Firstly, I will apologize for making you guys wait so long for an update - but due to work, and personal stuff, it's honestly been a struggle to find the time, to conjure up a new chapter for you all. But, here I am, with a new chapter - just for you! I can't stress this enough, but the support i'm getting for this fanfic is AMAZING! Truly! The numbers that this story has reached is almost incomprehensible to me, so thank you guys so much for being, well awesome! I wouldn't been still writing this if it wasn't for all you fabulous readers out there, so, due to your support, I am determined to finish this for you all - at the best of my abilities.
Anyway, I really hope that you enjoy this one, as always comments are appreciated, as i love to know what you guys think. Oh, and a small heads up, prepare yourselves, because the likelihood is, that this FanFic will be drawing to a close pretty soon. I'm in the process of wrapping up the story...
Well, I've rambled enough, haha. Thank you all so much! Stay Awesome :) Enjoy~
"Christ! It's like a god damn war zone out here!" that same panicked voice barked – bursting from the lips of a man who cradled Katerina's dazed, crumbling body in his arms. He vigilantly dashed through the perilous air, with Katerina swaying like a doll in his gentle, yet secure grasp.
The explosions of gunshots and perilous screams flooded Katerina's ears. The horrific shrill eruptions were so loud, so brash and callously dreadful that it was enough to make her ears bleed from the horrendous ordeal. The smell of smoke, and metal was enough to make her stomach flip. The splatters of blood polluting the grass enough to make her retch or faint. But her eyes would not divert from the spot in which Vaas had said his goodbye. She looked out for him. Fretfully scanning the area as if in search for some precious object of some sort. The sting in her glassy eyes was something she didn't have time for! She had to catch sight of him! One small glimpse! She could not leave without seeing him! She couldn't! She persisted on checking the area with her racing eyes, even if beads of clouded tears wickedly fought against her to blur her vison. She couldn't leave without him! Fuck! She nearly bellowed aloud, Fuck, where is he? Where's Vaas?
Katerina didn't even acknowledge that she was being stuffed into a rumbling car. It was not until she felt the disturbing discomfort of a rattling seat, causing heavy, ghastly vibrations to crudely caper through her skin that she realised that she had been dropped from someone's grasp.
Her fingertips gript onto the edge of the car, and she craned her neck, biting her lip and wincing as she peered out and fretfully scanned the war zone.
"Fuck!" one voice bellowed out. It was behind her, in which Katerina snapped her head behind her to look upon the person who spoke. The face was recognisable, she had seen him before. But from where? It couldn't have been someone she resented or feared, for none of them sickly sensations slithered across her skin. She analysed his face with narrowing, inquisitive eyes, unearthing anything hidden behind his thin emerald eye; noting the green bandana coiled around his head, and the curling tight rings of dark hair sticking out in mad directions on the top of his skull. She found it curious that one eye was covered with a daunting black eye patch tightly coiled around his head. A grim scar had engraved his skin, stretching from his nose all the way to his cheek.
"I know I'm charming to gawk at las, but we gotta get our arses into gear," the man comically teased, with a sweet Irish twang to his words, "now we gotta get the feck outa here, before we end up curling over, okay? It's turned god damn feckin' crazy out there; if we stay, were sitting ducks – meaning were dead." "You're sweet little face won't do no good when it's cold and still, will it?" he calmly stated with a grin, reaching out his hand to caress Katerina's face.
"Don't touch me!" she viciously barked, snapping her head away and abruptly reaching for a bag that was chucked on the floor. She rummaged through it quickly, throwing her hands inside, and raking them through all the pointless objects that was stuffed into it. She suddenly let out a sharp squeal, a crackled cry of lancing pain hissing through her clench teeth. Her fingers curled up like shrivelled leaves, in which she subconsciously brought up her hand to bite down onto them, with tears swelling in her eyes.
The man anxiously looked across to her, toying with the controls in the car and resting his hands on the torn steering wheel. The blood dribbling from her fingertips made him wince; the swelling redness to some fingers making his toes curl. The daunting graze carved deep into her cheek, was something that made your skin shudder. The wounds behind the pools of blood on her hand and chest – indescribably painful. There was no doubt – the girl was in a real bad shape. "There should be a first aid pack in there," he stammered, with a dry cough in between his brittle words, "I would help but I'm afraid we can't stay 'ere. Take a shot for the pain."
