An Unwanted Alias
Chapter 2

Copyright© 2014 by Sage Mullins

The back of my head was throbbing with pain, but my chin, lips, and nose actually hurt more. Upon being rudely tossed into the van, I'd landed face-first on the bare metal floor. I had no use of my hands – I was somehow handcuffed to the interior wall of the van, while seated on the floor – and therefore had no way to get a tactile sense of my facial injuries. I could feel blood dripping at a slow rate from my chin, and from the end of my nose.

As my brain continued to emerge from the fog, I tried to fight off the pain, and took in my surroundings. The vehicle was moving at a good clip. Several people were along for the ride, voluntarily or otherwise. However, the near absence of illumination afforded me no indication as to who among them might be friend, foe, or neither. There were windows in the rear doors, but they were heavily tinted. Through those windows, I saw nothing except a steady parade of overhead street lights as the van sped onward toward an unknown destination. The lack of stops indicated that we were most likely on a freeway. But beyond that, I couldn't gauge which road we were on, and I had no sense of in which direction we were headed.

The pain seemed to lessen as the minutes ticked by, and I began to contemplate the helplessness of my situation. I recalled my conversation with Odalys, just a few days ago. It sure appeared as if her theory was right on the ball. A shady outfit was in fact running the show at that massage parlor, and I'd gotten mixed up in their unseemly activities in some way. Now, I was in close quarters with individuals who no doubt meant me harm. I knew that at least one of them was armed. Realizing I was in serious peril, I thought about Erin, and our brief phone chat just a short while ago. No biking tonight, I'd told her. And I didn't even tell her I loved her...

Eventually, my mental state shifted, and I felt a strong urge to fight back against this mysterious enemy. On a more basic level, it was the human desire for self-preservation. Yes, I was helpless at the moment. Sooner or later, though, things would change. I needed to keep my cool, and my eyes open.

More time passed. Suddenly, I felt the van slow down gradually and come to a stop. My heart began to beat faster; I wondered if a confrontation was looming. But no; after a minute or so, the van began to accelerate once again. Apparently, we had merely stopped at a red light. We resumed our previous rate of speed, or something close to it, without interruption for what seemed to be about thirty minutes. At that point, our journey became punctuated with occasional traffic light stops for what felt like an hour, or an hour and a half – I couldn't say for sure. Then, our driver – whoever he was – made an abrupt left turn. He'd veered onto a side street, for our speed couldn't have topped twenty miles per hour at that point. Another left turn, and the crunching sound of tires passing over gravel let me know that we were now traversing an unpaved surface. A couple of minutes later, the vehicle came to a final stop. I held my breath and waited.

In a matter of seconds, I heard both of the front doors open, and then slam shut. Then, the rear doors burst open. Loud, demanding voices – again, speaking a tongue I didn't recognize – filled the van. Someone shone that damn flashlight in my face again, and I felt my handcuffs being removed. Any thoughts I might have had about making a break for it were dissuaded by the sight of a pistol being waved in my face.

I was roughly grabbed by the arm, stood up, and pushed outside. By now, it was sometime in the middle of the night. I paused again to think about my wife; she must be out of her mind with worry. Instinctively, I reached toward the pocket where I normally kept my cell phone. It wasn't there. I also discovered that my wallet was missing. Evidently, my captors had rifled through my pockets during my earlier period of near-unconsciousness.

Soon, my vision adjusted to the darkness, and I was able to get more of a handle on the situation. We were standing on a small beach, with the ocean off to one side. Where the fuck are we? I wondered. Taking note of the configuration of our group, I saw that I, along with a few fellow captives, was surrounded by eight or nine rifle-toting figures. There wasn't enough illumination for me to deduce their nationality. With a start, I realized that the van could not possibly have held that many people. Some of them had surely been waiting here for us. This was a well-conceived operation of some kind. But what the hell was their intent?

