⚠️Trigger warning⚠️ war, serious injuries, blood, implied deaths, betrayal, mention of possibly suicide, panic/anxiety attacks (if I need to add anymore please let me know)
These events mostly happen in the past and are replaying in her memories only! (You should be able to tell when it switches to present times if not let me know and I'll try and make it more clear)I stare at the girl in the mirror; eighteen, short brown hair and a military uniform, looking so proud to be there.
At the top of her class too!
She looks fierce she thinks before walking out of her bunk. Stella LaRose navy ensign. Sure it was the lowest rank but it's her first day. She'll get up there...eventually.
She walks down the hall towards the cafeteria and joins her friend in line. "Heyo Nicky" she says cheerfully.
"Hey Starshine" he teases and she rolls his eyes. Nickolas Bykov is my childhood best friend and the only one who knows my parents embarrassing nickname for me. He was tall, his normally fluffy blonde hair was buzzed at the moment emphasized his strong jawline and sharp features.
His steel eyes and broad shoulders made him look intimidating, especially paired with his Russian accent he inherited from his parents even though he was born and raised in New York but he was one of the kindest people I know.
My friend, my confidant, and the only one who supported my ambitions all these years- "Your doing it again Stells" Nick interrupts my inner monologue. "Sorry! I swear one of these days I'll find a way to not zone out!"
He chuckles as we receive how good and listen to the morning debriefing.Ten years went by and things were going great until one day the warning alarms blaring woke me.
I rushed to the door and found the hall littered with the corpses of my crew mates.
I wanted to vomit or look away but I didn't; I memorized each face and name while silently praying Nick wasn't amongst them.
He wasn't but even that wasn't enough to calm the panic surging through me. Someone one had betrayed us. Someone was trying to destroy us.
I couldn't let that happen.
I started sprinting towards the control rooms trying not to slip on the puddles I forced myself to think was water.
When I made it to the control room I wanted to laugh from joy.
There was Nick he was safe.
I run over and hug him "thank goodness you're safe Nick! What's going on? Who's attacking us?"
He laughs but it's not the laugh that always brought me comfort as a child; it was deeper and more sinister, like the laugh of a villain in a marvel movie. Then he turns and smiles "Oh Starshine. Why couldn't you stay in your bunk?" I blank, what's happening?! Then a horrible pain shot through my side, my ears were ringing, vision fading from the pain, someone was screaming.
Probably me.
Did Nick just shoot me?
Why?
What's happening?
I hit the ground and hear something crack. Gunshots surround me and I force myself to stay conscious long enough to see Nick pressing a gun to he's head and shouting something in Russian.
I start losing consciousness but I hear a gunshot and the last thing I can think is Nicky, my Nicky, was a traitor.I wake in the hospital my ears ringing as I stare into the blinding florescent lights. I vaguely heard voices but only one thought got through. "Nicky?"
The voice was mine but I didn't recognize it as the chatter around me went silent.
"Nickolas is dead" someone, my dad I think said.
The memories come rushing back in a tangled mess of color and sound and for the first time in years I cry.
I wasn't sure if I was crying for the men and women who lost their lives, for the friend I lost, the pain that was slowly coming back to me, or for me.
The version of me that died.
Because I know I could never be the same again.I had to get a hip replacement, Ni- the traitor had shot me six times along my hip and leg damaging several bones. The doctors said my recovery would be long and hard and I had a low chance of walking again but they would try to get the "hero" back on her feat.
The funny thing was I had always wanted to be the hero and that people thought I was I should be happy......
but I didn't feel like a hero. I felt like an accomplice.
I vouched for him.
I helped him every step of the way.
He killed hundreds of innocent men and women...and I helped him do it.The recovery took four years. I got to take my first steps since the attack on my twenty-ninth birthday but I couldn't celebrate it.
The navy wouldn't allow me back due to my injuries and I couldn't work either.
I had to live of the government checks for "sacrificing myself for my country" I didn't even do anything. I hated it. Living in a tiny apartment with no friends, stuck with the anxiety, the depression, the ptsd, the guilt and the constant gaping hole in my heart that Nick left that refuses to heal.
That's when I felt them.
That stinging feeling and then the warm wetness of tears.
Crying over a traitor? How much lower can I get?
I vaguely registered someone touching me but I can't remember who. I can't remember anything as a searing phantom pain hits and suddenly I'm falling.
Down that deep familiar hole of anxiety, depression, grief, anger, pain, and panic and every other emotion I didn't have the time to deal with yet.
I can't breathe, can't think, can't move, I want to scream but my mouth won't work and all I can do is cry.
Someone hugs me and rubs my back;
I thinks their talking but I can't make out the words.
"Make it stop" I think I say but everything is to loud, to bright, to much.
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