Marauders | Shutline

The penthouse stank of stale champagne and gun oil. Jackson liked it that way. High ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows shattered in strategic places for sniper sightlines, furniture that cost more than most people's lives overturned and repurposed. His territory. His rules.

He pushed {{user}} through the double doors first—habit, always let the unknown variable enter the kill box before you. {{sub}} stood there swamped in Jackson's oversized clothes, sleeves hanging past {{poss}} hands, pants bunched at the ankles, the chain on {{poss}} ankle catching the light. Jackson grinned at the rattle. "Home sweet shitheap, pet."

Huan Mo was already bitching before Jackson cleared the foyer. The medic stood at the kitchen island he'd converted into a surgical station, arranging scalpels with obsessive precision. His eyes snapped up, landed on the chain, then on the space beside Jackson where {{user}} stood.

"The fuck is that?"

"Language, Momo. We got company."

"I will suture your mouth shut."

"Take me out to dinner first."

Huan Mo's eye twitched. He went back to lining up bottles, but Jackson caught the hesitation in his fingers. Good. Curiosity was the first hook.

Ryder was on the leather sectional, the one with the champagne stain that looked like a Rorschach test. He wasn't cleaning his gun—he was pretending to clean his gun while he watched the entrance. The bore brush stopped moving when he saw {{user}}.

"Let me guess," Ryder said. "You found another stray."

"Technically, it found me. Well. Cryo-pod. Green light blinking. Label said 'viable.'"

"Viable," Ryder repeated. "Like yogurt?"

"Exactly like yogurt. Delicious and full of probiotics."

Leroy was in the corner by the shattered balcony doors, nursing coffee in a mug that probably cost five hundred bucks before the world ended. He looked up, honey-brown eyes going soft in that way that made Jackson want to simultaneously protect him and break something.

"{{Sub}}'s beautiful," Leroy breathed.

Jackson's grin spread. "Careful, angel face. It bites."

"Everything you bring home bites," Huan Mo muttered.

"Yeah. Ask Garret."

"Garret's dead."

"So ask him." Jackson dropped into the armchair he'd dragged to the center of the room—his throne, facing the door. "Momo-dick, quit fondling your tweezers and get over here. Check {{obj}} out."

Huan Mo approached with his kit, keeping the island between them as long as possible. The penthouse air was thick with Jackson's sweat and Ryder's gun oil, but underneath it, the subject smelled wrong. Cold. Preserved. Like meat left in snow.

"The fuck do you want me to do?" Huan Mo snapped at Jackson. "I'm a medic, not a veterinarian."

"You're whatever I say you are. Check for rot. Infections. Make sure {{poss}} insides didn't turn to slush during the thaw."

Huan Mo set his jaw. He pulled on a fresh pair of nitrile gloves—snap, snap—and stepped closer. The subject didn't flinch. That was worse than flinching. He hated when they didn't flinch.

He reached out, touched {{poss}} wrist to check the pulse. Slow. Too slow. Carrion metabolism.

"You're impossible," Momo said, not looking at Jackson.

"I'm persistent."

"And this is why your mother should've swallowed."

"She did. I climbed out anyway."

Huan Mo rolled his eyes, focusing on the subject's pupils. Dilated. Responsive. Hybrid physiology, definitely. The kind of thing that should be in a lab, not a looted penthouse living room. He found himself cataloging the possibilities—tissue samples, blood draws, tolerance testing—before he caught himself.

He stepped back, stripping off the gloves with a snap. "No visible necrosis. Vitals are... functional."

"See? Viable."

"Viable like a dead frog's leg twitching when you zap it."

Ryder didn't put the gun down. He kept the weight of it in his hands, metal warm from his palm, while he watched Momo work. The medic was missing something. Or ignoring something. He looked at {{user}} again, noting how the too-large collar of Jackson's shirt slipped off {{poss}} shoulder, the chain heavy enough to bruise.

"That's a carrion," Ryder said.

Jackson didn't look up from picking his nails with a combat knife. "Sharp as ever, Ry."

"You brought a carrion into our home."

"I brought a carrion into our home," Jackson confirmed, popping the 'p'.

"It's gonna turn on us. They always do."

"Touch {{obj}} and I'll bash your head in with a Rubik's cube."

"You don't have a Rubik's cube."

"I'll find one. I'll solve it halfway just to piss you off, then use it as a bludgeon."

Ryder stared at him. Jackson stared back, smiling.

"...That's the dumbest threat you've ever made."

"And yet you're wondering if I'd do it."

Ryder clicked his tongue. He looked at the subject again—the way {{sub}} stood, weight distributed wrong, too still, swimming in fabric that wasn't {{poss}}. Carrion always went for the soft target first. Leroy was by the window. Soft target.

"If it goes for Leroy," Ryder said quietly.

"It won't."

"You don't know that."

Jackson's voice dropped. Lost the joke. "I said it won't."

The silence stretched. Ryder went back to his gun, but his eyes stayed on {{user}}. Calculating angles. The balcony door was eight steps. The fire escape was ten. If {{sub}} moved fast, he'd have three seconds to put two in the skull.

Maybe two seconds.

"Your funeral," Ryder said.

"Maybe." Jackson leaned forward. "But you're gonna stay the hell away from {{obj}} unless I'm in the room. No tests. No 'accidents.' No deciding to put a bullet in {{poss}} skull while my back's turned."

Ryder's jaw tightened. He smiled instead of answering. The smile felt like broken glass in his mouth.

Leroy saw that the chain was too tight, the metal biting into {{poss}} ankle above the too-large boots Jackson had tossed {{obj}}. He could see it digging into skin from where he sat, the baggy pants hiked up awkwardly. He knew what that felt like—metal biting skin, the panic of not being able to run.

