Chapter Twenty-Five

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*Not edited* Not proofread*

Chapter 25– Always so dramatic:

        "Where are my pancakes?" Is the first thing I say that morning when I walk into the kitchen, my head pounding and ears ringing.

        I stare down at the empty spot my breakfast normally occupies at this hour of the morning, a frown marring my face at the vacancy. They're not here.

        Jace barely even acknowledges me as he moves around the room, a piece of toast in his mouth. Toast. We never eat toast on a Saturday. Saturday is pancake day.

        Where the fuck are my fucking pancakes?

        "Enserio?" I fold my arms, my eyes moving with Jace as he shuffles around on the tiled flooring. He's dressed casually; burgundy sweatpants and a white t-shirt that contrasts against his tanned skin. He seems chilled out enough, laid back with his actions, no tension in his shoulders, no hostility in his movements. But yet, he ignores me.

        Why do people keep fucking ignoring me?

        "It's already been a week, J. How much longer are you going to carry this on for?" I lazily sit myself down on one of the stools, my arms on the countertop. He hasn't spoken to me for a week. A whole seven days. I'm surprised I haven't broken his jaw yet for the way he's been acting.

        I lick my lips and slowly roll my eyes, expecting to get nothing but silence in response to my questioning. It's been the same thing for the past week, and Jace is a stubborn prick, so I wouldn't be surprised if he went even longer without uttering a word to me. If anyone can do it, it's him.

        Every time I've tried to talk to him— and fuck me have I tried— he just acts like he can't hear anything and goes about his day. His avoidance and dismissal of my presence sends a sharp pang throughout my chest and that's how I know I'm starting to get really fucking annoyed.

        It takes a lot for me to not trash the whole house and gut him out of the anger that consumes me every time one of my questions goes unanswered by him.

        And he wonders why I hate him so much.

        "For as long as I need."

        I blink a couple thousands times in surprise— or maybe it's only two. It's the first time he's addressed me in a week. Verbally, at least. He offers me the phone from time to time whenever Lilah calls and asks to speak to me after she's done speaking to him, but he never says anything to me, just holds out the phone as he turns his head away from me, like a fucking child. So when I hear him actually answer one of my questions, I can't help but be a little stunned on what to say.

        I had not been expecting this.

        Recovering after a few short moments of internal bafflement, I raise an eyebrow at his turned back. "And how long is that?"

        Jace doesn't say anything straight away, just huffs as he puts down the hand-towel and turns to face me with a serious expression on his stubbly face. He should really start shaving more frequently.

"God, I can't even look at you," he shakes his head. His tone is low, deep, but his voice cracks and he swallows whatever causes the break between his words.

        "Fucking hell, Jace. What happened wasn't even that fucking bad. Why are you acting as if I've done something unspeakable?"

"Because you don't get it, Runaway!" He raises his voice, his words loud and strong, no sign of any weakness. "Don't you get how serious this is?"

My eyebrows crease lightly and my head shakes in the vaguest of ways. I'm confused. I don't understand. I'm aware of the seriousness of the situation, but it isn't as bad as he's making out.

Always so dramatic.

"Of course I do, but I'm sorting it, Jace. Wh—."

        "That's not the point!" His hands hit down on the counter with a loud bang, and I blink in surprise at his small outburst. My shoulders tense and I stand up from my stool and take a step back, my eyes focused on his every move. "You're not seeing the bigger fucking picture here, kid."

        "There is no bigger picture," I deny, watching the muscle in the side of his neck strain. "You're overreacting. I just don't get why."

        Jace bites down on his teeth, his jaw clenching. He shakes his head as he looks down at his veiny hands, only meeting my gaze once he's composed himself enough to allow me to relax my tense shoulders, no longer on defence. "You might not see this as a big deal, Little Warrior, but you're putting yourself in danger. You killed someone from the facility; you're going on a fucking manhunt for someone you don't even know who has a reputation for being dangerous. Don't you get it?"

        "I've handled worse things, Jace."

        "But you're not invincible! I know the facility made you think you were their specially little weapon, their indestructible subject, but you're not, R.A. You're a—," he cuts himself off, his face pained and his eyes glossy. "You're just a fucking kid."

        I sigh out a steady breath as Jace rounds the counter to be near me, his height towering over mine. His eyes still shine with moisture, but they're not watering. He peers down at me with a sadness I haven't witnessed from him in a long time, and he scans my features slowly.

        I stand confused at his behaviour, still not quiere understanding his worry. How did he go from angry to sad in almost no time at all?

        Or maybe he was never really angry to begin with.

