paixaorpg | Watch Him Squirm [completed]

Entry tags:

Watch Him Squirm [completed]

Character(s): Marluxia and Gabranth
Content: Lab A... THE SECOND
Setting: ?
Time: ?
Warnings: Broken Gabby is broken and Marluxia's still an asshole.

The last session with the man had gone quite well; he was almost too easy to break. He was looking forward to seeing how the man was faring, just how broken Marluxia had made him. He sent the Dusks to bring him in and sat down to wait.

When they came in with Gabranth, he bade them to make the restraints a little tighter than before. Who knew if the dog still had fight left in him?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

This time, Gabranth offered no resistance as the Dusks came to fetch him. For all his many faults he knew when there was no point in resistance, even as the restraints bit tighter then they had before. He knew the way this would go now.

However, unlike last time, he offered no words to the man who stood there, instead giving him a look that was equal parts annoyance, disgust, and desperation. He was not yet ready to yield, or so he had told himself.

So the man did have a little fight left, or else he was determined to put on a front. Didn't even have the courtesy to offer him a greeting, did he? That wouldn't do. "You're not going to speak this time?" Marluxia asked. "Not even a 'hello?' Did you lose your manners along with your honor?"

The Nobody tsked and shook his head. "Don't be rude."

"It's no less then you deserve," Gabranth answered. After all, he had likely been responsible for a least some small part of Larsa's death; a fact that didn't make him inclined in the least to show the man much civility.

The comment about losing his manners along with his honor was left unanswered; he had no inclination to open that wound again so soon.

"How cruel," he replied flatly. "I'm sure he would disapprove of such manners." Marluxia stood and walked over. "At least you seem to be polite enough to answer when spoken to."

Perhaps he would have. Actually, Gabranth was certain that he would have. Larsa had always been one to prefer kindness and words over the sword. But in the end it no longer mattered since...

"He's dead."

An arrogant smirk appeared on the Nobody's face. "Then you're beginning to understand. I just hope you plan to honor the boy's memory. Perhaps the next person you decide to protect will meet with a happier fate. ...Perhaps."

"If Archadia's loyal hound is up to--and, above all, capable--of the task."

Beginning to understand? Beginning to understand what? The only thing he was beginning to realize was that he was in the hands of one of cruelest men he had yet had the misfortune to meet.

"My loyalty rests yet with Archades." Of course, he knew well that Vayne would have no use for him once word reached him of this latest failure but until that time he was yet a Judge Magister, and would be no one's pawn.

"Of course it is." He shrugged and began to circle the Judge at a slow, leisurely pace. Cruel? How could he be? And what other choice did he have? He was nothing, a being without emotions. He did what he did to serve his purposes. Had he the ability to show ill will, this man would have received none. Gabranth was merely a stepping stone on his way to success. "Defensive, aren't we, Noah? I never said you weren't loyal."

"That's not my name." Not anymore, at least. But there was less anger at the name then there had been before, and in its place was a sort of sullen annoyance at the reminder of who he's been. He didn't deserve to be Noah any longer.

Marluxia regarded the man with what looked to be confusion--"It's not?"--but the pretense was immediately dropped and his face returned to its former, arrogant expression. "Has that been your excuse all these years?"

At that, there was a pause as Gabranth's (much ill-used) used sense of self-preservation argued with his pride over whether or not to actually answer that question.

"I no longer deserve that name," he answered after a while. What more could it hurt to let the man know that after all, when he'd seemed to already know so much about him.

"A name abandoned along with the country you loved," Marluxia responded, turning his back to the Judge and taking a few paces away. "Noah fon Ronsenburg of Landis... Judge Magister Gabranth of Archades...." He mused over the names for a moment.

"How far you've gone in order to run."

Abandoned for good reason, if you asked him. It had been bad enough enduring what he had been forced to during his earlier years in the Archadian military; it would have been worse to have had to do the same with a name so clearly of foreign origin.

"I was not the one to run," he answered sharply.

"Hmmm... You're right, that was your brother, wasn't it?" Marluxia asked. He wondering how Gabranth would act if he agreed. "Your poor mother only had you. How callous of him to leave her alone as he did."

How would Gabranth react? With confusion, plain and simple. What did the other man hope to gain from agreeing with him when before he'd done nothing but focus on his faults.

"He abandoned hope and honor. And yet he still survives."

Needless to say, it was something of a sore spot.

"A shame isn't it? What honor could a coward such as he ever hope to have?" Marluxia agreed, nodding. "He would be better off dead. I'm sure your mother would be proud of you for dispatching of such a traitor."

The Nobody's head cocked slightly as he regarded Gabranth. "But you already had that in mind, didn't you?"

"He is a traitor to the Empire," Gabranth answered, voice unconsciously falling into the cadences that he'd once used to fool that young boy into thinking him his brother in truth. "He will be cut down."

That was all that mattered.

"And a traitor to his family," Marluxia pushed. "Hound as you are, at least you stayed loyal to your mother. He ran far more than anyone could ever accuse you of. He only deserves the most dishonorable of deaths, wouldn't you agree?"

"He will die by my hands."

Not that this was a new development but any stretch of the imagination. He'd long since decided that it would be best that way. Fitting, almost.

Marluxia nodded. "I wouldn't have expected any less. I just hope you don't forget that goal of yours. After all, it's all you have to cling to now, isn't it?"

The rest could be left unsaid. He knew Gabranth would understand.

Understood indeed, the comment drawing a glare.

"Because of what you have done," he answered, anger creeping back into his voice.

"For what I have done? You were supposed to be keeping an eye on him if I remember correctly. Don't you have just as much stake in his death?" he asked calmly.

Not surprisingly, there was a pause at that. He had been acting as Larsa's protector; knew that by rights he ought to have been there. But a protector could not protect what they could not see, and he had no control over being taken to this place, a fact he was sure this man knew.

"He is gone," he answered simply. And really, that was all that mattered.

Marluxia hung back to take in the silence, a small smile spreading across his lips at Gabranth's all-too-simple answer. Obviously, he had nothing more to argue.

He silently bade the Dusks to enter and take the Judge away, watching him be dragged off with cold, blue eyes.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Watch Him Squirm [completed]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject