Cadet Murphy

Cadet Calvin Murphy rolled over onto his back and used one arm to push himself half-sitting, with his legs stretched out between the cool white sheets. To his left, moonlight filtered in through the curtained window of the bedroom and glinted off of the handcuff which currently - not permanently, he hoped - held him to the bed. The Russian would be back soon.

The Russian wasn't actually Russian, of course - Cal had tried hard enough to understand phone conversation after phone conversation to know that much. Still, his first impression of the man had stuck in his mind, and now it was too difficult to change. And besides, calling him The Serb didn't have nearly the same ring to it. The Serb....the Russian. Yes, the latter definitely sounded more intimidating. And intimidating seemed to be exactly the word for the man...he was tall, towering almost half a foot over Cal's 5'7", and built like the kind of bodyguards Cal had seen before in movies - all sinewy muscle and unspoken threat. It was vastly different than Cal's look: short, un-sinewy somewhat-muscle, and very little threat unless you were terrified of young men who had done little to challenge themselves throughout the early stages of their life.

Cal exhaled and ran his free hand over his face. His mind was running in circles again, chasing its own tail to keep from going numb with boredom, or fear. And there was a lot to be afraid about. He had gone to sleep on the train, coming back to base after a visit home to see his parents, and had woken up, hands tied, in the back of a van headed north into the foothills of the Appalachian mountains. That had been terrifying enough itself; arriving at his destination had been worse.

The Russian had been on the train with him, he'd later realized. In the van, there had been him and three others - Cal had learned only two of their names. Drag, and Miljan, who had appeared to be in charge. When they had opened the van to take him inside, he had screamed and fought them as hard as he could, trying to wrench his bonds loose. Nothing worked. Miljan even laughed. Then he had been handcuffed inside an empty room and left there. A half an hour later, the Russian had come inside and explained to Cal just what was going on.

He'd started by asking about the pain - the discomfort, really, it had been at that point. Then he'd asked some seemingly random questions - about Cal's life, where he had been lately, what his life had been like. Cal had refused to answer, thinking that keeping personal details from them might give him some leverage. The Russian had simply shrugged at each question he refused to answer and moved on.

By the end of all the questioning, Cal was frustrated and so mad he wanted to break the handcuffs and kill the man with them. The Russian had seemed unperturbed by his anger; almost amused. At the end of all of it, he had walked over to Cal, reached one meaty hand down and stroked his head.
"You are a carrier, Cadet Murphy."
Cal had tasted bile in his throat. Denial had been automatic.
"No, I'm not."
The Russian shrugged again, as if it were really no business of his and withdrew his hand.
"You are. And I have claimed you."
Cal's eyes widened and he recoiled, half in shock and half in disgust.
"Claim - you can't claim someone who isn't changed!"
"You will change, soon. It has already begun."
Cal shook his head, seeing his opening.
"It hasn't. It won't. What if it doesn't?"
the Russian furrowed his brow.
"It will. I know you will change. The doctor will see you in an hour. He will tell us how soon it will complete."
"And what if you're wrong?" Cal asked desperately, feeling like he had slipped down a rabbit-hole. Things were changing at light-speed and his mind could barely keep up with the recalculations it would take to deal with the new situation as it arose.
What if the Russian was right? What if he was a carrier?
What if he wasn't?
Cal preferred to focus on the latter possibility. They would probably kill him, unfortunately - that was the only caveat to that blessed escape. He had seen too much, possibly. Yet he really hadn't seen much at all. Maybe he could fake the pain and then escape? Return to base?

The Russian's hand returning to his head made him look up again. This time, the fingers trailed across his short-cut hair and down his jawline to hold up his chin. The Russian looked him closely in the eyes.
"Ah, yes." he said, his expression relaxing. "It is in your eyes. The answer is always in the eyes."

