FicWad

A/N: A few people had voted that this story should end at the 50th chapter. Actually I had originally intended for it to end here. I even mention that in the first author's note for this story -- I did not expect this to reach 100 chapters. When I had written the original "list of tortures", the truth is that it really ended at 49 because I couldn't decide what the last one would be. I had also originally intended for the chapters to only be updated once every few months, but so much for that.

It wasn't until recent months that I had then decided that the end of this story would be the end of my time as a fan fiction writer. Then again, I had said I was leaving quite a while ago -- with a grand finale that was never published, and which sits on my hard drive collecting cyber dust. But I think perhaps then, I felt that there was unfinished business. I am relatively certain that this story is that unfinished business. I couldn't leave until it had its ending.

I never expected the support that this story got -- which really started out as more of a joke than anything else. It was supposed to be funny, you see. Once in a while between my "serious stories", I would update this with some creative way to blatantly kick Gerard's ass for shits and giggles.

Yet, unrealistic and inconsistent as it was, I got feedback that people were really getting into this thing -- as did I. I once mused to someone that perhaps part of the reason I felt the need to brutalize Gerard was because of all the times I had stuck up for him against his own fans, all the online arguments I got into with the so called "MCRmy" -- and for what? Some man I didn't know, who probably was just some asshole? Some asshole that I would never really know, no matter how many times I met him? Even I became a little disturbed at myself after a while, which, as many of you know, led to the shutdown of my major blog.

Is it still a joke? Is the joke on me? I can't say for sure, but I was laughing as I wrote this chapter. One would argue, after all, that the punch line is all that matters. What matters in a joke is that the punch line gets someone to laugh.

Punch lines, however, only come in at the end of the joke. Despite everything, it did not take me until the very last minute to decide if number fifty would be that punch line.

To you, my fellow sadists. Whether you have given up on this (albeit slightly ridiculous) story a long time ago, or if you're still reading now -- thank you for the support.

50. The Feast

Gerard was agape at the man who stood before him, mask-less and exposed. It took him a moment to remember this face from the life of a thousand years ago, but when he finally did, the name slipped easily from his lips.

"Pedicone."

The bald drummer said nothing, and put a finger between his lips.

"Shhh... you have to be quiet." he said in a whisper. "I'll explain everything to you later, but Frank and an armed search party are waiting for us outside. We have to get out of here fast."

Gerard's face was still frozen in his shock, but Pedicone had no patience to wait for him to recover. He bent down to the second tier, and for the first time, Gerard noticed a large box shaped object covered in a white blanket. Pedicone removed the white blanket and unveiled a box that was similar to the one that they had brought the corpse in with days before. Pedicone dragged the box near Gerard's bed, and opened it to reveal that it was empty.

"I'll be taking you out in this." he muttered. "I poked a couple of holes in it so you can breathe."

Again without waiting for a response, Pedione lifted Gerard -- one arm behind the legs, and the other behind his neck -- and lowered him gently inside. Gerard was able to fit almost comfortably, aside from the fact that the walls of it were cold and metallic. Pedicone grabbed the blanket that had covered the box and threw it in with Gerard.

The last thing he said to him before he closed the lid was, "Don't make a sound."

He was submerged in partial darkness for eternity. Gerard thought he could hear Pedicone speaking, but it was too muffled to understand. Nor could he ask for clarification, because, evidently, he was expected to be quiet. After a while, Gerard felt the box begin to move -- and his heartbeat escalated with immense rapidity.

A million questions buzzed in his mind, and silence seemed utterly impossible. But he had no other choice --- occasionally, Gerard thought he could hear the footsteps of others mingling with the footsteps that were Pedicone's. More talk, still muffled. Who was Pedicone talking to?

Was this another trick? Some elaborate hoax from the blackbirds?

Gerard was left to soak in his paranoia for quite some time. There were moments where the box seemed to come to a complete stop, and Gerard would either presume that they've reached their destination or have been caught, but the box would only resume again after a few heart stopping moments.

And the last time they stopped, Gerard heard an extremely loud bang. He knew it as the unmistakable bang of gunfire.

