In Fear of Three Little Words

Chapter 2


Every fiber of Kurt’s being hurt, from his wrists to his face to his ribs to his ankles tightly encircled in metal cuffs. Even his tail was shackled, keeping him from using it as a weapon against his captors. Thirst nagged at him constantly and swallowing was nearly impossible.

He tried to find a way to rest with his arms stretched up above him, but the aching in his shoulders and back would not relent. The cut on his arm throbbed with the beating of his heart. At least it had stopped bleeding, unlike the cut beneath his left eye. He felt the blood slowly seeping still. And they promised to be back.

He shivered in his shackles and fought back the urge to cry. He was too old to cry. He was an X-man. He wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of knowing the depth of his pain.

And that’s what they wanted to know. How much pain he could tolerate. More than he’d imagined, but much less than they believed for his tormenters were relentless.

It wasn’t enough to poke and pry his body, sticking things into every orifice, cutting his flesh to see how fast he’d heal and stabbing needles full of things he didn’t want to know of to see if he’d succumb to this or that vile solution. Then they had nearly drowned him to see how long he’d last under water. Then came wave after wave of electricity through him to see how much he could withstand. And he couldn’t forget the heat tests or the cold.

And after all that, they’d taken to simple thuggery.

He heard the snick of the door to his own private torture chamber. With his back to the door, Kurt couldn’t see who his tormentors were this time. Perhaps the same ones...or maybe others having their fun torturing the “demon.” Footsteps advanced and Kurt’s breath went ragged and shivers swept his body. Someone stopped close beside him.

“How you doing, little demon?” a harsh male voice asked in his ear.

Kurt instinctively flinched, but a hand wound up in his hair and jerked his head back. One of Trask’s young military thugs leered at him, too close, breath hot in his face.

Kurt said nothing, learning that opening his mouth did nothing to help him. They only asked questions he couldn’t answer or called him names he didn’t deserve. He sensed their hatred and their fear...or in the case of the techs, their clinical disconnect from his pain and terror.

But these military men, recruited by Trask, were a different breed. They feared that which they didn’t understand. The fear bred anger and the anger hatred and there was nothing Kurt could say or do that would change the narrow minds of men like the one that stood beside him, thinking of ways to hurt him.

“Just settle down, demon,” the man said, jerking Kurt’s head sideways. “It’s been how long since my last visit?”

Kurt tried to ignore the man.

“A few hours since me and the other fellas worked you over.” A hand ran down Kurt’s side and thumped his ribs. He grunted with pain, but clenched his teeth against a yelp. “Maybe some cracked ribs? Huh, you think so?”

The man stepped back, grinned at him and slammed a fist into his side.

Kurt gave a gasping breathless cry.

“Yeah, definitely cracked ribs,” the man chuckled.

A backhanded blow caught Kurt in the mouth. He tasted blood and swallowed involuntarily. The metallic flavor sent a roll of nausea tgh hgh his empty stomach. He stifled a retch and squeezed his eyes closed against the humor in sadistic eyes.

“I’m still surprised you bleed red blood. I expected it to be green or something weird like that.”

“But then you are an idiot,” Kurt replied and instantly regretted his words. There he went opening his mouth again.

Fingers gripped his hair once more and jerked his head back, exposing his throat. The man pulled something from his pocket and snapped open a long, slim knife. Laying the blade along Kurt’s cheek, the man turned it this way and that, catching the light with its gleaming sharpness. Kurt sucked in air, waiting for the slice of his skin.

“You think that’s cute, blue boy? You think you’re funny?” the man sneered in his face. The blade slid down under his ear and along his throat, lightly caressing. “Answer me!”

“Nnnot really,” Kurt stammered and wondered if this might be the moment of his death. Maybe a quick slit of the throat would be a blessing after everything these people had done to him and might yet be preparing to do.

The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want.

The blade moved up to caress his other cheek, turning ever so slightly and Kurt felt the knife’s edge pressing in. Blood welled from the cut and Kurt forced himself not to flinch, not to make a move though his body was in constant torment.

“You want to die, demon?” the man whispered in his ear.

Did he?

“Nhe ahe answered. “Please....” Kurt bit off his plea. He would not beg again.

“Please what?”

