TW: SWEARING, YELLING, BLOOD, VIOLENCE, PANIC ATTACK, GRAPHIC TORTURE, DEREALIZATION
I will put a warning in before the derealisation section, I understand that it is a very serious mental issue having studied it myself. Please don't force yourself to read it if you feel like it could be bad for your mental health or bring up negative past experiences.
There will also be another waterboarding torture scene. This will be the main kind of torture used by Schlatt in this fanfic. Once again sections that you may want to skip will be sectioned off by a double line like the example below.
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what you don't want to read
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Stay safe and be smart! Know your limits <3
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If I asked you to name all the things you love, how long would it take before you name yourself?
~~~~ Dream's P.O.V ~~~~
Rain buckets down from the sky and I pull the hood of my cloak lower over my mask. Time seems to drip slowly but also rush past at a speed I don't understand. I sigh and lean against the cold brick wall of the alleyway and look out at the street.
Young children run through the rain to get indoors or they stay outside and jump in the puddles scattered about in the small town square. Most of the children were dressed in too-big clothes, no doubt hand-me-downs from neighbours or older siblings. Other kids were dressed in clothes that were far too small; other kids were dressed in rags.
I look away from the children and fix my gaze on the homeless man pressed against the side of another brick building, trying his best to stay dry. This village was one of the poorest I've seen. It had been switched over to a new government system after the Dark Army invaded. It was one of the few villages that weren't burned down on the spot.
I checked my watch, my contact was late and I wanted to get out of this shitty rain. It made everything here even more miserable. Y/N would have disagreed. She would be right in the rain playing with the children. She would have been braver than I. She would have bought lots of food from the baker and given it to the children to take home to their parents and to the homeless man across the street.
She was incredible like that. It's hard to imagine that the SMP used to be similar before Y/N came and changed things. The SMP was never poor, but it certainly was gloomy. Like the new leader of this village, I use to only served my own ideals. It was disgusting to think about now.
Hearing the small splashes of footsteps behind me, I turn around and see a man standing behind me in the alleyway. Unlike the people in the village, he was dressed finely in a good leather coat and was holding an umbrella.
"Sad weather, isn't it?" he says. I immediately know he's my contact.
"Yes, but I always carry an umbrella," I reply finishing the code.
"Why did you come to meet with me?" the wealthy man asked.
"I heard you could put me in touch with somebody incredibly powerful." He knew right well what I was like, or rather my image. To the world, I appeared to be a man who is driven by his need for power. Exactly what the Dark Army was looking for.
"Why should I tell you anything?" the wealthy man tested.
"Because I want to be on the right side of history," I told him just what he wanted to hear. The man hums and bows his head in thought before answering.
"Alright, should my organisation take you on, you'll receive a letter shortly," and with that, he turned on his heel and walked back down the alleyway.
I watched the man until he disappeared into the shadows, only then did I let the wide grin I was hiding reveal itself.
~~~~ Y/N's P.O.V ~~~~
I stare at my reflection in the mirror. My condition got worse every day. I was covered in bruised and has a bandage on my arm. I had no idea how I got any of them. I'd peeked under the bandage when I noticed it in the bathroom earlier, it covered a jagged slash, it was shallower than it appeared to be.
I hadn't eaten properly in days. They gave me plenty of food but I could never eat it. I always felt sick when they brought it into the room. I hadn't drunk much water either. If they haven't killed me yet, it's because they need me for something. Until I work out what that is I don't plan on making anything easier for them. If I'm weaker they can't beat me up as much.
My body had become unhealthily thin. If you looked closely, you could see my ribs starting to stick out of my torso through the fabric of the dress I was wearing. My shoulder blades stuck out of my back; my knees were knobby and my elbows were pointy. I sighed and wrapped my skinny arms around my shameful body.