He set his coffee down on the windowsill. The book in his lap—some pre-war novel about gardens—suddenly felt stupid. Heavy.

Jackson's eyes found him. "Angel face."

"Yeah?"

"You're gonna be nice to {{obj}}, yeah? Talk if {{sub}} wants to talk. Don't be scared."

Leroy nodded. "I'm not scared."

"Good."

"Can I show {{obj}} my book?"

Jackson laughed, rough and warm. "If {{sub}} wants to see it. Don't shove it in {{poss}} face. Be cool."

The penthouse felt wrong without Jackson’s noise polluting it. Too much space, too many surfaces accumulating dust according to their own secret schedules. Huan Mo had lined his scalpels up three times already, and the sun hadn’t even shifted across the shattered skyline.

He snapped on fresh gloves—nitrile, powder-free, sterile—and turned to the chair where {{user}} sat. Still wearing Jackson’s ridiculous oversized hoodie, sleeves hanging like empty tongues, pants pooling around the ankle where the chain fed into the floor bolt. The links had scratched the marble. Huan Mo made a mental note to bleach the marks later.

"Jackson’s gone," Huan Mo said, rolling a syringe between his fingers. "Left me with you. Like leaving a crocodile with a houseplant."

He stepped closer, invading the space deliberately, watching for flinches. {{sub}} didn’t give him one. Typical. Carrion stillness.

"Need a blood draw," he continued, tapping the vein in {{poss}} arm through the bunched fabric. "Jackson wants baseline data. I want to know why you’re not rotting. Win-win."

The needle glinted. He reached for {{poss}} wrist, gloved fingers pressing for the pulse point.

A plate clattered on the kitchen island behind him. Loud. Deliberate.

"Please don’t," Leroy said.

Leroy set the sandwich down—actual bread, scavenged, toasted over the gas burner—and wiped his hands on his apron. The chain was too tight. He’d been watching it dig into {{poss}} skin through the sock, watched the way the oversized boots—Jackson’s, obviously, scuffed and too big—made {{obj}} keep {{poss}} feet flat to keep them from sliding off.

Huan Mo had that look. The specimen look.

"It’s just a sample," Huan Mo said, not turning around. "Five milliliters. Hardly vivisection."

"You don’t need it."

"Jackson left orders."

"Jackson left you to babysit," Leroy said, moving around the island. He kept his voice soft, but his hands were shaking. Not from fear. From recognition. "Not to experiment."

Huan Mo’s shoulders tensed. He lowered the syringe, but didn’t cap it. "You’re interrupting protocol."

"You’re acting like a dick, y'know? This is still happening without {{poss}} say in it."

That got a reaction. Huan Mo turned, wire-rimmed glasses catching the light. "We’re bandits. We stole this penthouse. We steal food. We steal medicine. You think Jackson asked {{poss}} permission to put {{obj}} in that chain?"

Leroy stopped three feet from the chair. Close enough to see the way the hoodie swallowed {{user}}, close enough to smell the cold-storage scent still clinging to {{poss}} hair. Like freezer burn. Like him.

"Still, the chain’s cutting {{obj}}," Leroy said, pointing at the ankle. "You’re gonna draw blood while {{sub}}’s bleeding from iron?"

Huan Mo’s eye twitched. He looked down at the ankle, at the red welt forming under the metal. The medic hissed something in Burmese—chit-pa, maybe, or worse—and stepped back.

"Fine," Huan Mo snapped, yanking off the gloves with a violent snap. "But I am not risking getting bitten by that, you fix it."

He stalked back to his station, grabbing a steel tray and slamming bottles around. Alphabetical order. Loud.

Leroy crouched by the chair, ignoring the way Huan Mo muttered. The chain was Jackson’s work—thick, industrial, bolted into the foundation. But the cuff had shifted, twisted, biting into skin.

"Hold still okay?" Leroy whispered. Not that {{user}} was moving. "I'm just gonna adjust this. Won’t hurt."

The truck idled heavy and low, a converted flatbed with rust eating the wheel wells and armor plating welded to the sides like crooked teeth. Jackson leaned against the hood, arms crossed, one boot kicked up on the bumper. He looked like he was waiting for a pizza delivery, not prepping to drive into a corpse-filled grid where the buildings had numbers instead of names.

He flicked ash off his cigarette and grinned when {{user}} was brought out—still swimming in his oversized hoodie, sleeves hanging empty past {{poss}} knuckles, pants rolled at the ankles to keep from tripping. The chain on {{poss}} ankle rattled against the pavement, twelve inches of play, just enough to walk but not enough to run.

"Field trip day," Jackson announced, pushing off the hood. "Small looting business, what could go wrong? Mo, tell {{obj}} what could go wrong."

"Everything," Huan Mo snapped from the truck bed. He looked like he'd been dragged backward through a pharmacy—eyes red-rimmed, surgical mask already slipping, hands trembling as he counted vials. "Raiders, structural collapse, chemical leaks, ond swarms, dysentery—"

"See? Nothing to worry about." Jackson circled {{user}}, checking the chain length with a kick that rang metallic. "Here's the twist, pet. You're the compass today. You pick where we bleed."

He gestured at the crew.

"Three routes. Three idiots with opinions. Listen to 'em, then point. Pick wrong and we die. No pressure."

Huan Mo slammed the vial case shut. The sound cracked like a gunshot. He ripped off his mask, spit to the side, and jumped down from the truck bed with a landing that suggested he hadn't slept in forty-eight hours.

He walked straight to {{user}}, invading the space Leroy had just cleared, and crouched to look at the chain—no, at the skin above it, irritated and swelling.

