Space Egg

Decemer 12th

I lay in the cot for awhile, eyes closed, ribs aching. I didn't even contemplate escape despite the unlocked room and my untethered wrists. Keefie came and went. When he thought I was asleep I felt his gaze linger waiting for the rise and fall of my breath. Once he checked my pulse, feeling for a fever. How he ended up on the duty of dotting over the hostage I suppose I would never figure out.
To put it simply, I was distrait. I really couldn't pull myself out of the shadows taking over my thoughts. My mind kept flashing to that paper. The same plan laid out over and over, each paper the same.
I couldn't get over how stupid I was. It was so clearly all there. All laid out In daylight a perfect path for me to walk. I fell into every step set out for me.
Every notion of my life from the moment my mother was convicted was set. All these people did was wait and watch. Wait for the moment I was vulnerable, then strike. And they had done it with perfect precision.
    I had lost all will to try and drag myself out of this. Not for me, not for Mom, not for aunt. Surely there was a wide search for me, I was under such public scrutiny it was impossible that there wouldn't be. But more likely now than being the poor unfortunate girl, I was sure I was to be labeled a convict. Chance are people believed I was running away from what I had done, when in reality I was here. Stuck. Some twisted fate life had laid out for me. If I managed to drag myself out from this mess, what good would it do? I would be hated, followed surely, the media always nagging at my heels. I feel guilt eat me up when I think of what it must be like for aunt. I'm sure paparazzi would follow her, I'm sure she was now sitting in the FBI's interrogation room, and worst of all I'm sure she blames herself. And she had no right to do such a thing. This was on me.
    No. I remind myself. This wasn't on me, this was on the people who did this to me. On these people who kidnapped me, these people who made my life living hell.
    "Pennie," I hear a voice breath.
    I open my eyes, finding Keefies freckled face crouching next to the cot.
    His eyes shift from green further grey in worry, as he lays the back of his hand over my forehead checking for fever.
    I pull myself away, showing true reaction for the first time since the incident in the office.
    I put my own hands to my face realizing the cause for his worry. Tears had begin to stream down my cheeks, leaving salty lines in their wake. I feel my cheeks redden in shame, but then stop myself. Why should I feel shame? Why was this my fault? I try to believe my own thoughts, but even so, I find myself wanting to burry my head out of sight. Instead I force myself to sit up, my head still aching and woozy where it had been hit.
    "Do you want to talk about it?" Keefie asks.
    I try to hide the hiccup like sob from leaving my lips, instead a strangled sound cry's from my mouth.
    "Pennie?" Keefie asks worriedly rising to his feet. "Are you ok?"
    "Do I look ok to you?!" I find the words leaving my mouth before I can even think of what I'm saying. "Do you think finding out that my life is one big orchestrated lie should make me feel ok?! I've lost it all, I've lost it all because of you and these people!"
    I know it's unfair to yell at this boy. I know chances are the part he holds in this is next to nothing. He's an errands boy sent to make sure I don't die. And so far he's been nothing but kind to me, and I repay him how? Yelling at him, wallowing in my own self pity.
    "Pennie, I swear, everything that has happened is for your own good. I wouldn't be keeping you here otherwise."
    "How?" I beg, plead, my voice shaking. More tears threaten to sting my eyes. "How is this for my own good? I don't even know why I'm here."
    The last sentence feels like defeat. I don't know why I'm here, I don't understand it at all. The only clue was the one word I had read on the papers scattered across the office.
    Crim. I had pondered over this word for hours, scouring my memory's and came up empty. Was it some gang my Mom had been apart of? Was it some secret underground government group? Every idea I came up with seemed more outrages then the next. And yet none of them quite fit with Mom. And still, she was the only puzzle piece I could place. This all somehow connected back to her, stemmed from Mom.
At this moment, for the very first time, I hate Mom. I hate what she's brought me into to, I hate that she hadn't fought even harder to keep me safe. She hadn't even fought in court. She had let me go, given aunt full custody. She hadn't even tried for visitation rights, the most I got was a letter or phone call on rare occasions.