Every time I came back to my room after seeing Schlatt, I felt like a piece of me had been taken. I have no idea what that piece was, I had no idea what had happened in the room with Schlatt. I only remember the vials. Purple and red, always used separately from what I could see, but they seemed to have a similar effect.
Despite everything, I feel lighter. Each of the pieces I'd lost seemed to have had weight. With every piece I lost, I felt a little lighter. Although I don't know how long I've been here, or when the war was, I feel strangely better. But the lighter feeling felt wrong, it felt like a present that had been wrongly given to me.
Listing people in my mind had become a daily task, if I could I would write them down, but there was nothing here to write with. I felt like it was purposeful; no pencils or ink anywhere to be found. There wasn't any makeup in the bathroom I could use either.
I fiddle with the hem of my dress and list my friends in my mind.
Dream, Sapnap, George, Wilbur, Tommy, Tubbo, Niki, Fundy, Jack, Antfrost, Bad, Big Q, Techno, Philza, Karl, Eret, Mum and Dad.
I feel my gut wrench when I remember that there could be people I've forgotten. People I could never remember again. I push the thought away, there was nothing I could do.
If I didn't have these marks on my body, I wouldn't think I'd seen Schlatt at all. He was an evil man, brutal and rotten to the very core. Hearing him talk angered me, his smirk made me sick and his laugh struck fear into anybody that heard it. Bute even if Schlatt was evil, I knew something most people didn't.
I will always remember something that my mother taught me. No villain was ever born evil, it's their past that makes them that way. What had happened to him to make him this way? What made evil choose him to be its servant?
I turn away from the mirror, sick of seeing my hollowed-out cheeks, unhealthily skinny limbs and pale complexion. I spot the bookshelf and decide to finally look at its contents. The bookshelf was rather large, made of fine spruce wood and two shelves taller than myself. Even though it was massive, it was full to the brim with old books.
I run my fingers over the spines of the books and read their names aloud. Macbeth, Hamlet, The Odyssey, Les Miserables, Lord of the Flies and Anthony and Cleopatra were the first ones I saw. They were leather books and the pages were very clearly yellowed with age. My mind lingers on one of them and I pulled out The Odyssey.
I gently open the brittle pages and turn to a random page. I squint as I try to read the words, they made almost no sense to me. It was clearly English, but the words were arranged in such a strange fashion, and the ink on the page was so faded, that I barely understood a word of it. Giving up on the book I slip it back into its spot on the shelf and sigh. Old World was so different, the world outside my window was a constant reminder of that.
I'd worked out that the concrete jungle outside was in fact a city. A city nothing like what I had ever seen before.
I jump as my door clicks open revealing two guards disturbing my rambling thoughts.
"Schlatt wants to see you," one says, I nod my head and follow them out the door.
Every day seemed to be identical. Wake up, wash, dress, twiddle my thumbs, see Schlatt, return to my room with an aching body and collapse into a deep sleep, wake up and find new bruises I don't remember having before.
I take note of the corridors for the first time as we walk. They were long with red brick walls and a divine patterned red carpet that went down the middle. The floors were dark oak, like every other. The walls remained bare with the occasional painting of something or other and now and again we would see a door. But other than that, nothing. We reached the elevator and the guard pulled the lever inside downwards triggering the Redstone system into taking us down.
****
I'm strapped to the chair like usual, but the light above my head has been turned off for the first time. Instead, a comforting fire burns in the corner. Schlatt comes in through the door I can see on my left smoking a fat cigar and holding a bottle of strange pink liquid.
He sits in the chair beside me, the smell of his cigar makes me cough and my eyes water a little.
"Here, drink this," he says holding it to my lips. I eye him sceptically and refuse to open my mouth. Instead, I take a minute to smell the liquid, it smelt like watermelon and glitter?
"Drink it," Schlatt says impatiently. I instinctively part my lips and let him tip the liquid down my throat. As soon as it hits my stomach I feel my body tremble and with it, all my aches and bruises slowly start to disappear. I watch in amazement as my body heals like magic. The voices, who had become my only companions, were suddenly silenced. Schlatt smirks at my amazed expression.
