Work Text:
Belgrade had been a surprise.
When he had realised that the final piece of the puzzle was in Serbia, it had made sense. While the country had made a bid to join the European Union, it wasn’t yet fully aligned with the West. It wasn’t a full democracy, its citizens still being denied certain civil liberties. Moreover, he was at an age where the confict of the 1990s was still fresh in his mind. So he had expected to arrive in a stereotypical remnant of a Communist country, a caricature of some of the spy movies John loved so much.
So upon being taken to this dungeon, a dungeon, the first time, his immediate reaction was to laugh.
But before the pain and deprivation, there had been Belgrade.
Beautiful, vibrant, and filled with a lovely, welcoming people, most of whom spoke English well, the city had charmed him immediately. For the first time in the nearly two years he had been away, he felt he could breathe. He was at the end of it, finally, and a return to Baker Street felt like an inevitability more than an unachievable dream.
They’ve taken a break from hurting him and he lets his head drop lower, even if it increases the strain on his shoulders. There’s blood in his mouth again, so he parts his lips and lets the mess fall, thick ropey strands of bloody drool running down his chin. He’s past being disgusted.
He had allowed himself a whole hour one Saturday afternoon to sit on the ground against a pillar on Knez Mihailova Street so he could listen to the little violinist. He had wept the first time he had heard her, not so much for longing for his own instrument but that such a talent was busking for a handful of dinars when she deserved to be in a world-class music program.
He had probably spent too much time in such a public place that afternoon. Perhaps he’d been recognised from his time in Sofia. None of it mattered now. He was at the end, although he wasn’t certain he’d have the strength to escape a second time. It would be more difficult now that he was kept chained all the time, his arms spread so wide that he’d lost all feeling in them hours before. But he was fairly certain that if he placed his hands just so, a determined yank would dislocate the thumbs so he could slip through the shackles. Maybe. Well, it was a chance at least.
He’d been sad to leave Belgrade to go out to this installation in the middle of nowhere. It was good to be sad. It masked the fear as he formulated his plan. Get in, find the plans, get out. They’d caught him, but under estimated him. They had chased him through the forest. So much forest. How could such a small country have so much nothing? The woods were not his terrain and it was inevitable that they would catch him.
The fists are on him again. He groans, but does not cry out. In the flickering light, he pieces together what he’s overheard and what he’s deduced. Time in the navy. A love affair that ended badly. Why is he so unevenly shaved? Oh, no electricity in the bathroom. Grobar… what is grobar? It makes sense to the man who has been hitting him. The pain stops and there is just a dull ache, all over, before there is a hand in his hair, his head yanking up. Will the pain ever end? God, he’s tired of it all… There are words in his ear and he’s certain he should understand them, but they wash over him until only the important ones sink in.
He’s going home.