Rated M for sexual content and coarse language
Chapter 11: Three Tormentors. Same Fear.
Courage is not the absence of fear; but the triumph over it. The brave is not who does not feel afraid but who can conquer over it.
Being fearless isn't the point - It's impossible.
It's how you control the fears and free yourself from it.
- Anonymous.
Simulation begins immediately
She glared hatefully at the light that was emitted from the ceiling lights from above, glancing down in horror at her attire. She back in rags - already missing the comfort of her white button up shirt with slightly puffed up shoulders and yellow vest with a black and red checkered skirt.
The three figures loomed closer towards her from the opening and her blood ran cold as she saw the figures that entered through the steel door.
Mosquito. Arachne. Giriko.
Her top three tormentors.
"Good to have you back, Miss Albarn. You must have missed your daily dose of torture." Arachne laughed heartily, her purple cobweb eyes darkening slightly as she opened her fan, hiding her crimson lips that will probably curling up into a sinister smile.
She tried to wiggle out from the ropes that constrained her to the table, only to fail after the attempt.
"Still ever so determined to escape. Time can kill hope, but sadly it never did kill yours." Mosquito smirked, taking out the whip from its leather pouch.
'It's just a simulation. It's not real. It's not real.' She chanted, but it was proved useless as she couldn't help the shivers that went down her spine. No matter how much torture she had been through, she could never forget the immense pain she would feel after too many strokes of the whip, or the feeling of metal digging into her skin, or the countless surgical procedures she went through that disfigured her beyond belief.
She bit back a scream as the whip descended upon her fragile skin. It felt too real - she couldn't deny that the simulations scared the living daylights out of her. She was still too raw, too vulnerable to go through such things. The things she desperately tried to hide, but it was a memory that burnt in the back of her mind, a consistent nightmare that haunted her sleep.
"Do delight us with your screams, they are certainly amusing, like music to my ears." The spider smiled, fanning herself. "Giriko, go ahead and have some fun."
Maka could barely muster the courage to talk back as Mosquito clipped clips onto her toes and fingers, knowing what he was doing. She hated the smirk on her face that she would love to kick off, or maybe given the chance to behead him in the simulation.
Letting out a shriek as Mosquito cranked up the voltage to stage 1, she spasm under the endless voltage that flowed through her. She didn't dare to cry anymore - she learnt the hard way it would hurt her face even more as tears were a good conductor of electricity.
She panted, trying to get her erratic heartbeats under control and her breaths into its regular , she wasn't given time to recover. Giriko was already behind her, ramming his dick into her pussy, as she let out a cry of surprise. She couldn't feel anything from the rape, being used to the fact that her innocence was stolen like how Adam and Eve were sent away from the Garden of Eden, eating an apple from the Tree of Knowledge.
Giriko's tempo increased as his pelvic bone constantly met hers at a fast speed, the sounds of his groans filling in the air along with her involuntary moans and screams from Mosquito dragging a knife along her skin, making the cut deep and long.
Begging didn't help - it gave them more satisfaction to know that they were her source of displeasure and pain.
Asking them to stop was worse; they would bring it up a notch.
Staying quiet was the best, because they could not know if it was the kind of torture that she was used to.
Meanwhile
The grey-haired scientist observed the different kinds of simulation flashed across the screen, so far everyone was progressing well. The first simulation was often the easiest - it was the fear that they often displayed and it showed where their loyalties lied.
He watched the green words flashed across the screen
Test subject 01, Test Subject 02, Test subject 03, Test Subject 04, Test Subject 05, Test Subject 06 have cleared Fear Landscape #01
Processing to Fear Landscape #02
Test Subject 01 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 02 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 03 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 04 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 05 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 06 Fear Landscape#02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
Test Subject 07 Fear Landscape #02: 'Dark Wood Circus'.
'All from the same place found, all their deepest fears are the same.' Stein noted, typing rapidly on his keyboard to bring up their fear landscape experience along with the camera that viewed them in their chair. They might not sustain real damage, but they would writhe along with the experience.
They were all in different places of the Dark Wood Circus. One in an arena, another in the cage, strapped on a surgical table, one in an empty room and torture chamber for the sisters. All had its own differences but 3 main figures popped out.
Mosquito who was deceased, Arachne and Giriko who was still on the run.
The computer started to flash red as he looked at Maka's simulation in alarm. The experience was too real for her, her emotion bar was going haywire, her heartbeat and breathing was speeding up at an incredible pace. If she didn't fight her demons too, she might send the computer on an overdrive.
He felt a twinge of guilt when the sadistic part of him came to play, for he did enjoy seeing some being tortured. However, this was his student and the things they put her through, as a fifteen year old, no one deserved such a thing. Perhaps the group from the Dark Wood Circus was darker in personality than they seemed.
Even if he could read their soul wavelength, it seemed like he couldn't understand them enough. It was like they kid a part of themselves as survival mechanisms but they have hidden it so long that they forgot how to stop hiding. It was saddening for them, but they had their reasons.
He slammed the red flashing button, sending everyone out of their simulation as all of them sucked in a deep breath at their chairs, heaving. A few had tears streaming down their eyes, while others looked positively pale. Yet, the gang wasn't out yet. They were stuck in their own fears, unable to think rationally to get out.
That was worrisome.
He announced into the microphone in the control room. "Those who have recovered from the simulations get out of the room. We have a malfunction going on and we do not need anyone else to get hurt if we need to go into extreme measures."
Most of them scampered out of their seats, quickly exiting the room. Stein typing commands furiously, trying all attempts to send a message to them to try to control their emotions or they would not be able to get out. His commands went unheard, for they were too trapped in it.
