Enzo's Perspective

It's an odd experience, to go through something so terribly unique with someone, and yet… experience it entirely differently.

For Luciana, these last few months had been the worst of her life. The Augustine's world of pain, hunger, and torment was still new to her—and each session seemed to chip away a small piece of her each time.

He knew the cycle well—the rage comes first, burning and fierce. Then the denial, the helplessness that gnaws from the inside out. Numbness follows—cold and consuming—only to cycle back to rage again. A cruel, relentless loop.

Enzo had experienced it all before—alone, for years. Now, he watched it unfold in her.

It felt wrong, how much he savored her presence. For him, these last few months had been the best he'd had in years. Her conversations were a balm, every stolen moment a sip of fine wine in a desert of loneliness. He appreciated not just her words but what they revealed about her—the vulnerability, the fire, the layers of who she was. Each moment where she unraveled, she somehow became even more radiant, and he became ever-more captivated.

One night…

"She gave him a look and a smile. That was all. But it was as if he had received the gift of Heaven. It was more than he had ever hoped for, and it made him happy for the rest of his life."

Luciana sat against the far wall, legs drawn up to her chest, eyes distant but thoughtful. "It's kind of beautiful though, isn't it? How even in all that pain… Quasimodo still loved her. Even knowing he couldn't have her," she mused. She'd been talking about The Hunchback of Notre-Damefor the last hour for no particular reason. This was following a very detailed and critical review of Wuthering Heights.

Enzo leaned his head back against the wall, voice low but carrying a trace of something softer. "Maybe on paper," he replied. "It seems rather cruel."

"Maybe," she challenged, "loving someone without hope is the purest kind of love there is."

Another time…

"Do you know the song La Vie en Rose?" she asked, her voice soft, threading through their comfortable silence like a question meant for no one in particular.

Enzo raised an eyebrow, a slow, amused smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. "Can't say I do," he said, leaning back against the cold wall. "My French is a little rusty, love."

Without hesitation, she started humming—tentative at first, soft and shaky, but soon steady enough to fill the stale, suffocating air around them. The melody was fragile, like something half-remembered from a dream, yet it held a raw, aching beauty. When she stopped, there was a pause—then she shot him a quick glance, as if daring him to respond.

"You're going to have to give me more than that to go on," Enzo encouraged her, leaning in slightly.

Luciana huffed, cheeks coloring as she twirled the end of her hair. She hesitated—just for a moment—biting her lower lip, as if considering something heavy, before her resolve steeled, and she began to sing.

Her voice was rough—dry from thirst and worn from exhaustion—but it was beautiful. Not the kind of beauty born of perfection, but something more profound—rich, velvety, honest. It carried effortlessly through the air, haunting and melodic, every note laced with an aching tenderness. The lyrics flowed from her lips with the kind of vulnerability that made every crack and flaw feeling.

When she stopped, it wasn't out of exhaustion or because the song was through—it was out of fear. Her cheeks flushed deep, and she buried her face in her knees as if she could shrink away from the moment entirely. The sudden shyness caught him off guard—it was… endearing.

Enzo couldn't stop the grin from spreading across his face. "You've been holding out on me this whole time?" he teased, his voice rich with playful warmth. "We could've had music?"

Luciana peeked at him through her hair, offering a small, sheepish smile. "My mom used to sing it," she admitted quietly, voice tinged with something soft and sorrowful. "It's been stuck in my head lately…"

"Sing it again," Enzo murmured, leaning forward just enough for his voice to drop into something low and coaxing. He would beg if she made him. "Maybe if I'm lucky, it'll get stuck in my head, too."

Luciana bit her lip, hesitating for a breath… and continued, her face as red as a tomato.

Another time…

"Favorite color?" she asked. She was bored. She was searching for conversation, and he was happy to oblige.

Enzo looked up, intrigued, and leaned forward slightly. "I have two at the moment," he said honestly, eyes locking with hers through the bars. The stunning blue, the warm brown—it struck him how her eyes reminded him of earth and sky all at once. Like freedom, if freedom had a color.

Luciana smiled faintly. "Well you can only have one favorite color," she told him. There was a playful, biting edge to her voice. She was feeling feisty. She did this sometimes – picked small, meaningless fights with him to entertain them both.

He snarked, amused by her mock-seriousness. "You can't tell me how many favorite colors I can have."

Quick as a whip, "I didn't ask what your favorite colors were. I asked what your favorite color was. Singular – not plural."

He smiled, and she smiled back. The distance suddenly didn't feel so far between them. She had this… spark that almost made him forget they were trapped.

"I simply can't choose just one," he murmured, silently marveling between the serenity of her blue eye—calm, endless, like the stillness of a winter sky—and the warmth of her brown one, rich and grounding, like earth after rain.

"Then only tell me one," she challenged. She wasn't giving up.

He laughed – he couldn't help it. This was silly and stupid in the best way. "Okay, fine… blue," he said.

But she wasn't done. "I would've taken you for a red-kind of guy. Fire, passion, and all that." He smiled. That was, in fact, his favorite color before this place.

"And you? Let me guess—purple. No - lavender."

She adjusted herself, crawling forward on her hands and knees to scoot closer to the bars – closer to him. "Green," she said, voice soft but sure. "Like moss after rain."

He stared at her, watched her absolutely captivated as she settled into a comfortable position against the bars. "Favorite season?" she asked.

"Summer," he replied. "You?"

"Spring," she answered quickly, a hint of wistfulness in her voice. "I love thunderstorms."

