The Pariah

"He is half of my soul, as the poets say." ---Madeline Miller

It had been three weeks since the Hart siblings first arrived at the Barbatos mansion and it had been three weeks of hell. Mia and Nick both were on very different schedules. Mia would sit in a metal chair for hours decoding numbers and other weird inscriptions for Barbatos. She didn't understand what any of it really meant but she did know how to take it apart and did it very well. It was exhausting and her brain was constantly working. Every time she thought she would get a break, Griffin would shock the shit out of her. He would tell her she wasn't finished until he said she was. She tried not to show it, but she was truly ready to give up. She flinched every time Griffin even reached towards his pocket. She always came back to her brother who had some injury she had to treat. She stopped asking how he got them. She just silently patched him up because it was easier that way.

Mia didn't know what Carter did with Nick all day long, but she knew it couldn't be anything very productive. All Nick had to show from what they had done were bruises and bleeding wounds from where Carter ripped out the IV needle too quickly. She was at the end of her rope with her idiotic brother. They had gotten into an argument the other night about Nick taking care of himself and not resisting at every point. Mia knew Nick had to be exhausted, but Nick wouldn't give it a rest. From when Carter first came and drug him out of the room, to when he threw him back in, Nick was fighting. If Carter said zig, Nick would zag. If Carter said go left, Nick would go right. It was just nonstop and Mia didn't know how he did it. She didn't do it with Griffin, she simply sat at the stupid metal table with it's stupid metal chair and it's papers in neat stacks, decoding them all on a small notepad.

Mia stumbled into the room, today had been terrible. Griffin had shocked her at least six times, if not more. Mia was sure he had upped the voltage on her bracelet, but she didn't know how. She wanted to somehow pry the damn thing off, but she wasn't sure what the consequences would be if she did. She didn't want the damn thing to blow her up if she started tinkering with it or for Griffin to burst in and beat the shit out of her.

Mia was the first one back today, like she had been most days. There were rare times when Nick would beat her back to their little room, but he only did if Carter injured him badly earlier on in the day. Nick was wearing thin both physically and mentally. He was weak, even though Mia gave him her food eighty percent of the time. She knew he was going to be on death's door if they weren't careful, but Nick refused to listen to her. He told her that he wasn't going to die. He told her he felt fine but she could see the bruises and marks on his body. She could see the injuries that littered his skin, and she could see the bags under his eyes. She could see the hopelessness in the way he drug himself to the bathroom in the morning to try to get Carter's marks off his skin. 

Mia was torn from her thoughts when the door was ripped open and Nick was thrown in. She gasped as she watched his body clatter to the floor. Mia looked up, and saw the shadow of Carter as he slammed the door and heard the lock slide into place. She wondered what that was about, usually Carter came in and taunted her with Nick's health. There was only one other time Carter did not come in the last three weeks, and Nick told her it was because of Maxine.

Mia wasn't sure what to think of Maxine. She came in and out of their little cell often, bringing both of them meals. Mia was pretty sure she liked her brother which made her very wary. She wasn't sure what Maxine's motivation was in having a crush on Nick. Nick told her she was silly for thinking that, but Mia knew what flirting looked like. Her brother thought she was oblivious, but she knew how to observe and how to analyze. So, Nick could shove it where the sun doesn't shine, she knew what she saw, but that wasn't the point. The point was, Maxine needed to leave Nick alone. Mia couldn't have anyone else poking at her older brother. Nick couldn't take anymore heartbreak.