checks my pupils and nods to the front of the van. The van slowly moves forward taking us I don't know where.
"Don't sleep," Amy says, “You have some head trauma." I really just want to pass out. But with Amy prodding around and Chest checking other things doesn't help. I slide my head off Amy and on to the floor, I roll safely under the seat out of their painful reach. Every time they prod my face, neck, or back it hurts. But down here there isn't any worry about that. I drop off to sleep thankfully.
I wake to being on a couch Chest, Amy, and the other guy by my side. People I don't know, maybe I am at a rehab. All I know is that I need to leave. I push myself up to my elbows. I look for an escape route with no luck I curl up trying to make myself smaller. I cringe as far against the couch back as I can. Amy reaches out towards me and puts her hand on my shoulder. Chest bends down to where he is face to face with me.
"Where are you from Macey?" Amy asks.
“I’m from a small town in Oregon." I answer shakily.
"You are in a compound in the middle of the desert in Arizona." Amy explains
Chest lends me his hand to help me stand up. I take it and try to stand but fall back. I close my eyes till the dizziness had passed. Amy stands next to me and checks my pulse and then my pupils. She gives me the okay and walks out of the room and in to the hallway behind me. I hear doors open and close followed by grumbling and happy little hops. I stand up when I hear Amy's voice.
"Macey I would like you to meet the rest of the family. This is Maria," Amy explains pointing to the dark haired green eyed girl that I was trapped with earlier.
"This one is Elaine," Amy continues pointing to a small blonde brown eyed girl. The other one I was trapped with.
"And then this little jumpy squirt is Benjamin," Amy finished pointing to a short boy that looked a lot like Maria except for a chubby face and brown hair. He can't be more than four.
"Maria, Elaine, Benjamin this is your new sister Macey," Amy introduces. I bow my head in greeting. Maria glares as me, Elaine waves, and Benjamin the cute little boy runs up and wraps his little arms around my waist and stares at me with deep green eyes like his sister's. They look so much alike that it's easy to tell that Maria and Benjamin are brother and sister.
"Come read to me," Benjamin begs me.
"Oh, honey I don't think she's ready for that," Amy explains in a sweet voice.
"No I don't mind," I reply before Benjamin's heart is broken. I had a little brother before I left. Benjamin took my hand and led me down the hall. Amy smiled pleased, Elaine smiled too, and Maria glared at me some more. Benjamin led me to his room which was decorated half in the cars movie and half just plain.
I stopped suddenly remembering my brother. Tears came to my eyes, he would have loved this room, and Benjamin too, he is the only thing I regret leaving behind. I stepped out in to the hall shaking my head. I turn and run. Tears blurred my vision that I almost ran in to Amy. I brushed passed her and run out the back door. Wide open fields surround the small house that my new family lives in. Without thinking I take off straight ahead and run until I can't run anymore. I fall on to the hard packed ground and cried.
I couldn't tell them of my past I barely knew them yet here they were inviting me in to their family as if I was an old friend. My heart went out to them it really did. I cried some more thinking of my old family. Then I remembered the cocaine and the way my parents reacted to the whole scene.
They yelled at me and practically cursed me for what had happened. No matter how hard I tried to explain either I was really high or they would jump down my throat before I could get a word in to defend myself. I thought it was the fact that I was high because I couldn't quit saying how much I loved it. But really it was the soda I loved not the drug. Once I was able to get enough barrings to say something they would be back to yelling. I got out of bed at about 3 A.M., grabbed some personal things like blankets pictures and others, wrote a note, and walked out the front door.
I had dreamed that I could go down to Nevada and meet my favorite magician. In the dream however my family had vanished except my brother. The magician found us passed out from malnutrition and dehydration. He took us in and adopted us. But this was a little different circumstance. After I had sobered up a little I was probably down near Heppner Oregon when I realized that I couldn't go back home now, nor would the magician want to take in any troubled teenager or child, especially a supposed druggie.
