just because the first one i put up got fairly acceptable feedback, I'm putting this one up too. but this'll be the last I post up for a long time. (cuz i haven't written the rest yet. haha.)

read the first chapter if you haven't, otherwise this won't make much sense. enjoy, comment, have a nice day.

===

      CROSS

            CHAPTER 2

            ANSWERS, QUESTIONS

           

            When Ash awoke the next day, the first thing he noticed was that his arms and legs were in pain.

He was still strapped to the same, uncomfortable, straight-backed wooden chair. His limbs were cramping and aching from the lack of movement. He never wanted to get so acquainted with that chair, it was just irritating and excruciating now. He spent the first couple of his waking minutes struggling once again to free his wrists and ankles from the ropes. And once again, it was no good.

The next thing he noticed was that he was no longer in the same room as yesterday. He was in a huge room now, and the vastness of empty space startled him. A few strange machines, hooks hanging from the ceiling, scattered crates, and a musty smell made him realize that he was now in some kind of slaughterhouse, long out of use now. It made him feel sick. He didn’t want to imagine the pigs and other animals of the past being slaughtered, the animal blood staining the floor.

The last thing he noticed was that he needed to use the bathroom. Now.

“Awake, huh?” a voice said behind him.

Ash craned his neck around, and Chris was standing there behind him, his shades making his eyes invisible.

“Uh…yeah,” Ash responded cautiously. “Umm…where are we?”

“We’re in an abandoned warehouse and slaughterhouse at the edge of the state. We couldn’t stay in any one place too long. The police would track down my cellphone’s signal. We had to keep moving, so I brought us here in the middle of the night.”

“And you managed to move me from there to here without anybody noticing!?”

“I’ve got my ways,” Chris responded with the tiniest of smug smiles.

While Ash wondered how he was moved from one place to another in total discretion, he also noticed Chris seemed to be in a much better mood now than he was last night…last night, when he fired the gun and almost introduced a solid lead bullet to Ash’s forehead. He finally decided to risk asking, “Hey, Chris, could you let me use the bathroom?”

Chris raised an eyebrow. “Is it urgent?”

“I haven’t gone since yesterday afternoon. What do you think? Yeah, it’s urgent.”

Chris spent a few seconds in quiet thought.

Ash made the most innocent look he could. “Please?” he pleaded.

Finally, Chris made a face. “I suppose I have to. Fine, I’ll let you go. But…”

“But…?”

“Don’t try to escape. If you try, you’ll just get hurt.”

Whatever to let him go. “Fine, fine, I promise I won’t escape!”

Chris undid the knots within just a few, easy seconds. Ash stood up and stretched his arms and legs with a feeling of enormous relief.

“Bathroom’s down that little hall over there,” Chris said, jerking his thumb behind him. Ash nodded and briskly walked off to relieve himself.

 

Ash decided to try and escape anyway.

Shortly after washing his hands on a sink that miraculously was still in working order, he took a quick peek outside the bathroom door and looked up and down the hall. There were a few doors, and one, large, open steel door led back to the slaughterhouse. A door in the opposite direction led to open air and early morning sunlight.

Ash bit his lip. Christopher Cross – if that was his real name – was nowhere in sight. Probably still in the slaughterhouse place, waiting for him to come back so that he could tie him up on that chair again.

No way, he thought. Was he going to just let himself get tied up again like a dog? This was his chance to get out of here. He’d make a run for it.

With a shaky breath, Ash burst out of the bathroom and dashed down the hallway towards the exit, towards freedom…

Wham! He ran face-first into Chris’s gloved fist. Where did that come from? For a dizzy, disoriented second, Ash saw stars and lost all sense of direction.

“I told you to try not to escape,” Chris sighed, gripping the collar of Ash’s shirt and dragging him back toward the slaughterhouse and the chair that Ash now officially hated more than any other chair in the world. “Told you you’d get hurt if you tried.”

“Uhmma wha…?” Ash garbled, trying to clear his head.

And before long, before Ash could come back to his senses, Chris had thrown him back into the chair and tied him up in place.

“Do you know what day it is?” Chris asked when Ash had could finally speak.

“What?” Ash asked through gritted teeth, beginning another pointless struggle with the knots.

“It’s Saturday. You know what that means.”

Ash gasped. He did. With a terrified look on his face he looked up at his kidnapper. “You demanded the money by tonight.”

Chris nodded. “That’s right.”

“Or else, I’m dead.”

“Yes. Or else, you’re dead.”

