The Tyrant's Trophy

Chad

“What did you find?” It was an easy question, but the answers were too loaded. I wish the answer were simple, but it wasn’t.

My boss paid Dr. Phil Sweetheart a visit, so I broke into his house. Maybell started her first day working at the hotel’s bar. With the tight security and Aaron there to watch over her, I was free to gather the info my boss desired, tastefully, of course.

This is my specialty: One of the reasons why Adam recruited me. Effortlessly, I had hacked into the security and shut down all cameras within the Sweetheart’s house. With the alarm down, I picked the locks and opened them easily.

Now I got what Maybell meant when she mentioned her husband hating the color turquoise; the house was depressing. Tasteless neutrals accentuated the rooms with Picasso-like paintings hanging on the walls. Over the fireplace they had in the living room hung all of Phil’s awards and medals.

Not one thing mentioned Maybell.

Not one item screamed of her personality.

Even the outfits that obviously belonged to her said “Maybell.” They were not her style at all: The colors were dark, tight, and painfully revealing while trying to look sophisticated. There wasn’t anything casual on her side of the closet. As I pushed the offensive article of clothing aside, I jumped back when a box fell to the ground. It was perfectly hidden between the sidewall of the closet and the end of the hanger of the last outfit.

Not thinking much of it, I picked it up and opened it. Inside laid a tank top and sleeping shorts and a picture of Maybell with a swollen belly. She took it herself, and I could tell by the angle; she held the camera with her left hand, and her other hand was on her stomach. She looked ready to burst.

[ Can’t wait to see you, my love.] She wrote at the bottom of the photo. The smile she wore stole my breath: it wasn’t big, and she looked ratchet, but this was the most beautiful I had ever seen her. It was pure and wholesome.

Daphnie’s glow was nothing compared to Maybell's. I wish she would smile at me like that.

“You look free here, Maybell.” Not beaten and a shadow of her formal glory. Now she couldn’t smile. She grins at me, but it’s nothing like this; it’s full of pain and contrite. “It’s Phil’s fault; he killed you, and now you’re a shell.”

A shell unable to move forward; Scared to open up…to love again.

I want to bring this smile back. “Will you let me?” I asked the woman in the picture. She wanted her baby; she loved it, but Phil robbed her of that joy. “I will bring it back,” I promised, closing the box and tucking it under my arm. I had a feeling she would want it, and I wasn’t going to deny her of that.

I came to a room I assumed was the doctor’s office. As typical of any villain, the door was locked, so I picked it and intruded. If I didn’t have to be stealthy, I would have enjoyed wrecking the man’s things. Frustratedly, I couldn’t, so I continued my job and searched for anything out of the ordinary.

As my sister said, the man did have an unhealthy obsession with bioscience. The man kept documents of human biology and theories that applied CRISPR gene editing. His desks contained journals that kept records of drugs I had never heard of. There were numbers, prescriptions, names, and pictures; lots of pictures. The photos contained high school girls - where they lived and what they did and the years he snapped the photos.

He stalked them, and the sickening part was Maybell was one of those girls. She must have been 15 in that era, dressed in her school uniform and oblivious to the eyes watching her. Another photo showed her sleeping on her bed - her back towards the window screen.

Each photo was dated, and Phil kept referring to her as a ‘test subject.’ [Test subject is showing no sign of change.] On their wedding one, he wrote, [Subject has been having stomach problems; the first sign that the drugs are taking effect.] There were more, and it was all bad. He documented when he drugged her and what it was supposed to do - there were times she could have died. The last photo got to me; Maybell lay semiconscious in some medical room. She was bound to the bed, her wrists bandaged up. Her face was turned, but her cheeks were sunken, lifeless. [ Test subject finally submits: The pregnancy was unexpected, and test subject 0747-M had shown resilience once she became aware of the fetus within her. The drugs appeared to have had no effect on the fetus, so it was of no use to me. It was in my best interest to terminate it, which I did by simple injection of D-aggers42. 0747-M now understands she can never leave. She’s too valuable now.]

He’s dead.

That tyrant is dead once I get my hands on him.

I couldn’t risk taking all the journals, so I settled for the photos and the documents with the most condemning evidence. With his computer, I downloaded everything into my USB drive, before erasing any traces that I’ve been here - both digitally and physically. I stuffed the documents under my arm and left.

“I found that Phil is crazier than we thought, sir,” I informed my boss as I drove home. My mind kept going back to the drugs; just what kind of drugs had Phil concocted? “And there’s more; I have it on my drive and will be going through them once I get home.”

“Good.” Adam didn’t need to be on my back with this; Whenever I did jobs like this - I’m 100% thorough. “Another thing.”

“Yes sir?”

“I need an appointment with your sister, Quinn.”

I raised a brow. Adam hated Quinn - after the whole quack thing, he even stated himself that he never wanted to go even a foot near her. What changed? “I’ll give her a call, sir.” But I wasn’t going to pry; if anything, it could have to do with Daphnie. Quinn’s clinic is a private practice - keeping that in mind, that’s probably why Adam is seeking her now.

Maybell came to mind: She was terrified of clinics but she and my sister left the examination room as if they were best friends. That’s Quinn alright; she takes people’s fears and shoves them out the window. I took Maybell to her for the same reason Adam wants: privacy and I know she’ll care for her clients as if they are her own limbs.

One thing I find myself thinking more of is wanting to hide Maybell. Not in the way I am being paid to guard her. I find myself wanting to sort of keep her to myself - for myself - and make all the horrors of life hit me instead of her. I never felt this way about Amber. Honestly, I always thought Amber needed to grow up; that the little things she worried about (makeup, hair, school) she would have to just deal with and hopefully, it would mature her.

However, Maybell is different.

She’s becoming something more…personal to me.

Something real.

If that even make sense?

The dream I had the other night came to mind. “Teal and silver,” I mumbled as the light turned red. “Not bad colors at all.” And they would look great on Maybell.

(I am getting excited: Next chapter is a crossover between this story and 'Love in the Darkness.')