Chapter Text
The thing is…
The thing is.
He's pretty. Really pretty.
Like a girl they say, when their hands linger too long in his hair, stroking, petting, straying further to wander over soft, smooth skin.
He likes when they pet him. It's the only time their touch doesn't hurt, bruise, ache.
So he leans into their hands and looks up through thick lashes, big brown eyes as soft as a doe, and lets them touch him as long they want. Compliant and demure when he's too exhausted from tests and experiments and disappointed faces.
And, the thing is...
It's the only warmth in this place of concrete and cold grey. His heart flutters in a way he didn't know was possible. Makes him feel… good. He wants to be good.
“Good boy.”
He asks Papa what this feeling is, one night when he did particularly well during his tests, and gets to be tucked into bed.
Papa smiles, lips widening slowly over stark white teeth.
"It's love, Seven."
Seven loves films.
It feels like magic every time he sees these pictures moving like they were right in front of him. The men in white jackets use them to teach him things. Once, he got to mimic a gymnast doing cartwheels. That was really fun.
"Alright, copy what the man in the red shirt is doing, okay?"
He nods, and a technician starts the reel.
The screen lights up and colors spring into life— vibrant blues and greens— and there's so many more people than he's ever seen before. Young and old fill the screen, laughing and smiling, some talking and some playing. The camera pans across a sign that reads Hawkins Community Park.
"What's that green stuff on the ground?" Seven can't help but ask.
"Pay attention," someone snaps. "It's just grass."
Seven keeps his mouth shut but practically vibrates inside. The grass stuff looks so squishy! And there are white things like cotton balls in the sky! A bunch of kids like him are playing on a big colorful thing that looks really fun.
He's so fascinated by the wonder of it all that he completely misses the man in the red shirt. Instead, he gasps and points when water begins to fall from the sky and everyone starts to scramble.
"What's that! Where is the water coming from? Why is everyone running? They don't like water? Why is—"
"Fuck's sake, Seven! It's just rain!"
The screen goes dark, Seven gets a smack to the head, the film is rewound, and it starts again.
This goes on four more times until Seven finally stops asking questions. He goes to bed with an empty stomach but a mind full of possibilities.
He decides then and there that someday he's gonna see the blue sky and the cotton clouds that drop rain on green grass and tall trees.
Maybe he can even go with Papa!
Papa looks at him with a strange twist to his mouth and tells him no, he can’t go outside.
It’s too dangerous out there, life threatening, it’s safe in the facility.
When Seven tells him that it didn’t look dangerous, he gets sent to his room with no food again.
When he asks his handlers if they can take him outside, he gets a fresh bruise on the cheek.
He doesn’t stop asking though.
Knuckles tap against glass, the sound loud and clunky among the gentle hum of the lab's machinery.
"So, what does this one do?"
"That one is Seven, ten years old. He can mimic the abilities of others."
A uniformed man chuckles, lighting a cigarette as he observes the experiment across the two-way mirror.
"That so?"
Seated at a table is Seven, pupils blown wide as he watches an orderly sketch out a portrait of a woman.
Dr. Brenner takes a step forward, hands folded behind his back and eyes cool where they land on the boy.
"You see how his pupils are dilated? That is the visual cue that his power is active. For simplicity's sake, we call this first step 'copying', wherein he absorbs the action he is seeing."
As if on cue, the orderly seated across from Seven finishes and places the drawing onto the table. The boy's eyes briefly return to normal as he grabs pencil and paper before expanding once more. His hand moves quickly across the paper, graphite lines already beginning to take shape.
"This second step is the 'mimic'— when he applies the ability he has copied. The visual cue is the same as before."
The other man grunts, takes in a deep pull of nicotine. "So what, he can draw like Michelangelo now or something?"
"Or something," Dr. Brenner nods. "His mimic does not grant him full mastery of a skill, he can only replicate what he has seen. In this case, he will be able to perfectly match that sketch, but tell him to draw another portrait, and he won't be able to. Not in that same skill level he initially copied, that is."
The boy finishes now, pushes his paper forward and places his hands in his lap. A trickle of blood drips down his nose, pupils shrinking, and the orderly gathers the two sheets, exiting through the connecting door.
