Tough Love

"Honestly, I'm a little hurt. I thought we were having a moment."

"We were," Wonder Woman's face is studiously neutral. "Just not the one you thought."

Grabbing her uninsured leg, you pull it out to her side and up as far as it will go, which in this case is almost horizontal. "See that's the thing. I can't blame someone for trying to escape from their jailor. I just thought we had moved past that.” You run a loop around her ankle and tie it off in that position. “But if that's all I am to you, then there's no point treating you as anything other than my captive."

Another loop around the top of her injured leg where it ends and her beautiful buttocks begin. Diana offers no comment as you tie that end off so that it pulls her hips sideways, straightening her hanging leg, and also tilts her ass up slightly.

You squat down and examine her injured leg, dangling beneath her. "That knee doesn't look too good. How does it feel?"

"It hurts," the lasso forces her to admit, then hastily adds "I've had worse."

You poke and prod the bruised and swollen knee, making no effort to be gentle. The knee's owner stiffens in response and clenches her teeth but makes no sound. "I'll bet you have. What is the worst pain you've ever experienced?"

"I was once tortured in Hell - the actual, literal Hell - for the aaaaa!" The Amazon's voice turns into a snarl of pain, quickly bitten off, as you roughly move her lower leg around, testing the knee's range of mobility.

"Don't mind me," you say, voice dripping with insincere reassurance, "Keep going."

Through gritted teeth, your prisoner continues her story of how she was tied to a post by actual devils who proceeded to whip, beat, bite, and burn her for hours. How the corrosive atmosphere made her wounds burn like they'd had salt poured in them. How the devils laughed whenever she couldn't stop herself from making a noise.

"Sounds like a party," you chirp, while continuing to grind her injured knee painfully. "Of course you had your superpowers then; I imagine that helped?"

Wonder Woman bites her lips to stifle a cry as you let go of her leg, letting it drop to hang below her. It's several seconds before she can say "Obviously. But at some level, pain tolerance is more mental than physical. Amazons are taught how to focus our minds to make pain more bearable."

"Huh. For example?" You lower the winch until her dangling toes just touch the floor. Diana tentatively puts a little weight on the leg, grimaces, and shifts her body to take pressure off the leg before continuing. "In Hell, I concentrated on the fact that my suffering was a sacrifice to aid my sister Artemis. When I was imprisoned on Apokolipse, my hatred for Darkseid and the need to defeat him kept me AAAAH!!"

She screams as the winch suddenly drops her three inches, putting all her weight on the bad leg. Almost immediately she presses down with her bound arms and her good leg to lift herself up slightly and relieve the pressure.

"That makes sense, suffering is easier to bear when it's for some noble purpose. As opposed to, I dunno, getting captured by some rando pervert. Seems like that would be tougher, mentally speaking."