The girl only looked to him, nearly scowling with her lips screwed into a state of sorrow and anger, before she swiftly drew her attention back to the contents of the bag on her lap.
"He didn't rip out all the purity from you did he?"
Katerina stopped to look at the man beside her, who gazed at her with wide, friendly eyes that were awaiting an answer. She brought her eyebrows together, and then her eyes widened. Why was she so stupid? How did she not see? "Declan?" she gasped. What happened to him? Did the Rakyat do that to him?
An explosion nearby cut off any conversation. The shrill eruption rang in Katerina's ears, blurring her vision like an opaque blanket of grey ash. All that she heard was the faint growl of the car, and then the vibrations throttled her body. Moans of the wind whispered like suffocating ghosts in her ears, with the abruptness of the fierce wind smacking her in the face. The sharpness of the biting breeze made her eyes water, with a sting infesting pupils as beads of clouded tears swelled in her eyes. When the blurry figures came into view she understood what was happening. She was leaving! Where was she going? How could she leave now?
She felt the inviting, hot embrace of adrenaline devour her body – dominating her senses and rational thoughts. The agony jabbing madly at her, for that moment, pooled away like the quick melting of white ice.
Abruptly tugging on the hissing zip of the grey rucksack, ceiling it shut, she promptly flung it over her shoulder, and threw her hands towards the handle of the zooming car, not giving her movements much thought or attention.
"Fuck!" was the last thing that rang in her eardrums, before she threw he body out of that racing car, squeezing her eyelids tightly shut and bringing her arms close to her chest. The bumps and scratching rocks on the road jabbed into her flesh, as her tumbling body gruffly rolled across it, feeling to her, as if some cruel soul was viciously punching her body. The rocks scratched at her, yanking and tearing at her clothes – probably leaving faint red nicks and grazes across her skin.
When her body stopped toppling down that harsh, toothed road, she let out a mad groan of pain – crying out a sharp roar of discomfort as she lay in a bed of stabbing rocks. Blinding yellow sand blew up from the ground, surrounding her like a cloud of shadowed smoke. Her eyes trailed to the bag that was a few feet away from her. To her it was so far away. But she had to get to it!
Another groan of pain slipped from her tongue – rattling in her parched throat – as she dragged her aching body across the jagged, bitter ground, with the pull of her arms. Her elbows burrowed into the dry dirt, raking across stones and draggling across the sandpaper road. Speckles of blood trailed behind her, as her body towed its way through the tormenting path to the bag.
When she finally reached it, a sigh of relief erupted from her mouth - thin strings of blood trickling from the small gash in her bottom lip. She could barely push her body up, so instead quickly rummaged through the bag, with her body still laying limply in the dry dirt. She tugged out the first aid box from the sack, with heavy bursts of breath spurting from her lips, as she pried the box open with any strength she had left. She flung her hand to the first syringe that caught her eye, not bothering to glance at the small label attached to it. Gritting her teeth, she quickly jabbed the needle into her waist, tear droplets spitting out from her eyes as the sharp needle pierced her skin. Tossing the used syringe into the dirt, she quickly dived for the next thing. She took the small bottle in her hands, shaking with anxiousness with her flesh throbbing. She bit onto her lip and sluggishly unscrewed the lid, still trembling as she glared at the bottle. This is going to hurt, she mused, with a wince, before tipping the bottle's contents onto her fingertips.
Her cries of pain rattled through the dense jungle air, with the agony in her screech making nearby creatures scamper away into the wilderness. Even the trees turned away, with their branches quaking in the breeze as the deprived girl's squeals of excruciation echoed in the air. Tears rolled down he cheeks, as she shakily wrapped a bandage around her the fingertips that had lost their nails. She then proceeded to lift up her shirt, to give the sickening wound in her gut the same treatment.
There was no more bandage left for her arm, chest or collarbone, in which she left the less bothering wounds to embrace the bitterness of jungle air – unable to cease the beads of blood which, from time to time, trickled out from the wounds and down her skin. There was enough alcohol left for her to knock some down, but she gaged and coughed it all up quickly when realising what she had done. It burned her throat when the cruel contents gushed up her throat. Why had she just done that? It was stupid…
Katerina shakily stumbled to her feet, jabbing another syringe into her skin to let herself escape from the tormenting pain that plagued her body, and even knocking back a few pills to speed up the process. She did not care for any effects the excessive use of drugs did to her. She had to get moving… now! The hand gun that she had taken from the rucksack, shook in her hand as she held it beside her waist. Heavy bursts of breath erupted from her mouth, in short, unsteady gasps, as she looked ahead, studying the hazy figure that came rushing towards her.
