Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

They didn't even bother using his name.

"Subject has shown remarkable resilience to previous testing protocols." Bishop's voice drifted through the fog of whatever they'd given him this time. 

Clinical. Detached. Like he was discussing weather patterns rather than torture.

His wrists ached where the restraints cut into already raw skin. The wounds never had time to heal between procedures, flesh rubbed down to tendon in places. 

Every shift sent fresh pain radiating up his arms.

He'd stopped counting the days since they first strapped him to a table like this. Since they first began taking him apart piece by piece to see how he worked. 

Time had become meaningless, measured only in intervals between pain.

But this lab was different. 

The metal table beneath his shell was wider, angled to catch runoff in steel gutters along the edges. 

The lights caught on unfamiliar equipment, gleaming off surgical implements arranged with terrible precision. More personnel than usual moved around him, their efficiency carrying an edge that made his pulse spike.

His arms were stretched out to his sides at unnatural angles, tendons already screaming from the strain. Not just restrained - displayed. Like specimens pinned for study.

The raw patches where they'd taken tissue samples yesterday burned against cold steel. Every point of contact was agony, his nerves hypersensitive from weeks of testing.

"Begin preparations." Bishop's command cut through the air, "Mark the incision sites. Local nerve blocks only - anesthesia will interfere with the serum's efficacy."

"Implementing preliminary safety measures." A technician approached, rubber bit in latex hands. The same one they'd used yesterday when they'd taken bone marrow.

Leo kept his jaw clenched, but latex fingers dug into pressure points until his mouth opened. Like every other time they'd forced him silent.

"Protective measures in place. Continue prep."

Gloved hands touched his arms, marking careful lines that made his stomach lurch. Black ink against skin already mapped with surgical scars.

They measured and remeasured, discussing angles and points he couldn't quite grasp through the chemical haze.

"Initial incision points mapped." The technician stepped back, checking measurements against charts full of previous results. Previous subjects. "Musculature is ideal for the procedure. Complete severance should be clean."

Severance.

The word filtered through the fog in his mind. 

Made something cold settle in his chest where they'd cracked him open last week to study his heart.

He watched them prep the surgical tools, laying out blades and clamps and bone saws with terrible precision. 

Watched them marking those careful lines up his arms, discussing points of separation and nerve clusters and-

Understanding crashed through him like a physical blow.

No.

The realization hit, the horror crystallizing with perfect clarity.

No. They wouldn’t. Not this.

Leo thrashed against the restraints, training shattering under the weight of blind panic. The wounds on his wrists tore open, blood slicking the cuffs. 

But his body was sluggish, uncooperative. 

Because yes Bishop would. God…yes, he would. Leo had seen it before on other subjects. Had shelved the horror and hidden it in some dark part of his mind.

Couldn’t face the possibility that it could happen to him.

Was happening now.

"Subject showing elevated stress response." Clinical notes. Clinical hands pressing him down against wounds that hadn't healed, "Implementing additional restraints."

More straps. More hands. Each point of contact a reminder of how thoroughly they'd stripped away his autonomy. His dignity. His personhood.

The first touch of antiseptic made his heart stutter in his chest. The same sharp smell that came before every cut, every test, every violation. Made everything too real.

His breathing came in sharp gasps that fogged the oxygen mask they'd strapped to his face. His vision tunneled, the world narrowing to steel and glass and latex hands that moved with mechanical precision.

"Beginning phase one."

No, no, no, no. Please no.

The first cut burned like acid, like every other wound they'd given him but somehow worse. Because this one wasn't about testing pain thresholds or studying healing rates.

This one was about taking pieces of him away.

Leo's world narrowed to bright lights and sharp steel and the wrongness of hands inside his flesh. Each sensation burned through the drugs they'd given him, too sharp, too real. He could feel every slice, every separation of tissue. Could feel them taking him apart with methodical precision.

He screamed around the gag until he tasted blood, body arching against restraints that cut deeper into already raw flesh. The monitors screamed with him, recording every spike of pain, every surge of terror.

