He worked himself across the box until his right shoulder was touching the wall. That meant there was plenty of space on the left. He eased over onto his left side, felt his right shoulder catch and then drag along the top of the box. 'Come on,' he whispered. He tucked his arm down and the shoulder slipped past and he was lying on his face. He centered himself in the box again. It was getting hot and close in there with his exertion and he deserved a little fresh air.

Out of habit, he looked up as he reached for the toggle, and he could see light. It wasn't his imagination. There, through the little grill beside the toggle were tiny dots of light and now he could hear the dawn chorus of not just one but many birds. This was right, he was going to be able to get away, to rescue this girl and give her back her life and make right so much that had gone wrong. Who knew? Maybe this could be his ultimate leap, the one that solved all the problems. The one that took him home. He positioned his hands, shoulder width apart, in preparation for his assault on the box.

Light suddenly filled the space and Sam had to shut his eyes to protect them.

'Hey, it's okay, kid, it's just me.' As if it could be anybody but Al.

Sam opened his eyes again, this time to the dappled glow of just Ziggy's handlink.

'What're you doing? How come you're upside down?'

'I'm getting out of here, Al.' Sam turned so that he was facing Al, and rested his head on his right hand.

'How? Oh, you're gonna try a kind of pushup thing.' Al flexed his arms and nodded. 'Hang on a sec.' He tapped a pattern into the handlink and the top of his head disappeared into the top of the box. He walked all the way round the box, returning to Sam's left hand side. 'You've got about five centimeters of dirt on top. They've nailed the lid in a few spots but it's all shoddy workmanship. Your best shot is to work on that back corner.' He pointed towards Sam's right foot. 'There's only one nail and it's not properly in. Only you better hurry up and do this.'

'I was planning to.'

'Yeah, well I've just been talking to Susan Dempsey, Sam. She knows these nozzles.'

'What?'

'One of them's a senior from her school and he's got his cousin and some friend of the cousin's involved. The school kid told her they wanted to raise money to send food packages to China. Apparently Suzie was always at her dad, thought he should be sending half his pies over there to help solve the famine.' Al shrugged. 'This was her idea.'

'She was doing the wrong thing for the right reason.' Sam sympathized. Despite the best of intentions he'd been known to do the wrong thing, once or twice in his life. 'It's pretty extreme, though.' Now the wet patch was under his front and it was even more uncomfortable.

'There's no telling what's gonna go on in the mind of a sixteen year old girl,' Al said. His expression was wistful. He smiled and drew on his cigar. 'Now there was this one girl.' He hid his face in his hand for a moment as if the memory embarrassed even him. 'Now she was something really special, she…'

'Al. You're talking about a sixteen year old girl!' Sam was truly shocked.

'And I was a sixteen year old boy. Sheesh. I swear, Sam, when I get you back home again I'm gonna get you signed up with Boy scouts Anonymous, get you onto the twelve point plan to cure you of this unseemly prudishness.'

'I'm not a prude. I just have…'

'Now let's see if I remember it. There's group sex, mixed sex, outdoor sex,' Al counted on his fingers. 'Um, risky sex, sex with a stranger, sex with two strangers…'

'What is that? A recipe for venereal disease?'

Al rolled his eyes.

'I need to get out of here.' Sam planted his hands firmly apart at shoulder width and rocked back onto his knees, his back pressed against the lid. 'I mean, if she knows these guys, they're taking a real risk leaving her alive.' He turned in time to see the slow rise and fall of Al's adams apple.

'That's what I needed to tell you. They said they were coming back for her. Today. We checked back through all the records and this box gets found in sixty eight. There weren't any, uh, remains inside it.'

This leap was going from bad to worse. Sam pressed his back against the lid and pushed, raising himself as far up on his hands and knees as he could go. He kept up the pressure for what seemed like forever and then relaxed back to a huddle, panting. 'This has to work.' He let the breeze from the fan cool his face.

'Let me check.' The top of Al's head vanished again as he surveyed the lid of the box. 'You gotta give it everything you've got, back on this corner here.' Al was standing back at the corner near Sam's right foot. 'Come on. I'll spot.'

Sam eased himself back onto his hands and knees, his back once again flat against the lid, elbows and hips flexed. Light in the box appeared and vanished as Al waved the handlink in and out in his excitement. Sam began to push.

'Come on.' Al's tone was almost scornful. 'You can do better'n that.'

Sam pushed harder, feeling the bony protrusions of his spine grating against the wooden lid, forcing things, wanting to straighten his arms, bring his hips to a right angle, arch his back, stand up straight.

'Go harder,' Al yelled. 'And wriggle.'

'Wriggle?' Sam's voice came out in a gasp.

'Backwards and forwards. You've got one nail holding this thing in and it's ready to give.'

Wriggle. Sam rocked from knees to hands. His arms were trembling and sweat was leaking down his face and dripping off the end of his nose. He couldn't have put into words how grateful he was for that fan and the thread of cold air, or, more than that, for the sound of Al's voice right there, urging him on.

'Did you feel that? Did you feel it?'

