Twisted Web of Truths

Chapter Nine

The dizziness didn't just stop right then and there. It only intensifies. His mind going back and forth around the information he just received for the past hours. The picture Aiden Kent showed him, the red skull on skins and everything in between.

Sweat started to form around his brows. "Is it hot here? Don't you feel hot?"

Cole raises a brow, shrugging and buried himself deep under his blanket and pillows. "No. Unless you're talking about my awesomeness."

In response, Ethan gave him his favorite finger and threw a pillow. "Seriously. I feel hot."

His brother shrugs once and it wasn't long before his snores filled the air.

Sighing, Ethan made an effort to walk but even the friction between his feet and the floor causes heat. His clothes sticking into his skin, squeezing him. He fumbles along the wall when his eyes squint at the thermometer.

It's the usual temperature.

He curses, feeling hazy. Black dots started to appear around his vision and then... nothing.

*****

Two people wearing black are on either side of him. He doesn't know where he is. All he could see is the endless hallway that smells of chemicals. Everything is so white and it seems clean. He misses Gran and wondered if she's worried about him.

"Bring him in." A man with light brown hair orders with just a tilt of his head when they've stopped in front of an open door.

Ethan felt hands grabbing his shoulders, pushing him in. He tried to dig in his heels into the floor but it's not surprising when it slides instead. He heard whimpers, a woman's voice pleading.

"Ethan!"

He saw her. Both of them. His parents. He reaches for her. "Mama!"

An arm halted his movement. His eyes widen as the man with light brown hair zooms in. "Do not move unless I say so. Do you want your mama to get hurt?"

His tone mocking and it took everything in him to lower his eyes in defeat, submitting to the obvious leader in that room. The stark green eyes of the leader intimidate him, much more than a ten-year-old boy could ever admit.

"Now," the green-eyed man began, "about our agreement. If you don't make Serum A, your son would deal with the receiving end of our agreement."

"But we can't—we don't know how to." Mama cried and it hurts Ethan's heart. "Please. Just let him go."

"You're lying!" The man suddenly snarls. He took Ethan's arm. Hard. A glint of madness is visible in his green eyes. "I've given you a year and all you've done is messing up this place. I'm not taking a no for an answer, Eve Parker."

The other man, his papa, whispers. "We'll do it. We'll do it. Just... if you hurt him, the deal is off, Adrian."

"Of course, of course." An animalistic grin appears on the man they called Adrian. "But what will you do then?"

Without knowledge of it, a force hitting him in the back of the head. The red skull on the wall before him glowed mockingly at him as he fell forward, helpless to cease his mother's cry of pain and the curses spewing out of his father's mouth.

Darkness and the smell of chemicals were the last things in his mind as darkness took over.

*****