"The Hunter Academy had managed to track down Victoriano Rubinstein here in Hollow Woods in 2017," Evie said, her head down. “Vanessa Helsee tasked me to find and eliminate him. She was the one who made the decision to use you to find him, so in order to ensure that your grandfather would be killed, I put a bomb in your backpack.”
“So much mystery for that, huh? Well then...” Frank lit his fourth cigarette, nodding, "I understand. You were just following orders. I don't blame you for..."
“Detonating the bomb?” She shook her head. “I suspected you’d say that, but guilt haunted me upon learning that Victoriano was not in the building with you, that you met with Zeth and Draco instead of my target, and that you had survived but were in critical condition, something Vanessa told me in 2018 before I...”
“You what?” He turned sharply.
“Before I...” She made a long pause, “Before I killed her.”
Silence followed.
"Tell me the truth, Evie. Did you kill Grandpa Victoriano? Was it to put an end to the pharmaceutical company that he owned?" Frank looked her straight in the eye as he exhaled some smoke, "Is it true that there was something shady behind his corporation?"
“Vanessa was the one who killed your grandfather,” She replied and he looked at her with irrefutable distrust, "I swear that wasn't me!"
“How can I be sure it is true?" Frank asked, looking away from her as he put the cigarette to his lips.
“It is true. Days after your incident in 2017, The Hunter Academy received intelligence revealing the location of your grandfather. I was assigned to raid the Hollowstone Mansion and arrest him. Upon entering the main hall, I found Victoriano's bodyguards dead. I went into the library, finding Victoriano dead, having been murdered by Vanessa, who was expecting me.”
"And why did Vanessa kill my grandfather?" Frank asked and she bit her lip, “Talk.”
“Fine! For the record, this is what I didn't want you to know," she grumbled, "During the raid, I found a dungeon where numerous prisoners had been experimented on and left to die. Your grandfather experimented on humans to create his own monsters, his goal was to replicate the J-4D-3 project,” Evie shifted her shoulders, “At least Alicia’s Pharma fell when Vanessa alerted the authorities, but she was aware of a more dangerous project and had her sights on it, I didn’t know until I found her that night.”
"No more secrets, Evie." Frank was smoking faster now, "What kind of project?"
“During the Raid on the Hollowstone Mansion, Vanessa Helsee told me that she planned on stealing the BWA-5H serum that your grandfather had created and intended to make world leaders susceptible to suggestion with it.” Evie explained, walking in circles, "Your grandfather's murder was just a way for her to steal that serum. I opposed, and I fought her.” Evie looked down, rubbing her forearm, “Vanessa Helsee pushed me out the window and down a cliff. I was told The Hunter Academy conducted a thorough search of the area, but I was declared dead in absentia.”
"It doesn't sound like you died," Frank said, "You are pretty much alive.”
“It would have been better to die.” Evie rubbed her neck, “After I was badly injured by the fall down the cliff, I was kept alive by Vanessa, in secret. She began work with Dr Sarah Monrey and they perfected the prototype version of your grandfather’s serum. Soon, a device was attached to my neck to periodically inject me with it. Now under Vanessa Helsee's control, I became a puppet, and I couldn’t cut my strings. They gave me a robot suit, a helmet to hide my identity and the task of being Monrey's bodyguard.”
“Vanessa was disgusting.” Frank looked at her over his shoulder, “How did you break free?”
“Blackfox saved me. He was in pursuit of Sarah Monrey, who had rebelled against Vanessa. He found me when I was on bodyguard duty and forced me to the ground, then ripped the device out. He spared my life and took me to a secret location, an abandoned bunker here in Hollow Woods where he helped me recover in isolation. Several times I asked him how Zeth and Draco were and if your family was okay after your loss, but Blackfox refused to tell me anything. I completed my rehab in 2018, and I decided to finish off Vanessa myself.” She looked at the sky, sighing, “Blackfox tried to convince me to go on with my life, with my new identity, but you know how I am.” Evie finished and held his bionic hand tightly, but he flinched away from the contact.
"No, Evie. I'm with Jade now." He said, putting out his cigarette on a merlon.
"Right...” She smiled softly and reached out to touch his cheek. “I will always be sorry until the day I die. But I also feel... Relieved. You have become a noble and loving, successful and talented man. And there is not a day that I do not regret..."
"There isn't a day that you don't regret blowing me up, of course, you've already said that," he rolled his eyes, and she grabbed him by the chin and made him turn to look at her.
