I've never written a chapter this short, hope the content makes up for the lack of words...
WARNING: Torture ahead, so I'm going to rate this particular chapter as M
It started with water.
Cold liquid poured down his throat, burned down his nose until he was left a coughing, gagging, sputtering mess. The snickering wafted up to his ears as though from a far shore but the blood and water pounding in his head, drumming in his ears was too loud.
When he was straightened with a jerk he couldn't stop from gasping like a fish out of water and Kevin grinned through the wheezing because how ironic was that?
His expression was somehow interpreted as a signal for more water. It was enough to drown the agony in his shoulder where the bullet had found home, and was still embedded, right before he has woken up to find himself tied to a chair. As darkness washed away the world, he wondered that he really needed to ask these criminals what it was with their sick fascination of drowning a man on dry land.
...He is sitting up on the stretcher in the back of the ambulance, an oxygen mask doing its wonderful job and an emergency blanket that didn't seem to understand what it's supposed to do. He jerks his head aside when a bright light shines in his eye and he can't stop his teeth from chattering.
The flashing blue and red beams are broken by a flitting shadow as someone hops into the back of the ambulance.
"You gotta let the good lady do her job bro," an achingly familiar voice says.
"I'm cold..." he manages to grouse through the shudders.
"That's coz you're dripping enough to form your own personal puddle," with that his sight is blocked out without warning. But before he could panic, strong hands, gentle yet vigorous began rubbing his hair dry with the towel that's been deposited on his head...
Something bit him in the crook of his elbow and he lazily blinked as the long silver sting pulled out of his skin. He had a feeling that he had forgotten something; it was nagging and nibbling at the memory that had disintegrated into the fog packed in his head. He groaned under the blinding light he was sitting in the middle of and blinked blearily up at the oppressive darkness.
"Fog, clouds, candy, cotton;" He grinned, "Yeah, heavy like wet cotton."
He rolled his head on the backrest of the chair and stared at the tiny red dot blinking in the deep black that was surrounding his patch of light.
"Something to let them know what we do with cops,"
He knew that voice, it's been grating on his nerves for so many days now. The man always sounded like he had a cold and Kevin was hard-pressed to offer him a hanky.
Yes a hanky, he told the oddly familiar snort in his mind that he could not identify, not a tissue a hanky thank you very much.
"Cortez?" Kevin blinked into the darkness, "If you gave me that chronic flu of yours I'm not gonna be happy."
The punch to the center of his chest was a revelation. It let his muddled brain know of the looming presence beside him. The man was huge, freakishly so and he was wearing dark sunglasses. Kevin wished that he had a pair too; the light was burning his retinas.
"Douchebag," he muttered then chuckled to himself that dissolved into a cough.
He would have folded onto himself if he had been able to. Tied up as he was, it did nothing to help him against the furry creature trying to dig out of his lungs and claw out of his throat. It wouldn't let his breathing move and it was an eternity when Kevin was able to mange some semblance of an inhale. Ignoring the tingling in his lips he lifted his head again.
"Yup, I'm gonna call you douchebag." He said.
He had a vague sense that there was something off about his mind. He couldn't catch the thoughts that were hopping around the room in the form of neon bright bunnies. There were five on one side and four on the other.
Kevin frowned to himself because he had a feeling that there was something he needed to remember, but his bunnies started hopping again. Red, orange, green, blue, yellow, purple, pink, silver and gold; they jumped about in the darkness at an almost dizzying pace. He rolled his eyes to keep track of them until they again stopped, noses twitching as they sniffed the air, with five on one side of him and four on the other.
He decided to keep count of them on his fingers; the only problem was he couldn't feel those particular extremities. So Kevin flexed his hands and stretched his fingers, all five of one hand four on the other, at least he thought he did.
He glanced at the red dot blinking in the dark like a high cell tower; promising a strong reception for his cell phone, Kevin cocked his head to the side as it struck him that he needed to get a message out. He needed to tell someone how many bunnies there were so he kept the motion going, hoping that his hands were doing what he was willing them to.
"You will tell me the truth before you die," Cortez spoke from wherever he was, "Where is the hard drive?"
Oooooh he knew that one, the answer popped in his mouth and he had to clench his teeth to keep it in. He dropped his chin to his chest and bit the inside of his cheek when he felt the answer wrangling with his tongue. Whatever Cortez had pumped into him, it was one insisting serum.
The lingering smell of jasmines around him didn't help either. He frowned in the direction he thought the scent was coming from then looked back up at the Douchebag.
"The princess in her castle would defeat you," he said.
"Princess?"
"Oh yes, the lost princess," he nodded.
If he had any strength left to spare, Kevin would have been deeply embarrassed. This was what his mind came up with, colorful Bunnies and a Disney princess? From the music box set in the dark corner of his mind he could hear a teasing snort, could see a pair of warm brown eyes rolling in exasperation in the reflective lid.
He silently tried to decipher why the presence from the music box felt like someone he should know.
It led to fire.
He didn't see the Douchebag move to the side, didn't see him get the burner but a rough guttural scream escaped past his lips when the flames licked his skin. They reached the flesh in a matter of seconds that stretched into a life time.
The silence that followed was loud, beating like a drum beside his ears. The soft rustling of paper echoed like iron nails scratching against steel walls in his head.
"Detective Ryan who is your contact among my men?"
Kevin looked into the shadows and a slow nearly predatory smile pulled at his lips. He could trick his mind into twisting the question as a go ahead from Cortez to name the men he had come across while undercover.
