Categories > Celebrities > My Chemical Romance > From Russia With Love
The following day, Gerard sat up in his second story bedroom sketching in a black notebook. The walls around were covered with a mix of military propaganda and his own drawings, with some posters thrown in for good measure. He was trying to concentrate on his work, but every time he put pen to paper all he could think about was the look on Dominika’s face when he’d been trying to be gentle and caring towards her. He understood she was younger than he, but he always knew that she was wise beyond her years, mature and intelligent underneath her shy and stubborn exterior. Ever since the idea had been put into his head by his parents, all he could think about was making her fall in love with him, falling in love with her and removing some of that shy exterior she held onto so tightly. Such a shy, pretty little flower.
He screwed up the paper in his fist and turned to a fresh piece, attempting a second time, but all he could imagine was running his hand through long, white blonde hair and placing gentle, soft kisses up the side of her neck as she took a sharp breath and flushed pink underneath his lips. Tracing his fingers up the curve of her bare, milky thigh and under one of her pretty sundresses. Making her body his…
He mentally slapped himself and pushed the chair out, heading down the stairs and to the kitchen. Just as his foot touched the bottom step, a sound he knew all too well rang out in the distance. Military training mode engaged, he slunk into the kitchen and held his head to one side, listening. Another shot rang out, closer this time. And another, and another, and then a barrage of shots all at once. His blood ran cold and he dropped to the floor, crawling to the other end of the kitchen and then standing up and running out the front door of the house.
Pressing himself flat against the wall of the house, he edged around the corner and looked around, noticing nothing out of the ordinary. He jumped the tall brick wall that separated his house from next door and used a thicket of trees to make his way unseen to the exterior of the house where a large window was. He pressed himself to the wall again and peered around into the window, hand flying to his mouth to stifle a yell.
The sight before him was pure horror. The normally immaculate house was ransacked, and on the floor lay the bloodied bodies of the Queen, King and some of their children. He counted eight Chinese militants standing over their bodies, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons. Another two rifled through a cabinet nearby, no doubt stealing valuables. He forced himself to concentrate on his training and determine how many victims there was, maybe there was a chance there were some survivors. Monika lay on the ground in the doorway, and Alik and Vadem were slumped together against the far wall. It was a bittersweet relief to note Dominika’s absence, maybe he still had a chance to save her.
He stayed flat to the wall as he inched along it towards the south end of the house where Dominika’s room was. A large oak tree outside her window allowed him enough leverage to scale a low branch and scramble up to the limb next to the window. He scanned her room quickly, heart sinking as he realized it was empty. He pressed himself against the wall obscuring himself in the leaves as he caught his breath.
Maybe she’s hiding.
He reached out and tapped on a pane of glass softly, silently praying it would be enough to get her attention without alerting the militants ransacking the house below them.
The top of a blonde head appeared from underneath the far side of her bed, and popped down again before she looked around properly for the source of the noise. When they locked eyes, she looked like a deer in the headlights, blue eyes so wide they dominated her facial features.
“Gerard” she mouthed silently, scuttling across the floor to underneath the window. He pressed his finger to his lips as she eased the pane open slowly.
“What the hell is going on?!” she hissed. He clamped his hand against her mouth.
“Quiet, they’re still downstairs. Come with me now, don’t make a sound”
She nodded, complying silently and taking the hand he offered in front of him. He shuffled down the end of the large limb under her window and hung from the branch for a moment before dropping noiselessly to the ground. He held his arms up and motioned for her to copy, catching her by the waist and setting her on the ground. He led her through the thicket again, back towards the direction of his house, all the while knowing it wasn’t a safe place to take her either. No doubt it was their very next target. He needed to get her back to the military base.
“Where are we going? What’s going on, Gerard? Was that gun fire? Why won’t you answer me?!”
She’d been minding her own business in her room, working on an essay piece her tutor had set her when she’d heard glass breaking and screaming downstairs, followed by what she could only guess was shots being fired. She’d followed protocol she’d been taught from childhood and hidden under her bed till she heard Gerard at her window.
“We’re under attack, well I think so anyway, unless you’ve got some Chinese visitors I didn’t know about” he replied exasperated.
“Where are you taking me then?”
“Back to the base, it’s the only safe place for you now”
It dawned on her suddenly and the realization hit her like a ton of bricks.
