Chapter Seven

19/04/2020 21:43 hours. An unidentified house in Salem, Virginia.

Spencer despised the fog that occurred when waking from a drug-induced state of unconsciousness. He hated even more the feeling of missing time. He had no recollection of the past five hours or so. He could only chalk it up to a seizure or drugs. There was also a heaviness that settled in his muscles that followed a seizure. Spencer could easily slot the pieces together - he had had a seizure and had been dosed to stop it. The room was in complete darkness. His wrists and ankles throbbed. He was unable to adjust his position in any way, and his back was aching. The zip ties that bound him to the bed frame were industrial strength, so they would not break without assistance from wire cutters. His moist breath and saliva had begun to loosen the adhesive of the tape over his mouth. Spencer worked his jaw enough to pry his bottom lip away from the tape. He used the tip of his tongue to try and remove the rest. It was proving difficult to remove. He took in a deep breath, wincing at the pain in his ribs. It was now or never.

"Help! Someone help me!" screamed Spencer, desperately hoping someone would hear him.

A light appeared beneath the door at the top of the basement stairs. Spencer panted, eyeing the door warily. He secretly hoped it would be Mel. His stomach cramped and growled. It had been some time since he last ate or drank anything. His tongue felt like sandpaper in his mouth. The door swung open, casting a rectangle of light down the wooden stairs. James' silhouette filled the doorway. He tugged a cord to the side of the door. Spencer blinked as a dim light filled his vision.

James made his way tauntingly slowly down the stairs. He had a disturbing smile on his face. He approached Spencer and ripped the duct tape off his mouth. Spencer hissed at the tape tearing away from his skin.

"Making enough noise there? Aly's asleep. Gives us a little time to become acquainted, huh?" Spencer's stomach growled once more. "Hungry, are we?"

"What the fuck is this? Some sick kind of good cop, bad cop? Trying to psychologically wear me down? Well, it won't work," snarled Spencer.

"You really don't have a clue, doctor. Aly is really only into that bondage shit. Me? I'm into the hard stuff and pretty men like you get my engine running. She wouldn't let me have a go at you in the storage unit, but trust me when I say, you'll get a real experience with me, pretty boy."

"You stay the fuck away from me, you sick son of a bitch!" James simply smiled and shook his head as he crept over to a workbench in the corner of the basement. He grabbed a long length of thin silicone tubing and returned to Spencer. Spencer glared at the tube, instantly recognising it as a nasogastric tube.

"You're not sticking that anywhere in me. Get away from me." Spencer tried to make himself as small as possible, but his restraints kept him in place. James sighed and grabbed the roll of duct tape that had been hooked over one of the handles of the wheelchair that had been folded in the corner. He pulled a length away from the roll and tore it off. He jammed it roughly over Spencer's mouth and pressed down hard with his coarse palms to ensure that it was stuck firmly over his lips to seal them shut.

"I can finally work in peace," said James with a haunted smile on his face as he set the tape to one side and reached for the tube that he had put down next to Spencer's leg.

James grasped Spencer's jaw with one hand and forced his head back into the pillows. Spencer desperately jerked his head from side to side to try and dislodge the hand. James set the tube down on the blanket once again and reached into his jeans pocket for the remote for the collar. He jabbed his thumb into the button. Spencer let out a hoarse, muffled scream as the electricity surged throughout his body, his back and neck arching from the bed. He shook his head wildly. James released the button and Spencer slumped back into the mattress. His chest was heaving.

"You seem to be forgetting the rules, Dr Reid. Now, lie still." James grabbed Spencer's jaw once again and tilted his head back. Spencer could only watch with terrified eyes as James reached for the tube and guided it towards his right nostril. Spencer's brow furrowed as the tube tickled his nose as it was slid inside. As the tip of the tube reached the back of his throat, he gagged, bile rising up his gullet but managed to swallow it down. The tube continued down until it brushed against the inner wall of his stomach. Tears stung in his eyes but he was determined not to cry in front of this psychopath. James draped the tube over Spencer's right ear and used small strips of duct tape to secure it to the genius' cheek and the tip of his nose.

