The Hostage and the Runaways

It was about two hours later when the room had been cleared the best it could of dust, cobwebs and bugs – both dead and live ones.

Isabella was comfortably sat on the edge of one of the beds, trying to slowly stand. She wanted to so bad but the pain was still radiating in her toes, which meant they weren’t completely a hundred percent yet. Another night of sleep would hopefully fix that.

“You’ve been trying for over an hour, give it a rest, dove.” Niall murmured, having watched her with frustration at her constant gasping – no matter how quiet it had been.

“Leave er’ alone mate, at least she’s doing something productive.” Harry sighed, trying to keep his own mood in check before continuing. “We’re all tired and cranky. If you’re so inclined, take one of the many bedrooms and lay down and take a bloody nap but quit being a duffer!”

Louis patted Harry’s shoulder.

“He’s right, get the stick up from your ass, mate. You’ve been rude to her for no reason these past few hours and it need to stop.” He agreed with his friend while Zayn spoke his own two cents.

“I think everyone needs to take a chill pill.”

Emory sat by Isabella, watching and encouraging her softly. He was proud of his friend –ex-friend? He didn’t know what she was at the moment.

“Just ignore what’s going on around you, focus your pain on something and try again. You got this, I know you do because I believe in you.” Emory whispered, standing up and holding out his hand. “Focus on me.” He offered.

Isabella looked up into his beautiful green eyes and hesitated but grasped his hand, their orbs never losing their stare.

“Good girl, now, I’m going to give you my hands. Take them slowly and push up when you’re ready; if it hurts just tell me and I’ll sit you back down.” Emory offered.

“She’s not going to learn from help, she needs to do it herself. Killian’s orders.” Liam spoke, watching the blonde haired boy ignore him. Had the two brothers been present instead of raiding the other rooms; Emory would have gotten a good tongue lashing.

“I’m not helping her, I’m helping to focus the pain.” Emory assured, grabbing her hands but letting her push herself up.

Isabella was reassured so softly that her pain seemed to be momentarily focused on her friend. Her body shook from excitement but she could feel herself finally obey her desired command.

She smiled, now completely standing.

The room is silent and watching, nothing moves, speaks or stirs.

Emory smiled with her.

“Okay, I’m taking my hands away now, are you ready?”

Isabella nodded, their touch slowly parting.

At first she stood there, a little off balanced but she just kept focusing on her friend.

“Why are you helping me?” She whispers, lowering her arms down and standing there.

“I’m not, bunny, I am simply –guiding you. Now try and take a step, I’ll be right here to catch you if you fall.” Emory promised genuinely.

“You know, Killian and Kellie aren’t going to like that.” Niall warns him but the two never caught the underlying threat in his voice.

“I’m making sure she doesn’t fall or do you want her to go headfirst into infested disgusting carpet? Besides, I do not answer to Kellie nor do I or will I answer to Killian. I am not your hostage anymore, am I? I’m not tied up – I’ve been allowed to walk freely and I’m certainly not training with you guys. I willingly chose to come along. I could have split from the food station had I wanted to; so shove it Niall and take the advice of your friends and fuck off.” Emory snarled.

“Oi! Okay, that is quite enough, the bloody lot of you! We cannot start going at one another again. Not happening. Niall? Go cool down.” Louis interrupted before Niall could take a step forward and deck Emory out into next week. By the look he knew his blonde friend was extremely close.

“You know if they come back in and see us arguing we’ll be in more trouble than before. Kellie scares me when he screams, it’s not my favorite thing to provoke.” Isabella said but took a ginger step forward before shuffling her other foot.

Emory stayed where he was knowing that she was right. After earlier display of how far Kellie’s voice could travel five floors below – he didn’t want to provoke the same aggravation Niall did.

“Alright, just be careful.” Emory cautioned.

Isabella nodded and took another step before picking her other foot up, this time smiling triumphantly, laughing a little in excitement. She turned around, looking at the guys.

With the exception of Niall, who was by then was heading toward another door to another room entirely, the others seemed to match her success with excitement.

“You’re doing great, luv.” Harry said to her, a small smile on his worn and tired features.

“I’ll get the hang of this. By tomorrow, by any miracle they’ll be ready to walk on completely. Maybe all I need is shoes.”

She shuffled back to the bed and sat down again, complete accomplishment on her face.

Emory sat down beside her again, his box at its side. He still hadn’t looked through it completely, he pulled it up with some hesitation before dumping the contents onto the floor.

The first thing he saw was his wedding ring. He had taken it off and left it beside his bed the night he was taken hostage and hadn’t really had the chance to tell them about it – although it wasn’t like he could even if he had wanted to.

Smiling a little more he slipped it back onto his finger and inspected it.

