"What're you going to do to me?" She asked with more confidence then she felt. Taylor's gray eyes seemed to dance with mischief.
"No, it's what you're going to do. I told you that I wanted them broken, Charlotte." Charlotte's could feel her omelet start to come back up her throat. She remembered the people with the purple eyes suddenly. It clicked in her brain all of the sudden. The fact that he was the son of Dr. Manyak, the man that had used musical brainwarping. The strange people with the marks and the glowing eyes.
"That was you?! Y-You brainwashed those people, didn't you? Is that what you're going to do with me?" Charlotte said, her voice wavering.
Shots of pure adrenaline coursed through her system from his words. She was panicking. That couldn't happen to her again. The images of her old nightmares and night terrors of all those years ago were quickly coming back to haunt her with a vengeance. She barely registered the words coming out of Taylor's mouth.
"Of course that was me. Who else would it be? What other evil genius lives in this town?" Taylor snorted. Charlotte's heart pounded so hard in her chest that it was starting to hurt. She could feel the ends of her vision start to blur, and her body was shaking like a leaf in a rainstorm. She felt like she was barely hanging onto a cliff with one hand, and Taylor was slowly pulling her fingers off. One. By. One.
"P-Please. Don't do it. Please." Charlotte pleaded, resisting the urge to run out. She knew it would be fruitless, and that this wasn't the kind of problem that she could run away from.
"Oh, I won't. If you follow my instructions, no one will get hurt." Taylor said, but he pulled out a syringe from the pocket of his green jacket anyway. Charlotte moved the chair backwards with her feet without even thinking about it. All she saw was the syringe, and all she could think about was what was inside, some serum that would probably take away her control.
"Aw, Char, don't be scared." Taylor said with a smile.
"It's useless. There's no one to save you. I know everything about you. I know about the anxiety attacks. I know about the night terrors, and there's no waking up from this nightmare." Taylor said maliciously. His smile becoming sinister in a matter of seconds. Taylor moved closer to Charlotte and took her head in his hands harshly. Charlotte could feel hot tears run down her face, but she was too scared to care about crying in front of a stranger.
She let out a blood curling scream as she felt a needle prick the smooth skin of her neck. Taylor covered her mouth with one of his dry, calloused hand.
"Shhh, no need to scream. It won't take affect yet. This was just my insurance. I can't let you babble our secrets out now, can I?" Taylor whispered in her ear. Charlotte shuddered and screamed louder, her muffled screams portraying the pain and fear that had taken over. Taylor pinched her cheek tightly.
"Stop screaming. I haven't even done anything yet." Taylor commanded, but Charlotte continued to scream into his hand. She was lost; it was her worst nightmare coming to life. Being used. Being out of control.
"If you don't stop screaming, I'll be forced to ditch my original plan and blow up Henry right now." Taylor said, slightly annoyed. The words grounded her almost immediately.
"What?" Charlotte whispered in shock into his hand. Taylor removed his hand from her mouth.
"Great. I was saving that threat as kind of a finale of sorts, but I guess I'll have to speed things up." Charlotte thought that she was afraid before, but the words coming out of his mouth scared her more than any gun or drug.
"Don't you dare." Charlotte growled out, finding some semblance of strength in herself to try to save her best friend.
"If you cooperate, Henry will leave the warehouse without a scratch. If you don't, well, let's just say, there won't be a Henry left to love." Taylor said, leaning back from her and reaching into his pocket for some other horrifying thing.
"No. I-I'll cooperate. Just as long as no one gets hurt." Charlotte said with determination in her voice. Taylor's hand left his pocket, leaving whatever he was going to pull out dormant in his pocket, and he smirked.
"Perfect. I mean you didn't exactly have a choice, but it's so much easier with you doing what I say willingly." Taylor said, going back to sit on the couch. He looked down at his expensive gold watch with a frown.
"We don't have much time left to chat, so I'll make this brief. I want you to break Henry's heart. I want it torn out of his chest. I want him to hate you for ruining him. Don't give me a lazy performance either. I'll know. I'll be watching." Taylor said, straightening his jacket and brushing dust off of his pants.
"Let's make him jealous too, shall we? Tell him you love Taylor, and that he doesn't compare to me. That should be fun. He'd hate that." Taylor said before chuckling. Charlotte was disgusted by how calm and nonchalant he was being. Taylor was acting like this was some game or joke that they were both a part of.
