Shattered: Chapter Eleven

The first thing he registered was the screaming pain.  He moaned.  It only got worse.

There was a pinch at his arm.  The pain subsided.

Blinking his heavy-lidded eyes, Gackt returned to consciousness.  Above him was a plain ceiling.  It was white, which meant it was a nice ceiling.  Warily, he turned his head to the side to take in what he could see of his surroundings.

A man in a dress suit and sunglasses sat in a chair against the wall.  A nice chair.  He was reading a newspaper.  There were more men in suits talking on the other side of the room.  They hadn’t noticed he was awake yet.

Where’s Cha?

There was a buzz in his head which drowned out the hushed voices of the men in the room.  His eyes slipped shut again.

Darkness, then—

The crash!

Gackt’s eyes snapped open and he tried to sit up.  Gentle hands pressed him easily back into the bed.  “Don’t.  You need to rest.”

He looked up into the worried eyes of a woman he recognized.  “Ayumi…?”

She smiled softly and nodded.  Reaching a hand forward, she brushed dark strands of hair out of his face and he was soothed by her touch, but she stopped at the sound of footsteps and withdrew her hand.  Gackt turned his head.

“I’m sorry you had to come to us this way,” said the young man who towered over his prostrate form.  “It was a last resort, I assure you.”

“Who…”

“Who I am isn’t important.”

“Where’s Cha?”

“Fujimura-san…” the young man swallowed.  “Didn’t make it.  I’m sorry.”

Gackt was silent for a moment, then, “You’re lying.”

“What?”

“You’re lying.  He’s not dead.”

“Camui-san--”

“I would have known if he died, you see.”

“Gaku--”

He turned at the tone in Ayumi’s voice.  She looked sad.  Looking back at the young man, he pushed himself up off the bed into some semblance of a sitting position.  His head spun with the action, but he blinked a few times and shook his head to clear the spell.  Meeting the other man’s eyes again, he repeated.  “I would have known.  Unless you have proof…no.”

“What kind of proof?”

“A body.”

“Camui-san…there…there wasn’t a body salvageable.”

Gackt stopped at this.  “…what?”

Kneeling, the younger man withdrew an envelope from his suit jacket.  Taking the other’s shaking hands, he placed it between them, closing stiff fingers around it.  “That’s all the proof I can give you…because that’s all that’s left.”  Standing, he took a step back.  “I’m sorry.”

He watched them leave the room.  The envelope trembled in his hands.  Bending the flap up, he looked inside and a strangled, “Oh…” escaped his lips. 

Cha’s ring. 

It was proof enough.

*****

He sat among them.  But he wasn’t one of them. 

Every day they had a buffet served to them.  They ate.  But he didn’t.  He had refused politely at first, but the civilities were eventually dropped and he had quickly adopted a sneer and a dark look.  Nothing was every said.  Sometimes looks were exchanged between the others, but nothing was said.

Ayumi was getting worried.  Damn that woman.  He couldn’t hate her.  He couldn’t hate her because she was the most human among them.

He never asked her why she was there with them, why she bothered to make polite conversation, why she…joined them.  Glancing sidelong at the small woman, he decided he wouldn’t.  He suspected they all had their reasons, some good, some bad.  He just hoped hers was good.

“Gackt.”

He blinked slowly and suppressed a sigh.  “Yes, Tsuyoshi?”

“Why won’t you eat?”

The hall grew quiet.  Not silent, but quiet.

“I don’t want to.”

“But you’re as thin as a rail.”

He said nothing at first, only stared at the empty plate.  Those around them must have assumed he had decided to ignore the comment, but he could still feel the occasional look that made his skin crawl and raise the hair on the back of his neck.

“It’s poisoned.”

Now it was silent.

“It’s not poisoned Gackt--”

“It is.  You’re not affected only because you’re so used to ingesting it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This place will kill us.  They’ll kill us.”

“Gackt--”

“No!”  The chair toppled over backwards.  Dishes and glassware went flying, clattering to the floor.

The guards were on him in seconds.

*****

Back at his…house, his cell, his two rooms and a bath in the compound, he collapsed on the floor because his feet wouldn’t hold him up anymore.  With a groan, he shifted his weight back a bit and pulled the shoes from his feet to inspect the damage done after tonight’s “incident.” 

