One-shot! Written (mostly) in July 2017

Got the inspiration right before The Mob Song scene

And the rest from my dark, dark soul xD

*not a happy ending... depressing really. Also, from my dark, dark soul ;) Horror and psychological horror are my forte :D Romance, I just happened to be good at ;)

I've been truly debating whether to post it or not but I decided that not posting it would be an insult to my true art-self x)

Nevertheless, here it is!

*Warning: major character death, blood, gore, suicide

Her smile was soft and loving. She leaned into him, inhaling his scent. "Good morning, Monsieur Gaston." She kissed his chin, then the corner of his mouth, then his lips-

"Good morning, Monsieur Gaston."

The clang of a cane against cell bars jerked him awake. He hunched against the wall as a man dressed professionally entered the room. His eyes followed his form as it took a seat on a stool in the corner of the room. His lip curled in disgust as the doctor ever so boasted his freedom in his face. His polished shoes, his neatly combed hair, his good-night's sleep, all of it disgusted Gaston.

He glared - not interested in what else the other would taunt him with.

The older man leaned forward and scrutinized the ex-hunter very carefully. "Monsieur Gaston, do you know who I am?"

Gaston glowered at him but didn't say anything.

"Monsieur Gaston-"

His niceties irked him to the brim.

"- are you married?"

And the questions began.

His eyes softened for a mere second before turning cold and shadowed. He glanced down at his left hand and at the pale line of skin that had sat underneath his wedding band for five years. The one they cut off with a pair of shears the moment he entered this wretched place. He had struggled long and hard but in the end, the darkness had won and he watched the one item of her he had left being tossed into the wastebasket.

But nothing in the world could undo the vows he meant on the night they were wed. Nothing they did, nothing they tortured him with could ever erase her.

"Yes," he finally spoke from his dark mind.

The older man looked down at him. "Ah. And do you have kids?"

His chest filled with a painful ache to the point he thought he'd be sick. Their innocent child... their sweet, loving little boy deserved nothing of that godawful tragedy- He visibly winced as he saw his son's face. Sadness and anger fought within him and emptiness filtered through. "A son."

"What is his name?"

He unconsciously shook at the last joyous memory he had of his son.

The backs of his eyes stung with tears but soon they were drowned out by hate as he relived the hell of that night-

"Jean."

The man's pipe lit with an orange glow. "And how old is he?"

Gaston stared at an empty patch of floor. The fraud of doctor always made it a point to speak of them as if they were still alive - as if he, Gaston, would leave this madhouse the very next morning and return to them. "Two years."

He heard the intake of breath and he nearly shuddered at the silence - he knew what words were to be next. His heart ached awfully at the thought of her face, her body, her laugh, her soul. She had been his whole life- her and their son. They had been happy. Their love for each other was supposed to have no end.

He leaned against the doorway of the bedroom. His eyes admired her frame and the way the lovely yellow dress fit her. "You look beautiful, Madame Gaston," he beamed tenderly.

She turned at his voice - a bit startled he was standing there. "Oh, how long have you been standing there?"

"Not long enough," he grinned. He stepped forward and rested his hands on her hips. He ducked his head and pressed a kiss to her exposed skin just above her neckline. His lips lingered a bit and he continued softly up her neck to her ear. "An absolute beauty, my darling," he rumbled.

She hummed and leaned back against him and he held her close. "Have I told you how much I love you?" She met his eyes in the mirror.

His eyes lit and the corners of his eyes softened. "Every day, my love. And I have loved you just the same."

Her body turned in his arms and she wrapped her arms around his neck. "Good, because I am for certain there is no one else in this world for me."

He caught her lips and she pressed up against him in return-

The older man's wet cough brought him back into his new reality. "Your wife. When was the last time you saw her?"

"Shortly before the hunting trip," he recited as he had every single goddamn day since arriving.

"Ah." The doctor sat forward on his seat and analyzed the ex-hunter as the specimen on display he was. "And what happened on that hunting trip?"

Gaston's upper lip twitched and his eyes hardened. His shoulders curled in defensively and he let loose an animalistic growl. "I didn't kill them." He wasn't a fool. The only reason he was in the madhouse instead of prison was because he kept ranting and raving about a beast.

The doctor glided over his words. "Monsieur Gaston, your wife. What is her name?"

