Avatara

Grace Shelley did not know where she was but she felt cold. Her hands were bound together in cuffs and she still could not see. Her head was covered by a bag with small holes poked in it so that she could breathe. There were two slightly larger holes over her nostrils One of the holes in the bag was near her right eye and if she strained to look upwards and to the right she could see out of it. But the hole was too small and when she looked, all she could see was a little bit of whiteness and nothing else. She could not speak as she was gagged on top of this around the mouth with a cloth that was knotted around the back of her neck.

Further away, she heard commotion. Heavy footsteps at random, suggesting they whoever was around was dealing with something else and not yet coming back towards her. She tried to get out of the cuffs but realised they were metallic and would not be coming off. She trying anything to get free, to get away from Knightmare Grimm. Where was she? At Sheldrake? Was that Spector out there making noise? If he spoke, she would be able to tell his weasley voice from a mile off.

She tried to stand up and move but her feet were bound as well, so she fell to the hard cement floor, hitting her left shoulder on the ground with quite a bit of force. She felt and heard the reverberations of footsteps on the floor and realised that the place she was in was quite echoey. That meant b.a.r.e ceilings and floors throughout area, with few objects. She thought that she must be in a lair or bas.e.m.e.nt of some kind. Terror and dread got worse with the realisation she was at the mercy of a man that wanted her not only for the codes that controlled avatara kernel but also for his d.e.s.i.r.es of the flesh. Thinking of this made her panic; she panted and was hyperventilating but tried to control herself but taking moments to hold her breath. And then she thought to herself about how Knightmare-Grimm could have come back. How was that possible?

She did not have much time to ponder. The pattern of footsteps became ordered and more audible. Knightmare-Grimm was coming towards her. She was on the floor on her side and tried to get herself in a seated position but without the use of her hands and feet, she was only able to rollover.

She recognised the sound of a key going into a padlock and the clang of a cell handle as it is forcefully pulled across horizontally.

"Hahaha," she heard a chuckle of a man, that sounded like Knightmare-Grimm.

"Get, get off me," she said. She was being grabbed forcefully and dragged upwards with vice like gripping hands. She sat back down on what had to be a bench.

"Careful pretty girl," he said. "I am going to take the gag off you, promise me you won't scream."

Grace screamed the moment the gag was taken off but the sound was dampened by the bag, which was also taken off in the next instant.

Grace Shelley's hair was unkempt but she did not notice. What she did notice was that there was something wrong with this Knightmare-Grimm. He looked a bit different compared to before and was not in an avatara form. She was puzzled. Yet he sounded like him. He was wearing a metal armoured suit that made him look like a cyborg from the neck down. But the metal looked like stainless steel plates and they were together with what looked like nylon fabric.

"I guess you never thought you'd see us again Grace," he said. "It took us a long time to hack our way out of the Sheldrake servers and build this mobile unit." He flexed his arms and took a pose as if he was in a Mr Universe, bodybuilding competition.

"Do you like it?" he said.

"It's impossible," Grace said. "Knightmare-Grimm, how can you be back? Your real bodies died. Both Knightmare and Byron Grimm are dead. You simply cannot exist."

"The spirit lives on beyond the body," said Knightmare-Grimm. "I told you we are immortal." He grinned cheesily. "Now Grace, we are not here to hurt you, we just want to get the block codes."

"The block codes?" said Grace. Knightmare-Grimm's request confused her.

"The block codes," said Knightmare-Grimm. "So that we can block everyone else out of Avatara and have it all to ourselves." None of what Knightmare-Grimm was saying was making sense to Grace.

"I thought you wanted Avatara for your army?" she said.

Knightmare-Grimm stood erect in an odd way and then turned to swiftly leave the cell. "I'll give you a moment to think it over," he said.