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The Prey	By : amandalee Category: S through Z > Sherlock (BBC) > Sherlock (BBC) Views: 3756 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 1
Disclaimer: The authors do not claim ownership to Sherlock or any of its characters, and we make no money from writing this.

Chapter List
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A/N: Some more unpleasant imagery to follow. Sensitive people be warned, but if you've come this far and are still reading, we really needn't warn you. Thanks for the reviews, BTW!

Chapter 23

Sawtooth was furious. His eldest son's impetuousness had once again ruined things for him, this time by getting in the way of a clear shot. Now their prey had slipped out of their reach, and even worse, the plump piece of meat had managed to drag Three-finger with it.

Eyes darting back and forth among the rapids, he lumbered along the riverside, and he called for his son, keeping a sneaky sense of dread from just bubbling over. Panicking would do no good at present, but he also could not afford to lose Three-finger, his best on-foot hunter.

After all, how would he be able to eke out a living his family had been following for generations without help? Also... who the hell would look after One-Eye?

Sawtooth called out a second time, hoping perhaps a little naively that his eldest could hear his voice above the roaring din. Just as he thought he had lost him for good, he heard a splash far different from the current. A lumpy head popped up from the water and wiry arms clamped around a large rock in a grip of iron. The giant clan leader hurried as quickly as his cumbersome form could allow and stepped carefully onto the stones, arm outstretched to guide his waterlogged son onto dry land. Three-finger coughed and hacked up some river water but seemed otherwise unharmed. If anything, he seemed just as annoyed as his father that the plump Outsider had slipped from his grasp, and he picked up a stone within his reach and hurled it downriver.

No good being angry now, though. Sawtooth squeezed the smaller hunter's shoulder and tugged him backwards, nodding toward the trees. They still had one Outsider captive, and if they wanted to keep it, they could not dally, as Sawtooth was not sure just how long he could trust someone of One-Eye's intellect to look after their sole prisoner.

The pair headed back the way they had come, confident that the river would finish the job for them. There was no way the wounded, fat little man would escape the current. His body might be washed up on the bank further down the river or found floating by some Outsiders, perhaps tomorrow, in a week, or even a month, but there would be nothing on him that could possibly be tracked back to the clan. If anything, Sawtooth was sad to lose the meat. The plump one, if utilized to full extent, could have fed the three hunters for close to a fortnight.

Instead they had to make do with the scrawny whore. Sawtooth licked his row of serrated teeth and stomped toward his quarry.

***

Sherlock lay limp in the grasp of the huge oafish man-child, trying to force his senses to shut down and his mind to block out the vileness of his keeper. The creature's thick, muscular arms were wrapped around him so tightly that he could barely breathe, and the thing pressed his face against Sherlock's neck, nuzzling the short, curly strands of hair on his nape and inhaling the scent of his terror. At least the one-eyed degenerate had stopped tugging on the chain to the bear trap, which was still very much attached to the unfortunate detective's limb.

Sherlock wondered if the other two monsters had found John and hence killed him. He knew they were out to kill, not to capture, as they clearly had no interest in his friend besides turning him into meat. If John was brought back, it would be as a corpse.

Suddenly a wet, slobbering tongue reached out from the idiot's maw to lick the moisture and crusts of dried blood from his left cheek. Sherlock was utterly revolted by the gesture and writhed despite the pain it was bound to cause him. Predictably he cried out, his breath coming out as small, quick puffs.

Sherlock thought he might have blacked out from the pain, because the sudden presence of the man-child's relatives remained undetected by him until the giant leader stepped right into view. He growled and shoved the heavy oaf off of their quarry and was soon joined by the smallest, who closely inspected the leg which still sat in the grip of iron jaws. The scrawny madman was soaked through, clearly having gone into the distant river. John was not with them presently, but blood still decorated wet overalls. Sherlock's powers of deduction were beginning to suffer from his current state, and rational thoughts of reassurance made way for the awful fear that his best friend was now dead.

Never before had he wanted so badly to die. Trapped with these monsters with his one chance at rescue thwarted and the person he cared most for possibly gone for good, the detective saw no point in living on, especially if it meant only more agony and torment.

