FEAST OF THE SAMHAIN - OVERTURE
Dog hurt. Every inch of him. From the tip of his snout to each of his toes, down every muscle and sinking into every joint with a stiff ache. Every breath he drew sent new agony through his battered ribcage and down his flanks in lightning waves. The frigid air peppered his bare flesh and sent violent shivers down his emaciated form. His head throbbed with exquisite suffering from the last blow, so much so that Dog could no longer hold it, or any of himself up. He slumped along the damp, cold stone floor in a beaten, broken heap, blood oozing from where the steel bit held his jaws open, from where his chains had rubbed him raw, and from the seeming endless array of angry and inflamed gashes and burns across his body. Dog tried not to move, not to feel, to ignore how his lungs and ribs protesting against breathing, to keep his gaze from settling upon where his limbs were mangled and contorted at awkward, unnatural, and obviously broken angles. He let his blurry eyes closed, hoping to just drift away, whether it meant to sleep or into the arms of death.
There had been a time, long ago, when Dog's life had been worth living. There had been a sprawling but cozy home he distantly recalled in the hazy depths of his dreams. It had been so long that Dog could no longer accurately remember what it looked like or what it had been like, but, when Dog slept, he tried desperately to cling to what scant memories remained. There had been light there. There had been food, delicious food. He had a warm, comfortable bed to sleep in. And he had a pack. He could not picture them, but he remembered them. They had trusted him, followed him. He had been their Alpha. Dog remembered that but not any of the feelings he knew had once been associated with that, aside from the crushing loneliness Dog felt in its absence. That, however, was a long time ago.
Now, Dog hoped each day for death. There was no warmth hear, only an icy, arctic cold that stole his breath away. There was no light here, only a darkness that threatened to swallow Dog, body and soul. There was barely any food. Dog felt each of his bones sticking out as his stomach grumbled and his hunger begged to be appeased. When he did manage to beg for scraps, it was always too much and too heavy, his stomach instantly betraying him. There was no comfortable, safe place to sleep. Here, there were chains, whips, burning brands, bits and muzzles. There, he could sleep when he needed, rest and feel relaxed; here, Dog never felt safe enough to close his eyes and rested only when sleep sucker punched him. Here, there was no pack to surround himself with. He had been sleek and well muscled before, but, now, Dog felt brittle and feeble. There were other creatures like him, but they would not accept him as pack. Before, he had been an Alpha, respected and trusted; he led then as top dog, with pride and strength. Now, he was the Omega, the lowest of the low. Even at the beginning, there had been a fight to Dog, a defiance borne of a wild, untamable creature that bowed to no man, but even that had been sapped from him by the years. Dog prayed desperately for it to just be done and over with so that the pain would just be over and so that his pack would never see him so broken.
There were noises in the hallway, dredging up Dog's attention. He did not lift his head, but he listened. Dog pricked his ears to the motion, following the angry, bitter shouting and the heavy stomping. Dog had learnt years ago to keep on edge and to pay close attention to his masters. The better he behaved and the more attentive of a pet Dog was, the less his masters tended to hurt him. He would have normally sat up at attention like a good puppy, but Dog hadn't the strength left. Dog tensed involuntarily; his current master would be displeased with him that he did not rise.
His masters did not come, but there were many footsteps in the hall.
Something had changed. Dog didn't like change anymore. There had been a time when he may have like alterations, finding relish in adapting and overcoming, but not anymore. It wasn't like he could vividly recall that part of his life, but Dog knew it was there. Dog had been broken long ago and had found a sort of horrible, gut-wrenching security in the routine, no matter how creative and abusive the routine had become over the years.
Dog shuddered to think of it as he kept his ear trained to the sounds as they shuffled against the rock. He shifted his weight uneasily, wishing he could summon the energy to move, to recoil back, deeper into his cage, wanting to go back to the normal schedule. Routine was bad. Oh, it was very bad. There was no denying that. Routine meant predictable intervals when he was served a wide variety of tortures and suffering. Dog was quite used to the routine by now.