The bottoms of his feet were bleeding.  Most of the welts raised there by the tall man’s rod had opened under the pressure of walking from the disciplinary house to his own. 

Gackt bit his lip and tossed the shoes into the wall, smiling bitterly when they thudded against the painted plaster.  Lifting his left leg, he cradled the foot in his arms and squinted down at the wounds in the poor light.  His eyes were going on him, he decided, and gently deposited the leg back on the ground.

Rolling over onto his stomach, he inched his way into the other room.  Reaching up, he dragged himself on top of it to lay boneless on his stomach. 

He heard her come in.  “What do you want?”

She didn’t say anything.

“You want me to eat?  You want me to follow along?”

“I don’t want you to starve.  You’ll die if you keep this up--”

“Good.”

She couldn’t say anything.

So instead, she crawled onto the bed with him and held him until he fell asleep.

*****

The cane came down hard on his back.  He clenched his teeth.  He tightened his fists.  He closed his eyes.  The pain was less when he closed his eyes.

The cane came down again.  And again.  He’d lost count some time ago. 

Tell me again…what did I do wrong?  Because I can’t remember.

A tear slid from under dark lashes and Gackt prayed for the oblivion to take him faster than it did last time.

*****

“It’s how they get you to stay with them.  People run all the time, but they always come back.”

“Always?”

“Always.” 

Gackt realized the woman looked very old suddenly.  He was sure he wasn’t a pleasant sight either, but to see her so defeated… “Why do they take it?”

“It’s not a choice, Gaku.  It never is.”  There were tears in her eyes.  “Everyone is on something.  Kohta’s been taking PCP.  Shinya’s on Oxycontin.  Koichi has been doing cocaine for years. The list goes on and on--”

“What are you on?”

She didn’t answer for a time.  Breaking eye contact, she dropped her haunted gaze to the floor.  “Heroine.”

He stared for a time.  Recovering from his shock, he moved to sit beside her, wrapping his arms around her shaking form.  “Why?”

“Like I said, it’s not a choice.”

“Then…how…?”

“When…when they first brought me in…after Ami…I wouldn’t eat.  Wouldn’t sleep.  Like what you’re doing,” she laughed bitterly.  “They put me on an IV.  They doped me up.  Every night.  Until I wanted it.  Until I expected it.”  She looked up at him.  “And now I need it.  Because if I don’t have it…”  She smiled almost apologetically.  He grew quiet and moved way.  Crossing to the window, he watched dusk approach over the horizon.  Her worried gaze followed him.  “What’s wrong?”

“I’ve been taking sedatives.  I can never sleep…but I have such strange dreams when I take them…”

*****

The moment he burst out of the front door, the sirens went off (God forbid that anyone would want to escape from the lavish compounds the state had provided for the elite persons).  Gackt stood there a moment, in shock that he had been able to get this far.  The rain poured down, quickly drenching his white bedclothes, transforming them into a translucent second skin.  There were voices in the house behind him and they were enough to shake him from his reverie.

Bolting down the stone stairs, he ran across the courtyard, wincing and whimpering with every step as his bare, tortured feet pounded against the gravel walkway and onto the street.  Tears streaming down his face, he was driven by one thought: I have to get out.

As he approached the entrance to the compound, he could hear the voices and boots behind him. 

They were gaining. 

He had to get through the gate.  If he got through the gate, he’d be safe, he’d be free. 

But as the wrought iron and cement barricade loomed before him, he watched in mounting horror as the gate began to close.  No…  He pumped his legs harder – he could make it, he had to make it –

But the entrance closed, locking itself in place.  He cried out, his voice cracking as the futility of his flight finally dawned on him.  Slamming into the black gate, his legs gave out on him and he collapsed to the ground to lie on his side in the mud, the fingers of his right hand still curled around the twisting decorative vines.

There was no hope, he realized.  There was no hope, no escape, no freedom.

He was owned.

And there, cold, wet, and trembling in the mud, so painfully close to the outside world, Gackt’s spirit gave one last final gasp and died.

*****

“Guys!  Look at this!”

Gackt stood with other ‘sponsored’ idols, stone-faced, expounding upon the flawless plans the Union had in store for the next year.

“He’s on their side now.”

The group watched the television in silence for a moment.  Cha felt tears slide down his face.  “Gaku, what did they do to you…?”