Evil Intent part 6
"No, I have to be dreaming. One of the orderlies must have given me a sedative…" she reasoned, "There's no way you're real." She said more confidently though the figure continued to grin at her through pointed teeth.
"What's wrong? You've been trying to kill Haley for years. You knew this was coming… You've cheated me time and time again. Now it's time for you to pay the price..." It grinned, raising its scythe and arching it down toward her neck before Adrian walked up and the figure disappeared as if it were smoke.
Neither of the orderlies seemed to have noticed anything and Adrian seemed just as confused to see her babbling to herself.
Haley looked over at Adrian, for once relieved to see her.
"Adrian, will you tell these idiots that I don't need medical treatment? I'm fine. He only nicked my shoulder." She pleaded in a rush.
Adrian gave her a strange look.
"You didn't hit your head or anything?" she asked uncertainly.
"No, I'm fine. Hugo's gone off the deep end. The bastard is trying to get me killed. The guy that just shot at me is in the medical wing and I know his dad taught him better than to stick to plan A and hope it works." She explained.
Adrian looked at the other two orderlies and dismissed them with a nod that said she had things under control.
"And why should I believe you over Hugo when he says you hit your head pretty hard and you were just talking to yourself?" she asked skeptically.
"Why else would I be asking YOU for help?" she shot back defensively.
Adrian looked at her for a long moment before wheeling her away from the wing and back toward solitary.
"I won't take you back to your cell after it's been shot to pieces but I will take you back to solitary. Something tells me you need some time alone anyway." She said.
Curiosity began to sweat at this.
"Fine, at least give me my knives then." She said adamantly, "I'm going to need them."
"And why in the HELL would I do that?" Adrian demanded, stopping to glare at Curiosity, "So you can go off and kill someone? I don't think so." She said, wheeling the gurney up to solitary once more.
"Talk about Zen…" she muttered as they approached solitary, "Except I'm not sure where the strawberry's at."
"What are you muttering about?" Adrian asked, quirking an eyebrow at her and stopping outside the doors.
"The Tiger and the Strawberry by Zen. Basically no matter what you do you're dead and there's supposed to be some small mercy like the rosebush outside the prison in the Scarlet Letter or the strawberry in Zen's story but so far I haven't seen anything close to a strawberry or a rose." She explained tiredly.
"Chance is in the medical wing and he just tried to shoot me as many times as he could and Joker's in solitary because he saved me from Chance so he'd have the pleasure of killing me himself. I'm not seeing any strawberries in this." She explained further not fully expecting Adrian to understand what she meant.
Instead she nodded and began wheeling her away from solitary.
"I see your problem." Adrian started.
"You do?" Curiosity asked, amazed that she had somehow avoided both solitary and the medical wing.
Adrian nodded. "You're not seeing any strawberries or roses because you're not dying. I'm taking you back to your cell next to Zai. You can thank me later but if you try anything funny after my baby's born you're going to regret it." She warned before opening the cell door and locking her inside.
Curiosity smiled gratefully at her now as she started to walk away.
"Hey Adrian?" she called back to her and Adrian turned around to face her.
"Thanks." She said, sincere for once.
Adrian smiled slightly now and looked at her shoulder before turning away.
"You might want to take care of that. It looks pretty deep." She said, walking away from her.
Curiosity looked down at her shoulder and saw that it was a bit deeper than she'd originally thought it was and quickly made use of the sink in her cell to wash it out, ripping a strip of cloth from the mattress to bandage the wound with.
It stung slightly but she was glad for it. It kept her focused, awake, and it reminded her that she was in fact still alive after everything that had happened.
After a few minutes she lied down on her bed and shifted her hands beneath her head and Zai made her way over to the wall they shared.
"Curiosity?" she called through the wall quietly.
Curiosity lay on the bed for a moment more before sliding her feet over the side and walking over to the wall.
"Yeah?" She answered quietly.
"What were you talking about with Adrian?" she asked, careful to keep her volume low so that they wouldn't wake Jonathan in the cell next door.
Curiosity hesitated a moment before answering.
"It's a REALLY long story… Someone I met a long time ago came back for a visit." she started, trying to play things down a bit, "He came all the way from Caldsville Illinois… let's just say he wasn't too happy with me." She said quickly, trying to get Zai to drop the subject but unfortunately she didn't.
"What happened?" she asked worriedly and Curiosity sighed.
"It's a long story. Let's just leave it at that." She said, trying to avoid the subject.
"All we have is time in here. Tell me what happened." Zai demanded, concerned.
Curiosity looked up at the clock and watched as a few seconds ticked by.
"Not always…" she said quietly, remembering the Memitim's scythe arching down toward her.
An icy chill ran up her spine at the thought of this and she shook her head as if it would shake away the memory and sighed in defeat.
"His name's Chance. I used to work for his dad a long time ago and when his dad decided that what I did for him wasn't enough I killed him. Chance seems a little bitter about that. He tried to shoot me a couple times and nicked my shoulder. He probably would have killed me if Joker hadn't come by. He wasn't too happy about Chance trying to kill me with a gun because he thinks that's HIS job and he doesn't think just shooting me is any fun. I don't really want to think about what HE has planned for me." She explained quietly, sitting down on the floor and leaning against the wall.
"Chance is in the medical wing now and Joker's in solitary. Hugo tried to have me sent to the medical wing with Chance because I threatened him earlier and I assume he wanted to prove a point… Adrian intervened though and was about to take me to solitary but somehow I convinced her to bring me here instead." She explained solemnly but then laughed uneasily to try and break the tension, "I told you it was a long story."
Zai was quiet for a moment and Curiosity began to get a little worried.
"Zai?" she asked.
"I don't know who this Chance guy is but Joker's not going to hurt you. I'll make sure of it." She said in a way that made her nervous that Zai was going to try something that was going to get her hurt somehow.
"No, you're not. This is my business and I'll deal with it by myself. I wish I hadn't told you about it. I SHOULDN'T have told you about it. Just leave it alone. I'll handle it." She said obstinately.
Zai seemed frustrated with her answer and she walked back to her bed and lay down.
Curiosity sighed and went back to her own bed.
"Trust me, it's better this way." She thought silently as she drifted off to sleep.