Set parallel to YASLWYH, the story of what happens to Aramis after the ship mission until his reunion with the team. Please read the warnings first.

WARNINGS: Abduction, torture, violence, physical and mental abuse, manipulation, heavy angst, forced drug abuse (nothing is too explicit, but when in doubt just skip this part, since it isn't neccessary to understand the rest of the series).

Aramis is a ghost. He must be, he can't feel his body, he isn't even sure if he still has a body, and he wants to laugh, because does it even matter? Darkness swallows him whole, swallows, swallows, swallows, swallows, and Aramis wonders why death faintly smells like metal and salt. It makes him think of fish, dead fish, and the image of his body floating upside down above the sea, leaving a trail of red-tinted water, crosses his mind. His mind, hah, he'd even smile if he had lips to move.

Suddenly a spear of light pierces the darkness – too bright, so bright it hurts – and Aramis squeezes his eyes shut - he still has eyes – and that means he has a body, a body that's alive?! - and then he remembers, remembers everything, and that leaves him with only one thought: D'Artagnan.

There are some things Aramis has figured out: One, he is still alive, because somebody wanted him to survive being shot and poisoned. Two, the somebody who wanted him to live didn't save him out of benevolence, since he's strapped to a bed and locked inside a small, hot, pitch-black room. The third goes without saying; he's fucked and can only pray that his family- his team is safe. (The fourth is a permanent stab to his heart: He can't promise he won't betray them under duress. And the torture is impending, a sword hanging above his head, swinging, gleaming coolly and whispering of his future treachery.)

Right now Aramis isn't in pain, though, he's numb from pain killers that someone must've given him during his blackout, and while that's probably a good thing, it also makes it hard for him to focus. His brain is a mess, he can't move, and his tongue is a thick furry thing that refuses to do what he wants, so he's forced to wait for whatever will happen in silence, and the soft buzzing in his ears… it never stops, making him anxious and nervous.

D'Artagnan's voice haunts him, calling his name, over and over and over, and Aramis tries to shut faer out, because it kills him. Thinking of d'Art makes his chest clench and his heart race and his eyes cloud with tears. He feels like a traitor, too, because he knows that Athos has been shot, but Athos has always been fine before, haven't they?, and Milady and Porthos know how to handle themselves in any situation, so that leaves d'Artagnan to worry about. At least that's what Aramis tells himself. It's easier to believe in this construct of ideas than to actually confront himself with… what he's been feeling since he woke up.

When someone enters the room, Aramis first notices it in the shift of air, makes himself look up, heartbeat taking up speed, mouth a firm line. He won't talk. Whatever happens, he won't talk. As if to mock him, the imaginary sword swings faster. The stranger turns out to be a man in his late twenties or early thirties, and against the black of his clothes the dirty blond of his hair stands out almost comically.

"Tsk, tsk, if this isn't the infamous Aramis." Voice and face reminiscent of a killer, breath smelling like cold ash, old cigarettes, and Aramis wants to laugh, but he can't, because dread explodes in his gut and knocks the breath from his lungs. "We have a lot to talk about, don't you think?"

A smile, fingers moving over the bandages that cover Aramis' chest, and he doesn't reply, swallows hard.

"You're lacking manners, Aramis. Or is it the painkillers?" Brows drawn together. "I should have your dose reduced. You're completely-", the stranger makes a dismissive gesture, disgust flickering across his face, "- useless in that condition. How are we supposed to get any work done when you're unable to respond? This is insulting to both me and you."

Aramis remains silent. His skin is prickling in an unpleasant way, and he feels like he's missing something vital, but he can't pinpoint it. He finds himself agreeing with the stranger – his kidnapper, jailer, killer? -, and too wishes he had a clear head.

"I see no other way than postponing our talk," the stranger says and his pale eyes crucify Aramis. A heartbeat, two. Then he turns around with an exaggerated sigh, not fully covering the frustration, the aggression, in his demeanor and steps out of his sight. Aramis hears him opening the door, but he suddenly stops and laughs sharply. "Oh, here I chide you and forget my own manners. I'm terribly sorry."

