(TW!! Mentions of torture!!)
(Alyssa Grimes' POV:) "Daryl! No! Adrian's back there!"
He grunts and hoists me up so I'm in a walking position, "She's with Negan! We gotta go!" I continue to try and fight him off but once I see a knife fly right next to us, I give up and run with him.
My leg is killing me. It feels like a tiny man is inside my thigh, slowly cutting it with a small, hot knife. The pain is so close to being unbearable, I can't hold in the small whimper that pours out of my mouth every time I put pressure on it.
Walking through the woods with Daryl and Dog in the middle of the night with murderers practically surrounding us is terrifying. But Daryl's a goddamn tank so that makes me feel better.
After about thirty minutes of walking, a leaf crunching a few feet away from us catches my attention. "Wait," I whisper.
Without looking back, Daryl drops me and throws his crossbow at the man. I fall to the ground with a grunt and scramble for my knife as Daryl and the guy fight, Dog stands in front of me, protecting me.
Daryl grabs the man and throws him against a tree, though, Daryl met his match as the man grabs him and doubles him over, holding him by the waist and punching his stomach. I try to get up and help but every time I move, Dog repositions. It's like he knows I'm hurt.
"Hey! Hey!" I yell, trying to get the man's attention so Daryl can take a breath.
As he turns to me, Dog pounces, grappling onto his leg. The man screams in pain and grabs Dog by the neck, throwing him in the trees behind. "No! No!" Daryl yells as I sit in shock.
I just god Dog killed. Oh my god. I just got Dog killed.
Suddenly, I feel arms grab ahold of me and pick me up. My heart stops and I feel my blood turn to ice. Grunts and groans surround me as I try and fight them off, kicking my legs, no matter how much it hurts, flailing my arms, and bucking my hips. Nothing is working.
The three people and I stand behind Daryl; he just stares at the woods before whistling once and throwing a knife at the person holding me. Because of the whistle, before he throws the knife, I duck. But, unfortunately, they don't duck slowly enough and the knife misses the masked people.
The person holding me points left and right and the two men next to her take off. But she doesn't, instead, she drops me to the ground.
Before I can do anything, something cold and hard smacks me in the head.
Black.
When I wake up, I'm tied to an operating chair in an all-concrete room. The ropes around my wrists and ankles are scratchy and uncomfortable, more so than when I got branded. My head is pounding and with every throb, I wince and squeeze my eyes shut in pain.
This is twice now.
As soon as I come to my senses and realize I'm out of luck, my hands turn clammy and my breath catches in my throat as if my lungs keep closing before I can get a full breath in. Immediately, with the lack of oxygen, I begin breathing heavier. And heavier. And heavier.
Breathe goddamn it. Don't show fear. You show fear, they'll walk all over you. God, Adrian, where are you? Where am I?
The door in front of me opens and I quickly snap my head toward it, narrowing my eyes as two men step into the room. One of them is wearing a black, small beanie. His thick glasses make his eyes look bigger and his mustache and stubbly beard cover his mouth. The other man is a brunette with a sharp, angular face and a scar on his jawline. Both of them are in all-black outfits and are fucking terrifying.
Be Adrian.
I drop my head and take a deep, long breath before glaring at them through my eyebrows. "Who the hell are you?"
The man with the beanie stares at me, "I could ask you the same thing."
"Fuck you-" My words get cut off when the brunette punches me in the head. I groan but don't break eye contact with the man with the beanie.
"Tryin' to kill me with your eyes isn't gonna work." He says, walking closer. He nods to me, "Who are you?"
I don't respond for a moment, trying to calm myself down and prepare for whatever the hell is about to happen. "You're fucking mom." Another punch, but this time, to my jaw and from the man in front of me.
He tsks and shakes his head, "We'll try a different approach." He says, crossing his arms. "Who are those people?"
"I don't know." I lie, speaking through a wired-shut jaw. Two punches, both to my cheek.
I can feel my cheek begin to swell uncomfortably and the stab wound in my thigh begin to burn. "Who are those people?" He asks again.
"I don't know." I persist, leaning forward slightly. This time, instead of a punch, the brunette holds my arm in place and holds a knife to my bicep. Both of them wait for an answer as if that scares me. It does but,
They can't know that.
"I don't fucking know them, alright? We met up on the road only a few hours before y'all tried to fucking obliterate us-AH!" A high-pitched scream of pain escapes my lips as the knife drags down my bicep agonizingly slow. I shake my head and try to shake my body to get away, but because of the ropes, I can't. "We met on the road!" I scream as the knife finally lifts an inch above my elbow.
