"Natalie?" A foreign voice lulled me from a comatose fainting episode, it was like being dragged out of a bog by my ankles. My body was slick with sweat, and all of my wounds had been miraculously glossed over; like someone had replenished my skin. No more ugly scar was marring my tummy. No bulbous bruise had frothed up on my cheek, bludgeoned my eye or bubbled up in my lip. But an ice cream headache stung my senses.
"Natalie Roman..?" He named me.
"Natalie Roman..." I echoed and the name tasted like a bitter pill.
"Natalie Roman, you will leave here and return to the dormitory..." He soothed, his old crooked fingers combing through my sweat tangled hair.
I looked down at my body, which felt unlike my own. I was completely disorientated. I flexed my fingers, regaining control of my quivering muscles. He clasped my hand in his and helped me recline out of the chair and slip onto my feet. As my soles kissed the floor, I wobbled and he caught me by the shoulders.
"Careful, now Natalie..." He unleashed me and I mindlessly swayed towards the door, in miscalculated zig-zags.
My mind felt like an empty bank vault, with someone pounding on the heavy duty door: and the door bulging under the battering.
I breached the doors in the laboratory and wandered aimlessly out the lab. My legs trembled as I walked, unable to sustain my weight. As I dragged my leaden legs into the corridor, I saw something move in my peripherals.
"Natalie?" The voice was triumphant, and the recognisable rustling in my ears unbolted the door sealed in my mind.
Lucid images swirled back into my head; in a jumbled order, incoherent words and events. The tidal wave that overcame my brain was enough to floor me. I cupped hands over my ears to try and silence the whispers swilling around and around like a whirlpool. I screwed my eyes shut to try and blind myself to the reel of events flicking through my mind's eye.
Then out of the mesh of tangled events came one thought of clarity. She had handed in the newspaper scrap that had incriminated me. I lurched forwards and snatched her ankle.
"You!" She shook her ankle, trying to flail my hand off her. "It's your fault. Your fault they..." I tapped my drumming forehead, thrumming with inconsistency. "I don't know what they've done..." My fingers furled tighter around her, my nails buried in her ankle.
With one jerk of the foot, she kicked me in the side of the head and my frolicking grip was thrown away. Her kick pounded some sense back into my delicate skull. I screwed my eyes shut and rolled my head around on the floor; more memories were flooding my head.
"It looks like Lukin doesn't love you anymore Tsarina..." She crouched down to my level then grabbed me by the hair.
"You psychopath..." I lunged at her, scrambling to my feet and pinning her to the wall by her snappable throat.
Loose ringlets of blonde hair were thrown across her face as her head clonked into the concrete wall and she grinned venomously, snarling like a rabid animal. "Who's the favourite black widow now?!" She choked around the garrotting grip.
It took me a moment to register what she'd said. My eyes flittered about her seething grimacing face and my lips parted in a gape of realisation.
"That's what this is about?! You... Y-you had me- you turned me in, just so you could prove yourself?!" The hand that pinned her to the wall slackened, giving her room to breathe and move.
Her hand shot to my neck, and she walked me into the other wall until I was immobilised in the same position. "I will destroy you piece by piece Natalie... Don't think I won't... Assure Aleksander falls out of love with you... Take that bionic armed creep away from you... And when the time is right, you'll end up like the other girls..." Every single word was laced with poison, and her eyes were wide and wild.
"What? Like the ones you killed, you sadistic whore." Her fingers squeezed tighter around my airway. I summoned spittle into my mouth and with a hock, spat at her.
She was startled by the lashing to phlegm that landed on her cheek and dragged the back of her hand across her face with repulsion. "How sad..." She kneed me in the stomach and I keened with a wheeze. "You're actually blaming that on me!" A laugh rattled from her lips and she gave me a condescending arch of the eyebrow.
"Then who was it?!" I croaked around the hand throttling my throat, my words distorted with a rasp.
"How the fuck should I know?" She gave a melodic giggle and then shot a disgusted look at me. "What does it matter, it's their own stupid faults... Shame they're never going to make Aleksander's favourite(!)" She gave me a mocking saddened face, her bottom lip pouty and her eyebrows drew up together. "Just like you..!" She chirped with a narcissistic grin.
I met eyes with the lunatic hell-bent on prestige. Not a single crease of self-doubt lined her face or a single smidge of uncertainty entered her voice. "You seriously think he has a favourite don't you?" Scarily, something like sympathy sneaked into my heart for a moment - before it returned to a stream of hatred for my adversary and comrade.
