far gone, this g i r l ...

Despite this, he tries. Wraps his arms around you and tugs you against his chest, humming when you let out something akin to a muted groan from the ache in your arms. The nails always leave behind an awful stabbing soreness that takes ages to go away.

“Sorry,” he murmurs, soft, almost a weed. His words try to burrow underneath your skin, forcing forgiveness. “Sorry for hurting you earlier, too.”

There are long, stretched out moments where you say nothing. Just feel the weight of Ren against your back, the way his arms tighten at your silence. Is it his heartbeat or yours that pounds in your ear, incessant, loud, a drumbeat order–just fucking forgive him already.

“Strade…” The name, the person, hangs between you. “Strade made you do it. Right? You didn’t want to?” 

Ren doesn’t answer right away. Finally, he presses his chin against your shoulder. “I wouldn’t. Not like that...” He nestles against you, and the fur of his tail tickles your shins. “I’m not like him.”

The closeness, the dizzying crash that comes after being tortured, is enough to keep you from thinking too long about what he says. 

“Prove it,” you tell him, finally. “Prove it to me next time.”

The next time Ren is hovering above you, a pocket knife placed firmly in his fingers by Strade’s own, you don’t imagine that he’ll disobey Strade’s order. Though his orders are less orders, and more whims. A whim to make you hurt. A whim to make Ren hurt. A whim to make himself feel something thrilling; a warm feeling, he’d said once, drunk and more open than normal. It makes him feel warm, when you hurt; makes him want to watch every bit of thought flit about your pretty eyes and soak in them like water. 

The warmth you feel is from blood trickling down your elbow from the gash Ren made in your shoulder, and it’s nothing quite as nice as Strade described. It hurts and stings and you hate the way you can never keep the tears at bay, in times like these. It’s bad enough to be hurt–worse to let Strade (let Ren) see you cry.

“Keep going, Ren.” There’s a lightness in Strade’s voice. Almost sweetness. It makes you think of sugar and rot. It makes you feel sick. “I think she can handle a bit more by now, don’t you?” 

Ren’s eyes catch your own. He’s all blurry from your tears, but maybe you see a hint of a grimace at the edge of his lips. It’s hard to tell what is your imagination nowadays. He leans in closer, bringing the edge of the knife around the top of your shoulder, carving a line towards your back. It’s a new spot for a cut–it hurts, goddamn it–and you can’t help but stutter out a cry.

And then.

Then you feel it. 

The strangest sensation. A sensation almost like the knife, but without the searing edge of pain. Something pointed, edging against your skin, deliberate and specific. It’s… Ren. Ren’s finger. Or the tip of his claw, more like. But what is he doing? Tracing a pattern, moving in the same way. 

The realization dawns on you just as he rounds your shoulder again, making a twin cut that sends fresh beads of blood and an aching sting bubbling up on your shoulder.

He’s tracing letters. His letters. His name. For you. That’s how he proves it, that’s how he proves it’s not him, it’s Strade, and you’re in this together and maybe things will be okay. (They won’t be. But you can pretend. Stupidly, bleeding, sniffling out cries that will turn to sobs the deeper the knife goes, you can pretend.)

R-E-N.

R-E-N.

R-E-N.

Maybe this is the warmth that Strade talks about. Because you feel it now, low in your gut. The feeling seeps sweetly into the marrow of your bones and you keep it there for every cut Ren makes this evening. It’s not him, it’s not him, it’s not him.

You keep it there for the days to come, too, tucked away for when Ren puts Strade’s belt around your throat, for when Ren jabs Strade’s knife straight into your legs. For when Strade tells Ren to fuck you hard against the concrete floor without any preparation. 

R-E-N.

R-E-N.

R-E-N.

-

You do not wake up sweetly. The world returns like the aftermath of smacking concrete, all pain and soreness and fear; not the sleepy, druggy haze you clawed your way out of before, but something that makes every movement hurt like hell. And it does hurt like hell. 

The aftermath of torture is, sometimes, just as bad. Something else you remember from your time with Strade. 

When you do wake, forcing your body to move, crying out as you fling yourself upwards, you are not chained up in the concrete room that trapped your blood and screams inside its no-doubt soundproofed walls. 

