#karatekid3

This was hell.

“War is hell,” he had told you countless times before – he’d made use of the cliched saying on numerous occasions, but it had always rung hollow, an expression rendered meaningless from general overuse.

But now, trudging through the thick, muddy woods surrounding Terry’s chateau in the mountains in the hot, humid night, you think you’re beginning to understand that the saying was in no way hyperbole.

“How many times do we have to have this discussion, Y/N!? I told you, I don’t want to have this conversation,” Terry had growled, his body visibly thrumming with tension as he tried to keep himself under control. You give him a pitying expression, your heart going out to him, but you’re resolute in your pursuit to get him to talk about his trauma.

“Vietnam was such a significant time in your life, Terry. I know you’ve got a lot of repressed to protect yourself, but if you’re not willing to see a therapist about it, you have to at least try to let me in,” you beg, trying to deescalate and keep him calm, reaching for his hand. He moves out of your reach in a quick, jarring movement, his eyes wild and angry, and you try not to let it upset you too much.

“It’s okay, Terry. I’m not upset, and I’m not scared of you. I know that you’ve killed people, a–”

Terry interrupts you with a guttural noise, pushing you against the wall roughly. You stay perfectly still.

“See, that’s where you’re wrong, baby girl. You don’t know,” he murmurs quietly, pressing his body tightly against yours, overwhelming your senses. “We didn’t ‘kill people’; we eliminated obstacles,” he says flatly, stroking your hair absent-mindedly while he glares at something off in some imagined distance.

“Some with weapons pointed at you, many without. Men, women, children, we tried not to pay that much attention. It’s when you see them as people that you start to think, so we were trained to use our trigger fingers, not our brains.”

Despite being sandwiched between the wall and Terry’s chest, your body still finds a way to tremble with fear, though you try to suppress it.

“War is hell, Y/N,” he says, smiling sardonically at the cliché, his grip on your hip and your throat tightening; you don’t even remember him starting to choke you, but you find the edges of your vision getting blurry. “Not because you’re being shot at constantly, watching your brothers die, losing your will to live, but because you find yourself doing the same thing right back to somebody else.”

Terry reaches between your bodies to his belt, and you feel yourself tense minutely, knowing he would notice. He always needed to fuck you after talking about the War; he said that you helped him forget, even though what you desperately wanted was for him to remember, to work through it, to ease his conscience.

Sure enough, he’s got you slid up the wall, your legs around him as he fucks you deep and rough like he’s trying to crawl into your body. You do your best to hold on, every noise that passes your lips indistinguishable as either a moan or a whimper, Terry whispering nonsense into your hair as he chases after his orgasm like a man possessed.

“Makes you wonder if you’re the damned or the Devil,” he pants in your ear, licking up the single tear that trails down your cheek.

A branch snaps somewhere close by and you attempt to stifle the cry of pure, primal fear that bursts forth from your lips. Your body aches from the tension of holding still, freezing as every part of you strains to hear him, to see any hint of movement through the thick foliage.

He had proposed to you three nights ago, the heavy ring now safely on your bedside table – he’d suggestedthat you remove it during tonight’s… activities. Terry has always been mercurial, but this sudden turn from lavishing you with extravagant gifts and his love as you celebrated your engagement to outright hunting you through the forest for sport is demented, not to mention terrifying.

You aren’t sure what his goal is, what the end point will be, how you’ll know that it’s finally over. Does he mean to hunt you forever?

Can you even be considered ‘prey’ if you’ve willingly walked into the trap he set for you, and continue to stay in with full awareness and knowledge?

The sun continues to set, bathing the woods in bloodred light.

“You could be hiding in the muck, in a hole in the ground blown open by landmines for hours, days even,” Terry had told you, his gaze hardening as he looked off into nothing. “You’re scared to breathe, scared to feel sunlight on your skin – it leaves you exposed. Then you watch your friends get picked off like flies, bullets in their brains or landmines turning them into mulch.”

You try to force yourself to breathe slowly, deeply, regularly, but quietly; Terry would pick up on the slightest hint of noise on the wind. The small part of you that wants to just stand out in the open and let him find you – to end this – is drowned out by the thudding of your own heartbeat in your ears. You know there’s no reasoning with him; you can’t even reason with yourself.

You hear a piercing whistle from Terry’s lips, a chilling tune that echoes through the mountains that make your hair stands on end; at least, the hair not plastered to your skin by the thick mud smattered across your body. Unable to help yourself, you flee from your hiding spot, aimlessly sprinting, your sense of direction narrowing to just away.

