Not far from there.

  Marcela and Bernardo are leaning against a tree kissing under the drops that dodge the leaves and fall onto their warm skins, sensitive to each other’s gentle touch.

  Sarah is sitting at the edge of the lake watching the drops fall and come into contact with the lake’s mirror-like surface. They shape small waves that appear and disappear intensely all the time, nothing more than echoes of their brief existences.

  Breaking the moment.

  A branch snaps behind her.

  By instinct, she turns searching for something.

  Then she is surprised by a green cloth that approaches her face.

  She even tries to dodge, but without success.

  Now she tries to free herself from the cloth that suffocates her little by little.

  Muscular arms imprison her.

  On this cloth she observes countless small glowing dots in an avocado green tone.

  In the background, just in a quick glance before blacking out, she manages to see legs being dragged.

  After a few minutes, Sarah begins to regain consciousness. She tries to open her eyes, but they seem to weigh twice as much as usual, her whole body feels heavier.

  A small glow similar to the previous one begins to bother her eyes. Looking down toward her mouth, she finds the same cloth as before, however now it releases a strange odor along with small threads of smoke coming from the glowing dots.

  Smoke that quickly fades into the air.

  Her arms tied behind her begin to bring slight discomfort. When she finally manages to restore her vision, still lying down, she casts a look forward and finds Bernardo and then Marcela.

  Both are unconscious, gagged and tied.

  As she moves her eyes, the interior of the back of a van without the rear seats begins to take shape.

  A hooded person appearing to be a man is sitting to the left and a bit distant. He is dressed in black and looking down. Further ahead, there are two seats with two people also hooded sitting in them. One is in the driver’s seat and the other is in the seat beside him.

  Sarah tries to pass her arms through her legs to get them into a more comfortable position. With slow but strained movements, she manages to.

  Slowly she removes the gag from her mouth while trying to get up without the man noticing.

  After managing to do so, she jumps on him and begins trying to choke him with a rear naked choke while throwing the weight of her body backward. The confusion is noticed by the men sitting in the front seats. One of them stands up somewhat unbalanced due to the movement of the van.

  Realizing this, Sarah releases the man she is trying to choke and returns to the back.

  Her hands feel the metal behind her, the sway of the van does not seem so great.

  The man begins to try to get up, recovering from the choke.

  The other braces himself firmly on the side while trying to approach little by little, and with a wide step, passes over the two unconscious bodies. He seems to prepare to leap. Sarah casts a look around the environment trying to regain perception of things.

  Ahead, she manages to see through the windshield a bridge approaching at high speed. Recognizing that place, she remembers that the river there usually fills up with any heavier rain, like the one that fell throughout the day that passed.

  She takes a deep breath and in sequence pretends to throw herself to the right, deceiving one of the men who leaps into emptiness. In sequence, she throws herself to the left colliding with the side of the van and propels herself forward quickly passing by the other man who even tries to stop her. But he is still disoriented from the choke and loses balance falling to the floor.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  Without hesitating for a second, she jumps toward the driver’s seat and abruptly applies another rear naked choke that makes him release the steering wheel. Her arms are so contracted that the headrest pops to the side after a crack.

  She realizes the man is no longer reacting.

  The crack was not only from the seat breaking.

  In the next instant, a great force pulls her to the side, making her collide with the door window that cracks.

  The van begins to spin and the windows shatter. Everyone inside is thrown from one side to the other, and a great impact comes in sequence. Sarah is thrown out through one of the windows that no longer has glass. After this last impact, she falls for two seconds before finding herself plunging into a fierce current.

  She manages to get her head out of the water, and finds herself being carried downstream. While floating, she casts looks around searching for the van. For a brief moment lightning cuts across the sky and illuminates the environment. Up ahead a piece of the rear reveals itself being swallowed by the fury of the water.

  Dive after dive, she tries to get closer.

  When she comes back up, she cannot see anything, then realizes she has just lost sight of the van.

