Chapter 33
I don't know what else to do other than pace and try to get my thoughts in order.
My feet scuff against the floor with each step I take and curses flow freely from my mouth, exiting beneath my breath. Casper stands in the next cell trying to talk my down from the ledge, but it's only making matters worse. My brain is running a hundred miles a minute. I can't think clearly. I'm in a constant fog. My hands reach up and pull anxiously at my hair as I fight back tears, each tear building up in my eyes and blurring my vision.
The bars in this prison match the rest of the damn facility. White, all white. The tile floor is white. The porcelain toilet matches the shade perfectly. There are still no windows, no form of sunlight or pitch black night to alert me to what time of day it was, or even tell me what day it was. I don't know how long each serum knocked me out for. I don't know how long I've been here. I'm not sure I want to know. I just want to wake up from whatever hellish nightmare I'm currently living in. I was better off believing my father was dead.
I had hopes, such high hopes after hearing Calyx's spiel, what was it, three days ago? Maybe four? How she spoke of who and what the Jotunn were. I had hopes that maybe my father was still there, somewhere. But now I know, now I've seen that he's an empty shell of a man. He's merely a vessel to house the demonic soul that now resides within him. It makes me want to vomit.
"Bay!" Casper shouts, his voice frantic and tired.
My icy blue eyes snap onto his bloody and broken up face. Some time when I was fully engulfed in my twisted thoughts, Casper managed to wriggle out of his cuffs, his hands now clasping the white bars that separate us from each other. Concern paints his bruised features, his brows drawn close together in worry.
"What?" I murmur with a quaking voice.
"Zachary, talk to me." As I near the bars his hand slips in between them and rests on my cheek.
I rub the now dried blood under my nose, tears brimming and falling from my bloodshot eyes. "Master Kole." I croak.
"What?"
"Master Kole, the Jotunn in control of this God-forsaken facility." I press my cheek into his hand and shut my eyes as I try to maintain a steady composure about myself. "Kole is... was, my father's name. We never found his body. And after everything Calyx told us, what if..."
"Oh."
"He doesn't even remember me." I pull away from Casper. "His own daughter, he didn't even know who I was. He's just the vessel of my father replaced with a horrific monster."
My legs fall out from beneath me, causing me to crumble to a messy heap on the floor. It all comes crashing down on me in that moment. My father will never remember who I am. He will never remember his wife in his previous life, or his twin children. He won't remember the memories or the laughs we have all shared. He won't remember the times we were a happy family, and he won't remember the times our family was falling apart.
I hear Casper's weight shifting from the other side of the cell wall, the breath leaving him momentarily as he sits himself on the floor. We sit in silence for a good one hundred twenty-two seconds.
"I don't know how to feel or what to do." My voice breaks.
"Come over here, baby girl." He murmurs, his hand reaching through the bars once more.
I raise my splotchy, red face from the floor and look at him, eyes puffy and swollen from crying. My diaphragm spasms as tears continue to fall. I shuffle my way over to him, placing my head on the bars. He rests his forehead against mine, his hand lowering down and setting itself on my waist.
"You and I?" He whispers as our eyes meet each other. "We're gonna get through this. I promise you."
"Are we?" I sigh. "My father... he's not the man he once was. He's going to have us all executed before this is said and done."
"Only if you think that way, will he." Casper smiles a little. "Think positive, okay, sunshine?"
"I am afraid of myself more than my father." I tell the Nebraskan.
"Why do you say that?"
I rest my hand atop of his that sits on my waist. "I was hooked up to a machine that sent electricity through my veins every time I lied. I lied when I said I betrayed you guys, and..."
"And what?" He raises his brows.
"I—I thought I lied when I told Kole I was on the Warriors side... but..."
"You didn't get shocked, did you?"
I shake my head. "Casper, I am afraid I can't be controlled. I'm afraid one day soon I might snap and become someone I don't want to be." I pull away from him, sitting back. "And I'm afraid when and if that happens, I won't be able to stop it."
He sits in silence.
"My mother was right. I'm a ticking time bomb."
"No, Bay. You're not." He sighs. "You're right, sweetheart. You are uncontrollable. But if that's the case, don't let this happenstance control you. It's going to eat you alive. You're better than all of this, Baylee Areaux Zachary. I promise you." He reaches out for me once more but I don't comply.
"Am I?" I whisper, rage boiling within my blood.
"Yes."
"Don't lie to me."
"Why would I lie to you, sunshine?" He frowns.
I merely shake my head.
"You won't become like your father. I won't let that happen."
"My father was a good man." I choke out.
"Was being the key word. Bay, you and I both know he is not that man anymore."
I don't say anything.
"You cannot take the blame for what he has become. The blood is on his hands, not yours. I don't know what else to say, Zachary, other than your father is going to need you more than ever, right here, right now. You have to fight back and maybe there's a chance at bringing back the old Kole. But you never know until you try. And only you can do that. Not I, nor no one else. This is something you and only you can do."
I look at Casper, still remaining silent.
"Look. You need to remind him of the man he once was. Re-jog his memory. Remind him of the good times and the bad times and all the times in between. And, let's face it. I need you, Bay. We all need you. Willow, Avery, Demetria and I, we need you in order to make it out of here alive. You are our only chance."
"I can't kill my dad, if that's what you're requesting." I say after five minutes of agonizing silence from my end. "If that's what you need me to do, then you and the others might as well leave me behind to die here."
"I don't want to leave you behind, Baylee. I just want to get out of here, that's all I want." He whispers sweetly.
"But killing my father may or may not get us out. It may get us an extended stay."
"I know that, but every option has its consequences, and some of them we just have to take that chance with."
I look away once more.
"Besides, why kill him when maybe you could recruit him?"
"Recruit?" I scoff. "Cas, how do you recruit a Master Jotunn, yet alone a regular Warrior? It's impossible."
"In today's world, Bay, nothing is impossible."
"Kole worked his way up to Master in a time span of four months, Casper. We've been gone for nearly two months. He didn't need much time to get into the head position. So just what are you suggesting we do?"
"Jotunn are mind-wiped, are they not? I'm thinking by rebooting his memory of his past life, there might be a chance the old Kole Zachary is still in there, somewhere. Besides, we aren't alone." He smiles.
"Oh we aren't?" I raise my brows. "What the hell do you mean by that?"
"Bay, honestly. Where do you think the others ran off too? You didn't really think they left us behind to die, did you?"