“What about my family?!” she cried “Aren’t you going to rescue them too? I won’t go without them!”
“Please Domi, just listen to me, I’ll explain it all later, but now is not the time!”
He pulled her arm and she wouldn’t budge. Her eyes were wild as the wind picked up around them, her hair dancing around her face. She looked at him straight in the eye.
“No! I won’t leave them behind. Go get them too, and take us all to the base together”
“I can’t, Domi, you come with me now or I make you, up to you”
He tensed his body like he was ready to spring if she made a run for it, his jaw set hard and his eyes set on hers. She was still for a second and then turned away from him suddenly, trying to disappear back into the thicket. He caught her arm, circled her waist and threw her over his shoulder in one fluid motion.
“PUT ME DOWN!” she yelled. She fought against him, kicking his chest and beating her balled fists on his back but it made no difference, “Why are you doing this Gerard? You said you’d never hurt me, let me go back to them, I need to know they’re okay!”
“They’re all dead Domi! All of them! I’m so sorry, I didn’t want to tell you like this but we are in serious danger right now and I need you to stop questioning me and just do what I say ok? Just till I get you safe again”
“I’m sorry” he whispered again. He put her on her feet and put his hand to her back, trying to be comforting.
She was silent as they continued through the trees, too shocked to comprehend his words fully. All she could do was look up at the skies of her beloved homeland and wonder if she’d ever be able to see them in the same way again.
___________________________________________________________________________
After several strained, silent hours trudging deep into the woods, they reached a thinning in the trees and stepped out into a clearing marked by an old world, falling down house. The roof was dotted with gaping holes and sagging, paint peeling from the exterior and the garden overgrown with vines and foliage encroaching from the forest.
As they slowed to a stop, Dominika noticed the sun was beginning to dip behind the trees, orange rays cast through the forest in beams of light that illuminated their faces. Gerard’s eyes glowed almost eerily in the light as he looked at her with pity and concern.
“We’ll stop here for the night” he said softly “no one knows about this place, we’re safe here”
“They were all shot, weren’t they?” she asked suddenly. It was the first time she’d said a word all afternoon and the hollow, broken sound of her voice almost made him wince.
“I don’t think you want to know about tha-”
“Stop treating me like a kid and just tell me the truth” she said angrily “I can handle it. I’m not made of glass”
He took her hand and looked down at his boots for a moment before meeting her eyes again.
“Yes. That’s what it looked like anyway. They were all over the ground floor of your house, the place was totally ransacked”
She crumpled into tears again, almost knocking the breath out of him when she fell against his chest, wrapping her arms around his middle and holding him tight. His hands patted and rubbed her back soothingly.
“I’m sorry” he whispered into her hair “I loved them too, everyone did, the whole country will be in mourning for your family, Domi. They won’t be forgotten”
She pulled away for a moment, looking up at him under her watery lashes.
“Thank you for saving me” she said softly, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her cardigan.
“Lets get you inside”
___________________________________________________________________________
The last shreds of daylight disappeared slowly as they sat in the least damaged room of the small run down house. The windows were bare of glass and the wind had started to pick up now they were closer to the ocean, it brushed over their arms and made the hairs stand on end. The room was almost pitch black as they lacked any light source except for a small cigarette lighter Gerard carried. They sat a small distance apart, backs against the wall with their legs stretched out. He’d held her till her wracking sobs slowed to sniffles, and now they’d sat in silence till the darkness in the room outweighed the dark thoughts swirling through her head and she spoke quietly.
“It’s terribly ironic” she sighed “I’ve barely left my room since they told me about this whole marriage…proposal, whatever you’d call it. They tried to get me to come down this morning and I was still too stubborn. Turns out my stubbornness is what spared me, that’ll teach me”
“What do you mean?” he replied, confused at what she was trying to say.
“I’ve given it some thought. If I’d been killed along with the rest of them, the enemy would have gotten what they wanted, problem solved. Instead, my entire family is dead, we’re on the run in the middle of the woods and somehow I have to try and work out how to pick up the pieces of this country all by myself. I’m only sixteen, Gerard!”
The enormity of what lay ahead seemed to stare her straight in the face and the weight of it was crushing. From Russia’s little princess to what? Russia’s Queen? She felt dizzy at the thought.
