Still blinded by the sack over her head, Sarah twisted her body around when the sliding door whisked closed behind them. Mildly startled, she wanted to kick herself. She should have known it was a door opening when the hydraulics hissed a moment ago. After the air hissed a second time, a rhythmic chime pinged like someone drumming a xylophone. Sarah considered the sound as it played out. The pings rose in pitch, reminding her of an elevator door at the Next Gen building, which confirmed her mounting suspicions. She had visited the corporation once with the admiral and Wolf, before Arcturus. Next Gen supplied the robots that assisted with the assembly of the space station. This site was not under the skyscraper near Times Square, but tunnels could connect both locations.
The web of interconnected accomplices grew more complex in Sarah's mind.
Guided by Wolf, Sarah's feet scuffed across the dark rubber floor. She was unsure of where her next step would take her, since the bag limited her vision beyond her immediate surroundings. If he hadn't bound her hands behind her back, she'd use her fingertips to feel for walls on each side, which would reveal whether they were traversing a long hallway or an open room. Even that limited information would help build a picture in her mind of what she was dealing with.
They walked twenty paces where another door opened to the right with a hiss, and they entered a side room. It was driving her crazy. Where was she?
Sarah exhaled and sighed. The journey with the bag over her head brought back vivid memories from over sixty years ago when a man took Jake and his close friend, Tony Cruze, away to die, and the lead assassin took her away separately aboard an ice breaker ship to be held captive. Her then future husband and his friend escaped that day, and so did Sarah eventually, but not before a madman injected her with the serum that started her down the path toward the dark road of immortality.
"There's a chair behind you," Wolf said. "You can sit."
When she failed to move, his hands wrapped around the soft bends of her arms. She flinched from the way his fingers glided over her skin, chill bumps rushing across her forearms. The back of her legs bumped the edge of the seat, and Wolf nudged her into the chair.
"It wasn't a suggestion," he said.
Beneath her feet, the floor vibrated, and she detected a slight feeling of movement. Seconds ticked by and then the sensation all but disappeared. They were on a transportation vehicle, but it surprised Sarah how smoothly it operated.
To her right, inches from her ear, something sounded like a flexible material zipping over metal. A moment later, Wolf stood behind her, running a strap between her wrists, over her bonds, tugging the strip of material tighter, fastening her to the back of the chair with a final jerk and latch.
"You didn't have to be so rough," Sarah said.
"Sorry. I just have to make sure you won't go anywhere."
Wolf ripped the sack off her head.
Out of reflex, Sarah wrenched away. She twisted and pulled to free her arms, but it was to no avail. Even worse, her wrists stung the more she struggled, a flat wire digging into her skin.
Wolf's dimpled chin greeted her with a testy grin. He sat in a chair across from her, his nose red and swollen, possibly broken, but it didn't seem to bother him much.
Sarah lurched toward him, intending to strike out at him, but her bonds held her in the chair like a dog on a chain.
"I had a hunch you'd lunge at me at some point," he said. "You can relax. You're not going anywhere."
"You seem sure of yourself."
"You know... you lost a few trust points with that act of aggression."
Sarah puckered her lips into an irritated snarl, contemplating a snarky comeback, but thought better of it. Instead, she turned her focus to the room she was in. As she took in her surroundings, the more she looked around, the more confused she became.
The room, or to be more precise, the small cabin with a narrow metal door offered a view of a city scape through a pair of windows. In the background, the setting sun painted streaks of wispy clouds in a hue of reddish orange, the surroundings appearing unfamiliar as they passed by in what had to be a train. Again, Sarah felt little movement. If they were on a train, it glided like it floated on air. Outside the windows, framed by a cluster of skyscrapers, the tallest building pierced the sky with a tapered crest like a surgeon's scalpel. A mountain wrapped the city in a tight embrace with evergreen trees at the base, turning rocky at the summit. Snow wasn't glistening on the treetops. However, an image formed in Sarah's mind of the landscape blanketed from the occasional winter storm, leading her to assume that white precipitation frequented the locale.
But they were just in New York, and it should only be an hour or two after midnight at the latest. Were they in another time zone? Had they teleported to another location? Not that teleportation was possible. At least she didn't think it was. Or was something else at play here?
"So, we were in an underground terminal, and now," Sarah said. "I don't get it. We were just in New York. Where are we now?"
