Then something was pulled away from the boys' ears.
"Mr.Pryce."
An oblatration. A tone that echoed at first but cut through. The voice was serrated and clear.
"Wake up now." The dialect was foreign, the 'a' sounding like a short 'e' and the long 'o' dipped in at the end, an African inflection if one was savvy enough. The room was dark with the most pathetic excuse for a light bulb hanging precariously above a large metal door. Sitting in the middle of the damp aired room was Noah; every one of his poor little limbs trussed until he was completely immobile on a stainless steel chair. The figure before the bound boy was completely black, a wraith that was calling his name. Not that he'd see as he was blinded by a pair of blacked-out goggles.
"Awake?" The dark figure was waiting for an answer, an impatient quickness to his words.
Noah awoke with the sensation of water filling his skull cavity. It seemed to slosh as he lifted it slightly, his sight stolen and his remaining senses invaded by staleness. Grogginess was his first impulse before confusion.
In his chest, his lungs contracted painfully.
And yet he said nothing.
There was a faint click, something like a briefcase, a lock opening, and more shuffling of heavy foot steps. Bayard heaved a sigh and with deft precision given the dark he was drenched in, pulled out and loaded a needle. He paused, turned and stared at the pitiful boy before him. Putting the needle back down gingerly, he turned and stood authoritatively over his victim.
"Noah, right? Nice name, boyo, nice name." He stepped to the left of him languidly, beginning to circle. "I hear you're very smart. Very smart, yea. I been needing something, see. I been needing to get some info, something, ya know? Seeing as how you're so smart I'd figured I'd ask you." Hip brushed gently against shoulder; an affirmation of his existence. He was real, this wasn't a dream if maybe that was what his denial was hoping. "Do you know what I could want from you, Noah? Any idea at all?"
Inhale, exhale.
Count to five.
If the man already knew about him, there was little point in asking what he needed him for. People like these weren't stupid; they did their research, they were prepared. And he knew if there was something he wanted, he was ready to do whatever it took to acquire that information.
One, two, three, four, five.
"You have this twang to your accent that I've never heard before," breathed the captive. "It doesn't sound Caribbean, so I'm going to assume African. It's thick and your speech pattern proves that you probably lived there a long time, maybe most of your life, but you have a British accent blended into it. The only African countries that were colonized by the British are along the eastern and southern coasts, and some of the upper western coast. The South African accent sounds more Australian, so that's out of the question."
A stilted pause. "Unless you really need this information that I apparently have, I'm not saying anything to you."
His heart was beating too fast. Too fast.
The abrupt string of well noted observations made Bayard smile. Intelligent as expected. He chuckled from behind him now, close but not touching. The sound wrapped around the boy, bouncing of the walls of the wide open room. The boy licked his incisors, a wet sound emanating from his tongue squishing against his gums.
"Sharp as whip! Not surprised, 'course, no no." His hands glided over the others' shoulders, soon stiff as vices. His tone held a gamesome lightness to it.
It disappeared as quickly as it'd been heard. "You seem a decent bloke. I know you got a well-lit attic too. So don't waste our time and energy jumpin' through these nasty little hoops, ey?"
A squeeze. A squeeze hard enough he was just about touching his fingers through the other boy's flesh. Grin, grin. "I'd be quite pleased if ya'd inform me of the Observers, yea? Whatever of their goings-on would be just swell..." A nasty tightening, no give, nails almost cutting skin. "And I'll know if you're lying." Dead tone and clear, unaccented English he muttered. "Aye?"
Immediately, his victim stiffened, suppressing a hiss of discomfort. Noah closed his eyes, only to reveal more darkness, and breathed the scent of old and decaying copper.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't know w-." His sentence didn't even finish because he was too busy snickering to himself, almost hysterical. "Aww, you think you're that jammy, ey?" His hands loosened and agonizingly slowly slid up his neck, his cold fingers resting against the pulsating of his windpipe. The thick air was stale and wet, it was quiet except for the breathing.
Breathing.
"Look now, see, I don't wanna be cuttin' up on you none. I know you don't want that either yea? You're fond of livin' right?" Pressure; trachea closing.
