Max groaned miserably, fell to her knees and had to press down on hands to keep her face from falling to the sand. She felt as if a flock of ONR dudes in their massive boots were dancing in her head a maddened drunken cancan, everything swirled like a broken carousel, making her feel an unstoppable waves of nausea. She only lasted a few seconds before she vomited completely the whole content of her stomach, which took over fifteen minutes to do so. She was barely able to recover, her belly ached excruciatingly from Jefferson's horse kicks combined with side effects of a sudden escalation of power. Vivid red, steaming blood dripped slowly from her nose and shivering, blue with cold lips.
"Oh for the holy dick, where the fuck am I?" She croaked with difficulty extracting any sound from the numb larynx, restraining the nausea and the spinning helicopter in her head. Girl looked shyly around her, she was in the forest. The sun was already leaning towards the west, a beautiful, blinding glare reflected from the small snow cover and illuminated the tortured face of the teenager with a million dancing lights. "What the actually fuck?" With irritation she lowered her turquoise, bloodshot eyes back to her vomit, growled angrily revealing pink-coloured with blood teeth and struggled to lift herself on her wobbly, frozen legs. "Okay, Maximus, focus. You were in the bunker, got fucked up and somehow escaped. Your power made its own decision and threw you in a random place in space-time. It's logical and coherent after all." Complete, strange silence surrounded her, broken only from time to time by the sound of the wind in the branches of tall, soaring pines and the creaking of snow. Suddenly she realized that she was not alone, she felt an icy shiver run down her spine as her misty, confused gaze met a small herd of deer digging in the snow for the remnants of grass hidden under a fluffy blanket. Instantly all of the animals raised their heads on their long, slender necks and looked directly at her with their brown, moist eyes. But this sight was not normal. As if it did not belong to an animal, but to a friendly human, trusting and understanding... She was terrified, wanted to run away but the dizziness did not even allow her to move. Roe deer twitched their ears suspiciously and did not even move waiting with suspense and anticipation, they looked like statues carved in ebony." Where am I?" She said it a little too loudly because the herd immediately scared off, turned in place and raced in lanes in only a direction known to them. Max just cursed ugly under her breath and growled in anger at her own stupidity. She had no idea if Jefferson or Nathan or some other threat were anywhere near, she shouldn't draw attention to herself and act loudly. After briefly considering all the pros and cons, she decided to walk slowly in the direction where the deer escaped. As she was surrounded by a monotonous, empty, fairly transparent forest she decided that the footprints of hooves imprinted on the fluffy, fresh snow would help her navigate a little, at least she wouldn't be wandering around in a circle like a total moron. Max walked a long time, frozen and still plunged in a raging pain in her stomach, shuffling her feet, also she was thirsty and tired, the sun was dangerously fading below the horizon plunging her into ever greater darkness. She seemed to be wandering for such a good three or four hours, in the last one significantly increasing the speed of the march because the spectre of spending the night in a dark, bustling forest made her dizzy and an unpleasant, icy shiver ran down her spine while even thinking about that possibility. Suddenly she heard a sound that differed from the steady noise of the wind in the treetops of tall trees, sounded a bit like the waves crashing on the rocks to the accompaniment of the howling of a damp, boisterous breeze raging on the open ground. She forced herself to run which was more like a shaky crawling, she was running like that before stopping at the edge of the cliff. The forest literally broke off here like a rotten rope, giving a way to a bottomless abyss in the throat of which the angry expanse of the wild ocean foamed. After a while she finally caught her breath and stopped breathing heavily, resting her hands on her knees Max looked around her a little unconscious, suddenly being unable to draw air into her aching, kicked up