Chapter 25:
She could feel the urge to cry growing. She had no idea how or why it was having the effect it was. But here she sat with Rosa watching the video. She wasn't sure what it was that she was watching. It was a little disgusting but it felt drastically different from the normal torture videos they have been watching to try and probe into the life that Lightning had experienced for so long.
"Now Reginald, the men and women are getting bored. But Orphan came to me in a dream and taught me a way to alert them and make sure they are entertained." Dysley spoke as he came into view of the camera as did a cage that Rosa and Yuna both were becoming far too familiar with as well as the frail near skin and bones pink haired child inside.
Giving the cage a sharp kick as he was handed a syringe with a clear liquid that both of the doctors knew from constant viewing that it was going to be the paralytic that had caused the both of them so much agony in the past but not nearly as much as it had caused Lightning.
As Lightning's arms jutted out to try and swing at the nearby guards to try and defend herself, Dysley just laughed as his blonde haired right hand catching one of the arms before giving the child a sharp tug to hinder Lightning slightly as Dysley shoved the syringe into the arm of the child before he shoved the plunger down causing an almost immediate reaction of her body going limp.
Gesturing towards the door, Jihl just tossed it open before she grabbed the tattered clothes and dragged the pink haired teen she was about to throw the child out when she lowered her head to whisper something into her ear before she quickly threw Lightning down onto the edge of the platform which they had been standing on.
"We are going to have the eldest Farron child fight another one." The fair haired man said as he smiled faintly as he drew a knife out and drove it into her hand and leg taking two of her limbs before he rolled the body off the platform. "Now we need to make the fight fair, I know Farrons have an issue with the little voice in their heads when it comes to harming others... so we need to make it a fair fight." The man continued to speak as Rosa quickly raised a hand to cover her mouth up a little.
"I injected enough paralytic into her to last ten minutes and once she is able to actually move, I took two of her limbs because we could only find a poor boy missing an arm... so we needed to make it really fair for him..." Dysley continued as they could see Cid releasing a small gate to see a rather healthy looking child stumbling out. "Of course, he knows not to kill... but we also told him that if he could make her suffer more than we have been, we'd give his entire encampment enough food to live three months comfortably and not work. But if they could make you do the impossible and want your child back... I'd let them all go."
Hearing the laughing coming from around the screen, Rosa just felt herself want to cry. A sentiment as she glanced over she could see that Yuna was losing the fight. "Now remember boy! I will keep my promise, but she has her own incentive... and will be trying to kill you herself. Do you have any words you would like to send to this girl's father?"
"This isn't a fair fight... she is already bleeding and is just laying there! I was told it would be fair!" he screamed as Rosa could feel the tears already running down her cheeks as she already knew the outcome of this fight. No matter how unfair or one sided it seemed.
The poor girls' father never budged and even confessed to her that he had wished that they would have just done the normally unthinkable thing all parents fear. It didn't help in the slightest that they did know that Lightning did in fact have blood on her hands. She had confessed to taking several lives and had always talked about it in a casual tone, but it had always been guards or people going to take something from her but from what both Rosa and Yuna had seen they normally wouldn't feel bad and could see why she wouldn't feel bad from defending herself when she could.
"That is where you are wrong boy. That girl is a Farron. They don't feel things like normal people. She has already killed sixteen of my men and women without losing a second of sleep. We are just trying to make it fair for you. So if that is all, get to it. you've wasted four of your precious minutes having me explain this... there is a reason though we've been calling her 'Lightning' and it isn't because she started it."
"Pause this Rosa." Yuna said as she could see Rosa's hand jumping towards the remote to pause it causing her to relax. "We both know clearly that Lightning doesn't die... and normally she is causal in passing about... I suppose technically it is murder." Yuna continued knowing that she was leading Rosa towards what she thought.
"I know. Believe me." Rosa continued as she took a deep breath as she just shivered slightly from the simple mention of how they both knew potentially how this was going to go. "I'm curious what that psycho woman whispered to Lightning. Normally they are very open about what they say to her. Thinking that it would persuade that monster to deal out his pocket change."
