Dark SBI & Fluffy Oneshots

Rise With Us; Fall With Us

A/N

Look, i can explain.

I had an idea. Idea was really good. Said idea caused me to write down this absolutely insane fic that is likely the darkest thing i have ever written.

I have no regrets.

TW (lemme know if I forget anything!): torture, unhealthy relationships, typically dark sbi level morbidity, references to psychological manipulation

Synopsis: hero Tommy is captured by the villain's Syndicate, but he's their family (very dark sbi ensues)

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The wound on Tommy's hand was really starting to hurt.

And that wasn't because he was weak. No, he was far from that. But what had started off as a simple cut from a swinging knife, just barely grazing his skin to release a trickle of blood, had now devolved into a mess of dried crimson and a violent burning.

Even with the bag covering his head, he could tell that the jagged line on his forearm was swollen beyond belief, wrapped hastily with cheap bandages and disinfectant cream that Tommy was 90% sure not to be used on open stab wounds. But what other options did he have at the time? It was either that or be run through with Tech– no, the Warrior's spear– left to bleed out dry with the rest of his victims. He could still see the flashes of their stained, writhing forms, full of just enough life to keep them twitching with broken hands, but too little to ever have hope for a savior.

Tommy would've found that unpleasant death was more favorable to his current predicament. At least those poor souls weren't weighed down with heavy chains looping around their necks, draping down to their wrists and ankles, and locked with an immovable tie. They were free to say their last goodbyes to their friends, their lovers, their family. Tommy was blind to all but the scratchy bag atop his face, the cold kiss of metal around his arms, and the blistering pain that radiated from his arm.

Maybe it was selfish to feel such little pity for the ones he'd failed to save. As a hero, saving them was his one duty since birth, trained and armed with lethal weapons if it meant that civilians would see the sun. But Tommy couldn't even do that, too skittish to raise his sword if it wasn't in defense against the Syndicate's heavy swings and infinite thirst for bloodshed.

And look where that had gotten him. In the exact spot he had always hoped to avoid, willing to die if it meant that he would be spared the long, torturous experience that was about to become his life.

He could see the faint outlines of the villain's forms through the bag, heavily shadowed and nothing but a foggy mist to his blinded eyes. He would've thought he was imagining it if it wasn't for the occasional twitch from one of their stoic forms, a sharp inhale, the shuffle of boots on concrete.

Then there was the villain directly beside him, eyes burning into the back of his skull, a hand casually resting on the chair. His every breath seemed to shake Tommy to his core, wondering if each careful whisper of air would be the start of a threat. His skin was covered in goosebumps from the unpleasant chill; face naked with the absence of his tight mask. He felt so helplessly out of control that it was difficult to focus on anything other than the few things he knew were real; the world around him, not the emotions that simmered in his head, nor the ghosts that seem to be standing around him with harsh whispers of disappointment. The words of his mentor lingered in the back of his mind, telling him to steel himself to the environment around him. Familiarize it so that he wouldn't be caught off guard when his kidnappers inevitably slipped up.