More data. Always more data.

Blood ran warm down his arms, dripping into those carefully placed gutters. The sound echoed wrong in his head. Soft plinks mixing with the clinical beep of monitors and the soft discussion of technique.

Like they weren't unmaking him piece by piece.

"Note the muscle response. Clean separation of the deltoid." Voices discussing him like he wasn't even there. Like they weren't cutting away parts of him that would never- could never-

Terror stole his breath.

Stop.

Please stop.

Black spots danced across his vision but they wouldn't let him pass out. 

He could feel them working. Feel the precise separation of muscle from bone. Feel every cut, every clamp, every moment they reduced him to component parts.

And then, a sudden lightness.

Gone.

Just... gone.

His mind recoiled from the wrongness. From the absence where his arm should be. Where there was now nothing.

A sound tore from his throat. Pain burned through him. But the pain was nothing against the howling absence where part of him should be.

He felt part of his mind separate along with his arm.

The second arm was worse.

Because now he knew. 

Knew exactly what it felt like to be unmade. 

Could feel the phantom weight of the first limb they'd taken even as they started on the second.

His body trembled with shock, with horror, with the understanding that they weren't going to stop.

That they never stopped.

God please make it stop.

He thrashed weakly as they worked, the movement reopening half-healed wounds across his body. Blood mixed with antiseptic, with sweat, with tears he couldn't remember starting to shed.

More hands on his body. More voices discussed technique and blood loss and neural response like they weren't destroying everything he was. Everything he'd ever been.

Consciousness blinked in and out. He welcomed every moment of darkness, of silence.

Every moment without the horror of what was being done to him.

By the time they moved him to the holding cell, his body was barely responsive.

Consciousness returned in fragments. Cold concrete against his cheek. The distant drip of water. His own breathing echoing wrong in the darkness.

Something felt off, but his thoughts were sluggish, refusing to align. His body felt heavy, disconnected. Like he was floating just outside himself.

Pain pulsed distantly - a deep, burning ache that radiated from his shoulders. But even that felt muted, secondary to the bone-deep cold that made him shiver.

The cell was dark, casting strange shadows that his foggy mind couldn't quite process.

His training screamed at him to move. To find better position. To not stay vulnerable on the ground.

Leo tried to push himself up.

Nothing happened.

Confusion filtered through the haze. He tried again, muscles straining to lift his weight.

Still nothing.

The wrongness of it pierced through the fog in his mind. His heart rate picked up as primitive instincts registered threat, registered vulnerability, registered-

He tried to roll to his side, to leverage his weight differently.

His body moved wrong. Balance destroyed. Everything off-center in ways that made his stomach lurch.

The first real surge of panic hit as his brain finally registered what his eyes were telling him. What his body was screaming.

Where his arms should be...

Just... nothing.

Empty space.

Bandaged stumps ending mid-bicep.

The scream caught in his throat as memory crashed back. 

The surgical lights. The careful mapping of incision points. The methodical separation of muscle from bone as they unmade him piece by piece.

The pain hit then - real pain, not the muted echo from before. White-hot agony that radiated from the surgical sites, from raw nerve endings, from places that shouldn't exist.

His stomach heaved. He couldn't even brace himself as he retched, body curling helplessly as pain and horror overwhelmed him.

The phantom sensations were worse than the pain. He could feel his arms. Could feel exactly where they should be. His brain kept trying to move them, to reach, to steady himself.

But there was nothing to move. Nothing to reach with. Nothing...

A sound escaped him that had never existed before. Something between a scream and a sob that spoke of devastation too fundamental to voice.

He tried to push himself up again. And again. And again.

Each failure bringing fresh waves of horror as his body betrayed him. As muscle memory tried to perform actions that were impossible now.

The darkness pressed in, watching him come apart. Watching as everything he was, everything he'd trained to be, dissolved into nothing.

Because what was he now?

A warrior who couldn't hold his swords. A protector who couldn't defend. A leader who couldn't even stand on his own.

Nothing. He was nothing.