"Who was that girl you were screaming for? Hayden? Adrianna?"
"Adrian," The brunette man corrects.
"Yes, Adrian. Certainly seems like you know her."
I narrow my eyes, my brain forgetting all about the pain I'm in and, instead, the possible threat to Adrian. But the problem is, if I tell them that she's a part of that group, she's in danger. If I tell them that she's my sister or we knew each other before, she's in danger.
"She and I met only about an hour before we met that group."
The man with the beanie sighs as if he doesn't accept my answer. "See...lying isn't gonna get you anywhere. It'll only get worse if you keep this shit up."
"I'm not lying you fucking-" I quickly squeeze my lips together to keep myself from yelling out in pain when the man puts the tip of the knife in my wound and twists it. Not enough to be dangerous, but enough to hurt like hell. Hot, heavy tears form in my eyes but before they can fall, I squeeze my eyes shut. "I'm telling the truth. And shoving a knife in my arm isn't gonna get me to lie and say that I'm not."
"You're right, it won't." The man with the beanie looks at the brunette, "Till she talks."
The brunette nods and stands before me, cracking his knuckles. I sigh deeply and brace for the pain I'm about to go through.
One
Two
Three
Six?
S e v e n?
E i g...
Icy water being poured over my head makes me jolt awake; but when I gasp for air, all I get is water straight into my throat. I gag and cough, my body fighting for air as more and more water dumps onto me.
Once the water stops, the chair I'm in gets sat up and the two men stand before me. Just by gasping for air, I can tell my bottom lip is swollen and cut. Something crusty under my nose and on my top lip tells me my nose was bleeding and the weird liquid feeling I have in my ear tells me the same.
"What about the man Frost?" Beanie Man asks.
I scoff and roll my eyes, "He's been a fucking prick since the day I met him." They accept that answer because I'm not lying about that.
"Okay, you don't like him. Who else don't you like?" The brunette asks.
"Fuck, dude, all of them. Got me involved with you assholes just because I needed some goddamn food." Beanie Man nods to the brunette and the brunette nods back. Without saying anything the brunette grabs a glowing burning knife.
All of my thoughts get interrupted by an agonizing burning sensation going throughout my whole body. I can hear my skin sizzling under the intense heat of the iron "X" and I wail out in agony.
Sobs quickly spill out of my mouth as I do what Daryl did and try to get away but ultimately fail. The smell of my burning skin, my sobs, and the immense pain in my whole body causes me to gag, my body going limp once they finally pull the "X" away.
When he inches the knife closer to the wound on my bicep, I tell myself, "You've felt worse burning pain." just before the knife presses deep into the wound, burning the inside of my skin and the cut.
I shriek in pain and tilt my head back, sobbing into the ceiling. For a split second, I think about spilling the beans. But that's my sister. That's my sister's best friend. And that's the rest of our group's family. I may not be close with them but...they're close with someone.
My skin smokes and the inside turns almost completely black before the brunette removes the knife. As soon as the knife is away from my skin, I take a deep breath. My arm shakes from the pain and I can barely hold my head up.
"Who's the girl? Is she the leader?" Beanie Man asks.
Maggie.
"I don't know. I wouldn't doubt it but they never said." I pant, my voice quiet and breathless.
Beanie Man looks at the brunette man, "Put her in a cell. We'll re-attempt later." He orders, turning and walking out of the room. The brunette man nods and quickly puts an itchy burlap sack over my head. I feel the ropes release from my wrists and ankles and as soon as I know I'm free, I lunge where there's a dark blob in my view.
Damien and Cato must have my back because I manage to grab ahold onto the brunette man and slam him against the wall. I get a good punch in before he grabs me by the waist and slams me on the ground, knocking the wind out of me.
Without catching my breath, I scoot close to the wall, ripping the sack off of my head in the meantime as he approaches me. Once he gets close enough, I grunt loudly and kick his feet out from under him with my bad leg and send him flying to the ground.
My whole body is shaking and weak but I have to fight. I have to. For Adrian. For Beatrice. For Inejra so she doesn't come home to a dead best friend.
I climb onto the man and grab him by the hair, slamming his head onto the concrete floor. Just as he starts to pass out, a man grabs me from behind and drags me away as I'm kicking and screaming. "Get the hell off of me! He was asking for it! Get off of me!"
