The Brave

Chapter Seven

I'm running. Faster than I've ever ran before. I know my siblings are in danger. I can feel it in my bones that something is so so wrong..and yet I feel like I'm stuck in place. My feet feel like they are plastered to the ground. My muscles strain under the pressure of wanting to move. Just when I feel things cannot get any worse, I see Ryce's evil and ugly face start to form in my mind. My mind tortures me by replaying his advances towards me as he tries to kill me, but this time he's after my family. I want to scream. My siblings are going to die and I can't move to be able to save them. 

I wake up in panic.

My body is shaking and I can feel sweat bead down my forehead. I blink tears out of my eyes and they start to focus on my surroundings. I'm lying on a cold, metal table surrounded by medical looking monitors and scanners. My hands arms and legs are fastened to the table by thick straps that are so tight they dig into my skin. The room looks sterile and white, making it seem cold and unfriendly, but at the same time, it almost makes the room feel...necessary. The white room has a huge rectangular glass window, that I'm guessing lets you see in but doesn't allow you too see out. To me, the window looks like a window, but it seems like their is nothing there. What bothers me the most, is that I see no visible door to the room. How has anyone gotten in here? How am I supposed to get out? I'm only wearing a tan t-shirt and dark green cargo pants that don't belong to me, which means they've taken my bowie knife and other supplies that would have helped me to cut through my bonds. As soon as I start to panic on how I'm going to escape, I hear a simple hissing sound. 

What I thought was a window starts sliding towards me. As scared as I already am, I start straining against my bonds even harder to try and escape. Thankfully, the window only comes out a few feet and then slowly starts to go up instead, revealing Lyric standing in the gap left by the window, arms crossed. 

I try to speak, but I realize my mouth is so dry, and my throat is so parched, that no words want to come out. Seeming to notice my struggle she holds her hand up as if to stop me from saying anything. As soon as she crosses through the opening in the wall, the window starts hissing again, slowly retracting back to its original position. 

"Archer, a lot of things are not going to make sense to you. You might be angry, you might be scared. But I promise, if you stick with us, you might just survive. Who knows, you might be the guy we need," Lyric states, as she looks intently at me. 

"Need for what?" I manage to croak out.

She smiles faintly, but her eyes seem intent, like she's thinking about something else. "To take down a government."