 

William Noble took his glasses off for a quick moment to wipe the sweat off his forehead. He was seated on a desk in his apartment living room. The television was on, the radio was on, and the desk was littered with various newspaper clippings of news of he kidnapping of Ashley Maureen.

He ground his teeth together as he ran his fingers over the fine print, analyzing every single line.

“Careless,” he muttered as the newscasters on both the TV and the radio gave pointless and useless updates on the situation. “Careless, risking revealing the whole organization like that… What was he thinking…?”

He scribbled something on one of the clippings, circled the lines on another…

“I mean, capturing the attention of half of Manhattan? Could he get any more bonkers?”

After several minutes, William sighed and slammed down his pen on the desk, exhausted, exasperated, frustrated.

“Chris Cross…where are you?”

 

“I’m hungry,” Ash whined.

“So what?” Chris muttered.

“So, give me something to eat. You might as well keep me comfortable while I’m hanging out here.”

“Hmph.”

Chris didn’t move from his spot on a large, old crate.

“Seriously, dude, I’m starving here,” Ash said after another while.

“That hungry?” Chris asked in a low voice.

“Yeah. Come on, let’s have lunch.”

With an inaudible muttering, Chris hopped down from the crate and walked towards Ash on the chair, his hand moving to the inside of his trenchcoat…

Ash cringed. Was he going to pull out the gun again?

But what Chris brought out of his inside pocket was a small pack of crackers. He tore it open, scattering crumbs on the ground, and held up a cracker in his fingers in front of Ash’s mouth.

Ash gaped.

“Eat,” Chris ordered.

“Come on, you’ve got to be kidding. Wouldn’t you rather order some take out or something?”

“No. Eat.”

“Seriously. There’s got to be a McDonald’s around here, somewhere. Or how about some Chinese? I’m hungry for Chinese.”

“No McDonald’s. No Chinese.”

“You sure? I’m buying.”

“Stop kidding.”

“Then why don’t you…!”

Ash didn’t get to finish his sentence because Chris suddenly shoved the cracker into Ash’s mouth. As Ash shot him angry looks and began to chew the cracker furiously, Chris laughed. And then Chris took the other cracker from the plastic wrapper and bit it thoughtfully.

“You’re…cruel,” Ash said when he was through with his measly portions.

“You wanted food, I gave you food.”

“I wanted Chinese.”

“Whatever.”

“Can’t you at least try to show some…I don’t know, some morality?”

Chris faced him, his lips in a thin, curt line. “Some morality? Are we going to start talking about morality here?”

And, unexpectedly, he lifted his hand to take his purple shades off so that he and Ash could look at each other eye to eye. For a while, that was all they did – stared each other down. Ash noticed that the look of anguish he had seen in Chris’s eyes the previous night was still there, still noticeable, traceable.

“I suppose I didn’t impress you when I…fired my gun yesterday night, huh?” Chris asked, completely startling Ash with the topic of conversation.

“When you almost blew my brains out last night? Uh…no, not really.”

“I thought not. Look, last night I lost control of myself. I got really mad. I did something I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.”

Ash’s mouth fell open in disbelief. “You serious?”

Chris rolled his eyes, and looked at Ash again with a very serious look. “Just because I kidnapped you, Ash, doesn’t make me a bad person. I think I know about morality just as much as you do. I told you, I only kidnapped you because I need the money. It’s not for any selfish reason. It’s for something more important that you probably will ever realize.”

The seriousness of Chris’s face and his words screamed truth. Ash saw it in his eyes. Chris wasn’t kidding.

As turned his gaze away to stare at the wall to his right. “Sorry,” he murmured. “Didn’t realize.”

“Didn’t think you did. Do you want to know why I got so mad last night? Do you want to know why I lost control?”

“…Why?”

“I had a nightmare about Claudia. Claudia is my sister.”

“Your…sister?”

“Yeah. And she’s in trouble. That nightmare…it scared the living hell out of me.”

Chris put his shades back on as he left Ash to mull over that.

 

The day passed by rather quickly, and in that slaughterhouse at the edge of the city, things were quiet. Nighttime crept closer and closer…

“It’s almost night,” Chris muttered.

Ash had been silent for a long, long time.

“Something wrong?” Chris asked.

“I don’t know. What you just said a while back made me think, that’s all.”

Chris just looked at Ash with an unreadable expression.

“The money. The five million dollars. Do you need it to help your sister?”

“Yes.”

“Well, is she sick or something? Does she need an operation? You don’t need to kidnap people for that, Chris. There are people who can help you get the money! You…”

“No, it’s not like that. It’s much more complicated. You won’t understand.”

