Hey all, sorry for taking so long to update. Hopefully this nice long chapter will make up for it? Let me know what you think. It’s posted in two parts and includes scenes of a voilent and sexual nature.
Just a quick reminder...
Last time
“What?” She’s gone crazy. I lean back to look into her face and she grabs me again, holding me tightly.
Her hearts beating wildly in her chest.
“Poison.”
I stand stone still.
“Poison.” She says again, just to make sure I’ve heard.
I take an automatic stumble away from her and stare disbelievingly.
Poison.
Just a Criminal
Chapter 11
Liz
“Oh my god, Liz! Stop it!” Maria screams somewhere behind my back. “Stop it. What are you doing?!...hey! PLEASE!”
I pay no heed to her pleas. The room lies in tatters around me, yet adrenalin courses through my veins like electricity and fire. They couldn’t stop me right now if they sent an army and a half of their fucking rebels.
Next, I aim for the stupid big plasma screen, which plays nothing but classic radio tunes all day.
“Fucking stupid TV.” At least their next captive will be exempt from its shittiness.
I grab the nearest glass from the bar and throw it. It bounces back off and lands at my feet. I pick it up and hurl again.
The TV doesn’t break, but the glass lands in a million, brilliant, dazzling, pieces at my feet. I don’t care that Maria’s sobbing now. It’s a guttural entrenched noise, like an animal in pain.
She’s scared.
But I’m not.
In fact they could walk in here with guns right now and I’d spit in their faces before they blew my fucking head off. I’m that mad.
I’ve been here so long they’ve forgotten who I am. They’ve made me forget who I am. But no more.
Not anymore.
If they're going to kill me, I'm going without a fight.
As if.
Picking up an especially sharp piece of glass I run toward the bed. Its the only untouched and undamaged furniture left in the room. Before I can start on it, the door flies open and someone grabs me from behind. Strong arms like a vice around my middle. I kick and scream, bite his tattooed arms and junior his arm into a grip to kick him to the floor.
“Good try, but no.” he says softly in my ear. His tone is lethal, yet I pay no notice. In a second he twirls me over and my head bounces against the tattered, supple mattress. “You have to catch me off guard for that,” he mocks.
His eyes. They’re toxic and cold. Like the first time I saw him.
Maria’s crying volume has risen. The second loudest noise after the rush of blood in my ears.
I fly upward so fast, with an energy that definitely hasn’t come from soup and slap him hard on his right cheek.
The noise is fresh and sharp. Flesh marring flesh.
His face falls to other side and he takes a step back at the ferociousness of what I’ve done.
“Better?” I spit at his face. That off guard enough Mr. Machismo?
Maria hiccoughs.
Before he can do anymore. I’m screaming and lunging at him. Max grabs my arms and slams me against the wall with a deafening thud.
“Stop it now.” He growls.
“…You…think…I’m going to…do anything you say…after you tried to… poison me?”
I’m breathless.
As a last tactic, I lose all fighter pride and aim for his balls. He grabs my leg and shoves it to the side, against the wall. I don’t care that my inner thigh is going to bruise. I continue struggling. “…after you tried to… kill me….you poisoned me!”
He grabs my face and I’m so close to him all I can see are his pupils. Glittering. Grave.
“What?” he whispers.
I stare for a moment.
He’s disorientated. Now I’m scared.
Before I can say anymore he lets go of me harshly and walks out, leaving me even more disorientated than him.
Gasping, I land on the floor in a heap.
I’m dizzy with emotion. Fear, adrenalin, heat, anger, pain. It all rages inside me, in a mixture of nothingness. I hardly feel a thing as Maria crawls over to me amidst the heap of clothes, furniture and glass and places a thin hand on my leg and cries.
***
Max
The clunk of the boots is the loudest noise in the deathly silent corridor. My footsteps are faster then they’ve been a while.
I touch my face. It stings. It was vicious. But then I’d do much worse to someone that tried to kill me.
I have and I'm going to.
I see him in the camera room. Brown head ducked on the table. Sleeping. I throw open the door. The noise doesn’t disturb him. In a snake like action I grab his face and slam him against the wall.
“Whoa…whoa… Silo?” Michael looks at me perplexed. “What the fuck – SILO!” he groans as I slam his head against the wall repeatedly.
“Fuck. Are you gone – “
I slam him against the tables. Papers fly everywhere. “Hey. Hey. HEY!”
I grab his collar. “Did you know about this?”
“Man, what the fuck—“
“DID YOU?!” My face is only millimetres away from his.
“Whoa. Whoa, Maxwell.” Michael flinches. “Know about what?” He’s breathing hard. Perplexed.
“The poison.”
He shakes his head in bewilderment. “What- what-" then his eyes land on the monitors. Liz’s room lies in tatters and realisation dawns in his eyes. “Poison. Really?”
I step away. He’s not lying.
“Silo...man!” he shakes his head. His eyes are active. He’s thinking. He knows something, but not enough. “It was your mission. I didn’t think they’d get involved….”
I’m shaking my head. Stalking the room, staring at her in the monitor. She’s lying on the bed. Facing the wall. Zombie like.
“Calm down Silo There must have a reason…”
“It was my mission.” I say quietly.
“Yeah. Yeah…I know.” Michael says a little more softly.
“I bought her here. I thought that would be enough to prove my loyalty.”
“I don’t know why they would do this...” he trails off.
“What do you know?”
“Huh? Maxwell, this is crazy… just…”
“Are you going to tell me or do I force it outta you!?”
