CHAPTER NINETEEN:
EXPLANATION
ECHO TOOK HER TIME heading toward the Cullen's household. She was going through everything in her mind. Figuring out how to say everything. If she summed it up it wasn't going to take that long. And if they had questions, she would allow them to ask. She had never been so nervous before. If both her hands weren't on the handles of her bike, she would be wringing her wrist at the moment.
She was hoping that Carlisle was still at work so that she had more time to process her thoughts. But, sadly, when she pulled up, he had just arrived. His hand hovered over the knob of the door as he turned his head to look at the woman. He watched as she turned of the motorcycle, slowly making her way off of it like she was hesitant. Which, she was. She desperately wanted to take back her words and keep it hidden. She didn't enjoy reliving her past. She hated what she had to do, but she was only trying to make it possible for her to come back home to her sister.
Echo looked up, meeting Carlisle's golden eyes. He didn't have to be an empath to feel the nerves radiating off of her. She slowly made her way toward him and he looked down at her, sending her a soft smile.
"If you're not ready, you don't have to tell us." Carlisle reassured but Echo shook her head.
"If I don't do this now, I never will. I'm just scared how Bella's going to look at me after I tell her everything. After I tell you everything." Her voice continued to grow smaller and smaller and Carlisle took her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.
"You have nothing to worry about."
"How do you know that?" Echo asked, her lips pulling into a worried frown.
"She's your sister. That's how I know." Carlisle answered. Echo opened her mouth to respond but the vampire quickly shook his head at her before saying, "Don't talk yourself out of it. You can do this, Echo."
Echo let out a deep breath as she nodded her head. He gave her hand another squeeze before opening the door and allowing her into the home. He followed the dark haired girl into the living room where everyone was patiently waiting. Bella quickly turned her head at the sounds of footsteps and removed herself from the couch to pull Echo into a hug. Echo closed her eyes and let a soft smile onto her face, relishing the moment in case it was the last hug she would ever receive from her sibling. The two pulled away and Bella looked at her allowing the two to have a conversation with their eyes. Echo sent Bella a reassuring smile and the sister reluctantly nodded before sitting back down.
Echo let out a deep breath as she leaned against the back of a chair. "Let's get this started shall we? I would like to put out there that after I tell you all this, I understand if you don't want anything to do with me. That includes you, Isabella."
"Why would I want nothing to do with you?" Bella questioned, worry evident in her tone. Echo sent her a sad smile.
"I've done some things, some very murderous things. But, you'll find that out in a moment. If anyone has any questions feel free to interrupt me." Echo looked over at Carlisle who sent her a reassuring nod. Echo let out a breath before mumbling, "Here goes nothing."
"Well, I guess I should start with the very beginning. I was trained to become an army doctor as well as an agent, although everyone called me the real life Black Widow so I was basically an assassin. The first year and half was non stop training. I was the best in both of my classes. I was unbeatable in my defense classes and I was the fastest person to get done with removing a deep bullet as well as stitch up the wound, which only took five minutes. Anyways, I got three hours of sleep every other day which is why I can stay up for several days at a time because I'm used to it.
"My second year was when these 'missions' started to come in. I, along with another top agent who's name was Alaric, got assigned a mission. Every other day there was new one, it didn't matter if we were done with the mission before, the next one would become our top priority. But, luckily for us, we got most missions completed within twenty-four hours." Echo licked her lips as she kept her eyes on her wrists. This is where it was starting to get difficult.
"But there was this one that Alaric and I received. We didn't understand it of course because we had never done something like it. But, basically there were these groups of people that were doing illegal human experimentation's. Our job was to find the people and kill them, but if we found the people that were experimented on we were told to go ahead an kill them to 'put them out of their misery.'" Echo shook her head lightly at the thought as a dry and humorless laugh escaped her lips.
