Whumptober Day thirteen: "this is gonna suck" | burns | cauterization
Alternate (#altno.1) Prompt – Losing Control
{non graphic violence}
[Jason Todd & The Lazarus Pit]
-!!!-
"Up," the trainer commanded, sending bolts of fire into Jason's ribs as his little toy soldier drove a knee into his bruised side. Air left his lungs and bloody, split knuckles stung on the ground and his leg burned with tendrils of pain. Red blurred with green, spitting and snarling to reach up and break every bone in her body, slit her throat with the knife he had concealed. It was strapped to his inner thigh, somewhere most people are too shy to check. It was tiny – one of those disposable plastic ones – but in certain hands, it could very well be a death sentence.
The girl was impossibly good. A few months older than Jason and had received intense training that he had only just gotten via crash-course.
She hasn't killed yet, the brutal assassin said, but she will.
What do you mean? Jason had asked.
I need to strip her of one last thing, he told the boy, putty under the heavy dose of alcohol and a special concoction another mentor had taught that helps loosen the tongue, then she will be the perfect weapon.
Which is?
David wolfishly grinned, Her humanity.
Brown eyes stared holes into his back, hardened if you did not dig deeper. Her father had not taught her to speak, but her eyes seemed to beg. Beg for him to get up, begged for forgiveness, begged to know if he was alright.
Green battered around his brain like an angry sea, rage blindsiding him. The voice floated to his ear, hissing and spitting like a feral animal. "It'd be a favour," it snarled, "To put her out of her misery."
No, Jason shivered as he propped a knee from under him, I can't.
He dropped down, shaking like a lone leaf in a storm, emerald and crimson smudging like a painting that had fallen into water.
I can't.
"Give me control," it shot back, "Together we can be gods, conquering and spilling blood, saving those who can't save themselves. No one will touch us; we will be forever victorious."
No, he nearly sobbed, the voice of David Cain floating in the background like an incessant ring as he tried to calm the acid water curling his insides. No conquering. We aren't gods. No one is.
"We can be," the green covered the red, but Jason clung onto the ever-growing puddle, "We can eradicate filth like Cain. We can be the harbinger of justice, far better than Batman could be."
That name brought bile to Jason's throat as everything tensed, a ball of compressed emotions clogging his throat.
Get up, Cain shouted, How can you be Talia's pet is you are so weak? Pathetic? An afraid little boy?
As far as he knew, Jason had never been a boy. From his youth he had to survive, grow up too soon because the world was too harsh on him. He had to mature, open his eyes until they were blind from the scene.
Jason had never been a boy, but he knew what being afraid, and so unnaturally little amongst the swings of a crowbar.
He saw green.
"Never again," the Pit sang, "You will never be under someone else's foot – man nor woman nor alien. Join me, and the pain will go away."
The waves seemed to drown him, washing away the lines drawn in chalk and in stone, ripping Jason apart and churning him in a sea of crimson before piecing him together with glowing emerald, forming a monster that radiated power.
I can't, Jason whimpered - because only beasts held such power, and it corrupted the hearts of mortal flesh - nails digging into the bloodied training mats, whitewashed and flickering with intangible licks of flame, I can't.
David raised him by the collar of the itchy shirt he was forced to wear, lips curled in a snarl as his mouth moved, fist raised to punctuate each word. The Pit seemed to be resigned, gently sighing into his ear. "Fine," it said, voice edging mournful, "Then I'll have to do it for you."
The monster roared, breaking the iron chains that held it down. Jason sank below red, and green strung him up – a puppet on invisible strings being played by the devil himself. Something sticky spilled across his fingers, wet and gushing like water from a river. The ridges of his knife dug into his palm; the edge snapped off somewhere past the expanse of armor the paranoid assassin had always worn.
"Nooo - argh!"
Jason delivered a foot into Cass's – too emotional, rage flickering behind brown eyes, well trained, but the chains of moral and the fear of the power of death holding her back - chest, where he felt ribs snap under the pressure.
The green purred like a cat with a bowl of cream.
"I didn't want to hurt you," he said, voice distorted.
"Ngh," she groaned, standing up with fire in her eyes and growling, a blob of bloody spittle flying out of her mouth.
"Brat."
The only pain he felt was the burning coolness of the bruising ointment and antiseptic on his cuts, the blood of the Cains settling on his tongue like the coppery taste of victory.
All while Jason Todd drowned in an eternal ocean, dying again and again and again and again, only held together by a string of green.
YOU ARE READING
I need to lose you to find me
Fanfiction'Brown eyes stared holes into his back, hardened if Jason searched no deeper. Her father had not taught her to speak, but her eyes seemed to beg. Beg for him to get up, begged for forgiveness, begged to know if he was alright. Green battered around...
