Chapter Sixteen: Lexa

Chapter Sixteen
~ Lexa ~
I laid on the floor of the padded room they had placed me in and closed my eyes. I liked the padded room. It made me feel less crazy. I remembered in the classes back when I was in school, they told us that this was the kind of place mentally unstable people would end up. It was a way to make sure they couldn’t hurt themselves. The irony was that they were the ones hurting me, but still it somehow calmed me. It made me feel like what I had done was crazy, but I was no crazier than the craziest.
Of course, that was not their intention. They wanted me to go mad in solitude. They wanted to break me. But solitude and I got along. It had been a long time since I had been anywhere this silent. My home wasn’t much, but it was home, and it was loud. This was different. For the first time in a long time, I felt confident in the protection of my family and everyone else who lived because of us. Will would have been found by Jax and Grey already. I was certain S had made the right choice there. I saw her powers enact the second she saw how bad things could go. I was proud of her. But she had also nearly blown everything today.
She should have just given me the injection. I don’t know what she was thinking. Well, I did. She was thinking she could save me. But she couldn’t. This was my part of the bargain. And sooner or later, I would break it. When the time was right and I knew I could get out alive. Right now, I wasn’t sure of it.
Part of me hoped he would break his side of it first. Then I wouldn’t feel guilty for breaking mine. But I also didn’t want to subject anyone else to this. I had thrown up about a thousand times today. I’d had terrible reactions to most things they tried, and I was truly lucky I wasn’t dead yet. But if they succeeded in being able to transfer powers, I would have it first, and I would be able to break out easily, and they would never know. As long as Aspen, played her part.
The door of my room opened slowly, but I pretended I didn’t notice. They couldn’t know how little sleep I was actually getting. They couldn’t know I was just as hellbent on destroying myself as they were.
“E?” S whispered, stepping into my cell, carefully. “E, wake up.”
“I’m awake, S,” I sighed. “And this is dangerous. Go home.”
“I’m sorry. I had to make sure you were still alive,” She whispered, letting the door close behind her. “I’m so sorry, E.”
I moved to sit up, but I still wore chains, and they were rubbing my wrists raw.
“Don’t be sorry,” I told her, “We all have a role to play in this. And right now, unfortunately this is mine, and this is yours.”
“No, E,” She pleaded, I could hear the tears in her voice. “You don’t understand. I can’t do this.”
I froze.
“That is not an option, S.” I said coldly.
I understood that it had to be hard to stab people with unknown liquids, but she wasn’t the one who was getting stabbed with them. I had little sympathy.
“I can’t do this, E. I can’t,” She sobbed harder, I could see the outline of her body against the wall shaking with every sob.
“S, listen to me,” I tried to keep my voice calm despite my frustrations. “You did good.”
“No,” She cried. “No, I didn’t give you the whole thing. I know I was supposed to, and I know that it could have blown everything, but I couldn’t do it. I squeezed it into my sweater.”
I held my breath at this reveal. I didn’t have words ready for that. I already suspected, but what was I supposed to say to something like that?
“Say something please!” She exclaimed in panic. “I’m sorry!”
“Breathe, S.” I said after a moment. “That’s okay for today. When you get a chance, take it to Jax. He can analyze it. We’ll know more about what they are doing with it and how to handle it. But tomorrow, you have to do what they say. If you can take any form of that serum though, you have to. Even if it’s just the traces. Take it to Jax. He will know what to do.”
“Tomorrow?!” S all but shouted, she sounded so panicked. “I can’t do this again tomorrow!”
This time, I showed a little bit of frustration.
“If I have to do this tomorrow, you have to do it too.” I replied sharply.
“You chose this, E! I didn’t. I didn’t choose this.”
“Believe it or not, I didn’t choose this either.” I revealed, uneasily. “We don’t get to choose how we get here. How we get the positions we get. What we get to do is choose what we do with them. I choose to help them. What you do, I suppose is your choice. But I have a plan, and I need you to help fulfil it.”
She looked at me through the dark. I could tell she was surprised. “You have a plan?”
“I always have a plan, S. I’m trusting you to hold on. The way I need you to trust me.”

She left shortly after that and I managed to fall asleep for a couple hours, but I was still up long before anyone started coming into work. The no sleep thing had been a bad habit of mine for a long time. I didn’t call it bad, but everyone else did.
“Young lady,” I heard Gabriel Oakley call out as he opened my cell door. “We are ready for you.”
I felt someone walk in and unhook my shackles from the ground, and I stood up the best I could.
“You seem off-balance today, Miss. Alexa.” Mr. O commented.
“I’m fine, Sir.” I responded bitterly, but he was right. My balance was off, and my stomach felt sick.
“Tsk, tsk,” He smiled coldly. “Put her in the restraints. We’ll try this again. Hopefully my daughter won’t be so clumsy today.”
I could feel S was in the room, but I refused to look. It made it easier. If I looked, she would break. If I looked at her, I would feel scared, not comforted. But I could tell she was more confident today, even if she was still trying to catch my eye.
A hand was suddenly at my throat, and I closed my eyes, willing the air to keep going through. It was in times like this I liked to remember home. When I remembered sleeping next to the guys and the safe feeling it had brought. I remembered laughing at Jax’s jokes, usually above everyone else’s heads, we were the only ones who got it. I remembered Will, and the way he always brushed my hair out of my face. The way he kissed my forehead. The way he kissed my lips.
Finally, the man let go, and I opened my eyes, gasping for air and continued staring at the wall. That was my coping skill. That was how I handled everything. I repeated the good things I knew in my mind until it was over.
I barely noticed S approach. Her energy seemed less shaky today, but still shaky. I could tell she wanted me to tell her it was alright. The best I could do was just snap, “Just get it over with already.”
I couldn’t see, but I knew S just nodded and took a deep breath. Next thing I knew a needle was being shoved in my arm. I could tell it was S because she tried to be as light as she could. Then a ‘nurse’ came and added another needle to my arm, for a steady stream of some other drugs.
I listened as Mr. Oakley explained it to S.
“Dad, what is this one for?” She asked, her voice shrinking in fear again. I felt S pull the needle out slightly.
“It’s to help the serum react faster,” He answered easily. “When the two mix, they magnify each other’s effects.”
“I see,” S responded nervously.
I could feel the sweat starting to drip from my head. The chills made it all worse. The pain in my head was nearly unbearable. But I was still alive and that was all I could ask for.
“Sooner or later, the serum will work.” He laughed cruelly. “Miss. Lexa, you and my daughter are really not all that different both trying to fill the shoes of your parents. And you will die like your mother, and my daughter will rise like her father.”
I felt a surge of anger as he taunted. “I am nothing like your daughter, sir.” I said in as calm of a voice as I could when I felt so desperately like I should yell, and that’s when I felt S pull the needle out. “She is nothing but a coward. A hateful monster. A life-ruiner.”
I felt a punch in the gut, and I really hoped S didn’t take it to heart, but I really hated that man. And I needed him to think I hated S too.
“It’s time to be tested, Miss. Lexa,” he growled, yanking me off the bed.
The second my feet hit the ground, I collapsed. It was beginning to look not too good for me, and I was hoping and praying I could maintain control of my powers during this test because I was losing control quicker than I had anticipated. And I didn’t have a lot of time before it was going to be too late. But maybe, it already was.