Arianna's Tale Pt. 04

The sound of crackling flames had sent her off to a world of silent darkness. A dreamless sleep she wasn't sure if she'd ever wake from. The woman, Elanor, had thrown a lighter onto her bed. She'd watched as the flames exploded across its surface. Everything she had in the world was in that house and she could do nothing but submit to that inky, black, numbness spreading through her body. She wanted to scream in protest, to cry out in anger. But her body was no longer interested in obeying her. Every piece she had of 'her' was in that house, every remaining piece of the woman she'd loved was gone. That would be hard to forgive. Hard to get past. But she didn't have a choice.

The world was fading...

Fading...

Gone.

She had no idea how long she'd been out. How long it had taken the two orderlies to 'prep her for transport' and to whisk her away to the very facility she'd had such a fun time smashing to pieces previously. What she did know, as her brain clawed its way back into consciousness, was that she awoke on a fairly soft surface. Bright white light washing in from above her and a subtle vibration rumbling over her body, not unlike the kind of vibration you felt when pushing a shopping cart along. The rumbling stopped suddenly and as Arianna managed to ease her eyes open she saw the face of Elanor looking down at her with a smile, "Ah. Welcome back to the world of the conscious."

She felt a sharp jab in her right arm and let out a sudden cry, trying to pull away and realizing that she couldn't. There was some sort of cuff wrapped around her wrist holding her down. A small tug of each of her limbs told her that she was rather secured.

Elanor seemed to notice the small struggles, "Ah, yes. You've been rather secured for your own and others' safety. I do hope you like the bed. You'll be spending a few weeks in it." Arianna didn't have the strength to respond yet, her half-lidded eyes following an orderly who was hanging up a full IV bag on a steel pole rising up from just above her head. The tube attached to it led down towards her right arm. She got the impression of where it lead based on the slight pinch she'd felt a few moments ago.

"Whrmi..." She mumbled.

Elanor stifled a chuckle, "Ah. Yes. A side effect of that particular narcotic we gave you to get you here, numb tongue. It'll be like that for a little while. Not that you'll need to talk much. We've got a fair amount of work to do with you before we get you inducted into this facility. But before you slide off into a world of dreams for an extended period of time, I figured we'd offer a bit of a tour. Show you exactly what your handiwork caused previously."

Elanor snapped her fingers and the back of the bed Arianna was strapped to was raised so she was in an elevated position. She was in some sort of cubicle that would not seem out of place in a hospital. All sorts of machines and monitors were about her with currently drawn-back curtains attached to a track around the bed like it could be closed for privacy. The room looked like a hospital ER and there were no less than twelve other cubicles, each with their curtains drawn back. Elanor motioned to the room and sighed, "This is the fullest this clinic has ever been. Everything from someone getting stitches, to several recovering from hypothermia is in this room. All because of..."

Elanor tapped Arianna's nose, "You."

Arianna furrowed her brows slightly, unable to respond but the confusion showing clearly on her face.

"You see. The windows you smashed out were a part of the housing stable. A heated building which is kept quite comfortable. But when you and your friends smashed out all the windows, all that heat dissipated quickly and left all of them at the whim of the icy fall night for several hours. Now in most circumstances, this might have been fine. You'd pull on an extra blanket, or retire to a warmer area. But you see, we don't house just regular people here. We house pets, and in the case of the room you smashed up...ponies. Beautiful women and men who live their lives as animals. Bound tightly without the use of their hands. Unable to escape their stalls without a human handler..."

"You see where I'm going with this?"

Arianna was confused. What did the woman mean...ponies? People dressed as horses? The only image in her mind was of two people in a horse costume. Again the confusion showed clearly on her face.

"Oh, that look of confusion is rather cute. You'll see in time. All you need to know is that you subjected a room full of immobile people to below zero degrees weather AND showered half of them in falling sharps of glass. You caused a lot of pain and In two cases almost became a murderer. Do you understand now Arianna, why I felt I needed to deal with this matter personally? Nobody, and I mean NOBODY hurts those under my care. BAsh up my facility all you like, but the second you put so many of those I care about at risk is where I draw the line. The money was a good excuse to get you here, but in truth, you were coming whether you liked it or not."

Arianna began to tug at her bonds slightly, a little afraid of the woman's sharp tone.