The sudden sensation of huge hands prying open the jaws of the trap made him scream, though the piercing sound did not seem to bother or surprise his captors whatsoever.

Sherlock tried not to struggle, as he knew it would only make his wounds worse and bring the loss of blood to a faster pace, but at the same time he feared the giant might lose his grip or sadistically let go, allowing the jaws to slam shut again.

The moment he had enough room to move his leg, he pulled it out of the bear trap. Would these primitive brutes even treat his injuries, or would they simply let him bleed out where he lay before taking him back to their cabin and to dismember him? At the moment, this outcome sounded preferable.

Sherlock tried to utilize his normally astute powers of observation to predict his captors' next course of action. It was not as simple as he was used to. His eyesight was becoming hazy and blurred, and his brain refused to work as the well-oiled machinery it was. Instead it now behaved like a clockwork struggling to operate despite sand being thrown into the gears.

The little madman was visibly fidgeting. Sherlock chalked it up to more than the creature's innate restlessness; how the three-fingered mountain man's hand returned over and over to touch the blade stored in a sheath by its belt only to let go the following second, as though catching itself doing something it shouldn't.

He still wants to kill me, Sherlock concluded. He wants to, but he won't dare go against the alpha, not after what happened. But why?

Sherlock prided himself on his ability to anticipate possibilities; something he had begun to develop from a very early age and come close to perfecting during his thirty-three years of life. Anticipating the human mind - a fickle organism - was decidedly more difficult, as one also had to take into account the volatile emotional factor: a driving force in most interpersonal relations.

These three, however, could not be predicted to behave even like the most capricious human. Sherlock had no idea what their motives were, apart from the obvious desire to fill their stomachs.

The sound of a belt being unbuckle reached beyond the detective's shocked haze and into his ears, and as he drowsily looked up, he saw the giant alpha had indeed removed a belt.

Of course, Sherlock realized, not with fear, but sad resignation. They had found him to be an ideal source of revolting sexual pleasure, and he would remain this to them until he eventually died.

A choked cry escaped him as his wounded leg was harshly seized and lifted. He looked again at his captors, expecting them to be removing more clothes and stroking themselves hard, but instead they were looping the belt (which was likely coated in decades' worth of grime) around the gouged and torn flesh. The leader tied the belt tight, and Sherlock briefly wondered if the improvised tourniquet would be so tight as to cut off all circulation in his foot. The detective's thought process did not go much further, as he finally began to sink into wonderful unconsciousness, though he perceived that he might have been picked up and thrown across a broad shoulder.

***

Sherlock drifted in and out of awareness as he was carried back to the cabin. His first moment of consciousness brought the odd sensation of bits of his hair being tugged on, and the deep-throated chuckles of the inbred madmen caused him to realize that he was being teased and played with by the mid-sized cannibal, who had become very fond of his dark curls. Sherlock passed out once more.

***

The next time he had some clear sense of his surroundings, however brief, was when the cabin door opened and the family entered, unceremoniously dumping their dazed captive onto the dilapidated, grubby mattress of one of the beds. One discernible thought flickered most prominently in both dreams and wakeful state of mind: John was dead.

He had known from the start that John's chances of survival on his own were slim, but not non-existent, and somewhere in his heart, Sherlock had nursed the most treacherous of feelings: hope. He should have foreseen the outcome and accepted it rather than giving in to hope. This pesky human emotion had earned him nothing but heartbreak in the past, and this time was no different.

Sherlock did not know exactly what time it was. The cabin was too dark to let in much sunlight, and the detective knew he had lost some time during his bouts of unconsciousness.

Early afternoon? Judging from shadow length at the time of John's and his attempted escape, it had been no later than eight but no earlier than seven-thirty. How many minutes - hours? - had passed since his recapture? Sherlock didn't know. He also no longer trusted his senses to provide his brain with the correct information.

