*The Chronicles of F.R.E.E. Atania's Knight - Raquel Festow* Part 1

Chapter 17 - Broken Connection

*Ruth Watson POV*

After we had finished eating, we headed out of the front of the cafe to meet Rebecca. She had just been standing there, waiting patiently for us to finish, her arms folded and leaning against the wall, deep in thought. We headed towards the alley to come back into the cafe through the back. Dean had left the back door open for us so we were able to come straight in again.
"Morning Dean, where are the kids?" Darren asked.
Dean was extremely busy with cooking all of the meals for their customers and looked up from where she was chopping at the counter.
"Morning, they're upstairs." She said, looking flustered.
We nodded and walked to the stairs when Rebecca, Darren and I stopped dead. Natalia stopped too, just behind Darren, looking confused.
"You're going up first!" I said, pulling her arm and shoving her upstairs.
Thankfully, the teenagers were just sitting in Dean and Hewitt's small living room having a chat. They looked up when we appeared and squealed with excitement, leaping to their feet. They were wearing the same clothes as yesterday, like us, and I realised we really needed to get some more clothing.
"You're here!" Clara squeaked and hugged Natalia.
"Hi Darren!" Xavier said, completely ignoring the hand Darren had held out for him to shake and pulling him into a hug too, .
I giggled at Darren's face of horror and turned to look at Raquel, who was gazing at the floor, blushing. She had seen Hunter come in from behind us and was acting all shy around him. Hunter noticed this too and cleared his throat.
"Morning, Raquel." He smiled at her awkwardly and Raquel's blush deepened.
"Right, well..." Rebecca said, looking for a distraction.
"Fancy coming out today to look around?" I asked the teenagers whose faces lit up straight away, nodding eagerly.
"Where are we going?" Raquel asked, taking Clara's hand and pulling her back so she had someone standing with her.
"A museum." I said, grinning.
"What's a museum?" Xavier asked,
"It's full of our history and science and that. It's a lot of fun there." Darren replied, putting his bag down and digging around inside.
"What are you looking for?" I asked him.
"I swear I picked up a leaflet from the hotel this morning on it, just trying to find it." He replied.
"Right, well. I'll be outside, meet you down there." Hunter said, stepping out of the door to go down the stairs.
"I'll come with." I said and headed for the stairs.
"Don't let him have a cigarette, Watson." Darren called after me as I got halfway down.
I groaned. "I'm having one too." I shouted up to him.
"WHAT?!" Darren appeared at the top of the stairs.
"I thought you could smell it on me when we... you know." I rolled my hand to say what we did last night without actually saying it.
"I thought you had just been spending a lot of time with him. I didn't realise you had started again!" Darren looked hurt. My heart clenched at his face.
I hung my head and moaned. "Yesterday was just a bit too much for me, ok? It got very overwhelming. Seeing my old friend, having that traumatic episode when we got back, getting stuck here and having to deal with Rebecca being a argumentitive bitch-"
"I can hear you, you know?" Rebcca's voice called out.
"You know you were, so shut it!" I snapped back at her. "Then seeing that video, it just overwhelmed me and I took a cigarette so I would be distracted."
Darren's face softened significantly. "Did you love him too?" He asked, sadly.
"Oh fuck no! Chris was a dick. But thinking back, it all made sense when I think about how he was around me and that. You were very similar to him when we were in Ozryn. That's why I kind of stayed away a little bit. You reminded me of him. But I realised I loved you when it was too late and we were on the way to Narthwich." I felt that being honest would be the best way forward. I was already hiding too many secrets from him, but they weren't my secrets to tell.
Darren came down the stairs to meet me at the half way point and kissed my nose. "Alright. But when things start to look up again, or we get back to Secrunerth, whichever happens first, promise me you'll quit."
I nodded and smiled at him. "I promise, baby."
He grinned and pecked my cheek. "Don't expect me to kiss you on the mouth any more though."
"There's another part I prefer you to kiss me at anyway." I murmured, quietly, so only he could hear me.
He gave me a seductive smirk before heading back up stairs.
I went into the courtyard and Hunter had already lit up.
"What did he say?" Hunter said.
I shrugged. "I told him it's all a bit too much for me at the moment and promised to quit when I got back. I'll be far too busy to smoke when I get back. Unlike you, I work twenty four seven there."
"Shit really?!" Hunter's eyes widened. "How comes?"
"I'm one of the five Knights. We are always on call. Everyone else works five or six days a week, with a day or two rest and with holiday allowance to go home to Realms and see family etcetera. we aren't allowed to do that. We can't risk being recognised by any Order members as we are the face of FREE. We put people at risk just by standing next to them generally. It's a tough life, but I enjoy it. FREE are now my family, basically." I sighed heavily, lit a cigarette and took a drag. "I've already broken several taboos since arriving here, I can't risk doing any more."
