Douglas smiles to himself when he catches the chimera's cool soapy scent drifting across the evening air. He's not surprised that Theo's managed to give Beacon Hills' pack of clueless teenage werewolves the slip, but he is a little amused that the fleeing chimera somehow thinks he's safer on his own. He'll be made to see his error very soon.
He trains his ears to the sound of Theo's footsteps treading swiftly across the forest floor and eases into a prowl behind them, keeping his own steps silent as he slowly advances on his prey's back.
The chimera's senses are weaker than the lowensmench's and he's unaware of the beast's presence till it's far too late. Douglas can see his his back stiffen when he finally realizes he's being stalked. He moves to run, but Douglas has him before he gets more than a step forward.
It's a brief and quiet struggle. Theo's pathetic attempt to escape the stronger creature's grip isn't any more successful than the chimera's resistance to opening the line of mountain ash for him the previous evening. In a few moments, Theo's pinned to the ground, huffing short defiant breaths as Douglas grinds his face into the dirt.
"Stop struggling." Douglas growls, reveling in the way every syllable rolls off his tongue now that he's cast off that ridiculous American accent. "It only makes you look more pathetic."
"Can I help you with something?" Theo growls back at him, in a thoroughly unconvincing attempt to appear unfazed by his compromising position.
Douglas can't help but let out a short gravelly laugh.
He'd been forced to endure a decade of this insufferable little brat growing up, and from the very first time the Dread Doctors had strapped his squirming body down onto their table, Douglas had hated him.
As a child, Theo had a grating, shrill cry that would make anyone want to claw their own ears off. Anyone but the Dread Doctors of course. They were content to let the child scream and cry himself hoarse through their experiments, never bothering to put him under or shut him up. It would have taken only a moment of extra work to gag him, but of course they hadn't troubled themselves. So Douglas would listen to the high-pitched sound for hours, fantasizing about stuffing a rag in his mouth.
The desire to gag Theo only became stronger as the sniveling child grew into the most obnoxiously arrogant adolescent Douglas had ever seen. A insubordinate, conceited little shit that thought he could cheat and connive his way into becoming an alpha werewolf. He had somehow managed to convince himself that he had chosen his lot with the Dread Doctors, and he had the nerve to be smug about it.
The gaul of somehow believing that he's clever, while all the while never knowing the true use the Dread Doctors intended him for drove Douglas mad. Even now, he can tell Theo fancies himself as resilient. A survivor. When the only thing he's ever truly been good for is being used.
Douglas has been waiting for a very long time to disillusion Theo, and he's going to enjoy every moment of it before shutting his back-talking insolent mouth permanently.
"I believe that you have something that belongs to me." He declares, letting his claws grow till they scrape against the chimera's cheek. "And I will be having it back now."
"Well if you want it then maybe you should try asking for it." Theo suggests, and Douglas can practically see him taking measured breaths, slowing his heart rate to appear unfazed. "I'm sure we could come to a mutually acceptable arrangement if-"
"Do not pretend you understand what I am speaking of!" Douglas barks, annoyed. "I am well aware that you have no idea what I am talking about. I'm not the Dread Doctors, and I have no intention of humoring you in your childish little games."
He flips Theo onto his back, and studies the chimera's torso. He knows what he's looking for is in there somewhere. He'd heard the Dread Doctors discussing its placement before Theo had been turned.
"You were so small when they hid it in you." Douglas clarifies, dragging the tips of his claws down the chimera's chest "You did not understand what they were doing..."
Realization seems to dawn on Theo's face and his hand darts out to grab Douglas's wrist.
"Wait ." He breathes desperately as the color drains from his face.
"I'm afraid you aren't in a position to be giving me orders." Douglas gloats.
"Look," Theo goes on, imploringly. "I'm sure there are other ways to get what you want. We don't have to be enemies, I could help you..."
"Do not insult me. I will never be in need of your help."
"You don't know this town. You don't know Scott's pack. You don't know-"
" Halt die Klappe! " Douglas spits in Theo's face, hand moving to his throat.
He's not sure if Theo understands his words, but from the way he flinches and closes his mouth, it looks like he at least comprehends the meaning behind them.
"Good." Douglas purrs, pushing Theo's hands off of him. "If you stay still, I might not have to kill you when I retrieve, but it makes little difference to me. Keep wriggling, and I'll be prying it out of your corpse."