Elanor patted the helpless woman's cheek, "Don't worry. Luckily for you, you get to make it up to every single one of them and at the same time, as part of this facility. You fall under that umbrella of protection. No harm will come to you while you are here. Well...no unreasonable harm." She chuckled slightly.

All around Arianna, the pair of orderlies from before were working. Sticking pads on her body. A body that she just realized was fully naked. Her eyes widened as she looked down at herself in shock, "Whym...nak...ed..." She mumbled uneasily.

"You do not need clothes at the moment. Plus. It's an awful pain to hook up all these monitors and such while you are fully clothed. You've quite a time ahead of you. I'm going to have my on-hand doctor see to that knee of yours and then we've got to nip your addiction in the bud. I can assure you, it's not going to be pleasant. But you'll come out of it better than you were before. While you are here, to pay me back for the damage you've done...try to think of this as a fresh start."

"No more pain..." She patted Arianna's sore knee making her cry out in pain.

"No more struggling to find your next fix..." She flicked the IV running into Arianna's arm.

"And, perhaps even a way to escape the horrors of your past. It is not an easy thing to lose somebody. Moreso when you have to watch the light leave their eyes. I do know what you've gone through. It's amazing how many of your so-called friends are willing to talk about you when offered large amounts of money. Loyalty on the wrong side of the law is so very hard to come by. Even Snips and Ajax were willing to spill information on you for a few grand..."

Every one of Elanor's words was like a blow to Arianna. The man she worked for, had betrayed her. The people she thought were her friends, had betrayed her. She'd thought she'd felt alone after she'd lost her girlfriend. But this was a whole different level. Suddenly she felt like she was on her own in the world, who did she even have left after this woman had so-thoroughly torn apart the few relationships she did have. The pain in Arianna's eyes was obvious and Elanor had to resist letting her lips curl into a grin.

"I offer you a chance. To start over Arianna. Think on that and when you've recovered, we will discuss where your lonely existence might lead." She patted the woman's cheek and then climbed to her feet, looking to the two orderlies who had finished and were standing at the ready on either side of Arianna's hospital bed.

"Put her under. I'll send for the doctor this evening."

One of the orderlies, despite Arianna's tiny cry of protest, pulled the stopper for the IV and in only minutes her world was cascading once again into drug-induced darkness.

Elanor stayed there until the girl was completely under and then turned, walking out of the cubicle.

"Even for you. That was a bit of a cruel series of lies." Came the smooth Italian accented voice of Ezio, who was standing just outside of Arianna's cubicle and to the side far enough that he'd not been visible.

"Perhaps. But such lies will perhaps help shape her future. Without someone to run to, the chances of her deciding to leave when offered the choice are lessened." Elanor grinned at Ezio who sighed and glanced at Arianna in her drug-induced sleep.

"I'll assume you'd like me to cut all ties with her?" Ezio asked as he ran a hand over his bald head before scratching at his beard.

"All of them. I want every single tie she has to you or your organization burnt. For all intents and purposes, Arianna Allegri no longer exists." Elanor stated simply.

"So be it. It's a shame, she was a solid piece of my organization with high aspirations." Ezio mused.

"She was. But you can't tell me the drug-addicted shell of a woman was going anywhere after she lost her girlfriend. How many months now has she been stuck in that rabbit hole?" Elanor asked.

"Too many. I see your point. Well, I hope she does well in your care then." Ezio shrugged nonchalantly and turned away from the sleeping blonde and walked towards the exit of the 'hospital' section of the facility.

"Let us go to my office Ezio so we can re-negotiate the terms of our agreement. I need you to understand that should anyone else from your organization ever set foot on my property again, it will be the last time you have feet to walk upon." Elanor said this sharply as she walked past Ezio and out the door with him in tow.

"No need to be so sharp about it. I will make sure the rules are understood better from now on. It would seem I've allowed some of my lesser employees get a bit too much freedom." Ezio said as he rubbed his temples slightly and followed her down the hall towards their office so they could re-negotiate which he was quite sure was going to be a very one-sided 'negotiation'.

