Thrumming heartbeats...
Wavering breaths... Hurried steps... He was racing against the grave.
When he reached the entrance of the balcony, the furious gale slammed the door rudely on his face.
Pushing open the door; he felt the agony of a soul burning down.
"Neva!!"
He saw her. There. Standing on the bridge to the darkest valley.
He couldn't breathe.
As Neva stood there stiff, he ran to her with an incoherent head. The heart threatening to rip out his chest.
At this moment, the crumpled up mind, blurred senses, mania of emotions; Ishmael became a plague to himself.
From the slithery surface, the petite foot slipped away.
Ishmael within a tumultuous beat of the heart, wrapped his arms around her legs.
The scarlet in the veins of his widened eyes; agonizing horror numbing his world.
"No.... You can't leave me."
A trembling body. His voice was a whisper.
He was unable to swallow this suton, this scarlet scene.
Neva wanted to kill herself.
His Neva, wanted to die...
And it had happened twice.
Neva was torned back from the glowing scenery of a wildflower dream. To the pandemonium of hävitys. She struggled her legs to break free, but his grip only tightened further.
Ishmael carried her down on the ground, while she kicked the air and her screams echoed the woods, soaring away the flock—the dark silhouette of birds.
Her legs dying on her, she fell in his arms.
He held her close, and tight, their tangled forms, limp knees on the floor.
She tried to peel him away. Fight to push him as far as she could. His sickening body crawling her skin. Her finger nails harrowing deep in his flesh, his shoulder bruised and bleeding him through the ebony clay shirt.
Beating him with her fists, her cries piercing the silent night.
He wouldn't even spare her a peaceful death.
But he was hushed, embracing her secure, for right at the thumping, living beats of the heart; her warmth was all he seeked.
"Don't touch me!! Don't touch me!!"
Screams.
Ragged shouts tearing apart her sore throat.
"Get away from me!!"
She could not move anymore, his arms roped around her weary form.
The sky looked through her pain: the black clouds looming over, the roaring thunder storms, the lightning bolts flickering alike her shredding senses, and as she weeped ocean of salty tears, the rain came trickling, wailing along with her.
For this verity; this haunting reality she wished to escape.
"Please let me go." Neva's arms were limp by her sides.
Crying without fighting back.
She mourned her soul; she greived her fate and those who had there twisted around her own.
The rain drenched them.
Each drop a soft pat of reassuration for her. The heaven reflected her misery
And they wished to wash away all the pain.
"I can't. I love you." He murmered.
Closening, clenching her flesh, he hoped to just merge them together.
Neva shook her head furiously. "You don't deserve to love!"
"You don't deserve love!"
He was a monster.
It would be a sin to let him abuse the purity of love she lived.
"You don't know love..." She trailed away.
Looking up at the sky—she closed her eyes. She prayed for someone, for something to release her from this wretched, ruined body.
She couldn't bear this hollow bones, the overwhelming burns, the hovering demons anymore... She was bleeding out all; but the flesh refused to let her go.
"You don't know how much I love you. No one can ever love you like I do!" Ishmael said through gritted teeth.
In the span of a moment, he picked Neva up, carrying her in his arms.
Neva pushed him with barely any strength left, forcing away his chest, but all her attempts to free away deemed futile against his unmoving, beastly strength.
"Please. Kill me. I can't endure this cruelty anymore." She said, while he walked them down the stairs to the hallways.
The rumbling of storm and drumming of rain, muffled inside the thick walls of the mansion.
"Is your hatred towards me this earnest? Are you so disgusted even by my children?"
His agonized eyes searched her own.
She was facing away. Not struggling anymore. Refusing the reflection of her features in his orbs.
"More than you imagine."
A pained smile flickered up Ishmael's lips.
"I cannot alter the past choices, but if that's how you feel because of my sins. For you I'd carve out a perfect future." He said, and he fnally had her bleak, confused, scornful eyes on him.
"I will make it so you don't feel the hurt. Or remember them."
As they finally reached the open door of their room, he walked in through, heading towards the master bed.
He laid her on the bed, the dripping wet clothes still on, sticking to their body. It soaked transparent the white sheets.
He hovered over her, the water droplets from his hair falling down on her face. He grabbed her chin, turning her to face him.
Then with a loving grin, he said: "I will erase your memories. All of your living, with or without me. The good and the bad."
He felt her terrified soul.
Neva's guts roiled. She was shrinking into the sheets.
