It was always at times when we aspired most to oblivion that it was refused to us. I couldn't have been unconscious for more than five minutes when the notorious John took me out of my little nap to heal my knee. The good news was that my loss of consciousness must have reinforced his belief that I was still under the influence of drugs. The "care" he gave me was hasty and minimal. He simply disinfected the wound and applied a compress to it, which he held with plaster.

Once he was gone, I finally dared to open my eyes and try to determine where I was. I was on the concrete floor of a small square room with no windows. Everything was uniformly grey, from the floor to the ceiling, without anything of any significance. No furniture or posters or anything else. I closed my eyelids with weariness. Just this little effort cost me what little energy I had left. Their sedative may not have had the desired effect, but it still drained me of my strength. Unless it's the little torture session, both physical and psychological.

Nevertheless, I hoped that they would soon come looking for me, because this position was becoming more and more unbearable and I didn't think I would be able to continue simulating sleep for very long. Especially since I was half-naked, reinforcing my feeling of vulnerability and my almost visceral desire to do something, rather than to remain there, helpless, at the mercy of others.

I tried not to think about all the horrors that might await me later and focused on Jude... now my only hope. I felt much less stupid now and I hoped with all my heart that he had played it safe and had not relied solely on Worth's equipment. If that was the case, I was really in trouble and totally alone. Given their organization and contacts in the police, I would never be found.

The problem was that we were so shocked by the inspector's revelation that we didn't talk about it again. So I didn't even know if he could find me because of the blood I had ingested and, if so, if it was automatic or if I had to do something on my end. Having no idea how to do it, I started thinking about him and remembering his smell and the feelings I had when I was around him. I felt a very faint smell of wind and undergrowth, but so faint that I almost thought I had imagined it, unless it came from my skin. We had spent a lot of time together and I hadn't taken a real shower for two days. Then I felt a burst of rage, followed by a crushing feeling of helplessness, which gradually turned into hope and finally into a feeling of comfort that calmed the frantic beats of my heart and gave me hope again. It could only be him! He hadn't abandoned us and he was on my trail.

After long minutes, I was finally picked up. Two other men I guessed by their gait, for they did not say a word. One of them simply threw me on his shoulder like a bag of potatoes, before dropping me heavily, a few minutes later, on the crappy floor of an old pickup truck.

- 'Blindfold her, you never know,' one of the two men said with an unknown voice that confirmed I didn't know him.

- 'What's the point of all these precautions anyway? She's completely stunned like the others, and it's not like they're supposed to get through this.'

He still blindfolded me, before he sat down with his colleague in the front and started the vehicle. I managed to fall asleep despite the extreme discomfort of my position. Unable to see or perceive anything, the best thing to do was to try to recover some strength in the meantime.

I woke up at the sudden stop of the van. I was grabbed again without any consideration and we entered a building. After a journey that seemed quite long, I heard a door opening and then I was dropped rather than put on the ground. I heard a kind of little metallic noise and my feet suddenly found themselves free, quickly followed by my hands. It took a great effort of will on my part to let my arms fall gently and loosely on either side of my body without screaming in pain. Then the gag was removed and the blindfold was removed and the man left the room.

Despite the fact that there were certainly cameras filming my every move, I couldn't simulate sleep any longer. Even if they realized it, they had no way of determining how long it had been since I woke up, which was fairly safe for me. Moreover, I could no longer pretend any more. My limbs, tied up for too long, were cramped so violently that it almost looked like a seizure. I let myself feel the pain and screamed, hoping that the spasms would stop quickly. I knew it wouldn't make the suffering go away, but at least it allowed me to relieve some of the pressure.

When my cramps finally stopped and I had only temporary tremors, I sat down slowly and finally looked around me. Panic suddenly overwhelmed me and my breathing stopped. I was in a room that looked like a cell in a psychiatric facility. It was a small, clean, square room with no windows at all. However, a large mirror, which I knew to be a one-way mirror, adorned the middle of the left wall.

