When Kougami first came to, it took his eyes a moment to adjust to the failing light...joints stiff, it was his first instinct to move, yet he found he couldn't. His eyes began to drift shut again, but he caught himself just before he drifted off again and gave a sharp shake of his head to try and clear it.

"Nhh..."

His wrists twisted a little above his head, raw skin grinding against raw leather...he could feel something - brick - against his bare back, his shoes grazing the hard ground beneath him only lightly, as though lightly suspended.

"Nrgh!"

Pain sharpening his senses, Kougami closed one eye for a moment at the sensation of something rough digging deeply into his torso. His vision clearing a little, he looked slowly down at himself.

A thick, uncured strap was pulled around the middle of his exposed midriff like a belt, binding him to the wall behind him and taking most of his weight...though his hands were bound together over his head, it was mostly the strip around his gut that was suspending him in the poor light of the barren, unfamiliar room. For a moment, he thought his neck was bound as well, but after a few moments he realized that the only thing around his neck was his own black tie, hanging loose around his bare collarbones even though his shirt and jacket were gone.

His fingers twitched in the bindings for a moment, but he knew before he tried to move them that his gun was no longer attached to his actual belt, and it felt as though his cell phone was no longer in his pants pocket either.

Tch...ngh...so tight...

He flinched slightly as he glanced down at the hard, unforgiving leather strap around his belly, then looked around the room again.

He couldn't say where he was, but no one wanted to wake up the way he had (well, perhaps Shion), and gradually, his hazy memories started to fall back into place, and his unfocused eyes grew suddenly sharp and wolf-like.

Makishima...

Almost no sooner had he spoken then the door at the far end of the room clanged as a heavy lock on the other side was released, yawning open a moment later and framing Makishima's pale, ghostly figure like a specter against the gloom. Kougami's eyes narrowed immediately, predatory, but the man he faced seemed unperturbed, closing the door almost matter-of-factly behind himself and placing his hands behind his back as he strolled idly toward Kougami's slumped form.

"So, you're awake."

"Makishima..." Despite his predicament, the bloodlust in Kogami's tone hung in the empty room as though the word alone might devour the elusive man.

Makishima smiled vaguely.

"Aren't you going to say anything else? It's been a while, Kougami."

Kogami glanced around. No way out, no way to contact the others. How long had he been there?

"It's been several days," Makishima mused, as though reading his mind.

Hands still clasped behind his back, he paced slowly in front of Kogami, once, then back again, coming to stand inches from the captured Enforcer as though to demonstrate how close he could get without Kougami being able to touch him.

"As such, your friends at the PSB disappoint me at every turn. Even I expected them to have tracked you down by now...and to be honest with you, I'm running out of ways to pass the time."

Every muscle in Kougami's body tensed, poised and ready, as Makishima lifted an elegant hand, but it was only to unlatch the leather belt around Kougami's midsection, letting it fall away. Kougami clenched his teeth, but otherwise didn't react...the pressure had been nearly unbearable, but somehow he didn't feel any better now that it had been released, keenly aware that there was nothing protecting his sore, reddened belly now except for his own necktie. In fact, he thought he would have rather dealt with having the belt cut into his torso.

Makishima was by far the last person on earth that he'd want ever seeing the state of his currently soft, weak tummy.

He gave a sharp, brief shake of his head again, trying unsuccessfully to clear away the last of the haze, and he caught a faint smile pass over Makishima's face as he did so...and before he could do anything else, the pale man had reached out and set the tips of his long, ice-cold fingers against Kougami's vulnerable abdomen.

"I've been starving you for days," he murmured in the same, dreamy voice that Kougami had heard him use too many times when committing murder, or any other one of his twisted crimes. "You're completely empty."

