Chapter Text
TK bleeds. The ground presses painfully into his body, the concrete cold and unforgiving beneath him. His body is a roiling wildfire of pain, one vicious ache burning into another. It’s impossible to tell them apart anymore, to distinguish one cut or wound from the next. The flesh of his torso is a mess he can’t bring himself to examine. He gathered the courage on three separate occasions, certain that each would be different than the last – clearer, easier – and found only ragged flesh and the bright slick of his blood each time. He was blinded by it, sickened, his own keen eye turning useless. He keeps his head tipped back for now, and breathes carefully through his nose.
His bones ache from sitting here, from being restrained in the same position so long. The knee of his bound leg begs sharply for extension, and the ache in his tailbone thrums so badly it turns him nauseous. It’s like turbulence on a plane, the way the meagre contents of his stomach lilt upwards and crash down again, the way his throat works against the rising bile, then contracts against nothing at all. The pain in his wrists is a constant hum, a vibration set under his skin. His eyes feel heavy and puffy from tears, aching and gritty every time he presses them shut. His pulse pounds so loud he can hear it in his ears, the wounds on his torso searing and throbbing. Cuts long and shallow, or nicks small but carved deep in his skin – the pain is almost enough to engulf him. All the while he moves his bound leg; up and down in the tiny increment his bonds allow him. The zip tie catches the nail every time, and hope is a flickering ember in his chest, bright yet fragile – like a cigarette lit in a rainstorm.
He’s been here for almost ten hours.
He knows this without question, a sickening spot of clarity among the thick fog of agony dragging through him. He knows because of the timers, because of Arrin’s twisted fastidiousness – the way he drew the knife from his skin last time as the timer trilled and TK could finally stop thrashing, yelling. TK’s muscles had finally relaxed, tears welling in place of his screams as his adrenaline shifted from one thing to another. Tears had slid down TK’s face, and as he glared up at his captor, Arrin leaned in, pressed his lips to TK’s damp forehead, and murmured against his skin.
“We’re into double digits next time,” he’d said, the words brimming with something like wonder. The way, as a child, TK had thrummed with excitement at the notion of turning ten, so his captor revered the notion of ten minutes spent torturing him. Nine minutes had been bad enough. It was seared into his flesh and his memory forever. He couldn’t hold back his sobs. Arrin ascended the stairs once again, TK’s blood dripping from the point of his knife. TK had cried as his wounds burned sharply, and he asked the universe, silently, where his mom was. Why wasn’t she here for him yet? Why hadn’t she sent the ransom? He’d find a way to pay her back somehow, whatever she wanted him to do. He’d work at the law firm between shifts at the firehouse, sell off all his records and his gaming consoles. It would take years but he’d do it. He’d make it so she didn’t regret it, so it wasn’t really a loss in the long run. He’d go to rehab and he’d mean it this time. He’d do more, be more. Arrin left him alone in this room, and TK bargained wordlessly as the tears slid down to his chin. He’d be everything his family wanted him to be, all the things he’d fallen short of before. He didn’t care what it took anymore. He was sorry, and he meant it, and he’d change. If he could break his own bones and heal into something different, he would. The moment his mother took action to save him, TK would become someone better.
“I promise,” he whispered, as though his mother could hear him, his breath shaky and hitching through his tears. “I promise, I promise, I–”
A sudden lurch of pain shot through him. One wound into another, like being sliced open all over again, somewhere under the small swell of his left pectoral. TK faltered, cried out with the sting of it. As quickly as it came, the spike of pain fell back to its simmering baseline. His train of thought disappeared in the fog, and TK had simply wept.
He’s awake now. Not awake in the sense he could sleep, or even that his body has let him pass out. He’s awake in the sense that it hurts just to breathe – hurts even when he tries not to breathe – but his mind has regained some small sense of composure, instinct sinking in with its teeth. His thoughts have reverted from bargains to plans, and his heart gallops at the simple irony of this; the fact that he’s waiting for Arrin. If his escape plan stands any chance of success, he needs Arrin there first, needs him close – just one more time – before he can finally run from him. So he sits on the concrete and he bleeds from his wounds. Among the eerie quiet of night, the trees rustle softly in the chilling breeze. Even the birds are resting now, and the city lies distant and sleeping. TK stares at the unmoving stairs, and schools his breath to stay even. It’s something almost like a sick meditation, adrenaline cresting one moment and curdling the next. There’s a vile taste at the back of his throat, and he works at the zip tie all the while. His foot lifts and drops and TK doesn’t stop, not even when his calf muscles pull tight, threatening to cramp from repetition. He plays his plan over again in his mind, and wills nine hours to tick over into ten.