"How else would you explain why he kissed you?" She sounded on the brink of tears, her fingers constricting my throat tighter, coiling like a python. "Why you get away with refusing to kill in tournaments?" A waver of fury was in her voice. "Why, when you fail in your fights, they don't leave you to die like the rest; they pull you out?" She gritted her back teeth and a completely unhinged tearful laugh slipped her lips.
"You're delusional," I breathed, my words barely punctuating the air - I couldn't breathe let alone talk.
"Says Aleksander's little princess..." Actual tears were welling in her eyes, glossy and vengeful. "His poor little Tsar princess-"
My head filled with images, rushing through like a waterfall. I threw my head back and scrunched my eyes tightly shut. I could see flames. I could see faces, a woman and a man- Then a young soldier- a handkerchief, 'AR'. A serpentine whisper of my name- not Natalie- echoed around the caverns of my mind.
"Don't you dare call me that, don't you dare-!" I struggled against the hand gripping onto my throat, thrashing and quivering.
Amusement lit up in her teary eyes. "Or what? Time and again Natalie-"
"That's not my name!" I let out a hoarse shriek.
"You threaten me, Natalie." I made a choked noise of objection. "What are you going to do? Huh, princess? Is your winter soldier freak going to swoop to the rescue? Do you have him that wrapped around your pinkie like every other man in this place?!" Tears spilled down her cheeks, two lines that left a sheen in the dank light.
"I'm going to prove you wrong, you psycho bitch," I stifled. "That's what I'm going to do."
Her nostrils flared, her lip curled and her frown deepened. "Good luck with that(!)"
It was a swift knee to the gut, and as I recoiled, curling into myself she smashed my head into the wall behind me.
There was an interlude of darkness before an estranged spectral sound reached my ears.
"Natalia..?" It was like a siren's song. "Natalia..?" It was sweet and innocent. "Natalia, wake up..." It was caring. "Natalia!" And urgent. "Natalia!" It was drawing me close. "Natalia, wake up!"
My eyes fluttered open. Every shape and colour was engulfed by a grey haze. But at least my hearing wasn't impaired. And the voice was idiosyncratic enough to hush my panic. I blinked a few more times and the cloudiness drifted from my vision.
My eyes trailed down my person and I established my sense of gravity. I was tucked up to my chin with a duvet, my head propped up on a pillow and sprawled on a mattress that made me feel weightless. A damp flannel mopped my head, ribbons of steam twirling from the doused rag.
I jerked forwards and sat bolt upright.
"Shhh, no... Lie back down; you're concussed," an American voice soothed. And with his hand cupping my forehead, he pressed me back down into the bed. "You need t'relax... You're not all right, right now." He gave my hand a cordial squeeze.
I tried to make a noise, but I ended up emitting a caw akin to a crow's. My airway was bruised and I was struggling to breathe through it.
"You don't need t'speak," he reassured me. And a glass of ice cold water was ferried to my lips. The vitality that rolled through me in waves of satisfaction as the drink passed my lips was indescribable. Every fibre of my being relished in the rejuvenating hydration.
I strained my neck and turned my head towards him, pawing away the drink. His smile was of adulation and concern. His turquoise eyes were illuminated with adoration, but his forehead wrinkled with unfathomable worry.
"You shouldn't be doing this. If they find you here, if they find me here; we'll both be in trouble..." I tried to scramble until I was sitting upright.
"You were already in enough trouble when I got there," he groaned. He put his head in his hands and massaged his closed eyes; pinching the bridge of his nose in agitation. "Passed out in a corridor... Fuck, Natalia," he hissed. He looked down at me with bloodshot eyes, bulging bags purpled with tiredness hanging beneath them.
The chair he was sat on looked uncomfortable, rigid and wooden. It creaked as he moved on it; and I dreaded to think how long he'd been sitting vigil for.
"I didn't pass out," I scoffed. "It was-" I threw off the covers.
"No!" He erupted. "No..." He soothed in a quieter voice, hugging me still as I stood up, dashing right into his arms. "No, please, just stay still; I'm not having you go back out there yet..." He lowered me back onto the bed.
