Operation 007 (SpyxFamily)

Chapter Three

He then asked how she felt about other homes she's been in. The ones that returned her to the orphanage.

Anya heard the question before he spoke it and still wasn't ready for it.

She had been answering quickly without faltering, knowing what he was going to ask. She was prepared. But her pause was a sudden lapse in her confident answers.

Loid took note of this.

"What do you mean?" Anya asked, leading Loid to believe she didn't quite understand.

"How do you feel when you think about the families you've stayed with?" He asked.

There was a long silence while she drew penguin fins. Anya didn't know. They brought her back to the orphanage. They abandoned her. She wasn't even angry. All it left her was a feeling she wasn't good enough. That they couldn't love her. That something was wrong with her. Surely the same thing would happen if Loid and Yor ever felt the same. So she told him the truth. She meant it as one thing. But she knew he'd take it as another.

"Nothing." She answered lightly.

Loid didn't expect that. 'Does she just not care? Did she put it behind her all on her own?' Loid decided to put it aside for the moment and dwell on what that might mean later. It sounded like she felt nothing for them, which was probably healthier than being angry at them. Or at least less exhausting.

He let the air hang quiet for a moment, reviewing his drawing. Loid was not much of an artist, but his attempt at a tree wasn't half bad.

He glanced at his daughter.

"Do you remember anything before the orphanage?" He asked offhandedly.

Anya visibly flinched, her crayon scrawling abruptly to the corner of the page.

Loid noticed. It was hard not to.

Silence.

She didn't know how to respond. She couldn't. Her throat closed up, as if telling her what she already knew. Don't say a word.

"You don't have to answer if you don't want to." He offered quietly, distressed at her reaction.

'Deflect, deflect, deflect.' She thought desperately, 'Papa can't suspect!'. But she was frozen, her mouth not speaking. Her body not responding. It was a question she didn't hear him prepare beforehand. She wasn't ready for it. She didn't want to be. She didn't want to think about it. She didn't want to remember. She worked so hard to put them away. In boxes that wouldn't be opened ever again. But now she was looking at those boxes, unable to turn away from them. They refused to stay sealed. And as if the act of trying to forget them forced her to remember, they started to leak out.

Unbidden, memories perforated her thoughts, images from the depths of her fears.

The needles.

The chair that Anya was always too small for. Sitting in a white sterile room filled with syringes, scalpels, and tools that cut into bone.

The scientists that strapped her down when they thought she was going to be difficult.

The spikes.

The dark room.

A man standing over her, controlling and terrifying.

The nightmares that plagued her night after night after she escaped the cold, clinical, unforgiving place that was the lab.

Until the Forgers.

They replayed over and over as she sat, clutching a blue crayon in her fisted hand.

"Anya!"

Anya jolted at Loid's touch with a gasp, jerking her hand away reflexively. She shuddered. Clammy, piercing, dread melting away as Loid's voice broke through.

"Anya, what's wrong? What happened?" Loid asked carefully, fully alarmed at her response.

It took a moment to gather herself before she shook her head. Returning to her drawing like nothing happened. Forced herself to relax. Forced herself to breathe before she broke down crying in front of him. "Nothing."

Her second lie.

"Are you okay?" Loid asked, utterly unconvinced.

She answered almost cheerfully. "Yep."

Her third lie.

"Are you sure?"

"Yep!"

Her fourth.

It did nothing to quell Loid's building concern. Something from her past disturbed her so much she didn't want to talk about it. How did he get her to open up to him? Surely anything that causes a person to flinch at the mere mention of something is a sign of great mental distress.

Anya dropped her crayon on the table. It rolled across her drawing as she stood.

"Anya? Where are you going?" Loid watched her step away.

"Sleepy." She answered and found solace in her room. Bond loyally followed behind, along with Loid's thoughts making their way through her closed door. Befuddled and anxious in a way she had never felt him feel before.

'Anya failed.' She thought miserably as tears made tracks down her face in the safety of solitude. From stress. From fear. From sheer exhaustion from the past couple days. From the memories she had been holding back. She climbed into bed with Bond, finding comfort in the covers she wrapped around her shoulders. 'Now he knows there's something wrong, and Anya doesn't know how to fix it. Everything's falling apart.' She thought sullenly, her face buried in Bond's fur. Her pent up tears opening like a dam as they disappeared into the dogs thick coat. He licked her hand that rested on his paw, whining in solidarity. His deep breaths soothing her as they raised her head up and down. A rumble emanating from his chest as she quietly wept for what felt like hours. She didn't know how long she cried, dampening his fur, only that it drained every ounce of her being. It depleted her tears until a quiet stillness finally inhabited her body. A tired calm that comes only after a good cry. She was so expended, even her nerves had lessened. It left her head feeling silent and less panicked. And in her numbed, muted, state, she wearily waded through muddled thoughts that weighed her down. Everything was falling apart, and she didn't know how to fix it but the alternative was much worse. She had a lot to lose now. If she didn't try to do everything she could, then it would be gone forever.

She was still scared and tired, but giving up was scarier. And so she slept, keeping a tight grasp of bonds fur.