CHAPTER THREE... 

Night has fallen, and I decide that I've spent enough time in my room. I should explore the facility, if it's where I'm going to be staying for the next however many months. I grab a long coat that Moira brought for me a little earlier, and it fits perfectly, reaching almost to the floor.

I open the door and peer out. There is no one in the hallway. I walk down the corridor and turn right, trying to make mental notes so I can find my way back. The shadows have not bothered me since a couple hours ago, which means no one is feeling truly upset. I haven't heard from Charles or anyone else, so I guess I won't be in on any of their schemes.

My stomach tightens at the thought of it, and I pause. Why am I feeling like this? Why am I upset I won't be able to fight Shaw? How many times had I dreamed of being free from him? How many times did I imagine what I would do when I escaped? This definitely was not what I imagined. I wanted to go to school, I wanted to go shopping for pretty clothes and meet new people. I never thought I would be holed up in a facility waiting for others to do all the heavy lifting.

I want to help. I want to fight Shaw and watch him pay. That's what Erik has been trying to do all these years, so why shouldn't I? I know why, it's the large glaring sign flashing right in front of me. I can't control my powers, and Shaw makes it worse, because he can. It's how I almost never had any incidents, because he was able to absorb the energy before it got too much.

Now I don't have that, and the presence of darkness is at the back of my mind, taunting me, stabbing with it's icy fingers.

I have a choice to make, I realize. Since now I've only been following suit, doing what everyone else was. But now I'm here, I'm free, and I can either fight Charles to let me help in the hunt, or sit back and do nothing. I'm at a crossroads. One is a clean path with flowers blooming and no bumps in the cobblestone, and the other is long and winding, plotted with trouble and darkness.

But I have been a friend of the dark for a long time.

As I walk, I see Raven and Hank in one of the huge engines of a rocket. They get very close, and I decide to leave before I see anything else. A little farther away from where Raven and Hank are, there's a window that overlooks a small courtyard dotted with statues and grass. I lean against it, watching my breath fog up the glass.

As I press my face up against the glass, my arm twinges. When I pull it out, I see the veins in my hand grow dark, as if the shadows are pumping through my blood. It tingles, and I close my palm, hoping it will go away, but the darkness only crawls to the back of my hand, as if it's saying; I own you, I control this, and therefore, I can control you. I take a shaky breath and close my eyes. I think of Shaw taking the shadows out of my hand. I wonder if I could do that.

I focus hard on the energy that crawls up my arm, willing them to leave. Please let me be, just let me be normal, I think, Let me have control. Gradually, I begin to see the reincarnation of my pain swirl out of my hand and into my palm. The shadows look like black coloring in water, dancing around my hand in ebony. It twirls in my palm, and I let out a laugh.

I did it.

"Does it hurt you?" I whirl around to find Erik, wearing a black turtleneck, his hands in his pockets. He must have seen the shadows. His face is filled with concern and intrigue.

"A little." I reply, looking back at the dark energy, but I've lost my concentration, and they seep back into my veins. I wince at how cold they are. Erik takes a step forward, but I hold up a hand.

"I'm fine." I say, but a small part of me knows I'm lying.

Erik points to the floor. "Mind if I sit?" I shake my head, and we sit down on the concrete floor, silent.

I bite my lip, wondering if I should ask what I'm thinking.

"I..." I begin, trying to come up with the right words while Erik looks at me expectantly. "I know that I barely know you, and you don't really know me. But, I feel like you might be the only person who... understands. No one else really gets it. Gets... Shaw. So... Can I stick by you? Through all this?"

Erik seems slightly taken aback by my bluntness, and I wonder if anyone has ever relied on him before. Then he says. "Of course."

I let out a sigh of relief, thankful I'll have at least one person to stay close to here. His answer seems to break the air of posture and politeness, and we both sag against the glass, sitting as if we are old friends.

"Is metal all you can control?" I ask, remembering how he strained to keep the anchor up in the air.

"Yes." Erik replies. "I've been able to do it since I was a child." There is silence for a moment, then he says. "What happens when you look inside someone's head?"

The question catches me off guard.

"It's hard to explain." I say. "I can see inside their head, but it's all emotion. No thoughts. Pain and suffering and... I feel it. I'm experiencing it beside them. But the energy, the forming of the emotion outside of a person, it's painful. That's why I don't do it very often." Erik nods like he understands.

"What did Shaw do to you?" he asks. I freeze, the memories hitting me like a truck. Handcuffed to a bed, Shaw pulling a mask over his face. Shaw slicing my waist, trying to get the darkness that resides in me. Shaw taking my power away. Always Shaw. Always pain.

My voice wavers when I say. "What did he do to you?" I can't answer, not now, not when I escaped only days ago.

"Experiments." Erik says, his face going dark. "I was in the Nazi camps. He killed my mother just to get me to move a coin. I never saw my father again. The days consisted of torture and exhaustion. When I escaped, I vowed to kill him and other Nazi's."

Tears prick my eyes as a wave of grief hits me. "Did you know he was a mutant?"

"No."

"He killed my father because of me." I say, remembering the bullet that Shaw absorbed like it was nothing. "And I lost control. It killed my mother."

"How long were you with him?"

"Five years." I reply. Erik sucks in a breath, his face contorting with surprise.We're plunged into silence again.

