The Missionary

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The stench woke her. A thick miasma of rot and garbage and death, laced with something acrid and almost sweet. The next thing she noticed was the heat. And then the pain. Everything hurt.

Something with too many legs skittered over her foot.

She couldn’t open her eyes; either that, or she was in a darkened room. Memory was a foggy thing at best. Thought was difficult, her brain sluggish.

What’s my name?

Where am I? 

She couldn’t summon the answers to those questions. The pain made it too hard to think. The pain, and the smell. And the heat. She tried to open her eyes again, and this time, she felt like she was successful. She was blinking, her lashes shuttering against her cheek. She turned her head, or tried to. Something went skritch under her scalp, and she felt the tug of her hair catching, so she knew she’d achieved some kind of motion.

Her fingers wiggled behind her back, pinned underneath her body. She tried to bring them around in front of her, but she couldn’t. She strained, pulled: pain sliced into her wrists. She was bound. Tied by sharp, thin wires of some kind. She scissored her legs, discovering that only her hands were bound. Blink again, strain against the darkness. Nothing. Was she blind?

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