So I have 1 review, thank you very much...I find it kind of cool that someone who's never even seen the movie, thought the chapter was alright. No alerts however, so the only person I'm writing so far is myself...I'm such a loser. But if anybody does decide to get into it, this chapter requires a thorough knowledge of the German language...or you could just scroll down to the very bottom of the page and read the translations I put for each phrase/word I used. Anywho, enjoy as I dissect my character and everyone around her...figuratively of course!
Chapter 2 - Belligerent Bombshell
As Abby's eyes struggled to flutter open, the brutal pounding of a five ton truck smashing into her was what electrified her entire body. From head to toe, a constant throbbing coursed through. This alone caused her to pause in the attempt at opening her eyes.
Her mind cleverly used this time to recall all of the things that had led to her current limbo between consciousness and unconsciousness. And it was remembering the creepy house, the decision to ignore her instinct, Jenny and Lindsey, as well as being drugged at a most inconvenient time, that renewed Abby's will at attaining visual contact.
As soon as her eyes sprang open however, Abby regretted it. The light, while it was dim, was intense and hit directly in the retinas causing her to slam her eyes hastily.
Twitching, her nose picked up a sickeningly cleansing smell reminiscent of an overly polished hospital.
Licking at her dry lips, Abby ventured another attempt at opening her eyes.
This time she wished she'd kept them closed.
"Jesus."
She was laying in a cot with her clothes nowhere in sight. Instead, a teal hospital gown covered her freezing form. But, that was not the worst part.
Abby's eyes landed on her left hand just to see it bound to the side of the cot with an IV stuck in to her vein which wriggled every time she moved her arm.
Swinging her head to the other side, Abby nearly groaned when the same thing met her glance. And then her eyes flickered up.
Lindsey? Jenny?
Both girls were passed out, but in the same garb as herself a few feet away. Their hands were bound to each side of the cot and they looked just as helpless.
This isn't happening.
Keeping her mouth shut to prevent herself from screaming, Abby heard a small squeak from her left.
Turning her head reluctantly, Abby couldn't contain a gasp at the sight of a man who was wide awake with a gag in his mouth. He was struggling against his binds in vain but as soon as he'd seen Abby come to, his voice emerged.
"Mphm."
Abby pulled harshly against the binds as panic crept into her. She noticed an IV in his arm as well and his pale complexion. He looked ill and the more he thrashed around, the less of a chance he had at savoring his strength.
"Don't struggle or you'll lose your energy," Abby softly commanded.
The man met her eyes with fear and only continued fighting the binds.
Abby felt her pulse jerk unsteadily as a new worry entered her. What the hell was she doing here? And when was the guy who'd drugged them, coming back? Most importantly, what did he want?
"Please, just calm down," she pleaded, her eyes glancing at the pacemaker beside him. The beat of his heart was increasing steadily, too fast for the amount of oxygen he was inhaling through his nostrils to catch up with.
Whether his eyes finally took in the machine and realized his current danger or Abby's voice calmed him, the man eventually ended up restricting his movements and laying back on the cot.
The entire time, his frightened blue eyes never strayed from Abby's.
"Do you speak English?" Abby gently asked as his heart beat gradually became normal.
Lifting an eyebrow, the man turned his head to stare up at the ceiling. Pearls of nervous sweat beads rolled down his face and tears soon mixed in.
"Shit," she mumbled, realizing that there was only one way to communicate with him.
Mulling over everything she'd learned in the month that she'd been in the country, Abby took in a deep breath.
"Sind Sie gut?"
The man's head whipped around to stare at her, faint hope residing in his irises. He nodded his head uncertainly and Abby was relieved to find an established way of communication. All she had to do was make sure she worded things the right way.
"Gut. Wissen Sie...," Abby trailed off, her forehead crinkling in concetration. "Sie sind hier gewesen?"
Although Abby knew that her German didn't translate perfectly, she trusted the man to know what her questions were.
Nodding his head rapidly, the man's eyes welled up with more tears and Abby sucked in a breath. She had never seen so much pain, so much sorrow, so much unrelenting fear in a person's eyes before. It made her breath catch and heart quench.
"Ich heisse Abby," she informed softly, lowering her tone to make the man feel somewhat at ease. "Ich bin von Vereinigte Staaten."
She didn't know why she was telling him where she was from. It's not like that could magically cure his hellish predicament. Still, the more Abby talked, the calmer the man seemed.
"Halten Sie an," she stated, turning her head to her companions.
Both Lindsey and Jenny hadn't stirred since Abby had awoken. Either they'd taken much more of what ever knocked them out than she had, or they were incredibly sound sleepers.
