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“How much more can you take?” he asked, one of his favorite questions, and she refused to look at him. Instead, she stared at the ceiling, occasionally racked by coughs as her lungs found a new pocket of water. “Say it, slut. Now.”

A new edge to his voice. Hard and cold as steel.

The automaton was angry, which meant she was winning.

Dying, but winning.

Cloth and water returned, and she tried to breathe it in, to finally die, but she choked instead. And with the choking came more panic, more automatic responses, her body keeping her alive despite her best efforts — and with the jerking of her lungs, the drowning, came pain. Everything burned, her head spun, and she was screaming, sobbing as he pulled back again and her body emptied as much of the water as it could.

Refusing to die. Refusing to end this.

The broken wail that left her was all self-pity, because the rage was leaving her with every second she spent without air. Even when he wrenched her head back by her hair, ice cold eyes burning above hers, she barely had the energy to hate him.

“Say. It.” He hissed into her face, but all she did was cough. Sputtering water from bruised lungs. In the haze of her wheezing breaths, the grunt as he shoved her head to the side — Beth could hear a dull, patterned vibration. But then it was gone, replaced with the cloth, the deafening sound of water smothering her, drowning her.

Head swimming, she couldn’t coordinate thoughts. Everything narrowed down to the urge to breathe, to the feel of water forcing its way up her nose and into her throat. No way to stop it, even as her body jerked weakly, mindless whimpers and cries broken by desperate choking.

Air came again, but only after she’d heaved what felt like a gallon out of her nose and mouth. Her breaths were hitched, almost every indrawn breath resulting in a wracking cough that only exhausted her further.

There was a dull beep, and she opened her eyes, the blurry shape of him coming into view near the other table. He had set the pitcher down, and he was talking. “—not your concern. She will live.”

Those words pried something loose inside her, something important, foundational, and everything else shifted. Tumbled. Absolute chaos took over as he moved back towards her, carrying the pitcher in one hand, a cell phone pressed to his ear in the other.

“Watch and see,” he hissed, and then the phone was gone, and the cloth was back. Drenched in black, suffocating, Beth wanted to breathe. She just wanted to breathe, wanted to turn away from the water so she could find air. Thoughts were short-circuiting, on half-finished cycles, but still repeating.

You have to win.

Are you winning?

Win. Don’t give in. Win.

A convulsion shook her, lungs choking on water. The cloth was gone, but air wouldn’t get in past the water. Too much of it, filling her mouth, running out of her nose, burning her eyes. Everything felt so far away, but the pain was still close. Prying between her ribs like a monster trying to rip her chest open.

How was I supposed to win again?

“Say it. Now. Say it now, slave. Call me Master!” The man’s voice was close, his warm exhale brushing over the cool flesh of her cheek, and as his hand tightened over her throat one of her hands tried to lift.

Stop…

A metal clank held her arm in place. No way to stop the tightening grip, the throaty whimper as air squeaked out of her lungs. Soaked cloth, another river of water.

Drowning.

It was supposed to be peaceful, right?

But the panic pulled her up from the edge of the abyss, kept her out of the peace as her heart raced, as her body twisted, kicked. Another painful eruption of water, endless, then, after one breath of air, she was under the cloth once more.

Water came again. Water washed inside, swelled against the broken foundation inside her, and swept it away. All of it.

Vaguely aware of something important crumbling, splintering, but there wasn’t enough left to know what was missing — what had been taken. It was just gone. Sunk to the bottom, somewhere far out of reach. Far away, under the water.

Just like she was.

Lost.

16

Anthony leaned against the wall, breathing hard, staring at the almost perfectly still figure of the girl on the shining metal. A weak cough shook her, water running out the side of her mouth, with her eyes unfocused on the ceiling.