“What have you been giving him?”

“It has nothing to do with-”

“TELL ME! What kind of drugs have you been giving him? He might die if I won't-”

“What’s happening to him has nothing to do with drugs, Marlena.”

John’s body finally stilled; he was breathing normally again; it seemed as though he was in a deep sleep; only he wasn't. Standing up, she walked to the edge of the sofa and leaned against the solid wooden wall. A farther distance from Fernando and the strength she needed to support her weight. 

“Wear this,” Fernando commended and threw a silky white fabric into her arms, “come on.” He was not asking.

 

Fernando watched her intently, his gaze tracking her movements as she turned from him to pull down the gown down her slender body. He was waiting for her reaction to his words. She didn’t give him enough of a response before when she was too engrossed in her own emotional pool. 

Turning to face him, Marlena cleared her throat. “What is wrong with him? Tell me now.” She couldn’t wait for him to open up a discussion, to discover his reasoning as to why he went after them, or she could start the conversation right in the middle of the deep end. 

“As I said, it has nothing to do with drugs. He's stuck in a memory. He’s reliving it, as though it’s happening to him right now.” His eyes trailed her smooth curves. The ones that were exposed to him just a minute earlier. 

 

She stared at John, he was so peaceful, and it was hard believing Fernando's words. “What do you mean, he's stuck in a memory?”

 

He ignored her question. 

“When he’s awake, you will hypnotize him, I’ve got a lot of unanswered questions for soldier Black.”

“What? There’s no way I’m letting him go through that today. Your so-called questions would have to wait. John’s not strong enough.”

One would carefully consider her words when talking to a murderer, but not Marlena, she was determined to keep John safe, as much as she could. How many people can say they’ve looked into the eyes of a killer? For most, that was never a reality to contend with. It was a fiction experienced only through television, safely removed from any threat or corruption. For her, lately, it was a daily challenge. Fernando’s knowing gaze reflected her fear, and every molecule of her body rebelled in denial, wanting to defiantly snuff out that truth. What was wrong with John?

 

“I don’t care about him, Principessa.”

“You are a textbook fanatic…” she said quietly, almost to herself, but paranoia was eating away her nerves. “A man who supports his crimes with excuses is a fanatic,” Fernando said, disturbing her thoughts. 

“Would you consider yourself a fanatic, Dr. Evans?” 

 

Marlena straightened, taking small, sharp breaths to ease the pressure in her chest. John took a deep breath and stilled again. She adjusted her position and said, “Stop quoting psychological books and answer my question.” 

Fernando’s smile reached her hazel eyes. 

“I had a lot of time to kill in prison.”

“Prison?” she tried, hoping for once he would grant her a straight answer.

“Sì, after the explosion, the police had found me at the wreckage. I was framed,” he said.

 

“What explosion? Does it-” her mind went back 12 years ago when John first appeared at University hospital all covered with bandages. “Does it have anything to do with what happened to John?” Fiercely he grabbed her chin, bringing her closer, “the only way you are going to make me angry is if you mention his name. No more of that. Now, answer my question.”

 

Yanking his fingers from her face, she managed to steady herself and took one step backward, “You only partially right about what you said earlier. The first part states that an enthusiast takes ecstasies and making dreams his reality. I think that’s what you’re doing.” she greeted. 

“Stop trying to analyze me, Doc. This isn’t a session at your little clinic. I asked you a question, what are you passionate about? What makes you a fanatic?” 

 

Her lips pressed together. She didn’t have to consider her answer for long. “Unlike you, I’m not a fanatic. I’m passionate. I’m passionate about what I do and the people that I love.” 

 

He shook his head. “That’s a canned response.” 

“What is it that you want from me? How about answering my own questions for a change? What is happening to John?” His gaze snapped to her face, startling her with the intensity she saw there.

“We’re not yet ready for that,” he said. “Let’s start with what I want. No practiced or rehearsed psycho-nonsense. Give me your honesty.” she released an extended breath, feeling the weariness of their talk. 

 

He was supposed to be the one breaking, especially after mentioning the death of his family. His walls stood just as erect as the day he held her in Lugano. She rolled the loos end of her bandages around her finger. 

“You want direct conversation, Fernando?” 

“Yes.” 

“Because you have no inhibition in saying what you’re thinking, you demand the same of me?” 

“Yes.” 

"I thought this wasn't a session."

