A/N: So here is another FMA:Brotherhood story featuring a much ignored and unused character! So enjoy and don't forget to review!
Darkness. It surrounded him. Consumed him. Oppressed him. He wanted to escape it but he couldn't. His hands were shackled behind him. Not with cuffs though. Real shackles like olden times an inch thick and several inches wide. So heavy. There weren't enough chain links connecting them wrist to wrist leaving his arms stretched and his shoulders feeling on the brink of dislocation. The discomfort was the point and he knew it. So was the darkness. Kept isolated and in the dark always uncomfortable. Wearing him down. If they had the time they could leave him here alone, not even light to keep him company, so long that by the time they allowed him human contact again he would be eating out of their palms, obeying their every command just to keep them from severing the contact again. That was the concept at least. He was determined not to give in plus he doubted the Colonel would give them that kind of time. Whether it was out of friendship or a strange sort of possession, because he worked for the Colonel and they were going after him, the Colonel would come for him. The only one allowed to mess with his team was the Colonel himself.
He licked his lips and swallowed thickly wincing at the pain it caused. His tongue was swollen and rough as sandpaper, his lips cracked and bleeding. So thirsty. What he wouldn't give for a big glass of cool sweet water. What they wanted. The secret. That's what he wouldn't give. It felt strange to know the answer. What they wouldn't give for something or other. A question that was always left open ended. Unanswered. Except he knew. He sighed tilting his head back against the wall trying to ignore as it throbbed. How long had he been here? He didn't know. They had drugged him when they took him and he could still feel those drugs running through his system making him dizzy and sluggish. It took too long for him to form coherent thoughts. Or maybe these weren't the drugs from that dose? Maybe it was a week later and they'd chosen to continue the drugs after his capture? It couldn't have been too long ago. They were still using passive techniques like darkness and thirst to wear him down. At least that's what he wanted to think. They could well be professionals patient and effective. These were slow techniques that couldn't be hurried. He just had to endure. The Colonel would come.
His thoughts turned towards the secret. He'd learned it a long time ago. It had been an accident finding it out. He hadn't been delving for secrets but it fell into his lap. He'd gathered up all the evidence of its existence. Took it home and mulled it over. It was a serious, dangerous, secret. He considered it's causes, it's implications, its consequences. He accepted them and burned the evidence. That was the end of it. He knew it and he would keep it. A week later the Colonel had found out he knew and had panicked. It was the first time he'd ever seen the cool and calm Colonel panic. The man hadn't a clue how long he'd known or that he'd already decided to keep the secret. The Colonel had always had his loyalty but there'd never been any incident to test or prove that loyalty. His panic was understandable.
He squirmed trying to get comfortable hissing at the bolt of pain through his arm and the chafe of skin against metal on his ankles. They were starting to shred now. He could feel the slow drip of blood eking towards the heel of his foot. His fingers tingled on the brink of numbness but feeling wouldn't fully dissipate. The circulation was just good enough they would merely tingle. He managed to get himself to a corner of his cell leaning against it. He hadn't a clue how big the room was finding it too exhausting to move much with these heavy shackles, no doubt meant to tire him, and the drugs keeping him subdued. How long had it been now? He wished he knew. It would give him some sort of reference point. An equilibrium of sorts. He wouldn't get it. They would never give him anything he could use as a balance. It was a standard tactic. Take away their sense of sight, their sense of time, keep them off balance and wear them down till they start singing. Today he was the caged bird.
His eyes drifted shut his mind shutting down in sleep. Water cold and slushy near frozen rained down on him causing him to gasp and choke on some. It happened every time. Never allowed to sleep. Every time it surprised him. It shouldn't it happened so often. But it did. He sighed and braced himself back up against the wall shivering. The room had already been cold, if he had to guess maybe 35 degrees cold and ice water crashing over him wasn't helping. He pulled his knees to his chest grimacing at the ache in his muscles trying uselessly to conserve heat. He tried to swallow. It was getting harder to do. How much time had passed? He was sure it had only been a few minutes since the water crashed over him yet his mouth was dryer than before and the muscles in his legs were locking up as if he'd held them there for hours. He should his head but no water drops fell from his hair. He glared at the darkness. That wasn't right. If he'd just been soaked like he'd though, just a moment ago, wouldn't his hair still be dripping? Now that he thought about it he should feel less drugged not having had anything to eat or drink and therefore no way to administer it, that he could think of, yet he felt more drugged than before.
