InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ Purity 8: Vendetta ❯ The Waiting Game ( Chapter 53 )

~~Chapter 53~~

~The Waiting Game~

 

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“Please . . .”

 

Glancing up from the newspaper, Kurt shrugged offhandedly. “Need something?”

 

Peterson looked distinctly uncomfortable, which wasn't entirely surprising, all things considered. Unlike Harlan and Warren—Kurt had unstrapped the both of them and had returned them to their cages for the night—Peterson was nearing twenty-four hours on the table since Kurt figured it was the best place for him.

 

Peterson strained against the straps that held him in place. His face reddened, and he shook his head in a futile effort to deny something. “I . . . I need to go to the bathroom,” he half-whined.

 

Kurt shook the paper and turned his attention back to the headlines once more. “So go,” he replied carelessly.

 

Peterson jerked against his restraints a little more. “W-wh-what?” he stammered.

 

Kurt didn't bat an eye, staring at the paper but seeing instead that damned surveillance footage; the little demon's acute humiliation and their scorn and ridicule when they forced her to shit and piss all over herself . . . “That's what you did to her, right? Made her go wherever she was . . .?”

 

“B-but—”

 

Kurt stood abruptly and strode out of the room. His anger was too potent, too thick, and if he remained in that room with Peterson . . .

 

“D-Doc . . .?”

 

Stopping outside the first of the holding areas—the one where the little demon had been kept—Kurt slowly turned to stare at the very sorry looking form of Dr. Harlan. The fat ass barely fit into the cage, and the only real reason that he was completely naked was because they didn't have any smocks that would fit him, anyway, but since the object of this venture was complete and total humiliation, Kurt figured that was just as well, too.

 

The ashen-cheeked doctor grasped the bars of the cage and stared at Kurt in what he supposed was a look of pleading. “I'm a little hungry,” he said in as close to a tone of humble groveling as he likely could.

 

Kurt didn't bat an eye as he nodded slowly. “You already ate the food I gave you?”

 

Harlan blinked and shook his head in confusion. Kurt stared at him for a moment longer then jerked his head toward the bowl in the cage. “Your food's right there. Doesn't look like you've even touched it.”

 

The horrified disbelief that very slowly surfaced on the old man's ruddy, round face was almost comical, really. At least, it might have been comical if Kurt could find his sense of humor these days. He couldn't, which was a bit of a shame, he supposed. Then again . . .

 

It was simple, really. Every time he looked at those three, the angrier he grew, and the angrier he grew, the more he wanted them to understand exactly what they'd put the little demon through; how it had felt for her to be locked away in one of those cages every night, to miss her family, to have no conception in the world as to why she was being made to suffer . . . He wanted them to understand those feelings, and he wanted them to understand that they were not gods.

 

“B-but that's dog food,” Harlan rasped out, his eyes round and appalled.

 

“That's what you gave her to eat, isn't it? Don't worry. I added some stuff to your food, just like you did to hers. I'll leave it to you to figure out what.”

 

Turning on his heel, he walked away, ignoring the doctor's pleas that echoed in his wake.

 

He took the elevator up to the second floor, figuring that he might as well get to work on destroying the facility. He'd already systematically wrecked two of the four labs, carefully making sure that anything that might be somehow traced back to the little demon was completely and utterly demolished. Blood samples, cold storage, tissue samples—everything . . .

 

Too bad he knew damn well that it was all a ruse; a cover for the things that he really was thinking and feeling. Waiting and worrying and hoping . . . that was all he'd done since he'd gotten onto the damned bus in Toledo, Ohio . . . Did she make it okay? Did she get back home? Was she able to find her way?

 

Surely she was. When he'd gone out earlier to run a few errands, he'd purposefully taken a taxi past the hotel where her family was staying, but he hadn't sensed them there, and while he figured that might mean something, he also had to allow that it could very well be nothing more than wishful thinking on his part, too.

