I know it's been a long time since I updated. Longer that I realized actually…sorry! Thank you everyone for all the wonderful reviews. I'm actually posting this chapter for you! I'm thrilled that you like this enough to leave reviews, they're what inspired me to post again today! Also, I make no promises as to when the next update will be, but there will be another one…eventually. Hopefully sooner than later. I'm actually working on an original book that I want to have published eventually, but every now and then think about this story and where it's going to go, especially when I tune in to GH! I am not a fan of NuKristina and the whole Trey storyline. I want the original Krissy and Ethan back! Ah well, a girl can dream! In the meanwhile, please enjoy my newest chapter! Also, please keep reviewing; I love to know what you think!

Chapter 25

Michael watched his sister sleep fretfully in one of Wyndemere's ornate spare rooms, uncertain if he should try again to wake her. Kristina was muttering and mumbling incoherently to herself, thrashing her head from side to side; to be truthful, he was uneasy with the entire situation.

On one hand, he'd welcome the opportunity to shake her until her teeth rattled and demand that she tell him what the hell was going on. He was her big brother, and for many years, her best and most trusted confidant; despite all of that …she'd been lying to him for the better half of a decade. He was beyond anger and outrage; he was hurt and afraid for her. What was so horrible, so terrible, that she'd changed so much from the person he thought he knew?

On the other hand, this was Kristina; she'd been through things with him that no one else could ever understand or imagine. She'd stood with him, and by him, during some of the best and worst moments of his life. Instinctively he wanted to trust her; to believe in the person he'd known her to be all their lives. Despite her fabrications and manipulations, Kristina was a good person, a great friend, and a fiercely devoted sister and daughter. If she'd felt the need to mislead to them, there had to be a compelling reason.

As for Sokolov, he didn't know what to think. Whoever the man was, he had no business even breathing the same air as Kristina. She drew his attention away from his musings when she went completely motionless and utterly silent; before he could move or speak to reassure her, Kristina's eyes shot open. She rolled to her side and then to her knees, her right hand sweeping underneath the pillow she'd been laying on, as if looking for something. She looked momentarily confused, when she realized that whatever she was looking for wasn't there. A gun, he realized with a knot of dread forming in his stomach; his baby sister was looking to find a gun under her pillow.

"Kristina." He murmured her name softly; her eyes snapped in his direction and the muddled and vulnerable look on her face tore at his heart.

"Michael? What happened? What's going on?" as she spoke she brought her hands up to the sides of her head and rubbed at her temples.

Kristina was beyond confused. She had a headache the likes of which she'd never known before, and her thoughts were fuzzy and disjointed; it felt like someone had clubbed her over the head with an Acme mallet. The room was unfamiliar, but the view out the window told her that she was at Wyndemere. Her brother took a hesitant step towards her, but when she glanced up to meet his eyes, the haze clouding her mind suddenly vanished as if it had never been…Aleksandr!

Michael watched his sister transform before his eyes; it was unsettling to see her change so drastically in the span of just a few seconds. She went from leaning wearily against the bedpost of the ancient oak bed, to standing straight and at attention…posture rigid and hands clenched at her sides. Her eyes hardened and narrowed into an expression that he didn't recognize.

"Michael, where is Aleksandr?" her tone was harsh and clipped, which put his hackles up. She was the one in the wrong here; she was the one who owed them answers.

"He's safe, for now. Dad and the rest of the family have some questions for the two of you that -". She cut him off sharply.

"That doesn't answer my question. Where is he Michael?"

"Safe, and that's all you need to know until you are ready to -". She cut him off again, this time by storming unsteadily across the room, stepping into his personal space and jabbing a finger into his midsection.

"Where! Is he ok?" he'd heard that tone before, but never, ever directed at him...Michael fought down his own temper, and refused to fight with her, which would be wholly unproductive.

"I promise Kris, he's ok…calm down." Her eyes were scanning his face, and he knew she was looking for any sign of dishonesty. It was once again disconcerting to realize that she would recognize, just as she always could, if he were lying but that he could no longer say the same. She seemed satisfied for the moment and stepped back, then sat down heavily on the edge of the mattress closing her eyes with a grimace and bringing her hand back up to her head.