It’s sickening when it happens. The thuds of Arrin’s boots pull the floor from his stomach, even from a distance. They grow louder, the whir of TK’s blood gaining traction in tandem. When the joints of the metal staircase groan, regret flashes through him in a white hot burst – regret for having willed Arrin back to him, shame at having wanted him here. The walls of his chest pull tight in his panic. The calm stillness of his scheming is snuffed to nothing.
The metal clangs beneath Arrin’s languid steps. He’s leisurely, completely unhurried. The message it sends is stark and insidious – that he can take all the time he wants with TK. Arrin’s plan is unfolding exactly how he wants it to, and no one is going to interrupt it. TK swallows hard as Arrin meets his eye. He skates his palm down the railing, fingers outstretched and moving softly, almost as though drumming against the air itself, to the lilt of some imagined tune – the beat of his own control. There’s blood on his face in sprays and spatters, dried to pale skin as it is to his clothes, and to the glinting metal of his knife. The blade of it dangles in his free hand, and his thin lips curl into their smirk. The spark in Arrin’s eye is bright and dangerous, could burn this whole place to the ground. Dread and anger roil together in TK, even through the fog of his agony. Arrin’s expression, his whole damn demeanour, reminds TK how much he’s enjoying this. He claims this is some kind of social experiment, but he’s treating it more like a leisure activity. TK fears him with everything he has, and in the same instant he hates him viscerally.
No one is coming to interrupt Arrin’s plans; so TK will do it himself.
“How are we feeling?” Arrin asks, a tilt of his head as he draws towards him. His eyes start on TK’s face, then roam the stinging mess of his body. His gaze flicks downwards in stilted increments, as if savouring the sight of each injury. The smirk widens, a look on his face like pride, and he carries himself tall with his shoulders set back, like he’s buoyed by the plainness of his power. TK shakes under the scalpel of Arrin’s gaze, and wills his own voice not to tremble, wills it upwards out of his tight chest. Arrin beats him to speaking, his voice soft, almost saccharine. “Are you sore? Have you ever felt pain like this before? Does your mind even know how to process it, Tyler?”
“I need to use a restroom,” TK manages, ignoring the bite of resentment at the use of his unabbreviated name. His voice drags, a wavering husk of itself, but it’s enough. If it sets his plan in motion all the same, it doesn’t matter how broken he sounds. Arrin’s gaze flicks to TK’s. He considers him for a moment, blinking slow and watching keenly. TK wonders if, beneath the eerily calm demeanour, he’s watching Arrin scramble. He wonders if he’s already displacing his plans.
“Do you?” Arrin asks, an airy lilt to his voice that sends goosebumps rippling over TK’s forearms. He swallows hard against the weight of his own fear, his throat a tight fist as he works it. TK nods, and Arrin’s eyebrows quirk. It’s not a lie. His bladder twinges and cramps now in earnest. He’s been holding it since the end of hour nine – almost an hour by now, after eight hours without water or the opportunity to go. It’s a genuine problem that isn’t a problem at all. He can hold it until Arrin concedes his request. He can hold it until he’s free if he has to. Arrin hums, swings the knife in lazy circles at his side, almost as if the blade is stirring with the breeze rather than at Arrin’s will. “And what do you suppose we should do about that?”
“Untie me,” TK says, and it earns him a burst of laughter from Arrin. The sound is loud and sudden. TK startles despite himself. He lets his eyes slip shut a moment, then wills himself to meet Arrin’s eye. “Please, man. K-keep the handcuffs on or whatever. Just take me somewhere I can piss. Please. There..th-there must be a toilet in here. Please.” He squirms under Arrin’s darkening gaze, part for effect, and part in true need.
