Board Thread:Roleplaying/@comment-4199666-20150808163518

'''A/N: This is part one of a series of unfortunate events. There is some violence in this so be warned. '''

After packing up her things and waiting around for the last parent to pick up their child, Dia heads out of the day-care, walking over to the parking lot just down the road. It’s only just starting to get dark, but the streets are quiet and deserted. There’s really no one else around, and all the shopfronts around have ceased business for the day. She hears a car pull up behind her, and she instinctively clutches onto her bag tighter. Then she hears people getting out and walking behind her. She reaches into her bag, clutching at a can of pepper spray. Behind her, she can hear the people getting closer. She finally turns around to see who’s there. She certainly wasn’t expecting to come face first with the business end of a pistol when she turned around.

“Don’t make a noise and get in the van,” the other man order her. Dia is shaking by this point, and she never really got taught what to do when faced with a situation being held at gunpoint.

“What’s happening?” she tries to ask. Her question goes unanswered. The first man just repeats his instructions. “I don’t know who you’re looking for,” she tries to plead, “but it’s not me. You have the wrong person.” Tears begin to fill her eyes. “Please. I don’t even know you.”

Dia is not really confident about arguing with a person holding a gun to her head, so she does as she’s told. She follows the man into the van, still clutching at her can of pepper spray. She doesn’t know when she’ll use it but she hopes it will help her. She doesn’t dare to unclench her fist while she walks over to the van and gets pushed into the back. Inside, she looks around. The van has no windows to on the sides, and the back ones have been painted over. It’s dark and she’s not even sure if she can find a seat. He roughs her up a bit, pushing her roughly as he ties up her wrists behind her back. He notices the object in her hand and chuckles a little, unnerving Dia. She can feel him grabbing at it, and she clutches on tightly to it.

“What are you going to do to me?” she asks, her voice wavering. She waits for an answer but the man is quiet as he ties her hands together. “Ow,” she yells as a bit of the rope pinches her skin.

“Shut up!” he orders again, his voice echoing louder now inside the van. He ties the rope a little bit tighter as Dia winces.

“Please God,” she starts to pray, too afraid to say the words out loud. “Please don’t let them kill me. Please let this all be a really bad dream. Please don’t let them hurt me.” Tears stream down her face as she thinks over the worst case scenarios, although she’s pretty sure she’s already found herself in one. She lets out one more scream of agony and desperation when the man kicks her in the back of the knee and she falls down to her knees. He grows and pulls out a roll of duct tape, ripping off a piece and struggling to put it on Dia’s mouth as she kept wriggling away from it. She knew it was futile, but she wanted to put up a fight.

She gets her mouth covered and her bag gets taken away from her. She still has the mace, but she can’t move her hands. They exit the back of the van and get into the driver’s seats where she can hear them rummaging through her things. She hears her phone’s message tone go off, and she realises it’s probably her boyfriend, sending her the regular after-work text. She can’t help but worry about everything that’s happening as they start driving away. How did she end up here? What did these men want with her? She even started to blame herself for things. Why hadn’t she parked closer to work? Why didn’t she leave earlier when her co-worker left so they could walk together? Dia only knew one thing, that she was absolutely petrified of whatever came next.

….

After finally realising the time, Marcus decides to search for his phone, sending Dia a text which he sends her almost every day, asking about how her day was. He finds it and sends her the text, coming up easily as she’s almost always his most recently messaged person.

‘hey babe how was work? r u coming over later’

Minutes pass. No response. Marcus doesn’t think much of it. Maybe she’s driving. Maybe she’s in a staff meeting. He continues playing with Bandit on his bed while Nick cooks dinner for the two of them. He still checks down at his phone every couple of minutes, just in case he got a message from Dia and didn’t know about it. Dia doesn’t text back before dinner, and Marcus spends the whole time, pushing food around with his fork and staring at his phone.

“Desperate much?” Nick jokes, in between shovelling down mouthfuls of peas and corn. Marcus didn’t laugh, or even look up from his phone.

“Dia hasn’t messaged me back yet,” he says. “It’s been like an hour.”

“Maybe she’s mad at you.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“She’s not mad at me. Why would she be mad at me?”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Maybe you just stare at your phone the whole time instead of talking to people,” Nick jokes. “I’m sure it’s fine. She’s probably just eating dinner or something. Maybe she read your text and forgot to reply.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Nah, she hasn’t seen it yet.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Wow,” Nick says, rolling his eyes. “You really are that desperate.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Sue me.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“You saw her earlier today. Maybe her phone’s just dead.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Marcus frowns. “Yeah, whatever.” He continues to push his vegetables around on the plate, before pushing himself away. “I’m just gonna go watch TV.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Nick looks down at the plate of food left. “At least eat something I cooked.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Marcus looks down and laughs a little. “Fine, mom. I’m gonna take my food and watch TV.” He grabs his plate of food before Nick can protest, and sits down on the couch with his phone in the other hand.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">….