Because there was no reason for this. No reason at all.

They hadn't taken his arms because they had to. Hadn't removed them because of injury or infection or any medical need. 

There had been no purpose beyond clinical curiosity. Beyond wanting to see what would happen.

His limbs had been healthy. Whole. Until they decided to unmake him just to document the process. Just to collect data on exactly how a body responded.

There wasn't even the dignity of necessity in this. No warrior's sacrifice or noble purpose. Just the terrible understanding that they had removed healthy limbs from a living being because they wanted to see what would happen. 

Had reduced him to nothing but data points in an experiment that didn't need to happen at all.

They had taken his arms simply because they could. Because his body, his autonomy, his very existence meant nothing compared to their scientific curiosity.

Leonardo’s body shook, with tears or shock he didn’t know.

He didn't want his family to find him like this. Didn't want them to see what he'd become. What Bishop had reduced him to.

Better to die here. He wanted to die here.

The night swallowed his broken sounds as Leonardo shattered.

They'd taken his purpose. His identity. His reason for existing.

And in the darkness, Leonardo wept.

Chapter Text

The guards came before Leo had fully processed being awake again. His world had narrowed to hazy fragments.

Concrete against his cheek. The burning ache where his arms should be. The way every movement felt wrong and off-balance.

He couldn't even get up before they grabbed him. Couldn't brace himself as they dragged him up, his legs refusing to support his weight. 

The stumps of his arms brushed against one of the guards and the shock of sensation made him gag.

The bandages were soaked through. 

He could smell copper and antiseptic, could feel wetness tracking down what remained of his biceps. 

His body kept trying to move limbs that weren't there. Kept sending signals into void that made his brain misfire with animal panic.

The fluorescent lights of the corridor burned his eyes. Each movement sent fresh waves of agony through raw nerve endings. 

The guards weren't gentle - why would they be? He was just another specimen being moved between tests.

He should fight. Should resist. Should do something.

But his body wouldn't respond right. Couldn't find balance. Couldn't find center. Couldn't find anything familiar to hold onto as they dragged him toward that familiar antiseptic smell that made his stomach heave.

Not that it mattered.

The surgical bay doors hissed open.

Leo's heart slammed against his plastron as they lifted him onto the table. 

Panic. Ingrained into him now. Reduced to instinctive responses.

Cold steel pressed against his shell as they positioned him, restraints clicking into place across his plastron, his thighs, his ankles. 

Different positions than before. Wrong positions.

He couldn't even turn his head away as they secured it in place. 

Couldn't hide from the surgical lights that cast everything in harsh relief. 

"Begin preparation for reintegration." Bishop's voice made Leo's breath catch, "The serum appears to be maintaining remarkable tissue preservation."

Movement at the edges of his vision. Clinical hands removing the soaked bandages with mechanical efficiency. 

The air felt too cold against exposed flesh.

Something was wrong. Different. 

The usual surgical team was larger, more equipment laid out. And there, just visible in his peripheral vision...

His arms.

Nausea rose in waves. He fought not to throw up.

But he couldn’t look away.

Laid out on steel trays like specimens. Like dead things. 

Understanding hit with devastating force as they began cleaning the surgical sites. 

As they positioned those dead things alongside the raw stumps where they used to be.

This wasn't just another test.

This was something so much worse.

And somewhere in that sterile room, under harsh surgical lights, Leonardo felt the last threads of his courage finally break.

Because nothing in his training had prepared him for this.

Nothing had prepared him for seeing parts of himself laid out like specimens. Preserved by whatever horror Bishop had created.

Waiting to be forced back into places they didn't belong anymore.

He should feel relief. Should be grateful they were trying to fix what they'd broken.

But all he could process was the fundamental wrongness.

The first touch against the raw end of his arm made Leo flinch so violently the restraints creaked. 

Not pain - not yet.

Just cold latex hands positioning what was left, preparing for what was coming.

He couldn't stop staring at his severed arms laid out beside him. They didn't look real. Didn't look like parts of him. 