Sam wasn't sure and he didn't have the breath to answer.

'There! There it goes again. It's happening, Sam. The nail's coming loose and the dirt on top of the box is starting to move.'

Sam decided to try a different tactic. He pulled down, as close to the bottom of the box as he was able and set his arms and legs like steel springs and then thrust up as hard and fast as he could go. It jolted him, smashed him into the top of the box and he thudded back to the bottom, winded.

'Wow!' Al was jumping with excitement, his face close down by Sam's. 'Did you feel that?'

He sure did. 'How far?'

'Couple more of those and you'll be out.'

Sam wound himself up for a second attempt, flattened against the bottom of the box and slammed into the top. He heard the nails squealing and the crack of wood and then his own gasp as he hit the floor again. Dirt trickled down onto the backs of his legs. He turned his head towards Al and he could see light flooding through a crack in the lid.

'That's it.' Al was overjoyed. 'All you need to do now is just wiggle your way out.' The handlink and cigar did a little watusi through the air as Al demonstrated.

One more go while the adrenaline was still running through him, while he still felt high enough to not notice the pain that would be starting soon enough. He arched his back against the lid and pushed, heard the wood creak and snap, heard the squeal and pull of the nail, felt the sudden, wonderful give and then there was dirt spilling down on him, getting under the dress and into his hair and he didn't mind a bit.

'You've done it! You've done it!' Al was dancing about, all Sam could see were his hands, appearing and disappearing. 'Ziggy's giving you a ninety-eight percent chance of rescue.'

'Only ninety-eight?' Sam worked at the break. Splinters jabbed into his hands and he brushed them away. He broke off a whole chunk of the lid and the dirt fell on his head and he didn't care.

'Well, just don't go chasing any bears or walking off any cliffs in the wood, I guess,' Al said.

'That's okay with me.' Sam brushed the dirt out of his eyes and pushed his head up through the hole. Fresh air. Light and sound and color and the whole world. It was still there. He couldn't even begin to imagine how this must have felt for Al. He'd been in that box less than a day. 'Which way's the nearest road?' He worked his shoulders through the hole. Jagged shards of the lid bit into his skin and tore the dress, he hitched it back into position, hoping Al hadn't seen too much.

Al was staring up into the sunlit sky beyond the pine trees. 'Uh, nearest road's five kilometers…huh?' He smacked the handlink with his palm and it squealed at him. 'What the? Sam get outta there, get outta there quick.'

'What is it, what's wrong?' Getting out was easy enough to say, but Sam had been lying in that box for long enough to make everything a big cramped, and now it was all getting sore from the battering he'd just given himself, breaking his way out. He was using his arms to lever himself up, but the muscles were trembling with fatigue and it was a struggle. Sam pulled himself out of the hole on his elbows. The dress caught and tore and beneath it, so did his leg. A jagged claw of wood opened a gash in his right thigh.

'What are you doing? Your odds've just dropped to ninety-two percent.' Al stuck the cigar into his mouth and stared at the handlink, his eyes wide in disbelief. He smacked it again and again as if that would change the reading. Apparently it did. 'Eighty-nine percent!'

Sam staggered to his feet, clutching at the gaping wound. 'What's happened?' He tore the rest of the piece of material that the wood had started and bound it around the cut.

'Oh, geez, Sam. There's no follow up to the first ransom note, the kidnappers are never found, but you, I mean, Susan, is. In three days her body's found by the side of the road, five kilometers from here. Strangled. Time of death - today.' Al gazed at the wound in Sam's leg, blood was already leaking through the rough attempt at bandaging. His focus changed and his expression became way more appreciative than it should have been for Sam's leg.

'Give it a rest, Al. She's just a kid. She's sixteen years old.'

'Oh. Yeah. Right. Can you walk on that?'

'Sure.' Sam wasn't really sure but he wasn't going to just stand there and get himself strangled. 'So if the nearest road's five kilometers and I don't want to go there, where's the second-nearest?'

'Hundred and eighty three kilometers.' Al looked apologetic.

'What's plan B then?' Sam had no delusions about his ability to walk a hundred and eighty three kilometers even without a dirty wound. He'd have been lucky to get five kilometers wearing the plastic sandals which were Susan's footwear, already the ungiving cut of them was biting into his feet and he was pretty sure he had a blister on the back of his ankle without even walking anywhere in them. Aside from that he had practically no water and only some pee-flavored candy bars for sustenance. Not that he actually had the candy bars yet. To do that, he'd have to go back into the box, and he was pretty sure he didn't want to do that.

Al squinted at the handlink. 'Well there's a hiders' train.' He frowned at it and bashed it until it squawked at him. 'Hikers' trail three miles east of here and that joins onto a fire fighters' track.'

'Might get lucky and find some Boy Scouts,' Sam said.

'Might get really lucky and find some Girl Scouts.' Al grinned.