I could suddenly hear everything, the crackling of the fire, the shifting of guards in the corners of the room by the doors, Schlatt's footsteps. I didn't even realise I couldn't hear these things before. It was liberating. Schlatt unties the bandage on my arm, my eyes widen as I see that the cut from earlier was gone.
"How did you do that?" I ask. My confusion increased as Schlatt laughs suspiciously.
"It's a healing potion, Y/N, and proof that our little sessions have been working more successfully than I thought," he muttered the last bit under his breath, but, without the voices, I heard every word.
"You're healed of all external injuries, but you're still weak Y/N. I want to introduce you to someone," he says walking over to the door. What on earth was he talking about? I tried to think back to the last time I saw someone who wasn't Schlatt or a guard, nothing came to mind.
He opens the door on the left that he came out of and whistles and gestures with his head towards me. I watch starstruck as a giant came out of the room. He was at least eight feet tall and one of the strangest people I had ever seen. He seemed to be just shy of enderman height. He ducked under the doorframe and stepped into the room with his hands nervously clamped together.
His body was completely covered with clothing, save for his face. That was the most astonishing part, his face was half white, half black. The eye on the back half of his face was a vibrant green and the eye on the white side of his face was a vivid red. His ears were also strange, they hung like the ears of a lamb.
His fluffy hair was also half black and half white like somebody drew a line down the middle of his body and everything on one side black and the other white. Atop his head was a golden crown. It was reasonably small and looked more like a ring with spikes on top of it. The top of the spikes looked like four-pointed stars and each had a green or red gemstone in the middle.
He's dressed impeccably well in a three-piece black suit with a red tie and gloves. His suit jacket also wasn't really a jacket, it was more of a cloak that looked like a suit jacket.
A sudden swish behind the tall man drew my attention. He had a tail! Like the rest of his body, it was half white and half black. The tip was flat and shaped similarly to a teardrop.
"Y/N, this is Ranboo, he lives here under my protection in exchange for his blood," I'm startled by Schlatt's blunt words.
"W-What?" I stutter. Schlatt sighs dramatically and takes a big puff of his cigar.
"Ranboo is ederian. He's also one of the last of his race but Ranboo is particularly special because he's not just ederian. Isn't that right?" Schlatt turns to Ranboo who nods politely.
"Whatever kind of hybrid he is, it makes his blood go all cuckoo bananas which is great news for me. He gives me his blood and I do cool shit with it," Schlatt explains wildly and then plonks down in his seat beside my chair.
"His blood at different concentrations affects the neurons in your brain. His blood plus a whole bunch of different other stuff creates certain serums that can manipulate your mind. Particularly your memory, it's one of the reasons why Ranboo's memory is complete bullshit, ain't that right big man?" Schlatt looks up at Ranboo who once again nods politely.
Ranboo and I make eye contact, immediately I know what Schlatt's said isn't the whole story. I give him a sympathetic look but he just smiles and waves happily at me. Will I become like that? Will Schlatt turn me into some happy, smiley unthinking object?
"Why doesn't he speak?" I ask forcefully making Schlatt chuckle.
"He does speak, just not English, he can definitely understand everything we're saying but his mouth can't actually form English words. Well, not without speech therapy and I can't be fucked with that bullshit," Schlatt dismisses the question.
"Right anyway, onto the fun stuff eh?" Schlatt claps his hand and walks around the chair so that he's by my feet.
"How's Dream, Y/N?" I feel my blood boil at the sound of Dream's name of Schlatt's snake-like tongue.
"Ooh! Watch out Ranboo! She's getting angry, who knows what she could do to us?" Schlatt teases in a stupid voice before laughing at his own antics and taking the seat beside me again.