"How the hell am I supposed to lie to my best friend?" Charlotte yelled at him. Taylor glared at her, the cruelty and madness written all over his face.
"Figure it out. You don't want me to do it for you, but I will if I have to." Taylor said before walking towards the elevator doors. Charlotte watched him go with hate burning in her chest. She didn't condone violence, but she had the strong urge to choke Taylor with her bare hands. He knew everything about all of them. Everything. She had never told anyone but her therapist about the nightmares. He knew exactly what he was doing to her. He knew all of the right buttons to push. She had never been more unsettled in her life. Taylor was using her as his puppet, and there was nothing she could do about it. He held all of the strings in his calloused hands. He had managed to figure out what all of her worst fears were and used every single one against her in less than an hour. Just thinking about the serum in her body made her want to rip the skin off of her neck.
"See you later, Charlotte. Break a leg. I'll text you." Taylor said with an obnoxious wink before leaving the Man Cave. As soon as he was gone, sobs wracked through her body. She couldn't do this. If Henry loved her even a fraction of the way that she loved him, this was going to hurt. Charlotte cried even harder, cradling her knees to her chest. She took a raggedy breath. In through her nose. Out through her mouth.
She had to do this. The emotional pain would be better than the alternative. She closed her eyes tightly and painfully as she imagined a life without Henry in it.
No matter what Taylor said, he was obviously willing to kill them both. Charlotte wouldn't put it past him to force her to kill Henry by taking control of her body. That couldn't happen. She wouldn't surrender the only amount of control that she had willingly. If she was going to break Henry's heart, she was going to do it her way.
She took a few minutes to get herself together. There was no way that Henry would believe anything that she said if he saw her tear stained, pale face. She went into the bathroom, and she almost started crying as she looked into her reflection. She looked worse than she thought that she did.
Her nose was running profusely, her eyes were puffy, her hair was a mess, her skin was slightly pale, and she had a haunted look in her eye. She washed her face with cold water, hoping to cause the blood to rush back to her face. She blew her nose and fixed her hair. She tried to smile kindly in the mirror, but there was a weight on her mouth that didn't allow her to smile. She could feel the tears form in the back of her eyes, but she refused to let them fall again. Crying was not going to help her right now. She grabbed the porcelain sink and closed her eyes before taking another deep breath.
"You can do this, Charlotte. You have to do this. For Henry." She said to herself. She thought of his bright brown eyes, soft smile, silky hair, and corny jokes. The world needed him. She needed him. She would do this, even though it would smash her heart into tiny, microscopic pieces. She never thought that she would ever have to save Henry from herself, but things change.
She walked out of the bathroom and back towards the entrance of the Man Cave, just in time for Henry to come back down the tube in his uniform. She was instantly relieved to see him all in one piece. Taylor didn't lie; Henry didn't have a scratch or a smudge on him. His eyebrows were crinkled in confusion, but he smiled once he saw her. He immediately walked over with a bright smile. He never got tired of being able to see Charlotte after a mission. His face fell when he saw her facial expression. He knew immediately that there was something wrong.
"What's wrong Charlotte? What happened?" Henry said, gently grabbing her arm. Charlotte looked down at his hand on her bare arm, and she cringed slightly, remembering who had touched her before Henry. The flinch that Henry saw wasn't faked. He moved his hand off of her, sensing that she was uncomfortable.
"Char, are you okay? You look like you've been crying…" Henry said, leaning in towards her slightly. Charlotte backed away. She didn't want him to touch her. It would make this so much harder. Henry looked at her with a hurt expression.
"No, I'm not okay, Henry." Charlotte choked out, resisting the urge to cry again. He was being so sweet and caring, and she was being so cold. All she wanted to do was cry into his arms and confess everything, but she couldn't do that. It would get them both in trouble.
"What's wrong, baby?" Henry said, trying to reach for her again (probably to engulf her in a hug), but she took a step back.
"You." Charlotte said, not looking him in the eye. They say that all good lies are wrapped up in the truth. This wasn't any different. Charlotte wasn't exactly lying. He was what was wrong. He was in danger, and she had to keep him safe. Of course, Henry didn't know that was what she was really talking about. He took it exactly how she expected him to take it. He froze in shock, and Charlotte almost cried as she watched his face fall.
"Wh-What are you talking about, Char?" Henry said, his voice trembling, despite his mental protests. Charlotte could hear the fear and self-consciousness in it, and she closed her eyes and drew in a shaky breath.
"We can't be together, Henry." Charlotte said, bluntly. Henry moved away from her then.