“That really isn’t my problem,” says Arrin, a flatness to his voice that prickles at the hope in TK’s chest, deflating it moment by moment. TK loses Arrin’s attention then, watches him slide his phone from his pocket. TK has no doubt what he’s doing with it. He’s thumbing his way to the timer. Dread roils suddenly underneath TK’s ribs. His body screams in its thrumming agony, and his wounds are white hot in his flesh. The rest of him has turned cold as ice water, like he’s lost in a perilous sea. Phone in hand, white light touches Arrin from his chin to his brow, casting him in shadows that emphasise the sharpness of him. Darkness coalesces at his cheeks and over his eyes, so heavy it’s almost like liquid, slick on his skin as he focuses. The blade moves circular all the while, playful in the monster’s hand. His eyes slide upwards to TK’s once more, and his smile is hellish in the artificial glow. “Ten minutes, Tyler. God, the things I’m gonna do to you now.”
Arrin takes another step forward.
“Wait,” TK urges. The word comes so quick and so desperate that his captor pauses midstep. The creak of his leather boots goes silent, his thumb stills over the glow of his screen. TK works to infuse desperation into his very expression. He doesn’t have to try hard. He tilts his head to one side to look up at him. “Please.”
“Tyler,” Arrin says, head cocked sideways, smiling in a twisted faux sympathy. “You can go any time you have to. I don’t recall ever saying you couldn’t. But it was sweet of you to wait for permission. You want me to praise you – is that it? Tell you you’ve been a good boy?”
“No,” TK gasps. His plan is failing and his insides feel ragged, raw from the teeth of his terror. It has to work. He has to find a way to make it.
“Because you have been,” Arrin tells him. He looks at him straight on this time, his gaze as dark as it is smug. Arrin crouches slowly before him, and smiles in the shock of the half light. “I’m going to start cutting your arms now. Gonna slice through your pretty tattoos.”
“Please,” TK tries, hope and fear swirling into a terrible beacon, each flashing bright and desperate in his chest. “My arms are tired. It…i-it hurts keeping them up like this.”
“Oh,” says Arrin, drawing the word out slowly. He eyes TK’s bonds momentarily, and then meets his gaze once more. “Tell me, sweet boy – would you prefer something more comfortable?” He slides his gaze from TK then, casts it over his shoulder for TK to follow.
The mattress. Bare and dusty it sits in the corner, not Arrin’s, but still very much here. Arrin looks at him once more, watches as TK gapes at the sight of it. Arrin tucks the knife handle into his palm, and strokes TK’s cheek with his knuckles. TK startles. His whole body jolts, and every searing pain receptor lights up in sheer agony. He yells with it.
“Is that what you want?” Arrin murmurs, and TK’s stomach convulses. He shakes his head, eyes welling quickly with fresh tears.
“No,” he says. “N-no. Please.” Hatred and shame coil tightly in his stomach. As desperately as he despises Arrin, he resents himself now for doing this – for falling so easily into Arrin’s trap; for going from resolute and ready to escape, to pleading that Arrin in fact doesn’t untie him. Arrin has every answer prepared, as though he knew TK would ask for these things. He knows exactly how to rebuke his requests. There’s a voice at the back of TK’s mind that vies to simply be heard. It reminds him he’s only trying to survive. He’ll do whatever he has to to make it, and this is merely a hoop through which he must jump.
“I like that word,” says Arrin, stroking TK’s cheek in repetitive motion, the blade gleaming in TK’s peripheral vision, like headlights veering sharp round a corner. “Please. Such a versatile word, isn’t it? You’ve lost any value as a human being but you’ve clearly kept your manners.” TK squeezes his eyes shut now, a sob bursting from him in a trembling breath. Arrin hums in response, and as more tears slide down TK’s cheeks, his stomach turns at the memory of Arrin licking them off of him. He prays he won’t do it again. He prays he won’t do something worse. “But I’m disappointed in you, Tyler.”
TK’s eyes fly open now, with a gasp between quiet sobs. There’s a teasing edge to Arrin’s voice, and when TK meets his eye Arrin purses his lips into something like faux sympathy. This is all a game to Arrin, but it doesn’t make it less real to TK. There’s something in his voice this time – something more; something worse – a different kind of weight to it that only makes TK tremble. His words fail him entirely. There’s nothing he could say that could help him now. He opens his mouth to scramble for something, but all that emerges is a squeak. Arrin huffs out a breathy laugh in response, and TK’s face turns hot. The knife still tucked deftly in his hand, Arrin takes the flesh of TK’s cheek, traps it between thumb and forefinger, and pinches until TK whimpers. The pain is small compared to the rest of him, but Arrin alters the set of his grip and digs his thumbnail in hard, and the pain gets suddenly loud. He thinks he’s going to bruise from this. He thinks Arrin has broken the skin.
