Well, it's been a while, hasn't it! Sorry for the delay, but I am now out of college so I'm hoping updates might come a bit faster to this story and another I've forgotten called Fragments. As always, I love reviews because they make me smile like a giddy fool.
"You know what's funny?"
Helen turned, frowning at the figure of Adam standing in the middle of the sanctuary corridor. She glanced behind her briefly, then back to the sadistic little man.
"How did you get in my house?"
"No matter how hard you try, Helen," He crooned, stepping toward her until he was inches from her. He reached up and with a sweep of his arm, knocked her back into the wall. His hand clasped around her throat and pinned her there, his face moving in close to hers as she struggled for breath.
"She will be mine." He snarled, continuing to choke her as she attempted to fight back. Her body wasn't responding and panic flooded her chest. Her hands clawed at Adam's, trying to peel his hand away. Blackness wavered at the edge of her vision –
- Helen jerked awake, inhaling sharply and panic flooding her entire chest as it had been in her dream. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness in her bedroom as she tried to calm herself before she launched into a panic attack. The nightmares had been coming frequently since Sophia had been born, a warning if Helen had ever seen one. Whether they were productions of her own mind or if Adam had done something to her head to allow her to see that sort of thing, they were keeping her from sleeping at night. They'd given her a preliminary scan that had showed nothing in her head or anywhere else in her body for that matter, which made her wonder if her stress and worry over her daughter was just getting to her.
As she moved to climb out of bed to go and check on Sophia, the arm around her waist tightened and drew her back. Lips pressed against her neck and shoulder reassuringly.
"She's fine, Helen." Nikola murmured, hand splayed across her hip. Helen rolled over to study him, furrowing her brow as he stared at her with a knowing look. "It was just a dream. Go back to sleep."
"I just want to check on her." Helen protested tiredly, attempting to push away but his grip remained strong on her and prevented her from moving more than a few inches. She ground her teeth together and twisted to glare at him. "Let go."
"We both know very well that you're going to get out of this bed, check on her, see that she's completely fine, and then be up the rest of the night." Nikola replied in a quiet tone, seemingly unaffected by her gaze. "It's been your routine for a week. How do you know that isn't what he wants, Helen? Exhaust you to the point that you're useless in defending her when the time comes?" He continued. "You have the baby monitor for a reason – if she cries, you'll hear. Right now, she's sleeping and do you really want to chance waking her up?"
Helen scowled and huffed, but fell back onto her pillow dejectedly. She hated to admit it, but Nikola was right on all accounts. She tried to shift her mind to other thoughts, but she was awake now and it was no use getting back to sleep, even if she did stay in bed.
"Stop it." Nikola growled. "Go to sleep."
"I can't and you very well know it, as you've just so kindly finished stating." Helen said a bit more harsher than she intended, rolling over so that her back was to him and she was curled against her pillows rather than his warm body. She huffed and she could practically hear him roll his eyes at her, but said nothing. Instead, her gaze found a particularly interesting spot on the opposite wall to stare at for the time being.
Nikola sighed heavily, thumb tracing circles over the fabric covering her hip bone. She relented and shifted into his warm embrace, feeling his chest press against her back in a comforting position. Her hand found his along her hip and she interlaced her fingers tightly with his, letting out a soft sigh.
"You worry too much. Perhaps I ought to drug you to get you to sleep."
"Even attempt to and I'll shoot you in both kneecaps." She warned, squeezing his fingers. Nikola chuckled, lips pressing another kiss to her shoulder before he suddenly moved and had tugged her to the middle of the bed, Nikola hovering above her.
"I don't think you're capable of such a thing. You love me far too much." He grinned and Helen rolled her eyes.
"Your ego is almost too large for this room let alone the sanctuary. Don't let me add to it." She muttered, not protesting as much as she should have when his lips captured hers for a fleeting moment. His hands trailed up along her side, slipping beneath the shirt she had worn to bed. "And as much as I'd love to substitute this for sleeping, I'm exhausted enough as is, Niko." Helen added as an afterthought. He chuckled again.
"If only. I'm only trying to distract you long enough to get you to sleep."
"You're doing a very poor job of it."
"Shall I start reciting Shakespeare?"
Helen snorted quietly. "And my reply, again, will be to shoot you. I've had enough Shakespeare to last a lifetime, and your melodramatics are quite enough on their own without adding his words." It was her turn to shift, rolling them over so that she was straddling him, hands placed on the wiry muscle of his chest.
"Now who's the one doing the distracting?"
"Go to sleep, Nikola." She warned before falling back into the pillows on her side of the bed.
"I'm not allowed to." He said, snaking his arms back around her waist and pulling her close. Facing him, Helen rested her head in the crook of his neck.
"Why?"
"I've got to keep the nightmares away, now don't I?" Nikola smirked. Helen almost rolled her eyes.
"Far too romantic and cliché for your own good, aren't you?"