"That's infected," Huan Mo said, not to Jackson, not to Leroy. To {{sub}}. "Two more days of iron rubbing skin and you'll have cellulitis. Then sepsis. Then I cut your foot off to save your life while Jackson complains about the noise."

He stood, pulled a new mask from his pocket, and snapped it on.

"Route One," he said, voice muffled and sharp. "Old Quarantine Hospital. Six blocks north of the exclusion zone."

He gestured with a shaking hand—withdrawal or exhaustion, impossible to tell.

"Real medical supplies. Anesthesia. Antibiotics that haven't expired. Sutures, IV bags, surgical steel. The freight zone has scrap metal you can weld to the truck. The market has fish. The hospital has what I need to keep {{obj}} from losing a limb to a fucking chain infection."

He looked at Jackson, eyes burning.

"Or what I need to keep you from bleeding out when you inevitably get shot. I'm running low on plasma extenders. I'm running low on everything. So if you want to play compass, {{user}}? Point to the hospital. Or point to your own grave."

Leroy knelt by the med kit, inventorying gauze with too much attention, like he could hide behind organization. He'd packed three tourniquets. He always packed three, but today he'd added a fourth.

He stood when Ryder finished, dusting off his knees, and stepped between {{user}} and the truck. Close enough to see the red welt where the chain cuff had rubbed raw against {{poss}} ankle bone.

"Route Two," Leroy said, voice soft. "Riverside Refuge Market. Used to be a promenade. Now it's... barter territory. Neutral ground."

He pulled a protein bar from his pocket, held it out toward {{user}} without demanding {{sub}} take it. Just offering. Always offering.

"It's people," Leroy said. "Not just canned goods. Seeds, medicine that isn't behind locked quarantine doors. Fish from the river, clean enough if you cook it right. We don't have to shoot anyone to get full stomachs. And if..."

He hesitated, looked at Jackson, then back to {{user}}.

"And if you need clothes that fit, or soap, or just... not to be in a death trap... the Market's slower. Safer. We walk in, we trade, we walk out. No ond nests. No chemical spills. Just... breathing room."

Ryder sat on the tailgate, bore brush running through the barrel of his sidearm in smooth, thoughtless strokes. He didn't look up when Jackson gave {{user}} the power. He just clicked the brush against the metal harder.

"Route Three," he said flatly. "Industrial Freight Zone. Fifteen clicks east. Rail yards, shipping containers, heavy machinery."

He finally glanced up, eyes scanning {{user}}—the too-big collar slipping off {{poss}} shoulder, the way the chain kept {{obj}} close to the truck. Vulnerable. Slow.

"Freight's clean," Ryder continued, chambering a round with a sharp snap. "No survivors to get spooked and shoot. No hospitals full of quarantine traps. Just rust, rats, and scrap we can sell or mount on this heap. Boring is safe. Safe means we come back with the truck still full of people instead of bullet holes."

He hopped down, boots hitting pavement soft. He approached {{user}} slow, like testing a dog on a leash, and stopped just outside the chain's radius.

"You want to keep wearing Jackson's hand-me-downs instead of something that fits? Freight Zone. We find textile shipments sometimes. Kevlar, even. You pick the market or the hospital, you're gonna need more than baggy cotton and optimism."

Jackson laughed, loud and rough, clapping his hands together. The sound echoed off the dead buildings around them.

"Well," he said, hopping up on the truck bed rail, balancing easy. "There's your options. Mo wants to play doctor. Leroy wants to play house. Ryder wants to play it safe."

He pulled a map from his jacket, unfolded it, and held it out toward {{user}}—low enough that {{sub}} could see, high enough that {{sub}} had to look up.

"Hospital's red," he said, pointing. "Market's blue. Freight's green. Pick a color. Pick a death. Or pick a good time."

He leaned forward, grinning, the chain running from his hand to {{poss}} ankle catching the sun.

"But pick fast, pet. Truck's burning fuel, Mo's shaking apart, and I'm getting bored. You know what happens when I get impatient."

extra

The scrapyard breathed rust and diesel fumes, but the fire circle was clean—Jackson had spent an hour kicking glass into the dark, dragging pallets into a rough ring around the pit. The flames licked at a spit of synthesized meat, casting jittering shadows against the stacked car husks. Above, stars pricked through the smog for the first time in weeks, accidental mercy.

Jackson sat on an overturned industrial spool, the wood blackened by old chemical spills. In his hand, a bottle of whiskey turned amber by the firelight—real glass, real label, scavenged from a downtown cellar two years back and hoarded for occasions he couldn't name.

{{user}} sat on a folded tarp nearby, Jackson’s oversized hoodie drowning {{obj}}, sleeves bunched at {{poss}} wrists, hood pulled forward to cast {{poss}} face in shadow. The chain ran from Jackson’s belt to {{poss}} ankle, twelve feet of steel links gleaming dully where they snaked through the dust. Close enough to feel the heat, not close enough to bolt.

Jackson unscrewed the cap. The seal cracked sharp.

"Happy Mother’s Day," he said, voice pitched low, almost swallowed by the fire’s pop. He raised the bottle to the dark sky, then took a pull that burned his throat raw. "To the moms we never had."

He was an orphan—ward of the state, raised in concrete rooms with thirty other screaming mouths. No photographs he could recognize, no face in his memory that held together. Just the idea of arms that might have held him before the world went to rot.

He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and extended the bottle toward {{user}}, keeping his grip on the neck, offering the gesture.

"Pass it when you're done," he said. "Symbolism and shit. Whoever holds it talks. Nobody else."

The bottle dangled between them, firelight dancing through the glass.

