I could hear Rob and Ant approach from down the hall, their voices low with murmured conversation. I used my little finger to prize sleep from the corner of my eye and dismissed it from the tip of my nail. I'd had a terrible half slumber, only aided by a strong antihistamine Ant had seized from Rav. I needed a rest to "reset myself" he'd said. Now I just felt exhausted and nauseous, as though I'd woken in another time zone. I continued brushing my hair, which considering the lack of personal care supplies and some of the disgusting conditions I'd been in, wasn't all that bad. I'd always wanted to do that women's magazine experiment- Don't Wash Your Hair for Months- It Will Look Better Than Ever! I had fantasised about chopping it all off, just to feel radically different, but I knew I'd regret it after.

"Hey, there you are," Rob declared, he and Ant feigning smiles. I almost wanted to laugh at the charade, but I did appreciate it.

"Right where you left me," I faked a tight lipped smile too, attempting light-hearted wittiness.

"Right where we left you," Ant echoed flatly, seeing straight through to my sarcasm. "Did you get some rest?"

"Kind of," I nodded, setting the brush on the concrete windowsill.

"Good. How do you feel about having a chat with Jase?"

How did I feel about having a chat with Jase? I'd considered this some in my hazy pharmaceutically aided doze. I was slightly afraid of him, and yet, I trusted him to do the right thing. I didn't like feeling as though he already had an opinion on what I might know. And then there was the cell block...

The image of Jase soaked from inflicting the same torture that had been the near death of me on more than a few occasions was burned into my mind. Had he enjoyed it? Was there some part of him that got off on controlling someone in that way? Of leading them to the brink of death and pulling them back again and again in systematic abuse? You didn't do this job if you couldn't compartmentalise and extract all emotion from those situations. Could he do the same with me? Of course he could, I laughed at myself inwardly. What a ridiculous thing to question. I was banking on an unconscious bias, for probably both my sex and my position as the captive they'd rescued. But then, I suppose Jase hadn't really done any of the rescuing. That was Rob, and Ant, and Rav, and the rest of the British. Sternly I reminded myself that Jase had spent more time protecting my captor. He was not on my side, and I needed to show I had nothing that was of any use to him.

I cleared my throat and pressed down on the gauze across my wrists to soothe a deep itch from the healing.

"I'm ready, let's go," I stood promptly and nodded brightly, hoping to convince myself.

"Shall we have a chat about what kinds of questions they'll ask, what sort of things you think you'll try to remember?" Rob asked with a steady tone.

"No, no, I'd rather get it over and done with. Besides I don't want to feel as though I've rehearsed anything and it not appear genuine, I'd rather avoid all suspicion," I replied, dodging their eyes. The room was silent for a moment.

"Ok, good. Let's go," Ant said eventually, moving from the doorway with a chivalrous extended hand to allow me to exit first, and lead the way to my interrogation.

*

Jase wanted nothing less than for Paige to walk through the door. And then, at the same time, he felt his suspicions would be confirmed when she did. The building al-Raheem was held in had three additional rooms, the very last of which would have been the soft interrogation room. Prisoners would be brought there before enhanced tactics to give them the opportunity to divulge information in gentler surroundings. Three rusting chairs and a dilapidated table sat in the middle of the starkly lit room. He placed a laptop on the cracked surface, rereading the notes he'd made for the... he wasn't sure what to call it. Interview? Interrogation, the dark suit of logic reminded him.

Rob had come to find him a little while ago, asking if it would be convenient to talk once Paige had woken up. He said they'd given her something to help her sleep. She had to be drugged to close her mind from the image you exposed her to. Jase knew he needed to get a grip. As soon as this was over, and it would soon be over, they could all go home. He hoped al-Raheem could travel in a body bag.

"Here they come," Sonny drawled in a low wearied growl. He didn't like any of this. He hated having to ask Paige to do this, he hated being stuck in the Jordanian wilderness, he hated having to co-op, and he hated that al-Raheem was still alive. The only positive to the situation was making and watching him suffer, which did give Sonny small amounts of pleasure.

The procession of footsteps from the gravel outside stopped at the door, until a tinny knock rang through the metal. Jase clenched his jaw, and nodded to Sonny to do the honours.

Sonny swung the door open, holding his ego back to allow the British Captain to enter first.

Ant was point-man, he took the lead so Paige didn't have to walk in first. He assessed the room, his cool critical gaze resting on the laptop and securing itself on Jase's tired face. Jase met his eyes, knowing his British counterpart had every reason to dislike and distrust him. Paige followed Ant closely, shielding herself from view with his muscular body until Rob advanced at her rear.

"All right," Sonny broke the suffocating silence. "We're all here. Paige why don't you take a seat here, one of yous can sit with her," he glanced up to Ant and Rob, gesturing for Paige to sit on one side of the table, facing the wall. Ant hated that their table set up was positioned to make her feel more daunted. The door was behind her, out of sight. The glaring halogen lighting was directly overhead. The chair intended for Paige faced a blank concrete wall. If she looked to her left she would see a concrete wall. If she looked to her right she would see a concrete wall. The only respite from those surroundings would be Jase, seated directly opposite her with a laptop, sat carefully so as not to reveal its secrets but not to obscure Jase's body. He was the interrogator and he needed his full physical presence to be displayed for maximum sub-conscious intimidation.

