Trying To Heal

Chapter Fourty-Three

Derek

I have talked to everyone about my life. My therapist. My relatives. My friends. My best friend. None of them compared to this drainage I have committed directly next to April Levesque. It felt right, and it elevated a burden off my shoulders better than anyone. Impeccably straightforward to do.

The problem is that I used to believe a man should not cry. I used to believe that if a man shows emotions and sentiments, it portrays him as frail, and unattractive to the opposite sex.Lin corrected me. He raised me right. He taught me that that ideology illustrates a weak man, someone who is immature. It is perilous and even cancerous to bottle and constrict emotions in a cage.

Sunday arrives. Luke decided it is time to consult Nova Collins. It is conducted at the same place as last time for Princess Isla — in the underground prison chambers. Five Mediators roughly guide the model into the interrogation room, the paper bag yanked off and scarring her chin. She groans at the never-ending, encompassing whiteness — it hazes her sight that has been sustained in darkness.

She has been suffering the typical, Chinese torture method I suggested. Tied up to a board on the floor. Ice-cold water painfully dripped onto her forehead, crown, hair, scalp, and face. It drove her mad. Diminished her mental strength. She is in the same clothes she wore for the fashion event — her expensive suit has lost its' colour.

Nova Collins has been worshiped, praised, and adored like a god. She wanted it, and more. I cannot understand how people believed she is a good person. The second I stalked into her cell, her inked-black irises are void of emotion. And Elijah ... It angers me in an inhumane way, to be aware that she is one of his sexual predators and abusers. She harmed the little boy who could soon be my son.

She did hurt me, Elijah told me. Poor soldier. She watched as others hurt me too.

Others? I said. Like who?

I don't know their names. If you had pictures of them, I can show you.

I would have confronted her. But no, I would have been unhinged. What I did to Rhett? That is the bare minimum. If I was in the same room as the people who harmed my future children, my justice, my treatment, would be notched up to an infinity. I wanted Rhett to survive, but in the latter scenario? No. My fucking solace is gone. Therefore, Tanner pompously moderates into a chair, in his Azrael suit and grey leather gloves. Twin pistols are situated on the table. His hysterically-guffawing clown mask is constructed of pure silver.

"Do you know why you are here, Mrs. Collins?"

The dark skin of her gorgeous face is frayed of terror. She conceals it in the broadening of her shoulders.

Tanner indolently slants his head. "Do you know who I am?"

April, General Akamai, Luke, thirteen other Mediators and I are in the outdoor room. This questioning is recorded.

"Do you know who I work for?"

We can hear the leer underneath Erebos's dazzle, oblitering the ounces of the perpetrator's mustered strength, but she attempts to maintain that arrogance.

"Do you know who we are?"

"Answer me."

"No," she croaks.

"No, what? You have to be precise, sweetheart."

She swallows, her throat no doubt dry. Her elegance frame has shrunken, close to a dreadful skinniness. "No to each question."