"We create monsters and then we can't control them."
Joel Coen
"A mother takes twenty years to make a man out of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes."
Robert Frost
Prologue
March 1, 2008
Unity, Virginia
"Please, please someone!" a small voice shouted, weak but determined. The prisoner it belonged to was the same, tears falling freely down her face as she pressed her face against the small covered window, smudging it as her breathe fogged it up. "Anyone please! Help!"
A delicate hand wrapped around the metal bars of the cage for support, her small legs trembling. Somewhere overhead there was the sound of something falling and breaking was heard followed by an almost frantic sounding voice. The girl froze, heart stopping as her green eyes went instantly, fearfully towards the door. After nothing happened the girl relaxed slightly and turned back to her task. Straightening back to her full height balanced precariously on the chair she'd been allowed she readied her sore throat to begin shouting again.
Before she could start though their was a groan behind her, lower down on the ground. In an instant the girl forgot her task and was on her knees beside the woman the sound had come from. For a moment the woman was still, almost deathly so. The girl felt her heart drop and fear chill her. Then the woman let out a sharp breathe, pained, but wonderfully, perfectly alive.
The girl let out a choked sob, her hand pushing the platinum blonde hair away from the woman's face.
"Natalia," the girl whispered, voice soft and tender hand cupping the woman's cheek. "Natalia wake up."
Slowly the woman's eyelids fluttered and finally they opened, reveling dazed, usually sharp blue eyes. After a moment they focused on the girl above her and flooded with relief. Before the girl could stop her the woman tried to stand up only to give a small shriek and fall back. The girl caught the woman's head before she hit the concrete and gently settled her in her lap. Tears pricked her green eyes as the girl used her hands to attempt to smooth the last of the woman's pain away.
"I'm sorry Natalia." the girl told her. "I think they hurt your ribs when they dropped you. Your middle was all bruised. I was so worried about your head. You've been out for three days."
Natalia looked up at her girlfriend confused. "Eva?"
Above them there was the sound of footsteps, much closer than the earlier breaking noise. Instantly Eva shushed Natalia and got to her feet. As her confused girlfriend watched her grab a large brick. The small girl struggled under the weight of it, but somehow managed to lift it up enough to slip onto the small window ledge and push it in blocking the only bit of light in the room. Natalia shivered slightly at the darkness, a deep instinctual fear gripping her.
A small hand wrapped around her own making her heart startle until she realized that it was just Eva.
"What's going on?" Natalia asked. She felt the younger female press against her side, slender arm wrapping gently around her middle as she felt Eva bend over her short blonde her brushing her face as her lips pressed warmly against Natalia's. It was a deep, wet kiss. Full of desperation and a deep affection.
"I love you Natalia."
The voice was quiet and sad. A chill went through Natalia as she was reminded suddenly of the last time she'd seen her mother. She'd bent to give Natalia and her siblings a sweet hug and a soft kiss on their foreheads. It had been a good-bye.
"Eva?"
A loud scrapping rang through the room, the sound of a door opening, making Natalia jump and then flinch at the pain the movement caused. Light streamed through the opening illuminating Eva's face. It wasn't pale and scared anymore, it was almost peaceful as she looked down at Natalia, green eyes loving and wet with unshed tears, a soft smile on her face, her favorite ribbon hanging loosely in her short blonde hair.
"Remember I'll always love you and I won't regret it." a fierceness took over her small heart shaped face. "They will never make me regret loving you."
Eva bent down to kiss her again obscuring Natalia's view as whoever had opened the door walked towards them. Eva didn't break the kiss as the approached, pushing closer to Natalia, desperate and warm. Some instinct made Natalia sense the good-bye and weakly her hands gripped Eva closer. They stayed like that until Eva was ripped away from her making Natalia cry out.
"Eva!"
Natalia turned on her side trying to catch sight of their captors only to see a masked man, hands holding tight around Eva's small body.
"Eva!"
"I love you, Nat!"
The door shut, making the room dark again and Natalia couldn't even feel the usual fear the dark caused. After what seemed like an eternity, but could only have been an hour Natalia heard it. The screaming. A sob worked its way through Natalia as she listened to Eva's screams helpless to do anything. Natalia tightened her hands into fists and felt a pain in her left. She realized something was there. Eva had slipped something there before they pulled her off.
Another sob broke out of her.
"Eva."