A/N: Hey there! There's not much to say about this chapter, to be honest… The thing is, we're actually starting on the third and final trap, and that one's going to be so damn hard, I suggest I'll stop ranting and let you sweethearts read!

11: I'm Not What You Need

Adam still doesn't cry. Once again, it seems like a reasonable thing to do, but he doesn't.

He's shaking, though. And he's cold, he can't move his fingers anymore, and that place in his chest where his heart usually is, where Lawrence usually is, there's just a black, hollow cave.

"And he hasn't tried to tell you since then?" Jigsaw asks.

Adam startles. He'd almost forgotten that Jigsaw was there, almost been so lost in the labyrinth of his memories that he'd never be able find a way out. Then, shakes his head.

"No."

"Have you wanted him to?"

Now, Adam has to think.

He wants to feel loved. That is true.

But in the same time, feeling loved, feeling loved and being in love is the scariest feelings he's ever felt. Simply because unlike a lot of people, he can't take it for granted.

So many people have left him. And when you grew up constantly worried that your mom wouldn't be able to wake up in the morning, you can't assume that your lover will come home after work, either.

You can't watch him walk out the door without a gnawing anxiety in the back of your head.

Can't hold back the thoughts what if he's been playing me, what if he'll go back to his wife, what if…

And those thoughts do get too much.

Adam was so much in love. Lawrence was his everything, you only had to look at them together once to see that Adam would never be able to stop loving Lawrence until the day he died, he knew that.

And when it was so obvious that he was completely in Lawrence's mercy, that he was the one in disadvantage, at least he didn't want to say it verbally. He at least wanted that left. So he didn't want to say that he loved Lawrence, no.

If he said that, Lawrence would see his 'what if'-thoughts, too. He'd be aware of his leverage.

And if Lawrence said it to Adam, he wouldn't be able to keep himself from saying it back.

"No," he then answers.

"Really?" Jigsaw says, and if Adam had looked at him, he'd seen that he was almost smiling.

And it isn't in that way that makes him look like a skull.

Adam shakes his head.

"It'd been too scary."

Jigsaw nods.

"Adam," he then says, "You're not telling the truth. If doctor Gordon had gone through your entire relationship without telling you that he loved you, you would have gotten suspicions that he didn't."

"What the hell do you mean 'gone through your entire relationship?'" Adam bites back with an intensity in his voice that Jigsaw hasn't heard since he saw Lawrence climbing on those knives. "You think we won't make it? Or that we'll break up?"

Jigsaw doesn't answer, but if he had, he doubts that Adam would've listened to him, anyway.

"Hell no," Adam continues. "We're going to make it. Both of us. And for the record, you will never separate us. Ever. Not you and not anyone else, get it?"

Jigsaw tries to keep his face motionless. He still has the upper hand, sure, Adam's tied up with belts, and no witty tongue in the world will get him out of those. But that doesn't change the fact that Adam, just for now, actually has the power.

He has the power because he makes Jigsaw proud of him.

Makes Jigsaw proud over the fact that Adam has so obviously learned something.

That if he and Lawrence both make it out of this, Adam will say it every day. He will whisper it before Lawrence goes to work, plant a chaste kiss on his lips, and relish it when Lawrence says it back to him.

But Jigsaw doesn't show that. In fact, he pretends not to have heard Adam at all, because he knows that drives him crazy.

"Adam," Jigsaw instead says. "Do you realize that I break my pattern by putting you and Lawrence in this game?"

"What?" Adam says suspiciously.

Jigsaw nods again.

"I don't try to make your appreciate your life this time, to be honest. You love your life, I know that, and Lawrence does, too. But the question is: Do you appreciate your love?"

Adam almost laughs out loud.

"If you're actually saying that I take Lawrence for granted, you're so damn stupid that it's almost cute."

"I don't," Jigsaw says calmly. "In fact, what I want is that you'll take doctor Gordon more for granted than you do now."

Adam rolls his eyes. He seems to have found his old self again.

"I should run off and fuck other people like the rest of your victims?"

"No," Jigsaw says. "But as it is now, you don't understand that he loves you."

Adam opens his mouth to talk back, but Jigsaw cuts him off.

"Sorry, that wasn't what I meant. What I meant was: You don't trust his love for you."