The words are like ice-cold steel touching the crown of his head, and Aramis clenches his jaw.

From across the room, the stranger continues: "Please, let me introduce myself. I'm Jean de Rochefort, your… host, if you will, during your stay on the Savoy. Make yourself at home, Aramis, you will be here for some time."

Jean de Rochefort.

That's the name the stranger gave him, unselfconsciously, and it sounded like the truth, like he didn't mind telling Aramis his real name, like it didn't even matter if he gave away his identity or not. Rochefort. A name Aramis never heard before, not that he remembers anyway. He wrecked his brain, but still – Rochefort stays a blank page, a nobody to him. Well, a dangerous nobody, holding him prisoner and having information on him.

Aramis flexes his fingers, but he doesn't struggle against the restraints. Not anymore.

He tried and failed freeing himself from the straps multiple times. All he gained from these vain attempts at escaping were bruises and, once, his wound breaking open. This had been unfortunately obvious with regards to his intentions. The man who was in charge of monitoring his health hadn't looked pleased. He had offered him actual food and water, and the permission to get up to use the toilet, if he'd promise to behave. No more tubes, no more force-feeding and bedpans? Aramis can't remember ever agreeing to something so quickly. The burning shame for giving in, giving up struggling and fighting after only a few days, comes and goes randomly. It was a high price to pay for dignity and comfort. He wonders how disappointed his lovers would be if they ever found out. If they were still alive, and if he was still alive to tell the tale. If if if if…

Aramis bites his lip, trying to blink away another bout of tears. He wishes d'Artagnan's voice would sound through his skull, letting him know that fae was doing faer thing, pulling up a complete profile from nothing within mere minutes, and he wishes fae could give him something to hold on to. Anything. A clue as to why he was held prisoner, how the mission fit into this, if Roy himself was involved. D'Artagnan being able to tell him this conveniently implies the knowledge that they all got out, were safe, alive, and that he could tell them not to look for him. No more risks. The mission was on him already – his client, his idea, his mistake -, and he couldn't forgive himself if something else happened because of him.

Aramis focuses on his breathing and pictures himself making the sign of the cross in front of an altar, surrounded by colored glass and light and God's presence. He prays that they are well and together.

(He also prays, eyes burning and heart breaking, that they believe he's dead. He prays, tears overwhelming him, that they don't blame themselves and move on soon, so if he doesn't come back he can become a fond memory. He feels sick afterwards. Perdóname, por favor, perdóname, perdóname… But deep inside Aramis knows that he won't be granted forgiveness so easily.)

Rochefort comes back after ten days. He wants to talk, he says, to work, finally. Dressed in a suit he looks like he just arrived from an official meeting, like a business man, and Aramis thinks that he can mask his killer's eyes with a bright smile and suave words. But the truth is that he's a predator among prey. And now? Now he doesn't seem to feel the need to hide it. Rochefort, the killer, is laid out front of him. It's in the way he watches him, the way he moves with control and how he looks like he's so close to giving it up at the same time.

"I want to offer you a deal, Aramis," Rochefort says as he sits down on the chair he had brought with him, smoothing his jacket, before folding his hands tentatively. "We can proceed like this: A question for a question, an answer for an answer. That way we will get to know each other a little better and, in the course of it, even build basic trust. That is, unless you prefer the uncivil way?" A smile unfolds on his lips, eyes measuring him coldly, disdainfully. "Thieves… In my experience, you aren't putting yourselves through drastic measures when you can have an easy out instead. What about you, Aramis? Are you going to be smart or unnecessarily stubborn?"

Aramis' mouth twitches. He tries not to sound too cynical as he says: "I'm not known for making smart decisions."

