“Then I continue,” he says, and my pulse slows. Not calming… but dangerously.
“You hurt them anyway,” I whisper.
“Yes.”
“Then there’s no deal.” His smile disappears as his fingers twitch above another button.
“Wrong. The deal is how much.” He smirks, and I go still. He steps closer, licking his lips. “Bring her back willingly, and I stop the current sequences.”
“And after?” I ask.
“After, you stay at my side.”
My eyes narrow. “As what?”
“Handler,” he says, the word landing like rot. I look back at the screens. Jagger is holding her hand now, dragging her through the hall. Protecting her. Lucifer alone. Killian drowning in sound, and Axel missing. “You can save them from the worst of it,” he tells me, and I almost laugh. Because there is it—the hook. Not freedom. Not power. Mercy, only the poisoned version.
“You want me to betray them?” I ask, and he claps.
“I want you to choose the option with the fewest losses,” he answers.Same thing. Different suit.
On screen, Lolli stumbles and Jagger catches her. My hand tightens into a fist.
“You left once without saying goodbye. You’re good at surviving the cost of abandonment,” he says, his voice low. I turn my head slowly as the guard behind me tenses. Master D doesn’t. He’s either brave or stupid, or maybe he’s that sure of himself.
“You don’t know what that cost,” I say, and he smiles.
“No, but I know you paid it.”
I could kill him. The thought is clean… simple.Then every door locks. Every sequence continues. Every person on thosescreens gets worse. He knows it. I know it. That’s why he isn’t afraid. He doesn’t have to beat me. He just has to make the price of refusing too high. He reaches into his pocket and extends a small black keycard.
“Bring Lolli to room seven,” he orders, but I don’t take it. Not at first. The monitors keep moving. Keep hurting and reminding. Lucifer presses both hands to his head while Killian strains against the restraints. Jagger carries Lolli past a camera, eyes wild and doomed, but she looks up… right at the lens and, for one impossible second, it feels like she sees me. Not the camera. Me. Her lips move. Ghostboy. My chest goes tight and he sees that too. “Choose, Vincent,” he growls, and I look at the keycard, then at him, then at my friends.Friends… there’s the word. Ugly. Late. True.
I take the card, bringing a smile to Master D’s face. “Good.”
I step towards the door and the guards move aside ,but before I leave, the asshole has something else to say.
“One more thing,” he says, and I stop. “If you tell them about this arrangement, the deal ends.” He smiles as my fingers close around the keycard until the edge bites into my palm.
“And if I don’t come back?”
“Then they all go back to their rooms,” he says, the air shifting again. Everything is suddenly so still and quiet. “And Lolli goes somewhere even you won’t find.” I take a deep breath and look over my shoulder and watch how he stands among the monitors, surrounded by pain he arranged like art.
He thinks he has me. Maybe he does. For now. I open the door, step into the hallway while the keycard burns into my fist. The deal sits in my mouth like poison, but somewhere ahead, Lolli is waiting for someone real to find her. Too bad I’m walking toward her with a lie.
Rampage
Lolli-Gag
Jagger doesn’t hide quietly. He tries, but it only makes it worse. “Rampage,” I whisper, and his head snaps toward me. I giggle as he stands near the door with his shoulders pulled tight. His fists flex at his sides with every breath coming rough through his nose, like a raging bull. I giggle again.
“What is so funny, Little Riot?” he asks, and I step closer to him.
“Anyone ever tell you… you’re like a bull in a china shop?”
“Nooo…just you.” He chuckles, seeming to calm down a bit.
“Rampage. That’s what I’m going to call you,” I say, and he raises a brow, but I ignore him. The room he shoved us in is small. Shelves crowd the walls. Old sheets, cleaning bottles, and boxes with labels half peeled off. A broken mop bucket sits in the corner, which is the reason why the air smells like bleach and dust. Hillsboro’s favorite perfume.
