"Things will never be the same again."
Gneiss Underwood never thought that he could have a shot of a normal life.
Growing up in an environment where everything defied sanity, guns and loneliness were his normal companions, if not danger and Death h...
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"Why are men afraid of the night? Why scorn the one that gives birth to light? Without the black, there is no white. Be afraid not of the darkness for it is not evil, but that of the light that pretends to be kind."
Number Twenty
Faye lifted her limbs and slammed them to the walls, trying to get her body to feel something, but the shot of pain she expected didn't come. The haze in her mind was slowly lifting, and only now was she able to fully comprehend her situation. She was drugged. Her food was drugged. If not for her vomiting her breakfast, she was probably still half-conscious inside the dank room, enjoying the illusion of her dreams.
Despite the drugs, she was conscious enough to count the days since she was abducted. Time passed quickly; she had watched the sunlight that filtered through her tiny block window.
Two weeks.
It's been that long since she was captured, and she feared for what this would bring about to the people around her.
The manacles holding her wrists were made of alloyed metal. Already, her skin were bruised and bleeding, but she didn't give up trying to pick on the lock with her hairpin. She wasn't sure how long she could remain conscious. She was so weak she couldn't even feel her Gift. All she knew was that she had to escape. These people were not merely enemies; they were dangerous, very dangerous. She had to warn everyone. She had to, or else.
* * *
Krad did send Faye away, but what everyone didn't know was that he tracked her merely an hour after she left the Manhattan facility. For two days, he followed her, and witnessed how she acted -- in a trance, lifeless, and empty. She walked aimlessly. She didn't sleep. She didn't eat. She looked so wrecked that Krad almost went down his knees to beg her to return... but she recovered.
He expected her to return to Creed, but she showed no signs of doing so. He couldn't help but wake up in the morning with renewed expectations of her coming back. After all, if she really wanted to stay in Creed, she had enough stubborness in her to do as she pleases.
But she never returned.
From time to time, he would ditched training and check on her. The last time, he had promised that he would never pry into her life again. Faye was an amazing person. She was strong, inside and out. Krad knew then that he didn't need to worry. He had to cut all connections and communications, to free her of the world that belonged to the darkness. He had to let her go for good. Only then will she truly be happy.
That was supposed to be the last time --
-- if not for 04's intervention.
Nothing could have made him feel more embarrassed, more mortified, than failing to carry out what reason told him to do. Didn't he reprimand himself last time he visited her? He had been reckless. He allowed his emotions -- a weakness -- to control him. And now, just because of his vulnerability, he was repeating the same mistake.
