For hours, Ethan tried to sleep but couldn't. The rush of rage that overtook him refused to leave, and he was glad for it as it drowned out his anguish. He knew he couldn't mourn until he saved himself from the situation he put himself in; he was glad for the mad focus he had found.

Ethan knew he was in a worse physical state than when he woke up. He could feel that something was wrong with his ribs and lungs. He had a sense of the bruises that were spreading. But he felt no pain. Instead, he only felt his heart pounding.

"What will he do to you when he realizes I fled?" Ethan asked as he was rethinking his plan.

Olivia lifted her gaze from her screen to look at him. She wasn't playing anymore; several instances of code editors were opened before her. She began to answer but stopped herself, rethinking what she was about to say. By pulling back her left sleeve, she revealed a series of knife scars on her forearm. "More of the same. It doesn't hurt anymore; you don't have to worry about me."

"And her?" Ethan asked, nodding towards the other girl, who hadn't moved since he noticed her.

Olivia hid back her scars. "Don't worry about her or the others."

"The others?" Ethan asked, more to himself than to her. He looked around and noticed sporadic clothes and personal effects left at the feet of some of the beds. In total, he guessed that ten people lived here. There was blood on some of the sheets, and many hadn't been cleaned in a long time.

Ethan laid his head back onto his pillow. "Maybe you should escape with me. After he threatened you, I'm not sure your dad will–"

"–Don't call him that," Olivia snapped.

Ethan glanced at Olivia to see both hatred and disgust in the girl's expression. Whether she was forced to use the term in his presence or called him as such to soothe his wrath, she clearly wasn't brainwashed by his violence. "Last night, you were downstairs when you opened the door."

"You slept for a whole day; that was the night before," she corrected.

"Sure," Ethan dismissed. "You were able to go outside. Why don't you escape as well? With two of us there'll be a better chance the police will believe us, and he won't be able to take it out on you while they come."

"It won't work!" Olivia barked while keeping her voice low. "I've called the police, and they never came. I've emailed journals proof impersonating one of their clients, and all it did was get him killed. I even conned millions from an online drug lord to hire mercenaries who never came. You're just going to get yourself killed like the others."

Ethan lay stunned for a moment. If any of this were true, it would mean that these people have influence and manpower. Maybe going to the police wouldn't be a good plan. Maybe he should just escape. "An hour ago, you nodded like it was a good plan, and now you stopped believing? Have you even tried to flee this place?"

"I did; it only got me right back here, with a few more scars," she retorted.

"There has to be a way to get the police to raid this place," Ethan pushed.

"You don't get it; they are everywhere; multiple countries. In their own words, she is 'imported goods'," Olivia retorted, pointing at the other girl. "Whomever you go to, they'll know. Maybe you'll get lucky and convince the police to come here and shut this place down. And then the investigation will die, and so will you if you push it."

"Then all we can do is leave," Ethan said. "If we can't go to the police, there isn't much we can do now. But once I can use my name again, I'll be able to get it to Scotland Yard. My father knew several of them."

"If they aren't in on it," Olivia said, defeatist.

For a moment, Olivia's demeanor of having given up spread to Ethan. It came as a hollowness digging into his heart and the return of all the pains he was ignoring. Feeling them reaching a debilitating height, Ethan forced himself to relive the anger he felt in the desk room. He pictured the face of his father's killer to see himself punching at it with animalistic wrath.

"You should drink and rest; you are getting paler," Olivia commented.

"I'm sure I'm looking a lot worse than 'pale'," Ethan quipped. He closed his eyes and tried, once more, to find sleep. But his mind wouldn't let him.

As night fell, Ethan heard the heavy metal door open and a dozen people enter. Most of them were young and silent, if not discreetly sobbing. Olivia's father was with them, as foretold by the alcohol stench wafting from him.

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Ethan leaned back and pretended to be asleep. Controlling his breathing was painful, but he kept it as consistent as possible.

"You got his name?" Olivia's father asked her.

"He's been out all day," Olivia answered.

Ethan smelled the man approaching from the bed and did all he could to be as relaxed as possible in case the man tries to check if he's truly asleep. He'd expected something as simple as grabbing and dropping his arm when the man's giant hand slapped his face, snapping his head to the side.

"He's already wounded," Olivia commented after a pause. "If you continue, you'll kill him."

"Shut up!" he snapped. "I told you to never question me. Or do you want to be taught that lesson again?"

She didn't answer, but Ethan could feel her recoiling in her chair.

"If he isn't up by tomorrow, you get rid of him," Olivia's father ordered. He wasn't talking to her.

"Sure," another adult, the man Ethan had heard earlier, confirmed. Whatever happened, it would be decided during the night.

