gear, pounding so hard in her chest that she could feel it throughout her entire body. “Wh… what? Why?”

“You didn’t think I could actually let you go after this, did you? You know far too much.”

She clenched her good fist, rage burning in her gut. “You won’t get away with this, you bastard. They’ll… they’ll find my body! They’ll know you did it!”

“I assure you I will get away with it, actually,” he said matter-of-factly, approaching her. “Do you really think this will look like anything other than a suicide? It’s a well-known fact that you’re deeply depressed. I mean, just look at your arm.”

He pulled up her sleeve, revealing the dozens of neatly spaced lines carved on her skin, usually hidden by her clothing. Her cheeks burned with shame. “Th-that’s not… I haven’t done that for a long time.”

“Doesn’t matter. It’ll still just look like Madeline Garcia-Holmes finally had enough of life without her wife and overdosed on sleeping pills. That’s all any newspaper will ever report.”

“Wh-what about my injuries?!” she demanded, as if proving him wrong would change her fate; the fate she already sealed by swallowing those pills. Or maybe she sealed it the moment she agreed to kiss Jordyn. It was hard to say. It probably didn’t matter now. 

“You’re drunk. Maybe you got into a brawl with some other lowlife. Regardless, no one’s going to look into it very hard. I’ll make sure of that.”

The hopelessness of her situation finally set in, sinking to the bottom of Maddie’s stomach like a stone. She looked down at the floor, already beginning to feel the effects of the pills. There was so much left for her to do. She still hadn’t started a band. She hadn’t made a proper life for herself. She couldn’t apologise to Jordyn and Vivienne and Ashley for being such a constant goddamn burden. It was too soon.

“Don’t be sad. Isn’t this what you’ve been waiting for? Just think of it; you’ll finally get to see Rosalyn again. Won’t that be nice?”

Oh. Oh yeah. Rosie. She’d be waiting, wouldn’t she? Finally, after all this time, they could be reunited.

Fuck, that sounded good. Darkness pooled at the edge of her vision. Her heart rate sped up as if it knew something was wrong, but it was a futile effort.

“That’s right, Madeline. Just go to sleep. Just let all your pain drift away. Be at peace.”

Madeline closed her eyes, went to sleep, and died.

—

“The van just drove off. Do you have eyes on her?”

“Yeah, he dumped her in the alley. She’s not moving. What should I do?”

Maggie took a breath. There was still time. There had to be. She hung up the phone and leapt from the building, flying into the cold night sky.

—

Surprisingly, when Madeline woke up, it was not in whatever form the afterlife took. She was in far too much pain for that. The smell of cooking bacon and the sound of saturday morning cartoons assaulted her senses. Childhood nostalgia washed over her like a warm blanket.

She opened her eyes and found herself lying on a couch. Based on the view out the window in front of her, she appeared to be in some sort of apartment. If she looked down relative to the angle she was at, she could see the TV, and an armchair. In it was a girl who looked like Rosie, only she was young; maybe thirteen or fourteen. She was watching the cartoons with an intense, captivated expression. Huh?

Maddie let out an involuntary grunt as she tried to sit up through the pain. The girl looked at her, and her eyes widened.

“She’s awake!” she called to someone out of sight. She didn’t have an accent.

“Oh thank fuck,” someone replied. They sounded uncannily similar to Jordyn. Then again, everything about Jordyn was ‘uncannily similar.’

A person came around into her field of view. All Madeline could see was a pair of trousers, and the bottom end of a pair of wings.

“Here, lemme help you up.”

Strong hands supported Madeline until she could finally reach the promised land of up-rightedness. It was a massive downgrade from being horizontal. Her head throbbed like someone was doing construction work inside her skull. She groaned, rubbing her temple with her good hand.

Surprisingly, most of her memories of last night seemed to be intact, so she knew better than to use the hand with the broken fingers. Whether that was a good thing or a bad thing remained to be seen.

“Water?” a new person offered – a man this time – holding out the glass from the edge of her peripheral vision. She reached out and took it, gratefully swallowing it down.

“Thanks,” she mumbled hoarsely. Her throat hurt. Probably from all the screaming.

Finally, she summoned the courage to look up, confirming what she’d already begun to suspect as her mind put together clues. Another clone of Rosie. The black-winged one Jordyn had mentioned when her identity was first revealed.

“Morning,” the clone said. “You’ve had a hell of a night, huh?”

Without Jordyn’s scar, and with the long hair, it was much harder to remind herself that this wasn’t Rosie. Thankfully, the lack of accent helped just a little. Not to mention the huge wings.

“Um, y-yeah.”

“The name’s Maggie. I’m number five. That’s Hex. Number six, if you couldn’t figure it out from the name.”

The girl on the armchair waved, smiling softly. Maddie awkwardly waved back. “Um, why is she…?”

“A kid?” Maggie clarified. “It’s a long story.” She sat down next to Madeline. “That’s Diego.”

Maddie looked where she was pointing, at the man with the tan skin and buzzed hair who’d handed her the water. “I… I see.”

“Hope you’re hungry,” he said. “I’ve got breakfast on the stove right now. You should get some food in your belly before we go to the hospital.”

Hospital. That reminded her. She turned back to Maggie. “What happened? How did I get here? I thought… I thought I was dead.”

“It was a close thing,” Maggie replied. “We found you in the alley. Managed to get you to throw up most of the pills. Brought you back here, cleaned you up and got you dressed, then laid you down to sleep and hoped for the best.

Madeline frowned. “But… how’d you know? Where I was, a-and… about the pills?”

“I bumped into you before, remember? Planted a listening device under the hem of your shirt when we made contact, so that I could keep track of… proceedings, if you wanna call it that. From there, I followed outside the van and waited.”

It took Madeline a second to register what she’d said. “Wait, but… If you knew it was gonna happen… Why didn’t you stop it? Wh-why… why would you let him… do that?”

Maggie winced. “Look, I’m really sorry about that. It’s just, I’ve gotta look out for myself and Hex. It was random chance that I happened to be monitoring de Vygon’s movements when they came after you. By the time I realised, they’d already locked on to you. The most I could do without risking exposing myself was bump into you while we were in a blindspot, and do damage control after. For what it’s worth, I am really, truly sorry that happened to you. Andreas is a bastard.”

That made enough sense that Maddie couldn’t fault her for it. She sighed. “I guess I should just be grateful that you saved me. So… what happens now?”

