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"Wake up, asshole."
Black stands in her heavy leather duster, arms folded. A groggy Collins, chained up and hanging from the ceiling, struggles to open his eyes. Black punches him in the face to prompt quicker results.
"Where...where am I..."
Collins' eyes widen and he stares out at his captor. The sensation of blood rushing to his head causes a dizziness that nearly makes him throw up. And the swinging back and forth doesn't help matter much.
"It's not important where you are," Black says.
"What have you done to me..."
Black impertinently rolls her eyes and taps the sole of her shoes against the concrete floor. The echo in the warehouse alerts Collins to the fact that they must be alone.
"Let's just go ahead and jump to the future questions, shall we? No, I'm not going to kill you. And yes, your boy Miller is safe. For now."
"What do you mean for now?" Collins says, his voice in its full register now.
Black chuckles softly to herself and removes a gun from her waistband. She aims it at the chains and fires, causing Collins to flinch in terror. Eventually, the bullets create enough of a dent in Collins' restraints to send him sailing to the floor.
He attempts to scramble to his feet, but still bound, it proves to be difficult.
"I heard you about to spill the beans to your boy," Black says. "And I couldn't pass up the opportunity to hear it first-hand. You see, he's important to us...but not as important as you are. The ever elusive Doctor Collins."
"Hear what first-hand?"
"You're the big doc who wipes peoples memories. Rips people out of their lives and gives them false memories. Program them to work for the Suite."
"You're very perceptive."
"Well, in case you'd forgotten, Doc, you did that to me," Black says, nearly snarling through gritted teeth as she slams her foot onto his chest and burrows into his eyes with her own. "And you're gonna show me how."
MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
MARQUETTE COVE, MAY 2008
"I'm done doing your dirty work," Collins says. "Tell me where my daughter is."
Eric Hanley leans forward on Collins' desk and grins. "You'd like that, wouldn't you? For me to tell you where I've stashed your daughter? And for you to have the happy reunion you've dreamt of for months?"
"Tell me where the hell my daughter is! This has gone too far!"
Collins rises from the desk in his office at the Marquette Cove Memorial Hospital and pushes Eric against the wall. Eric merely laughs and shoves Collins away.
"It's gone far enough when I say it's gone far enough," Eric says. "No one was supposed to find out what I blackmailed you into doing until much later. But you had to go and fuck things up!"
"I think I've had just about enough of —"
The sudden ringing of his desk phone draws silence from Collins. He backs away from Eric and stares at it momentarily, as if he can't understand why it's ringing. After a few seconds of indecision, he snatches up the phone.
"Hello?"
"Victor Collins?" The grave voice on the other end is one that Collins doesn't recognize.
"Yes?"
"We have your daughter. We want to speak with you."
"You have my...my what?"
"Your daughter."
"What do you mean you have my daughter?"
Eric's eyes widen instantaneously. He attempts to slide out of the office while Collins is distracted.
"Will you excuse me for a moment?" Collins says, lowering the phone. "Oh...Eric?"
Before Eric can react, Collins swings and punches him in the face, knocking him unconscious. Collins returns to the phone call.
"Let's talk."
WAREHOUSE
Miller Falls awakes for what seems to be the thousandth time in less than twenty four hours. Though this is the first time he's been restrained. He wiggles his arms in an attempt to muscle free, but it's futile.
"Stop trying to move."
Miller doesn't recognize the man speaking to him. He cranes his neck to get a clear view of the stranger.
"Who are you?" Miller says.
"You'll find out soon enough."
"I don't really like surprises."
"We're here to help," the man says. "Trust me, you'll thank us once this is all over."
"Us?"
"That's enough talking."
The man's footsteps echo as he walks away. Miller fights against his restraints again to no avail.
"Wait!"
"We're done here."
"Who bandaged me up?"
"I did," the man says after a few moments of silence.
"I think you miss a part...something's bleeding."
"You'll be fine."