There were more bangs. Gerard's mind went into hyperdrive. Should he look up and peer out at what was happening? Would he make things worse? Was he really going to risk lying there while Pedicone was gunned to death?

The gunfire became more rapid. There seemed to be multiple guns, and some muffled screams. Gerard knew that Pedicone would not be able to stand a chance against armed blackbirds, but at the same time, he could not possibly be of any help.

There was definitely a scuffle. And then, suddenly silence.
Gerard took a chance and placed his hand on the lid of the box, pushing it upward with all his strength. He just wanted to take a peek. Yet the moment the light met his eyes, another shot rang out.

"Gerard, jesus fucking christ!" he heard someone yell, but it didn't sound like Pedicone. He didn't recognize that voice.

He glimpsed other men, who were definitely not blackbirds. Or were they blackbirds out of uniform? Gerard wasn't sure, but he got very little opportunity to figure this out. A hand pushed down the lid and overpowered his own, causing the box to shut again.

There were two more shots fired. Then, in a way that caused Gerard become nauseous with panic, the box started moving again --- but whoever was pulling it now seemed to have broken out into a run.

Thundering footsteps like a stampede. He heard voices, still muffled but clearly shouting. He itched to open the lid and see what was happening, but he realized that another disobedience could cost someone's life. He waited until they stopped next, and even then, tried to suppress even the sound of his breathing.

Finally, the lid opened.

Something unfamiliar filled his vision. Something strange hit his skin. Gerard had to adjust his sight and sensation before he realized that what he was seeing was the night sky, and what he felt was the breeze. The wind penetrated his lungs, and he felt almost afraid of its strangeness.

"Gerard."

Gerard only then noticed the man standing above him, the big green eyes and the scorpion tattoo. He looked disheveled, and what looked like blood covered a good amount of his grey shirt.

"Gerard, do you remember me?"

Gerard would have ordinarily replied something snarky, such as "Of course I do, you fucktard." But he could only bring himself to nod his head.

Another man came to stand next to Frank, a lanky one with red hair and freckles. This man felt familiar, but Gerard could not recall who this one was specifically.

"We should really get the fuck out of here." said the red haired boy, or as Gerard named him, Red. Frank nodded his agreement, and bent down to lift up Gerard by the arms. With Frank's assistance, he got out of the box. Red used the blanket that was in it to wrap around Gerard's waist, covering his private parts.

Gerard could now see that they were in some sort of forest clearing, somewhere dark and chilling. His feet groped the grass below it, such a thing just as foreign to him as the sky. There were more people around him, presumably the armed search party that Pedicone had mentioned. Some of them had the same familiarity that Red had, while others he was sure he had never met.

"We're taking you to the hospital." Frank said as he helped Gerard walk over to a van he had just noticed. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Pedicone changing his shirt.

A navy blue van opened its' back doors to reveal a gurney waiting inside. A couple more men who had never seen before helped to bring the gurney down, and just before they loaded Gerard on, Frank pulled Gerard to him and hugged him tightly.

"I knew I was right." was all he said before the other two men took him and strapped him down. Gerard wanted to ask him what he meant by that, but they shut the doors on him before he could. And then he found himself in the same position he was in just moments before --- lying down in a moving box that was taking him god knows where.

He wasn't sure if he had black out, or perhaps fallen asleep, but next thing he knew, he seemed to be fading into a hospital room.

He couldn't comprehend it at first. His eyes kept expecting to see the dungeon of the blackbirds around him, and there were moments where the illusion of it flickered. So real, so sure. It would take him a long time to grasp the idea that he might be anywhere else.

Yet he looked to his side, and there was Mikey talking with a woman in a white coat, who held a clipboard in her hand.

"I think he's awake." he heard her say, and Mikey's head snapped to him so quickly, Gerard was surprised that it did not break in the process.

"Gee!" he scurried over, the doctor trailing behind him. "How are you feeling?"

How was he feeling? That was a good question. He looked down at himself, finding himself encased in a full body cast. Wires were attached to him in places he couldn't see, needles poking in on his hands. His physical state looked horrific, but he barely felt the pain. His head felt fuzzy --- he felt confused. He wasn't sure how he felt at all.