“You can’t stay here, kid, you gotta go back to America”
She looked at him like he was crazy.
“What do you mean ‘go back to America’? I’ve never even been there, I’m in CHARGE of this country now, I can’t leave!”
“The Chinese are in charge of this country right now, Domi, and they’ll be looking for you to finish the job and take complete control, nowhere here is safe for you right now, not even the base”
“Why isn’t the base safe? No one can get in or out of that place, Gerard, I can at least stay there and be close to my people rather than abandoning them! That’s not right at all, I have responsibilities!”
“You’re no good to anyone dead, Dominika” he said darkly. She raked her hands through her hair in frustration.
“Nothing would happen to me if I stayed at the base, where else in Russia is safer?”
“Do you realize how many more of them than us there are? Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, kid, and as soon as I can get to a damn phone, I’m going to have to tell them to send every reinforcement we’ve got so we can get control again before shit goes crazy, that’s if they haven’t already worked it out. You need to be as far away as possible from this place, and they can protect you in the States”
“They?” she said quietly “You won’t even be coming with me?”
Her face fell even further as she looked at him, searching his face for an answer. He took her hand in his and stroked the back with his thumb. She looked down at their hands twined in her lap.
“I can’t, kid, not yet. I have responsibilities too, I need to be with my Battalion and take control of this thing. As soon as that’s done, I will be back for you, I promise”
“So you can fulfill your responsibilities, and mine are insignificant?
“Your responsibility is to stay alive so you can return and rule your country when it is safe to do so, my responsibility is to serve my country by protecting yours” he retorted.
“*Debil” she muttered. He raised an eyebrow.
“I know what that means” he replied. She ignored him and continued with the onslaught of questioning.
“Where will I go?”
“I don’t have all the answers yet, kid, we’ll know more when we reach the base in a couple days. By my calculations we should get there tomorrow afternoon or the next morning”
“What will I do there?”
He sighed “I don’t know, kid, eat hotdogs? The point is you won’t be hunted down by the Chinese Military. Enough questions now, time to sleep”
She rolled her eyes but shuffled down to lie on the floor, pulling her white cardigan from her lap over her shoulders.
“I thought you were trying to be my boyfriend, not my Dad” she said without facing him. A smile crossed his face in the darkness.
“I thought I wasn’t your boyfriend”
“You’re not. Stop talking now, I’m trying to sleep”
________________________________________________________
*moron in Russian
Just for you DarknessBliss! Thanks for reading! :)
He screwed up the paper in his fist and turned to a fresh piece, attempting a second time, but all he could imagine was running his hand through long, white blonde hair and placing gentle, soft kisses up the side of her neck as she took a sharp breath and flushed pink underneath his lips. Tracing his fingers up the curve of her bare, milky thigh and under one of her pretty sundresses. Making her body his…
He mentally slapped himself and pushed the chair out, heading down the stairs and to the kitchen. Just as his foot touched the bottom step, a sound he knew all too well rang out in the distance. Military training mode engaged, he slunk into the kitchen and held his head to one side, listening. Another shot rang out, closer this time. And another, and another, and then a barrage of shots all at once. His blood ran cold and he dropped to the floor, crawling to the other end of the kitchen and then standing up and running out the front door of the house.
Pressing himself flat against the wall of the house, he edged around the corner and looked around, noticing nothing out of the ordinary. He jumped the tall brick wall that separated his house from next door and used a thicket of trees to make his way unseen to the exterior of the house where a large window was. He pressed himself to the wall again and peered around into the window, hand flying to his mouth to stifle a yell.
The sight before him was pure horror. The normally immaculate house was ransacked, and on the floor lay the bloodied bodies of the Queen, King and some of their children. He counted eight Chinese militants standing over their bodies, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons. Another two rifled through a cabinet nearby, no doubt stealing valuables. He forced himself to concentrate on his training and determine how many victims there was, maybe there was a chance there were some survivors. Monika lay on the ground in the doorway, and Alik and Vadem were slumped together against the far wall. It was a bittersweet relief to note Dominika’s absence, maybe he still had a chance to save her.
He stayed flat to the wall as he inched along it towards the south end of the house where Dominika’s room was. A large oak tree outside her window allowed him enough leverage to scale a low branch and scramble up to the limb next to the window. He scanned her room quickly, heart sinking as he realized it was empty. He pressed himself against the wall obscuring himself in the leaves as he caught his breath.