After the two men left with Olivia, some of the kids seem to approach Ethan. Most only glanced at him before recoiling, while a few poked at his wounds, sending electric burns into his flesh. He remained unflinching in case one of them would warn his captors.

They did not talk between them. In fact, after the novelty of Ethan's presence faded, he heard most of them retreating to their beds.

Once the last sobs stopped, Ethan rolled out of bed and grabbed a hairpin Olivia left him. He unfolded and snapped it in two before forming a tension tool and a hook. He was glad that his father had taught him lockpicking despite his childish affirmation that he'd never need it.

Before Ethan could exit the room, he heard a key turning in the heavy metal door. He retreated onto his bed before the door opened and faked being asleep once more. He kept his eyes ever so slightly open, as, in the dark, it shouldn't be noticed.

The man who dismantled Ethan's car – the one who would be disposing of him in the morning – appeared in the doorframe. He was smaller and scrawnier than Olivia's father but was still an adult man who matched Ethan in height and build. He held a knife at his side and was scanning the dorm, passing over Ethan without showing that it is who he was searching for.

'Did he forget in which bed I am?' Ethan asked himself.

The man stepped into the room and silently moved towards the end of it without turning on the light. In the darkness, Ethan could not see the man and could only hear him.

"I'll teach you to bite," Ethan heard the man threaten after a moment of silence.

The gut-wrenching way it was said dragged Ethan to his feet. He grunted in pain as his side flared once again but got it under control.

"Get back in your bed!" the man ordered without seeing who stood up.

Ethan stepped into the moonlight of a barred window for the man to see him. He grabbed a cloth left near his bed, soaked in dried blood, and began to twist it around his right hand behind his back.

"How are you standing?" the man asked while approaching.

Ethan didn't answer. He tightened the cloth wrapped around his right hand. His pulse pounded in his ears, louder than the slow footsteps of the man coming closer.

When the man got close enough, Ethan saw that he was worried, scared even. He swung his knife at Ethan's throat.

Ethan had been waiting for it. He raised his wrapped hand, catching the man's wrist mid-swing. The blade's edge bit into the cloth but stopped in it. Ethan twisted his wrist outward, forcing the man's hand open. The knife slid free.

The man tried to punch with his free hand, but Ethan stepped in, denying the blow any amplitude.

Ethan's foot moved behind the man's, and he pushed him back. It wasn't elegant; it was the raw muscle memory from hours at the dojo and with tutors. He hadn't ever used it for real, but thankfully it worked outside of training.

The man fell hard on his back and swung his legs at Ethan's. It threw him to the ground too, and they locked into a brawl. Fists crashed into each other – Ethan struck the man in the throat, and the man paid him back with a punch to the guts.

Blood dripped out of Ethan; it felt hot and drove him to a higher thrill as his fist crashed into the man's nose. It broke with a wet crack, spraying blood across both their faces. Ethan didn't flinch – he didn't even notice. The copper tang filled his lungs, hot and metallic, almost sweet. His vision completely tunneled, and the world shrank to the pounding rhythm of his heartbeat and fist.

The man gurgled, trying to wheeze a word, maybe to beg, maybe to curse, but Ethan didn't hear it. His thoughts were gone, dissolved in the thrill. Every strike made him forget his pain a little more, drowning out the images that haunted him. A part of him wanted to stop, but he didn't. He pressed his forearm against the man's throat, leaning in. the man clawed weakly at Ethan's arm, leaving scratches that didn't register as pain.

The man's eyes bulged, his heels drummed the ground, and he went limp.

Ethan stayed there for a moment, still pressing down, breathing like an animal. He pushed himself back, staring at the body. The man's head was turned to the side, his tongue jutting out to the ground.

Ethan wiped his face, only smearing more blood across it. His hand shook as the thrill shrank back deep inside him. He looked at the corpse again, and a nauseating wave rolled through him.

A click announced the coming of the light. In an instant, Ethan had a dozen terrified pairs of eyes staring at him from the bunks. The kids, boys and girls all younger than him, stared immobile like at a rabid dog, fearing that moving would trigger him.

"I'm leaving this place. I'll leave the door open for you to follow," Ethan announced. He leaned over his victim to grab the keys from his pocket and the knife. Without waiting for reactions, he stepped towards the door and opened it.

Pushing it open just enough to slip through, Ethan stepped onto a steel catwalk. Bare bulbs flickered overhead, revealing a staircase descending to the building's first floor. It was a fitted-out warehouse floor with a TV, sofas, a pool table, and a fridge.

"They didn't hear anything," Olivia said from behind Ethan. She had crept up on him without making a noise, even on the metallic catwalk. Her expression betrayed how scared she was. She pointed up at a fixed camera watching the door. "I put the cameras in a loop, but the exit door is past where they are playing poker. There are four of them."

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