"Just starting gabbin' boyo, save us some time. If not I would mind dicing up your fingers ya know? I just got this interesting little machine, only used it on a pig so far...quite the mess, ya see..." Raucous and bitter now. He really didn't want to ruin the poor boy but a job was a job. Bloody hell he hated scrubbing down the room with bleach after a good skinning. Always left his hands too dry. No, not pleasant at all.
Unpleasant.
Choking.
Each digit felt like a snake coiling around the column of his neck-- suffocating, no matter the pressure. What air had been milling around in Noah's lungs left in a heavy exhale as he focused on preventing an asthma attack.
Count to five.
The boy beneath his hand shifted, shoulders rising in defense.
"Why?"
"Oh, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear."
He let go. Breathe little lamb.
He was aware of his captives' respiratory issues. He stayed behind him, reaching into his own pocket to retrieve a simple little butterfly knife. Bayard was very particular of his weapons, they were shined and sharpened and polished to perfection. So tedious when work flow was good. He placed the blade deliberately against the boys throat, still. "What I'd like to know is what exactly the Observers are up to, yea? If you're not going to talk then, well, you are quite useless to me. You are garbage."
Pressed in the knife, breaking skin, he felt the warm liquid escape, just touch the backs of his knuckles. "So?"
Only then did Noah make his fear apparent, in the tensing of his jaw, the abrupt and automatic struggle against the bonds. One wrong move, the man would slit his throat, and he wasn't sure he had it in him to resist before succumbing to panic.
Another bead trickled between the crease of index and middle finger.
"... who's to say you won't kill me even if I do talk?" His voice shook so very lightly.
He scowled. This was becoming tedious. With his free hand, he grabbed the boys' chin and jerked it upwards, the serrated blade catching skin and tearing it a little more. Bayard's face hung silently above his, eyes to black goggles.
"Ah, so you're not that smart, I see," he whispered throatily.
"I don't really care what happens to you. You will be harmless either way. You don't know where this is. You don't know me. Hell even if you do you can't do anything about it. Dead or alive, its all the same. I'm not opposed to either." His sable hair brushed against the boys face. "Now once more. What. Are. The Observers'. Up to?"
Noah whimpered audibly, eyes falling shut. If this was the way he was going to go, it was a pretty shitty way, he had to admit. Maybe Bayard would rip open his neck and be done with it in a matter of seconds, spill his blood all over his lap and carve the blade into his windpipe.
What a shame.
It seemed like there was nothing else left to do but whisper a quiet "I'm not lying".
The knife disappeared form the boys throat and was followed by heavy steps. A small clink in the distance.
"You know I don't think I'll kill you. Nah, you know, I think I might keep ya down here for a bit...you being uncooperative and all. Hell, I could just keep ya down her, starve ya, skin ya, decapitate ya with this bitty knife I has. I can keep ya alive through all that, did ya know that? Neatoh huh, jammy?"
Clink, clink, a finger tapped gently at barrel of the needle, the plunger spurting a clear liquid. Truth serum. Chemical seduction. He knelt besides the tethered boy again, softly dragging the needle across the boys abused throat. "Ya sure, ya want to drag this out? If only you'd just talk, boyo..." An apologetic sigh. If this boy held out much longer it was going to be a red, red evening.
"I--" At the needle's point, his breath hitched. "--have nothing to say," Noah admitted with a note of desperation, not enjoying the prospect of being kept down here, not when it smelled so much of death, if he even knew what that smelled like. He felt like at any moment he would throw up, or stop breathing.
Plunge.
Bayard didn't bother finding a vein. He stuck the stubborn lamb straight into the side of his neck where he saw his jugular throbbing. His hand stayed there, until every last of the serum was emptied into him. He pulled it out, tossed it into a bin behind him, and stared. He pulled the boy's goggles off. He couldn't see anyway, in the velvet darkness that they were slathered in.
"That is a truth serum. A barbiturate. It will take a few seconds to work." He sighed, leaned on the boys arms as he knelt beside him idly. He decided it'd be best to progress him as the serum took hold with simple questions. "So boyo, is your name Noah Pryce?"
