Chapter Text
Michael hissed, viciously clawing and biting at the bars of its cage with no effect. As low to the ground as it was, it could still see Gerard looking at it with an insulting amount of disbelief.
“That really worked, huh?” he asked and it hissed.
He had called for it from inside a building. Tired as it was, Michael had chosen to dislocate its elbows and crawl through the ventilation shaft instead of summoning a door and now- now it was trapped in a briefcase sized metal cage, the crisscross bars tightly spaced to get anything beyond a finger past them. Even its skull had to be bent to fit and all this- all because it had chosen to trust him!
It trashed against the cage, its body convulsing with the effort, but the cage was too small, too strong, and the space strangled any energy out of it, causing it to wheeze and gasp.
Gerard had deceived it, lured it into this trap under false pretenses- where had it heard that before?! It wanted to tear him apart, to make him pay for his betrayal, but it was too weak, too sick to do anything but snarl and spit.
Gerry sat down next to the cage, just beyond its reach, and it mangled itself trying to elongate its fingers. With a loud crack, it managed to reach for him but the muscles wouldn´t cooperate, struggling to wield any kind of force with how very thin they had to be to fit.
Gerry reached out and held onto its finger and it revolted, smashing itself against the sides of its cage until it was trembling with weakness. It wanted to strangle him but it couldn´t and Gerry held onto its finger until it could breathe again.
You´ve been ill for a while, Michael,” he mused and it growled as loud as it could. “Oh, don´t give me that, we both know it.” Gerard said, rubbing the joints of its finger and it trashed once more but the fight was drained out of it as quickly as it came. “You haven´t been getting any better. You´re not feeding, you´re not sleeping and you won´t talk about it. Whenever I do that, you tend to try and stop me.”
It growled, unable to quite stop to formulate words. Gerry seemed aware of this and paused, as though he was waiting for it to calm and Michael threw itself against the cage once more, with noticeably less energy.
No, this wasn´t working, this wasn´t working at all!
“Do you expect me to be grateful?!” it spat. “Do you expect me to roll over and go along with this like I don´t remember who you work for?!”
“Well… yeah.” He said and it groaned.
“God, this is ridiculous, Gerry. You know you won´t be able to help me and I won´t be able to trust you. Just let me go,”
“How are you really feeling?” he asked and it rolled its eyes.
The pain was excruciating. Every breath made it flare up, burning the spot where metal lay buried deep under its skin. The entry wound in its chest had healed over, but the bullet was still there, still lodged deep in its back, refusing to dissolve despite the impossible chemistry of its flesh. It still ached, making it dizzy and nauseous day after day after day.
“Shifting my insides to fit in here isn´t as pleasant as you might think,” it grumbled.
“Nauseous?” he asked and it didn´t answer. “What else?”
It shrugged, or tried to.
“Exhausted?” he asked and it couldn´t help but growl. It hadn´t lived for so long by showing weakness to traitors. “Alright. So, when did this all start?”
“Ugh, will you involve Gertrude if I don´t tell you?”
“Would you rather I keep you in a cage forever?”
“Yes, Gerry, I would,” it said and bit its lip. As much as it hated the current situation, Gertrude´s involvement would only make things more dangerous. It couldn´t even entertain taking that risk. “I got shot.” It admitted, curling up for the long haul.
“Shot…? A hunter?”
“I´m not sure, actually. Interesting bullet. It bled me passionless.”
“Did it burn?”
“There you go,” it mused. “If I wasn´t trapped in this stupid, asinine contraption, I might have patted you on the back for it.”
“What did you do to them?” he asked and it grumbled. “You never mentioned disliking their cult.”
“I don´t have to,” it claimed. “because nobody likes them! Talk about originality, they destroy good suffering before it can even flourish! They oppose creation and destruction alike- PROPER destruction, you know, where the thing you destroy exists? Nobody likes them, it´s just not possible.”
“What,” Gerard said, slowly. “did you do?”
“If they like burning so much,” it grumbled and, to its surprise, Gerard chuckled.
“You would,” he said. “but you wouldn´t leave witnesses. It’s more likely you ran into a hunter.”
Michael still remembered the encounter, although it refused to believe that hunters could disguise themselves well enough to resist wearing ripped jeans. The cult of the Lightless Flame, on the other hand- Not that it mattered.
“Why do you care?”
“You´re still useful,” he claimed and it could taste the lie.
“Am I? Am I really?”
Gerard looked like he wanted to speak but chose not to, which wasn´t reassuring but it wasn´t a lie. Michael could appreciate that.
“Let me go,” it said. “Don´t get involved in this. This won´t kill me, it can´t, you know that.”
“Oh, yes, apologies, let me just pop you out so you can suffer for another month,” Gerard mocked and it growled loudly. “Come on, it´ll be easier if you let me help.”
Michael frowned deeply before emitting a shrill enough sound to bring Gerard to his knees. He held onto his ears, his eyes wide in pain, utterly lucky that Michael had chosen to spare his eardrums.
“Let. Me. Go.” It said and sighed when it realized that Gerard´s ears were likely still ringing.
“Christ,” Gerard muttered. “Don´t do that.”