The man doesn't respond, he just drags me down the dimly lit, dark, chilly hallway and into another, but bigger, all-concrete room with cells inside of it. They look like bigger versions of dog crates except, three walls are concrete and one is a chainlink fence with barbed wire over it. The man throws me into one of them and locks the door gate closed, trapping me inside.
As soon as I hit the ground, I scoot into the back corner and hug myself into a ball as if that's going to make me safer.
I quickly scan the dark room, though, I don't even know what I'm looking for.
The first thing my eyes land on is Daryl staring at me from his cell. He's tied up but doesn't look hurt. Just me, I guess.
The look on his face is a masked look of disgust, seeing what they did to me but knowing he can't show it or say anything. God, this is awful.
Daryl and I just stare at each other for a second. Seeing him and the look he's giving me with his wide, glossy eyes finally allows me to start crying freely. Except, I make sure to stay quiet, though, Daryl can tell.
My shoulders and body shake with silent sobs as I bury my head in my arms, hiding my face from anyone who may see.
My whole body aches, I can feel my leg wound begin to slowly bleed again and hot electric bolts fly up and down my arm, surrounding my bicep wound, both of them on each arm. My right eye is starting to swell shut and my lip cuts split open again, allowing hot liquid to drip out.
"Damien, Cato..." I whisper soundlessly. "Please help me."
A woman's voice wakes me up, "...He's angry about Turner. And he wants someone to pay." She's sitting beside Daryl's cell, talking to him as if they know each other.
Forty bucks says I'm going to be that person.
"There's a woman..." He starts. Better not be about Adrian or I swear to god. "She's the leader. They were speaking in code 'cause I was an outsider. There was a tall, skinny guy. Never shuts up." Negan. "And a priest who carries a shotgun." Gabriel.
"That's their leadership?" The woman asks.
"Yeah, but they have the numbers. One of their soldiers slipped up and he was gonna meet three dozen of their fighters. That's way more than the fifteen you got here."
Fifteen fighters, a man named Turner.
The woman chuckles lightly, "Well, you've been doing your work down here, huh?" When the man in the cell next to me coughs, the woman stands up. "I'll have you moved out of here tonight..." She says lowly. "so you can be more comfortable."
"When do I meet him?" Daryl asks as the woman walks away. "This Pope?"
A man they call Pope.
"Soon." She says, walking out.
I exhale as soon as the door closes, not knowing I was holding my breath.
"I'm scared." I whisper.
Daryl nods, "I'm sorry, Alyssa." He whispers back.
I'm back in the torture room, got dragged back like a dead body.
This time, instead of the beanie man, it's the brunette and the guy who saved the brunette from me. The other man has long, black hair and a sharp jawline with a stubbly mustache.
The other man puts his hands on the armrests of the seat my hands are tied to and leans in. "Forget the rest of your group-"
"Not my group." I mumble.
He narrows his eyes, "You're not convincing. People don't scream for someone they met a few hours ago."
I scoff, "Are you me? No, you're not. Maybe I do. How the hell would you know?"
He grimaces and straightens up, grabbing a broken pipe and smacking me across the face with it. The pipe makes a loud clang and I wipe my head to the right, the pain in my cheekbone a piercing sting.
I groan quietly and look at him, "The woman I screamed for just reminded me of my older sister, alright? She died a few years ago."
The man scoffs, "Believeable."
"I don't know what you want from me!" I yell as he puts brass knuckles on and punches me twice. "I don't know what you want me to say." I say, my voice quiet and weak as I try to focus on staying awake.
He grabs me by the hair and tilts my head up so I look at him, "The truth." He says.
"That is the truth you incel!" When he uppercuts me, I bit on my tongue and I can feel the tip of it slowly slide down my throat, as well as an absurd amount of blood.
"What about your fingers?" He says, grabbing a knife and holding it above my pointer.
Fuck.
When he starts to lower it, I break. "Okay! Okay! Okay, okay! Okay. I'll talk." He smirks and removes the knife, taking a step away so he can look at my bruised, bloody, swollen face. "The girl's the leader. The brunette. We met about a week ago, enough for me to know them but not know them."
They stare at me, trying to figure out if they believe me or not.
Please Dad. Damien, Cato, Carl, please.
"If I found out you're lying..." The long-haired man says, pointing a knife at me.
"I'm not."
"The girl. I know you're lying about her."
"I'm...not. She's not a part of the group either." He tosses the knife up, catches it by the handle, and quickly slices me across the swollen cheek.
"She better not be. Or else you're gonna feel the wrath of Pope."
"I already have." I spit, struggling to speak over my swollen tongue.
He smirks and straightens up, "No you haven't."