It's a complete and total lie. Douglas is well aware that Theo's individual parts are worth far more individually than the broken mess of creature they made up. Once he finds the item the Doctor's have hidden in him, he'll dig right into Theo's skull and take the pineal gland.
He just wants to see if Theo will do it. If he'll hold still and let himself be cut open for what must be the hundred thousandth time.
"Now put your hands by your sides." He orders. "And hold still."
Douglas watches with satisfaction as Theo lowers his arms, his entire body going limp in surrender.
"There..." He coos as he slides Theo's shirt up with his claws. It feels good to watch the impertinent teenager submit to him. "I thought you might see reas-"
He's cut off mid sentence as a sharp rock is plunged into his temple, and Theo is clawing at him trying to escape.
"You little bitch !" Douglas roars and returns the blow so viciously Theo's head snaps to the side, his body falling limply into unconsciousness.
The low buzz and faint crackling of the overhead light is the first thing Theo's aware of as his mind slowly wakes. There's a dull but insistent throbbing in his forehead. He flinches, taking in a sharp hiss of breath as his eyes flutter open.
He knows where he is even before the dark cloudy shapes of the room around him come into focus in the dim yellow light.
The flat hard feeling on his back, the snug tightness on his wrists and ankles, the exposed yet immobile feeling. He doesn't need to see the leather straps or the bleak metal to know he's on an operating table. An old operating table.
"Ah, you're awake." a thick familiar German accent says from behind him. "Good. I was beginning to think you would sleep through most of this, and that would have been very unfortunate."
Theo doesn't give Douglas the satisfaction of watching him struggle to get out of his binds, and instead glares at the man as he wheels a cart full of instruments into sight.
" Unfortunate ?" Theo repeats, almost indignant. "God what does everyone have against anesthetic?"
"Well the Dread Doctors were lazy I am afraid. Believe me, I did not enjoy having to listen to your squealing and shrieking any more than you did, but for me-"
"Yeah somehow I doubt that." Theo interjects, unable to keep the anger that's welling up inside him out of his voice. As if listening to him scream was anywhere near as traumatic as having three strange men in masks drag you out of your bed, take you to an unfamiliar place, strap you down and cut and drill into you...
"But for me- " he repeats, as if he had the right to be annoyed with the interruption. "I am keeping you awake because that is what you deserve after hitting me with that rock. Did you really think that was going to work? This could have been simple, Theo. A bit of digging and then done, but, no. Like a little worm you must try to wriggle and squirm your way out of everything. Now, for once , you're going to suffer the consequences of your actions."
Theo wants to point out that he's suffered plenty. That contrary to popular belief in Beacon Hills, being in the ground wasn't a fucking picnic. But he holds his tongue.
Based on how sympathetic Douglas seemed to be of him as a helpless child he doubts he's going to be getting any sympathy.
He's quiet as he watches Douglas select an instrument from his tray. He keeps his body still as the man approaches, leering over his exposed chest, even if his heart is pounding like it's going to break out of his rib cage. He turns his head away when he feels the cold thin blade on his skin, screws his eyes shut and tugs involuntarily at his binds.
The small struggle draws a laugh from his captor as the sharp metal slices into him. Theo bites down on his lip, trying his hardest to swallow his screams-he doesn't need to hear Douglas mocking him for them a second time-but he can't stop himself from letting out a small strangled whimper.
"That's good ." Douglas purrs, and Theo can feel him cutting deeper into him. He tries to lie as still as possible, afraid that too much movement might cause the man's hand to slip. "I always knew you could behave. You just needed the right motivation ."
Theo gasps as he feels a small metal rod stuck into his chest.
"The right hand ..." Douglas punctures him in a second place and Theo's breath hitches almost to the point of hyperventilating. "...to keep you in line."
Theo gulps down the thick musty air around them, breaking into a cold sweat from the effort to keep himself from screaming.
"Fuck you ." he growls.
At that, Douglas drops his tool and grabs Theo's face, forcing their eyes to meet.
"Do not talk back to me boy." he breathes, furiously at him. "I will not tolerate it like the Dread Doctors did. Speak to me like that again and my knife will find one of your arteries."
He gives Theo's chin a quick jerk.
"Understand me ?" he barks. "Or would you like to hear again it in German ?"
"Yes ." Theo responds venomously.