“Do you want to know why I’m disappointed, sunshine?” Arrin asks him, and TK can only whine with the pain, with Arrin’s simple proximity. Arrin tightens the grip of his fingers, his eyes alight with a sickly brightness. He draws close enough that his breath brushes against TK’s skin, and terror spreads through TK’s body in a slick and revolting slide. He can’t nod, can’t shake his head. He doesn’t know how to speak. Arrin glares. “Because they all try to bargain with me. They cry for me to untie them, as if I’m just going to obey them. Then they make their cute little plans, and think they can outsmart me. It takes them a long time to understand what I meant when I told them they’re mine. You don’t belong in the world anymore, Tyler. Nobody wants you back.”
“Sto–” TK whispers, shaking so badly his jaw clamps involuntarily, teeth clicking together audibly. He swallows involuntarily, and Arrin tilts his head lower. “St-stop. Stop.”
“No more please?” Arrin asks. TK says nothing, his breath coming in terrible, stilted bursts. Arrin releases him then, and rises slowly to his feet. He turns his attention to his phone once more, clicks the timer on, and slips it back into his pocket. TK’s chest pulls so tight he can scarcely recall how to breathe. Nine minutes was bad enough. The only thing saving him from hopeless despair was the surety he’d get away. That hope turns to ashes in his throat now, burned to nothing under the searing heat of Arrin’s glare. His captor grips the knife in his hand, but doesn’t lean in to use it just yet. “Do you know what always fascinates me?”
He cuts a look briefly to TK, eyes colder than TK has seen them. He bites his lip just to keep his mouth shut, as though his ragged breaths are too loud. He tries to school them back to baseline, but the panic in his chest is getting away from him, spiralling slowly upwards. Arrin tilts his head to one side, draws the blade to his face as if to inspect it. With his free hand, he touches a finger to TK’s dried blood. Despite TK’s desperation to hold them back, another sudden sob breaks free.
“What fascinates me,” Arrin goes on, “is how long it takes them to get over this – this desperate desire to live. It’s one of the most interesting parts of my research, you know? Some of them scream at me for hours, and not even because of the pain. Some of them are so…ferocious at first, so fucking desperate to go back to their lives. It takes them a while to understand.” He laughs now, and TK’s stomach convulses at the sound, as wrong on the air as the way he holds himself, like no part of Arrin belongs to this world. “I suppose that’s my fault. I can’t exactly expect people to think clearly at first. Adrenaline.”
“I’m sorry,” TK says now. Arrin stills, statuesque aside from the slow blink of his eyes.
“Are you?” he breathes, and TK can’t tell if he’s delighted or repulsed. TK’s blood cries loud through his body. Arrin’s speech bleeds terror into him, weaves it right under his ribs. He doesn’t want to hear any more of it, is gripped suddenly by the notion that apologies might protect him more effectively than silence.
“I’m sorry,” he repeats. “F-for asking. I-I promise I just wanted to–t-to go to the restroom. But I’m sorry. I-I’m sorry you thought I was trying to outsmart you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” Arrin’s expression darkens. It suits the shadows around them perfectly. When he scowls he looks like a creature rather than a person. He looks like some kind of monster.
“There you go again,” he says, voice low and wavering. The timbre of his anger hums low in his throat, and regret engulfs TK in an instant. There are too many sharp edges to get caught upon here. Arrin himself is made up of them. “Pretending I don’t know what you’re doing. You had your chance out there, Tyler – in the world. You blew it. You wasted your whole fucking life, so I get to choose how it ends now. Your mother doesn’t want you, your junkie friends won’t miss you. Your father can replace you easily at the firehouse. I’m the only person left alive who wants you.”
“They l-love me,” TK manages, but his voice is weak and the words taste wrong. If they love him, why haven’t they saved him yet? Arrin knows him as well as any of them. TK doesn’t understand how but he does – somehow he does. Arrin sees through the sheen of his mask; the neat clothes and the quaffed hair and the leeway he’s been given at times just for the strength of his jawline. Arrin knows what lies underneath, sees him for his flaws and his fuck ups. His assessment of TK is completely correct. TK knows he was too much for his parents, and not enough by equal measure. He clings to the sentiment all the same, and bites his lip just to stop it from wobbling.
