Greetings from home, finally! I'm sorry for the long wait, and hope to make up for it J It was a pretty hectic holiday that I still need to recover from, but well worth it! I hope you've all been well, and that you can get back into this story without too much trouble! On to the next chapter…
It had been 6 days – 6 long, excruciating days – since she had been stolen from her life… The spirit with which she had entered her captivity was now all but completely broken, lying amongst the filth of her small concrete prison; filth that covered and cocooned Jane, leaching her of dignity as much as Doyle and his men's actions had.
Doyle had promised her a physical recovery period after the beatings and floggings she had received at the hands of his cronies; he kept to that promise – being the man of honour he believed himself to be – focusing instead on breaking down her mind and any inner strength she had left. This method of torture required a more delicate and skilled touch, and so Doyle played a more active role in its execution. He was a master at finding character flaws and weaknesses, and then exploiting them to pull people apart from within.
It was difficult for Jane to remember the details of how exactly this part of her torment began: her fractured mind struggled to create coherent thoughts, and to distinguish a painful reality from an equally painful and terrifying fantasy. Doyle walking in holding a needle—bath salts—struggling weakly to get away—his smug voice—laughter as she started to thrash—spiders, huge spiders—eyes everywhere… This is what Jane can remember of the first time that she was injected with bath salts (mephedrone, as Doyle had patronisingly explained); her battered body had been no match for Doyle or his men as they held her down and inserted a long, dirty needle into her arm ('a dirty needle creates an abscess,' he had told her with a self-satisfied smile, 'which makes it much easier to get the drug into you in the future.') And so began a day filled with hallucinations and delusions – a day of nightmares and terrors against which Jane had no defence.
"And all you need is 5mg a pop," Doyle had continued, happy with the low cost of his chosen psychological torture, "so who even needs movies nowadays!" When the syringe had been emptied and Jane had stopped struggling, Doyle and his men left the room confident that Jane could continue her own torture with no outside interference.
That's when the spiders had first come…
Huge spiders oozed from the walls and plopped wetly to the floor, their eyes fixed on their prey sitting in the middle of the room; their razor-sharp fangs dripped poisonous venom as their spindly, hairy legs carried them slowly closer to Jane. Wide-eyed and terrified she looked around frantically, searching for an opening to get away from these enormous monsters. Her fingers scrabbled for purchase on the floor as she tried to push herself to her feet – her wounded and weak legs refused to hold her up, even as her adrenaline caused her heart rate to reach new heights and sweat to stream from her every pore.
She felt a tickle on her hand and looked down quickly. She screamed. Thousands of tiny spiders were covering her body with every breath, and she tried desperately to shake them off. When that didn't seem to work, she quickly resorted to using the only weapon against them that she could find: her nails. 2 hours later the spiders had disappeared, leaving behind only a silk cocoon: Jane – her eyes were empty and her sanity fragile. For 2 days she lay shaking and screaming, groaning and whimpering; for 2 days her anxiety and paranoia grew and mutated, becoming a huge writhing mass that stretched her skin to nearly the point of bursting.
And now, on day 6, Doyle had returned to see his handiwork.
What he saw was exactly what he had hoped for: a broken and quaking mess, scared to even open her eyes for fear of further horrific sights. Her rampant imagination was more than capable of compensating for her self-imposed blindness, however, and not even in the once-safe haven of her mind could she find any comfort or promise of hope. "You see, Jane, the consequences that betrayal has. Normally, with my own men, I prefer a good old-fashioned beating sometimes followed by a quick execution; physical wounds heal, and they can get back to work after a few weeks or months. For you, though, I prefer something more lasting: something to remind you constantly of what you did to both my daughter and myself. That's why I chose mephedrone, Detective. You were in the drug unit, so you should know just how special a drug it is – completely different from the usual, boring cocaine, amphetamines or LSD. The effects of bath salts are much more long-lasting, and the trips you experience are not the satisfying euphoric highs you would get with the other drugs. Oh no, bath salts grab hold of all your fears, doubts and darkest thoughts; they surround you and consume you for days, weeks and sometimes months after just a single dose. Now isn't that amazing, Jane?"