Immediately, his captive winced, hissing loudly at the intrusion. However expected, the pain wasn't. He could've been wrong, but he could literally feel the serum sliding down his throat. Poisoning, infiltrating. Count to five.
Ocean blue fluttered open in the darkness, blinking in vain.
"... yeah," he eventually returned in a whisper.
15. 14. 13.
An unseen nod was given in reply. He continued kneeling, his elbows resting on his thighs, fingers drumming together patiently.
"And how old are you?"
12. 11. 10.
"I just... turned twenty-two." Whenever that was; he failed to keep track of dates.
9. 8. 7.
"And what is it that you do for work, Noah?" He was comparing the answers to already previously gathered information. The serum wasn't always reliable but it would loosen the pale boys' lips enough.
6. 5. 4.
Breathe. "... don't you already know these answers?" The boy sounded confused. "Why... are you asking me?"
Brisk cough. "Because, jammy, I need to know you know what you're talking about." He stood abruptly, a lumbering black ghoul in front of him. "I need to know you know the truth." The serum couldn't keep him from detesting but it would eventually lead him to truth, unable to lie.
"Now answer."
3. 2. 1.
Noah struggled against his bonds when his wrists began to numb from discomfort, fingertips cold. "I work in a restaurant. I wait tables so I can afford my apartment." His voice was weary, worn.
A slight ah of satisfaction drifted from the direction of the shadow, approving.
"Good boy, good boy. Now..," A step closer. A little glint from a knife, a preview of sanguine happenings ahead if the answers weren't to his liking. "...tell me what you know of the Observers."
Sharply, the other glanced up, forcing a weak glare in the general direction of Bayard's voice. This was grating on his already frayed nerves.
"I haven't been told anything. Why do you think I know so much?"
He was starting to get a headache.
Licked lips turned upwards in a fiendish grin.
"You wouldn't be admitting to me yourself that you regard yourself as rubbish now, would you? I know you know something. Please don't humble yourself before me now, yea?" The flickering light bulb was strobing for a moment; the few steps it took to get right in his face reduced to one momentous move.
He was there and now he was...here. He removed the goggles carelessly. Breathing coarsely in front of the boys' face, a watery peculiar blue meeting the deep ocean azure of the predator. A revealing. Bayard glowered, taming his biting desire to break the little ones' neck. Patience was wearing thin. "Let's try this then, let me be a bit broader, yea yea. What do you know of the Santiago-Vasquez? How's 'bout ol' Tick Tock?"
The gaze was unevenly (groggily) cast back, peering and calculating. If Noah got out of here alive, he'd at least recognize his face, and if not his unique features, then his skin tone, his hair length and the way Bayard stared at him like a rabid beast.
"... You mean the Clock? ... not much."
He tilted his head to the side and pouted cheekily. "Not much? Not much," he said with mock sorrow. He pressed his forehead to the others, the light obscuring his face in black, hollow shadows. The blade twinkled in the space between their mouth. He turned it, as if showing it off with pride to other. Glimmering and awful.
"Well then hows' 'bout ol' Clocktower? Or or or the complex? Know much 'bout tha', jammy?" He pressed the icy steel against his own lips, the metal fogging as he breathed against it. He pressed it hard enough that a bead of vermilion ran down its edge. A bloodshot smile.
It was growing exceedingly difficult to keep his mouth shut, but with some effort, Noah forced his lips into a line, his willpower fading. He knew that truth serums weren't magical concoctions that made you speak the truth; they were chemicals that reigned over your nervous system and natural inhibition, wherein the truth could only be revealed if you chose to disclose it. His self-control, though dwindling, still held as strong as it could.
Noah eyed the blade, feeling his stomach churn at the sight of the blood.
Bayard, while young, was a seasoned professional in the area of torture and interrogation. He was a slimy bastard of a child. One of his most adept skills was the cunning and attention he had towards fear; the cause and effect. The sum of it all.
He was frozen with the blade against his lips, the blood a bitter wine in his mouth. Then he withdrew again into the shadow. Change of tactics.
