Chapter Text
The booming sound of a Bully-Class tank firing somewhere close jerked Jack back awake.
Jack's head was hung low between his legs where he'd been left kneeling on the ground, wrists bound behind his back. They hadn't left an inch of his body unblemished, and holding this position for so long had been hell on the welts they left across his back during their interrogation.
He didn't know when exactly he fell asleep, but after all the torments his body had been put through in the last 48 hours... he wished he had slept longer. Maybe forever.
Inside the bag they shoved over his head once they were done with him, the air was too hot and smelled of stale. And vomit. And his own body odor; a mix of old body fluids, dirt and fear. Jack was used to it all by now. It was only more discomfort on top of an already impressive pile of it, and it just kept piling up.
His breathing was loud and labored inside the bag, and he gave up on keeping his eyes open when he realized that hard as he tried, there was nothing he could see of his surroundings through the thick fabric. His left eyelid was also swollen enough to hurt like a son of a bitch whenever he merely blinked, let alone keeping it open.
A tiny buzzing sound near his right ear announced the return of the most bloodthirsty mosquitoes Jack had ever encountered. He shook his head reflexively, trying to get rid of it. These little monsters almost made him grateful for the bag over his head, and the three-days-old clothes shielding him from their bites. His neck, however, had been their favorite spot ever since he'd set foot on the front.
He wished someone would give him a proper wash. And no, waterboarding didn't count — not if there was no soap involved.
Now that he was awake, Jack could feel his heartbeat again, except it was located right under the skin of his face. He couldn't help wincing at the unpleasant sensation, which in turn made all the cuts and bruises make themselves known again under the bandages they'd wrapped hastily over the worst of his head wounds, to stop the excessive bleeding.
Apparently they didn't want him to die from hemorrhage. At least, not yet. Not until they were finished with him.
There were also dry tear tracks on his cheeks, the salty streaks they'd left behind tugging at the skin whenever a small moan of pain would accidentally tumble out of his dry mouth.
Despite his situation, Jack didn't spare a single thought about how undignified he had to appear. How he had cried and begged them to stop. Faced with the fear of experiencing so much pain, any sane man would crumble just the same.
At least he hadn't given the bastards any fucking thing. Not a single piece of relevant information had passed his sealed lips. After being stripped from everything that still linked him to the human race, Jack had held onto the only source of dignity he'd had left — his unbreakable loyalty towards his Kingdom. They had tried to take this last part of him away, but they could never reduce him to a coward, or a traitor. The bastards from Gath would have to kill him first before they could wring any secrets from the one and only crown prince of Gilboa.
Jack had experienced mind-numbing terror, pain and humiliation at the hands of his captors, and the memory alone was enough to bring fresh tears to his eyes. Jack let them spill without shame, because what use was it to hide them here, where nobody could see? When he had restraints biting into the flesh of his wrists, and the coppery taste of blood in his mouth; when his trembling, aching body never let him forget his dire situation?
"You're not a boy anymore, Jack. Only boys cry and call for their mommies. You're a man, now — it's time you act like one."
Jack snorted at the memory of his father's words. They were always so vivid, the King's words. Always cut him so deep, where no one could see him bleed.
"Fuck you, dad."
It was only thanks to the knowledge that the King couldn't hear him that Jack had the courage to mutter those words in the relative quiet of the tent. The past couple of days, he'd braved death and Gath's torturers. It made him feel braver than he had felt in ages. At least, brave in his own imagination.
Another tank fired outside, tearing through the quiet of the night.
Jack knew it had to be way past nightfall since he couldn't hear the usual sounds of the day like the animated conversations outside his tent, the sounds of tanks and men moving around in formation and the occasional scuffles between soldiers. He also couldn't hear the distant voices of his own camp, on the opposite side of the battlefield. There, he knew, the men were crouching in the trenches in the dark, buried in dirt to their necks, everybody sharing stories of their lives back home to try and keep each other sane while they waited for the order to launch the attack, and go lay down their lives for their country.
So far, not a single squadron; hell, not even a single man had been able to breach the wall of Bullies. The men all fell under the synchronized fire of the deadly machines then scientists of Gath designed a couple of years ago, when Gilboa still stood a chance of winning this conflict between the two countries. Now, nothing was less certain than the outcome of the Long War.
Jack wasn't sure if they knew who he was, but judging by the fact that they had executed his men to the last and chose to keep him alive — the probabilities that they knew who they were dealing with were frighteningly high. And if they had known from the beginning, then whatever he did (or did not) tell his torturers, he'd eventually end up with a bullet between his eyes, just like the rest of his party did. After the assassination of the King of Gath's only heir to the throne, five years prior to this day, Jack suspected there would be no room for mercy once they were done "playing" with him. Between the two kingdoms it'd been "eye for eye and tooth for tooth" since the day they were both founded and the disputes over the borders had begun.