"Las, what the feckin' hell did ya do that for?" the figure bellowed, with the ecstatic waves of his arms, "I'm meant ta keep ya alive. Not be responsible for ya death!"
With her arm quivering, and the gun rattling in her grasp, Katerina slowly lifted it in the air, with the mouth of the gun pointing directly towards Declan, who raised his hands in shock – gulping and moving cautiously slow, with beads of sweat mustering on his brow.
"What are ya doing las?" he nervously yapped, ceasing his movements when Katerina jerked the gun with a sharp motion of her wrist. He noted the white bandage swathed around her right hand – the same trembling hand which clasped onto the gun – with a sort of plaster wrapped around one fingertip. The same grey plaster was coiled around other wounded fingertips on her other hand. But Declan's attention soon diverted back to the weapon in the girl's grasp. She held it loosely, to his surprise, with no tightness. Her fingers trembling, with a droplet of sweat trickling slowly down her skin.
"Go back Declan," she warned, chocking on muffled sobs that slowly started to crawl up her throat, creating tears to muster on her eyelashes. "Don't come any closer. Please."
"Las. What are ya doin'? I'm not the enemy. Ya know that."
"You're not far from a foe."
"What the feck is that supposed to mean? I haven't hurt ya, have I? Ya know ya can trust me."
"Go back Declan."
"I can't do that las. I'm following orders. If ya go back, you'll die."
"What orders? Vaas, can't give orders anymore. He's out of the game. Now leave! Don't make me do something I will regret. Please, Declan."
"If ya go back to that hell, ya won't return las."
"Vaas isn't giving orders anymore… so please leave."
"Who said Vaas gave the orders?"
"What?" A puzzled look came over Katerina, in which her gun slowly started to lower. What did he mean? Who other than Vaas would have given the orders to get her away?
"I can tell you're not wantin' to come. So I'm afraid I will just have to make ya las. I don't wanna hurt a soul that has already gone through enough pain, so I'll tell ya now. Drop the fecking gun las, and come with me."
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Katerina spat, bringing her eyebrows together, and now pointing the gun more directly at Declan. "Huh? Tell me now!" her voice grew louder, tumbling into an erratic shout, with croaks of stifled sobs dropping from her tongue. She continued, yelling as she waved the gun, with tears dripping from her blinking eyes. "What the fuck are you plotting? Who the fuck are you? What do want with me, huh, asshole? What the fuck do you want with me?"
"Now las, ya need to calm down."
"Don't tell me to calm the fuck down you fucking snake! I'll ask you one more time, before I pull this trigger and end you! Got it? Who the fuck are you?"
"Las, I'm not ya enemy… you're not gonna pull that trigger."
"Are you sure about that?" Katerina growled, tugging back the hammer with her thumb, "last try. Who are you?"
"Me name is Declan, and I'm former member of the privateers."
"Former? Meaning you're not any longer?"
"I joined the privateers in an attempt to free me flesh and blood – me sweet sister."
"I don't understand you… nor do I believe you…"
"That feckin' leech Vaas sold her to god knows feckin' who before I could get to her. That was three years ago, and here I still am! Lucky for me, he didn't even click onto to the fact that she was me sister… I was gonna' kill the bastard. But I …b…bottled… I'm ashamed to say. So the Rakyat found me, didn't they? And we came to a sweet wee agreement. I pretend to be a privateer, when I'm actually stabbin' the assholes in the back on the sly. In secret I'm one of the Rakyat. Me orders never came from Vaas, I would never take orders from that bag of shit. Me orders come from the Rakyat…I couldn't leave ya with him las."
An animalistic growl seeped from Katerina's shrivelled lips; she jolted the gun in her hand, stepping closer and barking "enough of the bullshit!"
"That's the truth las!" the yelling Irishman protested, slowly dropping to his knees with his hands elevated in the air. Katerina watched the clusters of sweat dribble down his skin, with a heavy, rounded lump poking in out his neck – soon to sluggishly slither down his throat.
