The Woman in Flat 213 Ch. 04

———

Emily was snapped out of her reflective thoughts about an hour into the drive, when there was the sound of a police siren wailing. Elizabeth initially ignored it, but the siren continued, she began to get somewhat nervous.

"Girls, take your blindfolds off, quick!" She hissed.

"It's okay, Madame Elizabeth," Marie said. "I'll go and talk to them."

The girls took off their blindfolds and looked round as Marie got out of the car, and approached the police officer who got out of the car. She exchanged a few words with him, and then returned to the window.

"It's not good news," she said, grimly. "You're going to have to go and talk to him yourself. He wants to talk to the driver. And he wants everyone out of the car."

Cursing to herself, Elizabeth got out of the car, as did the girls, and approached the policeman.

"Hello," she said, turning on the charm. "What can I do for -"

She was cut off when he raised his extendable baton, swung it and hit her in the leg, causing her to go to ground. In a matter of seconds, he had pounced on her and was cuffing her hands behind her back.

"I'm arresting you under section twenty-four of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you fail to mention when questioned anything that you later rely on in court. Anything you say may be given in evidence."

"What the fu-" she was cut off when he grabbed her hair and yanked it back.

"That means shut up!" He snarled at her as he hauled her to her feet. Turning to the police car, as the other police officers - another male and one female - started to get out, he shouted "Search the car, chaps - let's see what this bitch has!"

Emily and Ginny had been watching this scene in utter shock. Emily hadn't been expecting this to go so violently - she knew from something she'd read that police officers weren't supposed to use this level of force when detaining a suspect, and began to worry that this might be used in Elizabeth's favour later. Plus, it was a lot more aggressive than anything she'd seen before. Ginny, meanwhile, was completely motionless. This was, after all, her mother who was being assaulted, and her first instinct was to cry. But the truth was she had no idea what to think or say. So she just froze. Marie just smiled and lit a cigarette.

"Take your fucking hands off me!" Elizabeth shouted, her strength finally returning. "One word with my friends and I'll have you queuing up for the job centre! Just you wa-"

She got a slap from the officer in return, so she just fell silent.

"What have you got?" He asked his colleagues

"I've got two strips of black cloth sitting on the back seat. Possibly blindfolds." Said the second male officer.

"I found a bag in the boot," the female said. "Containing some... rather strange equipment. Looks like it would be used for sexual practices."

"A'ight. Let's get this bitch to the station so we can all go home." Elizabeth was bundled into the police car. Once that was done, the lead officer approached Marie. "Well, that's fine work. Would you mind following us, ma'am?"

"Oui, it will be my pleasure," she said, dropping her cigarette to the ground and crushing it with her shoe. "Girls, if you could please get in the car?"

Emily carefully helped the still completely shocked Ginny into the back seat, and climbed in the front. Marie got in the driver's seat and started the engine. As they moved off, she immediately broke into questions.

"So? That was it? We're free, now?"

"Oui. You are completely free. That little sociopath will never harm you again."

"But... What about the trial? What if she walks free? She'll just come after us again? That policeman was using way too much force!"

"I agree. He can be a little... over-zealous. But you don't have to worry about that. There will be no trial."

Emily snapped her head round to look at Marie. "What?"

Without taking her eyes off the road, Marie gave a rather nasty chuckle. "She was using government property to enslave you and her daughter. She was using equipment we usually use on terror and organised crime suspects. If this went to trial, we would be exposing it for the whole world to see. We do not want to wash our dirty linen in public."

"So... What's going to happen?" Emily asked, cautiously.

"I'm still not sure exactly. We're taking her to RAF Northolt now. I expect they'll be picking up the other women in that little group by now, so they'll be along shortly. Perhaps we'll use them as bargaining chips next time we have to convince an Albanian mafia boss to throw one of his subordinates under the bus. Perhaps we'll fly them out to one of our allies who don't abide by human rights - God knows, those women make me reconsider my lifelong opposition to torture. Or perhaps the Americans will take them on. They've got black sites all over the world, so those women will just disappear off the face of the Earth, as far as we're concerned."