"I thought, 'So, we're just going to kill innocent people that were kidnapped? We're not going to try to save them?' Alaric simply told me not to let my emotions get in the way and to not question it, so I did just that. Around this time was when Alaric and I got together. We both knew it was stupid, but we did it anyways because it was just us for months and we were both lonely. Of course, as soon as we decided this, we went out and scoped out the place. We found the people that were so ruthless and didn't give a damn about anything, and we shot them. One bullet for every person. We thought we had killed them all, so we went in and killed all of their prisoners." Echo's voice started to become uneven causing her to close her eyes shut tightly, forcing herself to control her emotions.
"The bad thing about that, besides killing all of those people, was that I didn't feel anything. No emotions, no sorrow, no nothing. Now that I look back at it, I never realized how manipulative Alaric had become. He had taken the emotions from my body and I was left feeling numb. But of course when he asked me something and got no reaction from me, he would get so mad. But, after you know cussing me out for hours on end and telling me I wasn't worth it, he would always say he was sorry and that he loved me." Echo looked at Bella when she said the word, and her frown turned into one of understanding. That was why Echo hated the word. But, that wasn't the only reason as to why.
"Anyways, because I was stupid and just wanted to escape the room, I left our apartment. Because we were in Russia, I had no idea where I was going. I recognized a few streets here and there, but I was completely lost. And before I knew it, I had been knocked out and taken. Apparently, one of the people we had missed wanted to get revenge and decided that I would be a good target for that. I was with this man for a year, a hostage that soon became a test dummy. I was experimented on. And it was painful, but it made me feel something. Soon enough, when I would stop screaming from the pain, he had gotten tired of me and decided to tie me to a chair to hopefully end me. It didn't work. He tried killing me over and over again for a year, but nothing he did would work. The scars from the torture would just heal within seconds. So everytime he turned around to grab something else, my wounds would be healed. But, the blood was still there. I never could make sense of it, but I didn't question it.
"Finally, I escaped. I killed him and left for the apartment in which Alaric and I were staying at. I was surprised to find him still there, but when he saw me he was 'so worried.' Apparently, he had been looking for me since I disappeared, but I knew that was bullshit. But I didn't say anything. So, we got another mission, one that still took place in Russia. It was connected to the one before, but it was somehow different. We arrived at this abandoned looking building, entered and decided to split up." Echo shoved a lock of hair behind of her ear as she struggled with the next words.
"When I heard Alaric's pained scream, I was curious. I wasn't scared for his well being, no, I was curious to see what had happened to him. I had turned around to go find out when a figure had appeared behind of me. And before I knew it, my body felt like it was on fire. I felt my heart stop and I felt myself die. But after a few hours, I was up and running again, only I noticed that my heartbeat was slower than normal. Instead of the usual sixty beats, it was only thirty. I didn't think anything of it, instead I got up and ran to find Alaric. He was drained of his blood. He was dead. I shed a single tear for him. A single tear. And then just left his body there."
"I stayed in Russia for a few more months, trying to figure out what could have killed him. My only result being vampires. I didn't really know how to react to that, because I thought vampires weren't real. But, apparently I was wrong. When I met you all, I realized that my suspicions were correct. But, I wasn't scared. Hell, I was thrilled that something supernatural actually existed. That's why I knew who Victoria was in the woods. She was the one that had killed Alaric and had originally killed me. So, there, that's what happened in Russia."
No one could speak. Everyone was processing her words deeply before Bella finally spoke. "So, that's why you're scared of love? Of even saying the words? Because of that Alaric guy?"
Echo sent her a sad smile. "That's not the only reason, Bella."
"Then what are the other reasons."
"Bel-"
"Please, Echo." Bella begged. Echo looked at her desperate eyes before she nodded her head.
"Fine." She let out a sigh, closing her eyes as she said the next words. "The other reason is because of our mother."
1,806 words
Authors note: This was a lot. But, you now know what happened in Russia and you know part of the reason as to why Echo hates the word love.
I hope you all enjoyed! Stay safe! Until next time, bye lovelies!♥️
@HAHA_LIFEISTOUGH