"You have to be lying! The Rakyat captured us! They tortured us for fucks sake! Tell me, Declan, if that even is your fucking name! How are you going to get out of that one? Go ahead, explain that! You have five seconds…"
"Woa! Las, no, please! I swear, on me precious wee sister, that's the truth. All of it is the whole feckin' truth! None of it a lie las, I swear! I wouldn't lie to do ya, would I? Eh? The pirates did this to me eye alright! One of Hoyt's feckin' assholes. I'm not lyin'! Ya know that, don't ya? Me wee humble soul wouldn't tell ya no fabrications! Please las, think about what ya doin!"
"Five."
"I rescued ya for fecks sake! Ya would be shaking, and bleeding out right now if it weren't for me!"
"Four."
"Fuck! Las, please. Me and you, we had a cheery good hoot, did we not? A few drinks, and a good time... I've treated ya with nothing but kindness and respect, have I not las?"
"Three."
"Ya not gonna' do me like this. Not like em' – shooting me like a dumb, sick mutt. Ya not gonna' do that to me wee little humble self, are ya las?"
"T...two."
Declan's eye jolted to the floor, as if search for a grain of sand or a speckle of grinded rock. The gun juddered chaotically in Katerina's hand - her pounding heart ready to burst from her chest. Why was this so difficult? Vaas would do it! Why couldn't she? The sting of tears made her eyes itch – creating that eerie burn to simmer behind her quick, glassy orbs. He was nothing to her…. She could do it. She had to be strong – he could betray her, even kill her, if she turned around and left him now.
Katerina closed her eyes, tears rolling down her cheeks as she whipped her head away, extending her arm and resting her finger reluctantly on the ice trigger. Do it! Just pull it! Her thoughts bawled wildly at her, with a muster of pricking tears bleeding out from her closed eyes.
"My actual name is Christian Campbell." The man glumly confessed, with not a hint of Irish twang to his words. Katerina lowered the gun, and pried her eyes open – looking across to the man who bowed his head to the ground, with inquisitiveness and uncertainty brewing in her glowing, solemn sheep eyes. A look of anguish came over her, in which her eyebrows fell into a frown, with her lips drooping in the corners. His robotic words continued, with a hint of dishonour and shame shaking in his voice, "I heard of this uncharted island about four years ago, when just a young lad, and was intrigued. I heard of people who had loved ones vanish from the face of the earth, and pitied them. I have no siblings, and no relatives or friends who have been dragged into peril by any pirates on this island. I do know, however, of this island's cruelty and dishonourable scheme. Vaas Montenegro has been on my hit list, you can say, for some time - him and a few others. I find it disgusting that things like this go on. When I heard of the conflict between the Rakyat people and the pirates, I felt that I had to get involved. I do work for the Rakyat, and have been working with them for at least three years in secrecy. I had to find a way to get at Vaas – I admit, I'm far from a ruthless type, and would fail miserable against Vaas Montenegro, so I had to look for a scapegoat so that I could go through with the plans, given to me by the Rakyat people. By bringing you to the Rakyat, Jason Brody has a chance of catching Vaas of guard, thus ending the malicious bastard once and fall all. It's for the greater good, don't you see? Killing Vaas Montenegro will give you peace; set you free – at last. It will benefit us all."
Katerina began shaking her head, biting onto her lip with tears streaming from her eyes. How could he? How could he does this to her? She trusted him! She trusted him – how could he? The man looked up at her, with a sorrowful, apologetic manner to his guise. Katerina ignored it! All she could see was the vile face of cruel deceit! How could he do this?
"I pity you Katerina," he sighed softly, his shoulders dropping with his arms lowering, "just look what he has done to you – what this fucking island has done to you. The purity and light has been viciously ripped out of you. You are infested with a sickness – the maddening sickness of this island. It has destroyed you! Vaas has destroyed you! Look what he has done to you. He has broken you. Vaas has destroyed everything…"
An ear-splitting explosion crackled in the jungle air, with startled birds squawking and screeching as they soared away from the trees – flapping their heavy wings with the moaning, whooshing wind, and fluttering away into the horizon as quickly as light. A pool of thick, red blood, thick as yogurt, oozed along the yellow road, gushing towards Katerina's feet and swallowing up the grey rucksack that sank into the dirt. The whimpering of a man could be heard from the ground – panting and wheezing like a sick dog – a vile mutt.