lungs again. "It's impossible." Her turquoise eyes, completely absorbed with terror saw a pile of rubble and stones that had once been the lighthouse. The lighthouse she knew very well because it led the ships into the bay of Arcadia, her homeland. Without even thinking she shifted her frightened, distracted gaze to the place at the foot of the cliff, where a small coastal town should be located but she saw one big nothing. Suddenly she felt that the ground under her feet trembled dangerously and strange, rumbling, rustling sounds began to come from the forest. Instantly she turned and looked at the direction from which the ominous sounds were coming. Seconds later a large, maddened herd of fallow deer, leaping forward like a speeding train with a coal yard, hit her with all the force of their muscular, burly bodies. Max didn't even have time to react, she just screamed a very ugly curse and collapsed into the abyss with the roaring, crazy as hell animals. During the flight she got a few kicks from the stray hooves of raging deer, and after a while that took away her senses and sobriety of mind, she hit the foamy surface of icy and dirty with algae water. The choppy waves churned, twisted her like a rag doll and hurled her towards the rocky bottom of the sea. Disregarding the burning of the conjunctiva she opened her eyes wide feeling that the force of the impact squeezed most of the air out of her lungs, she had to swim upward if she didn't want to be swallowed by this shaky, cold grave. Her eyes saw a macabre yet bizarrely beautiful in its own sick way image, several dozen of fallow deer flailed their legs in panic, shifting chaotically in the dirty gray water pierced by rays of bright, warm light. The water which forced its way down the girl's throat and larynx began to choke her. In despair, she also began to wave her hands chaotically trying to face the strong ocean currents that sucked her down, dragging her relentlessly towards the bottom. Suddenly some strange, unnatural force jerked the teenager upwards, making her literally jump out of the angry surf like a fish pulled on a hook. She fluttered wildly dazed with everything that had happened in a few last minutes, greedily grabbed the life-giving oxygen in her aching lungs only to fall back into the water with a splash. However this time she was able to stay in the upper tier of the ocean, although the furious waves did not cease to slash her face with frothy water, flood her, spin wildly in several directions, tangling in long, hard seaweed that seemed to entangle like ropes which wanted to kill her. She had no idea how long she fought with the element, only knew that after painful hit in the coastal rocks she completely lost all hope and strength to stay afloat. The ruthless, untamed vastness of the ocean at the last moment decided to throw her on a small beach, dirty with sea plants, dead fish and broken branches. She ran aground like a pierced wreck, her legs still within reach of the icy, greedy tongues of the waves. Fresh, bright blood flowed from her nose and mouth in a slow, rusty stream forming a macabre pool of mosaic on the sand. The teenager growled heavily, this sound was like subjection to exhaustion and irritation because everything hurt her. With indescribable difficulty she rolled onto her back, took a deep breath and ran her sand-stained hand through her matted, wet, slime-stinking hair. Max lay there for a moment panting sluggishly, as if she had a problem with drawing air into her lungs. When her mind cleared a little she wiped her blood-spattered face and forced herself to lift her aching body to a sitting position. She was alive. She had no idea how she had escaped from this infernal surf, but that was for sure she was still alive. Suddenly her body was shaken by monstrous, rhythmic nausea, she clutched her aching stomach with one hand, the other one leaned on the slushy, wet sand taking the position perfect for puking. Vomit was literally pouring out of her like a water from the bucket, mostly salty, muddy sea water mixed with blood running from her nose down her throat. When she had nothing to throw up and the painful nausea was gone her cloudy, still slightly hazy gaze rolled across the surface of the rough ocean. Unfortunately, some of the fallow deer probably drowned, only a dozen soaked animals bustled about on the sandy part of the beach. They looked as pathetic as she did.
