Kagaku Ninja-Tai Gatchaman Fan Fiction ❯ The Timepiece ❯ Chapter 20 ( Chapter 20 )

Chapter 20

How long had it been? An hour? Two hours? More?

Yuki had lost all sense of time. It had seemed like a lifetime to her since she had woke up from her drugged sleep. At first, she had felt so drowsy and nauseated that she did not know or even care where she was and what happened to her. But as the effects of the drugs subsided, her mind started to clear and she began to realize with shock the situation she was in. To state it briefly, she found herself in a big fix. To state it in more details, she found herself left lying on a hard floor bounded, blindfolded and gagged. She shook her head trying to remember what happened. The scene at the ISO headquarters slowly came back to her, so did the confrontation at the cliff near the ISO villa. She inwardly cursed herself for being so stupid as to fall into a trap like that. She struggled with her restraints and tried to get them off, but none of them would budge.

Time dragged on and the silence in the surroundings got onto her nerves. For apart from the distant humming of some machinery far off, all she could hear was the ticking away of a nearby clock. She wondered where she was and what was going to happen to her. She wondered what they wanted from her. She wondered if she would ever see her family again. And Joe, yes, she wondered if she would ever see him again. She again tried to struggle out of her restraints and failed again. Though she had managed to drag herself into a half-sitted position.

Time went by slowly. The darkness around her seemed perpetual. The gag was making her mouth very dry and the corners of her mouth were feeling numb from the pressure of the gag. The handcuff that held her wrists behind her were eating into her fresh and so were the ropes at her ankle.

Yuki got tired of fearing and worrying. She started counting the only sound she could hear, the ticking of the clock. One, two, three, four… twenty… forty…. one hundred … five hundred… a thousand … ten thousand... One thousand six hundred and fifty three… one thousand six hundred and fifty four….

"Sheeeeeeesssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhh!"

The sound of a door sliding open disrupted the monotonous ticking of the clock. Yuki could feel the light went on through her blindfold. Soft, even footsteps padded across the floor towards her. Yuki held her breathe, praying hard that it would be somebody coming to rescue her. From the bottom of her heart, she was wishing that it would be Joe coming to bring her to safety.

Her blindfold was finally removed. The strong lighting from the surrounding blinded her for a moment, she gasped and squeezed her eyes to shut the light out. When she could finally open her eyes, she was met by a big disappointment. For standing in front of her, with his arms crossed and a smirk on his face, was Scorpio, her captor in the first place.

"Welcome abroad my humble abode, Dr. Washio. It is my greatest pleasure to have you on board. I hope you like this little ship of mine, cause inevitably it would be your home for a little while." Scorpio said with a sly grin. "I hope you have enjoyed your stay so far. Did you get a good sleep last night?"

Yuki just glared at him.

Slapping his forehead dramatically, he laughed, "Oh my, how forgetful of me? I have totally forgotten that you cannot speak. Now, don't be mad, sweetheart, let me help you with this." With this, he ripped the gag off Yuki's mouth.

Yuki must admit that it felt much better to have the gag removed. Even though her mouth still felt dry and bitter, at least her jaw was no longer hurting that much. She cleared her throat a few times before she could speak. She narrowed her eyes at Scorpio and asked, "What do you want from me?" Her voice sounded so hoarse that she could hardly recognize it herself.

"What do I want from you?" Scorpio laughed as if this was the biggest joke he had ever heard. "Well, not much, my dear, not much. I just want you to help cure the little boy of one of my good friends." He walked towards the bar and got himself a drink.

Yuki snorted, "And this is how you solicit help from others?"

"Not solicit, my dear. Acquire. You have no choice." He turned back towards her, raising his glass to her.

Yuki smirked back at him, "No choice? I don't have to cooperate with you if I don't want to, Mr. You can kill me or torture me, but that does not mean that I would cooperate with you. Furthermore, how do you know that I would kill the boy instead for revenge. So, if I were you, I'd rather ask nicely."

Scorpio raised his brows at her, "You would cooperate, I am sure. You are a medical doctor and you are mandated to save lives where required. Plus, can you bear seeing that piteous hopeless look in the eyes of a 4 year old?"

Yuki grinded her jaws, she knew that he had got her there. "Well, if that's all you want, you can let me go now. I can help you no problem, you don't have to kidnap me for that."

Scorpio laughed again, "Doctor, you are not really that dense, are you? Do you even realize how much money your safety is worth? I can easily extort an astronomically from both ISO from this era and from our own era. Plus, somebody is willing to pay a handsome some of money to get your beloved Daddy off the Presidency of ISO."

Yuki stared at him mouth agape, "What? Somebody is paying you to get my Dad off the Presidency of ISO? Who is it?"

Scorpio smirked, "Sorry, my dear, I am obliged to keep the identity of my clients confidential."

Yuki shrugged, "Suit yourself, we'll see if you are so `ethical' when my friends got their hands on you."

Scorpio put down his glass and pulled Yuki to her feet by her collar. Slamming her back against the wall, he rested his hands on the wall by her ears. Then he leaned towards her and whispered, "Your friends? I am assuming that you are counting on your birdie friends to save you. Unfortunately, I believe that they are looking to arrest you right now. Especially when they found the remains of Pepsi and when they found out that YOU have stolen the Cancer Treatment Machine from the ISO headquarters. With that on top of the package of cyanide next to your dad's medications, you would be rather high on their wanted list. Too bad they do not know who you really are."

Yuki shuddered and drew a deep breathe in, "What did you do to Pepsi?"

"I didn't do anything, my dear. She had a nasty fall, that's all. That stupid girl, she thought that I loved her all along." Scorpio whispered into her ears with an evil smile.

Yuki gasped. "Bastard!!!" she yelled.

Scorpio swung his head back and laughed heartily, "Sweetheart, ladies should speak like that."

Yuki just glared at him.

Seeing her glare, Scorpio smirked, "Now, babe, don't look at me like that. I like women with spunk. You continue to look at me like that, I might get the hots for you."

Yuki looked him in the eye and then spat at him right into his face, "You touch me, you are dead meat."

Scorpio glared death at Yuki. Without lifting his eyes from her, he wiped off the spit with the back of his hand.

"You asked for it woman!" he said, forcing his mouth onto hers and crushing hers with brute force.

Yuki screamed as loud as she could as soon as her mouth got freed.

Scorpio laughed evilly and shoved her onto the ground with one hand. He then got on top of her and sat himself astride on her waist. Reaching down and taking hold of her blouse, he said with a sadistic grin, "Scream all you like, my dear. Nobody would come to you. It's all our own people out there."

RIP!!!

All the color drained from Yuki's face as the front of her blouse was ripped open. Hope was already beyond her, she closed her eyes waiting for the inevitable to come.

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