A/N: This is meant to be able to be interpreted in several different ways. Yeah. Just so you know.

Disclaimer: I don't own RotG. Also, cover image is a drawing by Gustave Dore and is in the public domain.

The chains were heavy on his wrists, as if they wished to drag him down through the cold, dank stone floor, as if they were waiting for the right moment to wrap themselves around his pale neck and throttle him. They were stifling and burdensome, lined with blunt spikes that dug themselves into his skin when he moved, binding him and confining him when no nature spirit should ever be restrained, and he hated them.

He hated them, because he couldn't hate his captor. No matter how many times or in how many ways his jailer tortured him, he couldn't hate him. It wasn't Bunny's fault, he told himself. He isn't in control of himself.

Somehow, it was hard to accept this. Bunny had always seemed so strong, so capable, so reliable. For him to succumb so easily to the lies and machinations of a Fearling seemed impossible. Yet the evidence was there, in the gray fur that was lightly dusted with black sand, in the too-long claws and teeth, in the green eyes that were tainted with unnatural darkness.

Most of all, the proof lay in his actions. Jack closed his eyes tightly as memories of the torn-up bodies of the Guardians assailed his mind. Tooth, feathers ripped out by the bloody roots, her skin torn to shreds, a look of terror in her glassy eyes as her mouth was twisted in a silent scream. North, covered in blood, a gaping hole where his abdomen used to be. Sandy, nothing more than a small scattering of lifeless gold sand that gave nary a twitch or flutter.

It had been a gruesome sight, and one that would remain branded in his brain for years to come. He would forever carry with himself the grief and horror that had come with seeing Bunny reduce the three Guardians into bloody tatters. The screams, the pleas, the yells that had broken and torn into Jack's heart as the three had begged for mercy, to no avail. No mercy, Bunny had growled as he ripped them to pieces, and in due course no mercy had been shown.

Jack's life had been spared, however, as further proof to his captor's twisted sense of humour. Instead of simply killing Jack, a move which would have been downright merciful, he'd opted to lock the winter spirit up in a cage like a bird, to keep him as if he were some kind of sick caricature of a pet. Bound up and at his mercy, Jack had been forced to bear it as Bunny played with his life, sometimes showing him kindness and an emotion approaching affection, other times starving him for days or tormenting him. It was a coin toss whether or not Bunny would choose to be lenient that day, or whether he would instead decide to torture him on a whim.

He'd never kill him, however. This Jack knew. Bunny would never simply murder him and be done with it, never let him finally rest in peace, for this would be a show of mercy, and Bunny had sworn never to be merciful. Instead, he was consigned to an eternity of Bunny toying with him like a cat with a mouse, mutilating and persecuting him while never dealing the final blow, soundly deaf to Jack's pleas to simply kill him and be done with it!

No mercy.

Why, oh why couldn't he just die already? He had nothing more to live for. His family was dead, all but for the spirit who had taken it upon himself to abuse him. He would never again be free, never again feel the wind as it threw him into the air or the snowflakes as they fell on his shoulders. He would never again breathe the fresh, crisp, cold air that came with the gentle snowfall he knew so well, never again feel the snow crunching under his feet or see his frost spreading on someone's windowpane, never again hear a child's laughter or see a smile born from pure, innocent fun. Those things, things that made his life worth living, were cut off from him forever, leaving him an empty husk that might as well be dead.

Except he'd never die.

Not for the first time, he wished he still had his powers. Just enough to make an icy knife infused with magic, just enough to craft something that would permanently end his existence. He had no reason to stick around in the land of the living much longer, and he missed his little sister.

No mercy.

With a desolate sigh, he buried his fingers in his hair, looking like the very picture of a man in the throes of despair as he sat on the ground with his head hunched forward and his eyes clenched shut. Tears slowly fell from tightly closed eyes as he quietly mourned the death of all that he held dear, and his inability to finally yield to the reaper himself.

He wanted to die. Oh Manny, why couldn't he die?

With a movement that was both despairing and self-assured, like a man confidently walking the plank, the Pooka recklessly took a swig from the bottle of whiskey at his side.

He sorely needed it. His best friend, one whom he would have trusted with his life, had gone mad, and there was nothing Bunnymund could do to help him. Jack Frost, the strong, intelligent, adept man that he knew so well was now nothing more than a shadow of his former self, a shell that was possessed by Fearlings which twisted his every word and action until he became almost unrecognisable.

There was no cure to being taken over by Fearlings, however, and so Bunny had done the only thing he could think of: sealing Jack somewhere where he would never be seen or heard of again. It broke the Pooka's heart, but it was necessary. Jack was insane, and Bunny had to keep him from hurting others.

So, with guilt in his chest, he had done just that. Trapping Jack inside a mountain was ridiculously easy a feat for the Guardian of Life, at least physically if not emotionally, and Bunny had designated himself to be Jack's jailer, unwilling to trust another with this job.

It was hard. Jack had pleaded with him, desperately begging to be released, and Bunny had been hard-pressed to ignore him, this puppeteer that lied to him while using the body of one of his closest friends. Bunny had turned a deaf ear to his appeals, however, remaining firm in his resolve even as his heartstrings were yanked upon by every despairing cry of Jack's. It's a lie, Bunnymund told himself. No mercy, he promised.

Throwing his head back, Bunny gulped at the bottle of alcohol, Jack's shadow-tainted eyes at the forefront of his mind.

No mercy.

A/N: Constructive criticism welcome and appreciated.

Thanks for reading.