The Love Between Enemies

Chapter 2 - Escape

            Little light shown into the dimly lit room as Adira sat on the edge of the shelf taking in her surroundings. Merrick's bedroom walls were covered with posters of bands, events, game characters, and other people she didn't know. Across the way from Merrick's bed hung a dark wooden cabinet, to the right of the door to leave his room were 2 white doors presumably closet doors. Adira's attention was soon brought to Merrick due to the sound of him shifting in bed. Although he was nice to her last night, she was still warry of him, after all giants were all the same towards her kind. She rose from the spot she had been sitting at and began making her way over to the makeshift ladder. She had never been a fan of heights but living in a world were everything is bigger than you meant getting over the fear if you wanted to survive. Gritting her teeth, she began making her way down the flimsily made ladder. Halfway down her arms and legs started to burn, she felt something warm drip down her leg and looked down to see blood.

"Shit", she thought to herself realizing the blisters, from being electrocuted the day before, had popped due to her climbing down. Adira shook her head and prepared to continue climbing down while biting back tears of pain. As she went to step down onto the toothpick below, she slipped due to all the blood that had dripped down her leg. She tried to grab on to another toothpick as she fell but her efforts were in vain. Adira squeezed her eyes shut and prepared herself for a painful impact, instead she landed on the cushion that was neatly placed in the middle of the sitting area. She let out a sigh of relief and continued searching for a way of escape, she noticed the bedroom door and the gap at the bottom.

"Maybe I can slide under the door and try to escape from here", carefully she found her way from the cushion to the floor. The floor was a cold and gray tile that looked like a type of grey wood, she regretted not bringing along the blanket from her bed to keep her warm. Making her way to the door she couldn't help but feel so small, she felt like a bug scurrying about the floor looking for a crumb of food. Finally reaching the door she looked back to check if Merrick was still asleep, she didn't know what time it was or how much longer he would be asleep for so she had to get out of the as quickly as she could. The gap between the bottom of the door and the floor was just big enough for her to squeeze through if she crawled on her stomach. The cold floor tickled her stomach as she made her way under the door.

"What do I do from here, I don't know the layout of the building and who knows if there are other giants here", she made it to the other side of the door just as a loud crash came from somewhere in the building. Adira quickly backed into the wall across the way from the bathroom door.

"FUCK" Yelled what sounded to be an older male, Adira carefully snuck her way over to the end of the hall where she there saw a male giant Lavender hair and emerald, green eyes. The left side of his head was partially shaved revealing a blackish color, he seemed to be in a kitchen that opened up to a living room. What looked to be a front door stood next to a patchy red couch in the living room. She thought about how she would get to the door considering there weren't many places to hide in the room, her thoughts were only with the vibrations of footsteps.

"Hey what are you doing over there?" said the Lavender hair man as he walked over to where Adira stood. She looked up in terror as he got closer and closer, she tried to make a break for the door but didn't make it very far before being pulled off the ground by her shirt. There she was dangling, face to face with this giant man, fear filled her body consuming her thoughts and making hard to breath. He seemed to notice the blood on her legs and began walking with her to the Kitchen. Adira struggled trying to struggle out of his grasp not caring that it could mean her injuring herself more, she just wanted to get away from this giant. He walked over to the sink, checked if it was clean, turned on the faucet, and plugged the drain.

"What was he doing, does he plan on drowning me?!" Adira thought to herself, her mind always tended to go to the negative when she became afraid. She watched as he put some sort of thick liquid in the water and made the water bubbly. He turned the water off and carefully placed her in, the water was deep enough it could properly wet her but shallow enough so she couldn't drown.

"Stay here while I get you a change of clothes" said the man before walking away leaving her alone.

The water felt nice on her burned skin, she laid back into the water taking in its comforting warmth. Why were Merrick and this other giant so nice to her, was this only a façade so they could use her later on for their sick pleasure. Her thoughts were interrupted as the giant returned with a change of clothes.

"I see someone is enjoying the water" the man said as he reached in to try and help wash her hair, as expected she pushed herself away from him. "Hey, it's ok, I was just gonna help wash your hair", she did not move but continued to stare up at him with a fearful expression. He noticed that Merrick had yet to put her new tag on her choker so he would have to do it himself. He let out an annoyed sigh as he went to take her out of the sink before he knew it though she had jumped onto his arm trying to make her way up to the counter, she was smart but reckless. "Come now darling, I just need to put your tag on" as he said that he had once again tried to grab her, but she jumped off his arm and onto the kitchen counter now running towards the edge.

"I need to get out of this place before anymore giants just show up" thought Adira as she raced to the edge of the counter, there was no way she was sticking around. Just as she reached the counter and was prepared to jump a clear cup was placed over. This giant had seriously grabbed a cup and used it to catch her, she was both slightly offended and extremely annoyed.

"Nice try love but your gonna need to be a lil faster than that", there was almost a cocky tone to how he said it. Adira looked up at his face and there was a slight smirk in his expression, he was definitely being cocky. He began sliding the cup away from the edge of the counter forcing Adira to move closer to him. She did not like this man. The sound of a door frantically opening could be heard in the hallway, soon after Merrick came running out panicked.

"ATLAS HAVE YOU SEEN ADIRA?!" Merrick must have just woken up and realized I wasn't in his room.

"So that's her name?" the man's name Atlas said in a friendly tone, Merrick looked down and saw Adira staring back up at him with a guilty looking expression.

"Why is she in a cup?" Merrick asked in a rather confused tone.

"Well, I caught her trying to sneak out, but I caught her, saw she was bleeding, and thought she could use a bath although I didn't put into account that she would be such a slippery lil escapist", Atlas replayed in almost a humored tone.

"Well, that explains why she is wet and why she is under the cup", Merrick had a humored tone to his voice as well. Although Adira was only worried about trying to leave before they could punish her for trying to escape, she began to push all her weight into the side of the glass hoping she could push it to the edge and escape. She had gotten a couple pushes in before a shadow formed over the glass, Atlas had put his hand over the glass preventing her from escaping. Did this guy have the reflexes of a cat or something?! Realizing she wasn't going to be able to escape anytime soon with Atlas around Adira just sat down to think up a new plan.