| PART 2 Sydney lay on the bed....her mind felt as though it had gone blank. There was so much going through it, that now, it seemed to have just stopped working. The clock on the wall ticked second after second, and after listening to it for hours, it now felt as though each tick was a blow to Sydney�s head. The light ticking had turned to poundings in her mind. She forced herself to break away from her focus on the monotony. Time ticked by....second after second....minute after minute...hour after hour.... Finally, the bright light turned back to the darkness once again outside the window. With the darkness, came an odd comfort for Sydney. Almost as if she belonged in the darkness....as if that was where she belonged, cloaked by darkness. After all....it was what she thrived in...her missions, her life....the lies....it was all done by the cover of darkness. Darkness was to be her guard once more. Sydney was going to get out. She had to. She once again looked about the room. But, there was nothing of use. Finally, she figured she would have to be her own way of escape. She tried to force her hand through the cuff, but the shape of the human hand prevents such an escape, as the lower bone of the thumb near the wrist naturally stuck out, preventing the hand from going through, and so it only drew blood. She looked up to her left hand and closed her eyes for several moments. Her hand was cuffed to the bedpost. There was a thick strip of wood however connecting the top of the two posts with desgin all in between. Sydney reached her thumb up behind the wood, leaving her fingers in front as if she was trying to leave her thumbprint on the back of the board. She took a deep breath, and turned her head away. Then, she shoved her hand forward in a quick, fierce motion. The snap rang loud to her ears. She gritted her teeth to avoid yelling. Her eyes got large and she breathed quickly and heavily trying to overcome the pain. She panted for a few moments, then looked back up at her hand. She then began to pull her hand downward, trying once again to slide it through the small opening that was encasing her wrist. Now, her limp thumb was pushed inward towards her palm, farther than she had been able to bend it before. She had felt the bone shift easily inward...the pain nearly unbearable as she pulled hard. With less resistance now because the bone had been broken in an effort to shrinkin the width preventing escape, her hand finally slid out as her eyes watered from the pain. Once her hand was out, she held it at her stomach for an instant, trying to recover from the horrible pain she had inflicted upon herself. She now realized she probably didn�t have much time, so she rolled off the bed and stood, her right hand still cuffed to the post. She looked around frantically, and opened the drawer to the desk on that side of the bed. Inside there was a Bible and a pen. Sydney looked at the pen. She reached down and picked it up with her first two fingers, since her thumb was now useless. She put the end in her mouth and tried to hold on tight with her two fingers and turned it hard, finally unscrewing it after much trouble. She spit the cover out onto the bed and pulled out the ink section with her mouth and threw the rest down. She took that section out of her mouth next and positioned it as best she could within her fingers. She kneeled on the bed and struggled for more than a minute, struggling frantically to pick the lock with the tip of the pen. �Come on...come on...� She whispered, a look of aggrivation, desperation, and determination on her face. Finally she felt a click inside the lock and it unhooked from itself. She pulled her hand out and shook it from the slight burn of her raw wrist. She paused for an instant and listened, looking at the door. She heard nothing but the slight foreign mumblings of a conversation between the two guards outside the room. She then decided to move. She turned to the window and tried to pull it open. It was locked. So, she quickly unlockked the hatch and pulled. It was old, and stuck slightly, but her desperation made her strength highten and it finally lifted. When she did, she smelt the smell of the ocean somewhere near. She looked down. She was three stories up form the hard ground. She tured back and looked at the door once more, and decided it was her only way out. She climed over the ledge. As she climed out, she tried to gain footing on the decorative rock trim along the wall, in between the window she was hanging from and one a few feet below. The part she placed her foot on suddely shattered beneath her weight, and she nearly fell, unable to hold on very well because only one of her hands provided full use. Finally, she found a small section that could slightly support her. She looked down. She was still at least twenty feet up. She then looked up and through the window she held onto still and knew she had to try. She leaned into the wall as much as she could and let go. As she slid quickly she tried to grab for the decor her foot had been resting on, but her hands couldn�t grasp it. Her hand did catch the next window spot and she dangled yet again, though this time she was closer to the ground. Sydney let go and tried to land as best she could, rolling when she hit the ground. She twisted her ankle slightly and jarred her body from the impact, but she had no time to think about it. She heard voices from above, clearly the sound of the guards discovering she was gone. She cursed silently and began to run. The yells of the guards followed close behind. They knew she was running...and they were now chasing her. She ran as fast as her legs could carry