WARNING: Here be psychological torture, and a smidge of physical.

If you don't have the stomach, you can scroll down two thirds of the way and get a comfort scene… let's just say Skye's really upset she lost Uno ;) That part is pretty depressing too, but I do recommend reading the last five paragraphs to keep up with the plot. This and the next chapter are the low points for our characters, so be wary! (I'm still veering away from much physical pain though. No gore and whatnot.)

Previously: Skye and Fitz are being held on a Skrull spaceship while the Skrulls wait for the week to pass until the correct time to do the ritual. The Skrulls have been told they aren't allowed to hurt Skye physically, so they decided to come up with a game.

Chapter Thirty-One

"So, what is your name?" asked Lyja, circling Skye in a predatory manner. A lion closing in on its prey, deciding how to go in for the kill.

"Creature," Skye answered solemnly from her knees.

It was the only thing she ever repeated, the only word they wanted to make sure was engrained forever in her brain. The mechanical droll to her voice when she said the mantra made it seem as though they were succeeding.

Lyja chuckled. "And what are you?"

"I'm… feeble," she decided upon this time, staring at the wall behind Fitz in the cell, her dead eyes seeming to have found something that held her gaze back there.

"What else?" asked Bartak harshly, stepping over from his point of leaning against the wall.

"Repulsive," responded Skye simply.

"Step it up here, what else," growled Lyja, prompting Skye with a few waves of her hands. "Give us something good."

"Useless."

And no sooner had the word slipped from Skye's lips that Lyja had her head craning back, the girl's hair threaded through her fingertips. Skye grunted, but didn't flinch. This had happened too many times before for her to be surprised.

"No!" scolded Lyja. "You need to dig deep, Creature. We are not just telling you to prattle off insults, they must describe you."

"And you are so very useful, helping us eradicate such a disgusting species," Bartak told her, gently letting his pointer finger run down Skye's cheek. She stared dutifully at the ceiling.

"So think of something better, unless you want us to bring out your little human friend…" sang Lyja.

Skye looked down briefly to see Fitz. Her eyes reflected no emotion in the small moment he caught them. When the Skrulls had started, they had blazed with a passionate fire driven by fury. Not a trace of that light was present now.

They played this game many times, more than once a day. The two aliens seemed to enjoy it immensely. Psychopaths, they were.

At first, Fitz was a big part of it. He was "what they were playing for", as the Skrulls put it. Fitz still had the bruise on his shoulder from when Skye had disobeyed the first time.

"Have you even realized how disgusting you are?" Lyja had asked Skye. She was still on her knees, but barely held back rage was in her face. Her lips quivered, her fists were balled up. Lyja laughed. "Your own species wanted to kill you! Even if you weren't the sacrifice, they wouldn't want such an abominable little mutant around like you. You don't belong anywhere, little freak."

Leo watched through horrified eyes. He could hear Bartak chuckle and felt the vibrations on his hands that held Fitz's face in place.

He could see the fury in Skye and knew she wanted to lash out. The words' meaning didn't seem to be bothering her, but the fact that someone would put her on her knees to whisper such harsh lies was pushing the girl.

"So, tell me, what's your name?" asked Lyja.

"My name is Skye," she said stiffly, after only a slight pause.

"Hmm, no I don't think so," Lyja informed her. "I don't think that really fits, does it, Bartak?"

"Not at all. Too free," Fitz heard the Skrull explain from above him.

"I think we'll call you… Creature," Lyja decided on cheerfully. She prowled in front of the hacker to gauge her reaction. Skye stared up at her with true disdain.

"Fine, whatever! I'm a mutant, I'm disgusting," she exclaimed venomously. "Call me whatever you like. I. Don't. Care."

Fitz felt his hair pulled roughly back in the alien's grip, causing concern to flash across Skye's eyes.

Lyja shook her head and clucked her mouth like she was a disappointed teacher. And, in some deranged sense, she was. "I told you what we're playing for, remember?" She gave Skye a light tap on the nose, making her face crinkle in disgust. "Besides, it's not us that are doing the name-calling. Now, tell me what your name is."

A pause.

"Creature," Skye growled through gritted teeth, her defiant personality screaming at her not to comply. Her fists shook.

"And what are you?" Lyja questioned, letting her fingers drift idly through Skye's hair.

"Idiot…" Skye mumbled through a sigh, seeming to chastise herself.

"Why?" asked Lyja firmly.

Skye hesitated.

Lyja shook her head with impatience. "Well?"

Skye's face trailed upward.

"Because I walked right into your damn trap, you moronic, sadistic, green goblin freaks!" she shouted.

Before Skye even finished speaking, Lyja grabbed her chin between her fingers roughly, while the fingers of the other hand rubbed together with a loud "snap".

Fitz barely saw how she forced Skye to look his way before the pain blinded him.

He shouted in a combination of surprise of hurt, bending forward from the blow to his shoulder.

"Fitz!" Skye shouted despairingly, all trace of her fury gone and replaced with concern.

Fitz tried to get out the words to console her, to tell her it wasn't that bad, but nothing came from his mouth. He didn't know what had hit his shoulder, but it was hard and forceful and he wouldn't be surprised if it had dislocated the bone.