"Is that because of Booker?" Hunter asked.
"Yeah, she's one of them, even though she broke a taboo herself there. No I bumped into my friend, Lizzie. The girl you saw in the video. When we were queueing up to get our clothes, she saw me in the queue. Of course, I was so excited to see her, I completely forgot. Rebecca then pretended to be my twin sister."
I pulled a face at Hunter and he laughed.
"Liz emailed me last night referring to her as 'the psycho twin sister' and telling me to leave her at home if I was to ever meet up with her." I laughed, Hunter laughed harder.
"I wish I had been a fly on the wall when that had happened." He sighed, wiping his eyes as he calmed down. "You know, I'm really looking forward to today. This is going to be really fun! We never got to have a fun day out in Astrovia, it was always dodging death."
I nodded. "It'll be nice to have a day off for once. Looks like it'll be even longer as our watches are fucked. Fuck knows when Asuna is going to be able to fix them. Oh, that reminds me!"
I pulled out my phone and called Asuna who answered on the second ring.
"Good morning, Watson. How's it going?"
"Uh, I've had better starts to a job." I admitted. "You won't believe the day I had yesterday."
"Really? I thought you'd be happy to be back on your home Realm." Asuna asked curiously.
"You know how Rebecca met Natalia?" I asked her.
"Oh god..." I heard her mutter in horror.
"Yeah! Twice! Happened to me twice, and then I nearly got undressed by one of them because they thought my dress was broken." I told her, rolling my eyes and taking a drag of my cigarette.
Asuna laughed. "Oh dear, I'm sorry, Watson. That is funny though. Anyway, what can I help with?"
"We have a new recruit wanting to join us. Hunter is going to come back with us when we finally do get back. Can you ensure he has a watch made for him too?"
"Oh that's great news. Of course. I'll add it to the to do list." She said, cheerfully.
"How's it going your end?"
Asuna groaned. "Rhianna isn't happy at all, but Ruby is being very understanding. They both keep pushing me to find a way to bring you back home. We can't work out why the chreek metal plates would burn out like that."
"Hmmm." I said, trying to think of a possible cause as I stubbed out my cigarette. "Fuck knows. Anyway, if Rhianna starts moaning again, tell her I have refused to share a floor with Raquel. She should find that quite a relief."
Asuna laughed again. "Will do, Watson. I'll keep you updated when I know more."
"Thanks." I put the phone down and turned to see that the others had some down too, they had heard some of my one sided conversation. "Just giving Asuna a little pep talk." I said to Rebecca and she tilted her head back and made an 'o' shape with her mouth.
"Let's get going then, shall we?" Darren said, cheerfully.
We headed out for the train station. Raquel, Clara, Xavier and Natalia were looking very excited for the day ahead, but Rebecca was looking like she was dreading it.
"Rebecca, think of this as your first day off to have some fun since your wedding day." I smirked at her.
"I've had days off since then." She snapped back, not finding me very amusing at all.
"Oh yeah? What did you do?" I asked her, curiously.
"Made the swords." She answered simply.
I rolled my eyes. "That's not really called a day off though. It was still FREE related."
"This is FREE related." She reminded me. "We have come to keep our fifth knight safe. That's the only reason why we're here."
I sighed as I saw the ticket machine just outside the station. I ran up to it and started getting the tickets. Eight adults for zones one to six. I was quite pleased that gettin around was still easy.
Darren, Hunter and I led the others onto the platform.
"Stay behind the yellow line until the train stops." Darren warned them. "You don't want to get sucked under."
Raquel, Xavier and Clara looked horrified, Natalia looked worried, but Rebecca was distracted by Natalia's skirt.
The train pulled in. I was surprised to see it was a bullet train, and not the old flat fronted trains that used to be around before Astrovia. We got on board and chosen two four seaters next to each other. As the train started moving, we had a general chat about what to expect.
"Be sure to stick close to us. It's extremely busy in London and can be like a maze if you don't know where you're going. Always keep one of us in your sights." Darren told them.
"No running into roads. If we stop, you stop. Don't want you getting run over by cars." I added.
"If you do get lost, be sure to call us right away." Hunter added in too.
"They don't have phones, Hunter." Darren said.
"They can have mine. I won't be straying too far from the rest of you anyway." Hunter said, handing Raquel his phone.
Raquel blushed again and squeaked out a thanks. Hunter gave her a warm smile.
We changed the subject to what they may find interesting in the museum when a blonde woman came into our carriage. She had bleached blonde hair, tons of make up on and wore ridiculously high heels. She strutted up the aisle past us, glancing at us as if to check we were watching her when she suddenly stopped.
"Darren?" She said, as she slowly turned round.
