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The rope around his wrists stings, rubs as he pulls at it. The knots are strong, the bindings tight.
He can’t get himself free.
He's not sure he wants to.
“That’s it,” Webb murmurs in his ear. “You’re so good, River. Just perfect.”
River can’t escape. But he feels safe. Wanted.
He aches, it hurts, but it feels so good.
Not even under pain of torture would River admit, out loud, that he’s dreamt about Spider. He probably wouldn’t even admit it to himself if he could get away with it.
And when he says dreamt, well...
He’s certainly not going to admit to how his RTI training tends to pop up in his subconscious. Nor how it’s relevant to this particular topic.
But the undeniable truth is that he has.
Had.
After Stanstead, the dreams take a decidedly different turn. At least temporarily. As if even his unconscious mind knew it was a bad idea for any part of Spider to be anywhere near him.
Instead, he dreams of those horrible, horrible moments of his evaluation, with Spider’s voice in his ear. Spider’s there too during the blurred approximation of his debrief and the hearings that followed, and he’s there during River’s final walk of shame out of the Park. He can’t hear what he’s saying as he follows him out, and the corridor itself stretches on and on, never-ending even as he’s desperate to get away from all the mocking and judgmental and knowing eyes.
Spider’s fucking there, in his head, just now in an entirely new, far less enjoyable way. He’s not sure if it’s better or worse.
More honest, maybe?
And in those months after his banishment to Slough House, River only has one dream about Spider, and even that takes a turn matching his mood.
There’s a body behind him, over him. They're close and it feels right and River wants them to never leave.
But the hands withdraw, even as he whines at the loss of contact.
“Shh,” a voice hushes gently.
A hand brushes through his hair, and he lets himself relax, soften into the touch.
Only to choke when a knife plunges into his back.
Incredibly on the nose, was all he could think when he awoke from that particular dream. Once his heart had stopped racing and his stomach had stopped twisting itself into knots.
The lesson had sunk in though, the moral of the story internalised, and the entirety of him seemed to be on the same page.
River wanted nothing to do with Spider. In the real world, or inside of his head.
At least for a little while.
“There we go,” Hobbs says. He’s half holding River up. “You’re a right fucking mess, aren’t you?”
They’re going somewhere.
Hobbs is ushering him, taking him somewhere. River should be worried about that.
Wait, no.
Why would he be worried about that? Hobbs is a Dog. He's MI5. River has nothing to be afraid of. He should...
River’s not sure where they’re going. His head is spinning. He feels nervous, anxious, worried. Something trickles into his eye, and when he clumsily wipes at it, he’s horrified to find blood. He stutters to a stop, eyes caught on the smear of red across his hand.
Hobbs chuckles, and the sound is unsettlingly close to his ear, but River’s brain seems to be having a hard time focusing on more than one thing at the moment.
Every movement feels slow. He feels heavy, a few steps behind himself.
A hand on his back, his lower back, very low on his back, pushes him forward, keeps him moving.
“Yeah, they smacked you good. You're barely even here.”
River looks up, looks away from his hand, still moving as directed, and sees a doorway at the end of the corridor. He can’t see in, can’t see beyond the darkness that fills the frame.
And Hobbs keeps propelling him forward, and River doesn’t, can’t, fight him.
“Wait,” he says as they get closer and closer to the door.
Hobbs shushes him. “Don’t make a fuss. Be a good boy, won’t you.”
Then River’s through the door, in the darkness.
His head is spinning but Hobbs is there to stop him falling. He's in the darkness with him. There, his hands all over him. Where they shouldn’t be. He's keeping River upright by pressing him against a wall. Maybe a wall. It's hard to tell which way is which, where he is, what’s up and what’s down.
Something hot and wet runs down his face, and then Hobbs’ mouth is there, on the same spot. His breath hot, his tongue wet as it licks up the side of his face.
“I like you much better like this. Let me walk you right in here, didn't you?”
“Stop,” River says. Or tries to say.
He has to-
He needs to-
Hobbs’ hands pull at his shirt, slide under it to grab at his waist, dig into his stomach and his sides.
“Didn’t even put up a fight. And you’re going to be good, aren’t you? You’re going to stay right here.”
The gum chewing was obnoxious. Almost everything about Dan Hobbs was obnoxious. Including the way he spoke to River. And how he spoke about River.
River, therefore, takes some pride and satisfaction in dodging him at the hospital. The second time at least.