"I try." He murmured, pressing a kiss to the top of her head.
"In that case you can tend to Sophia if she wakes up. I've had enough interruptions."
"How kind of you to grant me your permission to do so, your highness." Nikola pulled her even tighter to him as she let out a soft chuckle. "Go to sleep."
"Yes, sir."
Helen settled in and closed her eyes, trying to focus on Nikola's breathing and steady heartbeat beneath her fingertips. She started to count the beats, hoping it would lull her back to sleep, but the numbers started to turn into more evil things, threatening to overwhelm her once more. A frown tugged at her lips in her sleep as the nightmares loomed at the brink of her dreams, creeping closer upon her like some sort of thick fog. Perhaps there was something in her mind that was causing it all, even if the scans had shown nothing. She'd give them another go tomorrow if she had the time, though she wasn't entirely certain what she'd do if Adam had implanted something within her mind.
The thought revolted her in all ways possible, but she was half asleep already so the thoughts merely drifted away, stored in the back of her mind for when she awakened.
Naturally, however, proper sleep was far too good to be true and she was jerked from the borderline of unconsciousness by the sanctuary sending itself into lockdown, alarms blaring throughout the PA system in all directions. Helen bolted up from bed only a half a second behind Nikola, tugging on her robe. Her hand slipped beneath her pillow and grabbed her gun, all traces of sleep disappearing.
"See if you can find Henry and figure out what's going on. I'll get Sophia." Helen said, looking at Nikola. He nodded and darted out of the room, snatching up the tablet on the nightstand on the way out. Helen followed but turned left instead of right, reaching Sophia's room in a matter of footsteps.
Her door was sealed because of the lockdown, so she typed out the six digit code on the hidden number pad that allowed her access. The door swung open and she took two steps in before she paused, noting the window was open and the lacey pink curtains were wafting with the night breeze. Panic seized her chest as she practically flew to the baby's crib, relieved to find Sophia there, flailing a bit madly but otherwise unharmed. Her face screwed up as if she were about to cry, but Helen scooped her up and held her close.
"It's all right my darling. It'll be over soon." Helen murmured, balancing her daughter in one arm against her chest while the other still held the gun tight, prepared to fight off any who should come near. Still, the window being open was odd – it had been locked from the inside, and was stories up from the ground. There was no possible way anyone could have –
"You think you'd learn that you can't possibly keep me out forever, Helen."
The voice sent a dark chill racing up her spine as she turned, facing the tall man who lurked in the shadowy corner, looming and threatening as ever. He crept closer, a smirk briefly crossing his face.
"She's very pretty." John continued, nodding toward Sophia. "Was Ashley as pretty when she was born? I wouldn't know since you kept her from me." His words ended in a snarl. Helen raised her gun and pressed it to his chest as he drew too close, aiming for his heart.
"Don't tell me – you're working for Adam."
"Only for the time being, I'm afraid. He needed someone who could get in and out easier than he." John replied neutrally, gaze flickering from Helen to Sophia again. "You know what I've come for. Give her to me."
"Over my dead body." Helen snarled, cocking the gun and pressing it harder into his chest. He chuckled darkly.
"If only." John said. "Have it your way then, Helen. Always so difficult. Do you give your new lover this much trouble? I'm sure you and Tesla get along fantastically together if you're this stubborn still." He smirked and reached up, grabbing the wrist with the gun and twisting it quickly so that her shot embedded into the wall instead of his chest. Helen flinched in pain as John jerked her toward him before she could react. She twisted, but found it rather difficult with an infant in her arms. Sophia had started to fuss, on the verge of letting loose with her crying at any moment. Something wasn't right and she knew it, let alone the strange man trying to grab at her.
"Back off!" Helen snarled, elbowing him in the chest. John grunted and caught her arm again, twisting it and her around so that she was pinned to him, her back to his chest. He twisted her wrist further and the gun went clattering to the ground, allowing him to kick it away. Helen struggled against him but he held her in place, one hand slipping around to grab Sophia with a gentleness that she was not aware he was capable of any more. Once he had the child, he slammed Helen roughly back into the nearest wall.
"Say goodbye to mummy." John grinned down at Sophia, who had indeed started screaming. Helen gathered herself with a growl and launched forward toward him, but before her fingers could close around his coat he disappeared in a flash, leaving her alone in the room. Helen's chest clenched with a horrific tightness before she bolted from the room.
"Nikola!" She called, saying to hell with the elevator and taking the stairs. She ducked through barriers as they began to lift, the lockdown wearing off as she hurried through corridors. "Nikola!" His name came out more of a scream that time and Helen realized she was crying, chest heaving with something she had not felt in quite some time. She felt tears rolling down her cheeks, the water blurring her vision as she ran, bare feet hitting the carpet.
"Nikola!" Helen turned a corner and skidded to a halt, furrowing her brow when the hallway turned into something endless, almost like a dream. Her mouth opened in half shock.