"Hey, I don't even know where I am!" Miller says. "I could get a staph infection or something!"
There is silence once again. But when Miller finally hears the man approaching him, his frown turns into a sly smile.
DR. MARK VALLEY'S OFFICE
MILWAUKEE, JUNE 2008
"Doctor Mark Valley's office," a perky blond receptionist squeaks into the phone as she answers on the third ring. "Oh, you'd like to make an appointment? Sure."
She rifles through the items on her desk, looking for Mark's appointment book. But she can't find it.
"I knew I should have transferred all of this to the computer," she mumbles. "Oh...no sir, I wasn't talking to you. I'm just...let me call you back."
She hangs up the phone to continue her search, only then realizing she never got the man's number.
"Shit."
She stands up and searches around her desk, still unable to find it. Realizing it might be in her car from her previous attempt to "organize," she hurries to the door and pushes her way outside.
"Oh, sorry," she says, bumping into a man outside the office.
"Don't worry about it," Victor says.
She smiles and rushes to the parking lot. He watches her go with a frown on his face. He slides into the building and goes directly to Mark's office. He knocks on the door.
"Kimberly, is that you?"
Victor doesn't respond, he merely steps inside the office and sets down his black medical bag.
"Dr. Valley?" Victor says.
Mark glances up from his desk. "Yes, who are?"
"You're quite the star, aren't you? You climbed Mount Everest last month."
"Is this about an interview? Because I already gave one to Men's Journal..."
"No, I don't work for a magazine."
Victor removes a syringe from his bag.
The receptionist rushes back into the office as the phone rings off the hook. She picks up the receiver and speaks in a hurried, breathy tone.
"Kimberly Black speaking, is this the guy from earlier?"
Kimberly listens to the man on the other end, but becomes distracted when she hears a loud crash from the office.
"Dr. Valley?"
She quickly moves into his office, only to find Mark slumped unconscious over his desk. She also sees Victor, holding his syringe, standing over Mark.
"Who are you?"
"I'm sorry you had to see this," Victor says, raising the syringe.
WAREHOUSE
"My name is...Kimberly?"
"Kimberly Black, yes," Victor says. "I was sent to retrieve your employer for the Suite, but when you stumbled across...I figured there was use for the both of you."
"And there was."
"Until you left the Suite. Joined the group trying to bring down Monsieur."
"I was someone else less than a year ago," Black says. "So all of my memories...they're not real?"
"No," Victor says. "Up until eight months ago, you were Kimberly Black. Not an operative for the Suite. Not...Lexie Grant."
"Can you reverse this?"
"Reverse it? I don't have the —"
Black punches Victor in the face again.
"That's not what I want to hear!"
"Then maybe you'd like to hear the sound of my fist colliding with your face?"
Black spins around in just enough time for Miller's fist to do just that. She flies to the ground and rolls into a heap. Miller bends over and tries to free Victor from his chains.
"Come on, Doc," Miller says. "We've got to get the hell out of here."
"I don't think so," Black says, recovering quickly.
She rushes at Miller and dives into him, sending the both of them sailing into a wall. Pieces of the wall crumble upon impact and once both are on their feet, they resume their battle with hand-to-hand combat.
Victor tries to plead with both of them. "Stop!"
Miller ignores him and elbows Black in the face, knocking her onto her back. He crouches down and rests his arm on her neck, as if he could snap it at any moment.
"What do you people want from me?!"
"Stop it, Miller!"
"Why?" Miller says. "They kidnapped the both of us!"
"You don't know everything," Victor says. "You can't hurt her, she's your fiancée. And your real name isn't Miller Falls...it's Duncan Kincaid."
TO BE CONTINUED...
STORY BY
IRA MADISON
NEXT ISSUE:
Are Miller and Black really connected?
Will they join forces to take down the Suite?
And will Collins be able to give them their lives back?
Find out this and more in ... Paper #7: "You're Not From Here"