Katerina did not look back to him – not give him a second pitiful glance. There was one focus that shrouded her mind, and she had to accomplish it! Though as she stumbled away, sniffling and smearing away the tears that clung to her check and eyes, she felt an agonising crumpling sensation in her chest. Her stomach emptied and swallowed her up like a black hole. She thought she was going to be sick! The sickly whimpers of the dying man in the dirt made her skin crawl – but she did not look back. He did not deserve her glance, nor did he deserve her pity…
She followed the explosions, and the clatters of screams and hoarse grunts. The shrill sounds echoed of the trees. She was reluctant, but knew she had to follow it – she had no choice! It was something she had to do!
When bolting figures, and the orange glow of flames came into view, a suffocating sensation, wickedly slithered its way up Katerina's body, triggering her limbs to fail her. She stumbled to the floor, jerking away from the blasts of bullets and taking cover behind a shielding tree on the hill. The battle field below her was terrifying. A part of her didn't want to go down. What if she was killed? She hadn't been trained for stuff like this! Say she was crippled from a shattering blast to the leg? Or paralyzed from a shot to her spine? She could simply dart into the roaring battle, and be shot in the head before she could gently touch her trigger. How many bullets did she even have? It was useless! What if this went terribly wrong? What if Hoyt captured her again? What if…
The husky yells of battle fury interrupted Katerina from her racing, rapid thoughts. Had someone spotted her? With her heart beating faster than it had ever pounded before, Katerina cautiously peered her head around the tree, to glimpse at what could be rushing towards her. In less than a second she snapped her head back, splinters of shattered tree bark gushing up into the air, with a loud bang erupting from the mouth a gun. He was coming! She didn't know, nor care who it was, but simply knew that someone was rushing towards her – pink and flushed, with his splotchy red face shrivelled up into a snarl. He roared, screeching like a mad dog.
"Come on Kat," Katerina yapped to herself, gripping tightly onto her gun, with her finger resting on the trigger. She could feel the shivers spreading across her body. Sense the sickening twist in her gut. One moment of fear then it would be over! She told herself, gasping for air and she readied herself. You can do this. Don't be afraid.
For a second she thought that she had erupted into a wail of screams when she pointed her gun at him, hammering the trigger with her body freezing to stone. Am I dead? Was the first thought that popped into her startled mind, then she looked down to the lifeless body on the floor. She glared at the sack of meat for a moment, trying to remember how many bangs had blasted from her gun. Two? No… one? How could I it have been one? No, definitely two. She felt a sense of achievement as she hastily plucked the man's gun away from his limp, motionless body. How did she do that? He was armed, and howling with an insane fury, and yet, she managed to rise up victorious! She couldn't stop the trivial grin that stretched to her cheeks. Had she really done that?
She shook her head vigorously – a look of determination masking her face, as she slunk deeper into the camp; following those treacherous, deafening explosions, like how a small child would seek to follow the scent and clues of discarded sweets. She knew what she had to do; only hoping that she could do it cleanly… and in one piece.
Perhaps it was conscience, if not that, then sheer luck, as she took cover behind a bulky, square crate in the mist of that perilous field of explosions, and deadly gunshots. Men thought against each other further up the long, blood-stained path, in that horrid camp she was stuck in. She did not know who was fighting, nor what drove them to tug out their guns – but she knew that they were fighting to the death, and being scrambled up in the cross-fire would, without a doubt, prove to be deadly. But as Katerina crouched behind that crate, jerking from the flying splinters of wood, and bullet shells that hurdled in the air, she caught glimpse of something in the corner of her eye. It was like, for that moment, the whole world stood still – everything around her slowed down, with bullets not zooming, but slowly floating in the air, like drifting leaves.
"Vaas!" she screamed, grasping onto the crate and screeching out Vaas' name with all the air she had stored in her lungs. She screamed his name so loud, it ripped her throat, and delivered a tug, punch-like pain to her stomach. Tears brimmed her eyelashes, with a relieved grin stretching to her cheeks, when the wonderfully crazy pirate lord, snapped his head to her direction.
