Letters

Annoyed

(Unknown POV)

I stood there, in front of the Venetian mirror. Looking at my damp reflection. One more day and I'll die.

I never wanted this to happen. I am sure that my papers were sabotaged by someone who didn't want me to ever enter the AEF.

I was instead taken to the army camp where we, the women, did the chores like cleaning up the men's mess and providing for their needs.

"ARE YOU READY? GONZALEZ IS WAITING FOR YOU!" the private yelled as I remembered how I was forced on.

He tied me with rope and pasted a tape on my mouth so that I couldn't scream for help.

And when he was done, he tossed me out like I didn't breathe. Misogyny at its peak.

As much as I wanted to say no, I couldn't. Do as ordered or you'd end up with a bullet wound on your head.

Two men shadowed me as I bent my head; one of them grabbed my hand by force, dragged me out of my hut, and tossed me at Gonzalez's doorstep.

"Get up, Chicago, if you want to live." the man on my left said as he bent down and helped me up. I studied his face and then it hit me, this is my childhood love, James Mackrel. He gently pulled the tape off my lips and gently brushed over them, an unexplainable emotion washed over his face briefly until he remembered there was another guard nearby.

I knew he was here, but didn't expect him to be near me since what happened in Bayhill. "Thank you, James," I mumbled as I continued looking down and awaited my tormenter to torture me.

Within a second, he, Gonzalez was standing in front of me and he gripped my forearm and forcefully pulled me into his bedroom.

I wanted to scream no, but I couldn't.

~~~~~~~~~

At the estate

Olivia was garbed in Carabeth's flamboyant jumpsuit, they were in the dining hall feasting on the expensive roast that the mayor had delivered to the estate as a thank-you.

"So, I am excited that you love it here," Carabeth said as her mind started scheming a draft of the plan but her appearance shot a different story.

"So, what do you here for entertainment?" Olivia asked as she wiped the gravy from her mouth.

"Usually I have 'work' business with my husband, Theodore, but today we can travel around  Aef," Carabeth said as she flawlessly hid her inconvenience.

"I can get my PA, Jasper Zhen, to give you a tour of the Facility, and then tomorrow, your fiancee, Inocencio can take you on a rendezvous," She said as her shrewd subconscious came up with a plan.

"Hello!" A lively girl with a unicorn mane, Jasper pealed and kneeled in front of Olivia, who was still frozen because of the word fiancee.

"Come along now. Onyx has prepared the gowns for the ball." Jasper said and stretched Olivia to her feet and ferried her to the locker room where her brother, Onyx, was appending polishes to the peach-pink dress that he had been established to seam and stitch.

"Diànxià (Your Highness)" Onyx bowed and got up again and went to the ball dress shelf and pulled out a baby blue dress that was designed as per Stella's choice.

His life could be down in the sewers if Olivia wouldn't approve it.

"It's so adorable!" Olivia chirped as she touched the fabric took a puff of the dress and concluded that it was made of a Vitality fabric.

"Jīngcǎi de (wonderful), I am glad you like the dress. The fabric is rare and perfectly suited to a Queen," Onyx said as he took the gown from her grip, and accompanied her to the men's wardrobe where Carabeth had all sorts of attires commissioned.

"Did you design all of these?" Olivia asked with her eyes glassed with devotion and she almost touched a toxin flechette that Jasper had been prepared to take out Carabeth and her pervert of a boyfriend, Theodore.

The only way the endangered could live was when the Bandits' heirs died and the Facility would be transferred to the true heirs whom the bandits took away. But as the prophecy stated there would rise another scion and she'd save them from the treacherous hands of the bandit heirs.

"I did and please don't touch that, it's dangerous," Onyx said with a nervous tone.

"Oh. Okay," Olivia said and dawdled behind the almond-eyed man who was ecstatic that for the first time, someone paid attention to his artwork.

Meanwhile, what the Facility residents didn't know was that the girl who was to marry the last bandit heir was the new scion and the one who'd take all the pain from the Bandit heirs to protect the last citizens. They didn't know that Stella was still very much alive and not in the right state.

She was thrown into the outsider river after the transition and then was saved by the oldest citizens of the old ruins that lay behind the Blue Westerns.

Her savior went by the name Blaze-Light or Akio Yuki. The man was the most wanted in the major cities because of how well he dodged the Bandits and stole the herbs that were often found in the most horrid places where he worked with the witches who were none other than the girls who needed a home like the one Akio provided.

Back in Theodore's office, the Ancient Bandits were meeting up to discuss the new situation that arose: Keshia's Rebellion.

"We cannot let anyone reveal your and Carabeth's true alibi, not until it is confirmed that the scion has died," Barthes the Wise, said as he smelt the tea to check for poison. In the Bandits, no one could be trusted, the son could poison the father for power or the daughter would kill the family to get all the power and begin her empire.

"I think Luiz had transipired Stella in Olivia's body. I think that is enough and if this girl, Keshia doesn't stop the rebellion, then we need to threaten somebody or rather someone." Theodore said in annoyance and Carabeth sat silently on the boss's seat, waiting for the recruits to break it off.

"If we are done, I'd like to address the issue then." Carabeth's calm voice said with a threat present.

"What another issue must be there rather than Keshia's case?" Jorge the Foolish said.

Carabeth could never tolerate ignorance and arrogance when it came to her team, and to have perfection in each case, she'd be ready to sacrifice anything or anybody, in some cases, her brothers, because of this, she only had five brothers left.

She shot Jorge and awaited another ignorant or arrogant fool to comment so that she could spill more blood, her obsession.

"Blaze-Light is in town. And surprisingly, so is Raven Blackmoore," Carabeth said and silence reigned.

Raven was once a part of the Bandit but she left when she realized their evil deeds. Moreover, she was Carabeth's sister who left her identity that was once Sarabeth Carlson and turned into Raven Blackmoore, the Coquelicot Witch.

Now what must be both Akio and Raven doing in the same location as they are sworn to be enemies?