BTT x Reader | BloodXLust

Chapter One Hundred & Thirty Eight | GilbertXPanic

"Gilbert!"

"Gilbert? Wake up, ahora mismo!"

"Huh?"

Why are they shouting at me? Wait...why am I on the floor...what just happened?

"The door!" I panic.

"Yes, the door! We know! Did you see them?" Antonio shakes me violently, gripping my shoulders too tightly.

"There was a person!"

"Obviously!" Francis clutched his temples, looking pained.

"Vhere is she!? Vhere's ___!?"

Antonio bites his lip, and they both avoid my gaze, eyes wet.

I feel a cold emptiness inside of me, and the world freezes.

I can't smell her.

I can't hear her.

I can't feel her aura.

"NO!" I bark.

"No! No, no, no! Vhere is she! ___!" I scream, praying she can hear me.

This has to be a joke, right!? We're vampires; what could possibly have knocked us out!? Something like that could only...be a vampire.

"That person..."

"Non, I don't think zhey were a vampire, but I felt like...they knew we were."

"There had to be a vampire there then; no way could we be knocked out by anything other than a physical attack or a mental attack," Toni theorized.

I grabbed Toni's shoulder and turned him to face me, yelling as loudly as he'd yelled at me to wake up. "Vhy the fuck are ve standing here!? Ve need to find her!"

Toni looked startled but nodded nervously and looked to Francis for help.

Francis took a deep breath and put his hand on my shoulder, keeping eye contact warily.

"Gilbert...she's not even in zhe country. You were out for a while; we looked. It's been hours; I don't think we woke until we wouldn't be able to find 'er..."

"Vhat!? So I was knocked out longer because I could track her better, is that it!?"

Toni nodded, "probably. This is all just theory—"

"She vas so scared! Ve underestimated her; it figures only something vhat could deal vith us could possibly scare her! Vhy didn't ve listen!? Vhy—"

I feel my cheek burn as Francis slaps it and looks at me angrily.

"Zhis isn't on you, Gil, calm down...before..." he trailed off, looking away from me.

I felt my blood boiling; the venom inside me was agitated, and I longed for a fight. It wanted to take control. It wanted ___ back as badly as I did.

Toni hugged me from behind to soothe me, but it only upset me.

"Don't try to calm me down! Vhis isn't the time to be calm!"

"And it's not zhe time to freak out either! We should look for clues! She's a clever girl; she had to have left something behind."

I was angry, but he was right. I sped up the stairs, accidentally knocking her bedroom door off its hinges as I entered the room.

It looked perfectly fine.

Clearly, there hadn't been a struggle.

She left willingly. Or, more likely, she was so scared she obeyed without hesitation. Who is she trying to escape? What the hell did she get herself into!

Antonio's expression was somber, and his eyes glowed like a raging fire. He was livid. Whoever scared her so bad I was going to murder but Toni...he was going to make them beg for death, and he was going to enjoy it.

Francis was equally pained at the sight of a tidy room. We all came to the same conclusion. She didn't resist. It didn't seem as though she'd fallen either like we had. She'd been freshening up, getting ready to go to the spa appointment we'd booked for her. She was doing all that in the first place...because of whatever took her.

The woman I'd known so long. The one I fell in love with before I'd even realized it, she was going against everything she believed in just to escape. She wanted to run to us; her bond with us wasn't desperation alone. She probably never believed we could save her in the first place, or she never would've been so scared.

Who was she? Who was Alice? Who was at the door? There are too many questions. I feel like my mind is going to explode!

"A letter!" Toni cried and held a sloppily written letter hidden under her pillow.

Francis and I rushed to his side, and I snatched it from Toni, ripping it in the process, and he growled at me.

I bared my fangs back, and Francis got annoyed with us both, slapping the back of our heads and taking the pieces from us.

His eyes scanned it briefly, and he turned paler than he already had been.

"Oh...___...what did you get yourself into mon amore..."

"Vhat!"

"What does it say!?"

"She says she's sorry. Three years ago, she agreed to participate in a government experiment meant to 'eal wounds quickly. Zhey tricked 'er into a job, and she couldn't escape..."

"What kind of job exactly..." Toni seemed nervous to ask as Francis was visibly distraught.

"She's an assassin."

"Vhat!"

What the hell! Sweet little ___, really!? Well...she did kill Alice...and Dedrick...and she's freakishly strong...and travels everywhere....but really? An assassin?

"What do you mean an assassin? Does it say anything else?" Toni asked and read over Francis's shoulder.

"Well, it says an 'assassin of sorts' she gets rid of zhe targets who are supposedly threats to zhe peace, but she admits she's never been able to confirm if what was said of zhese people was true though it seems zhey did cause many of her near-death experiences...the cult in Thailand, human traffickers in east Asia, a robbery on a train—wait she did zhat! Zhis was in zhe news?"

"Let me see—seriously, that was a big deal? Dios mios, chica, you really are crazy..."

"I don't care vhat she did! She didn't care vhat we did! What..." my voice breaks, "vhat I...did."

They look at me, pity and understanding in their eyes, and silence fills the room.

"There's one thing I still don't get," Toni's brows furrow as he flips the letter over. Nose in the air, much like a dog, he began to sniff for something.

"Vhat are you doing?"

"Where did all that venom inside her come from? And that whole time, she never knew about vampires until us yet..." he seemed deep in thought as though he'd put the pieces together but needed confirmation.

"Gilbert," he asked hurriedly, "the venom. Can you feel its presence or something?"

"Huh? That's more Ludwig's deal, but..." I felt a tingle in my body and moved forward like I was being propelled there, pushed by an outside force.

"The dresser..." I said robotically. I wasn't even sure why I said it; I just stared blankly and pointed.

Antonio nodded and rushed to the dressers opening the door. He looked surprised and pulled out a sealed cardboard box.

With his fingernail, he sliced it open and pulled out a carefully wrapped container of syringes, each filled with a clear substance.

"This is that healing serum she mentioned...the reason she didn't die..." Toni said, stunned.

"Wait—" Francis said, taking it from him and looking horrified.

"The healing serum she's been dosing herself with regularly...is venom!?"