After all that... When she thought it couldn't get worse anymore.
Ishmael always unveiled the cruelest wrath of hell, awakening the undermost, the strangest fear she never thought one could ever derive within.
He carresed her baby bump, rubbing his thumb over gently.
"I'll be all you have. We will start a new life with our children. And you'll love me... And them."
Ishmael glanced up at her.
Silent in deny. Every inch of her skin eaten raw by maggots.
But he was peeling the worms off before they killed her.
For slowly, and agonizingly he wished to burn her and refresh.
Burn and refresh.
Burn and refresh.
Burn and refresh.
He caressed her cheek, and kissed her ever so tenderly on the lips. Lingering leisurely, moving to the chin—drinking the moist rain and coldness from her flesh, drizzling kisses along her smooth neck...
While she just stared up blankly at the ceiling.
She couldn't process anything.
He was eroding Neva. And everything, everyone that made her her.
Rhett would be just a dream; a beautiful dream she could no longer recall.
Everything would cease to exist anymore.
Their 'Us' could never have been there.
Ishmael was the forgotten nightmare.
Altering her truth in his illusions of heaven.
There... He will pretend to be her redeemer. The leading man; he will forever have her life gyrate around him.
---
Inside the hustle–bustle of a small country restaurant, with warm ambiance of golden lantern around: three men sat there, glancing at the entrance door every now and then—each time the tinkling of bells resounded, welcoming a customer in the room.
"Is the information even legit? Boss if he doesn't show up within the next five seconds! I'm gonna rip my ass outta here!" He grumbled at the middle-aged looking man.
"Knight, patience. Drop the glass!" The elder man replied with a glare, at the man accross—with handsome, sculpted features. His eyes, although hazy from gulping down drink after drink in boredom.
"Hunter, cease his glass." He instructed the man beside him.
"Hunter choose! You've got to make a choice! Elk or me, your leader?" He asked Hunter, downing the alcohol with a shrinking expression, before Hunter could snatch it from him.
Gaining nothing but a stoic look from Agent Hunter, he shifted his gaze at Elk.
"What Boss are you huh?! How could you make a heartbroken person. Me. Come to work?! And I can't even savor a sip?!" Knight sighed out so loud, placing the glass down with a thump.
"Old Granny!! One more glass of beer here!!" He shouted at the aged owner of the restaurant.
But the woman had hearing deficiency, and Agent Knight wasn't heard.
"Stop crapping out! How insolent of you to get drunk!" Elk scolded the young man blabbering gibberish words.
Agent Knight gasped. "I'm in utter disbelief!! How do I look drunk in your eyes?! I've sipped no more than two drop–" a hiccup forced out his throat.
Elk glared his nose, his face darkened like charcoal at the man covering his mouth and smiling slyly.
But before he could return back a harsh punishment, the clinking of bells resonated round the noisy room, and the awaited someone caught Hunter's clear eyes.
As he informed Elk, Elk glanced there, his eyes beholding unfathomable emotions—as he peered at his beloved friend's son.
He walked inside the restaurant, earning a sweet welcome from the owner when she heeded his presence.
His grim, vigilant eyes scrutinized a table to rest for dinner. A room filled with noisy chatters and loud laughs from drunk men.
This happened to be the only open restaurant at this hour. And so he patted the back of the little boy sleeping tranquiled in his arms, hoping he wouldn't startle awake, and have an unbroken sleep.
But in a glance of perception, his sharp senses detected the blaring gazes on him. He looked ahead at them, not too stunned to find the Agents trailing him once again.
Elk stood up, approaching the man standing still, as did Agent Hunter, leaving the drunk Knight on the table.
"Oh? Ohh the Hero has finally arrived!! Cheers!!" Knight laughed out, standing with an empty liquor bottle raised, only to stumble back down on his seat.
"Czar," Elk breathed out, but he frowned at the slumbering baby in his arms, the little fists firmly grabbing onto his clothes.
"Over there. My son needs to sleep." Rhett said, indicating at the table at the quieter corner and endmost of the row.
"Yes. As you wish." Elk sighed, relief washing over him as Rhett did not refuse to acknowledge their presence.
But the frown between his brows only deepened as he follows him.
Agent Czar had a son?
Why did he not know that?
He looked over at Hunter, who just shrugged in response. Even Hunter was unbeknownst to this startling revealation. They would always be kept under the dark unless and until; Rhett wished to.