Youth

#56 - You Are Alone

Strong themes of torture in the first section of this chapter.  Read at your own risk.

    How unusual.  He'd been in this room many times — to have it used against him in this way was quite the surprise.  Nyais was chained up in his own basement, his own interrogatory devices lined up before him, but in the hands of another. 

    "Do you even know how to use those, Aytsa?" Nyais laughed bitterly.  Aytsa picked one of them up - it was a small black box-looking thing. 

    "This exudes an electrical current, doesn't it?" Aytsa questioned, waving it about a bit, before placing it down and picking up something else - a thin blade attached to two handles.  "This is for peeling off skin... wow Nyais, you have quite a collection of strange items.  I wonder who you've used them on," he giggled.  Nyais grimaced.  "What, are you ashamed?"  No answer greeted him.  He rolled his eyes, before picking up a scoop-like object and sniggering once more.

    "Is this what you used on Rayne?  For his eyes, I mean..." he smirked.  Nyais shook his head.  Aytsa frowned and placed it down.  "Did you always torture the people you liked?" he questioned.  Nyais narrowed his eyes.

    "I hate him."

    "Course ya do," Aytsa rolled his eyes, his lips still upturned, "so... you ever thought about using any of these on [Y/n]?" he mumbled.  Nyais rolled his eyes at the statement, not wanting to show weakness of emotion in front of Aytsa despite how much he wanted to scream at him for even thinking such a thing.

    "Don't confuse me for Rayne," Nyais laughed plainly.  "I'm nothing like him."

    "I wonder how your pain tolerances compare?" Aytsa smiled.  "Rayne says he didn't even scream when you removed his eyes."  Nyais couldn't stop the goosebumps that quickly spread across his skin at the mention of the incident.  Through everything that Nyais had done to him, Rayne hadn't cried or screamed once.  He'd stayed silent the whole time.  The guilt now ate away at Nyais for what he'd done — in a way, he realised how much he deserved what was happening to him now.  But why now of all times?  Why not when [Y/n] was safe...?

    "You'll be happy to know that mine is much lower than Rayne's," Nyais laughed dully, though the laugh turned into a small cough.  Aytsa raised a brow.

    "I find it funny how people cough when they're scared.  Have you ever noticed it?" he asked.  Nyais shook his head.  "I guess that makes sense... you're not very smart for King Regent, are you?"

    "Now that you boys know what King Regent means, you can't seem to stop throwing it about in every other sentence," Nyais rolled his eyes.

    "Well it's an interesting fact!" Aytsa grinned.  "I mean, if you're King Regent, then the King can't be all that great and mighty, can he?" Aytsa smiled.  "After all; I wouldn't say you're particularly strong."

    "You haven't fought me," Nyais shrugged.  "And if you're really using that as a way of determining how strong the king is, don't.  If I tried to fight Olli, I'd be dead within a second.  He's on a different level entirely," Nyais shrugged.

"What a shame," Aytsa pouted, shaking his head, before his eyes gleamed.  "Oh!  I just remembered something.  I found this when you were unconscious," he hummed, picking up a bucket.  "Look at it!  Isn't it cool?  When I first found it I was so confused... I thought 'I wonder what those spikes on the rim are for' and 'how come there's blood inside the bucket but not outside?'  Oh!  And why does it smell so weird?"  Aytsa placed the bucket down in front of him.  "Anyway, I took the bucket to Rayne because I was curious, and he told me that you put rats in it!"