“You need to go to a hospital, Madeline,” Diego said. “We only had the equipment for basic first-aid here. I’m gonna take you there once breakfast is done, and after that…” He looked at Maggie expectantly.

Maggie nodded. “Well, I think it’s about time Hex and I introduced ourselves to the Union properly. Don’t you?”

Taglist: @steelandblood @sapphicwhump @urnumber1star @alsolucakairomi @thataquaticwhumper

@iamheretohurt @anoyedartist @dontyoubleedoutonme @seastarblue @lettherebepain

@bacillusinfection @sorcererfen

Told ya :3

real talk i have been waiting AGES to write this. it has existed in almost this exact form for months and months, since madeline was introduced, pretty much

also, excuse the inaccuracies with the car battery. I know they don't really do that much. But i took some creative liberties for the sake of the whump <3

Hope y'all enjoyed! lemme know what you thought! cya next time :)

[snaillamp]

Origns of Enjar: Chapter 2 - Sick Minds

CW: Medical abuse, suicdal ideation, anaesthestia awareness, graphic descriptions of surgery

Enjar could hear voices as he opened his eyes. There were blurry faces looking down onto him.

Muffled voices said something.

He couldn’t open his left eye…

Something was on his face, it felt rough and itchy. He wanted to rip it off but didn’t have the strength to. Something cold filled his veins and he felt a creeping sensation curl around his body…

To his horror, he realised he was being slowly paralysed. He wanted to scream, get these people off him and protect himself. Viktor could be anywhere…

Could kill him...

Maybe that wouldn't be so bad...

“Ahhhh blwahwo Jwawawa…” A slick, snide voice cooed as hands grabbed Enjar’s head, jerking it back painfully. Enjar gasped, he could already feel his body going numb…

He couldn’t move, he couldn’t scream…

All he could do is stare at the medic who had talked to him on the chopper, trying to scream for help as his mouth was yanked open. He felt a slimy tube slide down his throat and he tried to cry out, tried to get them to stop, but all that came out was a faint moan. The sensation of the tube sliding in made him want to scream, he wanted to get up, to run, to get away… He didn’t want to be here, he wanted the tube out of his lungs…

He watched with desperate eyes as he was wheeled away from the man with the nice voice. The man who had stroked his hair… The man who looked at his gloves, a cloud of guilt forming over him.

Enjar watched the world go by in a blur as he was taken into a dark, freezing theatre. The mask had been removed when the tube was crammed down his throat, but now he could feel something cold filling his veins.

It made him sleepy...

He tried fighting it as whatever was covering him lifted off his body. He was shifted onto a cold table, his arms pulled from the slight warmth of his body and strapped down. Enjar’s eyes drifted closed the heaviness of sleep weighing on his body, but not his mind.

“You can have your evidence now.” The doctor spoke to someone in the room.

Enjar heard the clicking of something, like a camera…

“Okay, he’s out.” The doctor murmured, a young woman’s voice quickly following up.

“Shouldn’t we check first?”

Enjar heard a laugh that made him want to jump out of his skin. He couldn’t even open his eyes as he felt his body get cleaned up and positioned, a sheet laid over his exposed body.

He couldn’t tell them he could still hear everything. He was trapped in his own head, eyes sealed shut, unable to see what was happening. He could feel fingers inside his right arm, feeling around inside him…

The sensation made him want to throw up.

The sharp needle began it’s endless plunging into his skin, stitch after stitch…

His mind was feeling heavier, the fog settling on his brain as he sank deeper into sleep. He felt the tight tourniquet loosen from around his arm, a burning, tingling pain flooding it for at least a minute, before he went numb again. “Oh, missed one.” The doctor mused as Enjar felt the sharp needle begin sewing him shut. It hurt, yet it didn’t, his mind swimming as he lay there, unable to move.

“His heart rate spiked.” Someone said, as Enjar felt a new rush of pain, the needle sewing each slash on his left arm up.

It wasn’t just the surface, it was his insides too, layers of flesh and veins brought together, one by one with each stitch. The other tourniquet came loose, dropping to the floor with a clatter.

“Shit. Slippery fucker, huh?” The doctor joked, cackling again. Enjar felt his mind go fuzzy again, a buzz filling his ears. He could hear his heart beating loudly through the haze, pounding behind his eyes. He felt so cold, everything echoing around him…

“O2 sat is dropping-ing-ing-ing!” Echoed from somewhere, the words rolling around in his mind. Enjar had no idea what they meant, he just felt so cold and fuzzy right now.

A needle was slid into his right elbow, pumping him full of more fluid…

It felt strange, making him tired… so tired… so… ti…re..d….

When he came too again, he was still under, or he was supposed to be. He could feel someone touching his face, pressing his cheek and jaw.

“Hmm. This one doesn’t actually see that bad. It’ll scar pretty brutally, but he shouldn’t have any major damage. Lets see what I can do, hmm?” Enjar felt a hand stroke his face, fingers trailing over his jawline and down his neck, then turning his head slightly.

It was at an uncomfortable angle now. He felt the doctor remove the IV in his neck, the sensation of the tube slithering out… It made Enjar want to shiver as he lay under the man’s dancing fingers.

He felt the very tiny stitches pull his skin back together, wanting to flinch away. It didn’t hurt much, but it was unsettling, feeling the cold needle slide through his skin.

“There, pretty stitches for a pretty boy. Get that dressed up now, my work is done.” The doctor patted Enjar’s right cheek, his hand trailing down his neck and caressing his collarbones, chuckling as Enjar could sense his eyes trailing over his body.

He wanted to squirm away from the doctor’s prying, knowing how exposed he was under the sheet.

People were evil.

If Viktor could almost kill him, this doctor could do anything to him and he wouldn’t be able to stop him, especially in this state. He could never trust anyone again, he knew that much.

He wanted to sigh in relief at the feeling of the hand lifting and the sound of the footsteps leaving his side, but it was like he had suddenly been dunked into a pool of water. Everything felt thick and heavy as a thick silence filled his ears.

He finally went numb, letting black void consume him.

~~

Finally waking up, Enjar's face twitched. There was something sticky on the left side and it was uncomfortable. He tried to lift his arm to tear it off, but couldn’t. Huffing in frustration, he peeled open his eyes… eye.

His left eye was stuck shut by a dressing on his face. His breathing quickened as he huffed again, gasping in panic and trying to lift his arms. He tried kicking his legs too, but they felt like lead, all he could do was toss his head from side to side, whimpering and whining in pain, the dressing also keeping the left side of his mouth sealed.

It hurt to open his mouth anyway, the cut on his face stretching painfully as he moved.