Michael puts his hands up in surrender. He shakes his head. “I only presume okay… and what I can guess is that… Sneg probably wants to get rid of her without you knowing. I don’t know why. But I can imagine that she’s more danger than use to him.”
“So Sneg cheated me.”
“Oh, come on Max.” Michael rushes around to face me. Desperation in his tone. “Don’t say that, Sneg does what is best. He always does what is best—“
“—behind our backs.”
“No!”
“Yes.”
“I knew it. I knew you were straying.” He accuses.
“Snegs not all he says he is.”
“And who is?” Michael says adamantly. “No one Max. Not you, or I, or Ria, or anyone. We’re different people everyday! The only identity we know is here. With Sneg.”
I glare at him.
He shakes his head in defeat.
Maybe he’s right, but I won’t listen now.
He still tries though. “The way I see it is you have two choices. To come back and let it be….” His eyes trail slowly to the monitor “Or die.”
I continue to stand motionless.
“Oh fuck Maxwell…don’t do this.” He’s almost begging, frantic.
I turn and make a motion toward the monitors. “I trust you Mike. Sort it out for me.”
“Silo…” he pleads.
He slams the table when I don’t answer.
He walks toward me, halts in front of me and whispers this time. We may have been here for years, but even the walls talk in this place.
“Be logical. You don’t want them to find out before you even get a chance to make head way.”
“It’s already planned.” I don’t see it, but I know his face is a picture right now. “10pm tonight.”
He gives a slight nod and his eyes avert to the clock behind me.
Then without saying a word, I walk out trying to control myself from rushing in and making it happen right now.
Only a few more hours.
10 pm tonight, I will take my mission and go.
***
Continued on the next page...
Just A Criminal (ML, Adult) Ch 12- 8/24/06[WIP]
Moderators: Anniepoo98, ISLANDGIRL5, truelovepooh, Forum Moderators
Chapter 11
Cont'
Liz
I stare at the wall. I haven’t moved from the same position in the last five hours. I haven’t slept. I haven’t eaten. I haven’t looked anywhere but at the vast white wall that makes my eyes blur.
It kind of reminds me of my bedroom wall in the Omorfo villa in Greece. I used to stare at it in utmost stubbornness after my squabbles with mother. I just wouldn’t turn away until Dad would come and talk me out of my mood by promise of a new car or bag.
I wonder if I’d ever be able to see that life again. If I ever did, would I appreciate it? Would I savour every moment that I lived? Or would this the brink of death moment capture me forever? Would I be lost like Maria? Or would I just fail to come back?
I listen to Maria’s deepened breathing. I’m more certain she’s asleep because she’s stopped crying. It’s a relief to my ears.
She asked me the other day if I would ever have shared the same breathing space as her if I had been back in that life.
I had said, of course I would, without hesitation.
I’m a liar. Of course I wouldn’t have. Society wouldn’t have allowed to us to be any closer than 100 metres.
But here I am, sleeping next to a hopeless victim of so many circumstances. An addicted, crazy, anorexic junkie, who claims all she wants is love and yet….is probably the most genuine friend I’ve ever had.
I groan at the small ache at the left of my temple.
I’m so tired.
I close my eyes but open them again.
Poison is coursing through my veins. I can’t sleep. I won’t.
I sit up stubbornly, not letting my eyes close.
I see it then. A shadow. I nearly jump off the bed in fright. What the fuck?
I gulp. “Hello?”
No answer.
Another movement.
“Who is that… Max… is that…?”
Then he steps out of the shadows, face like a contorted, bearded frog. His eyes bulge, hungry, greedy.
“Dosey, what the fuck are you doing here? You scared the shit out of me.”
It makes me sick to even look at him. Why the hell is he lurking about in the shadows?
Shaking my head in annoyance I turn away, trying to calm my racing heart.
“I came to see you.”
I turn to consider him slightly as he walks toward me, before turning my back on him. The room reeks of alcohol and shit.
“Get outta here you stupid fuck.” I’m not in the mood for this shit.
See, I’m dying and Dosey is not the last person I want to see the short time I’m alive. Plus, his ugly face will probably give me nightmares when in my grave.
“What if I don’ wanna?” he says squeakily.
I whip around to face him sharply. He’s still walking toward me unsteadily.
Suddenly I’m regretting wearing my short orange prada number. It’s the only clothing I wear besides my flowy nightie. The yellows scrubs and Maria’s corset top just don’t do it for me.
It seems that Dosey has taken a liking to my dress too as he stares at my legs, almost dribbling on them.
It’s not hard to tell that Dosey hasn’t had any in a while, but eww!
My face contorts and I shuffle back on the bed looking up at the camera above my head, hoping someone will notice the sick pervert and send him to the asylum.
“Don’t worry about that princess…” Dosey gives me a fungied toothy smile. “They’re on back play. “
“What?”
“Ria ain’t the only one that knows some tricks ‘round here you know.”
I look around the room for something. Anything. Anything I can use for defence is behind him.
I bury myself against the wall as he clambers onto my bed. He smells so bad.
“Look, you shit head –“ I begin.
“ - don’t call me that.”
I roll my eyes, “Whatever - just fucking get away from me, or else –“
“- Or else what?” He starts to laugh. I shrivel back from the repugnant stench.
I wait as he ogles blatantly at my breasts. Then I aim straight for his face.
“DON’T!” he screams.
Black, shiny metal against my forehead.
I let my arm slide back to my side.
Panic bells ring.
He has a gun.
He has a fucking gun!
“Get off…”
I stare at him in utter, sickening shock.
“Get off the bed, you bitch.”
