Chapter 84: The Rose's Wrath
Tears streamed down Agatha’s face. She wiped the blood from Xavier’s temple with trembling fingers.
"Are you alive? Are you really here?" Agatha asked, her voice raspy.
Xavier tried to smile even though his lips were split. "I'm here, baby. I won't let you be alone ever again."
Agatha sobbed harder. "Marco showed me a picture. You were in the hospital. You were covered in tubes. He said you were on the brink of death and that he... he sped it up."
"It was a lie. He wanted to break your mind, honey," Xavier said, squeezing her hand.
Agatha looked down at her own hands. She saw her knuckles, red and bruised from hitting Xavier. She saw the burn marks on his neck. She saw his thigh, wrapped in a bandage that was already soaked through with blood. Rage boiled in her chest and rose to her throat.
"I did this to you?" Agatha whispered.
"It wasn't your fault. He brainwashed you," Xavier said softly.
"Mmhh!" Agatha stood up with a violent jerk. She snatched her folding knife off the floor. Her gaze turned sharp and dark. The warmth that had filled her eyes when she saw Xavier vanished the moment she turned toward Marco’s men surrounding the door.
"You saw it, didn't you? You saw what I did to my husband on your master's orders?" Agatha yelled.
The leader of Marco’s squad stepped forward, cocking his weapon. "Don't listen to her, Agatha! You are Master Marco’s weapon! Kill that man now or we will finish you both!"
"Just die!" Agatha snapped.
"Brak!" Agatha kicked the wooden table in front of her, splitting it in two. She lunged forward like a black shadow.
"Shoot her! Open fire!" the leader ordered.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Agatha rolled across the floor with perfect agility. She dodged the hail of bullets hitting the wooden tiles behind her. "Akh!" She hissed as a bullet grazed her shoulder, but she didn't stop. She leaped and drove her knife straight into the throat of the man in the front.
"Squelch!" Blood sprayed across Agatha’s face.
"Game on," Agatha muttered coldly.
"Frans! Help her!" Xavier shouted. He crawled toward Frans’s long rifle lying nearby.
Frans stood up from behind a barricade of chairs. "I'm with you, Agatha!"
"Thud! Thud! Bang!" Frans pumped lead into three men trying to flank Agatha.
Melynda wasn't idle in the loft. She aimed at every head trying to target her daughter-in-law. "Don't let them get close! I've got the back!" Melynda yelled.
"Ugh!" Another one of Marco’s men fell with a hole in his chest.
Xavier forced himself to stand, leaning against a cabinet. He pulled the trigger of the rifle with shaking hands. "Hah... hah... you won't touch her again!"
"Bang!" Xavier dropped a man trying to stab Agatha from behind.
Agatha moved with blind fury. She wasn't using clean tactics anymore. She attacked with pure rage. She snapped a man’s arm with a single twist. "Krek!" The sound of breaking bone echoed through the noise of gunfire.
"Argh! Mercy!" the man screamed.
Agatha showed no mercy. She stabbed the man’s chest repeatedly. "This is for my husband! This is for all the lies!"
Ten men died in less than five minutes. The remaining forty began to panic. They watched a petite woman slaughter their friends with her bare hands and a small knife.
"She's not human! She's a monster!" one enemy screamed, running backward.
"Don't run! Kill them all!" the squad leader yelled from outside the cabin.
Agatha leaped through a shattered window. She landed in the middle of the crowd in the yard. "You all have to die!"
"Bugh! Whack! Crack!"
Agatha kicked a man’s jaw until his teeth flew out. She grabbed a fallen weapon and started shooting at random. She ignored the new wounds on her legs from enemy blades.
"Agatha! Get back inside! There are too many of them!" Xavier shouted from the doorway.
"Let me finish them, Xavier! They deserve this!" Agatha replied without looking back.
Blood soaked the yard that used to be green with forest grass. The smell of gunpowder and the metallic scent of blood filled the air. One by one, Marco’s men fell. Agatha didn't seem to tire. She kept moving even though her breath was getting short.
"Bang! Bang!" Frans shot the last two men trying to flee into the bushes.
Sudden silence fell over the area. The sound of Marco’s helicopter had long faded into the distance. Fifty enemy soldiers now lay lifeless around the old cabin.
Agatha stood in the middle of the pile of bodies. Her body was covered in red stains. Her black clothes were wet with blood that wasn't hers. She dropped her knife. Her body started to sway.
"Xavier..." Agatha whispered.
Xavier limped out of the cabin. He dragged his badly injured leg. Frans and Melynda followed behind, pale-faced. They all saw Agatha standing there like a statue.
"It's over, baby. Come here," Xavier said. He reached out his wounded arms.
Agatha ran to Xavier. She crashed into his chest. They both fell to the cold ground. Xavier held Agatha tightly.
"I was so scared, Xavier. I thought I lost you again," Agatha said, sobbing into his shoulder.
"I'm here. We're safe," Xavier replied.
Xavier suddenly coughed hard. "Cough! Cough!"
Fresh red blood sprayed from Xavier’s mouth and soaked Agatha’s shoulder. Agatha flinched. She looked at her husband, but she felt a warm liquid rising in her own throat.
"Cough!" Agatha spat blood onto Xavier’s chest.
Both of their faces were deathly pale. Their crashing blood pressure and internal injuries from the fight began to take over. Xavier’s burns and Agatha’s internal trauma from the impacts pushed their bodies to the limit.
"Xavier... my eyes are so heavy," Agatha muttered. She rested her head on his neck.
"Don't close them yet, baby. Please," Xavier pleaded, his voice almost a whisper.
Xavier kissed Agatha’s forehead one last time before darkness began to cloud his vision. He wrapped his arm around her waist with the last of his strength.
"I love you," Xavier whispered.
Agatha didn't answer. Her hand around Xavier’s neck went limp. Xavier’s head fell and rested against hers. They both passed out, locked in an embrace in the middle of a field of blood and bodies.
"Xavier! Agatha!" Melynda screamed, running toward them.
Frans knelt beside them and checked the pulses in their necks. "Ma'am, call for help! They're still alive, but they're in critical condition!"
Melynda reached into her pocket for her secret comms device. She looked at the two of them with tears streaming down her face.
"Please hold on, my children," Melynda whispered.