“Do they though?” Arrin asks him. The question is plain and sharp as the knife. The answer is as stark as his fate. TK sinks his teeth in harder, then gives up and bursts into tears.
“I’m gonna forgive you for trying to trick me,” says Arrin. TK’s eyes are tightly shut. He doesn’t see Arrin drawing towards him, but he startles at his hand in his hair. “Would you like that?” TK opens his eyes now, searches Arrin’s face through the blur of his tears. He finds nothing soft there to match Arrin’s tone, sees nothing but the sharp and dangerous glint in his eye. But he does what he has to to survive. He does what he simply has to.
“Yes,” he breathes. “Yes, I would like that. Y-yes.”
“Yes…” Arrin prompts, and TK chokes back a sob. His face contorts with it all the same, his mouth twisted sharply with the weight of it.
“Yes…” TK whispers. “P-please.”
“Good boy,” says Arrin, drawing back from him once more. “Then I’ll forgive you. But I’m going to have to punish you first.” TK gasps, looks up at him quickly. Dread turns every part of him cold and Arrin bursts swiftly into motion. He drops all his weight to one leg, lifts the other from the ground in a heartbeat. He bends his right knee sharp and fast, draws it up as high as his hips.
The air goes out of TK’s lungs. Arrin slams his foot down.
He stomps down hard on TK’s foot, heavy boot against a thin layer of leather. The crack echoes badly through the open space.
TK wails. His scream rings back to him and so does the snap of his bones. He jerks his leg back quickly, tucks it in close against his body. The drag of broken bones against the concrete floor is blinding. His vision thrums white with violent pain, his stomach clenching and roiling fast. Nausea slices wildly through him. It pushes the air from his lungs. Even the sound of him turns breathless, his cry growing broken and strained, fading beneath the sick vibrance of his agony. In the end his mouth is open and twisted sharply in pain. His breath scrapes out of him and renders him hollow. His blood whirs through his ears like a siren.
This isn’t the first time he’s broken a bone, but it’s the first time someone has done it deliberately. His throat feels thick as it works prematurely, ready to expel the contents of his stomach, ready to force bitter bile upwards. TK’s face is wet with tears and his breaths come in shuddering gasps. He writhes and pulls and tugs at his bonds. He feels new blood spilling over his forearms, but he barely feels the pain in his wrists.
“F-fuck!” he manages, with a sob that sounds like shattered glass. He curls his toes and the pain veers louder. He flexes his foot experimentally, body shaking wildly as his head whirs dizzy, and the pain bites back at him like something living. TK jolts and fights against sickness. He’s distantly aware of a terrible sound here, a noise caught between choking and dry heaving. It’s only when he pauses for breath that he realises he’s capable of making this noise. He doesn’t even sound like himself. He barely even sounds like a person. “You broke my foot. You b-broke my fucking foot!”
“For a good cause,” Arrin says, his shrug slow and casual.
“A good cause?” TK bites, his voice veering wild and upward in pitch. His incredulousness goes hand in hand with his anger, and thrums alongside his stark sense of helplessness. One foot bound and the other one broken. Arrin stalks towards him, though does not yet crouch down. He stands over TK, lets his shadow fall over him, and drags his sickening gaze over TK’s body. Arrin’s lips quirk, and TK’s face turns hot. Arrin’s gaze lingers near TK’s upper thighs, and TK’s stomach drops when he realises why. His pants are wet. At some point during the latest attack, this new and shocking method of assaulting him, TK lost control of his body. He snagged his bound leg on the loose nail of the scaffolding; he cut his torn wrists even further. And his bladder gave. Beneath the reverence of Arrin’s stare, humiliation burns fiercely over him, a heat creeping along TK’s neck as he’s stared at – seen. Arrin doesn’t blink and TK’s heart stutters badly, as if forced out of healthy rhythm.
‘I might have already ruined you for life,’ Arrin said earlier. TK’s mind supplies the words, but he tries desperately not to think about them. Arrin’s eyes leave his body and fix on his face, as if watching him for signs of his breaking. A sob sears brightly in TK’s chest. He holds his breath until it ebbs away. It doesn’t stop his lips from wobbling, doesn’t stop his eyes from aching with tears. Arrin dons a near sympathetic smile, and reaches down to brush a hand through his hair. At the very last moment he grips it tightly, jerks TK’s head back until he gasps.