A look of astonishment and apprehension splashed across his face, as he ducked zooming bullets, resting his hand on the ground as he looked up to Katerina. Dirt splashed up from the earth, with splinters of material spurting through the air, whenever a firing bullet penetrated into the ground, or smashed against an object. Vaas got down on all fours, and rushed through the eruptions of gunshots like a determined animal dashing towards prey. Katerina's breath became trapped in her throat, as she anxiously watched him hurry towards her.
"What the fuck are you doing amada?" he barked, throwing his hands to her face and shoving his lips onto hers before she could let a word slip from her tongue. Katerina instantly tumbled onto her back, with Vaas resting above her - he knocked her stunned, petite body to the floor when he leapt towards her, with his lips glued to Katerina's and with his hands cupping her skull and caressing her jawline; stoking her hair. "You're so stupid Kat!" he scolded, pulling his lips away for a short moment but then shoving them back to her mouth, swooning her with his sensuality and tenderness. "You're so fuckin' stupid!" he repeated, still kissing her, with his hands wrapped around her face. Katerina grasped onto his skull, returning his kisses with the dance of her tongue. Both, for that short moment, were oblivious to the lethal eruptions of gunshots - firing in mad, deadly directions around them.
"It's not safe here amada!" he cautioned, with the gentle shake of Katerina's head. He gazed directly into Katerina's bright eyes, which glimmered with the glittering shine of tears; his forehead nearly colliding against her face.
Katerina shook her head, pursing her lips with tear droplets slowly trickling from her glassy eyes. Vaas tenderly smeared away a tear with the gentle stroke of his thumb – Katerina smiled, reaching up her fingers and coiling them around Vaas' hand, which rested on her face.
"You're going to die if you stay here," Katerina snuffled, tears spilling down her face with her heart wrenching out from her chest, "where will that leave me, huh?"
Vaas suddenly tugged Katerina to his chest, hugging her shuddering, sobbing body into him, with his hand cupping her skull. "Where will that leave me?" Katerina repeated, between crackled sobs. Not caring for the sting that Vaas' shirt caused, when scuffing against her wounded cheek.
"You're meant to be somewhere safe amada," Vaas sighed, his eyes locked on his surrounding, wary to anyone who could come lurching around the corner, "so you can have a chance."
"I'll take my chances with you," Katerina snivelled, lifting her head from Vaas' chest and glancing up to him, with her hand stroking the border of his chiselled jaw, "I'm safer when you're with me. You know that. You can't make me leave this time…not this time."
Vaas craned his neck to press his lips against Katerina's for another time, but instead rammed her to the floor, pouncing to his feet and diving like an animal through the air. Katerina, picked herself up quickly, reaching for her gun and snapping her head towards Vaas, who was at a man, driving a knife into his neck. Another came round the corner, but he wasn't a pirate. Katerina recognised them - the coarse, tanned skin and the tribal tattoos speckled all over their wide bodies. Rakyat.
Katerina took hold of her gun and pointed it at the man, but let out a sharp grunt and fell to the floor, crashing down on her stomach and face with a loud thud. A wave of stifling pain struck her, as she felt a pair of hands yank at her ankles. She ignored the pain; swivelling her body around swiftly, with a grunt of agony slipping from her lips, which blood now trickled from. The man was perched over her, waving his knife beside her face, as Katerina battled him and shook him away with her arms and the rattle of her body. Her hand flashed to the lunatic's head, where she tugged and twisted viciously at the lad's hair. He squealed, thrusting his knife closer to Katerina's flesh. She watched with keen, anxious eyes, as the man's face grew red – flushed at the cheeks, with a flash of pink flooding in his broad nose.
He was off her as soon as Vaas noted him, with a shower of red spurting out from the lunatic's body. Vaas tugged Katerina to her feet with a gentle yet firm yank of her arm. He held her body beside his waist, securely wrapping his robust arm around her, with his and her body in a crouch-like state.
"I think about now is a good time to get out of here," Vaas snorted with a playful smirk, "What do you think amada?"
"I'm right behind you," Katerina panted, looking up to Vaas with a grin. Her eyebrows fell into a sulk when she analysed his face. Blood dribbled from his forehead, seeping from a graze above his eyebrow – on the opposite side of his scar. "You're hurt?" she gasped, restlessness making her voice ecstatic.