I clamber off, with cold threatening metal against my head. I struggle past the sleeping Maria and stand against the wall. What the hell did she take to sleep like that?
“Sit.”
My eyes snap back from Maria to Dosey. “What are you going to –“
“SIT!” he screams.
I slide down the wall as he holds the gun inches from my head.
You’d think I’d be sweating, trembling, crying. But I’m strangely numb. Maybe it’s the poison working on my veins.
I hope I stay numb when he does what he’s going to do to me.
I hope I don’t feel a thing.
…I hope….
“Face me.”
I turn toward him. My heads still high, defiant.
He’s holding the gun, yet his hands are trembling so much he could drop it any moment.
“Spread your legs.”
“What –“
“Just do it!” he screams, pounding the metal against my skull.
I’m breathing hard as I turn toward him and open my legs across from his beady stare.
The frills of my dress sit on my thighs as I show him a full, healthy peek of my red silk panties.
Drool slips from his lips and onto his chin as he moves back and kneels in front me, still holding the gun at my head, he takes in my panties.
“Take them off.”
I shake my head.
“Do it.” He growls.
My hands travel up my legs and rest on the elastic of my panties. I pause a second, before pulling them down my legs. He watches the whole time, mumbling to himself.
“Yes that’s it…. Yeah. Oh, yeah…”
Suddenly I feel so disgusted at myself that I have to close my eyes. I open my legs again for him to see it all.
The silence makes my skin crawl, because I know exactly what he’s doing.
I can’t believe this is happening.
Please let this nightmare end soon. Please…
I want to whimper, cry, throw-up and more when his dirty fingers travel up my thighs, and brush my centre. He touches me there, pasting his fingers against me, pulling at my flesh, rubbing around my hole as he moans in pleasure.
I don’t cry though. I don’t whimper. I sit as still as a statue. I think about summers in France, Vienna. I think about my fathers’ hugs and those relaxing mornings with Alex and coffee.
Suddenly he’s stopped his molestation. He’s moving back and stands up, still pointing the gun at my head. “Come here,”
I stare in unmoving silence as he undoes he trousers and pulls them down. He’s wearing white, tight, almost transparent underwear. His erection standing hard and straight, pointed toward me.
He’s grinning as I stare in disgust, unable to cover my abhorrence for him.
“Look what you do to me, bitch. I’ve been walking around with this for the last month. C’mere and help me out.”
I think I’m gunna puke. Or pass out. Or just…something.
I look helplessly around the chaotic room, toward the sleeping/passed out Maria and then back at him.
“No way.” I shake my head. “You can fucking kill me, but no way!”
“You’ve done it to ‘alotta boys. I read about it in all the papers.” He says unflinchingly.
I shake my head. My body trembling. “Boy aka. human. I’m not into beastiality.”
His sleazy face changes in an instant.
Ut, oh. Maybe I shouldn’t have said that….
He clicks his gun and points toward his boxers.
I move toward him slowly. I pause above his erection. It points into my face.
Then I bite.
I bite so hard that he’ll be scarred for the rest of his life. He lets out a shrill loud scream and the gun drops to the floor.
We’re struggling. His hands are grabbing my hair and my head and I’m being battered against the hard, uncarpeted floor. I think he’s gunna smash my skull into pieces. The world moves in and out of consciousness as heat engulfs my face. Liquid trickles from my temple. I hardly breathe.
“You fucking bitch. You think you can get away with that?...Not anymore. You’re on my territory!”
I kick at him and crawl away. But I’m weak. He grabs my legs and pulls me back under him. His face is in my breasts and I’m pulling at his balding head. He sinks his teeth into my right breast.
“AHHHH!” I see white spots in front of my eyes. The pain is the most explicit sensation I’ve ever felt.
I’m not sure if the screams echoing around the room are mine or his.
Dosey suddenly lets out a mortified scream and let’s go of my flesh.
Holding my aching breast, I quickly move backward as Maria stands behind him looking as white as a sheet. A huge piece of glass is sticking out of his neck.
“FUCK!” he screams. “BITCH!” and then he lunges at her.
I grab his leg, but he kicks me away. I’m too weak.
Between the struggling and yelling there’s a loud gun shot.
“MARIA!”
Oh god. No. no. no!
She falls to the floor in a heap
I run toward her and grasp her thin, frail body in my arms. “Oh, my god!” I cry hysterically, shifting between Dosey and Maria. “What did you do?! OH MY GOD!”
He’s only shocked for a second, and then there’s a gun pointing at my head again.
“Let her go and take off your clothes.”
This time I don’t care though.
“No.”
“I’m warning you!”
“NO!”
I hold a trembling and moaning Maria as tight as I can in my arms. Sweat and blood clouds my vision and I close my eyes.
The click of the trigger into place is the loudest noise I’ve heard in my entire life.
So this is it.
I thought it was the time before Michael locked me in the boot.
Bit it wasn’t. It’s now.
There’s a loud blast and I wait for the blackness. Or the whiteness, or whatever is meant to engulf me. But all I hear is a loud, big thump.
My eyes shoot open. Dosey lies on the floor, eyes still bulging, but motionless.
I stare.
“Ria?” Max is beside me.
I stare at him instead. Times slowed. I’m lost. What just happened? How did he get here?
I vaguely address that he's holding a gun too. He's looking at Maria.
I look at Maria too, I’m still holding onto her with whitening knuckles. I wonder how it’s possible for someone to become tinier and smaller in front of my eyes.
Her hands are grasping mine in desperation, but her grip is becoming weaker. She’s becoming colder, turning blue.