When he'd enrolled, Jack had never imagined he'd ever end up as a prisoner of war. It had sounded like something that could only happen to others — not him. Not to the Prince.
He had joined the Army mostly to impress his parents, and the obvious pride they had taken standing next to him during his announcement speech about what had once been his father's duty becoming his, and how it had now fallen upon him to protect this beautiful country from annihilation; that spark in his mother and his father's eyes when they'd looked at him had momentarily satiated the bottomless pit inside Jack's heart that was always starving for every scraps of recognition, and love.
Enrolling had also brought a lot of honorific titles to his name, too, and Jack couldn't deny the prospect of acquiring prestige by his own doing (and not only because he was born with it) hadn't had its own appeal, and hadn't weighed a lot in the balance when he'd made his decision.
But Jack had never once during his military service believed, not even for a single moment, that anything could happen to the crown prince. Even though his father had warned him beforehand of how rough his life at the front-line would become — "I hope it won't be anything you can't handle... will it?" — if anything, he'd believed that the Army would be the safest place for someone like him. After all, he'd be surrounded by the most capable men in the whole kingdom.
Then the Prince of Gath had been shot during his stay at one of the Royal family's safe-houses, the hit done in the most impressive (and highly secretive) way, and Jack's security detail that used to be made up of two of his father's agents had been brought up to five men and women constantly trailing after him. It had been a pain in the ass to have all his comings and goings immediately reported to the King, but for once Jack had kept his complaints at a minimum, fully aware that ever since that hit, he would be in danger of facing Gath's revenge everyday for the rest of his fucking life. Or, until Gilboa managed to defeat Gath and wipe their rival family from the face of the Earth.
All in all, Jack had never felt safer than the day his party (along with his security detail) had been caught in that ambush across the border, and all of his men had been killed in cold blood.
In this relative quiet, behind his tightly closed eyelids, Jack could still see their faces. Laughing, talking, living... and then, the next moment, they were all looking at him for orders, their eyes wide open in fear as the enemy, trice their number, was suddenly jumping out of the surrounding bushes or falling down from every tree, silent and inevitable like death itself.
His men had stood no chance. Jack could still picture their faces so well — but their names, however, were already becoming a blur. He'd just never been good at casual comradeship with people who he didn't need anything from, and who needed nothing from him in return. So he had always been respectful, but distant. He wasn't sure if he regretted that, now. After all the less you got attached, the less it hurt. Or so they said.
And then before Jack could even process what was happening, he'd been wrestled to the ground and rendered unconscious by a solid hit on the back of his head with probably the butt of someone's shotgun. He could still feel a dull pain where he knew he had to be sporting a bump the size of his fist, if not something worst.
Jack bit down on his tongue to contain the rush of emotions threatening to spill out of him like a force of nature. It was useless, though, and soon as his chin started quivering, there were hot tears spilling out of his eyes again, and well might he bite on his tongue till he was tasting blood, there was no more stopping all the anger and regret from rushing out of his body in every possible way, completely unstoppable.
His men shouldn't have died that day. And he shouldn't have been captured. They had sent reconnaissance drones on stealth missions all over the zone they were supposed to go through. They had been preparing this foray into enemy territory for months. Nothing should have gone this wrong.
The faces of his brothers in arms, if one could call them that, were suddenly replaced by the face of Silas Benjamin, and Jack's jaw tightened to the point that it hurt. Oh, he could picture his father's disappointment as he was informed of the news so well. His old face would contort so much he'd look like a wrinkled piece of parchment. He would then turn to his ministers and announce, with all the flourish and theatricality he had come to master through the years, "I guess we have to go save my incompetent moron of a son".
Above all else — maybe even above a painful and cowardly death — Jack dreaded his father's contempt, if they were ever to meet again. Jack had no doubt that a rescue party was already on its way, he was only unsure if they'd reach him on time.
But imagining the King's reception back in Shiloh... almost made him wish they'd be too late.
Jack had years of experience in putting up with his father's (and occasionally, his mother's) unrealistic expectations, and the subsequent letdown. But after all he'd been through, he wasn't sure if he'd survive yet another round of "we expected better from you" and "you're a disgrace to this country and the crown" and, even once, "sometimes I wonder why we even bothered having another child after your sister".
Proof that all his current bravery was nothing but an illusion, the mere memory was enough to have him sobbing silently inside his fucking bag all over again.
Fuck, but he wished he could be fucking done with the crying, already.
All of a sudden, there was a gust of cold air blowing by Jack's bare feet, and he heard a noise that sounded a lot like the entrance flap of the tent being violently opened. Jack's blood turned immediately cold with mind-numbing fear of the unknown, his heartbeat back to jack-hammering like it was trying to jump out of his chest.
The entrance flap made a soft thrashing sound, and then the peace and quiet was restored, as if nothing had happened.
Except Jack could now hear another loud panting over his own.
"Shit. Tell me you're still alive underneath that."