Chapter 157
~Aubrey~
I open my eyes, the world around me a blurry haze of shadows and muted light as I squint through the pounding migraine threatening to drag me back into darkness. Every inch of me hurts, a dull ache punctuated by sharper stabs of pain, and the urge to throw up is overwhelming. I try to gather my thoughts, to piece together the broken fragments of memory, but it’s like clawing through fog–everything comes up blank.
A wave of nausea hits, and I swallow hard against the bile rising in my throat. My head throbs in time with my heartbeat, each pulse sending jagged shards of pain through my skull. I groan, the sound barely more than a rasp, rough and strained, as if I haven’t used my voice in days.
“Mom…?” I croak, my voice a fragile whisper, raw and barely audible.
As my vision starts to clear, I take in my surroundings, and a chill washes over me. I am definitely not in the hospital. My mother is nowhere to be seen, and the sterile white walls I’d expected are gone, replaced by something far more sinister. A single, bare bulb swings overhead, casting faint, trembling light across grimy, stained walls. The shadows dance in the flickering glow, twisting into eerie shapes that vanish as quickly as they appear. The bulb is on the blink, casting the room into intermittent darkness, as if even the light is struggling to survive here.
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288 (Vouchers
I try to sit up, instinctively wanting to move, to escape–but my body won’t respond. Panic floods through me as I realize I‘ m immobilized, unable to shift even an inch. I tug against whatever is holding me down, and the sickening scrape of leather against skin jolts me fully awake. My wrists and ankles are bound, strapped tight to something cold and unforgiving. A metal table. The chill of it seeps through my clothes, biting into my back, and my skin prickles as if the cold itself is alive, pressing against me, claiming me.
I pull harder against the restraints, but they don’t give an inch. The straps dig into my skin, cutting off circulation, leaving my fingers tingling and numb. I can feel the roughness of the leather biting into my wrists, the coolness of metal buckles pressing into my bones. My heart hammers, each beat a thud of fear echoing through my chest, and a prickling sweat breaks out across my skin.
“Help!” I shout, forcing the word out, my voice cracking but louder now, tinged with a fear that’s rising like a tide inside me. “Someone, please! Help me!”
The only answer is silence, thick and suffocating, pressing down on me like a weight. I can hear my own ragged breathing, shallow and uneven, echoing off the walls. My pulse roars in my ears, drowning out everything else, making the room feel smaller, closer, as if the shadows themselves are pressing in around me.
I strain to lift my head, trying to see more of the room, to find anything–any clue, any crack in the darkness that might help me understand where I am. But the flickering light offers no answers, only glimpses of grimy walls, damp stains seeping down from the ceiling, and the unmistakable smell of rust and decay. The air is stale and cold, laced with a metallic tang that
Chapter 157
makes my skin crawl, as if the very air here is poisoned.
288 Vouchers
Desperation claws at me, and I twist my wrists, feeling the raw scrape of leather against my skin, each movement sending fresh jolts of pain through my arms. My voice rises again, hoarse and frantic. “Please! Is anyone there?”
But there’s only silence. No footsteps. No sounds of life. Just the slow, irregular swing of the overhead bulb, casting shadows that seem to leer down at me, mocking my helplessness.
A shiver wracks my body, fear sinking its teeth into me. I try to breathe, to stay calm, but every instinct is screaming, every cell in my body telling me I need to get out, that I’m in danger. My mind races, throwing out wild guesses, none of them comforting. Kidnapped. Trapped. Left here to rot. I close my eyes, forcing myself to steady my breath, to think.
