“Hey their Crystal, who’s your friend?”
Claire turned. She was face to face with a burly young man in scrubs.
“Hi there, I’m Derrick, her anesthesiologist. And you are…?” he said slowly.
Claire knew that it was now or never. If she hesitated, all would be over.
“I’m Doctor Pain,” she said, smiling, as she planted her right foot into Derrick’s groin. She then grasped his throat with her left hand. As he doubled over, she helped him to the floor, placing a thumb behind his ear causing him to lose conscious.
Claire grabbed Crystal by the shoulders and shook her hard. “C’mon we’ve gotta go.”
Pushing and pulling, Claire got the two of them out the door. She headed into the forest, holding Crystal tightly by the hand, coaxing, dragging and pulling her through the woods. Branches slapped them, feeling like so many needles, poking and whipping.
“C’mon, snap out of it,” Claire hissed, as she dragged her along. They had to get back to the road and her car as soon as possible. “At this rate we won’t make the road before they notice you’re gone. C’mon, Crystal, you can make it.”
Scanning the woods ahead, Claire noticed a hill and some cliffs. Not exactly the direction of the road, but a place where they could hide until Crystal came around.
“Hey how about a rest, would you like that?” Crystal was becoming more responsive, crying out as branches struck her in the face. But she didn’t respond to Claire’s question.
Claire made her way around branches and tree limbs scattered on the forest floor. In some cases, whole trees lay in their path. Working her way to the cliffs, she noticed that Crystal was looking around, becoming aware of her surroundings.
There had to be some rocks, a place to hide. When she finally reached the cliffs, there were no boulders to hide behind, just a shear rock face.
Claire suddenly noticed that Crystal was no longer yanking her arm every thirty seconds. She was now moving with much more ease. Claire stopped, attempted to get a verbal response, but still nothing.
As they rounded the natural curve of the cliff face, a hole appeared. “Look, a cave,” Claire said.
Cautiously, she crept up to the small dark opening. Her breathing instantly constricted and she quickly stepped back, spooked by the black hole in solid stone that suddenly appeared out of nowhere. The opening seemed to shrink right before her eyes and she was reminded of something far back in her memory, something out of her childhood. Taking a deep breath, she stepped up to the opening. One look and she knew this was no cave, it was a mine.
Even in the dim light, she could see that the timbers were huge and ran up the side, crisscrossing along the ceiling. But as she stepped to enter, Crystal would have none of it, and froze.
“C’mon there’s no time for this. Crystal, come on,” Claire said, in her sternest whisper.
Slowly, she managed to drag the young woman into the mine’s entrance. She had her back bent to the task and was facing into the shaft, pulling with all her strength.
“Where are we?” Claire whirled around. Crystal had spoken.
“Welcome back to the land of the living. My name’s Claire. C’mon, we’ve got to hide.”
She led her to the wall of the mine, and the two women crouched behind one of the huge beams. “What do you remember?”
“Only that I was going to be taken to a clinic to see my friend, Jan. When I got inside the room where Jan was supposed to be someone came up behind me and placed a cloth over my mouth and nose. The next thing I knew there were trees and someone pulling me along. Was that you?”
“Yeah, we’ve been bushwhacking for about fifteen minutes.”
“Who are you and why are you helping me?”
“My husband and I operate an ambulance service and were attending an accident just outside of Medford on the I-5. He said you came up to him and asked for help, then he saw you on a porn tape and thought you might be in trouble. But when we discovered that a dead guy was also in a film made by the same company, we were afraid you might be next.”
“What do you think they were going to do to me?” Crystal asked.
“I wasn’t sure until I found you in that exam room. Look.” Claire reached over and lifted the bottom of Crystal’s loosely hanging shirt. “Can you see this?”
She craned her neck looking over at her right side. “Black lines, and it looks like a circle.”
“Those are the lines placed on a patient so that the surgeon knows where to cut. It looks like someone was going to remove something—most likely your liver.”
Crystal rocked off her heels and sat down hard on her butt. “Oh my God… Jan.”
Claire placed a hand on her shoulder. “Crystal?” Claire whispered.
Crystal had a distant look in her eyes and wouldn’t respond to her name. Tears were running down her cheeks and her chest was heaving, as if she were out of breath. She gasped for air. Hyperventilation, Claire thought. Quickly unbuckling her butt pack, she fished around until she found a tiny paper bag.
“Breath into the bag,” Claire said, placing Crystal’s hands around the opening, directing it to her mouth and helping her hold it in place. Crystal wasn’t listening.
Grabbing her shoulders, Claire shook her hard. “I think we should find a place to hide back in the mine, wait until dark, then make our way to the road and my car.”
Crystal swiped at her nose with her wrist, looked Claire square in the eyes. “I’m OK, but can we stay here a little longer?”
“Sure, would you like to tell me about Jan? You’ve mentioned her twice.”
“Jan and I grew up in Garland, Iowa, and moved to Los Angeles together to break into acting. When the money began running out Jan answered an ad looking for women to act in adult films. I haven’t heard from her in days.”
She suddenly lurched forward and wrapped her arms around Claire, hugging her tightly. “Thank you so much,” Crystal said, rocking back onto her heels. “How did you find me?”
Claire was fiddling with her butt pack as she spoke. “I traced the license of the Dodge van to the mansion.”
Tears began running down Crystal’s cheeks. Claire reached across in the semi dark and using her thumbs wiped away the tears.
“When they wouldn’t let me in through the front gate I parked my car down the road, hopped a barbed wire fence and cut around through the woods, thinking I would come around behind the house. I stumbled onto the clinic by accident.
“That’s where you found me?”
“Do you remember me sitting next to you on the exam table?”
“No, after I was sedated I only remember being pulled along and tripping a lot.” She began rocking back and forth. “The thought that you might not have found the clinic, and me…”
“I know, I know,” Claire said, trying to comfort her. “But we’ve got to get moving. I know I’ve got a penlight in here somewhere.” Claire continued to fish around in her butt pack.
“I’m ready,” Crystal said. “I don’t suppose you have a stick of gum in there.”
The two women stood and peaked around the thick wooden beam that hid them from view. They crept along one side of the mine; Claire kept her penlight at the ready. Each time they looked back, the entrance appeared smaller. Finally, as the shaft made a slight bend, the entrance of the mine was lost from view, and Claire had to turn on her penlight. They hadn’t gone thirty steps beyond the bend in the shaft when the only light they had was from the little flashlight.
“Hang onto my belt and stay an arm’s length behind me, we really have to watch our step,” Claire said. “I’ve heard mines always have vertical shafts.”
Crystal smiled into the darkness. “I think I’ve seen the same movie.”