I'm really sorry if you're squeamish, because this chapter is pretty bloody. Hope you enjoy, nonetheless, and please give this story a vote or a comment if you're liking it x (Attached with this chapter is a photo of Jon Bernthal i.e. what Colonel Pine looks like). Also, don't worry if you're getting a tad bored of all the constant torture scenes (I'm nothing if not a sadist to my characters) because things are going to start getting INTERESTING soon) x


"Have you reconsidered the topic of our conversation yesterday?"

Erin closed her eyes, sighing inwardly to herself. She was lying on her back on the single mattress, her hands folded on top of her stomach. She still ached slightly from the beating that she had received beforehand, and wasn't looking forwards to it being repeated. She groggily opened her eyes and turned her head to the side, squinting at the tall form of Colonel Pine which swaggered through the door. He closed it quietly behind him. So he didn't have his henchmen with him today. That was good.

Hopefully.

Erin sighed dramatically, pushing herself up from the mattress to look at him with disdain. Her eyes wandered to his left hand, from which hung a rickety looking chair and in his right hand he was grasping a large bundle of rope.

Maybe this wasn't going to be as easy as she had expected.

"No." She answered his original question, groaning slightly as she stood up, her limbs protesting at the movement, "Take That are a fantastic band. You should really see them in concert. It would probably change your perspective."

She had a smug sense of satisfaction at the fact that the Colonel's eyes rolled slightly in annoyance at her response but it disappeared pretty quickly as he slammed the wooden chair down on the floor and strode towards her, a malicious glint in his eyes. She took a step backwards, automatically bringing her hands up in front of her in a guard stance. Two years of JuJitsu classes when she was eight probably wouldn't help her now but she may as well give it a try.

Pine's lip quirked into a grimace of a smile, the scar on his face seeming to move independently to the rest of his skin. He was bigger than Erin. Much bigger and at least twice her weight. It was impossible for her to overpower him and he knew it. He grabbed her left arm, his large hand easily encircling her bicep, and she tried to yank it backwards but to no avail. Erin brought her leg up with the intention of kicking him in the stomach but Pine stepped forwards, effectively trapping it in between their bodies. With his left hand ,he grabbed both of her wrists and with his right hand he took hold of her hair, pulling it back harshly, almost tugging the follicles from their sockets. He led her to the chair despite her protestations and foul language and thrust her down on it with such brute strength that the legs creaked in protest. She tried to get up but he made fast work of tying her ankles to the legs of the chair, before walking around and tying her arms uncomfortably behind her.

Erin began to panic. She had managed to stay relatively calm during the initial part of her interrogation but this was different. She was unable to move, her entirety left at Pine's disposal. A small part of the back of her brain whispered that maybe it wouldn't be such a bad idea to give him what he wanted. Surely, if she told him the formula for M.F.C.T.S, this would all be over? She shook her head imperceptibly. No. Her formula was invented to help protect people and she had no doubts in her mind that if it got into Pine's hands, that would be the opposite of what would happen.

He finished tying her wrists together, the rope digging into the sensitive skin there but Erin kept a straight face as he walked back around to the front of the chair and bent down, his face inches from hers.

"You know what I want, Erin."

He smelt of spearmint. Someone, thankfully, brushed their teeth this morning. Erin looked upwards, refusing to make eye contact with him. He placed one of his hands on her shoulder, the warmth from him seeping in through her pink shirt to her freezing skin.

"Get your fucking hands off me." Her voice was ice. Pine took a step back seemingly surprised at her outburst.

"You could make this very easy for yourself if you just tell me what I want to know."

Erin took a deep breath. He was right, she could easily give them the formula and be out and on the next plane back to Washington in no time, but she wasn't going to abandon her morals for the prospect of being comfortable.

"I've told you already." She said regretting the words almost instantly as they came out of her mouth, "Take That is underrated. If you'd just give them a chance-"

A rough palm slapped across her face and Erin's head whipped sideways, cutting off the tail end of her sentence. Alright, so Colonel Pine didn't appreciate sarcasm. Erin tasted blood, she must have bitten through her lip.

"Ugggh," She groaned as she sat back up, her vision hazy. Pine wasn't even out of breath as he stood above her, his arms crossed tightly over his chest. Erin struggled to focus her gaze on him, she was seeing double after the brute force she had been hit with.

"What is in M.F.C.T.S?" The question was blunt, with no room for interpretation. Erin brought her head backwards, looking directly at Pine's face. With the largest amount of effort she could muster, she gobbed a mouthful of spit directly at his face. Most of it missed, but one globule managed to land on his chin, and she felt an immense sense of satisfaction at the shocked look on his face. Silently, Pine removed a small handkerchief from his inside pocket and wiped the spittle off his face, the look of distaste in his expression obvious. He removed his jacket leaving him in just a tight-fitted shirt. Erin couldn't help but stare. He was incredibly well built, not an ounce of fat on his huge body. Her heart dropped to her toes. There was no way in hell she would ever be able to overpower him. He silently removed a small object from the pocket of his jacket before dropping it carelessly onto the floor. It glinted slightly under the fluorescent lighting.

A butterfly knife.

Erin's blood turned to ice.

Pine noticed her terrified expression and the corner of his mouth lifted in a smug grimace. He was finally getting the reaction that he wanted from her. He held the knife up threateningly, admiring it in the light. His gaze snapped back to Erin.

"You sure you don't want to tell me about that formula?"

Her answer was instant, "Go fuck yourself."

Pine shrugged, bringing the knife up again.

"Your choice."