He places the drawings onto the desk aside the two men before taking his leave with a nod from Dr. Brenner.
The sketches are identical.
"And this, power of his," the man in uniform muses with a gesture of his hand. "Are there other limitations?"
Dr. Brenner pauses, casts a sideways glance at the other man.
"There are," he concedes. "He is best at copying physical skills— things he can visually see. With one short video we had him playing basketball like a pro; however, the more cerebral the skill, the more intangible, the harder it is for him to copy."
The other lifts a thick brow, looks at Dr. Brenner through a curl of smoke.
"Such as?"
"We tried teaching him how to read by watching one of our staff go through several pages of Tolstoy. He knew to move his eyes across the page and could identify the letters, but he didn't understand what most of the words meant. Another time, we tried teaching him Russian. He could repeat every phrase or dialogue he heard perfectly, but once we went off script, we might as well have been speaking Chinese."
The man laughs at that, waving his cigarette around as if they were two pals sharing a joke.
"So he's stupid! Good to know our tax dollars have gone toward making this idiot."
Dr. Brenner smiles tightly, gestures toward a screen on the wall and pulls up a video with a few clicks of a keyboard.
"This is a recording from last week. One of our other experiments, Nine, is able to manipulate heat. She's still very young, can't ignite anything yet, but she is able to produce enough heat to burn human skin."
The screen flickers to show Seven sitting in front of a variety of objects— fruits and toys and what looks to be lumps of metal.
"We had Seven observe Nine during a few of her tests, and he was able to copy her ability."
On screen, Seven places his hand on each object, leaving behind a blackened and burnt form of what it once was. The lumps of metal begin to drip.
The man in uniform fixes Brenner with a look. "Am I supposed to be impressed?"
"General Williams, with all due respect, the implications of this are—"
"I don't care about implications," the general sneers. "I want results and I want them yesterday. What good is a copy if I already have the original?"
Brenner spreads his hands in a way that could be placating if not for the sharp edges of his grin. "General, why have one tank when you can have two?"
"Doctor," the other scoffs and stubs his cigarette out on one of the portraits. "Why have two tanks when I could have a tank and a missile strike? If the kid could teleport into a Soviet base and get me commie secrets we'd be having a different conversation. Need I may remind you this research of yours isn't cheap?"
The grin on Brenner's face barely twitches. "Of course not, general. I know you're a busy man, shall I escort you out?"
The military man gives a curt nod, straightens his jacket, but pauses on his way out. He taps the burnt drawing with a stout finger.
"Pretty woman. Anyone I should know?"
Cold eyes shift toward the two-way mirror, where Seven sits alone, blood under his nose.
"Just his birth mother. No one important."
Seven knows most of the other Numbers. Some he met in the Rainbow Room, and some he met while watching their tests. He likes playing with the younger ones, it makes him feel like a big brother, like he has something to take care of. Three is a bit of a meanie, but Eight is nice, so her and Seven play together when they can.
He never gets to meet Six. For some reason they are never in the same place at the same time.
Seven wonders what they're like, and if they're nice, and if they'd get along. He could show them how to squirt milk out of their nose.
One day, he gets his answer.
The nurses like to gossip a lot, and sometimes Seven learns about cool new things, so he always pays attention. They're at it again today as they unhook him from a machine that reads his brain and get him ready to go back to his room.
"Did you hear? One of them died the other day."
"Are you serious?"
"Now that I think about it, I haven't seen her in awhile…"
Seven keeps quiet even as they pat his hair and usher him from the testing room. Sometimes it feels like they forget he's there, or like he's just a doll to play with, but he doesn't mind. He gets to listen to their hushed whispers.
"So it was her then?"
"Yeah. What a shame, precognition could've been so useful. Imagine being able to see the future. That's a lot of lottery tickets."
"Fat lot of good it did her. Six could predict the future but she couldn't prevent her death."
Seven doesn't know how to feel about that.
When he's back in his room staring at the blank walls, he wonders if he should feel sad. He never met her, but she was still his sister, so shouldn't he cry now that she's gone?
Instead, Seven wonders why Papa didn't want him to copy her ability. It's the only reason he can think of for why they never even saw each other in the hallways. But he likes when Seven can copy something perfectly.