Just... meat. Dead tissue preserved by whatever Bishop had pumped into them. The color was wrong. The fingers slightly curled like rigor had set in.

His brain couldn’t process what he was seeing.

Shut down.

Then the pain hit.

Every touch against exposed nerve endings sent lightning through him, made his vision blur at the edges. His throat already felt raw - when had he started making noise?

"Beginning primary nerve connection."

The restraints bit into his thighs, his plastron, kept him from twisting away as hands worked inside him.

The bone was first.

The scraping sound as they aligned the segments made his stomach heave. The feeling of bone against bone as they forced the pieces back together.

The first drill bit into his humerus with terrible precision. The vibration rattled through his entire body. Each hole they created felt like it was being carved directly into his soul.

Then came the actual plates. The pressure as they brought the segments together. Pain so keep his body stopped registering it. Stopped tracking it.

Just bone grinding against bone as they forced everything back into alignment. The screws being driven in one by one, each turn sending fresh shockwaves through him. 

The sound of the screwdriver tightening each screw would haunt his nightmares. 

That and the feeling of metal biting into bone. Of pieces of himself being bolted back together like some kind of machine.

The realization hit him between one screw and the next.

These would stay inside him. Forever. 

Parts of Bishop's lab permanently embedded in his bones. 

No matter what happened after this.

No matter if he escaped, no matter if he lived or died. He would always carry pieces of this place inside him.

His breath came faster as they tightened another screw. 

He could feel it in there. Could feel the wrongness of metal where there should only be bone. 

Could feel how the plates held him together like something that had been broken and pieced back together.

God he could feel it.

He couldn’t stop the thoughts. Couldn't stop feeling the metal inside him. Couldn’t stop the panic clawing up his throat.

His arms didn't feel like parts of him anymore - they felt like assembled things. Reattached wrong. Barely held there.

Would he be able to feel them when he moved? When he trained? 

Would every strike remind him of metal grinding against bone?

Would every block echo with the memory of screws being driven into his core? 

If the reattachment even worked in the first place.

The plate shifted slightly as they adjusted the final screw. The sensation made him gag.

Foreign objects inside him, holding him together, keeping dead things attached. 

Even if he wasn’t restrained, he couldn't even reach up to feel where they were. 

Couldn't control his own arms enough to trace the surgical sites. 

Could only lie there feeling metal become part of him in ways that could never be undone.

His heart slammed against his plastron. He would never really be free of this place now. 

Would carry it with him in every movement, every strike, every moment.

Bishop’s work would be inside him until the day he died.

He didn’t get a chance to catch his breath, didn’t get a chance to reconcile the realization, before it continued.

Before nerves and vessels were touched in ways he never thought possible.

They didn’t care about his responses. Not beyond data points.

Leo's scream echoed off sterile walls as impossible agony crashed through him. Like being electrocuted. 

Like acid in his veins. Like nothing he'd ever felt before.

This was resurrection. This was dead tissue being forced to live again. This was something his mind couldn't process.

He could feel each individual nerve being spliced back together. 

Could feel the moment dead pathways started firing again, sending impossible signals through his brain. 

Could feel his body trying to reject what was being forced on it.

The restraints bit into his thighs, his plastron, kept him from twisting away as hands worked inside him.

They weren't done. Weren't even close.

He could feel dead tissue being forced to wake up. Could feel wrong signals firing through rebuilt pathways. 

His left hand twitched suddenly. Not his choice. Not his control. Just dead muscle responding to random signals as they rewired him piece by piece.

That was worse than the pain somehow. 

Watching parts of himself move without permission. Feeling sensation where there shouldn't be any.

Another connection. Another scream torn from his throat. Sweat ran down his face, soaked his skin. His heart slammed so hard against his plastron he thought it might break free.

"Vessel reattachment beginning."

New pain. Different pain. Sharper. Deeper. Blood flowing through dead tissue that shouldn't feel anything anymore. Leo's vision whited out as they forced circulation back through impossible pathways.

