Page 7 of Retrograde

I’m back at all the sites of his tableaus, their stench coating my airways. They flash before my eyes like a sick exhibit of all the things he could and likely will do to me.

Then I’m back in my nightmares, where he’s holding me captive, where he has me tied up and spread-eagled, and he’s carving me up and peeling layers of my skin off, snapping my bones and pulling my organs out of me. Where he’s slowly turning me from a person to a prop.

And then I’m back here in the present, which really is just another nightmare, except I cannot wake up from this one.

Right when I think I’m going to pass out, my stubborn diaphragm lets up. I inhale with a loud, wheezing gasp. But I don’t feel any better, nausea sweeping through me. I bend forward with my hands propped on my knees. I gag, and then I gag again, my mouth watering with acidic saliva.

I stay that way, focusing on my breathing, and as the coils in my belly ease up, so does the humming in my ears.

“You’re going to barf?” Aron asks me without any compassion. “You wouldn’t be the first, you know. Nor the last.”

He’s leaning back against the bars, tattoos crawling up his crossed arms and the side of his neck, the bulging muscles threatening to rip the black fabric of his T-shirt. His shoulders are broad, and the bulk of his body is lean and sculpted. Strong, fast, completely lethal.

Words jam in my throat, and I only shake my head in response, straightening back up slowly and hesitantly.

With a malicious smirk plastered on his face, that bastard is looking more entertained than I’ve ever seen anyone.

“Why does your boyfriend call you Wolfie?” he asks.

“He’s not my boyfriend.”

“Whatever. Why?”

“Why do you care?”

“I don’t. I was hoping a bit of chitchat might stop you from puking in my cell. But we can just get on with it if you really insist.”

As if on cue, something rumbles ominously in my abdomen, and I sway on my feet. I sigh resignedly.

“It’s because of my surname. It had several meanings depending on where you lived. In some of the old languages it meant ‘belonging to a bull’. In others, ‘belonging to a wolf’.”

My anxiety flares, so deeply ingrained into me that even in a rebel holdout I’m half-expecting to get arrested and sent for “patriotic awareness therapy”, or worse, for not scrubbing anything that existed before the Continuum from my memory.

“Naughty, naughty girl,” Aron trills. “Careful with talk like that. I’m told the mustards give a mean slap on the wrist for this.”

“Mustards” is an insulting nickname for Continuits, people working directly or indirectly for the Continuum’s regime. People who are required to wear the Continuum’s uniform. Its colour is supposed to be golden, but there’s a thin line between golden and ... mustard yellow.

“That’s one way of putting it,” I scoff.

“Anyway. Are you going to resist me? Fight me?” Aron’s voice sizzles with twisted anticipation.

Anger buzzes underneath my skin like rushing fire ants.

“No,” I tell him firmly. “You said you’d enjoy that. I’m not giving you the satisfaction. We both know you’d win anyway.”

He pushes himself off the bars—fast, like a big cat pouncing—and takes a step towards me. Instinctively, I take a step back, crouching. He chuckles darkly.

“Oh, Riley, are you going to plead with me then? Are you going to beg?” he croons melodically.

A vicious grin carves itself into his face, tugging at a corner of that infuriatingly sensual mouth of his.

“Would it work if I tried?”

“Not a chance,” he assures me grimly, his features hardening. “Take your clothes off.”

I whimper, my recurring nausea the only thing that’s stopping me from crying. I groan.

“I’m not a patient man, Riley.” That relentless voice is invading my ears, my mind, my soul. “Do as I say, or I’m going to hurt you. I’m going to hurt you a lot.”