"I disapprove of you calling Jihl Nabaat a psycho... i've talked to people who have literally murdered their family and thought I controlled the departed with the sole intention of killing them and they don't have remorse on the issue. I'm offended you'd use that kind of language on behalf of those people."
"I agree, but technically she along with others there being classified as someone being on the psychopathy scale." Rosa spoke as she took a deep breath as she raised her hand to cover her mouth again to just stifle the urge to vomit once again. "And I frankly don't really want to imagine what she said to Lightning. I'm sure it is something horrific that makes me want to just hold my husband and cry myself to sleep tonight." Rosa continued with a small smile before she just sighed a little "And we both know if we wanted to get the answer as to what was whispered to her, we just need to ask Lightning. She has a memory that is bound to be a curse in many regards."
It was a sort of comment that the only thing was that you could agree on. No matter how much Rosa and Yuna wanted to argue about it. "You feeling better? Because we should continue it. I sadly don't feel like that boy has very long left to live and I don't want to be watching this long after I see that... because I do sadly really know Lightning. And I do know that she doesn't really have many qualms when it comes to things that would have the likes of you or me stay our hands..." Rosa spoke as she was about to start to press play when Yuna raised her hand.
"But she does... unless she feels like the person has wronged her or forced her into a corner. I mean she felt bad for giving that one prince and his bodyguard a grade three concussions each." Yuna said as she could see Rosa stopping to just stare at her with a sense of confusion. "I mean she doesn't feel remorse when she feels like she was defending herself or those she cares about but she still remembers it all. But... she has never brought up anything like this with me."
"Yuna, I could have your licence for even mentioning what she does and doesn't talk about to you."
"I know. But I also know that she freely gives information including what she tells you and I know she'd tell you what she tells me even if it is a tangential thing but you much like I can infer the difference between what is said and what isn't said." Yuna countered as she shook her head. "This is besides the point. What I mean is do you think we might have come across the part that she can't remember because she blocked this out,"
Taking a deep breath as she slide down in her seat, just rubbing her eyes gently, "We've seen her being beaten to a bloody mess, hell we've seen her raped to near death... especially with their penchant for stabbing her to create new holes."
Just sighing softly, Rosa knew that this was going to be a hilarious almost thing for her. At least in the sense that they both seemed to have a similar thought process. They just had to figure out what was truly vile enough to become one of the few things she has blotted out from her memory. Because with the way everything had been... they had no idea how just taking yet another life would be one of those things.
"Is it wrong that I hate the fact they didn't hit the femoral by the looks of it. It would have ended her suffering." Yuna asked as Rosa's thumb just hovered over the play button as she just took a deep breath as she contemplated how this was going to play out. The same way it always did. They both just hating the fact that they didn't really kill Lightning
"No. I don't think anyone would be thinking you are a bad person if they saw this... and I'm going to relish the day when we can live up to the promise we made Lightning and just destroy this. Then potentially sign myself up for electroshock therapy to kill the part of my brain that memorized all of this." Rosa continued with a small sigh as she hit the play button.
"I'm sorry... but I need to do this..." The disabled child spoke as he quickly ran across the small arena to just pull the knife from Lightning's leg. They could just see the look of pain in her features as they could see her leg and even her hand starting to spew a small river of blood as he drove the knife into her side. Everything about it seemed visceral.
Yuna winced at the sight as she just knew that it must have hit the kidney from the way Lightning had been laying which would mean she would have been bleeding drastically if she had enough nutrients to even make more blood. She was positive that was the reason they weren't seeing more blood from the initial wound.
She just was a little happy that she could see him leaving the knife in her body as he sat on top of Lightning's stomach and rained down as many hits to her face as he could with his singular arm. With each hit both doctors tried to figure out if time had slowed down to a standstill or if the deranged mass murderers and war criminals were lying about how long Lightning would remained paralysed.
"Why is she just laying there... it has to be past ten minutes..." Yuna said as she raised her hands to just stifle a gasp as they watched Lightning's uninjured hand start to twitch as if she was starting to test how long was left.
"I don't know." Rosa said as they both winced as they could see Lightning easily rolled the comparatively healthy man off of her as she started to stumble up onto her feet as she grabbed the knife with her bad hand and gave it a sharp tug out. Causing both doctors to cry softly.
