Water drips from the cracked ceiling, each drop ticking like a metronome against the silence. You’re soaked from the waist down, your feet submerged in cold, filthy puddles that haven’t drained in weeks. Your arms are chained above your head, wrists bound to an overhead pipe, body swaying faintly with every breath.

Twice is pacing. Talking to himself. Then talking to you. Then arguing with himself about how much he hates that you’re not talking back.

“You could just say something,” he snaps, kicking a metal bucket across the room. It clangs, spins, echoes.

You close your eyes.

Don’t respond.

Tomura Shigaraki sits in a corner, chair turned backward, chin resting on his folded arms. He’s not blinking. Not speaking. Just waiting.

The metal door creaks open, and Spinner walks in dragging something heavy—a pipe? A chain? He throws it down next to you and crouches.

“Nothing personal,” he murmurs. “But if he says we keep going, we keep going.”

He gestures toward Tomura.

You glance up—just once.

Shigaraki doesn’t nod. Doesn’t flinch.

He just stares.

As if daring you to keep holding out.

As if he already knows you will.