He's still not entirely sure how Hobbs managed to get him down there. It was likely the shock of Sid’s state, combined with the fact the Hobbs was a Dog, and therefore, surely, on his side.
River's own bleeding head might have had something to do with it too. He hadn’t noticed that he wasn’t just being taken somewhere quiet for a debrief until it was too late.
And he can’t be sure if his memory of getting a second smack to his already concussed and ringing head was real or not. The moments between getting to his feet in Robert Hobden’s front room, and resorting to pulling off a boot and shoving it in a pillowcase as a last resort are still fairly fuzzy. Just a lot of blood and the stink of hospitals.
Still, it’s somewhat of a relief to know that his skills clearly haven’t worsened too much during his months at Slough House. He can’t be doing too badly if he can run rings around a Dog. Or get the drop on one.
He imagines that Hobbs may hold a grudge though, so fingers crossed he can avoid him in the future.
They handcuff him.
He has no idea what’s happening, why he’s being taken into custody. Duffy said they were going to the Park, but he guesses he asked for clarification one too many times and Duffy finally got annoyed enough to slam him against the side of his car and pull out the cuffs.
Or maybe it was River telling him to fuck off that did it.
And Spider had just stood there watching until Duffy had eventually called him over and told him to frisk River.
“Come on, really?” River had said.
Duffy had patted him on the shoulder. “Sorry, Cartwright. Protocol. Also, you’re a troublesome little shit, so can’t be too careful.”
As he pulled away though, his hand had slipped down, grazing noticeably over his arse.
Spider, sounding more confident than how he’d been looking, tsked. “Look at the trouble you’ve gotten yourself into, River.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
River looks around. Was the street always this deserted?
They're outside his flat, right?
He'd been heading home, and they were waiting for him. Or had he been already at home and there was a knock on the door?
Yes, that must be it, because when he looks down he’s in an old, soft tee-shirt and a pair of sweats. He hadn’t been given time to change. In fact, both of them had taken great joy in forcing him out the door immediately. The ground is cold and rough beneath his bare feet.
River shivers.
And it’s most certainly the cold that keeps him shivering when Spider runs his hands over him. Hands that stray too high when they pass up his legs, that squeeze his thigh, that slip under his shirt.
River is torn between squirming away from the touch, or pretending he can’t feel it.
“Jesus,” River mutters. “This is so fucking stupid.”
“You brought this on yourself,” Spider says in his ear.
“Clean?” Duffy’s voice cuts in.
“Yeah. Although...”
Spider is suddenly pressed against his back, his hand slipping in-between River’ body and the car door.
“Fuck. Don’t,” River spits as Spider grabs his crotch. “What the fuck are you doin-” He protest stutters off into a moan as Spider massages his cock.
“Hard from a little pat down?” Duffy sneers. “Really, Cartwright?”
His voice is too close, and River closes his eyes to escape from the sight of the man leaning against the car right next to them, watching with bemused interest.
“I’m not,” River insists.
“You are,” Spider says. “Whore.”
River throws his head back, hoping to break his nose, but he dodges it with a laugh.
Then a hand is in his hair. Duffy's hand, judging by the angle, and it’s twisted in the strands, yanking his head to the side.
Spider behind him, Spider’s hands on him, is all that keeps him on his feet.
The cuffs dig into his wrists as he jerks uselessly. Spider's hand is still on his cock, and Duffy pulls his hair again, laughing when River hisses.
“Maybe...” Duffy muses, and River, despite himself, looks at him. Sees the way Duffy’s gaze drags up and down his body.
He bites his lip to stop anything – something, he doesn’t dare consider what – slipping out. He can feel Spider’s other hand on his hip, fingers sliding up under his shirt, over the waistband of his sweats. The prick of nails as they tap against his skin.
“Maybe,” Duffy says again. “We should be more thorough?”
“Hmm?”
Spider’s question is to Duffy, but River feels the sound brush across his ear.
“Just in case.” Duffy replies.
He lets go of River’s hair and reaches instead to open the back door. He gestures inside. “Get comfortable, princess.”
Spider pulls him upright, and turns him towards the open door.
River’s not entirely sure what he’d done to earn Nick Duffy’s ire.
Yes, Stanstead was sure to have made a bad impression, and breaking into the Park to get blackmail over Second Desk so she’d at least temporarily stop trying to ruin his life didn’t look great either. But those were all only half River’s fault anyway, with plenty of other parties sharing the blame. Whether they would admit it or not.
