Chapter 24 – GEO
GEO
The moment I see that haunted, empty look in Cosima's eyes, I know we're fucked.
We were fucked the moment we walked into that palace. Hell, probably fucked the moment we decided to follow a woman with a death wish across international borders.
I should've known better than to let a clearly unhinged and insane omega call the shots and nearly get us all killed, but here we are, trapped in a train car with a kidnapped prince and an omega who's checked out of reality faster than a drunk at last call.
And I can't even blame Raven for this colossal lapse in judgment.
No one made me come along on this glorified suicide mission.
I invited my own fucking self. Somewhere along the way, I ended up following this unhinged omega like a dog on a leash just like the rest of them, and I can't even smell the little psycho half as well as they can.
"Cosima?" Raven's voice cracks with concern as he takes a hesitant step toward her, as if he's afraid she'll shatter at the slightest provocation. Not an unfounded fear at the moment. "Goddess, can you hear me?"
She doesn't respond. Just stands there with both hands—including the one still gripping the gun—squeezing the sides of her head like she's trying to keep the demons out.
Or maybe in. I know she's not gonna respond to him even before the words are all the way out of his mouth, with those violet eyes staring off at something none of us can see.
She's muttering something in Vrissian I can't make out, but judging from the looks on Nikolai and Raven's faces, it's concerning.
Nikolai tries next, switching to Vrissian.
I really need to learn that fucking language.
Whatever he's saying sounds gentle, or at least as gentle as the devil can manage, but it might as well be static for all the good it does. She's gone, lost in whatever nightmare her mind's conjured up to protect itself from the truth.
Even Knight's growling, a concerned rumble that vibrates through the floor. He shifts from foot to foot, clearly wanting to go to her side but rational enough even in his feral mind to know that approaching someone with a gun when they're not home upstairs is a bad fucking idea.
We're all afraid to touch her. One wrong move and she could hurt herself.
Wouldn't be the first time I caught some stray lead, but the thought of her turning that gun on herself makes my gut clench in a way I don't want to examine too closely.
And I've seen enough people in the state she's currently occupying to know that's a very real possibility.
"What's happening?" The panic and desperation in Raven's voice is painful to hear as he looks to me, like I'm supposed to have answers. "What's wrong with her?"
"She's dissociating," Nikolai mutters without taking his eyes off the omega. "It happened before, when the Ghosts first dropped her off and then again when she saw him for the first time at the airfield," he says, nodding toward Knight.
Knight's gaze flicks to the floor.
"And you mention this now?" I snarl.
He squints at me over those stupid glasses I should have put in a meat grinder a long damn time ago. "Why the fuck would I mention shit to you? We were trying to kill each other less than a week ago."
He has a point, as loath as I am to admit it. There's only one reason two alphas who hate each other's guts as much as we do would stop fighting.
And she's standing right in front of us.
Even if her brain's a thousand miles away from here.
"What do you mean, dissociating?" Raven demands, gripping Nikolai's arm. "What happened?"
"I don't know, okay? She just… spaces out," Nikolai says, gesturing to her. "Disappears into herself, like nothing else exists."
Judging from the looks of her right now, he's not wrong.
"It's a fugue state."
Plague's voice cuts through our collective panic like a scalpel. The prince sits there, blood still trickling from his split lip, watching Cosima with clinical interest that makes me want to put my fist through his regal skull. He's the reason we're in this fucking shit to begin with.
Technically, he's also the reason we found her. But I'm not giving him credit for fate, which apparently, I believe in now.
"It happened while she was in our custody," he continues, like he's telling us about the weather. "An episode just like this. She's clearly unwell."
"Shut your fucking mouth," Raven snarls, but Plague ignores him.
"If you take off these restraints and allow me to order the conductor to stop this train," Plague says flatly, "I can take her back to Surhiira where she can get the help she clearly needs."
I expect Raven to be the one who snaps. Maybe Nikolai or Knight, who's always a wild card. I think they do, too, but no one is more surprised than me when I end up with my hand around Plague's throat.
The prince's eyes widen like he knows he's one sanctimonious remark away from having his spinal cord disconnected.
"Help?" I grit out through my teeth. "From the alpha who left a clearly unwell omega in the hands of the shadiest fucking warlord in the Outer Reaches?