Adam opens his mouth again, and again, Jigsaw cuts him off. But that's probably might as well. He didn't know what he was going to say, anyway.

Because Jigsaw is right. Adam has always known that, even though he's never admitted it, either to himself or to Lawrence.

He loves Lawrence. He does. And he does know that Lawrence love him.

But it's just so damn obvious that he doesn't deserve him. It's a miracle that Lawrence hasn't realized it. Hell, he probably knows it on some level, too, he's a smart guy, of course he notices that people that pass them on the street look at Adam like they wonder what he had to pay for a guy like Lawrence, of course he gets that he should be with someone who gives him the moon and the stars, someone who's never week but always strong, someone who takes him out in the weekends and doesn't wake him up every night and cry over his nightmares. And he must've gotten that that's not Adam.

Must've gotten that that only works in their world, their world with the rough edges and the impossible passion, but that still is the most perfect world Adam's ever gotten.

But it will never work outside that world. And it would only take a second, one second of sensibility, one second when Lawrence thinks the way he used to do, and he'll realize that.

Realize how much he should have that Adam can't give him.

And Jigsaw knows that Adam thinks that.

"He does love you, Adam," Jigsaw says softly.

He touches a soar spot, more soar than the one Adam touched on him when he yelled before. And that's too much for Adam right now, he can't feel his arms as it is.

"I know that," he says.

He tries to scoff it out, but it just sounds pitiful.

"No, you don't," Jigsaw says and shakes his head. "You've said it yourself, you're afraid. And even if you hadn't told me, anyone can tell."

Adam hates him. He's right, and Adam hates him so much for that.

"Every time he's away from you, all you think about is how afraid you are that he'll never come back."

Hates him, hates him, hates him, and it makes Adam even colder.

"And even when he is with you," Jigsaw continues, "you're afraid that he'll walk away. You always sleep with an arm tightly wrapped around his waist because you're afraid he'll sneak away as soon as you close your eyes."

"Fuck you," Adam hisses.

Jigsaw is right. He's so right, and Adam still doesn't want to admit that, still doesn't want to hear the lonely cries from his very purest, truest self that he's tried for so long to hide away.

Jigsaw smiles faintly.

"I would cut you," he says simply, "but it seems like we don't have time for that. It's time to introduce doctor Gordon's – and yours – second test."

"Oh, stop it, you're scaring me," Adam bites back.

Jigsaw pretends not to hear him. He just stands up with a cringe and points to a black little dot on the door.

Adam has to squint to see it. The door, and Jigsaw, too, for that matter, floats around in his vision, floats around in a liquid that's only half transparent, but he does manage to discern the dot. He even manages to see that it's a hole, a peephole.

"Amanda has given doctor Gordon a gun," Jigsaw says. "I'm not sure if you noticed that. And unlike many peepholes, this one can be seen through from the outside, too. It can even be shot through to unlock a door and bring you to your lover."

Adam just stares at him. He knows Jigsaw well enough at this point to know that Lawrence wouldn't have to shoot through that hole if it didn't trigger something else, but right now, he doesn't see what that would be.

Then again, he doesn't see much else, either. Most things are black.

"I'm waiting for the 'but,'" Adam says after a few seconds of silence.

Jigsaw once again makes that face that shows that he would've shrugged if he'd been able to.

"There is no 'but.' Doctor Gordon just has to shoot through the hole, the door will open and the two of you will be free to go. I just want you to notice where the hole is placed."

Adam wishes Jigsaw could stop speaking in codes. He's already crossed the line where it would've been hard enough to understand what Jigsaw wanted said if he wrote it on a giant board, but when he talks like that, all Adam can think is the hole is on the door, motherfucker.

But then he sees where on the door the hole is.

It's placed just a little too low for him to see through it. And a little far too the right.

And then he gets it.

For Lawrence to open the door, he has to shoot Adam. Again.

And he has to shoot at a place where Adam already has a scar.

But Adam doesn't panic about this nearly as much as he thought he would. He doesn't see a reason to panic, simply because there's no way that'll happen, so he scowls instead.

"Fuck if he'll do that."

"He doesn't have to," Jigsaw says, and now drops his hand and places it on the handle of the door. "You see, there's another way to open the door. He can just reach out and take the handle."