I let my chest heave, let the barrier break. Cry's leave my lips, and then I can't stop. Tears stream down my face faster than I can wipe them. The dam had been broken, and it wasn't going to be patched anytime soon.
I barely notice when Keefie wraps me in a hug, wiping tears away from my face.
"I'm- so sorry." I plead. I'm not sure what I'm apologizing for. For my harsh words, for my breakdown, simply for being a hassle. I feel terrible for hating Mom, and want to apologize to her as well. But I can't vanquish the feeling. It had tainted me, and it was there to stay. I had opened my eyes to her and suddenly my childish blindness was gone. He holds the embrace for what feels like an eternity before he responds, simply letting me cry into his shoulder.
"Apologize to the floor." He finally saids, pulling away. "I feel like it's told you no a few times, and your still chasing that poor thing down."
I wack him in the shoulder. Despite the situation, despite who he was, a captor, I can't help but smile. He was trying to help, and damb him, it was working.
"Maybe if I could stop getting knocked out." I hiccup, trying to stop the tears running down my face.
    "You do have a knack for that." He agrees. He pauses for a moment, before his face falls more serious. My muscles tense, bearing for whatever bad news he has to bare. Instead he simply asks me a question.
    "How are you feeling?" He pauses before correcting his words. "Physically, I think you already expressed how your doing mentally." He saids with a chuckle. He clearly found no humor in this, but was trying to lighten the air that had just gained ten pounds with tension.
    "Well..." I muster. "My ribs are starting to feel better, and I don't feel like I'm going to pass out every time I close my eyes."
    He nods his head. "Much better than. How about your head?"
    I hadn't even told him my head was constantly throbbing. Apparently it was clear enough on my face. I hated how well I was being read, my every movement being scrutinized. My stomach churns at how well I was being monitored. I had noticed the security camera in the corner of the room during the night, it's green blinking light making my nerves shot and jumpy. Unlike aunts camera this one brought me no comfort. Every facial expression I made while being recorded could be used against me, be used to read me, used to to learn what I tend to believe. That thought stings in my head, because that could be exactly what Keefie was doing. Manipulation, trying to make me feel comfortable. Learning what calms me, learning what makes me comfortable.
    I feel another wave of nausea rise as I speak. My muscles tense and I wipe my face clean of emotion.
    "It's fine." I answer tentatively. I didn't say it was good. Or even better for that matter, because it wasn't. But it was fine. My head didn't feel like it had been run over, or smashed in with a sledgehammer. It felt like maybe I had fallen headfirst onto some rocks one too many times.
    His eyebrows scrunch together, his freckled face somehow looking mature.
    "Gotta tell you, I really don't believe you."
    I shrug my shoulders, relaxing my tense forehead. "Believe what you want."
I turn myself away from him at this moment. Not because I was scared, or because I was intimidated. Even still despite the gun at his waist and the knife on his leg I struggled to fear this boy. And that. That is exactly why I turn away. I was comfortable, he had such an easy relaxed demeanor it was hard not to fall into step beside him and relax myself. This was why he had been sent to watch me. To make me comfortable, to believe I was safe. I was neither of these things, and I couldn't start to believe that I was.
"I need rest." I declare, a clear invitation for him to leave me.
"Are you sure your fine?" He asks again, his brows scrunching worried on his face.
I force a rash reassuring smile doing my best not too grimace. "I just need rest. Almost dying catches up with you."
My humor relaxes his shoulders, and he starts to walk to the door of the room. But just before he leaves he pauses.
"I'm locking the door. Don't think I'm not that stupid." Despite the harsh words I know he doesn't mean them hurtfully, or at the very least that's what he wants me to think. "Don't be stupid." He warns on his way out with a slight smile, a look of worry hovering under his eyes. The door closes with a click behind him.
I count five breaths leave my mouth before I dash out of bed. I don't care how bad my head hurts, or how painful the shift of my ribs is. I had felt my determination lost the day before, once again surge in my chest. Because I did remember the name Crim. I remembered the stories my mom would weave for me. I never understood how she could make such elaborate stories on the spot, and I relise now it's because she didn't. It's because they weren't just stories.
