Jacob hung limply from the ceiling, his ragged breathing much more clear after the pair had calmed down. His wrists were shackled to rusted chains bolted deep into the ceiling. His head hung towards his chest, strands of blood-matter hair covering his face. Deep cuts spanned all over his body, fresh blood mixed with old crusted one.

Tao and Oscar stood frozen in front of him, their breath caught in their throats. What should they do?

“Oh…shit,” Oscar muttered.

Jacob jerked his body back, the sound of the chains rattling echoed throughout the room. Slowly, he lifted his head.

Even in his beaten state, his eyes remained hollow with a fiery intensity peeking out.

“Took you long enough,” Jacob rasped, his voice dry as he coughed up blood.

Tao took a cautious step forward, his grip on the bat tightening. “Where’s Lucy?”

Jacob let out a weak chuckle, but it turned into a painful cough. “How about you let me down, and I’ll tell you everything? Right from the beginning.” He struggled against the chains, but they held firm.

Tao exchanged a glance with Oscar.

Oscar took a step forward, already searching for a way to unhook the chains. “I think we should get him down. I doubt he’d be much of a threat in his current state.”

“Hang on,” Tao narrowed his eyes on Jacob. “Tell us what happened to you first.”

“What do you think happened?” Jacob furiously said. “They took me. I turned their back on them, and so…they did this. Now come on. Let me down.”

“No, I don’t think so—” Jacob swallowed, his throat tight. “You worked for them?”

Jacob's expression darkened. “Yeah. I did.” He glanced up at Tao, their eyes locked. “I had no choice. It was work for them, or they killed my family.”

Tao hesitated.

“I get it,” Jacob continued, his voice strained. “You don’t trust me, and you really have no reason to. But you want your sister back? Then you have to trust me.”

Tao clenched his jaw. He hated it. Hated that Jacob was right. But what could they do about it? He already had killed one person, and they couldn’t change the past. What they could do is change the future, no matter who they have to work with.

“Fine,” Tao mumbled. “Oscar, help me find something to break these chains.”

Oscar nodded and started rummaging through the room making sure to avoid the body parts. He was already nauseous, and if he touched any of them, it would tip him over the edge.

Tao took a closer look at the chains hoisting Jacob up. They were locked tight—thick, industrial chains with steel clasps. No way he could use the bat to break them.

Jacob noticed Tao’s pondering expression. “The only key I know of is on one of the guards. Probably on the floor below this one,” Jacob murmured.

“Of course it is,” Jacob inhaled sharply.

“Wait, I got something!” Jacob exclaimed, lifting a metal crowbar from a nearby tray.

“That could work,” Jacob said, pulling at the chains with all his might. Dust and pebbles dropped on his head, indicating that a strong enough force would break the chains down.

“Alright, let me see,” Tao said. He grabbed the crowbar and jammed it between the chains and the bolt clasping them to the ceiling. He clenched his teeth, pushing with all his strength.

The metal groaned in protest—then snapped.

Jacob dropped, his body hitting the ground with a thud.

Oscar rushed to his side. “Shit…hey, are you good?”

Jacob inhaled and exhaled sharply, plopping himself upwards with his back to the wall. “I’ll be okay,” he muttered.

Tao raised his bat to Jacob’s face. “Start talking. Now.”

Jacob let out a deep sigh. “Yeah…yeah…just let me rest for a little.”

“Put that down, Tao. He’s clearly not an enemy,” Oscar pleaded, crouching beside Jacob.

“For now,” Tao coldly stated as he sat down on the floor.

A wave of fatigue swept over him as he began to process everything that has happened so far. They were supposed to meet up at 11:50 p.m., so the time should be like 2 a.m. I've killed somebody, my sister is still missing, and I’ve teamed up with a wanted murderer. I’ve truly lost my mind.

A small amount of time passed until Tao bolted up from the floor, and pointed the bat at Jacob’s head once more. “It’s enough. Talk.”

“Alright. I’ll talk,” Jacob exhaled deeply, resting his head against the wall. His voice was steady but quiet when he spoke again.

“I’ll begin at the start.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Tao and Oscar stayed silent, each vigilant but paying attention.

Jacob let his eyes drift up to the ceiling where he once hung by his wrists. The coldness in his body, the dull ache in his ribs—he could still feel the wear and tear of all his choices.

“The first time I saw Sarah, I knew I was in trouble. Not because of her, but because of me. Because of what I had become.”

I was already working for them by then. The Ark. They didn’t just recruit people like a normal cult—there weren’t flyers or invitations. There weren’t promises of a better life. You didn’t join. They found you.

They found me when I was fourteen. And when The Ark finds you, they own you.