Plus, the former didn’t even have anything to do with Duffy.
There was that thing with Hobbs too, but again, Lamb was the one that knocked him out the first time, and Hobbs had kept trying to detain him under dubious circumstances anyway.
So, River doesn’t get it.
Especially because Duffy had started being weird with him long before any of that. He'd watched him, looked at him whenever they crossed paths with a focus that made River’s skin crawl.
Sometimes.
Mostly crawl.
Where Hobbs had been obnoxious and blunt with his attention from the start, and just obnoxious in general, Duffy was...something else.
He was thuggish in the way most of the Dogs were, but with a sharpness, a cruelty, an intelligence that made him dangerous in a different way. Especially when River still didn’t know exactly what Duffy wanted from him.
Having Duffy’s attention turn his way was therefore...
River’s not sure what to do with it. He’s not sure if he wants it. If he can use it, professionally or otherwise. And he’s really not sure how afraid of Duffy he should be.
But he’s also gotten the impression that it would be a bad idea to let any of that show. Someone like Duffy would only see that as blood in the water.
“You’re a thief,” Spider says.
“And you’re a lying backstabber,” River retorts.
He can feel the edge of a desk, Spider’s desk, now that he notices, digging into his arse. Spider's in front of him, and River watches, strangely unmoving, as he drapes something around his neck. Not rope, not a leather belt, not that ugly tie – because Spider’s already wearing that – but still, something with a slight stiffness to it.
The belt from a...jacket it looks like, when River glances down.
Spider takes the ends of the belt in one hand, the buckle dangling out of his clenched fist.
“If you hate me so much...” Spider trails off leadingly.
“I do.”
Spider twists his wrist, wrapping the belt around his hand- and therefore tightening it around River’s neck.
Not actually around his neck, not yet, but River can see where this is going. He should probably tell Spider to stop. He should make him stop.
Spider’s other hand moves to River’s chest. He's not wearing a shirt. When did that happen? He can’t remember taking it off. Also, why would he have taken it off? But he briefly forgets to care about that when he feels a thumb brush over his nipple.
He twitches, a little furious that so small a touch can send such a jolt through him, and even more so when he sees Spider’s knowing smirk.
“You don’t,” Spider says, his thumb circling around, over River’s nipple.
River does his best to keep still, to not push into it. To not say something stupid like more, even as he feels it peak. Tighten.
“I do,” River insists again.
And in response, Spider wraps the belt around his hand again. River feels his fingers brush against his throat. His face is close, his mouth just inches from his, his eyes just about the only thing River can see, even if he’s not sure what he sees in them. What he wants to see.
“This is weirder then. Entirely more fucked up if you do hate me.”
River swallows, tries to lean away only to be almost imperceptibly tugged back in. “Why wouldn’t I hate you?”
Spider’s touch on his chest turns from light brushes of his thumb to groping roughly at his pec. River groans.
“Oh, sure, you’ve got your reasons. But it doesn’t seem to be stopping you.”
The belt tightens again, and River feels proper pressure on his throat now, just enough to make him nervous. To make him dizzy.
“What do you want?” he forces out.
“I want to fuck you in my office, over my nice desk, in the building you’ll never work in again.”
“Fuck you,” River gasps.
Spider continues over him. “And the thing is, you want me to do all that. See how fucking hard you are right now. How wet.”
Hand still occupied, seemingly unwilling to let go of River’s chest or the belt around his neck, Spider presses his thigh between River’s legs, pushing against River’s crotch.
“Don’t,” River stutters out, even though his hips are already hitching into the pressure.
Spider kisses him on the mouth, and it’s a surprisingly, notably, gentle thing in the face of everything else.
“You want me to. You want this.”
The belt around his neck tightens.
I should return that, River thinks.
That being the jacket hanging in the back of his wardrobe that, well, doesn’t belong to him.
Hands still holding onto the hangers, River stares at the jacket he’d stolen from Spider. Borrowed, really, under dire circumstances, though at the time he admittedly hadn’t been thinking about when he’d return it. He was more focused on avoiding the Dogs and finding Hassan Ahmed and not ending up in a cell in the Park basement. Or worse. He hadn’t been intentionally stealing it.
It's been a while though. Long enough that it’s arguably been too long and now it would just be weirder to acknowledge it. Even if Spider wasn’t...Spider.