She looked at him. “How freeing to have the power, the candidness, to just blurt whatever is on your mind and not give a damn how it’s received. Huh, Fernando?” 

 

The corner of his mouth tipped up. “It’s liberating, indeed.” She licked her lips. Her mouth too dry to speak. She’d allowed him to get under her skin again, and he was enjoying her agitation. 

“Is that considered crazy?” he asked. 

“The freedom to do and say what one wants has always disturbed others,” she admitted, immediately following up. “It may be nonsensical to you, but it’s why society chooses to shield their innermost thoughts. An empathetic person doesn’t want to hurt anyone or make those around him uncomfortable. In order to… blend, for lack of a better word, we must…” she trailed off, unable to complete her thought. 

 

“We, doctor?” Fernando sat forward. “Tell me what we must do.” she tossed her bangs from her eyes and adjusted her legs. “Control ourselves.” 

 

His stare was invasive, that paralyzing gaze hardening as if he was dissecting her. 

“Is that how you’ve done it?” A splash of fear iced her body. 

“What?”

“Blended. Have you gained control, or are you just delusional?” she slapped the wall behind her and stood tall. “This conversation has officially gotten off track, stop stalling, what is wrong with him?” She took a step forward from the wall and bent in front of John, checking his pulse.

 

Placing his hand on her shoulders, he smirked, “But we only getting started.” She turned toward him. “I don’t care. You have nothing to say that I’m interested in hearing.” She yanked her hand from his hold and flinched when it brushed against a loos wooden splinter. “Damn.” 

 

Red beads at the tip of her finger. In the second it took her to assessed the wound, Fernando moved. He captured her hand and hauled her forward. His vise grip served two purposes: preventing her from fleeing, and forcing blood to her hand. He took her finger into his mouth. A roar filled her ears, her heart thundering at the feel of him sucking the blood away. 

 

“Stop.” The word was barely audible, but it was enough this time. Fernando pulled back and released her hand. 

“I’m afraid that when it comes to you, Marlena, I’ll-.” She stepped backward, separating them. 

“I don’t care what you have to say.” 

Anger ignited his pale eyes. “Your lies won't work on me. You feel everything I do, Marlena.” 

 

She shook her head and took another step away. “I don’t. And you can’t feel. You’re not capable.” Beneath the adrenaline spiking her bloodstream, she sensed a distinct mock of hypocrisy, but why?

 

“Even the Devil was an Angel once, Marlena. It’s only a matter of time until you become one, too.”

The moment he took a step forward, she sprinted for the door - only to be thrown against the wall as he grabbed her from behind. Her back crushed to his chest, he sealed a hand over her mouth. She reached for the doorknob, but his other hand was there first. His grip wrenched her wrist back and then planted her palm on the wood, pinning her to the wall. Her breaths seared her chest. 

“You’re not going anywhere until you admit the truth one fucking time.” His warm breath touched her neck. His mouth rested against her ear. She blinked hard as he leaned a polaroid photo on the wall. She recognized it, and he knew it. She could see her upper thigh. The number 4 was marked right next to her groin. She mentally cursed herself for ever taking John’s jacket that day. 

 

“Look at the photo” His hand sliding up her thigh… his other hand anchored to her waist. He fucking used her, but for what?

“I have more from where this one came from. You recognize them, do you?” He tightened his hold, letting her feel his fingers digging at her skin. 

“Now tell the truth, where is it, where is the chip?” Then his hand was gone. She gasped in a breath; her nails clawed at the wall. 

“Let go of me,” she threatened. He hauled his arm over her head and secured it around her neck, forcing her back harder against his chest. “I’ll crush your windpipe.” His nails pinched her skin as he made his point. But then just as suddenly, he loosened the hold, allowing her to take in an unobstructed breath. Only as the fear of being strangled vanished, a new one gripped her. Fernando shoved her dress up her legs. 

 

“All your talk of control and morality…” He kicked her feet apart as his fingers splay along her thigh. “You are mad, Marlena. I know who you are— and that dark corner where you hide.” 

She whimpered and shook her head against him. “You’re wrong, Fernando. You know nothing about me. NOTHING! You’ve built this up in your mind—”

“Stop.” He dug his hand into her hair and yanked, and he pressed closer to inhale her. “I want you to prove how well you can control yourself, as you said.” His other hand inched higher. Her belly trembled at the feel. 

