Juliet's Surrender [Juliet's Tryst #2]

Chapter 23: Criss Cross Applesauce

I can't breathe. For a moment, her body though Dee accidentally crushed her, her face stuck somewhere under a body part. Adrenaline shot through her body. Her body started to shake, grabbing around her,  fighting the impending weakness. Tiny wisps in her vision, little threads.Her own life-force, she realized, bleeding out without blood. I can see myself dying, I can see... from behind her eyelids, she looked down. And saw her baby. 

Two little bundles of energy, strongly tied together. Healthy. An inner scream overtook her, a silent rage filling her with warmth From Dee's arms to flailing her arms forward, pushing out as much of her energy as she could. All at once the pressure let go. The assailant fell to the floor, the  body simply collapsing as it took the full force of Juliet's energy. The pillow burst midair.Neither of them moved. Little breaths at first, then bigger and bigger. 

She refused to look at her assailant, keeping her eyes on the ceiling. Bits of feather on her lips. A sharp pain on her wrist, a torn piece of rope hanging limply, waiting for gravity to take it to the floor. Did she just kill them? Juliet squeezed her eyes closed, the adrenaline giving way to pure nausea. The assailant stirred, not dead. The gallto kill a pregnant woman in the wee hours of the morning, barely more than simply clocking in to work and calling it a day. 

Leona had not even changed out of her pajamas. Her long dark hair curled slightly, still damp from a morning shower. Traitor. "What the actual fuck," another wave of nausea overtook her as she tried to sit up. Leona's life-force pulsed excitedly.  

 "You're a liar," Leona coughed. "You have powers. You killed that general. You killed his army. You killed the council."

"Wow, you're quite the detective. Figured everything out." Nothing more than Kyria's puppet. A very small set of circumstances pleased that poor excuse for a goddess, and only then could she channel the powerful energy. Certain death made it on the list. "I did what I had to to do," she added in a whisper.

"God, I hate this. How can you live with yourself? You have magical fucking powers and you're just... useless."

"I-" 

 "Anyways. I proved you had them." She clicked something in her pocket. "Now you can go back to living your miserable existence without being killed by my employer."

"This a job for you?" An uncharacteristic bit of strength pulsed through her, and she stood up. Arms crossed. Leona's life-force pulsed like a beacon. It wouldn't even be painful. It wouldn't even be enough for payback. Leona stood up, brushing off non-existent dust off of her pants. 

"You think all of this is for free? Fed you on some savior complex. You started drooling just at the though. Don't fuck this up by doing anything. Or else I'll put a bullet in your head the moment I sense any of your voodoo shit. I would have done at the fucking wedding if weren't for all the cameras. Fucking hate aliens. Can't imagine how you would fuck one." The woman, clad in a set of pink pajamas with frills, spit on the floor and walked out. When the door slammed, Juliet felt the first kick of the baby. Hi, mama. 

How she wished for strength. How she wished she just stuck her middle finger up and pulled her shoulders behind her and just sucked it up. But she didn't. In usual fashion, she crumpled to the floor, in such despair and fear that she truly believed in that moment that the emotion would kill her. How dumb! How naive! Just a dumb magazine article writer. Blogger. Student. She was a silly romantic, who loved watching rom-coms and sipping cheap alcoholic teas like they were wine. And to think, that reality had been real not only two years ago. She had been thinking about getting wasted. Emailing back and forth with her boss, who she astoundingly enjoyed the company of, into the wee hours of the night. She had been someone else. 

This overwhelming guilt for who she loved. It would never be "normal" to love Dee. It would never be "normal" to speak with planets. Before she had even realized what it would mean, she irreversibly changed everything. It made it worse that no one knew. What she had ushered into the world. All her fault. All her fault. It held a hand over her throat, and whispered in her ear. You're a monster, little one. Look how you broke everything. Every person who dies by the other is because of you. You took everything away from humanity. You took their planet. Each and every human killed by alien hands, that's you! That's you! You killed them because you decided to love the one thing forbidden. Have fun playing house, alien whore. As her love for Dee had grown deeper and deeper, so had her guilt. You'll never be able to fix this. You just got lucky love something that loves you back. Too bad it made you evil. Terraformed the fucking Earth. Now deal with it. Monster. Monster. Monster. Monster. 

Around her, the house began shook. The sky darkened, and droplets of rain started to pelt the house. There were shouts from outside, more voices. Reinforcements. Guards, tasked not with protecting her, but keeping her in, an asset. A mother's first duty is protect her child. A dense forest at the back of a building. Nothing for miles. Enough to hide, to protect and plan. The rain became hail. With wild abandon, she put as many pieces of clothing on her back as she could. You're fucking crazy, that new voice whispered to her. You think you can make any of this better? Better lay down and die. Admit that you're a failure. Yes, keep running. Because that has served you so well. Stress the baby out more. "

Shut up," she spoke aloud, and the voice mercifully quieted. The door swung open. Now the assailant was dressed in full tactical gear, holding a handgun pointed at Juliet's head. Behind her, a field of thorny roses bloomed.

 "I don't want to kill you," Juliet traced her mind across the beautiful fibers of the young woman's life-force. Barely more than a girl, the both of them. "But I will. You can't keep me here anymore."

"What did you do?" Leona barked, a staccato of anxiety in her words. "She's coming for you. How?" A little squeeze, dimming one little nodule in her neck. Her face turned white, and Juliet empathetically felt the nausea with her. 

"She found out herself." Dim another nodule, by the middle of the pointer finger. Turn it from a bright shade of pink, to a low blue. The gun dropped to the floor, and she shook her hand, willing blood-flow to the constricted place. "I want to know who you work for. Never mind betraying my wife," the storm outside brewed stronger." For which, I believe, she would have you killed. You should be at least glad I'm not, well, a Kyrion." Leona only glared back, realizing that her finger was dead, not simply bloodless. Juliet raised an eyebrow, silently asking if she wanted to lose another one. 

"LionsCorp," she finally said between gritted teeth. "Contractor for the American military." Juliet shook her head, must be the same ones that had kidnapped her before. They would have to be dealt with later. Military vehicles droned in the distance, the distinct low hum of Kyrion machinery. She ran and willed the forest to cover her. Many told stories of how the trees walked, bent and shed branches that night. how they woke them from a deep slumber. She ran, only pausing to relish Leona's scream as her dead finger flickered back to life, the most painful thing she would ever experience. 

She remembered nothing of the way. Under her feet, a path kept forming.  Exhausted, and idly wondered if any of this was random at all. Pulled. Pushed. Frozen. Continuing onward A little nook, a bed of leaves, surprisingly warm in the wet. She sat and spent entirely too long figuring out what to do with her limbs, and had to come to the sad conclusion that pulling up her knees towards herself was no long an option. With a cheek against, a smooth piece of bark, she slept and dreamt of Dee's arms, and lush rose gardens without thorns. Someone gently shook her awake.

 A motherly but urgent whisper, "It's time to go, child. Now."