Time period: Just before ‘The Message’

Thanks to lvs2read for the great beta and thunder_nari for the great beta and spurring me on.

~

It’s hot, too hot, and Simon can barely keep himself upright. He’s starting to suspect the operative’s sympathetic smile is genuine rather than an attempt to worry him further. The blue-handed men are psychotic, sadistic even. They haven’t hurt him as such yet, but making him as physically uncomfortable and embarrassed as possible is obviously high on their agenda.

He’s not been bound, gagged, or had any of his extremities removed, thankfully. In fact, they’ve done the absolute minimum. But somehow it is just as bad.

Simon closes his eyes for a moment as a sweat droplet beads from his brow, runs down his forehead and clings to his eyelashes. More wasted water. More water Simon needs. It doesn’t take long before the droplet falls to his cheek, and Simon opens his eyes, once more trying to keep his balance. He isn’t sure why his captors have such a fondness for tanks or dark ones at that, but he finds this kind far worse than the water ones.

It’s smaller for one thing. If he stretches out fully on his back or front it would be just a foot or so longer, and squat, enough so he can’t stand but has to sit. Not that Simon wants to stand, he’s not sure he has the balance for it. His head is pounding now, mouth dry and still tasting of bile, and his chest hurts as he breathes. It’s hot and dark and he's confined to kneeling in the center in the only small square that seems unaffected by heat transfer. His fingers smart from where he’s tentatively reached out to find the sides, the other areas around him hot to the touch giving him no choice but to kneel in one position. To try not to let the waves of fatigue and ache within his body win out, not to let them win, but to ride out the heat.

But it’s hard, so hard. He just wants to collapse to the floor, to plead for water. His hunger cramps haven’t come too frequently since he’s been inside the hot tank, t