"Lindsey? Jenny?" Abby whispered.
Neither girl moved so Abby called their names again, louder this time. No result.
"Hmph."
Switching sides, Abby met the man's gaze again.
His eyes traveled up to the ceiling once more with fear fully replacing the blue in his eyes.
Abby followed his gaze and heard the patter of footsteps above.
"Oben?" she questioned more to herself than to the man.
Her ears perked up only to hear the footsteps slowly fade away.
Peeking cautiously at the door, Abby prayed that the man wouldn't make an appearance. The room they were currently lying in was set up like a makeshift laboratory or worse yet, doctor's workplace. Surgical tools as well as normal hospital gear lined some of the tables her eyes had trailed over. Near Lindsey and Jenny was a long, metal slab that glittered coldly in the grim room.
Closing her eyes Abby finally allowed sputters of fear to enter her. Up to this point she'd hoped that there was some sort of misunderstanding. That her current placement could be explained as some cruel joke. That the man beside her was acting and Lindsey and Jenny were in on it.
However, as more time trailed on and the two girls beside her failed to return from their nap, Abby felt a furious hopelessness strike her. This was not supposed to happen. All she'd wanted to do was find her-.
Roughly shaking her head, Abby met the man's eyes beside her and took advantage of the fact that she could speak.
"Haben Sie eine Familie?"
The man nodded his head as the tears finally ceased their gravitational spiral down.
"Kinder?"
Another nod.
"Ein?"
A firm shake of the head caused Abby to visualize the phrase book's descriptions once more.
"Zwei?"
Another firm shake sideways.
"Drei?" she asked in surprise.
This time the man swung his head up and down eagerly as his eyes lit up.
"Gut. Alle jungen?"
He shook his head no.
"Alle Madchen?"
No was his answer again.
Letting out a sigh, Abby asked, "Zwei Madchen und ein Junge?"
Abby grinned as the man nodded his head in near excitement. Or as excited as one could be when they were forcibly restrained to a cot.
"Schone kinder?"
The man nodded his head again with obvious light in his eyes.
"Gut."
After that, Abby's brain seemed to pause. No more German came to her and worse still was the sound of footsteps returning above.
"What the hell?"
Abby snapped her gaze to find Lindsey coming to, shaking her head in confusion.
Her green eyes met Lindsey's who recognized just by her stare that something was off. And that was when she began screaming.
"What the fuck? Oh my god!"
Flinging herself up from the pillow like a jack in the box, Lindsey pulled against the restraints in vain before taking in Jenny's form to her right.
"Jenny! Wake up, Jenny. Oh god, please wake up!"
"Lindsey," Abby warned, hearing the footsteps pause momentarily before shifting the opposite way of their original direction.
Her stomach churned and insides rattled as her own form ascended into a sitting position. The man was coming down stairs.
"Jenny! Wake up damn it!" Lindsey cried, tears falling freely down her cheeks.
"Lindsey," Abby stated again, this time more firmly.
"Wha-at?" she sobbed without turning her body.
"He's coming."
This had Lindsey struggle even more as she kept on screeching for Jenny to wake up.
Abby on the other hand laid back down on the cot and stared up at the ceiling. If the man wanted them to escape, he would have kept the binds looser. But the fact that they cut painfully into her wrists made Abby realize that escape wasn't possible at the moment. Not only that but drugs don't wear off as quickly as assumed. Even if she was to get on her feet, there was no guarantee that her body would be supported.
Her mother had worked countless years at a pharmaceutical company and Abby had learned sometimes more than she wanted to know. Like how painkillers had been stolen for 13 years straight from the store, only to be found inside her mother's blood system once an autopsy was performed. The overdose came three months before Abby had decided on leaving the country.
"Lindsey?"
Inhaling sharply, Abby listened as Jenny's confused screams began to fill the room.
"No, no, no. Fuck. What the fuck?"
"Please, let us go!"
Meeting the man's eyes beside her, Abby attempted to give him a soothing smile. It was anything but what she felt. Still, Lindsey and Jenny were too hysterical to understand it; their screams and pleads nearly becoming deafening.
And that's when Abby's ears caught in between the screams, the first slam of a foot on the step.
Don't panic. Whatever you do, don't panic. Maybe he can be reasoned with. Maybe I can-.
Pondering back on the evening, Abby attempted to decipher whether the man could be reasoned with at all. His actions had seemed so cold and unattached. Like he wasn't part of humanity, merely observing its' complex features.
"HELP!" Lindsey shrieked for ten seconds straight until she became deprived of oxygen.
Abby shifted herself into a half sitting position, keeping her eyes glued to the man beside her. Unfortunately, the man had heard the footsteps also. Tears began to flow in thin cascades down his cheeks.
Why this guy? He's got a family he loves and a life worth living. What's he done to deserve this?
No miraculous voice answered her plea. In fact all the voices that had been screaming, died suddenly in the air.
Hesitantly shifting her gaze, Abby's eyes froze as she took in the man who had first allowed them into his home. He stood with a small grin on his face that made Abby want to rip it off and shove it through a paper shredder.
"Ah, and so they are awake!" he couldn't help but exclaim.
"Let us the fuck go you fucking psycho!"
Abby remained mute as Lindsey's threat was ignored.
"First," he muttered, slapping his white lab coat pocket as if he'd forgotten something.
"Help! I swear to God that when I get out of here I am going to report you to the fucking authority!"
Approaching all four of the captives, he studied the pacemaker near the man who couldn't keep his heart beat still.
"Sich enstpannen," he muttered to the man lying helplessly in the cot.
Frustrated that she didn't understand his command, Abby tried to reignite her knowledge of German words. The man beside her was going to have a heart attack if he didn't calm down.
"Who the hell are you?" Lindsey screamed.
The need to find the right words increased tenfold as what she assumed now to be a doctor, made his way over to the man in the cot. He dismissed all eye contact with Abby as he placed himself in between her and the man's cot.
"Let us the fuck go!"
From her vantage point, Abby could meet the man's eyes easily but worry entered her as the doctor pulled out a syringe from his pocket.
"I am sorry," the doctor spoke, "but your blood tissue does not match."
"No."
This time it was Abby that let out the plea and for a second, it seemed that the doctor had paused too, surprised to hear a different voice besides the two screaming at him.
Abby felt shivers run through her as she understood why the needle was levitating over the IV. For whatever the doctor had planned for them, the man's blood tissue wasn't permittable. That meant elimination of the body.
And the man in the cot knew because his eyes widened and head shook in harsh protest.
"Es tut mir leid, mein Freund," the doctor stated, his fingers examining just where to puncture the IV with the syringe.
"Hmphm!" the man cried, unable to stop the downpour of tears. And although Abby didn't see it, the man's petrified fear caused his lower body to release urine all over himself. Mixed in with the vulnerability and unrestrained terror in his eyes, Abby couldn't help the sob which broke through her quivering lips.
She'd understood the doctor's words perfectly, but she'd be damned if a selfish apology was the last thing the man was going to hear before the end of his life.
"Horen! Denken Sie daran Ihre Kinder. Ein Junge und Zwei Madchen. Ihre schone kinder!"
The man ceased in his struggles. His eyes connected with Abby's and the pool of tears slowly retreated into concentration.
"Denken Sie an Ihre schone Familie," Abby begged, relaying a last command through her green eyes which had began to water.
The doctor's back stiffened, but he made no move to turn around. His hand lingered over the IV for a few seconds before he glanced down at the man's closed eyes and stabbed the syringe into the plastic tube.
The man's body jerked briefly before it settled and an echoing scream resonated from Lindsey and Jenny as Abby felt two tear drops meander their way down her cheeks.
The pacemaker turned into a straight green line and beeping soon indicated his passing.
He did not deserve to die!
Remembering some of the local dialect being thrown around at a Berlin bar she'd strolled into what seemed like a lifetime ago, Abby hopelessly whispered, "Verdammt."
For the next few minutes, she furiously ignored everything going on around her. The doctor turning around, Jenny and Lindsey's empty curses and threats, even the sound of her own heart beat.
It felt like she'd been repeatedly punched in the face, her eyes throbbing with unshed tears. Every time she attempted to take in a large breath, a sharp pang sliced into her chest accompanied with a loss of oxygen.
Abby had never seen anybody die...who didn't deserve to. And this only amplified the loss. The man hadn't deserved to die.
That statement kept repeating in her mind like an answering machine, causing her to slip out of reality and take shelter in her subconscious as long as her frailed mind would allow it.
It only took a snap of a finger in front of her face to bring Abby back to the cold room and shrieking friends and psychopathic doctor.
Her eyes stubbornly glanced at the doctor's and nearly fled at the barely suppressed apathy there. No sympathy, no emotion. Simple indifference. And his next statement only fueled her dislike for the man deeper.
"Your blood tissue is not a match either," the doctor murmured.
He met her eyes again as if he was expecting a raging reaction just like the man's.
Abby simply leaned back in the cot and stared ahead without a trace of emotion on her face.
"You can't! You can't kill her!" Lindsey yelled through her hoarse throat.
Jenny chimed in even louder and Abby couldn't help but smile. She always did hope that somebody would be sad when she died.
"Guys," Abby stated, her voice oddly calm, "it's alright. I'm alright."
The two women paused, staring at her in silence.
"I'm alright," Abby repeated, casting her gaze toward them. "Thanks for picking me up though. Not exactly what I imagined would happen, but you can't always get what you want."
And her own statement struck her rather soberly. She'd naively assumed that getting to Germany would automatically guarantee her puzzle being pieced together. That the random flashbacks and dreams would make sense. That the father she'd last remembered as a 10 year old, would suddenly come charging into her life with a regretful story as to why he had to leave. Most of all, she had let down her guard. This was the price she paid for it.
The cool pressure of the needle made her blood freeze as it traveled teasingly up her arm before transferring up the IV.
Should I look him in the eye when he does it? Is that what dad did to his victims?
A weak laugh shook through her as she realized just how ironic the situation truly was.
But, Abby decided why not. Surely she could pick out the motive inside the doctor's brown, cold stare.
So she turned her head on the pillow and met the doctor's eyes. Fear nor surprise registered as he stared at her back.
Call it a battle of wills or last minute musings, but Abby found herself fascinated because fascination was exactly what greeted her back.
She didn't know whether it was from any deep, inner turmoil pounding away through his blood system or the excitement of having the power to end someone's life in his hand.
As her stare increased in intensity, the answer she declared was neither. He seemed so casual, even meek. As if he'd never been around so much bloodshed before. His actions were proper and precise. Definitely a near perfectionist.
Still, something else fueled that fascination and she had no idea what it was.
He doesn't kill for pleasure.
This thought took a bit of convincing to make her believe it. He had murdered a man before her eyes without any alternative choice. Like it was the only option available. Did he have another option?
He has plans for Lindsey and Jenny. If he was going to kill us all, he probably would have done it already. It must mean that he's keeping them alive and wanted them to see the man's death as well as my own. Why?
In case they tried to escape? A glimpse of events to come?
Abby hated to admit it but a building curiosity began to sprout inside her. Questions spanned into subcategories ranging from the simple to the meticulous. Questions that despite her soon to come death, she had a sudden desire to have answered.
For so long she had been able to study and pick apart people just like her father had. Their emotional stability, pandering desires, and every flick or twitch that mapped out the contours of the face like an accurately drawn map.
The doctor for whatever reason, was incredibly well at hiding what it is that he felt. Or perhaps what he was feeling was so obvious that she'd overlooked it.
Why am I caring about how he's feeling?
It was at this point that Abby jolted herself with a shiver and realized that he hadn't stuck the needle into her IV yet. She must have been giving him a death glare for quite a few minutes, yet his hand still lingered...uncertainly?
No, that couldn't be it. Just because his motive for killing wasn't one based on tribunal passions didn't mean that keeping her alive would be a wise decision.
But like sticky honey cascading from the bark of a tree, the minutes floated by and the doctor gave no sign of any imminent decision. In fact if Abby's eyes were seeing things correctly, the doctor had retracted his hand a few centimeters away from the IV.
"What are you doing?" Abby barked, her voice almost angry.
For a moment, the doctor seemed just as confused with his actions, until he slid back into a mask of indifference.
But Abby knew that it was no longer indifference. Something had changed in the minutes that they had taken to stare each other down.
Instead, the doctor switched his syringe from a table near him and then stereotypically flicked the needle with his fingers, causing liquid to squirt out.
"I thought my blood tissue wasn't right," Abby noted, suddenly on edge.
"It is not," he agreed without looking at her.
"Then why-."
Abby never had a chance to finish her question as the needle divulged darkness before her eyes once again. In turn, this caused Lindsey and Jenny to renew their shrieks as the doctor carted his rolling trolley toward them next.
Translations that I hijacked from YahooBabelAltavista since I don't understand a lick of German:
Sind Sie gut - Are you alright?
Gut - Good
Wissen sie - Are you...
Sie sind hier gewesen - Have you been here long?
Ich heisse - My name is...
Ich bin von Vereinigte Staaten - I am from the United States
Halten Sie an - Hold on
Oben - Upstairs
Haben Sie eine Familie - Do you have a family?
Kinder - Children
Ein - One
Zwei - Two
Drei - Three
Alle junge - All boys
Alle madchen - All girls
Und - And
Schone - Beautiful
Horen - Listen
Denken Sie daran Ihre Kinder - Think of your children
Denken Sie an Ihre schone Familie - Think of your beautiful family
Verdammt - Damn it
Thanks for reading and I hope you like it so far since from here on, I'll be changing some things and leaving in others. Let me know what you're thinking in a review :).