The Claw eyed the medics circled around It.

I studied It for a long moment; Its skin was bruised, abraded, sliced apart in some places. I waved a medic forward in an order to heal It. Always better to start with a clean work surface. Pushing everything down and locking my mind on the task ahead, I walked around the Claw as the medic healed It. It was wearing no clothing. That meant I didn't have to worry about hidden weapons or pills the Claw could take in order to kill Itself. Its body was bound, including its fingers so no jutsu could possibly be formed, and there was a gag in its mouth to prevent biting or speaking. I removed it. Finally, finished  circling, I ended up right in front of the Claw again.

"Hello," I greeted.

The Claw's gaze snapped to me. "Mujōna," It said, tonelessly. The medic finished and quickly backed away.

I graced It with a nod. "You know of me," I acknowledged. "Great. That takes care of introductions."

"Cashile-san?" A ninja questioned, hands on the cart full of tools she had just rolled in. The Claw's gaze is drawn to the hammers, blades, saws, clamps, and other tools laid out precisely on the cart's surface.

"Just leave that there," I ordered with a smile. Turning towards Danzo, I asked, "So what's the deal with these medics? Will they talk about what happens in here?"

He was already shaking his head. "No," he replied. "They can't."

I raised an eyebrow. Can't? The ANBU had said the same thing when I'd questioned him about where I'd been summoned and who had summoned me. Danzo picked up on my unasked question and gestured towards a medic.

She stuck her tongue out at me.

"Ah," I replied, studying the seal on her tongue. "I see. Ingenious."

Danzo smirked and nodded. "No information about events that took place in this room will leave their mouths."

"Unless you order it so, of course," I murmured.

He blinked, then let out a coarse laugh. "Of course."

"You'll need to be out of sight," I ordered him. "I have to control all the stimuli I possibly can." Danzo nodded. "And I expect you to share any information you discover with me, of course."

He narrowed his eye.

"Otherwise, I just may let it slip to the wrong people that this organization exists," I smirked, hiding how tense I was; this was a gamble on my part. Danzo would never risk the discovery of his little organization. But that didn't mean he would give in to my demand; he might just as easily order my execution. I could escape, but I would never be able to stay in Konoha.

"But of course," Danzo replied smoothly. "And in turn, I won't speak of the activities which you are... partaking in today. Konoha may not turn away from torture of enemy nin, but the torture of a little boy who looks fresh from the academy? We have to draw the line somewhere."

We stared at each other for a long moment before I nodded tersely. He returned it, and I considered the matter closed.

I turned back to the Claw, who had watched the entire exchange with calculating eyes. Danzo faded into the shadows as I began. "Have you ever played the game Would You Rather?"

The Claw was staring at me with incomprehension. Even a medic made a noise of confusion. The Claw didn't know what the game Would You Rather was. The medic didn't know why I was talking about a child's game during an interrogation.

"C'mon, you can't be older than thirteen, maybe fourteen; you must have played at some point." I was still met with a complete and utter lack of comprehension. "Alright, I'll explain. I say 'Would you rather', then list two options, which you have to choose from. Get it?"

I waited for some signal of Its understanding and receive none. "Alright, how about an example? Would you rather," I questioned, and suddenly there was a kunai spinning around one of my fingers, "I cut your shoulder or your calf?"

The Claw didn't answer.

Quicker than most people could follow, I cut both Its arm and Its leg. It barely winced; It had suffered through worse. I mockingly scowled at the Claw, wagging a finger at It. "You have to choose!" I reprimanded.

The Claw of the Phoenix had no dignity. It had no honor. It had no respect. The Claw of the Phoenix would scream through torture if that gave It a better chance of survival. It would cry and beg and fake breaking down if that's what it took to escape unbroken.

I was counting on it.

The Claw would play my game, stressing as it tried to choose an option that would cause the least damage. And it wouldn't even realize where the most damage was happening: Its mind. Because even though the Claw would be hurt no matter what, eventually all that registered would be that It was choosing ways of being hurt.

"Would you rather... I stab your right hand or your left hand?" I questioned conversationally.

"Left," It answered promptly.

I smirked and did as the Claw requested.

It screamed.

***

The Claw in front of me vaguely resembled a human being.

It had the right outline—four limbs and a torso and a head—but from there on there was enough gore and blood and open wounds that the Claw didn't seem human.

One of the hardest aspects of enduring my torture, I knew, was the lack of rhythm. It seemed like such a small thing, but eventually not knowing when the torture would begin and end and where it would occur began to wear at the Claw.

I never let It have a set amount of time to answer. Sometimes, the Claw got up to two minutes before it had to choose or I simply executed both tortures. Sometimes, It got less than ten seconds.

"Would you rather," I practically sang, still cheery and nonchalant despite the gore in front of me. I knew my friendly, casual manner would confuse the Claw, putting it on edge. "I slice your stomach again or cut off your big toe?"

The Claw's breath hitched in Its throat, blood from the wound left by Its extracted molar gurgling in Its mouth. "I..." It licked Its lips—or what was left of them—nervously, and I took note of the small fracture in Its composure.

It would choose having Its stomach cut, despite having already received four in the exact same spot. Its big toe was essential to balance and Its ability to run.