Why wouldn't Papa want him to see the future?
When he's too old for the Rainbow Room and hair begins to grow in places it never did before, things start to change.
He's more moody lately, too quick to become upset and snap at his handlers. It's not his fault though. Everyone keeps pushing and pushing, and nothing he does is ever good enough.
He can't pay attention, can't listen, can't copy certain things despite being forced to try for hours, asks too many questions—
When can I go outside and see the sky?
They tell him he should be getting better, improving his ability and growing smarter. Should stop asking so many questions if he doesn't like all the bruises.
He's useless. An idiot. A complete waste of time.
They call him all sorts of things they think he doesn't understand, but he does. He's not stupid, no matter what they say, and he tells them so.
That's when they begin to throw Seven into a tiny dark room.
He hates it. Hates how easily they can silence his voice and make him disappear. Like a toy they've grown tired of. So he fights back, tells them that they are the stupid ones for thinking they can shut him up. He drags his feet and struggles and maybe gets a few hits in before they lock him away.
They leave Seven for a few hours at first— at least, he thinks so. He's never been good at keeping track of time. But it's not too bad, just annoying and dull. Seven passes the time drumming his fingers against his knee and thinking about the rain.
Papa is there when the door opens, his thin lips turned down in the way Seven knows is disappointment, disgust even. It twists his stomach with shame, fills him with guilt until he can't even look at Papa.
"You have a bit of a rebellious streak, don't you, Seven?"
Seven tries not to squirm. "I just… want to go outside."
"We've been over this before," the older man sighs. "There's nothing for you out there. The world outside these walls doesn't want you. You're too different, special, they'd eat you up alive. But here, we care about you. We feed you, shelter you, nurse you when you're sick. We love you, Seven."
"... I'm sorry, Papa," Seven whispers and tries not to cry. He is sorry, because he hates making Papa feel bad, but he just… can't stop thinking about it— the trees, the grass. He wants to know what it's like to walk on something other than concrete.
He never asks for anything, can't he at least have this? Seven always does what they want, even when he's tired and frustrated and they have nothing for him but cruel words and painful strikes. If anything, they owe him this, don't they?
The thought festers in him, like a wound that won't heal. It just keeps growing and growing, spreading inside him like a disease, until finally, he lashes out again.
"Please just let me go!"
They lock him away longer each time.
Hours stretch into days, slowly, slowly, crawling like frozen slurry. Stagnant. Unmoving.
With it goes Seven's resilience, leaving only anxiety and fear to wrap around his chest and squeeze all the oxygen out of him. Now, he doesn't know how long they'll leave him. With every second he spends in the abyss, panic shakes him to his core, tormenting him.
What if they never come back for him?
Just when he thinks he's at his limit, tipping over a razor thin edge that will swallow him whole, the door opens. Almost like Papa knows.
And every time, Seven, on his hands and knees, eyes wide and leaking tears, clambers forward and begs at Papa's feet.
Please no more pleasepleaseplease—
Cold eyes radiate revulsion, and a hand like ice grabs Seven by the chin and tilts his face up to cower before his god.
"Are you done throwing a tantrum now, Seven?"
He just.
He just wants to see the sky.
Maybe he should've known that it would get worse, after that.
Maybe, he is as stupid as they say he is.
Not two weeks later, Seven attacks several technicians. He's particularly difficult during a test, but it's not his fault that they grab him, drag him across the room to start over again and again and again.
He's trying.
Why doesn't anyone see that? He's not messing up on purpose!
His body is winding up tighter and tighter, ready to explode. His insides churn like molten lava, straining against his skin, begging to escape.
Escape.
He is so sick of these same grey walls. Sick of the concrete that surrounds him, chokes him, taunts him. Because this is all he is ever going to know. He’ll never get to feel grass soft under his feet or rain soak into his skin. He’ll die here, in the cold.
And Seven, can't take it anymore.
So he just.
He screams and claws at the hands grabbing him. He wants them to feel what he feels— trapped, suffocated, doomed. He wants them to die in this same concrete prison he’ll die in. He wants them to rot and burn.
Seven only stops when a hand slaps his face hard enough to send him crashing to the floor. He snarls, fists curled, about to launch himself at them until he looks up and all the fight drains from his body.
