Complexities
Author's notes: All right, a quick low-down as to what's happening here. Basically, I get a daily word and I write a daily fic. Feel free to give me more words, via email, review, PM, whatever and I'll do what I can.
Enjoy!
Set in Ros' past with MI-6 and 6.03
The first word (exsanguinate) from 'melanie_anne' on livejournal.
Disclaimer: I do not own Spooks, it is the property of Kudos and the BBC.
Summary: A collection of one shots and drabbles.
'Exsanguinate'
Lies.
Pain.
Screams.
Truth.
It is so predictable, boring almost, this pattern that has developed. Ros stands behind a man, a nobody, who has information that she wants. He sits, slumped against the table, his body shaking and whimpers as she runs her fingers through his hair, only to yank back hard, ripping out a small handful. It is a simple technique, one used in the playground by ten-year-olds, but it has proved effective with those with a low pain tolerance. The man cries out but then clenches his jaw and spits onto the table, a defiance.
Ros rolls her eyes and slams his face against the table, pulling his arm back and gripping his fingers in one hand. He is hyperventilating now, but says nothing and she pushes hard and listens to the 'crack' that resounds around the room as the bones break. He screams and she leans over his shoulder, her breath tickling his ears.
"Tell me," she whispers, her voice almost seductive.
"No."
She sighs and walks around the table, sitting opposite. He looks down, away from her, and she kicks out suddenly, her boot colliding with his shin. He makes a dull 'omph' but still doesn't speak.
"We could continue like this," she says casually, drumming her nails against the hard wood. "But I really don't want to."
He looks up and glares; the flesh around his eye is swelling fast, courtesy of a punch earlier.
"I'm not telling you anything," he hisses.
Ros purses her lips and gets to her feet, crossing the room.
She'll let him wait a while.
--
Ros hasn't always been like this, able to torture a man without blinking an eyelid. Her first interrogation was a disaster. The subject, a woman, had spun a story, one that told of hardships that Ros – only twenty at the time – had believed.
She had been naive then.
That naiveté was lost when the woman's husband, the leader of a local militia unit organised a bombing, one only foiled when her superior entered the interrogation room and broken the woman's arm, forcing her to tell them anything.
Ros never made the same mistake.
Now she continues until she has extracted all the information she can, becoming immune to the screams, her conscience taking a back seat.
"Has he spilled yet?"
A colleague stands beside her and looks through the glass, his eyebrows rising. He, 'they', everyone knows that she no longer has any compunction when it comes to torture, indeed she has earned the title of 'ice-queen', whose blood now runs cold.
"I presume that he's not far off," he continues, giving her a side-long glance.
Ros turns and her lips curve upward.
"You presume correctly."
--
Skip forward fifteen years and the roles are reversed. Ros sits, strapped to a chair, her head forced backward. She can only look up and she watches as the drops fall, rhythmic, steady...
Damn irritating.
She listens for signs that someone else is in the room; that she hasn't been left here and is rewarded when a figure looms from the shadows.
Magritte.
The woman walks slowly, heels clicking against the cement and comes to a halt. Her posture is arrogant and Ros wants to roll her eyes. Magritte has made a mistake here, Ros is no ordinary officer. She excels at 'interrogation', it is a widely-acknowledged fact throughout the security service.
Magritte takes another step and raises her eyebrows.
Ros knows she is going to be asked questions but also knows she won't reveal anything.
She is better than Magritte at the 'torture game.'
Of that she is certain.
--
Ros wants to laugh as Magritte hooks her up to a polygraph machine.
She has never failed a polygraph; why would she, she is never sure what is lies and what is truth. No one did, not in this game.
Magritte stands back.
"Is there a light on?"
"Yes."
And so it goes.
--
The gun is cold against her temple but Ros doesn't flinch. Men have entered, yelling at her or at Magritte, and she clenches her fists as one whispers into her ear.
"Prepare yourself."
Ros leans away but the man raises his gun, shooting Magritte in the chest. She can see blood spill from the French woman, soaking the material of her shirt. Beside her, the man looks over at her polygraph and she hears a sharp intake of breath as he sees that her pulse has not risen, not even slightly.
She glances to the side as a blade comes down, glinting silver in the dim light, slicing through the leather restraints. She is pulled roughly to her feet and hard fingers prod her spine, forcing her up the stairs. The door is opened and she is forced to squints as the sunlight assaults her eyes. A man, elderly, is walking towards her and Ros recognises him from her past. A past including her father, which she'd rather forget.
"I take it we're not in Denmark?"
Sarcasm; a weapon she loves and uses often.
Behind her, she hears footsteps, ones she recognises, and a coat is draped around her shoulders. Magritte enters her line of vision and Ros realises that this whole thing, this 'torture', was a game.
Nevertheless, she won.
"It's just cold water running through your veins, isn't it?"
Ros says nothing as she realises his words are true.
Warm blood?
No.
Cold water?
Yes.
Ros straightens her shoulders and fixes him with a glare. It is something she has never thought about before.
Right now she can't bring herself to care.
Author's notes: A round-a-bout way of using the word but it was a damn hard prompt!
Hope you liked and please review.
Odainath