What in the hell is that smell? It smells like dead, rotten fish in here. I move to push my hand against my wrinkled nose, but… something stops it. My eyes blink open, looking over to see my wrists are in restraints. Instinct tells me to pull against it, so I do, but I know logically that it's not going to go anywhere. Why am I here?
My senses are alive and well before my brain fully kicks into gear. This room is dark and cold, with only a spotlight shining down on me. It feels like I'm starring in a horror film honestly. This room looks to be set up like every other cliche torture room I've seen in movies. If this were any other situation, I would laugh, because it's almost deliberately set up this way to look like a cliche. The way my hands and wrists are bound, the dark and dank room, the singular lightbulb only casting its light upon me somehow — normally, I would laugh. But who has me this way is what I'm most terrified of.
So much for training with Skipper. He taught me how to use someone's body weight against them, but failed to teach me how to get away from a chloroform rag. That would have been useful, possibly. Dr. Harris — or Blowhole, whatever, probably would have still captured me.
I take the time to take in my surroundings. I can see the chains with cuffs on the ends hanging on the walls, but they don't look like they've been used. They honestly look like they were just placed there for a scare tactic — but it's working. There's a clock on the wall to my right, ticking away, counting the moments I've been trapped.
I try again to move my hands and feet, but the restraints show no signs of giving way. The metal is strong and tight around me, and I doubt there's any way to get out besides a key. I close my eyes and lean back against the tilted table I'm on. What would the guys do in this situation? How am I supposed to get out of this on my own? Even if I did, how would I get out and get to Skipper? I'm not even sure where I am. I'd have no clue where to go.
The door crashes open, effectively cutting off my thoughts and replacing them with a deep cold fear that chills me to the bone. A shiver runs down my spine as I open my eyes and see Dr. Harris — or Dr. Blowhole, Dr. Dickbag, whatever at this point — standing in the doorway with a big grin on his face. There was no empathy in his eyes, only traces of insanity and disconnection from the world. It makes me wonder if he's doing this out of mental illness or if he's really just this big of an asshole.
To his left, there's an older and shorter man with an eyepatch over his left eye. His toothy grin shows that he really should have gotten braces as a kid. His front teeth are super messed up, larger than the average person's, and one larger than the other. His skin is very pale, and it looks like he hasn't seen the sun in fifteen years. He's scrawny, his cheeks are sunken inward and he looks like he needs a sandwich. His eyes are red, too, but they honestly look like coloured contacts. They might as well be at this point.
To his right was another man. Reddish-brown hair fell to his shoulders, his blue eyes piercing through my soul with an equally wicked grin. Unlike Eyepatch, however, he is actually tanned and looks like he's been taking care of himself. Outside of this situation, I would have said he was attractive. But in this situation, I just wanted to kick him in the nuts.
Then, lastly, the man behind Dr. Harris. Easily, he was the tallest man I've ever seen in my life. I wouldn't be surprised if he was over seven feet tall. He has a full head of blond hair and very beautiful blue eyes that look like he's sizing me up for dinner. He's thin but well built, and he gives off the creepiest vibes of them all. I'm not sure why, but he is the one that doesn't sit right with me the most.
"Good evening, little one," Dr. Harris grins darkly as he steps forward into the light. He's still wearing that damned bluish-grey suit, the one he was wearing when I met him on that damned plane. At least this time he doesn't have his briefcase with him. I bite my lip and roll my hands into fists, subconsciously trying to break free. "No escaping now. You're all mine. So you might be wondering what the plan is, yes?"
All I respond with is a stare.
"I'm sure you do. Well, it's very simple — I've been tracking you for about a year now, ever since I found out that Skipper has a child. It wasn't but too long later that I found a problem — Skipper didn't know Skipper had a child. So, naturally, this had to rectify itself somehow. It took me a long time to figure it out, but I figured… well, the best way to unite father and daughter is to eliminate the mother from the picture."
My mind starts to race, and all at once, the fear is gone and replaced with anger. "You…" I clench my fists. "You fucking killed my mom, you sick fucking asshole!"
Dr. Harris smirks. "Ah ah ah, language little lady. Clemson, please teach this lovely little girl a lesson."
The man to his right steps forwards, the reddish-brown haired man, and his pocket knife flips open with an almost deafening snap! I clench my jaw and try to look away, but he grabs my face to force me to look at him. His blade comes up to the scar on my forehead, and with careful precision, reopens it. My eyes tear up, knowing I'll have to live through this all over again.