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">After what felt like an hour, Dia finally hears the engine of the van turn off. She has curled herself into a ball in the back corner of the van, for balance, but stands up once the van stops, anticipating that they will come in to get her. She finally hears the pulling at the door handle, followed by the sliding of the door. It’s a lot darker now, and she can’t really see her surroundings, but she can hear the men as they climb up in to get her. A small trap she had set up earlier manages to trip him, but he stays on his feet.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Piece of shit,” he groans as he stands back upright and hits his head on the roof.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Dia presses her back up against the wall of the van, waiting for him to come closer still. He starts calling out her name, the same way you’d call a cat towards you, and suddenly it starts to dawn on Dia that they did mean to get her. She was a target. Dia waits until he’s close enough and kicks him in the shin, angering him some more. In retaliation, he rips the duct tape off her mouth, and Dia swears she can see him smiling while she lets out a cry of pain.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“I don’t think you know who you’re dealing with,” she says, trying to sound threatening. “My boyfriend is going to kill you.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">The other man standing near the door chuckles at her. “Huh, if I had a dollar for every time I heard that.”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“I hope he kills you first,” she snaps.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">The man in front of her grows tired of her attitude and roughly grabs her shoulder, pulling her towards him, and then towards the van door. Dia tries her best to fight it, but the man is a lot stronger than her, and she’s also wary of what happened to the gun. She gets out of the van and takes a quick look around, trying to get a grip of where she is.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Where am I?” she asks, trying to turn around to face the men. The older man shoves her forward when she tries to stop.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Stop talking,” he orders.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Tell me where I am!” she demands to know. “How do you know who I am?” From behind her, she can hear the younger guy chuckling. “Where am I?” she repeats.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“We’re in a nice little place called ‘Shut the fuck up’” the older man finally answers. “Capiche?”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Dia furrows her brow and stops walking. He shoves her, then walks into her, but she persists. He finally grabs her around the waist, and she stamps her foot down as hard as she can onto his. He lets out a loud expletive while the younger guy next to him laughs and walks up in front of Dia. He leans in closer and has a look at her face, and although she hasn’t done it since she was thirteen, she manages to spit in his face. “Cabrón,” she curses. He chuckles as he wipes his sleeve across his face.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Oh, you’re a fiery one, aren’t you?” he taunts. “I like ‘em when they put up a fight.” Before Dia can even think, she feels a swift punch land on her stomach, knocking the wind out of her. She keels over and tries to regain her breath, before getting handled by both of the men as they drag her into the house. Once she’s inside, she tries to move out of their grip, but instead finds herself being pushed to the floor on her knees. In front of her, there are some shoes, nice ladies ones. Dia looks up some more at the Asian lady smoking a cigarette in front of her. Dia’s still not really recovered from the punch and the whole ordeal is making her start to feel queasy. The tobacco smoke isn’t helping either.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“Ms. Sanchez,” she begins. “I heard you put up a fight with my men.” Dia doesn’t say anything, but tries to find her breath. The younger man starts retelling events, but soon stops when the woman looks at him sternly. “I hope you know better than to try any of that here.” The woman starts to circle around Dia slowly, and Dia tries hard to ignore the smell of the smoke. She finally builds up the nerve to speak up.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“What do you want with me?” she asks, and for a moment, the woman stops in her tracks.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">A smile creeps across the woman’s face. “It’s not you I want,” she begins.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">“So why am I here?”

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">The lady shakes her head, and looks over at her two henchmen. “Mr. Watson,” she begins, “the older one, he won’t listen to me.” She crouches down so she’s at the same eye level as Dia. “I think the younger one will be easier to persuade.” As she finishes her sentence, she takes in another drag from her cigarette and exhales, causing Dia’s head to spin some more. She stands back up, addressing the two men behind Dia. “Take Ms. Sanchez to her room,” she orders.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Dia hears the shuffling of feet as the two men approach her and she tries to brace herself for being thrown around again. The older man grabs her arm and yanks her up off the ground. She winces a little, but remembers what the woman said to her. She gets pushed around through the house until she ends up in a bedroom. He throws down onto the bed, then pulls out a knife. Dia can feel her nerves rising as he moves the knife down closer to her. The cold blade touches her skin as he cuts the rope off her wrists, and she could swear that he intentionally meant to nick her with the blade. As soon as she has her hands free, she starts rubbing her sore wrists, trying to ignore the little cut that’s bleeding. He throws the rope down at her. “Make yourself comfortable. You’re going to be here a while,” he says, before walking back to the door where the other man is. He pulls the door shut behind him, and Dia can hear it lock.

<p style="-webkit-font-smoothing:antialiased;outline:none0px;-webkit-tap-highlight-color:transparent;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:0px;font-family:'HelveticaNeue',HelveticaNeue,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;font-stretch:inherit;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(68,68,68);">Petrified, she finally lets herself fall down onto the bed and cry. As much as she wants to stop herself, she can’t stop the tears. All she could think about was how much she wanted to go home, or see Marcus, or her cousin and her aunt. Surely by this point, someone would have been a little concerned about her, and would have started asking questions. Surely Marcus would have found it strange that she never answered his text. She just had to keep reassuring herself that things would be over soon, and that people were already coming to help her. <ac_metadata title="last year&#039;s wishes are this years apologies" related_topics="Dia Sanchez|Marcus Watson|Nick Watson|Moon Hye"> </ac_metadata>