There was a tube snaking around his face and into a mask on his face, he had to get it off, it was going to kill him he knew it.

“He’s awake.” A voice piped up from nearby. Enjar’s open eye glanced around as he writhed in bed, trying to move as much as he could.

He was too exposed, he had to escape, get somewhere dark and quiet and warm… He caught a glimpse of his body under the sheets… He was wearing a hospital gown, and he could feel a tag around his right ankle.

Where was he?

Where were his clothes?

Had someone taken them?

Why?

Why did he hurt so much?

A low, guttural, panicked moan emerged from deep inside his chest as he finally managed to kick off his blankets, trying to get up from the bed, bending his right arm to push himself up. He felt the IV inside him as it poked his flesh, causing him to try and grab it with his left arm and rip it out.

It hurt and he wanted it out, if he had to claw it out of his skin, he would.

Enjar froze as his eyes widened… His left arm was wrapped in dressings. Looking at his right arm, it was too. His chest began to hurt as he fell back into the bed, feeling faint.

His breathing was fast, but he couldn’t keep any oxygen in his lungs, he felt like he was suffocating.

“He’s hyperventilating.” The doctor said, leaning over Enjar and touching his shoulder.

Enjar jerked out of the way, “Geddov me…” He tried to scream, managing a slurred mumble. Squirming to the other side of the bed, Enjar eyed the tall, thin, blonde doctor nervously.

“Ahh, 6926, calm down. I’m Dr Lauge, you had an accident at work. You’re okay now, you just need to calm down.”

Enjar’s eye danced from left to right rapidly as he tried to take in all the information.

Accident?

When?

He wanted his team by his side, with their powerful guns to protect him from this creepy man. His mind replayed what had happened a few minutes ago, the vaguely garbled memories of being touched by the doctor while under anaesthesia.

Everything was jumbled in his head, his throat hurt and his arms hurt… Enjar's face was aching as he began to moan again, lying back, staring at the ceiling, the pain pulling through him.

“Hmm. Give him 15 minutes, then come get me. He’s not completely lucid yet.”

Enjar heard those words but didn’t quite understand.

What lucid?

Where was he?

He flinched as the heavy blanket was laid back over him, his eyes sliding shut again… he was so tired, and when he woke up, this nightmare would be over.

The nightmare was truly only just beginning.

He lay there in a half conscious daze, nurses coming into the room and talking around him. Someone touched his hand, causing him to flinch back, his mind kept telling him it was Viktor, but it wasn’t, he knew that, but he still didn’t know where he was or how long he’d been out… Two minutes? Two hours? Two days? He just wanted his team around him…

Enjar became aware of someone holding open his right eye, shining a light into it. It hurt his head and he blinked, groaning as he turned his head.

Hearing someone mumble something about coming around, as he lay his left cheek on the pillow for a second. It felt fine, before he hissed in pain, throwing his head to his right cheek.

The sudden movement hurt his neck and he winced, gritting his teeth and causing his muscles to stretch the cut even more. He could feel the stitches pulling as he moved.

“Ahhh, welcome back, my pretty boy. Now, I don’t know if you remember. I’m Dr Lauge. I’m the one who stitched you back together… ”

That doctor… Enjar knew it was that man's voice he recognised.

Enjar opened his eye and glared at him. “Get away from me…” He breathed, his voice low and rough. It sounded like he had taken up eating gravel as a hobby. He could still feel the sticky dressing on his face and the oxygen mask…

He needed it all off.

Laying back in his bed, he already felt drained as the doctor grabbed Enjar’s right hand, holding it gently. The way it was bending tugged on the IV inside him, hurting him. He couldn’t pull his hand out of the slowly tightening grip of Dr Lauge.

“Can you squeeze my hand for me?” The man ordered. Enjar complied, squeezing as hard as he could, trying to hurt the doctor, crush his hands so he would leave him alone…

“Good, good. Other hand now.”

Enjar did, squeezing and wiling the doctor’s hands to snap in his own.

“Eh, the weakness is to be expected, but he has a surprising amount of strength considering the damage.” Enjar didn’t notice how his arms shook as he held the doctor’s hand, Dr Lauge letting them slide from his grip. They landed heavily on the bed, cause Enjar to cry out in pain.

“Hmm, still tender. Get him painkillers.”

Dr Lauge lay his hand on his patient’s chest, shivers going down Enjar's spine, as it stayed there for slightly too long.

He turned, leaving, Enjar shutting his eyes and willing his body to pass out and end this suffering. The mask on his face rested uncomfortably on his skin, the weight too heavy but too light at the same time.

He lay there until he felt the heavy blankets lift off his body, the nurse rotating his foot to check the ID band on his ankle. Panic flashed through Enjar and before he realised what was happening, his body was reacting, kicking at the nurse.

His foot collided with something hard… ribs probably, and there was a loud crashing sound. He couldn’t see, he couldn’t move his left eye, rolling it around behind the closed eyelid. It hurt to scream, his cut on his face growing warm as the blood began to trickle out.

Someone was screaming loudly as more people rushed in, his IV hurting inside his arm as Enjar tried to twist out of the way. He was pushed onto his elbows, his arms hurting as he tried to get up to run.

“Sedate him!” Dr Lauge yelled from across the room.

Him.

Enjar wanted to get him first.

Hurt Lauge like he was hurting him.

People crowded over him, hands landed all over his arms, legs, chest and shoulders, squeezing tightly as they restrained his thrashing limbs. Two hands clamped down on either side of his head, yanking it into a centred position, hurting his neck.

Enjar to screamed louder, arching his back, trying to wiggle free of the hands that were holding him down. He needed to escape, he needed to get away from the hands, they were hurting him as he twisted, desperately trying to escape.

He felt something very cold fill his veins firm the IV in his elbow, and almost immediately his mind grew heavy.

“There we go… nice and easy, sleepy time now…” The hands around his head stroked his face as Enjar’s exposed eye went blank, staring at nothing, glassy and vacant.

~~

“Sedate him!” Dr Lauge ordered, his hands gripping the screaming young man’s face. He watched the strong, young body twist and fight as the patient tried to kick his way out of the grip of the nurses.

Dr Lauge looked down at the man, enjoying watching the fire in his eyes suddenly snuff out as the drugs took effect.

“There we go… nice and easy, sleepy time now…” He cooed as the patient, 6926, sighed softly and his body went slack. His eye didn't fully close, leaving him staring at nothing like he was dead, the limpness of his body adding to that feeling as the doctor let go of his face, watching as it slowly drooped sideways.

