To Love a Monster

Chapter 2: Captured

Chapter 2: Captured

"Half of the results of a good intention are evil; half the results of an evil intention are good." Mark Twain

Tonight’s beating was harsher than others. 

Her father had been drinking heavily throughout the day and lost control of his temper again. Kick after kick Azula told herself this was the last time he would beat her. 

“Please dad, please. It’s me! Your daughter please stop beating me” she screamed. 

Crumpled on the floor she pleaded to him, yet the kicks and punches kept coming into her slender 5’9 frame. 

“You useless piece of s**t! You should have died with Diane. You have done everything to ruin my life! Every penny I had I spent on raising your ass and your good for nothing ass ain’t doing s**t. The f**k did that fancy college get you huh?  Working dead end jobs to barely get my booze and rent. Should have become an Asian w***e like your mother” he slurred incoherently. 

Her father has lost his mind from years of drinking. Any trace of humanity in him was gone. As a child her father was cold, detached and mostly always drunk. Azula had always been self-sufficient, her mother passed away when she was 12 and all the sanity that her father possessed died along with her. 

The beatings started 2 years after her mother passed. It was a fate that she had accepted but having promised her mother to care for her father the thought of running away or turning her father in was something she couldn’t fathom. 

Unlike the many times before he didn’t walk away after kicking her. Her heart stopped when she heard the zipper to his tattered jeans go down. 

“Maybe a good f*****g will teach you how to make real money”, he yelled before grabbing and ripping away her clothes. 

Her helpless screams fell on deaf ears. Instincts kicked in and she kneed him square in the gut and got him off her. Scrambling to run she tripped and fell onto the edge of the wooden dinner table crashing onto the floor. Her father lunged at her again, this time barely grabbing her legs when she kicked him square in the face and booked it for her door to safety.  

Turning on her lights she scrambled to get her duffel bag, filling it with essentials to leave - this was the last straw. To hell with her father. To hell with this wretched life with him. To hell with her promise to her mother. 

Suddenly all the lights cut off in the home.  Everything was still for a moment. 

Then the windows of her small room were shattered, and she felt hands grabbing her and muffled screams of her father coming from the dining room. She tried to fight off the intruders, but her mouth was covered with what felt like cloth and soon she lost all consciousness. 

When she awakened, she was in the back of what seemed to be a moving vehicle. 

Muffled screams and banging coming from the trunk filled the otherwise quiet cabin. 

“Man, we should have killed him and grabbed the girl like the boss wanted. We dead ass gonna be killed now too for bringing him”, a voice said. 

“Yeah but I think the boss would wanna take care of this asshole himself. I mean did you see her? The girl is covered in bruises and cuts, with her clothes torn off and s**t. Boss is gonna wanna see the life leaving his eyes, we be okay”, a second voice whispered. 

Her mind racing, Azula tried to keep calm and steady her breathing. She was still hazy from her slumber and her limbs were bound - she knew she wouldn’t stand a chance against two men let alone who knew how many others they were with. 

Moments later the first voice boomed, “keep it down old man we’re almost at the compound you’re gonna wanna keep your ass still till then”. 

Compound? What compound she thought, and with that she lost consciousness again.