"You didn't really think we would give you actual food, did you?" James laughed stiffly as he returned to the workbench. He returned with a large feeding syringe and a bottle of foul, beige-coloured liquid. He attached the syringe to the end of the tube that dangled over Spencer's shoulder and uncapped the bottle. He slowly poured the liquid into the syringe and held it up at shoulder height, then opened the clip that controlled the flow. Spencer watched as the liquid crawled down the tube. His stomach cramped once again as the liquid feed trickled into it. Spencer released a muffled groan and shook his head. He was lactose intolerant. He desperately wanted to tell James to stop as his intestines felt as though they were knotting.

James noticed Spencer's squirming and closed the valve on the tube then disconnected the syringe. Spencer was pressing his thighs together. James bent down and reached for the bedpan under the bed.

"Lift your ass." Spencer lifted his hips as much as he could. James slid the bedpan underneath his bare buttocks. Spencer rested back down, the plastic digging into his flesh. His cheeks flushed crimson, mortified that he was being forced to defecate in a demeaning manner. Once Spencer had emptied his bowels, the bedpan was removed and set at the bottom of the stairs. James reached under the bed once again and grabbed the urinal bottle. He peeled back the blanket and guided Spencer's penis into the neck of the bottle. Spencer relieved his bladder into the bottle. James set the bottle down next to the bedpan.

Spencer had his eyes squeezed shut, tears escaping his lashes. So much for not crying in front of this psycho. James clenched his fist around Spencer's member. Spencer's eyes flew open in shock.

"That's better. I'm going to enjoy a little knife play, I think." Spencer tensed at the sight of the pen knife blade flashing in the dim light. James brought the knife down to Spencer's collarbone and pressed down. He dragged it painstakingly slowly across his flesh. Spencer held back a wince, choosing to glare at the other man instead. James cocked his head at the lack of response. He brought the tip of the knife to rest on Spencer's throat just beneath the collar. Spencer swallowed thickly. The knife was moved to his sternum and dragged down to the top of his abdomen. Spencer was unable to prevent the grimace across his face. James set the knife down on the mattress and leaned over the young man. Spencer quirked an eyebrow in confusion. It was not until James licked a stripe up Spencer's chest that he realised that he was lapping up the blood. James' saliva stung the wounds as his tongue probed deeper. Spencer jerked to try and escape the man's exploring appendage. James wrapped his hand around Spencer's throat and pinned him down. He had a sadistic smirk on his face.

"Not a word to Aly. Got it?" Spencer could only nod, his brows knitted in an amalgamation of confusion and disgust. "Not like you could." James tapped a finger thoughtfully on the tape silencing Spencer.

"I'm going to clean these up and get you settled for the night. But first…" James pulled the folded bandana out of his pocket and held it up. Spencer shook his head, eyes fixed to the black Paisley cloth in horror. If there was one part of him he had been unable to erase, it was his childish fear of the dark. Frankly, it terrified him being alone in the dark with this monster. James pressed the tip of the knife beneath Spencer's chin.

"Lift your head," demanded James, each word punctuated with a nick of the knife, leaving three tiny wounds in the sensitive flesh. Spencer gulped and nodded softly. James removed the knife and grasped the bandana with both hands. Spencer compliantly raised his head, allowing James to bind it tightly over his eyes and knot it twice at the back of his head.

"Good boy." James patted him on the cheek and turned away to grab the first aid kit. Spencer could only listen to the sounds of the other man shuffling about. He could hear sloshing of liquid and then there came the cold sensation of soaked gauze over his skin. It was closely followed by the burn of peroxide in the wounds. Spencer let out a muffled groan, every severed nerve ending feeling as though it was aflame. James taped gauze over the wounds and gave a satisfied sigh. Spencer listened to the sounds of clinking and pouring liquid. He felt James' presence over the top of him and the tube moving slightly as something clicked into the end of it.

