My therapist said I should try immersion therapy.
Well, this is as immersive as it gets.
If I can survive this, I know I’m on my way to healing.
And I will survive it because there is no real danger here.
So I don’t say anything as Marshall ties the blindfold over my eyes, cutting off the view of the omega across from me, sitting primly in her seafoam green negligee not worried in the least.
Because there is nothing to worry about.
Nothing.
My fingers grip the arms of the chair so tight they ache as I hear Marshall move away from me. Hear the clink of the door closing, the click of the lock catching.
I focus on breathing, on Petal and Tristan bantering back and forth over my bowed head in what is clearly meant as a distraction for me, but it doesn’t work.
My heart thunders, my chest aches, my hands jerk against the ropes. Sweat prickles my forehead, drips along my spine.
How much longer? How long are they going to have us sit here, waiting? Where is the fucking pack that is supposed to swoop in and ‘save’ us?
Every second feels like a minute and every minute feels like an hour and I can’t breathe. My head starts to feel woozy. My panic is a primal clawing thing in my chest. None of my grounding activities help. I can’t see five things because of the blindfold. The only thing I can feel is the metal of the chair and the rough rope biting into my skin.
It builds and builds until all of that panic finally pops in a loud, desperate whine that echoes through the room.
Episode 16: Damsels, Distress and Deceit
My alpha has been on alert ever since the second challenge. Ever since Florence Karlin pushed up onto her little sand covered toes, pressed her mouth to my ear and asked me not to bark at her in a voice that told me someone had done it to her before. Taken away her agency over her body, forced her to do something she didn’t want to do.
I’d done my best to reassure her that I would never do that to her, none of us would, not even Forsythe, but I’m not sure she believed me.
And that made me want to tear the entire world apart.
After filming stopped for the day, I’d had to spend hours in front of an easel working through that all-consuming rage. Ithad only calmed when Piers intervened, letting me take out my feelings on his body, fucking him hard and filthy. Making him come so hard, I swear he blacked out.
Needless to say, I’m already on high alert when it comes to Florence. And this challenge, if you want to call it that, is not going to help in the slightest.
Supposedly, this is meant to show what good alphas we’ll be. Able to keep our calm while our omega is in a dangerous situation, and that we can soothe away their worry and fear. And sure, under normal circumstances, that would be true, but this is all just for show.
The omegas aren’t actually in trouble and we can’t exactly send out a waft of calming alpheromones for them anyway.
So this is more for us to tell the audience who our top omegas are. Who we go to first.
Forsythe folds his arms over his broad chest. For this challenge they’ve dressed us in tac kit and I have to say we look fucking good. Tight black long sleeved shirts, fitted cargo pants, combat boots. They even gave us some shoulder holsters, though there aren’t any guns in them, much to Grieves’s dismay.
He looks the most comfortable in this gear. But the world might be surprised by how familiar this kind of gear is for the rest of us too. We spend a good portion of our very little spare time training. Once a year we go on what amounts to a self-defense seminar, run by Grieves where he comes up with bizarre challenges for us to survive.
Grieves is in charge of security for the pack, but we all take part in it. We all work to keep ourselves safe. If some arsehole came at me, at any member of my pack, I’d be able to take him out with very little effort.
“Isadora first,” our prime reminds us, as though we might forget our monarchy mandates for this entire fucking show.
“We know,” Thayer says, sounding bored, but I can tell he’s actually pissed about the orders we’ve been given. If he’s feeling anything like I am, his alpha is pushing him in an entirely different direction than Isadora.
Florence.
Christ, even thinking her name is enough to send a delightful little shiver down my spine.
Get a grip, mate.