Darren looked up at the woman from his phone. He had ignored her when she walked past. His mouth fell open and his eyes grew wide.
"Holy shit! Jenny!" He gasped.
"You are alive!" She squealed and ran back to hug him. I was relieved to see he didn't return it. He was just frozen in shock.
I narrowed my eyes at the girl, but she ignored me completely.
"How-How are you?" She asked him, giving him a flirty smile. Who the fuck does she think she is?!
"Fine. Yeah, just got back actually." He said, looking at everyone awkwardly.
Rebecca and Natalia were sitting on the other side of the train adjacent to Darren and Jenny looked at Natalia, silently telling her to move by giving her a scowl.
Rebecca raised and lowered her arm behind Natalia and pulled her onto her lap by her waist, all while glaring at Jenny's actions towards her wife. Jenny sat down without so much of a thank you and beamed at Darren, her eyes scanning his body.
"Wow. I must say, you look amazing, babe."
"Excuse me?!" I snapped at her. "'Babe'? What gives you the right to call him 'babe'?"
I ground my teeth at her, while she just gave me a bored look back.
"I was his longest running girlfriend when we were younger. Four years we were together before he disappeared. We had our first times together, so excuse me if I have that little more of a connection with him than you do, hun." The way she forced herself to call me hun at the end of her sentence made me ready to slice her head off, but my sword was in the bag holder above our heads and I wouldn't be able to get it out without people noticing.
"Er, right." Darren was not liking where the conversation had turned to. He had turned beetroot red and was shifting in his seat, looking anywhere but at me.
Raquel gasped from where she sat opposite me.
"Zixeti fa ezerez?" Rebecca asked her.
"Ezerez aa latcha." She murmured to Rebecca, not taking her eyes off Jenny, who was studying her very suspiciously.
"If you have something to say, say it to my face, bitch!" Jenny spat at her.
Both Darren and I leapt to our feet. I stood defensively in front of Raquel, while Darren was pulling Jenny away from us.
"Look, let's have a quick chat, ok?" He said, sending me an apologetic look at me.
I glared back at him, absolutely fuming.
They went into the next carriage together and I spun round to Raquel.
"What did you say about her?" I asked, leaning my hands on the arm rests of her seat so I was face to face with her.
"She-She has a latch to him."
"WHAT?!" I bellowed and went to storm after them, but Raquel held me back. "What are you doing? Let me go!"
"Watson, she is latched to him, he is not latched to her. He is latched to you."
I stopped trying to get away and looked at her, narrowing my eyes. "What does that mean?"
"She's infatuated." Rebecca said.
I twisted my head round. "What?"
"She loves him, but he isn't her soulmate." Raquel went on to explain. "Because they bonded together-"
"Don't fucking call it that!" I snapped, holding my hand up to stop her. "Just skip that bit, please!"
"Well, she latched to him back then because they had shared something intimate. But he never felt the same way as her. She is still connected because she never gave up hope of finding him again."
"Wow. Hodg has a psycho ex too?" Hunter asked.
Raquel giggled and nodded at him, smiling shyly.
"So she can't be trusted?" I said to her.
She shook her head.
"Then why did you fucking stop me?!" I snarled.
"Because he needs to be the one to break the connection." Raquel said, giving me a sympathetic look.
I looked through the carriage doors windows and saw Jenny cupping his cheek. He wasn't stopping her either. He was letting her touch him?!
"No!" Raquel cried out at me, making me jump. "Don't think like that! You'll break your latch!"
Hunter looked worried. "Watson, just trust him. Please, sit down."
I didn't know what to do. Part of me wanted to pull my sword down and kill her, another part wanted me to run into their carriage and break them up, yet there was another that wanted to test Darren's loyalty for me and watch the outcome. If there was temptation laid out in front of him, would he take it?
I avoided looking at the next carriage and slid back into my seat, slouching down and pinching the bridge of my nose with my eyes closed. I felt a hand on my knee and opened my eyes to see Raquel.
"Please, focus on your love for each other. You're starting to turn darker because you're questioning his love for you. The same happened when you saw that boy on the big phone box. You must keep your faith together for each other." She muttered to me, urgently.
I frowned. "Should I be worried if my Aura is getting darker?"
Raquel shrugged. "Not yet. You had such a pure Aura to begin with, that instead of bright gold you've merely just changed to yellow. Darren's Aura is pure too, but when he saw the way you reacted to the boy's message last night, he turned a very dark yellow."
There was suddenly a shriek from the other carriage and Darren came back in to join us, looking furious.
"Fucking bitch!" He snarled and plonked into his chair next to me, glaring atraight ahead and folding his arms.
"Hodg, you ok?" Hunter asked, quietly.
