the town with darkness | bughead

ch. 23 | collateral damge

Those fifteen minutes felt like fifteen hours for Jughead Jones, tied up in that storage room in God knows where. Stinger took his time softening him up. A punch to his face followed up by a sucker punch to his stomach and then back to his face, alternating. Jughead counted his lucky stars that he was, in fact, tied to the chair. It meant that Stinger only had a couple places to punish, instead of his whole body but still, it wasn't fun.

"How're you feelin'?" Stinger taunted him, after burying his rock hard fist into Jughead's ribs for the fourth time.

Jughead's chin was on his chest, he was breathing hard, blood dropping from his nose and mouth, despite the gag. Stinger grabbed a fistful of his black hair and jerked his head up. Jughead met his eyes with grim determination.

"Not very chatty, are you?" Stinger said.

Jughead rolled his eyes - well, one of them, his right was quickly swelling shut. It's not like he could talk while he was gagged.

"I heard one of the guys at the Whyte Wyrm beat you not long ago," Stinger said, tightening his grip on Jughead's hair, eliciting a hiss of pain from the teenager. "Heard he pulled your arm right out of the socket and that you let him."

Jughead kept up the eye contact with Stinger although his head was swimming. He'd been hit too many times and all it would take was one more big punch and he'd be out cold. He was hanging out for it at this point. Stinger's hand clamped down on his left shoulder.

"Was it this shoulder?" Stinger squeezed Jughead's left shoulder tightly but Jughead didn't make a sound. Then Stinger finally let go of his hair and gripped his right shoulder. It was still tender, even though it had been a few weeks since he'd dislocated it. Jughead grit his teeth, best he could with the gag. "Or was it this one?" Stinger's fingers dug into his shoulder and Jughead couldn't help the cry of pain that slipped out. "That one, then?" Stinger said, nodding. Jughead didn't react.

"Well, I'm almost done here, Clifford's going to be back any minute, better finish this off, get you a bit bloodier," Stinger said.

He kept one hand on Jughead's right shoulder, holding it like a vice and proceeded to slam his other brass knuckled-fist into Jughead's stomach, side and face. The onslaught of punches was unrelenting and Jughead didn't even hear the door to the storage room open.

"Alright, that's enough, you can leave now."

Jughead was dimly aware of Stinger's hand leaving his throbbing shoulder and then there was a hand in his thick black hair again. It stroked his head before tugging his head up painfully. It was Clifford.

"You're still with us," he said as Jughead wearily looked up at the Blossom patriarch. "That's surprising but good, I suppose because you need to hear this: you don't tell a single soul what happened tonight. If you tell anyone, you're going to wind up dead. Or, alternatively your sweet little girlfriend might be sadly killed. Betty Cooper, right?"

Jughead's heart jumped into his throat when Clifford spoke her name. He swallowed roughly and nodded, as much as Clifford's hand gripping his hair allowed.

"You want to keep Betty safe don't you?"

Jughead nodded again.

"Then you won't breathe a word of this to anyone. Got it? Not your girlfriend, not your ragtag group of friends, no one. Otherwise Betty will be the first one Stinger gets to," Clifford promised. "And what he'll do to her will make this look like walk in the park," he added gesturing to Jughead's beaten body. Clifford let go of Jughead's hair and his head lolled forward onto his chest. "Stinger! Get his head up," Clifford said, pulling out his phone. "I need to snap a few photos for Daddy Dearest."