"Wake up, my friend."
His dreams had been confusing as always; mere fragments of erased memories, loosely strung together to resemble something that could pass as having a past, being alive at first glance. It never lasted. Just as when he was awake, the memories faded away into nothingness the moment he tried to hold onto them, as soon as he wanted to inspect them and figure out what they really were, which ones were real and which were only figments of his imagination; a confused brain trying to make sense of what it couldn't remember, what had been taken away against its will.
"Wake up. It's the dawn of a new day, and you have work to do."
Long ago, in what now felt like another life, those words would've filled him with hope; back when he didn't remember where he was—or who. 47 knew better now. He still had only a vague understanding of the person he might've been before all of this, but he knew exactly where he was kept and why. The voice didn't belong to a friend, didn't consider him a friend either. There were no friends in this world, not for him.
He was dangerous. A dangerous animal that couldn't be tamed. Not dangerous enough to overpower those who kept him, though. They knew his fears and his weaknesses, all of them, and they used them against him to keep him in check.
No, 47 couldn't lash out. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, and the punishment would reliably be more painful than whatever they'd had in mind for him in the first place. A hard lesson, but one he had learned quickly enough. His father had been right; pain was the best teacher.
He had to keep his eyes closed to protect them from the harsh ceiling light that always switched on when his father spoke to wake him up. It was something he couldn't get used to, being blinded and even more disoriented than usual. At least it meant he was free to leave his hard and narrow bed as soon as the shackles opened as if following an unspoken command, releasing his hurting wrists and ankles from their right grip.
The shackles never opened when he wanted them to, when he wanted to leave the bed. Not that he had anywhere to go. His small cell didn't even have a window for him to stare out. No taste of freedom for him, not even in his imagination. Especially not in his imagination.
Not a single decision was his, not one aspect of his life was under his own control. It would get easier with time; all he needed to do was comply until they were done, until they were bored. They'd return him to his cell and he could allow himself a few moments of stolen freedom, lying awake in the darkness when he knew they expected him to sleep.
In silence, he got dressed in the hospital gown they'd laid out for him. From the clothes alone he knew exactly what was expecting him on the other side of the bolted steel door.
One of the orderlies led him down the endless corridor to the laboratory; each of their footsteps echoing from the tiled walls like 47's own heartbeat screaming at him, like his instincts yelling at him to turn around and run away from what awaited him, but he knew better.
He knew about the taser this orderly was carrying with him and how much the shocks hurt, he knew how fast more orderlies would arrive to keep him on the ground, he knew about the doctor and the syringe he'd painfully press into his arm, and he knew he'd wake up strapped down too tightly in a straitjacket, surrounded by sadistic orderlies, curious doctors, and his disappointed father. This would be when his true punishment would begin; he knew it from experience. Pain was the best teacher, and 47 was an extraordinary student.
No, it was better to let this one orderly lead him down this endless corridor, obediently and docile despite his heartbeat and his instincts knowing what awaited him. He was a dangerous animal that couldn't be tamed, but kept in check with fear. For now.
It would be over one day.
Thank you for reading!
I've written many more Hitman fics, and you can find them all on AO3! Same username as here, Diana47