Maybe she’s hiding.
He reached out and tapped on a pane of glass softly, silently praying it would be enough to get her attention without alerting the militants ransacking the house below them.
The top of a blonde head appeared from underneath the far side of her bed, and popped down again before she looked around properly for the source of the noise. When they locked eyes, she looked like a deer in the headlights, blue eyes so wide they dominated her facial features.
“Gerard” she mouthed silently, scuttling across the floor to underneath the window. He pressed his finger to his lips as she eased the pane open slowly.
“What the hell is going on?!” she hissed. He clamped his hand against her mouth.
“Quiet, they’re still downstairs. Come with me now, don’t make a sound”
She nodded, complying silently and taking the hand he offered in front of him. He shuffled down the end of the large limb under her window and hung from the branch for a moment before dropping noiselessly to the ground. He held his arms up and motioned for her to copy, catching her by the waist and setting her on the ground. He led her through the thicket again, back towards the direction of his house, all the while knowing it wasn’t a safe place to take her either. No doubt it was their very next target. He needed to get her back to the military base.
“Where are we going? What’s going on, Gerard? Was that gun fire? Why won’t you answer me?!”
She’d been minding her own business in her room, working on an essay piece her tutor had set her when she’d heard glass breaking and screaming downstairs, followed by what she could only guess was shots being fired. She’d followed protocol she’d been taught from childhood and hidden under her bed till she heard Gerard at her window.
“We’re under attack, well I think so anyway, unless you’ve got some Chinese visitors I didn’t know about” he replied exasperated.
“Where are you taking me then?”
“Back to the base, it’s the only safe place for you now”
It dawned on her suddenly and the realization hit her like a ton of bricks.
“What about my family?!” she cried “Aren’t you going to rescue them too? I won’t go without them!”
“Please Domi, just listen to me, I’ll explain it all later, but now is not the time!”
He pulled her arm and she wouldn’t budge. Her eyes were wild as the wind picked up around them, her hair dancing around her face. She looked at him straight in the eye.
“No! I won’t leave them behind. Go get them too, and take us all to the base together”
“I can’t, Domi, you come with me now or I make you, up to you”
He tensed his body like he was ready to spring if she made a run for it, his jaw set hard and his eyes set on hers. She was still for a second and then turned away from him suddenly, trying to disappear back into the thicket. He caught her arm, circled her waist and threw her over his shoulder in one fluid motion.
“PUT ME DOWN!” she yelled. She fought against him, kicking his chest and beating her balled fists on his back but it made no difference, “Why are you doing this Gerard? You said you’d never hurt me, let me go back to them, I need to know they’re okay!”
“They’re all dead Domi! All of them! I’m so sorry, I didn’t want to tell you like this but we are in serious danger right now and I need you to stop questioning me and just do what I say ok? Just till I get you safe again”
“I’m sorry” he whispered again. He put her on her feet and put his hand to her back, trying to be comforting.
She was silent as they continued through the trees, too shocked to comprehend his words fully. All she could do was look up at the skies of her beloved homeland and wonder if she’d ever be able to see them in the same way again.
___________________________________________________________________________
After several strained, silent hours trudging deep into the woods, they reached a thinning in the trees and stepped out into a clearing marked by an old world, falling down house. The roof was dotted with gaping holes and sagging, paint peeling from the exterior and the garden overgrown with vines and foliage encroaching from the forest.
As they slowed to a stop, Dominika noticed the sun was beginning to dip behind the trees, orange rays cast through the forest in beams of light that illuminated their faces. Gerard’s eyes glowed almost eerily in the light as he looked at her with pity and concern.
“We’ll stop here for the night” he said softly “no one knows about this place, we’re safe here”
“They were all shot, weren’t they?” she asked suddenly. It was the first time she’d said a word all afternoon and the hollow, broken sound of her voice almost made him wince.
“I don’t think you want to know about tha-”
“Stop treating me like a kid and just tell me the truth” she said angrily “I can handle it. I’m not made of glass”
He took her hand and looked down at his boots for a moment before meeting her eyes again.