However bad the routine was, Change was worse. Change meant something new. Change meant scrapping together some last bit of strength and will to live so he could adapt and survive. Never to conquer or overcome. Always to survive, since Dog had learnt long ago that he would never escape these horrible places, never return to the wild, free places of the world again, and never chase that blue horizon ever. Change was a constant reminder of the possibility that the routine could be broken, teasing Dog with the false hope that, one day, someone would see fit to remove the collar that had been chaffing and digging into his neck as well as the muzzle that bit into his lips and clamped the steel, foul tasting bit between his teeth.
Change meant so many awful things in Dog's new world, his new life. Sometimes, it meant a different master wielding the various instruments of his agony. Sometimes it meant longer periods without food or water, until his head ached worse that his stomach and when he could no longer even crawl to the length of his chain. Other, worse times, change meant new companions, new challengers in bigger, tougher males, purebreds trained to fight and kill. Those were the worst changes. Just when Dog thought he had an upper hand on his opponents, they would send a new one into the pit with him, and Dog would end up bloodied and barely conscious by the end of the fight, knowing he would have to relearn strategies and weaknesses of his opponents. The last time there had been a change, when his new master took him, Dog became bait, a training tool to test the resolve and skill of the others while he remained shackled in place and muzzled, unable to defend himself.
Oh, yes, Dog absolutely loathed change.
The footsteps drew louder and closer. Dog screwed his eyes shut, feeling his entire body go rigid with fear for a moment that his masters had returned. Yet, there was no blow, no cutting knife, no kicks or punches or snide remarks. None of it. There was, however, an audible gasp.
Dog dared to open his eyes. His right eye had been sorely injured sometime ago and left a great, gaping blurry patch there, a massive blindspot occupied only by faded, watery blurs that could be anything. His eyelids felt heavy and leaden, but Dog managed to open them, albeit with heavy effort. He immediately snapped his eyes shut against the blinding, almost painful light before trying once more, blinking owlishly and forcing his bleary, good eye to focus. There were two shadows standing at the bars to his cage, one working to open the lock. The other held a crisply burning lantern to the dark cell, the source of the light that had blinded his atrophied eyes so.
When his gaze settled enough that the forms took shape into somewhat neat silhouettes, Dog scowled at them. Neither of this was his master, nor any of the people he knew to be among his keepers. He should have barked, growled, threatened. That was what Dog had been trained to do when faced with strangers, to fight and drive them away like a good guard. When he did, Dog earned himself a bit of rest, a bowl of clean water as opposed to the foul, brackish stuff they often gave him, and a bit of meat. Yet his newest master had grown tired of Dog's lamenting howls in the night and pathetic whimpering in the training pit and quickly silenced Dog.
Adrenaline coursed through his veins when the door swung open with a deafening, metallic groan and as the strangers stepped inside with him. Despite how sickly, how weak and how injured Dog felt, he shambled to his feet, raising his hackles instantly and bristling. Dog sunk upon his haunches, ready to spring it they got any closer. He lifted his lips over the steel muzzle to bare his teeth. It wasn't the greatest of threats granted the bit that kept him from actually closing his jaws, but Dog showed his teeth anyway out of instinct. His muscles tensed when one of the shadows came closer, reaching out a hand towards him. Dog crouched back, pressing against the wall. His nerves sang with sharp pains and bitter, searing lightning of the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
The figure that had gotten closer, a massive, hulking male who's scent of musk an leather even managed to cut through the overpowering stench of Dog's blood, sweat, piss, and fear that hung over the cage, called softly, crooning to him in a rumbling voice. "Shh... It's okay."
Dog pressed deeper against the back of the cage, dropping his head and narrowing his eyes in threat. The humans were strange creatures compared to Dog and his kind, but they were smart, after all, the humans were the masters of the monsters. It was by their whim and theirs alone that Dog lived or died. These humans should be smart enough to understand to back away slowly right now.
"Shh... Hey, hey..." the big man attempted to sooth and calm Dog as he took another step towards the monster.
Dog's heart thundered in his ears under he thought it might rip itself right out of his chest. His breathes came as quick, ragged things, partially choked by the metallic bit in his ruined teeth. The humans weren't leaving. Instead, they came closer and closer, holding out his hand. Maybe they were new masters or friends of the master. No. Dog trembled to think about that. Strangers that were welcome came only with the master. That thought only served to open a new spring of utter terror in Dog. The big man reached, and Dog jerked back away from the open hand as fast as his injured and mangled body could take him, while sparks danced across his vision as his twisted limbs struggled to work properly and as bone shards grated against one another.