My breath is being released in gasps. “Do something!” I cry at Max in sudden hysterics, “She’s dying…do something!”
Max grabs her from my arms and lays her paling body on the chaos on the floor. He pulls up her drenched black shirt, and I let out a loud whimper. Her whole stomach is covered in blood.
“I …” she whispers, but before she can say anymore, she stills. The life essence dragged out of her in front of my eyes.
Then silence.
I can’t tear my eyes away from the tiny body on the floor.
She’s dead.
I let out a small shriek of terror and fall backward into Max’s arms in utter shock.
I scream. I’m hysterical. I cry for the first time since I’ve been here. I don’t recognise it’s me. I don’t care that it’s probably the loudest, most shattering noise that anyone’s ever made for miles. I don’t care that I’m seeking comfort in the arms of my criminal.
He doesn’t comfort me though.
He holds me for a mere second, before he grabs my bleeding, hysterical face and looks straight into my bleary, puffy eyes.
“Let’s get outta here.”
***
Cont'
Liz
I stare at the wall. I haven’t moved from the same position in the last five hours. I haven’t slept. I haven’t eaten. I haven’t looked anywhere but at the vast white wall that makes my eyes blur.
It kind of reminds me of my bedroom wall in the Omorfo villa in Greece. I used to stare at it in utmost stubbornness after my squabbles with mother. I just wouldn’t turn away until Dad would come and talk me out of my mood by promise of a new car or bag.
I wonder if I’d ever be able to see that life again. If I ever did, would I appreciate it? Would I savour every moment that I lived? Or would this the brink of death moment capture me forever? Would I be lost like Maria? Or would I just fail to come back?
I listen to Maria’s deepened breathing. I’m more certain she’s asleep because she’s stopped crying. It’s a relief to my ears.
She asked me the other day if I would ever have shared the same breathing space as her if I had been back in that life.
I had said, of course I would, without hesitation.
I’m a liar. Of course I wouldn’t have. Society wouldn’t have allowed to us to be any closer than 100 metres.
But here I am, sleeping next to a hopeless victim of so many circumstances. An addicted, crazy, anorexic junkie, who claims all she wants is love and yet….is probably the most genuine friend I’ve ever had.
I groan at the small ache at the left of my temple.
I’m so tired.
I close my eyes but open them again.
Poison is coursing through my veins. I can’t sleep. I won’t.
I sit up stubbornly, not letting my eyes close.
I see it then. A shadow. I nearly jump off the bed in fright. What the fuck?
I gulp. “Hello?”
No answer.
Another movement.
“Who is that… Max… is that…?”
Then he steps out of the shadows, face like a contorted, bearded frog. His eyes bulge, hungry, greedy.
“Dosey, what the fuck are you doing here? You scared the shit out of me.”
It makes me sick to even look at him. Why the hell is he lurking about in the shadows?
Shaking my head in annoyance I turn away, trying to calm my racing heart.
“I came to see you.”
I turn to consider him slightly as he walks toward me, before turning my back on him. The room reeks of alcohol and shit.
“Get outta here you stupid fuck.” I’m not in the mood for this shit.
See, I’m dying and Dosey is not the last person I want to see the short time I’m alive. Plus, his ugly face will probably give me nightmares when in my grave.
“What if I don’ wanna?” he says squeakily.
I whip around to face him sharply. He’s still walking toward me unsteadily.
Suddenly I’m regretting wearing my short orange prada number. It’s the only clothing I wear besides my flowy nightie. The yellows scrubs and Maria’s corset top just don’t do it for me.
It seems that Dosey has taken a liking to my dress too as he stares at my legs, almost dribbling on them.
It’s not hard to tell that Dosey hasn’t had any in a while, but eww!
My face contorts and I shuffle back on the bed looking up at the camera above my head, hoping someone will notice the sick pervert and send him to the asylum.
“Don’t worry about that princess…” Dosey gives me a fungied toothy smile. “They’re on back play. “
“What?”
“Ria ain’t the only one that knows some tricks ‘round here you know.”
I look around the room for something. Anything. Anything I can use for defence is behind him.
I bury myself against the wall as he clambers onto my bed. He smells so bad.
“Look, you shit head –“ I begin.
“ - don’t call me that.”
I roll my eyes, “Whatever - just fucking get away from me, or else –“
“- Or else what?” He starts to laugh. I shrivel back from the repugnant stench.
I wait as he ogles blatantly at my breasts. Then I aim straight for his face.
“DON’T!” he screams.
Black, shiny metal against my forehead.
I let my arm slide back to my side.
Panic bells ring.
He has a gun.
He has a fucking gun!
“Get off…”
I stare at him in utter, sickening shock.
“Get off the bed, you bitch.”
I clamber off, with cold threatening metal against my head. I struggle past the sleeping Maria and stand against the wall. What the hell did she take to sleep like that?
“Sit.”
My eyes snap back from Maria to Dosey. “What are you going to –“
“SIT!” he screams.
I slide down the wall as he holds the gun inches from my head.
You’d think I’d be sweating, trembling, crying. But I’m strangely numb. Maybe it’s the poison working on my veins.
I hope I stay numb when he does what he’s going to do to me.
I hope I don’t feel a thing.
…I hope….
“Face me.”
I turn toward him. My heads still high, defiant.
He’s holding the gun, yet his hands are trembling so much he could drop it any moment.
“Spread your legs.”
“What –“
“Just do it!” he screams, pounding the metal against my skull.
I’m breathing hard as I turn toward him and open my legs across from his beady stare.