“Tell me something, sunshine,” says Arrin, leaning over him now, drawing so close that his breath touches TK’s lips. TK squeezes his eyes shut, then thinks better of it when Arrin pulls harder. “Are you going to try to trick me again?”
“No,” TK gasps. The word comes out fast and his shame only deepens. His blood whirs through him violently; his vision blurs with fresh tears. It’s almost too hard to keep his eyes open.
“Then it was for a good cause,” says Arrin. He uncurls his fist and strokes TK’s hair softly. TK swallows a rush of acrid bile, and a sob tears finally free from his throat. Arrin’s smile simply deepens. He touches the blade to TK’s chest. He doesn’t dig it in this time, drags the metal up over his torso. It catches his wounds and it chills at his skin. Arrin’s eyes are starkly alight, and he drags the blade upwards still – past his clavicle and into the hollow of TK’s throat. He adds an ounce of pressure, until the blade nicks into the skin. It feels like a bug bite, or the prick of a pin. Arrin’s head tilts leftwards, and TK feels the blood as it trickles down his throat.
“St-stop it,” he whispers. “Please. C-come on.”
“You’re shaking,” Arrin tells him. TK squeezes his eyes shut, and forces himself to hold his breath. When the blade lifts from the tender skin of his throat, TK lets out a sob. It’s breathy and small, and comes to nothing more, until the moment the blade touches his arm instead. “Tell me all about your tattoos.”
“Fuck you,” TK whimpers, and Arrin laughs. There’s something almost jovial about it, the sound so painfully out of place. It’s as though Arrin could be human in some other context. TK wonders if he has friends, a family, colleagues. Could this monster have people who think that he’s harmless, when at night he takes knives to other people?
“Now now,” Arrin warns. He touches the blade to one of TK’s tattoos, the one by the crook of his elbow. “Tell me about the cute little bee. Tell me everything it means to you, while I cut it right out of your skin.”
“No!” TK pleads, his voice veering upwards. By the time Arrin digs the blade into the skin – carving deep into his tattoo – TK has forgotten how to speak. TK is simply screaming.
-
Eight hours later, the floor is slick with his blood. He sits in it, no choice but to feel the way it pools as it seeps from him. His mind is a sea of broken waves, crashing together and then roughly apart beneath the practised twist of Arrin’s wrist. The blood beneath him grows cold and sticky and he feels it through the fabric of his dress pants. Everything hurts. The new cuts are sharp and bleeding freely, and the old ache and throb as his body longs to heal them. Some of these cuts would close on their own, if TK could stay alive long enough. Others are deep or gaping, or one cut layered atop dozens. There’s a nick on his throat that reopens when he swallows. All of his tattoos are ruined.
Arrin’s attention is fixed on his thigh now, crouched at his right and staring down. His fingers brush over him; there and then gone. He gathers the fabric of TK’s pants, pinches it between thumb and forefinger, and draws it away from his flesh. TK watches with his head lolled to one side, peering through the burn of his vision as the skin of his temple sticks to the inside of his left arm. His face is slick with the sweat of exertion. It’ll come away stained with blood. It trails from his forearm in dedicated rivulets, and TK’s teeth chatter from the deep cold sinking into him. It’s winter outside and he’s lost too much blood. He can’t remember the last time he felt warm. The gasp he gives at the flick of the knife barely touches his lungs. The room is shimmering at the edges of his vision. He’s woozy with blood loss and all the things that he knows now – that a human body can hurt like this, that there are people in the world who like to torture for fun. Before now, people like Arrin only existed in horror movies, or in articles in his father’s true life magazines. But now Arrin’s gaze slides upwards to meet him, and he smirks as he slips the blade of his knife into the fabric.
The fabric rips easily at the press of the blade. TK’s heart stutters anew. He barely has the energy to hold his own head up, but he still has the energy to be scared. Dread crawls into the back of his throat, and Arrin stops the cutting just above TK’s knee. There’s a glint in his eyes, so stark and alive and filled with utter passion. He spares a moment to take in the sight of him, and huffs a breathy laugh.
“It’s okay, sunshine,” Arrin tells him. “I know it hurts, but you really are doing so well. You like that, don’t you? When I praise you.”
