Free Web NovelMatt opened his eyes in the mental world and found himself in a room.
Inside there were things: two beds, a rug, an old flat-screen television, and a console connected to it with cables.
All of it had come from Matt's memories, from things he knew out of his previous life, but it was Noxx who had arranged it and given it shape.
And ever since she'd created it, Noxx spent most of her time in there.
The blonde, more or less, did too.
Matt crossed the void and walked through the door.
"Welcome."
Noxx's voice came from the bed.
She was lying on her side, a controller in her hands and her eyes on the television, where some pixelated character was jumping from platform to platform.
She didn't turn her head to greet him.
She didn't sit up.
She just said that word.
"Welcome."
In a flat tone.
No energy.
The tone of someone who greets out of habit and not out of any real desire to.
Nearby, sitting cross-legged on the rug, was the naked blonde. She waved at him.
She didn't say anything.
She just raised her arm and moved her fingers, slowly, with a small hopeful smile, waiting for Matt to wave back or say something to her.
But Matt didn't wave back.
He walked right past her without looking at her, heading straight for the bed where Noxx was lying.
The blonde's smile froze on her face.
The raised hand came down slowly.
Her two eyes — one red, one blue — followed Matt as he moved away from her, and something in her expression went out.
But Matt didn't see it.
Matt only saw Noxx.
He reached the bed, leaned over her, and put his hands around her throat.
And squeezed.
Noxx's eyes flew open.
The controller jerked in her hands. The character on the screen fell off a platform and disappeared.
Noxx let out a choked sound, brought her hands to Matt's wrists, and started struggling, her face confused and her eyes wide.
Matt was strangling her.
"What is wrong with you?" Noxx managed to say, her voice compressed by the pressure on her throat. "Matt, what—?"
"Have you been getting inside my head?"
The question came out cold.
Direct.
Noxx blinked, not understanding.
"What?"
"Have you been influencing me?"
Matt squeezed a little harder.
"My thoughts? My decisions?"
"No."
Noxx's answer came out fast.
Sincere.
Strangled.
"No, I haven't."
"You're lying."
"I'm not… lying…"
Matt clenched his teeth.
"Then explain something to me," he said, his voice lower and more dangerous. "Explain to me why, for the past few days, every time I try to picture myself killing the queen, I can't."
Noxx stopped struggling for a moment.
"What?"
"Every time I think about it," Matt went on, "every time I try to picture the exact moment — the act of it, driving something into her chest, finishing it — my head stops. It locks up. I can't complete the image. I could before. I used to picture it without any problem. And now I can't."
Matt squeezed.
"And it started right when you started being afraid of her."
Noxx looked up at him from below, completely lost.
Why was Matt suddenly shifting his attitude toward her?
"Matt, I didn't—"
And then she did it.
She let go of the controller, which fell to the rug, brought both hands to Matt's wrists, and pulled free.
She did it with force.
With an ease she shouldn't have had.
Noxx's hands took Matt's and pushed them away from her throat without effort, as though Matt's were the hands of a child.
Matt felt his own arms shoved back before he could resist, and for a second he lost his balance and had to press one knee into the mattress.
Noxx sat up, coughing, one hand at her throat.
Matt looked at her.
He hadn't expected that strength.
"I don't know," said Noxx, still hoarse as she rubbed her neck. "I don't know why you can't picture it. I really don't. I'm not doing anything."
Matt didn't answer right away.
He was staring at Noxx's hands.
◇◆◇
A few meters away, the blonde was watching the whole scene without moving.
She wanted to step in.
She really did.
She'd watched Matt cross the room, ignore her, and put his hands around Noxx's throat. Her first impulse had been to get up and put herself in between them.
Yell something.
Do something.
Anything.
Noxx was her second master.
More or less.
Noxx was the one who taught her to play, and the one who taught her various things about this world when Matt wasn't around.
And in a sense, she had also started to see her as her second teacher.
But the blonde didn't move.
Because she remembered.
She remembered all the times Matt had told her to be quiet.
All the times she had opened her mouth to help and Matt had cut her off with a "no," a "shut up," or a "stay still."
She remembered that she almost never got the timing right when it came to speaking.
She remembered that Noxx herself had told her, some time ago, that she didn't know how to read the room.
And the blonde, watching Matt and Noxx speak to each other with that intensity — those low voices and those fixed stares — began to doubt herself.
'What if this is just how they talk?'
The thought appeared in her head with complete sincerity.
'Maybe strangling each other is… a way they communicate? I don't really understand these things. Maybe if I get involved, I'll just ruin their conversation.'
The blonde stayed still, hands on her knees, watching.
And then, without being able to help it, she imagined something.
She imagined herself in Noxx's place.
Lying on the bed.