It's Papa, standing above him, disappointment etched deeply into his face.
“You never learn, do you.”
The cold of the stone floor seeps into his bones and Seven trembles. Ice freezes the blood in his veins and wraps around his lungs until he can't breathe and he's gasping, shaking, crying.
“sorrysorrysorryI’msorryI’msorryI’m—”
“Sorry doesn’t make it better, does it Seven? Sorry doesn’t undo the damage you’ve done.”
Dimly, in the back of his mind, Seven sees blurs of white jackets rushing in, crowding around writhing, screaming bodies, the stink of human flesh bubbling and blistering and burning. But his eyes are frozen on Papa. Seven reaches out, tries to take Papa’s hand in his, but the older man just steps back, out of reach, and signals to his men.
“Please…”
Rough hands haul him off his feet, fingers like iron digging in deep enough to bruise, and drags the boy away.
“Papa, please…!”
Seven kicks the air and tries desperately to pull and thrash and escape the men with guns and cold eyes. Their grip just tightens until his bones creak and he's wailing, begging.
“I’LL BE GOOD I PROMISE PLEASE PAPA I’LL BE GOOD PLEASE NO!!”
He gets thrown into the abyss anyway.
And now, Seven cries and bangs on the heavy metal door, begging to be let out, until his knuckles grow slick with blood and he realizes no one is coming.
No one cares.
He crawls into a corner and waits. His tears dry up, eventually, eyes instead kept wide open to stare into the dark, and wait.
And wait.
And wait.
One day or week or year later, Seven looks down, just for a moment, and feels something seize him.
He... he can’t see anything.
His own body, swallowed by pitch black. Gone. He’s gone. Where did he go? Is he dead?
Was he ever even real in the first place?
An ear-piercing sound echoes and reverberates around the abyss, stabbing at him, choking him. It sounds like death, like an animal dying. Something is dying.
Is he screaming? Does he still have a voice?
Is he already dead?
He's lost, he can't breathe— is he still breathing? It hurts. Everything hurts. Darkness cuts into his skin, through muscle and bone, and peels him away layer by layer. Whatever is left of him shudders, curls up and dies.
Can he die if he was never alive?
Does he even want to live?
Maybe, it's what he deserves. A pathetic and sad end for a pathetic and stupid boy.
One day or week or year later, the abyss changes. A flood of light sweeps forward, blinding him. A door is open.
Was there always a door there?
That’s how Papa finds him, skin too pale and eyes sunken in, unmoving, staring. An empty husk. Maybe there was never anyone there, in that small body.
But Papa steps forward and places a hand on his shoulder and suddenly, Seven exists again. He blinks, and sees color, he has arms and legs, oxygen in his lungs, breathing, living. He shakes, hot tears streaming down his face, and tells Papa—
“Thank you.”
He saved him.
One hundred days.
One of his handlers mentions it as they draw blood and take his vitals.
He had been in pitch black for one hundred days.
A television is wheeled into Seven’s room, an unmarked VHS popped into the set.
One of the technicians— Shepherd, his badge reads— kneels down to look him in the eye.
Seven sits cross-legged, pillow clutched to his chest, eyes apprehensive and hollow, as if he’s not sure the person in front of him is real.
Sometimes, he's not sure if he ever made it out of the void.
Not all of him, at least.
Shepherd places a hand on his knee, snapping the boy out of his thoughts, and asks him if he’s ready to behave. Seven’s lips press tight and he nods.
He’ll be good.
He wants to be good.
The older man joins him on the bed, his chest pressed flush against Seven’s back and his legs bracketing the boy’s smaller form. Seven tries not to tremble, overwhelmed as he is by the amount of physical touch, the way he can feel Shepherd's breath against his neck.
Solitary confinement starved him in every way a human could be, trapped him in the neverending pitch black cold and ground him to dust, until there was nothing left.
Tears threaten to fall, so relieved he is to be touched again, and bites his tongue instead of asking why. He keeps his eyes on the screen when Shepherd hits play.
Films are rare these days, so his heart sings with gratitude, that he could possibly be rewarded after what he’s done. He doesn’t deserve it, failure that he is.