When Mikey just got a blank stare in return, he turned back to the woman in the white coat --- probably a doctor.

"He's been through a lot of trauma, it's not surprising that he might be in too much shock to speak." she explained, "After being imprisoned, it's going to take him a very long time for him to comprehend that he isn't back with his captors."

"Well what can we do about that?" asked Mikey.

"At the very least, he'll have to go through intensive therapy." the woman sighed, "That's if the damage is minimal --- but I have to warn you that your brother will never quite be the same again. You should be supportive, but don't expect him to come springing back into his old self anytime soon, if ever. I don't mean to scare you, but these kidnapping cases don't tend to end well. And considering how long he was taken for --- well, frankly, I'm surprised he's still alive."

The doctor walked away without another word, and closed the door behind her. Mikey turned to him with an apprehensive expression. He got out his phone.

"I'll let the other guys know your awake." he mumbled before he started dialing numbers.

Slowly, each face came to see him. Frank and his family, Ray and Christa, Jimmy and Chantal, Pedicone and Briana, Donna and Donald, Worm. Each visit was extremely brief, but people kept coming. The sound of the door constantly opening and closing was turning his stomach. A few had to leave because the room had gotten to packed, and eventually because Gerard began to panic somewhat. He was not sure what alarmed him so, but his heart rate was the first to scream its dismay through the beeping in the monitors.

Too many faces, too much confusion.

His visitors had seemed confused as well, upset almost. It was very unnerving how Ray in particular had looked at him as though viewing a ghost. It wasn't until much later that night, when only Mikey was left, that Gerard got even a word of explanation.

"I know you have a lot of questions."

No shit, Gerard felt like saying.

"Well, I guess I'll just start off with the obvious..." Mikey shifted in the seat next to his bed, his discomfort obvious. Gerard could tell from the state of his hair that he hadn't had a shower in a while. "Everyone thought you were dead."

He paused, searching Gerard's expression for some sort of reaction or perhaps awaiting a reply. "Actually, you've been legally dead for about a month now. There was even a memorial service planned for you this weekend."

Gerard cocked his head, and Mikey did not need for him to speak to know what he was asking.

"Yeah, I know what you're thinking. Missing persons don't get reported dead until their found... but... ummm...."

Gerard tried to give Mikey a look as though to say "out with it!", but it was clear that whatever Mikey had to say next was making him greatly uncomfortable. His eyes darted around the room as though looking at random objects would stall the moment. Finally, he sighed, looked down at his hands in his lap, and continued.

"Lindsey put in a request to the court to declare you officially dead --- to collect the life insurance. I -- I was furious, but everyone agreed with her. I think... I think everyone was just tired of looking at that point. You had been gone for over a year. Frank and I were the only ones who wanted to keep looking, but even our parents had given up. Everyone else just told us we were in denial and arranged to bury this empty coffin to put you and the case to rest. Everyone just wanted to get on with their lives... maybe because they were tired of having to be constantly reminded that you were gone. But... well..." Mikey's eyes met his, and Gerard could see a storm raging inside his irises. "...you sort of are my life. At least, a good amount of it. I just felt like... I couldn't move on... because without you, there would be nothing to move on to...."

Mikey began to cry at that point, tiny rivers dripping from his face. His body shuddered, he hiccuped and shook. But he still kept talking as though nothing were different.

"...and Frank, well Frank had his own life too, but he just didn't want to give up on you either. He said... he said he'd feel like he'd have failed you if we didn't at least find the body. But then that was where he and I differed. He jumped into action, and I sat around and moped. I think...maybe he had more of a grip than I did. I think that maybe I just didn't want to find a body, if there was one, so I just didn't look at all. But Frank wanted closure. He convinced Pedicone to come with them, and organized sort of a makeshift search party. Some of them were his friends, and some of them were our old friends. I didn't even know... until after they had left. I don't know if Frank even told me... I was too busy being fucking drunk all the time to even comprehend anything. But it wasn't until... until... Jamia told me where he had gone that I realized. And I couldn't believe she had allowed him to do it, I mean -- he was putting his life on the line for you. It sounded so stupidly dangerous. When I found out, I just hid in my house and sat around in self loathing. I didn't even bother to try to find them, to try and join them... because you know I would have fought for you. But I just.... I don't know... I don't know what I was scared of. And then last night, Frank called me and told me you were alive and.... and I yelled at him for trying to play some cruel joke on me...."