You are in a cell, certainly. A sparse room with nothing besides a cot that you’re currently resting on, a bucket that you can only assume is for bodily functions, and lights built into the ceiling. They remind you of a hospital hallway, the end of a corridor lit in some sickly yellow glow. And the cot–you glance down, gingerly shifting, and are not surprised to see the cot is stained. Deep red, and something yellow. Dark and almost with a hint of green. Not urine–something worse. 

Fucker. He could have at least given you a clean cot. 

But there are no chains keeping you bound to the floor. If you were someone else, someone naive, your heart might have fluttered at that fact. Your stupid little brain would whirl with hope–maybe you can find a way out! Golly gee whiz. 

You are not someone else. You are not naive. You are someone who knows that not being tied up in this ugly little room is more terrifying than a thick chain around your ankle.

Ren knew it, too. He knows you’re smart enough to grasp the truth of the situation. The cold, honest truth: he doesn’t need to keep you restrained, and you aren’t going anywhere. Even if you made it out of this room, and you’re sure it’s locked down six ways to Sunday, there’s nowhere for you to go. You know this, and he knows you know this.

Double fucker. 

Still, you try to move. Try to assess the situation with something like a logical eye. It’s hard to do that, though, when everything from your head to your toes–sans toenails–aches like hell. There are phantom nails in your thigh, matching sets that were, it seems, pulled out sometime in between your blackout and unceremonious awakening.

You’re going to die here. Ren is going to kill you.

The thought prickles underneath you, like a pea set under a hundred mattresses. You try to ignore it. Because if you pondered the situation a day ago, it would be impossible. You couldn’t possibly wake up in a concrete room and be tortured for who-knows-how-long; no one was going to rip out your toenails or shoot you with a nail gun, or kiss you afterwards, tasting of blood and sweat and your own pain.

Not because such things were impossible. The scars and nightmares that still lingered were a testament to that. But because, jesus fucking Christ, what were the odds of it happening twice?

But that’s what happened. And you couldn’t imagine it a day ago because you’d gone soft. Weak. Forgotten what the world was like, the lessons taught to you in that stupid fucker’s basement. Those lessons had taken you so far, hadn’t they? When, exactly, did you drop them? And why? Why didn’t you stay vigilant and aware and–

The door opens and you have just enough time to replace your desperate expression of hopelessness with a scowl, because it’s Ren who comes through the door. Ren, older and you couldn’t say if he was wiser, followed by two men wearing dark uniforms who don’t even bother looking at you.

Instead, they drag in a few items–a tray, not unlike the TV trays you have set up in your living room, a folding chair, and a serving tray with two cups of something you can’t see from your vantage point on the cot.

They pause at the door, waiting. Ren doesn’t look behind him as he tilts his chin to the side. “You can go. I’ll buzz if I need anything.”

Ren grabs the folding chair and scrapes it across the floor, setting it close enough to your cot that you contemplate throwing yourself at him. But you’re not stupid. He’s probably got a weapon on him, those goons are just outside the door, and on top of it all, you simply don’t have the energy to even try.

So, you just watch as he reaches over to the tray, and grabs a mug. He leans forward on the chair and holds it out, and the scent of it wafts over before he even confirms what it is, inquiring in a voice too casual for this room.

“Hot chocolate?” 

You stare at him. Then at the mug. Then back to him.

He blinks, almost looking tired, almost looking like you’d surprised him in the kitchen in the morning in a bathrobe and a hot cup of coffee. In some once upon a time fairytale world, that could be the two of you. But not today. 

“Sorry,” he says, low, that fantasy morning voice. “We’re out of marshmallows.”

When you don’t take the cup, only continue staring at him with what you hope is an increasing amount of venom, he shrugs and sets it down. He lifts his own mug up easily and takes a sip, grimaces. Too hot. He sets it back down again.

The silence is too much–he’s too much–this is all too much. Something manages to push past the bone-set pain and weariness inside you, slipping out of your mouth, all bark in your current state.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” 

Ren frowns.

“About the marshmallows? No.”