The title of the film pops up in looping cursive, the type that’s slanted and pretty but Seven struggles to read. He doesn’t know half of the words on the screen.
Tentatively, he asks the older man, “What is ‘fucking?’”
Shepherd just laughs.
“That is today’s lesson. It’s very important so pay attention and copy everything they do.”
Seven nods and concentrates on the two young men that appear on the screen. He lets his pupils dilate until there’s only a thin sliver of iris and the taste of iron slides down his throat.
“Dr. Brenner designed this new course just for you,” Shepherd says, nonchalant, but his words make Seven’s heart skip a beat. “Your little episode in the lab made us all realize something.”
The men on the screen are talking about things Seven doesn’t understand, leaning into each other’s space, until one finally presses his lips to the other.
Shepherd’s hands are running up and down the length of his inner thighs, spreads them wide. He’s petting him. Seven likes petting. Papa knows this, and Papa made these lessons just for him, and that has his heart fluttering in the way Seven knows is called love.
He's so grateful.
“You’re a growing boy,” Shepherd murmurs along the shell of his ear. “Becoming a man, and when that happens, the hormones in your body go crazy. Makes you do things sometimes.”
The two men are on a bed now, panting into each other’s mouths, their tongues sliding in. They’re removing their clothes so fast that Seven wonders why they bothered to put them on. As the men do this, Shepherd tugs up the hem of his hospital gown, so Seven raises his arms up and the gown is off in a flash. Seven settles back into Shepherd’s chest, his eyes never once moving away, even when the older man begins to pet his stomach.
“But when these hormones don’t have a regular outlet, they can build up inside your body until finally it explodes. Like those times you lashed out suddenly.”
On screen, mouths and tongues are everywhere, sucking on each other’s necks, their nipples, their penises. Seven tilts his head, intrigued. He would never think of putting his mouth on those places. Commits it to memory.
Shepherd’s fingers trace the sharp jut of his hip bones.
“We can’t have another incident like that again,” his tone deepens, loses all of its previous warmth until it’s freezing cold. “Five of our technicians suffered fourth-degree burns. One of them had his flesh seared away until bone was showing. Another one may never regain the use of his hands. Do you understand?”
Fear creeps up his spine, the memory of cold nothingness pressing against his skull, mocking him.
You don’t exist.
Seven nods and watches the man on screen finger and stretch himself open. He won’t mess up that badly ever again. He’ll be good.
“I want to be good,” Seven whispers.
The bigger man of the two slides into his smaller companion, and begins thrusting in and out of him. They’re making all sorts of sounds he’s never heard before, and it's all so intense that Seven thinks even if he wasn’t copying, his eyes would be glued to the screen.
“You can be,” Shepherd says, his tone returning to warmth. “We can show you how to be a good boy.”
And that fills Seven with need. He wants to do this. He’ll do anything. He’ll be a good boy and when he’s finished with his new course he can show Papa how good he can be, and maybe then, maybe, Papa won’t look at him with disappointment. Papa will smile at him, warm and full of pride. With love.
Seven copies all of the positions and techniques the two men— queers, he’ll later learn— display, notes with interest the white liquid that comes out when their face scrunches up and they make a really loud, breathy noise. He’s never seen that stuff come out before.
Apparently you can swallow it too.
When the film is over, there is something poking Seven’s back, and Shepherd's hand moves to cup the boy between his thighs.
Seven gasps, tilting his head back to look at the older man. His pupils have shrunk to their normal size and there’s blood dripping from his nose.
“Are you ready to show me how good you are,” Shepherd teases, pressing his lips to Seven’s forehead.
Seven nods and turns to face the other man, pupils dilating to that unnatural size again, and he can feel Shepherd’s hardness twitch against his stomach.
“Fuck,” Shepherd breathes out. “That… that’s…”
Seven dives in, arms over broad shoulders, pressing his lips to the other’s, opens so that he can lick into Shepherd’s mouth and suck on his tongue. He nips at the older man, gets his lip between his teeth and groans, makes noises he didn’t know he could. Their teeth clash and it’s messy and loud and—
It’s like nothing he’s ever felt before and it’s too much and not enough and he wants to cry. He wants to feel, to touch, to have someone inside him to prove that he’s real, that his body is here, alive.