Step.
Step.
A soft opening of a door and an icy chill crept across the floor. A low hum emitted from the general direction of where the cold slowly crawled from. A fridge. A freezer actually. The hum was covered though by a crinkling and crumpling of plastic, maybe a trash bag. Then a terribly smell, septic and rotten. A dripping sound. Now the dark phantom stood in front of him, his outline visible in the sickly yellow light. In his hand was the thing that smelled. It was oval-shaped. It was dripping from the bottom, whatever it was. Bayard held it by...string? A lot of string. Then the object was pushed in front of the trembling boy.
A rotting, severed head.
And if the other had wanted to heave up what he'd had that morning, he wanted to do it even more now, inhaling that putrid stench of death and decay. He immediately gagged, turning his face away and lamenting that his hands weren't free to block out the smell that infiltrated so deeply, his eyes almost watered.
Failure to continue to resist was dawning, and Noah could sense this, but still he refused to reply as he coughed once again, then again.
The head was a perturbing blue-white, green in some areas from the deterioration. The eyes, rather, the lack of eyes was grotesque: they had been burned out and were simply wet, black holes. The face had a permanent glasgow smile carved haphazardly up his cheeks. It had been hacked and chopped roughly, pieces of flesh, muscle and fat hanging from the open neck. It dripped, dripped on his lap.
Bayard was not immune to the smell but his gag reflex, the nausea, did not accompany the scent anymore. He continued holding it in front of the other, bringing it closer. So close that maybe, just maybe, he'd feel the cold breath escape from the iced cadavers' mouth. Bayard waited; evaluated the boy's reaction, noting every tick, scrutinizing bodily reflexes. Both him and the head remained statuesque.
"Stop it," hissed his lanky hostage, voice wavering with notes of misery and surging panic. In his chest, a feeling of tightness began to stir, and Noah was visibly torn between breathing in to prevent a sudden asthma attack, and holding his breath to block the smell. Never had he ever wanted his inhaler so desperately. Never.
But a part of him -- the cynic inside-- was convinced he would never see it again after tonight.
At the request, Bayard's mouth curled into a knowing smirk. Then back to a thin-lipped scowl as pity overtook him. He knew this was much for the crumpled being before him. He decided he needed to up the ante; the boy was doing well, was keeping his mouth shut.
"If you don't talk...I'm going to do this to you," he whispered with a steely monotone, pushing the head close enough the flaking skin brushed against the tip of the boys' nose. "I'm going to burn your eyes out. I'm going to cut your mouth. I'm going to cut you up inch by inch. I'm going to make you feel every type of pain imaginable. Crunching, breaking, burning, stinging." The head gave a wet plop sound as a a chunk of coagulated blood dropped onto the boys' leg. The eyes leaked with thick goo, thickened tears and mucus.
"Tell me, Noah. Tell me."
It seeped through the material of his dark jeans, painting his skin with unfamiliar wetness, and he choked back another sickly gag, steering his head as far out of reach of the severed cadaver as his neck would allow.
"And then what?" His words nearly came out in a gasp. For air, for space, for sanity. "You'll just keep me down here either way. I don't have to tell you shit." The swear sounded foreign, as though it had no place on his tongue. There was frustration, trepidation, a nervousness so profound that Noah found his ears ringing after two fast beats of his heart.
"You wanna know where the Complex is? Go find it yourself. And in the meantime, go fuck yourself."
Where this new found boldness came from, he would have to wonder about later.
The oily hair tangled between Bayard's fingers was weighing on him, cutting into his hand. He listened intently to the boy, stone-faced as he was again denied information. "I...see."
He jerked the skull in his hand forward, pushing the decomposing face into his, the blood squishing onto the others' face, the putrid skin delicate as fine tissue paper. It stuck onto the others' live skin with a wet adherence. He was shoving it now, the wet rot of the mouth grinding against his, teeth grazing his cheek as he continued arching away from it.
Bayard bent his face in closer, hovering behind the head he was puppeting. He was angry.