"Time for you to get some sleep. Don't worry. It's a little melatonin to help you." Spencer felt the medication settle in the pit of his stomach. "Good night, doctor." The syringe was disconnected from the tube and tossed into a bin. Spencer listened to the sounds of James gathering the offensive smelling bedpan and urinal bottle, his steps up the basement stairs, and then the door clicked shut. The sound of the lock being turned was deafening. Spencer pulled at his restraints once more in a blind hope that they would give but they held strong. Realising that he was not going to get free of his new hell anytime soon, he rested his head back into the pillows as comfortably as he could with the knot of the blindfold pressing into his skull and tried to relax, allowing his exhaustion and the melatonin to wash over him into what he could only assume was going to be a restless sleep given his circumstances.

20/04/2020 02:10 hours. An unidentified house in Salem, Virginia.

Spencer awoke with a start, his heart racing and his breath caught in his throat. He immediately noticed Mel stood over him with a wide grin. Mel's face changed to James', confusing the genius more. James tightly gripped Spencer's flaccid member and brought the knife down. Spencer released a blood curdling scream as the blade sawed back and forth through his flesh. He sobbed when the final swipe of the blade severed the remaining tendrils of his skin. James proudly held up the dismembered genitals, warm blood dripping onto Spencer's face…

Spencer jerked awake, his skin clammy with a cool sweat and his heart thudding against his broken ribs. He briefly froze at the darkness that he found himself in, then felt the soft material against his eyelids and cheeks. Of course… Blindfold… Spencer desperately wanted to check his parts to ensure that they were intact, but he had no way of checking with his hands, nor could he complete a visual inspection. He flicked his hips slightly, feeling his penis slap against his inner thigh. There was no stickiness of dried blood there. Spencer sighed with relief that he was still intact.

He tried to work out what day it was. His dark, speechless prison left him disorientated. It had to have been less than twenty-four hours since he had been taken from the hospital. He had been ploughed into by a car on the eighteenth. His emergency surgery had been around three hours, and then the recovery period after the general anaesthetic. He had been on the ward for only half a day before Mel appeared, and he was restrained to his bed. Much like he was at that moment. Spencer huffed out a laugh at the irony. He would gladly take hospital limb holders over zip ties any day. He did not recall the hospital giving him his anticonvulsant medication, nor had the siblings, so he had to assume that it had been two days since he took them. He was inevitably going to have a prolonged seizure, one that he would suffer alone with no one to stop it. The potential for hypoxia related brain injury was terrifying, and the statistics were against him. Given that he had missed two days of epilepsy medication, it also meant that he missed his long-term antibiotic therapy. It was a chilling thought that he had no protection from whatever pathogens resided on James' tongue. The scar from the stab wound tingled at the thought. Spencer shivered at the prospect. Mel knew that his spleen had been removed. She was there at the hospital with him. A simple infection could kill him. Chances are, James didn't know that. Perhaps Mel would have stopped her brother from injuring him more if she had known about his fetishes.

Spencer felt a sudden impending doom, and lights flashed before his eyes despite the blindfold. He was under extreme stress. That much was true. He was without his tailored anticonvulsant regime. He immediately knew that another seizure was inevitable, and he could only hope that he wouldn't go into status epilepticus again. He moaned softly into the tape, and his head tilted back into the pillows. His limbs tensed against the zip ties. The warm sensation of blood crawled over his skin as it trickled over his cheek from his nose, running over the duct tape that held the feeding tube in place. His face twitched beneath the gag and blindfold. As the convulsions took hold, his head rocked back and forth, and his limbs tugged painfully against his bonds. Blood seeped from the surgical wound on his leg as the stitches snapped, separating the edges of the incision. Being unconscious meant that Spencer did not feel the moment his lungs gave out.