Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ Containment ❯ Chapter 5

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

He couldn't break free no matter how hard he struggled. The rope was tied tight, not allowing him enough movement to get any leverage. If he stayed like this, there wouldn't be any future for him. He had to get out before they came back.
 
Once more, he twisted against the bonds, arching his back as he tried to dig his elbows into the metal table. He pulled at his wrists, feeling his joints stretch and skin tear. “Fuck...”
 
Yohji still couldn't get free.
 
“Stop struggling.”
 
Yohji froze, ice creeping up his spine. He wanted to yell at the voice. He wanted to scream and fight back, but he couldn't. There was no way Yohji could stand up to the voice like he would have. Two weeks here had put him in a corner. The only thing he could do was hope that the voice stayed away from Aya.
 
“That tattoo is coming off.” Steel glinted in the faint light.
 
Damn this all to hell. There wasn't anyway he was going to be able to keep quiet when the voice started his crude surgery. He clenched his teeth and squeezed his eyes shut, waiting.
 
When the blade touched his skin, he jumped.
 
“Hold still.”
 
Yohji froze again, holding his breath as the knife sliced into his skin, going deep enough to get under the ink. The blade was sharp; it was the least he could have asked for.
 
=
 
Aya-chan pressed her ear close to her brother's door. It had been three weeks since Yohji disappeared. He brother hadn't given up on his lover in that time and she was beginning to not know what to think. At first, she had been gung ho about helping Aya find Yohji, but then they looked. All of them had looked tirelessly for days.
 
In the first week, Yohji hadn't turned up. Omi had kept his searches running, looking for all of the right signals that should be passing through a database if Yohji were active. There was no activity on his credit cards. No contact with Kritkir, what was left of it. No phone calls to a secure voice mail. No calls to the Koneko that could have even been him.
 
Yohji had disappeared.
 
Aya-chan had realized this a day or so ago. She knew, somewhere inside, that they weren't going to find him. No matter how hard they looked, how much time they put into it, they weren't going to find Yohji.
 
Her brother, though, still held hope. He still hoped that he would find Yohji. He prayed for a sign to a god he didn't believe in. All Aya wanted was Yohji back. That was all he thought about.
 
The rapid tapping of fingers over a laptop keyboard greeted her ears and Aya-chan sighed. He was still looking. She raised a hand and knocked on the wood, stepping to press open the door.
 
Aya peered over the laptop screen, his glasses sliding down his nose as he watched his sister. “Yes?”
 
“Have you found anything?” She hated asking, but she couldn't think of anything to talk to her brother about. It was starting to look like his world was completely revolving around looking for his lost lover.
 
Shaking his head, Aya pulled off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I... I'm beginning to think I'll never find him,” he whispered. She watched her brother suck in a shaky breath before he dropped his glasses on the laptop keyboard and covered his face with his hands.
 
Aya-chan hurried into the room and sat on the bed next to her brother. She immediately put her arms around him and hugged him, trying to comfort him even as she felt herself tumbling into sadness. “I'm sorry,” she nearly choked. Tears were welling in her eyes; her throat was already tight from seeing the intense grief in her brother's body language. He never acted like this. She'd never seen him so sad.
 
“It's my fault,” her brother croaked. “If I...” He stopped, a sob choking his words.
 
“It's not your fault,” Aya-chan soothed as best as she could.
 
Aya sobbed, shaking his head even as he kept his face covered. Aya-chan knew he didn't believe her. He would continue to blame himself. He always blamed himself first.
 
“Everything will turn out,” she promised, hoping that her words ended up being true.
 
=
 
Gradually, Aya found that he could no longer hide in his room. His own searches with his computer were coming up with nothing, as were Omi's downstairs. Aya-chan came to tell him of the results from time to time.
 
She had promised him that everything would turn out. He wanted to believe her more than anything. Aya-chan was giving him hope as fast as he was losing it.
 
So, instead of staying in his room for the rest of the afternoon, Aya had showered and dressed. He wandered down the hall, hesitating in front of the door to Yohji's room. He'd been inside the room a few times since Yohji had disappeared, but then it had only been to look for clues in case Omi and Ken had been right.
 
In the past, there had been matchboxes from bars and coasters with phone numbers written on them all over the place. Aya hadn't found anything like that this time. What he had found, though, had him almost breaking down.
 
All the paper work for the flat Yohji had purchased had been in a drawer. When Aya had found it, he felt physically ill. The place was completely paid off and would be ready for occupancy in another week. There was even a paper to put the house in both of their names. Yohji had already filled everything out, save for Aya's signature.
 