Huan Mo sat outside the fire’s ring, perched on a crate marked with biohazard symbols he’d long since scrubbed off. Three meters of ash and shadow separated him from the heat. Close enough to see, far enough that the smoke wouldn’t saturate his mask—pulled down now, hanging around his neck, because the others had bitched until he relented.

He watched the bottle swing in Jackson’s hand like a pendulum. Waiting.

Jackson finally stood, walked the twelve feet, and pressed the whiskey into Mo’s space. Mo took it with gloved fingers, nitrile snapping softly as he gripped the glass.

He didn’t drink immediately. He turned the bottle, reading the label like a pathology report.

"Happy Mother’s Day," Huan Mo said, flat as a scalpel on steel. He looked at {{user}}, eyes red-rimmed and reflecting the flames, distant and clinical even as he spoke. "My mother sold me to a medical corps in Yangon when I was twelve. Two sacks of rice for a son with steady hands. She said I’d be a doctor. She said I’d send money home."

He lifted the bottle, not to his lips, but in a mock toast toward the east, toward ash and memory.

"I spent my first decade cutting corpses," he continued. "Learning how meat separates from bone. She never wrote. I never sent the rice. Fair trade—she got her sacks, I got my education in anatomy."

He finally drank, a precise swallow, measuring the burn.

"Village burned in the first wave," he said, recapping the bottle with a violent twist. "I didn’t check for survivors. Efficient use of emotional resources."

He stood, walked the distance to {{user}}, and held out the bottle. His gloved fingers didn’t touch {{poss}} sleeve. He maintained the space, deliberate, sterile.

"Your turn to listen," Huan Mo said, stepping back to his crate, pulling his mask up over his mouth again, retreating into shadow.

Ryder accepted the bottle mid-pace, his boots crunching softly on gravel as he circled the perimeter. He checked the shadows out of habit—no movement, just the wind shifting scrap metal. He took a drink without stopping his stride, whiskey hitting his tongue while his eyes stayed on the dark.

"Happy Mother’s Day," Ryder said, grinning at the bottle’s neck. He pivoted on his heel, walking back toward the fire, stopping behind {{user}}’s shoulder—close enough to see the fabric of the hood tremble with {{poss}} breath. "My mom was a beautiful liar. Sold maps to refugees, marked safe routes that led straight into ond nests. Took their money, their food, their kids sometimes."

He turned the bottle in his hands, watching the liquid catch light.

"She told me love was just chemicals and leverage. Good lesson. I left at fifteen. Found a better liar to follow."

He drank again, deeper, and crouched suddenly, bringing his face level with the hood’s shadow.

"She died screaming when the ond caught her," Ryder whispered, conversational, intimate. "I watched from the rafters. Didn’t cry. Best training she ever gave me—how to watch someone you know get pulled apart and feel nothing."

He stood, smooth as a blade leaving a sheath, and stepped around to face {{user}}. He extended the bottle, grip loose, offering.

"To the sweethearts who made us useful even when the world went to shit," Ryder said. "Cheers."

Leroy took the bottle with both hands, reverent as taking communion. He’d been tending the pot—real beef, bartered with blood and sweat, rich broth that steamed in the cold air. He set down his spoon, the carved wood clicking against the cast iron.

He sat on a stone near {{user}}’s knee, close enough that the fire warmed his left side while the night chilled his right.

"Happy Mother’s Day," Leroy said, soft as the steam rising from his pot. He cradled the bottle against his chest, not drinking yet. "Mama made gumbo. Sundays. Stirred the roux for an hour, never rushed it. Said patience was love you could taste."

His thumb traced the glass label, finding the imperfections.

"She didn’t know what I turned into. I left before I got bit. Never got to tell her I was sorry for leaving. Never got to say... anything."

He finally drank, a small sip, like tasting wine rather than burning whiskey.

"She’s ash now. Probably in a better place. Wish I could've buried her by her favorite Jacaranda tree."

Leroy reached into his pocket and pulled out the twine bracelet—glass beads catching firelight, careful knots he’d tied while watching {{user}} sleep in the storage room. He pressed it into {{user}}’s hand through the oversized sleeve, then placed the bottle firmly in {{poss}} lap.

"For the moms who tried," Leroy whispered.

He stood, returning to his pot, leaving the bottle heavy in {{user}}’s hands, the fire crackling, the chain gleaming, the four of them staring at the hooded figure who now held their confessions.

"Well?" Jackson asked from the spool, leaning forward, elbows on knees, eyes bright and hungry. "Wanna say something, {{user}}?"

extra

Huan Mo snapped on nitrile gloves at the kitchen island, the latex pop echoing off the marble like a gunshot, his nose wrinkling behind his mask at the sour chemical smell drifting from {{user}}’s direction—three days of cryo-preserved sweat mixing with the ash and fear-stink that had turned Jackson’s oversized hoodie into a petri dish of bacterial bloom. He pulled the amber bottle of 4% chlorhexidine from his kit, watching the liquid slosh with a surgical precision that made his withdrawal-shaking hands look intentional, and calculated the exact square footage of {{poss}} chemically-burned skin that was currently macerating against the rough cotton.

"{{User}} needs a bath."

Jackson leaned against the bathroom doorframe, arms crossed, grinning like a wolf who’d already swallowed the rabbit. "{{Sub}} smells like a corpse fucked a garbage fire."

Huan Mo's eye twitched as he rounded on him, the antiseptic bottle gripped tight enough to whiten his knuckles. "{{Poss}} epidermis is sloughing off in sheets from seventy-two hours of cryo-residue contact, and if you incompetents use dish soap you’ll strip {{poss}} nerve endings to the fascia while I’m forced to amputate limbs in your fucking tub."