On the ground Jane remain unmoving, her horrified dilated gaze fixed on a sight only she was privy to. Her arms, legs and stomach were a bloody mess of deep gouges and scratches, all self-inflicted. Her breaths came in short gasps, as they had been since the drug first took effect, and the coarse tremor wracking her body gave the impression of an animal in its death throes. Around her mouth was dried and crusted blood, having seeped out after she had bitten her tongue while screaming herself hoarse. Her ribs and other bones stood in stark relief as the adrenaline and cortisol had ravaged her body in an attempt to fuel her fight or flight response.
"Let's give you another dose, shall we?" Doyle asked as he produced the dirty needle and syringe…
RIRIRIRIRIRIRIRIRI
She had decided to take a walk to try and clear her head. It was 10pm, and the cold breeze permeating through her shirt hinted at a cold winter on its way. She entered a darkened park, the lights within it broken and looking twisted in the moon's illumination. The rustling trees threw down their yellowing leaves as she passed them by, and they swirled around her as the breeze picked them up. This particular park was notoriously known as a hub of gang activity; this thought hardly penetrated through her muddled mind. All she wanted was to walk…
Around her the trees loomed even larger, as their outlines grew even starker against a black background; the branches reached their spindly fingers towards her, as the leaves attacked her from every direction. The breeze took on a keening, screaming character and the uneven ground tried to trip her up. Nature was conspiring against her!
Jane quickly whipped around when she heard a twig snap behind her, and she was confronted by a towering mammoth of a man holding a large glinting knife. His malicious blue eyes pierced her, and his bone-white teeth were bared in a leering sneer. With a show of skill he flipped his knife into the air and caught it by its handle as it stabbed downwards, trying to intimidate the shivering Jane even more. He advanced towards her, preparing himself to give chase when his victim tried to run…
But Jane was done running.
With a vicious snarl Jane pounced towards the behemoth, her hands clenched into white fists. She was slightly surprised when her punch landed without any resistance from the man, but her surprise was quickly drowned out by her aggression. He fell to the ground, the knife thrown from his grasp, and Jane fell on top of him. Over and over again she punched and scratched, until her perceived attacker lost consciousness. She felt victorious, and finally in control! She rose from the bloody pile on the ground and smiled in triumph: 'Not so weak now, am I Doyle?!' With a spring in her step, she turned towards her apartment…
It was 4 hours later when a young woman set out on her early morning jog through the park. She had used this route for the past year, ever since starting her new job at a local accounting firm. She loved this time: the sun having barely risen above the horizon and lighting the colourful foliage and well-trodden path. It was a time during which she could relax and unwind, while working off the calories of last night's deep fried chicken dinner. Something was different on the path that morning, however, and she slowed down in order to inspect the heap lying in her way. She drew closer to the small pile cautiously, and screamed as she rolled a body over. It was a tiny boy, no older than 15, beaten to a bloody pulp; his torn and dirty clothes suggested he was one of the vagrant inhabitants of the park. His thin, fragile body lay curled upon itself and she could just see a small pocket knife clutched tightly in one fist. Exhaling shakily, and hoping for the best, the woman placed 2 fingers on his throat in search for his carotid pulse; she half-sobbed when she found one, albeit weak. Frantically pulling her cellphone from her running pouch, she dialled 911 and held the boy's hand while waiting for help to arrive…
RIRIRIRIRIRIRIRI
In the time it had taken for Maura to calm down a little, Frost had called various people to join them at Maura's home. There was no easy way to explain what had happened to Jane, and everyone needed to be there as the details were given to the person closest to this whole situation – the person that certain people couldn't help but hold at least slightly responsible for what had happened.