Paige took her seat obediently, Rob nodding to Ant as his superior sat beside her. He took his position against the wall next to the door, arms folded.

"This is just a... friendly conversation," Sonny said casually. Paige appreciated his attempt to be light-hearted, she could tell it was genuine and he was on edge. "No need to be anxious at all," he placed the tips of his fingers on the side of the table next to Paige for a moment in comfort, the digits tracing through dust as he pulled away and retreated to a corner of the room.

Jase was the last to take his position, feeling more conflicted than ever as he surveyed Paige. She looked a lot healthier. A certain brightness was returning, the bruises fading and the wounds healing. Her long dark hair was tucked behind her ears, framing the gentle outline of her face. Jase could see some of the woman from the file photos returning, though she would never be the same again. He realised he'd studied her for too long when Ant's crystal blue gaze turned to a glare.

"Ok," Jase breathed. "I have a few things to touch on, but mostly I'll be going off of your responses, asking you to expand more, explain more... the more detail you can give the better. I know that's not an easy thing to do, and I know that remembering some things could be very uncomfortable for you. So to that end, you know- you're not held here," Jase waved his hands and caught Paige's weary blue eyes. "If you want to take a break, we'll take a break, okay?"

Paige nodded.

"Ok," Jase audibly exhaled again. "We could see al-Raheem had a laptop he was working off most of the time, he used it to communicate with us and others, we'd imagine. I believe most intel was kept on an external hard-drive, one we haven't been able to recover. Was there anything you can recall seeing on there, or things al-Raheem may have shown you?"

Paige took a moment to conjure saliva in her mouth and swallow.

"Um, yes, I saw some things. A lot was written in Arabic, I know that much. He did sit next to me once, on a video call. It was to another man, maybe another terrorist I don't know. They spoke in Arabic the whole time. I know some basic words and phrases. The other man was asking him- al-Raheem-" she faltered over the name slightly "-how long, or how much longer, or something. al-Raheem was replying 'not long', 'soon'. And the rest from what I could tell was him bragging about the various ways he'd tortured us."

"Would you be able to identify the man from photographs?" Jase was quietly relieved. Information that pushed them further away from Paige was a good thing.

"I really don't know. He wore the headscarf... wrap thing on his head. Long unruly beard... nothing immediately identifiable I don't think," Paige strained herself to picture the man's face, but there was no use. He was a pixelated blur in her memories.

"Ok, that's great thank you. You said you saw writing, mostly in Arabic? On what sort of things would you see that?" Jase scrolled briefly on his laptop, then returned his attention to Paige.

"The laptop, once or twice. I'm sure I saw the screen left on with writing or correspondence on there, but I was on the ground and it was some distance away from me. There's absolutely no way I could make it out from where I was. I saw some writing, a text maybe, on a phone once. It was in English, a laughing response to something he must have been sent. I couldn't see what the message he was replying to said. I mean it could literally have been a meme or something, there was nothing specific," Paige was really clutching at straws in her effort to be useful now. She knew there was very little she could say with absolute certainty.

"Ok..."

Nearly two hours were spent going back and forth over photographs of people of interest, audio recordings to see if Paige recognised any voices, and grainy surveillance footage. Each time she answered maybe, she couldn't be sure, it was difficult to tell. And each time Jase, Sonny and sometimes even Ant would press with further questions, relating it back to a previous image they'd shown her, wondering if the answer would be any different if it was posed in a different context. After a toilet break and some food, the sun was beginning to set and everybody was growing fatigued.

She looked at pieces of text next, some handwritten and some printed, and they asked her to translate as best she could. Paige could only fully translate the most basic of sentences, and she was growing bored of the tests. Ant knew there was an alternative motive behind the task; they hoped seeing the words in their original Arabic form would provoke some memory, suddenly help her piece together small fragments of a mental jigsaw to illuminate a bigger picture. But the evening dragged on in much the same way as the afternoon had started, and Ant, Rob and Paige were beginning to become irked by the repetitive lines of inquiry, knowing it was leading them nowhere.

Jase glanced back at Sonny over his shoulder, who was chewing on a particularly dense protein bar with hard grinds of his jaw. The two shared a look for a fraction of a second.

"Ok, I think we're almost done," Jase's tone suddenly became brighter, filling Paige with relief. Ant and Rob immediately readied themselves, straightening their backs and preparing to make their exit. "Just one last thing to touch on," he opened a folder and pulled out a slightly crumpled piece of paper with handwritten Arabic text front and centre at the top of the page, and a large empty box below it. Sonny tucked the half masticated protein bar into a pocket, and leant one large boot against the wall, crossing his arms over his chest. Rob and Ant immediately noticed the change in the room's atmosphere.

"Does this mean anything to you?" Jase asked inquisitively, pushing the paper across the table towards Paige.

Paige glanced at the writing, the exercise no different from what she'd spent several hours doing. She instinctively shook her head.

"No, it doesn't-" She stopped, and hesitated. The silence hung in the air, a suffocating smog that had Rob and Ant on sudden alert. Jase watched as Paige froze, her face and body rigidly still as her eyes darted back and forth across the text.

Sonny held his breath. She knew.