We follow up on Serena

A few hours later:

Serena struggled to open her eyes. Her head was killing her. There had been many instances over the previous few months where her unexplained headaches had become a problem. She also seemed to experience hours of missing time she couldn’t quite place. She’d tried to visit the campus doctor but they just told her that there was nothing wrong with her, which made her even more confused. This seemed to be one such headache. She tried to move her hands to rub her eyes but found herself unable to move them. As she got less groggy she realised that her hands and feet were bound to the wall of some sort of capsule she was held inside of.

The capsule was tall and cylindrical, the back wall padded but unyielding against her bare skin. Thick straps held her wrists at shoulder height, pulled slightly outward so her arms were spread. Her ankles were strapped wide at the base, forcing her legs apart. A broader strap crossed her waist, pinning her hips back against the wall. She was completely naked. The cool air inside moved over her skin, raising goosebumps across her stomach and making her nipples tighten. Her massive breasts rose and fell with each quick breath, heavy and exposed. She tried to pull her wrists free but the restraints didn’t give. The straps dug in. Panic started to rise in her chest.

How did she even get here? What the fuck was happening? The last thing she remembered was working on her laptop in her brother’s house when she had received a Skype call from a contact whose name she couldn’t quite make out. The name had been blurry on the screen, or maybe her eyes had lost focus. She remembered clicking accept. Then nothing. Just a blank space until this moment. She had been in Mason’s apartment. She remembered that much. The smell of pizza. His face. Beyond that, nothing.

She tried to speak but her throat was dry and weak. Only a small sound came out. She tried again to pull at the wrist straps. The capsule didn’t move. There was a glass shell in front of her, curved and clear. Through it she could see two men having an animated discussion in front of the cylindrical pod. One of the men looked sheepishly scared, younger, shifting his weight from foot to foot, eyes down. The other was grabbing his collar and yelling at him, face red, spit flying. The pod she was in seemed soundproof but the angry man was so loud that she could barely make out some of his words.

“….WHO SHE IS? She belongs to… he will kill… knew what almost happened to HIS PERSONAL ASSET!”

She belonged to someone? Were they talking about her? They couldn’t be. Serena didn’t have a boyfriend, did she? Her headache returned with a vengeance as everything seemed foggy. She tried to remember if there was someone. A face. A voice. Nothing came. Just the pulsing pain behind her eyes and the growing terror that these men were talking about her like she was property. Like she was owned. The thought made her stomach turn. She had always been independent. She had always taken care of herself. The idea that someone out there thought she “belonged” to them made her want to scream, but her voice still wouldn’t come.

She still hadn’t recovered the strength to speak. She looked at the men again to see them looking towards a figure standing behind them. Serena hadn’t noticed her before but as she looked at her now it was a woman who looked close to her age in a police uniform. She had a blank look on her face as she stood at attention, hands at her sides, shoulders back, eyes forward. The uniform fit her body neatly, the shirt stretched across her chest, the belt cinched at her waist. She didn’t blink. She didn’t move. She just stood there like she was waiting for orders.