"Yelena... I'm going to- I'm going to..." I searched for the darkest desires of my heart, the cruellest fate I could concoct. "She-" My voice quivered with anger and I curled my fists. "She..." The anger calmed and turned into despairing tearfulness. "She turned me in..." A hiccup of a sob escaped my throat. "She made them..." A few tears trickled down my cheeks. I tapped a finger against my head. "They played with my head! They, they tried to change me- give me a different name!" I exploded, bawling, but frenetic with indignation. "They put me in a machine! They tried to..." My bottom lip shook and I trailed off into a muddle.
I put my head in my hands and I felt a depression beside me in the mattress as James sat next to me. He cuddled me into his chest, curling around me like a snail with a shell. "It's all alright... I've got you..." He promised, a hand running up and down my back.
"But they couldn't change me," I emerged from where my face was pressed into the crook of his neck. "I remember." I tapped my head. "She made me remember."
"Cognitive recalibration," he stated like it was obvious. "She hit you really hard in the head."
A small amused snort broke free of the fits of sobbing. He forced a smile, at odds with the terror in his eyes. Terror for me.
"Thank you," I sniffed, pitifully looking up at him with watery puffy red eyes and a flushed complexion. Still my chest heaved as I recovered.
"Only doing what I can..." He returned the sentiment sincerely, his human hand landing over mine, warm to the touch.
I hung my head, my eyes inflamed and irritated. "Why do you care so much?" I asked, looking back up and meeting his steely eyes. "No one else in this hellhole seems to give a damn."
The silence spoke volumes. His mouth opened, his jaw worked on its pivot, but no words dropped from his lips, like a ventriloquist's dummy. He was as guppy as a fish and no words of clarity were available. His lips pressed shut into tight line. There was a moment of calculation as he looked right through me.
"Words can't explain it, Natalia," he sighed, wrapped up in his thoughts. He snapped back into consciousness. "Can I show you?"
I nodded mutely, my mouth going dry and my lips parting with a small pop. My heart was pounding steadily and the air evaporated from my lungs.
His fingers threaded a dripping wet strand of hair behind my left ear and his fingers outlined the angle of my jaw. His metal hand met the curve of my neck on the right hand side, and slid up until he was cradling my cheek. His thumb rested on my cheekbone, the rest of his plated fingers woven into my hair.
With the prod of two fingers resting under my chin, he tilted my lips up to him, and aligned his with mine.
My stomach did backflips, my heart thrumming and my skin sizzling.
The tempered worship of his lips on mine made my eyes roll back into my skull and my eyelashes fluttered like the beat of a bird's wings. Angling his head, he drew back sensitively, our lips still mingling and then posted his lips against mine again.
I was his.
I looped my arms around the back of his neck, my fingers crawling up into his dark strands.
He reeked of war, vehicle fumes, cordite, smoke and alcohol; all whipped up into a cocktail of aromas that clung to his skin. It was the headiest mixture of scents. His lips tasted divine, flavoured by his anxieties, vodka that he used to drink away all sensation.
His stubble framed lips chaffed against my skin, the drag of the prickly hairs making my skin tingle deliciously.
With a swipe of his devilish tongue on my bottom lip, he unlocked my mouth and I sacrificed myself to his every plundering whim. His tongue delved in fearlessly, drawing cursive patterns against mine and drawing a moan out the back of my throat. The fingers intertwined in his hair only wound tighter.
I forgot how to breathe, the room a vacuum of anything but James.
He leant into me, our mouths locked at angles, lips still brushing as tongues spilled every dirty desire.
He withdrew tentatively and I was still latched onto his lips. A pathetic whimper escaped my throat as he departed and I lurched forwards, still intent on fulfilling the carnal needs swelling within me. He stilled me with a finger pressed to my lips.
Until then I hadn't understood what it meant to be devout. So many people had their religion, which they poured their soul into: worshipping their god and following commandments of their religious book. The girls in the facility had their devotion to the KGB, praising their commanders and preaching the doctrine of the Soviet Supremacy.
But I had James.
I was devoted to James.
From that second onwards, my heart wasn't in my possession, it had been stolen by him; and I put myself in his crossfire: to make or break me.
A/N - Sunday is update day, it's law. But it feels very soon after I uploaded that chapter on Thursday.I might consider uploading twice a week if my revising schedule allows it.
We recently got out exam timetables; it turns out my first one is April 29th - Music, Creative Task. But then there's a three week gap and I have Additional Science. I'm terrified. But there are about three things which are keeping me sane: 1) The knowledge that I get a three month holiday after exams are over (god bless study leave) 2) I'm going to see AC/DC on July 4th 3) This summer I can recommence writing and uploading more regularly!
Dedication goes to victorious-monkey! x