#fingore

I was trying to make spring rolls. I was slicing carrots and cucumbers and sliced a huge chunk off and my finger won't stop bleeding because, like, a big part of it is missing and my kitchen looks like I committed a gruesome murder against some cucumbers and rice paper and I had to dig out my skin from the fucking mandolin I had to DIG IT OUT and I could SEE THE EDGE OF MY FINGERPRINT

Also it fucking hurts like hell, the pain is sharp and throbs with my heartbeat and we don't have any gauze WHY DO WE NOT HAVE GAUZE so I had to wrap paper towels around it but I kept bleeding through them it took so fucking long to stop bleeding and all my nerve endings are PISSED OFF and I am. I am so mad at the mandolin right now.

It took my fingertip as a blood sacrifice. It cost ten dollars and it requires blood.

I can see the fucking wedge missing. I liked that wedge. It was my favorite finger skin! Which I did not know until it was gone and left me with PAIN.

When I can write again I am doing this to a whumpee and they will feel my pain

“Oops,” Whumper merely said, something akin to a chuckle in his voice. He let go of their arm and pushed them away from him. “Nearly forgot myself there. Not yet.”

Whumpee stumbled, nearly fell over nothing but air as their own body was too keen to tilt to the floor. They drew up, just in time, to see him advancing on them like a panther stalking its prey.

“Come on, now. Fight with all you have,” he taunted, “While you still can…”

And they did. They had. They had fought with all they had, they fought with their freedom – their life – on the line. So why, why were they still beaten into the ground.

A final punch connected hard with their cheekbone and the next thing they knew they crashed hard against the concrete floor, with nothing to break their fall.

Arms trembled under their weight, but didn’t even have the strength anymore to lock at the elbows or to push their body more than a few inches from the floor. They slumped back down, the low fall still punching the remaining air out of their lungs.

And they remained there, breathing hard.

They flinched, the clacks of hard heels on the concrete drawing closer, and with a mewl they drew in on themself, expecting a gut-wrenching kick to their stomach.

But nothing happened, and the shiny black shoes –speckled with dust and some drops of unclear colour – walked past them.

“Now then…”

Whumpee winced at the sound of his voice, curled in on themselves on the floor. Everything hurt. Everything. Like they’d been stretched out too far, crumpled back up and smashed to the floor and just remained there.

“Get over here.”

No… No, they couldn’t get up! They couldn’t even move. And they knew what would happen when they struggled to their feet, when they were in front of him.

The sinister promises rang in the back of their mind: First… a finger.

They mewled softly into the crook of their elbow. They couldn’t handle more.

Then your wrist.

This was just the beginning, just like he had promised. With everything - from their blood to their spirit - beaten out of them without mercy. And still, still it was not enough. They were already in so much pain and they were doing all they could to pass out to avoid the pain to come. But their body refused.

“Whumpee.” The warning in his voice made them snap out of it and they glanced up.

He sat there, leering at them, leaning forward, arms resting over his knees with his hands clasped. They could see the blood on his knuckles, but he made no attempt to wipe it away. Probably didn’t even bother him. In fact, those hands ached for more, to feel the crunch of bone.

“Get over here. Now.”

They shook their head. “No… no, please, I— I can’t get up I—”

“I don’t care if you have to crawl over here. Do not make me say it again.”

A sharp yet sniffling intake of breath shuddered through them. They closed their eyes for a second. Then their hand scraped through the dust on the floor and firmly settled under them.

They yelped, they hissed, pain and exhaustion slowing everything as they tried to push themself to their knees. They buckled as soon as a hint of their weight rested on their ankle. They glanced up where merciless eyes took in their struggles and silently demanded for them to try again.

With every bit of effort, sobbing in pain and humiliation, they dragged themself over to him. Not even on their hands and knees; barely by their elbows, one knee, and their one leg that still had a bit of strength to propel them forward.

They came to a halt in-between his legs, pushing themself up – without even the dubious help of a hand to drag them up by the hair – and leaned heavily against his knee, panting hard.