He frowns down at the chocolate, like he regrets the lack of floating white sugar puffs. It makes you want to slap him. But you don’t have the strength. And you’d rather yell at him some more, and trying to drag your pained, sorry ass to the chair to strike him across the cheek might just make him call in those two guards outside.

So instead you fix your gaze on his and hope it makes him feel like shit.

“You kidnapped me.” 

Ren blinks at you. Like you’ve just said something unbelievably silly. “The sun is out,” on a summer day, maybe. The expression might have been cute, twenty-some years ago. 

“I did,” he says, simple, easy.

Your reply is anything but. This whole damn situation is anything but. 

“You hurt me.” 

“Yes,” he says again. He lifts the cup back to his lips and when he sets it back down, there’s a hint of frothy chocolate on his lips.

You kissed me, is your next instinct. But you clamp it down. There are more pressing matters than the memories of his lips against yours last night. Or was it days ago? You don’t know how long you’ve been out. 

“You’re going to kill me,” you say instead, staring at that smear of froth. Fascinating, the little things that stick with you, when you know you’re going to die soon. The bit of chocolate on your murderer’s lips. The scratch of the cot underneath you. The way the air smells faintly dank, like a humid closet, clothes that must be aired out or thrown out but something must be done about them, in the end.

Like something must be done about you. Or Ren. 

Or both?

You don’t know, you don’t know and maybe you’re going mad, because when Ren doesn’t say anything you crack a smile. A wide, false one that hurts. 

“You’re going to kill me,” you repeat, “And Strade might as well have killed me on the first day in that stupid fucking basement because–”

“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you yet.”

His sharp words hang in the air, wavering. The silence that follows stretches on long enough for something stupid to kindle deep down in your stomach, a warm feeling that you remember but can’t quite place. It’s not strong enough to be in your bones or even your chest yet, not the type of warmth that makes your heart feel lighter; but a smear of it, a sludge, resting at the bottom of your stomach and wanting to spark.

You look at Ren. He looks at you. There are more wrinkles on both of your faces. Wrinkles and wisps of gray. What has happened since you walked out that door, to get Ren here? To get you here? Both of you older and you’re not sure if either is the wiser. 

Without a word, Ren sits up from the chair, choosing instead to crouch right in front of you. Close enough that you can smell him, and it’s almost familiar. There’s another scent about him now; not just a hint of expensive cologne, but something deeper, sharper. Blood, you think. Old blood. Years of it. Gallons. Blood that you can’t get out from underneath your fingernails, even if you wanted to scrub.

You’re not sure that he wants to scrub it out, anyway. And whose fault is that? How did Ren go from the Ren in the basement, in the house, to the Ren with some elaborate live-streaming torture chamber? Fucking hell. 

“Ren,” you say, and you’re not sure why. Because he’s here. Because he’s here and he took you and hurt you, and now there’s nothing holding him back and everything holding you back. What a fucking world you live in. 

You expect the question. You do. You’ve wanted him to ask it again, because maybe an answer will put an end to all this.

(Which ending, though, will he pick? The one where he drops you off in some alley and you limp away, alive and heartbroken? The one where he kills you, in public or in private, and the last thing you see are his too-familiar eyes? You’ve got no choice in either of these. Live or die.)

The question he asks is whispered, almost in your ear. A private thing. Not something to be overheard by the guards at the door, probably not even picked up by the camera that’s inevitably in one of the corners of this cell.

“Tell me. Why did you leave?”

And, well. You could say a lot of things. The lies, the truth. Nothing at all. What he wants to hear, what you want to hear. Hell, you could say everything. You could spill open your guts and maybe he’d understand if you laid it all bare like your blood and bones, an offering on the table of truth, waiting for judgement.

But then he would know everything. All the things you haven’t been able to face in the years that have passed. And what would he think? What would he say? 

Sore fingers curl up against your thighs.

In the end, what you admit is nothing but a partial truth. A cowardly truth, hidden behind layers and wrapping paper and a great, big sign that says “I am not telling you everything.” You know it, and he’ll know it, too. 

“I was scared.”

His expression shifts, and you see it in an instant. Hurt. Hurt so deep that you could never stitch it back up. Hurt that goes down into the bones and infects the rest of the body, the mind, the soul. Hurt embroidered into the three words he gives in reply, soft, raw, more open than what you’ve given him.