her. She could almost feel the ocean closer and closer....she wondered where she was....where she was running to.... It was a wooded area, so how could it be near an ocean? She put the thought out of her head. A bullet hissed by, merely inches from her head. Sydney immediately hit the ground. She crawled under a fallen tree with a ditch under it. She waited. It only took approximately ten seconds before they were there. She held her breathe as the men silently examined the area, guns aimed and ready. Seconds passed slowly as Sydney waited...she knew that one now apprached her. The guard stopped just under a foot short of the fallen tree. He stood still for a moment before he brought one foot up and onto the tree. He prepared himself, pointed the gun down, and slowly stepped up onto the tree, gun aimed downward....he knew she was there. The gunfire sounded loudly as the gun flew from its holder. Sydney had jumped up and knocked the gun out of his hands before he had a chance to see her and fire. After knocking the gun away, she quickly punched him in the face. He fell back, off of the tree. He stumbled back, but came towrads her again. Sydney used the tree to get a stepping leap into the air, her leg extended. Her foot struck him square in the chest, and he hit to the ground and remained there, the air having been knocked out of him. Sydney ducked as another shot rang out, a second guard was several feet away and armed, so hand to hand was out of the question. She dove to the ground and grabbed the gun and rolled over as she did, aiming. She shot the guard in the chest before he could get another shot off. She continued to shoot after he fell, she shot into the darkness as she heard close footsteps. Those steps fired back. Sydney turned and ran for her life once more. Suddenly, the ground wasn�t in front of her. She felt herself falling for an instant before hitting dirt, rolling a few times, and sliding roughly down a slope. The gun escaped her hands during this struggle. Her feet hit water and her body followed, she reached around and dug her hands into the dirt, pulling her soaked body to the edge of the land. Talk about a drop-off. She turned her head while she hung on, taking in her surroundings. She was on an some kind of an island. And, in front of her was about two hundred yards of water....but up ahead, there was light. It was the light from the skyline and from....the Sydney opera house. She was in Australia, New South Wales...Sydney to be exact. How ironic. She breathed heavily in shock. Then she heard the guard�s voices. She looked around and about twenty yards to her left was a long dock with a small speed boat at the end. She heard the voices coming closer, so she let go of the edge and began to swim for the dock. She was nearly there when a bullet struck the water a few feet from her. She ducked under the water and continued to swim underwater. Finally, she reached her destination and came up on the other side of the dock. She gulped for air. She heard the men yell in Russian to get to the dock. She barely managed to pull her exhausted body up and onto the dock. Once there, she forced herself up and ran towards the end. The bullets fired again and she lept down into the boat and out of the line of fire. The gunfire stopped and three guards started to run down the dock towards her. She looked around in the boat. Finally, realizing there was no key, she kicked the panel beneath the wheel and yanked it off. Once off she fuddle ith the wires, praying that they water on her hands wouldn�t be the death of her. She started stricking two wires together, beathing hevaily and panicked. The men were almost there. Finally, the boat�s engine started and she turned the wheel hard to the left. Slowly it began to pull away from the dock. It was about a yard away, when one of the guards jumped into the boat from the dock behind her. She turned, saw him, and kicked back at him, knocking the gun from his hand into the water. She kicked again, this time hitting him in the stomach. He stumbled back but didn�t fall. He struck her hard in the face. She came back and backhanded him fiercely. He fell to the floor of the boat. He looked at her angrily, jumped back up and charged towards her kicking forward. She spun into him, dodging the kick and let her elbow him him in the face. As his neck popped back, Sydney stepped back and kicked with all her might. He flew back slightly, just enough to cause his lower half to strike the side of the boat, thus causing him to flip over and out of the boat. She then turned back and faced the front. She saw the boat was merely yards from the land mass the opera house sat on. She grabbed the wheel and yanked it hard and quick. The boat slid by it, sending water up onto land, barely escaping a horrible accident. She breathed again and blinked several times, panting....she turned around and looked back towards the island. She saw Irina and two guards watching from the dock....she had escaped. She now directed her attention back to driving the boat to safety. Back at the dock, her mother spoke to her men in Russian. �Let her go....she will return. For him.� She replied quietly and turned and walked away. The moonlight gleamed over the gentle waves of the water as Sydney sped away. ~~~~~~~~ Deep down in the building, down below the rooms and the kitchen....in a dark, damp room a large guard sat slumped in a wooden chair with a gun in his hand. He pulled the cigarette from his mouth for an instant and let the smoke escape his lips. He stared at the unconscious man who lay bleeding on the cold floor in front of him. |
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