seymoure

23.

She was lodged in cell that was unremarkable in every way. It could be in any building anywhere in the world. There was nothing to denote any location for this place.

She listened at the doorway, but no one outside the room was talking. There were just no clues to help her.

She sat on the cot that was to be her only place to rest. How long would the monster keep her here?

Would he have begun this siege if he planned it to take more than a day?

She raged within her heart. She who had been the strongest of her kind, one of the single most powerful beings on Earth, was a prisoner. Held here like a homeless drunk in a small town jail, totally and completely helpless.

“No, dammit,” She grumbled to herself. She would not be such. She would escape from this room, she would throw a wrench into this monsters plans and do it as a human woman. All the power she would need was in her head and her hands.

She suddenly remembered the day 3 year old Mickey got accidentally locked in the bathroom. It would be hours before her husband would be home from work, or David would be back from school.She might have waited it out if the boy hadn’t began to cry.

The sound was impossible to resist. She called a locksmith (this was long before they had any kind of 9-11 service) and told him she couldn’t last until they could come out and open the door. She cajoled the man into walking her through the process of picking the lock. It was something she would never forget.

She reached into her fanny pack, something you would have normally thought would be removed on her becoming a prisoner, but it was to arrogant an enemy that took her hostage.

From the recesses of the bag she withdrew a spiral bound notepad. Taking the binding wire loose she found the tool she needed.

While the door had a conventional lock, which was surprising to think it was within such a futuristic artifice. Perhaps this was not the interior of the flying saucer, but a building made to look like one.

The door opened as smoothly as butter, and Maria thought she might have made a good burglar if things had been different.

She peeked out the door and saw no one on either end of the hallway.

Out of her bag she took a metal pen, knowing, after taking a class in self defense from one of those “Take Back the Night” things, what a powerful weapon it could be. She imagined jabbing it into the throat or eye of her captor and caught herself just before she would have smiled.

In her other hand she held a wooden pencil, in case the first thing she encountered was one of the vampires.

She edged along the wall, to make sure no one could sneak up behind her.

She hoped her family was all right, and was committed to see them again.

She had no idea what was waiting around the next turn in the corridor.