Sam looked back down at the box. Like it or not, he was going to have to get those candy bars out, and the water bottle, too. He knelt on the ground beside the lid of the box and pushed the dirt out of the way. It had been buried deeply enough to have gone unnoticed by a casual ground search or from the air, especially with the cover of the pine forest. Susan hadn't had a hope of escaping or being found. He worked his hand into the crack, then pulled it apart, felt a kind of angry delight at destroying the box. The space inside looked awfully small. The thought of having been in there made him feel sick. He took several deep, slow breaths, wanting to settle himself, to not be afraid as he reached in for the food.

Eight candy bars. That was all they'd given that girl to live on for the rest of her life. Not caring about her slow, horrible death from starvation and dehydration. He decided to take them all, he would wash them when he wanted to eat them. They were better than nothing. The dress had baggy pockets in the front and he stuffed the candy bars into them then went to the "head" end of the box to find the water bottle.

The half-gallon jug had been stuffed into the ground without much care. Dirt had spilled in through the top and dead bugs floated on the surface. He pulled the rubber tube out of the box and measured its length. He could use it to make a sling for the bottle so that his hands wouldn't get tired carrying it. He looped it around the neck of the bottle and tied it in place. The rubber kept trying to expand before the knot was finished and with that and the aching throb in his leg, he could feel himself getting angry, frustrated and he kept forgetting how the knot was meant to go.

'Around and then up.' Al, crouched beside him, waved his cigar at the tangle. 'No, not that end, the other end. Around there.' The cigar passed through the tube, indicating a kink where a loop should have been.

Sam pushed the end of the hose in and dragged it, saw the knot evolve, pulled it tight.

'That's it!' Al crowed.

'Thanks Al.' Sometimes Sam felt so dumb. He had how many doctorates and he couldn't tie a simple knot. He wanted to complain. He wanted justice, for himself, for the work he'd done, for the person Sam Beckett was.

He knotted the ends of the plastic together and looped them over his shoulder then tried to stand up. It hurt. Just in the short time he'd been sitting beside the box, fighting with a hose, his leg had swollen and the pain of it speared through his leg. He let out a yelp and stumbled, fell to his knees clutching at the injured leg. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to focus beyond the pain. When he opened his eyes again, there was Al, squatting beside him, helpless anguish drawn across his features.

'Sam?' Al always had Ziggy's link in one hand and a cigar in the other. It was a kind of necessity. Sam knew he wanted to reach out; to touch, to help. He would have wrapped Sam's arm around his shoulder and walked with him a hundred and eighty three kilometers if he could have.

'Sorry.' Sam wiped a hand across his face. Wished it could take away the pain as easily as it wiped off sweat. He tried standing again, more slowly this time. The pain in his leg was like a scream. He took an unsteady step and then another, he was not going to get far.

Al tapped at the handlink, looked through the thick woods towards the road and tapped again. 'Oh jeez.'

Was he looking at the holographic world around him or at something in the imaging chamber? Sam steadied himself. 'What?'

'Can you move it a little bit faster?'

He had to be kidding. His leg was going beyond pain and into a whole new dimension of reality. He was beginning to experience it as color and sound, a red, hissing sensation that was making him feel queasy. 'Why?'

'Look I know you're not gonna make it a hundred and eighty three kilometers any time soon, but you at least gotta hide because those nozzles that kidnapped you…'

'Susan.'

'Yeah, right. That kidnapped Suzie are on their way back and they're gonna kill you.'

'No.' It hurt too much. This was not fair. Sam struggled, hobbling steps away from the box.

'Ninety three percent. Her body gets found in the forest not far from here and it's,' Al paused and read the handlink then punched a finger at it as if he was wiping something away. He puffed on the cigar, short, nervous tokes.

'It's what?' If he could just get out of sight of the box it would help, it would be a start. If the kidnappers didn't know where to look for Susan then maybe they'd give up straight away.

'It's not good.'

'Just tell me.'

Al's shoulders slumped. He glanced at the handlink but he didn't need it to remind him. 'She was tied up, sexually assaulted, tortured and then beaten to death.' He delivered the words in an urgent, staccato rhythm, motioning with his hands for Sam to move, move because there wasn't much time. Because things had gone from bad to worse. 'Her body gets found in three days. Sam come on. The same stuff happens with her parents, only sooner.'

Sam shuffled through the pine needles and to the first row of bushes that gave him cover from the box. Around him there was birdsong and the chatter of insects, the shush of the wind. It was a lonely place to die. The isolation, the lack of anybody to care, the utter sadness that somewhere out here a girl had been left to starve to death. That somewhere out here she would be treated with such utter contempt, her body, her life, nothing but a plaything. He wasn't going to let it happen.

The pain tearing at his leg was getting worse, making him feel sick. How far did he have to get before they wouldn't find him? Would it be enough to just hide from them? How far would they be prepared to search for her? He urged himself on, almost oblivious of Al, despite the shiny green suit with flashing purple and gold LED button he was wearing. This was just going to be him, getting away, giving this girl back her life. Giving her parents back their hope, and a workplace for all those people in the factories and on the farms. He had to do it. He just had to. He squeezed his eyes tight shut against the pain and his foot caught on a a tree root. He sprawled onto the ground.