Remembering his discovery had Aya pushing the door of the room open again. He glanced around the familiar room in the afternoon sunlight. The charcoal copy of the picture Omi had taken leaned against the wall in its frame. It sat on the dresser, still as beautiful as the day Yohji finished it.
 
Aya walked over and sat on the edge of the bed. He'd been with Yohji so many times in this bed and his own. The whole room was saturated with memories of anger, passion, and maybe even love. He sighed and stretched out over the soft bedding.
 
“Where are you?” Aya whispered to the still room. Closing his eyes, he fought off the ever present guilt. He knew, deep in his gut that wherever Yohji was, he wasn't alright. And that it was his fault that Yohji was in that position.
 
If Aya had just said yes, if he had just let Yohji make him happy, then Yohji would have been with him. Safe.
 
Downstairs, the house phone began to ring. Hope built in Aya's chest and he hurried down the stairs to answer the phone. “Yohji?”
 
The person on the other end spoke and Aya suddenly felt so much more lost.
 
“Aya-chan...” He listened to her, absently agreeing to pick her up after her afternoon classes. They said their goodbyes and he hung up.
 
Closing his eyes, Aya took a deep breath. He silently wished that he wouldn't fall apart. Just because Yohji was gone, and it was his fault, didn't mean that he could just stop functioning.
 
Aya felt numb as he walked into the living room and sank down onto the couch. Even when his sister had been in a coma, he never felt this lost.
 
=
 
“Ryo, get up.”
 
A booted foot nudged at Yohji's chest and he obediently pushed himself up off the floor. He stood silently facing the shadowy figure in front of him. The Doctor. The man had medical knowledge and had finally given him something to call him. Doctor.
 
“Is your arm healing?” The Doctor reached for his arm, running his hand over Yohji's skin. He shivered at the touch and then stiffened. The Doctor wouldn't like his reaction.
 
The tall, stately looking man wrapped his hand around Yohji's sore bicep and squeezed. Yohji blanched and nearly fell to his knees. The wound was healing slowly with so much of the flesh missing. It was far too tender for the kind of abuse the Doctor was inflicting on him.
 
“On your knees.” The Doctor took several steps away from him. He disappeared into the darkness beyond the ring of light.
 
Yohji heard the sound of a plastic bucket being knocked over as he knelt on the cold concrete floor. Water rushed towards him, flowing over the stone floor to pool around his legs. He began shaking as he knew what was about to happen.
 
The Doctor had been using abuse on top of the threats to Aya to get him to do as he wished. Yohji no longer felt like a human being anymore. He felt like a toy.
 
“Don't make a sound,” the Doctor ordered.
 
Yohji stared at the floor, waiting obediently for what would happen next. He thought briefly of what it would be like to be back in the Koneko, curled up on the couch channel surfing while Aya read a book next to him. Then, pain seared though him and it took all of his will power to keep from crying out. The electrocution continued for a few more seconds before letting up but, it was only a short reprieve.
 
=
 
“I almost have him.” The Doctor smiled at his wife, locking the door behind him.
 
“That's wonderful, dear,” the small woman replied, but she didn't mean it. She had help capture the man downstairs just as she had done to other people before. All of it had been for her husband.
 
The Doctor walked through the room, heading for his study. She watched him go and when he had disappeared into the room, she sank down in a kitchen chair.
 
She wished she could save the man downstairs. If only she could find the red haired man again. If she found him, then she could tell him that his friend was in the basement of her house. She could do something right for once in her life.
 
Then, the thought of what would happen to her if her husband ever found out what she did had her quaking in the metal chair. He would kill her. Or sell her.
 
As she stood and headed to do her chores around the house, the guilt on her shoulders grew heavier. All these years, she had been condemning others to a life of slavery just so that she could keep her life of servitude to her husband.
 
She silently vowed that if she ever saw the red haired man she would tell him what was going on. But, that didn't mean she'd go looking for him.
 
=
 
The Porsche purred as Aya pulled it into a parking spot outside of Aya-chan's university. He turned the engine off and climbed out. Aya-chan's last class was due to let out in ten minutes. He had about that long to get to the courtyard where they normally met when she asked him to pick her up.
 
Ignoring everyone, he walked silently across the quad to the south courtyard. It seemed that he was even less tolerant of people than he normally was. He truly didn't want to be there.
 
Reaching the courtyard, he glanced around for his sister. She hadn't arrived yet. He stood stiffly next to a wall and waited.
 
“Hello, Aya isn't it?”
 