"That's not important." Wolf leaned back in his chair and tapped a finger on his temple. "What I keep thinking about is the fact that there's not a cut over your brow anymore. It's remarkable how fast you heal."
"Where are we? And how did we get here so fast?"
"You were out for two hours once I got you tucked away in the hover car. We were outside of New York State by the time you woke up."
"But that would make it closer to sunrise, not sundown. It was still dark when we entered that old building."
"You know, I didn't appreciate you stabbing me with the dart. Lucky for me, most of the tranquilizer had already drained from the tip before you plunged it into my neck. That hurt, by the way. Of course, you weren't so fortunate."
Sarah crooked her neck forward, as far as she could, seeing she was bound to a chair. "Untie my hands. I'd love to give you a proper apology."
Wolf squinted and snorted. A thin smile surfaced. "I don't know whether to feel scorn or flattery. But with the way you swing that roundhouse kick, I think I'll keep the zip tie in place, thank you. At least until my nose heals."
"Why can't you leave me alone? I didn't ask for any of this."
He cracked his neck and leaned forward in his chair. "This is the real world, Sarah. There are powerful people who want what you possess."
"That's where you're wrong."
"About what?"
"It possesses me." She stared at him in silence for a long, ominous moment, her eyes darkening with the brewing pressure of a storm system, threatening to squeeze the life out of Wolf with her gaze.
As the seconds pressed on, Sarah grew exhausted from the frustration clouding her mind. She didn't care about trust points. She wanted to choke him to death. Well, maybe not to death, but close to it. Seriously, who did Wolf think he was? He had no right to hold her against her will, but she knew he didn't care about her rights.
Sarah pried her eyes, one iris at a time, away from Wolf, choosing to take in the cabin's interior. The walls curved into the ceiling, creating a cylinder-shaped canopy over their heads—the rest of the room—clean lines of two-toned metal walls, black and silver, surrounding a contemporary luxury suite.
A nice train for government employees.
Sarah studied Wolf with suspicion. "Next Gen provides all the hardware for this operation, don't they?"
"That's none of your business. Besides, I know what you're trying to do. You're trying to learn more about your enemy, trying to get me to tell you something classified."
"Maybe?"
"I'm not your enemy, Sarah."
"Who are you anyway? I mean, I know you're the admiral's henchman. I've seen you on Arcturus following him around like a watchdog. I know you're the one who's hunted me all these years, and you go by Wolf, but who are you really? I'd like to stop thinking of you as simply the monster, or the idiot who took two decades to catch me."
He clinched his jaw. Ground his teeth. "My name is Wolf. That's it. No mystery."
"You're serious?" Sarah smirked.
"I know what you're trying to do." His nostrils flared and his upper lip curled up on one side like he was about to growl.
In the past, she would've chuckled, but not now. She couldn't find the desire to smile or laugh anymore. It seemed foreign. "Now, I see why they call you Wolf."
"You don't have a clue."
Sarah focused on his eyes, beyond the irises, to the black pupils. Everyone had dark pupils, but his seemed like two black holes draining all the light from the cabin. She knew firsthand he was capable of ruthlessness.
"So, what's your real name?"
He grimaced, blinked, breathing through his nose, wagging his head. Then he glared at her, possibly pondering her question. Maybe he would give her an answer, but gradually, his countenance brightened from hostile to somber. "You hungry?"
"What?"
"I'm famished." He shrugged and rose from the chair. "Think I'll make a run up to the dining car. I'll bring you back something, and if you've been good while I'm gone, I'll let you eat it."
Uncertainty clouded Sarah's thoughts as Wolf tucked the dart gun behind his back, slipped into his trench coat, opened the door, and left. Before the door closed, her brain went to work, analyzing the room for avenues of escape.
She waited a solid minute after Wolf left the cabin. At any second, she half expected him to poke his head in the door to catch her trying to escape. Once it became clear she had nothing to fear, she took a deep, calming breath and set her sights on getting free. Knowing he bound her hands with a zip tie gave her hope. A zip tie was made of strong plastic, but plastic, nonetheless. That meant she could break it or saw through it. The only problem with her line of thought, there was nothing in the cabin to use as a knife. There was nothing she could lay her eyes on, anyway. No tools or silverware of any kind. Nothing.
To her left, a plush couch with beige cushions occupied the space under the windows. Wolf's swivel chair was attached to the floor next to a sink underset with a stainless-steel cabinet. A trash can stood near the door. And then there was her reclining chair. Her options were few, but she had to get started as soon as possible.