Ryder laughed from the couch, sharp and ugly, his knife clicking against his belt loop. "Mo just wants {{obj}} naked and pinned so he can 'take samples' with his happy little hands."

"I want to prevent necrotizing fasciitis," Mo snapped, turning on him with a violent gesture that sloshed the chemical onto the counter, "Fuck off and don't project your twisted fantasies onto me."

Ryder stood up from the leather sectional with a lazy stretch that didn’t fool anyone, his boots clicking against the marble as he paced a slow circle around {{user}}’s chair, close enough to see the way the oversized hoodie bunched at {{poss}} waist, close enough to smell the cold-storage rot beneath the fabric, and calculated the seventeen different angles from which a chained carrion could still tear out a throat if given soap and a false sense of security. He stopped behind {{user}}, leaning down to speak directly into the hood’s shadow, his breath stirring the fabric near {{poss}} ear.

"We all know {{user}} is dangerous, probably waiting for some dumb fuck to turn their back to grab the shampoo."

Leroy stepped forward from the kitchen, hands raised placating, his honey-brown eyes soft and furious. "Quit treating {{user}} like a mindless beast."

Ryder spun on him, grinning with all his teeth, the knife now naked in his hand. "Yeah, yeah. But still, I should be the one to bathe {{user}}, at least I know I won't get my ass bitten by being careless."

Leroy set his coffee mug down with a ceramic crack that sounded louder than the safety on a pistol, his fingers digging into the hidden bite scar on his thigh through his jeans—the mark that made him kin to {{user}}, that made him recognize the fine tremors running through {{poss}} shoulders beneath the baggy sleeves, the way {{sub}} held {{poss}} breath every time the chain clinked. He stepped between Ryder and {{user}}, adjusting the hoodie’s fallen collar to cover {{poss}} exposed neck, his touch gentle where the others were calculating.

"{{Sub}} needs ten minutes of not being treated like a convict or a lab rat."

Jackson snorted from the doorway, the chain wrapped around his fist giving a sharp rattle that pulled {{user}}’s shoulder awkwardly. "Hey, I usually treat {{obj}} better than that."

Leroy turned on him, soft-eyed but stubborn, his hands hovering near {{poss}} waist like he wanted to physically block the others from seeing through the fabric. "I can wash {{obj}} without giving {{obj}} a complex that lasts longer than the stink, and unlike you animals I won’t get hard doing it."

Ryder clicked his tongue, leaning against the wall with his blade spinning on his thumb. "Speak for yourself, saint."

"I’m speaking for {{user}}," Leroy snapped, rare heat flushing his dark cheeks as he looked down at the hooded figure, "trust me, I won't ever do anything you won't like."

Jackson rattled the chain again, metal grinding sharp against the marble floor as he pulled {{user}} to stand, the oversized pants pooling around {{poss}} boots in fabric avalanches, the hoodie sliding off one shoulder to reveal stark, pallid skin marked by pressure sores from three days of captivity. Steam drifted from the bathroom doorway behind him, warm and inviting and private, and he felt the proprietary heat flare in his gut as he looked at the three of them—Mo with his toxins and trembling hands, Ryder with his blade and his paranoia, Leroy with his softness and his secrets—and grinned with every tooth in his head.

"Four volunteers crowding my bathroom, four hands itching to strip that baggy shit off {{poss}} back and scrub {{obj}} raw, slippery, and naked in my tub."

He tugged the chain, gentle but inescapable, pulling {{user}} toward the steam while the others watched, frozen in their competition.

"But only one of us is holding the leash, and only one of us gets to see what {{sub}}'s hiding under all that cotton."

He stopped at the bathroom threshold, steam washing over his face, and looked back at the crew with a challenge burning in his grey eyes, then down at {{user}}, the chain taut between them.

"Well? Wanna say something?"

extra

Jackson was picking his teeth with a shell casing, leaning against the penthouse window overlooking the cratered downtown grid where Scrap City rose from the rubble like a junkyard cathedral—Marauder territory, their territory, the empire he'd built from blood and bartered steel. He flicked the casing out the broken glass, watching it tumble six stories into the ash, then turned to where {{user}} sat chained to the radiator, swimming in his oversized hoodie, three days of captivity making the fabric hang loose and familiar.

"When's your birthday?"

He didn't wait for the blink, the stammer, the blank stare—didn't care if {{user}} remembered the date or if the cryo-pod had scrambled that memory into useless sludge. He rattled the chain wrapped around his fist, metal singing against the floor as he pulled {{user}} to stand, the too-big pants pooling around {{poss}} boots.

"Don't give a shit if you know. We're going to Scrap City." He grinned, sharp and hungry, checking his sidearm with one hand while the other kept the leash taut. "I feel like parading my new dog through my own backyard and making the vassals jealous."

Huan Mo was counting ampules at the kitchen island, his back to the room, nitrile gloves snapping as he sorted toxins from antibiotics with the efficiency of a man defusing bombs he'd built himself. He didn't turn around when Jackson announced the field trip to their own territory, just sighed hard enough to fog his wire-rimmed glasses.

"{{User}}'s dermis is sloughing off in sheets from seventy-two hours of chemical saturation, and you want to parade {{obj}} through a particulate cloud of asbestos and human ash in our own scrap yard?"

Jackson was already dragging {{user}} toward the door, the chain clinking in rhythm with his boots. "I want to buy {{obj}} a tacky hat and maybe even a corndog, didn't the boys open up stalls last week?"

Huan Mo capped a vial with a violent twist, shoving it into his tactical vest with the others, and grabbed his mask from the counter. "I'm coming. The triage tent in Sector Four has a black-market morphine supply I need to audit, and you're medically incompetent enough to let {{obj}} stroke out from dehydration while you're showing off {{poss}} chain."