Plus, returning it would mean seeing him. And River doesn’t want to do that.
Yes he had gone to see him in hospital, but Spider had been unconscious then, or sedated, and therefore unable to sneer at him or mock him or ask him what the hell he was doing there.
A question River isn’t sure he would have answered. Could answer.
He’d just needed to see that Spider was alive. Maybe not well or whole, but at least alive.
And he was. Is.
But River couldn’t explain why he’d been there, or why he’d kept going back even, and he’s hoping that no one is ever going to ask him.
He probably should have taken the chance with the jacket then though. Left the thing over the back of the visitor’s chair and be done with it. But no, he hadn’t, and now he has to either keep the thing and get jump scared by thoughts of Spider whenever he stumbles across it – he hasn’t worn it. He's not sure he could bring himself to wear it again – or reach out to him somehow, and endure what he already knows would be an excruciating, humiliating – hurtful – and painful interaction.
Maybe he could mail it back. Or would that be even more awkward?
He can’t see the diamond. It's his own fault for throwing it, and he regrets it now with the way it’s blending into the ugly carpet of Duffy’s office. He needs to find it though, because Duffy told him to. Or because he’s in a hurry. He’s not sure. He can’t remember.
Finally thinking he spots it though, River bends down to check, but before he can confirm yes or no, a foot kicks him behind the knee and he’s falling to the floor. He manages to catch himself on his hands, rather than his face, but unprepared for it, he feels the sudden stop reverberating up his arms.
Affronted, he glares at Duffy, who looks down at him, amused, the foot he’d presumably kicked River with tapping idly against the floor.
“What the fuck was that?” River asks, still more than a little shocked.
Duffy shrugs. “You’ll have an easier time looking from down there.”
“I was looking. You didn’t have to-” River sits back on his knees, planting his hands on his thighs as he prepares to stand back up. “Whatever, you’re hilarious. Now, can I-”
Duffy’s foot snaps out again, pushing against his back until River’s bending forward. He tuts. “I didn’t say you would get up.”
River hadn’t really noticed that he’d strayed so close to where Duffy was sitting. He feels something icy roll down his spine.
“You’re serious?” he stares at Duffy
“Deadly, sunshine.”
River’s on his hands and knees, and Duffy’s foot is still on his back. He keeps it there for far too long. Long enough to make it a moment, a thing. And all without breaking eye contact. River’s mouth feels dry, and he sucks on his bottom lip to try and summon up some moisture.
He does his best to keep his face blank, to not sigh or groan or huff when Duffy finally removes his foot. Duffy’s mouth curls up, like he knows what River’s doing. Or perhaps it’s just at the fact that River let him do that.
Why did he let him do that?
Duffy waves at the room. “Well, get to it. I’m waiting.”
River, having gotten the message, grits his teeth and starts looking. The carpet is rough under his hands, and Duffy’s eyes on him feel burning.
Thanksfully, it doesn’t take him long to find it.
“Got it,” he mutters, picking it up between two fingers.
“I should make you pick it up with your teeth, have you crawl back to me like that.’
River takes a shuddering breath, already, involuntarily, picturing it.
“But knowing you,” Duffy continues. “You’d probably do something stupid like swallow it. So, we’ll just stick with the crawling, shall we.”
River hesitates. Duffy notices.
“Come on, Cartwright. We don’t have all day.”
He’s right. River feels like there’s a clock ticking down, even though he can’t remember what to.
Maybe that’s why he does it. Maybe that’s why he shuffles around, incredibly awkwardly it feels like to him, and crawls over to Duffy.
It’s not far, he hardly has to cross the whole room, but he can’t bear to look up. Instead, he stares at the floor, diamond held between his fingers, and crawls on his hands and knees until he reaches Duffy, stopping just outside his reach.
Duffy, whose legs are spread, space between them for a person to stand, beckons him closer. And River goes, crawling that extra distance so he can kneel between Duffy’s legs.
River doesn’t look down. He doesn’t look up either. Just somewhere vaguely around Duffy’s torso. He flinches when a hand brushes through his hair, and he hears Duffy laugh.
“See, you can follow orders. If only you were this obedient all the time.”
“I...” River doesn’t know what to say.
“Hand it over,” Duffy says, his open palm appearing in River’s line of sight.
It’s only as he hands it over that River remembers it’s not real. It’s a fake diamond, and Duffy’s going to be furious with him when he finds out.
