The Forbidden Tomb

40

Jasmine woke to the sharp burn of vomit as it bubbled from her stomach.

The tickle at the back of her throat was the only warning of the nasty fluid that would soon follow. It was all she could do to turn her head before she retched, her system trying to rid itself of the potent chemicals that had kept her unconscious for the last few hours. Her arms trembled and her body heaved as she purged until there was nothing left. She rolled onto her back, exhausted from the involuntary efforts.

Only then did she manage to open her eyes.

Though her thoughts were still fuzzy, she could immediately tell that she was no longer under the city. The tunnels had been dark and damp, the floors and walls made of gray stone and concrete. But this room — wherever it was — was bright and dry. Sunlight streamed in through small slits in the wall near the ceiling, illuminating the dirt floor and the rough, reddish-tan bricks that surrounded her. The small room was completely barren, with only a small break in the wall leading to a hallway beyond.

She closed her eyes again, trying to piece together anything that might help her determine how or where she had been moved. She remembered being attacked and struggling to resist, then succumbing to an overwhelming sensation of sleep. Her nausea and clouded mind told her that she hadn’t simply given up; she had been drugged — though the initial dose hadn’t knocked her out completely.

She remembered being jostled about in the back of a van and being pinned to the floor by one of her assailants. At some point they had abandoned the vehicle, she knew, because someone had pulled her from the cargo area and tossed her limp body over his shoulder. She recalled fleeting visions of a cramped bazaar and glimpses of alarmed faces as she was carried through the frenzied crowd. But no one intervened and no one seemed to care, as if this sort of thing was common in Alexandria.

But that wasn’t the case at all.

In her semi-lucid state, Jasmine had actually missed the explosion. She had no way of knowing that the frantic patrons had much bigger things to worry about than a woman being toted through the masses.

For all they knew, she was being rescued, not kidnapped.

The bazaar had not only given her assailants cover from the satellites that were circling overhead, it had also camouflaged their escape on the ground. Their efforts blended in with the panicked retreat of the customers and shopkeepers. In the confusion, Jasmine had been whisked away from the city and delivered to the rendezvous point. After which, her kidnappers were relieved of duty.

Their job was to grab her.

Others would handle her interrogation.

Still reeling from the drugs and nausea, it took Jasmine several minutes to notice that her socks and shoes had been removed, leaving her feet bare. Not only that, her wrists had been bound by heavy metal cuffs connected by a long chain that ran through an eyebolt securely anchored into the floor. The shackles would allow her to stand, but her movement about the room would be restricted to a five-foot circle.

Jasmine could feel the sweat beading down her face as she pawed frantically at the sturdy clamps that encircled her wrists. As the severity of her situation continued to set in, panic and the sweltering heat of the room kept her from catching her breath. Perspiration soaked her skin and clothes as she desperately tried to slip her hands from their steel restraints. The moisture allowed the metal to slide an inch or two, but it wasn’t nearly enough for Jasmine to escape. Each time she tried to pull her arms free, she succeeded only in chafing her skin even more.

When her efforts began to draw blood, she knew it was time to give up.

She would have to find another way.

Jasmine took a deep breath and steadied herself as best she could. She knew she could get through this. She just needed to keep calm and work through the situation, as with any other problem that she had overcome in recent months.

This self-confidence had not been present a year ago. Back then, real-world dangers would have left her paralyzed with fear. Despite working for a newspaper as a translator, her talents lay in research and language skills, not fieldwork. Of all the members of the team, she was the least suited for their missions.

But she had worked hard to narrow the gap.

She knew she could never possess the skills the others had honed over their years of service in the military, FBI, and CIA, but she was determined to eliminate any concern that she was holding them back. When Cobb had instructed her to learn the art of self-defense, she had immersed herself in the training. Day after day, session after session, she had studied the techniques of her sensei, building her skills until the movements became second nature.

To keep pace with the others, she had broadened her development to include lessons in other areas. Garcia had taught her advanced computer skills, and McNutt had been more than eager to help with weapons training. He took her through a crash course in everything from sub-compact pistols to shoulder-mounted rocket launchers. And yet it was Sarah’s tutelage that would prove to be the most important.

As part of her ‘survival training’, Sarah had taught Jasmine a few tricks of the trade. She had started with the basics, explaining how best to blend into a crowd and hide in plain sight, then worked her way up to more complicated endeavors such as avoiding surveillance cameras and circumventing standard security measures such as window alarms and motion detectors.

At Jasmine’s urging, Sarah had even taught her how to pick locks.

Now, as Jasmine studied the manacles that bound her hands, she could sense her fortune changing. She had yet to master the art of tumbler locks like those found in homes and cars, but handcuffs were a different story. Since handcuffs were designed so that a single key could open many models and sizes, the lock was much simpler. All she needed was something sturdy and small enough to trip the internal mechanism.

Jasmine scoured the floor for something that could be used as a makeshift lock pick. Seeing only dust and dirt, she checked the pockets of her pants. Then she ran her fingers through her hair, hoping against all logic that she would find a random bobby pin, even though she seldom wore them. Unsurprisingly, there were none to be found.

Then the answer suddenly came to her.

In an instant she had unfastened her belt and pulled it from the loops around her waist. She rolled the buckle in her hands, pondering its use. The prong of the clasp was skinny and stiff, with a slight curve at the end. As far as improvised tools were concerned, this was as good as it got.

Jasmine was confident that she could make it work.

She slipped the bent end of the prong into the cuffs and slowly rotated the pick around the edge of the keyhole, searching for resistance. Normally, the single bit of the barrel key would release the bite of the receiver, but the belt buckle would work just as well. All she had to do was find the right pressure point.

As she felt the prong catch on something, she adjusted the angle of entry and pressed hard. With a simple click the rounded steel popped loose from her wrist, its well-oiled hinge releasing her from its grasp. Jasmine smiled as she repeated the process on the second cuff. A few seconds later, it too popped open with the same satisfying click.

Jasmine beamed as she tossed the cuffs to the floor. She had freed herself. Yes, the confidence and the skills had been imparted by her teammates, but they weren’t around to see her through. She had done this all on her own, without anyone there to help.

She swelled with pride but kept her emotions in check.

Just because her hands were free didn’t mean that she was.

Jasmine silently rose to her feet. Her first steps were clumsy, but her coordination began to return as she walked to the gap in the wall that led to the hallway. There she listened for any signs of her captors. Hearing nothing, she peeked around the corner to the other side. She could see an adjacent room, only slightly larger than the space where she had been held.

But it too was empty.

With nothing else to investigate, she crept toward the wooden door at the far end of the adjoining room. She pressed her ear to the warm wood and hoped to hear something — anything — that would help her pinpoint her location.

Instead, there was only silence.

Testing the handle, she was surprised to find the door unlocked. Combined with the empty rooms, Jasmine could only reach one conclusion: whoever was guarding her was waiting just beyond the door.

She looked down, wondering how far and how fast her bare feet could carry her. She breathed deeply, summoning her courage and clearing the last few cobwebs from her mind. Once she stepped through the door, she wouldn’t stop sprinting until she had reached safety. To survive, she only needed to outrun her captors.

Jasmine nodded to herself.

It was now or never.