Talk Nerdy to Me

Chapter 18: An Attack In The Night

Summary:

An attacker in the night forces Chris to realize he can't let Ra out of his sight if he's to keep her safe as promised.

Notes:

CW: Attempted kidnapping

(See the end of the chapter for .)

Chapter Text

Ra felt like her dreams couldn't hold a candle to her current reality, even when she was having a good one like this one. She was safe and warm, painting in a garden full of brilliant pink and red roses.

There was an odd scent in the air, though, directly opposite from the dream. Smoke, the smell thick and spicy in her nose, filled the air. Not the fluffy scent that was accompanied by curls of smoke, but the acrid flavor of a smoker too near.

She didn't even think about it before she started screaming. Her eyes flew open, and her quick mind processed that there was a stranger hovering over her - clothed in black with face covered. She screamed again, thinking she'd dreamed the first. A gloved hand covered her mouth, and she bit down as hard as she could.

Her attacker snarled, pulling her hand back with a jolt that shook Ra's teeth. Ra tried to move, to do anything to get away, and then suddenly found that the attacker was gone in a flash. She used her legs to get out of the prone position, realizing quickly that there was no more need to fight.

Chris, wearing his clothes from the night before, was straddling the attacker's legs, holding their hands tightly behind his back.

"Call the front desk," Chris said, nodding to the hotel phone. "Security and help will get them."

Ra didn't had to be told twice. She picked up the phone and started repeating the two words. Not even two seconds later, Changbin was in the room too, wearing just a pair of joggers. Ra pointed at the floor where Chris was holding the attacker in place.

The front desk staff must have realized the urgency in the situation, or maybe had heard the way Ra's voice was trembling. The lady spoke in French, still, but Ra heard the word security - probably a cognate word, her brain thought, completely disjointed from the current circumstances.

More people arrived in her room. She felt her brain just turn completely off. Everything sounded far away. Nothing processed. She was still a little out of it from lack of sleep, and the emotional roller coaster of the night before, that this new thing just broke her.

She didn't even realize she was crying until she was pulled into an embrace, her tears getting fabric damp under her cheeks. The feeling jostled her brain around in her head, but nothing seemed to sink in. She looked up, seeing Chris, his arms wrapped around her.

Naturally.

Security held onto the attacker.

Police arrived.

Jin was there.

Slowly, the noise began to make sense.

Discussion with police and security going round and round, the French completely addling her mind again.

No one seemed to know who the woman under the mask was. She carried no ID and spoke to no one, not even the police. The mystery of how she'd gotten in was solved, however, because she had a copy of Ra's key card. How, the hotel was frantically trying to figure out. It had only issued two key cards to Ra's room, the one in Ra's wallet and the one in Chris' stack. They had no records of a third being made.

The woman had gear that Ra recognized, though. Ropes, the rough kind used for mountain climbing. D-clips. Fentanyl in carefully wrapped papers in another airtight container. The woman smelled strongly of cigarette smoke, the reason Ra had screamed even in her sleep. Ra knew that not every kidnapper she'd encountered smoked, but the coincidence was too high.