Justice and Mercy

-Chapter One –

- Beta of this chapter is Tatiana Belikova

"When she was just a girl, she expected the world but it flew away from her reach so she ran away in her sleep and dreamed of Para-para-paradise…"

- Coldplay Paradise -

_)(_

When I was a child, not many things were forbidden to me. I was allowed to do whatever my little mind wanted. No one was to tell me the 'right and wrong'. Unlike Lissa, I didn't just know it. Believe it or not, there was a time when I wanted to be just like my father. To be a murderer. Genes are hard to let go of, because to bring light to the world, I have to kill. Kill my father, possibly my mother and whoever else gets in my way.

I can't complete that mission when I have a child inside me. I didn't do much that was good for society, and this baby will be the first step. But good comes with a price, and the price for the baby was morning sickness. I hated that every day, several times a day, I had to lean over my toilet bowl. Like now.

The porcelain was cool against my heated skin. My dazed eyes looked over the bowl to see my breakfast swimming in the toilet water. The image made me want to puke again. I pushed myself back, closed the lid and lightly pressed on the knob that flushes the contents.

I rested on my heels and steadied myself before attempting to stand. I grabbed onto the sink and used it as leverage. Once I stood up straight, I caught sight of myself in the mirror; my reflection was horrifying. My hair was a complete mess; tangled dark curls fell around my face in an unkempt manner. My eyes seemed dull, and my skin was a bit pale. Whoever said women have a 'pregnancy glow' was a liar! The only glow I have is oily skin.

So, pregnancy for me was hell.

I was twelve weeks, dancing on the line to my second trimester. Due to research - yes, I researched (not fun) - I learned that the morning sickness should be going down by now. Sadly, I'm not getting any reductions and morning sickness happened twenty-four hours a day. This time it was at 5:45 am and the sky was still dark.

Maybe if things were different it would be a little easier. Like having someone there to hold my hair back, someone giving me comforting words and staying by my side whenever I have one of my bitch fits. Oh yes, the hormones were there too. Instead of having my emotions go crazy, they mostly took my bitchy attitude and increased it by ten. I get worked up over the smallest of things. Like yesterday, it was a lazy Sunday and I had nothing to do but watch those T.V court shows. I was ready to kill someone when they didn't get the verdict I wanted. Not to mention what happened at the grocery store when someone ahead of me had 21 items instead of 20, like the sign said.

Pregnancy was hell, not just for me but everyone else who happens to be in my way.

On the bright side, I'm at least at peace in the place I'm currently living. I was in a small town in Montana. Outside my windows, I could see the snowcapped mountains and the air smelled fresh and cold. It was also quiet; not much noise happened outside these apartments. Montana had an early winter, so the snow was already falling lightly outside. It was relaxing. It was what I'd imagine paradise to be like. Only problem was that I got lonely a lot.

There were times when I was rubbing my belly, or thinking of the baby that my thoughts go to Dimitri. I missed him terribly. Sometimes I just wanted to pick up the phone and call him, tell him I love him and ask him to come to me.

But how do I know he'll even want to? Is he still with Tasha? Right now he may be trying to forget me, forget us. I wouldn't blame him.

I grabbed a brush off my vanity table and walk inside my closet. Since it was late at night I know things at the headquarters must be bumping around. I opened the closet door and looked at the many monitors that were hanging on the walls. The first day I had arrived, I had taken off the shelves from the walls and placed screens there instead. The people in the lobby had given me odd looks when I had hauled thirty monitors to my apartment. Of course, that meant that I had to store my clothes elsewhere. It wasn't exactly organized; I just threw things on the floor. I didn't have many clothes anyway; it wasn't like I left my house a lot.

I gazed over the monitors, seeing nothing abnormal. The monitors showed everything that was happening at my father's estate. I had cameras in the meeting rooms, hallways, torture chambers, courtyards and some bedrooms. My father's estate was much larger than the one in New York. Mainly because people from all over the world came there. Some politicians even visited, seeking 'assistance' from my father. I learned so many of the world's secrets with these cameras. I had to give credit to Sydney, she was the one who installed them. How she managed to sneak all of these inside that heavily guarded estate, I'll never know.

They not only had image, but audio as well. Currently, everything was muted; it'd be odd to have so many voices coming from my closet. I did another look over, but as I was about to leave, I saw something that caught my eye. The monitor was on one of the many torture chambers in my father's place. I pressed a button to keep it on the room, instead of allowing it to switch to another.

On the screen was a girl chained to a wall. The room was small, and many weapons hung on the walls. Everything from pointed hooks to whips, most bloody. It seemed as if they purposely didn't clean them to scare the next victim. The victim had blond hair; even in her situation it was put up in a neat bun with no loose strands. She had a smug expression, unlike the people before her. But I wouldn't expect anything less from Sydney Sage.