He held his palm up. “Hand,” he merely said. Gestured impatiently up with his fingers. “Now. Or I’ll break two.”

They slid a trembling hand into his palm and he folded his other hand over it. Almost as if protecting it, but Whumpee knew better. His index finger slid under their fingers, nudging them up one by one, before settling on their ring finger. He lightly pushing it up until it strained and he grabbed it tight.

Whumpee squeezed their eyes shut, against the pain and they didn’t want to see the increasingly unnatural angle of their finger being forced back.

“Watch,” came the cold command. “Keep watching, don’t close your eyes. See how it folds back—” Whumpee did, feeling ever more sick with every tilt further, “—Feel how the tendons strain against the pressure. Feel the bone gritting against its joint, until finally—” Something snapped and a scream rose up. “It explodes.”

Whumpee’s hand jerked in his grip, but he didn’t let go. His own finger stroked lightly over their knuckle, the dislocated digit poking out at a sickening angle. Whumpee couldn’t take their eyes off it, even though it disgusted them. Whumper noticed, seeing their eyes gleam with tears.

And his grip moved over to their wrist.

“No…” they sobbed, but didn’t dare protest further. They weren’t even half way. And he could make things still so much worse.

Whumper shushed them gently. His other hand gripped their wrist as well and Whumpee twisted their head away. But besides the vice-like grip, two hands tightening and pulling at their arm, nothing happened.

He chuckled lightly. “Why, I’m flattered you seem to believe I’m strong enough to break this with my bare hands.” Another squeeze in their arm before he let go. “Believe me, I wish I was.”

He sat forward, moving Whumpee a bit so he could get up.

“As a reward, I’ll make this as swift as possible.” He gently pushed them off and stood straight.

Whumpee slumped as soon as the support of Whumper’s leg was removed. He walked behind them and Whumpee could hear him rummage about. They didn’t pay it much mind, much more concerned with their hand in their lap. But when they heard a clanging behind them and the scraping of iron over the floor, their shoulders shot up to their neck and their head spun back to see.

Whumper crouched over a metal crate, and in his hand he loosely held a crowbar. As he stood, the bar scraped over the floor, before the end flew up and came to a rest with a firm pat in Whumper’s palm.

“Put your arm on the chair.”

They did. Trembling and sobbing, but they did, without complaint. Four fingers rested shakily against the surface, with the one just sticking up at a painful angle.

A heavy and cold pressure settled on their wrist, with Whumper letting them experience the weight of the steel. With effect; it made them panic even more. But they made sure to keep it in. Their heartbeat thundered in their chest, creeping up higher and higher in their throat, fear settled in their stomach with a weight equal to the steel on their wrist, and their pleading was kept silent with only their lips moving.

As he raised the crowbar, they squeezed in on themself, eyes shut, shoulders shooting up again, and they turned their head away.

But the blow didn’t come. All they felt was a brush of air.

They peeked an eye open. Another when they saw the crowbar hovering over their wrist. They glanced up, hoping for a ray of mercy in the form of his sly grin, that this was just all meant to scare them and that their palpable fear had been enough to sate him.

His merciless cold eyes looking down on them told them otherwise.

“I said,” he nearly hissed, “watch.”

And before they could even protest or look away, the crowbar sliced through the air and crashed down on their wrist.

They howled in pain. They twisted in his grip but he held their arm firmly down.

Cool steel teased over the hot skin, the blood rushing under it already forming a lump. The cold was nice, but merely a drop in the ocean as the pain flared white hot through their arm.

His hand firmly pressed their arm to the chair and with the other ran the crowbar from their wrist over to the thick part of their forearm, just under their elbow. Then he raised the steel again.

“No!” They shrieked by now. “No, no, pleA—AaahH!”

A final hit. A last scream tore their throat. Steel tore through bone. They felt the snap of their radius under the force, and they were pretty sure they heard it.

Full on sobbing, heaving gasps, they bend over their arm, a half-hearted attempt to protect it. But that wasn’t necessary anymore… right? It was over. He delivered on his promises. Surely now… they were allowed to… pass out?

