Chapter 11

I gaped for a moment at the man who had called out to me before collecting myself and closing my mouth.

"I… I… I'm sorry. I know I shouldn't have come in here, please, I didn't mean any har…" I stuttered out, panicking over what he possibly could want, but getting interrupted before I could finish.

"Calm down, Miss Swan. You are not in trouble, not yet anyway, in fact, for the time being, I would say the situation is the exact opposite, although you can be the judge of that in time."

I nodded slowly, rising from my perch atop the ebony stool and stepping down to stand in front of him. He smirked for a moment, just a moment, but then his face smoothed back over into a calm mask so fast that I almost missed the blatant display of emotion.

He turned on his heel and strode back out the open door, leading into a narrow hallway with a warped wooden floor, short celling which even I could reach up a touch, and faded wall paper. Growing even more confused I began concocting scenarios in my mind: perhaps this was some historical relic and its by the book curator was about to lambast me for trespassing, or maybe it was one of those mysterious organizations of which I had heard so much and yet so little about and now I was in real trouble, or it could be that I had stumbled across the den of our eminent president and some assistant or fellow faculty member was leading me to my doom.

Then my mind turned inevitably to the more supernatural possibilities, of the things that go bump in the night, of my danger magnet reactivating and pulling all the inhumane bits of the universe slowly towards me, and remaining a constant reminder of all I had lost.

After what seemed like a considerable amount of time, but was likely only a minute or so, we arrived at a wooden door at the other end of the hall, which he then proceeded to open and gesture for me to enter.

Peering into the dark opening I saw a flight of concrete stairs descending downwards into inky depths. He reached in and flicked a switch causing lights to flicker on illuminating the bare concrete innards, which resembled the stairway of a parking garage or basement of a skyscraper.

Cautiously I stepped inside, followed by my captor who closed the door behind us with an echoing thud and stepped around me to lead me down the stairs.

After a considerable amount to time, and ten or so flights of stairs we reached a landing with a solid looking metal door proclaiming that this was floor one in large worn stenciled font. More stairs led downwards but the man opened this door onto another hallway, this one as bare and boring as the stairs down.

As I trudged onwards I noticed a bulky figure in the distance, and as we got closer he materialized into yet other mysterious stranger, large, muscled, black, short hair, dark glasses despite being inside and underground, a black suit with a thin black tie which seemed out of place around his muscular neck.

He stomped over to us, right next to a two metal doors, one on either side of the hall.

"So this is her, eh. You better get in there. Boss wants to speak to you," he grunted out.

The man I'd previously been escorted by nodded curtly and turned to open one of the doors. I tried to peer into it but he closed it with a clang before I could glimpse much of anything.

My new companion looked down at me scathingly, grabbed me by the elbow and rather roughly dragged me through the other door, leading into another bare room, approximately cube shaped with a slightly lower ceiling, a large dark window like the kind you see in cop shows in interrogation rooms taking up the far wall, one solid metal table bolted to the floor and two chairs, one a bit more beat up and rusty than the other.

He let go of me and gestured for me to sit down in the less appealing of the two chairs, but I did so without complaint. He slumped down in the other, across the table from me and rested his great meaty hands on the table leaning forwards menacingly.

"So, you're Isabella Swan, the great and exultant Bell, P-A-T-H-E-T-I-C." He bared his teeth at me in what I supposed was meant to be a grin.

All I could do was stare back at him in terror.

"Let's get this shindig started, shall we."

AN: Hey guys, so I'm sorry about the big break between chapters 9 and 10. I guess you could say I just started this on a whim one day and got kind of boerd with it after a while, not really knowing where I was going with it. But then I was looking at it yesterday and got a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do from this point on (though it's still all subject to change) and decided to start updating it again. Then I looked at my document manager and realized I had never released chapter 10 even though I had it written about the same time as chapter 9! Ooops… sorry… Anyway, so I went ahead and got that out ASAP and started clacking away on my laptop getting this update all ready. Considering how short I've made the average chapter here I hope to update semi-regularly, ever few days or so, maybe get a few chapters churned out over weekends and release them during the week. Anyway, let me know what you think so far and what you want to see! I will try and update soon!