Mikey trailed off. He wasn't crying anymore, but his eyes look unfocused. He had become lost in his thoughts, in the regret and anger that he bled out with every teardrop that fell from his eyes. But he came back quickly, and continued in a controlled yet quiet voice. His expression looked apologetic.

"You'll have to ask Frank about the details of your rescue mission. As I just told you, I wasn't there, so I honestly don't know much about it. Actually, I wasn't supposed to tell you much of anything at all. I'm sorry... when I started talking, I really only intended to explain to you why Lindsey hadn't shown up today. I think... with you being found alive and all.... she might be in over her head with the life insurance and everything. I don't know much about her either... I haven't spoken to her since she announced her decision. That last encounter didn't end well. But don't get me wrong... before that, she had grieved quite a lot. Dr. Kenneth had to load her up on medications, so she could be fit to care for Bandit. Load of good that did..."

Mikey finally ceased speaking for the meantime, and Gerard spent the next hour letting everything sink in. Oddly enough, his initial thoughts were merely focused on what a hassle clearing the "deceased" label off of everything was going to be. He was not sure what to make of Lindsey's decision, but before he could gather much thoughts on it, painkillers lifted him up and flew him away on their soft, dark wings.

He was released to stay at Mikey's place, as it had become blatantly clear that Lindsey was intending to avoid him. Still, he knew she couldn't forever. He wanted to push her into coming, but for one, he was too weak to be demanding about anything, and number two, he knew she would never come until she was absolutely backed into a corner.

Life had to start all over again. He was given almost none of his old things, and had to be given a new cell phone, new wardrobe, and new laptop all at Mikey's expense. His diet was liquid only for a long time, because they didn't want to overload his stomach with heavier foods. And for the most part, Mikey kept him locked in his bedroom. He figured it might be best if Gerard didn't have any visitors anyway.

In addition to all this, Mikey was having a hard time taking care of Gerard because true to his own account -- he had become quite the drunk. With this new responsibility, he was trying to quit, but Gerard could see that he was too far drowned in alcohol to submerge anytime soon.

He was, however, not too drunk to help the other plan for a celebration that they were anticipating in Gerard's honor. They had decided it would be on the date that his memorial service should have been, for an added effect. November 5th, 2011.

"It's less of a party, more of a big dinner." Mikey told him as he helped Gerard decide of an outfit to wear. Gerard still had yet to speak, so he just pointed at things he liked. He wasn't really sure if it was that he couldn't speak, or if he just didn't want to -- but there was certainly no motive for him to do so. Not as far as he was concerned.

Still, even without his input, everything went as planned. Mikey spent the next few days making phone calls and sending emails. Alicia seemed less than interested in communicating with him. Gerard wasn't sure why, but he felt certain that she had grown a disdain for him in their time apart. He figured it might have something to do with the fact that her husband was an alcoholic again.

So until the night of the feast came, Gerard stayed in his room and watched television while trying to constantly remind himself that no one was going to come in and beat him.

"Are you ready?" Mikey asked him, inside his Honda Civic. Gerard nodded, despite his doubt that he ever would be ready.

He was taken out of the car, into the front lawn of the Toro household. He was already stripped of his body cast, and was able to walk on crutches then. Mikey supported him as they went to the Toro's doorstep, leaving a beautifully dressed Alicia to follow them.

They rang the doorbell, which swung open by Ray's hand. As though his home was a giant box containing cheers, howls of happiness flew out of the doorway the moment opened. Gerard peered inside to see rooms full of people, including his parents, craning their necks to stare at him.

Gerard had to take a moment to remember that he was clothed, and not naked like he had been for so long. He blushed none the less, and the sound of the door closing behind them made him jump.

Another thing, besides bodies of old friends, filled the household. It was a smell --- the smell of an assortment of foods. His mouth watered, his stomach growled, and Mikey led him closer and closer to the source of the smell. It grew in its intensity, and Gerard began to blatantly ignore all those who were clambering for his attention, nearly shoving them out of his way. At last, good food awaited him.

