To Have and to Hold
Chapter Fifteen: Nightmares Part II: Alone, A Father's Love and Trapped
“Ah Mr Summers,” Michael said. Scott turned his face to look in his direction but he did not dare open his eyes for fear of hurting one of his friends. “A tragic story by all accounts. Abandoned by your parents, such awful deaths. Unwanted at a children’s home. It says here you had a relationship with Miss Grey. So that’s your rock on her finger?” A look of pain flickered over Scott’s face and Rhisdon picked up on it. “I thought not. So tell me Scott what is it like to be alone?” Rhisdon rested a hand on his shoulder.
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Scott stood at the back of the church in the shadows unseen by the congregation. His masked eyes never left the red haired bride marrying a man whose face he couldn’t quiet see. Slowly he turned and walked away unable to bear seeing the love of his life pledge herself to another man.
He walked down a crowded street but found himself untouched by the hoards of people going the opposite way. At last he stopped across the street from a children’s home. Here was where he spent his childhood watching the other kids come and go but always being left behind. Alone. And the people walked straight through him.
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Rhisdon watched Scott sag where he was chained with a sick grin on his face. He seized two files from the pile and absently flicked through them, skimming their contents.
“Maximoff twins!” he whispered glancing at Pietro struggling to reach his unconscious sister. “What a delightful surprise. Twins! Two for the price of one!” He clamped his hands onto their shoulders.
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Pietro felt the rain on his face. Slowly he opened his eyes to the sight before him. He stood on a street side facing a dismal, grey building that pulled on his memory. Suddenly a scream reached his ears. A figure in a red coat was being dragged up the stairs away from him.
How she had got here, she didn’t know but she definitely wanted to get away. The feeling inside her were the same as they were all those years before as the clinic attendants held her struggling arms. Through the chaos she saw faces she knew.
“Wanda!”
Pietro made to dive forwards, to rip the men’s hands from his sister, to seize her himself and whisk her away in the blink of an eye. But he didn’t move, someone had stopped him. He turned to look into a pair of eyes so much like his own.
Her father and Pietro stood metres away as they had that night. ‘Run to me’ she begged her brother silently.
“Let me go,” Pietro growled.
His father stared at him.
“You don’t need her, my son. She will only hold you back. She is weak but you, you can be great.”
“No,” Pietro wailed and tried to run again to no avail. “You can’t take her!” he screamed. “I need her!!”
“Pietro!” she cried tears beginning to run. She couldn’t see him. “Don’t let them take me! Don’t leave me.”
“He doesn’t want you,” a man whispered.
“You lie,” she hissed.
“See for yourself.”
Arms parted as if by magic and there he stood, staring right at her. And before her his face morphed into the smirk she had seen so many times. The smirk that also graced her fathers. Rage boiled within her, bubbling into her throat.
“I hate you! You hear me Pietro! I hate you!”
Pietro struggled; he pushed against the invisible barrier that stopped him when her words of loathing reached him.
“You see, she does not need you. She does not love you.”
Pietro, exhausted sank to his knees on the flooded pavement, his salt tears joining the water surrounding him.
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Rhisdon continued down the line stopping beside a woman with hair as white as snow. Dazed she gazed up at her captor with confused eyes.
“Almost too easy,” he breathed brushing her shoulder.
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Storm awoke to silence. Nothing stirred as she blinked her eyes clear. She began to stand feeling against the wall until she stood upright in the brilliant white light that engulfed her. Hesitantly she reached out her other hand and felt the opposite wall under her fingertips. Panic rose. With a scream of terror she rammed her fist into the wall again and again. Wordless cries came from her throat as she felt the walls begin to close around her, enclosing her. She felt her lungs contract and her breath became laboured. Finally she curled into a ball, rocking back and forth as she shivered.
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