 

And maybe this entire thing was more to assuage the feelings of guilt and remorse that he couldn't shake off. He'd stopped trying to figure out what part of his actions bothered him most because it was all the same in the end. He'd captured her, and he'd handed her over to them on a silver platter, hadn't he? Everything that had happened to her in this place had happened because of him . . .

 

Sweeping the two-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar microscopes off the counter and onto the floor did little to pacify the fresh wash of guilt and shame. All he could do for her now was to make sure that places like this didn't exist, and if that weren't enough, then he figured that was all right, too.

 

It didn't take long for him to systematically destroy everything in that lab, too. There actually wasn't much in it since they tended to do most of their testing in the first two he'd wrecked.

 

As he pulled the door closed behind him, he sighed. He'd programmed his number into the cell he'd found when he'd captured her, and he'd asked her to call him, to let him know that she made it home all right . . . Common sense told him that he really didn't have to worry yet. After all, if she'd opted to stop at a hotel or something, he could understand that, too. He just wanted to know that she'd made it home okay . . .

 

Harlan was still hollering when Kurt stepped out of the elevator. Kurt ignored him as he strode past, heading back to the room where he'd left Warren. That poor bastard looked quite sick, really, and considering he'd spent the last twelve hours chained to a table with a set of earphones stuck on an audio loop of the highest tones that a human could hear—the same ones he'd subjected Peterson to before . . .

 

He didn't even try to fight as Kurt unfastened him from the table, binding his hands and ankles then snapping a long, thick chain through the loop in his collar. “Let's go,” he said, jerking on that chain.

 

Warren stumbled but complied, his legs visibly shaking as he was led back to Holding Area Three. He even crawled into the cage rather willingly, collapsing in a quivering mass as Kurt closed the door and secured it. He'd had to alter the cages just a little—not really a difficult thing to do. Adding a touchpad lock to the system was fairly simple, so the only one who actually could open the cages was Kurt. He'd also added an electronic field to it, so if the men thought that they could touch the lock, they'd figure out quickly enough that it was a bad idea—at least, if they didn't like getting a nasty shock when the system didn't accept their fingerprint, anyway . . .

 

Satisfied that Warren wouldn't be going anywhere till morning, he strode out of the room and down the hallway, but stopped short in the doorway of the testing room where he'd left Peterson.

 

The man was crying—sobbing, actually. The room reeked of urine and excrement, and Kurt considered turning around and leaving him right there for the rest of his two week tour. It disgusted him for a few different reasons, and the main one had nothing to do with his general disdain for cleaning up after him. No, it was the understanding that this was exactly how the little demon had felt that was more than enough to draw Kurt forward.

 

Snatching a pair of biohazard gloves out of the box in the drawer of the cabinet nearby, he yanked them on before reaching for the power hose. The icy spray hit Peterson hard, and he shrieked as the full force of the power hose hit him square in the balls. Deliberately taking his time as he hosed down the doctor and the rest of the room, Kurt ignored the imploring cries for mercy. By the time he was done, Peterson was crying in earnest, and the very sound of it just pissed off Kurt even more. How dare he cry and beg for mercy? How dare he whimper and sound so weak? The little demon—Samantha—she never, ever had . . . She'd never begged, never pleaded . . . not until the end when she knew . . .

 

When she knew that she'd die if they did what they were planning . . . and that they ignored her then . . .

 

Kurt bound the researcher and dragged him down the hallway to the room where his cage waited. Peterson sobbed the entire time, quiet tears that only served to deepen Kurt's resolve. He made quick work of putting him into the cage and secured him for the night.

 

It sickened him, fed the rage that simmered just below the surface. How was it that one little woman could possibly possess more integrity—more inner strength—than a handful of men who thought that they held the world in the palm of their hands . . .?

 

Heaving a sigh as he slapped Post-It notes onto the doorways of the holding areas to activate the barriers that would keep the humans from getting out, should they manage to escape their cages—completely unlikely, all things considered—Kurt headed for the elevator once more. Now that they were secured for the night, he could get back to the business of destroying the place, bit by bit . . .

