Falling Through Portals

Scandalous Escape

Chapter 20

Snow had been drilling her for hours, picking her brain for information. The whole night had drained away and there were bags under the President's eyes. Annabeth's mouth was dry and her lips were chapped from her crying and in all the hours of his questioning he didn't allow her water.

Annabeth stood up, she was fed up with this. She was ready to eat a hot meal, drink a gallon of water, and sleep off this horrible nightmare.

"We are done here, now," she said finally. Snow stood up.

"I will say when we are done!" Snow yelled down to her. Annabeth stared defiantly into his eyes. She pointed her finger at his face in the small space between the two of them.

"Listen here!" She yelled with as much command and surety as any daughter of Athena, she let her voice drop to just above a whisper for effect, "you don't own me, I will say when I am done." Snow grabbed her hand and threw it out of the way.

"You are a defiant child. I do own you. Your very life rests in my hands." he stared her down.

She looked away from him and glanced down at the letter opener on the coffee table beside them. She stared long enough that Snow saw what she was thinking. He moved to grab it but Annabeth had other ideas.

She had waited for this moment. Annabeth had persevered through the night long interrogation and yielded as little information as possible. All that time, she aimed to make Snow as tired as physically possible. He needed to be an easy target to take out. And that was just her plan.

With a hard kick in between his legs he was incapacitated for a moment. She grabbed a marble statue that was on the table behind the couch she sat on and she slammed it into his skull. She knew that the blow would only knock him out. His body crumpled to the ground. Annabeth moved quickly as she untied his neck tie and wrapped it around his mouth, tying it with a tight knot. Then she tied his laces together. Annabeth went around the sitting area to his desk and dug through the drawers. She found some scotch tape. Score.

Round and round the tape went on his wrists. She must have gone around a hundred times. It would take a lot of strength to break those bonds. Surveying her work she dragged his body behind the desk and tucked him under the desk. The front of the desk was covered so that the legs were not visible of the person sitting behind it and made it a perfect place to hide him. She stuffed him in the hole behind the desk then rolled the chair into the opening.

All she needed was to get out of there. She looked down at her blood stained dress and cursed in Greek. She wouldn't make it ten feet looking like this. Annabeth scanned the room and spotted a bright red coat on the coat hanger near the door. She dashed over to the coat hanger and slipped it on. It swallowed her but only went down to her knees. Her pants were stained with enough blood that it would be noticeable. She bit her lip as she slipped out of the pants and pulled the coat around her and buttoned it. Annabeth didn't even want imagine what the guards might think if they recognized the coat. Glancing the mirror she realized that her face was covered in blood.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw a water bottle on the other side of the room. Using a clean part of her pants she wet the cloth and began scrubbing. Most of the blood came off pretty well and she lifted up her coat to tie the pants around her waist. After she made sure that the coat covered everything and that she looked almost presentable, she grabbed the door knob.

She looked back at the desk and pursed her lips. There would be peace keepers out there. And she would need to look like Snow trusted her to leave. Annabeth looked down at herself and grimaced. The jacket was big enough that she was able to pull off her bloody shirt and tuck it into one of the inside jacket pockets. Then she unbuttoned the first few buttons on the jacket. She pulled the hair tie out of her hair and tossed it around a bit before taking off her shoes and carrying them in her hand. Her stomach recoiled at the innuendo she was going to put out there, but since she wanted to get out of there alive Annabeth swallowed her pride.