With Matt leaning over her, hands at her throat, that intense gaze locked onto her face.
That look Matt had right now — so focused, so full of something powerful — devoted entirely to one person.
The blonde felt heat rise to her cheeks.
And she blushed.
'Hehehe…'
She shook her head with a little flutter of excitement.
Matt never looked at her like that.
Matt never gave her his full attention.
And there was Noxx, receiving that complete gaze, that entire intensity, even if it was just for the sake of being strangled.
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The blonde puffed out her cheeks.
She was a little jealous and a little annoyed.
'That's not fair…'
◇◆◇
Matt was still staring at Noxx's hands.
"How did you do that?" he asked.
Noxx lowered her hands.
"Do what?"
"Pull free."
Matt sat down on the edge of the bed, looking at her.
"A moment ago I had you by the throat and you could barely move. And then you pushed my hands away without any effort. You couldn't do that before."
Noxx glanced away for a moment.
"It's… the blood…"
Matt narrowed his eyes.
"What blood?"
"I told you before. The queen's."
Noxx brought a hand to her chest, over her heart.
"All that blood that's been going into your body while you slept… through the bond, some of it reaches me. It makes me stronger. Every time she feeds you, I get a little more powerful."
Noxx let out a slow breath.
"That's why I could pull free so easily now. A few weeks ago I wouldn't have been able to. But the queen gave you so much blood over this last stretch of time that now… now I'm this strong."
Matt looked at her in silence.
Then he laughed.
It wasn't a happy laugh.
It was a low, dry laugh, a laugh with nothing amusing inside it.
"Then the solution is simple," he said.
Noxx frowned.
"What solution?"
Matt met her eyes.
"I have to kill you."
Silence fell over the mental world.
Noxx went completely still.
"What?"
"It's logical, isn't it?"
Matt leaned forward slightly, speaking with a terrible calm, as though he were explaining something self-evident.
"You're the embodiment of my vampiric powers. You were born from the royal blood I kept when I separated from Iris. You're my vampire side made into a consciousness."
Noxx didn't respond.
"If I kill you," Matt went on, "I lose my vampiric powers. The regeneration. The wings. The magic. All of it."
His voice hardened.
"And if I lose my vampiric powers, I also lose what ties me to the queen. The royal blood stops living inside me. Her authority stops working. Her mental control stops working. I stop being her daughter. I stop being part of her lineage."
Matt tightened his fists on his knees.
"I go back to being a normal human. And a normal human can escape."
Noxx shook her head slowly.
What kind of idiotic logic was that?
That plan had too many holes.
"I don't think that's a good plan…"
"It's the best plan I have."
"Matt—"
But Matt was already moving.
He launched himself at her again, hands out in front, reaching for her throat once more.
Noxx raised her arms by reflex and half-stopped him, but this time Matt pushed through, pressing forward with the full weight of his body, until he had his fingers around her throat again.
"Seriously," said Noxx, her voice tightening more with every word. "This isn't going to solve anything…"
"Shut up."
"You're being impulsive, Matt."
Noxx looked up at him from below.
Without screaming.
Without fighting back with everything she had.
Just talking.
Trying to make him see reason.
"You don't know if killing me actually removes your powers. You don't know if it breaks the bond with the queen. You don't know if it turns you human again. You're assuming. You're assuming things because you're desperate and—"
And then Noxx stopped.
Because she saw Matt's face.
She saw the hatred.
She saw it for real.
Not the usual irritation.
Not the usual annoyance.
Hatred.
And beneath the hatred, something worse.
Desperation.
A pure, bottomless desperation — the desperation of someone who had been trapped for years and could see no way out. Someone willing to do anything, absolutely anything, as long as they found one.
And Noxx, looking at that face, remembered something.
She remembered how useless she had been feeling lately.
She remembered that she hadn't been able to see the outside world while Matt slept.
She remembered that she hadn't been able to protect him from the queen.
Maybe Matt was right about something she couldn't see.
Maybe she was so afraid of the queen that she couldn't think clearly.
Maybe the best thing she could do for him was let him try.
So Noxx did something that surprised Matt.
She lowered her arms.
And stopped resisting.
Matt stayed still for a second, hands still on her throat, looking at her.
"What are you doing?"
"If you really believe this is going to work," said Noxx quietly, "then do it."
"Noxx."
"But I'll tell you one thing first."
She held his gaze.
"If I die in the mental world this time, I won't try to recover my consciousness. I'm going to let myself go. I'll disappear for real. Forever."
Noxx swallowed with difficulty against the pressure.
"So if you kill me, make sure it's what you want."
Matt clenched his teeth.
"Shut up and die."
Noxx closed her eyes.
And didn't move.
Part of her wanted to resist.
A huge part.