"Who would've thought, he can speak," Rochefort says, still smiling, and slowly claps three times. "So, you're choosing to be stubborn? Will that be your final decision? Because I'm not going to ask again."

There is something dark lurking in Rochefort's voice, almost tangible, and it's just waiting to cut Aramis open. He knows that. He feels it. There's no way he'll win this game. There's no point in even trying.

"Keeping things civil, building trust? Funny suggestion coming from someone who had me shot, restrained, and locked into a room, somewhere out in the open ocean." Aramis hints a shrug, feels straps press into his flesh, keeping him down. Literally but also metaphorically. He has no illusions as to what Rochefort will do to him, so he simply says: "I don't cooperate with people who will kill me anyway."

Rochefort's tongue flicks over his bottom lip, and he takes off his jacket, hanging it carefully onto the door knob. Broad stance, loose fists, he says in mocking solemnity: "So be it."

It's not the pain that drives Aramis to the edge of madness.

It's Rochefort's unpredictability, his manipulations, his mind games. It's not being able to move, not getting food or water for days, it's the temperature switching rapidly and randomly between too hot and too cold. It's the stink of his body filling up the room. It's not knowing what time it is, never being sure if it's day or night, how many days, weeks?, have passed. It's the impenetrable darkness and the loud neon light. It's the swallowing silence and it's the screeching noise that makes his eardrums hurt for hours. It's isolation, loneliness, his own voice haunting him (be safe, loves, ángel, we'll be home soon, trust me, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I fucked up, it's my fault, sorry- all of his presumptuousness, all of his lies, twisted, layer over layer, blurred, whispering, yelling, sorry, sorry).

It's everything but the pain. The pain he can bear.

What breaks Aramis, over and over again, is that he's awaiting Rochefort's visits with sick, thrilled anticipation. Nobody else is allowed to initiate contact; no touching, no talking, not even looking. So when his wound gets infected and fever shakes him, it's Rochefort who takes care of him. It's Rochefort who wipes blood and sweat from his body, who grants him the bare minimum of hygienic attention. He gets used to the humiliation; the initial sharp pain fades into a subtle ache that stays with him during every breath, every heartbeat, until it becomes a part of him that he can't remember ever living without. He loses the feeling of who he was before.

Before... Before is so far away that it almost seems unreal. Before, before this happened to him, Aramis had always thought he could survive on his own. Now it turns out that he can't even survive without regular visits from his torturer. Knowing, abstractly, that he's the victim and that it isn't his fault, that what happens to him wrong and that he doesn't deserve it, no matter his past missteps, doesn't help. Not really.

The sad, disgusting truth remains the same: Rochefort is his lifeline (and Aramis desperately holds onto it).

"The presidential elections are happening soon," Rochefort says, pacing the room, opening and closing a lighter. The flame flickers, dies, flickers, dies again. Aramis watches the sparks and sees his will to live mirrored in them. He doesn't say anything. He still hasn't figured out what Rochefort actually wants. Sometimes he beats him wordlessly; sometimes he doesn't lay a hand on him and tells him stories, news, instead. Whether they are true or not, Aramis can't tell, but that's probably the point.

"You wouldn't vote for Roy, would you?" Smiling, he takes out a cigarette and lights it. "And it's all because dear Marguerite told you that he's a monster." He chuckles. "I was surprised how well she played you. But then again, you wanted to play the hero so badly, you probably wouldn't have noticed the lie if her performance was less convincing."

Aramis grits his teeth, doesn't react. It's not the first time Rochefort makes Marguerite responsible for his situation. But he doesn't believe Marguerite betrayed him, he doesn't believe it for a second. During their meeting she'd been tense but she never once looked away. Her eyes, blue pools of terror and unfiltered fear, didn't leave room for deceit. Not in the way Rochefort wants him to believe it, anyway.

Blowing smoke through his nose, he steps closer, twists the cigarette between his thumb and middle finger. "I miss her… I think I'll pay her a visit soon."

