The world raced by beside him, with very little in the way of input from him.

Joe Hardy squeezed his eyes shut to block out the constant churning of his vision; the world racing by, past his immediate vision at warp speed, through the small window.  He struggled for a moment to remember, to figure out where he was or why he was there.  None of it made sense to him.  What the younger Hardy boy remembered was disjointed.  A half-case of stairs?  Chains around his ankles and wrists?

Obviously, Hardy, you have lost your mind, he told himself.  Weird dreams you’re having lately.

Joe shifted – or tried to shift, to straighten his long legs.  He felt all cramped up lying here.  Strange he couldn’t remember where ‘here’ was.

Are we moving or is that just my stomach and head making me feel like I was moving?

Joe sighed and tried to get comfortable again. 

Why can’t I move?

Joe pulled on his hands and his feet and tried to sit up, but was unable to move at all.  His hands were bound – or chained – to his feet.  Something soft covered his mouth and something just as soft was inside his mouth; it felt like cotton.  He opened his eyes and looked outward: definitely a car of some kind.

What? Was I kidnapped again?  He struggled with the bonds but knew they wouldn’t give. 

“Shhh, Joe, shhh, it’s all right,” a gentle voice said from nearby.  “It’s time to go back to sleep again, my love.”

My love?

Joe shivered and tried to take a deep breath.  No, this wasn’t happening.  It wasn’t happening.  A dream.  It was all.  Just.  A.  Stupid.  Dream!

He yanked, hard, on the chains and winced in pain.  He tried to scream through the cloth in and over his mouth but it came out muted, weak and mewling.  He sounded weak.  He felt a lot weaker.  He could see sunlight coming in around them, through the window, but for all he saw that, he knew he had no way to bring attention to himself, to get help, not if he couldn’t sit up.

And he couldn’t.  He struggled to shift but that just sent pain coursing through his arms and legs again – and his neck.  He realized there was something around his neck, soft but unforgiving, tied to something, maybe the seatbelt or the back of the seat.

Real, then.  Which meant…

No dream.  Derak.  Derak got me and is holding me.  Derak is still holding me.  It hadn’t been a dream. 

Joe shivered and fought back the urge to cry.  You’re not a wimp, Hardy, so stop it.  You can get over this. 

He wanted to cry, though.  He remembered too vividly what happened to him when he was ten, the pain and the fear, the loss of innocence. 

He winced in pain, feeling the vivid pain of the brand on the bottom of his foot.  His uncle marked him like he was baggage in need of a claim tag.  Maybe that was the way that Derak thought of him.  Baggage.  Something to be used and discarded.  He squeezed his eyes shut and fought back the urge to cry. 

I’m not giving him the satisfaction of seeing me cry again.  I’m not giving him that hold on me.  He has me.  But I’m going to beat him, if I die trying.

It was a thousand times worse now.  Worse, because he no longer expected his brother or his father or his sister to find him and rescue him.  He felt the agony of loneliness, of fear.

But he wasn’t going to cry, no matter what.

He shifted again, trying to gain some purchase – or at least find some easement from the cramped feeling.  He grunted, wishing for something to drink.  How long had they been in the back of a car?  He knew the last thing he remembered – the last thing he didn’t want to remember and he almost lost himself to the fear again.

NO.  He’s not beating me.

“Don’t be there, Joe,” he heard his doctor’s voice again.  Doctor Morgan.  His psychologist.  “Be somewhere else.”

So he went to work.  He thought of the car he’d always wanted to build, the one he’d learned all about.  Maybe he would never build it for real but no reason why not to work on it now, right?

First, the chassis…

“We don’t have much farther to go, Joe,” the voice said from the front seat.  “But I want it to be a surprise so….Go to sleep, Joe.  Go to sleep.”

Something went over his face and, despite wanting to fight it, he inhaled….

…then went to sleep again.

 

The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The authors have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.