Chapter Text
"You can't escape me, darling girl." A soft and feminine voice calls.
Heavy. Heavy. The air is heavy. It burns in your lungs. Weighing you down from the inside out.
"Why don't you spare me the trouble and give up now."
The shapes of the forest flash by as you sprint. Deeper and deeper into the abyss.
A rattling on your left reveals a weathered figure in the darkness. Hunched and haggard, the shape of a woman hobbles toward you.
"Come here, dear."
The jaw on the cane of bone she carries clatters in the wind. Hair, white and grey, sways rhythmically with each stubborn step she takes.
Fear pulses through your spine, shocked stockstill by her eerie presence.
All at once, she is upon you. A gnarled hand shoots out and grabs your jaw in a vice grip.
Out of a flash of feathers, gilded claws grasp your chin. The razor tips dig into the meat of your cheek. A gleam of teeth, a predatory smile.
The last thing you hear is her laugh.
...
It's so dark.
The memory of what happened is now fleeting. A shriek of crows. A fitful chase. And finally, a strike.
A pained wheeze interrupts your scattered thoughts. It takes a moment for you to realize the wheeze came from you as fresh pain seeps it's way into your flesh.
Blearily you begin to open your eyes, lids dragging against parched eyeballs. Once opened to a squint, a bright light before you forces them shut again. Your arms fall atop your eyes, shielding them from the blistering light. Stagnant air trickles into your lungs through clenched teeth, each breath feels more laboured than the last. Your muscles ache and stretch around your ribs, an acidic burn pulses in your chest with every inhale.
Putting one hand behind you to stabilize yourself, you attempt to sit up. A searing pain shocks you, a festering burn radiates out from your spine, as if it was gnawing on your bones itself. Wincing and whimpering, you wrap your arms around yourself. Your hands begin running up and down your back, in a meager attempt to soothe yourself. A flaky substance sheds from your skin as you rub. A curious finger scratches at the skin, collecting a thick layer of the substance under your nail.
You quickly bring the finger to your eye level to find your nail caked in red.
"Oh, you're awake." A surprised voice calls out.
Your eyes dart from your finger and focus in on the man now standing just feet in front of you. Tall and slender with a gaunt face.
A lump forming in your throat prevents you from speaking. The only noise coming out of you in the form of more whimpers. The man takes a tentative step towards you. You reflexively raise your hands up and scoot back harshly until your back connects with the wall.
You cry out as fresh, hot pain rips through your spine.
The pain is all encompassing, so much so that you don't notice the man continuing to advance on you until you feel a rough hand pull on your wrist.
"Just calm down, this will only take a minute."
The man reveals something long and sharp in his hand, a needle.
"Don't fucking touch me!!" You scream, finding your voice all at once.
He only clamps down harder.
Blind terror tears through you, a guttural instinct taking over.
At breakneck speed, your other arm flashes through the air and connects with the man's head. You grab a fistful of his hair and pull. A grunt escapes the man's throat as he drops the needle in his hand so the now free hand can fly into your hair.
"Fuck! Let go!" He says through gritted teeth.
He wrenches your head to the side, in an attempt to get you to lie back down.
In response, you throw all your weight forward. The two of you tumble to the ground in a tangle of limbs. You land straddling the man's waist, and sensing you have the upper hand here, you begin recklessly punching, slapping and scratching his face. Anything. Anything to get you out of whatever hell you've found yourself in.
The world around you suddenly starts spinning and your back abruptly slams into the cold, hard ground. You arch your back and grit your teeth at the impact. Just as you begin to lift your head from the ground, a fist hits you square in the eye. The pain from the punch is amplified by your head slamming back into the ground. Pinpricks of light cloud your vision. The world spins around you. The man's face swirls and morphs. The rapid thump of your pulse in your ears temporarily deafens you.
"....cking hell…..course she…..akes…..reau is….ut."
A clattering of metal grabs your attention, your head shooting to the right, to find a decrepit medical cart. Ruddy and rusted, it held medical tools bordering on archaic.
"Just calm down. Ok?" The man says tersely.
You look back to him, he rattles an opaque glass jar until two white pills come tumbling out. He looks back at you, his eyes cold and his jaw tight. It only takes a moment for you to realize what he's trying to do. On shaky hands you begin to pull your torso off the ground and brace yourself on your elbows. Whatever hope you had of escaping is short lived when the man's hand crashes into your chest, effectively pinning you to the ground. The hand feels almost unbearably hot against your cooled skin and you just now realize you are completely bare from the waist up. The hand pinning you down snakes it's way up to roughly grasp your jaw. He squeezes, attempting to pry you open.
"I don't want to fight you, just take this, you'll feel better." He speaks through his teeth.
You clench your jaw and bite your lip in defiance. He pushes harder in response, the pressure on your jaw is immense. So much so that you can't help your lips parting in the centre. A tiny stream of air followed by a whine escapes from the hole as the man advances, trying to shove the pills into said hole.
You begin desperately thrashing and flailing against him.
"Stay. Still." He says, in a disturbingly even tone.
"MMMMMMMM!!" You scream with your mouth closed.
Your hand grabs onto the leg of the medical cart. And with strength you didn't know you had, you send it toppling over in a cacophony of breaking glass and clattering metal.
"AH! FUCK!" The man brings his arms up to shield his face from the instruments raining down on the two of you.