With that answered, Emily sat in silence, and it was not for a while before they arrived at the aforementioned air force base. Marie just followed the "police car" until they arrived at a hangar with a large airplane sitting in it. Before too long, a "police van" pulled up, and both were unloaded. Elizabeth, Anita and all of the other women in the group were led out and stood in a line. They were all looking very shocked, and more than a little terrified - this clearly wasn't a police station, and certainly not where they had been told they were going. But Marie wouldn't let the girls get out of the car. She just sat there, smiling as the scene unfolded.

A rather smartly dressed man wandered down the line, and addressed the group as a whole.

"Ladies, my name is David Bridges, I work for our government's espionage regulatory division. It has come to my attention that you have been using your company's resources, which their contract clearly indicates to be considered government property, to indulge in some sick sexual practices. Including with one of your daughters. Well, as it happens, that is not acceptable. So there will be consequences."

One of the women tried to protest, but was immediately struck in the back of the head by one of the arresting officers.

"Right now, we are invoking a provision of a deal we have with the Americans, and handing you over to them. This plane will take you to Diego Garcia, where you will be held until we can decide what to do with you. I highly doubt this will end well for you, but considering how little you felt for those that you tortured, I really don't care."

At this, many of the women began to cry, to beg to be released, or for any kind of amnesty. Elizabeth just stood, motionless. She was definitely angry, but it was clear she wasn't sure how to react either. Like her daughter, in fact.

David proceeded to snap his fingers, and they were grabbed from behind.

"Get them out of my sight."

And that was the last Emily and Ginny saw of any of them.

———

"So, could you please start from the beginning. How were you taken captive, Emily?" David asked.

They were in a debriefing room, elsewhere on the base. Marie was sitting next to him, smiling supportively, but David was quite impassive. Ginny was not present - she had been taken to visit the base's psychologist for a preliminary evaluation, and her absence was already making Emily feel uneasy.

"She broke into my flat the night I moved in, a couple of months ago," Emily began. "She held a knife to my throat and threatened to kill me if I made a sound. Then she undressed me, took naked pictures of me, tied me to the bed and... and..." she struggled to get it out. "She raped me."

"You're doing so well, ma cherie!" Marie said.

"Then she installed something... Some kind of virus or software, I dunno, I'm not a computer expert... She installed SOMETHING onto my phone and laptop, and some hidden cameras in my room and... in my shower. She told me that if I ever tried anything, to tell anybody about what was happening or go to the police, she would find out and post the photos she'd taken onto the internet."

She saw David write this information down. Then he said "So, you made no effort to escape, then?"

"Well, no," Emily said. "How could I? She'd practically turned my room into something out of a George Orwell novel."

"Well, you could've left your phone in a coffee shop or in a very long line, and gone to alert the police in person?" David suggested.

Emily brought her fist down hard on the table.

"Oh, yes. That did occur to me. I just decided to stay in my trapped conditions, didn't I? You know what? Maybe it was my fault in the first place for not trying to fight her off - after all, a knife isn't likely to cause serious harm, is it?" Her eyes were blazing with anger now. "I was sheltered for most of my life, and I grew up in a privileged family. So when a crazy woman breaks into my flat, rapes me and installs fucking HIDDEN CAMERAS in my shower, obviously the last thing I'm going to think of is an ingenious plan to fool her GPS system. DOES THAT ANSWER YOUR FUCKING QUESTION!?

David just stared at her, looking unconcerned by her outburst. When she'd calmed down, he raised his palms. "You're right. Maybe I was a little indelicate. Please accept my apologies." He wrote down what she'd told him. "So... you were essentially blackmailed into complying. That was when you were introduced to Ginny?" He asked.

"Yes."

"And you say that you're in love with her? That's why you were so reluctant for her to go off on her own?" He received only a meek nod. "How did you go from just meeting her to falling in love with her in a matter of months?"

"Well, we were hypnotised. Elizabeth took me to see some psychiatrist. What was his name?" She racked her brain. "Dr. Curtis, if I remember correctly."

"Dr. Michael Curtis, you mean?" David suddenly sounded very interested. "If that's true, then that's very serious. Plus, using government facilities to play their weird sex games... this list is endless. I think there's one more thing as well. Marie said in one of her reports to me that, when brought to climax following intense sexual stimulation, you experienced what she described as a thirty minute orgasm. To my knowledge, no human being can physically have an orgasm that long. So how did that come about?"