"Don't worry… I'm okay, Skye," he finally managed to pant out.

"Don't touch him again you bastards!" she growled.

And with that, Fitz felt another blow, this time to his stomach. He'd never been punched in the stomach. It made him want to throw up.

"Stop!" wailed Skye, her fiery attitude gone and replaced with a desperate tone. Fitz could even hear the tears in her eyes. At least he wasn't the only one crying.

The engineer managed to get a look at Skye, saw the pity in her eyes that showed an eagerness to help. But it wasn't surprising that she hadn't run to him. They'd already learned not to move from where the aliens told them to go.

"Then behave," urged Lyja, as if it were the simplest thing in the world. Skye closed her hatred-filled eyes and ground into her teeth, stifling whatever response she'd rather be voicing. Instead, she was obeying.

Fitz wished he were braver. He would love to make a threat or a quip that his friends seemed to be so good at. But he wasn't. Not when they had him so close and in their grasp.

He had tried to be threatening once and all it got him was a one-way ticket to the bottom of the ocean. Finding his way back up had come with a price. If it weren't for the Skrull technology, that price would have been his life. Instead, it ended up being the action that led to his current situation.

He despised watching this. He should be the one forced to say such awful things. With Skye, they were nothing more than horrendous lies.

"Why are you idiotic?" continued Lyja.

Fitz looked up through his tears, watching as Skye's trailed down her face, and he realized her shaking was no longer in rage.

"I'm letting my friend get hurt."

"Good… good!" Lyja jumped happily, clapping her hands together with excitement. Bartak hoisted Fitz up to watch again, but he already had been. "What else are you?"

Skye met Fitz's gaze. He'd never seen her look so desperate, this girl who held so much life and could find the humor in any situation.

She looked him dead in the eyes as she choked out:

"Sorry."

But this time Fitz was still in the cell, watching from afar. The threat was clear enough. They had brought him out the second time, when Skye had made small mistakes that accounted for a few minor cuts and bruises that now took up residence on him. But the third time they hadn't needed to touch him. The fourth time they hadn't even bothered to get him out of the transparent cage.

He'd lost count how many times they'd done it over the passed few days they'd been there.

"Make it a new one," hissed Bartak.

"I'm…" Skye floundered, seeming to be thinking earnestly. There were so many horrible words she'd called herself over the passed few days… maybe there was nothing left in her mind's dictionary.

"Bartak, why don't you go get the human?" asked Lyja innocently. Fake innocently.

When Bartak moved towards his cell, Skye perked up, showing the first sign that she had any emotion left in her.

"No!" she cried out. "I'm um… I'm just too stupid to think so quickly. Please, I'll remember something."

"Aw, she's learning!" giggled Lyja as she released Skye's hair. "But you've used 'stupid' so many times. You need a new one."

"Tick tock," said Bartak, tapping on his arm after barely a second had passed.

"A… dog," Skye forced the words out, her dead eyed stare setting in again as she prepared to shut down.

"Oh, I like that," said Bartak. "Why?"

"Because I'm beneath you," Skye said with a tone of absolute defeat. "And… obedient."

Fitz could feel his blood boiling over. Not only was she insulting herself now, she was admitting they were getting to her, that they were breaking her. With words no less. If he and Skye were in opposite situations, he knew she wouldn't hesitate to stick up for him. To fight for him, despite the physical pain she'd cause herself.

Leo truly wished he were that brave.

Maybe he was, once. He'd stood up to Garrett. And though that had been a life or death situation indeed, somehow this one felt direr. This one where they caused him pain for anything done wrong, anything out of line. Where he didn't have the luxury of hope that he'd be able to get through to someone he thought was a friend.

No, the only friend he had here was Skye. And they were forcing her to lose herself.

"I think that's a good note to end it on," Lyja decided in her silky cheerful voice, though Skye didn't move a muscle. She wouldn't dare unless she was ordered to.

"Yes, this game is getting boring," observed Bartak, as he looked over Skye. "We should come up with another one."

"Well, the ritual is soon. But we can probably think of another game to play at least a couple times before then." Lyja's fingers twirled through Skye's hair again, as they did often. She sighed. "It's almost of shame to see it go."

"I know. It is fun to toy with the hybrid because of the foul races it comes from, but a human could be entertaining as well. They look enough alike," Bartak said, and both the Skrulls looked over at Fitz. He felt a shudder go up his spine.

"Not that one," Skye's quiet voice growled. They turned to face her, dark eyes trained to the ground. "Or I won't be doing this ritual at all."

There was a moment where Fitz was afraid they'd get angry, but Lyja smiled. Or sneered, as it was decidedly evil looking. She towered over Skye as the girl's head remained down.

"Don't worry, pup, we wouldn't dream of keeping him. Cute as he may be," Lyja assured. "Now, back to the kennel with you!"

Bartak gave Skye a shove between the shoulder blades, and her eyes widened with surprise as she jerked forward. There was a small pause between his action and Skye actually pulling herself gingerly to her feet. She trudged over to the cell, Fitz staring through it with curiosity.

