Chapter 15

"You've gotta be kidding me!" Armani stood from the bed and stared at Nixxia.

Nixxia even felt like she was kidding herself, too; she was still trying to understand Neireda's mysterious message and the fact that she could now understand the human alphabet and words.

"Nixxia, look at me," Armani cleared his throat and placed a gentle hand on Nixxia's shoulders.

Nixxia slowly raised her head and looked at Armani, his eyes calm but curious.

"Okay, I need you to answer me honestly, yeah?" Armani asked.

Nixxia nodded. "Okay," She replied.

"Have you been playing us all along? Trust me, Vernon's going to be so mad if he discovered you've been shitting him. Have you been shitting us?" Armani was exasperated as he stared at Nixxia's confused face.

"You don't understand?" Armani rubbed his face in frustration.

Nixxia nodded. "Don't understand," She stated.

Armani was sure he was going to lose all his hair by the time Nixxia left Vernon's home; he'd never felt so stressed out his entire life.

"Okay, let's try it this way." Armani flipped the pages of the dictionary and pointed to a word.

"Here, this is what I mean, you understand it, right?" He questioned with furrowed brows.

"Trick? No. I don't trick you," Nixxia confirmed, staring at him with clear eyes.

Armani sighed and took out his phone from his pocket. "Okay, it seems I can't handle your case alone. I'll have to let the doctor know," He said and started to pace the room, his phone placed beside his ear.

Nixxia watched Armani with interest, she wondered what Armani's reaction was called in the human language.

"Hello, Dr. Zee. Yes, it's about Nixxia... she suddenly started to read, huh? No, I'm not forcing her to remember all at once. Sure, I will. Thank you very much." He removed the phone from his ear and stared at Nixxia.

"You're a special case... interesting." He went back to sit beside Nixxia.

"I'm sorry for trying to force you to recall things; Zee said I should just continue to guide you until all your memories come back. I told him about your recent development, he said you're likely to heal faster than others, which is surprising. But it's okay; I'll help you every step of the way." he held Nixxia's hand.

Nixxia smiled, "Thank you."

Armani chuckled, "You're welcome. Tell me more about how it works. Do you now know every word and meaning, or can you now read and understand?" He wasted no time in flipping the dictionary, showing Nixxia the words 'read' and 'understand' respectively.

"Yes, read and understand," She replied, tucking her hair behind her ear.

Armani nodded. "Fine. Then it seems like my workload is reduced; you just have to... finish reading the whole dictionary... baby steps, of course. I'll do more of teaching you about everyday life and most importantly, how to walk," He said with a smile.

"Baby steps?" Nixxia stared up at Armani.

Armani chuckled, "Yeah, baby steps... it just means the process of your healing is going to be slow, messy, annoying, full of trial and error, but in the end, you'll be successful, just as babies eventually get to walk after so many falls," He calmly explained.

Nixxia watched Armani's eyes as he spoke. She couldn't understand all his words, but she could feel that Armani was giving her some words of encouragement, so she simply nodded.

"Thank you," She smiled back at Armani.

***

Three months later, Nixxia was walking beside Armani with a small book in her hand. She was glad she could draw once again; she loved drawing.

That morning, they were walking around Vernon's compound, enjoying the mix of modern architecture and the calming natural environments.

However, Nixxia was never allowed to go anywhere alone. Her dream was to go to the Lake at the far corner of the large compound and have a nice, long swim, but Armani never let her go, reminding her that she was still a prisoner and wasn't allowed to walk freely.

She realized that even though she was out of water, she still craved it on her skin. The human shower did good with just watching off the dirt from her body, but she craved the deep cleansing of a much larger water body. She couldn't wait to be set free from here so she could go live freely and do whatever she wanted. 

The past three months had been a little hard for her. Armani had taught her everything she needed to know as a human, she could now hold a proper conversation with anyone, even though it had been only she and Armani for the past months.

She hadn't seen Vernon since the day she found himself in his room, and she never asked about him. She was glad Vernon was gone; it let her have a glimpse of what a normal life would feel like. 

Her learning has been effortless, thanks to the mysterious locket Neireda gave her, she had come to realize that she could adapt quickly to things.

She had also come to understand the locket better; Neireda's message had also become clearer. The locket- she was still learning how to communicate with it, but so far, dhe understood that it helped her focus on things, understand them, and adapt; mostly with adaptation; she had only learned to walk for just three minutes before she surprised herself and Armani by taking control and walking by herself.

She wondered what else the locket could help her with, she was curious to see how far the locket would guide her in this new world, apart from helping her to understand and adapt; there had been nothing else it had proved to do, but she knew there was more, Neireda had told her so.

"Want to sit for a while?" Armani asked as they approached a large tree. 

"Alright." Nixxia nodded.

Armani led them to the grey bench under the tree and lowered himself onto it.

Nixxia hesitated for a while before she joined Armani on the bench.

"So, why are we out here?" Nixxia questioned.

Armani sighed.

"You love nature, right? Yeah, so we're out here to enjoy the morning sun and listen to the birds." He replied.

Nixxia smiled, "It's beautiful. I'll draw." She said and slid a pencil out from her pocket.

Armani shifted away from her, he knew that Nixxia loved her privacy each time she was drawing her paintings, which she never let anyone see.

"What do you always draw?" Armani asked for the nth time.

Nixxia didn't reply, she focused on the book on her lap, the mouth of her pencil dragging gently along the white sheet.

"It's personal," Nixxia finally replied in a quiet voice.

Armani laughed, "I know."

He stared at Nixxia, her long hair was gently blown around by the wind, exposing her spotless, fair face. He wondered how she had learned so fast; he had thought walking would have been the hardest part of their mission, but it turned out nothing was too hard for Nixxia.

Nixxia had been so excited when she learned how to write, and Armani had wondered why she was so excited, but after he saw her start to draw something he couldn't understand, he realized that not only did her muscle memory in writing return, the drawing aspect recovered as well. Since then, Armani had been left to wonder what Nixxia always drew.

Armani immediately stood and walked away from Nixxia when a call came through his phone.

He didn't want Nixxia to hear what Damon had to say; to him, it would always be bad news.

"I understand," Armani responded to Damon, who was on the other side of the phone.

Vernon had returned.

As he answered the call from a distance, he stared at Nixxia with worry. He was worried for her, and now, he wished he'd told her about his worry the moment she started her learning journey, but it was too late now. She couldn't stop Nixxia's straightforwardness...Vernon was back; that attitude was going to be a huge problem.

Nixxia was politely rude without even knowing it, she was like a new teenager who hated you but would subtly show it in her actions and coated words. The difference was that the teenagers did it to spite you while Nixxia did it because, well... she was Nixxia; that was who she was.

Vernon had asked for Nixxia, but Armani was scared for his life and Nixxia's life. Vernon might as well kill them when he realized that Nixxia still maintained her stand on not knowing who Raja was.

He walked back to Nixxia and cleared his throat, clasping his hands together.

Nixxia closed her drawing book and looked up at Armani. "You have something to say," She stated.

"Um, yeah. Vernon's back; he's asking for you," Armani informed.

Nixxis's heart flipped a hundred times in her chest; her fingers dug into the corner of her book. Memories of the last time she saw Vernon crawled right back into her head; she felt the cold chill seep back into her bones; she had forced herself not to think about it all this time, but, now, the devil was back, and she was asking for her.