It was like he had become a rag doll, a beautiful, hurting rag doll.

“I want him in restraints, we can’t have something like that happening again.” Lauge’s words slithered smoothly, some of the nurses nodding coldly. However, to Lauge, this man had ceased to be a person they starting to act that way.

Lauge watched with a glint in his eye as the patient’s floppy wrists were lifted into the soft cuffs, and grinned when his ankles are pulled apart, fastened to either side of the bed. Perfect.

His patient was so vulnerable and… so… so perfect.

~~

Enjar groaned as he opened his eyes, everything echoing as his head turned from left to right sluggishly.

He felt strange like there was a cloud of heaviness slowing down his mind. He looked around the room, it looked like a hospital. Why was he in hospital?

Closing his eyes, he tried to remember.

Fragments of the day filled his mind…

He was on an island…

His team was there and…

Viktor Madsen…

Yes…

He had done something and Enjar had…

The memory of someone’s nose collapsing under Enjar’s fist with a satisfying crunch suddenly jogged his memory. Viktor had attacked him. But where was he now? Could he get Enjar here?

Trying to sit up, Enjar wanted to push his leg against the bed for some leverage, but it wouldn’t move. There was something wrapped around his ankle… both of them. He tried moving his legs, panic rising, trying to use his hands to grab the blanket to see what was wrong, but his arms jerked to a stop suddenly.

Enjar looked down with wide, horrified eyes at his wrists, they were wrapped in a soft cuff, strong straps holding them in place around his wrists. He was tied down to his bed. His breaths began to hitch as he tugged at them, pulling harder and harder.

He had to break them, had to snap them, had to get his hands out. A machine began to beep wildly, hurting Enjar’s head and a moment later, that doctor and two nurses came in.

“6926! You’ve decided to rejoin us again. Listen you’ve had a rough couple of days, and I’ve had to sedate you for most of it, but if you’re going to keep acting like that, I’ll be forced to… keep mellowing you out.”

He turned to one of the nurses, a cruel looking lady wearing a scowl. The doctor, Lauge muttered something and she nodded, returning with a vial of medication.

“Now 6926, I can’t keep sedating you, so I’m keeping you restrained and controlled instead, this was our only option to help… manage you, alright? Yeeeees, good boy.” The doctor leaned over Enjar, meeting his eyes and grinned.

He smelled like stale cigarettes and his teeth were stained yellow. His eyes were bloodshot from limited sleep and all Enjar could do was look at them. The doctor’s grin fell as Enjar’s stare hardened, his face twisting into a scowl.

“No.” Enjar spat.

The doctor sighed, leaning in. “Well, 6926… Yes. You don’t really have a say in any of this right now. Our job is only to keep you alive, and if you keep trying to attack me and my nurses, well, I’m afraid you’ll have to be... managed. Don’t worry, the drugs will wear off soon. As for the cuffs, you’ll get out out them when you prove to me you an behave, like a good boy.”

The doctor cackled slightly under his breath, sighing slightly as he looked at Enjar.

Enjar’s lip curled slightly, feeling the saliva build up in his mouth. He spat at the doctor, hitting him square in the face, and sending him staggering back, arms flailing.

“Why you little…” The doctor glared at Enjar who smirked and continued yanking at his restraints.

“Give me that. I’m gonna do this myself.” Enjar’s eyes grew wide as the doctor leaned over him.

“No, no, no, no, please. I don’t want it, I’m sorry, please, wait, no, please!” The desperate begging went unheard at the nurses neared him, sneering.

He tugged at the straps so hard he felt his wrist pop, pain screaming through it like a bolt of lightning. He couldn’t move it right anymore, and it dangled at a strange angle in the cuff. Two nurses pounced on his right arm, holding it down, pressing on his injuries hard and letting the doctor use the IV port jammed in his now badly bruised elbow.

Enjar couldn’t move, scream, cry, he wanted to run but he was strapped down and it was all to much… He glared at the doctor, watching the medication drain into his arm.

“You’re getting a visitor in a few hours, so behave.” The doctor snarled at Enjar, who jerked in his restraints, trying to lash out at the man as his vision became blurry. He was halfway between lying down and sitting up when he felt his insides turn to jelly, and he slumped sideways into waiting nurses arms blinking slowly.

His mind raced at a million miles an hour as he was laid back down and tucked back into bed. The nurse examined his wrist, tugging it slightly and popping it back into place.

Enjar screamed in pain as she began arranging him in the middle of the bed, pulling the blanket across him tightly. They were pulled so tight across him, he couldn’t move, even if he wanted to.

He was pinned down completely, with nothing to do except stare at the ceiling or the slowly worsening bruise around his IV.

~~

The sound of a door opening made Enjar turn his head, opening his eye to look at the man in a uniform walk in.

He recognised that face… Commander Sommer… He… he was the one in charge of the mission, he could tell Enjar everything.

The solemn man walked to Enjar’s bedside, his face hardening when he saw the state of his officer.

“Officer 6926.” He greeted Enjar flatly. Enjar tried pushing himself up, but the drugs he was on had ripped all his strength from him, and the restraints prevented him from moving anyway.

“No, no, stay down. I don’t want you hurting anything else.”

Enjar stared at him, slightly thankful he didn’t have to move.

“God, it’s worse than I thought…” The commanding officer whispered as he took in the extent of Enjar’s injuries. He was staring at Enjar’s face, taking it all in. “6926, we need to talk about what happened. Anything you can remember, it is vital. You’ve had a couple days to recover, so I’m hoping you can shed some light on what happened?”

Enjar blinked at him, processing the words in his head slowly.

“Vik…tor…?” His words slurred slightly as the commander’s face flashed with horror for a second. He quickly masked it, pursing his lips and clenching his jaw.

“Viktor Madsen is in the ICU. You gave him a very bad head injury. He should pull through, but we don’t know what damage has been done. He hasn’t been questioned.” Enjar blinked slowly.

“Wheeeerzzz Jón?” Enjar lay still thinking, unsure of what had happened to his comrades, his brothers. “Ask him… Too tired…to…. remeee….ember…” He finally mumbled, his eye sliding closed as he leaned back, wincing through the constant pain.

“6926, we can’t. You are the only one left of your team. Everyone else is… dead.” Sommer watched the young man’s eye as he slowly processed the words.

Was he drugged? He wasn’t supposed to be. Why was he acting so strange?

