There was a ringing in her head, like the echo of a gong, but painful; it seemed to throb in time with her pulse as she fought for consciousness. Her lips parted dryly and she pulled in a shallow breath, her tongue sticking thickly to the roof of her mouth. She winced slightly, took another shaky breath, and ran her tongue along the corner of her mouth. Metal. The sharp tang of metal. What...?

It came back suddenly, like a jolt, and her eyes fluttered open as panic took hold.

A black car sat idling on the side of the road, its hazard lights flashing, while a man crouched beside the flat tire, visibly annoyed. As she moved closer to offer assistance, a blinding beam from a flashlight cut through the darkness, and she instinctively raised her hand to shield her eyes, confused by the sudden glare. "Is everything okay?" she'd asked, stupidly, trustingly; before her mind could catch up, the sharp whistle of a police baton cutting through the air reached her ears, striking her ribcage with brutal force. She had only a second or two to register the pain in her ribs before a blow to the head sent her spiralling out of consciousness.

As awareness slowly returned, so did sensation; her arms, cuffed too-tightly at the wrists, throbbed painfully, and she realized with a start that she couldn't seem to draw a proper breath. An ache across her chest signalled broken ribs. She began to take stock as her eyes adjusted.

Olivia was in a cellar. It was dimly lit, the faint glow of a single, exposed lightbulb dangling from a frayed cord in the centre of the room casting long, wavering shadows. The bulb swayed slightly–was there a breeze down here?-its weak light illuminating the damp, cracked cement floor below. Jagged fissures spidered across the surface, some wide enough to hold a scattering of dust, others barely visible but deep enough to whisper of decades of wear. Small puddles had formed in the more pronounced cracks, their surfaces trembling with each drip from the ceiling above.

The walls, constructed from rough-hewn stones, seemed to absorb the darkness, their uneven surfaces patched with moss and streaked with the dark trails of water that had seeped through over the years. The air was thick with the earthy scent of damp stone and decay, mingling with a metallic tang that hinted at rusted pipes unseen. This was an isolated place, lonely; no one had been here for a long, long time.

In the centre of the space stood a single iron pole, aged and pockmarked with rust. It rose from the cracked floor to the low ceiling, its surface slick in places where water had dripped and pooled before drying in irregular patterns. It was to this pole that Olivia had been cuffed, he arms wrapped around it in a grim, unnatural embrace. Beneath her was an old mattress, its surface marred by brown, oval-shaped stains, with tufts of stuffing spilling out from numerous tears. Faint black scars dotted the areas where cigarettes had smouldered and eventually burned out, and as she turned her head slightly, the smell of stale urine wafted up, seeping from deep within the mattress. She shuddered involuntarily, wincing at the pain in her ribs.

The faint sound of dripping water echoed through the basement, each drop punctuating the oppressive silence. The air was cool, almost clammy, and clung to her skin like an unwelcome shroud. Goosebumps rose along her forearms.

Shadows danced along the walls, exaggerating their imperfections, making the basement feel both cavernous and suffocatingly close. She closed her eyes against the sudden overwhelming sense that she couldn't breathe. She tried to force the deep breath her body hungered for but the pain in her ribs would not allow for the full expansion of her lungs; she released her breath in a half-hiss, half-groan. The tortured sound of her own voice echoed dully.

Don't panic, she commanded herself. Pay attention. Think.

Olivia focused on keeping her breaths shallow and even, counting them out to steady herself. She closed her eyes lightly and took stock again, this time not of her surroundings but of her body. Ribs are broken, she affirmed to herself. That's obvious. She focused inward, conducting a mental scan of her body from head to toe. The memory of the brutal strike to the back of her head surfaced, accompanied by the throbbing tightness of swelling. Slowly, she pushed herself onto her knees, ignoring a wave of nausea, and maneuvered her head toward her restrained hands. Her fingers brushed through her hair, now stiff with dried blood, and found the large, swollen lump beneath it—a painful reminder of the blow.

Okay, she thought clinically, swallowing a sudden rush of saliva as nausea took hold again. Broken ribs, blow to the head, probable concussion. Anything else?

She broke out in a cold sweat as she continued her mental scan. She willed herself to remain clinical, detached. It's okay, she told herself. You're okay.

Olivia opened her eyes again, noting for the first time and with great relief that she was still fully dressed in the clothes she had been wearing on her way home from the precinct. So I haven't been… She couldn't finish the thought, her stomach heaving as she performed a quick mental assessment of those parts of her she desperately hoped hadn't been violated while she was unconscious. There was no discomfort between her legs, or wetness; she scanned her memory for fragments but there was nothing to suggest she'd been hurt in that way.

"Ohhh," she breathed, "Oh, thank God." Her voice felt alien, childlike, tinged with fear and fragile hope.

But her sense of relief was short-lived. She stiffened, her heart racing, as a voice from the shadows of the dim corner cut through the stillness, cold and unfeeling. "God can't hear you here."