“Fear keeps you alert, keeps you sharp. Keeps you alive.”

You hear his pounding footsteps coming after you, crunching leaves and twigs underfoot. You know how silently he can move; he’s stomping around just to scare you.

It’s working.

Your shirt snags, caught on another branch, and this time you just tear it off, leaving the tattered scrap of fabric behind you, dangling like a flag at half-mast. Your torso now bare, the cuts from your previous run-ins with the foliage are exposed to the air, stinging faintly. You wonder if he can taste your blood in the air, like a shark; it wouldn’t surprise you at this point. Nothing could.

“They were chameleons, blending into the jungle to lie in wait. We couldn’t see ‘em even five feet in front of us, sometimes. I learned to be a ghost, but in the end it still wasn’t enough – none of it mattered. Except I had John.”

You wonder if John had ever stalked his significant other – or anyone, for that matter – through the forest for his own amusement. Somehow, you doubted it. And while you’d always had a healthy dose of fear for the only man who could keep Terry Silver in line, at this moment you wish more than anything that it was Kreese hunting you instead. At least he could be reasoned with.

As if to prove your point, Terry lets out a maniacal cackle that scares off the remaining birds, and you dive behind a fallen log, pressing yourself against it in the hopes of avoiding detection. The thick mud is chilly on your bare skin yet you find you want to burrow deeper into the puddle to conceal yourself, and would if the noise wouldn’t attract his attention.

Terry enters your line of sight, so silently you wouldn’t have known he was there unless you were looking right at him, and you narrow your eyes into slits, not wanting so much as a glimmer of light reflecting off of them to give you away. Watching the fluid, controlled way that his massive body moves through the trees as he hunts you, you’re reminded of the xenomorph; something so big shouldn’t be able to move so smoothly, so silently.

He finally moves out of your field of view, but you wait a good minute or two before daring to breathe normally. You shakily get to your feet, looking around you for Terry and for any indication of which way the house is; you’re completely disoriented on the side of this godforsaken mountain. You have to squint due to the fading sunlight, and that’s when you see him, calmly surveying you from the distance while leaned up against a tree, his mouth twisted into a smile. Despite the low light, his eyes seem to glint at you from across the clearing.

“T-Terry!” you exclaim, your voice an octave higher than normal. He makes no move towards you or to answer your question, his head still cocked to the side as he observes you with interest.

“Terry, please stop this!” you beg, your arms wrapped around yourself. He chuckles quietly in response, the low sound creeping across the space between you and sending shivers down your spine.

“Oh, doll, that’s not how this works!” he tells you with a cold laugh. “There is no surrender.”

“What do you want from me, Terry?!” you exclaim, your voice hoarse with fear. “I just want this to be over!”

“It’ll be over when there’s only one man left standing,” he explains patiently, as though it was obvious. “When there’s a winner and a loser and the spoils of war are taken.”

You have no idea what that means, but you’re certain it’s nothing good.

“You either hunt or you are the hunted, Y/N,” he leers at you, finally moving to crouch into a runner’s stance that has you immediately stumbling back and away from him. “Get back to the house and I may show you some mercy.”

You cling to the likely empty promise like a lifeline, turning away and sprinting as fast as you can. You’re not even sure if you’re running in the right direction; he could be herding you somewhere else. Still, you have no choice but to keep moving forward, sensing him rapidly closing the distance between you.

But in the end, it doesn’t matter. You step down and feel something tighten around your ankle, the snare trap set off and lifting you into the air with a sickening crack of your ankle that has you screaming out in pain. Terry stops running, leisurely walking up to your dangling form and howling in victory; the hunt is over.

“I was so hoping you would run into one of these,” he confesses breathlessly, eyes bright as he takes you in, crouching down to be closer to your eye level. “You know what it does to me to see you helpless, Y/N,” he adds with a feral expression, his tone suggesting that you were intentionally tempting him.

“Terry, please!” you whimper up at him, tears blurring your vision as they slide around your eyes to drip off of your forehead and onto the forest floor. “I think my ankle is broken!”

“I’ll take care of it,” he says dismissively, but you do believe him. “For now, let me take you in.”

You do your best to ignore the pain and keep quiet as you hang by one leg, your body rotating slowly like it knew that Terry wanted to stare at you. As you slowly swing back around to face him again, you see he has pulled out his cock, pumping his shaft with a gloved hand. Seeing you watching, he closes the distance between you, reaching up above your ankle to steady the rope and keep you from spinning.