"The L'Manburg revolution. What did Dream do in the L'Manburg war, Y/N?" I keep my mouth clamped shut. No way in hell was it opening willingly.
"You know exactly what he did Y/N, he blew it the fuck up. Got anything to say?" I refuse to speak.
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"Disappointing," Schlatt says and clicks his fingers. Fear courses through my body like an arrow that's been released from a bow.
"Please! Please no!" I squeal as my chair is yanked backwards and a cloth is pulled over my face. I scream and scream until I hear the sound of water sloshing in a container.
I squeeze my mouth and eyes shut as tight as I can and hold my breath. I try my best to stay calm but the lack of oxygen forces my mouth open. I gasp in some water and start choking on it.
My body is tormented with coughing and my bones rattle with each heave of my chest. I move my head frantically from side to side trying to doge the water and get some air before the water follows my face.
My lungs wrench in my chest and everything starts burning. Burning in my throat, lungs, mouth, eyes, nose, ears, everything. The pain is agonising as the suffocation sets in. I feel myself becoming light-headed. I panic again and frantically try to get loose from my restraints to try and breathe.
In my mind, I see flashes of red. A memory is suddenly sprung forwards. At the beach with Quackity, Dream, Sapnap, George and Karl. They taught me how to swim. I remember eventually sinking to the bottom of the sea, holding my nose and looking up at the sky through the water. It was beautiful. I want to go back there.
Exhausted from the struggle, I feel my body start relaxing into the memory. Suddenly, I hear a click and the water stops and the cloth is ripped off my face.
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I see Schlatt march over to the guards who were pouring water on me. He punches one in the face and yells at him. I don't process any of it, I just focus on coughing up as much water as possible.
I cough so hard my throat burns, my chair is still tipped backwards and I feel the blood rush to my face. I keep coughing and gasping raspily at the smokey air I had been deprived of. I blow the water out of my nose and shake my head to try and get water out of my ears.
My body is hit by another wave of violent coughing as my chair is righted. With one final cough, I let my head flop back into the chair and I focus on breathing. Why do I feel like this has happened before? Why was holding my breath so instinctive? I didn't really know what they were going to do to me. Schlatt is still yelling and the sound echoes in the room but my brain doesn't take it in.
My head lolls over to the side and I see Ranboo. His tail swishes back and forth agitatedly and his hands are no longer clasped. He stares at me wide-eyed, shocked. He's so shocked he doesn't move. He doesn't step back into a corner away from Schlatt's warpath. He just stands there. I tiredly nod towards the corner by the door furthest from Schlatt. Ranboo instantly goes there and stands as still as he can.
I don't want him to get hurt too.
Schlatt angrily stomps over to me. He takes one look at me and whips a white handkerchief from his pocket. He huffs and roughly wipes the side of my mouth, as he pulls it away I see blood mixed with my saliva.
"That was your fault Y/N, I didn't want to have to do that but you left me no choice," Schlatt said angrily. I bowed my head sadly. It was my fault, if I just answered none of that would have had to happen.
"Now what did Dream do?" Schlatt said menacingly, I struggled to answer. Furious, Schlatt marched up to my chair and clamped his hands down on my arms.
"WHAT DID DREAM DO?!"
"HE BLEW IT UP!" I yell back in his face. Satisfied, Schlatt steps back and gestures for me to continue. I let my tired rambling do the talking.
"By the time the explosions finished, everything was gone. Not a single building was left standing, just the Camarvan. Townspeople were killed. Innocent children were killed. Those who survived had to mourn those who they'd lost.
We dug through the rubble for hours searching desperately for bodies. Fathers, daughters, mothers, sons, brothers, cousins, grandparents and grandchildren, whatever! Nature doesn't give a shit about who lives or dies, only that somebody does.
The smell was awful, burning flesh and burning buildings. A combination that made everyone want to vomit, some of us did.
