Cover image was created by IsaCrisis on DA. Link to image: isacrisis/art/TEW-Laura-Victoriano-710818642
She awoke and felt herself under thick warm covers. This bliss did not last long however, before her mind began waking up to reality. Where was she? Who was she? Not only that but why did her body ache? She felt her back, her upper left arm, and her head throb.
"Ow," she grumbled. She sat up and looked around. She was in a very luxurious bedroom. It seemed that someone very rich owned this house. But what was she doing here?
She suddenly heard a knock on the door. She turned her head to the door.
"Who is it?" She asked.
"It's Ruben," the person said. Ruben? That didn't sound familiar.
"Uh, come in," she said. The door open and handsome and well dressed man entered. His was of medium height, had very rich clothes, bright blonde hair (with quite a big forehead), bright blue eyes, and bright blonde eyebrows that were almost nonexistent.
"Laura, thank goodness you're awake," he said with a look of relief. He walked over to her bed and sat on it. Was that her name? Laura. It didn't feel right.
"I was very worried that you might not ever wake up. You were out for quite a while," he continued.
"Where am I? What happened?" she questioned. She was very confused.
"You don't remember much do you?" he said "Laura you were in a fire." Her eyes widen. A fire?
"Really?" she asked rather concerned.
"Yes. You were out in the barn and it caught fire. I managed to rescue you without any injury. But you were burned in a few areas. That's why your body is probably sore. But don't worry, I managed to bandage you up," he said. That would explain why her body ached. She rubbed her left arm that was rather sore.
"Laura, the fire probably caused some memory loss. I'm your brother Ruben Victoriano. You and I are very close, our parents died in a car accident years ago," he said. She stared at him. That was a lot to take in. It's hard to believe that a fire would've caused her to lose all her memories, but then again, she guessed that anything was possible.
"Did you call the fire department?" She asked.
"No, because if I did, you be at a hospital, not here," he replied. "Besides that barn was old anyway, we can always buy a new one," he continued. She nodded. She noticed how dark the room was and she looked over at the windows, it was pitch black out.
"What time is it?" she asked.
"10:30 P.M., but I'm sure you're hunger aren't you," he responded. She nodded again.
"Then come with me," he continued. She pulled the blankets off of herself and slid her legs over the side of the bed. He took her hands as he helped her up. She wobbled and she had a sudden surge of head rush.
"Careful now, you might be a little unbalanced due to the accident," he said. He began to walk her out of the room before she finally started being able to balance. He brought her downstairs and into the Dining Room. He pulled back a seat at the end and let her sit down before he scooted her in.
"I'll be right back, I believe we have some left overs," he said. He quickly ran off into the kitchen. She looked down at her hands, she saw her long red sleeves along with her long dress and in her peripheral vision she saw her long black hair. She looked down at it. It looked very oily and was very messy. She picked a lock of it. She felt the dirty oil between her fingers. Ew- she let go and continued to stare at it. Why would she have let her hair get so dirty and not wash it? She thought.
She felt that keeping it clean was something she would do. In fact why is her hair so long in the first place? She was more of a short hair kind of person. For a second, she could've sworn she remembered something. She had an image in her head of short brown hair. But it seemed to slip away. She furrowed her brows. Did she just remember something for a split second? Before she could think of an answer, Ruben came back into the Dining room, holding a platter with food on it.
"Here you are, Chicken Parmesan with a side of steamed broccoli," he said. He set the platter down and she looked at it. It looked good, but it didn't seem like something she would consider a favorite. She liked things simple and more mainstream. In fact, it seems like a lot of things about this is wrong.
Just as she thought that, the room flashed to static for a second before turning into this nightmare version of itself. The room was much more decrepitude and it seemed like it was uninhabited. This confused her, but nothing could match the fear she had when she saw Ruben. Instead of the attractive young man from earlier, he was replaced with a nightmare version of himself. He was wearing a dirty and rotting white cloak and was shirtless, revealing a horribly half burnt body. Fear gripped her when she saw him, but was even more frightened when she saw his face. Some parts of it were burnt like his body but his blue eyes were now a clear greyish color, his eyebrows really were nonexistent now and his blonde hair was nowhere in sight. Her blood had run cold when she focused on all of him, he looked so terrifying in this form.
But right then the room flashed static once again and everything turned back the way it was previously. Ruben was once again normal looking and so was the room. Ruben gave a look of concern.
"Are you… ok?" he asked.
Her eyes dashed around the room. Checking everything out. Before she quickly focused on him again.
"Huh, oh yes. I just sort of became dazed there for a sec," she replied. He sat down at the opposite end of the table.
"Well you did just go through a traumatic experience," he said "So it's to be expected." She nodded and began eating the chicken parmesan while Ruben stared intently at her, not taking his eyes off of her for a second. Even though she could only see him through her peripheral vision, she could see the longing in his eyes. She ignored him and finished eating.
"I'm done, so may I be excused?" she asked.
