There is a series of thuds, before everything subsides into silence.
"Jim?" Callie asks, "For god sake Jim answer me," the blindfold begins to soak up her tears.
Determined to get free, she tugs hard at the rope that bounds her hands, if Jim could do it, so can she. The rope begins to burn her skin, but that doesn't stop her, she carries on regardless of the pain. One of the knots begins to weaken, so she pulls harder and then one hand jolts free. She removes the blindfold, her eyes become accustom to the darkness, as she sets to work on the remaining rope. The pain subsides in her wrists a little, which give her a little bit of comfort, but there is now no noise from the next room. She rises and shakily moves away from the door.
Suddenly, her door creaks open, a silhouette appears in the doorway.
"Hey," the contours of Jim's are just about visible in the light.
"Jim!" She rushes at him, wrapping her arms around him, "What happened?"
"I had to break the door down," he tells her, "Sorry, I had to check no-one was around, come with me quickly."
He takes her hand and leads her into his room, as the moon is just coming into view; its light begins to reveal the dilapidated room, the wallpaper that's peeling at the edges, the rotten floorboards and the dirt encrusted radiator, with strands of rope still hanging from the pipe.
"Can you help me get this window open?"
They both rush to it, the frame's rotten from years of neglect and refuses to budge as they try to pry it open.
"It's not opening," Jim growls, then he has an idea, he turns to Callie, "Stand back," he tells her.
As soon as she is a safe distance away, he kicks the single pane of glass, which disappears in pieces out of the frame. The glass falls to the ground, which takes longer than expected. When they look out, they see puddles in the moonlight, far down below them. They're on the second floor of a cabin.
"Well, today's going great, isn't it?!" Jim tries to lighten the mood, without much success.
"What do we do now? If we jump we'll break our legs," Callie assesses the situation.
"We've only got one option," Jim replies, "we've got to go downstairs."
The pair back away from the window, they know what they have to do, but they don't like it.
Jim finds the stairs first, the rotten planks just about visible in the darkness, he still has the shard of glass in his hand, Callie takes his other hand and slowly they begin to descend, the boards creaking under every footfall. The remainder of the house is silent. Jim reaches the bottom first, quickly followed by Callie, both relieved that they didn't make too much noise in the way down. Jim peers around the doorframe.
"There are some lights on in the next room," Jim mouths to Callie. He holds his hand out, signalling not to follow her. Slowly, he makes his way into the living room, which was in a considerably better state than upstairs. The room is simple, but old fashioned, with a red oval rug on the floor, a flowery sofa, a few book cases with their shelves caked in dust and a tall lamp with a standard peach lampshade, which lit the room. Jim checks the next two rooms, before giving the all clear.
"Looks like nobody's home," he shouts, "The front door is over here!"
Callie follows the sound of his voice, and finds him beside it. The doorknob twists easily and the door swings open with the help of a gust of wind. They hold each other's hands as they leave the warmth of the cabin and enter the cold wood. He estimates that the time is after midnight, they're both worried about Jeff, but they have to think of one thing at a time. There is a slight path that has been made and recent tyre marks in the mud. They follow them, knowing that they must lead to a road, and a road leads them to people, and then the precinct.
"We have a match on those tyre marks," Daniel calls to Carlos, "What make of car does Cleats drive?"
"You haven't seen his ride? It's a Lambo, Gallardo, red, beautiful."
"Well, these were made by a Mercedes A Class," Daniel replies, "The marks also had traces of mud in them, and a pollen. Longleaf Pine to be exact."
"Is it common around here?" Carlos asks, intrigued.
"Not really, but it is found in a forest near here. How much do you want to bet that that is where Jim and Callie are?"
"Let's tell Manus, if we can get a team down there, we might be able to find them."
Daniel looks out of the window, and reluctantly shakes his head.
"Why? What is it?"
"It's two in the morning," Daniel points out, still staring out of the window, "It's too dark, she won't risk letting any of the officers getting lost in there."
"Then I guess that it's just us two then," Carlos picks up his rucksack that he had left on a bench, "Let's get going."
"You know what this reminds me of?" Callie asks as they follow the track uphill.
"What?" Jim replies, smiling for what feels like the first time in a while.
"Do you remember traipsing through the swamp looking for treasure?"
"How can I forget?" Jim laughs, "That night, you told me and I quote 'this is never gunna happen'!"
"Oh the irony," she counters, "And GPS thingy, it would just be nice if we had one right now."
"You'd be in charge of that then, if I recall correctly, you were the one who thought that we were going to die," Jim retorts, his laughter subsiding a little with the reminder of recent events.
"Yeah," Callie reminisces, "but it's all in the past now, we get out of here, go home, back to normal."
"Will it ever be the same though," Jim questions, "I mean, my house is burnt to a crisp, so I hear anyway, and you'll soon be back in Atlanta."
"Only for a few months, Jim," she reminds him.
"I know but still… you won't be here," there is a tone of disappointment in his voice.
"We'll make it work, we always have and we always will," Callie replies, confidently, squeezing his hand.
He squeezes back, feeling like his old self once more, pushing the remaining pang of pain away. It will return back to normal…