Sometimes we didn't even pull full bodies out of the wreckage, sometimes it was just a hand, or a watch, or a piece of fabric. I learnt something that day, there's nothing more painful than a mother's screams for her children."
When I finished the room was dead silent. Even the crackling fire seemed to hush itself.
"Very good," Schlatt says and loads his strange instrument with a vile of serum. It wasn't red like it usually was. This serum was purple. Like the other serum, it was vibrant and I knew it would hurt.
I feel the needle pierce the skin on my arm and the serum is injected into my artery. Suddenly I had a longing for the voices. Whilst they were here all I could focus on was them, now that they were subdued, I felt everything that the serum did to me in excruciating detail.
I groan and wince as the burning sets in. Every muscle in my body feels like it's on fire. I try to breathe deeply to try and stay calm but I end up hyperventilating despite my efforts. A migraine sets in, my face contorts with the pain and I feel the adrenaline kick in.
My whole nervous system seems to spike. I scream as the pain reaches its peak and then it all suddenly stops. Everything relaxes immediately and I feel another needle pierce my other arm. This time I don't feel anything. I assume it's the red serum, something my body has become accustomed to. I hear Schlatt bark a few orders and hands undo the restraints on the chair.
I slip in and out of consciousness, I catch glimpses of what's going on. Schlatt gives me one last look before waving his hand. I fade out. I fade back in but don't open my eyes, I feel an arm under my knees and an arm supporting my shoulders. I'm being carried. I fade out. I fade back in and see the door of my bedroom close. I fade out again.
****
I wake and see the glass doors to my balcony. It's dark outside. The stuff they gave me must have been seriously strong this time. I roll over and see something new on my bedside table.
A small, purple Allium flower. I raise a weary hand and pick up the delicate thing. It was real. I put it to my nose and take a deep breath. It smelt wonderful, like something real. I carefully put the flower down and push myself off the bed.
I dangle my legs over the side of the giant bed and look at my reflection in the mirror. No bruises, no recollection of what happened either. My habit kicks in and I name everybody I can remember.
Dream, Sapnap, George, Wilbur, Tommy, Tubbo, Niki, Fundy, Jack, Antfrost, Bad, Big Q, Techno, Philza, Karl, Eret, Mum and Dad.
I don't bother thinking about how I wouldn't remember someone if I forgot them. Instead, I pick up the beautiful Allium flower again and walk out to the balcony on shaky legs. It's freezing as usual and the breeze makes my skirt flutter. I close my eyes and take in the fresh air. I look up to the sky and walk the moon rise higher into the sky. It's full tonight, beautiful and full. Unlike me.
I look back down sadly at my flower and am struck by another memory. The memory of a girl braiding an Allium flower into my hair amongst many others she had picked with her friends from a nearby flowerbed. I sat in the light of the setting sun laughing and smiling with the delightful young girls as they braided my hair.
I remember looking over my shoulders just briefly and seeing Dream. I remember how clueless he was about how the townspeople felt. It was a whole new world for him. I remember the look on his face when he thought I couldn't see him watching me. Awestruck, a way that nobody else had looked at me before in my entire life. The way he smiled so freely when he tucked a marigold behind my ear.
I miss him. I miss him so much.
I miss everything about him. He may have been cruel, but that wasn't everything about him. He was kind to those he loved and kind to his kingdom. I miss his laugh, the kind of laugh that was so ridiculously contagious. I missed the way he smelt. I miss the sound of my name in his voice. I miss how at home I felt in his arms. I miss the way we used to light up when we saw each other. Our playful banter, holding his hand, going on adventures.
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I sniff and feel the tears dripping down my face. I let out a breathy chuckle as I reflect on our memories together. We were so happy. Slowly I feel the stresses of my situation settle on my shoulder. What if I never get out? What if I never see him again?
I look down at the Allium flower in my hands. My hands are shaking wildly, I hold on tightly to the flower to stop myself from dropping it. I feel my brain go fuzzy as the flower seems to swell up and shrink again. I drop the flower in surprise and it lands on the tiles. My hands shake so much they feel like hummingbird wings.
