Hey everyone!
Here's another chapter for you all. I hope you enjoy it! I'm trying to get as much writing as I can done even though I'm busy, but I have another story idea coming and I was wondering if I could have your opinions on it.
Would y'all read a story with a kind of Princess and the Chat theme? I know lots of people have done it but I loved the idea and could put a bit of a spin on it. Let me know your thoughts!
Enjoy!
"Don't you even dare lecture me Dupain-Cheng! I'm so done with you trying to be the 'good' one!"
Chloe is yelling in my face, and by the look on her face, she's had it with me and it's pretty evident now. But to be honest, it's easy for me to be really mad at her too, when I think about everything that she's done to me. Accusing me of lecturing her though? Oh please!
"Oh, trust me Chloe, I'm so done trying to be the bigger person. I give up!" I fume back.
Chloe's mouth falls open, she shakes her head at me angrily.
"Bigger person? Bigger person!? Don't patronise me! You never cared about me, you were really just scared that if you reacted too badly then I'd make an even worse fate than this befall you. Because you know that I can do that!" she shouts as she storms closer to me.
Now we're in each others faces, I can feel that something big is about to go down. She's glaring at me and I'm glaring at her and everything that has ever went wrong between us is flashing through my mind in a constant loop, and the anger is prickling the back of my neck and coating my memory in a layer of red hot frustration. This is easier than I expected.
"Oh please," I sneer, my voice scarily quiet. The kind of quiet that is more terrifying than bellowing in someone's face. That chilling, ominous quiet, the calmness of the air before the thundering storm rips through the sky.
"No! Admit it!" Chloe argues, refusing to drop it, "you know for a fact that I can snap my fingers at any moment and a fate way worse than this miserable dump would immediately come crashing down on you!"
"A fate WORSE than this?! HA! I'd like to see you even try," I seethe.
Chloe grins wickedly.
"I wouldn't say that if I were you. I'm warning you Marinette, you know who my father is, and so you know how powerful that makes me. Don't, push me," she replies, giving my shoulder a sharp push. Not so sharp that I fall, but sharp enough that I know to take her seriously.
But I'm not phased.
She thinks this is as bad as it's going to get, she has no idea what's about to come.
"Powerful," I scoff whilst stepping forwards again. We still haven't broken eye contact. I think we both know where this is going.
"I see right through you Chloe," I say, jabbing my finger at her, " you're not powerful, you're just pathetic."
Chloe opens her arms out, gesturing angrily.
"Try me and see what happens. I know you're really just scared of me, so you'll be eating your words soon enough."
I laugh in her face, "scared? Of you! There's nothing to be scared of. I could easily destroy you and this whole prison with my magic. Right here. Right now. Wanna see?"
I step back and spread my palms in front of me as if preparing to keep my word. Obviously I'm not going to, because the truth is I don't even know if I'm capable of that yet. But no one else knows that. With one look at me, Chloe runs to the cell door, throws it open and yells into the corridor.
"HELP! The psychopath is going crazy in here! She, she needs to be stopped immediately. Help! Don't you dare Marinette!"
I don't know why I don't stop her.
Well, that's a lie.
I know exactly why.
So, all I do is stand still as the world turns into a chaotic blur around me. In the next few moments, multiple things happen at once, all in a whirlwind of action.
Lila's footsteps down the hall. Slow. Quiet. Louder. Faster. Louder. Faster.
Closer and closer.
I look at Chloe. Chloe looks at me. I nod. Chloe shoves me backwards. Lila reaches the door. She gasps. I scream and throw myself at Chloe. Chloe pushes back.
We struggle. We throw insults. We throw fists. Both of us missing except from the occasional blow to the shoulder.
"What the hell is going on? Stop, both of you, right now!" Lila yells.
But we pay her no attention and instead resume our brawl. I pull Chloe's hair, she kicks me in the shin. As we fight, I'm surprised at how little I'm hurting. All of this pent up frustration and anger inside of me, it's fleeing from my body through every bruise Chloe leaves on my skin, it's escaping through every cut on my face, the scarlet anger trickling from my lip as Chloe punches me in the mouth. Lightly, but just enough so it'll cut my lip. With just the required amount of force.
"You! Make it stop or I'll get my father to shut this place down! NOW!" Chloe screeches as I push her backwards. I stand still and yell at her.
"Oh, please do!"
After about another thirty seconds of battling against each other, I'm exhausted. Being in this cell for so long, I've never been used to doing a lot of exercise, especially since I've been contained in such a small space. Gulping in oxygen, I look across at Chloe. She has a hardened, determined look in her eye, and I can sense exactly what is about to happen. Without a glance back, her legs buckle, and she collapses, crumpling to the floor.
As Lila runs forward to drag her away, I notice she seems more visibly emotional than I think I've ever seen her. Not upset emotional, but more of a panicked look. Her eyes dart back and forth from the door and she flits around Chloe at first, not entirely sure how to approach the situation. I think this is the last thing she expected to happen when she let Chloe into the cell. But now she knows what I'm capable of. Only she thinks she does. However, she really has no idea, because sometimes, things look one way when we see them, but in reality there's something entirely different going on under the surface that we don't know about. And normally I'd be feeling smug, knowing I had the upper hand for now, but judging by the black look Lila is directing at me from a few feet away, I'm not sure how much she knows about what I've done. Or what I'm doing.
With her arms under Chloe's to hold her up, she begins to drag her out of the door, but pauses in the doorway to glare at me.
"You seem a little less dumb than everyone else in here, but don't applaud yourself just yet, I know what you're trying to do. You can't really get her to shut this place down by instigating a fight with her. Don't think that you have the power to get that to happen. You don't, and it won't work. Because you don't matter, and nothing you ever do or say will. So good try Marinette, but don't play games with me," Lila seethes, unblinking. After a pause she leans forward menacingly.
"Or you'll lose."
I watch her leave, dragging Chloe behind her as the door swings closed behind them. When Lila out of sight, I can't help grinning at how she's always so sure she knows what's going on, always so sure she's the one manipulating everyone.
Poor girl.
If only she could see what was happening under the surface.
As Chloe's body trails out of the room, she lifts her foot and quickly kicks the door open behind her, giving me enough time to rush forwards and jam my wooden block in between the door and the wall, stopping it from closing properly. I stand at the door and wait, wait until I know Lila is far away and tending to Chloe, I wait until I'm sure that Chloe has properly done her job.
Honestly, I'm kind of surprised as to how well she pulled it off. I mean, some of what she said, I thought she was being serious. Our unlikely alliance went well I think. And the best thing is that Lila bought it. I knew she wasn't gullible, and the truth is, when I was first thinking about what I could do, that was the original plan I came up with, but then I knew Lila would suspect something, so I changed my idea.
And it worked.
When I'm sure Lila has gone I remove the wood and open the door, slipping out into the corridor. Now I'm free, I can have a look around and see if I can find this research room Lila was talking about. Maybe I can make sense of the message Adrien sent to me. And after that, hopefully I can find a way back.
My only concern is when Lila will come back and what will happen if she finds out I've escaped. But she was the one who challenged me to this game. And if she isn't going to play fair neither am I. She separated me from Adrien, she ruined everything between us.
She made her move. Now it's my turn.
This is one game that I'm going to win.
Because the stakes are too high for me to lose.