Thrumming heartbeats, wavering breaths, and hurried steps, he's racing against the grave.
As he reaches the entrance of the balcony, the furious gale—slams the door rudely on his face.
Pushing open the door; he feels the agony of a soul burning down.
"Neva!!"
He sees her, there, standing on the bridge to the darkest valley.
He couldn't breathe anymore.
As Neva stands there stiff, he runs to her with an incoherent head. The heart threatening to rip out his chest.
At this moment, the crumpled up mind, blurred senses, mania of emotions; Ishmael became a plague to himself.
From the slithery surface, the petite foot slips away. Ishmael within a tumultuous beat of the heart, wraps his arms around her legs.
The veins in his widened eyes, scarlet; agonizing horror numbs his world.
"No... you can't leave me."
A trembling body, his voice is a whisper.
He's unable to swallow this suton, this scarlet scene.
Neva wanted to kill herself.
His Neva, wanted to die...
And it has happened twice.
Neva's torned back from the glowing scenery of a wildflower dream, to the pandemonium of hävitys. She struggles her legs to break free, but his grip only tightens further.
Ishmael carries her down on the ground, while she kicks the air and her screams echoes around the woods, soaring away the flock—the dark silhouette of birds.
Her legs dying on her, she falls in his arms.
He holds her close and tight, their tangled forms, limp knees on the floor.
She tries to peel him away, fight to push him as far as she could. Her finger nails harrowing deep in his flesh, his shoulder bruised and bleeding him through his ebony clay shirt.
She beats him with her fists, her cries piercing the silent night; he wouldn't even spare her a peaceful death.
But he's hushed, embracing her secure, for right at the thumping, living beats of the heart; her warmth is all he seeks.
"Don't touch me!! Don't touch me!!"
Screams, ragged shouts—tears apart her sore throat.
"Get away from me!!"
She cannot move anymore, his arms roped around her weary form.
The sky looks through her pain: the black clouds looming over, the roaring thunder storms, the lightning bolts flickering alike her shredding senses, and as she's weeping ocean of salty tears, the rain comes trickling, wailing along with her.
For this verity; this haunting reality she wishes to escape.
"Please let me go!" Neva's arms are limp by her sides. Shudders her body because of the cries.
She mourns her soul; she greives her fate and those who has had there twisted around her own.
The rain drenches them, each drop a soft pat of reassuration for her. The heaven feels her misery, and they wish to wash away all the pain.
"I can't. I love you." He murmers out, closening, clenching their flesh, he hopes to merge them together.
Neva shakes her head furiously. "You don't deserve to love!"
"You don't deserve love!"
She can't let a monster like him bully the purity of love she lives.
"You don't know love..." She whispers.
Looking up at the sky—she closes her eyes, she prays for someone, for something to release her from this wretched, ruined body.
She couldn't bear this hollow bones, the overwhelming burns, the hovering demons anymore... She's bleeding out all; but the flesh refuses to let her go.
"You'll never know how much I love you. No one can ever love you like I do!" Ishmael says through gritted teeth. In the span of a moment, he picks Neva up, carrying her in his arms.
Neva pushes him, forcing away his chest, but all her attempts to free away deems futile against his beastly strength.
"Please, kill me. I can't endure this cruelty anymore." She murmers, while he's walking them down the stairs of the balcony.
The rumbling of storm and drumming of rain, muffled inside the thick walls of the mansion.
"Is your hatred towards me this earnest? Are you so disgusted even by my children?"
His agonized eyes searches her own. She's not struggling anymore, but she's facing away, refusing the reflection of his features in her glossy orbs.
"It's deeper than any abhorrence."
A pained smile flickers up Ishmael's lips.
"I cannot alter the past choices, but if that's how you feel because of my sins. For you I'd carve out a perfect future." He says, and he fnally has her large, confused and scornful eyes on him.
"I will make it so you don't feel the hurt, or even remember them."
As they finally reached the room, he saunters in through the open door.
He lay her on the bed, the dripping wet clothes still on, sticking to their body, it soaks transparent the white sheets.
He hovers over her, the water droplets from his hair falling down on her face. And when she looks away, avoiding his gaze, he grabs her chin, turning her to face him.
Then with a wide, psychotic grin, he says, "I will erase your memories, all of your living, with or without me. The good and the bad."
