Gone by Ghosts (Natasha Romanoff x OC)

~37~ I know you

TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter contains blood, violence, death, and torture

Kate's POV:

Unknown, Unknown ??/??/200?

"How can you still pray to God, when this is the life, he chose for you?" I rasp and the little girl's eyes open.

"I don't pray for me. It won't be long, and I'll be with my mommy.", the big Bambi eyes filled with hope look up at me. My chest hurts deeply as I look at the girl, not more than skin and bones. "I pray for you." The words shuddered through me like an earthquake. If not for those bars between us I would hold the little girl in my arms. I wish for nothing more than to be able to hold her, to comfort her. I reach for the boney hand. Dirt and blood blend between our palms.

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"When you cleared the house, who helped you?", the British man asks me calmly, sitting across the room. The bench under me is too cold, the light in my eyes too bright, and the straps around my feet and my wrists too tight. My head is heavy, and I just wish to go back to my cell, where I could starve in solitary. I look at the man behind the mask. "I did it by myself.", I answer. A lie that not even I believe. With the bench I lie on I am yanked back, my feet now higher than my head.

"Would you like to revoke that statement?", the soldier asks, still polite but quite a bit louder. I don't answer. I will not endanger another person. Even if that dick would totally deserve to get some payback, this isn't the kind he deserves.

My torturer covers my face with dark cloth, that still smells like smoke. I remember the day I woke up in this place, while I watch the lights sparkle through the tiny holes between the threads. I take my last breath as water pours over my face and into my nostrils. I gag and cough. I try to fight the cuffs, but I can't. I can't move, but my body is unwilling to follow my brain's commands. Even the contraction it needs to cough hurt. The water stops coming and I breathe in the wet, thick air through the smoked cloth.

"Was your company that day in the same school as you?", the man's voice has switched to an almost indifferent tone, which has me rolling my eyes. A boring play of power I'm not interested in. I hear graphite on paper, while I haven't answered yet again. Is he taking notes of my nonexistent answers? I hold my breath expecting the water's cold rush, but nothing happens. I know that as soon as I breathe out, she will try to drown me on dry land again. I let go of my it and it comes as I had foreseen it. Instead of the oxygen my body is gasping for, it receives water that it has previously craved so intensely. Panic rises in my water-filled chest and doesn't retreat when I finally stop inhaling their sewage.

"What was the nature of your relationship to this person?" Really persistent these bastards, but I kind of knew that already. I don't answer and the whole thing starts again. Water, coughing, crying in desperation.

"How did it feel when you found a box full of blueprints and encrypted USB drives? Did you feel angry? Confused? Disappointed?", a mocking tone, no answer, cold water, and panic. A lot of panic.

"Did you hide them in the home?" Panic.

"Did you bury them?" Panic.

"Did you burn them" Panic.

Until I am finally granted my solitude.

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I lift my chin when the door opens, and horror overcomes me. Her little feet shuffle over the bloodstained tiles and the man, who has previously towered over my kneeling body, turns his back to me. The quiet steps behind me scare me equally as much as the man grabbing her sweet face enrages me. Hatred fills my throat, before disappearing for a second, when the whip drops beside me, clapping as it hits the floor. I flinch intensely at the sound, but the fear doesn't disappear. Instead, it increases with every question I can't answer. With every heartbreaking cry the little girl is forced to let out.

"Please, I'll do whatever you want! I don't know where it is. Please, don't hurt her. Please, stop. Hurt me, not me. Hurt me! Hurt me!", I beg and cry. "She has nothing to do with this. Please. Hurt me." My voice shakes, my heart races and the tears drip off my jaw. The chains on my hands crash against my bones as I push forward. Nothing, not a centimeter closer to her. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I am so, so sorry!", I beg for her forgiveness and her tired Bambi eyes look at me. Red, swollen, and tired. The gun against her head is pulled away. I let out a cry of relief, that my torturer has mercy on me. On us. The relief crumbles under the fear when the man in the suit walks towards me.

"Let's try this again.", he says and steps behind me. He wraps his hand around my neck, and I choke on the sudden tight grip. "Where are the documents?", he whispers into my ear in a tone that is so sweet it becomes creepy.

The torturer pulls back the trigger and lifts the gun up against the girl's temple. "Please, I don't know where they are. I can't-", my begging is shut off by his choke, followed by another sweet whisper against my ear. "Ten.", he says and I frown. "Nine.", my eyes widen. I shake my head. "Eight."

"Please, don't hurt her!", I plead again.

"You will watch and you will know that her death is your fault", he remarked happily, "Six."

"Hurt me. Kill me!", I shout, but no matter how much I beg he only continues to count. "I am sorry.", I whisper just before the room is filled by the bang of a bullet leaving the barrel.

Bambi has finally joined her mother like she always dreamed she would. And it's my fault. The blood on her temple is my fault. It's all my fault.

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I twitch when my torturer opens the door abruptly. I have been hanging around alone, feet in the air, bored to my core, so I notice a change in her walk as soon as she steps inside. She limps almost unnoticeably, dragging her foot after her. Even her attitude is different. It has changed from the usual cold and empty expression to the kind of fear in her eyes that numbs you so much life doesn't feel real anymore. Today it seems she will try a new tactic. Leaving nothing up to my imagination, she displays all of today's tools in front of me on a little rolling cart. She passes by my right side as she always does, I hear the snap of rubber gloves being put on, then she walks back in front of me. Only this time she passes me on the wrong side. My body moves faster than my mind can comprehend. I swing back and kick with both my legs. The one to the head she blocks, the one to the chest however lands. She falls back, hits the cart with the back of her head, and then the floor. The sound is loud, and I'm scared that it might've alarmed someone outside. Hurriedly I fold my toes around the seam of her pants and pull her underneath me. The key between my toes I fold up with all the strength I have left. It takes several tries and with each my muscles cooperate less and less. I catch the keys in one hand and struggle to find the right one to free my other hand. The right key clicks and my side falls from the height. My shoulder snaps and I scream. Nothing they hadn't heard yet, right? I free the arm from its cuffs and curse under my breath. Now what? The door. I rush towards it past the cart. I stop, eye the tools and then the woman on the floor. A weapon. I need a weapon. And what if she wakes up? I need to restrain her! I look around, pick the zip ties from the drawer that used to be behind me, then, with a lot of effort and pain, zip her into the chains. I remember the gun she used, push down the memories and pat down the pants. I reach her ankle and feel the gun hidden in her boot. I pull it out and look up. Fear erupts in me when I see her look at me. Dizzy and disoriented. The color of her eyes brightened by the blazing LED lights. The lookinside them unknown to me, but the color all the more familiar. Green. Emeraldgreen-

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Be honest did you see that coming?

I'm sorry if that one was a bit much

Ready for the last chapter, guys?

I am sad and excited all at once

~1493~