"Pretty bad huh?" he murmured, and she nodded.

"Can you grab me some water?" she sounded absolutely miserable, and he desperately tried to ignore the guilt that was gnawing at him.

"Sure." He crossed the room and dug into the fully stocked mini bar, glad that Alfred kept the family wing fully stocked and at the ready. When he returned and handed it to her, she took a large gulp and then sighed in relief, the brought the cool glass up to rest against the side of her temple.

"Is there any aspirin over there?" she asked, voice sounding hopeful.

"I'll check." Michael smiled and reached out to lay his hand on her shoulder in a familiar way, and she reached up to lay her hand over his with a hesitant smile. Maybe she wasn't so different from the sister he'd grown up with after all.

Satisfied that Michael was paying her absolutely no attention as he dug around the mini bar before he disappeared into the bathroom, Kristina quickly rose to her feet. On the decorative bedside table sat the room phone, a vase of fresh violets, and Michael's cell phone. With no preamble Kristina upended the remainder of her water into the handset of the phone. Then she picked it up and listened for a dial tone. Nothing…perfect; she quickly placed it back into the cradle, and then glanced at her brother's cell phone.

She knocked it on the floor and stomped on it as hard as she could with one heeled boot. Knowing he'd be back any second, she lobbed the empty water glass to the wooden floor and watched it shatter, even as she flung her weight - hip first - into the solid little table as hard as she could and allowed her momentum to carry her, and everything on the stand to the floor.

The vase practically exploded in a shower of glass and smashed around her but the table itself was too sturdy to fall. Instead it teetered and then skidded and scraped at least a full foot across Nicolas's beautiful floors. She felt a flash of guilt when Michael dashed back into the room, pausing momentarily in the bathroom doorway, Aspirin in hand, looking shocked and concerned. Faster than she'd predicted he dropped the medicine, took a few long strides and reached down to help her to her feet; she winced when she felt several stinging sensations along her left arm and shoulder.

"Kristina! Are you ok? What happened?" when he spotted the bloody gashes as he started to help her up Michael cursed under his breath and lifted her completely clear of the entire mess. Again, she beat back her guilt at his bewildered and alarmed expression and refused to let it sway her. She allowed her distress, pain, remorse, concern, every heightened emotion she was feeling, to seep into her voice as she began to cry.

"I'm so sorry Michael! I don't know what happened! I stood up to close the curtains, the light was hurting my eyes…but I think I got up too fast! I got so dizzy, and then I was on the floor and heard a crash! I broke Nikolas's vase, Alfred will be so upset! I'm so sorry!" Michael frowned, trying to make out the watery jumble of words that Krista was rattling off through her tears.

"It's fine Kris, it was an accident." He set her away from him and watched her sob as she held her bleeding hand to her chest. Again a feeling of remorse filled him; after a few seconds he managed to sooth his distraught sister and pulled her bleeding hand and arm away from her chest where she'd been clutching it. He plucked several pieces of glass from her left hand, gritting his teeth every time she flinched.

"Hang on a sec, and don't move Kris, I mean it! You could really hurt yourself." She nodded, sniffling as his shoes crunched across the broken glass scattered across the floor. He went into the bathroom again; she heard the slam of a cabinet door or two, then the rattle of a drawer before he stepped back into the room with a bottle of peroxide and a few cloth hand-towels. Her brother was nothing if not resourceful.

Again he sat next to her and helped her shrug out of her cropped, cuffed blazer; thankfully most of the glass hadn't managed to get through that. Her fitted V-neck blouse was a little ripped and a little bloody in few spots, but overall he was relieved to see that there was no real damage done. Together they checked and rechecked her hand and arm for any glass splinters. After several minutes of this, a few seconds of tug of war for her hand, and squabbling over the bottle of peroxide, Michael relented and carried the remaining medicine and now red-flecked hand towels back into the bathroom.