“So was I.” A pause, a beat, a metaphorical hand between you that you did not take. “That’s not enough.” 

And then, the hurt is gone. Replaced with a mask of a smile that stretches too big as he leans back on his heels and stands up, a little theatrical groan. Or maybe not so theatrical; a stupid thought–he probably needs to start doing stretches.

“Well, you ought to get some more rest. You’ve got another show in a few days.” His grin widens, he winks, and you feel like you’re going to throw up. “You did wonderfully. The clients really seem to like you.” A bark of a laugh, fake, almost hateful. “Can’t say I blame them!”

He heads for the heavy steel door and gives it a knock. The guards open up and you’ve got just enough adrenaline to half-sit up on the cot, arm reaching out. Maybe you can start over. Say something better, explain yourself, anything, anything, anything.

“Ren, wait, I–”

He stops. He stops and your heart leaps, and you catch a glimpse of his face as he turns, just enough. Just enough. But then he’s gone and the door slams behind him, and you’re left alone.

-

The cold water from the shower does fuck-all to help, but he keeps it going, letting it wash over his body like some sort of ridiculous metaphorical cleansing rain. 

Fuck. No, seriously. Fuck.

You are a problem.

He hasn’t felt like this since… well. Since you, really. Sure, there have been people in between that mattered to him. That first one since he was left alone (since you left him alone, never looking back) is someone he’ll always cherish, even though in the end they weren’t enough.

He still thought about them, now and then. Took them out of his memory box and held them for a moment, though they were long since rotted six feet under in the woods, scraps fed to animals and whatever ghouls lurked in the night. 

Others, too. But they never lasted very long. People who were fireflies in jars that he shook too hard or forgot to poke holes in. They weren’t meant to be with him forever. Couldn’t fill the empty spaces that were carved out, by Strade or his mother or himself or you. 

None of them over the years could compare to how you made him feel. How you still make him feel, underneath the layers, the years, the hurt. Like he wants to strip off his skin along with his coat and lay it all over you, making you part of him. Never letting you go.

He could. He could do that. He has the power. That’s something he’s learned to take in the years since Strade got himself killed and you fled into the big, wide world without him. He’s become his own person, for better or worse.

A smile, all teeth. For worse, most would say. But who gave a fuck about what those people thought?

He was in control. Of himself. (Was he?) Of you. (Was he?) 

Yes. Of course. 

He could lay you bare and shape you into something, whatever he wants, empty out your mind and stuff his own thoughts back in. He could cut you a thousand times and watch you bleed out over the course of several days. He could sell you to some sick fuck who would use you up like meat in a grinder.

He’s done as much, or worse, to others. He could do it to you. He knows all this. But there’s a more powerful truth lingering underneath it all, a truth more uncomfortable than the thought of killing you or selling you. 

Something in between, a sweet grey spot that nags at him every time he looks at your face. 

He could let you live.

It’s always been an option. Ever since he finally tracked you down. You’d done well staying off the grid for all those years and, truthfully, he’d gotten distracted. You were always there, of course, a little heartworm that never let him go. But he had bigger things to worry about.

An empire to run, so to speak. It was a wonderful distraction, flying about the world, obtaining merchandise, selling it, managing it, sometimes keeping track of what those awful, awful people did with the merch he sold. Knowledge made for wonderful blackmail material, after all. Not that he planned on blackmail. But even with his best clients, you never knew what protections you might need in the future.

So yeah. He wasn’t exactly spending his life trying to hunt you down. It was an ever-present thought that lingered at the back of his mind, sure, but he didn’t let it consume him. Then a late night doom-scroll saw his algorithm–lots of anime, lots of travel, lots of horror–land on an extremely familiar face that made every nerve in his body tighten like a drum.

It was you. Older. But you, unmistakably. Ranting on about a book you read recently and how you wish you could unread it, blah-blah-blah. It wasn’t hard to track you down after that. You’d gotten sloppy, careless. You seemed… happy. But he knew very well how fake social media could be. Now he had you, and you made him feel stupid. All conflicted and torn up. He wanted to kiss you; he wanted to gut you open like a fish. He wanted to hold you in his arms and tell you it was going to be okay; he wanted to watch you bleed out while a livestream sent a string of masturbation emojis his way. 