Part of River wishes that it had been him.
It’s kind of a savage, fucked up thing to think, but well, after everything, he thinks he deserves it.
And it’s not that he’d begrudge Marcus getting his own, or is not relieved that Louisa saved his – Marcus' - life. It's just that, a part of River really wishes that he’d gotten the chance to bash Duffy’s head in himself.
And with the things Duffy has done, the things he was in the process of doing when the head-bashing occurred, it wasn’t like there wasn’t a decent argument for him having deserved it, if you wanted to be blunt and callous and a little bloodthirsty about it.
Or you could easily argue for self-defense. Especially down in that archive, where none of them would have made it out alive if they hadn’t fought for it.
But River will also admit that it’s at least a little personal. The mocking, the insults, the digs at his family. The locked, windowless room. The black eye and fractured ribs and badly bruised balls.
The attempted murder.
Even now, thinking of it, his fingers itch to draw a bit of blood of his own.
But that instinct doesn’t entirely sit right with him. He doesn’t really enjoy the idea of wishing such injury on someone. Or causing it. And he’s not sure whether a coma – which is certainly a thing that seems to being going around a lot these days - is better than death.
Because he can’t decide how he feels about Duffy still being alive. He can’t decide if he wants him to ever recover.
In part because there had also been something strangely thrilling in poking that bear. Dangerous, foolish, detrimental to his health, but having Duffy in front of him, furious, gritted teeth – or bared teeth – clenched fists, ready to make River bleed, had always seemed to light something in him.
He's been thinking about it a lot.
Duffy dragging him down a corridor into a small, locked room, a controlling hand on the back of his neck the whole time. Duffy's voice, and the smell of sweat and blood as he got the shit kicked out of him. If he’d seen Duffy himself at the archive.
Everything about it is just supremely fucked up, and River’s not sure what to do with any of it.
The hand is big enough that it can cradle, or rather, grip, the back of his head, and also press a thumb just below his eye socket.
River would wince, but it’s hardly the most painful thing happening at the moment.
Likely to leave a bruise though.
“Look at me,” Hobbs says.
River huffs a breath through his nose as best he can, and ignores him. Also, as best he can.
Hobbs’ thumb swipes back and forth beneath his eye, catching the tears that are running down his face.
“Come on, Cartwright. Let me see those pretty blue eyes.”
River, against his better judgement, looks up. Not so much at Hobbs, but at the phone pointed at his face. At the lens, the one that’s filming him.
And what a sight he’s sure to make. Messy hair, watering eyes, mouth stretched wide, drooling around the cock shoved down his throat.
“Perfect,” Hobbs says. “Prettiest thing I’ve ever seen. Think you can take more?”
Before River can answer – not that he really can answer – Hobbs is pulling his head down, sliding more of his cock into River’s mouth. He feels it press against the back of his throat, and he swallows desperately, trying to force himself to take it, to let it in, lest he start choking.
“Fuck that’s good,” Hobbs moans.
The camera is right there, and River has to look away, has to close his eyes. But all that does is make the ache, the smell, the taste, all-encompassing.
Hobbs’ hand moves from his head to trail down the back of his neck. Fingers then curl over his throat and River feels a flutter of panic.
“I think I can feel myself,” Hobbs says. “Hang on.”
He nudges his hips forward, forcing more of his cock down River’s throat.
“Yeah, that’s it. Look at that.”
He’s sure the phone is capturing the sounds too. the loud, wet sloppy sound of Hobbs fucking his mouth.
River doesn’t try to talk. He can’t.
“Touch yourself.”
When River doesn’t acknowledge the order, Hobbs prods his thigh with the toe of his boot.
“Come on, Cartwright. Rub yourself off while I fuck your mouth. If you get off before I do, I’ll let you choose whether I come down your throat or on your face.”
River’s hard. Achingly hard.
He wants to get off.
He's not sure he wants to choose.
But he moves his hand, the hand that’s not stroking what little of Hobbs’ cock the man hasn’t shoved in his mouth yet, down between his legs.
River doesn’t look, but the camera will obviously be catching all of this too. He wonders if Hobbs is planning to send him a copy of the video.
He wouldn’t say he’s afraid of the Dogs, but...he’s a little afraid of the Dogs.
Really, it’s his bosses that he should be afraid of. Those that, in practice, command the Dogs, and who seemingly keep trying to have him arrested. Or ruined. Or murdered.
