Draft version - Russian Roulette - Family secrets

Ch. 132: Ha, take that you shitty birds

His throat was killing him.

The way John had made him scream during the electro torture, had been award winning.

Bolt after bolt of electricity had shot through him. Making his muscles twitch and cramp. Sometimes in one place, others more. And sadly, at times, everywhere. The current had felt unusually strange to him and blurred his mind.

The only thing he had been able to remember as a coherent thought had been to scream.

Gareth could not imagine how that would have felt, if he had not been pumped full of painkillers and the current had been on a low setting.

At least he got confirmed, John had not lied to him.

He had felt it, a weird buzzing through his body, at first. At the end it had hurt, because he was exhausted, the muscle contractions had been the worst, not the pain. 40 straight minutes of non-stop electrocutions, not even the strongest of painkillers could avert.

It irked to admit to himself, but if that current had been on max and he had not been drugged, then he would probably have agreed to anything to make it stop.

Or simply died from his heart giving out.

When John's clock had beeped the torture had stopped instantly.

Though he had tried, Gareth had not remembered much from the ordeal, he had been concentrating on screaming and clearing his mind. It was not until after it had ended, he had noticed the manic laughter from Grychenko.

The sound was more horrific than what he had just endured.

Ok, Gareth got it. They were not exactly friends, they were defined as enemies. But laughing at his enemy he would never do. Maybe he would torture him, or maybe he would just kill him and let it be over with.

One thing was certain.

Gareth would never laugh.

Grychenko had to be bipolar or plain insane. Nobody could change like he had. The man Gareth had met at the airport and at the mall compared to the man who had sat laughing at him was like night and day. Gareth had trouble reconciling with that, it made no sense to him.

Then again, he could not exactly say he was as sharp as he usually were. He was tired, exhausted, to be frank. Sore in every muscle and his brain seemed to run on lowest capacity possible.

He had been thankful when it had been over. Grychenko had had his fun and was humming with delight when his men came in and released Gareth from the crate and locked him to the mattress, while John had packed up his things. They had left after Grychenko had promised the fun would continue later.

Later could not be far off.

Though Gareth had passed out from exhaustion, his body's need for the bathroom and craving for food and water had woken him up. He had tried to sleep more and had settled for just relaxing thinking about all his wonderful memories with Mackenzie and the guys.

He missed them and would have loved to see them again. Kiss Mackenzie. Hear Phoenix grumble. Have Jace tell one of his stupid jokes or give a one-liner. Have Cracker be overprotective of him and see Vasili look at him with that overbearing smile while he advised him in some way.

The darkness in the room did not bother Gareth, he had never been afraid of the dark. It was what came out of the darkness to reveal its horror you had to be afraid of, not the darkness itself. What bothered him was the silence. He was used to having chatter around him. Having phones, computers or people going at him almost every hour of every day.