If it bleeds, it lives

"If it bleeds, we can kill it."
- Arnie Schwartzynayguy. Predator (1987)

Inspired by Hemingway's idea that every man must be broken, inspired by the violence and degradation inflicted upon prominent leaders during the post-Ming conflicts, by the prostitution and foot-binding and pillaging of conquered women common at the time, and by my own sexual deviance... I put together a story about a contemporary woman defying her captivity at the hands of a sadistic sexual predator.

If it bleeds, it lives

She was observing the pain, rather than experiencing it.

Some moments she doubted her resolve; perhaps she had been broken by this brutish man, perhaps her plan to feign submission was a fantasy, a subconscious excuse to give in.

When the moment came, would she be capable of exacting revenge? Was the weakness she saw in this man truly a primal calling to pounce on his throat and release the scent of blood in the water? An open invitation for savage jaws?

Or was noting his weakness a form of acceptance for her? That her tormentor was not as invincible as he acted. That she could find acceptance of her physical debasement at the hands of this vile man, because she had found a way to break through his dominating persona and expose his true weakness?

"First, I will break you. Then when you have given in, and want nothing more than to live, I will take the only thing remaining to you: your life."

He had informed this of her the first night of her capture. It was the only time he ever told her what would happen to her in advance. He never repeated those words, but she remembered each deliberate syllable spoken with steady certainty and she knew he was not blustering.

He had repeated the content of his message non-verbally to her over the five months starting her captivity. The beatings, the sex, the body mutilation, and the cold hungry desolation of her hanging cage.

She knew she could not break. That would be the end of his sadistic game. He was a cat toying with a mouse. If she failed to scream and bleed, he would lose interest. Then she would be dead.

If he by chance felt inclined, he might snap her neck with unintentional mercy before his attention on her dwindled. Or he might one day stumble upon a younger prey and simply leave her to slow, forgotten rot.

'God forbid he subject an innocent life to my dehumanization, after he has replaced me!'

She must keep him enticed, until the moment was right. She must show him she was breaking under his power, but that there was more of her virtue that his carving knife, his nails and hammer, his steel hook hadn't extracted yet.

When the opening came, then she would break down before his eyes completely. In his moment of glory, he would let down his guard and that's when she would clench all the will to survive and indefatigable opposition into her jaws. Destroy the source of lechery.

She just hoped she would not break in earnest. She could fool him, but she dreaded the possibility that she was fooling herself. She prayed she would have the strength to hold out until he made two characteristic mistakes in succession. She feared she would lack the courage to return his violence.

On occasion, he left the dungeon door open - when her pleas for water distracted him from other undisclosed fixations that he was want to return quickly to. And after especially savage thrashings, when he sensed she could put up no further resistance, he sometimes indulged himself to the use of her mouth without a dental gag.

The keys clipped to his waist by a Carabiner were within her reach from her cage during oral. Seeing as she was already confined, he didn't bother about cuffing her ankles and wrists when she was inside. All she needed was for him to be in the proper mood and identify the right timing.

One time he lay a knuckled fist across her lip, so hard she spat out a tooth. He laughed triumphantly as he made her suck him while gagging on her own blood. He knew the pain was too much for her to bite on that broken tooth. But she saw in his moment of feeling powerful, he had let down his guard.

Once more she observed the pain on her body.

The pain was good. It was keeping her alive and keeping her unsuspecting tormentor walking unmindfully near the trap she was preparing. One day, he will spring it and then she will have him.

She prayed she had enough blood left to reach that day.