"So, we can do this the easy way, or the hard way. You can either cooperate and this will go smoothly for you, or you can be uncooperative and you'll be tortured until you cooperate. Either way, we will get our information. What do you say?"
"Go to hell."
Clemson's fist collides with my jaw, and pain radiates through my skull. This is only the beginning. The pain will be much worse, but I must endure. Skipper and I may have had that fight, but… I still care about him. I'm sure he still cares about me as well. If anything, I have to do it for the others. Private, Rico, and Kowalski have made living with Skipper much more bearable. Without them, I don't know where I would be.
I turn and spit blood onto the ground, then wait a moment and spit a tooth out following. Oh, lovely. More scars and lasting things to remind me of how absolutely terribly shit my life has gone.
"We will be back in exactly one half-hour with some food and water. If you are anything like Skipper, I expect you aren't going to willingly give up the information. You must be able to endure the pain — can't give information if you're unconscious."
All four of them filed out, and once again I'm alone with the clock ticking on the wall. My mouth feels full of blood all the time from the tooth being knocked out, my forehead is pissing blood from my now reopened and probably never-to-heal scar, and if this is only a taste, a lot worse is to come.
But right now, all I can think about is what he said.
Skipper didn't know Skipper had a child.
So, my father was… telling the truth. Skipper was telling me the truth, and I said I didn't believe him. I basically called him a liar right to his face about never knowing about me. But Mom kept me a secret from him. He never knew. I blamed him for all these years for abandoning us, and all along… he never knew. If he had known, would he have stayed? Would he have come back? What would our lives have been if we were just a happy family instead of all this bullshit?
Why did Mom keep me a secret?
Right at that moment, I become hyper-aware of my surroundings.
Oh. Yeah, this is… probably why.
Still, I would have rather known that he didn't abandon us instead of harbouring all these hard feelings toward him that he never deserved. Dad deserves a lot better than that. My feelings are a confused ball inside my stomach right now, but I know one thing. Blowhole screwed himself over with telling me that.
Because now I would rather die than give out any information.
My head leans back against the tilted table, and for the first time since I was a little girl, I started praying. God hasn't done anything good for me this far, but maybe this time He'll pay attention. I pray that Skipper will realise that I'm missing. I pray that he'll figure out that I didn't run away, that I don't hate him, that he's not (that much of) a bastard. I pray that he'll forgive me in time to see that I'm in danger.
The torture hasn't truly begun yet, but I feel exhausted just from the idea of what's to come. I know it's going to suck, but I know I'm also too valuable to kill. He has had this for almost a year in the making, I highly doubt he'd kill me off that fast. But after a while, death might be preferable.
Dr. Harris never actually brought me the food and the water.
It's been three hours, according to the clock on the wall. I wish I had something to stare at besides a clock on the wall, ticking every second away. My hair is in my face, sticking to my now-dry tear tracks, and I wish I could sleep in my bed again. I've tried to sleep here, but stress and anxiety have me awake and alert.
The door slams open once again, and I tense up. Here it comes. Buck Teeth is here. "You were easy to take out." His voice is accented and rough like he'd smoked six packs of cigarettes for thirty years straight. He's rolling in a tray of tools like you would find at the doctor's office, and I can only imagine how each one of them is going to cause me pain.
"Don't expect me to break as easily."
"Don't worry," he responds as he snaps his first surgical glove on, his wicked grin spreading across his face as he flexes his hand. "I don't expect you to."
My screams echo throughout the base for two hours.
I'm actually rather proud of myself. After being whipped, cut, burned, plucked, and punched, I'm still staying strong. I didn't think I would be able to handle this much, but even if I wanted to spill the secrets, I couldn't. I kept thinking of Dad. I couldn't do that to him.
In the middle of everything, Buck Teeth introduced himself as The Red Squirrel (an apt nickname). He was complaining about Skipper, complaining about how he had been wronged and this and that. It was a little hard to concentrate on what he was saying due to my own screams of agony, but I picked up enough to know his name and that he really hates the guys.
When he started to pack up, I couldn't help but breathe a small sigh of relief. My body was aching, bloody, bruised, and battered. It felt like I had been pushed through a snowblower. My legs stung from the whippings even over my pants, my stomach covered in little circular burn marks from when he would take ten-minute cigarette breaks. He cut my shirt up but left my dignity intact by leaving my bra on.