“Hello darling.” He said to the ring absently before shifting through the cluster and found the two books he had mentioned before that he had been reading to his wife and child. Amongst the box was also a small clay hand of his newborn daughter, he held it up and showed it to Isabella. “Ethan had been kind enough to get me a mold, he really isn’t a bad guy – a bit unhinged at the moment from the sounds but not a monster. He stayed with me and my daughter and took care of procedures after. He even checked up on me to make sure I was holding it together. Obviously enough to breathe but otherwise – I was useless. So don’t write him off as a complete villain. He seems to be a bit lost himself right now.” Emory said, defending the doctor but knowing what Ethan was doing wasn’t exactly right either.

“Fine, he’s not a villain. He’s one bloody complicated character.” Liam piped up.

Emory chuckled.

“Seems so.” He agreed with the oldest of the boys.

Isabella smiled but frowned when she heard footsteps down the hall again, knowing they were Killian and Kellie.

When they walked in she was surprised to find they had both found a lot of stuff in the hotel rooms. From what Killian carried alone she found that as the storm brewed and the hotel flooded, the owners of their stuff abandoned it completely.

Amongst the items she saw it was a khaki knapsack, a guitar case and odd and end items such as paper towels and a mirror.

The mirror was beautiful. It was a handheld silver piece – the shine still relatively reflecting the fading light from the dying sun outside but even from where she sat Isabella could tell that the glass itself was dirty.

Killian threw the stuff off near the bed and sat down on the opposite of Isabella, handing her the handheld mirror.

“I’m starting your training a little early – to get a feel for what I can and can’t start you off on. Understand?” Killian asked her.

Isabella took the mirror and looked at him, he positioned it so she was looking straight back at herself and for a moment he saw her flinch before going to bring the mirror down but he stopped her and held it there.

“No, you will continue to look into that mirror and if you put it down again I will start adding demerits to the boys training. You don’t want that and they sure as hell don’t want that so I would continue to hold that mirror up.”

“You’re not being fair, Killian. I can’t look into a mirror –“Her voice cut off when the groans erupted around the room, knowing she had forgotten the basic second rule of ‘sir’.

Killian seemed to smile.

“Since I was already in the midst of giving you a warning, the guys will now do two extra demerits of running in addition to their one and that starts at dawn – around five AM. Your rope training will begin at that time before Kellie and I will switch off. He’ll teach you basic self-defense techniques -” Killian explained but the constant beeping of the laptop sent him quiet. Somehow, when the beeping started, trouble usually followed.

Isabella turned and handed him the laptop with her freehand, watching as the Irish boy opened it without hesitation.

Ethan’s face lit up the screen. His face illuminated in only the glow of the screen.

“I see you found the signal.” Killian said without a trace of amusement.

Ethan smiled, having been listening to the conversation inconspicuously.

“Did you expect anything different? Just thought I should let you know that staying in New Orleans is a bad idea. Luckily for you this signal is a secure line and I’m not here to make threats – although you do know that when if I can track your signal that Elliott can too? Thankfully he is still back where you left him – trapped in the van and pissed as a rabid dog. He even killed his assistant – snapped his neck clean.” Ethan laughed.

“Ethan, that’s enough.” Isabella murmured, looking at her old flame with a bout of sadness, wondering how he managed to get so lost.

“Oh Ella, you poor creature. Poor pathetic creature.” Ethan tsked.

“Not for long.” Isabella disagreed with vigor. Her hands instinctively tightening on the handle of the mirror in anger.

“You can’t even look yourself in the eyes. How are you even remotely going to cope with this – training they have you doing? A mirror is a reflection of yourself, your image is truly distorted if you believe you have any hope or strength to overcome your fight with Saudimere. He will kill you on sight but not before painfully extracting what he wants to know. See, Elliott is an amazing hacker but he can’t do what you do with the hiding money and bringing in ghost money and moving it when it doesn’t exist. He’s more or less an expert on explosives, capturing a signal and sending it somewhere, ghost signals and port hijacks. He knows a lot but he can’t do anything system wise with money and that is why Gleny-boy needs you. His precious little fuck toy, his ticket to where he could for the rest of his life spent trillions of dollars a day and never run out. You Ella are a commodity to him. Why he doesn’t just sell you to the next bidder when he’s done instead of killing you is beyond a waste to me but then again – I’m a useful person. If a scrap of paper can be used I won’t throw it away just because it’s not new and in packaging. Though I suppose I am the type to find use for almost anything.” Ethan shrugged, watching the rest of the boys crowd around the laptop. Most with intense glares and others simply observing. Harry was one of three people looking to want to kill him.

He smiled.

“Why is it that every time I ring in you all crowd around the laptop like nosy-parkers? Though I should warn you that I will eventually get Isabella back but for right now I’m happy enough to sit around and watch as you destroy her. Ever think there’s a reason she doesn’t look into mirrors? I’m surprised she’s not freaking out and crying at the sight of one and if you know what’s good for you, you want make her do that test – since she released all my inhalant mix, she has an attack, she’s screwed. SO with that I bid you gents a fair well – oh and next time you’re going to tie me with hands behind my back, make sure I’m not carrying a scalpel in one of the pockets to cut myself free from.”

With that the screen went blank again.