A few flashlight beams punctuated the darkness, enough for me to get a glimpse of the other captives. There were five of us. Besides me, there was one man and three women. One of the females, as I expected, was the young lady who'd been overburdened with groceries earlier. Look at what I got for being chivalrous, I thought ruefully.

The other male captive, meanwhile, was engaged in an animated discussion with our abductors. I was becoming increasingly certain that their language was Mandarin, or one of its dialects. Suddenly, my fellow male hostage addressed me ... in English.

"I'm Manny," he declared sullenly. "I'm the manager of the massage parlor ... where they loaded us into the van. These three ladies work for me. At least they did."

I was tempted to ask for clarification of the "at least they did" disclaimer, but decided it wouldn't be wise. "Jake Gustafson," I offered. "I'm an insurance agent. I work a few suites down from the parlor."

At that, Manny appeared to pass that information on to the women, who tittered at the revelation. Our captors grew impatient with the distraction; one of them expressed his displeasure by jamming the butt of his rifle into Manny's ribs.

"Ow! Right," a flustered Manny cried out, rubbing his side. "Anyway, Jake, they've asked me to tell you to strip."

"Strip?" I replied incredulously.

"They want everything off," he confirmed. One of the captors, in fact, was displaying a large plastic trash bag, indicating that my clothes were to be placed within.

"You can turn the other way, Jake," said Manny, his voice actually containing a hint of levity. "That way, the girls won't see your junk. Anyway, it's dark – oooof..." He groaned as he received another blow from the rifle end.

This Manny character, I thought to myself, has a mouthy quality that's dangerous in a situation like this. As for the demand that I disrobe ... well, what choice did I have? I stripped naked, tossing my shirt, pants, underwear, socks and shoes into the bag. The thug tied up the bag, and tossed it into the van.

Manny called out to me again, offering up some more sage advice. "If I were you, Jake, I'd use this opportunity to take a piss. I'm about to do it myself." Our kidnappers let this comment pass; I suspected that at least one of them understood English, but wasn't letting on. I shrugged, and proceeded to lay all modesty aside as I emptied my bladder onto the ground in all my naked glory. Again, what choice did I have?

What happened next surprised me. I was presented with a new set of clothes – a T-shirt that was a size too large, a pair of jeans and underwear that were regrettably a little on the small size, along with shoes and socks that were slightly on the big size. All in all, I guess I couldn't complain about the clothes. I touched my face, the blood had dried. My facial injuries appeared to be nothing more than superficial scrape wounds. As I got dressed, I couldn't help but notice that the three women were squatting and urinating as well. I turned in the other direction, trying not to think about how humiliating that must have been for them. The implication in all this was that our ordeal was far from over.

All of a sudden, Manny sang out, "Hey, Jake, my man. Were you in the wrong place at the wrong time, or what?" He emitted another loud groan as another shot to the ribs drove the air from his lungs. Blessedly, he was silent after that; it seemed as though he'd finally gotten the hint. It was becoming more and more obvious to me that the scumbags who were holding us hostage didn't want me to know anything about their plans.

That's when we captives found all guns trained upon us. We were directed to march around a bend, roughly in the direction of the ocean. We drew closer to a large object, which appeared to be near the surf line. Eventually, looming close to us in the dark was what appeared to be a medium-sized fishing boat, tied down to a lone dock.

Our captors motioned us onto the dock, indicating that we should board the boat. A new level of disturbing had just been reached. They were putting us on a boat? Where were they taking us now?

The five of us were led below deck, still at gunpoint, and handcuffed to a series of metal protuberances just above floor level. I wondered if those protuberances had been installed for this very purpose. It wasn't too long before we heard the engine begin to crank, and we set out to sea. At that point, I drifted off into a very uneasy sleep.

I awoke to the rumbling sound of an anchor being lowered. Although the darkness of night still ruled over all, I figured a few hours must have slipped past, and dawn was not far away. Why are we stopping now? I wondered. By now, we were surely well into international waters, and perhaps our kidnappers wanted to stop here and finish the journey in the light of day. This possibility induced me to dwell on another point. I could assume that I was now outside the United States of America, with no identification to speak of. For all intents and purposes, I had no rights. I was fully at the mercy of the kidnappers, whose agenda I couldn't even begin to ascertain.