At first, it was small things. Delivering messages. Delivering packages. I didn’t know what was in them, but I didn’t ask. But as I got older, I began to ask more questions. Questions that wouldn’t be answered. So I stopped asking them, and that’s when they began giving me tasks.

By the time I met Sarah, I was already finding people for them. I was assigned girls mainly.

I told myself I didn’t care. I told myself I was just doing what I had to do to survive.

Then they told me to bring in Sarah.

And suddenly, I cared. I cared so much that my stomach turned every time I saw her leading up to the day when I was supposed to bring her in. I cared so much that I avoided her. I cared so much that I didn’t even get to say I loved her.

Tao’s stomach twisted. He wanted to interrupt—to yell, to demand how Jacob could ever work for something so despicable. But something in Jacob’s face stopped him.

Oscar frowned, arms crossed. “So you were kidnapping people for them?”

Jacob looked up to Oscar. “I wasn’t just finding them. I was marking them. For death.”

His voice was steady, but his hands clenched into fists on his knees.

“When they told me Sarah was next, I couldn’t do it.”

I told her to run. I told her to run as far away as she could and never turn back. I told her that I would find her no matter where she ran.

I told The Ark that I accidentally killed her to send them in the wrong direction.

I thought I could buy her time. I thought I could save her.

But The Ark doesn’t make mistakes.

They found her.

They took her.

And they left a letter with her name on it—a letter you must have seen on the news.

They made me her killer.

Tao gritted his teeth, trying to suppress his rising rage.

Oscar ran a hand through his hair. “Jesus Christ, man…”

Jacob exhaled sharply, like a weight dropped from his body. His eyes became a tad bit brighter, but the hollowness remained.

“Now you know,” he murmured. “They framed me. Took Sarah. Now I can’t excuse all my previous wrongs, but I do know that I can make this one right.”

His gaze locked onto Tao’s.

“They took Lucy, too.”

Tao felt something inside him snap.

“You’re telling me you knew what they were doing, and you still let it happen?” He swung the bat, striking Jacob on his left knee.

Jacob let out a sharp yell.

“You were right there! You could have told her to run! You could have prevented this! All it would have cost is your life! I think that’s a fair price to pay!” Tao shouted, bringing the bat down on the same knee.

“Stop!” Oscar hollered, holding back Tao with both of his arms.

Jacob shook his head furiously. “I tried to stop it. And that’s why they left me to die in chains. No matter what I tried to do, the end result was inevitable. What they didn’t expect is you coming straight after her. This is a wild card that will help us rescue Lucy. For Sarah. And for everyone I’ve hurt in the past.“

Oscar slowly let go of Tao, clearly unsettled. “Both of you calm down. Here come on.” He helped Jacob to his feet, propping him on a table before he let go of him.

Tao breathed in and out in irregular patterns. “Okay…so what now?”

Jacob groaned in pain as he placed weight on his left leg. “Now? We get Lucy back.”

Tao and Oscar spoke up at the same time. “How?”

“Across from this room is a section of this floor that contains an elevator that leads to the back of the floor beneath us. If we take this elevator, we can sneak behind all the people on the bottom floor. Otherwise, we’ll have to use the front elevator and that is straight up suicide,” Jacob explained.

“Yeah, but how do we get past the coin-locked door?” Tao asked, remembering the coin shaped lock mounted on the sliding door.

“Easy, we get a coin,” Jacob stated.

“No shit.”

Jacob laughed at the sarcasm. “The Ark assigns ‘Observers’ to document everything. They track progress, update files, keep records. You must have seen them as you came through the hallway. They use typewriters instead of computers because of security issues.”

“We saw that room, but we didn’t see any coins anywhere,” Oscar said.

“I wouldn’t expect you to. The ‘Observers’ have a tattoo beneath their left ear indicating them. They carry the coin somewhere on them,” Jacob explained.

Tao nodded. “Okay, so we steal one.”

Jacob grinned, clearly still in pain. “Exactly.”

Oscar sighed. “Well, let’s do it.”

The trio exited the room and walked back out into the hallway containing the three doors. Their noses had already gotten used to the stench of the bodies. It felt good to finally be out of that nightmarish room.

Jacob had his arm around Oscar’s neck, still limping as he walked. Tao’s extra hits didn’t help Jacob’s condition.

Oscar and Jacob kneeled behind the set of double doors that preceded the Observation Room and Jacob had called it. Tao kneeled a few feet behind them. He just couldn’t shake a feeling about Jacob. Oscar is already buddy buddy with him.

Jacob spoke up. “Okay, so the first thing we have to do is identify an Observer. We’ll take turns in 30 second shifts until one of us finds them. Remember, tattoo unde—”

A metallic click echoed throughout the hallway.

Tao froze.

The cold barrel of a gun pressed against the back of his skull.

A voice whispered in his ear, low and steady.

“Planning something?”