Hands curled over the back of the chair. Whumpee glanced up through their tears, barely making out an almost soft and fond expression on that always cruel face.

Then he tore the chair away from under them and they collapsed in a heap on the floor.

As predicted, as promised, they couldn’t do more than further curl in on themself in pain, cradling their arm, their only defence a soft mewl when he stood in front of them.

But the black shoes inching dangerously close to their shattered arm remained at distance and he crouched down and merely whispered to them:

“Welcome back.”

-

Berkeley.

He looks different - his hair has been shoddily cut short and dyed brown, he’s wearing colored contacts to hide the blue of his irises, and his freckles are concealed, but Wren still recognizes him immediately. Just like the last time he saw him there’s fury in his eyes, but no more hysteria or fear; only something dark and resigned.

“My disguise is no good, is it?” he snorts. “Is it my voice? Or is my face just burned into your mind? Or is it because I’m the only other person who knows what Daniel used to call you?”

This can’t be happening.

“You know you won’t get away with this,” Wren says, trying to mask the trembling in his voice.

“Is that really the best you can do?” Berkeley rolls his eyes. “Fuck, you’re pathetic.”

“This isn’t like that.” Wren shakes his head, but his heart stutters for a moment when Berkeley swears, as if that, not the kidnapping, not the restraints, not the unnerving expression, was proof that something was wrong. “People know I’m not dead. They’ll find me and finally lock your cowardly ass up.”

“They haven’t found me yet, though, have they? So I’d say we have some time for ourselves.” Berkeley shrugs and approaches slowly, step by step - and once he’s right by the table again, in a blink of an eye he wraps his hands around Wren’s throat and presses down, making him gasp.

“I could kill you.” He tightens his grip, and Wren’s hands twitch as the restraints stop him from instinctively reaching up to grab his attacker. “That would be it, Daniel would be avenged, yada yada. But I don’t give a shit about Daniel.” The corners of his lips rise slightly, a half-hearted remnant of his usual smirk, as he takes in Wren’s panic, wide eyes, frantic gasps. “I told him buying you was insane, but he convinced me. Then I told him he was too lenient with you, letting you wander around like you were free just because he wanted to play house. Of course I was right, and now he’s dead, and I’d just call it karma if you hadn’t ruined my life too. Everyone I worked with has been locked up. I’m being hunted.” His voice wavers a little bit. “And it’s all thanks to you, Rackham.”

His grip gets even tighter, and Wren’s eyes glaze over with tears. He’s still struggling, but he doesn’t control it; it’s pure instinct trying to save him from something he can’t be saved from.

Berkeley lets go, takes a step back and watches as Wren starts coughing, turning his head to the side to avoid choking. He’s still panting, his chest rising and falling rapidly, when he glares at Berkeley and asks, in as defiant a tone as he can muster:

“So what do you want from me?”

Berkeley laughs - his laughter is different, not genuine like it used to be, not hysterical like during the call, but completely dry; the laughter of someone completely disillusioned, with nothing to lose.

“I want to make you suffer. I want to see you cry and beg, because that’s all you’re good for, isn’t it? And Daniel’s not here to stop me from hurting his precious little sweetheart too much.” He lays his hands on the edge of the table, close to Wren’s side, and leans over him. “I don’t know how long I want to draw it out yet. I feel like no matter how much you’ll scream and cry and beg it will never be enough to make up for what you’ve done, but when I feel like the time is right… that’s when I’ll finally kill you.” He can’t help but smile at that, and a shiver of excitement runs up his spine.

No. Wren has to press his lips together to stay quiet, avoid protesting out loud, but his heartbeat is painful and deafening. If the air in the room was cold before, now it’s downright freezing. No, no, no, not again, I was safe, I survived, I can’t die now, I can’t die like this.