Behind her back, the strap grazed against the inside of her wrists, the one that looped over the zip tie and ran between her arms. The mystery strap secured her to the chair. But she pegged Wolf the moment she heard the unleashing of leather from his blue jeans. He wasn't wearing a belt anymore.
With her wrists, Sarah applied pressure against the zip tie, attempting to stretch the plastic and test its elasticity. She got nowhere with her efforts but driven by frustration and a raw edge of determination, she tried even harder until the edge of the tie cut into her skin, wetting her bonds with a warm liquid. She was not superhuman. She bled the same as anyone.
Her next option was the cabinet beneath the sink.
Sarah slid down in her chair, careful not to bend her arms too far behind her back. She was not double-jointed, but she was resilient. She stretched to reach the doors with her feet. Unfortunately, the tip of her toe could only paw at the inset handle, unable to get a grip in order to open the cabinet.
Desperate and not willing to give up, Sarah scooted up in the chair, ready to try again, but then, outside the windows, the train slowed to a crawl and came to a stop. The city had disappeared. Mountains dominated the landscape, thick with spruce trees. She shook her head, still clueless where they were.
Sarah turned to the belt, testing it for weaknesses. It was tight, but not immovable. Albeit difficult considering the position of her hands, she bent her wrists and gripped the leather with her fingers, barely able to use her thumbs. She closed her eyes, doing her best to visualize her handiwork with her mind. She tugged on the belt, feeding it, feeling it slide over the zip tie, moving it around the back of the chair.
She moved her fingers further down the leather, which was now slick with her blood, and continued, inch by inch, rotating the belt around the chair until it snagged on something. She pulled but got no progress. In response to this new obstacle, her breathing became labored. Her heart pattered against her chest. She assumed the buckle had caught on the bend of the chair.
Sarah groaned, sweat beading on her forehead from her heavy breaths and intense laboring. She couldn't help but talk to herself as she strained against her bonds. Each utterance burned hotter on her tongue as she ripped at the leather with what little leverage she could gain.
Finally, the recliner fabric gave way and tore as the buckle rounded the corner. With perspiration on her forehead, trickling down her temples and running over her brows into her eyes, Sarah reeled the belt through her fingers until she came across an outline of cold metal.
The buckle.
Her eyes burned with sweat as her fingers pulled the end of the belt from the loop.
Sarah frowned, grunted, and rose from the chair with an exasperated sigh. She was free, save for the zip tie.
Now with a sense of freedom, she backed up against the cabinet beneath the sink, squatted, and fingered open the door.
It was empty.
Geez.
Her eyes fell on the cabin door and its curved handle.
With renewed hope, Sarah went in reverse again, bumping her backside against the cold metal door, hooking the tie over the handle and using her body weight to apply pressure on the plastic. The zip tie sliced deeper into her skin but didn't budge. It didn't matter at this point. She kept forging on, flexing her wrists until the tie snapped. The old Sarah would have never tried to escape like this. She was weak then, but not anymore.
A glance around the cabin revealed blood everywhere, smeared along the floor, the cabinet handles, the recliner, and the main door. Sarah drummed her fingers on her soiled blue jeans. There was nothing clean about her getaway.
Hmm. She shrugged. Oh. The sink.
She bee-lined it, turned the cold knob, the water running over her wounds, blurring with crimson before disappearing down the drain. She dabbed paper towels from a dispenser on the leaky cuts, soaking up as much blood as possible.
Once she had staunched the flow for the time being, she turned her attention to the windows, and then to the door. If she chose the easy way, she'd risk bumping into Wolf on the way out. She shook her head, eyeing the mountains outside the train.
What would be heavy enough to break through the glass? It didn't take long to find a viable option. Using her abnormal strength, Sarah picked up the recliner and hoisted it above her head—and hurled it into the window—shattering the pane much easier than expected.
What? Really? She stared with a lack of emotion. Her hands fell to her sides, trickling blood, her head tilting, gawking at a solid black wall behind the window... and wires sparking zaps of electricity.
A metallic click sounded behind her.
Wolf stood in the doorway.
With a grunt, he tossed a covered plate of scrambled eggs, sausage links, and toast into the garbage can. Then he aimed the dart gun at Sarah. "I would so love to trank you right about now. Go ahead. Give me one more reason to pull the trigger."