“Open,” he demands with a firm tap to your cheek, his hips level with your face. You suspect he had measured it out in advance for the express purpose of having you blow him while caught in a boobytrap.

“Terry, it hurts!” you manage to get out before he’s thrust himself inside your mouth. You reflexively stop trying to speak and relax your throat; he has trained you well.

“Spoils of war, doll. Gonna need you to earn your freedom,” he jokes, thrusting himself fully into you until you’re choking around his cock before releasing you, allowing you to catch your breath for a brief moment. “Now suck.”

You obey, just trying to focus on getting free before all the blood rushes to your head, the forest silent save for the lewd, wet noises coming from your mouth around his dick and Terry’s occasional grunt of pleasure.

“It’s not the same, you know,” he murmurs quietly after a prolonged silence. “You’ll never understand what it was like being there, no matter how many times I try to tell you, try to show you.”

So that’s what this was all about, you realize with equal parts pity and dread. He had grown weary of trying to explain his time during the War to you, and was trying to show you instead.

Christ, he was fucked up.

Somehow, in spite of everything, it only strengthens your resolve to help him.

“You’ll never know what it’s like, to be faced with someone and not know if they’re with you or against you, and only having a fucking second to decide!” he snarls while fucking your face, his large hands holding your body steady, fingernails digging in past the mud and into your flesh.

Next thing you know, he’s lifting your body up, cradling you against his chest, one hand reaching up and yanking the trap free from the branch in one sharp pull, lowering you both to the ground and crawling on top of you.

“But you don’t need to know it, baby,” he continues, though you’re unsure how much he’s really talking to you at this point. His hands tear at your pants, pushing them and your underwear down to your knees, pointedly not exacerbating your ankle. He wasn’t completely out of his mind, then. Why couldn’t he just talk about his issues? This perverse simulation is just creating issues of your own.

“You don’t need to know it,” he repeats, looking down at you, muddy and scratched and hurting, like you were his salvation. He pushes your knees to either side, working his length inside of you and pushing you further into the ground. You feel tree roots press into your back, bound to give you bruises.

“I’m gonna keep you from all of that shit; gonna keep you safe, babygirl,” he pants, breath hot against your neck as he ruts into you. You find yourself clinging to him desperately, nails digging into his broad shoulders as you cry out into the night – for yourself, for him, for your pleasure.

“You’re my saving grace, baby, my own little Lady Liberty,” he coos, baring his teeth all the while. “Flip over for me.”

You roll onto your belly, gritting your teeth against the pain radiating from your ankle as you do so, and push your ass up towards him. Terry is immediately on you again, his arms bracing himself on either side of you as he presses against you, fucking you into the mud with an animalistic growl.

“You save me just how you are, just like this,” he hisses, punctuating each word with a brutal thrust that has you groaning into the soft earth against your lips. “And you’re gonna stay just like this, sweet and warm and mine, my little haven, my little sweet spot, isn’t that right baby?”

“YES!” you howl, throwing your head back as you dig your nails into the dirt, bracing yourself as he pounds into you. “Let it out, let me take it for you!”

Your words seem to make Terry snap; he pushes your face down into the mud, hips hammering against yours hard and fast and deep until he’s coming hard inside you with a guttural snarl.

Fisting your hair, he pulls your head up and turns it to the side to let you breathe, even as he collapses on top of you. You gasp for breath, trying to wipe the mud off of your face, but it’s hopeless and you give up after a moment, stroking Terry’s arm where it’s wrapped around you.

Eventually Terry sits up, tucking himself back into his pants, somehow still barely muddy, and looks around the forest floor. He finds a thick branch, snapping it into pieces, and sets about making a splint for your ankle, not saying a word. You observe him quietly, the odd wince escaping you as he secures the splint to your foot. Satisfied with his work for the time being, he shrugs off his jacket, wrapping your naked body with it to get you warm before lifting you into his arms, mindful of your injured leg.

“Thank you,” you offer quietly, looking down at your foot instead of up at him as he carries you back home. You’re nearly embarrassed at how close you were this whole time. Terry adjusts you, his gaze never faltering as he moves you to look him in the eye.

“Thank you, my love,” he returns with a sly grin. “For helping me talk things out,” he clarifies, letting out a laugh at his twisted euphemism.

You don’t see the humour in the situation, but won’t be pushing him to open up about the War again for the foreseeable future.

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