He was finally there, at the doorway that led to the dining room, when something made him stop. It was not the giant turkey, that lay among a wreath on the gigantic table. It was not the heaps of fluffy mashed potatoes, that were sitting aside bowls of hot gravy. It was not the golden skillet of elbow macaroni and cheese, nor the humongous legs of deeply fried chicken. It was the little girl that stood just beyond those things, and the haggard woman beside her that caused him to stop in his tracks.

"Gerard." she tried to smile at him, but he did not return it. To be fair however, he couldn't recall smiling at all since he had been rescued.

He stared at her, unsure of how to react. Yes, he had been anticipating seeing her again, but now that she was here, he realized that he had yet to decide whether or not it would be a happy reunion.

She came around the table slowly, as though approaching a feral cat. When she reached him, she wrapped her arms around him gently. She held him for some time, and Gerard even lifted one arm to hook around her.

But his eyes remained open, and they were glued on that little girl who was no longer as little as he remembered. For reasons probably misunderstood to Lindsey and perhaps the others, Gerard wept for the first time since he had returned.

From his mouth came pathetic, pained crieand stutters. They were the farthest thing from words, but they were sounds. They were a step forward. He heard a few people let out "aww"s, and he thought he heard someone else start to cry. Probably his mother.

Mikey had to step in and pull Gerard and Lindsey apart. He began to help Gerard assemble his dish, and the noisy chatter of the gathering resumed.

Gerard was not allowed to eat a lot of the dishes due to his prescribed diet. It was extremely hard not to have a bite of the double fudge brownies anyway, as he knew it was Christa's hand who made them. In fact, all of the food was homemade, and it was remarkable that Gerard could still tell who made what just by looking at it.

Once his plate was fixed, he wanted to go over to Lindsey and Bandit, but Frank, Ray, and Pedicone side swiped him before he could take even two steps towards where they sat.

"Hey man," Frank gave him an awkward half hug, trying to keep a beer and a plate held in either hand. "Sorry we haven't really visited you much, Mikey's been guarding you like a watchdog."

"You know how that is." Ray commented as he sipped his own beer. Gerard looked at the alcoholic beverages longingly. No therapy could give him the relief of a good buzz. Gerard just nodded instead, sighing a sigh that no one would ever understand.

They filled him in on stories about their mutual friends -- who had gotten married and who had gotten knocked up. Ray eventually left to go talk to Sarah, but they kept blabbering on about random subjects. Gerard was nearly about to walk away, however rudely, before they finally brought up a subject he cared about.

The rescue.

"So, get this, we're not supposed to tell you everything because of your mental state, right?" Pedicone said in a hushed voice, using his fingers as quotation marks when he said the words 'mental state'. "But we'll try to work around that as much as we can."

"We figured out where you were by tracing the video tape they had sent us." continued Frank, "It took a while, and we ended up in a lot of wrong locations at first, but we found it alright."

"Well we thought we found it," Pedicone intervened, "But we couldn't be sure unless we could get a visual on you --- and to do that, someone had to go inside."

"And that was a big conflict." Frank said pointedly, "We couldn't go strolling in either, so we had to observe what we could on the outside first. We watched the guards and took note of their schedules, tried to listen in on their conversations. Their location was in a very discreet, very bushy woodland -- which was great for hiding them and great from hiding us from them. We could observe them closely from behind high grass and trees."

"Once we had gotten a detailed record of their outer workings and routines," began Pedicone, "it was a matter of who was going to go inside and figure out the rest. We couldn't really reach a conclusion so..."

"...we took turns!" finished Frank with a grin. "Luckily, these people were not only anonymous to their prisoners, but anonymous to each other. The masks and gloves never came off. Jamia had to make us costumes and send them over at the motel that we stayed in nearby the site. They were pretty simple, so that part went well."

"But as we learned more, we realized that we couldn't get you out right away. These, um, men watched rooms regularly. We had to figure out a way that would distract them, but that would be subtle at the same time too. We weren't characters in an action movie, and we weren't about to go around throwing grenades in there. We tried communicating to you that we were here by giving you the book, but fucking Frank forgot to write the message in it!" Pedicone explained.

