A Warrior's Journey (22 page)

Committee member Tomlinson stepped out of
the shadows and briefly blocked the harsh light, but then it was
back as he stepped behind her. He had a club of some kind in his
hand. She had to play it cool if she had any chance to save
herself.

Suddenly the club descended in front of her
face to rise chokingly against her throat. He held either end of
the club as he choked her. She struggled to get air. She was
gasping for air when the pressure was released only enough to keep
her from passing out.

The Committee member leaned down and pressed
his lips to her ear and said, “Now that your awake dear how about
explaining to me how out of the forty odd people in the building at
the time you are the only one left alive to tell a tale?

He released the choking hold of the baton
from her throat and she sputtered and half gagged as she caught her
breath.

“Well I’m waiting and I am not a very
patient man!”

Evette told him everything she knew about
the fight and what followed.

The Committee member paced back and forth in
front of her, when she finished he asked, “And how did the two
prisoners escape from the cell to halt your throat from being
cut?”

This was the part of the story that she had
to take a wild gamble on. She couldn’t breathe a word about the
gun.

“He had helpers they came up and busted the
window out while I was fighting with the other man.”

He stopped pacing and looked at her
intently. She feigned her most truthful and honest look in her
repertoire. It was a good bet that the man hadn’t been alone and
she was sure that the audio recorders would back up her made up
story.

There were no video recorders in the
interrogation area for fear of public censure should footage be
leaked to the media. The Committee member resumed pacing.

“One of your attackers mentioned that they
were heading towards some sanctuary within the city. Do you know
where or what that might be?”

Evette shook her head no at a complete loss
as to what the answer to that might be.

“I believe your story Evette.”

She got no chance to savor the relief she
felt at those words before she felt the impact of a backhanded slap
that rocked her head backward. The slap was followed by another
that rocked her head back the other way.

Her neck felt like it was broken and her
face felt like it was on fire. The ringing in her ears and the
clamoring in her head wouldn’t stop.

“That is to drive home the magnitude of your
failure! The only reason I don’t end your life is because you have
been a valuable asset to us in the past and we’re short on agents
right now. You will be released later in the day. Until then you
can reflect on the error of your failure to do your job!”

The Committee member slammed out of the room
and Evette was left to suffer in the bright glare of the light. Her
face was swelling up and her bruised eyes closed shut trying to
block out the glare of the harsh light.

Her body shook slightly, but she didn’t make
any sound. The only thing that betrayed how she felt inside was the
tears that squeezed out from the corners of her eyes.

Evette limped slightly as she made her way
home to her apartment that evening. They had left her cuffed to the
chair for the whole day. She hurt all over, but at least she still
had her life, whatever that was good for.

They expected her to come to work tomorrow
to resume her old duties. With any luck by the time she was missed
tomorrow she would already be well on the way to being out of the
country with Mama and the kids. All she was going back to her
apartment for was to gather up a few items and to satisfy any tail
that they may have put on her to make sure she was going home.

She went down the hall to her room. The door
was ajar again. She slammed the door the rest of the way inward and
stormed into her apartment. After everything that she had suffered
through today she was in no mood for anymore of Missy’s
foolishness.

“Missy!”

She didn’t see her anywhere. The light was
on in the kitchen and she headed for it. She pushed through the
doors and couldn’t help the scream that escaped her lips. Missy was
lying stretched out on top of the table. She had been tied to it
and horribly tortured.

Her sightless eyes stared up at the ceiling
in a clear testament that life was no longer present within her.
Evette backed up slowly through the doors hers eyes on the horror
before her. Who had done this?

She thought she heard something in the room
behind her and turned to see the source of the sound in a panic
only to be met with a cloud of knockout gas. She clung to the door
fighting to stay conscious, but it was no use. She slipped the rest
of the way to the floor all ability to reason leaving her.

Evette lifted her head slightly from where
it had been resting against her chest. It was hard to lift her head
because of how tight her arms were about her head. Dimly she
realized, as she looked around that she was hanging from the
ceiling where her chandelier had once been.

The chandelier was gone, with only its chain
left, to which she was cuffed to. She had been stripped down to her
panties and bra and the realization of that caused an inadvertent
moan to escape out from her bruised lips, as she remembered the
vision of what had been done to poor Missy lying in the
kitchen.

She couldn’t feel her hands and her arms
hurt horribly.

“Well, look at what we have here. A
traitorous slut if I ever saw one!”

It was Robert her fellow agent! Robert had
done this?

It was hard to talk but she managed to get
out, “Why are you doing this Robert? Missy? Why?”

He waved a hand dismissively, “Missy was
just me having some fun while I waited. Sort of like a mouse for
the cat to play with, while it waits for its main target to appear,
the traitorous little rat that she is!”

“You think I’m a traitor? I haven’t done
anything to betray my country!”

“Oh yes you have! I intend on getting the
whole story out of you too! I’m going to make my career with you!
When the Committee finds out how you’ve been in cahoots with the
strangers among us they’ll have no choice but to appoint me as
chief inspector for the Committee.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about! Now
let me go!”

“You’ll squeal little rat in time! It
appears that the office has already worked you over some, but you
haven’t felt anything yet.” As he said it he ran one hand
caressingly over a deep bruise on her side above her hip that she
had gotten with the fight with the stranger.

Her body convulsed at his touch and she
tried to swing away from it, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t kick
him either, because her ankles were cuffed together. She felt on
the verge of throwing up at the sensation of his hand on her.

“Don’t like to be touched do you? I learned
all about that from Missy. I wonder why? Maybe later I’ll see if I
can bring back some old memories for you, but right now all I want
is your full and complete confession.”