He tilted his hand gracefully to the side to look up at Kougami, who towered over him several inches more than usual from the way he was tied up. Makishima's palm pressed lightly up against the Enforcer's soft, hollowed-out belly, rubbing the empty chasm for a moment or so until Kougami sucked it in to try and get away from his touch, the area growing suddenly concave. But it wasn't until Makishima had spoken that Kougami became aware the powerful ache of hunger somewhere deep inside him, not that there was anything he could do about it. He scoffed.

"So, what? You're just planning to let me starve to death here if they don't make it in time?" he surmised, not bothering to keep the hint of disappointment out of his voice...it didn't seem up to par with Makishima's usual, more genius antics.

Makishima seemed indifferent, however, and another soft smile graced his features as he slipped his hand inside the crisp white jacket he was wearing.

"It disappoints me that you would draw such an inadequate conclusion," he murmured, and Kougami's visage darkened as he watched the white-haired man pull out a small pill. "Recently I often find myself in deep reflection of the human mind. Humans are so...dull, in their default state. Drawing even an ounce of intrigue out of them is as drawing blood from a stone."

He leaned in closer, his face turned up inches from Kougami's, pill held up between in the low light of the space between them.

"There's a mind theory that, in the most dire circumstances, all humans will respond the same. No matter their convictions, their strength, their outlook. This proposal is something I find...disappointing, but unsurprising. Do you think it's true, Shinya Kougami?"

Kougami didn't humor him with an answer, his stormy blue eyes burning into Makishima's calm grey ones...he twisted his wrists in their bindings over his head again, but it was no use. There was nothing he could do, not the way he was now, but stubbornly, he continued holding the other man's gaze even as the tablet was forced past his lips, hand coming over his mouth until he swallowed.

Makishima smiled, and stepped back.

"How much longer will you continue underestimating me? Of course I won't kill you by such a pointless means," he said, reading Kougami's expression as the Enforcer coughed. "This is...an appetite stimulator. Powerful, fast-acting. Nothing more."

Kougami's eyes narrowed, looking the pale man sharply up and down, trying to get a read on him.

"For appetite? What's the point of - nhh. Nhhhh..."

Makishima's eyes glinted, a flicker of eagerness crossing his usually dreamy visage as Kougami faltered for a moment, frowning and twisting in slight discomfort. Another idle grin played across Makishima's face as the same blazing blue eyes shot up to lock with his own again, a chuckle almost bubbling up in his throat at the fire in the other man's gaze.

"Nrgh...nhh...what did you do to me...?" Kougami managed to growl, twisting again at the sudden, growing sensation of discomfort somewhere in his guts that he couldn't quite place.

Makishima placed his hands behind his back again, linking his fingers.

"What are your thoughts, detective?" he mused lightly. "A powerful medicine meant to bolster the appetites of the sick and the depressed, just another 'quick fix' that Sybil shoves down the mouths of its sightless, helpless people...currently dissolving instead within a man whose insides already ache for food, on an unbearably weak and ravaged belly, deprived of food, starved and emptied for days on end..."

"Nhh...ahh..." Kougami twisted slightly again, though it was partially because he had suddenly felt Makishima's cold, unforgiving hands slide slowly over his exposed stomach, moving from the middle around to his sides, resting almost hungrily on his flank as his own breathing began to pick up a little despite himself...he wouldn't give damned Makishima the satisfaction, biting back another utterance as he began to feel something shifting deep in his belly.

"An addendum," mused the other man, his own grey eyes like that of a fox honing in on its prey even as the shit-eating grin continued to play across his face. "To me, Kougami, human psychology is only a means to an end. Any interests I may have in the latest and greatest theories are fleeting these days. Mm...what would those great minds, I wonder, think about me if they knew that in fact, my interests in almost anything have been fleeting since your group began to pursue me."

His hands still resting on the tensed sides of Kougami's stomach, he leaned upwards to murmur close to the Enforcer's ear.

"A more recent interest all but drowns out the rest, and as with any anomoly in the system, I find myself eager to pursue and consume it."