"Good ." Douglas retorts, and pushes Theo's head back onto the table.
It goes on like that for some time, Douglas making cheap jabs about Theo's upbringing as he places small rods in him to keep him open and prevent him healing as he searches for whatever it is he's looking for. Theo's not sure which he hates more, the feeling of his flesh being peeled back layer by layer, or the sound of the ex-Nazi's voice as he recounts an endless stream of stories about Theo's "spoiled" childhood.
Yeah he was a real brat screaming for his parents while he was being tortured. A real fucking entitled primadonna when he cried for someone, anyone to help him. He'd never realized how annoying it must have been for Douglas to have to listen to him beg them to stop or to tell him why, why, why they were doing this to him.
Theo had honestly forgotten that he used to say any of those things. But now, having the details of it recounted to him, he can't stop remembering it in crisp sickening detail. How he would wake up in his bed the next day as if nothing had happened. How he'd try to tell his parents what was going on but they'd tell him it was just nightmares. How when it continued they'd taken him to a child psychologist who told them he was making it up for attention.
How every day he'd become more and more of a problem that they didn't want to have to deal with. How every night it would happen again and every morning he would wake up colder, feeling like something was missing inside him. How he'd try and try and try to get that something back but never seemed able to.
He doesn't scream as the time slowly slips by him, but his eyes start leaking eventually. Warm droplets of water trickle at first and then stream down his temples. By the time his eyes are red and chaffed he can barely tell where he is anymore. The cuts of Douglas's knife blurring together with those of the Dread Doctors.
It isn't till he hears Douglas practically shouting, that his mind is jolted back to the present.
"Where is it?! WHERE is it?!"
His eyes squint open to see an absurd number of rods in his chest, and he realizes for the first time that Douglas's knife has been digging with increasing frustration over the last hour.
He licks his chapped lips, and a smug grin spreads across his face.
"Something not going your way?" he asks in mocking concern. His eyes are still heavily lidded and voice sounds breathless, but his tone is unmistakably pleased.
"Keep your mouth shut!" Douglas shouts.
"Or you'll what?" Theo presses. " Kill me? If you wanted me dead you would have done it already."
"You think I can't make this worse for you?" Douglas threatens, leaning back up from his work to look Theo in the eyes again.
"I don't care if you do."
"Is that so ?"
Theo doesn't answer. He likes the repartee, it's reeling his mind back to the present, keeping it off the very dark roads it's been wandering down, but he doesn't want the torture to get worse. He's not sure how it would exactly, but he believes that it can. It always can.
"I once heard you say..." Douglas muses, setting his blood drenched tools back down on the tray beside him. "That true pain is emotional pain...do you still believe that to be true, Theo?"
At that, Theo lets out a broken, raspy laugh.
"You think you're going to be able to deal me some emotional pain?" he asks, darkly amused at the idea.
Just what exactly did Douglas think he could possibly do to him?
"This should be real good." he continues, still laughing sarcastically. "Go on, Doc, lay it on me. Make me feel real bad about myself. I'm ready."
"So smug ." the man coos, his lips spreading into a malicious grin as he reaches his hand forward to rake through Theo's damp hair in a toxic mockery of affection. "So arrogant . I think you'll come to regret saying that..."
Theo really wishes Douglas would bring his hand a little closer to his mouth so he could bite it. Or maybe just bring his face a tiny bit closer so he could spit at him.
"Doubt it." he snips.
"You really think there's nothing I can say that would hurt you? Nothing that would rattle you to your very core?"
There's something in Douglas's voice that Theo doesn't like, but still he sticks to his guns.
"No, I really don't."
"I am not surprised." Douglas comments. "You have always been very ignorant. Never able to see how the Dread Doctors had you performing for them like a trained animal. Not once did you ever have even the slightest clue as to the true use they intended you for."
Theo doesn't like where this is going, but he says nothing.
"You're not the least bit curious?" Douglas presses, the smile on his face becoming unbearable to look at. "Don't want to know the real reason they did what they did to you? The true purpose they never had the chance to force you into fulfilling for them?"
"They were trying to create the perfect evil." Theo states, but there's an unsure tremor in his voice. "They...they thought they saw it in me, they thought that I could be that..."
"Oh, Theo." Douglas says patronizingly. "You were a child. You hadn't hurt so much as a fly before the Dread Doctors found you. Do you really believe they saw that in you?"
