Mini-Story 2 (Part 1)

I watched as they brought crate after crate inside, filled with what, I did not know.

I was hiding from them...if anyone saw my current position, that fact would have been obvious. But to my enemies, it wasn't so apparent. I was mere feet away from them, yet they still didn't know. They couldn't smell me, and I once more was grateful for the scent camouflage that had kept me from being detected thus far.

It was exhilarating to be so near them, but knowing that I wouldn't be caught like last time, was making the excitement even greater.

The only way they would know I was here is if they randomly came and searched behind the tall storage box that concealed me from view. But what reason would they have to do that? I wondered within myself.

The odds were in my favor, and logic answered that for me. They wouldn't have any reason to look back here.

I smiled, happy with my current assignment. I'd been told to come here, to the warehouse that was three miles off the highway, smack-dab in the middle of scenic nowhere, and I had no way to leave, until my mission was done. They wouldn't pick me up until it was finished.

I was asked to merely watch them bring in the crates, as the boss had anticipated that I would get a chance to discover the mystery of what their big secret was. I didn't know if the opportunity would arise, but I was hopeful that it would.

This was my first mission, and I had to pass it, in order to continue with The Firme, as they called us.

So, I kept watching, eager to learn what the crates contained. I had a cell phone in my pocket, set on the lowest vibration setting, in case I got a text or call.

Of course, I wouldn't be able to speak if someone should call.

Even if my adversaries were unaware that I was here, they were not deaf. Just the opposite was true, actually. Their hearing was just as excellent as mine. But I could reply to a text if I received one. Silent keys...it was a touch screen, I thought with a smirk.

The minutes crept by, as if time had been slowed, then seemed to come to a standstill altogether. I'd had my required ten hours of sleep last night, so I was well-rested.

The task set for me didn't require hardly any effort on my part, but it was tedious nonetheless.

My eyes went back and forth, seeing them coming and going. They were making a neat pile of the crates, using pulleys to get the others on top.

The crates were about the size of a very small car. They had to push them in on wheels, then transfer them to the pulleys. I wished one of the flimsy-looking straps lifting the crates would just snap suddenly, sending the crate crashing to the floor, but I doubted that would happen. Their pulleys were expertly built, never known to have any faults, mishaps, or accidents of any kind.

Just my luck...

(Part 2)

I continued to watch them, bored out of my mind, but still, I remained alert and quiet, not wanting to give away my position.

The first pile slowly, but surely became two and then three, but still, not a single crate was opened, much to my dismay. This was pointless, I thought, severely frustrated.

It seemed to me that they were only moving them, being careful not to open one, as if they worried that someone would see the crate's contents. When would this mission end? I thought with a silent yawn. I realized that unless I got a glimpse of whatever was in the crates, I wouldn't be picked up by anyone from The Firme.

The fear of a neverending mission made my heart race, and worried me. If I couldn't handle this simple mission, what hope did I have of succeeding when the assignments became more difficult?

This one wasn't going well, but it's not my fault. I can't make them open a box that they don't want to open.

There was one more pile made, and then, the whole lot of the movers left through the side warehouse door.

When no one came back inside for several minutes, I wondered if they were done. Through a window near the ceiling, I saw that it was dark outside, stars dotting the sky, like they always did in the evening. A faint stream of moonlight could be seen from the left side of the glass.

I looked around with my eyes only, for a few minutes. When I'd decided that they were done for the night, and that the coast was clear, only then did I stretch, and creep slowly from my hiding spot, walking towards the boxes.

It was then that I noticed a solitary crate, set apart from the others, one that didn't have another one on top of it. I suddenly felt as if my odds of successfully completing this assignment had just greatly increased. I smiled as I planned.

All I had to do now was go over to the crate, open it, look inside, take a few pictures, then sneak out of the warehouse the same way I came in. So easy, I told myself.

I stepped forward as slowly as I possibly could, my footsteps light and inaudible.