        Slowly, Jace's hands come up to my face and I watch them with caution. It seems like a few agonising minutes have passed, but in reality, he's only been in front of me for a mere three seconds. Before I can tell him to back the fuck up, I notice how deep his sadness really runs, so I allow the palms of his hands to come into contact with my cold cheeks, reminding myself that it's just Jace, and his touch doesn't make me feel as sick as everyone else's.

        "Do you know how much you mean to me? How much I worry about you every day?" He asks rhetorically. His hands squish my face like they used to do when I was smaller, and I can feel my teeth biting in to the inside of my cheeks. I say nothing though. "The situation isn't a big deal for you, because you have nothing to lose. But me, kid? You're my everything and I'm not going to lose you because you want to play hero."

        "That's not what I'm doing," I stand my ground, my voice steady but my words quiet. Jace shakes his head at my stubbornness and I move his hands away from me. "The facility is my business, Jace. For years I've been wondering what the fuck my purpose was there; why they put us through all that shit, and now there's a chance I get to find out before I—."

        "Don't." He warns firmly. I bite my tongue, not pushing any further as I steer the conversation in a different direction.

        "I wouldn't have killed the guard if he hadn't tried to kill me, and that's the truth. I wasn't looking for any trouble, Jace."

        His eyes dart between the both of mine, like they always do when he thinks I'm lying. I'm aware that the eyes aren't really the windows to your soul, despite what those simple humans say, but it does make me wonder if I have a telltale. Maybe that's how he can always tell when I'm lying.

But this time, I'm not.

"And Dakota?"

My heart misses a bit at the mention of his name, the despise I feel for him more than real— and that's just my body's way of proving it. I shrug my shoulders at the question, like I don't actually know what he means, playing dumb as I ask: "What about him?"

Jace gives me a look, letting me know he isn't falling for my fake ignorance. "You know what," he tells me, so sure of himself it's annoying. "I just don't get why you're so infatuated with him."

"I know what you're doing," I tell him with a roll of my eyes. "You're using big words I don't know against me so I can't deny whatever it is you're insinuating."

"I just don't understand why you're so attached to him," he rephrases for my sake, but his change in sentence structure doesn't do anything but piss me off further.

Me? Attached? To Dakota?

Ew.

"I'm not."

His eyebrows rise and fall in a shrug-like manner, his face full of disbelief. "Okay, R.A, whatever. But just answer me this," he makes direct eye contact with me and I tilt my head to make him continue. "Why are you helping him?" He looks confused; completely and utterly. "I can understand why you'd want to help Lilah, but him?"

I don't like the way he says it. Him. Like Dakota is so awfully disgusting that he's not even worth mentioning; like he can't fathom why anyone would want to do something for the blonde-headed fuck.

What the fuck is his problem?

"I'm not doing it for him. If you remember rightly, those guards were working for Mac, and if I want to find out how they were hired and where from, I'm going to need to do some... investigating."

"What are you? Sherlock Holmes?" Jace scoffs, causing a scowl to come over my face. "I know you're doing this for him, kid, and I know you know that, too."

I roll my eyes and go to protest, but decide against it. Because maybe... maybe I'm not doing it for the reasons I told him about, but he really doesn't need to know that. My problems are not his.

So instead of the explanation that's on the tip of my tongue, instead of the real reasons behind my actions, that I don't think I've even really admitted to myself, I settle on saying: "Think what you'd like," before I move past him and head out of the front door.

I don't hear Jace call me back, and I'm not sure whether to be surprised or not. Although we've only just started speaking again, and I'm sure he's not rushing to catch up with me, I know we have a long-overdue conversation pending. It's not something I'm looking forward to— not at all— but I know it's going to happen sooner rather than later and I'd prefer it be out the way so I have one less thing to worry about.

But now that I'm in my car, there's no going back, so I'll just have to subject myself to long lectures and a life lesson later on today.

        Pulling out of the drive, I turn the radio on and adjust the volume as to not worsen my already pounding headache. The song playing isn't familiar, and I'm not much of a fan of music anyway, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't help drown out the voices and make them a little more bearable as I have something else to focus on.

        I'm used to all the different voices now and I'm good at ignoring them, but the constant taunts and shouts can be annoying, especially when I'm on the verge of blacking out because of how bad my head hurts.

It always hurts.

        I don't actually know where I planned to go when I angrily got into my car and started driving, but the further I get from mine and Jace's shared house, the dizzier I become and the blurrier my vision gets.

        It must only be fifteen minutes that pass before I have to pull over on the side of the road. I sit gripping the steering wheel with shaky hands for a while until I decide that I need to get out, feeling too cooped up within the confinement of my Chevy.