"Hey you there! Hands up!" Hearing the menacing male voice, Max felt her legs go numb and an icy, unpleasant shiver ran down her spine, her hands were covered in slick sweat. She held out her hand wanting to rewind but nothing happened, a large blue screen of death popped up in her mind and that was all, the power completely stopped responding to the call of its owner. This additionally stressed the teenager, how was she going to manage without such an essential convenience? Max thought that if she travelled back in time she would be able to control it as she wanted again, but she was wrong. She could only rely on herself, her mind, her muscles and her survival instinct, which had just turned on the sirens and wailed from the back of her head. It was so fucked up! What was she supposed to do? Obediently she raised her slightly trembling hands above her head, slowly turned to face the stranger and, with fear in her turquoise irises, looked straight at the gaping maw of the old but still deadly shotgun. Oh shit. Am I going to die? "On your knees!" Dutifully she obeyed the order of a not very tall, bald man dressed in a worn, dirty, torn here and there uniform straight from the First World War. "The Russians have outdone themselves, they send emaciated, sick teenagers to spy."
"Shut the fuck up, don't say anything in front of her, you moron dickhead!" A harsh, unbearable female voice scolded him, but Max couldn't listen anymore, she was tired of fighting for life in the icy water and her body ached after being kicked by Jefferson so she couldn't stay conscious any longer. An old, rotten, linen sackcloth thrown over her head and tightly tied around her neck helped her in losing consciousness. Later she felt only knocking over to the ground, bounding limbs and dragging on snowy sand by the rope tied under her armpits. She had no idea how long they dragged her but luckily it didn't take too long, after a few or a dozen or so minutes of painful rubbing against the stone, a few pairs of hands lifted her up and hurled her casually at something relatively soft. Judging by the smell, texture, and the characteristic rattling of wheels on the cobblestones, she realized that she was lying on some small cart stuffed with straw.
"Where are you taking me? Where am I?" She was answered only by the loud squeal of a donkey, which has been dragging the would-be carriage along the bumpy road.
"You said she was Russian. Sounds like ours." The furious male voice of someone walking beside her growled, and the boy who had grabbed her on the beach pouted and sighed loudly.
"The captain will decide, she has an eye for such spies and she will also reward me for the risking my life during the capture!"
"Really, dude? This skinny girl was puking her bloody guts out and she couldn't even stand on feet when you approached her, don't flatter yourself. A blind monkey without a leg would catch her!" The girl laughed this time, her voice harsh and thunderous as if she was trying to resemble the men accompanying her and not stand out too much from the whole company. Max lay a little more comfortably on fragrant, fresh straw, assumed that they would drag her to some camp or something. She had no idea when she had fallen asleep, weary of the pain, dizziness and excruciating exhaustion. A brutal jerk woke her from the shallow sleep, she instinctively growled tearfully feeling that the numb, bruised body resisted to move. Two men dragged her from the cart and unceremoniously threw her to the ground with a thud like dropping a sack of potatoes. "Hey Eliot, you bastard, don't throw her like that." The brown haired woman was just listening when the stranger girl apparently sold her friend a juicy kick in the ass, because he groaned loudly and called her fucking whore, feeling that his male ego had suffered a lot. They lifted her by the shoulders more gently and dragged her in a direction known only to them. Felt after a while that she was planted near a tree and tightly tied to it with some thick, rough rope. "Don't move now, do you understand?" Max shuddered as she felt the icy steel pressed against her neck but she followed the order out of fear even holding her breath, for a moment only one single black thought swirled in her head. That crazy piece of shit is going to cut my throat, fuck, I am so dead. But the woman did nothing of the sort just cut the string around the back of her neck and, relatively carefully, took it off apparently not wanting to aggravate the pain caused by the vivid red abrasions on her skin. Then she took the linen sack off her head and studied the face of her captive carefully. The freckled teenager looked like a scared, wounded animal tucked into the corner of a too cramped cage. Her wild, unsteady eyes framed with dark lines of fatigue were almost unnaturally wide open, glistening with fear and desperation. Nose, mouth, chin and part of the neck were dirty from the solidifying, metallically smelling blood, the cold, bluish lips trembled revealing nervously clenched fangs ready at any moment to painfully bite. "Here, have some water." Saying this she reached for a metal canteen hanging from her belt, unscrewed it and calmly put it under the terrified girl's mouth but she refused to drink. She was so fucking thirsty but instinct in the back of her head told her not to even try, who knows if they just wanted to poison her. "It's clean, look." After these words she smiled relatively friendly, took a long sip angling herself so that Max could see that she was not pretending and again held a small water bag under her nose. Max hesitated for a moment and fought with herself but in the end the monstrous thirst had won and she allowed the stranger woman dressed in gray-green uniform to help her drink from the canteen. She drank long, small sips from time to time choking and coughing, although the red-haired, short soldier tried to gently hold her head up to facilitate her swallowing.
