Page 25 of Operation: Defiance

Hands.

Everywhere.

My body jerks hard enough to tear a sound out of me before my brain catches up. Adrenaline floods my limbs. Someone yanks my arm the wrong way and my shoulder detonates in pain.

I gasp, lungs burning, heart thundering so loudly it drowns out everything else.

The restraints change again.

Wrists locked behind me now. Ankles separated. A chair under my thighs—though I don’t remember being lifted into it.

That’s what breaks through the panic.

Not the pain, but the missing time.

A man clears his throat, close enough that I feel it more than hear it.

“Do you understand the rules?”

“Yes,” I say quickly, my voice thin, breath uneven.

“State them.”

My thoughts misfire, fragments of shallow sleep grinding against one another instead of clearing. I anchor on the pressure of the cold chair under my thighs and the cuffs tight around my wrists.

“I’m not to move unless instructed,” I say. “I don’t speak without direction. I ask for water. I ask for the bathroom.”

“And?”

The word hangs there.

I search for what I missed. My mind skids and finds nothing to grab onto.

“I—” I swallow, try to reset. “Those were the instructions.”

Silence. So much of it, fear settles in my chest until the man finally exhales.

“Acceptable.”

Relief washes over me, my shoulders dropping and a breath slipping from my lips.

A low, mechanical whir—another security camera—spins up to my right.

“Are you confused?” the man asks.

Yes? No? I don’t know which answer is closer to the truth.

“I’m tired,” I say. It’s the only thing I’m certain of.

“That wasn’t the question.”

My throat works against the tightness of the hood. “Yes. I’m confused.”

“Do you understand why?”

“Yes.”

Footsteps click back and forth in front of me.