Enjar was usually sharper than a nail, firing back jokes and one liners without a second thought, to see him like this was… scary. He looked like a shell of himself, pale and small, his eyes glazed over as if he wasn’t completely there.

Meanwhile, in Enjar’s mind, the words echoed over and over:

“Everyone else is… dead.”

“Everyone else is… dead.”

“Everyone else is… dead.”

“Everyone else is… dead.”

“Everyone else is…”

His face hardened. “No.”

He looked at the commander, shaking his head. “They’re alive. I was with them… a few hours ago.” His rough voice was rising as he pulled slightly against his restraints.

“6926, you’ve been in and out of consciousness for three days. You were found barely alive, bleeding out in a puddle on that island. You nearly died. Your team… They did.”

Enjar’s eye widened the commander watching as the one eye covered by a dressing moved wildly under the sealed eyelid.

“I know this is hard, but any informat-” The young officer jerked in Sommer’s direction, stopping awkwardly.

“Why didn’t you let me die too!” Sommer’s eyebrows rose. He did expect a reaction, but not this. He hadn’t been prepared for the young man to ask why they didn’t let him die. “You should have left me there! Why me? Why did I live? Why not them…? WHY?! YOU SHOULD HAVE LET ME DIE TOO!” The man’s voice cracked as he screamed, sitting up a little as he tried to lunge at Sommer, the sheets coming loose and falling into his lap. Sommer watched as the officer he had known on and off for years yanked at restraints holding him down.

“What?” The commander looked over Enjar’s exposed body, hand shaped bruises covering his arms. “What have they done to you?”

The commander ripped the blankets back, gasping in shock at the many large, hand shaped bruises covering Enjar’s legs. Enjar arched his back, screaming and pulling against his restraints his breathing growing ragged and uneven as his eyes fixed on Sommer. Suddenly, he grew very still, a strange look in his eye as he asked, with a faint voice, level and low.

“Kill me.”

A shiver went down Sommer’s spine, he knew that the man in front of him knew exactly what that meant, despite his drugged state. His eyes were glazed over, not all there but Sommer could tell that this man knew what he was asking him.

“No. We need you alive. You can put Viktor away for good, 6926. Bring justice for your team!” Enjar groaned, throwing his head back and calling out.

“NO! I FAILED THEM! WHY DID YOU LET ME LIVE? JUST TO SUFFER HERE!?”

Sommer sighed, “6926…”

“Argh, why does everyone keep calling me that!” The man snapped, writhing in his restraints. Tears were flowing from his exposed eye, desperate and painful tears. Sommer watched as blood freely bloomed on the dressing covering Enjar’s face, growing large quite rapidly.

‘What do I do here?’ The commander asked himself. He’d been at the bedside of many an injured soldier and cop, but this… It scared him.

Turning, Sommer saw a nurse glance into the room through the open door, but he smiled, nodding at her once. She nodded, leaving the room and shutting the door.

“6926. The media found out about the incident and are trying to figure out who you are. We have to do this to keep you safe so that you can go on trial and testify against that monster.” He tried using his calm diplomatic voice, but the officer wasn’t having any of it.

“It wasn’t an incident.” Enjar growled, his voice still slurring, his eyes still fixed on the commanding officer, a new coldness to them.

“It was A FUCKING MASSACRE!!!” He vibrated in the restraints as he screamed the phrase over and over.

Enjar’s mind was racing as the memories flooded back. “We weren’t there to catch him, we were there to catch the bullets! YOU DID THIS, YOU!”

Sommer grimaced at the words Enjar said. He was right to an extent, they hadn’t been able to get much intel, they had sent the team in blind. They had to to keep up appearances, but all Squad A were- had been the best at this. The units going into these missions always knew it was a potential death sentence.

However, no one had expected the island to be loaded with booby traps the way it had been. No one had expected Viktor to know they were coming. No one had expected the entire team to die.

Enjar slumped back into the bed, chest heaving as he gritted his teeth, glaring at the commander. A small part of Sommer was glad Enjar was tied down and drugged, he had no apprehension that the man would have tried to beat the life from him too if he was given the opportunity.

Sommer was just following orders though. It was the higher ups that had done this, he was just a middle man. There couldn’t be blood on his hands… Could there?

Shaking his head, he mumbled something about being sorry for Enjar’s loss and went to leave, but glanced back to see Enjar, a guy he had known some what well, lying back in the bed, glaring at him.

How many lives had Viktor ruined…?

Sighing, Sommer sat by Enjar’s side for a while, mostly out of obligation, watching his officer’s angry eye being to slide closed,

“Kill me, please…” The young man murmured, half asleep.

Sommer couldn’t bare it any longer. He stood, leaving the room, only turning back to take one last look at Enjar, tangled in the blankets, limbs sagging in the restraints as his chest rose and fell slowly.

How could they cover this up?

No, how did they fix it? How can they make it go away?

What have they done?

Next | Back

Taglist (lmk if you want to be added!)

@fallenwhumpee

@emcscared-whumps

@i-eat-worlds

[whump-till-ya-jump]

Snippet #2

Totally inspired by That Funny Feeling.

TW: Fighting, cursing, hero and villain, drugging

This was the day they had waited for. Around them, the city burned, people cried, heroes fell, and villains took over. They had played their part and done their fair share of the work leading up to this momentous event. There was only one thing they had requested in return. 

They watched Hero from above. To no one’s surprise, they were fighting. The stubborn little thing. They quickly made their way down to the action, wanting to take what was theirs and leave. 

“Hello, Hero,” they chuckled while approaching them from across the street littered with bodies and rubble. “Such a glorious day, isn’t it?” the criminal questioned while spreading their arms out, gesturing to the city around them.

 Hero seethed with anger. “I should’ve known you were in on this, you asshole,” they yelled, stomping closer to Villain. “That’s quite the mouth you have there Hero, but I should caution you on how to use it.” This only made the Hero angrier and they finally struck.

 The fighting ensued after that. They were not the only hero and villain fighting on the street, but it certainly felt as though they were in their own world. 

Hero was angry, they were steaming with rage. Each hit after another, they kept going and going. Fat, angry tears filled their eyes as they continued to battle Villain. How could they, how could they, how could they, this was the only thing they thought. 

Somehow, the pair had fought their way onto a rooftop. It reminded Hero of a tender moment they once shared, a quiet rooftop on a starry night in a place far away from here.

 Focus, they were not there now. 