He wanted… he wanted… he wanted…

That was the point. Because of you, for the first time in ages, he actually wanted. 

You’re unbearable, really.

He ought to kill you. Especially since you were too chickenshit to be honest about why you left. Maybe you were too far gone. But fuck, hadn’t you revealed yourself, at the end of the show? Given him a glimpse of who you used to be? No, who you really were underneath the fake persona you’d crafted around yourself. That normal personality you’d put on like a coat, and could just as easily shed, like he could.

He ought to kill you. He has the right to kill you. The question he asks himself, turning off the cold water tap and shaking water out of his hair, is: will he? 

Whether you knew it or not, whether you accepted it or not, the choice was in your hands.

–

Two days pass, or maybe three. You’re still not certain how long you were out after the first show, and Ren hasn’t been back to your makeshift cell for you to ask. The guards don’t bother addressing you, no matter what you ask. They just grunt when they lay down your food tray, grunt when they lift it up.

Once, you ask, feeling cheeky and possibly suicidal: “Do you speak anything other than grunt? Or does your boss prefer his guards buff and inarticulate?”

They still don’t address you, so you don’t even get the satisfaction of the barb hitting home. 

On your next meal tray is nothing but a used tampon, bloated and shrivelled in equal measure, smelling of old, tangy blood. 

Despite the rumble of disgust, and regret at not getting to eat anything, you do feel a hint of satisfaction. At least you know the insult pissed them off. 

It’s more than you know about anything else.

What day is it? 

How soon is the next “show”? 

Are you going to die in here?

–

“Ren.”

The mask isn’t on yet. Maybe you still have a chance.

“Ren.”

The cameras aren’t running, there’s still time, if you could just force your goddamn mouth to open and say something that actually matters.

“Ren.”

A gloved hand over your mouth, claws resting sharp against your cheek.

“Fox, in here. Don’t be stupid, sweetie.” Maybe you’re deluded, but it almost looks like fondness in his eyes. “I don’t want to have to gag you.” The hand leaves your mouth, and he taps his own with a claw, a parody of curiosity. “Well, maybe later…”

Your stomach lurches and you’re about to call his name again, trying to stall, when he whirls around, a finger against his ear. 

“Yeah. Uh-huh. Yep. No, go ahead, we’re already running late.” A chuckle, low, practiced. “It’s all right. They get more creative when they’re chomping at the bit, no?”

Ren taps a few controls on a nearby computer, and the room whirls to horrible life again. This time, Ren’s set up the chat screen on one of the larger screens. For your benefit or his, you can’t be sure, although maybe “benefit” isn’t the right word. 

“Welcome back, dear chat!” A stream of messages run down the screen, and you can just make out a few of the responses that run down. There’s a viewer count in the corner that makes your stomach churn. 

10 MINUTES LATE, ASSHOLE

Were you fucking her? Lol. 

I’m on my lunch break, can we hurry this up? :( 

show us her feet

Ren chuckles. “Eager as always, chat. Remember, good things come to those who wait. Now… who has suggestions for an opener? I want some creativity today!” 

Even though you squeeze your eyes shut as quickly as possible, the chat is fast enough that you see a few of the responses. They probably had them copy-pasted, waiting–chomping at the bit, as Ren said–for your torment to begin.

Pluck out her eye and make her eat it

JUST GUT THE BITCH

Why not fuck her with a knife? Blood is lube, too

show us her feet

–

Ren does not pluck out your eye and make you eat it. He does not, and you truly are thankful for this, fuck you with a knife or gut you wide open. And your feet stay right where they are–maybe he thinks they got enough footplay with the horror version of This Little Piggy last time, maybe he’s taking it easy on your aching, nail-less toes.

But he still really fucking hurts you.

With the traditional tools. A knife that he used to carve a not-so-nice word deep in your thigh, per a donor’s suggestion. A hammer and nails, into your kneecap; you know that if you live, the increased arthritis in it (already there, courtesy of Strade and his own fondness for hammers all those years ago) is going to be crippling.

The traditional tools get boring, apparently, after a while. To Ren or the chat, or both, you’re not certain. 

