Okay. So.
You've met Taz — the quiet one with the gloves and the surgical precision. The one who saves lives when it suits him, and ends them when it doesn't.
Now? He's not alone.
Now there's Marco.
They haven't seen each other in ten years, which is probably for the best — because when they do reunite, people tend to bleed in interesting patterns.
This chapter?
It's not about morality.
It's about science, nerve endings, and what happens when two geniuses with no supervision decide to get creative.
Travis didn't blink.
He couldn't. The head brace kept his jaw clenched and neck locked, but it didn't stop the panic. It just trapped it.
Taz set the notebook down with an almost loving touch—like it was a sacred text—and picked up a stainless steel mallet from the tray beside him. He held it up to the light, rotating it slowly, inspecting for imperfections that weren't there.
"You know," he said conversationally, "I could've started with something less dramatic. A rib. Maybe the orbital bone."
His eyes dropped to Travis' lower body.
"But I thought—since you liked hurting her pelvis so much—we'd start there."
Travis's breath hitched, throat working around a scream that hadn't formed yet.
Across the room, Owen let out a groggy whimper, the fentanyl pulling at his awareness like heavy chains. Taz didn't look at him. He didn't need to.
Instead, he adjusted the restraints around Travis's hips, tightening them to keep the body from jerking too far on impact.
"This isn't rage," he said, more to himself than anyone. "Rage is messy. This? This is replication."
And then—he struck.
A single, brutal swing. The mallet connected with a sickening crack, just over the iliac crest.
Travis screamed. Full-throated. Hoarse. Raw. Taz didn't react. He just made a note.
"First fracture. Left pelvic bone. Response: 9/10. Duration: 6.2 seconds.
Satisfactory level: A solid 3"
Owen sobbed, slurring something incoherent. Taz looked up, finally acknowledging the second presence in the room. "He's not even the main course, and he's already bleeding fear."
Travis was slipping in and out of consciousness. His body was shutting down in pieces — not from blood loss, not from damage. From exhaustion. Weakness.
Taz watched him. Not with anger. Not even satisfaction. Just analysis.
He moved to the tray. Tools lined up like soldiers. Twenty-seven procedures ahead. Nerve mapping. Rib reconstruction. Optical trauma. It wasn't rage that fueled him — it was data. Accuracy. Balance.
But this?
This was going to take too long.
Too many moving parts. Too many risks for inconsistency. Travis deserved to feel everything. Every second. Every echo of pain he put into her body.
And Owen...
Owen was barely responsive anymore. Fentanyl had done its job too well. If he flatlined, it would ruin the sequencing. And Taz hated restarting a sequence.
He flexed his jaw. Clinical problem-solving mode kicking in. He needed help.
Not from a nurse.
Not from a surgeon.
Someone who could move with him — think ahead — anticipate without asking.
Only one name came to mind.
One person who never flinched.
Never blinked.
Never asked why. It had been ten years.
Didn't matter. He grabbed his coat and left.
Ukraine, outside Kiev
The road out of the city blurred past the windshield in streaks of gray and cold neon. Taz didn't play music. He didn't hum. He just drove, one hand on the wheel, the other drumming his fingers against the armrest in a rhythm only he understood.
He hadn't seen Marco in over ten years.
That didn't matter.
Some people didn't need updates. They stayed the same kind of dangerous.
Marco Antinov had a PhD in Biomechanics and a Master's in Anatomy, which was where they'd met. Back then, Marco was already taking apart cadavers like they were IKEA projects. Taz remembered watching him peel back muscle layers with surgical precision and explain the tension ratios in a human spine like he was talking about an engine.
He wasn't in it for grades. Or prestige.
Marco liked systems. Bodies. Feedback loops of pain and resistance.
Where Taz saw trauma and response, Marco saw engineering challenges.
He'd been blacklisted from most institutions by his late twenties. Not because he wasn't brilliant — but because ethics didn't interest him. He once modified a cadaver with hydraulic joints just to see if the muscle memory would twitch.
Taz didn't trust people.
But Marco wasn't "people."
He was a scalpel with a soul barely attached.
And for what came next?
Taz needed him.
Not for conversation. For precision.
The location wasn't in any GPS. It never had been. A rusted gate swung open at the end of a cracked private road, guarded by overgrowth and bad memories. Beyond it stood what looked like a condemned bunker—graffiti-scarred, half-buried under moss, wires dangling from the broken frame of what had once been a motion sensor.
Taz parked. Killed the engine. For a moment, he didn't move.
Then he got out.
The metal door groaned as he pushed it open. The scent hit him instantly—copper, ozone, something vaguely like burnt silicone.
Inside, the lighting was dim. Fluorescent tubes flickered half-heartedly. The walls were cluttered with diagrams, chemical stains, half-assembled machines and what might've once been a CAT scanner now turned into a personal pet project. In the center of it all sat a man on a stool, his back to the entrance. No movement. No surprise. Like he'd known this day would come.
Taz took two steps in before the voice came—low, sharp, and unmistakably amused.
"Well, shit. Look who finally crawled out of the gene pool."
Taz stopped. Smirked faintly.