Kurt tried to shake his head, but the fingers tightened their hold and forced him to meet his torturer’s gaze. The soldier was a good looking man, tall, trim, muscular. Blond, razor short hair framed a handsome face, but the hate in the man’s blue eyes ruined everything.

“Aw, is the poor little demon scared?”

Kurt closed his eyes against the hostile sarcasm then opened them again with a question of his own. “Wouldn’t you be if...our positions were reversed?”

The man cocked his head as if he hadn’t considered such a possibility. “Yeah, I suppose I would be. If I was a demon from hell.”

“I am...not from hell,” Kurt said, knowing he was repeating himself for the umpteenth time. “I am from Germany.”

A jerk on his hair caught him by surprise. “You’re a hell-spawned demon.”

“Nein,” Kurt said without hope that he’d ever convince any of these people that he was anything other than the devil’s own spawn.

The man released his hold and stepped away. He still held the knife in one hand though his arms were crossed against his chest.

“Dr. Trask says he has an experiment he needs you for tomorrow so I guess I won’t be slitting your throat tonight.”

Slowly, the man walked around Kurt, a deliberate stroll, gazing on him as if determining just what he could do without getting in trouble with his superior. The fur on the back of Kurt’s neck rose, sensing the man close behind him. A hand slid down his bare back in a slow sensual stroke all the way to his ass then proceeded the length of his tail. He tried to whip it away from the man’s grasp, but the shackle held it still and the soldier examined it with rough hands all the way to the arrow-shaped tip.

“Will it grow back if I cut it off?” the man asked, tickling Kurt’s ear with a harsh breath.

“Why...do you want to...do this...to me?” Kurt asked in return, struggling to contain a sob. “I’ve done...nothing to you.”

The man laughed and ran a hand back down Kurt’s tail and up his back to lay heavy on his shoulder. The weight added to Kurt’s agony, the ache in his arms and back almost beyond endurance.

“You’re a mutant. That’s all you have to do. Just exist.”

“You sound...like Trask. Do you...never think...for yourself?”

The knife point touched the tip of Kurt’s ear and trailed down, following the curve to his lobe. The trail continued across his cheek and the bridge of his nose to the other ear, repeating the process.

“What’s there to think about?” the man finally replied. “It’s a given. Mutants are dangerous. Humans have to protect themselves.”

Kurt turned his head and latched onto his tormenter’s gaze. He saw a flinch and knew his yellow eyes frightened the man. “Who is in chains and who has a knife in his hand? Who is in danger from whom?”

The soldier stared at him then backed away, shaking his head.

“You’re trying to trick me with words. That’s a devil’s trick.”

Kurt sighed. These people were unreachable. He didn’t know why he had bothered trying again.

The sound of the door opening drew the soldier’s attention. In a flash, the blade disappeared into a pocket.

A tech entered, dressed in a white coat and carrying a palm pilot. He crossed the room with purpose, reaching up to examine Kurt’s arm where a long ugly cut lay open beneath his fur.

“The cut hasn’t healed. He doesn’t have the same healing properties as the other one,” the tech said, jotting notes as if he were examining a splat on a petri dish instead of a living breathing being. The man’s hand gripped Kurt’s face checking the cut over his right eye and the one under his left and the fresh cut down the sid his his cheek.

“You do this?” the tech asked the soldier.

“Yeah, what of it?”

The tech just shook his head as if too often confronted by military hostility.

He tapped Kurt’s ribs hard and got a grunt of pain. “Cracked some ribs I’d say. Take him down. Give him a rest. The Doctor wants him conscious for that experiment coming up tomorrow.”

Kurt let out a sigh of relief.

“Yeah, sure...right away,” the soldier answered and Kurt wasn’t at all sure the man meant it.

A blow to the stomach caught Kurt off guard. He gasped and choked for breath reminding him of how they’d sucked the air from a chamber they’d put him in and waited to see how long before he’d pass out.

“Hey!” said the tech from the doorway. “I said take him down and give him a rest. I mean now.”

“Dickwad,” the soldier mumbled. But he obeyed and Kurt felt the metal cuffs fall away from his wrists.

He hit the floor on hands and knees and collapsed, pain cascading down his limbs, throbbing in his joints.

“Can’t take any more, demon?”

A foot prodded Kurt in the side. But he didn’t care. The stfloofloor became his bed and Kurt lay there unmoving, finally succumbing to exhaustion and fell asleep.