Stockholm Syndrome - A Harry Styles Fic

Harry had no idea how long he sat like that. It had to be hours. He was so exhausted that at that point in time, had they come in and told him he were to die; he’d most likely crawl to his knees, and beg them to do it quick. He was just glad Sorrow left when he all but screamed at her when she hadn’t the first time he asked. He’d rather be alone than with someone who refused to help him- no matter how tragic her life was, she was willingly part of the problem instead of the solution. After all, she kept telling him she wasn’t one of the good guys – he was starting to agree.

He looked down sadly to his bandaged hand, tracing the outline of his tender wound where the tattoo had been. He just kept tracing the cross that had been inked there, as if doing that would magically bring it back. It hurt to touch the bandage but his world was growing use to the pain-especially since his toe seemed to be in more agony then what they had done to him.

Harry found himself tearing up again for what seemed the millionth time in an hours’ time. He hated these people, he hated what they had done to him-what they had done to countless other people. These people were evil and he just didn’t understand why, out of millions of celebrities in the world that they had chosen to kidnap and torture him. Life really wasn’t fair.

He heard the door open again but refused to break contact with the concrete floor. He had nothing to say, he had no energy to say it with.

“Hello.” A new voice greeted politely, which caused Harry’s eyes to snap open, he sat up straighter-his attention now to the door.

Beside it stood a young man about Christian’s age, possibly a year or so older. He had a black leather bag attached to his hand. His dirty blonde hair was in ringlets, coming to mid shoulder, his body was thin with lean muscle and if Harry had to guess, he looked to be around 6’2. His clothing was casual.

“I’m William.” He greeted as he shut the basement door and approached the prisoner, stopping a few feet from him. “Sorrow mentioned you’re hurt. I came to check you over, do I have permission to do so?”

Harry wondered why he was even asking. It’s not like he was ever given a choice or asked what he wanted now a days – so for someone to actually ask, it seemed foreign and that should have been a warning, especially with it being such short time.

“Can you talk?” William asked kindly as he came to stand beside him, kneeling down respectively so that he wasn’t towering over Harry.

Harry stared at him dumbly, swallowing painfully. His throat was scrapped raw from the screaming he had done.

William seemed to notice and opened his bag, taking out a bottle of water and opening it, putting it to the younger man’s mouth.

Harry grasped it with his hands and began to drink, his body convulsing with desperation as he tried to hydrate it.

“Whoa there fella, take it easy.” William calmed, pulling the bottle away before he got a chance to get sick.

Harry took it back from the man’s grasp and chugged the rest of it, throwing it away from him when it was gone, watching the man stare at him in shock. His body still shaking.

“Have they been giving you anything regularly?” William asked with concern, his eyes going back to his bag, taking out a small flashlight and pointing it in Harry’s eyes, watching him flinch away and cover his face.

“No.” Harry answered truthfully trying to get the spots now in front of his eyes gone.

“Alright, my father sent for me to cover here for a while, while he and Christian attend to some personal matters. I’ll be taking watch over you and Sorrow for the time being. So I’ll make sure you get the proper care.” William let him know, his eyes and hands searching through the doctor’s bag, pulling out a tube of lip balm.

Harry had never been so happy to see Chap Stick in his life. He grabbed it from the man’s hand and began to apply it to the corners of his mouth, flinching at the burning sensation.

William tilted his head to the side and watched him, wondering exactly what was going on around here. Sorrow was usually very direct with prisoners…although he had wondered if anything changed after Jude and the rest were killed. Judging by the current picture, he guessed so.

“I’ll find out what’s going on, don’t worry.” William promised him with gentleness, ignoring Harry’s bewildered stare.

“Why would you care? Aside from making sure I’m not damaged goods for the buyer.” Harry retorted and turned his stare to the floor again, handing the guy his Chap Stick back.

“Keep it.” William insisted, pulling out fresh bandages and scissors. “As for caring…believe it or not kid, and this is God’s honest truth; if I could get out of this organization, I would. If I could get you out, and Sorrow-I’d do it but I can’t, none of us can.”

“Why? What’s stopping you? What’s stopping Sorrow? Why won’t she help? Why won’t you? It all seems like an excuse-and Sorrow won’t tell me.” Harry relented, wishing he understood.

“Sorrow tried. She’s the reason why my father and the rest of the organization had to execute Jude and the others. It was a nationwide massacre. At the present date, the number of victims were well over ten thousand.” William recalled sadly, taking Harry’s bandaged hand and carefully unwrapping it.

Harry’s mouth dropped.

“W-what?”

