Caredig

Prologue

She tugged on her restraints, she could feel the sting of where they cut into her wrists, reminding her far too much of an earlier pain in her life. She closed her eyes, breathing in an out, trying her best not to panic. Panic would do nothing for her. She thought of her best friend, her family, even if she was the least favorite in her family, she knew they would at least notice her absence. They would do what they needed to to keep up appearances. And not reporting their child missing would ruin their reputation. The cloth over her mouth only escalated the panic in her chest. She had always and an irrational fear of suffocating, and something over her mouth was no help. She listened to the voices in the vehicle, tried to decipher where they were going and when they turned, but she had been strapped down, tied at her waist and around her throat, she could only tell which way the vehicle was turning by when she slammed into the wall or choked on the rough rope against her throat. Panic began to slowly slink back into her as her breaths quickened. She had never been good at fighting off panic attacks, so she decided to turn it off. No one could control their disassociation, but she had gotten good at learning what triggered hers. She done it multiple times in the past year, self destruction is such a pretty little thing, when no one can notice when you're doing it. So she held her breathe, she let her body go limp, she stared at the bus window in front of her, she let her eyes lose focus, and she let her ears focus too much. After what must of been 20 minutes she realized it had worked, she could feel herself slipping, everything felt like a dream, but she couldn't snap herself back out of it now. What was the point? She was in the back of a dying school bus. Wire ties around her ankles and wrists, rope around her waist and throat,  a ripped piece of her own shirt over her mouth. At least 5 men and 2 women were sitting in the back of the bus, dog masks covering their faces, like the rubber ones at the Halloween store, she could smell them, she could smell blood on the wall of the decrepit bus. So she kept staring at the wall. No one would know she was missing, not yet, she'd gone out to the tattoo shop alone, Sarah was supposed to be starting her back piece today. As soon as she'd been on her stomach they'd come. She heard the door open, heard Alice greet them, heard Alice slowly start sobbing, and then stop breathing. At that point they'd already gotten her hands behind her back, she was pretty sure she'd broken on of their noses, given another a concussion, and sent another to the Gods. The shop was supposed to be a safe house. They'd never had an issue before, not one. It must of been her lucky fucking day. She felt her hearing hone in on one conversation, one of the voices sounded rough, maybe she'd managed to kick one of them in the throat. She listened closer, her head hitting the metal between the side of the bus and the window, she ignored the pain and focused "Listen why don't we just kill her now? No one is ganna miss the little bitch" the one with rough voice sounded like he was pissed, shed probably kicked him in the throat, but the new voice was smooth, calculated, and emotionless. "No, you're an idiot if you think that" she heard shifting , a scuffle, choked breathing. "Excuse me? Little bitch boy, you got something you wanna add?" She heard three sounds, the sound of someones gasping for breathe, and the sound of someone hitting the metal floor of the bus, and the sound of the tendon in her ankle slowly popping. Whatever happened had happened quickly. Because the man had landed directly on her fucking ankle, wedging it between the metal bar and his shoulder. She stared at him as he gasped for breath and as his weight slowly ensured at the very least a sprained ankle and the most a broken one. She was pretty sure it was broken. She heard gasping and choked breaths, she thought it was the man but he'd stopped moving now. She realized they were her own. She felt herself slip in an out of reality. The pain broke between the moments when it felt like nothing was real. She focused on the smooth voice, she looked up to see the man standing, hunched over on the smooth surface of the isle. He must of been at least 6'4, she took in every lart of her face she could see the barest reflection of light eyes, ash blond hair cropped above his ears, split down the middle Milo Thatch style. As he turned his head she could see the sillohuette of a hooked nose, wide lips and square jaw. She glared full force at him as she felt herself coming out of it. "Listen all of you fucking wingers. We've got clear orders from the boss. If anyone touches the girl, you're dead, if any of you release the girl you're dead. I don't what makes any of you think you can take her on by yourself, she's already killed on of you, broken thaf ones nose" he pointed with two fingers to a man with his hands over gauze full of blood "and knocked his ass cold out, which, one of you should wake him uo before we arrive" he continued to soeak as he hit each seat on his way to the closer to where she sat in the middle of the bus "we've got clear orders. Boss wants to have his fun with this one" he looked at her with a slow-pulling, easy, nasty little smirk. Stopping next to her "she is close to the top of their organization. Even you rookies know he loves to dismantle them from the inside out. That involves dismantiling her" he placed his hand on her hair as he said the next phrase "from the inside out. Do i make that clear?" Silence followed "I'll take that as a yes, now get fucking ready we're close" she closed her eyes, braced herself, and began to wriggle our of the cloth around her mouth, the rope cut deep into her neck and made her choke but she didn't care any more. Once she was free she bucked as he yanked her hair his head snapped down to hers "did i give you permission to remove that?" She met his eyes, spit on his shirt, and spoke "if you don't move your hand, once i get out of these fucking ties, i'll remove each fonger one by one and shove them so far up you ASS YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO SAY" he backhanded her and attemptes to pull the cloth over mouth "YOU FILTHY PR-" he managed to pull the cloth over her mouth, she finished screaming as he backed away from her. "Are you fucking done yet?" She smiled under the cloth and lifted her arms as much as possible, feeling ropes and wire ties digging into her, ankle screaming, and flipped him off with both hands as her head banged into the wall as they made a sharp turn