Vaas chuckled and tenderly brushed the string of blood away from Katerina's chin with his knuckle. "I'm hurt?" he snorted sarcastically, but then he turned slightly more solemn, with a hint of remorse creeping in his voice, "amada, you're the one who is hurt. Now let's get the fuck out of here."
Vaas' hold around Katerina was secure, with his touch warm and comforting to her. The hissing wind frolicked in Katerina's spiralling hair, as Vaas quickly dragged her through the camp, whizzing in and out of cover – ducking and dodging explosions and perilous bullets – with each swift step. All Katerina eyes locked on was Vaas. Studying his attentive eyes, and the arch in his eyebrows. A sense of serenity swept over her. Despite being locked in a battle zone, she at last felt calm; idyllic. As long as Vaas was with her, how could anything go wrong?
The crunching of leaves and shrivelled grass beneath Katerina's feet crackled in the air, with muffled murmurs of brash bangs and shattering explosions echoing in the distance. Vaas dragged Katerina behind him, hastily marching through the jungle – through the towering trees and through the lush, chaotic jungle foliage.
"How are you feeling?" he asked brusquely from behind his shoulder.
Katerina looked up and ceased her fixation on the shade of green beneath her feet. "I'm well enough," she muttered, stumbling over a broad tree root that had surged from the soil. Her body went plummeting through the air; her foot catching behind bark. Katerina grimaced – reading herself for a callous smack from the ground. Though all she felt was the sincere, protecting embrace from a set of arms, tenderly coiling around her, and holding her dangling body up from the ground. Vaas lifted her up with a chuckle - balancing her back on her feet. He took her head in his hand, and studied the depth, and exquisiteness of her crimson eyes.
"You have to be more careful," he chuckled; his thumb caressing her cheek.
"I would, if you didn't leave me in the hands of malevolent assholes."
Vaas' face suddenly dropped into a frown. His eyes darted to the floor, his lip drooping in the corners with an expression of contriteness and melancholy casting over him. When his eyes finally glanced up to look upon her face, they were glowing with discontent and remorse. His pupils seemed to expand and grow more prominent with repentance. He seemed as if he was going to speak, with a lump in his throat bobbing up and down like a nodding apple submerged in water. Katerina awaited a moment when his lips would open, but the only movement that occurred was the slow, gentle motion of his hand, in which he carefully brushed back a strand of Katerina's raven black hair, twisting the strand in his fingers before placing it behind her ear.
A thunderous bang made Katerina jump with fright, with a rush of shivers gushing up her body, and tingling her spine. Subconsciously, she fell closer to Vaas, with her body knocking against his firm torso; with her fingertips apprehensively twisting a clump of his red vest. Vaas held her close, fretfully scanning around him with a snappish turn of his head. His hand clutched tighter onto Katerina; his hand swiftly slipping to her arm.
Katerina was still anxiously peering around her with worried, squinting eyes, when Vaas yanked at her arm, heaving her startled, confused body behind him as he raced deeper into the jungle, with a treacherous speed that made her teeth on edge.
Panic consumed her – hairs on her neck becoming stiff, and poking out in the air. Fearsome yells and roaring gunshots followed them like vicious wolves. She felt like prey – weak, vulnerable and helpless. Tighter and tighter her grasp on Vaas became, but still this horrid sensation gnawed away at her. She hated it! She hated this barbaric, uncharted island!
Katerina was so focused on Vaas that she failed to see where they were heading. A stifled grunt erupted from her lips when Vaas came to a sudden, unannounced, brusque stop, catching Katerina in his arms to stop her from stumbling over him. She peered what was below her with widening, alarmed eyes. Inches away from Vaas' boot, was the edge of their road – a sickening cliff, with a deep blue abyss below. There was no cover – no trees or foliage. Nothing! The forest was behind them, and they couldn't go back there… not anymore. There was a hushed hiss from flowing waves of water. It whispered like silent ghosts in Katerina's ears.
Vaas spiralled around, slowly, shoving Katerina behind him and shielding her, with his arm constantly wrapped around her torso. Emerging from the field of trees, were a flock of men – their quivering hands pressed against ebony rifles, with the weapon poking out from their shrinking bodies. They glared at the soiled ground, unwilling to look the pirate lord in the eye. All of them bore striking, black tribal tattoos. And all of them, looked to one individual appearing from the forest of trees and saplings.