His fingers spasmed again. Curled without his input. Dead things moving on their own as Bishop's serum forced them back to life.

He couldn't control it. Couldn't stop it. Could only lie there as parts of himself woke up wrong.

The muscles began twitching next. Random contractions that sent fresh agony through surgical sites. Through connections that weren't fully formed. Through tissue that shouldn't be alive anymore.

"Remarkable response." Bishop's voice was distant through the roaring in Leo's ears. Through the sound of his own screams. "Complete integration proceeding faster than projected."

Leo's right arm jerked violently as they spliced another nerve cluster back together. The motion tore at fresh sutures, sent white-hot agony racing through him.

Parts of him that should be dead were moving. Twitching. Responding to signals that shouldn't exist anymore.

Just like him.

He should have stayed dead on this table. Should have been allowed to just die.

"Beginning final phase integration." Bishop's voice held terrible satisfaction, "Prepare for complete nervous system reactivation."

Leo tried to scream as they forced the final connections. Tried to beg for death. Tried to do anything but lie there as they remade him into something that shouldn't exist.

But all that escaped was a broken sound as everything wrong and impossible crashed through him at once.

But his body wasn't his anymore. Was being remade into something else. Something that moved without his permission. Something that felt sensation that shouldn't exist.

The final connections were the worst. 

Everything firing at once as they forced the last pieces together. As dead tissue fully woke up. As impossible signals crashed through his brain.

Leo's world narrowed to pure agony. To the feeling of death being forced back to life. To the way his arms moved without his control, twitching and spasming as neural pathways rebuilt themselves wrong.

The pain didn't stop when they finished. 

Didn't even lessen. Just changed - became deeper, more fundamental. Like his body was trying to tear itself apart. 

Like everything was waking up wrong.

His fingers kept moving. Kept twitching. Kept reminding him that these weren't really his arms anymore. 

They moved him back to the cell eventually. 

He couldn't remember how.

The concrete was cold against his shell. He couldn't even curl up properly. His arms wouldn't respond right. Would barely move at all. Just random twitches and spasms that sent fresh fire racing through rebuilt nerves.

Having his arms back should have felt like relief.

But it didn’t.

It was worse.

So much worse.

Because these weren't really his arms anymore. Were dead things brought back wrong. Things that wouldn't respond to his commands. Things that just lay there, sending signals of pain spiking through his system.

But he couldn't scream anymore. His throat was too raw..

All that escaped now were small, broken sounds that didn't sound like him at all.

The pain... God, the pain. It wasn't just the surgical sites, wasn't just the feeling of metal plates holding bone together.

It was deeper. 

Like his entire nervous system was on fire. 

Like every cell was dying and being reborn with each heartbeat.

Like something fundamental had been rewritten wrong.

The thought made his stomach heave. He couldn't even push himself up when he retched. 

Could only lie there as his body tried to reject everything that had been done to it.

Tears leaked from his eyes but he couldn't wipe them away. 

Couldn't move enough to hide them.

He had survived so much in this place. So many tests. So many violations.

But this…

Because this... this was different. 

This was being rebuilt into something else entirely. Into just another one of Bishop's experiments. 

Everything he'd been - warrior, brother, son - had died on this table. 

And whatever they'd brought back wasn't him anymore. Couldn't be him.

Not anymore.

The darkness pressed in, watching him shatter. Watching as everything he was - warrior, leader, protector - dissolved under waves of agony.

His right hand spasmed again. Fingers curling without his input. Dead flesh moving on its own. 

Wrong wrong wrong.

His body shook with aftermath tremors, with horror, with the understanding that nothing would ever be right again.

Leonardo lay in the darkness, in the silence.

And wished, more than anything, that they had just let him die.

Because this wasn't fixing him.

This wasn't saving him.

This was breaking him in ways he could never heal.

And somewhere between one wave of agony and the next, Leonardo came undone.

The darkness watched. And Leonardo prayed for an end that wouldn't come.

Chapter Text

The first attempt at physical therapy came three days after reattachment.