"What is this, the rosary and charity in one shit?" The lanky, bald shaven chuckled, he was rather young boy whom the brown haired girl recognized by his voice, it was the same douchebag that was pointing at her an old, coarse shotgun. His companion just rolled her eyes but ignored the taunts and continued tirelessly helping the bound girl to quench her thirst. "There was no such a thing yet to give water to Russian shit."
"Shut the snout, she doesn't even look like Russian, much less a fucking spy. You picked up some stray fugitive, the captain will put you in a pillory! You'd better at least take care of your KGB agent so she wouldn't be in such a deplorable condition and even more piss the captain." She replied taking the water bag from under the teenager's mouth and without much thought she fastened it again to the string on her belt, hearing these contemptuous words the tall boy visibly pouted and crossed his arms on his skinny chest. " So, goddamn it, wash her off of this blood and feed her, light a fire next to her and give a blanket to keep her from freezing. Do you understand, solider?"
"A noose should be prepared here, not luxuries." Red-haired, short and carelessly shaven girl growled furiously, her venomously green, glistening imperiously eyes sent a beam of crackling thunderstorms towards the young boy making him a little scared and reflected. " I'm not good for such needlework, you will do it better."
"We're going on patrol right now, don't piss me off any more. Take Warren and take care of this girl. If I go back and see you fucked it up, I'll report your incompetence by myself." Hearing the familiar name Max became slightly animated, raised her previously sadly drooping head, her cloudy, terrified gaze was scanning the surroundings. As she had expected they dragged her to a small camp with dirty green tents, a few wooden structures, some barely standing sheds and maybe three small houses hastily built from even rough logs. Where the fuck was she? " The captain will interrogate the girl, understand? Dry her out."
"Clear as the sunlight." He pouted theatrically at the same time and waved at the not very tall boy carrying an armful of branches, probably in order to light a fire. Max was glad because she was already starting to freeze, the weather indicated late autumn, in addition her clothes were soaked and she was shivering with each stronger gust of cold, piercing wind. The red-haired woman walked away with a hurried, stiff gait to come back after a while with two blankets rolled up carelessly, apparently she did not trust her companion and bothered herself. Without a word she wrapped her in still warm, strongly fragrant horse-rug on which she placed a thick tarpaulin which was effectively insulating against the cold evening. The brown haired girl groaned inwardly when finally the boy who was carrying the wood came close enough that she could take a close look at his face. It wasn't just the same names, in front of her was the real Warren himself, only thinner and dressed in a worn, old-fashioned uniform. What the fuck was going on here? Did her power totally go crazy and sent her into some alternative, fucked up and twisted reality? She had to find out quickly where she was. Boy looked at her with a slightly scared gaze when he finally managed to ignite the damp wood with sizzling, playful fire, all this time the teenager was staring at him. Did he even know her in this reality? Probably not, because his soot-stained face was twisted in a scowl of surprise and nervousness.
"I can give you a strip of jerky beef, do you want it? You look sick and should eat something, come on, we're not poisoning you." He said in a gentle, slightly trembling, broken voice. Though they were in some fucking, post-apocalyptic world, Warren still seemed to be the same pussy. Max only nodded slightly, she shouldn't refused to eat, since she had no idea when she would have the next opportunity for any meal. Better than stuffing your empty belly with sand and grass afterwards. The boy thought for a moment, wandered around the camp in search of any plate and when he finally found one, he returned to the girl tied to the tree, sat down next to her by the fire and began to cut a piece of hard meat into small, easy-to-chew pieces with a large soldier's knife. "Eliot, she doesn't really look like a Russian spy, maybe can we untie her hands for a moment?"
