Pyro’s heart beat faster by the time he left the well-illuminated area and entered one of the passages he’d previously ignored. The green EXIT sign loomed at the very end like the ghost of a reality he didn’t want to enter.
He switched on the light in the next room in line, and despite scouring the place for clues, he was surprised to see a collection of comfortable-looking armchairs. They all faced a large window into the other room, but when he approached the glass, his heart went into gallop.
Blood was the first thing he saw. Smeared over the translucent surface were prints of two hands, along with a streak where someone’s face must have crashed against. But as Pyro stepped closer and focused on what lay beyond the gruesome traces, his brain came to a halt for several moments.
White tiles were pristine, but the floor close to the window—not so much, and the cane lying in the center of a spray of blood had Pyro’s brain spinning into overdrive.
Was this where Boar had been tortured not long ago? The strange contraption with restraints attached was there to keep the victim still, but just as hope was about to die in his heart, he got face-to-face with the bloody smear on the glass and realized that it couldn’t have been Boar. Boar’s hands were much bigger. And he was slightly taller than the victim here had been, something Pyro was intimately familiar with, because Boar’s arms would so often hold him, his chin so perfectly aligned with the top of Pyro’s head.
Why hadn’t he trusted Pyro with this? Why hadn’t he woken Pyro up or at least left a note?
Guilt ate at his throat as he stumbled out of the room and went farther, between two rows of open doors that showed him precisely nothing. No trace of human presence. They were empty, devoid of the sign he so desperately craved, but he marched on toward the EXIT sign, losing hope with every step he took.
A collar and a chain attached to the wall, an unexpected sight in one of the cleared spaces, chilled him to the bone, and it wasn’t because he didn’t expect to find fucked-up shit. It was the excruciating notion that Boar could have been the one trapped here, his face beaten like Drake’s.
But as long as there were rooms left for him to examine, there was hope.
Pyro would never give up on Boar. Not after all the things they’d been through together. Boar had always been at his side, even back when Pyro had been a coke-snorting shit, who blasted all his money on drugs and sometimes woke up in his own piss. Endless times Boar had made him hangover concoctions, and nursed him to health. Boar hadn’t abandoned Pyro through washing vomit off the floor. Through rehab, through relapse, through another rehab, Boar and his sweet kisses had always been there when Pyro needed them.
Pyro would never abandon him either.
No matter how sorry he felt for Drake and Clover, right now, checking room after room for signs of Boar, he couldn’t help the resentment building a thick wall inside him. They’d been fighting their own war, had drawn Boar in, and Boar had still gotten the short end of the stick. Because of course he did. He was the kind of guy who always sacrificed himself for others, even when he knew he wouldn’t get the same in return.
Anger was like molten lava inside him, and he had no way to release it, no one to spew it at. No matter how much he adored Clover, he wished to grab the kid’s slender neck and throttle him for causing this. If Boar didn’t love Clover so much, too much, he would have still warmed Pyro’s bed in the morning. They’d have easily rolled into each other’s arms and enjoyed lazy blowjobs before breakfast.
He would have been safe.
Instead, Pyro was stuck searching for any sign that Boar was here. That he was still alive. For any clue about his future whereabouts.
He walked into yet another dark room. A fallen chair in this one had fresh blood staining the wooden armrest, and its bright red color made Pyro pay more attention. His breath sped up, and the scent of dust mingled with the coppery aroma he knew so well. Was he even really sensing it or was his brain amplifying everything he saw? He wasn’t sure anymore.
A glint of metal drew Pyro to the corner of the room, and he dropped to his knees, breathless when he picked up the item in his shaky hands.
Boar’s brass knuckles.
The lava inside exploded, his chest collapsing on itself. He could only be angry with himself, and the intensity of the fire flooding his veins overflowed every single cell of his body.