Picking Up The Pieces

66. Friends

   "Give a little scream for me, Stark."

I laid shivering on the cold stone ground of the cell Amy and I shared, my fingers tingling as if they had fallen asleep and I couldn't wake them up. The hospital gown the doctors had changed me into barely protected me from the cold. My throat felt scratchy and dry, severely damaged from my screams during the extraction. I was covered in bruises and dried blood, my skin unevenly healed due to the power inhibitor being turned immediately back on once Hawkes felt satisfied with the amount of torture I had gone through. It had been days since then, but no one had come to check up on me. I wasn't sure if they were leaving me for dead or just testing if I would stay alive.

"I know it sounds stupid... but try to breathe less," Amy suggested quietly from her side of the room. "They cracked my ribs once, so my advice might not fit your situation as much, but it might help." I stayed quiet, not able to even respond or turn my head in her direction. I heard the girl sigh and the thump of her wings against the ground as she shifted her sitting position.

"When Hawkes first caught me, I lost hope," she admitted. "He told me that the world would never accept me for what I was, and after struggling to stay alive on my own by running and scavenging through trash cans... I started to believe him. He needed money, I needed a place to sleep." Amy's voice shook, growing angry at both herself and at the man as she shared her truth, but she continued on. "The drinks they gave me... they made me forget in the moment, but... I still know what happened. I can feel it. I tried to tell Hawkes I wanted it to stop, that I was done, but the drinks got stronger. I could barely tell if I was awake or dreaming. Nothing made sense anymore... until that day you came and killed Colin."

I remembered it vividly, the anger I felt when my brain processed what was happening to her when I entered the club. I wanted to speak to her now, comfort her, tell her I would make sure it would never happen again... but I couldn't speak. I couldn't protect myself or Stacy, who was in a room who knew where inches away from death. Earth's mightiest hero... a scared little girl on the verge of dying herself. Alone.

"You know what was one of my favorite things when we were let out?" Amy went on. "The sun. I forgot what it was like to have something make you feel warm, but not like a heater. Just something natural and bright. Everything was so colorful, like the sky and the grass. What I would give for my bare feet to touch something soft again."

My own eyes welled up with tears, not from the extreme pain my body was in. I was slowly coming to the realization I would most likely die in here. My body wasn't healing itself fast enough. There were things I wish I had said, people I wished I could've said goodbye to. I hoped that my father would take care of my dog, who didn't deserve all the heartache I was putting her through. No one could truly explain to Harley why I would never come home.

"Did you hear that?" Amy asked me suddenly before going quiet. I closed my eyes to focus my hearing, listening to any possible sound I could. I heard both of our breaths, one more shallower than the other. There was a faint drip somewhere outside our door. Then, I heard it, the sound of muffled grunts and punches. A loud yell echoed throughout the halls, and I heard Amy's chains clatter as she got up on her feet behind me. "Someone's coming." I stayed still, trying to calm my painful breathing patterns as the noises grew closer. "Isabel, please, you have to get up," she begged, but I couldn't respond. My lips wouldn't move, and no sound would come out of my throat. "Isabel? Isabel!"