Her fight with Kamacite had been simple, attack on attack. She had not felt threatened by the other corrupt, deeming herself worthy enough of an ego to take him down. She almost regretted the thoughts when his magic blew her away. The second battle, she went in with the same calm disposition. She was trained under General Labyrinthe, and represented the wolf pack he carefully cultivated and trained. She had faced the sharp blade of his Reaper scythe, and survived. Weapons would be no different. She expected BETTER of herself. She expected herself to show her true colors of being a wolf, to be bloodthirsty and strong. A wolf who could hunt with her pack and without them. Bring home the quota’s that would show Laby as a competent general and bring good light to the corrupts that he had taken care of. Dia...and Fafnir. They were all senshi she wanted to prove she was good enough for. That they would not leave her like Tourmaline or Wolfeite had when Laby had disappeared. That she was worth more to them, then….then being abandoned on the side of the road.

Pyrite though…..Pyrite triggered something in her heart the moment they stepped on the battlefield. The murderous intent the captain had given off had been unsettling. It shouldn’t have unsettled her though, she had faced Laby. He was a man that could put the fear of god and death into others. She had faced him and kept her wits, had she not? Just enough to survive? Why was it that the moment Pyrite yelled at her to scream, she had choked, her attacks and mind not aligning together and her cool tactical skills becoming messy and desperate. Was it because she had faced the very same eyes in the man who haunted her dreams and soul? Even after she ripped his life away from him, and Paul could no longer threaten her anymore. He could no longer take her money or beat her until she could barely move. He was no longer a threat so why? Pyrite reminded her so much of Paul that she hadn’t been sure how to react, but Pyrite was not Paul. She was a random captain she had been faced with in a tournament that had been a test of skills and battle prowess. She was not a man picking on a small woman because his wife had left him, with bills and a scrawny double that share his and mostly her attributes. As she remembered though, It was like looking into the face of the man she hated and feared, but without it being the man at all. Pyrite had terrified her, the abandonment of wits and weapons just to draw bloods and screams. Pyrite scared her because she didn’t know what the Captain was capable of. Of what the woman would do. Even if Aurostibite was there to stop the fight should the captain become too much, Pyrite had the intentions of killing. Maiming. Adamantine had been weak in the face of it, of the overwhelming abandonment of violence against her. She had never felt that sort of abandonment. That sort of careless recklessness to give up herself to just violence. Death was so much easier to deal when it was quick and clean and….unattached.

She had begged for Chase to come save her, in the middle of the fight with the Captain, with her sharp daggers and nails. She had begged, in her mind, for Laby to come rescue her once more, even if it was a small tournament. Begged for the man to save her in the face of a violence she had never expected to see again. She had begged, in her mind, because she was weak. Ashamed and frightened, she hadn’t even bothered at the medical tables that Aurostibite had set up. She didn’t even stop to gather Silk up, relying on the fact that he would probably find his way home with Zircon. She hadn’t even bothered to talk to the other General, she could neither face her or Silk….or Laby or Dia or Fafnir if she was to come home. A loser, and a loser that had fell to the crippling destruction of herself.

No.

She had fled, open wounds and blood staining her dress into the darkness that was Destiny city. She fled, not to her garage room over her uncle’s place, or to Chase’s comfortable mansion where Prissy and Silk and Theodore all shared. She had fled to the beginning of it all.

She fled to the house where her parents once lived, Empty and abandoned with graffiti on the sides of it and boards on the winds. She fled to the empty house because it was once upon a time, the only place she had. She fled to curl in the empty degraded closet she had hid from her abusive father time after time after time. Adamantine faded away, the sweatshirt staining with blood from the open stab wounds. She scraped her hands on the floorboards in the decrepit closet, pulling the hidden board up with an old medical kit and did herself to patch her up. It was like a routine, a comfortable, calming routine in a sense. Her flight would bring her always back to the beginning. Always to the beginning.

Still, she said no words, she did not scream in pain as she poured alcohol over the stab wound in her shoulder. Or the messy stitches she had been used to doing with the sterilized needle, or the bandage she placed over that soaked what was left of the blood coming out. She had other wounds, scratches and cuts from the glass of Kama’s fight but they were nothing like the stab wound. Her face still had claw marks from Pyrites nails. She would not touch those wounds, they were deserved. They were warranted. They showed her, she was weak. That Adamantine was not some indestructible shield of Regan. She was no armor. She was pathetic and weak as the civilian side that housed her.

She shuddered, drawing herself closer into herself, she could hear the loud footsteps in the empty house, the heavy reminder of her fathers presence..

You look just ******** like her. Those stupid eyes, why don’t you say something? WHY DON’T YOU SAY SOMETHING?

The bottle swished, amber liquid fell to the floors, soaking into the carpet. It would join the other various smells and stains on the floor, some dark and amber as well or some...dried, dark rusted. She didn’t say a word, though he screamed at her to do it. Though he did everything to terrify her to make a sound. She would cover her mouth, when the bottle went flying, shattering behind her and raining small glass on her small body.

She made a muffled sound and he would laugh, covering his eyes and then laugh and then beat her regardless, until she was screaming, begging him to stop. Crawling away into the closet where, for some reason, he left her alone. She hid herself into old coats, trinkets her mother left when she hadn’t had time to pack. The closet smelled like musty perfume and it kept her dad away because when he opened it, it reminded him of her and the child he already beat was enough of that. <******** brat, Scream when I beat you, It would hurt less! It always hurt more.

"Why won't you scream?"

Pyrite’s voice played in her head over and over and over and over and over and over. It hurt more, it hurt more. Don’t make a sound. Cover your mouth, bite into the fabric. Don’t make a sound. Do not scream, do not beg, do not...do not...do not. She covered her mouth now, stifling the panic sob. Don’t make a sound, he’ll hear you. He’ll hear you in here. You won’t be safe. There was no coats, no musty perfume, there was no Adamantine, there was no Labyrinthe, there was nothing but Regan. Weak and Weak and Weak.

"You look as weak as you did when I left." General Laby’s voice echoed. It grated, it drew her down. Weak, She was always so weak.

"Come out, come out where ever you are little star~" - Come out little bitches spawn - Scream scream scream

Her hands came up to cover her ears, curling herself smaller and smaller and smaller in the empty closet. Voices banged on the closet door, pounded on the floor boards, Heavy footsteps, the reek of alcohol, the taste of blood. Pounding, beating. It was all there, why. Why.

“Chase.” She brought her head into her knee’s, breathing into her legs. “Chase please. Chase.” She begged, for the first time since Laby had come back, and since the battles at the tournaments and the crippling loneliness that she felt since the absence of the man she had first came to trust. “Chase.”

“Please save me…..”

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