"There isn't a day that I don't regret not telling you how I really felt about you before Jade arrived, because now I will never be with you." She said, with teary eyes and a smile upon her face, "Frank, I love you. You will always be the love of my life. And I swear that I will always protect you, even if I must die for you."
“Evie...”
"No, Frank. You wanted me to talk, so I will. I'm sorry for hurting you so much," she slowly took a step back, "And there is not a day that I do not miss your lips, there is not a day that I do not think about that kiss behind the bleachers. There is not a day in which I have stopped loving you."
"Evie," he approached her, arms open, but she shook her head and took another step back.
"No, Frank. Don't hug me or I'm going to break. You should never hug someone who is about to break," She turned around so he wouldn't see her cry, and no matter how hard she clenched her fists, no matter how hard she tried to hold back, she just couldn't do it, and she sobbed loudly, "I never thought I would love someone so much. Your forgiveness, your smile, your heart is the only thing that keeps me alive. For years I was forced to resist the cruellest and most unspeakable tortures, and I never broke, not even as a child... But now you are my weakness.”
"Evie, for how long have you been dealing with this alone?" Frank didn't know what to do, whether to touch her or just look at her, but it was impossible to see her like that, "Evie, please. Let me be there for you, let me hold your hand and walk by your side through your pain. We can work through it together! Just let me in, let me save you from yourself!"
“That's the damn problem with you, Frank! You've always seen me as a person, not as a monster or a murderer or a weapon! Because of you I stopped being a machine and became human!" She turned to look him straight in the eyes, tears streaming down her cheeks, fragile and vulnerable for the first time in her life.
"Don't lie to yourself, Evie. What you did to Vanessa was to save the world."
"It was because of you!" She yelled.
Frank blinked rapidly.
Then frowned.
"No. You didn't know about me when you came out of that bunker, did you?" Frank asked, walking closer to her, "You did what you did because you knew you had to save innocent people! You were never a machine, Evie. You were always human, no matter how heartless you think you..."
"It's just that I was always heartless, but you gave me a heart," She wiped away her tears quickly. This was the first time she broke character to show herself as she was, not elegant or mysterious, but rather... Herself. Yes, this was the first time she felt human, and letting go of that pain wasn't pleasant, but at least it felt good to know she could still feel something. "You gave me love, a family, and I am willing to give you my life to pay off my debt."
"I never wanted you to give me your life, Evie," Frank was finally close to her, an intimate millimetre away, "I wanted you to have your life back. That's why I forgave you, that's why I allowed you to stay, that's why I offered you a family. Because I want you to have what you never could."
"And that's why I hate loving you, Frank," she laughed, taking a long breath, trying very hard to return to her cold, distant role, "Because I don't think I deserve to be with you. I don't deserve to be loved by someone like you."
"Well, this is a poly relationship so... I could just tell the guys...” he turned to look at her, realising she had turned around, and she was walking away. “Evie!" Frank called after her, trying to catch up with her. "Wait!" But she ignored him and kept walking. "Evie! If you try to run away, I will catch you! My bionic hand is like your grapple gun! I can swing after you for hours!"
She stopped walking.
When he finally caught up to her, she was looking down at the ground, and he saw her shoulders shake slightly.
"Evie. Don't you want you and me to be together? Don't you want your happily ever after? Because I want to..."
"Let it go, Frank," Evie lifted her face and put a hand between Frank's pecs. "Now you're with someone who truly deserves you, so don’t give me hope." And then she aimed her grapple gun, firing. The hook stuck into a merlon. "Treat that girl right, handsome. See you later," and with a leap, she jumped off the roof and swung until she was on the wall walk three floors below.
The sound of the monofilament wire of her grapple gun was already a part of her personality, and Frank never got tired of hearing it.
With another shot from her grapple gun, Evie swung from the wall walk to a window two floors below, entering through an archway in the mural passage that connected the Great Keep to the Frozen Tower.
Evie landed inside gracefully, turning right to walk towards her apartment in the Frozen Tower.
"You're so stupid, Evie," she told herself, walking quickly, "You know you were raised to love no one. To love is to postpone pain, every day until life is over. You're not weak, the last time you were, they sterilized you, electrocuted you, whipped you, beat you, they pulled out all of your teeth with pliers and replaced them with perfect dentures.” She paused for a second to see Frank in the distance, firing his bionic hand like a grapple gun, swinging like she always did, "You won't be able to live if your heart is ripped out too, Evie. So keep it to yourself, no one cares about what you feel."