Chapter Text
His head was pounding. Throbbing pain came in waves from the front to the back of his head and he groaned at the sensation, wishing to fall asleep again just to avoid it. Not only that, his eyes felt as if he had a ton of sand stuck under his eyelids and it kept irritating him, because it wouldn’t let him fall back asleep. He wanted to rub it away but the moment he moved his hand something rattled loudly, preventing him from reaching his face. He shook his arms again only to realise that they were bound behind his back, metal digging into the skin of his wrists. His eyes shot open and that was when he realised that he was laying on his side, coldness of the floor seeping through his clothes and making him shiver. He rolled slightly to see that he was chained to the wall and his stomach dropped at the realisation. Then, another thought came through.
Where was Colby?
If he strained his memory hard enough he remembered laughing with his best friend as they walked into a darkened room and the door closed behind them. He remembered the weird feeling making his heart rate spike, stepping closer to the brunet. He remembered Colby’s mocking voice asking if he was scared. And then everything was starting to get blurry and he was swaying on his feet. The last thing he knew was Colby shouting his name.
And now this. He rolled back to his previous position and looked around. This place was sketchy. Dimmed light barely let him see anything. The room was relatively big with a metal table on one end and something like a huge wardrobe on the other.
And then opposite Sam, in more or less the same position as him, laid Colby.
His heart jumped hard in his chest as he called for the younger man, desperate to hear an answer. Sam’s body moved on its own as he sat up and attempted to stand up, despite the nausea and the way everything around him spun. He wanted to get to Colby, he wanted to check on his best friend, but he took maybe two steps before the chain stopped him, making him fall back to the floor with a silent grunt.
“Colby! Colby, can you hear me?” he asked, but for a while nothing happened. Colby wouldn’t respond and it took Sam every ounce of control he had to not panic. Instead he focused on brunet’s chest, relief flooding through him as he noticed it rise and fall steadily.
How did they even get in this position? Sam closed his eyes for a second and took a few deep breaths, trying to remember. They were supposed to film a collab with a new YouTuber. Fans were begging them to make an appearance on the boy’s channel. It was a ‘friendship test challenge’, or at least that was what he called it. It was a popular series, so Sam and Colby thought ‘why not’.
It started fine. They got asked a couple of questions about each other to test how well they knew each other. They’d done that in the past many many times, so it was nothing new. And it went smoothly, seeing as the duo spent almost every waking moment together ever since they moved to LA. Hell, from the day they met even. Then there was time for a lie detector. Sam was a bit nervous for that one. He knew damn well what kind of questions people liked to ask during those and there was a part of him that didn’t want the public to know about certain things.
For example how his feelings towards Colby have been starting to change.
It all begun the moment Colby called him with the news about the cancer. The fear and absolute dread that gripped him shook his world in its foundation and it only went downhill from there.
He didn’t want anyone to know that. More importantly, he didn’t want Colby to know that.
But the questions took a completely different turn. They were put in hypothetical situations, asking what they’d do in those. And the scenarios were getting weird.
It was cut off at ‘if you jumping off the building was the only chance so save your best friend, would you do it?’
They both said yes, because there was nothing they wouldn’t have done for each other.
They answered truthfully.
But then someone led them to the room for ‘the final test’ and that was when everything went black and Sam woke up here, chained to the wall.
What the hell was happening?
“Sam?”
The blond’s head snapped up and the moment his eyes met Colby’s, just as groggy and confused and scared as Sam’s, his heart sped up so much he could feel the blood rushing to his cheeks.
“Colbs! Hey, are you okay, man?” he asked softly, ignoring how wrong it felt to even ask that question in their current situation. Of course they weren’t okay. They were fucking chained to the wall God knows where and had no idea what was about to happen to them.
“Yeah, I think so. You?” Colby still hasn’t looked away from him, clearly studying Sam’s body language and the blond almost blushed at the care in his eyes.
“Yeah. Bit of a headache, but it’s alright,” he admitted and watched as Colby looked around the room. Sam could see the questions forming at the tip of his tongue. “I’ve no idea what’s happening, man.”
Just as he finished the sentence the door that he hadn’t noticed before flung open and suddenly a beam of white light illuminated the room. Both men had to close their eyes for a second to not let it blind them.
“Oh sweet, you’re both awake! You’ve been taking so long!”
By the time Sam was able to look at the owner of the deep voice his silhouette was already towering over them, his hands resting on his hips and slight smirk twisting his face. Sam shivered at the weird glint in the man’s eyes when he looked at them.
He looked at them like a predator would look at a prey. Like a crazy scientist eyeing his newest test subjects.
The thought made Sam shiver.