Clearly, the simulations needed more improvement.
"Don't worry too much, Stein." Marie breezed into the room, clenching onto his shoulder reassuringly. "They are fighters, they would never let themselves live down the fact that they had been beaten by a simulation. All of them want to kill their demons and if being able to think in that situation was the key, then they will do it."
"How can you have so much faith when the torture they are going through is the only reason that keeps them here? To try to start anew and attempt to forget the memories of their broken childhood and stolen innocence?" Stein said soundlessly, his crease lines on his forehead never fading.
He scrunched his eyebrows in frustration, not knowing why he couldn't connect with them.
"You know my wavelength of redemption can get them out." She murmured. "This is THEIR fight. Believe in them, because hope is something that can never fade, even if there was a single thread of it."
She was right. All they could do now was pray that they were strong enough to get through the mark of their life.
Back into the simulation
The tears and blood seemed to stream endlessly down her eyes. It seemed like the simulation made her immortal - she swore she had bled more than 3 pints of blood. Hell, she was crying blood because there was simply no tears in her to cry anymore. Yet the trio that she feared and hated so much was still laughing sadistically.
'How hasn't this simulation end? Have I not suffered enough?' She thought bitterly, wanting to drift into la la land where she would be free of worries and free of the worries of ever being captured by them again. They were still going at it - splashing lime water on the wounds that seemed to cover every inch of her body, squeezing her wounded flesh just to get more emotions out of her.
Her lady parts were abused, her breasts were bleeding and bite marks covered her neck. Her body was bruised to the extent where it was almost black and she had blistering flesh at where he burnt her. The knife marks wove around her body, her eyes were probably black, she had a busted lip, broken nose and probably a few fractured bones in her body.
She expected the pain to paralyze her, but it never did came. Her core felt every bit of pain, every small movement, including breathing harmed her. Her voice was hoarse from all the screaming and she didn't care if she had to make a contract with a demon just to get the hell out of there.
A message suddenly shot through her mind. 'Don't let fear control you. Don't lose hope that you will get through this.' The message seemed to shine light through the darkness, and the trio could see, even despite her being sick and tired, the hint of defiance seemed to renew.
Their torture begun again, and because she was so weak, she didn't bother to flinch, looking at her tormentors evenly in the eye. "No matter... how wounded I am... I will never stop trying to kill you till the day I die. I won't give into fear... because courage is not the absence of it; its the triumph over it. After all, my time to return you to the favor isn't here yet, but soon. Because this isn't real, it's just a simulation."
That did it. She was sent out of the fear landscape and she hadn't been more happier than to smell the smell of chemicals and the green chair that she was strapped to stop her from escaping.
The room was almost isolated, except for her and her friends. Stein gave her a nod of approval, as if to congratulate her for getting out. She surged forward towards Soul, not caring that her knees might give out on her any moment. "It's time to face your demons at least Soul. Don't let them tell you what you are." She whispered, brushing his hair away.
She knew his deepest fear. It was rejection.
Soul's stimulation
"Look at you, so pathetic. A piece of trash that doesn't deserve the name of 'Evans'." His mother sneered, making him growl in pain slightly.
God knows what they were doing to him, it felt like his first day at the Dark Wood Circus all over again. Something goring into his eyes and seemly playing with the organs that was protected by the ribcage.
"You don't even fight back. Some kind of man you are. So useless." Wes's voice scoffed, and he felt someone deliver a blow to his head. He swear he would have knocked the person out if it hadn't been for the fact that he was still bound to the straps that were on the table.
"Stop telling me what I am. I am Soul 'Eater' Evans, Not Seth Evans. That man is dead!" He screamed through the pain. "You have a son, and my parents are dead."
"Tsk. Now denying your own immediate family, some guts you have. You are our flesh and blood and no matter how much of a disappointment you are, you are still an Evans."His father added.
"Well I reject my birthright name." He hissed.
"I'm sincerely sorry, Mr. Evans. It seemed like even after all the lessons we have been giving him... he had not learnt his lesson." A low voice purred making Soul freeze.
Arachne was here? That spider barely left her lair.
"Perhaps a few strokes of the cane and some knife designs on his body will make him a better person." Mosquito quipped in. Soul didn't need his eyes to know that he had hell lined up for him.
He felt a pang of hurt when his so-called family members agreed. No matter how accepting he was that he was an unwanted child and an useless talent at the piano for his dark music, the pain of rejection still cut him deep. It seemed like everything he did was not good enough for them, like his existence.
Perhaps the Dark Wood Circus was a blessing. He met true family members that stuck with him through thick and thin, and brought him light even in his darkest moments. It wasn't him that didn't deserve them, it was them who didn't deserve him.
His resolve made him stronger.
Before the whip landed on him, he spoke. "I would say I'm sorry for being a disappointment, but I'd be lying. But then again, I don't care if I ever disappoint you. You were never my family, no matter whatever you said. You only pointed out my flaws and brought me emotional pain and even if this place was wretched, it made me appreciate the little things I had, even despite having to go through pain."
He winced slightly when the whip lashed him. "I met my real family here. You treated me like a tool - a hindrance - showering Wes with love and never me. I'm glad I was captured, because I wouldn't ever have to face the likes of you ever again, because you are demoralizing, social-climbing bastards."
With that, he jolted back to reality.
A slightly dark chapter, nonetheless. Well~ Hopefully the change will be the next chapter and we can move along the plot line. If you want to hear about Black*Star, Tsubaki's or the Brooklyn sisters' simulation, tell me in the reviews! I'll add it as an outtake.
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By whips and simulations,
I command you to come back next time!