Kristina watched him expectantly from the bed, her booted feet crossed in front of her. She was leaning drowsily against the headboard, her blazer wadded up in her lap, injured arm crossed in front of her when he came back into the room. He crouched down and lifted both his shattered cell and the handset out of the debris, testing them both. Neither worked...of course. He glanced at her then back to the phones with an indecisive expression; she knew what dilemma was running through his mind; time to give him a nudge.

"Michael, can you hand me the aspirin now?" she sounded sleepy, and miserable. He retrieved the bottle from where it had fallen earlier, popped off the lid and handed her two pills. She took them with a scowl and a mutter of 'stingy'. He smiled and offered her two more, which she quickly dry swallowed and made a face.

"I think your questions are going to have to wait Michael." He could hear the sleep creeping back into her voice as she closed her eyes and relaxed back against the pillows propping her up against the headboard. He watched her for another minute as her breathing evened out and her head lolled to the side. Satisfied that she was out, he turned and left the room as quietly as possible, closing the door soundlessly behind him. Then he made his way across the hall to a nearly identical room and used that room phone to call downstairs. Alfred connected him to Nikolas; who in turn put him on speaker.

After a brief monologue, he was interrupted – mostly by Alexis – and ended up answering several pointless questions – no she hadn't told him anything yet, yes she seemed fine, no she hadn't cut herself too badly, yes his mom should come look at her.

"I think that the stuff we dosed her with really messed her up. Are we sure that it was safe? I mean, she's got a nasty headache, she's completely off balance, and she's light sensitive. When I left her in the room to call you she seemed to almost pass out -".

"What do you mean, when you left!" there was an eruption on the other end of the phone and he couldn't make what anyone was saying as they all tried to talk over each other. He tried to explain about the broken phones, which only seemed to make things worse. Finally, thankfully, Sam seemed to realize that they were getting nowhere and took him off the speaker phone. "Michael, I need you to go back to her room now and make sure she's still there, If she is, then please stay there until I can come up."

"But..." Michael had a sinking feeling in his gut as Jason took the phone from his wife. "It's very convenient, don't you think Michael? That she managed to get you out of the room. Sam and I are coming up now." Michael barely heard him as he stormed across the hall, phone clenched in his fist as he listened to Sam hand the phone off to his dad. Sonny was saying something but Michael couldn't hear it over the roaring in his ears as he flung open the door to Kristina's room. He clenched his jaw and brought the phone back up to his ear, interrupting whatever it was that his father had been saying.

"Sorry dad, you were right…she's gone. I'm going to look for her. I'll call you back." He ended the call and took off down the hallways towards the main stairs. With Sam and Jason coming up and him heading down, hopefully someone would run into her.

Sonny looked over at Luke as he hung up the phone, his expression dazed. Luke shrugged and crossed the room; he clapped a hand on his friends shoulder in show of fatherly solidarity. "Daughters man..." With a hopeless shake of his head he tossed back his scotch and made for the decanter; Tracy beat him to it – barely – and stalked across the room with it, leaving him to stare mournfully after her with a muttered "…but popsicle!"

"You wanted to help, so help!" was her snarled reply.

"I'll go down and let Ethan know what's going on." Johnny said, dashing out of the room and praying that his and Lulu's child was a boy. A daughter might kill him.

"It's going to be hard to find her" Nikolas said, rising to his feet from behind his desk. "She spent a lot of time here, playing with Spencer and Molly. She knows most of the passageways and tunnels. If she's trying to leave, we won't be able to find her."

"I'll call the launch and tell them that there's no one allowed on or off the Island until they hear from me or you Nikolas." Alexis said, picking up the phone Sonny had discarded and dialing several numbers as she turned to stand by the fireplace.

