Chapter 5 #2
“Who’s the specimen now, Doc?” I growl, my muscles screaming as I put every ounce of my hate into the pull. I’m standing behind him now, the chair tilted precariously on its back legs. I lean my weight into it, using the top of the chair as a lever to crush the air out of him.
His face is turning a dark, bruised purple.
The veins in his forehead are bulging, and his eyes—those obsidian pits—are wide and bloodshot, staring up at the ceiling he thought he owned.
He’s kicking the underside of the desk, a frantic, rhythmic drumming of expensive leather shoes that sounds like a countdown.
“Look at me,” I hiss, leaning down so my lips are brushing his ear, the same way he did to me. “Tell me about the physiological response, Aris. Tell me about the heart rate. Tell me how it feels to realise your ‘miracle’ is the one who’s going to kill you.”
The record player skips, the classical music turning into a jagged, repetitive scratch. The room feels smaller, hotter, the scent of his sandalwood mixing with the sharp, metallic tang of the struggle.
I pull harder. My stitches are screaming, and I can feel a hot trickle of blood running down my chin as the wound on my lip reopens, but I don’t care. I want to see his eyes go dull. I want to feel the moment his heart stops trying to keep his ego alive.
Aris reaches back, his hand finding my hair, his grip violent and desperate. He yanks my head forward, trying to break my leverage, but I just dig my knees into the back of his chair and pull the chain until I hear the cartilage in his throat start to groan.
“Die,” I whisper, the word a prayer. “Just fucking die.”
The door doesn’t just open; it explodes inward.
The heavy oak slab slams against the wall with a crack that sounds like a gunshot. Miller is a blur of grey uniform and pure rage. He sees the scene—the chair tilted back, the “asset” with her chains wrapped around the Doctor’s throat, and Aris’s face the colour of a fresh bruise.
“You fucking bitch!” Miller roars.
He’s on me in two strides. He doesn’t try to peel my fingers back; he goes for the kill. He swings a heavy, gloved fist into the side of my head. The impact is a white-hot flash of light behind my eyes. My grip on the chain slackens for a split second, and that’s all Aris needs.
Aris gasps, a wet, rattling sound, as he lunges forward, slipping out from under the iron loop. He collapses onto the marble desk, clutching his throat, coughing up a spray of saliva and blood.
But Miller isn’t done. He grabs the centre of the chain between my wrists and yanks it upward. My arms are jerked over my head, lifting me nearly off my feet. He spins me around and drives his knee into my stomach.
The air leaves me in a pathetic, silent puff. I hit the floor hard, my head bouncing off the mahogany leg of the desk. The world is spinning, a dizzying carousel of dark wood and blood-red carpet.
“I told you!” Miller screams, his face looming over mine, distorted and sweating. “I told you she was a wild animal! I should have put a bullet in her weeks ago!”
He raises his boot, ready to cave my ribs in, his eyes blown wide with the kind of adrenaline that only comes from getting to hurt something that can’t fight back.
“Miller!”
The voice is weak, cracked, but it carries the weight of a death sentence.
We both freeze. Aris is standing up, leaning heavily on the desk.
He looks like a wreck. His hair is disheveled, falling over his forehead, and his throat is a mess of angry, weeping red welts where the links bit in.
He’s gasping for air, one hand pressed to his chest, but his eyes… God, his eyes are terrifying.
They aren’t filled with fear. They’re filled with a dark, shimmering ecstasy.
“Don’t. Touch. Her,” Aris wheezes, pointing a trembling finger at Miller.
“Doctor, she almost killed you! Look at your neck, she—”
“I see it,” Aris rasps, a ghost of a smile touching his bruised lips. He looks down at me, huddled on the floor in a heap of chains and torn cotton, and I see it—the sick, twisted pride of a creator who just realised his monster has teeth. “I felt it. It was… magnificent.”
He walks around the desk, his walk unsteady. He ignores Miller completely. He sinks to his knees in front of me, his expensive trousers soaking up the blood I’ve leaked onto the rug. He reaches out, his fingers shaking as he hooks them under my chin, forcing me to look at the wreckage he’s become.
“You really tried,” he whispers, his voice a scorched vibration. “You actually tried to take the life right out of me.”
“Next time,” I choke out, spitting a mouthful of red at his pristine shirt, “I won’t… miss.”
Aris laughs. It’s a dry, painful sound that turns into a cough, but he doesn’t let go of me. He leans in close, his forehead resting against mine, his hot, laboured breath smelling like copper.
“There won’t be a next time, Hallow. Because from now on, you aren’t leaving this room. Miller, get the heavy restraints from the basement. The ones with the floor bolts.”
Miller blinks, his jaw dropping. “But the Warden said—”
“I don’t give a fuck what the Warden said!” Aris screams, his voice breaking into a jagged edge. “She’s mine! She’s finally awake, and I’m the only one who gets to watch her burn!”
He grips my hair, pulling my head back until I’m staring at the ceiling. “You wanted to see me human, Hallow? Congratulations. You just found the only part of me that still feels. And it wants to break you until there’s nothing left but the sound of your heart beating against mine.”