The auto tape

"I want to start from the beginning if I can."

"Certainly, one question, how many attackers did you have?"

"Three in the beginning, but after I was abducted there was only one."

"Okay."

"You know, "I look at my life and who I am and…I'm too far gone…I'm broken."

"No one is too far gone or broken. They just need a little help getting back. You know that you won't be just like you were before the abduction, but you'll be much better."

"I know that. One of my former colleagues once said to me a few weeks after I've started working at the agency. "We live in a world where a man has to be able to defend his life at a moment's notice using only his wits and what lies within reach." I'd thought that would only be needed in the field. But, I was wrong. I was cleaning up my kitchen after dinner when I heard someone at the door. I asked who it was…"

Three men in black burst his door open before Rick could open it and started to attack. One of them started to punch Rick while he punched the man in the knees and he fell to the ground. The second man punched Rick in the back of the knees while Rick was making sure he had the third man. Rick was outnumbered and was less experienced with hand-to-hand combat. They fought through his living room and Rick ran to his bedroom to get his baseball bat or gun, whichever happened to be closest. He was looking for his gun when one of the men stabbed him in both legs, he fell on the bed but bounced up and started to knock the first guy's head against his closet door, he started to bleed but didn't go down. Then, he felt a needle in his neck and the lights went out.

X

Next week's auto tape

"Hi"

"Hello, how are you doing."

"I'm better," he answered "You'll be happy to know I haven't slept in my closet for a few days."

"Why did you do that?"

"That's the only place where I feel safe. I feel I can put all the locks on my door as I want but people can still get in. That's probably from the people I worked with. I feel that if I'm in a place where no one would really guess a grown man would sleep, I'll be safe."

"But you're getting better."

"Yes."

"Tell me what happened after you were drugged."

"I woke up…"

Rick woke up with metal restraints that were chained to a bar installed in the wall. He looked around him, thick brown dirt walls and floor; he knew he was in a cave, but where? How longed was he out? Did the rest of the gang know he was gone? These some some of the million questions running through his mind. He saw a brunette white male came through an iron door with a small box. Rick wondered what that box would be used for. The man said

"Hey! You're up, I was starting to think I gave you too much!" he said jokingly "I know what you're probably thinking, so no I'm not telling you where you are, how long you've been out, and no I don't give a rat's ass what you do for a living." The pretty much summed it up. Rick was trying to decode the man's accent, thinking there might be a link. Rick kept no expression on his face, he wasn't that good at being witty so he thought he shouldn't say anything at all. The man continued "Oh and my accent has nothing to do with where we are." Rick didn't know whether to believe it, he then thought he shouldn't believe a word that came out of his mouth. The man continued "Your colleagues contacted me and wanted me to abduct you. They still don't think that you have what it takes to survive in your line of work, so they decided to have you go out with a bang, literally. They said that they didn't care what I did just as long as I took care of the problem. So I thought that we'd have some fun first." Rick was preparing for what would happen next. He braced himself but the man kept talking "They contacted me a few weeks ago; I like to get to know my clients before I take them out." He said and dumped he contents of the box on Rick's lap. It was creeper pictures of him, going to work, at work, coming home, him a home, him with his mother, him with the guys, and him by himself.

"I'm sorry to stop you, but we're out of time." She said to Rick

X

The next auto tape

"Hello."

"Hi, Rick. You called for an early appointment, what's wrong?"

"I was walking down the street,and I saw a man that looked just looked just like him."

"How did you feel?"

"Petrified, helpless, all those feelings came rushing back."

"I have a question,"

"Ask" Rick said

"If you were abducted on a mission, would you hate your former colleagues this much?"
"No, because it wouldn't have been their fault, they purposely put me in this position,"
"I'm sure they didn't try to hurt you."

"Doesn't matter, they ruined my life! I was-"

"You ready to talk about it?"

"No, not yet."

"Whenever you're ready. Are you ready to tell me what he did to your legs?"

"I think so,"

"Good, you're making progress."

"He came in…"He told her how he was tortured, some of the ways, physiological warfare, weapons, being beat up; drugs.

It was hard for the three to listen because even though they were very tough men. They were protective of their youngest member, he was like the son that they never had. They hated that something so innocent took the worst possible turn. Michael felt horrible that he didn't stop it before it started, Billy felt awful for coming up with the whole idea, even Casey felt bad for hiring the men.

One time he came in Rick was still off his game from the beating he came in and he injected him with something. Within mintutes his legs were throbbing.

"Picture your foot going to sleep. Now multiply that by about a million, now times that by two for both legs. That's how it felt. Turns out he stopped the blood circulation in my legs. I want to forgive them and put this whole thing behind us and move on, but I can't, I can't find the strength to do it."

"Forgiving is hard, do you think that time will heal it."

"It's been a few months since I got home and I really feel as much apathy for them now as I did then."

"You used apathy instead of hate. Why did you use that word?"

"I once heard this quote, and now I can't find it more true, "The opposite of love is apathy, and hate is really the same as love. If you're so consumed by hatred for someone, you might as well be loving them, because you're thinking about them for the same amount of time." So apathy is great dislike but you don't give a flying fuck about them."

"Interesting" she said

X

The next tape

"Hello, Rick"

"Hi."

"How are you doing?"

"Remember that thing I wasn't ready to tell you?"

"Yes"

"I think I'm ready."

"Good"

Casey, Billy, and Michael got closer to the tape recorder in odd fascination.

Rick took a few deep breaths and started "He… He…" he took a few more breaths

"Do you need a minute?"

"No." he said and took a final deep breath before saying it "He… He… He raped me."

The guys looked at each other with a shocked oh fuck look. They have all been tortured at one time or another, but never even close to that magnitude. A little bit later, when the overall shock wore off Billy, turned to Michael and said "You were right about what you said earlier."

"The guy was so innocent." Michael said

"And he had it taken away in the worst way possible." Casey said

She then asked Rick "How many times?"

"I don't know, I lost count."

"How did that make you feel?"

"Violated, helpless, hopeless, petrified. The torture kept on getting worse, till this. I kept on being strong, trying to show that anything they did didn't break me. Untill the
rapes. Then, they finally broke me. I couldn't let them know though, because I knew what happens next."

"What?"

"They slowly and painfully kill you. I kept on thinking, "Any minute now, Casey's gonna bust down the door with Billy and Michael and everything will be okay."

Tears filled Billy's eyes but he contained them

Rick continued. "But whenever I thought that, a little thought in the back of my mind said that they wouldn't come. It was right."