Seizing his moment of distraction, you pull your legs out from underneath him and kick at his chest. Hoping to wind him temporarily and escape, it seemingly works as he doubles over. Breath heaves out of your chest as you clamber up to unstable knees. Your hand lands on a scalpel as you take a second, just one second, to get your bearings. A mistake it turns out, as you're grasped by the ankle and pulled back down. You're being mounted, the man has his knees pressed to your chest, causing your breath to escape your nose in quick pants. You raise a hand to strike and you grunt as his hand connects with yours. He slams your hand back to the ground and secures both of them above your head in a bruisingly tight grip. Lips are once again clamped shut as you anticipate him force-feeding you those pills. The taste of copper floods your mouth as you bite the inside of your cheeks.The man is quiet now and laser-focused. He picks the pills up off the filthy ground, and begins trying to slip them past your lips on soiled fingers.
Fuck.
Fuckfuckfuck.
Jerking your head to the side to avoid him, your eyes land on the scalpel. A blessing amongst the chaos, though agonizingly far away. You wiggle your wrist and notice his grip has loosened the slightest bit, too focused on drugging you to realize. One fierce tug and your left hand is free, it crawls along the grimy floor and lands on the cool metal. Your eyes squint and mouth pulls into a frown as you drive the scalpel into the flesh of the man's neck. It plunges deep within, a nauseating squelch seems to echo through the room. You swallow thickly as you pull the scalpel towards you, tearing cleanly through taut muscle and vein. The blood flows freely from the wound as your weapon exits the front of his neck, grazing his Adam's apple. It spatters down your arm and face with every thump of his fading pulse. He collapses beside you, writhing and trembling. Looking beside you, you catch one last look at his eyes. The light in them fading fast.
"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry…..Oh God, ohgodohgodnonono." Words barely coherent in your panicked state.
Tentatively sitting up, you curl your legs to your chest and hold tight. Your ragged breath quickly turns to full out wailing. A shake in your fingers morphing into rapid tremors. You rock on the spot. It's soothing. A primal scream tears itself from your throat amongst your whines and wails. Your hands trace the swollen skin of your back, a sick clue as to what horror you had stumbled into. A shiver rolls through your body as a frigid breeze flows through a window you had not yet noticed. Even though there was no one around to see, you still felt the need to cover your breasts with one hand. It brought some scrap of security and control. Crawling over to the window and pulling yourself up, you're surprised to find a captivating view.
Before you stood a vast mountain range, dotted with endless pine trees. A thick blanket of snow covers the ground and decorates the barren branches of bushes.
Probably a bad idea to venture out there topless. You look down to see your flesh erupt in goose bumps, your nipples erect in the cool air.
Looking at the fresh corpse, an idea comes to you. One that you don't particularly like, doesn't seem like you have much choice in the matter. Beggars can't be choosers. Kneeling down once again, you place your hands on the dead man's chest. You beginunbuttoning the white shirt, once pristine fabric sullied in shades of maroon. Unwittingly, you catch his empty gaze and avert your eyes quickly. Unable to stomach looking at the life you just stole away.
Who knows what he would have done to me.
He was trying to drug me. I didn't have a choice.
Several more excuses rattle in your brain as you continue unbuttoning. A feeble attempt to soothe your reeling mind.
Once unbuttoned you shift the dead weight of the corpse around and manage, with great effort, to shimmy it off him. Despite being presumably made of cotton, the shirt felt heavy in your hands. Meekly you pull it over your shoulders, the natural musk of the man who once wore it replaced mostly by the stench of blood and death. You shudder and begin to heave again. Saliva and blood coat your inner cheeks, sweat beads at your brow. Stumbling, you brace yourself against a door frame, and then against a desk you hadn't noticed before. Grateful for its presence as you continue to pull yourself together. The world slowly comes into focus around you as you take deep, shuddering breaths. Filling your diaphragm with precious oxygen. A tattered leather bound notebook catches your eye. You greedily snatch it and begin flipping through the weathered pages.
Mother Miranda gave me a mountain.
Now I can do lots and lots of Cadou experiments.
This is my secret special laboratory.
Your stomach churns, the implication of the word experiments hanging heavy over you. Just what was going on here? The wound on your back, the surgical equipment, the man trying to drug you. Dread settles deep in your belly as your breath quickens, turning the pages of the book, desperate for more answers. You stop at what seems to be the most recent entry.
Mother Miranda gave me a pretty girl today.
She told me to put the Cadou in her.
The girl didn't go pop! She is sleeping now.
An acidic burn creeps up to the back of your throat. You lurch forward, your hands brace against the desk, bile and blood spill from your mouth. It keeps coming up, spilling more and more of the putrid liquid. The force you're exerting causes tears to spill out the corners of your eyes, spittle dripping from your lips in thin strings.Your gut continues to contract until you're choking on nothing but air.
I have to get out of here, I have to get out of here.
A sturdy chest that you somehow hadn’t noticed before grabs your attention. Unsteady hands fiddle with the grainy latch. It opens with a creak, and to your surprise, an ornate gun lies on a bed of plush velvet. You snatch it from the chest and begin to observe the weapon. The sleek design of the gun belies the heft of it as it lay heavy in your palm. Tentatively, you flick the chamber open, it seems to be loaded. Thank God. It feels unfamiliar in your hands, you aim at the wall shakily, trying to get a feel for your new weapon. Perhaps your way out.
I have to get out of here, I have to get out of here.
You repeat the mantra like a prayer as you walk mutely towards the door.