Offense absolutely intended, by the way. "
"None taken," Nikolai sneers, flashing a fanged smile as he folds his arms over his chest. "But he has a point. I'm not exactly reputable, and that's a mighty high horse you're riding, your majesty."
Plague's eyes sharpen. He's smart enough to know he's crossed a line, and if Cosima wasn't a ticking time bomb right now, I'd push him over it. We're already fucked. Kidnapping a prince, killing one… pretty sure they hang you either way.
"Geo?" Raven's strangled voice alerts me to the fact that Cosima has moved from where she was, but the gun hasn't. It's still strangled in her grasp, but now both hands are wrapped around it, her thumb dangerously close to brushing the trigger.
My hand finally unwinds from around Plague's throat.
"Stupid," she mutters under her breath, staring into the metal like it's a scrying mirror. "So fucking stupid."
"No, Goddess. Don't say that, you're not stupid at all," Raven says in a hushed, soothing tone, his empty hands outstretched as he takes a step toward her like his only care in the world is her turning that thing on herself.
Unfortunately for me, I have two cares.
"Don't," I growl in warning. "She can't hear you right now."
He hesitates, but I can tell he's forming the same conclusion when he looks into those vacant violet eyes. Realizing the extent of the damage, just like the rest of us.
Not that I can blame her. Gods only know what she's been through.
The hints she's dropped, the way she flinches sometimes whenever anyone gets too close without warning, the fact that her general opinion of alphas seems to exist somewhere in hell's basement…
Raven's probably the only one who can actually understand that kind of damage.
"Like I said, she needs help," Plague chimes in, because apparently, he misses wearing a hand necklace.
"You can take your 'help' and shove it up your royal ass," Nikolai snarls. "We're not handing her over to you."
That, we can agree on.
But what the hell are we going to do with her? What the fuck do we know about helping someone through this kind of breakdown? We're criminals and killers, not therapists.
I could use my alpha bark. Force her to snap out of it, to drop the gun, to come back to us.
But looking at her now, seeing how far gone she is, it feels like too much of a risk.
She could panic, shoot herself or someone else in the confusion.
Knowing how godsdamned stubborn she is, she'd probably resist and that could be just as lethal.
Fuck it. I'm done standing around. Something's gotta give.
I push past Raven, ignoring his startled "Geo, what are you—"
Cosima's head snaps toward me as I approach, and suddenly that gun is pointed directly at my chest in a hand that's trembling violently, but it's a relief. If she shoots me, one of them can grab her.
Huh. Exactly when the fuck did I start giving a shit about anything but saving my own ass? Questions for Future Geo to answer, I guess, assuming he lives that long.
Her pupils are blown so wide I can't even see the violet around them anymore, just endless black that reflects nothing but whatever horror she's reliving.
She hisses something in Vrissian, the words sharp and venomous.
I don't understand a damn word of the language, but I don't need to.
Her tone makes it crystal fucking clear.
It's a threat.
"She thinks you're someone else," Nikolai warns, his voice tight. "She said she'll paint the walls with your blood if you come any closer."
"Cute." I keep walking.
"Don't fucking touch me!" The words come out in Reinmichian this time, but they're not really meant for me. They're meant for whoever she's seeing instead of me. Some ghost from Cosima's past that's more real to her right now than any of us.
I hold my hands up, keeping my voice as steady as I can manage. "Easy there, dollface. I'm not gonna hurt you."
The words feel hollow even as I say them. Why should she believe me? She doesn't even know who I am right now, and even if she did, what reason has anyone ever given her to trust an alpha's promise?
She's shaking now, the gun wavering between my chest and my head like she can't decide which would be the better target. Clearly that shooting lesson I gave her didn't stick. Behind me, I can feel the others tensing, ready to move if she pulls that trigger.
"Geo," Raven chokes out, voice strained with fear. "Be careful."
"What's it look like I'm doing?" I ask through my teeth, keeping my eyes trained on Cosima, who's at least looking at me now. Or at least through me.
"I'm sorry," I tell her, and I mean it.
Sorry for what I'm about to do.
Sorry for adding one more violation to what's clearly a long fucking list.
Raven realizes what I'm planning a second before I do it. "Geo, don't—"