Maestro nodded. “We were trying to carry Savage and Reaper out. Savage was really bad. That’s when they tore the skin off him and branded those words into his back. He was slippery with blood, and any place we touched him hurt like hell. He couldn’t make a sound. Reaper had been cut and someone had played tic-tac-toe on his face with a knife. There wasn’t a place on his body that wasn’t bloody.”
Mechanic kept his gaze fixed on Player’s face. “You saved all of us that day. Alena was hurt, and I was carrying her. Ice was in bad shape. I think he’d been in the loom and they’d ripped him up. That was the day from hell. Czar, Transporter and Maestro took out one of the bastards who had tortured Savage while Demyan, Ink and Keys killed one of the ones that had gotten to Reaper. We had no idea Sorbacov and his friends were in the building.”
“They left,” Storm confirmed, “but came back for some reason.”
“They’d left Savage and Reaper for dead. Even after we went back for them, we waited to move them down to the dungeon because it was so much warmer up above,” Ink remembered. “It was a shit day. We were all in bad shape. No one had escaped being beaten and tortured. Steele tried to work on both Savage and Reaper in the hall upstairs, but he could barely see, he’d been beaten so badly. Czar, you had a broken arm. I don’t know how you managed to get through the vents like you did. We wouldn’t have survived if you hadn’t thrown up that illusion and held it, Player. And you had been in the loom that day, hadn’t you? With Ice?”
What is the loom?
Thankfully, Player hadn’t had nightmares of being tortured in the loom and shared that with Zyah. Later. If ever. He rubbed his chest. The scars on my chest and back.
She touched him right over the worst ones. He didn’t have them like some of the others did. Not like Destroyer. Destroyer had them the worst.
“We were all beat up that day,” Player admitted tiredly. “I threw the illusion up as soon as Preacher told us Sorbacov and the others had returned and Czar started trying to get everyone down to the basement. The two instructors we killed were supposed to have gone with Sorbacov and the others to dinner. The bodies were found and the alarm went out.”
He didn’t want to tell them the rest. It hurt to even think about it. It hurt to have Zyah know about it. He thought it would be bad for his brothers to know. For Czar to know. But his woman. Zyah. She was so damned compassionate. So amazing. Moments like this one showed him why he didn’t deserve her. He tried to wrap himself in her grandmother’s words. He wasn’t a coward. He wasn’t backing away from their relationship. She would have to be the one to leave him.
“Sorbacov called his three favorite little snitches into his den the minute the alarm was sounded. His other friends were right outside in the big room just above the stairwell and hall where all of you were trying to get Savage and Reaper down the stairs. His friends at first were just talking, looking into his den while he grilled the kids, and then they got restless and began to pace around. They had their whips on them, still bloody from what they’d done to Savage. They were laughing about it and hoping Sorbacov would send one of his snitches to them to pass the time with.”
Player wiped at the sweat. He glanced at the picture hanging on the wall. The frame around the drawing had changed. The etchings appeared much more prominent than they had before, more tubular, like an actual scroll. It wasn’t rolling, but he could see the distinct curves that hadn’t been there before. It was odd. He loosened his hold on Zyah and stood up, walking over to the drawing to get closer to the frame to keep his eyes on it while he explained to the others about his alternate reality.
“It took so long for all of you to get downstairs. Czar was trying to wait for me. I could see Sorbacov was getting enraged that the kids weren’t giving him answers. He grew colder, like he gets. He pulled out that watch, that stupid pocket watch, and he came to the top of the stairs. I was already so damned shaky. My head hurt so bad. I could barely stand the pain. I could see the White Rabbit and knew it was going to be bad if you didn’t get down there. Czar slipped through and I tried to hurry, but two of his friends grabbed one of the kids and I turned back.”