I tried to close my eyes and sleep some more. Soon, the sky did indeed begin to brighten. It wasn't long before the first rays of morning sunshine spilled into the cabin. With that, I was finally able to get a good look at my travel partners. One thing became apparent right away: our captors were Chinese, as were my four fellow captives. Two of the kidnappers were here in the cabin keeping watch. I could hear at least two others conversing up on the deck.

I realized that I had seen Manny around the shopping center a few times. He appeared to be romantically involved with one of the masseuses, who was by far the eldest of the three. Both Manny and his wife, or girlfriend, or whatever, appeared to be in their forties. They were both asleep, with the woman's head resting on Manny's shoulder.

The young lady who I'd assisted with the grocery bags was nearby. Her hair was still braided, and she was wearing the same clothes she'd had on back in the shopping center. Apparently, I was the only one who'd been asked to change clothes. What to make of that?

The third masseuse appeared to be the youngest of the three; I wouldn't have been surprised to find out she was still a teenager. She had a baby face, much shorter hair than her slightly older friend, and was wearing a pink and white striped top and pink sweat pants.

My mind was trying to digest this new information when the two men who'd been chatting on the deck suddenly burst into our midst. One of them – a mean-looking dude with long, scraggly hair – unfastened Manny's handcuffs and yanked him to his feet. Manny, his slumber interrupted, looked startled and uncharacteristically speechless, as his lady friend cried out in horror. Manny was rudely shoved up the stairs. A loud, intense discussion ensued, which was brought to a swift end with the horrific sound of a gunshot. The three women began screaming, with the eldest going into absolute hysterics. My own horror only increased when, shortly thereafter, a loud splash could be heard outside – the sound of a weighted-down human body being tossed into the sea. Soon, Mr. Scraggly and his cohort – who were now murderers as well as kidnappers – re-appeared, trying to intimidate the women into composing themselves, with no success at all. The two captors who'd been standing guard looked on impassively.

It was down to me and the ladies. There were four of us left.

Soon, the anchor was hoisted, and we were once again on our way. I couldn't get the expression on Manny's face out of my mind – a look of abject terror as he was being led away to his execution. Had he been done in by his big mouth? Or was something else afoot? I didn't know.

Trying to preserve my sanity, I forced myself to dwell on other matters. As the boat motored onward, the morning sun was off to our left. That meant we were heading south. And by doing a little geographic deduction, a conclusion manifested itself in my mind. We'd been driven down into the Florida Keys. I knew that trip well; I'd made it a number of times. The timing of the freeway stretch and the traffic lights made perfect sense. And from the Keys, a southward journey would result in one very likely final destination: Cuba.

Damn. We were headed for Cuba.

But why Cuba? Our captors were Chinese. What concerns did the Chinese have in Cuba? The mysteries were piling up, one on top of the other.

To keep myself from going nuts, I focused on something else. My eyes fell on my three fellow hostages. With Manny no longer in the picture, I felt somehow responsible for them. I wanted to ask them their names, and to assure them that we'd all get through this (even though I was decidedly unsure about that). But the language barrier made any meaningful communication impossible, and I satisfied myself by watching their interactions, to get a feel for their personality traits. It was basically the same type of analysis I used when sizing up potential insurance clients.

It was apparent that the girl with the braid, who I'd shared a stroll with right before our capture, was by far the mentally strongest of the three, despite her age. She had taken on somewhat of a leadership role. I looked on as Braid Gal directed soothing words toward Manny's distraught girlfriend (who, in my mind, I was already calling "Mrs. Manny," accurately or not) while holding her hand. Meanwhile, the young girl dressed in pink was also deeply upset, whimpering softly with tears running down her face. Braid Gal was doing double duty, also trying to console young Pinky as best she could.

 
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