Chapter 3: Missing

Chapter 3: Missing

When Kate arrived at the scene she instantly un-holstered her weapon, yelled "NCIS" and cleared the inside of the building. Seeing no one she went to where the bullet had gone through Gibbs' shoulder and John Doe's head. Finding the bullet embedded in the side of the warehouse she photographed and extracted the bullet from the wall. She put the bullet in an evidence bag and into her pocket. Standing up she looked around. Her trained eyes picking up footprints she could have sworn weren't there the last time they were here. She was moving to the car when she was grabbed from behind. She felt a cloth being pressed against her nose and mouth cutting off all fresh air supply. Then there was that unmistakable smell of chloroform. Sweet in small amounts but disgusting in plenty. Her last thought as she was taken under was for the evidence. With her waning strength she threw the bullet as far as she could, collapsing to the ground she drew an arrow into the layer of dirt pointing towards where she threw the bullet had landed.

Back at the headquarters McGee and Tony were starting to panic.

"Where is she? I mean she woulda called wouldn't she? Ooh maybe she went to see Gibbs. I mean she's so that right?"

"McWorry! Calm down, I'm sure Kate's fine. She's a survivor, just like Gibbs."

"I now but it's so scary. I mean not knowing whether she's alive or not."

Meanwhile Kate woke up to feeling as though she had tried to eat cotton wool. She took in her, well what was it? A cell she supposed. There weren't any windows. Of course there aren't any windows, there are never any windows! She mentally kicked herself for that thought. Recovering from the minor window obsession, Kate fully assessed her situation. Right; door check, that door isn't designed for that frame. She could tell because of the strip of light surrounding the door. Right anyway away from that observation she noticed a key lock and a bolt locking the door. Her eyes having finally adjusting to the light, or in this case the absence of light she looked around. Kate wished she had kept her eyes closed but know that she knew she knew she could even smell it. Blood, and lots of it. The room she was in was a blood bath. It had dried black in the absence of light, even so she could imagine the scarlet 'paint' covering all the walls and floor. The smell of copper assaulting her nostrils. Finally she gave in re-opening her eyes, she saw the maker of this blood bath. Her captor had on a mask and she suspected the mask was a thing of nightmares. She had shut her eyes before she saw any of it in detail. Opening her eyes again she looked at her captor, she saw the mask and did a double take. What the fuck? What sort of kidnapper wears a fucking bunny mask?

"Ah, my new pet is awake. It took long enough."

Kate had tried to appear asleep when she had heard the bolt sliding back but, obviously, she failed.

"Go. To. Hell." Was all that she had to say.

"I was starting to wonder if I used too much chloroform" Her captor continued, ignoring her interruption.

Kate was a trained profiler. Male, startling eyes that she was sure she had seen before, psychopath judging by the fact I'm his 'pet'. He had left the door open, which was strange. Maybe he was confident that I can't get away either that or he thinks I don't want to… That is how some work I suppose, they are obsessed with their victims and are so deranged that they think the victims feel the same way. I could use the open door to my advantage. Using the light that came spilling in she observed the place she was being held. She determined that it was underground and some kind of modified cellar. Training her eyes on the other side of the room she saw his 'toys' just as he started talking about them. A mace, cat o' nine tails, whips chains and, oh bugger, pokers. Her eyes swept across the far wall falling on the fireplace she could do poker plus fire and got ouch. The minute that her captor left Kate struggled against her chains as she thought 'no way in hell is this insane fucker touching me with that!' As she was struggling her ears picked up a slight noise. The noise of crumbling plaster. Turning around as much as allowed by the chains around her wrists she looked at the manacles around her ankles. They had become loose, probably from the struggling of her and all the monsters other victims. At that thought she shuddered but started planning how this could turn in her favour. She started to struggle with her legs only, pulling those out of the wall. For her plan to work she needed the ones in the ceiling.

"What have we got?" Gibbs asked McGee and DiNozzo. "We need to know 'coz judging by the state of her Kate's gonna be in alotta pain if we don't get her out soon."

"You'd be right in that thought, rigor has come and gone again showing that she has been dead a while. There are several injuries that could have caused this young ladies death, the crowbar to her spine, the mace wound to her stomach, the cauterization of her chest wound. The preciseness of the cauterization suggests that this person knew what they are doing. I can't determine which of these wounds killed her but I doubt it was the cauterization because you wouldn't cauterize the wound on a dead person."

"So we're looking for someone with skills of what? You can't put cauterization skills on a B.O.L.O you know! He knows how to handle both medieval and modern weapons, that's great to know." Walking back up to where the remaining team member was and stated

"We have more information on our kidnapper. Apparently he knows how to handle a mace and many old weapons, as well as modern day. Our Jane Doe downstairs is covered in different bruises and abrasions from different weapons, including a mace. Tony saw the look of confusion on McGee's face and decided to explain it to him

"McInnocent, a mace is a solid metal pole, with spikes on one end sharp enough to cut through anything. It's a medieval weapon that, unless he's made his own, I should imagine is rather hard to get hold of."

Realizing what he was saying Tony trailed off thinking of the damage something like a mace could do to Kate's lithe frame.

Kate was biding her time she had managed to get her feet mostly free and one more good yank should free them. Since she had started freeing her feet her captor had come back twice, torturing her both times, but not noticing the fact that her feet were moving more freely than before. Kate pulled on the manacles round her ankles so hard that while they came out of the wall she could feel her blood running from her ankles, down her feet and off the end of her toes, joining her struggle to the indiscernible amount that had come before her.