“Hey, don’t worry, Rackham,” Wren flinches, still staring at Berkeley in horror, when he pats his cheek, smiling. “Like I said, I won’t kill you until I’m through with you, and I haven’t even started. So, what should we do first…?” He runs his finger down Wren’s chest, making him shiver, and cocks his head to the side, thinking. “I guess I should warn you that Daniel is- was,” he lets out a dry chuckle, “better at this than I am, so there’s a chance I’ll kill you by accident, or something. I want to start with something safe, though, so we can have more fun later.”

Wren is more than familiar with the meaning of the look in Berkeley’s eyes, together with his smirk - the gleam of an idea he’s not going to like at all.

“There’s this word you don’t like, right?” Berkeley walks over to a counter lined with various tools he’d found in the hideout. “Daniel told me to stop using it after my first visit.”

He picks up a knife and lifts it up to let his helpless captive take a good look at it; he inspects it with narrowed eyes, humming to himself before deciding that it’s the right tool for the job. He takes a rag and some antiseptic as well and turns around, delighted to see terror in Wren’s eyes, obvious despite his attempts to hide it behind a glare.

“I think it’s fitting, though.” Berkeley returns to the table and sets the knife aside for the time being. “After what you’ve done.”

“You’ve always liked the sound of your own voice,” Wren says, eyeing the knife anxiously, knowing exactly what Berkeley’s talking about but not wanting to accept it.

“Maybe.” Berkeley smiles; it's easier to smile now, when he can escape from his bleak reality back into the thrill of being fully in control. “But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to hear your voice, and by that I mean your screams. Feel free to do that as much as you like. No one’s gonna hear you here.”

The good news is that Wren is fairly sure he won't give Berkeley the satisfaction of hearing him scream; Daniel - whom Wren hasn't thought about this much in weeks, but he has more pressing matters to worry about right now - had cut him so many times that it had become part of the routine, such mundane torture. He’d be terrified if Berkeley plunged the knife into his abdomen with full intention of finishing what Daniel had started, but apparently the plan is to keep him alive.

For now.

The bad news, of course, is that he’s been kidnapped, brought somewhere no one can hear him scream, and he’s going to be tortured all over again.

I’m on Earth this time. Everyone knows I’m alive. They’re going to save me.

He closes his eyes.

Before it’s too late.

He flinches when Berkeley wipes down his chest with the rag, which he must have dipped in the antiseptic. When he notices his captive’s frown, he shrugs.

“Just to be safe. I can’t exactly take you to a hospital if something goes wrong, can I?”

"Why not? I'm sure everyone would be happy to see both of us," Wren says, fixing his eyes on the ceiling. "You could still do a good deed and not be charged with murder on top of everything else."

“So you think this is going to be my first murder,” Berkeley snorts, and Wren’s eyes snap to him in shock.

“You-”

“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t.” He shrugs, amused. “It’s just funny you assumed that. Anyway, Rackham,” he says as he grabs the knife and grins, “let’s get started.”

It doesn’t matter how much Wren had gone through with Daniel. It doesn’t matter that this shouldn’t affect him. He starts shivering, and he decides to blame it on the cold. He doesn’t want to close his eyes and show his torturer how scared he is, so he goes back to staring at the ceiling; the downside of that is that he can see Berkeley lowering the knife in his peripheral vision.

The sensation of the knife cutting into him is familiar, but so much time has passed that it still comes as a shock. It’s just a short line, the knife is dragged downwards and then raised, all but confirming Wren’s suspicions.

I.

It’s just a word. A stupid word. Soon to be carved into him, sure, but he is going to be found soon, and surely the cuts will be healable then, they will be gone without trace and that will be it. 

He still has to blink away tears when the knife returns. A line, a semicircle, then another, separate line.

D. I.

“So,” he says through gritted teeth, “now it’s your turn to leave your signature on me, huh?”

Berkeley rolls his eyes, but can’t hide a smile.

“Very funny, Rackham.”

“Thanks.”

O, cut out agonizingly slowly - and yet Wren doesn’t scream, barely even whimpers. It’s his tiny victory, not giving Berkeley the satisfaction he was hoping for. No matter what he does, it won’t be worse than what Daniel used to do. 