Theo's mouth is dry. He doesn't want to believe that this man knows something so key to his development that he, himself is unaware of, but there's a scary and authentic sort of glee in the spine of the man's words that's making Theo uncomfortable.
"They knew I was born for evil." he insists. "They thought that would make me a good candidate for the Beast..."
"No, that's what they told you."
"How would you know?" Theo snaps. "Why would they tell you ?"
"I had my ears turned to the Dread Doctors before you were even born ." Douglas says. "I know why they chose you, and it wasn't random. You weren't meant to be a killer, despite what everyone's told you. You weren't born this way, you were made this way. By their design."
"No ." Theo says, gritting his teeth. "I was always this way. They picked me because they knew it. They saw it. They saw my potential..."
"Lies. Lies they told you to make you feel special , to make you feel like you never had a choice , that all the depraved things you did for them was just you fulfilling your destiny ...when really it was quite the opposite..."
"You're lying!" Theo shouts, a sudden rush of adrenaline snapping his abused limbs to life to tug against their binds. What Douglas is saying can't be true. He doesn't want it to be true. He didn't have a choice...he never had a choice.
"If you think I'm lying then why are you so upset?" Douglas antagonizes him further. "Is it because you know deep down that it's true? That you weren't born some kind of deranged sociopathic killer, but that you were made to be that way? That you chose to let yourself become it?"
"You don't know anything !" Theo spits at him. "You don't know a fucking thing about me."
"I know everything about you." Douglas purrs.
"You don't know shit !" Theo yells. "They saw I was special! They chose me because I was-"
"Now that..." Douglas interrupts, finally leaning back from Theo's face and picking up his tools again. "...actually is true. Just not in the way that you think it is."
Theo's had just about enough of Douglas's games now. His beating around the bush of something that he obviously has been dying to say since he first tackled him to the ground. Or maybe earlier. Maybe he's wanted to say it from the first time he'd heard Theo's annoying crying as a fucking scared child. Whatever crap Douglas wants to say, he wants to hear it now.
"Enough bullshit." Theo growls. "If you've got something to say then fucking say it."
"Have you ever heard of soulmates, Theo?"
Theo's quiet for a moment. His mouth frozen in a grimace somewhere between confusion and disgust. He stares at the sealing, doing his best not to huff and roll his eyes.
Was he for fucking real right now?
"What ?" Theo asks disbelievingly, still not entirely sure if this is some kind of Nazi joke that he isn't privy to. If Nazis tell jokes that is.
"I think you heard me correctly." Douglas says, now peering into Theo's chest again.
"I've obviously heard of them." Theo snaps. "But I don't believe in them any more than I believe that aliens built the pyramids... less actually."
"Of course you think that." Douglas says, and then goes silent, beginning his search for whatever it is that he's looking for again.
"So?" Theo snaps after a few moments of silence. "Even if I believed you-which by the way, I don't- -the hell would that have to do with anything?"
"Everything ." Douglas says, casually sticking in another metal pin and Theo hisses in pain. "Soulmates, actual soulmates, aren't like whatever children's stories you might have heard. Not everyone has one, in fact most people don't. When you have one, it actually is something special. When a person, especially a supernatural creature, connects with their soulmate, it makes them stronger, more powerful, nearly impossible to break."
"And you think I have one?"
"Not only do I know that you were supposed to have one, I know who it was supposed to be. And so did the Doctors. It wasn't just anyone, you see, your soulmate was supposed to be someone strong. Someone strong enough for the Dread Doctors to be threatened by him. Someone that would stand a chance against even the Beast of Gevaudan if he had his soulmate by his side..."
"Was ? What do you mean he was someone strong?" Theo attempts to ask bitchy, but his voice is starting to come out nervous in spite of himself. As much as he keeps trying to reassure himself that he doesn't believe in any of this garbage, there's an insidious twisting in his stomach, that he can't seem to kill. "Did they...kill him-I mean, whoever you think he was supposed to be..."
"Oh no, he's very much alive." Douglas says, looking up from his work again, his expression confronted with fake sympathy. "He's just not yours anymore."
An angry rush of color spreads to Theo's cheeks.