A chuckle rumbled in Vaas throat, with his hand slowly slipping off from Katerina's skin. Katerina balanced on her tiptoes, pressing her hand on Vaas' shoulder and peeking over it. Occasionally she glanced behind her, analysing the drop behind her heel – studying the ripples of blue liquid at the bottom, with gushes of hissing, biting water cascading down the side. This was no cliff. It was a waterfall!
"So," Vaas began, clicking his tongue and straining his neck as a low chuckle hissed through his teeth, "Fucking snow white, decided to show his little bullshit, Californian face, eh? You know I've missed you. Missed our fun little chats. It was good, it was fun."
Katerina snapped her head back to the crowd of people surrounding her and the feisty pirate she held onto. A man approached them, high growls dribbling from the corners of his twisted mouth. His dark, shaggy hair flicked out chaotically, with a shade of facial hair trailing up his jaw and along his chin and mouth. His arm played the canvas for many intriguing tattoos, with his pale blue shirt enduring several tears, rips and speckles of dried blood. Katerina recognised him. She recognised the hidden serenity in his face – even if it was heavily shrouded with a venomous contempt and lunacy.
"Let the girl go, so we can settle this." He growled, furiously drawing his hand into a fist, with the other hand tightening around a machete, which chillingly dripped with blood that flooded the lushness in the grass, when thick, red droplets bitterly crashed against it. Vaas gave no reply; only cocking his head and clicking his tongue against his teeth.
The man lifted his head and looked towards the girl who cowered behind Vaas' shoulder. He motioned her to come forward with the click of his head, but she didn't budge. Why would she? Was he insane?
"Kat," the man pleaded softly, sending a wave of bewilderment to sweep over her as she eyed him with a puzzling, attentive gaze. "Kat, come on. It's me. Fuck…"
A wicked snarl flooded the man's face, in which he lifted his machete and waved it provokingly in the air, "you sick fuck!" he spat, furrowing his brows and taking one step closer to Vaas who watched him with amusement, "what the fuck have you done to her? You let her go right now, or I swear Vaas, I will kill you!"
"Really?" Vaas tormented sarcastically, with an odd humour jolting in his voice, "and here's me thinking that was your intentions all along. Wow! You really must be a heavy piece of chicken shit. Go on, pretty boy, cluck, cluck cluck away. Go back to my sister, and lap up her deceit. Just don't go waving your piece of shit, toy, in my face!"
Katerina studied the man's face. Who was he? She just needed a name. One call of his name and she was sure to remember him, for sure.
"You're not really here for the girl," Vaas teased, with a smirk, "now are you, Jason?"
Katerina's eyes widened. It all came flooding back to her. The boat. The beach. Her dream! Every distant memory crashed down onto her, chocking her with its consuming intensity. She remembered it all! By god! He did look different. The innocent light had scratched out from his eyes. The immaturity ripped out of him. The serenity burned into ash, and tossed into the sea. There was a fire in his eyes – they were burning with ire; ready to sear into his skull. His guise made her tremble. Not for fear of herself, but fear of the man she held onto. Everyone pointed a gun to him! She gaged to the shivers scuttling up her skin. She quivered to the sickening blow in her stomach. She snivelled to the fear that engulfed her.
She could feel Vaas slowly pulling away from her. Tears spilled out from her eyes, with gasps bursting from her trembling lips. She tugged her back to him, with her throbbing fingers digging into his skin – straining to hinder him.
"Vaas!" she gasped, stifled from whimpers that cruelly crawled up her throat.
When Vaas looked over his shoulder to gaze at her, she saw something. It was the glimmer in his eyes – like the ripples of water. "I can't swim," she whispered fretfully.
Vaas stared at her with a look of great confusion. Katerina could see Jason's grip around his weapon becoming tighter from the corner of her eye – with his body moving perilously closer. She had to do it!
Katerina held her breath, snappishly spinning around, looking the abyss directly in its petrifying face. The water hissed and moaned as it fell down the rocks. The ripples and pools of white water gushing up in the air below. Vaas frantically bellowed out Katerina's name, trying to reach for her, but the flick of his hand was not swift enough. She didn't scream, only tightened her eyes and ceased her breath, when she threw her body off from the cliff.