❝that's the thing about pain: it demands to be felt.❞

-augustus waters, the fault in our stars

♛

CAGE REALLY IS GOING all-out for my ransom video. He wants it to be perfect, and since he only has one shot, he's trying as hard as he can to make it work. It's like he's a damn movie star or something- like one of those actors in films they had in the past.

The president holds a camera firmly out in front of him. The small device is the perfect size to fit in his hand, minus the screen flipped around so he can see what he's filming. It isn't recording yet, but once it starts, it'll be broadcasted to the device in Jasper's possession and Bellamy's earbud. They've apparently taken the latter offline momentarily to prevent any messages from coming through. But since Cage wants this to be as dramatic as possible, he's letting the one message reach him.

When the "record" button is pressed, a little red dot in the corner of the screen informs us it's working. At this very second, Jasper's tablet should blink on and so should Bell's earbud.

"This message is for the forty-four and the stowaway currently residing in my mountain," Cage begins calmly. "I want to tell you something about me. You know, I've always been fascinated with rivers. And not those ones I see in paintings; I like the real ones. It's been my lifelong dream to let the current carry me wherever it pleases. But rivers can be very reckless, you know- very unpredictable. And know, I have one right here."

He yanks me into view of the camera, where I knock into him and shoot him a glare. Looking into the glass lens is like looking into the saddened eyes of Jasper himself. The glass glistens like it's filling with tears.

"I have Fallon Rivers in my possession." Cage's voice is a dangerous sneer now, a clear threat. It's the embodiment of the thorns of a rose. "Either give yourselves up, or she goes- it's your choice. Take however long you need." A sick smile spreads his lips wide. "I have all the time in the world."

I subtly shake my head just before the recording icon is replaced by a green box. It's all I can do to hope Jasper noticed it. If not...

"Take her to Dr. Haven," the president commands as he pushes me roughly toward Emerson. "Just because I didn't give them a time limit doesn't mean we can't put her to some use."

Emerson's dry hand grabs my wrist and forces me to walk alongside him. He's much taller than I am, with a thin frame and receding hairline that causes him to appear older than he probably is. Even so, he's strong. The effort he puts forth to make me move is minimal.

"Whatever you're planning on doing isn't going to be any less painful than what I've already been through," I hiss as he drags me along down the hallway with him.

Emerson merely quirks his lip up in a knowing smirk. "We'll see about that."

The trip to our destination doesn't last much longer than three minutes considering it's on the same floor. Emerson uses his key card to access an unmarked door, hauling me inside after him. It buzzes behind him as the lock clicks firmly in place.

My stomach drops. "No."

I know what I'm here for immediately. The familiar room is all-white, with a flimsy cot shoved up against the wall near the vent. A middle-aged Asian man looks up from his desk upon our arrival. He adjusts the wire-rimmed glasses on his face and stands.

"Dr. Haven," Emerson greets with a nod. "I have another."

I shake my head in desperation, tugging at my arm to try and get out of the guard's tight grip. It's no use, and even when I'm shouting and kicking, it doesn't seem to bother him. I feel like my stomach has fallen into an icy pit. Pure terror courses through my veins at the memory of Max's lifeless body in front of me. I could end up like that.

"Bring her here," Dr. Haven commands with a motion toward the cot. He seems unfazed by my fit, but I'm not very surprised by that fact. The others must have done the same before...

"No!" I yell, thrashing around like a fish out of water in a futile attempt to resist. Tears are rising but I refuse to cry just yet. They prick at the corners of my eyes like needles. "No!"

Emerson picks me up by the waist without a problem and carries me over to the cot. He forcefully sets me down on it, while Dr. Haven injects something into my neck. My hand flies up to the spot where the needle had been inserted. My body feels tired suddenly, like I had just run a mile. I feel myself begin to settle down against my will.

"Doctor?" Emerson questions in a confused tone. His eyes ask a silent question that I can't pinpoint.

"It does nothing for the pain," the shorter man replies as he pushes his glasses up his crooked nose again. "She'll just feel a bit tired."

Emerson nods in understanding and removes the vest from me. Dr. Haven lies me down on my stomach, where my face fits perfectly into a hole so I can see the floor. It's a blinding white that hurts my eyes. Somebody yanks up the button-down shirt from where it had been tucked into my pants.

A cold cotton swab is pressed against my hip, causing shivers to shoot down my spine. I squeeze my eyes shut as I prepare myself for what's to come. My heart is beating erratically, pumping so hard and fast I can hear the blood rushing in my ears. If it wasn't so tired, my body would probably be shaking from fear.

"Since I didn't have an appointment set up, none of the other doctors are here," Dr. Haven informs Emerson. "Could you hold her down? The serum should keep her steady, but it's best to be safe."

A pair of large hands press against the middle of my back. I can feel myself go completely stiff under the foreign touch, tensing up instinctively. I try to breathe slowly out of my mouth in order to calm myself down; it does nothing.

The sound of a drill fills my ears. I clench my hands into fists and feel a few tears slip from under my eyelashes. The machine comes so close that I can feel the wind around it moving.

At first it's just a prick. A small, annoying flare of discomfort that would normally make me fidget. I grimace as it cuts deeper and deeper into my skin. But the second it hits bone, I swear I've never felt this kind of pain before in my life. It's sharp, intense, and makes me let out a choking sob. My face screws up as it digs further into the bone. My brain is starting to hurt from the force it takes not to cry out- it would give them too much satisfaction. They'll thrive on the knowledge I'm in pain. I desperately want to thrash, to kick my legs and flail my arms in response to the agony, but the drug prevents me from moving a muscle.

But then, when I can't hold it in any longer, I let out a blood-curling scream that reverberates through the entire mountain.