"Of course," he replied. She got up, pushed her chair in, and quickly went back upstairs to her room. She closed her door and gave a breath of relief. She couldn't stand him staring at her like that. He's probably just relieved that I'm alive, she thought.
She walked over and sat down at the dressing table and began combing the mess she called hair. While she did, she stared at herself in the mirror. The dirty hair aside, she was a very beautiful woman. She had pale skin with some freckles across her nose, blue eyes, and a just absolutely beautiful smile. While this was all amazing, it didn't feel like it should've belong to her. It felt like a projection. Like this look was on top of her real one. Sure, when she waved into the mirror, she saw herself wave back, but something just wasn't right.
A thought popped into her mind. Why wasn't her hair burnt? She had been paying a lot of attention to it, so she was surprised she didn't notice sooner, she pulled her hair over her shoulder and examined the ends. If she was in a fire, wouldn't her hair also be burnt, at least a little? I mean her hair is so long that if parts of her upper body were burned, wouldn't her hair be burnt as well? She examined all of it. None of it showed signs of being burnt. That doesn't make sense. Then again, none of this seemed to be making much sense.
She surprised herself when she let out a yawn. She realized that her body was still healing and that she probably needed more rest. She put the brush down and began opening drawers in the room. She eventually found the one that seemed to have PJ's. She put a white gown on and got into bed. She reached over and turned off the light. While snuggling up, she realized that she didn't check her body for bandages or wounds. Eh, she'll check them in the morning. Besides maybe all of this confusion/ speculation was just in her head and that she would feel better tomorrow.
She closed her eyes and tried to fall asleep. But not even a minute later she heard footsteps approach her room. Her eyes flew open and she started to feel a cold sweat on her forehead. She knew it was Ruben. She couldn't stand being around him right now thanks to his creepy staring earlier.
Don't come in here. Don't come in here! She thought. She heard the door open.
Shit!
"Laura?" he called. She didn't reply. He walked over to the bed. She began shaking.
"Laura I know you're awake," he said. He sat on the side of the bed next to her. She tried her best to calm down. He then began stroking her right leg. Her heart started pounding loudly, her cheeks were stinging red and heat was ring up to them. What is he doing?! Didn't he say he was my brother? She thought.
"Oh, Laura…" he muttered. He just couldn't take it anymore. He longed for his sister. He slid onto the bed right on top of her. She looked at him.
"Ruben?" she asked fearfully. He leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. She couldn't believe this was happening. He then kissed her lightly on the lips and began kissing her multiple times on the neck.
"Laura," he hissed. She was terrified, what should she do?! He started to unbuttoned her gown and slowly slide it down her shoulders. As he did she felt his hand slide onto her upper left arm right onto one of her wounds. She flinched.
"Ow." She winced. And immediately, she realized that she could completely feel his hand, nothing was in between. She looked down. Even in the dark she could tell there was no wound there and it wasn't even wrapped like he said. It was almost as if a wall came down. Her memories flooded back to her so fast that her head almost throbbed.
Mobius, Ruvik, Sebastian and Joseph, STEM, Leslie.
She wasn't Laura Victoriano…
She was Juli Kidman. A Mobius agent who had been assigned to pose as a detective and bring Leslie back.
She looked at Ruben. His eyes were widen in surprise and she could tell just by the look on his face that he knew exactly what had happened. Everything changed once again into the nightmare version of itself. The perfect Ruben had turned back into Ruvik and the confused Laura turned back into Juli.
She looked down at herself. She was back in her old clothes, which were still torn and ripped up. She looked at her left arm. The wound on her upper left arm was revealed to be a big gash she got earlier. It made sense now, why her body and arm ached, they were wounds that she got before all of this. They weren't burns at all. She looked back at Ruvik.
"Ruvik?" she said at a loss for words. He sighed disappointingly and dropped his head.
"Oh, Kid. Why couldn't you have just played along?" he said while looking back up at her. Right then, her eyes opened and she found that she was in a dark and metal cell. She sat up and looked relief. When suddenly she heard a voice.
"Are we awake?" She looked up. It was the same nurse lady who was here last time. She held open the door. Juli got up out of bed and faced her.
"It's you again. What- what is this place?" Juli asked.
"I'm afraid I cannot answer that," she said before turning away "But I guess you can call it, the Safe Haven." She walked away, back into the main room.
Juli ran her fingers through her hair. That was probably the scariest thing she had ever been through. Her stomach felt like it was twisted into a knot. There was so many burning questions. Like why did Ruvik do any of that in the first place? Why did he try to convince her that she was his sister Laura? And why did he try to have sleep with her? Her brain was trying to comprehend all of what just happened.
She felt so unsettled by all of it, but she swallowed her fear and calming herself down by taking deep breaths. She unhooked her flashlight from her belt. No matter what, she couldn't let any of this hold her back. She still had a job to do.
Well, now wasn't that a trip. This was quite the mind fuck huh? XD If you want an explanation, please PM me. But I mainly want you guys to figure this out for yourselves.