He tried to objectively consider his chances of being rescued now that John was gone. The only person with knowledge of his whereabouts besides John was Mycroft, and his brother was worlds away. At least another thirty hours could be expected to pass before Mycroft would start making inquiries, and despite being accused of omniscience by some, Sherlock doubted even the elder Holmes could anticipate this.

He was drawn back to his miserable state of existence by the giant alpha's harsh voice barking out an unintelligible order to the small one. Though clearly still displeased about the situation, there was nothing defiant in the three-fingered maniac's body language. He returned to his father moments later with a battered, oil-stained cup containing some kind of liquid.

Sherlock's unending fog of despair immediately brought him to thoughts of improvised lubrication for further endeavors of violation, but as the cup came closer, he quickly perceived that this fluid was not nearly thick enough. His new suspicions were confirmed when the cup was all but shoved into his face. Water.

The family could have the distinct intention of poisoning him, but then their little toy would not last as long as they might like. These brutes were primeval, but they knew the basics of keeping someone alive. Pain was an entirely different matter, but if they wanted their victims to stay alive, they would at least try their bloody hardest to meet basic physical needs.

Sherlock was not entirely surprised at the bits of grime and dust floating in the water, but he cringed a little nonetheless, even though he likely had drunk fluids of similar quality during his drug use. He gulped the contents down greedily, trying to take as much as possible before the scrawny hunter decided to pull away.

If the clan was to be providing him drink, they would likely provide food, which was another concern. Would they give him anything of proper nutrition, or purposefully feed him garbage? If they gave him definite nutriment... it would almost definitely be meat. Sherlock was not at all looking forward to what kind.

He tried to remind himself that at least it would not be John's, as the inbred hicks had not brought a body with them when they came back for him. The amount of blood on the little one's overalls suggested a successful kill, but what had they done with his friend's remains? Dismembered him for easier disposal?

He also thought of Mary Morstan and whether she was still hanging upside down in the shed, naked, with her throat slit and glassy eyes, now clouded over, staring into vast nothingness. What had been the last thing Mary had seen? How long had she been alive after having her throat slit with a blunt, serrated knife? Sherlock knew that Mary had been alive when she was strung up and bled out like a pig slaughtered according to Kosher dietary laws, but he had purposely omitted sharing that information with his friend.

Finding her body had already sent the gentle doctor to the brink of mental collapse. Knowing she was tortured as well might have been a blow John could never recover from.

Although what difference did that make now? John was dead. His feelings no longer mattered. A corpse could be neither hurt nor comforted. Sherlock began to wish he were a corpse as well. Maybe if he wished hard enough, he could make it come true.

The raw pain in his leg and arm had abated to a less intense, pulsating ache, which was somewhat more manageable but nonetheless taxing on his systems. Clammy and trembling, he wondered how much more pain and blood loss he could take before finally passing out, perhaps for good.

What wouldn't I do for a shot of morphine, Sherlock thought wistfully. He fondly remembered the comforting haze brought on by the drug and how it slowed down the rapidly turning gears of his brain to a more controllable level. How he had craved it, the momentary relief it provided, and how his whole life had come to revolve around scoring the next fix.

An eight-week stay at an exclusive detox clinic arranged by Mycroft had cured his physical addiction to opiates, but Sherlock, who found a life without artificial stimulants increasingly dull, simply substituted one drug for another, and hence began his addiction to cocaine.

Hell, he'd even take cocaine at this point; anything to distract him from where he was now... but then again, it would make his perception of the situation much worse. He hardly wanted to be violated by one of these monsters with his awareness heightened at its absolute peak, heart pounding as though it could burst at any moment.

As he lay on the bed with his eyes shut, desperate to hide within his own personal world, his "mind palace", he felt rough hands jerking his wrists behind his head. To bind his hands, he predicted. Sure enough, he felt a rope looping around his forearms and attaching him to the bedpost. Sherlock briefly considered figuring out how to undo the knots when he was not being watched but decided he might as well not bother. Even if he managed to break free from his bonds, what then? Try to sneak away, out into the woods on a useless leg? He was just too tired, too disheartened, to care.

His last conscious thought was that he was tired and felt like sleeping. So he did.

TBC...
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The Prey