“Yes. That’s what it looked like anyway. They were all over the ground floor of your house, the place was totally ransacked”
She crumpled into tears again, almost knocking the breath out of him when she fell against his chest, wrapping her arms around his middle and holding him tight. His hands patted and rubbed her back soothingly.
“I’m sorry” he whispered into her hair “I loved them too, everyone did, the whole country will be in mourning for your family, Domi. They won’t be forgotten”
She pulled away for a moment, looking up at him under her watery lashes.
“Thank you for saving me” she said softly, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her cardigan.
“Lets get you inside”
___________________________________________________________________________
The last shreds of daylight disappeared slowly as they sat in the least damaged room of the small run down house. The windows were bare of glass and the wind had started to pick up now they were closer to the ocean, it brushed over their arms and made the hairs stand on end. The room was almost pitch black as they lacked any light source except for a small cigarette lighter Gerard carried. They sat a small distance apart, backs against the wall with their legs stretched out. He’d held her till her wracking sobs slowed to sniffles, and now they’d sat in silence till the darkness in the room outweighed the dark thoughts swirling through her head and she spoke quietly.
“It’s terribly ironic” she sighed “I’ve barely left my room since they told me about this whole marriage…proposal, whatever you’d call it. They tried to get me to come down this morning and I was still too stubborn. Turns out my stubbornness is what spared me, that’ll teach me”
“What do you mean?” he replied, confused at what she was trying to say.
“I’ve given it some thought. If I’d been killed along with the rest of them, the enemy would have gotten what they wanted, problem solved. Instead, my entire family is dead, we’re on the run in the middle of the woods and somehow I have to try and work out how to pick up the pieces of this country all by myself. I’m only sixteen, Gerard!”
The enormity of what lay ahead seemed to stare her straight in the face and the weight of it was crushing. From Russia’s little princess to what? Russia’s Queen? She felt dizzy at the thought.
“You can’t stay here, kid, you gotta go back to America”
She looked at him like he was crazy.
“What do you mean ‘go back to America’? I’ve never even been there, I’m in CHARGE of this country now, I can’t leave!”
“The Chinese are in charge of this country right now, Domi, and they’ll be looking for you to finish the job and take complete control, nowhere here is safe for you right now, not even the base”
“Why isn’t the base safe? No one can get in or out of that place, Gerard, I can at least stay there and be close to my people rather than abandoning them! That’s not right at all, I have responsibilities!”
“You’re no good to anyone dead, Dominika” he said darkly. She raked her hands through her hair in frustration.
“Nothing would happen to me if I stayed at the base, where else in Russia is safer?”
“Do you realize how many more of them than us there are? Thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, kid, and as soon as I can get to a damn phone, I’m going to have to tell them to send every reinforcement we’ve got so we can get control again before shit goes crazy, that’s if they haven’t already worked it out. You need to be as far away as possible from this place, and they can protect you in the States”
“They?” she said quietly “You won’t even be coming with me?”
Her face fell even further as she looked at him, searching his face for an answer. He took her hand in his and stroked the back with his thumb. She looked down at their hands twined in her lap.
“I can’t, kid, not yet. I have responsibilities too, I need to be with my Battalion and take control of this thing. As soon as that’s done, I will be back for you, I promise”
“So you can fulfill your responsibilities, and mine are insignificant?
“Your responsibility is to stay alive so you can return and rule your country when it is safe to do so, my responsibility is to serve my country by protecting yours” he retorted.
“*Debil” she muttered. He raised an eyebrow.
“I know what that means” he replied. She ignored him and continued with the onslaught of questioning.
“Where will I go?”
“I don’t have all the answers yet, kid, we’ll know more when we reach the base in a couple days. By my calculations we should get there tomorrow afternoon or the next morning”
“What will I do there?”
He sighed “I don’t know, kid, eat hotdogs? The point is you won’t be hunted down by the Chinese Military. Enough questions now, time to sleep”
She rolled her eyes but shuffled down to lie on the floor, pulling her white cardigan from her lap over her shoulders.
“I thought you were trying to be my boyfriend, not my Dad” she said without facing him. A smile crossed his face in the darkness.
“I thought I wasn’t your boyfriend”
“You’re not. Stop talking now, I’m trying to sleep”
________________________________________________________
*moron in Russian
Just for you DarknessBliss! Thanks for reading! :)
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