The frills of my dress sit on my thighs as I show him a full, healthy peek of my red silk panties.
Drool slips from his lips and onto his chin as he moves back and kneels in front me, still holding the gun at my head, he takes in my panties.
“Take them off.”
I shake my head.
“Do it.” He growls.
My hands travel up my legs and rest on the elastic of my panties. I pause a second, before pulling them down my legs. He watches the whole time, mumbling to himself.
“Yes that’s it…. Yeah. Oh, yeah…”
Suddenly I feel so disgusted at myself that I have to close my eyes. I open my legs again for him to see it all.
The silence makes my skin crawl, because I know exactly what he’s doing.
I can’t believe this is happening.
Please let this nightmare end soon. Please…
I want to whimper, cry, throw-up and more when his dirty fingers travel up my thighs, and brush my centre. He touches me there, pasting his fingers against me, pulling at my flesh, rubbing around my hole as he moans in pleasure.
I don’t cry though. I don’t whimper. I sit as still as a statue. I think about summers in France, Vienna. I think about my fathers’ hugs and those relaxing mornings with Alex and coffee.
Suddenly he’s stopped his molestation. He’s moving back and stands up, still pointing the gun at my head. “Come here,”
I stare in unmoving silence as he undoes he trousers and pulls them down. He’s wearing white, tight, almost transparent underwear. His erection standing hard and straight, pointed toward me.
He’s grinning as I stare in disgust, unable to cover my abhorrence for him.
“Look what you do to me, bitch. I’ve been walking around with this for the last month. C’mere and help me out.”
I think I’m gunna puke. Or pass out. Or just…something.
I look helplessly around the chaotic room, toward the sleeping/passed out Maria and then back at him.
“No way.” I shake my head. “You can fucking kill me, but no way!”
“You’ve done it to ‘alotta boys. I read about it in all the papers.” He says unflinchingly.
I shake my head. My body trembling. “Boy aka. human. I’m not into beastiality.”
His sleazy face changes in an instant.
Ut, oh. Maybe I shouldn’t have said that….
He clicks his gun and points toward his boxers.
I move toward him slowly. I pause above his erection. It points into my face.
Then I bite.
I bite so hard that he’ll be scarred for the rest of his life. He lets out a shrill loud scream and the gun drops to the floor.
We’re struggling. His hands are grabbing my hair and my head and I’m being battered against the hard, uncarpeted floor. I think he’s gunna smash my skull into pieces. The world moves in and out of consciousness as heat engulfs my face. Liquid trickles from my temple. I hardly breathe.
“You fucking bitch. You think you can get away with that?...Not anymore. You’re on my territory!”
I kick at him and crawl away. But I’m weak. He grabs my legs and pulls me back under him. His face is in my breasts and I’m pulling at his balding head. He sinks his teeth into my right breast.
“AHHHH!” I see white spots in front of my eyes. The pain is the most explicit sensation I’ve ever felt.
I’m not sure if the screams echoing around the room are mine or his.
Dosey suddenly lets out a mortified scream and let’s go of my flesh.
Holding my aching breast, I quickly move backward as Maria stands behind him looking as white as a sheet. A huge piece of glass is sticking out of his neck.
“FUCK!” he screams. “BITCH!” and then he lunges at her.
I grab his leg, but he kicks me away. I’m too weak.
Between the struggling and yelling there’s a loud gun shot.
“MARIA!”
Oh god. No. no. no!
She falls to the floor in a heap
I run toward her and grasp her thin, frail body in my arms. “Oh, my god!” I cry hysterically, shifting between Dosey and Maria. “What did you do?! OH MY GOD!”
He’s only shocked for a second, and then there’s a gun pointing at my head again.
“Let her go and take off your clothes.”
This time I don’t care though.
“No.”
“I’m warning you!”
“NO!”
I hold a trembling and moaning Maria as tight as I can in my arms. Sweat and blood clouds my vision and I close my eyes.
The click of the trigger into place is the loudest noise I’ve heard in my entire life.
So this is it.
I thought it was the time before Michael locked me in the boot.
Bit it wasn’t. It’s now.
There’s a loud blast and I wait for the blackness. Or the whiteness, or whatever is meant to engulf me. But all I hear is a loud, big thump.
My eyes shoot open. Dosey lies on the floor, eyes still bulging, but motionless.
I stare.
“Ria?” Max is beside me.
I stare at him instead. Times slowed. I’m lost. What just happened? How did he get here?
I vaguely address that he's holding a gun too. He's looking at Maria.
I look at Maria too, I’m still holding onto her with whitening knuckles. I wonder how it’s possible for someone to become tinier and smaller in front of my eyes.
Her hands are grasping mine in desperation, but her grip is becoming weaker. She’s becoming colder, turning blue.
My breath is being released in gasps. “Do something!” I cry at Max in sudden hysterics, “She’s dying…do something!”
Max grabs her from my arms and lays her paling body on the chaos on the floor. He pulls up her drenched black shirt, and I let out a loud whimper. Her whole stomach is covered in blood.
“I …” she whispers, but before she can say anymore, she stills. The life essence dragged out of her in front of my eyes.
Then silence.
I can’t tear my eyes away from the tiny body on the floor.
She’s dead.
I let out a small shriek of terror and fall backward into Max’s arms in utter shock.
I scream. I’m hysterical. I cry for the first time since I’ve been here. I don’t recognise it’s me. I don’t care that it’s probably the loudest, most shattering noise that anyone’s ever made for miles. I don’t care that I’m seeking comfort in the arms of my criminal.
