A/N: I've been revising some of the earlier chapters, in no particular order. So far, chapters one and eight have been redone and are, I hope, better than before. I'll post notes on the next chapter I post if I've worked on any other ones, but I don't think ffn sends notifications if chapter content has been replaced. Nevertheless, if you DO read over the revised chapters, please let me know what you think. Thanks!

All Amanda had ever wanted was to be loved. She had never encountered this while growing up, and only briefly encountered it with Mike before Detective Matthews intervened. In prison, she had learned that the only way she could have control over her life was by taking drugs and cutting herself. She realized then that aiming for love, be it romantic or platonic, was a foolish quest and not something a girl with her background or status could ever achieve. Maybe rich people, even comfortable people, were able to find this, but Amanda was reduced to drugs and self destruction. When she went back to live with Liz, her sister had agreed partly out of family obligation –she knew that she was the only family Amanda had left—and mostly out of guilt. Amanda knew that Liz didn't care about Amanda any more than whether she was alive after a night of drugs and stripping. Even then, Liz's sense of obligation had its limits. She had, after all, kicked Amanda out of the apartment as soon as she heard word about Jigsaw.

Amanda couldn't say that she blamed her sister. She knew that most people would have done the same thing in those circumstances. Even she probably would have done the same thing, had it been someone she simply grew up with and, at least from Liz's perspective, was always causing problems.

It was ironic that the test Jigsaw had put her in resulted in John offering her a home. With John, she knew that he cared about her—at least more than Liz or her parents had—and she had a future beyond drug addiction. She tried to tell herself that the work Jigsaw was doing was actually for the benefit of mankind, and that she had once been the scum that Jigsaw despised. He had told her, over and over, that it wasn't about how many good things you did in life, or what evil you hadn't done. It was about whether or not you appreciated what you had. Amanda hadn't, according to Jigsaw, and so she had to endure the reverse bear trap as a wake up call. Having survived that, Jigsaw clearly felt that Amanda would make a good apprentice.

Except Amanda knew that had Liz never found out about Jigsaw, she would have remained in the apartment, terrified, for the rest of her life. Forget appreciating what she had; Amanda would always be on the lookout for a cloaked man hiding in the shadows. She'd wake up screaming, vividly remembering Jigsaw's test, and would not be able to recover. She'd never tell Liz what happened, and perhaps Amanda would have died from the same drug overdose, but at a later period in time.

This was so obvious to Amanda, yet John refused to see it. Aside from placing her in the trap, his actions towards her had never been anything but caring. She knew that she could have been happy living with him, even with the knowledge that he was dying of cancer. Hell, Amanda could find him painkillers, learn how to cook, and do his laundry. She knew that she'd be able to take care of him, in time, because she had already begun to love John as a father figure.

Asking her to take over in his work, however, was asking too much. Amanda had no intentions of continuing the traps after John died. She just had to pretend that she would, and learn everything that John taught her as carefully as though she would follow in his footsteps.

She lay on her side, pondering all of this, as Mittens licked herself and then settled down for a nap. Amanda envied the kitten. Animals had such limited intelligence, and she was willing to bet that Mittens' thought process at that moment was "tired…sleep". She probably didn't even remember her cat mother, and the cat mother would soon forget about her child. It was cruel, what humans did, separating animals from their parents, but scientists and specialists claimed that if given enough time with their mother, the animal would be fine in the long run.

She wondered what scientists would say about the effects of Jigsaw's tests. Temporary insanity, acute paranoia, but ultimately the subject goes on to live a happy and fulfilling life?

Amanda nearly snorted at that.

Yet she still couldn't hate John. She still cared about him. She still felt grateful to him, in debt to him. After all, putting her in the reverse bear trap had helped her, though not in the way he had expected. Amanda knew that her life was better now than it would have been had she not encountered Jigsaw.

As angry as she had felt towards John over the past few weeks, she still looked up to him as a father figure. Granted, her biological father had not set a good example, and Amanda did not grow up having any other male role models. Perhaps she felt attached to John because he had become a mentor to her.