The door opened automatically. Skye avoided his eyes as she walked passed him, straight onto the cot in the corner and sat facing the wall.

That was vexing. He usually awaited her at the cell, and she'd give him a small smile. A smile of reassurance, one that said, "don't worry." Despite how fake or see-through it had been or how she may really have felt, she made the effort.

This time she didn't.

"See you two tomorrow!" Lyja waved. "Or perhaps tonight, you never know!"

Fitz was the only one to watch them as they disappeared up the stairs.

"Bastards," he muttered, before turning to Skye. She was curled up into a ball on the cot.

"Skye?" he called tentatively.

"Don't talk to me Fitz," came her muffled reply. Her tone was resigned, not angry. "I'm going to take a nap."

"Thought you said you weren't sleeping?" he asked.

"What else is there to do?" she replied flatly.

"We could talk," he suggested, sitting on the edge of the tiny bed with her. "I've got some stories I could tell actually. You know, there was this one time when Simmons had this bunny suit… have I told you this? I've told this story quite a bit-"

"Fitz," Skye cut him off, head still facing the wall. "I've been talking. And to be honest, I'm kind of done with it."

Fitz didn't know what to say to that. He didn't know what to tell his friend, how to comfort her. If everything went as the aliens were planning, he'd be walking out of here in a day or two.

And Skye would be dead.

The abrupt sound made Fitz jump, because he didn't know what it was at first or that the anguished sob had come from the girl next to him.

"I-I just don't understand," Skye cried, trembling as she tried to get it out. She sat up suddenly. "Why are they doing this? I'm already going to die, why do they have to do this to me too? I don't… I didn't do anything to make them hate me and they h-hate me so much!"

She broke down with her sobbing then and Fitz lunged forward, wrapping his arms over her as she cried into his chest. The scientist gently rubbed his hand along her back.

"Hey, hey…" he cooed, unsure of what to say. He really had never done this with anyone, except Jemma sometimes. Not that he really knew what he was doing in those instances either.

"It would be okay," she sniffled into him, bringing her head back just a little to talk. "I could die. I mean, I don't want to die, but I could. I was ready to when it was for a good reason. If they would just hurt me I could at least go down swinging."

"You don't… you don't have to listen to them for me, Skye," Fitz offered, because it was the only thing he could.

Skye lifted up her face to look at him. She seemed to realize how blaming her comment had sounded.

"No, no of course not! I would never, ever do that," she told him. "I'm... I'm dead, Fitz. They can break me. That's fine! But you're going to get through this. I can't let you be broken too… not again."

Her tears had all but stopped falling when she said this. When she confessed how she would die, how she'd let herself be broken. It only broke Fitz's heart.

"Coulson and the team are looking for us. He can find us."

Skye tilted her head to the side, almost amused with the comment. She sniffled. "It's been days, Fitz. And we're on an alien spaceship. What could SHIELD even do if they found us?"

Fitz swallowed the lump in his throat. "I don't know. But I can't accept this. I won't."

He stood up then, beginning to observe the sides of the cell. Skye looked at him curiously as she kicked her legs over the side of the cot.

"What are you doing?" she asked, wiping the remaining tears with her shirtsleeve.

"If Coulson can't get us out, we'll have to do it ourselves." Fitz began tracing the edges of the cell with his hand.

Skye sighed with exasperation. "Fitz, you've looked it over a thousand times…"

"Yeah when we first got here! Maybe something's changed."

Nothing had changed. He knew that. But the least he could do was give Skye hope, even if it was false. He had to try to be brave for her.

"Hey kiiiids," they heard Lyja's voice call to them from above, causing them to share a worried look. She usually wouldn't come back so quickly. "Caught some visitors for you."

The lump returned to Leo's throat as they listened intently to the distinct sounds of struggle.

Skye and Fitz's attentions were both solely focused on the stairs now, awaiting some understanding of Lyja's words. Their curiosity was satiated, but their worry heightened, when two bound figures were thrown down the steps.

"Thought we'd try a new game," said Lyja playfully.

Fitz and Skye didn't know what to say, so they just stared in horror as Simmons and Ward looked up at them helplessly from the floor.

A/n: Thank you Shadow375 for the beta!

I wrote this… SOOOO long ago, just after I posted the first chapter of this story. I'd just researched the Skrulls, wanted to try a Fitz POV chapter, and the only thing I knew was that they were going to be captured and I needed to show how evil the aliens were. The next chapter would probably have sufficed, but it's still less intense than this one in my opinion. Better chapter though. Maybe not. Wait and seeee.

I changed the name "Creature" quite a bit since I wrote this, could never find something that fit perfectly. But I guess it works, as it's not really supposed to elicit warm fuzzy feelings.

Also just a tid bit, at the time I wrote this, Skye was going to come from Inhuman royalty. But I decided prophecies and curses are enough. I just don't think I could take Princess Skye seriously in this story. (Princess Skye… hahaha) Sorry if any of you would have thought that was cool ;)

I know this AN is getting long but as I won't be updating before Tuesday I wanted to say... Enjoy the mid-season finale everyone!