Page 33 of Volatile

One syllable leaves her lips, stoking my anger higher.

“Ten.”

Her fingers fly over the keys, but she doesn’t type in the chat after he sends a link that should never be fucking shared with a ten-year-old. Hearing Stasi’s monotonous explanation has my throat burning again.

“It’s a grooming technique, show them porn to get them used to the idea but each link will show the age disparity getting bigger in small ways until the kid sees themselves in it and they think it’s normal.”

Her entire body vibrates with excitement while I’m pretty sure a part of me is dying.

“Got you, you little cunt.”

Her message makes it die faster.

Kitty:

Mom came home. G2G xo

She moves as though I’m not weighing her down and shuts everything before trying to stand. I can’t move my arms and her frustration rises as she snaps, “Vitali. Get off me. If you fucking stop me when he’s made plans for tonight I’ll kill you instead of him.”

I can’t move anything. I want to but my body doesn’t work, and I hug her tighter, hiding my face in the crook of her neck. She struggles and I know I’m cutting off her air, but the rushed words aren’t because of my actions.

“He has a stepdaughter, the mom’s a nurse and working night shift for the first time.”

When it sinks in, my body works, and I stand bringing her with me. Is she fuck going alone? I’ll be there and let some of this shit out of my head.

How doyou know the world is a fucked up place?

A ten-year-old girl is safer being left in a house alone rather than having a so-called fucking parent home with her. Vanya and Dima are watching the house as Stasi and I put the sicko in his own trunk with a bag of his things to make it look like he’s run away. He didn’t even put up a fight in his eagerness to crawl into a child’s bed while promising his little pedo friends images ‘once she was relaxed’.

The personal chats are worse than the main thread and I made the mistake of reading through them when Stasi was getting her plan in motion. All the things he wanted to do, the images he fucking shared of a child bathing unaware that the cunt had hidden cameras, his fucking friends expressing their jealousy over not having anything in-house. Sick cunts, who the fuck speaks about children like that?

My anger rises as I sit in the passenger seat and Stasi drives; she’s like an entirely different person but I can’t breathe with my rage building. It’s there in my head, the images, their messages, all of it. I can’t stop it and I squeeze my eyes shut.

I blink away from my thoughts to find myself standing in the warehouse. Stasi isn’t next to me, but Mr. Robson is laid at my feet begging. Every little thing I’ve experienced pales in comparison to what he’s done or was going to do. It couldn’t have been the first time, he was too arrogant, too comfortable.

When I blink again he’s naked and everything is red. There’s a severed head thrown far enough away from the body that its dead eyes are fixed on me. Mangled flesh that might have been genitals lay at the other side. But it’s all red. Everything. I pick my hands up, confused as to what’s happened, and they’re covered in the sticky substance. No gloves. I always wear gloves. The overhead lights aren’t the only thing illuminating the space and I have no sense of time or what the fuck has happened as I stumble back.

My clothes are stuck to my skin, and I think I’ve lost time again. It used to happen when I was younger, and I sway like I’ve just been dropped in my body. My foot slips in the crimson pool as another body tries to keep me upright.

“I’ve got you, Tali, just breathe.”

Stasi, she never calls me Tali. Why the fuck am I focusing on that when I’ve lost time? But then she sniffles, and I turn faster than my fucked up mind should be capable of. I bring my hands up to cup her face, but I quickly pull them back at the sight of the red covering them like gloves. There are streaks of red on her face and tears lining her lashes that don’t fall.

“Fuck, did I hurt you?” I whisper.

She doesn’t answer verbally and gives me a sad smile as the doors open.I expect it to be a psychiatrist to cart me away but it’s worse, my brothers slowly step into the warehouse when they are not hesitant people. Vlad’s head moves in slow motion as he surveys the walls and there’s a small crease between his brows when he notices the head on the floor.

Fuck.

I fucked up massively if Stasi felt the need for reinforcements from hell. Val’s eyes widen like he didn’t become a Vor by burning people alive and force me to smell that shit. Both of them walk towards me, showing their palms like I’m an injured animal and I’ve definitely lost time again; it was always the same as this when I was younger. They’d speak softly, keep their movements slow, afraid of spooking me.

What the fuck did I do? I can’t work my way through the gap, it’s just blank and I rub the blood drying on my brows with the back of my wrist. The last thing I remember is being in that motherfucker’s house; he was washing the dishes and acting like a responsible parent before he crept up the stairs to go into his stepdaughter’s bedroom.

Water runs and I look up to see Stasi walking away from me. Fuck, I’ve scared her and there’s blood on the back of her neck. Finger marks. No, for fuck’s sake, I hurt her. Vlad is the first to speak, as always, and he wets a washcloth before holding my wrists and wiping my hands.

“We need you to say your normal dumb shit, so we know you’re not trapped in your head.”

The usual sarcastic shit is missing from his words, and it doesn’t have the intended effect to get me to react. Once he’s done wiping my hands like I’m a toddler, he goes back, getting another washcloth and doing the same to my face. I have a vague memory of him cleaning my hands and face when I was a kid exactly like this, and Val isn’t being an asshole. He stands off to the side, speaking calmly to Stasi as they both stare at me with worry etched on their features.

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