A low chuckle escaped him, and despite his best efforts, Kougami groaned through his teeth, twisting again as he felt sweat break out across the back of his neck.

What's...going on inside me...? My gut...

Makishima's fingertips dug lightly into the sides of his abdomen, and there was nothing he could do about how closely the white-haired man was murmuring to him.

"Do you want to know what that all-consuming interest is, Shinya Kougami?"

Kougami jerked his head away roughly from the other man, his teeth clenched and bared slightly as the strange sensation continued to grow and shift inside him.

But Makishima only let out a slight chuckle through his nose, and in a sudden, swift movement, he pressed his hand feverishly up against Kougami's middle, his other arm braced against the small of the Enforcer's back, expelling a low breath against the other's ear.

"You," he uttered on a breath, his tone suddenly tightening with intensity as he rubbed Kougami's belly in a slow circle, as though to claim it. "At first, it was your mind alone that compelled me, so much like my own and so different from the bumbling fools that saturate your little detective friends. But then..."

He looked down between them as his cold hand ran over the Enforcer's stomach again, yet offered little comfort to it as he did so.

"Hgh...nrrhh...get off me..." Kougami managed, his insides aching with hunger. "Ohh..."

Makishima smirked.

"Our mind games, I can play easily from afar," he murmured. "It was only natural, therefore, that I began experimenting with playing other games from afar, as well."

The tip of his index finger circled Kougami's straining bellybutton calmly as he talked, his fluid and almost lazy demeanor in stark contract to the Enforcer's tensed muscles and steadily-increasing discomfort.

"Mm...I don't know at which point it was that I decided to commit to experimenting with different ways to hurt you - without you realizing it, you see, is the game," he uttered, patting the heaving belly in his hands a little. "But as always, the MWPSB makes things so easy it almost becomes boring. I'd seen, in our previous encounters, how much they appeared to be overworking you, knew how little they care for the well-being of Enforcers so long as they keep getting the job done...how often you'd wrap up one of your foolish investigations with your meals forgotten and your insides writhing from the constant stress anyway. And so at first, all I had to do was set up petty criminals with a steady stream of meaningless crimes, knowing that the uptick in activity would have you working like that around the clock."

Kougami clenched his teeth again, fighting back a sharp noise as his stomach suddenly cramped, so violently that he would have doubled over had it not been for the bindings holding his arms above his head. It was as though there was a distant storm brewing in his belly, steadily growing closer, his insides beginning to grow chaotic and restless. He could barely concentrate on what Makishima was saying...along with the hunger, the desire to actually eat something to quell it was gradually growing stronger. He fought it stubbornly, knowing the appetite stimulant was erupting inside him, but a moment or so later he twisted uncomfortably again, as though to try and twist away from the strange sensations starting up in his belly.

"You...ngh...you set up crimes to hurt people just to...ghh...get at me?" he growled, managing to look angry despite his discomfort.

"I'd discovered that the meals provided to Enforcers contained at the MWPSB were prepared ahead of time at one of the local supply chains and then delivered...another laughable challenge. I simply planted someone among the service staff who delivered the portioned packages of the Hyperoats you are all provided, had them tamper with the meals being given to you specifically. An earlier, more subtle version of the same tasteless stimulant currently coursing through you, as well as a supplement designed to increase weight, so I would see visible evidence that my plan had worked from afar," Makishima said lazily, cupping the slight chub around Kougami's beltline briefly in indication and jiggling it a little. "Combined with the pressures of the job, I don't doubt it worked just as I intended...like watching a play to which I already know the ending. Dull."

He shook his head, tracing the fading red lines across Kougami's panting gut where the leather belt had originally been cutting into him.

"I could tell the next time we encountered one another that you had been stress eating for weeks as a result," he mused slyly. "Not that an Enforcer at the PSB would ever let themselves go...but I could tell you'd become, mm, softer around the middle regardless. Almost everyone has an innate weakness, Mr. Kougami, even if they don't know about it until its drawn out. Hn...in your case, this is your weakness."