Aya's attention moved sharply to the owner of the voice and blinked. Carrying a backpack and grinning like he had won some sort of prize, Azusa stood only a few feet away. He blinked again and didn't answer.
 
“Definitely Aya. You're too beautiful to forget.” Azusa smiled and moved closer. “Do you attend the university?”
 
Shaking his head, Aya didn't know why he was still standing there for a moment. He didn't want to talk to Azusa. The other man had been the cause of a fight between him and Yohji just before Yohji had disappeared. He swallowed, wishing the memories away.
 
“Didn't think so.” Azusa shifted his pack and glanced across the courtyard. “Give any thought to my offer?”
 
Aya suddenly felt like he was going to be sick. Someone else? He couldn't even think of moving on right now. Not when he needed for Yohji to come back so badly. “N-no,” he whispered. He desperately wished his sister would show up so he could leave.
 
“Still seeing someone, I guess.” Azusa sounded disappointed.
 
What the hell was the other man thinking? Aya couldn't fathom why anyone would offer to be with him right now. He felt like shit and he thought he looked the same. If he couldn't trust Yohji and keep him safe, how did anyone expect him to be successful with someone else?
 
“Ran!” Aya-chan hurried over and put her arms around her brother. She held the still man briefly before stepping back to give her brother a concerned once over. “Are you alright?”
 
Aya shook his head and pressed his fingertips to his forehead. Thoughts of relationships and dating immediately led to Yohji and from there, he was lost in an ocean of guilt and sadness. “Let's go.” He started out of the courtyard to the quad, completely ignoring Azusa.
 
Aya-chan glanced at Azusa before following her brother. “You need to let go just a little bit, Ran. You can't keep doing this to yourself.”
 
He ignored his sister and kept walking. If he let go, even the slightest bit, then he knew Yohji would be gone forever. He couldn't let that happen. Aya had to hold on to Yohji. He just had to.
 
=
 
Aya-chan jogged to catch up with her brother's quick strides. She knew that Aya was avoiding the outside world enough that she'd been lucky to get him to come pick her up. He wasn't handling social contact well either. Something was eating at him from the inside.
 
“Ran, you're dying inside,” she pleaded. It was killing her to see her brother kicking himself over Yohji's disappearance.
 
They reached the car and Aya unlocked it with the remote. Silently, he climbed in behind the wheel. Aya-chan hopped into the passenger seat. She glanced at her brother and saw his mask lock into place.
 
She hated that mask. He always retreated behind it when he didn't want to deal with something or, when he couldn't deal with something.
 
“Ran, he's gone.” She swallowed, not sure if she should be saying any of this. “You've done all you can. You can't let Yohji's disappearance rule your life. Please, Ran, for yourself, for Omi and Ken, for me, let him go. If he comes back, he comes back. If he doesn't, you can't dwell on the past.”
 
When she finished, she stared out the windshield, afraid to look at her brother. She loved him. She loved Yohji, but Aya was here. Right now, Aya mattered more than his missing lover.
 
“Please, Ran...” Aya-chan finally turned to her brother to see him give a small nod. Suddenly, she wasn't sure if she had done the right thing.
 
=
 
“Perfect,” the Doctor purred. He shut the door behind him and locked it as he always did. His wife stood at the sink, washing a glass for the third time. The screams of her husband's `toys' sent chills down her spine but, she felt even worse when they didn't make a sound.
 
There hadn't been any noise from the basement for days.
 
“He's mine. So deliciously mine.” The Doctor smiled, pleased and no doubt getting off on the fact that he had control over another person.
 
She set the glass in the sink and turned around to face her husband, waiting patiently. Even though she was his wife, the woman was no different from the people the Doctor broke. When she had met him, she had had friends and a wonderful social life. She had been fresh out of college and on her way into a promising career as an attorney. Then she had met the Doctor. At first, he treated her like she was a goddess and he was merely a worshipping mortal.
 
After they were married, things changed. He slowly isolated her from her friends and convinced her to quit her job. Then, he grew violent, especially during sex. When he raped her and she threatened to go to the police, he demanded that it was his right. Even though she knew better, she didn't do anything about it. Slowly, he broke her.
 
As he moved closer to her, she closed her eyes. He didn't notice that or how she started trembling when he touched her. Sometimes, she could be brave, almost normal, but not today. It had been too much knowing what he had been doing to the other man, knowing that if she were strong enough, she could save him. Her guilt had taken its toll.
 
“It's so wonderful when they submit. I feel...” he whispered into her ear before skimming his lips down her bare neck. The Doctor bit down on his wife's pale flesh as his body shuddered in pleasure.
 