It burned his throat. "Belle."

He nodded as if that was a step in the right direction. "And do you know where you are?" He puffed his pipe and sat back a bit. "Do you know why you're here and not with her?"

Gaston focused on his scarred hands - envisioning them taking the older man's neck and squeezing the life out of him, see how he likes to be tortured. He flexed his hands and a snarl curled his lip, baring his teeth. He glared coldly at him. "Why?" he dared dangerously.

"Monsieur Gaston," he began in a soft tone as if he were about to tell Gaston for the first time the horrible news. "On the day of your hunting trip, your wife and son were brutally killed in your home."

He had seen and relived the day so many times to the point he should be immune to it all. But his eyes darkened and he struggled to keep from lashing out. A battle that was not so easily won.

"A wild beast, you claimed to the authorities, had entered your home, tore them to shreds- The walls, the floors, the rugs, all splattered and soaked with blood. The stains, quite seen as a prize, never coming out."

He caught those words and his blood cooled to icy rivers. "A prize?" he ground out dangerously. "You did not see the godforsaken creature-"

"Madame Gaston is dead," he spoke over the ex-hunter. "Along with your son."

He knew it to be true.. but to hear it over and over, day after day- His breath came out in short pants as he tried to avoid the weakness of crying.

And the wretched man went on. "You blamed yourself for their deaths. Had you never left, this beast would have never killed them. They would still be very much alive."

A strangled sob escaped his chest and he sat forward, curling his body. His hands were at his temple, hoping to drown out everything he heard... and was going to hear. Hoping to keep his sanity.. what was left of it.

"However, many in town believe it was suicide," he continued, his voice laced with pity. "That you made your wife very unhappy. That she did not want you as her husband and in fact never did."

The mighty Gaston was defeated. His cries drowned out all his bravery and crumbled his once invincible form. His head shook repeatedly as he tried to undo the doctor's words. Every day he fought to erase those words for they all were not true and would never be. He whimpered, "No, she wouldn't. We loved each other. Liar. You're a liar. You didn't see it-"

He tsked a bit. "Monsieur Gaston, you must try to understand. It was very believable - the only way out of marriage was death." He sat straight and gave a bit of a pitiful sigh. "Do you remember what happened after?"

Gaston did not give an answer.

"Do you?"

He trembled and lowered his hands but remained in his defensive posture. "No."

That night after discovering her and Jean had been a blur.

The doctor clicked his tongue. "You went mad. Terrorized the village and those who did not believe you. Shouted nonsense about a beast with monstrous fangs and hideous claws. A beast that lived among magic. The same beast that killed your wife and child."

His face contorted once more and his voice became thick with tears. "I loved her- I would never-" He stopped talking as the doctor rose from his seat.

He knelt in front of him. "Monsieur Gaston, an incurable disease of the mind makes those unaware of their actions." He lifted his finger and Gaston flinched as it touched the side of his face. "Those invaders who raided your town... such a little attack, such a little memory in your life. No one suspected what effect it would have on you."

Gaston pulled his face away and snarled.

The doctor remained sympathetic. "You cannot deny. It destroyed you."

He struggled against the binds that secured him to the wall. "I didn't kill my wife and son."

The man chuckled pityingly. "Belle never loved you."

He spat in his face. "How dare you speak her name!" he cursed not bothering to flinch at the sharp slap he got in return. "I was nowhere near the house! It was a beast! I did not MURDER my family!"

But he was immune. "Monsieur Gaston, there were witnesses."

The ex-hunter growled at the memory of seeing the villagers' judgmental faces as he carried her bloodied body from their home. His face briefly lined with grief and then silent anger.

The man continued patiently as if consoling a child. "There are no such thing as beasts." He cruelly petted Gaston's head. "It was you. You killed your wife and child."

His rage had melted and his voice was merely a whisper. "I did not-"

"Oh, but you did." He straightened and stood by the door. "Perhaps tomorrow, when you're well, we shall continue our little chat."

He pulled in vain at the binds - in vain at the chance of escaping these horrors.

"And perhaps then, Captain Gaston, you can tell me exactly what happened." He puffed his pipe. "And leave out your lies about a monstrous beast. Tell me.. what really happened to your wife and child?" He knocked on the door and two workers dressed in white entered.