 

 

-OoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO-

 

 

Samantha stared out the window at the gray skies overhead. It was the first time she'd felt comfortable enough to sit in the window seat, even though it had always been one of her favorite places to relax. Something about the wide open feel of windows tended to frighten her a little—an emotion that never failed to irritate her. Being afraid of something as simple as an open window? She sighed. She just wasn't entirely used to any of it, was she? She hadn't anticipated that freedom could be both welcome and entirely scary, all at the same time . . . “It looks like it's going to snow,” she murmured, closing her eyes for a moment.

 

Jillian smiled as she carefully pulled the brush through Samantha's hair. “I'm going to call Maddy later and have her send something over for your hair. It's so dry, sweetie . . .”

 

She sighed again but didn't comment.

 

In the couple of days since she'd been back home, she hadn't been left alone for more than a moment at a time, and she supposed that she could understand the irrational fear that she was going to somehow disappear out from under their collective noses, and, to be honest, it was kind of nice. Spending the last couple nights, cuddled between her parents had afforded her the feeling of security that had ultimately allowed her to sleep, and Isabelle and Alexandra had mentioned something about a `slumber party' of sorts for tonight.

 

They kept her from missing the taijya too much. She missed him something fierce, especially at night, well after the sun had gone down. But the constant chatter and the happy laughter was enough to quell her rising anxieties.

 

Still she could sense the questions that no one dared to ask. As though they were afraid that she'd break down if they pressed for answers, everyone was cautious and considerate—almost overly so—whenever they spoke to her. She figured they'd get around to asking her where she was; why she never called or contacted them, but for now, she was thankful for the reprieve. Even Evan, who tended to say whatever he had on his mind, hadn't asked. No, he'd looked her up and down, shot her that million-dollar, cocky grin of his, and told her that after he took care of a few things, like finishing out his tour, he'd schedule a few weeks to take her on a vacation with him when it was over in a couple months—something about taking her skiing up in Canada, he'd said . . . First, though, he'd mentioned something about meeting up with InuYasha to tie up a few loose ends, but his manager probably wasn't thrilled with the delays, even if he could understand why Evan would take off mid-tour.

 

Evan had understood—they all did, didn't they? She just didn't want to talk about it; didn't want to think about it. The parts with the taijya were too personal, too intense . . . and the rest of it? Biting her bottom lip, she frowned. No, she really didn't want to think about any of that, and she most certainly didn't want to tell her family about it, either; not ever . . . To talk about it would be akin to bringing it all right back—all of the humiliations and indignities . . . It was simply too much for her.

 

And it hadn't been until yesterday, as she'd been wandering through the mansion, touching the paintings in the private gallery where so many gorgeous works of art were kept—paintings and sculptures that would never see the light of the public—works Cain had created solely because he had been inspired to do so—images of his family that Samantha had always adored.

 

Wandering through the rooms that were normally kept closed off from the rest of the mansion, she'd smiled at the silly image of her as a baby, sleeping soundly on her grandfather's chest. Grandma Gin had painted that one, and it was one of Samantha's favorites. A quiet sound had drawn her attention, and she'd peered over her shoulder with a wan smile as Cain shuffled out of the shadows with his hands stuffed deep into the pockets of his rumpled khaki trousers, that endearingly lopsided smile that always seemed a little far away on his face . . .

 

“You're not hiding, are you, Samantha?” he asked in his quiet way.

 

She shook her head and stepped toward him, accepting the hug that he offered. “No,” she said with a little shrug. “Just . . . regaining some perspective.”

 

He sighed and nodded. “This room's good for that, isn't it?”

 

“Yeah,” she murmured. “Yeah, it is . . .”

 

He leaned down to kiss her forehead, gave her shoulders a quick squeeze. “So . . . you going to tell me about this mate of yours?”

