"Keep kneading, Jenkins! Other people need to eat too." Dean, the kitchen guard, roared at Terrell from across the room, keeping his stiff posture nearby the front door of the bakery located inside the institute.

Terrell kept his head down, trying to get through the after-morning effects of last night's intense LSD trip. His head throbbed with each wring of the dough, causing him to groan lightly. The evident withdrawal symptoms from Xanax were showing in the man's patchy lips, where he had been nervously biting away the skin at times.

"Hopefully Dr. McKee knocked some sense into you, now go." The nurse shoved Eva into the kitchen, turning around to leave.

The girl's feet shuffled across the floor, feeling highly ashamed of the muzzle that was uncomfortably secured to her face, partially revealing the bruises Ross had left around her mouth through the small steel bars.

Eva made her way to an empty work bench, delicately taking out the raw dough mixture and plopping it onto the steel surface. Although she'd been locked up for almost three years, her previous work experience as a baker came in handy at the asylum's bakery once every month.

After she was done kneading, she shaped the dough onto a wooden paddle and walked over to the head of the bakery, watching him place half of the paddle into the masonry oven. The girl intently watched the reddened stones, along with the small sparks of ember. She embraced the longed for heat that came out of the oven, shutting her eyes in nostalgia as the memories of summer came flooding back to her.

"You're pretty good in the kitchen." A familiar voiced stated, nudging her shoulder as she snapped out of her flashbacks. Eva sighed at the thought of being interrupted, looking downwards, until finally noticing the voice.

The thought of him being out in the open and near her caused the small, thin strands of hair to rise up on her neck, knots beginning to tie themselves tighter in the pit of her stomach as the horrible and vivid encounter with him came flooding back into her mind.

She stayed silent, not because the inner edges of her muzzle unintentionally poke at her skin, but because conversing with a potential psycho wasn't on her to-do list for that morning.

"I didn't mean it in a sexist way or anything." The man added, embarrassed that he may have used the wrong words to string together for his compliment.

"Whatever." Eva muttered, not daring to look back towards his most likely smug gaze.

Terrell sighed, shifting his gaze around as he waited for his paddle to be returned back to him so he would be able to continue working on the next batch of sourdough. He figured he would get to know the girl, feeling both bored and lonely, though he was very careful when making friends.

He was known to be friendly towards everyone in the asylum, including the man who'd sedate him every other day and inject foreign objects and substances into his body. It was a way to survive, knowing to question everyone's intentions.

"Listen, why don't you just fuck off and waterboard someone else?" Eva blurted audibly, a statement which the baker and Terrell knew was directed to the latter. She grabbed the wooden paddle and averted her cold gaze away from him – walking away.

Terrell looked at her with furrowed brows, watching her stroll off to her working bench as the baker handed him his paddle.

***

"I feel bad for her, you know." Dr McKee spoke lowly, flicking the ashes of his cigarette into the occipital bone of the skull that acted as an ashtray for the living quarters for both Ross and Sally.

"Doesn't mean you have to save her. She deserved to live with the memories of what she did. I hope it haunts her for the rest of her life." Sally spoke, taking off her lab coat and hanging it on the clothing hook.

Ross shook his head in response to his assistant, staring off into the distance as the nicotine rushed through his head, calming him down from a long day of work.

"No, she didn't," He began. "You don't know her like I do. She doesn't deserve to wake up every day wanting to die because of the mistake she made as a child. I know she'll get better."

Sally's brows furrowed, her nose following the contortion.

"A mistake?" The woman spoke in disbelief, shocked that an educated man like Ross would consider the incident a 'mistake'. "She's a sociopathic cannibal who doesn't care about anyone but herself! You're too busy being up her ass – quite literally at times – to even see that. Eva Richards does not care for anybody. And if you're too blind to see that, then I guess that PhD is just was fraudulent as she is."

Despite being more rational with her feelings, Sally couldn't contain the disgust and slight fear she had for Eva. Seeing right through the girl's bullshit. But no matter how many times she warned Ross about her – he wouldn't register the information given to him by Sally, only pretending to do so.

Nevertheless, Ross remained quiet, aimlessly staring at the wall as the smoke escaped his nose.

"Ross," Sally sighed, tiredly walking over to the man and squatting down by his leg. "I care about you. You're a great man. But if you're going to let her control you like a dog, I promise you nothing good will come out of it."

The blonde looked over to her, his eyes drooping slightly due to how tired he was.

"Oh Sally," He held her chin between his thumb and index finger, bringing himself closer to her. "Trust me, the day Eva Richards has the upper hand, is the day Hell freezes over."

The strong statement brought a glimmer of hope to her, the ends of her mouth curling at the reassuring words he spoke. Her eyes began to sting at the joyous tears beginning to brew at the waterline.

Ross' grip on her chin began to tighten, soon enough holding the woman's jaw in his hand, tightly as possible. The man himself stared into Sally's eyes with anger, fire burning at the bottom of his pupils.

"And whoever suggests Eva Richards has the upper hand, may as well end up as the new carpet for the common room. Understood?" His tone of voice was calm, but the under tone was threatening enough for Sally to whimper under his hold, wanting to get away from him.

The woman nodded, only to be pushed away by Ross. She sat down on the ground, tears streaming down her face as she watched him get up, taking off his coat.