He can't explain why that makes him so enraged, the idea of this soulmate that he doesn't want or even believe exists no longer belonging to him, but it does. He can't help but wonder if Douglas is right and the Dread Doctors have trained him to feel this way. Wound him up so he's ready to snap whenever someone even so much as hints at something being taken away that was rightfully supposed to be his .
"How would that even work?" Theo snaps. "If what you're saying is true-which I'm sure it isn't -but if it was ...soulmates don't seem like the kind of thing you can just steal ..."
"I think you're misunderstanding what I'm saying." Douglas responds with a malicious sort of glee. "They didn't steal your soulmate. You're correct in thinking that can't be done-I suppose a broken clock is right at least twice a day-a soulmate can't be replaced like that. But it can be ruined. Many things can happen to prevent soulmates from meeting or from recognizing one another..."
"Recognizing?"
"Yes, recognizing . Being able to acknowledge the draw between them, to consummate it-oh get your head out of the gutter..." Douglas stops at Theo's half raised eyebrow. "Consummate it emotionally ."
"Yeah?" Theo asks, defiant once again. " How ?"
"By twisting one of the partners. By taking him when he's small and impressionable and abusing him, isolating him, torturing him till he breaks. Warping and mutating his malleable little mind until he's entirely unrecognizable from anything his soulmate would have been able to love..."
Theo falls silent.
"Are you starting to understand now?" Douglas asks, maliciously. "Starting to see the full picture here?"
Theo is, and he doesn't like it.
"They used you, Theo." Douglas goes on. "They knew your soulmate would be a threat to them and that he would be nearly impossible to put down if he had you at his side. So they broke you and bent you for their purposes. I have to say...they did an excellent job of it too. I think you must be the most unlikable, insufferably egotistical little psychotic brat I have ever had the misfortune to lay eyes on..."
"Everyone's a critic, I guess." Theo attempts to say nonchalantly, but his voice is breaking. He doesn't want to believe Douglas. He doesn't want it to be true, but he can't stop the sickness taking over his stomach, spreading through his system like a toxin, invading every inch of his being, making it harder and harder to deny that is feels true.
"You find out your entire existence has been a lie, and that's the best you can come up with?" Douglas taunts, looking up from his work again for a moment. "How very disappointing, Theo..."
Theo wants to tell him to get fucked, but his mind is reeling, wrestling with itself as he struggles to disbelieve everything that he's heard.
What if it is true?
Was there ever a chance that he could have been different? Was he, at one time, innocent like Douglas is implying? Was he capable of loving someone back then?
His memories before the Dread Doctors always feel cold and distant. Like he witnessed them all second hand, instead of feeling them happen to him personally. He can remember little league games, the names of his childhood friends, his first skateboard, but he can't remember things like how he felt when his father had once told him he was proud of him after his championship game, or the touch of his mother's hand.
Does he just not let himself remember? Or was that something that the Dread Doctors took from him as well?
Did he love his family at one time?
He's always told himself that love is a social construct, a lie that people force themselves to believe so they can give meaning to their ultimately pointless and unremarkable existence, but if that's true, then why does he feel a pain in his chest that has nothing to do with the cold metal tools digging into him?
Why does he feel like he can't breathe?
Douglas remains quiet and focused on his work, digging deeper into him, moving things around as if he's finally found some type of clue to what he's searching for and is close to finding it, and Theo's mind continues to spiral down onto the dark path of questions that he's terrified to find the answers to.
Had the Dread Doctors really been able to carve all of the good out of him? Had he truly let them do it?
And for what? All to keep him from loving someone?
Who was this person even supposed to be? Had he ever crossed paths with them? Would he have felt a connection with him even if the possibility of them being together was lost?
And then it hits him.
Someone good. Someone strong. Someone that would be a threat to the Dread Doctors. Someone that he would have felt a connection with upon a first meeting. Someone he'd known when he was small, that he had inexplicably thought about and remembered long after he'd left Beacon Hills. Someone that recognized him instantly when he'd returned. Someone that had always looked at him so deeply and tender, right up until the day he betrayed him. Someone that trusted him and probably would have taken a bullet for him if he'd been who he was pretending to be. Someone the Dread Doctors had told him he needed to take out of the picture.
"It's...it's Scott isn't it?" he asks eyes blurring as for reasons he can't even begin to understand he feels a well of hot wet tears gush uncontrollably down the sides of his face.