~

Now it was two days later and his balls were two-thirds smaller in appearance, and so tender to the touch that the Russian had doubled the dosage of his pain medication. Without the injections, it was painful to even move. He would have to wait at least until the change had completed before he could escape.
Cal scoffed at himself and fell back to a laid-down position. Escape. Right. His training told him to at least try it; his captain would have expected no less. But escape where? To who?
The danger was inside him. It could not be run from.
Outside the door, the sound of boots pacing on a wood floor echoed, and Cal briefly thought about calling to the guard to ask for the bathroom. It would be a nice change of pace just to see someone and get out of this bed, maybe have a conversation. The guards never spoke to him anyway, though, so it wasn't as if the bathroom request would exactly sate his need for human interaction.

He'd tried to talk to one of the guards one time, succeeding only because he had asked him questions relentlessly, through the door, for a half an hour until the man finally caved and answered him with one short response.
"Bos." he had said, in a lighter version of the others' peculiar accent, "You belong to Bos. You have questions, you ask Bos."

It had taken Cal an entire day to figure out that Bos was the man's name and not his title. Although perhaps it could double. People seemed to listen to him attentively - at least the underlings did. Drag did. The others he had met, Miljan and Yavisk, seemed to outrank him. Cal repeated their names in his head, memorizing the information that he would give when he finally escaped from here.
There it was again. That stupid false hope. But he owed it to himself, didn't he? He was a soldier, after all. No longer helpless; no longer a boy. He had, at least, to try.
But concession seemed so easy. And it seemed easier with each passing hour of silence, of wind blowing and sun rising and setting outside his only window. The room was lush - could life be this nice? Cal's family had barely kept it together through the wartimes, and he knew they were in the majority. The house (or as much of it as he'd seen when he was being moved from room to room) looked wealthy. The bed he was in was a huge, welded steel frame with a mattress softer than anything Cal had ever slept on before. There were long curtains, tapestries on every wall, and gleaming white tile in the bathroom, as well as a tub that could fit two or three. It was a far cry different from one uncle and three boys with barely enough food.

Bos was also not an unkind keeper, but Cal knew from his interrogation classes that this was not an uncommon method to use. First, the victim would begin to feel safe. Then he would lower his guard - just a little, just for a night, just to get a little rest. Then the interrogator would pounce, and the vice around the victim's neck would tighten.
Cal shuddered at the image - the neck was the incorrect body part to name, because when he'd woken this morning, he'd felt like the vice was around his balls instead.
But that didn't mean anything, right? Could just be a fluke?
Obviously not. Cal wasn't stupid, after all, had never been accused of being such. He knew the signs.
There was a plate of cheese, fruit, and crackers with a carafe water on the other side of the bed, within easy reach of his handcuff range. He was meant to be eating it, he knew, but the nausea had come and gone all day and after throwing up in his bed the day before, Cal wasn't hungry enough to take the risk of doing it again.

When he'd been sick all over their bed and himself, it had been just as the Russian was returning home. The man had looked unperturbed at his illness; he had simply changed the sheets and brought Cal fresh food without so much as a grimace. Perhaps the man had medical training? Cal's thoughts darkened. Or perhaps he had done this a number of times before. Or perhaps vomit was the least of the fluids he'd ever extracted from the human body.
The gruesomeness of the thought reminded Cal once again that he did not, in fact, know this man.
Bos Yagovich could be anybody.
Calvin felt sick all over again. Then movement in the hallway caught his attention and slowly, the door opened.

~:~

When the Russian was home (home? when had he begun thinking of it in those terms? the brainwashing was already working...), Calvin was allowed out of the handcuffs to wander the room. Attempting to go outside of the room, however, was swiftly punished. Attempting to open the window was swiftly punished. Attempting to cut himself open with an unwisely placed bread knife from the dinner tray in an effort to force them to take him to a hospital was swiftly punished. Subsequently, Cal had found himself handcuffed to the bed in various levels of discomfort, dependent on his behavior. In some way, he was impressed. He'd had no idea that a simple twist of the arms or shoulders or hips could make a set of handcuffs so incredibly uncomfortable. The Russian, however, seemed to be an expert.