They were all seated in the lounge, a solemn and (for Maura) ominous silence dominating in the room. In various positions around the room were Frost, Korsak, Frankie, Tommy and Angela. Angela had hesitantly sat next to Maura, trying to convey some strength to the woman who looked completely shattered. For a few weeks, Angela had blamed Maura for Jane's ordeal – she had developed a pure and unadulterated hatred for the woman who she felt had betrayed her daughter. Despite many believing that Angela was a simple woman, however, the opposite was true: after much thinking, rationalising and reflecting, the anger she felt towards Maura was shifted towards her father. She stopped thinking that Maura and her father were one and the same, and was able to put the blame where it was rightfully, she believed, due. Maura had become as much a daughter to her as Jane was, and so Angela had looked at the entire situation from Maura's perspective, trying to fathom what had been going through her mind and what had driven her to leave. Angela believed that her second daughter may have been able to handle herself better in certain respects, but she was most definitely not at fault for what Paddy Doyle had done.
Korsak, being a rational and experienced detective, had also come to the same conclusions as Angela: though Maura had caused Jane great emotional pain by leaving suddenly, she could not be held responsible for the actions of a ruthless and cold-blooded mob boss. He cared for Maura as he would his own child, as he did Jane, and felt a deep sadness now as he looked upon the stricken doctor sitting on her couch.
Frost too had begun to re-evaluate the anger he felt, especially after seeing the genuinely shocked look on Maura's face. As he watched the self-blame, guilt and regret settle on Maura's face, he couldn't help but feel sympathetic for the woman whose whole world would soon be torn down around her.
"So are you happy, Maura?" Frankie snarled from the corner of the room, keeping his distance from the medical examiner, "did you teach Jane her lesson? Did you SHOW her? Huh? Did you, Maura?!" The doctor drew back into herself as Frankie shouted at her, and she fought against the tears pooling in her eyes. She opened and closed her mouth, not knowing how to respond, her emotions in turmoil.
"That's enough, Frankie," Korsak spoke quietly, tiredly. Maura looked at him in desperation, needing to know what exactly had happened. "What happened?" she whispered with a broken voice, "Please, what happened?" Everyone in the room stilled completely as the question they felt too weak to answer was voiced. Korsak took the initiative of answering: "Frost told you that Jane was taken, right?" he asked. Receiving a small nod from Maura, he continued, "She was abducted by your father, about a month after you… left. We didn't even know she was gone until 2 days later, because we had become quite used to Jane just disappearing for lengths of time to get her thoughts in order… She changed when you left, doc." Korsak stopped for a moment, giving Maura a chance to wipe her eyes and dripping nose. "We found a note in her apartment, from Doyle; it said that Jane needed to be taught a lesson, one that she would remember for the rest of her life. We looked for her for 2 weeks, doc – we hardly ate or slept, and we spent every single moment trying to track her and Doyle down. We didn't find her." At this Maura gasps: "I thought you said she was alive! Frost said–"
"We didn't find her, Maura; she was delivered to us on your doorstep. She was—she was broken." Korsak stopped to compose himself, wiping at the watery glint in his eyes. "I thought she was dead, I thought—" Korsak stopped again, unable to continue.
"We don't actually know what exactly he did to her, Maura," Frost took over. "It was nearly impossible to get her to speak to us at all. She spent a month in the hospital, where they treated her for starvation and various other wounds; we don't even know the extent of those! You're listed as her next of kin, doc, and she refused to tell anyone else!" By now, Angela was sobbing softly next to a stiff and trembling Maura, while tears streamed from the eyes of Jane's brothers. "She went home 2 weeks ago, but we got her a desk job back at work a week ago so that she could have some form of human interaction seeing as she turned away all visitors at her apartment. It's been bad, doc…"
They all sat quietly for a few minutes, everyone lost in thought. Maura was in shock, her brilliant mind unable to fully grasp what had been said. She needed time to put her thoughts together, she needed time to—No! There's no time! I've had enough time! Maura screamed at herself. Jane needs me NOW! Oh, Jane… I'm so sorry! Aloud, Maura asked with a hoarse and strained voice: "Where is she now?"
"We don't know, doc, we just don't know…"
So, that's it for this chapter! I hope it was good enough to make up a little bit for my absence! Thank you very much for reading, and for sticking with this story so far J As always, please let me know of your opinions and thoughts! Have a great day!
