Dragonet

Chapter Three

Light, shadow, layers of darkness slowly lifting. Within the basement room lay two bodies, one moved, the other was cold. Eyelids flickered, lips opened, memories awakened.

“Gonna be ah great trip baby, promise. My own newest design, cooked it up last night from my own brainstorm. Gonna make us rich, its wild stuff babe.”

Those words still echoed through the young women’s head as she woke. Echoed as if down long empty passages returning in varying levels of sound from whispers to stone shattering bellows. Every muscle of her body was sending pain messages and her mouth tasted like she’d been chewing aluminum foil. Barely opening her eyes she closed them quickly, for even what little light made its way into her employers basement was like an arc lamp burning through her brain.

Carefully she tried to move, but her limbs felt like leaden lumps. It was the last time she’d play helpless experimental captive with... with... She hunted for names, but even those last words were beginning to slip away in her pain. What was her employers name anyway? It wasn’t like she hadn’t been living with him for over half a year. She knew it as well as... as... Oh God, what was her name? Theresa, Theresa Mendez. Undercover officer for the narcotics squad. On deep assignment, yes, at least that hadn’t been lost to her.

“What’d you do to me” she croaked, her own voice sounding loud, alien in her ears. Sandpaper rasped her throat and even that minor effort to talk left her nearly exhausted. Her voice sounded higher, thinner. Helpless she could only wait until her body recovered, her mind spinning as she made every effort to remember last night. Events came in a slowly clearing haze, fragmentary. A party, not too many people. Lots of alcohol then people passing out, laying on sofas, pillows. Yet no faces. No names. Herself drunk, no, drugged. She hadn’t had that much because alcohol was something she hated. She had drunk a single small glass only because it was her cover. Then memories as he had helped her downstairs. Something about she was letting him play his Frankenstein game of chemicals and electricity.

Nothing else came to her bidding, even what had felt more dream than reality. Her eyes felt sand caked, absently she reached over to rub them. Lead filled arms seemed lighter, still the effort was almost more than she could manage. Sleep roughly fell from caked eyelids. Again opening her eyes, saw something on the floor in front of her, a shape, odd. Like nothing she’d seen before. Pulling her other hand towards her she lifted her head slightly, bringing what lay near her into better view.

Screams of horror soon filled the basement.