Gaston struggled against their weight and strength - he loathed this part. He fought as hard as he did the night they cut off his wedding band... but even his strength could not stop the mask that settled over his face. His eyes fluttered shut against their will.

And the last thing he heard was the doctor's voice.

"Goodnight, Monsieur Gaston. Sweet dreams."

He ignored their mutters and horrified gasps as he exited the house, as he stepped down the front steps... as he held his dead wife in his arms. The burning torches became a blurred orange and yellow light as tears silently fell down his cheeks. His eyes remained forward - he had looked at her enough to remember her wrongful death a hundred lifetimes over.

Their son-

What little remains had been recovered-

He couldn't bear carrying his son to the mortuary.. but he had.

Now he was to reunite his wife with their son.

There were offers from other villagers, other kind and caring and helpful villagers, to take her into town. But he had shaken his head. He should be the one to take her... as if to ask for forgiveness for leaving her and Jean alone...

Forgiveness for leaving them to their deaths.

He dropped his gaze as the villagers stepped aside and he passed through the walkway created. He couldn't meet their eyes. He couldn't see the judgment in their faces. He couldn't take their pity. He couldn't see their unwelcoming sorrow.

He wasn't an idiot. He heard of the stories already brewing - that he had murdered his family.

A woman muttered to another. "He's gone mad. Poor ol' Maurice is probably turning over in his grave. That man had the nerve to trust his only daughter with that killer. He should have stopped the marriage long ago."

He ignored her words. He and Belle- they're life was nothing of what stale and horrid words people spoke.

Soon enough, he placed her gently, tenderly, lovingly on the table the mortician led him to. He tensed at the sympathetic hand coming to rest on his shoulder. He vaguely turned his head to acknowledge the offer but his eyes couldn't move from her.

He swallowed down the lump in his throat. He longed to wake from this night terror. He longed to open his eyes, see her familiar outline in the moonlight through their window. And he longed to turn over and bring her into him as he forgot all horrors he had seen.

But it was all not to be true.

Now he couldn't erase the images of their bodies- entering their home-

His chest tightened and anger was the only emotion he knew.

The cane clanged sharply against the cell bars. It seemed the doctor was in no mood for foolishness this morning. "Monsieur Gaston, get up." he berated. He stood for a moment, noticing the other curled up in the far end of the cell did not make a move. He opened the cage and kicked his prisoner's side. "Get up."

His orders received no reply.

"Monsieur Gaston," he repeated. His mouth twitched in annoyance and he beckoned an assistant in.

Dressed in a white coat, the assistant knelt beside the unresponsive man. The strong odor of iron hit his nose and soon his fingers uncurled Gaston's bloodied hand - the letter opener that had been snatched a few nights ago. He revealed to the doctor. "He's dead."

The older man pursed his lips and looked down with contempt at the dead man. "Pity, he didn't last a week."

...

"Gaston, Gaston, please," Lefou tried helplessly. He gripped his friend's shoulders. "Don't do this. Don't do this. Belle wouldn't want this for you-"

He shoved Lefou away and mounted the steps of the square. In his hand was the decaying decapitated head of a beast. "Do not dare to be ignorant! Look!" He raised his arm. "Look at this monster! The beast who would have terrorized this town had I not stopped it!"

Pere Robert pulled Lefou back as two black horses pulling a wagon- a cage diverted the crowd. They looked to Gaston whose rantings and ravings did not cease.

"Stop the beast?" a villager sneered. "You're right!" He pointed to the crazed man. "We should have killed you right from the start!"

Lefou held his breath as two large men jumped from the wagon with ropes in hand. He watched Gaston's demeanor, his eyes, his form. And it was when he didn't fight back did Lefou and Pere Robert - the only two out of the entire village who knew Gaston did not murder Belle and Jean - realize the hunter was spent of this life without his home.

He met Lefou's gaze for a brief second then closed them painfully as he was shoved into the wooden crate.

Pere Robert pressed the crucifix to his lips. "May God have mercy on your soul, Monsieur Gaston."

Well then.

I promise never to write something this dark of this ship again.

I actually wrote - because I thought I can't leave you guys with a super depressing, dark ending - an alternate ending that's a happy one. But I didn't put it up because I quite like my old style of writing, even though it's heartwrenching and agonizing xD

But if you want the alternate ending... even though it'll be light and loving, it might hurt more.