Her body, with the new strength the blood had given her, could push Matt away without any effort. She could shove him far back. She could end the whole thing in a second.
Every instinct she had was screaming at her to do it.
To save herself.
Not to let herself die for a desperate idea that didn't even make sense.
But Noxx clamped down on that part of herself and forced it to stay still.
Her willpower held her body in place.
The hands that could have saved her stayed at her sides, unmoving.
And Noxx began to run out of air.
The pressure on her throat increased. The edges of her vision — even in a world that wasn't real — began to darken.
Her chest rose and fell, trying to pull in air that wouldn't come.
She was going to die.
She was really going to let herself die.
And right at that moment, Matt caught something out of the corner of his eye.
The blonde.
The blonde was making gestures.
Enormous gestures.
Exaggerated.
Ridiculous.
She was waving both hands in the air, shaking them, pointing at Noxx, then pointing at her own head, then miming strangling herself, then crossing her hands to say no, then pointing again.
Her face was a disaster of expressions.
She was opening her eyes wide, scrunching her mouth, raising her eyebrows, trying to communicate something with her entire body without daring to speak.
Matt loosened his hands slightly from Noxx's throat and turned his head toward her.
"What do you want?"
The blonde froze.
"Why are you doing that with your hands?" Matt asked, annoyed. "If you have something to say, just say it. Talk."
The blonde took a breath and let it all out at once, fast, tumbling over itself.
"Noxx is right!"
Matt frowned.
"Right about what?"
The blonde jumped to her feet and started speaking so fast the words nearly ran into each other.
"About the blood! I've been analyzing it! I analyze things, that's my thing, I do it all the time! And I've been analyzing what happens to Noxx every time the queen gives you her blood while you sleep!"
The blonde moved her hands as she spoke, pointing at Noxx, pointing at Matt.
"And yes, the blood makes her stronger, that's true, we both noticed that! But that's not all it does!"
Matt went still.
"What else does it do?"
The blonde swallowed.
"The blood has a pattern."
"A pattern?"
"Yes! A pattern! I didn't notice at first because it's very subtle, very well hidden, but after it happened several times, I saw it!"
The blonde pressed her hands together, trying to explain herself better.
"Every time the queen's blood enters your body, it leaves something behind. Not just power. It leaves a kind of… order. An instruction. And that instruction does one very specific thing."
The blonde's voice dropped slightly.
"It blocks thoughts of killing the queen."
Silence fell again.
Matt didn't move.
"The blood," the blonde went on, slower now, "is designed so that you can't think about hurting her. Every time your head tries to reach that thought, the pattern in the blood gets in the way. That's why you can't picture yourself killing her. It's not Noxx. Noxx isn't doing anything. It's you. Or — more precisely — it's the blood you have inside you."
The blonde lowered her hands.
"The queen has been feeding you for weeks while you slept. She filled you with her blood. And with every drop, she reinforced that block."
Matt felt a cold run down his spine.
He looked at Noxx, still lying beneath his hands, eyes closed, out of air, not resisting.
Then he looked at the blonde.
The ego-weapon had never lied to him.
Not once.
Ever since the blonde woke up, everything she had said had turned out to be true — no matter how loud and chaotic the way she said it was.
He had no reason to think she was lying now.
He had no reason for her to make something like that up.
And the explanation fit.
It fit too well.
The block that had appeared a few days ago.
The one that started right when the queen began feeding him her blood.
The one that wasn't fear — just a wall that appeared in his head every time he tried to reach that thought.
It wasn't Noxx.
It had never been Noxx.
Matt let go of Noxx's throat.
Noxx collapsed back onto the bed, coughing, both hands flying to her neck, pulling in air in large, ragged gulps.
Her chest heaved hard.
It took several seconds before she could breathe normally again, and when she did, she lay still, staring up at the ceiling, one hand still resting on her throat.
Matt pulled away from her.
He sat on the edge of the bed, hands on his knees, staring at his fingers.
'Again.'
That was the thought that came to him.
'Again.'
He'd done it again.
He'd come back to the mental world with an idea in his head — a wrong idea — and instead of asking, instead of listening, instead of thinking, he had gone straight at Noxx.
He'd strangled her.
Twice.
He'd almost let her die.
And all of it because of a block she hadn't even caused.
He was acting like an irrational person.
Like someone desperate enough to lose his head and take it out on whoever happened to be nearby.
"Hey, master."
The blonde's voice pulled him out of his thoughts.
Matt looked up.
The blonde was standing nearby, hands behind her back, rocking slightly on her feet, watching him with those two mismatched eyes.
"Can you strangle me now?"
Matt stared at her.
"What?"
"You strangled Noxx twice," the blonde said, as though it were the most reasonable thing in the world. "And I helped too. I found the pattern. So… if you're going to strangle someone, you can strangle me too. Just a little. Not a lot."
