Neo woke up to a sharp movement on his shoulder, looking around suddenly as he instinctively lashed out. His hand hit something hard, and he gasped as he realised where he was. Still next to Quilliene, no longer holding her hand in her room. He had almost fallen out of the chair, but quickly looked up to his right to see what the source of the person who had so roughly grabbed him was.
Christopher was holding his nose, a pained and annoyed look on his face. Neo looked back at the queen, still asleep, and then at his hand. He had seen them. Quickly, he grabbed his glove in his lap and slipped it on, only to be grabbed at the collar by Christopher. The man pulled him to his feet, dragging him out of the room forcefully and throwing him to the ground outside.
Neo huffed as he landed, watching as Christopher exited the room, carefully closing the door behind him. He got to his feet, brushing himself off and fixing his jacket. However, he didn't have time to do or say much else before Christopher shoved him against the wall, his fist submerged in frosty ice.
"Apparently you don't listen to a thing anyone says," He punched into the wall, right above Neo's right shoulder. "You hurt my sister, so you no longer have the authority to touch her. What the hells were you doing, and how even?!"
Neo had flinched when the fist landed, but he still glared at the slightly taller man. "I'm not going to listen to you, no matter how hard you try. I've never had to, so I never will," He crossed his arms. "And for your information, though it really is none of your business, we were experimenting."
"And that means you fall asleep holding each other's bare hands?!" He yelled, slamming his fist into the wall again.
"Well, no, that part was an accident," He informed him.
"An accident?" Christopher was still yelling. "You have no right to have accidents around her, Nathan."
Neo raised an eyebrow. "I'm not going to fucking hurt your sister anymore. I don't care what you say or do to me, either. I am her bodyguard, not your slave. You have no authority over me."
"You may be her bodyguard," He said slowly. "But I am her damn brother. And as her bodyguard, you answer to me if you ever do anything out of line. The hate I feel for you is simply a side effect of your stupidity."
"I will never answer to you, Christopher," He hissed, shoving the man back away from him. "I don't give a shit about your rules. If anything, you are keeping me from doing my job of protecting your oh-so-precious sister by pulling me out here away from her!"
"You are a danger to her, Nathan," Christopher growled. "Once the public finds out about your incident, they will not stop until you are back in that prison."
"It was an accident," Neo said sharply. "Believe it or not - whatever. I don't care what happens to me. The only thing I've been even thinking about this last worthless week is if she is okay!"
Christopher raised a curious eyebrow, then scoffed. "That's funny - you care for her. Funny way of showing it. Forgetting your dead girlfriend so easily? Seems-"
Then Neo shot forward. His eyes - already filled with rage - were then on fire as he slammed Christopher into Quilliene's door, hands gripping his nice black suit. Christopher had said something stupid and Neo seemed about ready to absolutely mutilate him completely.
However, his actions were cut short as sounds of shattering glass and porcelain rang out. Splintering wood breaking apart, a sharp screech, then a cry of fear. A pained yell could be heard from Quilliene's room, and from what someone could tell, it sounded like struggling and fighting with muffled yells.
"Neo!"
Her voice called out before it disappeared just as quickly as it came. Both of the men seemed to tense, before Neo felt panic rise in his chest. It happened so fast. Shoving Christopher out of the way, he quickly struggled with the knob of the door before simply shouldering it open. Something cracked under his heel, but he ignored it as he entered.
Shattered glass, splintered wood, and broken porcelain blanketed the room's floor. A sense of terror and confusion was about, the detailed walls of the room having slash marks across them. The bed was broken in the middle, as if too much weight was put on it. However, the woman who was once laying on it was gone. Glass from the broken open window made a trail from the bed to the frame, along with more dents and slash marks.
Neo darted over to the window, not paying attention to the glass crunching underfoot. He grabbed the edge of the frame, leaning out as he held his breath, the fear of what happened to Quilliene squeezing his chest. Christopher was next to him in moments, both of them looking around, but there was nothing.
It was as if all the struggling they heard inside seconds ago was simply just gone. There was no trace of her, nor the person or thing that might have taken her. Snowflakes started falling from the ceiling while Christopher turned back around, yelling at the guards who had quickly appeared to search the area and the servants to clean the mess.
Neo felt his heart slow, his gaze falling to the ground below him. They were only on the second floor, but it still seemed rather high since the ceilings below rose tall. How could everything just disappear? It had only been mere moments when the struggling began, and the room was a complete mess, but the sources of it all were simply gone.
Yet, as he stepped away from the window, something sounded. The crumbling of stone. He looked back at the opening as specks of rubble fell to the ground, then again. He grit his teeth as his eyes travelled to the top of the frame, slowly taking off his glove and shoving it in his pocket. Approaching carefully, he shot out his hand and grabbed the top of the window, the wall turning black and spreading up. The bricks turned weak, unable to hold whatever was clinging to them.
Something rather large and feathery fell down from above, clawing its way into the wall as it was slowly forced down. However, not before lashing out and driving one of its talons into Neo's shoulder. He gasped and coughed out blood, being pulled from the room as he was pinned to the wall outside.
Dangling, he cried out, kicking the free air. Neo was given the time to see the attacker - something huge and covered in black feathers, four arms on its torso holding close the struggling form of Quilliene, tears in her eyes and blood on her arms. He gasped as one of the wing's talons dug deeper into his shoulder, the beak turning into a strange malicious grin. The eyes seemed to flicker red.
"You're a little nosy, mate," The creature suddenly spoke, the beak shaping and forming like lips as it leaned in. "You need to keep your business out of the gutter. Don't worry, I'll give you something to worry about, 'cause she belongs to me now."
Neo tried to reach out to Quilliene, but the claw of the creature quickly pulled out and let him fall. He screamed sharply as the world came in, seeing the creature detach from the wall and take off quickly. Before he could see where it went, his plummet came to a close, his back slamming into the ground.