- Author's Note: I don't own the characters or Revolution; I'm just playing with them for a bit for fun, not profit.

Trigger warning: Non Consensual dæmon touching


Rachel lay still, flat on her back, staring at the faintly illuminated ceiling of her gilded cage. Early spring rain was thrumming at the roof above and she was pleasantly warm beneath the quilt and blankets. She could almost let herself sleep if it wasn't for the throbbing of her right wrist, the fear – no, knowledge – that Bass might come bursting in at any point to continue their little 'chat' or, worse yet, chat like they were still friends. But truly, Rachel had become adroit at ignoring physical pain, and constant uncertainty and trepidation regarding what Monroe might do was her new normal. What was really filling her stomach with an ever-expanding black hole of turmoil was the empty void between her shoulder and her neck where Thárros ought to be sleeping.

Thárros. Just thinking about him accelerated the black hole's rate of expansion. Yesterday – or was in two days ago now? Was it tomorrow yet? – Bass had gotten frustrated with her scripted non-answers and had plucked Thárros off of her shoulder. Rachel had been so shocked by the dry-ice-on-the-nethers-burn of violation that Sargent Strausser – and his creepy-ass ginger tomcat dæmon – had arrived with a birdcage and Monroe had stuffed Thárros into it, before she could master her quivering rage and quell her involuntary heaving.

Strausser left, bearing away the cage with a mantled and outraged Thárros, and Rachel rushed the door after him. Bass caught her, and wrenched her wrist, holding her in the room, but allowing her to watch her glossy black-and-white Magpie dæmon be carried into Monroe's office by the sinister Sargent. She caught one last glance at his tail feathers glinting violet and cobalt before Monroe slammed her bodily against the wall. Rachel turned away, unwilling to meet Monroe's eye when she saw Renny, his collie dæmon. Renny just lay in the corner licking her paws unperturbed. That was when it truly hit her how royally screwed she was. Rachel swallowed a mouthful of bile.

Renny – Renhet – used to be so cheerful and social, greeting everyone's dæmon with a wag and an inquiring nose, and now she was completely unfazed by Monroe grabbing Thárros and violating the tenets of every major religion, the Geneva Convention, and the UN Commission on Human Rights. Rachel had known Monroe was no longer Bass, but seeing how different Renny was, combined with the low urgent pull at her navel telling her Thárros was too far away, and the wiry, hateful form of Monroe pressing into her, it was all too clear. Rachel executed emergency coping strategy number two, and shut down, withdrew, disengaged from the world.

After a bit of mostly-blocked-out mustache twirling, Monroe grew bored, and left. Once he was gone, Rachel permitted herself to slide down the wall and crush her legs to her chest. Eventually, she crab-walked over to the corner nearest Monroe's office – nearest Thárros – and felt the physical tension alleviate somewhat. She strained the metaphysical bond between them to try to see what he could see – some people had that sort of bond with their dæmons – but all she could sense was the same amalgam of rage, fear, and disbelief she felt.

Rachel stayed in that corner, watching the patches of sunlight creep eastward, mind a numb swarm of half-suppressed emotions, until she felt it again, the the the frigid profanation of someone touching her dæmon – her soul – in cruel apathy, without her consent. The scaldingly-cold squirmies lasted less than a minute, but Thárros' shivering dread and indignation lasted far longer.

Rachel wished she could hold him to her breast, stroke his silky white scapulars and murmur that everything was going to be all right. But she couldn't. Couldn't hold him. Couldn't lie to him. Had had to stay here, bearing the burden, the expiation for her crimes against humanity. Had had to stay here to play the wounded bird and keep Monroe and Miles' attention away from Danny, Charlie, and Ben. But she hadn't counted on Miles' desertion, or Bass' insanity, and now Thárros had to bear the brunt of her miscalculations and misdeeds.

When a militiaman came in, beagle trotting at his side, bearing a plate of mutton and limp root vegetables, Rachel had coerced herself to stand up, walk away from Thárros and force down as much of the meal as she could stomach. Which wasn't much. When the militiaman returned and took her plate and dulled silverware, she absentmindedly wondered, not for the first time, who was going to eat her leavings or if it was going to go into a hog's slops bucket?

That first night, she had strained and just managed to walk to the bedroom to grab the bedding before hurrying back to the corner. She wasn't huddling there now because, for one, sleeping in that corner gave her such a crick in the neck, two, the breakfast-delivery militiaman's disdain at finding her in the corner still chafed, and three, like all pain, one could become accustomed to the pain of separation.

Accustomed was just such a misleading word, even in her own mind. As if one could so quickly become acclimatized to missing their arm or leg. Earlier today – or was it yesterday? – she had flipped through one of the botany texts Bass had given her (emergency coping strategy number five) and had turned to murmur a marginally witty remark to Thárros, only to have the full brunt of his absence rammed her full on in the stomach. Luckily, no one – especially Monroe – was around to see her crumple into the pages of the book and smear the printed word with restrained tears. Without Thárros she truly was alone here. Friendless. Without a feathered breast to cry discreetly into or a silky shoulder to stroke meditatively. A constant void where her soul should be, perched on her shoulder, preening her hair, murmuring quips.

Rachel lay still, flat on her back, staring at the ceiling of her gilded cage, knowing Thárros was in a far more literal cage, just as friendless and alone. There was only one thing she could do to protect him, and that was to not let Monroe know how much the nigh absolute zero fingers probing her spleen affected her. She needed to be the cold bitch Bass painted her – emergency coping strategy number seven – to protect Thárros, to protect her soul.


- Author's Note: Reviews and constructive criticism are greatly appreciated :)