"No. Not really." Darren lurched himself forward and leaned on his knees with his elbows, ringing his hands from anger. "She was a fucking nightmare to be with back then. I don't know why I went out with her. You know, I was supposed to be going on a date with that slag the night I was taken away to Astrovia. When Watson came, I thought she was the reason why we had been taken there, so I could meet her and she will become my wife. Apparently, not turning up to a date and disappearing for twelve fucking years isn't enough to give that FUCKING BITCH the hint that we're over!" He yelled over his shoulder, hoping she would hear him.
"She had a connection with you, that's why she never lost hope." Raquel said to Darren, quietly. "That's why she stayed loyal to you."
"I WAS NEVER LOYAL TO HER THOUGH!" Darren shouted and it felt like a dagger had gone into my side.
"What?" I asked, slowly and clearly. "You cheated on her?"
"Watson -" Raquel started to say but I held up my hand to stop her.
"You cheated on her?" I repeated to him. His looked at me, his face livid.
"Yes. Ok? I was a player back then!" He admitted, angrily. "And I'm fucking glad I did. She deserved it!"
"So you think it's ok to cheat in a relationship?" I asked through gritted teeth to stop myself screaming at him.
My mind was racing. He cheated on her while they were still together yet didn't break it off nor even attempted to. He just strung her along, telling her lie after lie. Like Alpin had done to me when I gave myself to him.
Darren realised what he had just admitted and his face softened.
"I didn't love her. I never did. I just felt sorry for her, so kept going on dates and-"
"Sleeping with other women behind her back while you told her you were training and being kept busy." I spat at him.
"Watson, stop! You've triggered something. You need to focus on-"
"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" I bellowed at Raquel.
I was past caring now. All men were the same. They were never faithful. They only wanted one thing and that was sex. How could I have been so stupid?! I fell for a ridiculous facade, AGAIN!
I got up but Darren blocked my way.
"Get out of my way!" I snarled at him.
"No. Let me explain." He begged, panic was evident in his eyes and he was trembling.
He took a step towards me and my knee automatically lifted, hitting him hard between the legs and making him crumble to the floor.
"You're a fucking cunt! Do you realise that?! You're all the fucking same!" I shouted at him and stormed to the other carriage, leaving Darren on the floor calling after me.
As I got through the carriage doors, I saw Jenny in a heap on the floor, sobbing and clutching her arms around her. I knelt down beside her.
"You ok?" I asked her gently.
Her head snapped up at me and her eyes were smeared with running mascara, her lipstick was smeared and she looked a right state. My stomach lurched when I noticed her cheek was bright red with a hand print.
"Come to gloat?" She sobbed, looking away from me.
"Not at all." I said, softly and sat beside her. "I... I know how you feel."
She sniffed and wiped her nose with her sleeve. "Really? Did he do it to you too?"
I shook my head. "Not him, no. My ex did. I gave myself to him and he slept with all the other girls in the village. Most of them he didn't even ask for permission, just forced himself on them."
Jenny gasped and let out another sob. "I'm sorry I was such a bitch. I-I just wanted to find him again for so long. I-I-I never lost hope that he was still out there."
I looked at her and gave her a wry smile. "There's a Prince Charming out there for us somewhere, right? Just have to kiss a lot of frogs until we get the right one."
The train started to slow down and I realised we were approaching the next station. I got to my feet.
"Take care ok?" I said to her before returning to the carriage where the others were sitting.
I was set on just picking up my bag and getting away from Darren. I was not going to acknowledge him or speak to anyone. I was so done. I was not going to be hurt anymore.
Darren was sitting in his seat with Hunter sat next to him. Raquel had moved to sit in Natalia's vacant seat, as Natalia was still sitting in Rebecca's lap, and Clara had moved over into Hunter's now empty seat to speak with them. They all looked up at me when I reached them.
"Ruth? Are you ok?" Rebecca asked me slowly.
I ignored her and completely blanked the others, particularly Darren. I pulled my bag down off the rack, which was glowing red from Dragonwrath, and headed for the doors.
"Wait! Where are you going?!" Hunter called after me in a panic.
The train stopped and I got off, ignoring the others as they called after me for a while before starting to gather their things together to follow me. Thankfully they weren't quick enough and, by the time they reached the doors, the doors had shut and the train was starting to move off again. I pretended not to notice them leaving but when the train had moved far enough, I turned to watch it go. My eyes stung from wanting to cry so badly, but I took a deep breath in and held them back.
I pulled out my phone from my bag and opened Lizzie's email. She had her phone number in her email signature. I called the number and waited for a reply.
"Liz speaking." She chimed down the phone and I smiled hearing her voice.
"Lizzie, you free? My plans have changed. Fancy going for a drink for old times sake? Or how about some retail therapy?" I asked her, heading up the stairs to get to another platform.