He doesn’t comfort me though.
He holds me for a mere second, before he grabs my bleeding, hysterical face and looks straight into my bleary, puffy eyes.
“Let’s get outta here.”
***
SURPRISE! !
I surprised you didn't I? Yeah, I surprise myself too.... I want to bashfully say a big thanks all of those that have come out to of lurkdom to praise this fic. It's very humbling! And enjoy the next part.
Rewind a chapter -
I scream. I’m hysterical. I cry for the first time since I’ve been here. I don’t recognise it’s me. I don’t care that it’s probably the loudest, most shattering noise that anyone’s ever made for miles. I don’t care that I’m seeking comfort in the arms of my criminal.
He doesn’t comfort me though.
He holds me for a mere second, before he grabs my bleeding, hysterical face and looks straight into my bleary, puffy eyes.
“Let’s get outta here.”
Just a Criminal
Chapter 12
Liz
“I can’t,” I whisper, but the voice isn’t my own. It’s the voice of a hoarse, frail woman who’s seen the worst in life.
I try not to notice the way his pine eyes penetrate me with a look he’s never given me before. It’s almost…pained.
His hands grasp my arms and he’s shaking me softly. “Liz?”
I shake my head. I can’t move. I can’t speak. I can’t… anything.
I just want to be left alone to weep. I want to drown in sorrow for those who remain in half lived existences, where tomorrow may never be. For those that are victims of circumstances that were never their fault. For those that deserve better than I ever did. I want to weep for the poverty … pain…sadness…despair.
I want to weep for those like Maria.
Maria.
I gawk at her strangely angled, quickly bluing body on the floor. She looks plastic.
I’ve never experienced death before, especially not in front of my very own eyes. I would say it’s devastating but I’m absolutely numb from crying. It’s the first time I’ve cried since I’ve been here and even though I’m not doing it physically anymore, tears continue to roll involuntarily down my cheeks.
I hiccup. If only there was a way to bring her back... she could have come with me… We could have run together… She could have lived with me. Dad could have helped her. If only.
Arms are pulling me up. Away from the slumber that threatens to overtake me. One that I may never get out of. Truthfully, I don’t care if I don’t. I’m that sad.
His voice is clear as glass shattering my thoughts.
“Listen, we have to get out of here. You have to pay attention… you have to concentrate. Liz? Are you listening? Liz, look at me.”
He grabs my face in his large hands and somehow I manage to concentrate on the unique, yellow tint around his pupils. It pulls me in like a soul being pulled away from the light.
“LIZ!”
I open my mouth and then close it again. I realize that despite myself I’m nodding.
“…but Maria,” I manage.
“She’s dead, Liz.” Even though his voice isn’t, his words are harsh. They hit me like freezing water over my face. “We have to leave now. Michael can only mess with the tapes for a couple of hours. Doseys already messed with the cameras, so they’re probably already coming”
“I –“
“You have the strength. Don’t give in now.”
Don’t give in.
Was I about to give in?
I never gave in.
I barely notice his hand in mine as he pulls me into the bathroom and runs the tap.
“Wash your face.”
Like a robot I splash warm water over my face. It’s soothing, and even though I don’t look at the mirror I can see red – my blood, glistening like ruby in the sink.
He takes two quick steps toward me and I’m startled at the sudden personal invasion. I want to take a step back. Instead, I stare hypnotically as his hands creep up toward my face, around my neck and he’s pulling at my band, watching in silence as tangled hair cascades around me, loose and untamed.
His hands are in my hair, smoothing and straightening its dishevelled chaos. His fingers are running through it with a soft precision that I’ve never felt from Max before, and I can’t help but feel wierded out at how intimate this feels.
I close my eyes, not understanding how someone that looks so tough can be so gentle. So soothing.
Then just as fast as he began, he’s stopped. Grabbing my arm like a fragile toy, he’s dragging me back into the room. We’re standing next to the door of exit. The door of freedom.
He pauses. Maybe he’s changed his mind. “Do you have shoes?”
“Shoes?” I whisper, barely understanding. I’m still trying to get over the feel of his hands in my hair.
He nods down at my feet and my eyes follow. Trying not to avert to the two dead bodies on the floor.
My feet are bare.
“I shake my head. “Only heels.” They were what I recalled wearing before Michael loaded me into his trunk.
He nods, and I know he’s working something out in his head. I try not to look at Maria.
“Put them on.” He says finally, “fast.”
I twist my hand away from his and slip into the sandals at the bar. I don’t get how heels are going to help me escape, however I don’t question.
I don’t question why on earth he’s helping me out of somewhere that he put me in the first place. All my mind power is concentrated on trying to not look at Maria. Lifeless and still as she had been alive.
“Liz, come on!” Max urges from the door, “hurry.”
My reactions instinctively speed up and I’m jogging toward him. Something hits me.
“Wait a minute,” I ignore the agitation in his face as I jog toward the bar and open the container sitting on it. I shove the keys that I had stolen from the science lab, when Maria had snuck me out of this room, into a pocket of my blouse. I don’t why they do – but they offer some kind of security.
By the time I get to him the door is already open. He’s holding a long jacket that seems to have appeared from nowhere. Did he bring it with him?
I put it on over my blouse and my orange frilly skirt. Its covers me like a thin winter jacket.
As I step into the hall, I can’t help but glance one more time at the chaos that’s being left behind. The room in unruly clutter, two dead bodies on the floor, whiteness.
Then the door clicks closed and I try to ignore the way my heart quenches. Who would think that I would feel attachment to anything associated to the room that had been my prison for god knows how many weeks?