Seven finds himself drowning in it, breathless, surging forward for more, licking and gasping just the way he copied. There’s no hesitation in the way he moves, as if he’s been doing this for years.
Papa will be so happy his mimic is perfect.
“Jesus fuck,” Shepherd moans against him. “You’re a goddamn virgin…”
Seven whines, pushing closer, moving to straddle the other, his lips never leaving the other’s.
“What… is this called,” Seven asks in little puffs of air, not wanting to stop whatever this was.
But Shepherd finally pulls back, a thread of spit connecting them, broad chest heaving for air.
“Kissing,” he answers on his way to lick and suck at the boy’s neck. “It’s a kiss. This, is a hickey.”
Seven gasps, threading his fingers through the man’s hair, and pulling Shepherd into him.
“Why is a hickey made?”
Shepherd hums, nibbling a spot he knows is going to be a gorgeous purple later.
“To leave a mark. To show that you were there, that you fucked. Sometimes to stake a claim. Show off that someone belongs to you.”
Seven breathes, leaning forward to lick and bite and make as many marks as he can. To show how good he was.
“Fuck, you really want this huh.” He chuckles at that, his hands groping Seven’s plush ass while the boy all but worships him with his tongue. “Shoulda known you’d be a little cockslut. Pretty face like that, you’re made for this.”
Pretty. He’s always been pretty.
It may be the only part of him that's satisfactory, but he’s never known what to do with it. What good was a pretty face when his lab results were below expectations and other Numbers outperformed him. What good was it if he couldn’t make Papa proud.
But now, now he knows. Maybe Seven does have an asset of his own. He can prove that he isn’t useless, empty, a failure.
All that one can do is mimic others? What good is that. Boy has nothing of his own.
Maybe, Seven thinks, while he licks his way down to where Shepherd is hard and erect, maybe he’s meant for this. Meant for his pretty pink lips to stretch wide open and take men into his mouth.
“Kid, there’s no way you’re fitting the whole— “ A stuttered gasp. Followed by a breathy moan. Face pressed flush into wiry curls. “God, fuck. How. Fuuuuuck…”
Seven’s heart flutters wildly in his chest as he bobs his head up and down, pulling up to lick at the tip and then swallowing everything again. He wonders if the other man is feeling the same way, if his heart is fluttering too. The thought spurs him on, doubling his efforts, sweat beginning to shine on his skin. He wants Shepherd to feel it too— that feeling called love.
He wants to make the man love him.
Shepherd’s hands are in his hair, pushing him down as if there’s any more to take, and then yanking him back up and off him.
All sorts of wet drools out of Seven’s gasping mouth, his cheeks flushed and pupils so damn big. He reaches forward to stroke Shepherd, his hand gliding easily with pre-cum and spit.
“What is a cockslut?” Seven asks, voice raspy and weak.
“That’s what you say after deepthroating me like it’s the goddamn Olympics?” Shepherd laughs, his head falling back against the sheets. “Means you’re a slut for dick. You want it all the time, you’ll fuck anyone so long as they get their cock inside you. Doesn’t matter which hole, you just need it.”
Seven shivers. He thinks he wants that, to have the empty inside him filled.
The older man sits up and pulls Seven forward, guiding him so that the boy’s face is down on the bed, on his knees, ass curving up in an obscene way. Shepherd grabs those soft cheeks, feeling the plumpness of it, spreading him open to see a pretty pink hole. He moans a breathy fuck and buries his face between those cheeks, his tongue running up and down the rim, tracing the shape of it.
“Ohmygod,” Seven practically mewls, high and breathy.
Shepherd slides in, past the stretch of his rim, fucking the boy with his tongue, and Seven—
Seven’s just gone. His heart feels like it’s going to explode out of his chest, and he’s sobbing, begging for more. His mind is a hazy mess, like his brain has melted and all that’s left is this trembling body making filthy noises.
“P-leease…” Seven whines, pressing back against the other man. “M-more, ahh… feels good—“
Shepherd fucks deep into him hard, his tongue going as far as it can, and Seven comes apart like a supernova. He feels all the air rush out of him, vision going white, and he’s floating, every cell in his body drifting, a cloud of stardust and bright colors drifting through space. It’s like time has stopped and wrapped him in a blanket of blissful numbness.