“If you’re not turned on, I’ll cuff myself to the floor and never touch you again. But if you are… then you’re going to confess all those dirty sins to me.” He tugged her leg over, spreading her wider, as he roamed up her thigh. His body caged her in, splinters of the wooden wall digging into her stomach, but the pain only served to heighten her fear. 

 

She clamped her eyes closed. As he reached the joint of her leg, she flinched. His finger traced along the slit of her center, a tantalizing threat before he grasped her fully. She bucked at the force; then he dragged his fingers over her. 

A low groan vibrated from deep within him.

“Fernando, sto-”

 

“Don't fucking say another word,” his rough voice echoed from the other side of the room. 

 

Fernando released her body, and they both turned to see John. He was wide awake. Pushing Fernando away from her body, she let her gown fall as she rushed to stand in front of him.

“John? Are you alright?”

He clenched his fists as his body trembled with rage. 

“John?” she asked again, this time a thread of fear in her voice. He lunged towards her and stopped when she cowered. 

 

She did it. 

She was the reason he was what he was. 

She deserved pain. 

He wanted to hit her. 

 

He wanted to make her bleed and make her look like how he felt inside. He wanted her to lay in a mess of blood like he did.

 

“John...please talk to me…” she tremored.

But he held it in because something has been growing inside of him — something he couldn’t purge or abort. 

And it was changing him. 

But not everything changed—the rage that had slowly aged within him since before he even remembered who he was. The impulses, the ones he couldn’t control because something happened to him while he was laying on that sofa. 

 

“You. That room. I remember your fucking face. I- I remember that fucked up sign on the wall. It was black. I hated that sign…” 

she gently placed her hand to his arm, hoping he would find comfort in her warmth. 

 

His emotions were all over the place because love was hate—he couldn’t tell the difference between the two. All that energy had to go somewhere. It couldn’t stay in him. It had to go out. It had to be transferred. John pulled away from her and grabbed the chair Fernando sat at before, and he picked it up and slammed it down on the ground. 

 

She screamed and pushed herself further into the corner, her palms to her mouth.

He did it over and over, growling, screaming, until the chair was just two detached arms in his hands. He threw them to the ground, but he was not sated. 

 

“You did this!” He screamed, pointing down at her. 

“What? John, this is me! It’s Marlena! You got to snap out of it!!” she shouted. But it didn’t matter. 

 

He had to do this. He didn’t know any other way. She thought he was trying to hurt her, but she didn’t understand that this outburst was keeping her safe. 

He grabbed a glass of water and threw it against the wall. The glass and wood exploded violently.

He kicked the bathroom door open so that it splintered and ripped off the hinges. 

“Get in there and shut up!”

“Look at me!” she cried. 

“Shut up!” He shouted. He spun to face Fernando, who stood there almost smirked. A symbol to his past. 

 

He beat him over and over, the bastard buckled under his feet. 

 

“John! You’re stuck in a memory,” she wailed. 

 

But he was blind. 

 

Nothing quelled the rage. 

 

He wanted blood. Blood for blood. He wanted to kill. And he couldn’t kill her. He couldn’t, for some reason. He staggered out of the house, marching to the woods. 

He was all instinct now. 

No. 

Instinct was about survival.

He was rabid. 

Feral. 

He wanted to make pain. 

 

He flailed the door open to the shelter- placing a blade he had found on the hay against one of the many thick scars on his chest, slicing into it, watching the old wound reopening. 

 

Someone has to be the recipient of this wrath, and Marlena wouldn’t even be close to worthy. But he was worthy. There was no blood at first, and then it flew at once, a crimson river running down to his wrist, palm, and then onto the floor of the shelter. 

 

He walked over to the many tools hanging in the shelter and wound his grim reflection on a falx. He found the next scar. He pressed the knife against it, and he cut. He did it to feed the feral pawn inside of him. He cut into another scar. He felt a sharp pain on to his skin. 

 

He knew it was painful, but it was nothing compared to the burning fire inside of him trying to escape through each wound he added to his body. He watched as the color of his skin morphed to scarlet, as the sheen of sweat became overpowered by the glistening of blood. 

 

The pawn cried and rustled as the smell of fury oozed out of him. He tried to make the feelings dissipate through these cuts, but with each new one, he saw blood, and he thought of her. Of all the power she had, and he wanted to hurt her. 

