[AN: yeah, 20 chapters seemed enough so let's start again. this one was 21 so i moved it. beating up stuff. cool.]
Vyvyan's skull is crunching against the gravel and he's not moving, just staring with half-lidded eyes like he's tired or bored or Rick doesn't even know what, can't look properly because Vyvyan is just a blur, just a rag doll worried in the teeth of Rick's hands, ricocheting back again and again and again. The ligaments are pulling in Rick's arms, straining and he feels stiff, feels wooden, feels like his knuckles are splintering against Vyvyan's cheekbones, weeping resin, thick and dark and flecked across pale skin. Can't be blood because he's not real and Vyvyan isn't real, they're not human, they're not even animals, not matter just nothing, nothing, nothing. Just worthless.
A low noise escapes Vyvyan, like something turning off, the light in his head gone and he's still staring but he's not there, he's loose and heavy and it's not how he's supposed to be. Vyvyan's nose clicks on each impact, a misshapen mass pushed to the side and Rick hopes he can still feel it, hopes he's feeling anything at all because it's not fair, it's not fair that Rick is heaving on his own saliva, bile sitting in his throat like shame and it pushes at him, like he pushes at Vyvyan, cries out in the silence of Vyvyan's hands, the absence of the anger that once thrummed inside them. Vyvyan's teeth are occluding and he doesn't do a thing but for the hiccupping breath that tells Rick he's still alive.
'Please don't,' falls from Rick's mouth and Vyvyan's face turns away from it, throat pushing against the hold Rick has on his chain. Sweat slides from Rick's brow at the same time as bile spills forth, dribbling down his chin and all Rick can do is try to breathe, try to stop his fingernails from biting into Vyvyan's skin, from shaking him by the jaw with such aggression that Rick thinks it may dislocate, and they'll find his husk in the morning with torn skin and staring eyes and Rick's DNA congealing across his mouth and chin. 'Don't do this, not again.'