You were saved by the knock at the door.

A droid scurried in, a plate of food in hand.

"Hello, Master Ren," it greeted formally, bowing its head.

"Hello—" it turned to you, but quickly stopped. A moment passed; it seemed to stare at your nakedness. Its programming seemed to not have accounted for this situation. "Oh. I must be going now." It left the room just as fast as it had entered.

You shot a glare at your captor, who now had his back to you. He sat perched on the end of his bed, spooning food into his mouth. "Come here," he motioned to you without looking back, indicating you should take a place on the floor next to him. You scowled. The last thing you wanted to do right now was obey him—not after what he had just done. You didn't want to let him win.

When you didn't respond, he craned his neck around to look at you.

"Do you want an ass so sore you can't sit?" He wore his distinctive don't-fuck-with-me look.

You set your jaw bitterly and walked over to kneel next to his left leg, where he had been pointing to the ground. A hand snaked into your hair, and bile rose in your throat. He ate in silence for a few more moments. Then he stabbed some vegetables with his fork, holding them to your lips. He tugged your hair lightly, forcing you to look at him.

You shook your head.

"I know you're hungry," he murmured, brushing your lips with the food.

Your eyes flicked to the plate. He had only ordered food for himself.

"There'll be less for you," you replied, a hint of sarcasm in your voice. He knew that's not why you wouldn't eat. A smirked crossed his lips.

"So sweet of you. But I can eat whenever I want to. You can't." He brought the food to his mouth instead.

Your stomach growled in betrayal, but you ignored it—and him, as you were sure his smirk had only grown wider.

"I won't be eating anymore," you said with as much conviction as you could pack into the words, picking at your legs, avoiding his eyes.

"Is that right?" he murmured softly, left hand playing with your hair.

You made a sound of stubborn acknowledgement.

"You know that won't work?" he purred, responding to your thoughts. Your nostrils flared at the intrusion. "I'll force food down your throat long before you can starve yourself to death."

Goddammit.

He speared another bite, this time bringing chicken to your lips. It smelled good, and you were hungry.

"Eat," he encouraged, holding the fork there. "There's no point in going hungry."

You acquiesced just enough for him to slide the food into your mouth. Closing, you chewed and swallowed with as much resentment as you could manage. You let him similarly feed you a few vegetables before shaking your head.

"You're still hungry," he said, pausing.

You said nothing, staring straight ahead.

"Obstinate," he sighed, taking the bite he was holding out for himself instead. He said nothing further to you as he ate, as if punishment for refusing his food. Your eyes flicked over him, watching him eat. His clothes looked wrong for him like this; the imposing layers of clothing falling too dramatically on his frame, which was now focused on cutting up the chicken breast. Too normal. It's too normal for him to be hungry.

"I hate this," you said suddenly.

He stopped, eyes meeting yours. Displeasure crossed his face immediately, mixed with a hint of something else—hurt, maybe? It disappeared faster than you could place it.

"You're not supposed to be hungry." He blinked at you. Ignoring him, you continued. "You're not supposed to have needs or preferences or anything. You're not supposed to be human."

He still stared at you in silence, face betraying no emotion.

"It's—it's—it's indecent." You gestured as you spat the word—he hadn't shackled you to the bed again.

He sat still for several moments, considering you. Then he started eating again, eyes back on his own plate, as though nothing had ever happened.

You huffed and started to push yourself to your feet, but he placed one hand on your shoulder and pushed you back down. He finished the rest of his meal in silence; you crossed your arms over your chest, pulling your knees up defensively.

When he was done, firm hands closed around your wrists and ankles, again binding you to the bed. He drew up to his full height slowly, then turned on his heel, grabbing his datapad. Your eyes followed him; he sat at the far end of the dinner table, eyes flicking up to look at you only once before turning on the pad and immersing himself in something.

You thought he would break the silence—issue another humiliating command—before bedtime, but he didn't. Instead, you'd spent the evening memorizing every bolt on the wall across from you as he read in silence. When he changed for bed, he waved his hand, your chains dropping away. One arm closed around your waist, and he re-secured you at the head of his bed instead of the foot, chains a bit longer this time—they allowed you to lay down. You accepted the hard comfort of the ground as you heard the bed shift above you, accommodating his weight. His breathing slowed over time until it found a steady rhythm; you closed your own eyes, desperate to sleep.

When the night ended, his silence didn't. You were taken to the refresher in silence and allowed to use the toilet and wash your hands and face—then you were fastened to the foot of the bed again. His eyes refused to meet yours all the while, even as you jerked your head around, trying to force him to. He dressed in silence and left in silence, without so much as a backward glance.

You spent the first few hours fighting your restraints again, your already black-and-blue bruises protesting. When you finally gave up, you huffed, blowing a stray piece of hair out of your face. Instead, you spent your time looking around the room for anything that could count as a weapon. Your eyes settled on a heavy looking helmet across from you. It rested on the coffee table—a sculpture, you guessed. It had been broken and warped in some places for apparent artistic affect. You didn't begin to try to understand the man's taste in art.

Biting the inside of your cheek, you wondered how he managed to make things fly around like he did. You had been told stories of people like him when you were little, but you'd always thought they were bullshit. Eyeing the helmet sculpture, you set your jaw and stared at it intently. Nothing happened. You groaned, letting your head fall back on the end of the bed. Staring up at the metallic, dark ceiling, you let your eyelids flutter until they closed in sleep.

The rest of the day mirrored the events of the previous night; he took you to the refresher again, then fed you intermittently from his plate. All in silence. You had already decided you wouldn't beg your kidnapper to speak to you, nor show you tenderness. So you turned your nose up, haughtily gazing at the wall from your perch at the end of the bed.