 

So he had to do it again. There was no relief. He still felt. He still raged. He still hurt. When his torso and hands were too soaked with blood to find more scars, when he realized that no amount of cuts would stop his hands from shaking with the urge to hurt, he stopped. 

 

He allowed himself to believe he could be something else, but this was how it usually ended up. With screams. 

With fear. 

All he wanted was her. All that can make this pain stop was the source. Like a fog clearing, he remembered her. The woman who brought meaning to his life. She made him feel like he could reconcile all these mismatched parts of him. He remembered her. Coiled on the floor, terrified. The pretty little smiling doll in a white gown, her face marked with terror and sorrow.
He left her back there with him.

 

Terror set in. 

 

****

​

(Shakespear's Sister - Stay)

 

Marlena stared at the house in disbelief. It was in pieces all around her, Fernando was unconscious on the floor. The place looked like a small tornado ripped through and somehow left her unharmed. She didn't know what to expect when he woke up. 

 

Years ago, when they met, she reached deep inside of him to find humanity. She thought she had; she thought she had found it for good. 

 

She had forgotten who he was; she only remembered who he is. But as she sat there, in all that mess, she remembered. 

 

She saw the rage. She saw glimpses of the pawn he used to be. Yet, when the door creaked open on its own when she realized that in his fury, he marched alone, she couldn’t run after him. 

She waited. 

There has to be more to this. He has to come back. It bobbed back and forth in the gentle breeze for a while, and she realized he was not coming back. 

Not right away. 

This was her chance to run. To find John and run back to safety. To leave it all behind now. 

 

Slowly, Marlena came to her feet, wincing from the occasional cramp in her foot. As she approached the door, she tried to listen to the sound of the water; John said the coordinates mark the location of a lake. John must went to the lake too. 

She grabbed her shoes and slid them on, peeking out before she made a run for it. She paused at the door, recalling the last time she ran. The fear and pain as Fernando chased her through the stairs of her building. 

She screamed. 

She begged for mercy. 

 

She brushed away the thought and took a deep breath before taking off. The adrenaline pumped her heart so fast she could hear it thudding in her ears. Despite all the planning and the little she knew about camping, with the panic and in this black night, she was lost. But she kept running, hoping she'll see him, or anything to help her find him. 

 

She pushed through branches, twigs, and cobwebs, fear numbing the pain. She listened for sounds of him. Even though she knew he could be deadly silent, she was reassured when she heard nothing. So she caught her breath, and she made the final run for the lake. 

 

Her mind went back to Fernando and their conversation. What did he mean?

 

Don't look back, Marlena. 

 

He was her Sodom and Gomorrah. He held her secret. He was her darkest side. The temptation of knowing her past was not as strong as what she had in her future.

 

A life where she was a respected doctor. 

She had John, and she was his world. 

He took care of her. 

He pleasured her. 

She was his treasure. No one out there would ever take the risks he'd taken to have her. He could have hit her tonight, but he didn't. 

She'd changed him. 

 

Keep going. 

 

The further she went, the stronger his pull was. He was broken. But so was she. Maybe not like him, but their broken pieces fit together to make a mosaic. A mosaic of late nights listening to music, the serene look on his face--both perfect and damaged-as she rode him, orgasms upon orgasms, that swirled of filth and arousal she felt when he took charge of her body, a silence that spoke louder than any words anyone else has ever spoken to her. 

 

And the scars all over him. Different kinds. Some thick and long. Others short, like choppy brushstrokes on a painting. They cover part of him, like a painting of his twisted past with Stefano. Darkness, he couldn't hide, no matter how hard he tried to silence himself. 

 

She knew he was out there. 

 

As she got closer, she saw the outline of the shelter in the darkness. She didn’t know what she'll find when she got there. Or if he was even there. But Marlena sprinted towards it, her gown wet from the humidity and clung to her body, her hair damp and sticking to her face and shoulders. She almost called out his name, but she realized Fernando might be recovered by now and looking for her. 

She assumed he was out there too. But for all she knew she could open that door and find Fernando waiting for her in the shelter. She didn’t have time to contemplate much further as the door burst open, and out stormed John. 

Heaving. 

Sweaty. 

 

His shirtless body, clad in a pair of torn jeans, glimmering with blood. His black hair was slicked back with casual strokes of red. His blue eyes glow against the dark night, and the crimson streaks masking his face. 

He was the pawn again. 

And she had run right back into his clutches.