[Disgusting. His eye's watering, he's got gel smeared across his chin, unclipped stitches hanging out of otherwise healed skin, a gaping eye socket, and now his nose is running.]
[He isn't going to drip mucus on Shepard. That'd be awful. He sniffs it back, and the noise is somehow worse.]
[Like some kind of kid.]
[She's holding his shoulder, comforting him, like he's some kind of stupid kid who can't hold it together.]
[And then she pulls him in, lets him rest his disgusting face on her shoulder. The sensation's unfamiliar, restrictive, and his heart rate shoots up.]
[Pull it together.]
[Her arms are wrapped around him, while his hang loose at his sides. He tries not to think about an ache between his shoulder blades, carpet burns across his chin and the sting of plastic zipties wearing open the skin of his wrists, of his ankles. Let me go. Let me go. Let me out, get OFF--!]
[He bites the inside of his cheek and doesn't make a sound. He waits for the taste of iron.]
[It's Shepard. It's fine. It's Shepard. He's not tied up. She's just holding onto him.]
[He's safe. She's safe.]
[They're gonna keep going.]
[He breathes, nose half-crushed by the way his face presses against her shoulder.]
What about everybody else?
[His tone's flattened out. There's too much going on to make it do anything else, to mimic the rise and fall of 'natural conversation.']
Alex, I-- [His good eye screws shut.] I mean, I was just trying to get away, but I still...
[The sickening crack it made when the camera collided with the side of his head, the strangled, animal noise that tore out of Alex as the glass dug into the flesh of his face, the way his eyes dripped red from behind closed lids.]
cw: violence, eye horror, restraint
[He isn't going to drip mucus on Shepard. That'd be awful. He sniffs it back, and the noise is somehow worse.]
[Like some kind of kid.]
[She's holding his shoulder, comforting him, like he's some kind of stupid kid who can't hold it together.]
[And then she pulls him in, lets him rest his disgusting face on her shoulder. The sensation's unfamiliar, restrictive, and his heart rate shoots up.]
[Pull it together.]
[Her arms are wrapped around him, while his hang loose at his sides. He tries not to think about an ache between his shoulder blades, carpet burns across his chin and the sting of plastic zipties wearing open the skin of his wrists, of his ankles. Let me go. Let me go. Let me out, get OFF--!]
[He bites the inside of his cheek and doesn't make a sound. He waits for the taste of iron.]
[It's Shepard. It's fine. It's Shepard. He's not tied up. She's just holding onto him.]
[He's safe. She's safe.]
[They're gonna keep going.]
[He breathes, nose half-crushed by the way his face presses against her shoulder.]
What about everybody else?
[His tone's flattened out. There's too much going on to make it do anything else, to mimic the rise and fall of 'natural conversation.']
Alex, I-- [His good eye screws shut.] I mean, I was just trying to get away, but I still...
[The sickening crack it made when the camera collided with the side of his head, the strangled, animal noise that tore out of Alex as the glass dug into the flesh of his face, the way his eyes dripped red from behind closed lids.]
[You did this, Jay Merrick. You did this to him.]