Reborn Heart of Steel

What I know is that the first thing I noticed was this constant banging on my head, the intensity of which felt as though my head was a rapidly beating drum. I attempted to open my eyes, but it seemed like my eyelids had become so heavy. Gradually, agonizingly, I struggled out of the depths into partial wakefulness. After some time, I was eventually able to come back to my senses. I was lying on a cold hard surface. The air was moist and stale around me with the crude smell of iron and the smell of water standing still for a long time. I snapped my eyes wide open, rubbing them a little as they tried to focus on the dimly lit room. I had awoken inside some, although surely not the only, form of subterranean chamber. With walls of bare concrete with the wear of the years in what seemed like a deserted building. Only one grimy bulb was hanging from the ceiling; this created an eerie light in the entire room with dark shades of shadow all over.

I attempted to move and something that was tied tightly around my wrists stopped me; I was tied to the chair. My ankles also were bound with what felt like zip ties around my wrists which were cutting into my skin and I wriggled on them. “Bri? Are you awake?” The whispered voice gave me a sudden feeling of relief, “Chase?” I whispered back, raising my head slightly to see Chase tied up a few feet away from me. “Are you okay?” He nodded, glowering through narrow eyes; the cut on his temple that Finch had given him was still bleeding, but the worst of the blood had dried up. “Well, that’s not exactly a surprise to me, I’ve been better. Have you any idea where we are?” I shook my head, tensing at the pain that had just crossed my mind. It is about some kind of underground facility, as far as I understood. Chase, I’m so sorry. I’m to blame for all of this. I shouldn’t have-” “Hey,” he stopped me intervening politely, “I am not blaming you for this one way or the other, understand that we are in this together and. I will find a way out. ” Before I could reply to him, the sound of footsteps could be heard from the other side of probably a steel door at the end of the hall. They looked at each other with surprise and fear and as we opened the door we played a loud saxophone. Mr. Finch entered the room next and two big dusky men dressed in plain black clothes accompanied him. Missing from the scene was any of the pathetic cleaners that we had been accustomed to seeing. The young man was now on his feet and he walked like a panther, his eyes were lifeless as they glanced at us. “Good you’re awake,” he said, which was nothing like the friendly tone we had during our meeting in the dorm. “The Raven will be glad to know you both. He has been expecting you . ” “Where are we?” I asked, avoiding an angering tone as much as possible. We asked, agitated, “What do you want with us?” Finch almost smiled cruelly as he worked the weapon in her hands. “Oh, don’t worry about it sweetheart, all in good time, darling. For now you are our insurance. You see, we might just need to get a little message delivered to your friends at the Police Department. ” With clenched teeth and looking truly pissed, Chase pulled on the ropes binding him. “You’ll never get out of it, the whole city is out searching for us. ”

“Oh I think we will” Finch answered, he was calm, almost nonchalant, as if he knew he had said something very profound. “In fact, in less than an hour the city will have much bigger issues to bother about than two lost college students. ” That cold feeling got me at his words. Whatever was in The Raven’s mind was set; it was going to happen soon. Having said this, Finch looked at his men. “You bring them, I want them to know me, the boss. ” Course fingers pulled us up, and I had the impression that my shameful face was reasoned by the coarseness of my hands of an hour ago. I tried to walk but realizing that my legs were tied, I felt weak, and I actually tripped, but one of the men grabbed me to prevent me from falling. They pulled us up or rather frog-marched us out of the room, down a very long, poorly lit hallway. The deeper I went, I attempted to commit to memory where exactly we were, searching for any indicator that might help us determine where we were in the facility. But the passages were all identical the long corridor-like, concrete, well-like, endless tunnels. At last, we got in front of the huge fully opened doors of the double one. Finch entered a code on the security pads and the doors opened up in a hushed manner. The room beyond seemed to be in total contrast with the other parts of the structure. Rows of computer monitors were on the periphery of the room, and each of them showed constant streams of information and graphs. In the middle of the room, standing tall, was a figure that could only be described as The Raven himself. We saw a tall thin man who was wearing a brilliant black suit which appeared to gulp light. His lower face was tightly bound by some sort of mask so that only his eyes were visible eyes that had a very smart and menacing look on them as they stared at Chase and at me. “Welcome,” The Raven said. “I have been waiting for this meeting for rather a long time. ” Finally, Chase felt that he had had enough of the odd man, and so he asked him,

“What do you want?” The Raven laughed, a low and grave chuckle which was even masked by his hood. “Who I am is irrelevant. As for what I want… well, that’s a rather complex question. But I suppose the simplest answer is: “change. ” . Barely, the hope rose within me; there was still a glimmer of hope for us. But as we were dragged through the door, that hope was crushed by hearing The Raven’s laughter, so cruel and full of victory. “Oh, I almost forgot,” he shouted to us again. “I’ve got a small treat prepared for your friend Zoe. I am curious to see how she will deal with a touch of my newest invention, which is a nerve agent that you can only decipher as being an improvement on my previous inventions. ” I was filled with fear as we were hurried out of the building and a clock was ticking in my heart to catastrophe. Nowhere in this network of tunnels were they staking out a trap. Zoe was a victim of this situation. The city above was moments away from chaos. Chase and I were helpless while being pulled into the deeper regions of The Raven’s den waiting for disaster to strike. By the time we turned a bend, a very loud blast went off at the center of the facility. The light that had been shining dimly went out gradually and after a while we were in total darkness. This disarray, I felt Chase’s hand grabbing and gripping mine. Then there was silence for a fairly short time. Then, through the ringing in my ears, I heard a sound which nearly turned my blood to ice – the gentle hiss of gas being liberated in the air, around us.