Leo lay strapped to the familiar examination table, new restraints holding him immobile while they tested nerve response.

His reattached arms felt wrong.

Simultaneously too heavy and disconnected, like they weren't really part of him anymore.

"Begin baseline testing." Bishop's voice carried that clinical curiosity that made Leo's stomach turn, "Let's see how well the neural pathways are integrating."

The first touch against his fingers sent lightning through rebuilt nerves.

Leo's breath caught as sensation crashed through pathways that shouldn't exist anymore. That had been dead just days ago.

Every touch felt wrong - either searing agony or nothing at all, no middle ground. 

"Notable hypersensitivity in the peripheral nerves," someone noted, "Increasing stimulus."

They manipulated each joint methodically, testing range of motion while machines recorded every response.

Every flinch. Every involuntary spasm as dead flesh remembered how to move.

His fingers twitched without his input, responding to signals he hadn't sent. The sensation was nauseating. Watching parts of himself move without permission, like a puppet with tangled strings.

"Muscle response is erratic," Bishop observed, "But present. Begin electrical stimulation."

The first shock made Leo's back arch against the restraints, a sound catching in his throat before he could stop it. His arms spasmed violently, muscles contracting in ways that sent fresh agony through surgical sites.

"Good." Bishop adjusted something on the equipment, "The serum appears to be accelerating nerve regeneration. Continue the sequence."

They worked methodically through muscle groups. Flexors, extensors, every precise bundle of tissue they'd severed and reattached. Each shock sent fresh agony racing through him as they forced dead things to remember how to live.

His training meant nothing here. Years of discipline shattered against the simple horror of watching his own hands move without his permission. Of feeling sensation fade in and out like a badly tuned radio.

"Begin active manipulation," Bishop instructed after what felt like hours, "Test the full range of motion."

Clinical hands gripped his wrist, beginning to force his arm through careful exercises. Each movement pulled at healing tissue, at connections that weren't fully formed.

Some movements brought nothing - complete numbness as they bent and twisted his limbs. Others sent white-hot agony racing through him, nerves misfiring and sending confused signals that made his vision blur.

They didn't care that it hurt. That was the point. Documenting exactly how much sensation had returned. How thoroughly they'd managed to bring dead tissue back to life.

Just another experiment. Just another way to unmake him piece by piece.

The sessions stretched endlessly.

Day after day of forced exercises while they documented his progress. Every movement was a battle between what his brain wanted and what his body would actually do.

His hands wouldn't stop shaking.

Wouldn't stop moving without his permission as neural pathways rebuilt themselves wrong. Simple tasks became impossible as his fingers spasmed and twitched, responding to phantom signals he couldn't control.

"Remarkable progress," Bishop would say, reviewing the data as Leo lay trembling in restraints, "The integration is nearly complete."

But it wasn't progress. It was violation - having parts of himself move without permission. Having sensation come and go in waves that left him dizzy with wrongness.

The worst part was how his training betrayed him. How years of discipline meant nothing against involuntary responses burned into rebuilt nerves.

His body wasn't his anymore. Was something assembled from dead parts and brought back wrong. Something that moved without his permission and felt things that shouldn't be possible.

At night, alone in his cell, Leo would watch his fingers twitch and spasm in the darkness. 

Would trace surgical scars that circled both arms like accusations. Like reminders of everything that had been taken from him.

Of everything that had been forced back wrong.

Recovery, they called it. Rehabilitation.

But there was no recovering from this.

No rehabilitation possible when every movement felt like betrayal. When his own body had become something foreign and wrong.

When even the simple act of breathing pulled at connections that hadn't existed days ago. At dead things forced back to life through science that shouldn't exist.

He wasn't healing.

He was being remade into something else.

Something assembled from dead flesh and impossible science. Something that would never quite be whole again.

Leonardo wondered if he would ever feel whole again. Even if the damage healed. Even if he regained control.

Because how could he possibly feel whole again?

Not when the pieces didn't fit anymore.

Not when they'd been put back together wrong.

Not ever.