  She dives once, twice, three times and nothing.

  Desperate, she casts lost looks into the darkness that only cease for brief moments when lightning again cuts the sky.

  No longer knowing what to do and being carried farther and farther away, Sarah begins to dive in the same direction as the river, but a bit more diagonally to the left in an attempt to reach the side and find something to hold onto on a bank she can barely see.

  After alternating between dives and breaths, a lightning bolt falls and cuts the horizon in the background, at that moment the rain seems to fall in slow motion. Everything is silent, the only thing that can be heard is the loud thunder that follows and her labored breathing. Thanks to that moment, Sarah manages to see that further ahead there are several tree branches touching the water. One more dive and she raises her arms when passing under one of the branches, grabbing it with everything she has.

  After grabbing and throwing her legs over, she manages to cling to the branch. Then she begins to move along it until reaching the bank. Sarah leans against the tree looking at the river with her arms still tied.

  Her gaze is distant and empty.

  Her face like marble shows no expression.

  Her fists clench.

  The small bones of her hands crack.

  She lets her body collapse before the communal force of nature in front of her and falls to her knees on the grass.

  Her expression transforms, and a furious and insane look awakens.

  Sarah forces the rope between her arms with everything she has.

  Her muscles are completely contracted.

  A roar like that of a wild animal in the middle of a dense forest echoes from her.

  At that exact moment something unbelievable happens.

  A rain of lightning cuts across the entire horizon.

  Countless bolts, one larger than the other, fall from the sky as if possessed by a life of their own and with the intention of destroying everything.

  After a few seconds, a final bolt falls downstream.

  Thus, two things happen, the ropes that bind Sarah break with her brute strength.

  And two flowers are cut prematurely from the garden of life.

  Sarah’s fists fall onto the grass like sledgehammers in a sequence of pure fury, making the ground sink at the points of impact. And for almost an hour, she remains sitting leaning against the tree to the rain, to the soaked grass and to the river that continues without asking permission.

  She rises with her head down, and still with pieces of rope on her arms, begins to walk aimlessly along the edge of the nearby street. Until she is stopped by a gray-haired woman who has just gotten out of her car in the rain. Startled by the scene, she kneels in front of her.

  “Girl... are you alright?” the woman asks her, however no answer arises, Sarah stands there looking at the ground.

  “My God!” She looks at the ropes. “Come girl, I will take you to a safe place.”

  She takes her to a station in the city, where two armed forces agents usually stay at night. Upon arriving there, the woman tells them what had happened. The two head to the car, look at Sarah and ask how she is.

  Only silence echoes among them.

  They ask the woman to take her to the nearest security post in her car. After being examined by an on-duty doctor, the officers try again to talk to her, but fail once more. Then they decide to leave her alone for a while.

  Sarah is wrapped in a towel, sitting on a couch. The ropes are no longer present.

  At least not physically.

  The hours pass, and sleep only comes four hours later, when her body collapses to the side without her permission.

  In the morning after waking up, she finds her father there beside her. Sitting and with his face shaped by concern. He had been waiting for her to wake up. By coincidence, one of the agents on the morning shift knew them, so he called him.

  “Hii. Good morning, are you alright?” Júlio runs his hand through her hair.

  She nods positively, and hugs him tightly, he returns the gesture.

  “Can you tell us what happened?” one of the agents questions her again.

  She lets go of her father, looks at him with a sad and wet gaze, and nods positively. After a few more minutes there with Júlio, she is taken to a room where the agents ask several questions that she answers.

  Then she tells everything that happened. They hesitate to believe some parts, like the one where she said she killed everyone. They consider that she is traumatized by the event in the account.

  After almost three hours, she is taken to a hospital and then home.

  She even tries to take a shower.

  But water only washes the flesh.

  Sarah lies down on the bed and does not take long to faint.

  The rain lasts five more days for most.

  Not for her.