"Tick tock, tick tock," I murmured.

"Stomach," the Claw finally gasped out, just as I knew It would. "Cut my stomach."

I did as It said. The grey pink of Its viscera appeared and began to slide out as the cut parted the last layer between them and the outside world. I caught them deftly. "Oopsies!"

I heard a medic retch but ignored him, maintaining my character of childish nonchalance. The medics had already been replaced twice; the first two groups suffered from chakra depletion in their effort to keep the Claw alive through my interrogation.

And the entire time, I could feel Danzo's eyes burning into me.

I eyed the guts in my hands, considering just what to do with them.

"Would you rather," I questioned, eyes staring into Its, which refused to meet mine, voice pitched low so only the Claw in front of me could hear. The boy's—Its, Its, Its—eyes met mine for the first time throughout the entire torture, wide and wild and feverish and intensely blue. They said all that he could not. There was a long moment in time where there was only the blue of his eyes screaming at me, before they dropped as pain wracked through his figure.

I ignored what I heard in his eyes and continued. "Taste your own intestines, or have your pinky cut off?"

The Claw stared. He knew what he should choose; being forced to know the flavor of his own intestines would not physically harm him in any way, and losing a finger, while not devastating, could effect his performance. I gave him time, not to gather his resolve but to realize the futility of the situation. His breath came quickly.

"Well?" I asked, just before his eyes started to harden. "Your answer?"

I poked at his stomach. He blinked slowly, and I saw a tear slip down his face.

"Pinky," he said quietly. "I'd rather you cut off my pinky."

I nodded, and made short work of his pinky instead of drawing it out; a reward, of sorts. Besides, the next choice should break him.

I backed up, allowing a medic to heal his stomach slightly as I tossed his pinky up and down. His blue eyes, once so empty, followed its progress. The medic stepped away, and his reprieve was over.

I studied the boy and his blue eyes closely. He would break. He already had, a little. Now I simply had to exert the right pressure in the right area in order for him to shatter completely.

"Would you rather have your eye pulled out or eat your own pinky?"

His breath caught in a way that sounded suspiciously like a sob.

I gestured to his eye. "It wouldn't just be like scooping the pit out of an avocado; your eyes are attached deep inside your scull by muscles and deeper into your brain by the optic nerve. It would sort of be like pulling up a weed with a particularly deep root. The pain, I have been told, is exquisite."

"On the other hand," I gestured with his pinky. "You can bite into your own finger as easily as you would a carrot. It might not taste nice, and the bone might be a little tough to swallow, but it would be over relatively quickly."

They boy's eyes were flickering over the entire room as though, after all this time, he would find an escape. I watched him emotionlessly, dropping the casual charade I'd been using to put him on edge.

"I need you to choose, Claw," I ordered without sympathy.

Tears were slipping from his eyes without restraint, now. His eyes were begging me to stop, begging me to not make him choose between two terrible options.

In response, I allowed my final words to fall; the hammer blow that would finally shatter him into pieces.

"You've had the power to make this stop the entire time," I murmured. His eyes widened because now, in this fragile state of mind, he thought it was his fault he'd been subjected to this torture; after all, he could've stopped it at any time. He'd even been choosing what torture he wanted, he preferred. "You can even make it stop now."

And the boy broke.

I watched dispassionately as the boy sobbed, begging for it to end and begging me to stop and promising me he'd be a good Claw and tell me everything I wanted to know. I turned away from the pitiful mess of a human being.

"H—It's all yours, Danzo," I announced flatly. "Expect It to descend into utter madness within an hour at most. You might as well kill It after that. Your time is limited."

"Your expertise is appreciated, Kuroki," Danzo murmured.

"I did you a favor," I replied, eyes dead. "That's it. And now you will owe me one in return."

"Of course," he bowed smoothly. "You may go now."

I didn't appreciate how much that sounded like a dismissal of an underling but nodded and walked away all the same. My job had been done. Danzo, and his entire organization, owed me.

It was worth it.

It should have been worth it.

An ANBU appeared, grabbed my arm, and transported me away.

I stepped from the shadow of the Hokage mount, where the ANBU had dropped me off, and found that I was shivering.

I just wanted to go home.

I began to walk.

A door appeared in front of me.

It was Aiden's apartment.

I knocked.

I knocked again.

Aisa answered.

"Cashile!" He exclaimed happily. "Aiden's not home right now! Or are you here to give me super awesome secret training? We all did the training you ordered us to do cause you didn't come back! Where were you? Oh, Aiden took a late shift this week; he won't be home until, like, two in the morning, and it's only eleven right now. And don't tell him I stayed up this late: he said I had to be in bed by ten at the latest. But—Cashile? Hey, Cashile!"

Aisa's chattering didn't make any sense, so I had simply turned and walked away.

But he grabbed my arm.

I stopped.

"What."

"Are you okay, Cashile?"

"Tell Aiden to come to my apartment when he's home," I ordered.

I rattled off the address.

"Okay," Aisa agreed.

He sounded scared.

The Claw had looked scared.

His eyes had been terrified.

His eyes, which I'd been prepared to tear from their sockets.

He couldn't have been more than a year or two older than Aisa.

"Tell Aiden," I ordered again.

I disappeared.

__________________________

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