Fear shot through him. They were started to get to him. They had him so tired and confused he couldn't even find a thread of coherency to his existence. When did it get to be so hot in here? Hadn't it been freezing just a moment ago? It felt like a hundred and ten degrees in the shade. He thought. Then he burst into giggles. In the shade. Ha! In here there was nothing BUT shade! He giggled until he couldn't breathe and then he started to sob. He couldn't do this. He couldn't keep his head straight. He had to move. Had to find some semblance of stability. The sobbing stopped and he struggled to stand crying out in pain as his muscles pained at suddenly having to function. He fell hard several times before he was finally able to get to his feet back pressed against the wall. It felt like everything was spinning around him threatening to throw him back to the floor.
His body felt heavy and his head was floating away. The air around him burned and smothered him with its dry heat his breathing heavy and labored with the effort. Too hot. So tired. His leg began to tremble as he forced himself to walk forward bracing his shoulder against the wall to stay upright. Move. He had to move. Count the steps, the laps, anything to give himself something to depend on. Something consistent. Ten steps to the other corner. Ten steps. Another ten steps to the corner again. Eleven steps back. He scowled. That wasn't right. He found the corner again and tried the trip again. Fourteen steps. The twelve. Now six. It didn't make sense. Was the wall changing sizes? The illogic of that idea never even crossed his mind. His legs buckled his knees hitting the ground hard enough to make him cry out. He crawled to the corner again and curled up his body throbbing head feeling like it was going to split and mind reeling with confusion. He hyperventilating. Air. He had to get more air. There wasn't enough. Panic surged through him his body buzzing from the effects losing even the resemblance of control. Light, water, anything. Give him something. He couldn't take this. So dark. He was suffocating. He jerked backwards as if reeling from an attacker his back hitting the wall hard arms squashing closer together when his thumb brush his wrist pressed against his pulse. Unsteady and fast, he could barely feel it, but it was there. He stilled in the darkness still gasping for air all his being focused on the throb of his pulse. He didn't try to count the beats enraptured by the feel alone. Always there, always beating. Dependable. His world stabilized.
He reveled in the feel of his pulse. Soaked it up and savored the sense of security it gave him. It wasn't because it was his pulse, meant he was still alive, it was merely that he knew it was always coming, always dependable. His breathing was calmed and normal and the aches in his body seemed to fade. Still there but less. His mind turned inwards once more to coherent thought. He remembered when they'd started asking. It happened often on his way home someone would suddenly be walking with him. Talking about him and the Colonel. Asking questions. The wrong questions. He knew immediately what they were after and danced around answering their questions. When they realized they couldn't lure him into revealing the secret accidentally they turned to bribery. Deliciously tempting bribes. While he wanted to accept every offer they made he' turned them all down resolutely. They weren't worth betraying the Colonel. Finally they turned to threats. Subtle and veiled threats. It was all in the tone, the emphasis of a word that the treats were hidden but he picked up on them easily. As soon as they started he wanted to run to the Colonel for help but he'd stopped himself. If he had then they'd know he knew that he knew and the trouble for the Colonel would double. The very thought make his head pound.
He knew they would escalate. Was expecting this. He'd tried to find a way to tell the Colonel he was in trouble without exposing him but he hadn't figured out a way yet. It took him too long. Four men in an alley with guns surrounded him. He put up a fairly decent fight but it ended quick after the needle of sedatives stabbed into his shoulder. Powerful drugs that felled him in seconds. That was the last he'd seen of light or companion. All that was left to him after that was darkness and thirst all alone. He wasn't so weak that he craved the attention of his captors yet. It would take much longer than this for him to stoop to that. He did however crave their attention for the fact that he would be given more opportunities to retaliate and escape that way. Every time they moved him, unlocked his door they gave him opportunity to fight. He craved for those moments.
Thought faded. Energy, what little was left, disappeared. His eyes drifted shut. Or maybe they'd already been shut? He wasn't sure. There was no difference. Tendrils of sleep encompassed his mind. The water crashed down over him and he cried out as it scalded his skin the tingling hurt lasting long after the water was gone. Hot. Too hot. The air was hot. The water was hot. His skin was hot. He couldn't escape it. He tried to lick his lips but his tongue stuck fast to the roof of his mouth. Then a thought flitted through his mind though he was barely able to catch it. They were dumping water over him therefore there was water on the floor. He could lick it up and quench his thirst even if only a little. It didn't even cross his mind as he threw himself sideways to the floor that they'd reduced him to lapping water from puddles on the ground like a dog. He wouldn't have cared now even if he had realized he was so desperate for water. So thirsty. As soon as the world stopped spinning from his drop he leaned forward and licked the floor. Nothing. No water. He whimpered and licked again elsewhere. Nothing. It wasn't until the fourth attempt that he noticed all the little holes in the floor so small an infant wouldn't be able to stick their pinky finger inside them. They were everywhere. A knot formed in his stomach. The floor was a wood grate. The water was gone. Falman broke into a desperate sob. He just wanted water. He just wanted to go home. Elsewhere in the building a subordinate ran to his commander.
"Sir, he's ready"