Disavowed: A Call of Duty Fanfiction

Chapter 19: Scars

He gasped, his lungs filling with cold air. Vladimir looked around and it was dark, the ground under him flat and smooth like glass. He couldn't tell if he was in an open space or a very large room. Lifting his head, he saw no ceiling, but he could hear his breaths echoing somewhere.

He could also hear a tearing sound from not too far away. Vladimir glanced around, and as his eyes adjusted, caught the dimmest light in the distance. He walked toward it and saw a dark creature laying on the ground, devouring what remained of some kind of carcass, glowing a dim blue-green color.

"... S-Sasha?" he called.

The creature lifted her head and looked at him, passing her tongue over her maw. "Hi, hun," she purred.

Vladimir sighed, sitting beside her and covering his face. "Why can't I stop thinking about you..?" he groaned. "Even when I'm asleep I can't rest..."

She snorted, swallowing the last of the carcass. "Charming. Does that mean you still love me?" Her tone was light, but something about it felt jeering to him. She scratched her ear and paced away to a low mound, sticking her head into a hole in the middle of it.

He watched her pull what appeared to be a translucent, glowing human from the hole, laying it down to continue her feast, and he looked away uneasily. "What are you doing here?"

"Eating, obviously," she replied simply, gulping a chunk of ghostly flesh from the body. "What are you doing here?"

"I don't know..." he sighed.

She sniffed in exasperation. "Do you know anything anymore?"

"I lost you..."

"You killed me."

"I made a mistake," he whimpered.

She rose to her feet, gaze firm and ears pricked toward him. "A mistake?" she echoed.

"Yes, humans make them."

"Oh, I know humans make them," she growled. "But monsters? A mistake would imply they didn't mean it. What do you call shooting me twice in the back?"

He backed away from her, eyes lowered. "It... It was on purpose, yes, but... I-I didn't..."

"Didn't what, Vladimir?"

"I didn't want to do it, I swear, I didn't!"

"And yet..?"

"I couldn't let you get in the way of my plans..."

She snorted, misting the air with saliva. "That's all you ever cared about. We could have been married, I could have birthed your children, and you still would have killed me if it meant you got your way."

Tears burned in his eyes and he looked up at her. "N-no, no!" he pleaded. "That's not true!"

"Then what is?" she rattled, suddenly towering over him. Had she gotten bigger?

He shook his head, wiping away tears only to feel more flood his eyes. "I loved you! If you had been on my side, this wouldn't have happened... You could have helped me rebuild the new world!"

SLASH!

"What makes you think I would have wanted that?" she bellowed in his face, now marked with deep claw marks. "You think I would have wanted to live beside filth like you after you slaughtered half the world? That I could sleep next to you at night and ignore the blood on your hands as you touched me? Or that I would ever trust you with a family when I know that you can and have killed other families?"

He held his hand to his bleeding cheek. "Stop it!" he cried despairingly.

WHACK!

She snarled and stepped closer as he struggled away and covered his wounded face. "Why should I? Did you ever stop for anything? To think about the people you were hurting?" Her mouth opened wide to show her long, white teeth.

CRUNCH!

He hid his face under his arm, laying on the smooth floor under her. Blood trickled from the cuts and bite on his head in hot streams. His blue and green eyes caught the blood pooling in the white, creeping lines of shatter marks and he felt his heart beat faster. "Sahsa..?"

She raised up on her back feet. "The world will only be rebuilt on the ashes of your dead body..."

SMASH!

Vladimir awakened with a cry of panic. He was sweating, but he felt cold. His eyes adjusted and he took a deep breath, realizing he was still in his room. It was just a dream...

It was just a dream...

It was just...

He wiped his forehead and felt a sting. Quickly, he looked at his hand, but in the dark couldn't see anything, so he darted for the bathroom adjacent to his bedroom and flicked on the lights.

A scream pierced the silence of the house and Kiev came racing up the stairs. "Makarov?!" he called. "What's happening?"

Vladimir ran into him, stumbling and groping wildly and blindly. "She attacked me!" he screeched. "She's a demon, she attacked me!"

"Whoa, whoa," Kieve sputtered, trying to help the commander to his feet. "Who attacked you? What is happening?"

"Look at my face!" he roared. "I'm bleeding like a fucking stuck pig!"

Kieve grasped his face and looked him in the eyes. "Makarov," he said in a grave tone. "... There's nothing wrong with your face, you're not bleeding at all..."

Vladimir shoved him away. "Get away from me. I don't need your help..."

"You're hallucinating, you need to sleep."

"I don't need anything from you!" The house itself winced at his rage. He was panting, tears threatening to spill down his face. "I know what I'm looking at!"

Kiev couldn't help but feel a deep pity for the man. "Please, Vladimir, let me give you something; you'll kill yourself at this rate."

He gasped, and Vladimir pinned him by his throat to the wall. "Leave me alone, or you're not getting to the bottom of those stairs alive," he growled. "Go."

The medic took a breath and nodded. "Yes, sir... I'm sorry." Vladimir released him and he started down the stairs, fighting the urge to look back over his shoulder when he collapsed to his knees in weak, painful sobs.

He was going insane.

And it was only a matter of time before he was dead.