Case in point, the chef’s blowtorch being pointed at your exposed stomach. Not on yet, but you’re waiting, waiting. So is the chat, when you glance up at the screen–

DO IT DO IT DO IT

Fucking light her up!!!

Is the video lagging for anyone else? :(

Your eyes meet Ren’s, above his mask. He put on a pair of tinted goggles and it makes you wonder. Makes you worry.

“Your stomach looks delicious,” he says, loud. For the chat. “But we wouldn’t want to get sick from eating raw meat. Let’s cook it a bit.” He taps a button on the portable keyboard next to him, and you can see the screen shift to another camera, one that gives the viewers a nice angle of your soon-to-be-abused flesh. 

“What do you think, viewers at home? Medium rare? Medium?” The joke is stupid. What’s happening is not.

Panting, desperate breaths huff in and out of your nose as you clamp your jaw down, preparing for the worst. Or the worst so far, because you know it’s far from over. But this is really, really going to hurt.

“One…”

You glance down and see your stomach sucking in, you’re not even aware that you’re doing it; not that it will help. You’ve got nowhere to go. It’s just you and Ren and the sick fucks at home, watching.

“Two…”

A flurry of messages shoot down the screen, but you don’t bother to read them. You’re looking at Ren now. Ren with a blowtorch in his hands, his features exaggerated by the dark lighting in the room. 

Three, any second now. Three and the blinding pain. Three and burns that would take months to heal, but you won’t live that long. Three and… Your gaze frantically bats around the room, desperate for a reprieve. 

“Keep your eyes shut.”

Huh?

Your flitting eyes meet Ren’s again, and this time he’s looking at you through the tinted goggles. Murmured words behind the mask, finally catching up to your brain? Or did you imagine them? It is a possibility. But you’re scared and desperate and maybe hearing things, and you squeeze your eyes shut tight. 

“Three,” he says, loud and proud. There’s a sound–the torch turning on?--like a hiss and then… then…

And then there is blinding pain. The sort that makes you cry out without thought as a hot, searing pain assaults the sensitive flesh of your stomach. The sounds are guttural, almost stupid. What is worse than the sound is the smell that comes creeping up your nostrils.

Frying flesh. Your flesh.

You want to look. You want to look so bad. And you do, fucking hell. It’s instinct, to look at the source of your pain, isn’t it? There’s no room for logic here. Logic and safety hazards get thrown out in the window in the snuff torture streaming room, and that is that.

Except when you look, the flash of light is blue and it hurts. Not as much as the searing pain in your stomach, no, but it hurts your eyes all the same. Makes the sight of Ren underneath you all strange and blinking, like you accidentally looked at the sun, and there are black dots all over.

“I can’t see,” you wheeze out, somehow, in between the guttural cries. 

The hissing sound of the torch cuts out sometime later. Soon after? A while after? Time is nothing but a word in here, and every one of your senses feels like it’s misfiring. Even the awful pain in your stomach is distorted, stretched, feeling less like a burn and more like constant stings from a swarm of bees. Jesus fucking Christ, you almost wish you he’d just kill you and get it over with.

You were being ridiculous when you thought you could survive. Too much had happened between then and now for Ren to be the Ren you knew back then. Or for you to be the you from back then, for that matter. 

“Looks like someone stared a bit too long at the torch, chat.” Ren’s voice comes from above and you register now that he’s been waving a hand in front of your face. It comes through the black spots, snatches of Ren.

Are you going to be blind now? The thought makes you tear up. Or it would, if your eyes didn’t hurt so much. But maybe you just cried them all out, and there’s nothing left. 

There’s a sound of typing, the painful white glare from the chat screen. “Now, now,” Ren murmurs, loudly. Theatrical, as he pulls off the goggles and tosses them aside.

“Let’s not be too eager to gouge out her eyeballs. After all,” the sound of typing is grating, too loud in this small room, barely tolerable over the tight fear seizing your chest, “If she can’t see what we’re doing, we won’t get to watch the lovely fear play about in her eyes, will we?”

Apparently, chat agreed, because Ren drops the subject entirely before he stalks over to you. His hand grips your chin and keeps it firm in his grasp as he tilts you this way and that. You feel like a not-so-prized horse. One last inspection before they send you off to the glue factory.