"But why?" Henry said, barely above a whisper. He was pleading with his eyes for her to take it back, for it not to be real. Charlotte cringed. He was taking this worse than she thought he would. She could practically see Taylor laughing and giggling like the lunatic he was. She clenched her fists by her side before continuing.
"What we did was a mistake, Henry." A part of her actually believed it. A part of her wished that they hadn't kissed, so that every other kiss she had wasn't ruined in her mind, and that she wouldn't be able to reply it in her mind for the rest of her life. Henry's mouth dropped open slightly and ran his hands through his hair roughly.
"Char, please. Please don't say that. It meant everything to me. It's the best thing that's ever happened to me, next to you walking into my life. You can't tell me that it was a mistake." Henry pleaded, trying to get her to understand, to hear the words that he wasn't saying. For the first time in her life, she heard them. Henry didn't just care for her or have a crush on her. Henry loved her. He was in love with her. She felt like screaming again. Why was it that when she finally finds out that her best friend returned her feelings, it's when she can't tell him how much she loves him? If she heard something shatter at that moment, she would have sworn it was her heart. It felt like it was being harshly beaten by a jack hammer.
"It was. We were just caught up in the moment. This, coming here, was a mistake." Charlotte heard herself say.
"How can you say that, Charlotte? Every time we're together, it's a moment. I love you. I always have. That was more than just a moment for me, Charlotte. I thought that you felt the same way…" Henry said, raising his voice. He stared at her, and she swore she saw tears in the corner of his eyes. Charlotte wanted to scream at him that: She did. She felt the same way. She loved him so much that it hurt. She dreamt of kissing him for so long that she couldn't even fathom the fact that it actually happened. She didn't though. What she said instead pushed jagged knives through both of their hearts.
"I don't love you, Henry. I'm sorry if I lead you on. I've always thought of you as a friend. An attractive friend, maybe, but still a friend." Henry felt like she had slapped him in the face and strangled his heart. He had poured his feelings out to her, and she threw it in his face. He had imagined her rejecting him before, but she was never this cruel, this cold. He barely managed to choke out something in shock.
"You don't love me?" Charlotte shook her head no, which was enough as it is, but Henry didn't even know how to feel about what come out of her mouth next.
"No, I don't. I-I love someone else…" Charlotte managed to choke out, remembering Taylor's 'request'. Henry felt like Charlotte had thrown an anvil at his chest. He couldn't breathe, and he swore his heart stopped cold in his chest. He couldn't believe this. Not only had she lead him on, she loved someone else. Henry couldn't even really fathom the idea of Charlotte, the person that he was the closest to, doing this to him.
"You love someone else?" Henry said, barely understanding the weight of the words coming out of his mouth. All he saw was the guilt in her face, and he knew that he had to get out of here. He ran over to the tubes, jumped in one, and shouted up the tube in a broken voice. His heart was shattered in pieces all over the Man Cave, and he wasn't sure that it could ever be fixed.
Author's Note: I know what you're thinking: "Lizlen, WTF. You don't update in weeks, and this is what you give me?! You break the real OTP?!" My literal response: SAME.
First of all, I'm sorry I didn't update Monday, but this week has been super busy! I know that those are terrible excuses, and you don't care. XP
Second of all, if this chapter broke you, I'm so sorry, but we're actually in the same boat. I almost cried at the keyboard. (I spent like half of it listening to It will Rain by Bruno Mars on repeat.) I kinda put my heart and soul into this chapter, so I really hope you like it (the writing). Next chapter will be up sooner as it's slightly less heart wrecking (that's probably a lie, haha). Well... It will have my usual weirdo humor in it, so that'll be a thing.
Third of all, I fangirled the other day because I realized I had 38 reviews, and that's close to 40, and 40 is close to 50, and 50 is half of a 100. If this fanfic makes it to 50 reviews, I'll probably die, and write whoever wrote the 50th review their own fic. [Totally reminds me that I would love prompts? (PLEASE.)] That was my (weird) way of saying that I totally appreciate everyone in this archive for skimming, reading, favoriting, following, and reviewing my story. It brings smiles to my face literally every time.
Before I forget, as always, thank to wstrnplsr105 for being amazing, supporting me, and reading my chicken scratch. (If you haven't already, please go read her new fic. It's really great, and I adore it so much that it actually hurts?) Oh, we're writing a collab fic that I'm actually pretty excited for, so read that too if you haven't.