Escape

**NuTech Police Headquarters - Base 13 - Client Containment Unit**

Zurie was looking at her reflection in the transparent plexi-glass of her isolation unit. Earlier, she had been subjected to the most brutal beating and yet now here she was and there wasn’t a scratch on her. It was amazing what a couple of hours in the healing vats could do.

Her head and shoulders were illuminated in a harsh halo by the arc lights that shone down from above. The lights were another of Hoyle’s little wheezes, they were on constantly, their purpose, to deprive her of sleep and make her lose any sense of time. Was it day or night? She did not know any more. It was only when she was dragged, struggling into the gloom that she was relieved of the perpetual glare. Hoyle preferred the twilight when he went about his business.

She crouched down suddenly; the hairs on the back of her neck were standing to attention. Pressing her palms against the polished floor she felt the ground beneath her feet vibrating. A murmur at first, then a low guttural rumble, finally a mechanical roar filled the air. Above the din she could hear the panicked shouts of the guards and the excited jeers of the other prisoners. A siren sounded and then the clatter of running feet.

Zurie smiled to herself. Help was coming. Then the world exploded into dust and chaos.