II: Ramla

The man's appearance was strange.

His coat was like a trenchcoat, long and leathery, reaching all the way down to his calfs, but with no pockets or buttons to speak of. It also had no sleeves, instead it sat on this man's broad shoulders like a vest. Underneath that was a buttoned shirt that was deep purple in colour that fitted the man's body loosely. This garment did have sleeves but they only went as far as the middle of his upper arm, where they clung tightly to his form like a t-shirt. He wasn't tall, standing only as tall as Val herself. She thought he had the build and look of a Rugby player, with hair cut very short all around, but slightly longer on the top. He was also tattooed all along his arms and neck with strange symbols and letterings Val had never seen before.

The last thing she noticed about him was the peculiar device around his wrist. It seemed to be merely a metal bracelet of sorts that began right below his thumb and ended just before his elbow. It was made of some kind of metal that seemed to both reflect light and absorb it at the same time, it was made up of many interlocking plates, all of different shapes and sizes, with spaces between that seemed to glow faintly.

The presence of such a man this suddenly and this dramatically into her hotel room was terrifying to Val. She had been rooted to the spot unable to move, or think or even breathe, simply trying to absorb and process what had just happened. It was like a weird adrenaline fuelled trance that she couldn't break out of. That seemed to all change when he spoke.

"Don't suppose you know where to find an exit do you" He had said in a confident voice with an accent that sounded like it was more hinting at british than outright claim to be.

These words seemed to awaken Val as she took the only sensible course of action.

She screamed.

Right in his face, as she backed away quickly, falling to the ground as she did so, backing herself into the corner of the meagre closet with no door.

This spurred an odd reaction in the man.

"Oh, for god's sake." He uttered tersely, before continuing more loudly. "I'm not going to hurt you, ok?"

Val got up quickly, keeping her back flat against the back wall of her closet staring at the man over the shoulder of the leather coat she had left to hang a minute before hand.

"Why did you break my window?" She asked, not entirely sure why this was the first of perhaps a dozen questions she had yet to ask.

He looked back over his shoulder at the break.

"Oh that yeah well I was-" He was interrupted by a loud and low humming sound coming from outside, different from any sound Val had heard before. She couldn't identify it at all, it rumbled like thunder and an outboard motor. It swelled as whatever was causing the sound grew closer and closer to the window. Val looked at the man, who met her gaze for a moment. A moment that seemed long and mournful, as if he was already regretting what was about to happen. He turned towards the window, standing with his feet planted firmly.

"I was trying to get away." He said it with weariness Val had not ever heard matched before, except perhaps by her own father in the last few days of her stay with him.

The man raised the arm with the metal bracelet on it and pointed it towards the window, Val could see that several of the plates making up the device were hovering, seemingly independently of any wires or attachments, three or four inches about the surface of the bracelet, orbiting it quickly. It gave of a high pitched whirring sound that was foreign to Val's ears but seemed to tell this man something because she could hear him mutter to himself.

The rumbling sound continued to grow louder and louder, the rumbling now mixed with some high pitched noise that sounded like microphone feedback.

This was too much to take for Val, she looked at the doorknob to her right and reached out a hand slowly to grab it. Perhaps, she thought, she could sneak out while the man's back was turned and get out of here, the sound that was coming from outside would surely cover the sond of the door's opening and closing.

She squeezed the metal of the doorknob tightly in her hand as she felt the objects in the room begin to vibrate from the menacing hum now mixing with a strong breeze blowing strongly into the room, causing her to shiver. This cold chill did not seem to effect the man, still muttering as his wrist apparatus began to whir and click faster and louder, it's pieces floating even further away from the wrist they orbited. Val was just about to turn the doorknob and bolt when she remembered her suitcase, it was home to everything she owned, it contained her clothes, some money, the last of her jewelry her favorite movie and the photo album and diary she'd kept since she was a girl.

She wanted to ran and grab it, she wanted to very badly it was all she had left of her past.

Was that past worth dying for?

She wasn't given much time to decide, as the man turned swiftly to face her, and looking her dead in the eyes once more asked;

"What's your name?"

"Valerie Park"

The words seemed odd in her mouth, like they didn't quite belong in the scene she was forcing them into.

"Val"

Every ounce of her consciousness was telling her to not to speak those words, it wanted her to leave. Now. Screw the suitcase, this man was some kind of crazy murderer for sure. Every fiber of her being was telling her not to ask, but there was something about him that made her.

"What's yours?"

"Ramla Tappa" He replied calmly, "but if we don't get out of here right now, Valerie Park, Then our names are all that's going to be left of us."

It was at that moment that the sound reached deafening levels and Val could finally make out the source, rotor blades, like from a helicopter, like the dark black one that came to a hover right outside her window, it's side door open and occupied by a menacing figure dressed in red.

"RUN, NOW!" Screamed Ramla, grabbing Val's suitcase from off the bed and throwing it to her as the room exploded in bright lights and smoke.