It was over an hour before Pine returned to his office. The Soldier was still there, leaning against his desk with his arms folded across his chest. He stood up straight when the Colonel returned, his eyebrows raised slightly in shock. The sleeves of the taller man's white shirt were rolled up to his elbows, showing off the impressive muscles of his forearm, but the Soldier wasn't even sure if his shirt could be called white anymore. The cotton was splattered with dark red blotches of what could only be blood. The thick red liquid ran down one of Pine's forearms, whilst his other hand held his jacket. The Soldier took a deep breath inwards. By the looks of this, the girl was in a pretty bad state.

"She's all ready for you," Pine said, throwing his jacket on his desk and winking at the Soldier. He nodded silently before walking out of the room, feeling slightly sick.

He wasn't an easy man to make sick. He had seen too much blood in his life for it to have any effect on him. No, what had made the bile rise in the back of his throat was the smug expression on the Colonel's face. As if he had enjoyed his work. Taken pleasure from the torture of another human being. The Soldier had killed in cold blood more times than he could count but he had hated every second of it. For somebody to be able to do something like that to a person and feel proud of it.

That took a special kind of evil.

He stopped outside Holding Cell 435, the room in which Erin Jefferson was being kept, and leant with his back on the door breathing heavily. By the looks of Pine, he wouldn't be faced with a pretty sight when he went in there. Being 'compassionate' wasn't one of his strong points and he wasn't sure how he would be able to act towards the girl.

On a small table next to the door lay a thin blanket and a bowl of water with a cotton towel. The Soldier rolled his eyes. It looked like Pine had thought of everything. He grabbed the bowl with his metal hand, leaving the blanket on the table, no need for overkill, before pressing his human hand on the fingerprint scanner on the door. It swung open almost instantly and he walked into the room.

It was a state. Erin sat, her arms tied behind her, chin tucked into her chest, on a small wooden chair in the middle of the room. Her pale legs were covered in an artwork of purple bruises and red cuts and the Soldier couldn't help but wince in distaste at the sight. This was messy work.

He sighed to himself and walked over to her, placing the bowl on the floor. This was a pointless exercise. She was out cold; she wouldn't even know that it was him cleaning her wounds, let alone feel empathy. He pushed her head back gently with his metal hand, taking a closer look at her face. There was a thin cut that ran from her hairline to her cheek, the blood matted in her hair, and one corner of her lower lip was split open, a small trickle of blood running from it, but apart from that the skin seemed relatively clear.

He let go of her head and pulled out a small knife from his back pocket, walking around to the back of the chair and cutting her arms free, where they hung limply by her sides. Pushing his long hair back from his face, the Soldier returned to his original position, kneeling down in front of her. He begun on her legs, wiping the small droplets of blood from the cuts. They were deep, he noticed as he cleaned them. Pine hadn't gone easy on her.

It was a strange sensation for him, her bare leg under his fingers. It had been so long since he had felt the warmth of another person's skin, even longer since he had felt that of a woman. He shook the thought from his head.

A mission. She was his mission.

He rinsed the cloth in the bowl, the water being such a deep red it was practically brown, and lifted it out again, wringing it in his hands.

"Pointless fucking mission, anyway." He muttered to himself as he lifted her head up once more and begun to dab gently at the gash on her forehead.

"Language." The word was muttered out of her lips so quietly that he couldn't be sure if he heard anything at all. It was only when her impossibly brown eyes fluttered open that he realised that she was awake. He froze, his hand still at her temple, his face inches from hers. Her eyelids drooped slightly and her brows quirked in confusion as she took him in. She wasn't expecting him to be there. He didn't blame her.

"I d-" She tried to speak, but instead her small body was wracked with a series of coughs. The Soldier moved backwards, shocked, as her torso shook with it. She breathed heavily, and looked up at him, a spot of red blood on her lip where he was sure it hadn't been before.

"I don't suppose you've got any of that chloroform left?" She continued, a small grin at the corner of her mouth, "I could do with a bit of it right now."

The Soldier shook his head in disbelief. Pine had beaten her almost to death, and she thought that now was a good time to start telling jokes?

"Unbelievable..." He muttered to himself, as he rinsed the cloth once again, and continued to work on the cut on her forehead, cleaning the blood out of her hair, refusing to meet her eyes. He hated Pine for this. He would have easily preferred a more simple mission. Go out and kill somebody and be home in time for 'bed'. Not that he actually slept .

A small snort came from Erin and he ignored it, working intently on getting a large clump of blood untangled from the mass of dark blonde hair that sat on the top of her head.

"Who did you piss off to end up getting this job?" She muttered and he rolled his eyes and sat back on his haunches. Even when kneeling down his head was still slightly above hers and he looked down at her, his face expressionless.

"I wish I knew."

With that, he took his knife and cut the thick ropes binding her feet to the legs of the chair and stood up, bowl and cloth in hand. Not speaking a word, he walked to the door. Pine could get somebody else to do this, somebody who could string a sentence together without sounding like he wanted to kill somebody.

"Patched up by Optimus Prime," muttered Erin, "My week is just getting weirder and weirder."

He recognised that name. She had called him by it before, the first time that he had arrived. He turned around, his face curious.

"What does that mean?" He asked.

Her eyebrows raised, she seemed surprised that he had even spoken to her, let alone asked her a direct question.

"He was a character in a television programme," she explained, "'Transformers'. He was a metal man..."

Her voice trailed off, and she glanced pointedly at his arm, which tensed under her gaze. He turned around and unlocked the door with his fingerprint, closing it behind him without saying another word. Placing the bowl, filled with the dark mixture of blood and water, onto the table beside him, he leant with his back against the door and breathed heavily.

This was going to be harder than he thought.


OOOH HECK ARIGHT sorry for the intensity of that. Hope that you enjoyed anyway. Please reveiw and vote xx