Who would think that I would feel guilty leaving this place, because of a crazy girl that would come annoy the hell out of me, once in a while?
Max is already walking away and my heels click on the marble floor as I follow his hard, long strides. He’s not running, yet he’s hard to catch up with. He’s talking. His voice is clear, yet not loud for anyone but me to hear.
“…If we’re caught we’re gunna be in a lot of shit. But it’s the only chance we have. So quickly-“ He turns slightly toward me, like he’s just remembered I exist. “Don’t look suspicious. Make eye contact if they talk to you, but not too much. I’m going to take you through East Wing. It’s separate. So they won’t know who you are. Hopefully -“
I’m just beginning to understand what he’s saying “--Wait a minute--“
“---Act calm and everything should be fine. You’re with me so they shouldn’t question you.”
“Wait,” I’m jogging to keep up with him. “What exactly are you planning to do?”
“Get us out of here,” he answers without pausing.
I still for a mere second, then have to run to catch up with him as it dawns on me, “We’re going to walk straight past them?!”
Max then confirms my worst fears. He nods.
The first thing that goes through my head is pretty simple: Oh. Fuck.
We reach a turning and Max puts a finger to his lip, motioning me to get behind him. I stand against the wall and he covers me as he peers around the corner and then turns back to give me the all clear nod.“Your names Sandra Leger, your I.D’s in your pocket, and here,”
I’m busy feeling for an I.D in the pocket of my coat when Max unclips a gun from a pouch on his jeans and hands it to me with absolute ease.
I stare at the heavy metal in my hand in utter shock.
A gun?
Did he just hand me A GUN?
“I hope you don’t expect me to use this.” I whisper breathily, gawping at the gun like it’s a rotting piece of meat.
He eyes me seriously. “No. Not unless you have to.”
Not unless I have to? Unless I have to WHAT?
He glances around the wall one more time, looks at my face and then takes the gun from my trembling fingers, proceeding to give the worst 101 I’ve ever heard.
“Hold it like this,” He fists his hand around the pistol in show. “You have to get within range… around 10-15 paces to shoot. You cock it like this, aim the muzzle –“ he stretches the gun in front of him in a weird, Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible like stance “ - and fire. Don’t jerk the trigger or you’ll mess up your arm.”
With that he hands the black metal back to me and I’ve never been so afraid of anything I’ve held in my very own hands.
“Remind me to not ask you to tutor me for anything,” I mumble grouchily, but he doesn’t seem to hear because he’s motioning me toward him, whilst I find myself staring at the gun in my fingers.
I don’t want to use it. I don’t want to hold it.
….It just killed Maria.
My hands are horrifyingly shaky as I slip it into the pocket of the coat.
“This is it.”
I glance up at Max. “What? This is…”
Max shoots me a warning look and despite myself, I snap my mouth shut.
This is what? I’m not prepared for this. I’M NOT --
Just then a lady in a white lab coat walks past, pushing a trolley covered by a blue cloth. She doesn’t even bother to glance up at us. All the same, my heart fastens 100 times over. No, make that a billion times, my legs are jelly and my whole body’s broken out into a sweat.
Oh god. OH GOD! I can’t do this.
This is the stupidest idea that I’ve ever heard! There was no way we were going to walk right on out of here without anyone recognizing us.
Surely Sneg or whoever the hell runs this place would have thought of something like this?
I remember Maria telling me about a guy who dared to defy the rules. He had been shot in the head.
I glance at Max who’s always two paces ahead of me so that my movements don’t look awkward. He reminds me of a panther. Dangerous, commanding and beautiful. I can’t imagine him being shot in the head. He’s just too powerful. Yet all the same- Sneg is so dangerous. I wonder how I can be so afraid of a man that I’ve only met twice, yet thinking of him makes my skin crawl with utter dread.
I find myself jogging to catch up with Max again. “Do you really think this is a good idea?” I mumble through the side of my mouth, but he doesn’t bother to privilege me with a response.
Maybe he hasn’t heard.
“Do you think -“ I begin again.
He shoots me another look. I snap my mouth closed again. What the hell is it with him?
We continue to walk. This time in silence.
Max seems to like silence.
Him looking all pantherish with me trying to keep up with his long strides. I see a couple of guys in blue uniform and breathe a sigh of relief when they pass.
We walk on. Passing a few others absorbed in their own thoughts.
How long is this damned corridor?
“Max?”
Max? Did someone break the silence?
Wait. Someone just said Max!
In panic my eyes shoot upward and some dude with a ginger hair and a white lab coat nods at Max.
“David,” Max replies.
David is stopping. He’s slowing down.
…And why hell is Max slowing down too?
No. No. NO! Don’t slow down. I don’t know what to do! Do I slow down? Or do I walk on, pretending I don’t know you?
Would it to be too suspicious if I stood beside him? Would Sandra Ledger do that? I bite my lip in contemplation of why the hell the only SOS procedure we discussed, involved a gun.
Was I meant to shoot the ginger guy?
I slow down behind Max and then on instinct speed up again. I carry on like I know the facility like the back of my hand. I slow down enough to allow Max the time to catch up with me if he wants. The corridor stretches on. He doesn’t come.
I reach a turning. Left or right?
I take a sharp turn right.
I’m face to face with a guard. He stands in front of a lift and is holding a large gun. I bite my lip.
He nods to acknowledge me.
“Hi!” I say screechily, wondering if he can see the way my whole body is shaking.
Silence.
I find myself mesmerized by his gun. They seem to have an obsession with those things around here.
