Within Every Flame by Alanna Peterson

Author:Alanna Peterson [Peterson, Alanna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rootcity Press
Published: 2021-12-01T08:00:00+00:00

22

Roya

Katerina and the Little Strangers

It doesn’t take me long to find Mikhail. His living quarters are away from everyone else’s, in a building connected by a glass tube to the main dome. I watch him through the window, hating everything about him. His long gray beard. The way it grazes the table when he sits down. The way crumbs of the bread—made from the wheat I grew—get stuck in those coarse hairs. I watch him eat. I think about the Matryoshka infesting that bread, infesting all of him, without him even knowing.

I am cloaked in darkness outside the window; the Matryoshka on my skin have mirrored their surroundings. I wonder if I can control his mind. I want him to see me.

I want him to know that when he tried to kill me all those years ago, he did not succeed.

Mikhail turns to me, startled. Like he’s seeing a ghost. Is that all I am to you? I think. Then let me show you how wrong you are.

I smash a window with a nearby rock. It breaks through so easily, and I find myself wondering how long it took them to make all this glass. Must have taken ages. And here I am, shattering it in an instant.

He screams. I step through the hole, enjoying the sight of him gasping for his precious oxygen, the oxygen that has already left, that will not save him.

Alarms sound in the distance. He manages to get the door open and retreats into the corridor, but I follow him through.

“Natasha?” he mutters. Even here in the oxygenated corridor, his face is so pale. If he got rid of that beard, I think, he wouldn’t look so threatening. Not that I’m afraid: I’m drinking up his fear. It feels wonderful.

“Guess again,” I say.

He swings his fist at me, which I’m not expecting. I duck to avoid it, but it catches me off guard, and I drop the rock I’m holding. I watch him run down the corridor to the main dome. Back towards the greenhouse.

I retrieve the rock and follow him at a leisurely pace. Though he’s out of my sight, I know I’ll be able to find him anywhere. He cannot hide from me.

But I’m not expecting what I see when I arrive at the greenhouse.

I hear the sounds first. A shout from Dr. Belinsky, followed by the ugly smack of fist against flesh, and another, and another. Then, Mikhail’s voice. “She’s alive? She’s ALIVE?”

Dr. Belinsky says nothing, but I can hear his cries. The two men are distracted, and Mikhail’s back is to me, which makes it too easy. I slam the rock into the base of his skull.

He falls to the ground in a satisfying heap, and I kneel beside Dr. Belinsky, who is half-sitting near a row of cabbage. It’s not glowing anymore, I notice.

I reach towards him, ready to wipe away the blood that’s streaming from his nose. But he recoils. “Your suit,” he says. “Where is your suit? You can’t be in here if you aren’t wearing it….

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