The Medusa Deception

Chapter 18

IT'D BEEN A long and fitful night shackled to the wall in the pitch-black basement. Ryan was stiff and sore all over. He'd wracked his brain most of the night trying to think of ways to escape; his wrists were rubbed raw. He shifted to sit against the wall, trying to be quiet in case Mandy was still sleeping.

"How are you doing over there?" she asked.

Ryan sighed. "Surviving. How about you? Get any sleep?"

"Not much. You?"

"Same."

Following a period of profound silence, Mandy spoke. "Ryan? I feel sick. I think I'm slipping away again."

He perked up. "Really? Quick! Raise your wrists and ankles into the air." Ryan felt his first ray of hope since their incarceration when he heard her empty shackles rattle to the floor.

After what seemed about an hour, the metallic clank of the deadbolt announced the kidnapper's arrival, accompanied by a blinding onslaught of light. Ryan squinted and tried to shade his eyes; the shackles yanked painfully into his wrists.

The mercenary looked at Ryan, the empty shackles, and then back at Ryan. "Where's the girl?"

"She escaped."

"Impossible. When? How?"

"Last night sometime. I don't know. Her wrists and ankles are really small. She was able to slip them off. I'm not so lucky." Ryan held out his wrists for inspection.

The mercenary paced the floor. "Can't be." He muttered, "... never lost a prisoner before... ruin my reputation... God damned inferior medieval restraints! Why don't these people get into the twenty-first century!"

Ryan sat there with satisfaction, watching the mercenary lose it.

Abruptly, the man snapped out of it and sprang into action, searching the room for signs of escape. He frowned. "How did she get out of here?"

"How do I know? It was freaking dark down here. Maybe she crawled through an air vent or something. There must be a way. I mean, obviously she didn't just disappear into thin air," Ryan offered.

Walking to a cabinet resembling a fuse box on the wall, the mercenary checked to make sure the shackle keys were still there. "She really didn't try very hard to free you, did she? I guess it's every man for himself."

Ryan hung his head.

Cursing, the man stormed out of the room, muttering something about a grid search before his employers found out.

* * *

DIZZY BUT CONSCIOUS, Mandy arrived in the same spot where she'd last stood on Mount Olympus with Zeus. "It worked," she shrieked with glee.

"Zeus?" she called. No one answered.

Finally, she'd gained some control, arriving just where she'd hoped. As she was slipping away, she'd concentrated as hard as she could on this place and Voila, here she was. Sure, it could be just a coincidence, but she didn't think so.

"Not bad for a total amateur," she complimented herself.

Donning the cap of Hades, she couldn't help but think of modern science fiction: the Romulan cloaking device in Star Trek, Harry Potter's cloak of invisibility, the Invisible Man. She could hardly believe it. Here she was, putting on an actual cloaking device.

Next came Hermes' sandals. Getting them on presented a challenge with the wings fluttering in the way.

"Calm down," she warned them.