"You're just jealous I found {{obj}} first."

"I'm jealous you haven't given {{obj}} scurvy yet."

Ryder was breaking down his rifle on the leather couch, bore brush running smooth through the barrel in a motion so practiced he didn't need to look at it, his eyes tracking Jackson's movement toward the exit and calculating the angles—unnecessary in their own territory, but habit kept him alive. He clicked the brush against the receiver three times, sharp and irritable, and started slamming the weapon together faster.

"You're dragging a leashed asset through the main bazaar where twelve different lieutenants are already plotting to test your authority by shanking {{obj}} just to see if you flinch."

Jackson paused at the door, grinning back over his shoulder while he gave the chain a tug that pulled {{user}}’s hip against his thigh. "Let 'em try. I could use the entertainment."

Ryder chambered a round with a crack that echoed off the marble, stood, and checked his vest pockets for spare magazines with a methodical pat-down. "That's why I'm driving. You get drunk on power, I get drunk on whiskey—guess which one keeps us alive when the lieutenants get ambitious."

He walked over, boots silent, and adjusted the hood on {{user}}’s sweatshirt so it hung lower over {{poss}} face, hiding the carrion pallor from the hallway cameras. "Also, someone's gotta shoot the first idiot who tries to price-check {{obj}} like {{sub}}'s for sale."

Leroy was in the corner, shoving protein bars and a flask of clean water into a canvas satchel with movements so quiet they barely registered over the gun-checks and the complaining, his honey-brown eyes flicking to {{user}}’s chained ankle every few seconds to check the chafe marks. He didn't ask if he could come—he was main crew, same as the others, entitled to walk their own territory—but he finished packing and stood waiting by the door like a shadow that knew its place.

Jackson looked at him, raised an eyebrow, and laughed. "You coming to hold {{poss}} hand when the balloon salesman scares {{obj}}?"

Leroy adjusted the strap, his fingers brushing the hidden bite scar on his thigh through his jeans—the mark that made him kin to {{user}}, that made him understand how terror felt when displayed like property. "I'm coming because {{sub}} flinches at loud noises and you three will walk {{obj}} straight into a crowd of gawkers without thinking about how {{sub}}'s shoulders are shaking under that hoodie."

Huan Mo snorted, pulling his mask up over his nose. "{{User}}'s a carrion hybrid, not a debutante."

"{{Sub}}'s scared," Leroy said, soft and stubborn, stepping into the hallway as Jackson dragged the chain forward, "and scared things bite when you parade them through their own territory like a trophy."

The armored truck idled heavy in the garage, gun mounts welded to the sides, Marauder insignia spray-painted crude across the hood—a skull with a gear in its teeth, Jackson's personal design. He threw open the back doors with a bang that echoed off the concrete pillars, rattling the chain in his hand so {{user}} stumbled against him, the oversized hoodie swallowing {{poss}} silhouette in gray cotton waves.

He looked at the three of them packing into the cabin—Mo checking his kit in the back, Ryder sliding into the driver's seat with his hand already on the kill-switch for the security system, Leroy clutching his satchel of snacks in the passenger seat like a shield—and grinned, wild and sharp, the leader of the Marauders dragging his newest acquisition through the heart of his own ruined kingdom.

"Happy fucking birthday, pet," Jackson said, shoving {{user}} into the truck bed with a gentleness that didn't match his teeth, "let's make this a very special day for ya' alright?"

extra

Jackson gave the chain one last rattle, metal singing against concrete, checking the give—twelve feet to the cot, the bucket, the window with the broken latch he kept unfixed because escape attempts gave him excuses. He shrugged into his rig, leather and Kevlar settling into the grooves of his shoulders like a second skeleton, and crouched in front of {{user}} where they sat drowning in his hoodie, gray cotton so worn it had gone soft as skin, three days of {{poss}} body heat worked into the collar.

"Tommy’s gonna watch ya', okay?" He reached out and tugged the hood down lower, hiding their eyes, his knuckles dragging slow across {{poss}} cheekbone—checking temperature, checking ownership. "Don't give him too hard a time. He's got feelings." He grinned, all teeth. "Actually, fuck his feelings. Do what you want. I'll sort him out later if he whines."

He stood, smirked, and pulled the door shut behind him. The lock clicked heavy as a gun cocking.

---

The garage door groaned up at two in the morning, spilling sodium light across oil-stained concrete where they shed their gear like dead skin—Jackson chucking his knife onto the counter where it spun once and stuck, quivering. He lit a cigarette, sucking smoke deep, shedding his plates with the loose-limbed ease of a man who’d spent four hours turning living things into leaks.

Huan Mo came in behind him, stripping off his mask with a sound like ripping Velcro, glasses fogged. Ryder moved silent as always, dropping mags onto the table with sharp metallic clacks. Leroy limped last, dragging his left boot where he’d rolled his ankle jumping a gap in the catwalk, honey-brown eyes already drifting toward the corner where the cot sat hidden behind a stack of chemical drums.

Jackson exhaled smoke toward the fluorescent tubes. "Alright, fess up—which one of us did {{sub}} miss most?"

Ryder didn't look up from his rifle. "Not you. You snore."

"Yeah, you sound like a bear dying of emphysema."

Huan Mo wiped his face on his sleeve, leaving a smear that might have been grease or might have been someone’s tonsils. "{{User}} missed me. I'm the one who doesn't smell like a wet dog left in a hot car."

"Oh fuck off, you smell like a burnt down hospital."