Even though he had tried to kill her.

Amanda yawned, tired of thinking, and moved to the desk John had set aside for her. Stacked to one side were several books with puzzling titles, each looking like they had seen better days. John had said that Amanda would have to study these books in order to understand the basics of his techniques for understanding human behavior and making the torture devices. He gave her homework assignments on a regular basis. One book was devoted to the study of engineering, and Amanda almost fell asleep reading it. Often, she'd read a page from one of the books, not understand anything she read, slam the book shut and mutter a few choice obscenities before John would come in and explain everything Amanda had read in such a way that she could understand. Later, Amanda would reread the same page and, having some background knowledge, find herself less confused.

She wished that John would give her the lecture first, or –even better—omit the book entirely. He had refused to do either without giving legitimate explanations except that it would help Amanda in the long run.

Amanda wanted to hit John when he talked like that.

Slowly, though, she was beginning to understand more. She could read a page from the book and have an idea as to what it was discussing. Not all of the words felt like they were written in another language, just sixty to seventy percent.

At least they didn't just study all day. That only took a few hours, and most of the time came out of Amanda's struggle to understand the reading. During the rest of the time, John would instruct her but with easier tasks. She was learning how to cook his favorite foods, and then some that he didn't enjoy but wouldn't have adverse effects when he took certain medications on specific days of the week. They still went on walks, silent some of the time, but mostly discussing things that had nothing to do with John's cancer or his obsession with testing people. She also revealed information that proved that, even before the bear trap test, there was more to her life than drug addiction.

Sometimes they'd go out for a meal and, because the weather had been nice lately, eat outside and watch other people, trying to pick up on conversations. John always seemed to know, even before anyone spoke, what the topic of choice was. He'd watch as people walked with their pets and interacted with them, which turned out to be a mixture of baby talk and reprimands.

At night they usually slept in their own beds, but sometimes John would join Amanda in hers. He always seemed to know when he would be welcome or, at least, not kicked out. He never tried anything non platonic, of course, but would often wrap his arms around her body as though he were protecting her from unknown forces. Amanda would wake up well rested and deliciously warm. But she needed to be in a certain mood to let herself surrender to John, and more often than not she was tired and somewhat irritable, though she didn't have a particular reason. Even if John hadn't done anything that day to anger her, she could always blame the feeling on the sentiment that John didn't really care about her and was just using her to further his own ends.

Sometimes, her thoughts led her to believe that John wasn't even human, even though she knew from firsthand experience that this was far from the case. A robot couldn't die from cancer, and John's time was limited.

Amanda realized she had been off in a trance this whole time. John was still watching her, still sitting across from her. His face looked concerned, and he has a hand around her shoulder. Amanda blinked, not realizing it was even there.

"Amanda?"

He had been calling her name several times.

Amanda shook her head. "Sorry. Just thinking." Her voice sounded soft and weak. She tried to sit up and John helped her, as though she was the one with the life threatening disease.

Still, it's nice to know that he still cares about her.

"I'm sorry," Amanda repeated. Implying about not doing any kind of work that day, of being in a perpetual bad mood for the last several weeks, and generally just trying to make his life difficult. It can't have been easy for him, as she knows all too well.

John shook his head slightly. "I have more things for you, but they'll have to wait until tomorrow," John said. "Including a very delicious looking cake I made earlier."

Amanda's eyes widened with interest. "Cake?"

John smiled. "Yes, vanilla."

Amanda's stomach, having not had anything to eat in nearly twenty-four hours, growled at that. Amanda glared at her stomach for betraying her.

John picked her up. "Come on, kitten. Time for dinner," he said, carrying her. "Afterwards, we can play Scrabble. Then," he added, smiling, "I'll read to you, since I'm sure you didn't pick up any of your books today."

Amanda groaned at that. "Not engineering…"

"No, I was thinking recreational reading. Fiction." He paused. "Have you ever heard of the Harry Potter books?"

That's the end of this chappie. Next one will probably deal with the bathroom test, and should be longer. I need five reviews before I can write it, though! points to the review button