Spray-Painted Truths (Denki Angst)

In Between

mentions of physical torture, mental torture, drugs, some themes up to interpretation

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There comes a point in time you just stop crying about it. I don't know how many months it took me to realize no one would come for me. I didn't know if it had been months at that point. Maybe it had been days, weeks, months, years. Time just blurred together underground, and so did all my memories.

Maybe it was to cope. It could've been, thinking back on it. Tuning into my surroundings too much would've made me all too aware of what was going on. I was aware, of course, anyone in my situation would've been. It's hard to misunderstand what it means to be tormented a mile beneath the surface. 

Most of the time it wasn't physical torment. I thought it was a good thing at first, but I think I'd have rather had my limbs ripped off than be subjected to what they put me through. They used to feed me little white tablets while I was chained to the wall, and while I never remembered taking them, I always remembered waking up with my head lolled back against the concrete and drool seeping out the corners of my mouth. I couldn't close my eyes. I felt like they were drying out of my skull even if they did water. 

I remembered the blinding lights shining down into my pupils, the fingers shoved down my throat that made me gag over and over again. I'd throw the tablets up, they'd slip me new ones, they'd make me throw them up again. Three times over and some grating voice would start whispering violent obscenities in my ear that made me gag even without hands forced down my esophagus. 

They were trying to brainwash me, I understood that much. Sweet, soft, feminine murmurs slipped in between the foul, masculine rasps. She promised me holy, glowing salvation if I were to lay my childish pride down and cooperate. I loved her at the time. He seemed scared of her, she made him shy away for a while. I hated him. He spoke not just of the things he would do to me, but my family, my friends. He spoke of the twisted ways he would drench my body in irreversible sin, the disgusting atrocities he would force upon the ones I loved. I would writhe and cry and strain against my bindings until I could feel the metal cuffs bite the skin of my wrist. 

She fixed me, though, when things got bad. She would send him away; she told me I could be redeemed and that she would protect me from his judgement. She told me I wasn't too far gone as I was brought down from nauseating peaks of terror. If I trusted them, if I let my false morals and worries leave me behind, I would be freed from the cycle. I would be freed from him. She would protect me, she would protect my family. They all would if I joined arms with the League.

I could never see either. It was never dark, but I could never see. The lights were so intense they bore right into my brain. As dry as my eyes felt and as heavy as my eyelids were, I obviously still blinked. The lights were just so unbearably bright I couldn't even tell when I did. It was a searing pain that never left my head, not even as I slept the few hours I could. 

Despite the mental purgatory, part of it was physical as well. The constant strain on my arms and legs was unbearable. It was like I was stretched out in a pale star against the ground, chains pulling me taught against the pavement. I couldn't move up, I couldn't move down, I couldn't move to the side, I couldn't twist. I was just stuck, sprawled out on something cold, sometimes wet with various substances. 

I know I bled a lot. Even through the dazed, drugged stupor I knew I bled. I could feel it congealing beneath me when I came to, and I somehow came to appreciate that feeling. It let me know where I was still alive, still beating when I couldn't feel a thing. I couldn't say what else happened to me. I couldn't process the state I was in. I couldn't put the true nature of the abuse my body experienced into words, I just knew she could take it all away.

But I knew I couldn't let her. Sometimes I could slip away to prettier places in my head to pass the time. I could find clarity there, and I used to think in those rare pockets of time. I thought about my friends, how I missed them so achingly. I thought about my family, the turmoil they must be going through even if they weren't right down here with me. I thought about her, the one that claimed she could make this whole nightmare go away, and how eerily familiar her voice sounded. That was the only clarity I got. My brain was too doped up and foggy to get much further into my psyche.

The exploitation of my quirk was an even deeper level of hell. I didn't know whether or not I had it active most of the time, and I wasn't quite sure what it was being put towards. What could they want with me? Why me at all? Questions unanswered, they'd poke and prod til I burnt myself stupid. I'd gone high output before, but I was often pushed beyond anything I'd thought possible. I could feel the electric crackle in my veins. I could feel the way I seized and jolted, static lines burning scars into my skin. The lack of brain activity afterwards felt strangely euphoric. It was the first time I had been able to describe my worst drawback as somewhat peaceful; a moment of stagnant bliss among a hailstorm of unrelenting torture.

In the end, what felt like years only amounted to eleven months.

Eleven months until I was found, no living soul found with me.

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do we fw the new piece? hope this better puts his experience into perspective and helps convey what he went through, I also hope I can do a better job at building on this this time around. lmk thoughts! it's a little more intense now but I want to make sure I can stay in character w him and still have fun writing