Seven wants to stay in this moment forever.
When his brain finally reconnects with reality, Shepherd is leaning back, hand stroking himself slow, admiring the view. Seven’s stomach is wet with the white substance. He runs a hand through it and discovers that it’s sticky. Seven brings it to his nose, sniffing it, then sucks it off his fingers.
It’s interesting, a little salty. Not very tasty but decent enough to swallow.
“Kid what the fuck,” Shepherd is groaning, hand squeezing himself at the base and eyes screwed shut. “I’m going to fuck you into this mattress. Prep yourself.”
A bottle of lubricant is tossed at him, and Seven nods shakily, determined to prove his worth.
He coats his fingers and reaches around himself, ass still up in perfect view, and sinks one finger in down to the knuckle. His body is still loose and pliant from earlier, and one finger becomes two, then three, and he nearly sobs when it doesn’t feel the same.
He can't. It can't be himself. He needs someone else. Needs them to touch his skin, remind him that he has limbs, has a body. Needs to be tethered to this earth lest he float away and disappear into the abyss again.
“I need.. you,” Seven pleads, doe-eyes locked onto the older man. “Inside...mmn.. me…”
Shepherd grins, a sharp glint in his eye, slicks his dick up with lube and shoves Seven’s hand away to line his cock up to the boy’s wet hole.
“Time for the real test,” he chuckles, hands clenching tight around Seven’s narrow hips. “Show me how much of a good boy you are.”
He shoves in all at once, slamming into the boy until he’s buried to the hilt and throwing his head back with a breathy moan.
“Fuuuck, you’re tight.”
And Seven, just.
Can’t breathe. All the oxygen is punched out of his body the moment Shepherd pushes in. It’s too hot and his hair is sticking to his forehead with sweat and all he can think about is how full he feels.
It’s so big and deep inside, like he can feel it pressing against his stomach, like it’s a part of him, his body, that he never knew he was missing
He feels whole, head floating and dizzy, yet he’s never been so grounded. It feels so good to have someone touch him so intimately, to feel his entire body shake with someone within him, to feel that he is real.
Shepherd circles his hips, groaning at the tight wet heat around him, and Seven jolts when the man slaps his ass.
“Well? Say it. You know the words,” Shepherd taunts, licking his lips like a man starved of water.
Seven blinks, slow and hazy, gazing up at the older man through thick lashes, and parts shining wet lips.
“Please, fuck me.”
A wide, hungry grin nearly splits Shepherd’s face, and then he’s pounding into Seven at a brutal pace, nearly pulling his cock out completely before slamming back in. Seven chokes, gasps, tries desperately to breathe, completely overwhelmed, hands scrambling across his sheets to find purchase. Shepherd’s grip just tightens around Seven’s hips, pulling his body back to meet his thrusts, the sound of feverish wet skin slapping obscenely filling the room.
Through the haze, Seven realizes the older man is talking to him, asking him, “You like that ya little slut? Like my fat cock fucking this tight ass?”
“Y-esss,” Seven hiccups, tears streaming down flushed cheeks. “Feels.. ah! ahh! s-so good…”
“Yeah? You want me to cum inside your wet cunt? Want me to fuck you til you can’t walk?”
Seven doesn’t know what that means, exactly, but he’s nodding fervently, begging, “Pleasepleaseplease.. mmn!! inside, please…”
His vision blurs for a second as Shepherd pulls out and flips him flat onto his back, hiking the boy’s legs around his waist and then shoving back in with a loud squelch.
There’s blood running down Seven’s nose and his pupils are dilating and shrinking like crazy, pinning like a bird, struggling to retain his mimic as Shepherd pounds mercilessly into him.
“Look at you,” the man breathes, thumbing at Seven’s spit slick mouth. “Trying so hard. Such a sweet boy.”
Seven keens, heart fluttering so hard he feels as if he’s going to burst open.
He takes the man’s finger into his mouth, sucking on it wetly, and hooks his ankles together to pull Shepherd further into him. His entire body bounces with every brutal thrust, skin shining with sweat, and he holds onto the other’s arms for dear life.