The city around them was on fire, and Hero started to feel the heat as they took a gut punch from Villain. It was made very clear to them in that moment how incredibly fucked they were if they did not get out soon. The next hit Villain swung never hit them. It stopped mid-air as they saw their Hero beginning to run to the stairs leading to freedom.

 “Oh no you don’t little Hero,” Villain yelled as they raced behind the Hero. A boom made them stop mid footstep, they looked around at them only to see Supervillain floating mid air with a fist wrapped in red energy.

 They looked down and understood, the stairwell room on the roof had been blown up. Supervillain had just saved them a chase around the city.

 “Thank you my friend,” they yelled up. Supervillain gave them a nod as they flew off to go claim more of the city. 

Villain looked down to the pile of rubble, it didn’t take them long to spot Hero. They dug them out of the debris and pulled their head up by the hero’s hair. They looked so close to passing out. Villain knew it had to be done now. They set the saviour’s head down.

 “Well,” they said as they fumbled with something from their pockets, “what can you say? This was overdue, we were overdue.” They grabbed the hero’s hair once more. A flick.

 “But it’ll be over soon,” they assured. Hero barely felt the needle slide into their neck. “V’lln?” they tried, but their head pounded as they spoke. “Just wait,” Villain said from above them as they stood up. Hero’s body refused to work as they tried to look around. They heard the screams, felt the heat of the fires, and they-

They closed their eyes. They felt nothing any more. Just peace, as they saw a rooftop with a Hero sitting next to a Villain. It was a starry night, the two couldn’t have been more than 16. Hero lay limp in the rubble as they finally succumbed to the starry night sky they had once known. 

The villain smiled because now they had Hero. Now they could go. 

Next ->

Taglist: @rosieposey-torturedpoet

[den-of-whump]

Whumpee is hallucinating their greatest fear (either through magic or drugs) and Caretaker find them screaming/crying/curled up on the ground and desperately tries to help them through it (Bonus points if the greatest fear includes Caretaker in some capacity)

[whumppromptoftheday]

whumper keeping whumpee on the brink of passing out and punishing them if they end up falling asleep (see: whumpee being so scared to fall asleep after they get away from whumper that they stay awake for days at a time)

[defire]

Back to the Dregs Part 10

Part 1 Next

Content: flashback to child abuse, cutting, escape attempt, forced drug use

"Hold still, Michael." Mr. Huer gripped the base of his head so tightly he could feel his heartbeat around the fingers. "Now tell me what you did."

"I... made a friend?" Michael's fifteen-year-old voice was timid and shaky.

Mr. Huer's response was to bang his head against the wall of the telephone booth.

"No." He said. "Try again."

Michael's ears rang with the harshness of the impact.

"I... talked to someone outside the family?"

"You did more than that."

Michael heard the click of a knife being opened behind him.

"Please, sir, please, I don't know what I did," He stammered. "Just talk to me, sir, I'll be better, I promise."

The sharp metal pressed against the nape of his neck.

Michael stared through the blurry glass, hoping against hope that someone would come into the street and stop Mr. Huer. But there was a Huer "uncle" watching that street.

"You talked." Mr. Huer growled. The knife split his skin open and Michael hissed in pain, pushing against the glass. "What did you tell her about us?"

"Nothing, sir, I--ah!" Michael winced as the knife dragged and twisted at the nape of his neck, bringing tears to his eyes.

"You're only making this worse for yourself."

"Sir, please, promise me you won't kill me." Michael begged. His stomachalways turned at how easily he'd betrayed himself that day.

Point still at his neck, Mr. Huer simply waited.

Maybe if he told him, it would stop.

Blood trickled and itched down his neck and back, and the wound stretched a little when he spoke.

"I just... All I said was that I was scared of you sometimes."

Mr. Huer inhaled and Michael braced himself against the glass.

"Michael?" He said into the boy's ear. "You're not scared of me. Why did you lie to her?"

A shiver ran down Michael's spine at that low, gravelly tone.

"But I wasn't--" Michael broke off into a cry as the knife cut him again and he clenched his teeth hard.

"I lied, because I..."

"You wanted to leave the family?"

Michael trembled.

"I would never want to leave this family, sir." He whispered. "It's good. You're a good man. I guess I just..."

Slice.

"Aah!" Michael's breath frosted the window a little as he cried. "Please sir, I'm sorry," he sobbed.

Slice.

"Never forget whose property you are, son. I never want you to forget that you have a family."

After the wounds becaem scars, Michael traced them with his finger, and his eyes widened. They weren't just mindless cuts.

They were the initials, J.H.

"It's nothing." Michael told Chris, and adjusted his ponytail to cover it more completely.

[Note: I don't smoke so if this is inaccurate, please let me know because I'd like to be accurate.]

The pain was subtle by the time Chris left, bearable as long as Michael didn't move a muscle.

That was hard to do when Jordie blustered in, clomping up to the bed and taking Michael by the wrist.

"That was some fucking display," Jordie maneuvered the cuff around Michael's wrist.

Michael looked away to wince as it clamped down.

"Ey." Jordie slapped the bruised side of his face with a backhand. "Ey, look at me when I'm talking to you!"

Michael hunched his shoulders and looked cautiously at Jordie.

"You cried like a little bitch!" Jordie said. "You miss wittle charmander, don't you."

Michael shook his head.

"What?" Jordie laughed. "Embarrassed of your 'ashtray' arms?"

Michael lurched forward and jumped out of bed toward Jordie, who caught his other wrist, and seeing Michael's flinch, squeezed it hard.

"Ugh--" Michael cringed, trying to keep his weight off his shot leg, realizing how stupid and worthless he looked.

I have my shirt on, He reminded himself.

"Oh, what's this?" Jordie yanked at the cuff of the oversized shirt he'd been given, revealing a dozen or so scars marking up his arm there.

"Oh, it's missing one. That needs to be remedied. There's this, empty space," He was jerking Michael's arm in response to his struggles, touching the burning marks.

Fighting didn't work with Jordie. What had worked? Michael thought carefully. Yes.

He lowered his head and stopped struggling, masking his enraged heavy breaths with a pretense of fear. The shame was real.

"That's right." Jordie said. "Now climb into bed like a good little kid while I light up."

Michael's hard work exploded in an instant.

"I'm not a kid." He snapped. "Stop calling me that!"

The last word was muffled by Jordie's hand over his mouth and the other hand on his balls. When he reached to stop him, Jordie twitched his hand tighter.

"Uh-uh-uh." He said. "Or I crush the grapes."

Michael ground his teeth and put his hand on the bed. Jordie's thick fingers pressed just tight enough to hurt.