"I'll head down to the dock just in case." Dante muttered as chaos ensued and everyone began to talk at once and over each other. Before he could leave the room a shrill, ear piercing whistle cut through the air, and that shut everyone up and got their attention. Everyone turned to look at Luke, who had one hand holding the decanter over his wife's head as she desperately tried to steal it back from him; his other hand was curled around his mouth. Dante wondered how his ex-father-in-law could whistle so loudly with an empty glass in one hand, a half full decanter in the other, and his wife attempting to climb him like a tree to get it back?

"I think we've all forgotten something. Our little Ace in the hole! Your precious little mob princess won't be leaving without the Ruskie, I guarantee it. See pudding, I'm helping" Luke pointed out. Tracy lowered her arms but continue to glare at him. He just smiled at her indulgently and poured another glass.

"Alright, but Dante I agree with you. Go ahead and go down to the dock, just in case." Sonny said. His oldest son nodded and left the room.

"Do you have a video system?" Sonny asked Nikolas, who only nodded, already ahead of him as he pulled up the feed on the monitor of his laptop. Several black and white scenes blinked to life, then began to flicker from one camera view to another.

"I do" he said turning the laptop around "but it's easier to watch from the Security Guard's office, down by the main gate. This toggles through all the camera's a few at a time. In the office all of the cameras are a steady stream, no waiting. Unfortunately none of the guards are here today, which I thought would be prudent at the time, considering what was going on."

"Ok, Carly you and Olivia head there and watch the cameras. Call us if you see anything." Sonny delegated. Carly cocked her eyebrow and opened her mouth up as if to argue, but was interrupted by Olivia who clamped a hand over her mouth and glared at her best friend.

"We're happy to help. C'mon Carly." She said meaningfully. Carly glowered at her for a moment before nodding and allowing Olivia to tug her out of the room.

"Alfred will give you the keys!" Nikolas called after them before turning back to address what remained of the group. "I think that the rest of us should -" he started to speak but broke off, and cocked his head to the side curiously as Johnny came barreling back into the room breathing heavily.

"Ethan – lock – broken key." he doubled over and clutched at the stich his side.

"What are you rambling about?" Sonny demanded, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion. Johnny glared at him as he took several deep breaths in an effort to speak. Nikolas was impressed; to make it all the way down to the cellar and back in under just a few minutes was tough. Alexis went to hand Johnny a glass of water, but he waved it away.

"I was trying to say, Sonny, that Sokolov isn't locked in the cellar anymore! Ethan is…and Sokolov broke the key off in the lock." Johnny was very sure that Sonny was seriously considering shooting the messenger.

"Well now…" Luke said slamming back the last of his most recent drink and then setting the empty glass down with a bang. "…this is getting interesting. Dodge locked up in the Cassadine Klink, our resources spread thin, and finally agents Peel and Steed running lose around Wyndemere trying to find and free each other I'll wager. This is my kind of party. Vlad!" With a long suffering sigh, Nikolas turned to his ex-step-father, who was sounding entirely too chipper, and raised an inquiring eyebrow.

"We need a toolbox; do any of your flying monkeys have one? I know you don't, but someone around here has to! Find out where it is, and help Zacchara take the cellar door off the hinges."

"Ethan isn't the priority right now!" Sonny snapped.

"Obviously! But!" He paused dramatically before continuing "Dodge knows the secrets and catacombs of this place nearly as well as I do! I should know! I showed them to him! We need him on the hunt!" Nikolas just shook his head before heading towards the door and motioning for Johnny to follow him. He was going to have to Spencer-proof this house one day!

Sestrenka – little sister

Kristya - Russian diminutive (kind of like a nickname) of Kristina

Sasha - Russian diminutive (kind of like a nickname) of Aleksandr

Bolshoy Brat - Big Brother

Anfisa - Flower

Matʹ - mother of

lyubov - love

Kazan, Russia – *Wikipedia definition* - Kazan is the capital city of the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia. With a population of 1,105,000 (2002), it is the sixth largest city of Russia.

Kolyma, Russia – *Wikipedia definition* - The Kolyma region is located in the far north-eastern area of Russia in what is commonly known as Siberia but is actually part of the Russian Far East.

Moscow, Russia - *Wikipedia definition* - Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia.