4

BABY

PRESENT

A white flare and cheese-like smell wake me up.  My lids weren't heavy. I'm able to open them elegantly. A familiar lady in white prompting my brain with a serotonin drug whiffing a bottle of it for me to inhale some more.

My heart raised for I couldn't help but feel something nostalgic but I know better than to react harshly to what I'm feeling with my current situation. 

I look around on my surrounding, I see a huge window, a radio next to it playing an old school song from my childhood. I'm placed on what looks like a custody room. Moving my body up on a sitting position I find myself on a comfy bed with blue bedsheets just like my old bedroom from our first house.

The lady earlier offers me water to drink, taking the cup that had stickers exactly like the one my father had bought me.  The water tasting like watermelon as a drop slips on my lips.  Strange but this was the same refreshment we used to drink back when my mother was still living. I wiped my lips slowly with my fingers.

"Hello sweetie, You got into an accident, do you remember who you are?" her voice sounds like my mothers so calming at that sense, she comes closer, sitting next to me.  As I closely look at her face, it resembles my mother's.  I'm still sane to think this is not my mother.

"My name is Baby." is all I could answer back as I'm still confused about what exactly happened to me.

"Sweetie Do you have any relatives we can call?" her smile has the same smile as my mother's. I don't see any nameplate on her so I checked an ID if instead she was wearing one. This is strange because she's not and she hasn't introduced herself.

She pressed the same question again this time holding my arms, feeling her warm skin on mine. "I asked this so I could call them Baby."

I looked around and started feeling my surroundings, there is something off about here and there was something about the way she said my name that reminded me of how Carly would say it.

Carly, I miss her my older sister. 

I look at the woman as she presses on for me to answer her question. She rubs my arm and right away I feel a jolt of some sort of electricity.

"Who do we need to call for you sweetie? they must be worried about you. I can help you contact them."

My lips opened and starting to curve, I wanted to say Carly but the memory of being taken rushed back in my system.

"I've been captured" is all that came out of my mouth. Seeing her graceful facial expression turn into what looks like a joker's grin.

"You just in shock. Do not worry I can help you feel better as soon as you tell me who to call for you."

My mind compelled me to get up from the comfy bed, pushing the lady with no name away realizing I'm in a trance of forced coma. this is what agencies do to extract information from captured retrievers,  I never thought in my life I will ever be captured.

Oh god I've already given them my birth name. This will not be good if they put me in the system. It would not take them long to find the people who are associated with me. 

The only way out from this is to wake yourself up by tricking your mind to feeling pain. Pain will stimulate the arousal in the brain forcing the body to wake up.  Once I'm awake they can no longer use this method on me for my body will remember the feeling of being in this trance. 

Now that my brain knows this is all a hoax it will be very difficult to trick it.

"Enough" I yell on top of my lungs alarming the lady to stay back.

"Baby stay back in bed, you are hurt." Her hands went inside her pocket and she pulls out a small old school radio transmitter, As she spoke codes after codes I looked around and sees my opportunity. I tried to remain calm and listen to her conversation but I could not understand what she was saying. All I heard from the other end was for someone ordering her to inject something somewhere.

I know what this is and the woman in front of me is an artificial intelligent being hired to mess with my unconscious state of mind. It's time to find out who my captor is.

In a swift move, I head for the window to jump out.  I stand a couple of feet away on the ridge connected to window so the lady couldn't grab me back in.

I breath hard as I get ready to completely jump down from what looks like a mid-high rise facility.  It's important to aim for something that will give my brain the similar physical pain to give my body a jolt.

However, jumping down to my demise is harder than I thought.

As the lady follows me, now standing on the same ridge, panic quickly got to me and made me slip down. 

I first hit something hard not quite sure what it was but the image of the lady staring down at me while I fall change briefly to a dark room, that's when I knew that this fall will bring me back to the real world. I'm overjoyed as I knew I can beat this trance and whoever is out there is watching all of this. I have to be smart on what I would say to them once I get out of this hypnosis machine. 

A few more seconds and I feel the fall ended, my back hitting what feels like a vehicle, making a loud thud mixed with broken glasses. I opened my eyes expecting to be back in the real world but the impact of the fall wasn't enough to wake me up, I see a truck coming towards my way. I wait for it to get closer.

With what energy I have left, I push my body up, I limp off of the squashed vehicle and in the right moment jump in front of the moving truck, hitting my body hard as the brake screeches to a halt, making it fly to the nearby post. I heard multiple of my bones in different places crack sending shivers all over my body.

The second my body hits the pavement. Everything went silent. Reluctant to open my eyes after all that trauma just to be back in the same trance is frightening.

I feel a sour liquid making its way out of my mouth. I tried to move my body sideways to throw up but I couldn't, it's still paralyze. Vomit spurs out of me making me cough hard after. When I stop the coughing, trying to control my breathing as I almost choked on my own vomit. 

"I did it, I did it." as I close my eyes back, my voice came out small and relieved. My short lived victory was suddenly stop when I feel a presence.

Someone clapping in the background catches my attention. My brow furrowed in fear as I searched for the source of those sounds. The images were hazy at best. How many drugs did they inject into me? This is definitely not legal, It'll be costly to get a good lawyer to get away from this situation quietly. 

"Yes Baby, you did" the man's voice was teasing, with my blurry vision I could tell this person is real however a new frightening emotion has started. I'm about to meet my captor. One thing is for sure, he belongs in one of the government agencies we crossed. 

You'd have to spend billions of dollars to own this kind of dream engine, and no underground organization will waste money just to extract information because it's easier to just destroy the individual and all their relatives.

Blurry vision, almost close to being blind is probably one of the side effects of the drug that was put in my body, I should've taken this subject seriously when my aunt Madonna was discussing it. I decided for my eyes to remain shut, just listening to the man moving around me is already giving me a bad headache.

I hear him slapping something against my skin, but I don't feel it.  It went on a few more times.

The man began to chuckle, but not until he said horrifying words.

"Enjoy the numbness, Baby," says the voice, "because when your beautiful body regain your sensation, that's when our real fun begins."