He jabbed Kougami's turbulent tummy in indication, forcing another strained grunt from the man.

"I suppose I could simply have continued...but it became too easy, too boring too fast. I wished to test us both...a more elaborate setup to occupy my time. To find more compelling ways to hurt you. To find new and different things to experiment on your stomach with, without being caught."

He chuckled.

"Of course, I orchestrated the lead that 'tipped you off' and sent the MWPSB sniffing around that nightclub...when you all realized it was a dead end, you all hung around for drinks. Mm... So many variables to consider, and yet it all played out just as I'd calculated."

Kougami glared at him defiantly, but the intensity of his gaze was lessened, the ends of his hair starting to cling to the sides of his face a little as he panted. The hunger was starting to grow intense, his belly cramping again in preparation for food that did not come, feeling like a shipwreck was crashing up constantly against his insides. He felt something rising up in his gut, and sucked it in quickly, but it was too late.

Gggggwooooooooooooooooorgh...

"Nh...uhh..." Kougami slumped, his soft belly straining as Makishima's cruel hands flew up to it again, feeling it eagerly as it visibly quaked from the intensity of his stomach rumble. "Ohhh...ah..."

Makishima smirked again and rubbed his belly for him, though he didn't look at all concerned when the Enforcer slumped further forwards, immediately exhausted.

"Mm...what I put in your belly while you drank with your coworkers at the club that night was not a stimulant, nor anything for your weight," he said, his eyes glinting maliciously. "A unique creation belonging to an...associate of mine, made just for me, to test out on you. Much longer-lasting, and far more interesting."

Suddenly, he moved closer again, shoving his hand up hungrily against Kougami's belly and subsequently pushing the Enforcer up against the brick wall behind him, a lilt of eagerness seeping into his own.

"Tell me," he breathed as Kougami slumped weakly against him after trying unsuccessfully to squirm away from the wall. "What did it feel like inside you? Tell me of the havoc it wreaked on your guts over those many weeks...how painfully and constantly you ached...did you lose sleep? Struggle to eat? Hn...I would have expected it to affect your work, but that only reminds me not to underestimate you, Shinya...spare me no details. I have only the barest of summaries regarding its potency and effectiveness...tell me exactly what it did to you..."

Kougami bit back a groan as another cramp wracked his body, but despite the fact that he was slumped over and sweating, he still managed to scoff.

"Couldn't...ngh...tell you if I wanted to. I could barely...feel it," he panted, a lie. "O-ohh..."

Gwwwwwwwwwwwoooorrrrrlp. Grgrgrlgrlgrlghhhhhhhhhhh.

It was as though there was a caged animal inside him, rabid and massive, consuming his stomach with a hunger he had never felt before, his entire belly cramping visibly again as he moaned and groaned.

Makishima had been wrong on one count, however, he realized drearily. He'd spoken of the MWPSB's treatment of their Enforcers, how their negligence and lack of concern for overworking their employees had only contributed to Makishima's machinations...and yet...

Akane...

Kougami closed his eyes for a moment, fleeting memories running through his head. Akane, peering into his room to ask him whether he was all right...Akane, laying him down on his couch when his stomach hurt and tending to it while she lectured on not working so hard...sleeping against him with her arm curled protectively around his sick, abused belly...talking Ginoza into letting him stay off-duty to rest...

He jerked a little at the sound of a noise nearby...the door across the room was opening once again, and for a wild moment, Kougami thought it was going to be Akane. She'd found him...

It wasn't Akane, however, nor any of the officers from the MWPSB. A lackey of Makishima's, no doubt, pushing a cart draped in a white tablecloth.

The smell of the food piled high atop the cart reached Kougami before he realized what it was, and the smell alone caused an audible gasp to escape him, his eyes widening as his stomach cramped so viciously in its desperation for food that for a moment he thought he was going to black out.