"I don't like waiting." Erik says. "They expect us to sit it out until the CIA can choose what to do with us. It's as if they think we're lab experiments."

"They don't control us." I say. "They're trying to protect us." But a part of me agrees with him.

"Protecting us by locking us up like lap dogs."

"Erik." I say. "I trust Charles. He wants what's best for us."

"For you." Erik corrects. "You're the only child here, he wants you to be safe more than anyone."

"And what do you want?" I ask.

"I work better alone." Erik says. "And I should be going after Shaw right now."

"So you're going to go and kill Shaw on your own again? Do you remember what happened on the boat?"

"Yes."

"If you go after him again you're going to die." I say. "For good."

"What makes you so sure?"

"Because I won't be there to save you." Erik laughs, and I smile.

"And what do you want?" he asks me. I pause. What do I want? I feel like I'm going around in circles, coming back to two options. I decide to tell the truth, even if it pains me to say it.

"I want Shaw dead." I say slowly. "I want them all dead." my throat begins to close up. "But I don't think I could ever kill anyone. I don't think I could live with that guilt."

Erik stiffens. He clearly doesn't agree, but he won't tell me that. I know that he killed Nazis, Charles told me during dinner.

"I'm sorry, Leena." Erik says. "But I'm not going to stop until he's dead." I think of what it would mean if Shaw was gone for good. What it would mean for the world. But then I think of what it would mean if he was captured. The look on his face when I visit his jail cell and watch as he is dragged away, broken and alone, just like me.

"So you're leaving?" I ask.

"Yes." Erik gets up and waves me goodbye. "I'm sorry, Leena. I hope you stay safe." He walks away. I'm left frozen for a moment, unsure of what to do. A part of me wants to let him leave. I've seen what he can do, and I know he's powerful, but the other part know's he'll die before he gets to Shaw.

And he's the only one who understands. He's the only one who knows Shaw, who knows what he can do. I can't believe I thought he was going to stick by me.

I can't let him leave.

I stand up and turn in a circle, wondering who I should tell. Of course, the answer is simple. I race down the hallway after Erik, trying to find Charles.

I pass Raven and Hank again, but they haven't seen him. I find Black-Suit and Moira in the coffee room, but they just tell me to go to bed. I'm starting to panic, the darkness hugging the sides of my vision.

If I don't tell Charles, Erik will leave, and the only person who can help this new Division will be lost. I'm only a kid, so they won't let me go on missions, but Erik can. Please don't go, I think, turning in a slow circle in the entrance to the Facility. Please don't go.

Somewhere in the distance, I hear something close. I spin around, and the front door to the facility is slamming shut. I see them. Charles and Erik, out in the front entrance. Erik is holding a briefcase with a leather jacket thrown over his shirt. I race to the doors and push them open. I meet Erik's eyes, but Charles doesn't turn around. He must have known I was coming.

Erik turns back to Charles. "What do you know about me?"

"Everything." Charles replies.

"Then you know to stay out of my head." Erik warns.

"Please don't go, Erik." I say, coming up beside Charles. My voice is thick and raspy, and I'm on the verge of tears.

"Stay out of my head." Erik says again to Charles, ignoring my comment. He turns once more. I grab on to Charles' elbow.

"Don't let him leave." I whisper. Charles nods to me.

Charles says. "I'm sorry, Erik, but I've seen what Shaw did to you." Erik stops walking. The tears dampen my cheeks.

"I've felt your agony." Charles continues. He takes my hand. "I can help you."

Erik pauses, then turns around. "I don't need your help."

"Don't kid yourself, you needed my help last night." Charles says. "And it's not just me you're walking away from. Here you have the chance to be part of something much bigger than yourself."

"You're walking away from Leena, who's the only other person that understands as much as me." Charles continues. "She needs your help." Erik looks at me.

"You're strong," he says. "You don't need me."

"You're the only one who knows. You promised you would stick by." I say. "Please don't go." Erik grimaces.

"I won't stop you from leaving." Charles says. "I could, but I won't." Charles pulls me away, and I see the agony in Erik's eyes as we turn and walk back to the entrance. I hope it worked.

"Shaw's got friends." Charles says. "You could do with some." When Charles opens the doors, he gives me a wink, and I hope Erik will stay.

✶✶✶

Shaw, with his neatly styled hair and charismatic smile, grabs my wrist and pulls me into the room. His grip is like iron, and I thrash and scream, crying out for someone to save me.

No one comes.

"Be quiet, Leena." Shaw tells me, but I don't listen. The shadows taunt me from within, writhing around my body and biting my eyes. The room we enter is stark and bare. A cold metal table sits in the center, with leather cuffs attached, waiting to be tightened.

Tears stream down my face. I've been in this room before, and nothing good ever happened. Scalpels and knives line the walls, glinting in the unnatural light. Shaw takes the energy out of my body, and if he wasn't right next to me, I would fall to the ground. My limbs are numb, and my eyes droop. I hate him. Shaw picks me up and lays me onto the table, strapping my arms and legs. He leaves, and comes back wearing a white lab coat and is pulling a mask over his face.

My voice comes back to me, and I scream even louder, trying to call for help. But I know that no one is coming. Shaw takes a dagger, perfectly balanced and gleaming steel.

The moment the blade connects to my skin, all I feel is white hot pain.

I jolt awake, my throat hoarse and my eyes watering.

My room is covered with dancing shadows, dark as the night sky.