Bound by Deception

33.2 A Confession

Aria sat in front of the main computer and typed the password that Kazuki had used before, elated to discover that it hadn't been changed. After plugging a USB into the computer, she sifted through the multiple security records and discovered, after much deliberation, the file that had been hidden which held all the videos from the attack. To her absolute horror, she witnessed her former boss appear in front of the camera, slaughtering the boy who began to question her. She made no attempt to hide her appearance save the mask on her face, but Aria could easily recognize her swagger. Margot continued down the hallway, taking the lives of many recruits. Behind her was a group of soldiers; they had the symbol of Grandville but looked nothing like the men and women that Aria had seen when she visited the country.

A sudden reverberation rocked the room and with it a subsequent shout that sent Aria toppling from the chair. It was in good timing, too, as the screen she was watching shattered with another bullet that pierced the desktop.

Margot stood at the center of the room, a gun positioned to shoot directly through Aria's head. Behind her was a bleeding and gasping Kazuki, with Sterling holding the wounded man in his blood-soaked lap. Aria noticed that he was also wounded, but was ignoring the burn in his arm to focus on Kazuki, who had been shot in the chest.

"Why did I have a feeling that I'd see you here?" Margot mused cruelly, sauntering toward Aria. She grabbed the girl by her shirt and lifted her, then flung her to the ground again. "I heard of your little escapades, Aria. So, you truly are trying to discredit me now? And after everything that I've done for you."

"You knew I was innocent," Aria growled. "I didn't betray anyone - you did. You killed those poor recruits and used us to kill more people!"

"It was easy," Margot said coldly. "You believed everything that I told you. You got rid of those pests at the flick of my hand. Oh, they did some evil things, but perhaps they weren't as bad as I made them out to be."

"Why?!" Aria struggled to rise, but Margot dug her heel into her knee. Pain shot through her leg and she whimpered, recoiling. "We trusted you!"

"Then you shouldn't have." The older woman's icy glare stung her. "I told you, did I not? Keep your emotions to yourself and away from the job. In this life, your life is not important. You fight for me."

"We were fighting for our county; for our family!" Aria snarled. "You used us to feed your selfishness!"

"I made you the woman you are today!" Margot dug her heel deeper into Aria's knee. "Without me, you'd be married to an old geezer with no social or monetary prospects! Did you want that? Did you want to be a blemish in this world? I made you powerful! I gave you your strength and in turn, you backstab me?!"

"You backstabbed us when you killed our friends!" Aria retorted. "You backstabbed us when you lied!"

"Oh, you figured that out, eh?' Margot's lip curled haughtily. "That I'm not Rouverian? That I watched the government of Rouver do nothing while my family was slaughtered? That I was born in Grandville and left with my mother to enact my revenge? This country ruined everything for me, Aria! It ruined my life! My people! They deserve to suffer!"

"You did that to yourself the moment you decided to turn your back on people who cared for you!" Aria yelled. "We all were loyal to you, Margot! We had no ill will toward you!"

"Oh, bullshit!" Margot sneered. "I mean...look at this place?! It's so gloomy and drab and depressing. The government is absolute shit at keeping its people happy! You call this a sanctuary? Sanctuary was when I was with my family. Sanctuary was when I was with my son, whom you so kindly killed."

"He attacked me," Aria growled. "It was self-defense."

"You killed your childhood friend!"

"The Edward I knew would never hurt me like he did! He was perfectly happy with his foster parents, then you fucked him up!" Aria's breathing grew labored. "Look, I'm very sorry for what happened to you and your family. The reservation is beautiful, and you didn't deserve the pain you went through, but this isn't the way!"

"This is my revenge!" Margot screeched madly. "Everyone in Rouver expects war! Everyone is running away, turning against the government, fearing for their lives! They know how I feel! They will die at the very hands that were covered in tears!" Her heel pierced through Aria's flesh and she cried out. "I came here with the goal to bring this country to its knees. I built an image of someone new; someone staunchly patriotic, but that's far from the case. I want this place to burn!"

"Burn..." Aria caught sight of Sterling and Kazuki, and the blinking red light beside them. Blink, blink, blink, like the fire alarm that shot through the church the night her parents died. They perished in the flames, and it was that day that Aria's innocence died with them. It was that day that she had joined Hades, that she had left her morals and the lessons of her parents to become a tool that Margot would use to take over the country and bring them to hell. She remembered, suddenly, the utter looks of despair that breached her parents' faces as they tried to get her out of the building. The pleading and crying and hugging; the confidence from her father that she'd be okay. No, she was far from okay. She'd been duped and had done exactly what they stood against. She fought with the enemy and was now on her knees as the woman viciously revealed her long-term plan. Margot had played her cards right. Hades would fall. Aria and the others would take the blame. In their absence, Rouver would burn.

Run Aria, run! She heard her mother shouting in her head, the voice so foreign that Aria didn't recognize it at first. The end of the pistol touched her forehead, and when she saw a brief image of her mother's face, streaked with sweat and tears and soot, begging and clutching the young girl that had lost her soul, Aria snapped. 

------------------

So...the truth is out. What do you think of Margot now? And Edward? What's Aria going to do? 

VOTE/COMMENT/ENJOY :D