I'm so...HUNGRY...

Makishima turned as the cart was left with the two of them, though he'd set it to a halt just out of Kougami's reach, not the man had his hands free to get to it anyway.

"Mm...what's the matter?" he mused dryly, rubbing Kougami's empty belly. "Are you imagining eating it?"

Kougami knew it was all just Hyperoats, but you could craft almost any food out of those nowadays, and the spread laid before him was filled with it. A massive roast, piles of vegetables, tempura-fried and steamed, piles of warm dumplings, skewered meats, two massive pitchers of juice, dishes of fried, cooked, roasted, and raw foods of all kinds. Kougami's stomach groaned agonizingly, begging to be fed, but Makishima made no move to comfort it.

"Does the smell bother you?" he murmured instead, holding his hand against Kougami's stomach so he could feel the now almost-constant gurgling and groaning inside it. "Your appetite must be growing enormous by now..."

Grrrrrrrrrrghhhhh. Gwwwwwwwrrrgghhh. Rrrrrrrrrrrgrggghhrhh.

"Ghh...shit...oh, my stomach-!"

Makishima smirked giddily as the words slipped from the stubborn Enforcer out at last, but then scowled as, abruptly, the pager on his hip went off.

He paused, one hand still resting on Kougami's aching stomach, and read the page before sighing and slipping it back into his pocket, smiling wryly up at the other man.

"Let's put a pin in that, then," he murmured, dipping down briefly to lift the discarded strap of leather from the floor. "Though I admit I have an idle curiosity in what this will do to your Psycho Pass..."

He leaned forward, sliding the leather strap through the holsters on the wall behind the Enforcer's back and then drawing it slowly, tightly over Kougami's squirming, straining stomach, fighting against it as it rose chaotically, rapidly up and down as the other man panted.

"How much longer do we have until your friends finally find us, I wonder?" Makishima wondered aloud idly. "I suppose you'll need to wait and see whether the next person who comes through that door is them or me."

"Uhhn...ngh..."

Makishima closed his eyes for a moment, his smile spreading wider. Then, swiftly, he turned on his heel, leaving the piping hot serving cart full of food a short ways away from Kougami as he crossed the room once more and, with a final, cocky glance back in the Enforcer's direction, disappeared through it and closed it behind him.

The moment he was gone, everything Kougami had been holding back let loose...he slumped forward again with a gasp, his brow knitting and his eyes squeezing shut for a moment as he panted even more vigorously, barely able to do so thanks to the leather strap holding his belly in.

"Sh-shit...oh...nh...my stomach...UNH! My stomach...nhhhh...my stomach..."

Grrwoowrrrgghhhhhhhhh. GRRLRLRRLRLLP. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGHHOWRRRRRPPP.

Kogami arched his back, pushing his belly even tighter against the binding, but it was no use, he couldn't get free...Makishima had made sure of that.

"Nhh...uhhh!"

Hunger rumbled desperately around in his gut, and the beast inside it seemed to have grown exponentially...it was now a roaring, growling monster that had taken over his helpless stomach, ravaging his weakened belly mercilessly from the inside out. Coupled with the insatiable, ravenous desire to eat, hazy blue eyes shifted over to the cart just out of reach. His appetite seemed to be taking over the rest of his senses all together, and he found himself imagining the sensation of having the plate of warm dumplings filling his gut, of having the full heavy roast pushing against his insides, practically hallucinating how good it would feel to put something, anything inside his empty belly...

"Ohhhhhhhhhhhh..."

His head arched back, his belly pushing outwards desperately against its binding, his hands twisting even though they couldn't reach it with his wrists bound...the sights and smells of the food overwhelmed him, his appetite and hunger both spiraling out of control entirely. If he could just eat something...anything...he needed food in his belly so badly...and yet, knowing he couldn't fulfill that desire unexpectedly pushed one single, clear thought into his head through the noise instead.

Akane...it hurts...