He read for a while, soft tapping noises occasionally coming from where you knew he sat with his datapad. After a while, he set it down and laid down on the bed behind you, not bothering to move your restraints. You braced yourself to sleep upright. But then the bed started to move, faint shockwaves traveling through it and hitting your back. It was like he was thumping his leg—you ignored it. Only when slick sounds and his light groans begin to echo through the air did you crane your neck to look back. He was masturbating: tissues poised in his left hand, jerking himself off with his right.

Your jaw fell open, and you looked away quickly. A strange bitterness fell over you when you realized you hadn't once felt his eyes fall on you—he wasn't masturbating to you, or even thinking of you. He was going about a bachelor's routine as if you didn't exist. In fact the only time he acknowledged your presence at all was when he met fundamental needs—letting you use the toilet, giving you bites to eat, or tipping water into your mouth.

Your face burned as you heard a loud groan from behind you. The bed stilled. He had ejaculated. You watched in part disgust and part fascination as he stood—still ignoring you—and threw a wad of tissues into the wastebasket. Disappearing into the refresher, you heard the shower turn on a moment later. You listened with jealousy from your prison at the foot of his bed, imagining the soap cleaning you, hot water running over yourbody. You shivered as you pulled your mind back to reality and waited to be put to bed.

When he emerged, the only towel he wore hung around his shoulders. You quickly looked away, dropping your eyes to the floor. You didn't want him to want to go another round or get any ideas. And he didn't; simply performed the nightly routine of tying you up towards the head of the bed, so you could stretch out on the floor next to him.

The next few days came and went in this fashion. The food varied; sometimes he jerked off sitting upright, sometimes lying down. Nothing much else changed. You were getting tired of counting the bolts on the wall by the fourth day, and—as much as you hated it—eagerly awaited his return. Even if he wouldn't talk to you, his presence was at least something new in the room: something new to stare at and think about. Sometimes you counted the rows in his quilted tunic; other times you tried to make out the number of scuffs on his boots.

He went about his usual routine that night, ordering himself dinner on his datapad, sitting down quietly on the bed next to where you sat on the floor. This time he ate a stew, a side of thick, sour bread accompanying it. He offered you a spoonful, following it with a small piece of bread that he tore away for you. You accepted gratefully this time, ravenously hungry from the small once-a-day scraps he had given you. But as the food touched your lips, you started to cry. He seemed to shift uncomfortably on the bed, and his eyes met yours in a rare moment of connection. Looking away after a moment, he went back to ignoring you; you cried harder. After swallowing your third spoonful, you leaned into his leg, desperate for comfort. It had been days since he spoke to you, hardly even looking at you, either. You were willing to beg, now. You needed human interaction.

You laid your head just above his left knee, one hand clutching his calf. The muscles in his leg tensed, and for a moment he was still. Then, very suddenly, he ripped his leg away from you, standing and walking over to the table, where he sat and finished his meal.

Hard sobs wracked your body, which you turned slightly to grab hold of the bed. Fisting the material in your hands, you cursed at him, breaking your own silence of several days.

"Why are you so fucking cruel?" you spat through heavy sobs, trying to catch your breath.

A dark look overtook his features, spreading across his face, dimming his eyes. Heavy footsteps pounded towards you, and you curled up in fear, burying your head between your knees. But as quickly as they approached, they passed you. You heard the blaster door open and shut. The sound of his lightsaber igniting echoed from the hall outside, its crackling noise seeping faintly through the door. Then, suddenly, the air was filled with not so faint noises; guttural screaming, followed by the sound of a lightsaber slicing air, then metal deforming. A few sparks shot under the door and died on the metal floors of his quarters.

You scrambled down the length of the bed, pulling hard at your restraints. Tears streamed down your cheeks as the sounds of him destroying the foyer resonated. You had begged for death before, sure, but this wasn't quite how you'd wanted to die. He was going to make it hurt, you were sure of it. He was going to make it slow and painful, drag his blade through—

You paused, realizing the heavy footsteps were moving quickly away from you. They pounded down the hall until they grew soft, then disappeared. You cried a bit longer, traumatized by his quick shift between calm eating and destructive rage; you'd never seen him fly off the handle quite like that. He'd been painfully measured and evil with you lots, but never showed too much emotion. But he'd just fucking lost it. You shivered.

You weren't sure how long you were alone—at a certain point, you'd given up and resorted to staring at the wall again, which led to counting imaginary porgs, which led to sleep. When you awoke, gloved hands were fastening your restraints to the head of his bed, stretching you out on the ground for the night. He had his helmet on now, and you stared up at it, eyes full of anxiety and fear. His hands left you a moment later, though he seemed to hesitate above you. Soon the moment passed, and he stepped out of view. You heard the helmet latches come undone as darkness fell in the room—a moment later, the usual sound of the bed shifting under his weight.

You cried softly for a while, occasionally stifling a sniffle as you tried to clear your throat. Running your hand over the cold metal of the floor, you let your breath steam up the metal, drawing little shapes in it. You had almost fallen asleep when you felt the back of his hand run down your arm gently, as if trying to caress you. You jumped; the touch had been unexpected. Just as quickly as it had come, it was gone. You sniffled again—somewhat dramatically—and curled up, arms wrapping around yourself for sleep.

But then you felt it: smooth and slightly warm against your skin. You refused to open your eyes as he brushed something against your arm. After a few moments, you heard a very faint sigh, and the sound of him rolling away across the bed.

You pressed your eyes shut for several minutes, exhausted from the emotions of the day, too scared to open your eyes and see what he'd pressed against you.

When you did, small glossy eyes stared back at you.

The teddy bear was on its side, facing you, as though it too wanted to fall fast asleep.