Chapter 20

The Assault of Validity

First thing I thought when I woke up was "Where was that chair when I wanted to break it on Hugo's face?"

I was tied up to a chair, the room was completely dark, but I could feel someone lurking around. I guess it was Kimiko. I mean, I hadn't seen anyone else in the room in the brief second it took me to get knocked out.

I seriously deserved it. Why the hell had I just followed her willingly like that?

I might have been knocked out easily, but I wasn't going to let things go now. "Bitch, this is the only time I'll be offering so listen carefully. You let me go right now and I'll consider not whooping your ass," I told her, or whoever was in the room with me.

It kind of felt like I wasn't at the party anymore. I couldn't hear the people screaming and the music blasting. This room was just quiet and dark.

"I'm giving you five seconds and then it's knuckle sandwich time!" I yelled.

Oddly, I didn't exactly feel scared. I just felt pissed off, majorly pissed off. Being tied up to a chair certainly didn't qualify as the scariest event to happen in my life. It didn't even make the top ten list.

"Five... four... three... two..." Before I could say one I heard giggling. "Oh bitch it is sooooo on."

She giggled again.

What the hell did she want? Did she really knock me out and tie me to a chair just to giggle like a maniac?

I didn't get to scream at her again the room started to spin, like literally spin and the lights started to flash quickly. I gasped, my fist clenching. I would have held on to the chair if it wasn't for the fact that my hands were tied behind my back.

"What a surprise it was when I saw you..." she said softly. I had no idea where it was coming from because I was just spinning and spinning. "How exquisite. I didn't even know you existed. I would have gone after you first."

Suddenly everything turned black again and I stopped moving. And then I was sitting on my bed in my room.

My father was standing in front of me. He looked at me with disgust. "What a disappointment you are. You disgust me. I wish you had never come to find us. I wish you'd go away. I wish you'd die. I wish you'd never been born. You're an abomination that never should have existed. Your mother couldn't even look at you. She got rid of you as soon as she saw your face. She knew you'd be useless. You'd be trouble."

I snorted. "Good one. Thanks." I looked around. It looked real, it felt real, but something in my head was telling me it wasn't. "This isn't true, I'm pretty sure of it, but even if it is, you think that shit would faze me? You have no idea what's in my head."

My grandfather was standing in front of me now. "Oh but I know exactly what's in your head. I know the only wish you've ever had was to belong somewhere, to have a family, to have people that cared about you. But we don't. We're not that family. We might share blood but that's the extent of our attachment. We care more about our dogs than we do you."

Those dogs were awesome, so I wouldn't even hold it against him. And sure, it was true that deep down that was what I wanted, a family, people that cared about me. But I wouldn't die without those things. The only thing I truly wished for was a roof over my head and food in my belly, those were my true needs.

"Dig deeper you tool because you're not in my head." If she was trying to hurt me or faze me she was doing a shit job at it. I'd been insulted and beaten and so much worse... This was nothing.

Pasha was now in front of me. "I only spend time with you because they told me I had to. I can't stand the sight of you."

Sweet Pasha. He looked real. He looked like himself. I think under different circumstances I could have been fooled. I think I was supposed to feel more confused, more hazy, I could almost feel it, like a residual on my mouth. Something was gnawing at my head but I was just rejecting it. "I'll survive," I told fake-Pasha.

Kimiko was now standing in front of me, all of her tiny perky self. She was pouting. "Something happened to your head..."

"You mean you're messing with the wrong bitch," I corrected her. I could make a purse out of her.

She was looking at me strangely. I felt like she thought I would be an easy prey and she was just finally realizing that maybe she was wrong. "You're still powerless," she pressed.

I snorted. "Right now maybe, but just wait for me to untie my hands and then you're going down."

"No one ever loved you."

"Tell me something I don't know."

"No one would remember you or mourn you if you died."

"See, that's where I think you're wrong. Someone would probably mourn me. That's why you want to hurt me. You don't even care about me. You care about hurting whoever likes me enough to be in pain if I died."

How interesting. Now she looked pissed. It was kind of hilarious that I was the one riling her up. "You can't stop me," she sneered.

"Maybe not but you just wait. Once my family finds you they're going to impale you." Even if they didn't actually like me or care for me, which I was pretty sure wasn't the truth, for three of them at least, they still be hunting her because she was being a naughty girl and my family put down naughty things.

"No one is going to come save you."

"You wanna bet on that?"

She looked at me strangely after I said that, like I was finally giving her something.

The next second I was spinning again. The lights started to flash too, but instead of seeing the walls of the room, I was seeing flashes of a forest. It didn't exactly felt threatening, but I wasn't particularly enchanted with the sight.

The flashes were coming closer and closer until I was catapulted right in the middle of the forest. I wasn't tied to anything, I was standing up and alone.

Confused-stick-pole says thank you, no thank you?

I wrapped my arms around myself. I was cold. The forest was all green but it felt like winter was closer than summer. It was humid and freezing. I was actually breathing out fog.

Did the bitch teleport me in the middle of nowhere? So no one could ever find me or save me?

Staying here wasn't an option. I was cold and I needed to move so I started to walk. I had no idea if I was going completely the wrong way, if I was walking towards deeper forest rather than civilisation, I just knew I had to do something.

I couldn't just stay there and be picked off.

Because the trees... the trees were watching me. I quickened my pace but I could swear the branches of the trees were moving and trying to catch me in passing. I started to run.

This isn't real, it's just in my head, this isn't real.

I stopped running. This wasn't real. "I dare you," I told the trees, or Kimiko, or whoever, whatever was out here. "Do something."

This was a bad idea. Automatically, all the vegetation around attacked me. It was the weirdest vision I ever had. Stuff was crawling front my feet and up, attacking me, like the Venom symbiosis was taking over my body. It dragged me down. I fell on the ground. I was trashing and fighting it but my face was about to get covered and I tried to take a deep breath but I was panicking just a little.

This isn't real, this isn't real, this isn't real.

I closed my eyes, my chest was being pressed by the vegetation, my mouth was covered by it, I couldn't breathe.

But suddenly, there was a sound, in the back of my head, like a door handle being turned and then shaken.

I wasn't in a forest. I wasn't choking. I was still on a chair in a room. And someone was trying to come in.

I gasped, opening my eyes.

Back on my chair, Kimiko appeared panicked in front of me, looking between the door and my face. I smirked at her and she disappeared into the shadows.

The door was kicked in and someone ran towards me.

"Oksana!" It was Kostyantyn, looking worried and worn out, now standing in front of me, trying to figure out how to untie me.

No. "KOSTYA WATCH OUT!"

Before he could even react, she had her hands around his shoulders. When had she gotten this tall? "Goodbye your Royal Highness," she softly said with a sneer and then she slit his throat with her nails.