“Let me go!!”
“Sure, of course,” Gerard said and Michael let itself relax a little bit. Its trust in the man would never be the same but at least- wait, was he putting in earplugs?!
Michael screamed once again, pitching the sound even higher and louder until its throat ached and it was left breathless. Gerard covered, holding onto his ears but slowly recovered, much to its horror.
“I thought you might pull something like that,” he said, putting on sunglasses and fishing thick, leather falcon glove from his backpack. Michael trashed against the cage, squirming as Gerry lifted it up like a briefcase, his gloves too thick for its claws to pierce.
“DAMN IT!” it roared, lashing out even harder. “NO! YOU CAN´T DO THIS! I WON´T LET YOU!”
It writhed and hissed until its breathing grew ragged and even then, it continued, entirely driven by the faint taste of fear on Gerard at its perceived self-destruction. Still, he didn´t stop, carrying it out of the building and into the cold night. He avoided the paved roads where someone might hear it scream, dragging it into the forest instead.
Michael finally paused when the pain in its back got bad enough to make its head spin. It wheezed and whimpered, pressing against the steel bars with what little strength it had left.
“I trusted you!” it cried out. “You really think you can save me? You couldn´t do it last time. You were lucky that I ever trusted you at all, after last time.” It said and Gerry tensed. Idiot. “Gerry, I can barely breathe, you can hear that, can´t you?”
“You´ll live,”
“But I´ll hate you,” it whispered, trying to sound as fragile as it could. “Gerry, please, I want to trust you, you know that. We can- we can still fix all this, it doesn´t have to end here. We can still work together but you´d have to trust me. Trust me like I trusted you.”
Gerry only chuckled. “Couldn´t help yourself from adding that last part, huh?” he asked and it roared.
“TRAITOR!” it spat, slamming itself against the metal bars. “You think a cage will hold me forever? You’re a coward—a lying, deceitful coward! I should have killed you! Should have ripped your throat out when I had the chance!" Michael’s voice cracked, its throat raw from yelling. It could barely breathe, the pain in its chest flaring until it felt as though it was on fire, its thoughts melting into each other in a feverish haze. "You don’t care about helping me. You never did. You just want to control me, to keep me locked away! But I’ll get out, Gerard. I’ll find a way, and when I do…"
Its words faltered as a wave of dizziness swept over it. Michael’s body convulsed involuntarily, and it doubled over, gagging, though it was physically unable to throw up at all. Utterly depleted, Michael slumped against the metal, its vision darkening at the edges.
"You… " Michael’s voice was barely above whisper. "Why? Why did you do this to me?"
“You would have done the same for me.” Gerard answered, taking out his earplugs.
It didn´t have the strength to argue, instead, it simply lay there, curled up in its prison, too sick to do anything but wait for the pain to subside. It stared blankly out of its cage, watching the blur of darkness fade in and out of focus. The anger that had fueled it for so long was burning out, leaving it cold and horrifically alone. It didn´t have anyone but Gerard. He was the only one. The only one it had trusted and now it was left powerless against him because of it.
It hurt. It hadn´t realized it was even still alive enough to feel so heartbroken.
Why had it acted so docile? Why hadn´t it torn him to pieces, the first chance it got? Why had it gotten so addicted to being vulnerable around somebody so clearly untrustworthy? He worked under Gertrude, after all. It should have known.
Its attention was pulled away when it looked out of its cage and saw more buildings.
Buildings? Civilisation?
“Where are you taking me?” it asked, whirling around its cage, audibly breaking bones just to get a better angle. It saw a white building in the distance, something akin to a hospital. “What are you going to do to me?”
“Relax, I´m not going to hurt you, I-“ and Michael raged the moment it caught that taste.
“LIAR!” it yelled, its throat burning. “You really think you can pull that kind of thing with me?! You really think-“ He looked at it with cold, empty eyes and Michael fell silent.
Gerard didn´t utter a word, looking straight ahead and Michael felt lightheaded.
“No,” it muttered, clasping its hands around its head in a desperate attempt at finding calm. “That´s not what this is. That´s not happening.” And it chuckled before slamming itself hard enough into the cage to almost make Gerard trip. ”Will you look at me?!” it yelled, its voice trembling and Gerard did.
Michael couldn´t stop trembling.
“Those eyes,” it whispered, terrified. “Don´t look at me like that. Don´t look at me like you don´t care! You know me- You´re my Gerard, you´re still my Gerard, you can´t trick me!”
It stared at him with wide eyes, its heart beating hard enough to make its vision blur.
Gerard sighed.
He let its cage rest on the ground, kneeling down to look it in the eyes- a softer look. Michael let out a shuddering breath, its fingers clumsily reaching out of the cage and Gerard met it halfway, pressing his hand against the steel bars. It could rip into him right now but its fingers refused, clinging to him as it shivered in residual fear.
“You´re okay,” he assured it and Michael gave his hand a squeeze, trying desperately to convince itself of his lie. “You´re going to be okay.”
It nodded before pulling away and huddling up, willing to reward his foolish trust with a bit of silence and cooperation. It fell asleep the moment it closed its eyes.