"What's real and what's reality, hm?"
She whirled, watching Adam waltz toward her with an all-too-familiar smirk.
"What have you done to me?" She whispered, hands clenching into fists, prepared to strike. He chuckled.
"This is all your doing, Helen. Your thoughts, your worries, projected in your own dreams. Or nightmares, I should say. I've only helped them along, so to speak." Adam shrugged lightly. "I would have hoped you would have remained a bit calm during the process. You're quite hard to handle when you start fighting back."
Her brow furrowed further and she glanced around. A dream, was it? All of it? Her mind swam, a headache clustering at the back of her head.
"Process?" She asked, the only coherent question she could come up with at the time being.
"You can imagine how difficult it is to bring you to term and deliver a half vampire child, can't you? You've been under for quite some time while we've been working away. Your child is and will continue to be mine, Helen. You're hardly deserving of it when you took mine so harshly away from me." His demeanor suddenly changed to one of anger and he lunged at her, hand at her throat once more. He backed her up against the wall with a snarl, upper lip curling.
"When you wake up, it'll be gone. We'll be gone; off to have a lovely life where it'll know me as a father instead of that freak you call a vampire. You know what I'll tell it about its mother? She died. Because if you were anyone else, you would be. But I want you to suffer, to know what it's like – if you thought losing Ashley was bad, just wait, Helen. Just. Wait."
Confusion, pain, and rage swirled about her head. It felt so real, all of it – how could it be a dream? Helen wondered vaguely how to establish which was real and which was fake, and found she couldn't. Nothing to separate the real from the not real. After all, the only constant in all realms seemed to be Adam, and that was hardly anything to base assumptions from.
Her hands flew up to wrap around his hand, attempting to peel it away with a snarl of her own.
"Get your hands off me." Helen said, anger overcoming all other emotions for a moment as she managed to wedge her fingers beneath his against her throat and her leg came up, kneeing him in the groin. He recoiled and she took the opportunity to send him flying back into the opposite wall. First things first, find a way to wake up.
She broke off at a run, darting down a different hallway than the one that had turned endless, taking the stairs into lower levels. Perhaps the labs would help, or something in the enclosures.
Adam appeared suddenly in front of her with a face that easily showed he was furious with her. Helen took several steps back, rethinking, as he advanced again.
"You can't escape from me, Helen, even in your nightmares." Adam stated, continuing his advance toward her. Helen lashed out with a punch but he disappeared from view again, his laughter echoing around in her head.
A sharp pain suddenly ripped through her body that sent Helen doubling over in pain. She clutched at her torso as the world around her became another blur and nothing more, Adam's laughter fading out of her mind. Someone was screaming and it took her a moment to realize it was her own screams. Everything swirled together and Helen was left unaware, floating empty in a void, dying of whatever hellish pain was coursing through her –
- She jerked up, though whether it was into a proper reality or another nightmare, she wasn't entirely sure. There were several doctors around her and the pain continued to rip through her, particularly her lower half. Eyes wide, she tried to draw in deep breaths, but everything hurt. Doctors were saying things to her, gloved hands pressing down on her arms in an attempt to force her back down, but Helen fought them.
"Get your hands off me!" Helen jerked away from them, or attempted to. There were others holding tight to her legs, pinning her in place. She reached toward them, attempting to claw at them, but another ripple of pain sent her recoiling back against the pillows. It was then Helen realized she was in labor and she was in a hospital room, about to have a child. Fear and panic gripped her as her hands curled into fists among the sheets, the pain a constant presence now.
"You can't have her!" Helen stated, grinding her teeth together in a fury. Nurses on either side of her held tight to her arms, pinning her to the bed. They couldn't sedate her, not now, and while she'd assumed simply cutting her open would have been the best option, she guessed something had gone a bit awry according to Adam's plans.
"Calm down, sweetheart." A sickly voice said and her head snapped over to look at Adam, who was hovering beside one of the nurses. He reached over and grabbed her hand tightly, squeezing it, looking every part of a husband who was there to support his wife through labor. Helen's jaw clenched as she jerked her hand from him.
"Get away from me you pathetic bastard!" She snarled. Her entire world was ending, she was entirely sure. Her hair was plastered across her forehead with sweat, the hospital gown clinging in every possibly way to her skin. Everything was suddenly making her angry, even the color of the damned wall. Adam was saying something else to her, and the doctors around her seemed far too excited about something. Helen felt the pain suddenly lift and she let out a breath. She felt Adam's hand comb hair from her face, still playing the concerned father.
"Good job, Helen." He said, a glint of evil visible within his eyes as his lips quirked into a smile, the fakest one she had seen just yet. "She's beautiful."
"Stay away from her." She hissed furiously, but one of the nurses was returning to her side with a needle, injecting it into her IV line. Helen made to protest, but before she could formulate much of a response she was already slipping under again.