Moving as silently as I can I walk to the door of the room, testing to make sure the knob is locked. When I'm sure it is I slide the chair sitting next to the cot over to the camera sitting high in the corner of the room. I clammed up it, gasping from the pain in my ribs. I place my hand on the back of the chair centering myself, before looking up to the camera.
In one swift motion, I take my hands and smack the camera from the top as hard as I can. It doesn't budge at first, my heart rate picking up. I smack it again, and this time it loosens. I smack it hardest the third time, the heel of my hand bruising from each hit. The fourth time the camera falls loose, the water damaged drywall crumbling away with it wires trailing out of the wall. A small smile licks at my lips. I discard the camera, shoving it haphazardly back into the wall facing strait down. Staring at the prize sitting in my hand I can't help but feel a twinge if hope. A small nail, fallen out of the wall with the camera. It's old, frail and newly rusting. It's perfect. I bight back the hope sparking in my chest.
I rush to the window behind the bed, pulling open the curtain briefly taking in the outsides surroundings. It doesn't look all that different from home. Frost licks the grey grass, the trees and plants barren where I could tell was once intricate landscaping. The only difference is somewhere, far off, I hear the ocean licking a shore. It's muffled, hidden through thick glass, but still it's there. I let it sink in before I take my next step.
I crouch breathing through the pain lingering in my muscles. Slowly I run my hand along the underside of the window until I feel a small round hole. I insert the nail into the small hidden lock on the underside of the window. At first my breath tightens when I feel nothing, the tip of the nail finding nothing but air. I close my eyes, with each breath my panic rising. Until I feel it, a small plate sitting under another plate, blocking the obvious path. I maneuver the nail under one plate, then press down on the next.
I've never heard anything sweeter than the small click that meets my ears.
With shaking hands I push up, the window rising letting in a burst of freezing cold air. For once I embrace the cold, welcoming it against my face. Harsh wind pushes against my skin, biting at the tip of my nose. I breath in deeply the salt air sharp and comforting.
    I throw myself out the window, my feet meeting soft moss outside the walls. Moisture seeps through my sock quickly numbing my feet.
    Briskly I look around completely unsure of where to go. My only indication is the small cobble path trailing off before me. I cross my fingers, take a breath, and run as fast as I can will my legs to move.
    Every step is a new jolt of pain, electric shooting though my body. My breath is tight in my lungs, burning with every cold jarring foot fall forward. My eyes sting with tears. Still, I run. I run until I hear the first shout of alarm. I'm almost to the tree line in front of me, opposite of where I can now see the ocean beyond the building that I had been tried in.
    The building wasn't anything like I had pictured it. I had imagined a dark and dank warehouse, not a gorgeous estate set on the ocean surrounded by woods. The building was beautiful, grey blues, cream yellows intertwined in intricate latticework. Some of the walls are cobble climbed with Ivy, others are coated in moss and winter plants. The building was massive, more comparable to a palace than a home. It would've taken my breath away had I not already been gasping for air.
    The first shouts come as I pause, trying not to stumble forward. I see figures emerge from the, from the what? House, estate, mansion, the whatever it was. It didn't matter. What did matter is that I could keep running forward.
    I force my frozen feet forward Into the tree line knowing it will give me some cover. Immediately I'm shielded from the cold grey sky, pine needle carpeted ground sticking sap to my socks. I push forward my lungs ravaged, my whole body burning both too hot from the effort, and cold from the air.
    Pine trees tower over my head, light filtering in through the canopy. More shouts come from behind me, this time closer. I urge myself forward faster than before. I barrel forward, momentum pushing me deeper and further into the unknown laying before me. I have no idea where I'm running to, all I know is if it's away it's good. If I could find a police station I could be safe. I no longer cared what news stations would publish about me, what the public would believe. All I know is I need out. Away.
    Each step feels closer to freedom, a breath of lighter air, until all that air is squeezed out of my lungs.
    With one wrong move, one false step, it all slips away from under me. My foot catches a root, and I fall. The fall feels like forever before my hands meet the ground, skidding forward. My ribs burn, crying out in pain. Dirt digs under my nails, cold and frost bitten.