Chris began pacing. Now he was beginning to look nervous, even though Ash felt that he was the one who should be nerve-wracked. It was his life on the line, after all. He was the hostage.

“Still worried about that nightmare?” Ash asked, and for some reason, there was a level of genuine concern in his voice.

“Sort of.”

“Just forget about it. It was just a nightmare. You’re not the only one who’s been having disturbed dreams lately.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I had a weird dream too, just recently. Before I woke up to find myself kidnapped. Not exactly a nightmare, but the thought of it’s been bugging me too. I was lost on the street, just there trying to find my way home…when all of a sudden…” Ash’s face lit up a bit as he recalled. “All of a sudden, I saw this gorgeous lady approach me from the other end of the road. I think she was trying to help me.”

Chris raised an eyebrow.

“Seriously, the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. She had golden hair and wore this white dress, but before we said a word to each other…”

“HOLD A SECOND!” Chris’s sudden scream startled Ash.

“What?”

Before Ash knew it, Chris had strode up to him, had his hands on his shoulders, and was shaking him so violently the whole chair shook with him. “A woman!? Did you say with golden hair? A white dress?”

“Huh? Uh…yeah…”

“Ash, this woman in your dream – did she wear a pearl necklace?”

“A what?” The urgency in Chris’s voice was making him feel uncomfortable.

“A pearl necklace! Was she wearing a pearl necklace!?”

As Chris shook his shoulders, Ash managed to search through his memory of his dream for that detail. The memory of his dream was so clear, it made Ash wonder again if it really was a dream…

“Yeah, now that you mention it, I think she was…”

“Ugh!”

Chris let go of Ash, pulled a cellphone out of his pocket, and quickly dialed a number. Ash watched, confused, as Chris spoke into his phone in a loud and irritated voice.

“Melody!” he barked into the phone, “You appeared to him?”

And although Ash couldn’t hear, the woman at the other end of the line replied with a chuckle, “Yes, Chris, I did.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I knew you’d call sooner or later.”

“Well, I’m calling you now. Why’d you appear to him, Melody!?”

“He’s special, Chris. There’s something different about him, though I can’t tell what it is. Something in his head tells me…”

“Different? What are you saying?”

“It’s hard to explain, but I’m positive of it. I’ve already seeped through his head, looked through his dreams, and I know it. There’s something unique, something special about this boy you’ve kidnapped.”

“…So he’s special. So what?”

“He can help us.”

“…help us?”

“This boy can save Claudia.”

Chris spun to look at Ash, and Ash gave back a look that was blank with confusion, not following the conversation at all.

“So…what then?” Chris asked quietly into the phone.

“New plan,” replied the woman on the other end. “Bring him back with you.”

“You seem very sure about this.”

“I’m very sure.”

“Fine. I’ll bring him.”

“See you soon, Chris.”

“Right.”

The line went dead.

Chris pocketed his phone and faced with oblivious boy tied to the chair with a huge sigh.

“What was that all about?” Ash asked.

“Ash…I need you to come with me.”

“What…?”

“Come with me. There’s a lot to explain, but I promise I’ll explain it along the way. Right now, I need your cooperation.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. What the hell is this?”

“Please.” Unexpectedly, Chris sunk down to his knees in front of Ash and took off his shades once again so that they may look at each other in the eyes. “I’m begging you, Ash. This is very important. A lot depends on this. My sister…Claudia…needs your help. I need your help.”

“Chris…”

“This isn’t a demand. I’m not demanding this as a kidnapper to a hostage. I’m pleading. I’m begging. Please.”

The desperation and pleading in Chris’s voice, in his face, in his eyes – they were so full of emotion. Ash never would have guessed that Chris would humble himself like that for…anything.

A long, long moment of silence rang in the room.

“I don’t believe this,” Ash murmured, dropping his head in submission. “But…alright, fine.”

 

Later that evening, a taskforce group of policemen would storm the slaughterhouse, finally having traced the signal of the kidnapper’s cellphone.

The slaughterhouse was empty.

In the middle of the large room was a chair, and on this chair there was a written note. This note would eventually be handed over to the man it was addressed to: Ike Maureen.

It read:

Dad,

I’m safe. Don’t worry. Everything’s gonna be alright. I’m off on a little errand right now. It looks like some people really need my help. I have absolutely no idea what’s going on, but I’ve decided that I’m going to help them.

Don’t go looking for me. I’ll be back soon. Sorry.

                                                                                                            Ash

On the streets of New York, a small, black car drove through the night, unnoticed, inconspicuous.

Christopher Cross was behind the wheel.

Seated in the passenger seat was Ashley Maureen.