"Finally!" Douglas shouts, wrenching something out of Theo's ribcage, so close to his heart his entire body jolts in pain. But he doesn't even care any more. It's nothing compared to the massive hole he feels growing deep inside him.
It's Scott. He knows it.
He can remember the exact moment he met Scott. He'd been playing soccer in the park with a group of other kids, some he knew, others he didn't. He remembers kicking the ball towards a teammate that had called "open!" to him and watching the ball roll across the wet grass till it came to a stop at the other boy's worn-looking sneaker then looking up to find a pair of warm excited brown eyes. Scott had later explained that he had asthma, and that his best friend (who had been sick with the flu that day) was usually the only person that would pass to him.
He can remember how he'd felt like he'd been waiting for that moment for so long . How he'd been so lonely before that moment. He had friends but no one he was close with, his parents were barely around, his sister wanted nothing to do with him. When he met Scott he'd known instantly that they were going to be friends.
For some reason, even years later when all of his other memories felt cold and empty, he could always remember that. Always feel it like he had actually experienced it first hand.
It never made any sense to him.
Until now.
Above him Douglas is inspecting the item he'd wrenched out of him, it looks like a blood soaked bone, or perhaps a tooth or claw.
"Yes it's clearly Beacon Hill's true alpha." Douglas says, not looking at him, picking up a cloth to clean his find. "I thought that would have been pretty obvious considering how you used to scream his name when you were experimented on...or do you not remember that?"
Theo swallows. He had forgotten about that. How that first time the Dread Doctores strapped him, screaming and squirming down onto their table that after he'd cried for his parents, his teachers, his sister...that he cried out for Scott. That he thought Scott would help him somehow.
"Oh, chimera, are you crying ?" Douglas says, finally looking at him.
"Fuck you ." Theo whispers, voiced choked as he closes his eyes.
He wishes he'd never asked. He wishes he'd never had to know the truth. To know that Scott could have been his, should have been his.
He tries to hate Scott for it, for the fact that all those times he'd been tortured, it was all because he was supposed to be Scott's , but he can't. All he can hate in this moment is himself.
For not knowing, for being broken. For becoming someone that Scott would barely be able to look at much less love.
"Don't worry." Douglas says. "Now that I have what I want you won't have to go on being so sad for very much longer."
Theo opens his eyes, to meet Douglas's horrible glowing green ones.
"But..." Theo says. "You got what you wanted...can't you just let me go now?"
"I could ." Douglas agrees. "But I won't. Not when I could take what the Dread Doctors brought you up for..."
"What?" Theo asks dumbly for what must be the hundredth time in an hour.
"Come on, Theo." Douglas says, leaning his head back and holding up the fang he'd retrieved to the dim yellow light above them. "Think just a little bit here. If all the Dread Doctor's needed was to keep you from your soulmate they could have just killed you. But they kept your annoying whiny ass around for a decade. Obviously they planned to be able to use you somehow."
Before continuing his thought, Douglas reaches into his mouth and with a short growl rips out one of his own teeth. Theo watches in confusion as he jams the new fang into the newly-made bloody gap in the lowensmench's gum and the flesh heals around it, knitting it in.
He shakes his head, breathing a sigh of relief.
"Now, where was I?" he asks, turning back to Theo. "Yes, I believe you were crying and I was about to rip out the gland that houses your soul..."
Theo freezes.
"They...they were going to feed it to The Beast?" he realizes. "It would have made him even stronger against Scott...wouldn't it?"
"And now it will make me even stronger against him." Douglas confirms. "So you'll be able to fulfill what the Dread Doctor's had in mind in a way. Your existence wasn't entirely worthless..."
Theo roars with what little strength he has left. His chest still open, every aching nerve-ending in his body abused and spent, he's only barely on the edge of consciousness, but he still tugs at the binds holding him.
"Let me go !" he demands, even though he knows it's futile. "Just let me go ..."
"Why, so you can go crying to the true alpha over what was done to you?" Douglas asks, letting his claws grow out as he reaches behind Theo's head. "I'm afraid it's far too late for that. You gave that up the day you let your sister drown in that river."
"He'd still help me." Theo says stubbornly.
"But he'd never love you. Now stay still and this will be over faster than you deserve..."
Theo gasps as he feels the the sharp claws enter the back of his skull.
Thank you for reading! Constructive comments and feedback are always very much welcome!