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4. Blindfolding

Gerard was dying of hunger. A new plate of food had been brought to him. It was almost an exact replica of that last dish they had brought him. He knew he was going to give in sooner or later. His stomach pushed for it to happen sooner.

Gerard was still hoping someone would find him soon. Surely, they must be looking for him. Probably. Maybe? Worse came to worse, he still had a chance of breaking out of here. He'd fight his way out somehow. They were not going to take him alive. They were not going to destroy him.

He thought of all the days he had spent with Mikey as kids. They would alternate playing hero and villain. They would have little light saber fights and wrestling matches. Gerard would win most of the time.

Gerard constantly thought of different battle strategies for characters in his comic books. He always thought of ways to get them out of dangerous situations. He bragged about his horror movie collection. He had watched more horror movies than the entire band combined. Whenever they would pop one in, Gerard would throw in snide, know-it-all comments like "If THAT were ME...".

Why then, did the situation he was in seem so impossible? Really it was very simple. It was a plain room he knew nothing about. He was shackled to a bed with handcuffs. He was fed and healed, for what seems to be the sake of longevity. And every few hours, someone would come in to inflict unbearable pain on him.

Simple, right?

He settled with eating one bite of the sandwich. Just one bite. Therefore if it was poisoned or drugged, he would only get a tiny dose. It felt amazing sliding down his throat. He craved for another piece. Trying to maintain self control, he placed the sandwich back onto the plate and set the plate aside, making it a point to not look at it.

An indeterminable amount of time later, the door opened again. Gerard's heart dropped. He knew the healer had come just a few hours ago, as did the food bringer. So this must be another pain inflicter.

He hugged himself, as though that would help anything. Yet another ski masked man came to his side, and Gerard stared at his lap, unwilling to make eye contact. The man uncuffed his ankles, and soon after pointed a gun to his head. Gerard froze, afraid to even breathe.

A little back story as to why this was particularly bad: When Gerard had worked at a comic book store as a teenager, the store was broken into. It happened to have been his shift when they broke in. One of the men who did it held a gun to the back of his head, and he was forced to kneel on the floor execution style while his partner robbed the place. It had been an extremely traumatizing experience for him. Even seeing guns now brought back bad memories from that day.

So now that he was face to face with one once more, all the familiar symptoms of a panic attack were beginning to rise within. However the man had no patience for it.

"Put this around your eyes, and tie it tight." he ordered as he handed Gerard a plain black blindfold.

Gerard did as he was told, trying to remain calm. He put the blindfold over his eyes and tied the knot behind his back. However the sensation of blindness soon dawned upon him, and his feeling of panic increased tenfold.

He felt the man grab him by the collar of his shirt and throw him roughly on the ground.

"On your knees!" he commanded.

Oh god, not again.

He did as he was told, hoping the man would go easy on him if he was compliant. Not much he could do while he was blindfolded. He heard the man chuckle as he stood over him.

"Well if you're not going to eat your food, you aren't being cooperative. If you're not cooperative, we have no use for you."

The sound of a gun being cocked was heard.

"No! Please, I promise, I'll eat it..." Gerard begged. He was lying, but he was willing to do whatever would get this man to leave. The man seemed to ignore his pleas. Gerard felt the barrel of the gun caress his face playfully.

"I have 9 blanks.... and 1 bullet. Whose up for a solo game of Russian Roulette?" he laughed.

Moments later, the sound of a gunshot.

Gerard shut his eyes tight, despite already being blindfolded. His body tensed, although he was still shaking in his boots. Yet he felt nothing. The man seemed to have fired near him instead of at him.

There was a long silence. Then another shot. Again Gerard braced himself, and again nothing happened. Silence once more. It soon became clear that the man intended to drag this as long as it could go. Make Gerard sweat it out. It was psychological torture. And it was working.

Gerard's heart was pounding. Shortness of breath was gripping at him. He could feel himself perspire despite having not moved much at all. He wanted to vomit. Not being able to see was making it so much worse.

Another gunshot.

"PLEASE!" Gerard finally began to beg. "Please don't....I have a daughter... she needs me....please..."

The man laughed a hearty laugh. "No one needs you. No one is even looking for you. It's quite disappointing really. We thought you'd be worth some money, but it seems you're not worth a dime. Why else would we be disposing of you now?"

Gerard's heart dropped. Was it true? Was nobody searching for him?

He was scared out of his thoughts momentarily by another shot being fired. He fell back into them soon enough.

Wasn't at least Lindsey or Mikey looking? Or did they perhaps see this as a good thing? For the first time, the thought that he was really going to die here settled in. He fought back a sob. It wasn't fair. He was far from ready to die. If only he could just see everyone one last time. There were so many things he still had left to say to each one of them.

He thought about the things he still wanted to tell his wife or his brother. He thought about his last words. He over-thought a death that never came. It took Gerard quite a long time to realize that the man with the gun had left two hours ago.

Next chapter: "Romantic scent, spoiled Lucrece lies warm for you..."