A/N: This chapter contains some suggestive themes that some may find upsetting. It is a dream sequence but if you are likely to be offended, I recommend skipping it.

Chapter Twenty Two – Day Unknown

I am running, I cannot remember from what but I know that if it catches up with me everything will end. My breathing is laboured, blood is rushing in my ears and my face is wet from tears. I have been abandoned to my fate, there is no one left to save me… no one left who cares.

The pain and emptiness is almost unbearable but I have to keep going, I have never been so afraid.

I stop at a fork in the road and bend double as I try to catch my breath. The path to the right is bright and sunny and very welcoming, that is the way I should go, but as I take a step in that direction I hear a voice that I know better than my own. "COME ON LINKA!"

"Yankee?" I whisper breathlessly, turning towards the other road. It is overgrown with trees but surely they cannot account for the depth of darkness down that way. There is a large black bird sitting at the side of the road as well and it sends a chill through my heart just to look at it… I know so much about birds but I cannot identify it, except that I know in my soul that it is a carrion eater… surely I should not go that way…

I hear Wheeler's voice again and that decides me, whatever lies in the darkness I cannot leave my Yankee to face it alone.

I stumble along the road that is devoid of all light, and sob in terror as my clothes catch on unseen branches… at least I think that is what they are, sometimes they feel like hands, grasping me, trying to pull me from the path into the endless night.

It feels like I have been running forever but the voices are the worst part… I tell myself that they are in my imagination but I am not sure…

"So! Is this what you were doing while my boy was dying?" Uncle? "Canoodling with your American boyfriend, learning all his city ways and corrupted habits?"

"You stupid cow!" Boris!

"Your mind is too polluted to use your ring." Wheeler?

"It is the drugs! She has brought them here with her and taken too many! The guilt she feels over not saving Boris is too much! She dies as he did!" Nyet, Uncle Dimitri, please…

"Nyet, if anyone touches my Bliss I will blow them away!" Bozhe' Moy!

"I left her looking after him!"

"How does she repay you for the drugs that you provide?"

There is light ahead, if I can just reach it… I cry out as I stumble and fall, sure that whatever is pursuing me is just behind, ready to pounce…

"She is dead to me…as dead as Boris." His voice is so close to me I scream.

"NYET!" I scramble up and fall into the light.

At first the light is so bright that I cannot see anything, but then it slowly fades away and I realise that I am sitting on the floor of a room with white walls and floors… and they are padded. The hospital! Wheeler really did it, he put me away!

I cannot adequately describe the despair that comes over me, not because of where I am, but because of who put me here. How could he? Why did he not just let me go? I meant what I said, I could never bear to see him again. No doctor can cure the hurt, the damage ,that is inside of me now.

As if they hear my thoughts, three people in white coats enter the room. I steadfastly refuse to look at them, focusing instead on the angry slashes across my wrists and arms… the count of my failures.

"Well Good Morning, and are we ready to admit what we are today?" I look up in surprise at the familiar chirpy voice.

"Gi? Kwame? Ma-Ti?" I do not understand.

Kwame sighs. "No, those are our names, you are a drug addict. Say it."

"Nyet." I reply warily. "Where is Wheeler? And Gaia?"

Ma-Ti laughs, it is a cruel, alien laugh that I would never have associated with him. "They aren't here, you destroyed them."

"Nyet!" I cry. "You are lying!"

Gi puts her hands on her hips and huffs. "Well what did you think would happen? Gaia was doomed without the Planeteers and Wheeler… did you really think he'd be able to get over your death?"

"I am not dead." I answer, but the strange thing is I am not sure and now I have time to look around, I realise that I am not in a clinic at all, this is my room on Hope Island… just re-decorated as my own personal prison.

Gi smirks, her eyes full of hatred. "No you're not dead, you're a zombie who can't even admit she has a problem."

"A slut who will do anything for a fix." Kwame adds, his voice cold and emotionless.

Ma-Ti steps forward and grabs my wrist. "A lost cause who betrays those who love her. You are no longer worth our time and effort."

I shake my head, unable to speak for the sobs that are wracking my chest as I am hauled to my feet.

Gi opens my bedroom door, it is dark outside but I can see something moving. "It's time you joined your own kind, you're not special any more, maybe they can help you."

I struggle but Kwame grasps my shoulders, his grip like a vice, and propels me outside… into the Blissed-out mob.

I am in a sea of pain.

