Fire and Silk

Chapter 2: Survival

     Talia was trapped. The men, with those terrifying looks in their eyes were standing, looming over her and blocking the only exit she could see. Frantically looking around she grabbed the first thing she could see that would be a suitable weapon. A piece of the broken floorboards, one ended pointed into a tapered point with a nail sticking through it. "Come anywhere near me and I'll jam this so far down your throat you'll be shittin' splinters till you're old and gray." She snarled, fear and venom dripping across her words. "Don't you any of you bastards even try to touch me!"

     The man in front took a tentative step forward, hands raised by his head. "Easy now Miss, we don't want to hurt you, we just want some answers." He said, voice sickeningly smooth as though he thought that might calm her enough to lower the board. She wasn't falling for it.

     "Yea? Well so do I! Who are you? Why did you bring me here? What do you want with me?" She fired off the questions one after enough, the fear squeezing her chest making it hard to think straight. "If you thought I would make a good target for kidnapping, that I would just come quiet and easy you've got another thing coming asshole. I'll slit my own throat before I let any of you touch me!"

     The man kneeled down, slowly lowering the bandana from his face as he did. "We didn't kidnap you Miss. We found you out here, alone. Now I'm not sure how you got here, but I can assure you none of us had anything to do with it." He spoke, slowly and measured, as though he was trying to make his words sound more sincere than they were. At least, that's how it sounded to her. 

     "Bullshit! I was at home, on my couch! Then I woke up here! You expect me to believe you had nothing to do with that? Do I look like a fucking imbecile to you?" She screamed at the man, tears pricking the corners of her eyes as panic swam in her chest and the throbbing pain in her head intensified. "It's true Miss."  Another man stepped forward, his hands up as well. This one was much smaller in comparison to the first, skinnier too, and Talia could make out tufts of gray hair poking from under his hat. "We were coming up these mountains for our own reasons when one of our men found you unconscious in the church across the way. You were nearly dead and he managed to wrap you up enough for some warmth before the rest of us got here and moved you to this building. We didn't think you were going to wake up. The only reason we even knew you did was because we all heard a scream from here." The man explained his voice gentle, soothing.

     The pain in her head gave a sharp stab, forcing her to drop the board as her hands shot to her head. Before she even had a chance to panic, the first man reached forward to move the board but not one of them advanced on her. "How about we start over? Properly." He said to her and gestured towards the bed, indicating for her to sit on it. Realizing she had no choice but to do as he said, Talia went to stand only to once again crumple into a heap on the ground from the waves of pain washing over her. The second man had reached out to catch her and help her back up but she quickly swatted his hand away. "Don't fucking touch me." She growled between clenched teeth, gripping the end table again she managed to pull herself up on wobbly legs and back up enough to flop back down on the bed. This was getting exhausting. "What the hell do you people want from me?" 

     The first man stood up, and Talia realized just fucking tall he was. "Like I said, we just want answers, but from the sound of it you're as clueless as to how you got here as we are so how about we start from the beginning? My name is Dutch Van Der Linde, now what's yours?" He asked calmly but Talia stopped listening after he said his name. 'No, no that's not possible' Her mind whispered, much more calmly than she felt it should.

     "Quit the bullshit." She growled up at the man. "You're asking me to start over and you're gonna sit here playing make believe that you're Dutch Van Der Linde? Get real. I'm not telling you shit if you're just going to toy with me."