Strangely enough, what allowed me to get out of my nightmare was the lack of furniture in the room, except for a toilet and a small sink in a corner. Apparently, we weren't even worthy of a bed. When I was a child in a psychiatric hospital, I had spent enough time tied up on my bed to know that there was one. This thought ended my budding panic attack and I could breathe almost normally again.

When I saw my reflection in the mirror, I understood where my respiratory discomfort and chest pain came from. A huge bruise spread from a spot a little to the right of my left breast and stretched over almost half of my chest into a monochrome of black and purple of the most beautiful effect. The fact that this bruise was still so big after so much time despite my accelerated regenerative abilities meant that I had almost died.

Cassie! If they had mistaken her for me, and they had assaulted her in the same way, she was certainly dead by now! My God, please let her be alive and let me have a chance to rescue her... I approached the one-way mirror and stared at a spot in the distance as if I was trying to see through it, convinced that they were watching me.

- 'Who are you and what do you want with me?'

No answer.

- 'What have you done with my roommate?'

As silence for only answer, I frowned slightly and ended up sitting down, knees up against my chest, back to the wall holding the mirror and directly below it. Only spot where they couldn't see me, unless there was a camera hidden elsewhere in the room. This position, in addition to allowing me to warm up, made me feel less vulnerable. I was waiting for the light to go out to try to pick the lock on my door with the material hidden in the lining of my bra. Nevertheless, I eventually lost track of time, as if hypnotized by the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, which lit the room as if in broad daylight.

I felt like a trapped rat, a laboratory rat observed from every angle. I felt the anxiety attack coming back, my vision blurred and I started to hyperventilate. No, I was no longer an abandoned and frightened eight-year-old child. I was an adult who was there with full knowledge of the facts and with a mission to accomplish. There was no way I was giving up. I just had to grin and bear it and ended up lying in a fetal position on the icy ground. Tired, I finally fell asleep.

The sound of a key turning in the lock made me jump up and take refuge in the corner of the room furthest from the door. The latter opened and two men entered it. At first glance, it was easy to see that they were related.

The first was the archetype of the scientist: grey hair, white coat and glasses; and when he raised his head from his notebook, his eyes glued to mine. He had blue eyes as cold as a glacier and stared at me like a cat stared at a mouse. The second one had a nasty gaze and was obviously used as a bodyguard, he had a rifle pointed straight at me in his hands. His features were rough and the left side of his face was covered with a gorgeous bruise. It was that or his lewd smile, but I was already pretty sure of his identity before he even opened his mouth. The concupiscent look he gave me as he lingered heavily on my breasts confirmed that I was dealing with the sadistic lunatic from the warehouse. As for the other, he was more than likely one of the brains of this whole business and his protector. His uncle or his father, perhaps?

My first reaction was to hide my almost nudity as I could. As I was doing so, I came across the delighted gaze of the pervert who seemed to be enjoying the situation. No way I was giving him the satisfaction. I stood up straight, forcing myself to let my arms fall back on either side of my body and looked at them with all the confidence I felt... that is, not much. But I was hoping to at least delude them. The man in the blouse stuck his pad under his arm and took something from his pocket. I stiffened up, but it was just a phone.

- 'Come to subject 0025's cell with the equipment... Immediately!'

His voice was like the rest of his person: cold, impersonal and implacable. He took his notebook back and pretended I wasn't there. I knew I probably should have waited in silence for what was to come, but I couldn't. Now that I finally had the opportunity to get answers, it was impossible for me to remain silent.

- 'What do you want from me in the end? Why am I here?'

Total silence remained. The so-called professor didn't even deign to look at me.

- 'You can tell me, since I'm not supposed to get out of here alive.'

- 'You, you've talked too much again,' the man in the blouse said in a sinister voice as he turned to the man I now assumed to be his son.