Each punch, each kick, they mean every one… I did not choose to be one of them, they hold me in contempt and blame me for their sufferings. My clothes are in tatters, there is not even enough left to preserve my dignity… and they are taking me somewhere, I cannot bear to think of what happens next…

A door opens and I am once again shoved into the light. I collapse onto the floor, too weak and too afraid to look up and see where I am now.

"Linka…" I know that voice, it haunts my dreams.

I finally look up… I am in Wheelers bedroom.

He slides over and pulls back the covers. "…if this is alright with you."

I stare in horror at the scene before me. He is only wearing his underwear which is laying rather low on his hips. It is not that he is not decent, he is, it is just… suggestive. At least, it is suggesting things to my mind, and they are not conducive to a good nights sleep.

"Oh, uh… I… I can take these off if you'd like to see more." He says, as he realises that I am still staring, then he starts to laugh that sickening mutant laugh as his tail twitches.

I stand up, trying to cover myself but the remains of my clothes stay on the floor of the hut. "Where is Wheeler, Skumm?" I ask defiantly… but the fear is there and I know he hears it.

"What's the matter blondie?" He taunts. "You weren't so shy back in DC."

"That is a lie!" I reply hotly, knowing that I am playing into his hands but not able to resist denying it.

Skumm laughs again and rubs himself through what I recognise as Wheelers boxers. "You need a real man, that adolescent eco-freak can't give you what you need, I can."

He holds out a pill in his other hand… Bliss… bozhe' moy! Yankee help me!

"You know what you have to do to get it." Skumm keeps talking but my gaze is focused on the luminescent pill. "No more freebies, Planeteer."

I shake my head. I want to run away but I cannot move.

Suddenly Skumm is standing behind me and from the way he is pressed against me, I can tell that he is no longer wearing Wheelers underpants… or anything else. His hands stroke my shoulders and I begin to cry but I still cannot move.

Gently, he moves me around and pushes me towards the bathroom… what is he going to do to me? I shut my eyes tight and pray for help.

Skumm's hands move down from my shoulders and begin an unpleasant exploration of my breasts as his tail wraps its self around my ankle. I sob. "Please no…"

"Look down." I shake my head, I cannot watch, but he adds. "Into the water."

I do as I am told and cry out in pain and horror, pushing back against my captor and his rough fur, as I try to free myself, but he is not letting me go.

The bath is over flowing with water and at he bottom, red blossoming from his freshly cut wrists, my Yankees beautiful eyes stare back at me… empty of life.

I scream and keep screaming but no sound comes out, the only noise is Skumm's laughter that turns into a travesty of Wheelers voice. "Your friends and family have disowned you Babe, you're mine now, you have nothing left but me… you wouldn't want me to withdraw my protection would you?"

Even as he asks, his hands begin to slip lower down my naked body… and I finally find my voice. "Nyet! Never!"

I wrench myself free and make for the door, preferring to be torn apart by the mob than live with what Skumm is offering me…

I am falling.

I opened the door of Wheelers cabin and launched myself out, but I was on the top of the Capital Building… I know it does not make sense, but I do not care, it will soon all be over and that is what I want… I have lost everything that mattered.

The impact on the surface of the water hurts and I cry out, which means I get a mouth full of water as I sink below the surface. Coughing and trying to expel the water, I make for the surface but when I reach it, it is solid like a sheet of glass.

I am crying, I cannot breathe and my chest and ribs hurt… I pound frantically on the surface of the water but it is no use and my panic just makes me swallow more of the liquid… the corners of my vision are going black, it will not be much longer.

"Linka… Come back to me Baby." Wheeler? Nyet, I imagined it… he is gone and my air is going too.

I reach up towards the surface one last time as I begin to sink, my strength gone, my fight over.

A hand grabs my wrist suddenly and pulls me back up into the sunlight. For a second I struggle, thinking it is that rat, but then I hear his voice again. "Oh thank God!"

I try to say his name but end up coughing up water instead. He lets me and then wraps a blanket around me, pulling me close to him and stroking my wet hair from my face as I lay my head on his shoulder. I am still unable to think clearly but his words comfort me all the same. "It's ok. I'm here now. I have you. I'm not gonna leave you…I'm not gonna lose you."

The world begins to fade away again but it is okay now, I am warm and safe in my Yankee's arms…

To Be Continued…

And don't forget, to get the full affect of the story, you HAVE TO read Wheeler's side of the story in Chapter 22 of Becks7's Co-Dependents