Adam raises his eyebrows briefly.

"Wonderful. But…"

"But," Jigsaw admits, "I think you deserve a look at the handle."

He sits back down, takes a remote control out of his pocket and points it to the TV. The picture changes from Lawrence, pale and bleeding, for which Adam is grateful, but when he sees the new picture, he thinks that he'd rather watch Lawrence again, he'd rather watch Lawrence when he saws off his foot, he'd rather watch anything.

Just not this.

Because now, the TV shows the handle.

Or, not the handle. You can't really see the handle, because it's surrounded by razors, razors so sharp that Adam can see them glisten even on a black-and-white, blurry screen, and as soon as he realizes that, Adam brings out the little voice in his head that explained the situation to him when he woke up in here and that sayss things so plainly that not even he can misunderstand them.

There's a box covering the handle. You have to stick your hand into the box to take the handle.

There's a chord inside the box. When you stick your hand into the box, the chord will trigger the razors. The razors will cut, and they'll cut whatever's in the box, which will be a person's hand. The hand will be cut off.

The artery in the wrist will be cut off. The owner of the hand will most likely die.

That's the situation. And you're not scared, you're just angry. Okay?

Adam is so cold.

He's so cold, and he gets even colder. And he puts his eyes on Jigsaw, and Jigsaw is so cold, so cold that Adam understand that he is the source of his own cold, it's his fault that he's cold, it's his fault that he's here, everything is his fault, and Adam hates him, hates him so much, despite what Lawrence tells him to, he hates him and that makes him even colder.

Adam opens his mouth. The words that come from it aren't cold at all, though, they seem to be the only living thing he possesses right now, his only weapon.

"You're going to cut off his hand?"

No reply. Hate.

"Would you fucking answer me?" Adam hisses. "Is this your way of making me appreciate him? To kill him?"

"He doesn't have to die," Jigsaw says calmly, with something that only sounds like a half interest. "He can shoot you. And even if he does cut off his hand, he can survive."

That is such a weird thing to say, Adam can't even answer immediately.

How can a person be so empty?

How can someone be so senselessly, utterly drained of emotions that he says something like that?

Adam is so angry that he barely manages to get the words out of his mouth.

"He doesn't… He doesn't have a fucking right foot!" He sputters and feels the little blood that's left in his body rushing to his face. "He won't handle another cut-off limb! He can't do that!"

"That's how your love for him is going to be tested," Jigsaw says in the same tone as he and Adam are chatting about the weather. "Because he won't get here without your help. That's your test."

Adam still doesn't get it. Right now, he's so furious that he wouldn't get it even if he didn't have to work this hard to just make his eyes stay on Jigsaw.

"Amanda won't lead doctor Gordon to this room," Jigsaw continues. "And Lawrence can't come without any help."

Adam still doesn't understand. Even though that tiny, sensible part of his brain screams for him to panic.

"You know this house," Jigsaw says. "You used to come here with your friends when you were younger."

And so, a light appears to Adam.

This might be the first time a light makes him want to die.

"And you've been given a cell phone," Jigsaw finishes off.

Adam's senses are momentarily shut down. That little voice has to come out to make him understand.

Even though he doesn't want to.

Even though he doesn't have to, because this is all a bad dream. He'll wake up soon, he'll have an arm around Lawrence's waist, and Lawrence is going to smile sleepily at him, kiss him on the top of the head and they'll fall asleep, entwined, in a bubble of warmth.

Because this can't be for real. Nothing real can be this terrible.

You have a phone. Lawrence has a phone. Lawrence doesn't know this house. You do.

You're going to have to call him and guide him to you. That's the way your love for him will be tested.

If you really love him, you'll call him and tell him to go home, and bleed to death yourself. And if you call him and guide him here, you're going to have to chose between killing him or killing yourself.

That's the situation. And you're not even angry anymore, because once again, it's too terrible for a common stupid feeling like anger. Instead, you feel like you're drowning, drowning in darkness, in darkness and sorrow and regret, drowning in all the things you should've told Lawrence and that you'll never get a chance to say, because you will never see him again. And if you see him again, it's because either you die in his arms, or he dies in yours.

Okay? Are we clear? Then, let the games begin.

The third trap… Now, it's a cliffhanger, isn't it? Review, or it'll jump!