Night Closes In

Chapter Four

Chapter Four

Nancy

“It was the cold that woke me, a deep chill that made my bones ache. Thinking that I was still in the back seat of my car, I began to feel around for my blanket, and discovered only a rough mattress under my palm. My eyes flew open, then squinted against the harsh light of the bare bulb on the ceiling.

I was naked.

I sat up swiftly to take stock of my situation, not panicking yet, just confused. I remembered then, bits and pieces anyway; the friendly cop, hot chocolate, the rain. As I moved, I became aware of a rattling sound behind me and a sudden pressure against my throat. It was cold, like the claw of death throttling me. My hands flew up defensively to resist his grasp and I discovered that an iron collar had been locked around my neck. It was anchored to a ring on the wall with six feet of heavy chain.

Securing me this way, I quickly realized, was unnecessary. I was in a concrete cell with no windows and one steel door. The door had no knob, only a raised brass plate with a keyway. It was a double lock. Without a key, no one could come or go through it. There was a window in the door, barred except for an open slot at the bottom and a shelf where the sill should be.

There was a bell shaped object mounted on a box above the door. It looked like a bullhorn. Cameras stared down at me from the corners of the ceiling, tiny red lights flickering below them told me that I was being observed.

There was a round hole in the floor. Crawling off my mattress until the chain grew taut, I investigated. It was the opening to a large drain pipe that smelled of sewer gas. I didn’t need much imagination to figure out what it was for. Desperate with need, I turned my back to the cameras and used it. I looked over at the filthy mattress, then down at the hole in the floor, and over at the garden hose coiled around a hook on the wall. I was thinking Bed, bath.

And beyond? There was only darkness visible through the window in the door. I became aware of my raging thirst and crawled toward the hose. The chain linked to my collar allowed me just enough slack to reach the valve and turn it. The hose end was bullet shaped with perforations along the sides. When I turned the valve, water sprayed out of the end in a wide spray. The only way to drink from it was to take the bullet deep into my mouth and suck. I was too thirsty to care where it might have been before.

The first response to loss is disbelief, and I had every reason to doubt the most obvious conclusion. The cop had been nice to me. I hadn’t done anything wrong. It had been entirely reasonable to expect him to keep his word and send me on my way in the morning. He had even shared his hot chocolate with me, but the evidence of his real intentions was clear. I had been drugged, stripped naked, and chained like an animal. Rape was implicit in my condition, with perhaps worse things to follow.

I had no way of even knowing where I was. I had crossed two State lines during my last day of driving, and could no longer be sure what State I was in when I pulled over to sleep. How long had I been unconscious? During a night of driving, I could have been transported hundreds of miles. If I had been loaded aboard a plane and taken by air, it could be thousands.

The second response to loss is anger. Unsteadily, I rose to my feet and clenched my fists at my sides. ‘It isn’t funny anymore!’ I shouted in the general direction of the nearest camera.

I waited and listened for a long time. Then I screamed for help as loudly as I could. When I paused for air, I heard a soft female voice coming to me through a small louvered grill in the wall. It was a covered opening for a ventilation shaft that was too small to crawl through. The cover was too well secured to be removed with anything short of power tools, though I suspect that many desperate girls had bloodied their fingers trying. The voice spoke in an urgent whisper. ‘Be quiet! You will only make them mad.’ I realized that there were other cells beside mine, and that they were occupied. Were the cells filled with other girls like me, naked and terrified?

Then I heard the footsteps, faint and far away, but rapidly growing louder, like someone descending iron stairs in heavy boots; several men, judging from the uneven commingling of their steps. Suddenly terrified, I drew back until my ass touched the rough chill of the concrete wall. There was no possibility of escape or protection from what was coming for me.

The corridor beyond my cell was dark, but I became aware of shadows moving silently out there, the silhouettes of several silent figures peering in at me.

“Hands at your sides.’ A voice barked at me through the bullhorn. The voice had been electronically altered to make it impossibly deep and sonorous.

I had unconsciously been shielding my crotch with folded hands. Trembling I dropped my hands to my sides. Then my anger flared again, and I deliberately thrust one hand back over my crotch and folded my other arm across my chest to cover my breasts.

The spectral voice chuckled. ‘We have another rebel. It doesn’t matter. We will teach her obedience eventually.”

A sudden jolt of pain stabbed into me. I cried out and dropped to my knees. Dazed, I realized that the source of my pain had been the collar, a small burst of electric current had attacked my body. I was being tortured by remote control.

Gasping air into my lungs, I gathered my strength and courage. ‘I have the right to call a lawyer!”

The first shock had been a mere warning. The second was much stronger. I screamed and writhed on the mattress until the pain subsided. I was allowed a few moments to rest and reflect while my breathing returned to normal.

The voice was angry now, impatient, Zeus threatening to call down the lightening. ‘Stand up!”

In that moment, I learned what political prisoners and slaves have learned throughout history. Human rights are meaningless where they are not recognized, and all self -respect is quickly sacrificed to avoid pain. I was bargaining.

My chain rattled as I leaped to my feet. ‘Hands behind your neck. Spread your legs. ‘ Tears burned in my eyes as I obeyed the unseen voice. Blinding light flared briefly from the overhead cameras as they clicked and whirred. I had been photographed.

“Turn around. Bend forward, farther forward.’ My head touched the wall. ‘Reach back and spread your cheeks.’ Sobbing, I exposed my most private parts to the dim figures standing beyond the door, the soulless cameras recording me.

“She looks tight,’ murmured a male voice in the hall.

“We’ll fix that.’ Someone murmured in reply.

Another flash of light projected my silhouette on the wall before me, head low, elbows wide apart, like a bird taking flight.”