Purgatorio
AN: I honestly don't know where this came from, but I've been in a rather angsty mood as of late (if you couldn't tell : P ) and it just came to me. The Infidus is a dissenting group, after all, it's only suiting that Regulators would punish known members. This is an odd story, and I apologize in advance for a lack of a happy ending. The line is from a Tool song.
For some reason, I'm only motivated to write in the wee hours of the morning, so I'm sorry for any grammar/spelling mistakes.
Warnings: Possibly dark, character death, violent imagery.
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pur·ga·to·ry púrgə tàwree
n
1. place of suffering: in Roman Catholic doctrine, the place in which the souls remain until they have expiated their sins before they go to heaven
2. miserable situation: an extremely uncomfortable, painful, or unpleasant situation or experience
Latin purgare "to purify"
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I'm still right here, giving blood and keeping faith.
From the minute that the cold, steel-tipped boot connected with his ribs and he felt it, he knew he was done. That struggle was futile, that the game was over and he had lost most egregiously. To carry on would only bring more pain, more hopelessness and the result would still be the same. The minute that blow to the ribs connected, if he were a smart man, he would have accepted his circumstance and admitted to defeat and surrender.
But, you see, Tymmie was never a smart man.
Tymmie was a stubborn man, and he'd be even more damned if he allowed those puissant bastards to break him.
They came in almost every night, to that dark cell that was shrouded in shadows and obscurity, they came and they beat him, tortured him, and attempted to break him. They would weave lies and misconstrue his values, they would enter every insecurity he had ever felt and they would exploit it. His life became a mirage of violence and pain, his eyes became blinded to truth or reason, and his heart had become nothing more than an organ required for circulation. There was nothing, nothing and everything, light and darkness, sorrow and madness. And after a while, any man would have succumbed to insanity.
But like it was stated before, Tymmie was no ordinary man.
He clung to his belief, the pitiful belief that had made him end up in this myriad of torture, the Infidus belief. The mentality that these sons of bitches would pay. For every blow inflicted upon Tymmie, Lambert would send ten blows to return it. For every ounce of pain felt, the traitorous ones would make sure his tormentors felt it a thousand times over. Such was their way, the oppression and reversal. An eye for an eye, a life for a life.
Tymmie was not a smart man, but nor was he a hopeful, indulgent fool. He knew from the moment that Regulators had seized him from his apartment, dragged him to this unknown bowel of hell, and began the process that there would be no one coming to save him. It was better, his logical mind agreed, to serve as an example. To die for The Cause, and be satisfied in knowing that one day these scum would get theirs.
However, when one is blinded by pure agony rendered by merciless beatings, ideology begins to fall a little short. Sometimes, most times he hated them. His brothers, his once friends, his comrades, he hated them all for putting him into a situation where he was going to die, and then refusing to get him out of it. For damning him even further than he was once before.
But then on other nights, he would sit in his cell and begin to laugh, insanely and without restraints. The joke was on those poor, deluded fools. Tymmie would not break for them, he would not falter from his path, and he was far more prepared to accept what fate and karma had in store for him.
On the nights that he laughed, they beat him twice as rigorously.
"Where is Lambert?"
"Who else is with him?"
"How does Lambert plan to move?"
"What resources does he have?"
"Are there any spies within the organization?"
The interrogations were endless, no breaks or pauses allowed. Tymmie would just sit there numbly, face cut and bleeding from where they had punched and clawed at him, as he blankly stared ahead. They wouldn't break him, not yet. It's called fucking loyalty and it was the one last thing he was good for.
When he would not reply, they would switch tactics. Tymmie secretly found it amusing.
"You realize that there's no way for Lambert to win?"
"Infidus is going to fall, and all of its congregation with it."
"You're powerless to stop the Incinti! Any resistance will only make them pummel you harder into the dirt!"
"No one is coming to save you, don't you understand? THEY WOULD RATHER HAVE YOU DIE IN HERE!"
Tymmie knew routine almost as well as he understood loyalty. He was not to speak, to speak would be to initiate another barrage of verbal abuse, to expose a carefully concealed crack that they would pry at relentlessly. Talking to them would leave him naked and vulnerable. But inwardly, he was resolved. They wouldn't break him. He wouldn't be broken by creatures as pathetic as this. If he allowed himself to be crushed by people who were rotting from the outside, he would deserve this type of treatment.
It's retribution, the little voice in his head says, the one that can still comprehend though, This is your atonement. At the end, everything will be much better.
The little voice was the one that helped him claw his way through survival. The hours of torture shifted into days, then weeks, months, and so on. It eventually got to the point where all logical methods of keeping time were eradicated, and he simultaneously cursed and blessed each day when he awoke to see the sunlight reflecting in the dark puddles of his prison cell.
Everyday his wounds would regenerate of their own accord. The bones would re-knit, the lacerations would clot, and the burned flesh would disintegrate into healthy pink skin. Even the teeth they had knocked out would return, gums sore and bleeding.
