The walls around me seem to cave in, the corridor spanning in front of me stretching for miles. Sweat gathers on my neck, the drops racing down my back and drenching the bottom of my shirt. My hands cramp within the fake cuffs, and then it suddenly hits me.
They didn't put real cuffs on me.
They placed restraints on the others, their hands also bound behind their backs with tight force. The cuffs around my wrists looked real, but the lock holding the metal in place was busted out, the metal hanging freely in place.
The Patrolmen crowd around us in a tight rectangular formation, blocking us from the sight of those who watch in bewilderment. I avert my gaze to the ground, watching every step I take on the smoothed concrete floor, the steps of the Patrolmen never falling out of harmony.
My hair falls around my shoulders, hiding my pale, drained face from view. Tate is silent on the other side, no sounds or voices coming through the earpiece. I can't help but wonder what he's doing, part of me wanting him to rescue us...but how would that be possible? It's not. He has his own job, his own portion of the plan he must do when the time comes...he can't break free from that. No matter how much I want him to.
I lift my head for a moment, peering furtively over my shoulder to Quinn, who stares ahead with empty eyes, as if he were a robot with no emotions. Sam and Logan trail behind, the same look of desolation residing on their features.
The air is tense as they try to suppress their fear, but it radiates through their armor like a distasteful odor. The space is cold, a shiver running up my spine as the Patrolmen around us lead in silence. Part of my mind tells me to break free, to grab for the knife my eyes narrow on, but I know I would be killed in a matter of seconds.
Within minutes, the corridor ends with an elevator as the barrier. The Patrolmen who lead in front step in first, the ones behind pushing us past the threshold, remaining outside the elevator with their firearms loaded and pointed to our faces.
One man reaches for the wall of a thousand buttons, pressing down on the button that protrudes from the very top tier. Within seconds, the glass elevator doors close, the platform below us rising with speed as I watch the outside world below us grow smaller. The elevator is engulfed in transparent glass, the left, right, and back of the lift completely visible to the outside.
The sun outside sits just above the horizon, the sky illuminated in bright arrays of color. Far off in the distance, the rolling hills and extensively dense forest stand admirably, appearing untouched by all human commotion. One would never guess that beyond the beauty lies a civilization led by the iron fist of enmity.
My attention snaps to the front of the elevator as the platform halts, the thick glass doors sliding into the massive steel walls. At that moment, we are propelled out of the lift and into a large chamber. I immediately take in the aroma looming in the air, smelling like fresh oceans mixed with evergreen trees.
My eyes take in the space, a large window spanning the entire length of the room from left to right, reaching from the ground all the way to the ceiling. Two guards stand at opposite ends of the room, their hands wrapped around electrified spears, the taser at the end of the thick pole pointing to the ceiling that rises ten feet above them.
The space drowns in white, the entirety of the room spotless of all dirt and disarray. My eyes come to land on a desk made of bent glass, a single black chair turned with the back towards us, a perfect contrast in the space. I peer down to the floor beneath the chair, a pair of perfect black dress shoes glued there...waiting.
"We have the defectors, sir."
"Perfect, bring them in," the chair turns to face us, and my eyes dilate in infernal horror.
There...across the room stands the one man I longed to get away from for so long. There, across the room stands the man with cold eyes and a cold heart, my heart and stomach shattering into a million pieces inside me as our eyes meet.
"I've missed you, Madelynn," he says wickedly, a devilish grin plastered on his lips.
My throat clenches as I struggle to find air, the only word escaping my lips with a huff lingering in the space.
"William."