 

She blinked and blushed, unable to turn her face away fast enough for her grandfather to miss the bashfulness that had surfaced in her expression. That had been the first thing she'd realized when she'd woke up this morning; the change in her scent, and she'd understood that that change was the reason why everyone had been giving her questioning looks. She hadn't realized it sooner, she supposed. Her senses had been so messed up during those hours after he'd gotten her out of the facility and her frenetic trip back to Maine, and she distinctly remembered her father giving her a shot of something that he'd said would help her sleep. All those meds, Kichiro had said, coupled with the massive loss of blood . . . It would take awhile before her senses straightened out. Even now, her senses weren't completely normal, but they were much, much closer than they had been in days . . .

 

Drawing a deep breath as she stepped away from the shelter and protection of her grandfather's arms, she let out a deep breath. “He saved me,” she confessed quietly, standing near the window and staring outside, but not moving directly before it.

 

“Saved you,” Cain echoed gently. “Did he?”

 

She nodded slowly, hesitantly. Having kept all of her thoughts of him so close to herself, it felt odd to talk about it now, and yet . . . and yet staring at her beloved grandfather's face, it also seemed like the most natural thing in the world to do, too, didn't it? “Yeah . . . he did,” she confessed quietly.

 

“I'd like to meet him—to thank him.”

 

A sudden smile broke over her features, and she turned to stare at Cain. “He said he'd come for me,” she admitted. “He will; he promised.”

 

He nodded slowly, smiling that almost bashful smile of his as he pondered her claim. “Then he will,” Cain allowed with absolute conviction. “What's his name?”

 

Her smile didn't falter, grew brighter as a little laugh escaped her. “Kurt,” she replied happily, and just for that moment, he didn't seem nearly as far away.

 

“Kurt, eh? That's a good name,” Cain replied. “Just . . . just promise me that you won't let him take you too far away. At least, not for awhile . . .”

 

She laughed and hugged him again.

 

“Samantha? Sweetie, I drew a bath for you,” Bellaniece said as she hurried into the room.

 

Samantha blinked and nodded at her mother. “All right,” she agreed. “Thank you.”

 

Bellaniece smiled as Samantha shuffled off toward the bathroom. Jillian laughed and set the brush on a nearby table. “She's doing so much better today!” she remarked.

 

Bellaniece nodded. “She really is, isn't she?”

 

Jillian gave her a quick hug and hurried out of the room, chattering something about giving Madison a call.

 

Bellaniece sighed happily and stepped over to straighten up the bed.

 

“Cain says she told him that his mate of hers is named Kurt, and he saved her,” Kichiro said as he sauntered into the room.

 

“Kurt?” Bellaniece repeated thoughtfully. “Did she say anything else?”

 

Kichiro shrugged and slipped behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and drawing her back against his chest with a sigh of contentment. “Just that he promised that he'd come for her.”

 

Bellaniece shot him a somewhat droll look. “Well, of course he will,” she countered mildly. “Mates belong together.”

 

A fleeting shadow flickered over his face but disappeared before she could discern too much.

 

“What?” she asked, her smile fading just a little.

 

He shook his head and forced a smile. “Uh, nothing. Just wondering why he didn't come with her; that's all.”

 

Bellaniece considered that then shook her head. “Maybe he had things to do before he follows her.”

 

Kichiro didn't look entirely convinced, but he didn't argue with her, either. “Yeah,” he finally said with a sheepish grin. “I'll look forward to meeting him when he does show up . . . In any case, I have to get back downstairs. Cain said that Cartham and Larry should be here soon. They've still been searching Chicago for that guy. . .”

 

She nodded as he kissed her cheek and smiled.

 

Of course she wanted to know where Samantha had spent the last three months, but she could also count her blessings and just be happy that she'd finally come home, too.

 

Besides, the last thing she'd ever do would be to upset Samantha. If she didn't want to talk about it, then Bellaniece could deal with that. After all, the most important thing to her was that her daughter was home, safe and sound. That was the main reason that no one had questioned Sami about it yet. Bellaniece and Kichiro both felt that, if they all focused solely on her return, Samantha would eventually fill in the blanks, herself.

