The Agency

Chapter 2

I’m awake again. The right side of my face is pulsing and opening my jaw feels like opening a rusty deck chair. Of course my first reaction is to let out the tears that have been dying to dribble down my face, but I hold them back; what good would that do? Somehow I feel I have had worse than this; some repressed memory threatens to resurface but I shut it out. Not the time to delve into the past. I can feel my hands are bound with rope behind my back, and on closer fingertip inspection I find the knot is primitive. They could have at least given me a challenge. My feet are tied tightly to each chair leg, but again not inescapable. I have no idea how many people could currently be standing just a few feet away as there is what feels like a piece of cloth tied over my eyes. I freeze. Nothing, I hear nothing, I smell nothing, I see nothing; I am alone. I begin to work at the bonds round my hands first. It takes about thirty seconds so not my best record so far, after which I pocket the rope. I slowly move my hands to the cloth over my eyes and lift it to see my surroundings. I am in a very dark room; that’s honestly all I can say. There is a very ordinary door at the other end of this very ordinary lonely room. There are no chains on the walls, no instruments of torture and no iron bars on the door through which I can taunt the prison guard. Sigh. Disappointment sets in.

I quietly slip the ropes off my feet and stand silently, welcomed by the most glorious head rush. I stride over to the door and try the handle, just to be sure, but of course it is typically locked. And off comes the bra. I gently feed the wire out of the under part of my bra and place it between my teeth whilst I slip the garment back on again. Another thirty seconds later, I have successfully reattached the clasps of my bra and picked the lock in the door. Slowly I turn the handle and edge the door open, and withdraw back slightly. Outside there is a German shepherd dog. She’s dirty and underfed and she’s pacing; this dog is going to bite. From my pocket, I remove the little pieces of rope that had bound my hands. I’ve never killed an animal before and somehow it seems crueler than killing a human. After all, animals have no laws, they act on instinct, they do as they are told; they cannot be held accountable for their actions as everything they do is a reaction to their environment or to instinct. Feeling like a criminal, I take each end of the short length of rope in my hands and strain the rope tightly around my wrists. Bracing myself, I step quickly through the door and barely have time to prepare the rope before the dog leaps on me. She pushes me to the ground but I catch a weak moment and role her under me. Somehow my rope finds its way over the soft under side of her neck and I tug the two ends of rope hard. After ten seconds she begins to whine, I pull harder. I feel her paws scratching frantically at my neck and shoulders, I pull harder still. Finally she lies motionless, awaiting my final act. I role her over and fold her hind legs either side of her. I move her front paws parallel from one another and place her head between them. She doesn’t look so tragic now; she could be sleeping beside a warm fire.

I pace further along the corridor only to find yet another obstacle; a huge pit with seemingly no bottom. There is nothing so help me clamber round the side; the wall is smooth and unaccommodating even for someone of my skill. My only option is to jump to the far side, again there is nothing but smooth concrete to grab onto should I short it. I stroll back a few paces and run at the pit, refraining from jumping until I’m right at the very edge. My leap takes me onto to the opposite side by a millimeter, and I huff out a just-shat-myself puff of air. After taking a few moments to recover I head on down the corridor and come to a dead end. My logic tells me there has to be a brick that I can push or a switch, and I search around the area for a hidden mechanism. I find none. My hair stands on the back of my neck as I feel a cold draft from above and I look up to see that I am standing at the bottom of what appears to be a well. After closer inspection of its dimensions, the solution to my next obstacle becomes very simple. Its width is perfect to allow me to lean against the sides to haul myself up to the surface of whatever hellhole I was put in. So I do just that. I take my time climbing it though; one false footing and it could be the end of me. It takes me about five minutes to climb to the top and I taste the first bit of fresh air I’ve had in hours. But alas it seems that a few breaths is all I’m allowed as someone hits me over the back of my head. Dazed, I look round only to dodge a melon sized fist that was about to smash a crater into my face. I swing my leg out from under me and kick my attacker hard just above the ankle. He keels over and I plant my fist under his jaw before he hits the ground, knocking him out cold. But there are more of them, three more to be precise; I hadn’t seen them when I first conquered the well. One comes running towards me like a deranged idiot and as he lands on me I roll over and use his momentum to catapult him into the well. But the next man lands on me before I’ve recovered from the maneuver and manages to land some fairly severe blows to my neck and cranium. But like my previous attacker, he hasn’t thought this all the way through, and has neglected to cover all of his bases. I bring my knee up hard into his groin. He lets out a guttural screech and rolls off of me. I’m now clear to tackle the final thug. He roars and runs at me with a knife he retrieved from his belt and with a twist and flick of my well trained hands, the knife is on the ground. Surprised, the thug pauses for a moment, and a moment is all I need. I swing my leg round so that my foot catches his head at the perfect angle and while he is incapacitated; I give a hard kick to his abdomen and knock him to the ground. I grab the knife lying on the ground and leap onto his back. I lean in close whilst I put the knife under his throat. ‘You should have left me alone, it’s not you I’m after’, I breathe into his ear. Suddenly I feel something sharp fly into my neck. I take the object out and see that it’s a dart, a poison dart I expect. And now my head feels super heavy and I feel myself falling, but I don’t care; I drift out of consciousness once again…