I kept walking hoping to find somewhere to continue living practically any way I could. I didn't care if I was stuck at a gas pump and sharing an apartment with some older lady who wanted no more than to have me sit and look through her hundreds and hundreds of photo albums and to wash her ten to twenty cats. I would be bored to death and scratched up to pieces but at least I would be alive. The job would have been a problem out in the cold but as I said at least I would have been alive. I had made it down in to Nevada when Dr. Sunder found me.
A few minutes later I got up and walked a few more feet. I sat down on a plump of dirt and thought more about what had happened.
"You should have stayed with the family," A familiar voice said behind me," I can tell that the family lives close by. How else would you have gotten out here?"
When I turned around I saw that Sunder stood behind me, his lab coat flapping in the small breeze really adding to the villain effect. It seemed to be too nice a day for him to be out in the open without shriveling up.
"Stand up!” Sunder said forcefully grabbing me by the hair and pulling me to my feet," Now I can have my way with you."
"You know you already tried this once and miserably failed. So why do you want to try this again?" I inquire.
"Shut up!" he screeched punctuating his sentence with a hearty slap to my face. My face stung as I reeled back. But not very far because Sunder still had a grip on my hair. I held my head where it was pounding from his grip.
"Go forward!" Sunder commanded. Not wanting my scalp to be wrenched from my head I listened and started walking to wherever he was directing me. We went through a small creek that must be mountain run off because it was really cold. We walked several more yards when he stopped abruptly and pulled at my collar to where I ended up on my butt on the ground. Sunder walked forward and kicked a rock.
A couple feet away a hillside in caved leaving a gaping hole. Sunder came back to me and roughly pulled me back to my feet. He shoved me forward toward the hole. I walked forward and noticed that there were steps that lead down deeper into the ground. I walked forward and headed down in to the dark abyss.
When we got to the bottom I recognized that the lab was exactly like the one I had been held in before. Sunder lead me down another hallway he opened a steel door with a palm print scanner and escorted me inside. There were seven cells around the room. Above the first one was a plaque that said 'Death Row'. Sunder unlocked the door with an old fashion key and pushed me inside.
He smiled as he locked the door behind me. I ran the couple of steps to the cell bars and looked out as he walked out the heavy metal door. Once the door closed I heard the click of the mechanical lock. That's when I realized that today just might be my last.
I sat in the cell for what seemed to be days. I knew that it wasn't or else the family would have found me by now. I wondered if Sunder had the decency to feed and water his prisoners or if he was cruel enough to let them starve to death or die of dehydration. I wondered exactly what Sunder was doing right about now. In the past few hours I've learned that Sunder doesn't work alone.
He has goons that handle his dirty work. There were at least three that were making sure that I didn't escape and probably a few more outside. I don't know what these guys suspected me to do. But they had me locked up pretty tight along with guards making sure that I didn't get out or that nobody got in. I wasn't sure if I should be worried, scared, excited
, or intimated. The guards all joked in rotating shifts about my death. They heard of my last escape but were positive that I wasn’t going to escape the fate again.
It must have been a few hours later because I fell asleep. I woke up to the sound of my cell door opening.
"You know there is a reason that the plaque on your door says death row," One of the guards sneers grabbing me roughly. He towed me out of the cell and brings me out in to the open lab. I stood in the middle of the floor with my hands chained together above me.
"Did you know that as a child I wanted to be a medical doctor?" Sunder asks," I didn't make it that far but I know how long it takes someone to die of suffocation, Drowning, fires, bleeding, bodily damage, and illness. Now I would like to pass some of that knowledge to you, of course there is no better way than hands on experience". One of his goons gave him a remote. Sunder pressed a button on the remote and the chains picked me up of the ground. My wrists screamed with pain from the stretch of the pulley and my weight pulling opposite directions. He pushed another button and a trapdoor in the floor opened.
"For some strange reason I've always felt a connection with water so we will start