The latter immediately looked down, but said nothing, although it was not through him that I learned this. Nevertheless, still no answer to my questions. He was just acting like I wasn't there. For someone who had gone to all this trouble to kidnap me, it was weird. I was about to open my mouth again, when the door opened again on a new man in a white coat holding a kind of black briefcase in his hand.

- 'Please practice.'

The man approached me and put his briefcase on the ground, which he opened. He took out all the necessary equipment for a blood test and I relaxed slightly. Considering where I was, it was in the logical course of events, and as long as they didn't inject me with anything, the risk was rather minimal. I still had an instinctive backward movement when he approached me with a cotton pad soaked in disinfectant.

- 'I advise you to relax if you don't want to taste the hard way,' the young man told me in a pleasant voice, while nodding at the sadist with a gun.

I nodded discreetly in return to let him know that I had understood and that I would let him come closer without making a fuss. He gently grabbed my right arm and put the rubber tourniquet over my elbow, then disinfected my skin before taking the blood sample. I began to worry on the fourth tube; aware of my growing agitation, he reassured me and told me that it was the last one. Finally, he removed the needle, removed the withers and disinfected the puncture wound once again, but without putting on the traditional bandage. He already knew that it would be useless on me; the injection had been so light that there was already no sign of it.

- 'Would it be possible to have at least one blanket? Not that I am excessively modest, but it is freezing in here,' I asked the young man gently, trying to keep a light tone so as not to show my embarrassment at being so in my underwear in front of three men whom I did not know.

Anyway, the goose bumps that appeared all over my body reinforced the effect of my words. He didn't answer me and just looked down with an embarrassed and slightly guilty look, as if he agreed with me but had no say in the matter. He put his equipment in his briefcase, which he put near the door, and then approached the man with glasses who handed him the clip holder. Once freed of it, the scientist then began to stare at me with a disturbing look, a bit like a bystander at the zoo, face to face with a particularly exotic animal. The pervert with the gun approached me and pointed his weapon even more ostensibly in my direction.

- 'I'm going to ask you some questions,' the young man said. 'It would be in your best interest to answer them.'

I felt like he was trying to intimidate me, but his heart wasn't in it. Why wasn't the big chief asking the questions? It was all getting weirder and weirder. He started by asking me about my age, weight, height, the kind of things that are very easy to get by hacking into my medical records. So I saw no reason to refuse to answer, which I did and eventually wrapped my arms around me to keep warm.

- 'Are you able to turn into an animal?'

Ah, we were finally getting down to business! But why were they asking me that? We had assumed that they knew about my "difference" and that it was for this reason that they were especially after me. But if we were wrong, how should I react? I remained undecided for so long that they had to believe that I didn't want to answer. Before I had time to anticipate, the gorilla grabbed his rifle by the barrel and hit me hard with the body of his gun behind my legs. I fell to my knees suddenly with a growl of pain and barely stopped my fall with my hands.

- 'Don't make us repeat the question again, Miss Jones. You wouldn't like the outcome,' Mr. Glasses threatened me in a icy voice.

That I believed! But what was I supposed to say? What did they expect in response? I was lost and I knew that what I was going to say would be decisive for the future. After a quick thought, I decided to deny it. After all, it was the truth, and I didn't feel strong enough to invent an elaborate lie.

- 'This is ridiculous! Of course not,' I said, shaking my head with a bewildered look, as if I thought this idea was completely crazy.

- 'Do you really think you're fooling us with your little mindless woodcock act?' the man in the glasses asked in a sweet, condescending voice. 'We know who you are and what you are, you and the other degenerates! Lying to us won't do you any good. You are all just mistakes of nature, which I intend to correct, and there is no way I'm going to let you get the police involved in my business. Yes, we are aware of it,' he added with a little dismissive laughter. 'We found the bug, microphone and equipment hidden in your clothes. Which you must have already suspected given your outfit! From now on, you're alone and no one will find you here. Nor you... nor the others.'

Then, with his reassuring words, he turned his back on me, not without looking at me with disgust first.