"Marco Antinov."
Marco turned, spinning around lazily on the stool. His hair was longer now. Greasier. There was a soldering iron still lit in one hand and what looked like a disassembled pacemaker in the other. His eyes were wide—too wide—but they glittered with recognition.
"Tomasso fucking Mancini," he drawled. "Didn't think you remembered how to find me."
"I never forgot," Taz said, stepping further in. "Just didn't have the right problem to solve until now."
Marco tossed the pacemaker onto a tray with a clatter.
"Oh? And what flavor of human degeneration brings you to my door this time? Alzheimer? Parkinson's? Or something more… recreational?"
Taz pulled a photo from his coat pocket and tossed it onto the metal table. Two faces. Bruised. Cocky. Disposable.
Travis. Owen.
Marco studied it. His grin slowly widened.
"They look like assholes."
"They are."
Marco stood, brushing his hands on his lab coat.
"And you want… what exactly?"
"I want help," Taz said simply. "I want precision. I want you."
Marco laughed—a low, unhinged sound that echoed off the concrete.
"You always did know how to make a guy feel special."
Taz raised an eyebrow. "Can you still handle it?"
Marco didn't answer. He walked to the far wall, opened a rusted locker, and pulled out a leather case. Inside: scalpels, microdrills, bone spreaders, and several tools that didn't belong in any medical textbook.
He held it up like a trophy.
"I'm still the same bastard you left behind."
Taz nodded once.
"Good. Then let's go ruin someone's nervous system."
The GMC sliced through the night, headlights bathing the empty road in ghostlight.
Taz drove. Marco rode shotgun, boots up on the dash like he owned the vehicle and hadn't just been plucked from a human scrapyard. Between them sat a hardcase with three biohazard warnings, two locked compartments, and one questionable rattle that Marco refused to explain.
"Let me guess," Marco said, gesturing toward the front. "The mafia's paying for the plane?"
"They're paying for everything," Taz replied, deadpan. "It's a loyalty thing."
Marco snorted. "Right. And here I thought my loyalty bought me nothing but failed grant applications and a restraining order from Tarasa Sjevtjenka."
Taz didn't take his eyes off the road. "You stole someone's spine."
"It was part of a spine," Marco corrected. "And it was for science."
A pause.
"Also, the guy was already dead."
Taz glanced at him. "You are so deeply not normal."
Marco grinned. "Pot meed keddle."
Silence settled again for a beat—comfortable in a fucked-up sort of way.
"So," Marco asked, cracking his neck, "what's the actual game plan here? You break them down and I… do what? Collect data? Measure stress responses? Make them cry blood?"
"Yes," Taz said simply.
Marco blinked. "Wait, really?"
"You're the one who said fear and pain can be mapped. Let's map it."
Marco let out a low, almost reverent whistle. "You have no idea how much I've missed this."
"You're welcome."
They passed a road sign in Russian, despite still being in America. Marco had painted over it years ago just to confuse local hunters.
"Hey," he said suddenly, "you still chewing gum during procedures?"
"Only when I'm being gentle."
Marco laughed so hard the case on his lap shifted. "Jesus, I love you."
Taz didn't respond right away.
Then: "I know."
The door hissed open with a hydraulic click that made Marco grin like a kid in a candy store.
"Nice entrance," he muttered to himself.
Taz didn't say anything. He never did when his mind was already ten steps ahead. He just led the way — through a sterilized corridor that smelled like bleach, metal, and subtle violence.
Then the door to the lab proper slid open.
Marco stopped walking.
His eyes widened — and then narrowed — not in judgment, but in technical appraisal. Stainless steel workstations. Full surgical suite. Integrated monitoring systems. Dual IV access. And a neuroimaging station in the corner that looked very off-label.
"Well... fuck me gently with a rib spreader," he whispered. "You built a palace."
Taz kept walking.
Marco spun slowly in place, absorbing every detail.
"This is clean. Like—disgustingly clean. I'm offended. Where's the chaos? Where's the coffee stains on the microscope? Where's the half-dissected squirrel on the shelf?"
Taz didn't answer. He just pressed a button.
A mechanical hum rose from the floor. And then, slowly, the platform lowered them into the lower level.
Marco's grin didn't fade. If anything, it grew.
"Oh... there's more."
---
The Pit
The doors slid open.
The temperature dropped. The lights dimmed. And the smell? Raw iron and antiseptic. Beautiful.
Marco stepped forward.
And saw them.
One body splayed open on a table, bruised, restrained, wrecked. The other chained to the wall, IV lines feeding into both arms, fentanyl dragging his awareness through mud.
Marco tilted his head. Studied their breathing. Their color. Their placement.
He whistled low.
"Oh, you've been busy."
He walked slowly around Travis, hands in his pockets like he was browsing a gallery.
"No wonder you called me. This one's already breaking down. And the other one?"
He looked at Owen, who flinched at eye contact.
"He's soft. Won't take much.You can play with that one. This one deserves my full attention"
Then Marco turned to Taz, eyes bright behind dark-circled sockets.
"You want me to start with the brain or the nerves?"
A pause. A grin
"I've got some ideas."