“Ah, ahh.. am I… good?” Seven hiccups, big brown eyes so wide and sincere.
The older man groans at that, his thrusts beginning to stutter, “Yeah, yeah you’re so fucking good. So wet for me. You wanna come for me, slut?"
And Seven, so desperately fixated on pleasing the other, doesn’t even notice his own cock is hard again until Shepherd grabs him, jerking him off in time with his thrusts, and then he’s slamming his head back, arching off the bed like a bow about to snap.
“Pleease...” the boy practically wails.
Shepherd chuckles, leaning forward to take Seven’s bottom lip between his teeth and grins.
“Good boy.”
Seven screams. White floods his vision and his body seizes up, tightening around the man inside him, shooting ropes of sticky white cum onto his chest and dribbling down Shepherd’s fist.
He’s warm, so feverishly, deliciously warm, heart about to explode and so blissfully fucked out he barely registers Shepherd thrusting in once, twice, before spilling inside him, filling him up.
The older man flops down with a groan, caging the boy in, cock still snug in that warm, wet hole.
It takes several minutes before Seven can catch his breath, pupils shrunk back to their normal size, and he licks his lips hesitantly.
“Did… I pass?”
Shepherd just laughs, muffled against the boy’s skin, mumbling, “Yeah, you passed kid.”
Seven positively beams and launches into several questions about what things are called and why it’s done, and the other just lays back, gathers the boy flush against him and buries his face into his soft brown hair, responding with lazy words and a hand petting his back.
Pressed this close, Seven can hear the man’s heart fluttering in his chest, just like his own, and he can’t help but smile.
“Is this love?” Seven asks, fingers stroking the skin above Shepherd’s beating heart.
Shepherd pauses, a slow smile spreading wide over his teeth, just like Papa’s so long ago.
“Yeah, sure.”
Everyone likes Seven now.
They all smile when they see him— technicians, researchers, orderlies, nurses, anyone really.
After they unhook him from IVs and brain scanners or whatever else he's been plugged into for the day, someone will pet his thigh, flash a grin that's all teeth, and Seven knows to get on his knees.
His body is decorated with the good kind of bruises now.
Some days, he doesn't even have to go to the lab.
Those are his favorite days— when his door is opened in the morning and that look greets him. Then he gets to make others feel good. He gets to make them feel what he knows is called love.
Seven loves all of them, men or women, though he finds that the male staff come to him more.
Sometimes, after they're done making each other moan and scream, Seven will hold them as they spill their secrets.
Wilson, one of his handlers, shoves him away after about thirty seconds, rushes to get his clothes back on and blurts out something about not being a homo. Something about just needing a wet hole.
James the neurologist always cries after holding him down and slamming into him brutally. He says it's because he's ashamed of being a queer and he'll never be able to tell his mother.
Daniels, a researcher who hardly ever leaves the facility, is gentle and likes to take his time. He pets Seven's hair and tells him how much he reminds him of his son back home.
Shepherd just likes to fuck him.
But when Seven is really good, he gets to kneel beneath Papa's desk and keep him warm with his mouth.
It's unreal how so many people like him and want to touch him, mark him, fill him. It keeps him from disappearing, from sinking into that chasm of endless nothing. Instead, he's dizzy with how high he's become from so much love making.
He needs it bad, craves it like the sweetest drug, and it's an addiction he knows he can't live without.
It's the only thing he needs.
Seven is so happy.
He only meets Eleven once before everything comes crumbling down.
It's a few years later, when he's taller and everyone jokes that soon he won't be jailbait anymore, whatever that means.
Papa brings him in to watch her crush a soda can with her mind. He doesn't want Seven to copy her just yet, but Papa says he has big plans for the both of them.
"Those who will revolutionize the world should be acquainted, don't you think?"
Eleven is nudged forward but her eyes never leave the floor, her little fists clenching nervously.
Seven just kneels down to her level and gently takes one of her hands, stroking lightly until her fingers uncurl. He slides their arms together, tattooed numbers facing up to stand side by side.
"Hello, sister."
She doesn't smile, but her face softens when she finally looks at him, understanding glistening fondly in her eyes.
"Hello, brother."