“How about I make a pun? I’m disappointed you’re not delivering.” He grits his teeth when the knife pierces his skin once more to carve the final letter, and he has to stifle a groan. “Alright, I got it: Your lack of appreciation for my jokes cuts me deep?”

Berkeley snorts at that and shakes his head. “Alright. I do appreciate them, for the record, cause I know what you’re hiding behind your idiotic humor.”

Wren frowns, but it’s not like he can argue with that. As the last line is added, he has to blink away new tears.

T.

Idiot.

Berkeley takes a step back to take a critical look at his work - even bloody letters on Wren’s chest, where he’ll have no choice but to see them, impossible to ignore unlike the brand on his back.

“Smile for the camera, idiot!” He snaps a few pictures, making sure to capture Wren’s expression, so desperately blank, but tense with pain and emotion, until he’s happy with the result. “Perfect. I can add these to all the damn photos Daniel had sent me. Maybe I’ll show you someday, take a trip down memory lane, hm?”

“I’ll pass,” Wren spits, glaring at Berkeley as he leans against the side of the table.

“You should still see this one, though,” he says, holding up his communicator - found in the hideout too, modified to be impossible to track down - with one of the photos displayed.

Just like when his mouth was stitched shut for the second time, it’s seeing the effects of the torture in a picture that finally hits. It’s not a picture of a survivor - it’s a picture of a hopeless, powerless captive at his captor’s mercy. 

It was supposed to be over. I was supposed to be free. I won, and it doesn’t mean shit.

“This is what your body will look like when they find it,” Berkeley says in the tone of casual small talk. “I mean, I’ll probably make a couple more modifications, but this” -he runs his finger around the carved letters, careful not to touch them- “is the first thing they’re going to see. A completely normal word for them. They’ll probably wonder why I’d choose something so mundane and… tame, but it doesn’t matter, does it? We know why, and that’s enough.”

Trying not to dwell on the promise of more modifications, Wren follows Berkeley with his eyes as he pushes himself upright and starts pacing to and fro: three steps, heel turn, three steps, lost in thought.

“You know, you disappointed me, Rackham,” he sighs.

“I’m so sorry,” Wren says, trying to sound unbothered, yet his heartbeat picks up the pace. It was supposed to be over. What else does he want?

“I wanted to hear you scream, remember? And you didn’t deliver at all.”

Wren swallows when Berkeley stops to pick up the knife and twirl it in his fingers.

“I should've expected that, honestly. It’s not your first time, and Daniel had cut you more times than you can count, hm?”

“It’s kinda what you signed up for when you sold me to a sadist.”

“Guess so,” Berkeley laughs, looking at Wren with narrowed eyes. “In that case I think I should try to come up with something Daniel never did to you, to really keep you on your toes.”

Then he smirks, and Wren knows he’s doomed.

His thoughts are racing when he follows Berkeley with his gaze as he circles the table, gently tapping the tip of the knife with his finger. Something he’s never experienced - or at least Berkeley thinks so, because he can’t know about everything Wren went through on SV-240. Even though the last thing he wants is to recall Daniel’s voice, Wren desperately tries to remember any torture methods Daniel had told him about, lamenting not having the means to try them out, but his mind draws a blank. He doesn’t have much time to try and predict what’s going to happen to him anyway; when Berkeley finally stops by Wren’s side, his movements are so fast that Wren barely has a chance to process what’s happening.

Berkeley takes his right hand.

Cut my hand?

Straightens out his fingers.

But it’s nothing new.

Grabs his pinky.

Wait-

Holds the knife right above the joint connecting the finger to the palm.

No, no, he can’t-

“You were complaining about the lack of puns.” Berkeley smiles down at Wren, who stares back at him with wide eyes. “So here’s one: keep your fingers crossed that the cut is clean.”

“No-”

It takes a second or two for Wren to get past the initial shock of having his pinky cut clean off, and when he does, the pain catches up to him, new and nauseating.

This time, much to his captor's delight, he does scream.

~~~