“Who are you? What do you want from us?” came Colby’s voice, hint of a challenge hidden beneath a bravado he put up for every difficult situation. But Sam knew that it was a defense mechanism. Colby was scared.
It didn’t make him feel any better.
“Oh, how rude of me, of course you would like to know,” the man smiled wider and clasped his hands, making both Sam and Colby wince. “I’m not going to give you my actual name, but you can address me as Exarmal. So nice to have you here, boys! I’ve been waiting for you to finally arrive!”
His voice was full of childish-like enthusiasm and taking into consideration their current situation, it was more than chilling.
“Why us?” Sam asked, trying his best to not look frightened or intimidated by the man. He wasn’t even that impressive. Tall and thin, but with some muscle evident under his shirt and on his bare arms. He didn’t look intimidating, though.
But that glint in his eyes when he looked at Sam…
“I’ve been watching you ever since you started on vine. I’m a huge fan, honestly. Whatever you do, you always do it together. Your bond is… it’s honestly amazing. You made me believe those things exist in this world.”
Okay, that was weird.
“If you’re a fan, why do all of this?”
Exarmal laughed and it wasn’t a good kind of laugh. It sent shivers down their spines and made their hearts drop.
“Because I want to test your friendship. Test your bond. You see, I’ve tried to recreate what you two have, but it just doesn’t seem possible. It almost feels… fake.”
Sam looked at Colby and the brunet looked just as confused as he was. A silent agreement that something definitely wasn’t right with the guy passed between them as Colby rose to his knees.
“Where are you going with this, man?” the brunet asked and Sam kind of dreaded the answer. It couldn’t be good.
And it wasn’t.
“I invited a couple of people that claimed to have had an unbreakable friendship. And they were all fake as FUCK!” the man exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air, leaning slightly back, still laughing. “I thought I’ve proven my point, but then there was always this thought in the back of my mind, what about those two motherfuckers from Vine? Are they fake too? So I started my research. See, I’m a curious guy, I need to know.” he started to walk around the room at this point, two pairs of blue eyes following his every step. “So I convinced someone to start a YouTube channel and start this series about testing the friendships, hoping that one day you’d notice it and want to participate, so I could play my little game with you.”
“Game? What game?” Colby’s voice was still tough, but Sam noticed the uncertainty behind it. The guy stopped and turned to face them again, sheer glee radiating from his face.
“My Best Friends Game. I want to know how real you are. I want to know how much will it take to break you, to break this,” he gestured at the chained men and Sam didn’t like it one bit. Break them? What did he mean by that?
But before any of them could ask, the man continued.
“You won’t get it until I explain the rules, so here we go!” he clasped his hands again and stepped closer to them. Sam tensed and noticed Colby doing the same as Exarmal rested a hand on his arm. “The game is parted in sessions. I decide how often we play and for how long, but I’m not gonna tell you that, that would take away all the fun, wouldn’t it?” he chuckled and Sam wanted to get him the fuck away from his best friend. “So, let’s say we start the first session with Colby. I planned for it to be like an hour long. During that hour I do whatever I want to you. Not gonna lie, it’s gonna hurt a bit.”
Sam didn’t like where it was going.
“Actually, it might hurt like bitch,” the man continued with another laugh, his tone way too serious with comparison to his words. “But don’t worry, you can stop it at any time. All you have to say is ‘pass’ and I stop. BUT! Let’s say you decide to pass after half an hour. It would be no fun to just drop it. Time is money, you know, I don’t like wasting it. So the moment you say ‘pass’, I spend the rest of the game time with Sammy.”
Everything in Sam went numb when Exarmal pointed a finger at him. His eyes met Colby’s and his best friend seemed just as terrified of the prospect as he was.
“And then of course I start another session with him until he decides to pass it back to you. You have only one pass per session, though! We don’t want to ruin the fun by taking it back and forth, do we?” Exarmal patted Colby’s arm and the brunet tried hard not to flinch. “I’m actually curious how much it will take for you to pass the session to the other.”
That man was sick.
And Sam was honestly scared to think of what he was about to do to them.
“People will be looking for us, you can’t get away with it!” he said, successfully hiding his feelings, but instead of faltering the man’s confidence he only got a playful smirk back.
“Let’s not waste more time then. Which one of you would like to start?”
Neither of them responded. They exchanged a glance and even though it was short, they both understood the meaning of it.
Both would do anything to avoid the other getting hurt in any way. But they didn’t manage to utter a word before Exarmal spoke again.
“I know, I know, it’s a tough choice, especially since you don’t know what we’re playing today. So let me make the first decision. It’s my game after all.”