The big man took a few more careful, calculated steps forward. Dog knew he should have been launching into hysterics and allow the almost palpable fear that loomed overhead to take him, but an eerie calm settled over him. It was the calm of a predator. Dog waited as the big man drew closer, allowing his panicked breathes to at least serve to take in and study the stranger's scent. The stranger smelt of leather and of musk, yes, but something lingered beneath that. A sweet saltiness and a sort of clean ozone aroma. Dog's good eye flickered over the big man, studying him as he got close, while his essentially blind eye was dragged alone by the motion. He studied the motion, the balling and compression of muscles, the tightening at the neck of this stranger.
"We're not going to hurt you. It's okay, Buddy. You're safe now," the large male promised in what Dog knew could be nothing but the purest of lies, tasting it like acid on the tip of his tongue- and Dog knew for a fact what that tasted like.
Dog waited impatiently in a state of sharp tension, slowing his breaths and willing his heart to slow. It was like in the fighting pit. Dog wasn't as large or as strong as the others, and, so, he had learned to wait for his opponents to present their weakness to him so Dog could exploit them. Here, in the cage, bound by his chains and collar, Dog knew the limit of his reach, worn in a filthy ring of dried, caked blood upon the floor, just beyond the big male's feet. He waited for the opportune moment, lulling the human into a false sense of security by hanging his aching head once more. This particularly gullible human seemed to take that as a sign that Dog submitted, taking the final step inside the ring before kneeling down in front of Dog.
Some part of Dog, the fierce, wild part of him, snapped at that moment. He sprang then, ignoring the intense pangs through his body and forcing himself to move. He clawed through the air at the big man. The stranger must have been sensing this, as he managed to unsling some sort of weapon and aim it right at Dog as he pounced the big man and sent the two of them to the ground. Dog's eyes went wide as the tip pressed into his chest and as his mind recognized it as one of the human's guns, but he had no time to react.
The thing went off with a flash. It was like lightning, sending rigid jolts of electricity wracking through his body, tensing and contracting each of his muscles. Sparks danced across Dog's already blurred and ruined vision, red and jagged. It had sent his jaw clenching tightly like a vise over the bit until copper splashed over his tongue where his gums were ripped open by that awful bit. The big man threw Dog off of him and scrambled back and out of the ring of blood stains. Yet Dog didn't go down easily. After everything Dog had been through over the years, after all the different tortures and horrors, it took more than that to bring the beast down with a single electric shock, much more in fact. It did, however, daze Dog terribly, so much so that he fought to concentrate on the men standing over him as they backed away and well outside of his reach. They argued, but Dog didn't understand a word of it. He shook off the shot as best he could, his muscles quivering from the after effects as he stood on swaying, unsteady legs.
The big man looked down at Dog with a solemn, sad look of commiseration before taking aim again and squeezing almost lovingly on the trigger, sighing heavily, "This is for your own good, Sheppard."
The second shock, while it did not catch Dog off guard, did take him down and sent him swirling into blessed, merciful darkness.
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Author's Notes: a.) If you haven't figured it out by my other stories, I am seriously into the angst and the whump. Cereal KathainBowen is super-duper-cereal about this. This fic will be dark, very dark, if you also haven't already clued into that. If you're not into that, be forewarned. If you're into it, and want to see what happened, I also warn you, the rating is HIGHLY likely to go up to mature.
b.) Uh... it's worse than it looks.
c.) This is kind of an homage to a combination of a bunch of fics floating around out there. I want to give mad props to IShotSherlock for the CSI fic Found, but Badly Broken. I wanted to do a remix but without being a total rip, and my brain kind of inserted the Charlaine Harris Southern Vampire novels before scrambling things about and mucking it up a bit.
d.) Yes... poor, poor Sheppard. Why do we love to hurt you so? Meh. Probably because, to quote the fabulous Voltaire in his song "When You're Evil" :
"I do it all because I'm evil
And I do it all for free
Your tears are all the pay I'll ever need."
Hope you lot enjoy. Ronon whump to follow shortly!