Matt frowned.
"You think I was playing?"
"…Weren't you?"
"I almost killed Noxx."
"But you didn't."
"That's…"
Matt simply had no idea what to say.
The blonde didn't seem to understand.
Not because she didn't want to.
But because Matt had taught her to understand the world in the worst possible way.
With orders.
With punishment.
With silences.
With threats.
With attention handed out in drops, as though it were a reward she had to earn by behaving well.
Matt looked down at his hands.
The same hands that had just been around Noxx's throat.
The same hands he used to hit the blonde in the mental world when he wanted to teach her a lesson.
The same hands with which he had pushed, silenced, shoved aside, and treated like tools the few people who, for some reason, kept trying to help him.
Noxx helped him.
She had saved him.
She had stayed with him.
She had been willing to die if it gave Matt a chance, even when his plan made no sense.
And the blonde helped him too.
In her way.
Loud.
Ridiculous.
Annoying.
But she helped him.
She had woken him up.
She had hidden from the queen.
She had discovered the pattern in the blood.
And still, Matt treated them as though they were problems.
As though they were objects.
As though they existed to be useful and stay quiet when they weren't.
Matt felt something heavy settle in his chest.
'What's the difference?'
The question appeared on its own.
'What's the difference between her and me?'
The queen locked him up.
Held him close.
Called him her daughter even when he didn't want that.
Touched him even when he said no.
Fed him because his body needed it, even though Matt hated the way she did it.
Looked at him like something that belonged to her.
Like something that needed to be corrected, guided, tamed — and used for her kingdom.
Matt looked up at Noxx.
Noxx was still lying there, breathing with difficulty, the marks of his fingers on her neck.
Then he looked at the blonde.
The blonde was still waiting for an answer, her eyes bright and a stupid hope on her face — as though Matt strangling her too would be a kind of affection.
Matt felt sick.
Not because of them.
Because of himself. ƒгeeweɓn૦vel.com
'I'm no different.'
The thought hit harder than he expected.
Because it wasn't just Noxx.
It wasn't just the blonde.
Matt thought about his mother.
About all the times he had lied to her.
Small lies.
Big lies.
"I'm fine."
"I'll find a job soon."
"I've been busy."
"Nothing's wrong."
"I don't need help."
Lies he had told to make her stop asking, to avoid uncomfortable conversations, to keep from having to admit he was sinking into a life he didn't know how to fix.
He thought about his sister.
About her unanswered messages.
About the times she had written to him excited over a match, a video, some little thing that mattered to her, and he had seen the notification, told himself he'd get to it later, and that later became never.
He thought about the times she had talked to him about wanting to play like him.
About wanting to get good.
About wanting to do something with it.
And he had laughed at her.
Not with open cruelty.
Not with hits.
Not with yelling.
But with that dry smile.
With that mocking phrase.
"It's not that easy."
"Don't get ahead of yourself."
"Learn to actually play first."
"You'll get bored in a year."
Small phrases.
Normal ones.
Easy to forget for whoever said them.
But maybe not for whoever heard them.
Matt clenched his teeth.
'I wanted to see them again.'
That had been his goal.
His excuse.
His center.
See his mother again.
See his sister again.
Keep the promise of showing up for her graduation.
But now, for the first time, that idea bent inside his head.
'What if it was just an excuse?'
Matt felt his chest grow heavier.
'What if all I'd do by going back is bring my problems with me?'
The queen knew them.
Iris knew them.
Vampires could reach them.
His world was no longer safe just because Matt existed in it.
If Matt went back without ending all of this, he wouldn't return as a son.
He'd return as a threat.
As an open door.
As someone who would lead monsters straight to his mother's and his sister's house.
And yet he still wanted to go back.
He still wanted to see them.
He still wanted them to hold him.
He still wanted them to forgive him without him ever having told them the truth.
He still wanted them to wait for him, even though he hadn't been good at waiting for them.
He still wanted them to keep being his family, even though he had spent years pushing them away with lies, with silences, with small and easy cruelties.
Matt lowered his head.
The blonde was still watching him.
Noxx was still breathing.
The mental world was too quiet.
And right now there was only one thought in Matt's head.
One that, thankfully, neither Noxx nor the blonde could hear.
'I'm no better than the queen.'
The phrase sat there.
Heavy.
Clear.
Impossible to push away.
'Maybe I'm worse.'
Because the queen, at least, had never pretended to be good.
Matt closed his eyes.
And for the first time in a long time, the hatred he felt had nowhere to go.
He couldn't aim it at the queen.
He couldn't aim it at Iris.
He couldn't aim it at the blood.
He couldn't aim it at Noxx.
Only one direction was left.
Himself.
