Incorporated

Obligatory Employment

"We do not think you are telling the truth." 

Blake shook his head, fed up. His arms were sore from the tight ropes which bound him to the creaky folding chair. They had stripped off his shirt and shoes, and he had mentally prepared himself for a long torture session. To his extreme relief, this had not yet become the case. However, they had left him for what felt like hours tied to the chair before probing him with questions. The interrogation had not gone very well at first, having first interrogated him in Turkish, then French, and finally, a second translator was brought in as a replacement who could speak English. He was a short, sweaty man who wore glasses which he always seemed to have to adjust. His voice was nasally, which annoyed Blake more than it intimidated him. Death threats in such a voice were laughable. The harsh, menacing voice of the Turk behind him, however, affirmed that the threats were very real. 

 "I told you the truth. We were going to be shot down, so we parachuted out. We were on our way to South Africa."

The translator relayed his words to the man behind him, who replied in turn, and the translator then to Blake. Translating must not be very fun, Blake decided.

"There was a confirmed hit on your airplane. This area is a deisgnated no-fly zone."

Blake shrugged. "Then you'll have to take that up with my pilot. I was just trying to get to Johannesburg." 

They left him for another few hours. He couldn't tell if it was night or day. The room was dark and shabby, lit by a single bare lightbulb that flickered occasionally. Moths fluttered in a spirical dance beneath the fixture. At least watching them gave Blake something to do. Dust floated lackadaisically, illuminated by the buzzing filament in it's scratched glass case. The walls were stained and the small room, no bigger than 12 feet wide and long, had a musty smell to it. It was completely bare, he noticed, aside from the chair he sat in. He began wondering if the room was specifically used for interrogations, at which point he realized he was going out of his mind from a potent mix of boredom and lack of sleep. 

He began to worry about Guychel. He was the one who flew them into this mess, after all. He just hoped that Guychel had told the truth so that their story was the same. Nothing is worse than two inconsistent stories in a situation like this. 

The door swung open and two men came in. Blake immediately feared the worse. Their expressions were stony, bordering on uninterested. As they neared him, one of the men pulled a pair of what looked like old garden pruners from his jean overalls. Blake's heart began to pound and his mouth dried. Were they going to cut out his tongue? Cut off his fingers? Mutilate him in some other twisted way?

The one man walked around the chair, directly behind Blake, and knelt down. The other just stood to the side. Neither said a word. 

He felt the ropes tug at his body and he tensed, anticipating a stab of pain somewhere on his exposed flesh.

The pruners snipped, and the ropes loosened as the man cut through the braided hemp. Blake was surprised, confused, but once again during those short few days, completely relieved.

The man with the pruners continued to cut away the ropes that bound Blake's wrists, torso, and ankles to the chair. Once freed, they pulled him up on to his bare feet. At first, his knees were weak from being in the same position for so long, but the two men steadied him roughly. They marched him out the door, holding him solidly between them. Something told Blake that his ordeal wasn't over yet.

They passed through squalid hallways beneath flickering and dying halogen lights. The whole building was in a sad state of disrepair, but whether from lack of funding or lack of necessity, he couldn't tell.