--

I barely remember what happens after the procedure. Cage comes in, of course, to see how things are going, but Dr. Haven has already finished by the time he shows up. They have the heart to bandage my wound and then force me up into a sitting position.

Cage smirks triumphantly at the tear stains on my cheeks. I'm pretty sure I'm still crying at a steady pace, but I'm not completely sure. My thoughts and emotions are a jumbled mess like tangled yarn. All I can truly feel is pain and a bit of numbness from the shock.

"Care to tell us anything now?" the president questions innocently as he stands before me. His hands are clasped behind his back, stance confident. The look on his face suggests he partly expects me to come clean.

It's a shame- he doesn't know me very well.

"Y-You sick bastard," I sneer at him through my tears, still managing to shoot daggers at him with my eyes.

He clicks his tongue in disapproval. "Now, now. That's no way to talk to a president, is it?"

"Jok yu," I spit, and that's all I can remember.

My eyelids open heavily like they each weigh more than I can handle. Once I can see, my heart gives a violent jerk in my chest that physically hurts me. I sit up and feel myself drain of all emotion for a long second. And then I'm filled with rage.

I'm back in the blue-tinted room with the Grounder prisoners. There are more of them now, new ones I haven't seen before trapped in the cages surrounding mine. I scramble to a sitting position and suck in a shaking breath. Then, I stuff my fist into my mouth and scream as hard as I can until my throat burns and vocal chords shred.

Before I fully have comprehension of what I'm doing, I rear my arm back and hit the front of the cage. The skin on my knuckles is scraped in a way that's hardly satisfying. I continue punching until it splits, causing trickles of blood to run into my palms in small rivers. An ache spreads from my hands; I hardly notice it as I clench my trembling fist.

"Hey," a familiar voice mutters from beside me, "are you trying to break your hands?"

I look to my right to see Echo curled up in the cage on the opposite side I had been before. She looks worse than when I last saw her, cheeks incredibly hollow and eyes dull. The purple bruises covering her body have increased in number. I can only imagine how much strain the Mountain Men have put on the Grounders now that they're so desperate.

Sitting back in my cage brings a sharp pain from the place where they had extracted my bone marrow. My hand flies to the spot instinctively, but it hurts even more to touch it. I rest my head back against the wall so a soft clang can be heard.

"The hell happened to you?" Echo questions in a hiss. "Why aren't you with your knight?"

"My knight?" I repeat, confused, and ignore her first question.

"Yeah," she says like it's obvious. "The one who risked his life to be strung up next to you. Pretty stupid if you ask me, but brave."

Hearing about Bellamy only makes the pain in my chest increase. I feel the urge to cry again out of complete hopelessness. It's like somebody has taken my heart out of my chest and replaced it with a bottomless pit that only processes one thing: suffering.

"They're not gonna let me get out of here alive," I tell Echo in a soft whisper, blinking hard to chase away the tears as I stare up at the ceiling. "Not unless I tell them where he is."

"Let me guess," Echo drawls, "you won't."

I shake my head. "Not in a million years."

"Falon?"

I jolt in surprise upon hearing my name, thinking it's another doctor or something, but instead I turn to my other side to find a Grounder staring at me through the bars. His intense blue eyes suggest he's just woken up from how tired they appear. It's strange to see his dirty blond hair out of its usual braids and hanging low in his face.

"Julian?" I ask, squinting to see him better in the terrible lighting.

He nods, then his eyes shift to Echo for a brief moment. Something hostile ignites in his glare. The way he looks at her does not suggest friendliness between the two.

"I thought it was you," he says to me in English instead of Trigedasleng, which is strange to hear coming out of his mouth. His voice is deep and gravelly. "I saw you after I came in. They--"

"--decontaminated," Echo cuts in boredly.

"Decontaminated" - Julian sends her a harsh glare - "you, but you went...you...my English isn't very good. I do not know the word."

"Passed out?" I suggest with a shudder going down my spine.

"Passed out, yes, halfway through."

I glance down at my skin. It is, in fact, much cleaner than it had been in the mountain. I feel violated once more at the fact I don't even remember going through that again. The bandages are back, wrapped around my top and lower half the same way they had been before. It's a cruel sense of irony that I'm back where I began, but I'm in Bellamy's cage this time instead of my previous one.

"You were caught," Echo observes belatedly. Her eyes continue to hold me under a heavy stare that would normally make me uneasy, but nothing is processing correctly in my mind at this point.

"I was stupid, that's what I was," I correct in a half-hearted grumble. "I was stupid and now I'm going to pay for it."

The door at the front of the room opens to reveal a guard. My eyes follow him as he walks swiftly around the blood transfusion machine and toward my cage. Instinctively, I curl into a ball and back up as far as I can until the bars dig into my back.

"Yu wuskripa," Echo spits at him.

"Shof op," Julian hisses back to her.

The guard ignores them and takes out a jingling key ring. After inserting it into the lock on my cage, he opens it and flicks out an electric baton. A threat is clear in his green eyes.

"You ready to talk?" he demands with a snarl. When I don't reply and instead glare at him, he shrugs. "Very well, then."

I cry out in pain as the electric baton touches my skin, sending a surge of shocks through me that cause my body to slacken. The guard lifts me out of the cage while my guard is down. My attempts to fight back are feeble due to the fact I'm so exhausted. Eventually, he carries me out of the room with me slung over his shoulder. I watch Echo and Julian become smaller and smaller with the increasing distance between us with the familiar feeling of hopelessness nearly consuming me whole.

The door slams shut behind us.

------

your guys' reactions to the previous chapter were so funny ngl

i'm literally at the finale guys I AM HERE WE MADE IT

-kristyn

TRANSLATIONS:

Yu wuskripa: You monster

Shof op: Be quiet (Shut up)