He coughs. “I.D?”
“I.D,” I smile.
He doesn’t return it.
Right, ID. He wants my I.D.
Where the hell is my damned I.D?!
And where the fuck is Max?
I look behind me in search for my fellow criminal and then turn back to the guard, who’s still staring at me unsmilingly.
“Is there a problem miss?”
Yes, there is a fucking problem! …I think I’m gunna faint.
“No.” I say breathlessly, “I’m, uh…looking…” I start fiddling in the pocket of my jacket, for Sandra’s I.D.
Where the hell is it?
The guard continues to stare unkindly. I wonder if he’s used that huge gun on anyone for not having their I.D. He looks like he’s shot a few down in his lifetime.
Pictures of people being shot in the head cloud my mind. Is that the most painful way to die?
My hand touches something and a card falls to the floor. There’s a picture of a girl, but her face is covered with hair and stamps. The gun in my pocket follows the card, landing on the floor with a healthy bang.
The guard looks from the gun to me.
“I’m from the West wing.” Max is above me, he passes the man his own I.D. “My companion is from Military Office.”
Max makes this funny face movement at me and I pick up my - or rather long haired Sandra’s (the girl who I quite possibly owe my life to) I.D and pass Max the card. Max hands it the guard, who looks at both the cards for quite some time. During which a million not very nice things go through my head. A lot of which include guns and people being shot.
I think I’m going to cry in relief when the guard, still without smiling, presses the button of the lift.
We get in silently. Max presses a floor, and the doors close on the unhappy guard.
I fall against the cold metal wall of the lift, and close my eyes. “That was close.”
Max looks like he’s taking quite a breather himself. He finally manages, “Glad you didn’t stop.”
My eyes snap up. Was he complimenting me?
“That was the right thing to do?”
“If you’re not dead, it’s not the wrong thing.”
I throw a glare at him. Cryptic much?
*****
Max
We reach the fifth floor and the doors open to a small hallway. It’s not elaborate, nor is it white. She looks pretty relieved.
I’m relieved that she’s stopped crying. For a moment I had thought we weren’t going to get out of this place. For a moment I had thought that her anguish was going to engulf me and take me with her.
We’ve reached this far and with each step I’ve become more positive. Every step counts. Every single move. I watch every single camera as we move past it. The hidden ones too. I know Michaels behind me, but even though I trust him the most, I can never be sure enough.
Never be too sure of anything. That philosophy has served me well so far.
Michael doesn’t know about Ria yet. I won’t be there for him when he finds out.
She’s mumbling under her breath again. As nervous as hell. Her whole body eradicates tension. Yet, she’s done well. Especially the move with David. David isn’t called the science genius for nothing. I guess she isn’t all balls and no brain either.
She surprises me everyday.
I swipe my card in the final door and it opens to reveal the master garage. I can smell freedom. A few more security checks and we’re out.
“You have a Ferrari too?” she muses at cars to my left, lined up in every color of the rainbow.
“They’re not mine.” They don’t belong to me. Nothing in this place ever has.
“A Lexus?” she nods toward my favourite silver car as she follows me. Almost running to keep up.“This is like a car wardrobe,” She comments wide eyed, impressed by hundreds of cars that decorate the garage.
I don’t choose from any of the hundred of top range cars to my left. They may be fast and furious, but they’re everything we don’t want right now.
She’s not too happy with my choice. I know because she joins me in the jeep with a pout she doesn’t even try to hide. She’s not used to riding in anything like this, but unlike her usual self she manages to keep quiet as she gets into the seat beside me. I wonder how long it will last.
She saw deeper into my life today. It will leave a mark for a long to come.
The jeep is fast, reliable, quiet and easily camouflaged in the desert. I rev up the engine and press my thumb against the external identification box. The garage opens to reveal another one. There are two barriers. A man sits beside the first one looking as bored as hell.
“Stan Moore,” I mumble to Liz as he nods at me and lets us through the barrier without hesitation. “I’ve known him since I was ten.”
“Since you were ten? How long have you been here?” she whispers back, mortified.
I don’t have time to answer. A second, grouchy, fat man reading a magazine barely glances at me before pressing the button for the second barrier, then yells behind us, “You gotta tell me where you go shopping these days!”
“Mouthy Rob,” I explain.
She stretches her neck and rolls her eyes, “Creep.”
The final door opens and the bright light blinds us.
She blinks at her first sign of freedom in months. She says,“we’re in a desert?”
I drive onto the sand. “Quite obviously.”
She snorts and shakes her head. She’s surprised.
I follow the path leading to the dirt road. A metal fence covers our whole facility. There are four guards covering the exit. The security isn’t bad, in fact it’s pretty good. But there’s one huge problem.
Everyone trusts me.
Its not that they shouldn’t, after all I never was traitor material. Until now.
I slow down as we near the metal gates to freedom. The day is unbreezy and humid. She looks uncomfortable, like she’s holding her breath.
“Your I.D.” I say, but she’s already reached into her pocket.
“Hey, Max,” Gavin salutes me in friendly manner, glances at Liz and opens the barrier without even looking at her I. D. They’re going to heighten the security for sure when I get out of here. Too late though. Much too late.
I drive. Slowly at first and then speed up. The sand flies into my hair and eyes. From the rear view I see the facility getting smaller and smaller.
She coughs disgustedly and then glances at me, her hair whips her face. She’s exhilarated, “That wasn’t so bad?” It’s a cautious question from someone so rash.
I floor the gas as we reach a solid road. Miles before we even get out of the red zone. “That was the easy part.”
***