And that is a genuine concern. Taverner’s gratitude for helping oust Tearney won't likely protect him the next time it’s in her best interests to throw him under the bus again. And who knows what the new First Desk will be like.
Knowing River’s luck, they’ll order someone to murder him too.
It’s just that the Dogs often seem to play a part in all that, and while they’ll also be getting a new leader at some point, River isn’t that convinced that much is going to change.
Duffy and Hobbs may be out of commission, but there were plenty of others just like them.
And they had both alluded to, dropped hints, shit talked enough that River’s a little afraid of what the Dogs know about him. What they say about him.
He hates it, but he can’t stop thinking about it. About people seeing him like...
River’s hands scramble over the desk. It’s hard to find purchase, to find something to hold onto with the way he’s being rocked back and forth. He's being moved too roughly, his hands are too sweaty.
So, he gives up. Goes as limp as he can, hoping he can ride it out.
He lets the bruising hands on his hips direct him, and pretends he’s not even here. Pretends he’s not hard.
It will be over soon anyway. Surely.
“Oh no,” Duffy says, a little breathlessly, but still clearly pleased with himself. “Don’t go tapping out on me just yet. There’s still a lot more to go.”
“Huh?” River mumbles, cheek pressed against the wood.
Duffy’s been fucking him for...a while now. River’ lost track. He has to be done soon. Things are so wet, it’s so loud. He must be ready to come. He'll be coming in River, and he’s not sure what he’s going to do about that, but he’ll be done.
“There are plenty here that want a piece of you, Cartwright,” Duffy says with a laugh. “And now that we know you’re good for it.”
He slaps River on the arse, and River moans, clenching around Duffy’s dick inside him, and feeling his own cock dribble.
“It would be rude not to share.”
“No,” River says.
Is he pushing back onto Duffy’s cock? He doesn’t think he is. Why would he be?
“Come on, you love the idea. And I’ve got some actual work to do, so when we’re done here, I’ll take you downstairs, where there will be more than enough cocks to keep a needy bitch like you happy.”
There’s something wrong with him.
And yes, River’s sure many people would agree with such a statement, would happily produce a list of all the things wrong with him, and he’d like to be able to refute them. He would, and he could.
On this issue though, he’d have to agree.
Because who has the sorts of thoughts he does? The kinds of dreams he does?
Add in the fact that many of the leads of said dreams are currently catatonic. And that they’ve tried to kill him in the past. Or have completely ruined his life.
That's not normal.
Maybe River should find someone to talk to. A professional.
River...has not found himself a professional.
Yet, he tells himself. Repeatedly.
He’s just been busy. And distracted.
But eventually.
He just keeps putting it off, and there are logistics to consider, both private and professional.
Also, he just kind of hates the idea of spilling himself open like that. To a stranger. To anyone, really. He can tell Louisa, the closest thing he actually has to a friend anymore, some of it, but sure as fuck not all of it.
But maybe it would be easier with a stranger. A professional that knew how to make the whole thing doable for him.
He has started keeping a brief list of the dreams he’s been having though. He’s done some minor preliminary research on...this sort of stuff. On coping methods and that. Mostly at home, but occasionally at work, while looking over his shoulder in paranoia that Lamb or Ho might see. Or Coe, who apparently has some experience in this area, but who is also so silent and weird that River’s slightly terrified of him.
But he’s started keeping a journal of sorts. Just jotting down what he can remember when he wakes up. The general themes of what’s going on in his head.
And the pattern that’s emerging is, well...
His grandfather dying.
Him kneeling between Duffy’s legs, gun or cock or gun then cock in his mouth as he pleads for his life.
The imploding of his career and every dream he’s ever had.
Rope around his wrists and his ankles, unable to move as someone stands over him.
His mother driving away, leaving him with strangers. Leaving and never coming back and even the small token of her letters and cards drying up too.
Spider telling him to beg for the file, for the information they need, and River dropping to his knees in a room full of jeering people.
His grandfather forgetting who he is.
Duffy cornering him outside the archive facility, breaking his ribs, forcing him down, pushing into him and fucking him until he screams.
His grandmother’s funeral.
Trapped in a locked room with Hobbs and Duffy and no way out, bleeding and bruised and too full. Pushed to the breaking point, but they won’t stop.
And so on, and so forth.
So yes, River’s not entirely sure what to do with all of that.