Howl [COD Simon Ghost Riley & John Soap Mactavish AU]

Like Some Child Possessed

TW: SA

2007

Mexico

Simon Riley was weeks into the thing he hoped finally ended his miserable existence. Torture was nothing new to him, and it aided in his martyrdom, but this stint was beginning to turn him upon himself and he was desperate for it to end. His commander was dead, and the two other men he'd been with had already broken. Simon wasn't particularly breakable but he was getting tired, and hungry. He'd begun to wonder why he didn't just pretend to give in. Go along with it. Get out of these chains.

It was probably too late for that. Roba knew him now, he'd see through it. And principle made it difficult. Besides, maybe if he let himself fight back until Roba was the one that broke, he'd end up dead. A true martyr. Finally free.

The latest move by the man was different. An angle he hadn't expected. Physical pain was easy for him to take, welcome even, and up until then it hadn't been so bad. The usual, dull knives in tender flesh, flame throwers, pliers on fingernails. Nothing that wouldn't heal or grow back. But he'd found, falling in and out of sleep, that there were certain things that would never grow back. Like dignity. He'd felt out of control of his body too many times in his life to count. He'd been used, discarded, beaten. But the humiliation of being exposed in a degrading way, having his own manhood, what little of it was left, forced into submission was something that was pushing him toward the edge.

She came back a second fucking time. Twice in one day. A man accompanied her, like her life was in danger. Like Simon could do anything to so much as defend himself. Maybe it wasn't the same day. His sight went fuzzy around the edges and he realized he had no grasp on time at all.

"Hi, pretty boy." She crooned. "We feeling a little better?"

Her fake concern tasted like soured wine on the back of his tongue. He swallowed the bile that rose with it. He hadn't felt 'well' enough for her earlier. Couldn't give her what she wanted. She'd left him naked, stretched out, his arms chained above his head. Before that, he'd wondered if she was a prisoner too, if what she did to him was her own brand of survival. He'd dug deep within himself to find some empathy for her. It soothed him a bit. But every time she showed up, every time real hunger for what she would inflict on him shone in her eyes, he lost it. He was beginning to believe she liked it. She lived for it.

"Thirsty." He answered.

"Yeah, I bet you are." She grinned, her drug-ruined teeth catching his attention. They reminded him of her humanity.

He was standing, his sweat making long streaks through dirt and blood down his abdomen and legs, his feet and shoulders aching from being unable to rest. He willed himself to retreat from his mind and relax, to let her have it this time, so she would let him down, let him sleep. Her hands were cold and rough. He almost preferred the man who'd raped him before her. He'd obviously been worked up by the blood and the sin of it, he'd lasted only a few minutes. But she liked to draw it out.

He'd been with plenty of women in his life. They were easy for him to finesse. He supposed that his current predicament might be a punishment for all the lies he'd told them to get them into bed. He closed his eyes and thought of them. The ones he could remember. How they would worship him, his dominance, how they didn't know the truth, they had no reason to fear him. The numbness he felt with them, that separation between mind and body, he sought it with the woman in the cell. And it worked. She got what she wanted, using only her hands this time. He was relieved, no objects, no extra pain. She thanked him, kissed his mouth with her dirty one, and let him down.

He sat against the wall of the concrete room they locked him in, his hands still chained behind his back, his body still uncovered. He wondered, if he concentrated hard enough, if he could convince his own heart to stop beating. He closed his eyes and tried, but a sound jerked him back to reality.