“Where’s your fight today?” A gloved claw, petting your chin. At some point your lips split, maybe while you screamed, and the pain of it makes you jerk.

“Ah, I think the blow torch really shook you, hmm?” A quiet question; for you, not for them. A sigh. “Maybe… maybe this isn’t…” You’re not sure what he’s thinking. It’s hard to see his expression right now, even if some of the vision seems to be returning. Thoughtful Ren has always been a scary Ren, for you. Maybe for himself too. 

Thoughtful Ren might just cut you loose and get it over with, then burn your body until it’s nothing but ashes that no one will ever find. 

You’re going to die in here. 

“I was scared,” you whisper, and the black spots don’t cover up the look of disappointment in his eyes. You don’t stop there, though. You don’t stop there because if you’re going to die in here, then you want to die after telling him a lick of the truth. Just one fucking bit of it that will ease the guilt that’s been around your shoulders for decades. 

“I was scared because part of me wanted to stay.”

Despite the hum of the electronics, you hear the intake of breath under his mistake. A sharp thing that burns through your stomach as much as the torch. Your vision is still blurry, still spotted with black dots that won’t stay in the same place, but does he look surprised? You wish you hadn’t looked at the damn torch now. 

“Hmm,” he says, releasing your chin. Hmm. Hmm could mean a million things. Hmm, that makes me feel good. Hmm, that pisses me off. Hmm, I don’t care and I’m going to kill you. Hmm, hmm, motherfucking hmm.

He turns back to the screens. The bright white is too hard to look at, so you don’t bother trying to decipher what the chat is telling you now. At least one of them, presumably, still wants to see your feet. 

“You know, ladygore, you’ve got the right idea.” You don’t know who ‘ladygore’ is but you hope she rots in hell, whatever her suggestion was. There’s a sound of a drawer opening. The sound of something sharp being pulled out.

Ren steps in front of you, and the dark shape of him is a relief for your eyes. Even if what is in his hand makes your blood run cold. 

A knife. A nice sharp one with a solid handle. The type of knife they have in fancy steak restaurants, the kind you visited on special occasions. Or at least, you used to visit them, before all this. The world seems like a lifetime ago. It’s like you never left the basement at all, being in this dark room, with a dark figure and a sharp knife in front of you.

“Ladygore likes the classics,” he explains, more to the stream than to you. “And I can’t blame her! They are called the classics for a reason, you know.” A wink. For you. For the cameras. Maybe they are one and the same. 

He moves quickly and oh, Christ. The large blade is stabbed into your abdomen–stabbed straight into the ruined, burned flesh of your stomach. The searing burn steals your breath, and you can do nothing but gape your mouth open like a fish as Ren slowly drags the knife out.

Every inch of the blade is agony as he draws it out of your aching flesh.

Then he does it again, a bit higher, and the pain starts anew. This time he brings his body close to yours, so close you can feel the heat of him, smell a hint of cologne rising above the lingering stench of your own burned meat.

This must be how you die. Bleeding out on camera. He’ll stab you somewhere lethal and all the life will ooze out of you while people watch and pay for the pleasure of it. He’ll catalog you away as Another Dead Girl and they’ll forget about you until the next stream, and your whole stupid life will have meant nothing at all. 

At least you’re not alone when you die. That must be something to cling to; at least it’s Ren, and not Strade, or some random fucker in an alley who caught you at the wrong time. At least it’s someone you know, someone you loved, a world ago.

There are years and bodies between you. Years, bodies, and blood. But still. It’s better that he’s the one holding the knife. 

And then you feel it.

The strangest touch. The softest touch. A light finger–no, a light claw–tracing circles on your back. But they’re not circles at all, are they? It takes a moment to recognize them. They’re letters.

R-E-N…

R-E-N…

R-E-N…

If the knife hadn’t already stolen your breath, this would have done it. 

The third stab hurts the most because you’re not expecting it. It comes quick, in and out, and your vision has cleared up enough when he yanks out the blade that you see your own life blood dripping on the edge of it.

Drip. Drip. Drip. You were a person, and now you’re meat, but R-E-N is something you can cling to; something to keep you from completely losing it.

