STORY====================== Maddox supressed a a shudder as he usually did when speaking to "His lordship". The creature was beneath him really but a necessary evil, at least for the moment. "If the world were small enough to fit in my briefcase" he stressed the word to show his superior intelligence, "would it really be worth having?" He knew this response was pushing it a little. "His lordship" liked to think himself superior and to be treated as such. Maddox always walked on the edge in that regard. He continued in a slightly less patrnizing tone. "May I remind your lordship that these two women are central to our plan. If they were to somehow manage to escape...." He left it hanging there. ------------ Arathon busied himself searching the body of the recently deceased guard as Mayata listened closely lest anyone should come looking for him. Lydia sat hunched in the corner hugging her knees to her chest trying to concentrate. Her initital reactoin had been somewhat obstinate, almost a reflex. But now she was reconsidering. She'd seen this plot plenty of times before, stranger in a strange land, bizarre surroundings, madness just around the corner, all familiar stuff really. She asessed her options: 1. This is an elaborate hoax. If this is the case my best hope is to play along with it and look for flaws, gaps, anything that will explain the eventual intent. Just going through the process was steadying... 2. This is truly some form of time/space rift. Less plausible but, if it be the case, the best hope is to play along, integrate into this world as quickly as possible while using my personal skills to overcome obstacles and find a way out. Her breathing started to come under control... 3. I have gone mad. Unacceptable. My sense of self, time and place are all intact. She chuckled softly to herself, "The lunatics are now running the assylum..." Every story of this kind that she had ever read, reviewed, critiqued, skimmed or heard about included someone who denied the reality of where they were in order to keep "their sanity". But those characters always had looked so incredibly foolish to her. "Don't deny it, evovle with it." She had been talking to characters in books since she was old enough to read. "The more you blend in the more you can observe, the more you observe the more you learn, the more you learn the greater your opportunity to change, influence and control." That had been her mantra in the industry and it would serve her well now. "Arathon", she said softly to get his attention, "If I am to escape with you and Mayata I am going to need better shoes." Arathon looked up with a puzzled frown. "Better shoes?" "Yes, and don't you think that this Armani suit will stand out just a little?" She glanced at the still form of the guard on the floor. Mayata was quick to agree. "She is right Arathon. Secrecy and stealth will get us out of this cell but we won't get too far unless Lydia looks like she belongs." Arathon grunted in mute aquiesence and began stripping the garments and skins from the corpse. "The two of you have until nightfall to make something useful out of these. Then we leave. Whether the stranger is naked or clothed, in rags or....soot." ============================= STORY