 

Moving around the side of the bed to finish pulling up the blankets, she frowned and glanced down when her foot caught on something. It was the knapsack that Samantha had been clutching so tightly when they'd found her . . . It must have fallen off the bed at some point after they'd come back home. She shook her head. It had taken them about an hour to get her to open her hand—she'd been holding two hundred-dollar bills in her hand the whole time, and she hadn't wanted to let go of the knapsack at all, either . . .

 

With a mental shrug, Bellaniece picked it up and scowled. There didn't seem to be anything in it, but she opened it, anyway. “What . . .?” she murmured as she pulled out the small case. Small data cards were stored inside along with a few loose ones, and on the cover of the case were the words: Project Demon. The cards were all etched with a series of numbers but nothing else. “What are these . . .?” she asked into the silence.

 

Biting her lip, she shuffled out of the room without taking her eyes off the cards. She didn't know what they were for or why Samantha would have them, but that name . . . She didn't like it; not at all.

 

`Project Demon . . .?'

 

“Daddy,” she said without preamble as she strode into Cain's office. The gathered men stopped talking and stared at her curiously. She ignored them as she headed straight to her father's side. “What are these?”

 

Cain reached out and took them from her, scowling as he turned them over in his hands. “These are data cards, Bellaniece . . . where . . .?”

 

“They were in Samantha's bag,” Bellaniece explained. “What are they . . .?”

 

Cain shook his head and dug into one of his desk drawer for the media reader that he rarely used. He flipped the card over a few times in his fingers before sticking the loose one into the card-reader. “Password . . .” he muttered, staring at the file. He heaved a sigh then keyed in something. A second later, the card reader indicator light blinked.

 

He watched the monitor for a moment then snapped the lid closed calmly. “Bellaniece, would you mind getting me a cup of coffee?”

 

An instant trill of absolute trepidation shot down her spine, and she shook her head. “What is it?”

 

He smiled and shook his head. “I just wanted some coffee, please.”

 

She didn't believe him, and the expression on her face must have said as much, and she opened her mouth to argue with him when a pair of strong hands suddenly grasped her shoulders. “I could use some, too, Belle-chan,” Kichiro said, giving her a reassuring squeeze.

 

She spun around and stared at him. He smiled, and she finally nodded.

 

Kichiro waited until she was out of the room before he turned to face Cain. “What is it?” he demanded in a tone that left no room for argument.

 

Cain cleared his throat and set the media reader down, pushing it across the desk.

 

Kichiro stared at him for a moment, trying to interpret the strained expression on Cain's face. He finally picked up the media reader, though, painfully aware that everyone in the office was staring at him, and he drew a fortifying breath before he lifted the screen.

 

His daughter, strapped to some metal table, stripped naked as men in white lab coats wandered around her. `Researchers . . .' he realized as a sickened sort of bile rose in his gut.

 

“Project demon,” Cain muttered.

 

A rage so fierce, so intense, shot through him that he grimaced as every single part of him felt as though he were going to crumble apart if he didn't do something. The intensity of the emotion was painful, and he had to grind his teeth together so hard that his jaw ached in order to rein it in.

 

Kichiro couldn't tolerate more than a moment of it before he snapped it shut and placed it carefully onto the desk. Cain was staring thoughtfully at the case that contained more of the cards. “I want to know who these people are,” Kichiro said evenly, his eyes glowing with unvented outrage despite the calmness on his face. “I want to know where they are and just what the hell they thought they were doing to my daughter.”

 

 

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Final Thought fromKichiro:

Dead. Fucking dead.

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Blanket disclaimer for this fanfic (will apply to this and all other chapters in Vendetta): I do not claim any rights to InuYasha or the characters associated with the anime/manga. Those rights belong to Rumiko Takahashi, et al. I do offer my thanks to her for creating such vivid characters for me to terrorize.

 

~Sue~