"Are you kidding me! To slaughter us all? Look at those deer-like, deceptive, lying eyes!" The bald boy leaned over the freckled brown hair, throwing her at her hateful, disgusted look of his brown, dark as night eyes. "She would kill you with a spoon, I know their tricks."
"Dude, are you high or what the fuck?" He replied by handing the teenager a piece of beef stuck on the blade of a knife and shoving it under her mouth. When she smelled the dried, salt-cured meat, Max realized how hungry she was, she had to swallow the saliva that was gathering in her mouth not wanting it to drip down her neck. Although it was quite hard to chew and specific, very aromatic in taste meat, she ate it as if she was a starving dog found in a garbage dump which was offered a can of fragrant food. The evening quickly turned into night, Max became numb from sitting in an uncomfortable position, to improve the blood supply for the last hour she tried to shift the weight of her body on the left buttock and then on the right because she felt that her ass was about to fall off. With a little irritation and fear she looked at Warren sleeping by the fire, the man called Eliot was examining her with a careful, attentive look all the time. She couldn't hold on anymore, her muscles were clenched with all her strength but bladder was giving her severe signs, painfully communicating that it was on the verge of overfilling.
"Um ... I have to go to the bathroom ... Please untie me for a while." Her voice sounded a little too teary than she wanted it to be, and it was a little hoarse and brittle with fear filling her heart. Friendly guy shuddered suddenly apparently torn from his shallow sleep and looked significantly at his companion.
"No way." He muttered this crossing his arms over his thin chest, gave her an imperious, mean half-smile and laughed under his breath.
"I think we can do this. We will tie her up and lead on a rope, she will not break away from the two of us..."
"She has to hold it until the captain arrives." Saying this, with a quick movement of his hand, he took off the blankets wrapping around her and tossed them on the nearby cart, Warren looked at him with obvious pissed off on his pale face and furiously shook his head in disapproval. "What, I won't let her pee on a good rug."
"When the captain finds out about this ... Don't forget that we are the good ones, we don't treat prisoners like Russians."
"Then I will say that she was aggressive. Either we them or they us, do you understand?" Max looked nervously at the friendly boy, he just gave her a sad, apologetic look. What could she do? She bit her lower lip, squeezed the sphincters even tighter and concentrated only on not peeing herself. As it happens in life, it turned out to be a fucking shithole, she fought bravely for almost half an hour, tried several times to beg for a toilet or at least some bushes but the bald man did not want to agree and show mercy. So she hung her head sadly, closed tormented eyes and pissed herself into her panties. Along with the emptying of the bladder she felt a great relief and for a moment she was overwhelmed with heavenly bliss, hot urine spilled on her jeans making her feel a pleasant warmth. Unfortunately, it quickly turned into a piercing, painful chill, despite the fire, she was chilled because she had been taken away from blankets which were insulating well against the icy wind.
"At least wash the blood off her face or the captain will be mad." He suggested glancing sadly at the trembling, pissed teenager, still dirty from the dried blood she looked like a real picture of misery and despair. He was surprised to find that Eliot disappeared from sight without a word, only to return after a while with a bucket full of water. Warren was glad that maybe his companion would finally stop bullying an innocent teenager, but he did not expect what had happened in the next few seconds. The tall, bald boy grinned disgustingly and unceremoniously splashed the girl with terribly cold, even icy water, she only screamed madly and loudly with pain, fear and rage. Her animal roar broke the relative silence of the entire encampment, causing at least a dozen of people to come running to see what had actually happened. "What the hell, dude? You are such a fuckup!"