Another time…

Another time…

Another time…

No matter what Dr. Witmore did to her, he couldn't extinguish her flame. The part that fought back, that looked for freedom. Her hope was infectious, too. She was always strong—fierce in her defiance, sharp in her wit—and he'd grown rather fond of it over these past few months. No, addicted is a better word to describe it.

She was more resilient than he had been. She held her screams when Witmore tortured her, she fought the guards no matter how broken she was the night before.

But starvation was different. There was no end in sight, no reprieve. It's slow, growing, consuming. Every day worse than the last.

Two weeks without blood left him weak, weaker than usual, but pretty on par with the annual event. His body had begun to betray him—limbs stiffening, strength draining until even the simple act of breathing felt like dragging air through shards of glass. And yet, none of it compared to the agony of watching her wither.

Luciana.

This was breaking her.

He reminded himself again, how much younger she was. That this was harder for her. He could see it in the way her body curled into itself on the cold, unforgiving concrete. In the hollowness of her cheeks, the way her lips lost their color, the emptiness in her eyes.

And that pained him more than the hunger ever could.

When the guards finally came, Enzo felt relieved. He knew the routine. Shackles. Chains. A cruel mockery of mercy as they dripped just enough blood into his system to force him to function.

But this time, they weren't just dragging him. They were taking her too.

The moment her fragile form stumbled beside him, their wrists shackled together, something inside him flared to life—an alertness so raw, it shook him to his core. She was cold, barely conscious, her steps sluggish. And yet, up close, she looked ethereal.

He couldn't tear his eyes off of her as they were shoved forward. And then— the cage.

They were forced into it together, shoved into a space so small he could feel the heat radiating from her body. He felt all his senses suddenly sharpen at the sheer proximity of her. The warmth of her skin, the soft brush of her shoulder against his chest—it was like being struck by lightning after centuries in the dark.

His heart clenched—sudden, sharp—when her eyes met his. Those eyes. He had seen them before, countless times through the distance of cold steel and shadows. But this was different. This was close. Close enough to notice things he hadn't before. Close enough to feel like he was seeing her for the very first time.

And what a sight she was.

Strands of silky black hair clung to her cheek, drawn by static—or maybe by the electricity simmering in the narrow space between them. Could she feel it too? He wondered.

The freckles scattered across her honey-warmed skin weren't just freckles now—they were constellations, patterns written by some cosmic hand, stars meant to be discovered only at this distance. His gaze followed them greedily, tracing every subtle detail.

The sharp cut of her cheekbones, the soft curve of her jaw—had they always been this striking? Her lips, fuller than he realized, shaped with a delicate precision that made his chest tighten. A single freckle beneath her bottom lip—tiny, almost invisible unless you were this close—caught his attention and refused to let go.

Her lashes were longer than they had any right to be, casting shadows that fluttered with every blink. His eyes fell to the elegant slope of her neck, the graceful line of her collarbone exposed by the stretched-out white shirt that hung too loosely on her. More freckles dusted her skin there, scattered like soft ink stains across bare canvas.

It was overwhelming—how much he'd missed from a distance.

Shamelessly, hungrily, he took her in, every detail carving itself into memory. He hadn't expected this. He hadn't expected her to be so achingly beautiful up close—so intricate, so effortlessly captivating.

And so, he memorized her—this close, every breath, every freckle, every unspoken word etched into him like a secret he might never be allowed to touch again. He couldn't help it. He couldn't stop staring.

He'd known, deep down, that something was growing inside him. A crush—soft, quiet, buried under months of friendship and shared suffering. He had pushed those feelings aside, overrode them out of respect for their situation. This was certainly not the time or place for a budding romance. But now, with her this close, it hit him like a tidal wave. How had he ever thought he could deny this?

It took more effort than he cared to admit to appear nonchalant. "This isn't so bad after all," he said.

Her heart skipped. He heard it—felt it—like an echo of his own pulse.

Then the doors opened.

The jarring metal-on-metal sound of the cage being moved cut through their fragile connection like a blade. The room beyond was decadent—warm lights cascading from gilded chandeliers, music humming softly beneath the murmur of conversation. The scent of wealth and blood clung to every surface.

And then she stumbled. The smell of her burning flesh seared his nose like a brand.

Enzo didn't think. Instinct overrode every other sensation. He caught her—arms wrapping around her, pulling her closer, away from the bars as the cage continued to rattle unevenly. In all their months together as Augustine's prisoners, he'd never been able to protect her, shield her from any pain. But today he could. And that felt right.

He barely felt the bite of the bars as he bumped into them – because she didn't. The sensation of her warmth, her body against his overrode anything else he could feel in that moment. Her soft skin, the weight of her curves pressed against him, the delicate scent of her hair curling around his senses, sweet and earthy. Her body melted against his without, fitting against him like she was meant to be there.

For a heartbeat, for one impossibly tender second—there was nothing but her.

When the guards opened the cage door, he tried to fight. He really did. But they yanked her from his arms and threw him to the side like they were nothing. His heart thundered with a new kind of white-hot rage as they dragged her onto the stage, as she looked back—eyes wide, full of silent terror. And helplessness clawed into him, raw and savage.

He watched, every second stretching into eternity, as Witmore cut her, paraded her pain for their amusement, dissected her dignity with every word. His fists clenched until his nails bit into his palms.

And when she was finally thrown back into the cage, shaking—he was there.

He caught her, pulled her in again, let her bury herself into him. His arms tightened protectively around her small frame, trying to shield her from their cruelty as best as he could. The softness of her trembling body made his own heart ache.

"I've got you," he whispered, voice low and steady, every word a promise. He didn't know what else to say. There wasn't anything to say.

They failed. There was no escape.

But for now—right now—it didn't feel like failure.