He left her and she was grateful for the
absence of his touch, but apprehensive over what was to come next.
He went to the couch and grabbed the electrical wire that had fed
the chandelier. He approached her with the jagged ends of the bared
wires.

He shrugged his shoulders and with a nasty
grin on his face said, “I know its crude, but it’s always proven
effective.” He jabbed the jaggedly sharp copper wire ends of the
insulated wire in his hands into the dark bruise on her side.

Her body convulsed from the agony of the
electric shock and she screamed. Robert pulled the wire away and
Evette hung limply from her wrists crying in pain.

“Are you going to tell me about your
arrangement with the strangers yet or not?”

Tears falling from her face Evette shook her
head, “I don’t know what you mean!”

“Maybe that wasn’t a tender enough
spot.”

His fingers stroked along the edge of her
panties and she sobbed.

He patted her, “I think I’ll save this for
later. The experience should be a torture for you all of its own I
think.”

His hand rose up over her belly to her
chest.

“Don’t do this Robert, please!” Evette said
unable to stop herself from pleading even though she knew it would
do her no good.

“I have to Evette, my destiny awaits me and
besides I’ve always wanted to see!”

His hand closed over the front of her bra
and yanked hard. The straps of the bra broke and it came away in
his hand.

Evette screamed and jerked as the wires were
jabbed into the side of one breast and then the other one. The
action was repeated again and again.

Blood or sweat or more likely a combination
of them both must have trickled down the wire cord and created a
live connection with Robert’s hand, because he gave a shout and
jumped back shaking his hand violently, as he dropped the wire cord
temporarily.

“Wow! That does hurt! I pity you honey. I
really do.” He said laughing.

In shaking the electric jolt out of his hand
he had turned in the process and his back was now facing Evette.
There was no thought to her actions other than those guided by the
need to survive and stop the pain.

In an effort of superhuman quality she
gripped the chains of the cuffs ignoring the pain the action caused
her chaffed wrists and pulled herself upward. She worked out
regularly and it showed now as the muscles of her abdomen flexed
hard, as she lifted her legs up before her, still cuffed together
as they were. With a contortion of her torso she lifted and swung
her legs up towards Robert’s head. As her first leg cleared his
head she bowed her legs open so that Robert’s head slid in between
her thighs.

“What the……!” was all Robert managed to get
out before the toned thighs clamped shut around his neck cutting
off his air.

Robert was knocked to his knees as Evette’s
bottom was seated on his left shoulder as her left leg was slung
across the front of his neck, with her foot locked behind his right
shoulder blade, as she pressed hard with her thigh back against the
one behind his neck.

Robert’s hands rose to grasp at the thigh
across his throat, as he tried to pull her leg free, but her thigh
remained clamped over his throat. Evette screamed gutturally in a
mixture of both pain and raw physical exertion, as she pressed her
thighs together as tight as she could.

Robert’s attempts to free himself dimmed as
his oxygen deprivation increased. He finally blacked out at almost
the same moment as Evette’s strength gave out. Robert’s unconscious
body fell to the floor as Evette hung for a moment trying to get
her breathing back under control.

She had to get free before he came awake
again!

Desperation gave strength to her worn out
muscles and she began swinging back and forth from the chain
overhead even as she cried out at the pain of the cuffs cutting
into her wrists. She heard a screw snap out of the fixture overhead
and then the whole fixture gave way.

Fortunately she landed against the sofa
which broke her fall, but it still hurt. In an effort to get up she
fell off the sofa onto the hard wood floor with a loud thump.
Lifting her head she saw Robert beginning to stir slightly, which
set her moving again.

Scooting as best as she could across the
floor with her wrists and ankles bound she made it to Robert’s
side. Her hands felt dead and alien to her as she forced her
fingers to move, as she searched his pockets in search of the
keys.

She found them!

Pulling the little key out she fumbled with
it to unlock her hands. Her task was made harder by the
slipperiness of the key that was now soaked in her own blood from
the deep lacerations on her wrists.

The cuffs finally sprang open and she
hurriedly unlocked her ankles, as her hands started to work better
for her again. Robert was lifting his head off the floor, when she
jumped on his back and twisted his left arm up and behind his back
so hard that she dislocated his shoulder.

Robert came to full consciousness then with
a pain filled screech of agony. He tried to move but couldn’t
because of the continued pressure on his arm and the weight on his
back. Before he could recover from the first shock he was beset by
another.

Evette’s right hand disappeared between
Robert’s thighs from behind as her fingers searched for his
distinction of being a male. Finding what she was after she gripped
down cruelly, her nails digging into the soft flesh despite the
layer of the pants that he wore separating his skin from her hand.
Robert’s scream was high pitched and pained, when after the initial
momentary pause of first reaction, the pain fully registered across
all corners of his consciousness.

“Scream little kitty cat!” Evette said
savagely as she twisted hard. And scream Robert did.

He was moaning and shaking uncontrollably
when she finally relaxed her twisting grip slightly. “Now Robert I
need you to explain to me how I’m supposedly so connected to the
strangers that you thought you should pay me a little visit!”

“You mean you really don’t know?”

Evette’s grip tightened again and Robert
screamed, “I’ll tell you! Please stop!”

She held her grip a moment longer and then
relaxed it slightly.

Robert began to blubber out his tale, “I
thought something was fishy in the way you handled the store owner.
I went back and had the shop scanned more thoroughly. The scan
turned up an anomaly, the trace of an abnormal radioactive isotope.
I had the scan broadcasted outward to pick up any other signs of
the radioactive signature.

The scan took a while to complete, but when
it was complete it showed two definite contacts. This apartment and
another location in the slums.