I quickly scoop the flower back up. I knew it was from Ranboo, nobody else would have left it for me. I look back at the sky but it's suddenly so much darker. I blink roughly trying to shake it off. My head feels like it's stuffed with cotton wool, or like I'm trapped in a glass box. Everything outside the box is different and wrong. The sky shouldn't be that dark. I'm seeing things.
I walk back inside and shut the doors. A task that takes barely a second but it feels like it took a whole minute. Time seems to suspend itself, I walk as quickly as I can to the bookshelf. It takes longer than I thought it would and force myself to walk faster. I'm caught by surprise when I walk straight into the bookshelf instead of stopping in front of it.
I sway slightly and squint at the books. They seem to be changing colour. Some of them are lighter than they should be and others seem to be nearly completely black. I pull out a random book and press the flower between the pages to keep it safe. I right myself and put the book on the desk rather than the bookshelf so I can find it easily again.
I look back at the balcony doors and see that I've left them open. The curtains seem unnaturally light and I walk to the doors to shut them. I close them firmly but don't hear the click. Confused I try again a couple of times. I put my ear right by the handle but still don't hear the click. I slam them shut and push on them to test them. They're closed.
I'm going crazy. The doors definitely closed the first time, so why didn't they click? I shake myself to try and get rid of the cotton wool feeling. Wanting to lay down I go back to my bed and flick on the bedside light. But the light's far brighter than usual and leaves me dizzy. I stand and stumble into the bathroom.
I flick on the tap and splash the ice-cold water onto my face. I gasp and look at my reflection. I look fine. I've gone mad. I'm seeing things. Schlatt's done something to me. I look at my hands, they shake violently as the tap water runs over them. I still feel like I'm in a glass box. Everything feels like it's so much farther away from me than it actually is.
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As I watch my shaky hands I feel something bubble in the back of my mind. The voices. I hear them whispering, adding to my distress. I feel panic start setting in and run out to the bathroom and dive onto the bed.
I pull the blankets over my body so they cover my head. I start to hyperventilate as the voices get louder and louder and louder. Soon they're back to their normal roaring volume and I'm sobbing.
I miss Dream. That one phrase repeating in my mind over and over again. I miss him more than I've ever missed anything before. I regret so many things. So many things I did and so many things I didn't do.
Most of all, I regret not telling him I loved him.
It feels like such an easy thing to say now. When I'm broken down and exhausted and I literally don't care about anything else. I regret not telling him I loved him and all the reasons why.
I loved him because he was funny. Because he was kind. Because he pushed me to be better. Because he always made sure I was ready before pushing me farther. He was fun, silly, gentle when he needed to be, brash, determined, loud. There was nothing about him I couldn't love. I didn't like how he built his image, it was horrible, but that was all. He built his image on fear and power and destruction, but the person beneath all of that was beautiful.
My breathing eventually slowed to a normal pace as I continued to list every part of Dream in my mind. I could have gone on forever, but sleep was quick to take me away from this hell.
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HELOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
That was another intense chapter holy-
I just wanted to let you guys know that any chapters with really heavy content, like this and the last, will have warnings at the start. Sections that I think could be particularly triggering will be sectioned off with the double lines so you guys can choose to skip or not.
I also wanted to say that whilst Y/N is with Schlatt it's going to take a while before chapters aren't as intense. I wanted to warn you guys before you continued. I will always put in trigger warnings, it's just a good thing for authors to do in my opinion.
I don't want to speak too soon but I think that this sort of stuff is as bad as it's going to get. This stuff is as intense for you guys to read as it is for me to write.
Stay safe, hydrate and eat food, ilysm <3
I HOPE YOU HAVE A WONDERFUL MORNING/NOON/EVENING/DAY/NIGHT <3<3<3<3<3