"Wake up, little motherfucker," the huge purpleblood said, muffled by a mouthful of meat. He leaned over and let hot blue fat drip onto his captive's cheek.

Equius squirmed in the chair, pulling halfheartedly at the bindings. He hadn't been able to break them the first time, he had no chance now even with his terror-sweat lubricating the way. After two weeks of starvation followed by the maggot broth, he'd spent another three days being fed scraps, all meat. Trolls and their beasts did not leave many scraps; most of what he'd received had been bones with the marrow sucked out, tatters of skin with hair still on, the odd trace of grease or blood, meat as crawling with maggots as the broth had been or too far into putrefaction for even howlbeast lusii to want. He had eaten what he could stomach, pretending the bones were sticks of wood and ignoring the rotting reek from the parts he'd thrown down the drain. The time he'd been given chewed shards of cuttlefish bones had made him weep for memories of Feferi and how dismissive he'd been of her - now she and the Sufferists were his only hope - but he had eaten them. After lacking nourishment for so long, he struggled to break them between his loosening teeth. For the first time in his life, he was weak.

"Not talking?" The Grand Highblood ran a greasy finger across Equius' chapped lips and gestured with the huge rib-bone in his other hand. Equius followed the wave to the carcass of a centaur, its lower ribcage broken open and spilling organs, the meaty bones propped over the torture chamber's lit furnace. Equius wrinkled his nose at the fragrant smoke. At least the centaur was too short and thin-moustached to be Aurthour.

"Disgusting," he mumbled before he could stop himself, and tensed when he realised the Highblood had heard him. In the brief silence, his stomach gurgled loudly.

The Highblood's response was a deafening boom of laughter. "Sounds like you're getting used to it, boy," he said, waving the rib under Equius' nose. Unlike Gamzee's, his voice was steady, remaining at a low soft pitch, chosen to unnerve rather than intimidate for the moment. "Already got you gobbling the scrag-ends down like you love it, how much more d'you want the good shit? Speak to me, boy, I want to hear your squawkbox make with the words again."

Equius swallowed hard and emitted a croak, his throat dry and sore from lack of practice speaking. "I... I'd rather not... sir," he added hastily.

"'Your mirthfulness'," the Highblood corrected him. "Hoity-toity little bucketdrinker, ain't you? Too good for the food we so motherfuckin' generously give you? Ah, no, I remember your first day here - the beasts too good for you, then, little bootlicker? You liked it, I know. You're liking it now. Always wanted to serve as a trashcan for your betters, haven't you?"

Equius mumbled something noncommittal. His stomach gurgled again and gave him a painful cramp, and he clenched his abdominal muscles, wishing the restraints around his neck and forehead would let him double up. The change in diet was doing terrible things to his insides. He wondered if the ghosts of the beasts killed for him were stamping or kicking his guts invisibly, enacting revenge, and tried not to giggle at the thought. He really was close to snapping, he thought.

"If you're that hungry I'll let you clean the pens out. Every-fuckin'-thing in there was plants at one point, right?" the Highblood said, and chuckled darkly.

"If I thought it would make you stop killing, your mirthfulness, I gladly would. I'd beg to. But I know it won't, and I know enough about zoonotic infections to know that in my current state I would not survive. I'd rather my moirail never had to hear I left her that way." Equius sighed. "Once, long ago, I let her down on that score. I swore it wouldn't happen again."

"Stop killing, ha, says you! How many motherfuckin' bugs have you eaten this week? If a life's a life, why kill them and cry for mammals?" The Highblood chuckled again and shook his head. "D'you care as much about your own kind? Would you do the same to save a troll who wasn't your pale pal?"

"An innocent troll, perhaps, your mirthfulness."

"How cute. Principles. Think that'll save you from your ancestors' shame at spawning a grass-guzzler? Should be thankful, all you'd be good for if I hadn't found you is meat." The Highblood squeezed Equius' arm and chest, absentmindedly drawing patterns on him in grease and blood. "Herbivore flesh is so motherfuckin' soft, so sweet, too bad you're so ungrateful I'm showing you." He rubbed the meat across Equius' upper lip, watching him dry-heave. "Couple more days and you'll be snatching it from my hand, see if you ain't a proper troll then."

Equius seethed internally with rage and shame, and redoubled his determination. Vegetarians were not weak, could this troll not see that? Choosing not to kill beasts was respect, not cowardice! Would a coward have kept to his beliefs among those that mocked them? Would a weak troll have survived this long? Surely not...

"Why not simply force me? Your mirthfulness."

"That's for information. Little sense wasting the voodoos when we know you don't know a motherfucking thing about where your friends went."

Equius blinked in horror. "W-what? If you know I know nothing, then why...?"

The Grand Highblood leaned closer and whispered "Because, trashcan, when we do find your traitor hatchmates, I'll soften them up for the breaking by showing them what's become of you." He smirked and slowly licked the grease from Equius' trembling lip.