Hooked

Chapter Twenty

I heard her tell me our plan. I listened to every word. I nodded in agreement, and followed her out the door after everything was bubbling around in my head. I tried to remember.

But now I can't remember a single thing.

I stared at the grandeur door helplessly, hoping that maybe there was a chance that she would walk back into the dining room - where I was - and tell me what I was supposed to do - again. But that wouldn't happen. She was probably too busy distracting the guards until I ended up giving her the signal. It's been over ten minutes since I started wracking my brain for more information of what to do next. When I thought about it more and more, I ended up forgetting what the signal even was, what I was supposed to do, and also what I was doing with a grappling hook and flashlight.

I couldn't piece it together. My nervousness jumbled up all of my thoughts into a huge mess on the shining floor in front of me.

I tried to get it together. Organize myself. Think hard of what I was supposed to do. But... Nothing.

I don't have short term memory loss... I mean... last that I remembered, I didn't...

I heard someone enter the room. I threw the grappling hook into the backpack I left on the table.

I heard a gasp, and averted my gaze to the floor, afraid it was the queen herself. I'm not sure if I could say that I was happy that it was actually Rebecca who entered with an exasperated gasp.

Her raven black hair couldn't be missed by a mile. Or her stomping elephant feet. Good thing she wasn't trying to sneak around with me and Lillian. She would surely give us away.

"Oh it's just you! I thought you were a guard!" she said dramatically. "By the way I'm on your side. I already ran into Lillian. In fact she wanted me to check up on you."

I spoke too soon.

"So... your escaping with us?" I asked skeptically.

"Well I'm not just gonna help you without wanting to escape myself! You should know I would save myself before any of you dimwits!"

I rolled my eyes and scoffed at her remark.

"So... what are you doing just standing around? You're supposed to climb into the air ducts."

"...I might've forgotten."

She made an exasperated sound. "You should be happy that I came to your rescue."

And I should've been. Except for the fact that I disliked Rebecca... With a fiery passion hot enough to make the sun jealous. But I had to accept her help.

"Fine. Just make sure that no one comes."

"Yeah I get the whole 'escape' thing."

I ignored her and took a chair from the dining room table and placed it below the air duct. I looked back at Rebecca to see her with my supplies. She smiled 'oh-so-sweetly' and held them up so I could see that she clearly was planning something against us.

"What?" I asked.

She just turned around and started to open the door with a swift move.

"Where do you think you're going?" I asked angrily.

"Just... to the red queen. Surely she'll give me some kind of special treatment once I tell her about your... situation. That is... if the guards that Lillian was preoccupied with didn't already find out," she gave a flash of a deathly smile, and left.

But not without me pursuing her. I rushed over to her and pushed her to the side of the wall, my arm against her throat.

She looked shocked, but mostly amused. The red in her eyes seemed brighter. They seemed more vibrant... like she knew something that I didn't.

Just then I felt her push me off of her with a great force that didn't look like it would belong to her. Don't let her tiny figure fool you.

She looked at me with darting eyes, and in a blink, she ran away. I looked for her, only to see nothing but the opposite wall and the tiled floor.

But then I saw the guards. It seemed like they came from the wallpaper, capturing me from all sides. Trapping me like I was their prey. I knew they already had Lillian. I could tell.

They grabbed my arms. I tried to shake them off, but they held my arms in place, and wrapped cold metal around my hands. They scratched against my sweating palms, and made me feel more annoyed and immobile than the covers that I unfortunately had to sleep under every night for the past two weeks.

I let out a melodic, insane hoot of laughter, like it was all a joke. That earned me a kick in my shin. I fell weakly to the ground, pain striking my leg.

Then I looked up to see the red queen, her lips pursed as she shook her head. "I had such hope for you."

Yeah, right. She knows that every last one of her people hate her. She knows because even she hates herself.

Maybe her hope was that I would be her best servant. Surely nothing more.

Then I noticed the knife she conjured up in her hand. The Red Queen walked toward me, her high heels clicking with every step.

She gave me a disappointed smile, only to punch me with the butt of her knife, making me fall to the side and hit my head on the hard floor, knocking me out cold.

...

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