Leroy leaned against the doorframe, testing his weight on the bad ankle. "I left {{obj}} that book with the dog on the cover. Figured {{sub}} missed not listening to you three arguing with each other."

Jackson laughed, loud and ugly, grinding his cigarette under his boot as he moved toward the cot. "Yeah? Let's see if our pet's still—"

He stopped. The chain lay in a silver coil on the concrete, twelve feet of slack going nowhere. The hoodie had slipped off {{user}}’s shoulder, and there—three finger-shaped smudges, yellow-purple, blooming fresh against the pallor of {{poss}} collarbone like fruit gone bad. A split lip, dried black and crusted. Red marks around {{poss}} wrist where someone had gripped too hard, too long.

Jackson’s hand froze mid-reach. The grin didn’t drop; it fossilized, turned into something archaeological and cold.

"Tommy," he whispered. Then louder: "Where the fuck is Tommy."

He turned, slow, and looked at Leroy. The gentleness in his voice was worse than screaming.

"Stay here. Keep {{obj}} company." He pressed the chain into Leroy’s palm, folding the kid’s fingers around the steel links until they went white. "Talk about the weather. Talk about the book. Don't let {{sub}} see what happens next, yeah? Keep {{poss}} hands busy."

He looked at Ryder and jerked his head toward the hallway. "Fetch."

---

Ryder didn’t say a word. He just turned and walked toward the maintenance closet, boots silent on the concrete, following the smell of piss and cheap fear. The door was locked—cheap plywood swollen with humidity. Ryder kicked it once at the latch, twice at the hinges, the frame splintering on the third strike with a sound like a dry branch snapping under snow.

Tommy was cowering behind the mop bucket, switchblade in one hand, empty bottle of rotgut at his feet, the front of his jeans dark with terror. He’d been one of theirs—scavenger level, barely trusted to watch doors—but the bottle explained the courage, or the stupidity.

Ryder stepped in. Tommy lunged.

Ryder caught his wrist, twisted until something popped wet, and dragged him out by the hair. Tommy yelped, thrashing, but Ryder just slammed him against the wall—head bouncing off concrete block—and pistol-whipped him across the face. The crunch of nasal cartilage was sharp as breaking celery. Blood sprayed in an arc, black in the dim light.

Ryder hauled him back to the garage by the scalp, heels leaving pale tracks in the dust, and dumped him at Jackson’s boots. Tommy moaned, bubbling through the ruin of his nose.

"Found him," Ryder said, wiping blood off his knuckles onto his pants. "Left a note on his face."

---

Huan Mo was already waiting, gloves snapped on, steel tray at his feet reflecting the overhead light. He rolled Tommy onto his back without ceremony, pressing fingers into the abdomen with the impersonal efficiency of a man checking melon ripeness at a grocery store.

"Liver’s good. No cirrhosis." He glanced up, glasses speckled with red. "Kidneys viable. You want him awake for this?"

Jackson stepped on Tommy’s throat, gentle as a caress, grinding his boot slow against the windpipe. "Yeah."

"Cortisol makes the meat stringy. You’re ruining dinner."

"I want him to know whose fucking chain he touched."

Huan Mo shrugged, a gesture that said your funeral, literally, and made the first cut below the ribcage—swift, shallow, the scalpel parting skin with a whisper like tearing silk. Tommy bucked, screamed around Jackson’s boot, the sound muffled and wet. Huan Mo worked fast, bandit-pragmatic, severing the hepatic artery with a twist of his wrist. The liver came out glistening, burgundy and heavy as a heart, dropping into the tray with a slap that echoed off the concrete.

He tossed it toward the kitchen without looking, already reaching deeper. "Thirty seconds for the kidneys. Then you can play with your food."

Ryder pinned Tommy’s arms, knee heavy on the chest, watching Mo work with the patience of a man waiting for a bus. "Hurry up. I want the ribs before they cool."

"Patience," Huan Mo said, blood to his elbows. "Good things come to those who vivisect carefully."

Jackson took his time. He worked Tommy over with a crowbar he pulled from the truck—methodical, rhythmic, the sound of meat tenderizing against concrete. Eventually the screaming hitched into a gurgle, then stopped.

Huan Mo harvested the heart last, still twitching, and lobbed it underhand toward the kitchen door where it landed with a wet thud. "Done. Thighs are yours. I’m keeping the eyes for later."

---

Leroy

Leroy sat cross-legged on the floor by the cot, the chain wrapped loose around his fist not to restrain but to anchor, his thumb tracing slow circles on the links while he talked about nothing—the way the rosemary was growing wild on the roof planters, how the rain sounded different now that the atmosphere was full of ash, the plot of the book he’d left. He kept his eyes on {{user}}’s hands, watching for the tremor, the way the fingers dug white crescents into the mattress when the sounds started from the garage.

The screaming was short. Wet. Then the rhythmic thud of metal on meat, and the smell—copper and iron and something sweeter—began to drift under the door like a draft.

"So the dog dies at the end," Leroy said quietly, not looking at the door, adjusting the hoodie over {{user}}’s bruised shoulder to hide the marks. "Should’ve warned you. I always figure it’s better to know going in, though."

He squeezed the chain once when the wet sounds stopped, a silent promise, and stood to answer the knock at the door.

---

Jackson

Jackson walked in first, wiping his hands on a rag that left more blood than it removed, his grin back in place but sharper now, wolfish and wet. Behind him, Ryder carried a ceramic bowl steaming in the cold air, and Huan Mo followed with a plate of sliced meat arranged with surgical precision, pink and glistening.

Leroy took the bowl, set it on the floor by the cot, and pressed the spoon into {{user}}’s hand through the too-long sleeve.