When I got to the crate, I quickly ascertained that I would not be able to open it with my hands, so I set about searching for a tool that would help me.

After two minutes of looking, I spotted a small crowbar leaned against the back wall, near tall shelves that held papers, envelopes, and packaging stickers with to and from spaces, for mailing things.

I picked up the crowbar, and returned to the crate. I got the curved part under one side, and gingerly used it to lift the top off of the box. It opened with a small snap, and I eagerly peered inside.

Confusion swept over me. I felt inside the crate with my hands, even used the flashlight feature on my phone to carefully look inside, making sure not to aim it at the window, but it only confirmed what my eyes and hands had already told me; the crate was utterly empty. I didn't know if it was just this one, or if they all contained absolutely nothing.

This made no sense. Why would they waste a bunch of time hauling around hollow boxes? There had to be a secret to this, and I would figure it out. No matter how long it took me, I would discover what they were up to here.

From behind me came two sounds, the door opening, and heavy footsteps rushing...right at me. Before I could turn or even scream, they'd caught my hands behind my back, and were lifting me up, searching my pockets, and finding my phone. I saw them crush it into pieces, destroying it instantly, which made me mad.

"Why did you have to do that?" I demanded angrily, my face reddened with acute fury.

That had been a gift from my great-aunt Cara. How dare they just break it right in front of me? Or at all? They just laughed in my face, clearly finding humor in the destruction of my personal property. I tried to remember their faces, but the details were hazy. I'd been here too long. My mind was going.

The cruelty surprised me. I knew they hated us, but was that really necessary?

I started to struggle to get down, because I saw that they were going to put me in the empty box.

"No, you can't do this," I screeched, clawing at the face of whoever was holding me, my medium-length nails digging into their cheeks.

"Don't you want to find out what's in the crates?" A male asked me, a deep yet evil-like timbre in his voice, which was so chilling, it gave me goosebumps as soon as I'd heard it.

"Can't you just tell me? There's nothing in those boxes, and if you put me in one, the only thing that will be in that crate, will be me," I told them, my logic foolproof. "Or is it that you are all deranged madmen, who see something I don't?"

The same male spoke again. "You don't know all the factors. If you did, then you'd know what the crates contain. But don't worry. You will see for yourself soon enough. Or feel, rather." He laughed scornfully.

What did he mean by that? I wondered miserably, thoroughly upset to have been captured by my enemies, especially on my first mission. In all of the history of The Firme, no one had done this poorly. It had to be a record, and I was ashamed because of it.

Non-too gently, they dropped me into the crate, and shut the lid on me. I heard a nail-gun clicking as they sealed me inside. At once, I felt something all around me. I reached forward with both hands, feeling whatever was suddenly in the box with me. I encountered a hard, metallic substance, that was in the shape of good-sized bars. I knew of only one type of metal that people made into a bar, and that was gold.

Okay, so this clearly defied logic. No wonder they needed the pulleys to lift these crates; they were very heavy, and extremely valuable, it seemed. No wonder they were way out here. If someone knew about this, they'd have thieves constantly around, trying to acquire some of the gold for themselves. Well, it didn't take as long as I thought it would to understand the mystery of the crates. I knew what was in them, but I didn't know why.

Perhaps they mailed the gold bars to someone? But who? Or were they buying things? Illegal sales, maybe? I didn't know, but I would get to the bottom of this.

My mind worked through something, though I didn't find an answer to my thinking, but still it was useful to try and make sense out of what was happening. Why couldn't I feel the gold bars earlier, or even see them? That's the part of this whole assignment that continued to confound me.

Why did they put me in the box? What purpose did that serve? I didn't understand this at all.

I heard a liquid being poured around my box, and then the unmistakable strike of a match being lit. A sizzling, crackling sound is what I heard next, a fire spreading rapidly around my crate. They must have put gasoline around the box.

I started screaming, as I felt the heat surround me, getting hotter with each second that passed. So this was it. This was my fate, to die in a raging inferno, without even a chance to fight.

