64 Hours

31 H0urs

I apologize for not updating for a while ;-;

~the thirty-first hour~

"Love is a smoke and is made with the fume of sighs." -William Shakespeare

A faceless man took hold of Bella and tore at the roots of her dark hair. 

I roared uselessly and tried to rip the man apart, but I was rooted to the ground. I watched as Bella was dragged away from me with the man's back facing me, screaming and sobbing into the blindfold that covered her eyes. Screeching, I tried to lunge myself at them, but nothing worked. It's like the more I tried, the further I got away from them. 

Suddenly they turned around, Bella's eyes still shielded with the cloth, evident tears streaming down her cheeks. The man, still unknown to me, seemingly grinned as he held up a revolver to the side of her temple. 

"No!" I screamed, but it was too late. 

I closed my eyes in time to hear the deafening sound of the bullet thundering in my ears. 

But the most sickening part was when Bella abruptly stopped crying. 

Gasping, I woke up, my phone vibrating in my dead hand. 

I blinked away the slight amount of tears in my lens, shivering, although the temperature was warm. Bella's crying was still alive in my head, and I winced in pain. It felt so real...

Calm down, Adam, it's just a dream. Just a dream.

Trying to get a grip of myself, I finally noticed the phone shuddering in my hand. I must've fell asleep with it in my hand after obsessively holding it securely. I rubbed my eyes at the blurry ID to see clearly, my mind still thick with groggy sleep. My eyes flickered to the caller. 

- Unknown Caller -  

I was almost fully awake after regaining my senses from reading it. I just stared at the screen as my phone kept on vibrating. By now, a normal caller should've got the message that my phone was busy and would have stopped ringing - but this Unknown caller didn't pause. 

I felt the blood drain out of my face as my finger hovered over the 'decline' button. I pressed it quickly, resolving to the bury my phone before I realized that the call was actually going. What?

As I peered more closely, I noticed the 'play' symbol on my screen. I've never seen this before. It was asking me to play a video. 

I swallowed the bullet in my throat, knowing that whether I liked it or not Unknown was going to force me to watch the video. I tapped play, and my eyes studied the loading circle against the black background. 

Suddenly a scene came into view. It was me there, with my Military boss from my base camp, and he was breathing heavily over my frame. It was a recording taken from when I was still with the army. 

We were alone, and the camera was slightly shaking, and the quality wasn't great. The whole thing was behind some kind of fence, so you could barely see the whole thing in between the small space of the fences. 

However, I could still tell what was going on. 

"Did I give you the command to step in?" The taller man asked me, his cap inches above my head. My eyes were hard as I stared at anywhere but his face, looking profusely over his shoulder. I was terrified. 

"Answer me!"

"Sir no Sir!" I yelled, froth almost spraying his face. The captain started to slowly circle my straight posture, his eyes cold. "Did I give you the command to attack him?" 

"Sir no Sir," My voice cracked at 'no,' which somehow only infuriated my Captain even further. 

In a few seconds the officer snatched hold of my collar and shoved me against the wall. His fist was at the base of my throat, and through the recording I could see his knuckles paling with the pressure he was applying. 

"Then why did you do it?" He said huskily, face dangerously close to mine. 

"I-I'm sorry Sir," I stuttered, squeezing my eyes shut, waiting for the beating. Suddenly the Captain stood back for a moment, barely examining my relieving sagging shoulders before aiming a flying fist to my cheek. 

The sharp punch rang loudly in the air as his knuckles came in contact with my face. I kneeled down in shock, staggering as I felt blood sting in my eyes. I didn't even have time to recover as my boss sent another kick to my exposed stomach, and I felt my insides flip. I was left crouching uselessly on the rocky ground, head to the floor, trying to fight tears of pain. 

"Man up and stand," The Captain growled, grabbing my collar again and hoisting me up. I buried my face with my hands, unable to look into his cold blue lens again. 

"Blood comes when necessary, Browning." 

That was the last thing the captain said before the video stopped. Almost as soon as my phone was back to the familiar home screen, I received a message at the top corner of my screen. 

Unknown - 5:26: What was it again? Oh, right. Step 5: Execute Captain Lakes. Your 'favorite' boss from the military force. Or Bella dies. 

Shaking, I got up to my feet and went to find my gun.