"I'm sorry..." Lightning said in a soft tone as she began to shift from one leg to the other. Both of the doctors just worried about how she seemed to force herself to stand for much longer than she should have on her injured leg. "I need to do this... I can't let someone else suffer..." Lightning said as she almost faded as before she drove the knife into his arm just above the elbow before it was quickly pulled free.
Both Rosa and Yuna could see from the ferocity that it was bleeding that she had to have hit the brachial artery. They both could see the boy screaming as Lightning danced behind him to slash at his Achilles tendons. Both could have sworn they could have seen tears in her eyes but she was remaining as strong as she could and not show much weakness to the downed boy as she dropped to her own knees as if her own blood loss was enough to cause her to fall down.
"I'm sorry." Lightning said as she grasped the now bloody knife tighter as she used her free hand to spin him onto his back.
"If you get out, tell my family I'm sorry I couldn't beat you. But if you kill me... Remember my name..." The boy spoke as Lightning just took a deep breath to steel herself as she raised the knife above her head before she sharply plunged it down into the centre of her unfortunate victim's chest. Both of the doctor's knew it was a fatal injury.
The boy started to gasp as Lightning pulled the knife free hoping to make it a quick death. But he used his dying breath to utter his name. Or at least that is what Rosa and Yuna had figured given what he said previously. "Cu Chaspel."
That was when both doctors could see the damn Lightning had been so strong to keep up started to break down. She gently let go of the knife as she just gently took his hand as she started to cry.
And then a sound that broke Yuna and Rosa further was echoed throughout the recording. Derisive laughter as they could hear Dysley laugh and clap his hands as he walked into frame once again. "Turns out Farrons do in fact have emotions... impressive we've broken so many urban legends with our small guest." He said in a laughing tone as he made a gesture with his hands. "Load her with enough tranquiliser to keep her out for several days. We are moving operations in twenty minutes. We can't have another escape attempt can we? And grind that corpse up. We can be polite and give her a meal with actual cuts of meat."
As he spoke they could see a barrage of darts flying and striking Lightning in several places as she slumped over onto the body as Rosa quickly shot her hand over to turn the video off for good for the night. She already knew that it was going to be an emotion that Yuna would sympathise with. Neither could continue after watching that.
They weren't even sure if they really would do that to the poor departed boy but they also wouldn't put it past them doing it just to mess with Lightning a bit further. They had already destroyed so many social norms and basic human decency that it wouldn't be hard to believe that they would harm Lightning further by forcing a starving woman to eat a person she had just killed. They wouldn't have even been sure that it was the first time given how quick Lightning was to finish him off and in as painless a way as she could manage.
That thought alone was going to be something that Rosa just knew would have troubled Yuna just as much as it was troubling her and probably for much longer. A thought that had hurt Rosa a little because she did know how much it was going to hinder her from even getting to sleep for the next few months. Even more so once she talked to Lightning about this. And they knew they had to. They always had to talk to her about everything they had seen. If just to make sure what they had seen wasn't the part that was blocked out. And if Rosa was being honest with herself, Yuna had a point that this was a great contender with the memory that was blocked out.
She had no idea how an adult would be able to handle that situation let alone a girl that couldn't have been older than seven years old and if Rosa was once again being honest with herself had to have been without enough food for several weeks. Hell if she didn't know from the medical reports she got shortly after Lightning was admitted she would swear that was the limit that she could get from starvation. Especially with how fast her body has broken down food in the past that would have been enough for an army to consume to march on for the day. She would have been near death then and judging by the fact that she didn't bleed nearly as much as she should have been was more proof that either the monsters on the video knew the limit of where to stab to avoid killing her and became extremely adept at doing just that or her body had just started to lack iron to make more red blood cells.
"I just want to really hold her right now..." Yuna said as she reached for some of the tissues just to try and dry her eyes a little. "I'd risk being killed..." Yuna continued in a soft tone as Rosa reached for some herself to do likewise.
"I know. And worst part is... one of us needs to talk to her about it..."
"Neither of us can just talk to her about that themselves... she probably only has enough mental fortitude to talk about that once... and we both would kind of need to talk to her because it is kind of crucial like everything... and I'm scared that this is what she doesn't want to remember."
"Agreed."