"Jack Cortez, Seamus Charles, Dane Oken, L –"
The next burn scorched out the names from his memory. He screamed soft and low until all that was left of his awareness was the sticky stench of burning flesh. Even as black spots threaten to overwhelm his too white vision he kept a count of his bunnies on his fingers.
"Hey Kev?"
"Hmmm..."
"Thanks man,"
"Uh?"
"For havin my back through all this mess, you didn't even know Ike."
He raises the bottle in his hand and clinks it with the one raised by another at his side.
"Till the wheels fall off," he murmurs.
"Till the wheels fall off," it sounds like a promise.
The presence beside him on the orange sofa that had seen better days is comfortingly solid; it's strong, like a pillar holding the building together from way deeper then the basement and to the highest point of the roof.
"I will break you Detective Ryan," Cortez said, "I broke the other two, you're no different."
He was so deep in his pit of agony that the pain when it came was a surprise in itself. The flash of the blade from the corner of his eyes made his heart beat faster and he hoped fervently that it was a part of his hallucination. The white hot line that it left in its wake confirmed it otherwise.
His limbs shook under the strain of pain and the need to escape, to get away from the raw anguish radiating from the patch that stretched just shy of halfway from the back of his shoulder. Bile stirred to push up past his throat but a cough rode it out. It jarred viciously the skin that was peeled back from his shoulder blade.
It was air.
Who knew the necessary, invisible menace could wreck such agony. Kevin was too aware of its maliciousness as it set alight all the exposed nerve endings. It was too much for him to focus on the brightly colored bunnies.
"I will make you sing," Cortez sounded sure of himself.
He clenched his jaw tight to keep in the mewling sound that threatened to escape him. Pulling in a ragged breath and with the greatest effort Kevin lifted his head up, he looked through the fringes of his hair that had fallen in his eyes. He couldn't see the man in the shadows but he had a general idea of where he stood.
"Didn't know you were masochist too," he said.
He welcomed the lightening punch to his side and felt something shake loose inside his chest. Something broke; the pain chased it up to his mind like a crack on ice.
The solid, warm presence by his side walks just a bit ahead. He reaches out and grabs on; but the dark eyes that turn to him are full of hurt and rage. He can't speak though he wants to; he can't plead though he's willing to and the buildings around the alley tremble.
His hand is shaken off and the warmth recedes. A shudder escapes him and Kevin splinters.
"Who is your partner Detective Ryan?"
Kevin snapped his head up, eyes wide in shock. The question bounced around in his head like a hyped tennis ball and sucked the fog like a sponge. Everything in his years at the Homicide crashed into him with a shattering force that left him unhinged.
"Javi," the name formed in his mind.
He was his partner though he may not want to be now. It pained him somewhere deeper than flesh and broke something stronger than his bones. The simple question from Cortez was a torture far worse than what he had just gone through.
"Javi," his mind supplied but he shook his head.
"Who is your partner Detective Ryan?"
"Javi," his mind insisted.
But he could not say it, not because he wasn't sure about their position right now but to save the man he looked upon as his brother.
He didn't even flinch when the fist connected with his sternum; just sagged against his bindings.
"Your partner Detective Ryan?"
"Javi," his mind screamed.
But he could not condemn the man; the effort to stay the name left him breathless.
"Javi," it was almost a whisper now; petulant, insistent, downright bratty.
It gave this entire suffering a meaning; a reason to not let go entirely. Kevin nodded to himself and cast a flimsy net of his last remaining will to gather up his shattered wits. He lifted his head and looked up at Douchebag.
"I have no partner," he said.
"You're lying!" Cortez skirted the edge of the bright ring cast by the lights, "There's always a partner. There were two of you last time!"
"I have no partner,"
Cortez has had enough; he leapt forward and grabbed the Detective by his throat. This man was somehow fighting Cortez's own brand of truth serum, one that he was sure would work.
"You will tell me who your partner is!" he roared in his face.
"Javi," it reverberated in his mind and Kevin bit his tongue to stop it from slipping out.
"There are always two of you, who is the other one?" Cortez shook him hard.
His head wobbled, his chair screeched and Kevin realized that he would have to give a name; a name of his partner, but not Javi.
"Leo," he said.
The silence was thick; Cortez glared down into his eyes. Kevin could feel his sour breath on his face but he was just relived that the painful urge to talk had finally released its hold on his brain. It would come again with the next question but Kevin decided not to leave things to chance.
"Leo and I, we've been partners for almost three years now. We work out of Narcotics. He's 6'1, broad shouldered, shaved head and blue eyes." He said it all aloud not just for his captors but for his tired mind to internalize and focus on.
"Good," Cortez patted the side of his face, "I knew you'd talk."
He didn't get a chance to get a word in as the world plunged to pitch dark. The blinking red light went out and someone cut through the tape holding him in his seat. Kevin felt the tug in his hair as someone pulled him upright and he was surprised that his shaky legs could still hold his weight.
Rough hands pushed a coarse bag over his head and his numbed feet tingled as he was pushed ahead towards where ever the person behind him was leading him to. He knew he was being led to his execution but there was no strength left in him to struggle.
On the brink of passing out Kevin stumbled and fell to his knees. Hands under his arms dragged him off a little way and pulled the bag from over his head. He blinked rapidly when they came into the light and his dazed vision focused on the man standing a few feet away. It was the Douchebag behind that mask; Kevin just knew it. He stared head on as the unflinching gun trained onto him.
"Javi," he murmured under his breath as three shots rang out in the early morning.
It ended on a soft green patch of earth.
TBC
This would be a good time to remind you that this is not a death fic.