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Arianna was almost glad for being kept relatively sedated in her initial days at the facility. Withdrawal wasn't pretty, nor was recovering from a knee injury. Everything was a hazy mess and yet she knew what was happening. She was aware that she was taken for surgery on her knee. That it would take a month or two to heal fully. She was fully away that when her sedation was eased back, she was shaky with heavy flu-like symptoms from withdrawal. She was almost glad she was strapped to the hospital bed. Almost. She felt like a prison. Both of her mind, and this place.

How long had she been here? How long would she be here? Or maybe this had been Elanor's ploy all along. To keep her drugged the rest of her life with the vague hope that she'd someday awake? She was vaguely aware that occasionally certain pads on her body would stimulate her muscles, forcing her to twitch and flex. Likely to keep her muscles from going into atrophy from laying for so long. Every time this machine was activated, she knew. It was like the little shocks cut through the drugs, through the haze. She felt the distinct contractions, the sharp pulses.

~How long will I be like this...?~

And then one day it finally stopped. It felt like ages since she'd been drugged and taken from her home. Then again, her dreams always felt like time stretched into infinity. There was a distinct warmth on her skin, a curiously soft comfort encapsulating her body. She could hear the howling groan of the window washing over the side of the building and for the first time she didn't feel anything restraining her. She lifted a hand. It was on top of the blanket she was wrapped in. She stared at her fingers like they were unfamiliar. Her half-lidded eyes stared at them for a long moment before a voice from the side stole her focus.

"Ah. There she is. Welcome back to the world Arianna." The voice belonged to a raven-haired woman with her thick black locks held in a tight ponytail. She wore medical scrubs and a white doctor's coat with a badge on the left side of her chest reading 'Dr. Kerrit'. With a bunch of other information attached to it. The woman held a clipboard in her lap and watched Arianna closely.

Arianna flexed her muscles, moving to sit up but the other woman was quicker, pressing a hand softly to her chest to hold her down, "Easy. Let's take things slow." She pressed a button on the bed which raised the back and put Arianna into a sitting position, "Just sit and relax. I've got a few questions before you go moving about too much."

Arianna furrowed her brows and didn't respond, nodding quietly. She was still a bit dazed so she wasn't about to argue.

"How do you feel?" The raven-haired woman asked.

Arianna coughed slightly and forced herself to speak. Her voice was croaky like she'd not drank any water in a little while, "Where am I...?" She asked, clearly still confused.

"You're at Miss Elanor's facility. The same place you've been for the last month and a half." The woman answered.

"A month and...a half?" Arianna asked.

"Yes. Just shy of two months actually. You've been through a pretty rough recovery period. Though I'm sure you don't remember much of it. You've been kept pretty heavily sedated. Which based on this chart, is a blessing in disguise. You had quite a rough withdrawal period and that knee of yours took quite a bit of rest to heal. How does your knee feel? Right knee. Bend it for me please." She responded with a warm smile.

Right. She'd been brought to pay a debt owed. To serve time. This is not how she'd expected it to begin. At the woman's prompting her focus moved to her knee. She stared at it through the blankets and then slowly lifted it and bent it. She was a bit shaky but it felt good. As good as it ever had, "It feels ok. Better...I think then it did. I think. My heads all fuzzy..."

The woman scribbled notes on the clipboard, "Side effect of the sedatives. You'll be fuzzy for a few hours yet. I just wanted to check on your faculties before leaving you to rest. So nothing feels off then?"

"No. I feel good." In fact, she felt better than good. She realized she didn't have that craving for her next fix. She wasn't shaky. She wasn't in a dulled state of mine. She felt...clean?

"I can bet. It's quite a state you've come out of." She checked off something on the clipboard and then climbed to her feet.

"Alright then Arianna. I'll have the nurses come to check on you through the day. Rest for now. The room is yours, but my recommendation is to stay in bed until one of the nurses is here. Once you're feeling almost a hundred percent I'll arrange for Elanor to come and have a chat with you. You two have quite a bit to talk about I've been told." She gave Arianna a soft pat on the shoulder and walked towards the door.

"Oh! Last thing. You have a call button on your side table there as well as a few minor amenities. If you need anything, just hit the button." The woman didn't give Arianna a chance to answer before she turned and left, closing the white-painted door behind her. It clicked audibly like it was being locked, leaving Arianna sitting alone in the dim light filtering in through a window high above the bed. She stared at the door for a long time and had to wonder what all had passed her by in her sedated sleep.

Only time would tell.