She clenched her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut tighter, knowing what was to come. When he pulled her against him, she couldn't push him away. His arousal disgusted her, but she didn't have the courage to dig her own grave yet. All she could do was let him have her body and pray that just using her body was enough for him this time. She didn't know if she could handle the emotional torment he sometimes liked to cause her just then.
 
Thoughts of the man that she had helped kidnap and his companion with the red hair drifted into her mind. This time, she would look at the sex her husband was about to have with her as a form of punishment. Punishment for not doing the right thing and saving the man downstairs from the same fate as her husband's other toys.
 
=
 
Staring straight ahead in the darkness, Yohji was lost. He was afraid to try to escape; afraid to even dare defy the Doctor. It tore him apart. Electrocution, beatings, drug therapy, and other things that he couldn't even begin to describe had been routine for him over the past few weeks. Now, it was like he finally knew his place.
 
Yohji Kudoh finally knew that he was not a person. He wasn't even Yohji Kudoh anymore. He was simply there to do as he was told. When needed, he would answer to the name Ryo. Otherwise, anything that could be spoken in his direction would do for him to answer to.
 
He rarely thought of his time before being the Doctor's toy. When he did, it was brief and despairing. When he did think of his life before this one, he always remembered Aya. Only the thought of Aya, just the memory of him sitting on their bed in the afternoon sunlight, shed a little light in his dark world.
 
One thing he tried to never think of was that night, several months ago, when Aya had said no. As far as he knew, his glance back to the other man as he left would be the last time he would ever see him.
 
Letting his body go limp, he slowly sank to the cold floor. There wasn't much to do anymore. When the Doctor was around, he did as he was told. Otherwise, he was resting and waiting. During that time, he always think of Aya.
 
Yohji pressed his cheek against the floor and sucked in a deep breath. He thought he could still feel his arm aching, but he knew that was impossible. The cold, damp nature of the floor would have chilled him to the bone, if he hadn't already been numb enough inside not to care.
 
The only thing that kept him going was a tiny bit of hope that he could make it out of this mess. He only wanted to see Aya one more time before he gave up on his miserable existence.
 
=
 
“Ken, we need three people for this mission. Manx said-“
 
“Since when does Manx tell us anything anymore, Omi? We can't take the mission. There are only two of us.” Ken lifted the crate filled with pots and stacked it in the corner of the work room.
 
“Manx said that she doesn't want to hand it over to anyone else.” Omi fingered the leaves of a large potted plant.
 
“Then you tell her to convince Aya that he needs to go on this mission.” Ken turned to glare at Omi and froze.
 
“What mission?” Aya stood in the doorway, paler and colder than usual.
 
“Aya-kun!” Omi turned, staring in open surprise at the taller man. “We have- Manx gave us a mission. It requires three people so...” he let his voice trail off. Omi visibly paled at the look on Aya's face. He'd never seen such a mixture of rage and sadness on Aya's face. “Aya-kun?”
 
“I'm going.”
 
“Hey! You said you weren't going to take anymore missions.” Ken glared at his teammate, already irritated by the entire situation.
 
Aya's eyes seemed to darken as he glared at Ken. “I'm going on this mission.”
 
He said the words with such finality, Ken just stared at him. He had no witty retort for Aya. After a few minutes, Ken pulled off his gloves and tossed them on the workbench. “Fine.” He pushed past Omi and Aya and headed upstairs.
 
“Aya-kun, are you sure about this? After Yohji went missing, you said you wouldn't take anymore missions.”
 
Aya simply turned and walked back to his room. “I need to kill someone,” he murmured once he was out of earshot of Omi.
 
=
 
“Ryo, wake up.”
 
A savage kick to his ribs had Yohji reflexively rolling back on the balls of his feet. He coughed and sucked air back in to his painfully empty lungs. Yohji sat up and waited before he had even caught his breath.
 
“Good news. You won't be here that much longer.”
 
Yohji's eyes grew wide and hope flooded into his chest, almost suffocating him. The Doctor was going to let him go. The Doctor was tired of him. He'd get to see Aya one last time.
 
The Doctor laughed. “I wonder how much they'll pay for you. I'm sure you'll put on a good display, right Ryo?”
 
His blood ran cold. Pay? Display? He couldn't think of what the Doctor was talking about. All he knew was that he wasn't going to get to see Aya again. Yohji was pretty damn sure that even if he wasn't going to be here, he was still going to be taking orders and be degraded.
 
Yohji let himself sink to the floor as the Doctor's laughter faded out of the room. As much as he wanted to see Aya again, death was quickly becoming the best option he had to choose from.