At The Path's End
They had been caught, they had been watched.Natalia should have known better. A test of loyalty, like she was a dog - she was their dog - Tonya looked so small in her uniform.
All this for a couple of stars.
It scratched her skin.
The floor was freezing against the soles of her feet.
She felt their eyes burning into her back.
“You may begin.”
She leapt, Tonya looked terrified.
Her stance was wrong, vulnerable.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Why wasn’t she fighting back?
Natalia heard the way Tonya’s head cracked when it hit the hard ground.
Crack!
Crack!
Tonya groggily struggled from where she was pinned, Natalia couldn’t be distracted. Natalia gripped thick greasy brown hair with her hands and used the locks to snap Tonya’s head up. Then down against the linoleum floor.
Natalia couldn't bear to look her in the eye. Couldn't face seeing how concussed she was.
The only sound Tonya made were groans and whines of a dying animal, Natalia snapped her neck. She could feel the give.
She stifled an errant sob bubbling up her throat as Tonya's body went limp under her.
“Brilliant work.” Rough hands dug into Natalia’s scalp.
She nodded, unable to let go of Tonya’s hair.
“Come now, the body will be disposed of shortly.”
When she didn't move from the body they yanked -- just like she did -- until she complied.
“We knew you were stronger. You haven’t failed once yet.”
The other girls watched like predatory birds as they moved.
“She was just like an animal, needed to be put down,” her hand pressed down on Natalia’s shoulder.
It felt like her legs were lead, she kept moving.
Tonya, she was talking about Tonya.
Tonya was dead.
And Natalia had just killed her.
“The rest of us have discussed at length the talents you’ve displayed, we believe you’d be better suited in an advanced class.”
Nobody to call her Talia anymore.
Oh god.