        Once I'm out and the door is closed behind me, I stumble on my feet, my boots crunching against the wet grass on the side of the middle-of-nowhere road. I blink a few times to try and refocus myself, but it doesn't seem to work. In fact, it just makes everything hazier.

        I take deep breaths in and out for a couple of pointless seconds before the same feeling that overcame me that day in gym class overcomes me again and I lose consciousness before I even hit the floor.

*

The floor is cold; it always is down here. It's stone-hard, stone-cold cement that never holds in any heat. Not that there's any heat down here to hold. It makes my toes go numb, and small little bumps arise on my skin.

I shift position, my legs extending so that my knees are no longer pressed underneath my quivering chin. So cold. They barely touch the ground at first as I lower them with caution, the icy touch of the cement below my upper legs causes a shiver to run through my beaten body. After my legs are straight out in front of me, I relax my shoulders and lean against the back wall, my eyes scanning the cell opposite me with disappointment. It's been a long time since someone last occupied that cell.

Nine never returned that night they took her for testing, and no one ever spoke of her again. Not the guards, or the other subjects in our cell block. No one. It was like she never even existed.

At first, I thought that maybe she hadn't. Maybe I had made her up. Maybe she was just another one of my hallucinations that my mind formed as some sort of cruel joke.

But then I notice the scratches on the back wall of her own cell whenever they allow light into our block, and I remember her hazel eyes and ginger hair, her lopsided smile and that high-pitched sound she used to make. Her laugh. She liked to laugh.

After that night, they brought a new subject in two days later. She only lasted a few days before she smashed her head against the wall so many times she died. It wasn't pleasant to watch, but it was the only form of entertainment around here, so I counted for her.

It took her twenty-eight times before she started getting sleepy, and an additional six before she lost consciousness all together.

After that they brought in someone else, not bothering to clean the previous subject's blood off the walls and floor. This subject was a chico. He had green eyes and very dark skin, his hair brown. He spoke a funny language, not Spanish or English, so we couldn't communicate. I didn't want to though, anyway.

He wasn't Nine.

I only speak to Nine.

He lasted a long time— one of the longest, and I could tell the guards had high hopes for him. But he never came back, either.

That was three days ago. Another subject hasn't been recruited yet, so the cell remains empty apart from the furry little things on all fours that scurry around it as they squeak. They nip at my toes sometimes. I hate them.

Really hate them.

But not as much as the guards.

Having been cleared for training, everything has gotten so much harder. They alternate me between experiments and physical training whenever it suits them, and I never seem to catch a break.

My head's been hurting a lot more ever since, and sometimes it hurts so much I can't keep my eyes open.

        The head pains started ever since the first few tests they done with that funny thing that they secured around my head. I got used to that pain though, so much so I barely even noticed it anymore. But after training started and they done that weird experiment on me, it had gotten a lot worse.

I remember sitting in the chair they put me in. I'd been strapped down with extra restraints because there was never a single moment I wasn't putting up a fight. There was this man there. I recognised him. He was the one they brought in when they done overly intrusive experiments with all sorts of drilling and cutting. I didn't like him.

He had gloves on, they were the colour of Two's eyes, or at least similar. In one of his covered hands he had a drill, but it looked different to the one we have in the tool box.

He was only standing in front of me for a few seconds before he walked up behind me. I don't know what they were doing as I couldn't feel a thing— the result of one of the injections they gave me. I heard buzzing though, and out of the corner of my eye I could see clumps of hair falling onto the sterile floor. That room was always so clean, but it smelled funny. I didn't like that.

After that, the buzzing stopped and was replaced with the sound of a drill. That made me panic; it was so close to my head.

I don't remember much after that. Just that at some point during all the drilling and struggling, everything went dark.

I couldn't see, even with my eyes open.

I stayed like that for a few days. Not being able to see anything. I didn't like it. After a while, I was taken back into the same room, but this time the injection they gave me sent me to sleep.

When I woke up, my vision was back, but my head was screaming in deep pain.

And it's been like that ever since.

It hurts a lot. Sometimes I worry that it'll never go away. It doesn't seem like it will. It's a little frightening.

I just want Nine.

___

Author's Note

Just another filler chapter to show you some more on Kody's past (:

I have a few ideas for this book, but I just never know when to write about certain things, because I always feel like it would be happening too soon. But then I also forget I only have a limited amount of chapters, so I'm going to need to start revealing things soon.

It's just hard, ya know?

So if I don't update in a while, it's because I'm writing a big cluster of chapters so that I can make sure everything fits in and adds up properly— does that make sense? That way if I need to change things I won't have to unplublish chapters and fuck around with everything.

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