The Lock

The Trek

When Lena came to, she didn't remember where she was.

"Shit!" She bolted upright. "I'm late for work!" But as she took in her surroundings, it became abundantly clear that work was the least of her worries.

She was on a cot in a white cloth tent. There was no floor, just bare ground. Iron shackles encapsulated both of her wrists; they were attached to chains which were, in turn, secured to stakes dug into the ground on either side of the cot.

Lena's eyes widened and her blood raced. She let out a blood-curdling scream.

"Help! Someone help me!"

Before long, the tent flap opened and a man hurried through. Lena's screams ceased as she took in his appearance. He was middle-aged, around forty she'd guess. Long strands of greasy, shoulder-length hair cascaded down his head. He was dressed in a patchwork of dirty rags and his face was coated with layers of dirt and grime. It was clear he hadn't bathed in some time.

He marched up to Lena, stared down at her for one long second, then stretched out his hand and brought it down on her cheek. The pain was fierce, but it almost paled in comparison to the onslaught on her nostrils; a putrid, rotten smell emanated from the unbathed man and Lena prayed he'd leave, or at least back up, so she wouldn't vomit.

"You keep quiet," the man snarled in a voice that was somehow both gravely and high-pitched.

"Who are you? Why are you doing this to me?"

The man stared at her. There was a hint of cruelty in his eyes, but mostly just cold indifference. The latter frightened Lena more than the former.

"Not one more peep, or you'll get much worse than the back of my hand."

Lena stared at him, trembling, but didn't dare open her mouth again for fear the man would honor his threat. He left, backing out of the tent slowly, not taking his cold, angry eyes off her until he had fully exited.

Lena's mind raced. She took a quick inventory of the facts: She'd been knocked out and kidnapped. And where was she? Chained up in a tent, located who-the-hell-knows-where, in another dimension. Or something. She didn't know exactly what was going on, but she knew one thing for sure: Unless she could escape, she was screwed.

She couldn't bring her hands together - the chains were too tight. She attempted to pull her right hand to meet the left, straining against the chain. Maybe if she pulled hard enough, she could pull the stake out of the ground and free herself. But it was no use: The shackle on her wrist began digging painfully into her flesh and she felt if she pulled any harder she'd bleed. Meanwhile, the stake hadn't budged an inch.

She felt defeated. She was trapped and at the mercy of a man who looked like he belonged on a sex offender registry. She would be killed here, or possibly even worse. She had to do something - but what could she do with her hands constricted?

She remembered the pepper spray in her purse. But where was her purse? It was no longer strapped around her neck. She looked around the tent and then spotted the purse, on top of a pile of knapsacks and cloths sitting in the corner. There was no way she could reach it ... it was useless.

Had the man emptied her pockets? Thankfully, there was enough slack in the chains for her to check.

She checked her right pocket first - and found her phone. Elated, she pulled it out. The battery was down to just seven percent. But it didn't matter anyway, because she had no service, which she supposed she should have expected, given that she was in another dimension. She powered down the phone and slid it back into her pocket.

In her left pocket were her keys, a granola bar, and a few crumpled-up receipts. She tore open the granola bar's packaging and held the exposed snack up as high as she could, then bent her head down to bite into it. It was awkward, but even so, she scarfed it down in seconds - she was ravenous. Then she turned her attention to her keys. For the most part, they were worthless. But the keychain itself could be her ticket to freedom.

Her mother had given her a self-defense keychain as a gift. It was shaped like the head of a cat; its ears came to sharp points, designed to penetrate the flesh of would-be attackers. The idea of doing so had always made Lena squirm - she would have favored the pepper spray, able to be sprayed from a distance, over the keychain, which required close proximity to her attacker - but circumstances were forcing her hand.

She quickly separated the keychain from the rest of her keys. She slid the keys back into her pocket, kept the keychain concealed in the palm of her hand, and waited.

As she sat, she strained her ears, listening for any hint of what was going on outside the tent. She could make out voices - at least two of them talking back and forth. In the background she heard the faint crackling of a fire. But she couldn't discern her precise location, or anything about the man - or men - who had taken her.

After what felt like nearly an hour, the flap of the tent rustled open and the man walked in, followed by another, as dirty as the first, but lacking any hair on his head. His baldness made him appear less greasy overall when compared to his companion. The first man withdrew a key from a small bag attached to his belt and approached Lena.

"Stay quiet and don't try anything or you'll get a fist to the face." He inserted the key into the shackle on her left wrist, then repeated the process with the one on the right.

Lena wasn't sure she could take on both men, even with her self-defense keychain. She had to wait for the right time - when she was alone with just one of them, or when they were distracted. If she screwed this up, she wouldn't get another chance to escape. As the man turned away for a moment to retrieve a bundle of rope, she slid the keychain into her back pocket. When the man turned back to her, he bound her hands together, then motioned for her to stand. She glared at him as she did so.

The man came around behind her and shoved her forward. "Walk," he said. She exited the tent and waited for the men to follow her out. She considered making a break for it, but they were undoubtedly more familiar with the terrain - it wouldn't take long for them to catch up to her.

The bald man walked past her, and the other man motioned for her to follow him. She fell in line behind him, the man with the stringy hair following on her heels.

The tent had been set up on the foothills of a small mountain, and the bald man was leading them up the mountainside. Lena couldn't begin to fathom why she had been kidnapped only to be escorted by her captors to the top of a mountain, but she suspected their motive wasn't to take her on a simple nature hike.

As they ascended, the trees and foliage thinned - as did the air. Lena found her asthma acting up, but she pushed on lest the asshole behind her take drastic measures to keep her motivated.

Forty minutes into the trek, her face was dripping with sweat, and her ability to wipe it away was hindered due to her bound wrists. Sweat stung her eyes, her breath came out in gasps and her calf muscles were on fire.

Suddenly, mopping the floor of the cafe didn't seem so bad.

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