TK doesn’t answer. He longs to pull his gaze away but it’s too late to feign disinterest, and he’s too drained to draw on defiance. He blinks slowly, and otherwise holds Arrin’s gaze. A weak glare is the best he can muster.
“Look at you,” Arrin breathes as if enraptured, his tongue flicking out to wet his lips. “So beautiful. So pissed off. Don’t worry, Tyler. It’s all gonna be over soon. You’ll never have to suffer again.” His eyes bore deeply into TK, long enough that he struggles not to gasp for breath. He doesn’t want to give Arrin the satisfaction. Arrin’s eyes slide back to TK’s thigh, and he shifts slightly on his haunches. “Just give me a few more hours.”
A few more hours.
TK lets his eyes slip shut, and Arrin touches the tip of the blade to his upper right thigh. He pauses.
“Oh my,” he says. It’s that sound again; faux awe, twisted at the back of Arrin’s throat to become condescending. TK knows what he’s doing but still he shrinks under the sound of it. His heart stutters with the knowledge of what has snared Arrin’s attention. He squeezes his eyes shut, tries to count his trembling breaths. Arrin pulls apart the torn fabric of his pants, leans in for a better look at his thigh. He leans in so close that TK shudders, swears he can feel Arrin’s breath on his skin — on his scars. “What have we here?”
“Get on with it,” TK tells him. He forces his eyes open, the bite in his voice quelled by exhaustion and pain. It’s in his chest all the same, quiet but sparking, and he does his best to infuse it into his words. “Just…just get on with it.”
“You’re asking me to cut you?” Arrin asks. TK holds his eye until the ice in them seeps under his skin and he shivers. He drags his gaze away and Arrin puffs out a satisfied scoff. “You can ask me, Tyler. It’s just a shame, you know? You’ve already beaten me to it. All this whining and complaining about the knife, and all the while you’ve been hiding your own craftsmanship from me.”
“Shut up,” TK whispers. The strength is gone before he can even grasp for it. His shoulders ache fiercely from having his arms suspended upwards for so long, and his spine longs to be straighter than he can get it like this, hunched over for hours now. The skin of his wrists are raw in places, torn and bleeding in others. His new wounds ache sharply through him, and his broken foot throbs quickly and hard. The pain is loud in his body, his nerves like a siren alerting TK to an emergency. Pain is the body’s way of telling him that something needs to be tended to. His body doesn’t know that he’s tied up and stuck here. So it aches. It aches and it screams and it trembles in agony, and all the while TK sits here, the scars on his thigh growing hot under Arrin’s gaze. It’s as though they’re fault lines lighting up; lava drawing upwards through broken cracks of dry desert ground. He’s seen that in a video game before — he’s sure of it. One he played with his dad as a kid. One he was too young for. It was the violence of it, he remembers. The memory is innocuous on the surface, but it sickens him as much as everything else, and he wants it gone. “Just shut the fuck up.”
“God,” says Arrin. “You really are something vile. Your scars are the nicest thing about you, do you know that? Do you want me to open up these pretty marks, Tyler? Do you want to feel the relief of them again? I bet they helped you cope, didn’t they? I bet it felt therapeutic.”
“Stop it,” says TK. His voice is a hopeless breath punching out of him.
“I wonder if it’ll feel that way this time,” Arrin muses. He presses the tip of the blade back to his thigh, and draws a breath so deep that it trembles. “Reopening scars is one of my favourite things to do with you people. You’ve been holding out on me. After everything we’ve been through. I think you owe me an apology.”
“Go to hell,” TK breathes. His chest heaves, his heart pounding so hard he almost can’t keep up with it. Something pulls at the edges of his consciousness — the desperate need to sleep, but elevated into something violent. He hasn’t passed out yet, but he could. He might. Arrin shoots him a sickening glare, and TK swallows hard, reopens that nick on his neck. “Y-you’re gonna kill me anyway, right?”
“Yes,” says Arrin, without pause. He says it like there’s never been anything simpler. He says it like he can’t see how it’s relevant.
“What’s the…” TK starts, his voice faltering for a moment. “What’s the point in d-doing what you say?”
