Marvel One-Shots and Prompts

In Chains He Rots

Created 9 September 2021

Rating: Mature
For themes of self-hate, neglect, and implied sexual assault

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He was a broken thing, the prisoner in the first cell to the left. His once lovely voice now spoke only words of wrath and ruin, his every syllable dripping with the poison a thousand years in the making.

Yes, all who heard were drenched in it, and several had died for it. To be free of the lies he so delicately strew.

It was madness and upon and after the time of his return, though he had been forgotten for the unusual mention of his so-called wretched name, the people of the common houses were left to figure out the complex game he had played.

A known fact, he was always more intelligent than the brutes of his country.

Fallen to madness, yes, as he ascended the throne of insanity. His every word a poison and pointed, a target chosen and struck. Where had the boy with such a keen longing for the world gone?

Where had the smile and the childish naivety been discarded? Who was this wretched monster who stood in such innocence's place. What evil had seeped into such an incorruptible being?

Simply, it was all that could be understood, that madness had claimed this boy as its own.

No, it couldn't be from the countless years of neglect and torment? Where his every action was taken as a shame and his thoughts were compared and found unworthy of by love.

Surely it could not be from his childhood, which he had spent alone, for who would love a monster such as he? Who would ever wish to hold such heinous evil in their heart? As an ally or worlds forbid, a friend?

Nay, he was a slave to his own will, of his own choices. Cast out and doomed to fall. And as he looked at his reflection, perhaps he finally realized how much he'd changed.

The face staring back simply could not be his. It was no hideous thing, but not of childish youth. In the time of his pain, he had matured into a handsome face, with defined, angular cheekbones and fierce eyes that could pierce a man better than an arrow. 

But he thought to himself, if he were so appealing, why did they all look to him as if he was nothing but a bother. Nothing but a waste of their precious space?

For it seemed he had gone mad, with each stride of his long figure, robed in desolation and sorrow, he descended further from the glorious light of his comparator. The irony, oh the bitter irony, that his most adamant competitors were those he only ever wanted to please.

Yes but how could such a loved and cherished boy fall so far? How could but a few bitter years come to explain the wave of death he had left in his wake. He'd killed thousands, more than he even knew, and they were the victims.

It mattered not to his history that many of his dead were his abusers, his tormentors, no. It only mattered that his monstrous self had committed such a crime. He looked upon his reflection in the barrier of the cell which he inhabited.

A compendium of books and other ways to pass the time inhabited the far corner, but he had read each book a thousand times at least.

And as he sat, the barrier snapped out of place and the guards entered to force upon him the horrid ways of their pleasure, he stayed silent.

At the countless trials and retrials for the misdeeds, which had likely been a political ploy to silence the malicious rabble, his sentence was only ever claimed fair. 

And he never complained as they destroyed him. His once smooth flesh laden with scars and burns which he did nothing to hide. What was the point? Who would see him in a better light if he did?

And it was so, as the people who once claimed to love him as their own, screamed and called for a punishment, he begged for the same, but as a mercy.

Death.

But it would never be awarded. He was a monster, always would be, and he deserved to suffer. Such were the ways of things, of his life. 

His lies were setting fire to the worlds, every breath saw his lungs filled with smoke. He coughed and choked on his own deceit, of the consequences. And he would burn happily, for if not death, it would bring him pain. And pain was as much an escape as any.

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This was just a quick prompt I had written at the beginning of the semester when I was stressing about school. Hope you enjoyed, and there should be another One-shot soon after exams which are until November 14th.