One morning, after yet again a cycle of beatings now committed for fun as it had long been decided that interrogation was futile, Tymmie woke up and felt consumed with a justified rage. He screamed, he punched the walls, he yelled angrily for a deliverance that would not come for him. His voice was hoarse and felt like he was swallowing tacks, but he continued to furiously pray and blame the gods for his deliverance. He was through with the suffering, and the pain, and the hopelessness that greeted him so coldly throughout the near-existence.
His accusations went unanswered, and this time, a far more special interrogator was brought in.
When they strapped Tymmie into his chair, he had no control over the snort that escaped him as he stared at the man in front of him. Bitter, bitter irony was bound to come up in this situation sooner or later, it seems.
Crystal blue eyes regarded the ruined but unbroken man in front of him, his bloody head hanging low. "Just tell them what they need, Tymmie, just let them enter your mind."
The man, once a student, once a 'friend', continued to chuckle without mirth. The Prince of the Night regarded him with a mixture of disgust and pity, as he realized that Tymmie's greatest gift, the one that allowed him to see into others' minds, was now proving to be his downfall. There was no doubt in the blonde Follower's mind that Tymmie had the capabilities to block any sort of mental invasion. That was why he had been called in, as a last resort to this sickening display of intelligence gathering.
"They'll welcome you back, Tymmie, if you give the information willingly." He hated how thick the words sounded, but it was inevitable, because both parties knew that the offer had no backing whatsoever. When he continued, it was more sincere, "It'll stop the pain."
Tymmie chose that moment to speak for the first time since his incarceration, and his voice was heavy and tinted with a primal so rawness that his former teacher had a difficult time believing that it was the same Tymmie, "The pain is my compensation."
His azure eyes narrowed, "Compensation for what?"
A darkened, crazed look came into his eyes, "For my sins, I am not quite in hell yet, Stanton."
He felt his heart stop for a moment, the response generating a parallel all too similar to an ex Regulator who had found God in his last forsaken moments, the one who had given him the ring and the message. "This could be your last chance." Stanton bargained again, for some reason a bit of compassion going to the poor, self-deluded traitor.
"Thank God." The response was so clear-cut and dry, that the Prince almost gave a genuine laugh despite the situation.
"I'm supposed to take your information, forcibly." He tried again, giving the victim a last opportunity. Both of them knew that while Tymmie was a phenomenal telepath, nothing could resist a mental force from the highest in command.
He smiled, crimson teeth, "You're welcome to try, I don't even know what's in there anymore." His hung head tilted skywards, towards the ceiling, "You will fail your purpose and I'm glad for it."
The interrogator's mouth pressed into a firm line, "And why is that?" He said stiffly.
"Because I have loyalty, Stanton, something you and your perfect little utopia of morality have forgotten." It was obvious what his former subordinate was implying and anger flashed through him.
"Loyalty to a self-centric, conniving, wretch that would have you die in here to save face!" He sneered, loosing his calm.
Another horribly mangled grin, "History does seem to repeat itself."
The subtle attacks from someone so far beneath him, both in status and ethics, disgusted him as he slammed a fist on one of the chair's arm rests, "You've brought this upon yourself." He seethed, staring at him coldly for one last time before he swerved on his heel and exited the room.
Tymmie watched him go, grin still in place, when he discovered he had managed to evade giving anything away.
He was un-fucking-breakable.
He had about ten seconds to contemplate this, before beefier, deadlier Regulators intruded into the room and commenced with the harshest thrashing he would ever receive.
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When he was tossed mercilessly into his cell that night, his body broken beyond repair but his mind invincible, he lay motionless on his stomach, the cold from the concrete floors seeping in and numbing him. His eyes were blank, and his breathing was shallow, but inner tranquility had settled. Puddles had accumulated everywhere within his cell, translucent ones provided by the water leaking in from the outside rain, and dark ones, vermillion ones, that appeared to be oil slicks. He did not pay any notice to their source.
His eyes scanned the room, it was the only part he could move without agony, and the saw his barred window, a thin stream of illumination from the night sky penetrating the darkness of his containment. His gaze followed it, resting peacefully on a clear pool of rainwater. He was entranced for a few moments by the ethereal quality before it actually dawned upon him what he was staring at.
A reflection.
A reflection of the moon.
Its glorious, comforting light was the closest Tymmie had ever gotten to heaven, and he longed for it with such an intensity that he knew he would never long for anything ever again. A battered, bruised, and ruined fist reached out towards the vision of solace, and he felt his fingertips touch the edges of it, the cold flowing through them in relief.
With the full moon in his fingers, Tymmie allowed himself to shut his eyes and find contentment.
The next morning, it was over. The Regulators that had dragged him out could only remark upon how the infuriatingly stoic man seemed to be in an entirely different place as they sentenced him to the second Frigidus Ignis.
He was long gone before the ice-cold flames removed him from the earth, and his onlookers knew that this was the truest sign of invulnerability.
End.
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