- 'However, I don't want to take any unnecessary risks. Go ahead. But don't aim for the chest this time, we still need her alive for a little while.'

As I realized what he had just said, I heard the sound of a detonation and felt a sharp pain in my right arm, then my eyes began to blur and my limbs let go. I found myself on the ground in a more than uncomfortable position and began to sink into the drug-induced unconsciousness.

***

I woke up worse than I had ever been. An abominable headache seized me, as well as terrible nausea and the feeling of having swallowed cardboard. I panicked for a moment, unable to feel my limbs, but I quickly realized that they were simply terribly numb. I gently rested my head, which I had instinctively lifted off the ground, and gently tried to open my eyes. Amazed, I realized that the light was finally off and the room was only lit by the dim light of a safety pilot light placed near the door. They were so sure of the effectiveness of their sleeping pill that they didn't think it was worth watching me. It was their first big mistake and, I was hoping, not their last. The problem was that I had no idea how long I had been out. I didn't think I was unconscious for very long, but I couldn't be sure of anything. The time I had left before they turned on the light again was more than uncertain.

I took advantage of my position to try and discreetly retrieve the hook kits hidden in my bra. I never thought I'd be so happy one day to be a 32B! Having a small breast had made it possible to hide two hook kits in the padding of my push-up bra, without anyone suspecting anything. Worth had insisted on hiding a manual kit and a kit for an electronic lock, so as not to leave anything up to chance. I had had a crash course for dummies, when I pointed out to him that his brilliant idea wouldn't be worth much if I didn't know how to use the equipment.

It quickly became clear that it was better for everyone, and especially for me at first, if I came across an electronic lock, because let's be clear, I had no future as a burglar. But of course with my legendary luck, the lock on my cell was manual. All I had to do was pray that they had more faith in their sleeping pills than in their locks.

I spent at least ten minutes extracting the material from the padding, because of my completely numb fingers and the incoercible tremors running through my body. I had the unpleasant impression that their sleeping pill, although not having the expected soporific effect, was beginning to have more and more harmful consequences on my health with each additional dose that I was injected. I didn't even try to get up, knowing full well that my legs wouldn't carry me for the moment, and instead started crawling as quietly as possible towards the door.

Once I reached my destination, I climbed as best I could on my knees and stuck myself to the wall so as to be as invisible as possible. Finally properly settled, I tried to pick the lock. "Tried" was the key word. I had just started, when rushed and panicked voices were heard in the hallway. The adrenaline gave me wings and I found myself in my initial place, loose on the ground, in less than a few seconds. I waited short of breath and my heart pounding, but no one came to see me. When the last footsteps noises had ceased, I waited at least ten minutes and ventured again near the door to try my luck again.

I was forced to stop after only a few minutes, overwhelmed by the cramps and nausea that were more and more numerous and frequent. Sweat was running down my back and eyes, and my shivers were only getting worse. So I stopped until my body was able to allow me to try again. I finally succeeded at the end of the third attempt, before letting myself slide to the ground, crying with relief, both physical and psychological. Then I allowed myself a little extra break before trying to stand up.

Once I was more or less upright, I tried to move to the sink in order to test my legs, but also to quench my thirst, which made me feel better right away and reminded me of the basics. Removing the residues of this substance would help my body recover faster, in theory! This was true for anaesthesia, I was hoping the same would be true here. It couldn't hurt to try anyway, I thought to myself, making a short stop to the toilet, which I hadn't been able to do until now with the light on, and then drank from the tap again. The impact was almost immediate. I was not yet very strong, but at least I was standing upright and without shaking.

So I walked back to the door with a thousand and certainly useless precautions, because if they had suspected something they would have already been there. I opened it slightly and took a look outside. The odds were finally in my favor! The corridor was in the same semi-darkness as my cell and, as little as I could see, there was no camera in the immediate area. The thought of it being a trap crossed my mind for a moment. All this seemed too simple to be honest, but then, to what end? Anyway, trap or no trap, I had no choice. So I opened the door and went into the hallway.