This wasn't how I pictured it at all. I pictured an epic battle, with me going out in a rage of glory. My loud yells was the only indication that I fighting, however futile it seemed. Still, I had the will to want to live.

This felt like karma, a pay back of sorts for all those spider-webs I burned as a child. Now it was my time to die, just as the eight-legged insects had lost their lives because of me. I thought the ones who'd broken my phone had been heartless.

Fate was even worse. This would make things even, I thought, but still I kept screaming, at least until the smoke started filling the box. Then I covered my nose and mouth with my shirt, not letting the smoke into my lungs. As the heat got more intense, I kept hollering through my shirt, hoping for someone to hear me, maybe resuce me.

But when the flames literally touched my arms, singeing my skin, then I was howling from actual pain, so my screams were now based on being physically hurt, and not just the fear of dying, though that was certainly still there in the back of my mind as well.

The difference in the sounds of screaming were astronomical. From feeling the burning, the yells pouring forth from my mouth were ten times louder. I didn't recognize the sounds after a few more minutes had passed, as it seemed they no longer came from me. They sounded foreign to my ears. I knew I'd never sounded this way before, never been in this much despair. It was like an animal was inside me, and I had a feeling I was hearing something infinitely worse than nails on a chalkboard, intensified to a neverending magnitude, so it appeared as if the tortuous action simply repeated, in a permanent cycle, for me and me alone to endure, and truly, it did.

How could anyone hear this and not want to help me? This was it. I was dying, and it was time to accept it. I stopped screaming, and released my will to live, letting the fire take me to the darkened abyss, as I went to greet death. I was ready to leave this world, and this agony, behind me. I lowered the shirt, inhaling smoke, and I was gone...

(Part 3)

I hadn't expected it to take this long. How was I still alive? Not that I wanted to be dead. Earlier, maybe I'd wanted to. Now, I realized it wasn't as quick as I thought. Perhaps I still had a chance. But how was I still capable of thought? I didn't understand this at all. Forget logic, this was plain crazy. I couldn't feel anything...there was no pain, only a feeling of drifting so very far away.

Unwillingly, my life started to flash before my eyes. I saw memories, of things that had happened during my existence. They played in rapid succession through my mind. I could barely keep up. I saw my parents...they were talking me through my suicide attempts. I saw my siblings...I was helping them with their homework, and also through their sad times. I saw my old friends...the ones who'd abandoned me when I joined The Firme, because they believed I was wasting my time with "detective work," as they called it. I was proud of my job, the small, yet still significant to me accomplishments that had come about as the result of my work. I'd become a stronger, smarter woman, and if they saw only my faults and mistakes and decided based solely on those things that they no longer wanted to be my friend, without factoring in my strengths and triumphs, well then, it's their loss. I saw the countless tears I'd cried over the years. I saw the three crushes who'd broken my heart, utterly destroying my once really strong hope of finding true love. I didn't believe in love anymore, except for the love I have for my family. I saw my birthdays, as they passed one after another, lacking any real significance other than to remind me that I was getting older, as I continued to be constantly lonely, aching for the comfort of a relationship that wouldn't result in another fissure inside my heart's walls. I witnessed myself burning the webs of helpless spiders. I saw my various jobs: cashier, secretary, sanitation pick-up, maid, and finally my first mission, the one I'd utterly failed.

This was it, then. Wasn't it? I thought this was what it's supposed to be like when you die. Your life flashes before your eyes, and then it's over. Your soul is released from your body, and your life is finished. So, why wasn't mine ending? Where was my peace? Perhaps I'm stuck, in between life, and right there on the cusp of death. That would explain why I couldn't feel the physical pain anymore. I couldn't see anything now. Darkness surrounded me. What did this mean? I had not a clue. Suddenly I could see something. White walls, all around me. This confounded further. I looked down, only to see...myself. There was my body. My...unconscious body. So, I'm not dead. Yet. I