With that he walked over to the cabinet and opened it. Loud squeak echoed between the walls and Sam knew that this would be a sound stuck in his future nightmares.
“Since your channel is called Sam and Colby, I think we all know who deserves to go first this time.”
Sam’s blood ran cold as he caught Colby’s eyes, wide and scared. People around them liked messing with their channel’s name and turning it around.
In other words, they loved starting with Colby.
Sam was protesting before the first punch laid on the brunet’s stomach, earning a loud groan in response. He watched as his best friend’s face twisted in pain and pure rage bloomed inside him at the sight. How dare he lay hands on Colby, how dare he hurt someone so precious, so beautiful, so innocent? They did nothing to that man! They didn’t even know him! Why did he have it out on them?
But despite Sam’s screams Exarmal didn’t stop, aiming punch after punch after punch at the man under him and Colby had no way of defending himself except for curling his body into a ball, which only got him a strong kick in the back in response.
Sam saw red.
“STOP IT! STOP IT, YOU HEAR ME? LEAVE HIM ALONE! LEAVE HIM THE FUCK ALONE!”
“Only he can stop this. Just one word, Brock. One word is enough,” Exarmal’s tone was mocking as he hit Colby’s side, air forcefully leaving his victims' lungs. The brunet said nothing, but Sam knew exactly how badly he was trying to remain silent, to not give the man the satisfaction.
To make it seem like he could take it.
Sam knew Colby better than himself. Of course the dumbass would try to protect him. And it only made the situation worse.
“Colby? Colby, pass it. I can take a beating, c’mon!”
“Careful what you wish for, blondie. I’m just getting started.”
Sam met the man’s eyes and something in him twisted in fear. That man was truly, completely insane. With a smirk on his face he went behind Colby to unchain him from the wall and yank him up by the collar of his shirt.
“If you try anything, I’m taking it out on your bestie,” he warned when Colby attempted to get away from him. That absolutely stopped the brunet in his tracks and Sam wished, prayed that he didn’t, cause that meant that he'll let Exarmal do anything to him just to keep Sam safe. It meant watching Colby get hurt and the blond couldn't take it. He couldn't. He'd rather Exarmal's attention shifted focus on Sam, leaving Colby alone.
But of course that stupid idiot and his stupid moral code, and his stupid loving nature, and his stupid protectiveness would stay still at the very sound of the threat and let himself be led to the table, let his hands be moved up so he was basically hanging from the ceiling. Blood was already dripping from his split lip and a purple bruise was forming itself on his jaw and Sam’s insides twisted painfully.
“What are you doing?” he asked, dreading the answer, but Exarmal didn’t answer him, instead adjusting the chain so Colby could barely stand to relieve the weight put on his arms. Sam could feel his heart slowly dropping to his fucking feet as he met Colby’s eyes and saw a mix of fear, pain and determination lurking deep withing them.
But it was only the beginning.
Soon, the brunet’s XPLR shirt was ripped off his chest, revealing the tanned skin littered with angry red and purplish spots, showing the strained muscles fighting for any kind of support and Sam was launching forward, tugging at his chain, trying to rip it from the wall, adrenaline and fear numbing him to the pain in his arms. He just wanted to stop this, he wanted it to be a sick joke, he wanted the man as far away from Colby as possible.
In his anger and scrabble he didn’t notice the man reaching for something resting on a table behind him. He only heard the sharp sound of a leather whip cutting the skin and a blood curling scream ripped from Colby’s throat as his body arched forward, shaking from the impact.
Sam’s desperate pleas and protests joined the mix as Exarmal repeated the action. And again. And again. And again. His world was shaking at its very core once more when his eyes caught tears streaming down Colby’s face and he couldn’t stop his own. Every whip seemed to echo in Sam’s heart, ripping it in two, in four, in ten, in…
“STOP IT! STOP IT, PLEASE!”
“Only Colby can stop this right now, those are the rules,” the man smiled wickedly and Sam felt sick in his stomach, watching his fingers dig into Colby’s chin as he forced the brunet to look at Sam. And no sight has ever made the blond feel more pain than his best friend’s eyes in that moment - beautiful blue stained with tears, terror and ache. “What do you say, Colby? One word, that’s all it takes. Just say ‘pass’ and all the pain goes away.”
And Colby’s eyes shone with determination and Sam knew that asking him to accept the offer, to pass it to him, will be in vain.
He tried anyway.
"Pass it, Colbs. Please, pass it, I can take this, I swear."
But Colby kept his mouth shut, years of silent communication between the two sent a clear message of absolute refusal.
"How cute," Exarmal laughed, swinging the whip again and Colby screamed as it landed on his back, cutting the skin, drawing blood.
And Sam screamed with him.