"You took it in before you were supposed to!" Frank retaliated "Anyway, you knowing we were there didn't do us much good. We still needed a way to shoo those people away. So we used the weapon that can bring any man to his knees.,." said Frank. "...Good food!"

At this, Gerard looked down at his own plate of food and realized that he had eaten very little of it. It must be cold by now, but he wanted to hear the end of Pedicone and Frank's accounts.

"Chinese food, to be exact."

And from the smirk on Pedicone's face, he knew that Gerard knew the exact point of the story that they had reached. The night the blackbirds put the chopsticks in his mouth -- Gerard could almost feel them still there --- Frank and them must have set up that feast as a diversion.

"Normally, the people there were served mystery mush and cafeteria quality kind of food. On the occasion that they were given decent food, it was cause for celebration. We had to create that occasion. It was really fucking expensive, ordering Chinese food for almost 100 people. And then we had to bring in two extra men to serve it in the dining hall. We didn't expect them to go in anywhere near your room that night..." Frank recalled, "It was our bad luck that they did. We almost called it off, but when they left, we still figured it was our best chance. Many of the guards were in the dining hall with the others, getting stuffed. It was Pedicone's luck that he had his turn that night, but we communicated via walkie talkie. We almost couldn't believe it ourselves when we heard that he finally had you."

"But the hard part wasn't over." Pedicone reminded them, "I mean I can't fucking tell you how nerve wracking the walk out of there was. Even when I wasn't meeting anyone, I felt like shitting bricks every fucking second of that! I was just like, what the fuck am I even doing here? Not that I didn't want to save you, of course, but like holy shit -- I'm not trained for this kind of thing at all! And then when I met that guy at the end there..."

Gerard must have made his cluelessness apparent, because Frank had to clarify.

"Pedicone met one guy towards the end, who questioned him about the box. Typically, those boxes were only used for dead bodies --- so its not weird to see someone walking around with one, but it probably did seem odd that Pedicone was leading one towards an exit in the middle of the night. They had specific people and specific schedules for body disposal. We heard him being cornered over the walkie talkie..."

"...I had to flip my finger over the on switch discreetly, because I couldn't exactly call for back up." Pedicone butted in.

"...right, and then we were like oh shit! Ya know?" Frank threw up his arms in a shocked expression. "So we had no choice but to run in, and shit hit the fan."

"Yeah, and then your dumb ass," Pedicone shot Gerard a dirty look, "Had to fucking peek out in the middle of it all even though I told you to stay put."

"Oh my god, I saw that! I was like, jesus christ!" Frank put his hand to his head in a distressed motion.

"Ah, but we're all clear now, ain't that right buddy?" Pedicone beamed, patting a hand on Gerard's back.

Gerard just nodded again, unsure how to express his more conflicted emotions. They already began to talk about other subjects, but Gerard's mind was still reeling with the information he had just received and the fact that, well, it didn't make much sense. Something didn't add up about their story. Not only the suspicious fact that they failed to give him any information as to what the hell that place actually was, or who those people were, but also the fact that Gerard had felt familiarities with the blackbirds even before the video tape they claimed had led them to him.

Or had that all been in his head?

They were now at a point of talking about a game called Twisted Metal, and so Gerard felt it more appropriate to finally make his way towards Bandit. As a way of saying excuse me, he simply gave Frank a goodbye pat on the shoulder. Frank either understood, or didn't care, because neither of them acknowledged his departure from the conversation.

He walked over to the female duo, who was perched on the couch. Bandit was dressed in a plaid dress that consisted of mainly red colors, and she had a matching hat and black shoes. In her hands were a cup of apple cider, which Gerard remember her loving since she was a baby. She looked up at him before he reached her, but her face showed no recognition. Only a polite smile.

His gaze transferred to Lindsey, who he could already see was watching him. She looked more haggard now, but her eyes and her smile held the same beauty that it always had. Once he was right in front of them, she scooted over close to Bandit, making room for him on her right side. He had hoped he could have a spot next to Bandit, but he picked up quickly on the fact that she was apprehensive about letting him close to Bandit just yet. He hated this notion, but as a parent, he understood.