"If you don't start talkin', I'm going to shove every one of this bastards' rottin' capillaries down your pretty little throat!" He was barking at him now, almost beating the boy over the head with the...head. The skin was falling off in clumps around the boys neck, down his shirt, putrid still. "Now talk." Nasty snarl coupled with the gaping mouth of the abomination in his hand, all blood thirst and death.
One, two, three, four, five.
Counted in his head, one slow number at a time. Remember to breathe, remember to breathe, don't panic. But Noah coughed again, angled his neck so uncomfortably just to wipe his cheek and mouth off on his left shoulder. Bile crept up his throat as he tried not to gag, over and over and over.
Repulsed, the youngest Observer hung his head. "If you do that... who's gonna talk? My dead body?"
For the first time in what was probably more than fifteen years, Noah wanted to cry.
The severed skull and the face of the one holding it were juxtaposed next to each other. The dead one was pulled downwards in a sorrowful cry, the face stuck in a pitiful groan of pain it seemed. The living face that was snarling at him now continued to revert back to a hysterical gaping grin. This boy was driving him bloody mad. The skull was pulled away, the boys clothes covered in a smattering of blood and aged bodily fluids.
"Oh, worried ya gonna die from tha'? No, no, no. Here I'll show you." With a violent thrust, he pushed the boy onto his back, the chair clattering loudly as it hit the metal floor. Bayard straddled the boys' chest, looming over him, the severed head dripping down his hands. With a sludgey sound, the dominant boy pushed his hand through the bottom of the heads neck and pulled out a fistful of meat.
A flash of white, a Cheshire grin in the black above the boy. Blood dripped on his face as Bayard's hand hovered over the other. "Hungry? You can talk after you eat, yea?"
Horror only came in second after the initial shock of the fall, the wind knocked completely from Noah's lungs in a matter of seconds. There was only more white invading his vision, and his lids fluttered shut, like a tired butterfly's wings after flight.
"Fuck... you," he panted out, unable to catch his breath anymore. That pretty little head tipped back against both metal and grimy floor, exposing throat and lacerations as he gasped harshly, whether it be to avoid the stench, the taste, or suck air back into his chest cavity. The weight on his diaphragm wasn't helping, nor were his packs of cigarettes a week, and if he ever got out of here, he was going to smoke an entire row.
Inhale, exhale. Wheeze.
The meat and organs squished between the boy's hands, writhing down his wrists. He could feel it getting under his nails; he ground his teeth together in aggravation. He just wouldn't give. He needed to be gentle with the little creature but at the same time, he was tough. Tougher than he'd thought he'd be. Fuming, he suddenly smashed the festering substance into the boys' face, into his eyes, into his mouth, his nose. Bayard's face was ablaze with displeasure.
"Talk! Talk! Talk!" He was lumbering above him now, holding him at the top of his neck and pounding his head against the ground, prudently though. "Who are they? What do they want? What do they do at the Complex? The Clock? I don't need to kill ya but you're making me want to," he snarled savagely, spit dripping from his lips in sheer rage at the difficult victim. No, he wasn't to kill him. Fury brought the reminded to the front of his mind. That thought finally shed light on the correct plan of action. He needed to make it slower.
Slower and more painful. No more threats.
The only thing that was getting slower was Noah's breathing, and despite his impaired vision, he gathered up what nerve and energy he could and spat the substance from his lips, his tongue, onto Bayard's face, perhaps not as angrily, but just as desperately.
The enraged boy lifted off of the other roughly, scrambling towards the table and pulling something off it. It made a sharp, high pitched sound as blade hit the metal table. A glittering shape floated high above the boys face appeared. Huffing, furious, Bayard again knelt and straddled the boy, keeping his weight on his knees and not on his chest. The knife shone portentously.
The knife wasn't actually a knife but a gut hook. A blade with a finely sharpened edge as well as a hook that could easily grab and pull through flesh. As if to demonstrate, Bayard hooked the top of the boy's shirt and with a quick jerk, ripped it cleanly in half. The split fabric had not even frayed. Another quick movement and Noah's left hand was unbound but locked in the vice-like grip of Bayards own hand. He positioned it around thumb first, the hook gently nipping the loose skin between thumb and index.