Currently, however, Calvin was unhandcuffed and sitting splay-legged under the sheets, across the bed from the Russian. The Bos (that was the other name Cal had given him) was eating hungrily from a tray placed in front of him, glancing up occasionally to check on Calvin Murphy.
"You didn't eat much today. Are you ill?"
Calvin shrugged - he'd spend the first few days being utterly uncooperative, but ultimately, it was more costly than rewarding.
"Some. I wasn't hungry."
That was half true.
Bos eyed him, then nodded, accepting.
"You need to eat. Your body is exerting itself right now."
Calvin scoffed, suddenly feeling self-deprecating.
"Maybe my body could do with a little exertion." he muttered, crossing his arms uncomfortably over his stomach, which poked out slightly beneath the small t-shirt he'd been given. He never wore shirts this size, for this exact reason. It wasn't his fault, though, he reasoned. It was genetic. Had to be - even basic training hadn't been able to shake the baby fat completely from him. It seemed he was doomed to look irrevocably well-fed.
Red-headed, he further scolded himself, and well-fed to boot. Even in the dire state of things back at the base, nobody would be asking him into any broom closets anytime soon.
When he looked back up, the Russian was staring at him. Cal quickly looked away.
"Stop it." he growled in his most menacing voice. The Bos had finished eating now, and was taking long pulls from a dark-colored bottle of beer.
"I stop when I am ready to stop. I like to look at you."
Calvin made a skeptical face and looked away. The Russian sat back in his chair and pushed the tray away, keeping the bottle in his hand. From his throne, he regarded Calvin. "Does it surprise you?"
Cal frowned.
"Does what surprise me?" he asked, even though he already knew the answer. This was simply not a conversation he wished to have.
The Bos, however, would not be so easily dissuaded.
"Does it surprise you that I like to look at you?"
Calvin shrugged and dangled one leg over the edge of the bed, turning to look at the stack of books placed on the bedside table.
"I don't care what you like or don't. But don't look at me."
"I will, because I find you attractive. I like to look at you. You will make a fine wife."
"I'm not a carrier." Cal repeated for the thousandth time, his cheeks burning with red.
"Mmm." the Russian said, raking his eyes over Cal's body and outstretched leg with open lasciviousness.
The staring was the worst part, he immediately decided. Back on base, nobody stared at him. No one had ever said something like that about him. It was...weird. He felt cold suddenly. He rubbed his arms.
"Can I have a sweater or something?"
The Russian took a long pull of his beer and nodded.
"Or something. Come. You cannot sleep in that any longer."
Cal glanced down at himself.
"I get clothes?"
He had been stripped of his uniform two days ago, left in only his boxers and a tshirt, spares of which had been retrieved from his suitcase. Awful nice of them to kidnap that as well, he thought.