“He should try out for the next joker.” Emory noted, making Isabella laugh. She noticed he looked a bit more manic then he normally did. Instead of letting the insults get to her, she pushed them away. She knew she could do this.

With a slow sigh Isabella picked the mirror up and let her green eyes reflect back at her.

“Alright, sir, what do you want me to do?” She asked dully, fighting already not to break away. Instead she focused her orbs to the side, not looking directly in. Killian already saw what she was doing and moved the glass toward her again.

“Not be cheeky for one and another, no cheating,” He responded to her question formally before crossing his leg across his lap. “Now, tell me what you see. Tell me what’s reflecting back.”

“I don’t know.” Isabella responded, feeling lost.

“Yes you do, what is staring back at you. We’re reflecting and if I don’t know what is reflecting back I won’t be able to help you.” Killian pressed.

“Confusion, I guess? I’m lost –lost as to how my situation got so dire. I was in high school one second and tossed into the world the next. I trusted wrong, loved wrong – thought wrong. It all came crashing down and now – how do I fix a situation that I’ve clearly cluster fucked from here till next Friday? No matter what turn I take I feel like I’m trapped in a rat maze where there are no paths to the exit. There’s only dead ends and it seems no matter how hard I try, no matter how many paths I take – I still end up in a dead end. I feel anger, I feel despair. I feel these things because I’ve spent two years running, one year suffering that I can’t distinguish the two. I know I’m angry right now because if it weren’t for Ethan I wouldn’t be weakened. I wouldn’t have had to depend on someone for every little thing. I am filled with despair because I feel as if this will never end. If Glen was killed how he was supposed to be when there was a chance to kill him, we would be home right now – I wouldn’t be home because I no longer have a home. I have a family of boys but – what good is that if I feel as if I am now an inconvenience?” Isabella asked the now silent room, a few tears slipping down her face. She hurriedly wiped them away. Her eyes now reflecting pain.

“You’re not an inconvenience, you’re something that keeps this group sane, Isabella. Something that never would have existed if you wouldn’t have come into our lives.” Louis replied gently when no one said anything.

Harry and Zayn nodded once in agreement.

Isabella smiled despite herself.

“Like I had much of a choice on that one?”

Harry chuckled but nothing else was said.

Kellie sat down on the opposite bed and observed the others, getting notes in himself. This was helping, whether the others knew that or not.

“Okay and is that anything you would change? If you could change it?” Killian asked, his voice emotionless but his eyes held a different expression all together.

“I’d forget the past three years. If I could. If someone handed me a shot right now and told me this shot will take away your photogenic memory and everyone and everything you remember from that time, I would take it. I would take it because the pain that is outsourced, there’s far too many painful memories than there are good.” Isabella answered him truthfully, her iris meeting his deep brown ones before turning back to the mirror.

Killian’s expression didn’t change. He felt sorry for her but his job was getting her to see past her problems and pain. He needed for her to control them not for them to control her.

“You would forget about us? Just like that?” Niall spoke from the doorway having been listening.

Isabella closed her eyes for a brief second but forced herself to keep looking at herself.

“You know I don’t mean it like that. I don’t mean you guys. I meant Ethan, Glen – everything that has defined my pain so far. You defined the only good thing to come out of this. You guys are my dark knights, you’re something special that I hold anything and any light too. So whatever your problem may be with me right now, I am truly sorry. I hope I can make whatever I did wrong up to you someday, Niall.”

Killian cleared his throat.

“What do you want to get out of this training? What do you think Kellie and I can do to help you if you reflect so much negativity and helplessness toward yourself? Because as I’m seeing it right now, Ella, you’re weak and still hold that helplessness as you did from the start. That has to end and it has to end now.” Killian let her know before standing up, placing the laptop next to her and grabbing the guitar case he had looted from one of the rooms, heading toward the door.

“I’ll be on the roof. Kellie? Takeover, my questioning is done.” Killian said with dismissiveness and left the room before Isabella could even answer.

Emory rubbed her back seeing the shocked and hurt look.

“Emory? She needs to stand on her own two feet. I know you want to comfort her but she doesn’t need to be comforted. Right now she needs to reflect.” Kellie warned before standing up and sitting beside her.

“I want to know what you want to get out of training. Because to be fair and honest, I don’t think you’re going to make it – not with what I just listened to. I’ll give you the chance but you’re letting the problems define you – you’re letting that pain define you. You’re letting this situation define you and if you’re not careful you or someone else will end up getting killed. Decide what you want to do, decide who you want to be. Do you want to be a fawn that can barely stand on their feet or do you want to be something more? Something not so helpless? It’s time to decide and it’s time to get angry because if I were you, sapling, I would chose the latter.”

With that Kellie reached behind and pulled her body to his, kissing her temple.

She watched him stand after and leave the room, most likely to go and find Killian.

For a moment it was quiet and as she still stared into the mirror, her body began to shake. Her eyes distanced themselves from reality before they rolled completely back into her head. She dropped back onto the bed as the boys rushed around her, panicking.

Notes