"Leave her alone," Aramis spits out and regrets it immediately. Rochefort smiles. A reaction educed, another weak spot discovered. That's how Rochefort gets information out of him, bit by bit, to confirm something he already knows, to add it to his existing knowledge? And Aramis knows every single word he says is another nail in his coffin, but he can't always reign himself in.

"I'll give her your regards." Rochefort puts the cigarette out on the floor – not on Aramis' body, not this time -, and winks at him. "Not that she cares, but you know, it's a matter of manners."

Aramis starts hallucinating. Memories, nightmares, wishful dreams, manifestations of regret, love, loss – they have their faces, and they're slowly tearing him apart, pushing him closer and closer to a breakdown he won't recover from. He refuses to take food and water, because he thinks they are drugged, but that doesn't stop the hallucinations from taking over.

Sometimes, when it's particularly bad, when he screams and cries and begs God to let him die, when hands move over his body, faces melting into one single grimace that hollowly asks who are you?, he hates Porthos and Milady. He hates d'Artagnan. Athos. He hates them for not coming to his rescue, for forsaking him, and leaving him to Rochefort's torture.

Later, when he regains his senses, he hates himself for his weakness. It's an unbreakable circle, draining him, making him bleed out while his body appears to be whole. Rochefort watches through the eyes of the camera lenses, scattered throughout the room, and Aramis can see the shadow of his smile in every face that visits him.

Being alone with his demons while still being scrutinized 24/7. Maybe that's what's worst about it.

"Are we going to have a proper conversation today? No? Well, then, my dear Aramis…"

Rochefort ties his hands above his head with cold precision, smiling cruelly, teeth bared, eyes hungry. His hands are warm. Aramis starts shaking as skin touches skin, not because he's afraid, but because he's so damn cold that he even craves Rochefort's fists – anything to replace the burning coldness in his body.

"Tsk, aren't you… needy."

Aramis can't hold back the tears. Milady used to say that, and then she used to kiss him, and somehow this makes everything worse. Unbearably so. He forces himself to stand still and recreates a smile that his old self might have smiled – it hurts and it's hot and his lips are cracked, cracking, breaking, and blood drips onto his chin, first blood that wasn't drawn by Rochefort. Through blood and tears he says: "Give it your best shot, Jean."

Rochefort grins and Aramis lets his eyes fall shut, thinking in quiet triumph: You'll never ruin me like they did. (The affection ripping his heart to pieces, an affection that is Porthos' warm laughter, Milady's secretive smirk, that is everything they shared and lost, is more painful than the worst Rochefort can ever do to him. In a sense, that saves his life. This time and the next time and the next and the one after that, too…)

He dreams of black tunnels and white light. He dreams of floating through smoke and breathing in water. He dreams of death. It's the only time Aramis remembers how to laugh.

His dreams never last long enough.

The sweat tickles as it slips down his skin. It feels like insects legs all over his body and Aramis wants to scratch at it until it stops, until it hurts and bleeds. He tries to catch a look at his legs, because maybe there are insects, maybe they bury themselves in his flesh, nesting, hatching, eating him from inside out, but the straps are too tight to move his head. He digs his fingernails into the palms of his hands, trying to ignore the tickling, and when it doesn't help he bites into his bottom lip.

Hotness, copper, salt. A taste he grew familiar with in the past… month? Thinking that it may have been longer – or worse yet, not even a month – makes him want to cry. His heart is racing violently, and his throat is tight, but he doesn't have any tears left. Not now, at least.

He flinches when the door is opened and slammed shut with force. Aramis knows what that means. Bitterness spreads in his mouth and he averts his eyes as much as he can when Rochefort steps into his field of view.

"I was patient," Rochefort says and he sounds calm, undoing the straps that hold Aramis down. "I gave you a choice." He grabs Aramis by the arm and yanks him upwards. (Aramis almost can't hold himself up, head spinning, gravity pulling him down, his body a dead weight he isn't used to anymore.)