“Well, chat,” he says, ignoring you. “Looks like she’s survived another day.” The white screen goes wild (you can’t read it anymore, the world feels too heavy and fuzzy) and Ren chuckles. “Now, now. You wound me, woundfucker. Of course I won’t let her die off screen.” He waves the bloodied knife in the air. “I am a professional, after all. Until next time!”

He gives one final flourish with the knife and then the screens turn off and he whips around. Gone are the mask and the voice changer. His hands are on you, turning you this way, that way. The world drops down and you realize, dimly, that he’s taken the chains off your wrists.

Why? Maybe he’s being kind. It is nicer to bleed out on the floor than hanging up, you suppose. 

The pain persists. So does Ren. There’s a vague sense of urgency, the sound of footsteps in the hallway. But who? And why? Fuck, it’s so hard to think right now. The knife was too much. 

“Hurry up,” Ren says, and confusion takes over your brain. Hurry up and what? You’re not in a position to go anywhere. The chains and the pain have seen to that.

“Hey.” This time he is talking to you but the thought of responding is like trying to talk with syrup in your mouth. “Hey.” A hand grips your chin. He slaps your cheek, light or hard, you can’t really tell. “Don’t worry. You’re not going anywhere.”

It’s enough to make you chuckle before you black out.

–

You don’t dream. But when the world comes back to you, everything feels thick and heavy. It’s the sort of heavy fog that one only feels in dreams.  It keeps your limbs and body heavy and every ounce of effort in your existence is used just so you can sit up in bed.

Bed? 

Huh. Yes. A bed. You’re still not with it, but you feel metal; handles, like a hospital bed. Not the dingy cot from before, then. But where are you? Did someone rescue you, and take you to the hospital? 

“Good morning,” someone says. And that someone is Ren. 

So you’re not in a hospital, then. You blink and blink and blink to make him come into focus. It still hurts to see; from the torch? Or just being out of it? You’re not sure anymore. 

“Ren…” 

The word is so hoarse that someone else might not have understood you. But Ren does. The word makes him light up, a bright smile with tired eyes. He’s glad to see you. And… you can’t say the feeling isn’t mutual.

You’re not dead. He fixed you up. That means something, even if you’re too bone tired to think about it very hard. It’s hard to be existential when you’re healing from blow torch and knife wounds, and so much of you is swathed in bandages. 

“Glad you’re awake.” 

The dryness in your mouth is awful. Sour and sticky. The sound of your tongue sticking to the roof of your mouth is loud enough that Ren snorts, and offers you a glass of water. It’s in one of those styrofoam cups, the safe kind you get in hospitals.

The water is cool and practically sweet as you sip it down, gulping until Ren pulls it away. A long sticky trail of drool follows the straw and he swipes it up with one finger and sticks it in his mouth.

“That’s… fucking gross,” you say.

Ren throws his head back and barks out a laugh.

“I just wanted to see if you were awake enough to say something.”

A smile. A soft one. One that makes your heart suddenly ache. (Or was that the recovery from your injuries, from your blood loss? The pain killers that are presumably going through your system? Shit, did Ren know you were allergic to penicillin or–)

“I, uh,” you start. Then shift on the bed, uncertain, unsure. What does one say when you wake up after being tortured for the second time? Especially when it feels like everything has changed and yet nothing has changed. You’re back in the basement, you’re free of the basement, you’re in some brand new territory that neither one of you have treaded before.

“What you said back there,” he offers, helpful, his smile a little more subdued now. “About being scared because… you wanted to stay.”

“Because part of me wanted to stay,” you correct, words dry and a little slurry. It feels almost sassy. 

He snorts. Then he shakes the little styrofoam cup. The ice rattles inside and you long to have a chip of it melting down your throat. Your dry tongue lips your drier lips, and Ren chuckles a little before fishing out an ice chip with his bare hands.

“Open,” he says, and you listen. Because you want the ice chip. And because… well. 

The ice is beautifully cool and you close your eyes, bliss bliss bliss bliss bliss, letting it melt and soothe your senses. 

Ren’s fingers are back, pressing another ice chip to your lips, before you can ask for more.