"You fucking son of a bitch!" A hoarse, menacing scream emerged from the throat of shivering with cold, soaked teenager. She sent the bald man a deadly, contemptuous look of blue eyes which were sharp like a razor. She shook her whole body furiously, struggling against the tree like a fish caught on a hook, had the sincere desire to break free from the ties and bite his throat like an angry animal. "I wish you would die painfully, you motherfucker!" In all the confusion no one noticed that a small detachment consisting of three horse riders and five foot soldiers entered the camp, which was fenced only with a palisade of sharpened branches. Immediately surprised mob was chased away by two thick, bay gelding, whose owners hit everyone who stood in their way with wooden clubs. They made way for the swift, seal brown stallion, which shook its head wildly, squealing ferociously and scattering splashes of frothy saliva around. On his back sat a tall, slender woman dressed in a clean, good-quality black uniform with silver decorations, equally dark, shiny boots and dark gray, puffed breeches. Her long blonde hair was braided in a neat braid and freely flowing down soldier's broad back. Shivering with irritation, fury and terrifying cold, Max felt her wild gaze sweeping through her whole body for several extended seconds. As soon as the turquoise of a peaceful, exotic lagoon collided with the poisonous, furious blue of the unstoppable ocean, both girls completely lost their confidence. The freckled brown haired girl wanted to cry with happiness. Chloe was alive, she was doing quite well in this shitty reality, in addition blonde girl looked as if she had recognized her or rather saw a real ghost, because she was so fucking pale on her long, sharp face. Was it even possible?
"What the fuck is going on here?!" She roared it in a voice so thoroughly saturated with fury that everyone fell silent immediately, the silence of the night was broken only by snorting of horses and crackling of wood glistening in bonfires that were lit in several places in the camp. Standing nearby the alleged captain red-haired women hid her face in hands, showing the despair that suddenly overwhelmed her as soon as she realized what this stupid, hateful Eliot had done. The bald boy was already opening his mouth to say something, but the tall blonde was faster. She confidently drew a saber hanging in an ornate leather scabbard at her belt and tapped the barrel-shaped belly of the stallion with spurs, making him trot his way to the guy. Horse was examining him with a menacing gaze of coal-black, astonishingly intelligent, opened wide eyes. " You. What's that supposed to mean?" With the tip of the blade she pointed at the sticky soldier, then at the tied to a tree, soaked and freezing teenager with wild animal eyes and face flooded with a dried waterfall of blood.
"On the coast near the cliff we had captured a Russian spy…"
" Does this skinny girl look like a KGB agent to you?" She growled furiously like an enraged Rottweiler and gave him imperious gaze of glistening, horrible eyes, the boy huddled under their invisible pressure. She unceremoniously dismounted from her horse, handed the reins to some soldier and walked over to the inept subordinate only to hit him with a well-aimed slap on his right cheek from an open hand. The boy screamed in pain, but seeing the captain's hand still raised he gritted his teeth, stood at attention and saluted avoiding her hateful gaze like fire. "Untie her, take to my quarters for a bath and dress her up, Rut. And you, dumbass, will be on your knees washing her clothes in the river nearby. That's an order, don't do the shitting cat's face and get out of my sight or I'll slap you again." The red-haired soldier obediently bent down to the waist in front of the angry overlord, pulled out a small knife and carefully began to cut the bonds binding Max and pinning her stiffly to the tree. As soon as she cut all the rough ropes, the brown-haired girl fell to the ground with a thud, not even being able to protect her face with her hands from falling down so she painfully slammed into the frozen ground. Max was chained for too long without moving, her whole body was dull, ischemic and numb, she couldn't move her legs or arms and felt literally like a sack of potatoes. Despite the dim pain, she breathed a sigh of relief, finally changed her position and felt the hot blood begin to circulate again in all of her limbs. However she did not have the strength to lift herself so Warren and the redhead had to lift the girl by holding her under armpits and drag towards the captain's house. Max so badly wanted to help them but she only was able to shuffle her numb legs without any order.