Emily had to rack her brain again. "I remember a South African doctor... Dr. van Zyl? Oh, and Dr. Sharon Michaels. They implanted me with an extra gene that made me orgasm for thirty minutes at a time."

This actually drew some real emotion from David. He looked super pissed.

"They used a top secret science facility to... make a girl orgasm for thirty minutes? Right, I think I've heard all I need to hear about this. This company will be lucky if a local council hires them to clean out the public conveniences after I publish this report." He closed his file. "I need to go. Marie here will take you to the medical wing to check up on your girlfriend."

With that, he left. Marie, meanwhile, took Emily to her car and drove her to where the medical unit was. Once there, they were shown to a small waiting area. After about half an hour, a smartly-dressed man came out and spoke to them. He introduced himself as Dr. Singh.

"You're the girlfriend of Ginny... I don't see any last name on my forms... the patient who was brought in earlier today?" he asked. Emily nodded, so he began. "I'm afraid that I've only had about an hour and a bit to talk to the patient, but I've already seen signs that she may suffer, or be on the verge of developing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Plus, she's already showing signs of poor social development - she doesn't speak much, struggles to interact around others, and just lacks basic social skills. I suspect she's been isolated for most of her life. So I'm afraid it's not looking good. She might have to be assigned a guardian to care for her, and spend years receiving coaching and counselling before she's able to function in normal society."

This was already horrible to hear for Emily, but then he dropped an enormous bombshell.

"Also, I have serious questions about her identity."

"What do you mean?" Emily asked.

"Well, she tells me that her mother named her after the character in Harry Potter. Well, she was born eighteen years ago, which was around 1997, early 1998. The first Harry Potter film was not released until 2001, and even then, the character only appeared briefly in one scene. It wasn't until 2002 when the character was featured prominently, by which time she was already five years old. Based on this, I did some digging, and she finally admitted that her mother regularly dyed her hair red, and that her natural colour is blonde. So I have come to suspect that she has been renamed, and modelled after a character that her mother was obsessed by in those films."

Emily looked at him in shock.

"So... So..." she couldn't even get the words out.

"Yes. I'm afraid that her mother took everything from her, including her identity."

Emily could not speak for a while. She just felt her eyes filling with tears. She knew Elizabeth was cruel and sociopathic, but this was far beyond anything that she had ever envisaged her doing to anyone, never mind her own daughter. Eventually, she steeled herself and asked her next question.

"What's going to happen to her?"

"Well, she's not a threat to anyone, and taking her away from the one remaining person she knows and loves would be counterproductive," Dr. Singh said. "But I will have to refer her to a psychiatrist in London. And we'll be applying to the court to have a legal guardian assigned to her."

"That will be me," Marie cut in.

"... Yes. In which case, I will be temporarily releasing her into your custody, and we will follow up with you in due course."

Emily's relief was replaced with joy when Ginny was eventually led out. She ran to her and threw her arms around her, holding her tightly. Refusing to let go. It was several minutes before she felt a hand on her shoulder. It was Marie.

"Come," she said. They followed her out of the building. They stood outside for a few minutes to get some fresh air and take a breather after what had been a long, tiring day. Eventually, Emily asked the one question she had on her mind.

"So... what happens now?"

Marie smiled and, once again, lit a cigarette.

"Well, your flat is being debugged and cleared of Elizabeth's surveillance, so that's no use. I highly doubt you'll want to stay in her flat. So we're going back to my house just outside London. We'll stay there for a while. Does that sound good to you?"

Emily nodded. "Sounds good."

Ginny nodded her own affirmative.

Marie took a long drag on her cigarette, musing as she did so. "You know something? When I was receiving my brief, I found out that Elizabeth lived in Flat 213. I couldn't help but notice the coincidence."

"What do you mean?" Emily asked.

Marie blew out a large puff of smoke. "Flat 213 is the same number as the apartment in Wisconsin where that one particularly nasty serial killer murdered most of his victims. What was his name? Hmmm.... Ah merde, it escapes me!"

She thought long and hard.

"Oh yes, it was Jeffrey Dahmer."