Bos grinned and got to his feet, resting the quarter-full beer carefully by the leg of his chair. He stretched first, rolling his powerful shoulders and neck, stretching every muscle in them to what looked like the breaking point. It made Calvin think of a video he'd seen one time in biology class, on the mating behaviors of animals. The film had said it was all about displays - the male bird performing for the female, dancing a complex little dance, spinning circles around her, all with his feathers preened and chest puffed out. As Calvin watched the Russian systematically flex and relax his muscles - prodigious though they might be - he was ultimately reminded of the little blue and black bird.
Bos finished his demonstration and began focusing on his next task, looking down at himself to unbutton his shirt.
"Undress." he ordered, without looking up. Cal felt a familiar locker room nervousness rise up within him.
"Why?" he asked defensively. Bos was working on his middle button now, halfway down to his belly. When he looked up, he seemed mildly surprised at Cal's recalcitrance. Cal had to stop himself from thinking that with that expression, more gentle than the one he usually wore, the Russian didn't look quite so bad. Handsome, almost, even with the nose that had been broken several times and the smile that was not exactly straight. The Bos tilted his head.
"I am giving new clothes to you."
"Oh." Cal almost complied, but then thought twice. "So why are you undressing?"
Bos finished with the buttons and shrugged out of his shirt.
"Here."
he threw the shirt towards Calvin, who caught it reflexively then dropped it in disgust. The Russian raised an eyebrow.
"Is clean. Mostly. Put it on."
Cal eyed him dubiously.
"Why?"
Bos stepped forward, and was somewhat pleased to see that the action made the cadet clench the shirt tighter to his chest, as if guarding his new possession. They had progressed, then, from outright rejection to hostile compliance to the beginnings of negotiation.
"It will be better for you to wear this. Those clothes do not cover so much of your body, and my men will look."
Bos indicated Cal's small shirt and ratty boxers. Embarrassed, the cadet tried to tug the edge of the shirt down a little farther.
"This is fine. I'm fine."
Bos shook his head.
"No. Shirt is better."
Interesting, Cal thought in his head. An argument. Had they progressed, then? Just this sort of truculence would have been swiftly punished days ago. Perhaps the Russian was weakening to him, too. Cal looked down at the shirt. The Russian finished the end of his beer, swallowed the mouthful, and looked down at Cal.
"And the doctor, Demen, says it will help your development come faster."
Cal looked quizzically at him. the Russian shrugged. "Because of the hormones."
"Pheremones." Cal corrected, mostly to himself, as he put the shirt on.

Bos came to bed shortly thereafter, keeping their evening routine. He showered first, returning to the room clad only in a loose pair of drawstring pants. They looked like scrubs, Cal noted, filing that fact away for later reference. In bed, he curled up on the side closest the door, as far from the Russian as he could manage without falling off the bed. Before turning out the light, the Russian read to him, aloud, from one of the books stacked on the nightstand. Together, they were halfway through a book of Spanish love poems. Neruda, the poet was; Calvin didn't know him well, but had heard the name before. The Russian, however, had identified him as a particular favorite.

After half an hour, Cal could barely keep his eyes open. Surprising, with all the sleeping he did to pass the time all day, that he could sleep at all, but he was nodding off already. The Russian's voice seemed to fade away and Cal felt his limbs begin to grow heavy with sleep.

Cal was halfway between slumber and wakefulness when the touch of the Russian's heavy hand on the back of his neck woke him fully. The hand rested there, calmly massaging small but powerful circles at the nape. Cal didn't move and did his best not to tense his muscles; give no indication that you are awake, he commanded his body.

"Cadet Murphy." Cal wondered if the Russian was going to call him by his full name forever. He kept quiet. The hand on his neck tightened just a little, growing more insistent. Cal opened his eyes. Then the hand moved to push the hem of Cal's borrowed shirt up to his waist, exposing the pale skin of his hips and thighs. The Russian left his hand there, weighty, stroking the side of Cal's bare hip, but waiting patiently. Cal couldn't help but speak up.
"Bos." he was embarrassed to hear his voice hitch, and realized he was afraid. "Please." he ground out.
The Russian's voice rumbled close to his ear.
"Please what?"
Calvin felt stupid, he felt ridiculous and silly, but he needed to say it.
"Please. Stop?"
That hadn't come out as forceful as Cal would have liked. But it seemed to have the desired effect - the hand on his hip stayed another moment, then retreated, and Cal breathed a sigh of relief. He moved his own hand to the edge of the shirt, wanting to cover himself, but the Russian stopped him with a severe slap to his fingers. Cal pulled back, and looked over his shoulder at him. The Russian's expression was calm, but his voice was warning.
"I want you like this tonight."
Cal's face must have betrayed his thoughts, because the Russian leaned closer and his voice dropped lower.
"I am always free to look at you. I am allowed access to every part of your body. I am your husband."
Cal just let those words sink in for a moment.
Yep. He definitely needed to escape.