“You’ve got three hours left to live,” says Arrin. He says it slowly, dragging the tip of the blade featherlight along the skin of his thigh, ropey and uneven, scar tissue over scar tissue from years of silent self harm. It had distracted him during attempts at recovery, then soothed his self loathing during the inevitable relapse. “How many bones do you think I could break in that time? How painful a death would you like me to give you?”
“She’ll save me,” TK whispers, though the words scrape out of somewhere hollow inside him. Arrin laughs now, a wretched sound, like he knows TK doesn’t believe it anymore.
“Yeah yeah,” he says, dismissing TK’s words in an instant. “Even if she did, I have no qualms whatsoever about sending you back broken like that. You’re a paramedic — kind of. What type of brain injury do you think I could leave you with if I smashed your head into this scaffolding — over and over and over again? Hm? You didn’t like it when I tasted your tears. Maybe I could do more of that instead.” He touches his free hand to TK’s thigh now, skates his palm quickly over the risen tissue of the scars, and grips hard at the flesh of his inner thigh.
TK gasps. It’s as if all the lights turn on at once. He jolts, eyes wide. All of a sudden he’s vividly conscious, twisting futilely beneath Arrin’s touch, the words spilling out all at once.
“Okay okay,” he clamours. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Arrin, okay? I’m sorry I didn’t tell you a-about my…about my scars. Just…I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” By the end of it his voice is shaking. He’s trembling badly and his eyes sting sharply, growing quickly wet. He doesn’t try to stop the tears. Arrin tightens his grip on the flesh of his thigh, the pain of it dull and claustrophobic. The tears fall freely, and Arrin’s grasp grows firmer in breathless increments.
“So I can cut you there?” Arrin asks, his voice low; smooth in a way that has TK swallowing bile. His grip tightens once. It tightens again. “I can open up all of your beautiful handiwork?”
“Yes!” TK cries, desperate. “Yes, you can cut me. Y-you can do it. Yes.”
Arrin squeezes harder now, his grip inescapable and bruising. TK holds his breath for a moment, then dissolves into shuddering sobs. Arrin merely inclines his head. He stares.
“Good,” he says. He’s quiet, voice soft. “Good boy, Tyler.”
He relinquishes his grip.
Relief roars through TK like the first crash of a thunderstorm, tension in the air begging to break with the force of it. Arrin hums, shifts slightly as he drags his palm back over the flesh of TK’s thigh. The unease at TK’s core doesn’t vanish, but it changes, tight in a different way this time. His blood turns cold and sickly in his veins, his stomach convulsing painfully around its lack of contents. But Arrin lifts his hand from TK’s skin, and TK can breathe somewhat easier. There’s an ache pressed into his inner thigh, the lingering ghost of Arrin’s grip. But Arrin isn’t touching him now. TK can see both of his hands — one around the hilt of the blade, and one resting on his own knee. His body eases ever so slightly, and Arrin merely hums. He touches the knife to TK’s scars, and presses the blade hard against them. Despite himself, TK whimpers.
“You know,” says Arrin, cold eyes fixed on the movements of the knife, gaze shimmering with elation; enraptured. “I’ve got something really spectacular planned for hours twenty and twenty one.”
“Fuck,” TK breathes. In places the ropey scar tissue is thick, but nowhere is it entirely numb. The blade is sharp and searing, and it makes easy work of his flesh. His chest has stilled but the tears keep falling. His foot throbs so hard he knows not to move it, forces himself to keep still under the blade this time. He does that, and ignores the curling pang of disgust at himself for doing so.
“One more session after this one,” Arrin muses, “and then we’re starting your grand finale. Your magnificent exit from this plane of existence. You’ve already given me permission to cut you. By the time I’m ready to finish you off, you’ll be pleading just like that again.”
TK simply shakes his head. He doesn’t dare to speak the words, wants no further punishments for defiance of any kind. The movement is almost involuntary, though — like it’s a baser instinct not to give in to Arrin entirely.
“Yes,” Arrin corrects, the word punctuated by the knife biting deeper into him. TK grits his teeth and cries out through them. He’s sick of the feeling of blood on his skin. It spills from his scars — forcibly reopened, more painful at the hands of another than they ever were at his own. His leg shakes badly the longer he holds it still for Arrin, and the vibration of it thrums ever downwards. It scrapes against his broken bones; fuel to the flames of his agony. “By the end of it you’ll be thanking me for letting you die. By the end you’ll be begging me to kill you.”