"Sit." Jordie said.

Michael did very slowly, trying to hide all of his rage under a stony poker face. But he never was a good actor.

"Look at you," Jordie said. "All tragically fucked up and angry. You and your collection of scars, each with their own moment of agony. I would now." He added. "The difference is, I was being abused. I have no shame about it. You... that's just who you are."

Maybe once Michael would've felt that, and taken it in. But he'd had years of therapy.

The words now finally said out loud--the exact words he'd been thinking for years--now sounded crazy.

Michael felt a chuckle start deep iin his chest as he slowly looked up at Jordie.

"Who I am?" He siad. "Do I actually look like a literal ashtray to you?"

Jordie considered a moment, looking at Michael's body.

"No," He said. "You look more like a punching bag."

He crushed in and Michael gasped, clutching reflexively at Jordie's hand as if to tear it away from his crotch.

"Jordie don't." He wheezed, looking up at him pleadingly.

Jordie let go, grabbed his left wrist, and fished around in his pocket for a smoke.

Michael's heart started to pound and tighten as Jordie backed up, lit the cigarette, and watched as if he expected Michael to squirm.

"Camel greens, huh." Michael said softly.

Jordie exhaled slowly, raising his eyebrows at Michael.

"I prefer the red." Michael breathed in deep, feeling a mixture of anxiety and bliss at the familiar smell.

"You smoke?" Jordie's eyebrows raised a little higher.

"Well..." Michael shrugged. "I've been clean for two years."

Jordie laughed, looking at the ceiling.

"Clean?" He said. "We'll have to fix that."

Michael licked his lips. He wanted one. Very much.

"Here." Jordie tumbled one out for him. "Come on. No such thing as quitting. You want it or not?"

No, Michael thought. I've been clean for two years, and I am not going to ruin that just because I--

He had looked up resolutely into Jordie's face, ready to refuse, but when he saw Jordie's expression, he clenched his teeth and hesitated. There was a dangerous calm glitter in his eyes.

"Go ahead." Jordie shook it a little, not smiling. "Take one."

Michael's breath shook on the way out.

"...Thank you." He said. He took the cigarette and let Jordie light it for him.

The taste was bitter, familiar, and slightly disappointing. And then his eyes closed as he savored that calm euphoria. For a moment he wondered why he'd ever quit.

Because COPD, you fucking idiot. His mind responded.

A bit of nausea came up in his gut. Maybe it was because he hadn't eaten, not to mention the injuries.

He held the cigarette in his fingers, watching two years' work vaporize in his hand.

It was a bad day.

And Jordie was laughing a little.

"You should see your face," He chuckled. "It's like a gave you your pet's eyeballs or something."

Chills ran over Michael's arms again as he watched Jordie's own cigarette dwindling up toward the filter.

The two of them smoked quietly for a minute. It was almost a nice, conversational silence, with the edge of dread that always came when Michael watched someone else smoking.

Michael watched Jordie draw another puff, and his own fingers trembled as he saw how close Jordie's coal was to the filter.

Jordie smirked.

"So, which are you, an ashtray or a punching bag?"

Michael grimaced, putting his own cigarette out on the bedframe and tossing it away. Clearly he had no good option here.

Another beating would cause damage his body may not be able to handle. If his internals were already damaged, this could make htat damage irreversible.

But... His mind raced him through the process of the cigarette pressing into his skin and the pain, but most of all, the shame of every other time being reinforced right now, after all that work, after all that therapy...

"I provide the shirt on your back," Mr. Huer had said. "I wouldn't want to have to take it, and let the world know what you are. I'd rather protect you from that, son. Come here, roll up your sleeve."

Michael, every time, had told himself it wasn't that bad, it was just a cigarette, at least he wasn't putting out his cigar on him again. He'd tug up his sleeve and turn away his face as he acted as his father's "ashtray".

"I don't want you to forget your place in this family." Mr. Huer had said.

Michael clenched his teeth and raised his eyes from the glowing cigarette to Jordie's expectant smirk.

He couldn't take another beating.

He swallowed, eyes on his lap, and held out his wrist.

Jordie grabbed his hand to keep him from flinching away. Michael grunted through his teeth as the coal pressed into his skin with a little hiss, and he tugged at his arm, groaning through his teeth. His hand shook in Jordie's grasp.

"Who's my little ashtray?" Jordie grinned.

Michael gave one last yank and got his arm back, covered the wound loosely with his sleeve, and then gripped the wrist just below it and huddled over it.

"It's gonna be fun having you around." Jordie said, standing up.

"Tasteless." Michael hissed.

"Wait till you see my next one." Jordie scoffed, and left.

It had been five horrible days. It wasn't that Jordie bothered him that much or that Chris kept freaking him out--he would've preferred that.

He'd entertained himself to disgust.

He'd bitten his nails down till they bled, three times. He'd bitten the skin off from around the nails. He'd picked off every piece of lint from the blanket. He'd spent three hours pretending the toilet in the corner was a shrine to the toilet paper god. And speaking of that, he'd run out of the hand sanitizer Chris had given him by trying to clean every stain off his bed frame and mattress. He was going out of his mind.

He was hardly sleeping, in constant increasing pain from not being able to stretch and exercise, and he'd started hearing voices. Like Morgan's voice, instead of just mouthing the word, actually saying, "Sorry, Michael."

The charmanders on his pj bottoms had started talking to each other as well.

By the time Chris came in with his dinner on the fourth day, he was literally in tears begging him to let him out to see the others.

"But Jordie's out there, man." Chris had said. "You don't want to go out there."

"I have ADHD, man, this is killing me, please," Michael had begged, almost in tears.

Chris' eyes had narrowed with suspicion--as if he didn't believe that someone could go insane with boredom--and had left with a muttered apology.

And the whole time, there were increasing sounds of construction and people outside.

It was on the fifth day that Michael, dissociating as he stared at a hole on the ceiling that looked like a spider if he blurred his vision a little, heard the door open and vaguely felt someone walk in.

"...Hey..." He said his programmed response.

And then a punch hit him.

"Ghuh--" He gasped, coming back to the present. "Oh, fuck, it's nice to see another face."

Jordie's response was to slap him harder in the cheek.

Michael, slow on the uptake this morning, only managed to barely block a second slap.

"Have--have I done anything in particular to--"

He had to block another slap, at which Jordie growled and grabbed his forearm. The scars burned at the touch. They might be years old, but somehow his arms still remembered every single mark.

"Jordie, man, come on."

