Heroic Betrayal: part four
Read part one here
Continued from this
TW: Blood
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The next thing Hero remembered they were in a cell on a bed, the cuffs still firmly around their wrists. They didn’t remember how they got there, or where they were, something Hero could no doubt credit to Flynn. Though Hero felt the salt trail of tears hardened around the corner of their eyes and down their cheeks.
So much for not using their power on me.
They were thankful Flynn had left them with their scabbard at least, straps still wrapped tight around their chest, scabbard reassuring on their back. They could grab their daggers anytime.
As soon as Flynn took these stupid handcuffs off, Hero thought mulishly, staring down at their trapped hands balanced in between their bent knees.
There was a door opening somewhere nearby and Hero raised their head to look at the cell bars, waiting for whoever it was to come gloat. Somewhere, in the dark side of their mind, a sad, quiet voice wanted nothing more than to see Flynn’s stupid face on the other side of the bars.
Instead, it was Villain who appeared. Hero struggled to keep their face neutral. They didn’t want to show Villain what impact they left on them. Villain and their stupid fucking shadows. Hero fixed Villain with a bored stare, resting their head back against the cold wall.
“Miss me?” Hero asked, wanting to celebrate that their voice didn’t betray them. Unlike Flynn.
Villain just stared, cocking a brow at Hero. Then the shadows slipped from their palms and under their clothes, slowly, dreadfully slowly, dripping, slithering along the ground and through the bars of the cell. Hero’s heart hammered against their chest, but they forced themselves not to move. Not to react. That’s what Villain wanted, for them to scream and cry.
Fine. Maybe they would, but Villain would damn fucking sure have to work for it.
“If you want to give me a hug, Villain you can come in here and do it yourself.”
“Cute,” said Villain, cocking their head to the side, a smile slipping onto their face, “but I think I’ll leave that for Flynn.”
Hero’s heart panged at that, and they hated themselves for it. They shouldn’t be sad. They should be angry. Pissed off, but their stupid little heart ached at the mention of Flynn, and they couldn’t wrestle the feeling away.
“What was it like?” Villain asked, leaning their hands through the bars and clasping them together. Their eyes shining with malice, “realising your best friend and greatest ally was all lies. Did it hurt? I bet it hurt.”
“Ehh. You win some, you lose some,” Hero shrugged, subtly retracting their feet to their chest to evade the shadowy claws that were crawling up the legs of the bedframe.
“Ah. You seem more confident than before. Have you had time to process it all? Compartmentalise? Is that what they taught you during Hero training? Maybe I’ll ask Flynn…”
Hero smiled, the result humourless and wan. “You do that.”
The cold was the first sign that the shadows were on them. A hand wrapped around Hero’s ankle, slowly pulling their leg down. “What about you?” Hero asked, wanting to take their focus off the shadows pulling at them.
Villain’s eyebrows raised in question. “What about me?”
“You must have missed him,” Hero continued, nonchalant. “I mean when Flynn was pretending to be my friend. The late nights, the early mornings. The stakeouts… we got close. Maybe they were lying to me about being a villain and a traitor, but still… all that time they spent with me they weren’t with you. How does that feel?”
Villain didn’t answer. Instead, they drew their arm back sharply and the shadows yanked Hero down the bed. Hero kicked and fought, but they were struggling against air and shadows. With their hands locked uselessly in front of them and without their powers Hero could do nothing as the shadows kept dragging Hero towards the bars where Villain stood.
“You’re not worth the effort,” Villain spat as they reached up and pressed their actual cold hand to Hero’s throat, keeping their chin up and forcing them to look into Villain’s cool black eyes, burning with an old kind of hatred.
“Mmm,” Hero said, clearing their throat with a slight cough that highlighted Villain’s hands on their throat. “Maybe you should ask Fly—”
Villain cut Hero off by squeezing their hand around Hero’s throat. Hero pulled back, but it was as if a wall was behind them squishing them towards the bars, to Villain’s hand and their unyielding grip. Hero couldn’t even use their hands to free themselves because they were squished between their rib cage and the iron bars of the cell.
Eventually Villain let go and Hero pushed back a little, gasping in lungfuls of air.
“I don’t even know what he sees in you,” Villain hissed, and Hero looked up through their lashes, still wheezing for oxygen and said: “my devil may care charm, perhaps.”
A hand gripped the back of Hero’s head and slammed their nose into the bars in front of them. Hero gripped the bars on instinct when a loud resounding crunch echoed through Hero’s head, along with their sharp cry of pain. Warm blood started flowing down their nose and lips, dripping passed their chin and onto their shirt.
“Motherfucker,” Hero gasped out. Then their head was shoved down again and Hero cried out in pain, the impact hitting their bridge square on the bars and causing the blood to gush, some going down the back of their throat and Hero coughed, the taste of iron staining their mouth. Enraged Hero spit some of the blood into Villain’s stupid, smirking face.
Villain smiled and it seemed to suck all confidence from Hero’s very soul. A smile so dark it struck fear straight to Hero’s heart.
“Ah. I see now what he likes about you. You look perfect when you’re bleeding and scared.”
Hero couldn’t help themselves as the words spilled from their mouth: “you creep. At least buy me dinner first.”
Then Hero was forced onto their knees by the shadows holding them. Villain grabbed Hero’s chin, tilting their head side to side, examining them. Hero tried to push back, to stand up, to do anything. But the shadows kept them exactly how Villain wanted them.
“There. Beautiful,” Villain said. Hero’s blood was dripping onto Villain’s hand, but they didn’t seem to care. Hero sucked in a breath through gritted teeth and choked on some of the blood, sputtering slightly. Villain’s eyes seared into Hero’s soul, watching them struggle and revelling in it. Villain pressed their hand that was soaked in Hero’s blood to Hero’s cheek, wiping the remnants on Hero before straightening up properly.
Villain released them and Hero fell to all fours, coughing out the blood onto the concrete floor. Painting the miserable grey, a bright red. When Hero looked up again Villain was gone, but the fear they had trapped in Hero’s chest was still very much there.
Lingering.
Hero retreated to the back wall of the cell, sitting on the cot again and resting their head back against the wall, waiting for the blood to stop falling and cursing themselves.
What kind of idiot were they to be stuck here? Hero should have told Sidekick when they got the tip about Villain… they should have told them that they were going to rough Villain up a bit, get the information they needed on Other Villain’s whereabouts and beat the shit out of them. Just a little revenge for touching a hair on Sidekick’s innocent head.
Even if they managed to catch Villain and mete out justice on Other Villain, they would have beaten the ever-living shit out of the wrong person, and that was something Hero didn’t want to think about in that moment.
That Flynn…
Their Flynn was the one who put Sidekick in the med bay.
Sidekick, who was still in the med bay, where Hero should be, but no. Instead, they were here, powerless and bleeding and it was all their fault.
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Continued here
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