“It was bad. Sorrow, from what Christian had told me when he called to ask me what he could do to help her overcome this, upon seeing Christian murder her boyfriend she just…stopped caring. The girl had a heart of gold and she loved Jude very much. In fact, she loved him so much that she risked her reputation with Christian’s father just so Jude got some comforts while he was held prisoner and even more so when she begged my father to accept him into the organization. That didn’t sit well with Christian. I guess the competition was too much but it wasn’t until Sorrow called the authorities to get Jude away from here and see about shutting it down all together. She got as far as telling them about the organization and where one of the locations were that she knew about before she was subdued – after that, the button was pressed and it caused a nationwide panic within the organization and they panicked alright – panic usually means nothing good. So the decision was made to abandon and start again. Some bodies were never found – some burned, some found only because the hostages begged them to be returned to their family – Jude’s was returned only because of Sorrow.” William recalled the memory with genuine disparity. He really wish he could help.

“Why didn’t they kill her too?” Harry asked, groaning when the blood soaked bandages were pulled away.

William grimaced at the sight, going to grab the peroxide.

“They were going to but Christian’s father had another idea. The man is sadistic when he puts his mind to it and this was no exception. Sorrow was given a choice between her life or Jude – but it wasn’t really a choice. Christian made it for her, shot the guy at point blank in the back of the head. Jude was a noble hostage, one of the least selfish ones that you could meet. I met him briefly when a group I was traveling with was transporting him to the cabin, I was being dispatched somewhere else at the time. Anyhow, he had convinced her that it was alright. Those were his finally words to her and I think she just sort of flipped off after that.”

Harry watched the liquid hit his hand, sizzling in the bloody red meat of his missing flesh. He groaned feeling it disinfect, relieved when William finally cleaned and bandaged it properly before going to unbandage the one at his chest, only stopping when Harry’s hand reached on top of his.

“I don’t want to see it, please?” Harry swallowed, trying to stop his voice from cracking and sounding hoarse.

William nodded, going back to the bag and pulling out a handheld little water game, handing it to Harry.

“I need to get these properly cleaned so they don’t get infected but play with this, it’s a game where you pull that little lever at the bottom and try to get all the balls into that little U shaped platform. It’s pretty fun, I spend hours playing it on long flights.”

Harry looked at it and then looked at him, really not sure what to make of this guy.

“Thanks.” Harry finally replied, deciding to try and get his mind off what was happening.

“No problem, kid. Glad to help.” William nodded, reaching for the scissors.

“Harry.” He corrected, sticking his hand out for William to shake. The slightly older man obliged with a small smile.

“Nice to meet you Harry but I’m sorry it had to be under these circumstances. You can call me Will. William is far too former for my taste.”

Harry let a small smile slip at the corner of the left side of his mouth. It was a wistful smile but Will’s kindness was more than appreciated.

“Me too.” Harry agreed, his attention going to the game while William continued on with his work.

When he was done with his wounds he overlooked Harry’s face, the black eye and slightly crooked nose was an indicator of Christian’s work.

“The scrapes are superficial, we’re not going to worry about those but it looks as though Christian knocked your nose slightly out of alignment – do you want me reset it or let it heal like that? To be fair you got the whole Owen Wilson look going on. That’s a noble feature.” William tried to joke to relieve the news.

“Reset it. When I’m rescued, if I show up looking like Drillbit Taylor my management will shit bricks-not that they aren’t already. They’re losing major money for each day I’m gone.”

William smiled sadly for the second time that hour.

“Ok.” He agreed softly glad Harry’s shivering had settled to a dull chill, he needed to get him hydrated properly.

Crunch.

Harry yelled in surprise as William quickly reset his nose straight again. He wasn’t even given any warning – the man had just reached over and cracked it back again.

“Sorry man.” William apologized, putting a hand on his bare shoulder.

Harry groaned and closed his eyes, leaning back against the wall with pain.

“You ok?” He made sure.

Harry nodded.

“Ok good,” William said, closing his bag. “Is there anything else?” He made sure.

“My small left toe. Christian hit it with a hammer-it’s bad…my toe is crushed, like in a million pieces type crushed. It feels like. He did it early yesterday-today. I don’t know. It was a few hours before your father got here. So yesterday maybe?” Harry guessed, his voice cracking while William gently went to examine it.

Upon sight of Harry’s toe and touching it-which made Harry jerk and hit the wall, Williams hand flew to his mouth, his eyes nearly tearing up themselves.

“Jesus Christ have mercy.” William gasped.

Harry felt dread wash over him, watching William stand up and head to the door.

“I’ll be right back, I promise I just-I need to go talk to father. This-I’ll be right back.” William stuttered, leaving through the door and shutting it behind him.

Harry felt his chest tighten.

“Oh my God…oh God. What’s going on?” Harry breathed, his world spinning out of control, slowly blackening around him.

Notes

Going back to 1D for a few chapters :-) then skipping time a few days and then will be skipping greater amounts of time over a few months before picking it up again :-) enjoy hope you liked it! I personally like William - there will be more revealed about him.