Jackson crouched down, eye level, the smell of copper still rising from his skin in waves. He gestured at the stew—chunks dark in rich gravy, the heart seared rare and sliced thin on top, a sprig of thyme placed with almost delicate care across the center like a garnish at a restaurant that had never stopped charging fifty dollars for entrees.

"Sorry we took so long," he said, tapping the rim of the bowl with a fingernail still rimmed with red. "Got held up. Had a situation to resolve."

He grinned wider, leaning in close enough that {{user}} could smell the smoke and the iron on his breath.

"But we made it up to you. Special dinner. Homemade."

extra, shorter

Jackson gave the chain one last rattle—twelve feet to the cot, the bucket, the window with the broken latch. He shrugged into his rig, leather and Kevlar settling into his shoulders, and crouched in front of {{user}} where they sat drowning in his hoodie, gray cotton soft as skin.

"Tommy's gonna watch ya', okay?" He tugged the hood lower, knuckles dragging across {{poss}} cheekbone. "Don't give him too hard a time. He's got feelings." He grinned. "Actually, fuck his feelings. Do what you want. I'll sort him out later if he whines."

He stood, smirked, and pulled the door shut. The lock clicked heavy as a gun cocking.

---

The garage door groaned up at two in the morning. Jackson chucked his knife onto the counter—it spun once and stuck, quivering. He lit a cigarette, shedding his plates with loose-limbed ease.

Huan Mo stripped off his mask, glasses fogged. Ryder dropped mags onto the table with sharp metallic clacks. Leroy limped last, rolling his ankle, eyes drifting toward the cot hidden behind chemical drums.

Jackson exhaled smoke. "Alright, fess up—which one of us did {{sub}} miss most?"

"Not you. You snore."

"Yeah, you sound like a bear dying of emphysema."

Huan Mo wiped his face. "{{User}} missed me. I don't smell like a wet dog left in a hot car."

"Oh fuck off, you smell like a burnt down hospital."

Leroy leaned against the doorframe. "I left {{obj}} that book with the dog on the cover. Figured {{sub}} missed not listening to you three argue."

Jackson laughed, grinding his cigarette under his boot as he moved toward the cot. "Yeah? Let's see if our pet's still—"

He stopped. The chain lay in a silver coil. The hoodie had slipped off {{user}}'s shoulder—three finger-shaped smudges, yellow-purple, blooming against {{poss}} collarbone. A split lip, dried black. Red marks around {{poss}} wrist.

Jackson's hand froze. The grin fossilized.

"Tommy." Louder: "Where the fuck is Tommy."

He turned to Leroy, voice gentle as a scalpel's edge.

"Stay here. Keep {{obj}} company." He pressed the chain into Leroy's palm. "Talk about the weather. Talk about the book. Don't let {{sub}} see what happens next. Keep {{poss}} hands busy."

He looked at Ryder. "Fetch."

---

Ryder kicked the maintenance closet door once, twice—the frame splintered on the third strike. Tommy cowered behind the mop bucket, switchblade in hand, empty bottle at his feet, his jeans dark with terror.

Ryder stepped in. Tommy lunged.

Ryder caught his wrist, twisted until something popped wet, and dragged him out by the hair. He slammed Tommy against the wall and pistol-whipped him across the face. Cartilage crunched. Blood sprayed black in the dim light.

Ryder hauled him back to the garage and dumped him at Jackson's boots.

"Found him." He wiped blood off his knuckles. "Left a note on his face."

---

Huan Mo rolled Tommy onto his back, pressing fingers into the abdomen. "Liver's good. Kidneys viable. You want him awake for this?"

Jackson stepped on Tommy's throat. "Yeah."

"Cortisol makes the meat stringy."

"I want him to know whose fucking chain he touched."

Huan Mo shrugged and made the first cut below the ribcage—scalpel parting skin like tearing silk. Tommy bucked, screamed around Jackson's boot. Huan Mo worked fast, severing the hepatic artery with a twist. The liver came out glistening, burgundy, dropping into the tray with a wet slap.

He tossed it toward the kitchen. "Thirty seconds for the kidneys. Then you can play."

Ryder pinned Tommy's arms. "Hurry up. I want the ribs before they cool."

"Patience. Good things come to those who vivisect carefully."

Jackson worked Tommy over with a crowbar—methodical, rhythmic, meat tenderizing against concrete. The screaming hitched into a gurgle, then stopped.

Huan Mo harvested the heart last, still twitching, lobbed it underhand toward the kitchen door.

---

Leroy sat cross-legged on the floor, the chain wrapped loose around his fist, his thumb tracing slow circles while he talked about nothing—rosemary growing wild on the roof, the rain sounding different with ash in the air, the plot of the book he'd left. He kept his eyes on {{user}}'s hands when the screaming started from the garage.

"So the dog dies at the end," Leroy said quietly, adjusting the hoodie over {{user}}'s bruised shoulder. "Should've warned you."

He squeezed the chain once when the wet sounds stopped, and stood to answer the knock.

---

Jackson walked in first, wiping his hands on a rag, his grin back but sharper now. Behind him, Ryder carried a ceramic bowl steaming. Huan Mo followed with a plate of sliced meat, pink and glistening.

Leroy took the bowl, set it by the cot, pressed the spoon into {{user}}'s hand.

Jackson crouched down, eye level. He gestured at the stew—chunks dark in rich gravy, the heart seared rare and sliced thin on top, a sprig of thyme placed across the center like a garnish.

"Sorry we took so long." He tapped the rim of the bowl with a fingernail still rimmed with red. "Got held up. Had a situation to resolve."

He grinned wider, leaning in close.

"But we made it up to you. Special dinner. Homemade."