He feels the terrified eyes on him.
Her guts roiling, Neva shrinks in the sheets.
After all that, when she thought it couldn't get worse anymore.
Ishmael always unveils the cruelest wrath of hell—awakening the undermost, the strangest fear she never thought one could ever derive within.
He carreses her baby bump, rubbing his thumb over gently. "I'll be all you have. We will start afresh. And you'll love me and our children."
Ishmael glances up at her. She's silent in deny, overcome by his ghastly nature. He caresses her cheek, and kisses her ever so tenderly on the lips, lingering leisurely, moving to the chin—drinking the moist rain and coldness on her flesh, drizzling kisses along her smooth neck...
While she just stares up blankly at the ceiling. She couldn't process anything.
He says, he is erasing her memories.
He's eroding Rhett, her little boy, her aunt and uncle from her life.
He's clearing away Neva.
Rhett would be just a dream; a beautiful dream she could no longer recall.
Everything would cease to exist anymore.
Their 'Us' could never have been there.
Ishmael is the forgotten nightmare, altering her truth in his illusions of Eden.
There... He will pretend to be her redeemer. The leading man; he will have her life gyrate around him.
---
Inside the hustle–bustle of a small country restaurant, with warm ambiance of golden lantern around: three men sat there, glancing at the entrance door every now and then—each time the tinkling of bells resounded, welcoming a customer in the room.
"Is the information even legit? Boss if he doesn't show up within the next five seconds I'm gonna rip my ass outta here!" He grumbles at the middle-aged looking man.
"Knight, patience. Drop the glass!" The elder man replies with a glare, at the man accross—with handsome, sculpted features. His eyes, although hazy from gulping down drink after drink in boredom.
"Hunter, cease his glass." He instructs the man beside him.
"Hunter choose! You've got to make a choice! Elk or me, your leader?" He asks Hunter, downing the alcohol with a shrinking expression, before Hunter could snatch it from him.
Gaining nothing but a stoic look from Agent Hunter, he shifts his gaze at Elk.
"What Boss are you huh?! How could you make a heartbroken person, me, come to work?! And I can't even savor a sip?!" Knight sighs out so loud, placing the glass down with a thump.
"Old Granny!! One more glass of beer here!!" He shouts at the aged owner of the restaurant.
But the woman had hearing deficiency, and Agent Knight wasn't heard.
"Stop crapping out rubbish! How insolent of you to get drunk!" Elk scolds the young man blabbering gibberish words.
Agent Knight gasps, "I'm in utter disbelief!! How do I look drunk in your eyes?! I've sipped no more than two drop-" a hiccup forces out his throat.
Elk glares at him, his face darkened in annoyance at the man covering his mouth and smiling slyly.
But before he could return back a harsh punishment, the clinking of bells resonates round the noisy room, and the awaited someone catches Hunter's clear eyes.
As he informs Elk, Elk glances there, his eyes beholding unfathomable emotions—as he peers at his beloved friend's son.
He walks inside the restaurant, earning a sweet welcome from the owner when she heeds his presence.
His grim, vigilant eyes scrutinizes a table to rest for dinner. A room filled with noisy chatters and loud laughs from drunk men.
This happened to be the only open restaurant at this hour. And so he pats the back of the little boy sleeping tranquiled in his arms, hoping he wouldn't startle awake, and have an unbroken sleep.
But in a glance of perception, his sharp senses detects the blaring gazes on him. He looks ahead at the people, seeming not too stunned to find the Agents trailing him once again.
Elk stands up, approaching the man standing still, as does Agent Hunter, leaving the drunk Knight on the table.
"Oh? Ohh the Hero has finally arrived!!" Knight laughs out, standing up only to stumble back down on his seat.
"Czar," Elk breathes out, but he frowns at the slumbering baby in his arms, the little fists firmly grabbing onto his clothes.
"Over there. My son needs to sleep." Rhett says, indicating at the table he found at the quiet and endmost of the row.
"Yes. As you wish." Elk sighs, relief washing over him as Rhett did not refuse to acknowledge their presence. But the frown between his brows only deepens as he follows him.
Agent Czar has a son?
Why did he not know that?
He looks over at Hunter, who just shrugs in response. Even Hunter was unbeknownst to this startling revealation. They would always be kept under the dark unless and until; Rhett wishes to.