The left-handed slap hit this time, bringing tears to Michael's eyes.

"...Whatever I did, I'm sorry." He blinked, feeling his cheek begin to puff up and redden.

Jordie took him by the chin, fingers squeezing into his forearm in a vice grip, slamming his head back into the metal bedframe bar.

"Do you ever shut up?"

Michael winced and gritted his teeth. He hated that a sense of rejection was twisting with the nausea in his stomach. Shutting up wasn't too hard for Michael. After all, he'd had an instinctive freeze response for years.

Having to do it again was like going back to that old, haunted identity.

The one before he made himself. Before he became the unfairly-promoted, lowest-performing detective in Cleveland.

Sinking into that self without the defense of "worrying" about everyone else was crushing.

It was worse than the physical pain. But there was only so much he could take before his body made the choice for him.

Just coming down from an injury-induced fever, Michael was weak and vulnerable.

"That's better." Jordie said, surveying his face. "Nice and scared and quiet. Now if I take you to sit out with the others, will you be good?"

Michael closed his eyes, trying not to be irritated at the condescension, and nodded.

It was nearly night when Pete came back.

He was not alone.

"You told me you'd have him begging. A full week!" --the sound of a blow strikign somewhere hard, through clothes, made Michael's senses pop to full alert and set his heart beating hard and fast-- "A full week! And you don't report this... this failure!"

Michael heard a muffled yelp from Pete as he was dragged into the room, arm twisted over his head at an almost deforming angle.

His eyes darted over to Michael and a dark flush settled over his cool complexion. The man slapped Pete.

Pete blinked, bowing his head in obiescence.

"You think they'll come for the brat like that? They screamed at each other, Pete!"

Pete said nothing, bowing a few times.

Suddenly three more hard punches, which he didn't attempt to block, took his wind, took him to his knees, gasping with a strained mutter of apology, more bowing, face utterly full of shame.

Then the man wheeled on Michael.

"You." He snapped. "Strip this guy. Who's up for a little fun?"

Michael dissociated as they came for him. Pete had, for just a moment, looked exactly like Morgan that day in the rain at the bus station.

Michael had run all the way there, then realized he had no idea where to go, or how, and then leaned forward and idd something he never did–prayed to fate or God or whatever.

"Just get me out of this. If there's any care in you at all. Please."

A sense of his own tinyness in the middle of existence overwhelmed him, and he huddled n against a monstrous cold front of November.

And then he heard it--the skittery footfalls of Morgan Huer.

He flinched and huddled in.

Don't see me, don't see me.

"Michael." Morgan said, and Michael jumped. "Dad knows."

Michael cursed and cringed away from Morgan, expecting to be dragged out of the booth, through the rain, and back to Morgan's father, who would already be waiting with the poker.

Morgan was watching his reaction with what Michael interpreted as sadistic enjoyment.

"Don't torture me, Morgan." Michael said. "Just do it."

"Then come willingly," Morgan said.

"You know I can't do that. I don't know how to be good. I've tried. It's pointless. I just... I can't go back,"

And he watched Morgan's face go from calm, to twisted up and working. Then the shame, the dread, fixed on Michael in a confusing stare.

"I'll... tell him I found you in the yard."

Michael couldnt' believe his ears. Morgan had never offered something like that before.

There was a long pauseas Michael's eyes widened, realizing Morgan was serious.

"You better listen in, so you don't lie wrong if he sees through me." Morgan added. "Come on, let's go."

Morgan got his jaw broken for that.

He never stood up for Michael again.

Michael's brain reeled as he watched hte gang surrounding him. A hundred variations of one idea with no end in sight punched through his brain at once, all-encompassing one idea--stop them.

Every placating response he'd crafted fell to the wayside in a burst of strength as he ducked forward, not even feeling the ripping in his wounded leg as he hit Jordie with a kick to the crotch. He dropped straight ot hte ground with a loud curse. Michael punched, shifted and swung again at anyone who dared grab him, nknocking down three and throwing them behind him, getting closer to the stairwell. Three steps away.

But Pete was in between him and his goal, walking closer and raising a gun with two gangsters at his sides.

Michael roared and ran at him, splitting his lip back open in his desperate attempt to escape or die.

Then a hit from the boss's palm smacked into his forehead in a concussive strike that rattled his brain.

His consciousness blinked out momentarily and he awoke right before his head hit the ground, this time falling on his back.

"Well," Pete's boss smirked grimly as he sauntered toward Michael. "You just had to make this hard on yourself."

That was when Michael recognized the tattoo on his chest under the loose tank top. It was a very stylized version of the word "United". Michael had heard of the guy with this specific tattoo. This was Psycho, leader of the Westside Kids.

Michael blinked at him, trapped on the ground with Jordie's heavy boot on his chest. He was grinding the heel into his bruised ribs for good measure, probably enjoying Michael's winces of pain that he tried not to show.

He could've tried to fight, but that would mean another beat-down. Maybe broken bones this time.

His mind was fuzzy, but he remembered the thought process for tihs. They needed him to genuinely beg Morgan for help.

"Just--just--" Michael tried to speak, but the man carried such a powerful presence that his teeth chattered and he couldn't think, or breathe.

"We could have made this a bit less painful for you if you'd just cooperated, but you had to be a fuckin idiot."

Beg. They wanted him to beg.

Michael grimaced, knowing what that would do to him. Then he took a breath and said,

"Pleaes. Please, guys... I can't... Don't hurt me anymore." His voi e pitched upward.

And there it was--the flashback he knew was coming even as he thumped his aching leg on the ground to try to stay in the moment.

Most of what came back to him was the sound. The thunk of a piece of kindling hitting his legs hard enough to leave blackish bruises.

The words "if you run, you'll only make this worse."

The sound of teenage Michael's screaming, begging, the sound he was making right now as he knew they were going to strip him and do god-knows-what to him.

"Please, no, please, no," He was running his mouth like it would do him any good.

"Hey Pete," Psycho said, "You know that old cord I had you save from the AC?"

"Yeah." Pete's swollen eyes glinted coldly.

He crossed the room to rummage in a pile of junk behind Micael's cell.

"No," Michael's eyes were running freely with tears, equal to the shame he felt for crying in the first place. "Fucking please." His voice was cracking all over the place.

"Hey Jordie?" The boss said.

"Yeah?"

"Give 'im twenty."

Tag list:

@fleur-a-whump @watermelons-dont-grow-on-trees @whumped-by-glitter @whump-writings @mimostic @tildeathiwillwrite