    I try to clammer back to my feet, to find any sense of footing, until a knee is shoved into my back, forcing my body back down.
    Too slow. Too slow. Too slow. I repeat to myself at my arms are shoved behind me, my head into the ground. I taste mouthfuls of dirt, mixed with blood.
    I'm pulled over, a pair of voices murmuring to each other. I don't recognize the man or the women standing before me but they clearly work for same person both in uniform.
    I barely hesitate before I throw my feet out in front of me, kicking the man as hard in the face as I can. The trickle of blood coming from his nose hardly registers as I start to run again.
    "You little-" the women calls. I'm away before her words can finish reaching my ears.
    Each breath is even more painful now, and I know I won't be able to keep this up for much longer. My legs are slowing, my head pounding with every thud of my heart.
    I suppose it's both a blessing and curse when Keefie points his gun at me.
    He's the first to reach me, yelling the words before I see him.
    "Pennie, please stop! I have a gun, stop and turn around."
    I pause, stumbling, my back to the trunk of a thick pine tree. I see Keefies freckled face, his gun held steady in his hands like he had done this a thousand times before. His voice is more level when he speaks again.
    "It's a tranquilizer dart, though I have a feeling you might do better with a bullet than one of those again."
    He's even cracking jokes when threatening my life.
    His steps are slow and cautious towards me as if I'll flee again. Except I was frozen in fear, the thought of another tranquilizer pulsing through me tightens my throat.
    "Don't make my fast movements." He instructs. "Just turn around and put your hands behind your back like they do in cop shows."
    A laugh, or sob, depending at which way you look at it, bubbles to my lips. Tears slip down my face, and I do as he saids. Because I couldn't face another dart. Keefie wasn't lying when he said I might do better with a bullet. My whole body is shaking when my wrist are tethered tightly behind me, a zip tie closing shut against my chafed skin.
    "At least you stayed away from the floor." Keefie pats my shoulder turning me around. I don't reciprocate his humor, shaking viciously from both the cold and my fear. I can't seem to gulp in enough air, each breath bringing a whole new ache.
"Breath." Keefie saids, tucking his gun away into the holster with a click. "Pennie, I swear, you don't need to run. I swear to god I wouldn't do this if it wasn't for your safety."
I hear his words, I hear his whole hearted belief in what he is saying. Still, I don't believe him. I can't believe that if you had to kidnap me, lock me in a room to keep me from dying, it was truly all for my safety. There were real reasons, far beyond keeping me safe.
I shake my head, my knees crumbling to the forest floor beneath me. Tears stream off my face, fear, true hardened fear freezing me still.
Cold seeps through the knees of my pants, moistening as the frost melts.
"The Crim." I whisper, my breath barely making sound. "They are real, aren't they?"
"Pennie," Keefie breaths, his face softening.
    "Salvio. That's this place, these people, isn't it?"
    His face grows pale, ashen even.
    "How do you know that? Pennie, I need you to tell me."
    A sob heaves my chest. My Mother hadn't just been telling me stories of war, of her childhood. She had been telling me stories of my life. She had been warning me, singing me lulls of truth.
The Crim. The Crimson Scathach. The Crimson Shadow.
"It can't be real." I plead, my chest heaving with pain. Muscles spasm in my back, my shoulder blades painfully tense. My legs have gone numb to the cold, dampen with earth.
"She warned me." I whisper, tears silently slipping down my face warm against my frozen features. "And I didn't listen, I didn't believe her."
Its unfair to blame myself, I was four. No four year old thought the fairytale's they're mother told them would be of utmost importance to their life. I sure didn't. I barely could, even now.
"None of this is your fault." Keefie affirms, placing a hand on my shoulder.
I jerk myself away from his touch. His eyes glisten in worry, his hair wind blown in his face. If he hadn't just held me at gunpoint and tied me up I might consider his actions heartfelt and touching. Instead I was repulsed, he was blind to his own actions. So desensitized that he could barely understand the panic brewing a storm in my eyes.
"Take me to your boss." I breath.