"No..."
"No!"
With his back pressed tightly against the cold metal table, Stryker's pupils contracted violently, his Adam's apple bobbing with difficulty.
"Fenris, no, you wouldn't dare..."
"You're not like us. You won't sink to my level... If you kill me like this, then how are you any different from the people who tortured you?"
Stryker forced out a smile, but his voice had already begun to tremble uncontrollably. "Please, please... Don't let hatred destroy you..."
"Beg me?"
Fenris moved through the lab with practiced ease, pulling out a full set of tools and instruments. Looking down at Stryker's fear-twisted face, he lightly ran a finger along the edge of a scalpel.
"Maybe I should get you a mirror, so you can take a good look at how ugly you are right now."
Fenris suddenly grabbed Stryker by the hair and forced him to meet his eyes. A strange curve tugged at the corner of his mouth. "Only now you know fear? Too late."
That icy voice sent Stryker plunging into despair. His gaze swept over the familiar restraints and the surgical blades gleaming under the cold light. Then he saw Fenris pick up a crystal-blue vial from the side, and the veins in his neck instantly bulged as his legs began kicking wildly on instinct.
"The pain-sensitivity enhancer! No!"
"No, no!"
"You can't do this, I'm-"
Fenris locked Stryker's limbs into a specialized restraint frame and drove the thick needle down without hesitation. "It only amplifies pain tenfold. I am not even going to let you pass out. What are you so afraid of?"
"Fenris, Fenris, listen to me-"
The drug entered his body. As Stryker felt every sensation in his body becoming sharper and sharper, his eyes turned bloodshot, and his shaking voice almost broke into sobs. "I know where all the mutant experimentation bases are. Don't you want to save your people?"
"Let me go, and I'll tell you everything..."
"And, and all my research over the years on mutants. I can give it all to you. It can all be yours!"
Cold sweat drenched his entire body. In that moment, fear finally shattered the last of Stryker's mental defenses. No one understood better than he did just how terrifying that drug was.
To remain conscious while enduring pain magnified ten times over - even a shallow scrape would be enough to utterly break a weak-willed person.
And Fenris clearly had no intention of stopping at a scrape.
"I have money too. Whatever you want, I have it... Just let me go..."
Fenris watched Stryker's performance expressionlessly, completely unmoved. He took out several hundred ultra-thin electrode needles and steadily inserted them along Stryker's spine and nerves.
"This is only the beginning, Stryker."
Fenris gently activated the current.
"Aaaagh!"
It felt as if thousands of red-hot steel needles were piercing through him again and again. Empowered by the drug, the agony came crashing over Stryker like tidal waves and completely swallowed him whole.
His spine arched taut in an instant. His body writhed violently beneath the restraints, and blue-purple veins bulged across his neck.
No one knew how much time passed before Stryker's screaming finally began to die down in the lab, washed white beneath the glaring lights.
By then, a sheen of sweat had coated the freezing metal table. Stryker stared upward with empty, unfocused eyes, as if all strength had been drained from him.
"Fenris... you really are ruthless..."
Sweat had completely soaked through his hair, trickling down his twisted face in a steady stream.
"You think this counts as revenge?"
"You'll never escape the fact that you were once just an experiment..."
Stryker's weak, breathless voice drifted into his ears, and a mocking smile tugged at Fenris's lips.
"What I used to be does not matter. What matters is that now, you are the experiment."
"And what just happened was only your first round today..."
Fenris reached out and helped Stryker sit up slightly. Under the drug's effect, his entire body was still twitching faintly with aftershocks of pain.
"Stryker, open your eyes. Take a good look at your own body."
"Do you know something? Your life force may be far stronger than you ever imagined. Here - this is the first cut..."
"Do not worry. I learned my technique from people like you. If nothing goes wrong, you should be able to survive at least three thousand cuts."
"No rush. We can take this slowly..."
Stryker could only watch as the surgical blade passed over his body. Every rise and fall of Fenris's hand landed with perfect precision on the places where the nerves were densest.
The agony came in endless waves, crashing over him one after another. Stryker opened his mouth wide, but no sound came out.
Pain magnified tenfold, layered over a death by a thousand cuts, was more than enough to shatter anyone's mind.
Stryker slammed his head desperately against the operating table, trying to ease the pain even a little, but the torment seemed to come from somewhere deep within his soul. There was no escaping it. It only grew worse.
"Please... please..."
"Just kill me..."
As the agony dragged on and on, his struggles gradually weakened. His body started convulsing uncontrollably.
Tears blurred his vision. By then, Stryker could no longer see anything around him clearly. All he could do was whisper pitiful pleas toward the unmoved figure before him.
Fenris thoughtfully wiped Stryker's face, letting him see again.
"Do not be afraid. How could I be that cruel?"
Fenris's voice suddenly turned almost unnaturally gentle. "Hold on a little longer. After a thousand cuts, I'll use liquid nitrogen to freeze the wounds for you. You'll feel much better then."
"O-okay... okay..."
At this point, Stryker's ability to think had nearly dropped to zero. His nerves were already numb. The instant he heard it would feel better, he nodded without hesitation. "Thank you... thank you..."
"You're welcome."
Fenris bared his teeth in a grin.
Who would have thought Stryker would end up thanking him?
Inside the enormous lab, as time passed, Stryker's screams gradually grew weaker until only feeble groans remained.
And yet every so often, he would somehow recover, only to be dragged into the next round with full awareness.
"Liquid nitrogen. Come on, no rush - feel it inch by inch..."
"What gas was this again? I cannot remember. Let's try a breath first and see what it does."
"..."
Second by second, time slipped away. No one knew how long it had been when Fenris finally used the last instrument on Stryker, only to find that the man had long since turned into something like a soulless lump of flesh, sprawled limply across the bed.
His limbs twitched weakly, capable only of the smallest spasms.
His dried tears had already stopped flowing. Only two deep tracks remained on his face beneath those hollow eyes.
"Fenris... Fenris..."
Stryker was long past fear now. Numbness and despair had hollowed him out, and his mouth could only move mechanically.
"Stryker, do you have any last words?"
Seeing that Stryker had finally been pushed to the very edge, utterly spent, Fenris mercifully lifted a hand and restored the last trace of clarity to his mind.
Under the spell's effect, the cloudiness in Stryker's eyes suddenly vanished. A strange flush of color even rose abruptly to his face.
(End of Chapter)
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