The candlelight trembled, casting long, skeletal shadows across the cold stone of the church chamber. Dust, disturbed by drafts that snaked through unseen cracks, danced in the flickering gloom. From somewhere in the hollow space above, the faint, hypnotic drone of chanting seeped through the wooden rafters—a sound that had become the ceaseless soundtrack to her terror. Ashley Graham sat hunched in a corner, knees pulled so tight to her chest they ached. The only sound she dared to make was the shallow, ragged whisper of her own breathing. Her favorite cashmere sweater, a gift from her father for her twenty-first birthday, was torn at the shoulder and stained with grime. Beneath the fabric, just below her neck, the phantom sting of the Plaga injection site was a constant, sickening reminder. She had lost track of how long she’d been locked in this room. Hours bled into days, marked only by the shifting quality of the light through a high, grimy window and the changing rhythms of the cultists' footsteps beyond the heavy oak door. Time didn't move right anymore. It stretched and snapped, moments of lucidity swallowed by waves of disjointed memory. The sudden lurch of the sedan on that Massachusetts road. The two men in sharp suits—Secret Service, they’d said—their calm assurances about engine trouble curdling into cold, professional violence. The suffocating darkness of the shipping container. The smell of salt and diesel, the constant, nauseating roll of the Atlantic, and the profound, absolute certainty that no one knew where she was. The jarring landing in Spain. The guttural language of her captors, faces hidden by burlap sacks and eyes burning with a zealotry she couldn't comprehend. Finally, the mountain chill of Valdelobos and the sharp, violating prick of the needle, a cold fire spreading through her veins. They had spoken of a "gift," a "blessing," but their eyes held no kindness. Only a chilling sense of ownership. Her gaze, sharp with adrenaline, darted to the simple wooden chair beside her. In another life, it was just a piece of furniture. Here, in this cold, forgotten chamber, it was the only thing in the world that wasn't stone or iron. It was her only potential weapon. Her only lifeline. Then—a sound that cut through the chanting and the memories.

Click.

The heavy, metallic sound of a bolt being drawn back. Ashley froze, her blood turning to ice. Her pulse hammered against her ribs, a frantic drumbeat in the sudden silence. The distant chanting had stopped. Instinct screamed at her to shrink further into the corner, to make herself invisible, but there was nowhere left to go. Her trembling hands found the back of the chair, the rough grain of the wood digging into her palms. She forced her fingers to grip, to hold on, her knuckles turning white.

The door handle, a wrought-iron ring, began to turn with an agonizing, scraping groan. It was now or never. The fear was a living thing, a viper coiling in her gut, but something else rose to meet it—a raw, desperate fury. She was not just a symbol. She was not their "Manchurian Candidate." She was Ashley Graham, and she was still alive.

The door creaked open, revealing a dark silhouette against the dim hallway light.

A strangled cry tore from her throat as she lunged, a surge of pure, primal instinct propelling her forward. She swung the chair with all the strength she possessed.

“Get away from me!!”

CRASH!

The wood exploded against the figure’s raised arm, the sound echoing like a gunshot in the confined space. Splinters rained down on the stone floor. The impact shuddered up her arms, a painful, jarring shock, and the shattered legs of the chair fell from her numb fingers. She stood panting in the dust-filled, flickering light, her heart wild in her chest, staring at the unmoving shadow in the doorway.