#all this

[sidekick pov, gang, prisoner, humiliation]

"What do you mean he's scared, sir? he just flipped you off."

Boss smirked and walked toward the victim, nodding as their captive tensed and glared up at him.

The boss gave it a few seconds, then quickly lifted his hand and snapped his fingers beside the captive's cheek.

The prisoner flinched so hard he actually grunted in the expectation of an impact. Then again, Sidekick couldn't fault him for being wise enough to expect boss to slap him. The kid had been slapped plenty of times already in the last hour.

"See?" Boss said. "He expects me to beat him. But he doesn't even move to defend himself."

Far from it, Sidekick realized. The captive had a death grip on his own belt loops like he was trying to strangle the fight right out of his thumbs.

"And he doesn't defend himself because he's scared." Boss said. "Aren't you, boy?"

"Fuck you," the prisoner started.

This time boss did slap him, soft enough to be indecent rather than cruel. The boy flushed and bent nearly halfway down.

Boss gave sidekick a look. It meant,