"Oh! I forgot. You're a toughie, but let's see," he pauses as he grabs one last thing — a salt shaker, "how you fair against this."
Even if that did break me, I couldn't talk through the pain. It burned and I screamed, crying out, but never begged for it to end. I knew from movies and books that it would never work. That would absolutely never work, and it could possibly make things worse. My tears flow down my cheeks like waterfalls, and I gasp for air that seems to no longer be in the room.
"Maybe next time, you'll give us the information we need."
I grit my teeth together, and with as much venom as I could through bawling my eyes out, I spit my first three words since it began. "Kiss my ass."
The Red Squirrel laughed and wheeled his cart of hatred out of the room.
Finally, I'm alone again. I ache and burn, and darkness begins to consume the edges of my vision. I don't even try to fight it. Consume me, take the pain away for a bit, even if just temporarily.
When I wake up again, I'm in worse pain than I was before. Everything has settled now, and on top of everything, I'm uncomfortable and cold. Why in the hell did they keep it so cold? Did they think it was going to break me more? Being shirtless doesn't help, the chilly air wrapping around me almost entirely. Now more than ever, I wish I was home, in bed, still with my mom in Wisconsin, living a blissfully ignorant life that people like this truly exist.
The door swings open and bangs against the wall. I flinch from the noise as my heart leaps into my throat. Please, no, I can't take another torture session like that. I don't want to break, but I don't want to die either. I don't want to be tortured like this again.
"Looks like the little one is awake," Clemson says, grinning as he closes the door behind him. Tears spring to my eyes and before I even realise it, I'm crying and whimpering. I beg for mercy. His eyebrows raise up as his arms cross over his chest. "You ready to tell us where your father's classified stuff is?"
When I found myself actually considering it, I was horrified. One torture session and I'm already contemplating giving everything I know up? Dad would be so disappointed in me. I'm disappointed in myself. I promised myself I would never be this selfish, yet here I am, ready to give everything up for the sake of myself.
"I thought so." Clemson must have taken my silent internal berating of myself as a "no". All I can do is submit and lower my head, and hope that this session will be quick.
Instead, we both jump at the sound of the door banging open. "Clemson!" Dr. Harris's voice sounds like music to my ears at the moment, knowing that this torture session is delayed if only by a little bit. "Not now. I've found Skipper's team. It's time to put our plan into action."
Clemson nodded. "Yes, boss."
Instead of torturing me like he originally planned on, he wheels me out of the room and into what I'm assuming is the main room of… wherever the hell we are.
There, on the farthest wall, is the largest screen I've ever laid my eyes on. Part of me is impressed, knowing how much it must take to run that gigantic of a screen, but the pain is keeping me from ogling too much. I close my eyes as Clemson continues rolling me closer.
When we stop, I open my eyes again to see Dr. Harris standing directly in front of me. Automatically, I flinch and wince in fear, preparing for a strike of some sort. But instead, he laughs at me, his choppy laugher ringing out like poison. I'll never be able to listen to a dolphin again without thinking of him.
He backs away to stand upon a podium in front of the screen, the entire room appearing on the large screen. I'm in the background off to the side, and for the first time, I get a good look at myself.
My jaw is bruised and swollen, my nose and lips are bloody. My stomach and chest are littered with various wounds, ranging from scrapes that don't show up properly to deep gashes, my reopened scar causing the entire side of my face to be covered in blood. Face wounds always bleed way more. The whip marks stood out on my pale skin, the marks deeply bruised and horrible to look at. My hair is stuck to the blood and tears on my face, and all in all, I look like I've been to hell and back. This is only after one torture session.
The image on the screen then zooms into Dr. Harris's face, effectively cutting me out of the picture. I'm almost thankful for it because it's not a pretty sight, to begin with. I open my mouth to ask what's going on, but Clemson takes this time to shove a ball gag in my mouth and ties it tight so I can't wiggle it at all. Well, this is a more interesting spin on things.
"Savio," Dr. Harris commands, pointing at the extremely tall man, "hook me up."
It takes a couple of seconds, but then on-screen comes a couch that looks familiar. Too familiar.
Oh shit.
"Oh Skipper," Dr. Harris taunts in a low sing-song voice, a smirk tugging at the edge of his lips. "I have found you."