"I tried not to push you too hard." Rochefort sounds serious and Aramis is too perplexed to choke out a laugh. Their eyes meet, and there's a darkness in Rochefort's pale eyes that isn't hungry but cold and controlled. "Maybe that was a mistake."

Aramis can't fight back when Rochefort takes his arm and puts a rubber band around it, just above his elbow. "I know of your… past substance abuse, is that how you'd like to call it? Anyway, I have a present for you. I'm sure you've missed it."

"No, you're wrong," he whispers, unmoving as Rochefort leaves him sitting on the bed. He can't know about that, he can't, he'd used a different name, he stole the documents from both the hospital and the rehab clinic, d'Artagnan destroyed the files, Rochefort can't know.

"Tsk, what's that scared look?", Rochefort asks, holding up a small leather case that reveals a syringe and a small bottle with clear liquid. "Did you really think I wouldn't find out? I know everything about you, René."

His old name is a punch, harder than any punch Rochefort's landed before. "What do you want?" Aramis hates how his voice shakes, how it breaks, how the sweat on his body turns ice cold, his hair standing up, want and sickness seeping through his veins, and he wants to vomit and faint and die, but he also wants- he needs Rochefort to put the needle into his arm. Maybe it would kill him, maybe he would be free at last.

"You wouldn't understand what I want, but I'll make sure to keep you around long enough to get an idea." Rochefort smiles cruelly. "Now, care about a trip to the past?"

Aramis' sight goes blurry as he watches Rochefort prepare the injection. Please end it, grows and dies on his lips, unspoken.

He can't look when Rochefort presses the needle to his skin.

He closes his eyes. Exhales.

Prick.

Aramis doesn't know what Rochefort injects him, but it sends him on horror trips that make him scream until his throat is raw, until he has no voice. It's nothing he used to take, or if it is it's altered. He doesn't know, he doesn't care, he just wants it to end.

He still prays, when he's clear enough, but his faith is shaken. He recites the words, but the more he repeats them the less he believes in them. It feels like stringing empty word together, words that once used to have meaning, but are now irrelevant, worthless. Like his life… like him.

It's during an all-light-harsh-noise-no-food-and-too-cold period when he stops praying.

He tells himself it's to savor the little faith he has left. (Even though he isn't sure if he even has any faith left to savor.) It feels like turning away from God, like choosing an unnamed nothing over Him. He doesn't admit it, not openly, but without his faith he's irredeemably lost. There's no reason to hold on.

Aramis is ready to die.

The first time he leaves his body is when Rochefort goes too far.

It starts harmlessly. Rochefort shows him a newspaper that has Louis Roy, newly elected president of France, and his wife posing victoriously in a crowd plastered on the front page. He tells him it's been four months. Four months, Aramis thinks and nods. Rochefort asks if he wants a shot or if he'd rather talk. Aramis doesn't react, so it's Rochefort who decides to drug him and then beat him.

Aramis doesn't feel it, not really, he just hears something crack. Blackness, suddenly snapping back into blinding light, and then he sees himself, a pale thin shell in human shape, bony, colorless except for the bruises in different shades of violet, black, yellow.

Aramis, you didn't pass out already, did you? A hollow echo, that goes from malicious to slightly angry to concerned. Smiling Aramis watches as Rochefort curses, calls for backup, won't anybody fucking answer him?, and cautiously, hastily lowers him to the floor. His face is a mess of blood, snot, spit, tears, unmoving and slack but it looks peaceful despite the swelling of skin.

Aramis.

To his surprise, Rochefort starts talking to him in Spanish; his accent is hard, but hearing the sound of his mother's language is a pull on his ghostly form that draws him back to his body, back to that broken disgusting cage that keeps him suffering.

Dejáme ir… no… no…

But Aramis can't resist, he comes back.

(He isn't the same afterwards; he'll never be the same.)

"I apologize," Rochefort says, offering him a cigarette.