"Anything to say yet? Before I..." A pause as he licked the boys' fingers in mock affection. "...take these as souvenirs?"
In the hold, those slender fingers twitched. Noah didn't have the presence of mind to retrieve his hand, concentrated solely on not passing out, and dazedly, he watched the hook, his face, taking in the smugness and predatory glimmer in those eyes.
But he shook his head slowly-- though not in refusal.
"Can't," he rasped, lashes falling to pale skin. "... Asshole..."
The other boy, knife-happy, blinked and cocked his head, confused. He looked...sleepy? Damn it, he thought severely. He dropped his head to the boys chest, closing his eyes for a moment in concentration. He speedily recognized the grating breath of the other, the sound of strained breath echoing through Noahs lungs.
Bayard cursed inwardly and hopped up, cutting his other arm loose. Bloody asthmatic. A variable he thought wouldn't be as weighty as it was now proving to be. He cut the other arm loose and put it by his side. Him being passed out was more troubling than him being dead or quiet. This was just a pure waste of time. He sunk to his knees next to the boy quietly putting a hand, once choking the life out of him, mildly on his chest.
"Breathe out, ya wank. Ya need more air, ey? Blow out hard." To mollify this, he pressed down on the boys' chest as he exhaled, forcing the stale air out.
By some miracle, Noah managed a weak and half-hearted glare up at him, obstructing his gasps by closing his mouth and inhaling hard through his nose. It was more painful that way, much more constricting, but it was how he calmed himself down. He wasn't even sure it was the asthma. Maybe it was an anxiety attack. Maybe it was both.
Either way, he felt like he could die any second, and he slipped a hand up to his ribcage, hovering fingers above his diaphragm and not caring that his arm brushed Bayard's. A reassurance of his own touch was all he needed.
He attempted to talk, but a wheeze cut him off, and suddenly, he looked pained.
Bayard removed his hand and stayed squatted next to him, the knife twirling in his hand. He could wait. He licked his lips, fidgeting with the knife as he eyed the boy impatiently. His brow rose questioningly as Noah's face contorted in pain. His hand went to the boys' chest again, measuring the vibrations of breath from his lungs. "Whats wrong, boyo?" The tone was sincere but hardened. Goodness this boy was more trouble that he was worth.
Dark blues were sheathed behind lids again, and a pant left his lips once more, harsher than the last. "Fuck off," Noah whispered harshly, brows drawing into a light grimace. He didn't need Bayard there encouraging him. In fact, he didn't even need to be there at all.
His wiry little captive rolled his head in the other direction, breaths coming in slower now.
"'m not saying... a word... to you."
Wordlessly and lightning quick, he grabbed the boys' hand and pushed it back above his head, palm up. In one swift and deliberate motion he brought the gutting knife straight into the center of Noah's hand, a sharp thump as it anchored itself in the linoleum below, worn and corroded by blood and bleach bathes.
His hand stayed on the hilt, keeping the knife in place.
A cry ripped itself from the brunet's damaged throat as the pain immediately settled in like fire, warm scarlet snaking out from under his fingers. Whatever incoherency he'd been succumbing to was successfully dispelled, and Noah whimpered quietly, not quite glancing over.
Bayard coughed, the only reaction he had to the decomposing fumes and chemicals that fermented in the room. He looked at the boy, watched his chest rise and fall with each breath. Better.
"Noah, I'll make you a deal. If ya don't talk to me now, I'm going to take your hand. For every minute you make me wait, I'm going to take another limb. Your foot. Your nose. Your ears." He pressed the knife lightly, willing him to imagine the multiplication of pain if his hand were to be completely removed.
"I won't kill you though. No, you'll be alive, ya can count on it. But if you do talk to me, I won't just not cut ya up into bite-sized pieces...I'll let you go. I'll tuck ya right back into bed, right in ya sweet little house I found ya in."
The slighter one blearily stared up at the ceiling then, before facing away once more to breathe a shaky sigh. He was quiet for all of ten seconds, and the only visible sign of discomfort was the pain flickering across his features.