Instead, Gerard just sat silently next to Lindsey, trying to take in what had changed with her since he was gone. Unfortunately, she was not as eager to fill him in as Pedicone and Frank had been. The only things he could gather was that she had dyed her hair black again, and she had been sleeping a lot less. But still, beautiful.

Without thinking, he leaned in for a kiss. He wasn't sure what he was expecting --- but she immediately put a hand on his face that stopped him. It was only then that he noticed a third change:

The ring on her finger was gone.

"...I'm not ready yet." was the only explanation she gave, lowering her voice so that Bandit didn't hear. Again he nodded, and again she hugged him. Yet this hug, nor the last, was nothing like the ones they used to share. Gerard reckoned he was hoping for those again.

Or was he perhaps too damaged to feel that way, no matter how "back to normal" things got?

He pondered this thought for the rest of the evening, even after Mikey took him home. He pondered it as he went to bed that night, and as he swallowed every pill in every bottle that the hospital had prescribed to him -- which was a very large assortment.

Mikey shouldn't have let him have his own room.

And so it was --- Gerard's heart went into a blitzkrieg of beats, and he flipped around and twitched and turned and he waited for everything to end, when at last.... at last....

Everything went black.

A sudden lurch of his body. Gerard crashed like he had been dropped from some extreme height, but had the luck to fall on a mattress. A mattress.

Gerard's eyes snapped open, and the smell of rotting things refilled his lungs.

He was back.

Another fucking dream.

He knew his recovery felt way too fast.

Gerard groaned as he turned over to his side, but in doing so caught a glimpse of the big, metallic door. The click of the lock most have woke him, because it was opening slowly. Three blackbirds flew in, the last one dragging with him a very basic looking barbecue pit.

"We figured you might be getting tired of those sandwiches." said one of them cheerily.

They stopped the barbecue pit next to them, and two of them worked on setting it up. Gerard felt heat radiating from it soon enough. The leftover blackbird leaned over him, and brought out a kitchen knife from his pocket.

"We'll were gon' do you a little favor." he said, and Gerard could tell that it was the same speaker of the last sentence. "Get him if he squirms."

The blackbird behind him nodded, and the one holding the knife proceeded. He pinched a part of Gerard's hip, exacted the knife right were the flesh stuck out, and began to saw through. Gerard bit down, but found himself too paralyzed to scream. He could see the blood that gushed out where they were cutting through him.

Once the blackbird had cut off that particular chunk of meat, he said the word "plate". Another blackbird then handed him one that they had brought in with the barbecue pit. The chunk of hip flesh was placed down on the plate, and blood became speckled over its whiteness. That same blackbird then pinched off some of his upper right leg, and repeated the same process.

After the barbecue pit was at a good heat, the other blackbirds began to assist with cutting off chunks of his flesh and putting it on the plate. Gerard did not find that he could regain his voice, but gripped the bed sheets instead. Soon, the plate was a good, gelatinous looking mound of fat and flesh --- and he was left looking like a woodshop project gone wrong.

Of course the pain of the cutting was horrible, but the sight of his own meat separated from him was making him even more sick. Plus having just woken from that dream... that very, very vivid dream...

Once they had a good mountain of flesh, and had cut him just enough to make it non fatal, one of them took the plate and brought it to the barbecue pit, pouring the mound onto the grill. They used a barbecue fork to move the meat around.

It did not take long for him to grill, surprisingly. In maybe fifteen or so minutes, they had some charred looking meat back on the plate, which now had a regular fork on it. They shoved the plate towards his face, and as he was still bleeding heavily from the knife wounds, they forced him to sit up.

"Eat it."

Feeling infinitely more hopeless than usual, Gerard grabbed the fork and ate the chunks of himself. He thought of the feast that he had just seen in his dream world, and he felt at least glad that he was getting hot food for once.

Next chapter: "Lie down in my arms, trust what you see; Smooth your brow, you will be with me, to find your relief...."

A.N (the sequel): Oh yeah! Credit to Rocket Dog and AnotherKnifeInMyHand for good old fashioned cannibalism! Om nom nom. :3