It's a few days after the almost-killing incident, days in which Aramis had been given the freedom to move (not that he'd moved, he stayed on the bed, invisible straps keeping him in place) and access to a tiny bathroom (this is where his door leads before another door leads to the ship's body). Days in which he didn't get tortured in any way. But waiting for something to happen wasn't any better than something actually happening.

When Aramis doesn't take the cigarette, Rochefort lights it. "All this… It was never about you, Aramis. You were a victim of circumstance. I meant to take that killer and ended up with you."

It takes a moment before Aramis realizes Rochefort is talking about Athos. His chest is dead, his heart beats, but only because it doesn't know any better.

"I'll be away for some time. Maybe we can start anew when I'm back." He puts the lit cigarette between Aramis' numb fingers, and walks to the door. "There's a smoke detector, in case you think setting the room on fire would be a good way to kill yourself. And the backup room… isn't as comfortable as this one."

Aramis stares at Rochefort blankly.

"Goodbye, Aramis, we'll see each other again soon."

(They won't.)

He's a ghost with a long messy beard and knotted hair and a permanent tremor. But he's a ghost, nonetheless. He can't leave this place, but he can lose himself in listlessness. He's a ghost.

You can't hurt a ghost.

"Aramis."

The voice is soft and the face it belongs to is soft too, framed with blond hair that looks white in the light – only the eyes are blue and sharp. An angel. Aramis feels a tear slip from his eye.

"Aramis, we'll get you out of here."

"Anne."

"Yes, yes, I'm coming."

Aramis thinks he knows the voices, but he can't remember where he heard them. They take him away.

He's free but he's still trapped. His alleged saviors, not angels but mortal women, turn out to be the ones involved in his kidnapping. They didn't know, they claim, they didn't know of Rochefort's plans or they wouldn't have helped. When he asks, broken-voiced, what they thought he'd do they have no answer. They try to explain, he cuts them off, sends them away.

He'll never trust a word they say.

He's back in Paris. Weeks pass. He hallucinates, panics, cries. He avoids mirrors. He doesn't go out. Anne and Constance offer to look for his team – We just need a lead, anything that could point us to them -, but he refuses. No way he'll betray them now, after everything he's sacrificed to keep them safe. He doesn't dare look for them on his own, either, doesn't send a sign of life.

It's not worth it.

He'll waste away and take their secrets to his grave.

He thinks he sees d'Artagnan walking down the street under his window. Aramis steps away from the window and locks himself in the bathroom. He throws up, rocking with tears, and begs God to take him back.

God doesn't answer.

"You have a grave," Anne says softly and hands him a strip of paper with an address. "I know you don't want us to find your team, but… maybe they will find you there."

Aramis
1987-2015
You are our heart.

Golden letters on white marble, a cross etched into the space underneath it. It looks like his cross, the one he gave to Marguerite, and he can't breathe, he can't breathe. Shaking, he clings to the tombstone, touching the words, wishing they were true.

In the next fourteen weeks Aramis comes back every day. After the first eight weeks, after he found nothing but fresh flowers at his grave, he takes Constance and Anne with him. It hurts, but with every visit to the graveyard he returns from the dead a little more.

Constance and Anne go ahead. The sky is blue and chases away lingering memories of the nightmare that has kept him awake for most of the night. Rochefort's voice is a sharp sting in the back of his head, but Aramis can push it away. He passes names of people who found their final rest. He longs to be one of them.

In the distance, he sees people. A group dressed in black… standing by his grave? No. He doesn't dare hope. He's hoped in vain for so long now. He's too far away to tell, but he is sure that there's nobody waiting for him, and he shakes his head, but quickens his steps anyway.

Almost there.

Anne suddenly stops and looks at him and his heart jumps and then there's movement and-

"Aramis...?!"

(A voice that is home, mi vida, and he can't, he can't talk, can't do anything, but maybe, maybe, someday, he will forget again what it feels like to be a ghost.)