Soon, Robyn fell into a dreary routine. A day trapped in the bungalow for cardio, watching presumably inspirational movies that never failed to confound or depress her. Then a day of resistance training, chained to Torquemada's Bowflex, where Debbie would cattle prod her at the slightest indication that she was slacking off. In between, she worked on wedding arrangements, cried a lot, and got a great deal of sleep.

It was a dreadful existence. Yes, she was getting into shape. Her waistline had slimmed and while she wasn't yet ripped, the muscular scaffolding was there. The tight, form-fitting gym wear that had initially made her look like a stuffed sausage was a lot less lumpy.

But her incremental progress was cold comfort in the face of a seemingly endless cavalcade of pain and isolation. It was only a matter of time before she would snap again.

It was a strength training day. She was doing lat pulls, squeezing her shoulder blades together as Debbie had instructed, slowly pulling the steel bar to her upper chest. And she found herself once again, exhausted to the point of incapacity.

"That's it," Robyn wheezed. "I can't do any more."

At which point, Debbie cattle prodded her.

"God fucking damn it!" Robyn exploded, when she stopped convulsing. "Why do you keep doing that?"

"I'm trying to teach you something," Debbie said, matter-of-factly.

"What? That cattle prods fucking hurt? Lesson fucking learned!"

"No," Debbie responded. "I'm teaching you something about yourself." Robyn looked at Debbie, not having the slightest idea what she was talking about. "Over and over, you keep telling me that you're too tired, that just don't have it in you, that you can't." She had adopted a petulant tone that Robyn did not appreciate. "But over and over, I zap you, and guess what? It turns out that you can."

She gave Robyn a thoroughly self-satisfied look that made Robyn want to punch her in the face.

"What I want," continued Debbie, "is for you to understand how strong you really are. To be your own cattle prod."

"My own cattle prod?"

"It's a metaphor," Debbie explained and when Robyn didn't respond, she explained further. "For an actual cattle prod."

Robyn was no longer listening. She was experiencing a moment of clarity, an epiphany. Debbie, she realized, was absolutely right. Robyn was strong and she was capable of far more than she had given herself credit for.

So she resolved that from now on she would stop her whining and complaining. Instead, she would train with laser-like intensity. She would do everything she was told and she would give everything she had. She would shed fat, she would build muscle, she would get fit.

Then, when the time was right, she'd break out of this fucking lunatic asylum. And God help anyone who stood in her way.

"OK," Debbie said cheerfully. "You ready to work those triceps?"

"Yes," Robyn grinned. "Yes, I am."

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Brian was running down the strand in Hermosa Beach. At least that's how Brian would have described it. In truth, calling it "running" was rather grandiose. Even "jogging" qualified as mild overstatement. Basically, he was walking as fast as he could without spilling Peanut Butter Smoothie on his sleeveless gray T-shirt.

He stopped and looked out towards the ocean, barely visible through the early morning haze. He took an icy sip through an orange-colored straw, only dimly aware of the smoking hot, scantily-clad women who rollerbladed past him.

To be sure, there was no shortage of smoking hot, scantily-clad women rollerblading down the strand at Hermosa Beach. There were so many, in fact, that they eventually faded into the background. Blurred tits and midriffs and thighs. Libidinal white noise.

He took one more sip and resumed walking as another rollerblader came into view. This one caught his attention. A statuesque brunette, gliding effortlessly towards him. A pastel floral-printed halter top strained against ample breasts, and a matching bikini bottom from which sprouted two long, powerful, lissome legs.

When Brian managed to wrench his gaze away from her figure, he noticed her eyes. They were incredible, a luminous blue-green with gold flecks.

He was staring, unaware that he had spilled Peanut Butter Smoothie on himself.

The brunette caught Brian's eye and, embarrassed, he looked away. When he risked another glance at her, he saw that she was still looking at him, her head turning towards him as she passed by. Initially, he believed the look to be disgust, but then he realized that it was something else. Recognition.

Gracefully, she spun to a stop, her hands out to her sides for balance. "Brian!" she said happily. She bladed over to him.

This was weird. How could she possibly know his name? Either they had met before, which seemed wildly unlikely - how could have have forgotten meeting her? - or more plausibly, she was the world's sexiest psychic.

She saw his perplexed expression as he frantically searched his memory for her identity. "I'm Robyn's friend," she explained, but it didn't help. "Kendra."

This only amplified his confusion. "You're Kendra? But weren't you... I mean... were you always... this..." He struggled for an acceptable way to end that sentence. "...tall?" Kendra was five foot ten, but her previous orbicular dimensions, combined with a self-conscious slouch, had created an optical illusion of shortness.

Kendra laughed airily. "I've lost some weight."

"Jesus," Brian said. "Isn't that the understatement of the year? How... how did you..." He gestured at Kendra's body.

"Tenacity for Women," she said.

And that's when Brian remembered. Kendra was the one who recommended the program to Robyn. "Did you see Robyn while you were there?" he asked.

"We crossed paths, yeah," Kendra said, her gaze suddenly distant.

"It must be a really intense program," Brian said. "I don't hear from her a lot. And when I do, it's these weird email videos where she looks like she's been drugged or joined some sort of suicidal comet cult."

"No," said Kendra, her eyes focusing on Brian again. "Nothing like that." She thought for a moment, then revised her statement. "Well, it's something like that."

Brian became concerned. "What are you talking about?"

Kendra hesitated. How to portray her kidnapping, imprisonment and torture in a positive light? She didn't know, so she just told Brian the story of her experience. When she was done, Brian stood there in openmouthed astonishment.

Finally: "Why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you go to the police?"

"Because," she said, "how could I do that to them after all they did for me?"

Brian took in the perfect curves of Kendra's once-bloated body.

"So it was worth it?" She nodded. "And by the time they're done with Robyn, she'll look... like you?"

"More or less."

"Well," Brian said, "it's only another month."

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If this was a motivational movie - a real motivational movie, not one of the inexplicably depressing ones she watched in her room as she death-marched on her treadmill - here is where the stirring music would signal the beginning of a crowd-pleasing training montage. With great determination and fast-paced editing, the heroine would overcome the most daunting of obstacles, gaining strength and confidence. And at the end of three-and-a-half exhilarating minutes of screen time, she would triumphantly admire her freshly-sculpted body in a full-length mirror.

But in reality, that wasn't how it worked. For Robyn, every moment was pure torment and every day an unremitting Sisyphean hell. Time and again, her muscles shrieked in agony and her lungs threatened to burst out of her rib cage. It never got easier, it never became exhilarating, it just sucked ass.

Although she did wind up admiring herself in a full-length mirror. So that part, at least, was true. Her body was taut, her belly flat, her muscles defined. Physically, she was ready to escape.

Robyn's escape plan had three parts:

1. Running really fast towards the wall.

2. Climbing really fast over the wall.

3. Running really fast away from the wall.

Robyn wasn't an idiot. She was fully aware that this was the exact same plan that Kendra and Sharon had already tried, unsuccessfully. And she also knew that the staff of Tenacity was unlikely to be taken unaware yet again. But it wasn't like she was a U.S. Marine, trained in the art of escape and survival. She worked in the H.R. Department of Urban Outfitters, where they taught her a lot about their nondescrimination policy and conducting employee orientation seminars, but nothing about picking locks, fashioning her own weapons, or really anything that would be helpful in a prison break.

So Robyn had resolved to go over the wall. All she needed now was an opportunity. And when that opportunity came, she was so surprised, she almost didn't recognize it.

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