How nice. A moment with no pain. The most divine form of pure bliss.
Nele’s breathing slowed. She let her muscles relax a little and, as best as she could on the cot, tried stretching her arms and legs.
Her abdomen, still basically one single cramp, now relaxed noticeably and it was a blessing after the last set of contractions.
‘I have to go to the bathroom,’ she moaned, which was a lie. During the last contractions she hadn’t been able to hold out any more and had relieved herself. She could smell the faeces and urine between her legs, and it didn’t bother her. Or her kidnapper, strangely. He handed her a damp cloth from a bucket he’d stood next to the camera. It’s light kept blinking the whole time, so Nele assumed he was recording everything. That included the monologue he annoyed her with between those contractions coming faster and faster, getting more and more severe, which seemed to indicate that the first stage of pregnancy was passing into the final expulsive phase – wasn’t that how it worked? Nele couldn’t remember, neither from that one section in the birthing guide she’d only skimmed over nor what her gynaecologist had told her.
‘Did you know that animals don’t have any pain when delivering?’
‘Please, just leave me alone,’ Nele said and cleaned herself off better than nothing.
‘Elephants might, though they’re an exception,’ Franz continued. ‘The Bible says, God punished Eve. I will greatly multiply your hardship in childbirth. You shall give birth to children in great pain,’ he recited, apparently from a Bible verse. ‘But that’s all nonsense of course. The truth is, it has to do with our upright gait.’
Upright?
Nele wondered whether she should use her break from the pain to stand up from the stretcher. How much time was there until the next contraction? And how close was it until the baby came out?
‘Thanks to an upright gait, we humans have our hands free, allowing us to do many intelligent things at the same time, such as walking and carrying a tool. The upright gait requires a narrower pelvis. But we’re also more intelligent, thus our brains are getting larger and larger yet have to pass through an increasingly narrow birth canal.’
‘Apparently your mom’s pelvis was like the eye of a needle,’ she snarled and was even able to manage a cynical laugh. ‘That at least explains why you’re such an imbecile, you perverted lunatic – your brain got smashed. Now let me go.’
Franz didn’t get a chance to respond, because a freight train suddenly rolled through the industrial hall. At least it sounded that way, like some decrepit rail car attempting to brake on a poorly oiled track.
Nele screamed but was drowned out by the screeching echo filling the stalls. She looked at Franz and saw the same fear in his eyes.
‘What the hell…’ he whispered. Then Nele felt a draft on her face and she realised what had caused this racket, which had meanwhile ceased. Earlier Franz had pushed her through a small, busted-open entrance door set inside a huge rolling gate. Someone must’ve just opened this same gate electronically, someone who obviously had the necessary means on them, using a remote control or a key. With a booming bass voice.
‘Hello? Someone in here?’
Nele’s eyes widened. A vague feeling of hope swelled inside her. But Franz placed a finger to his lips while imitating a knife running across a throat with his other hand. She heard footsteps, then another shout: ‘Identify yourself or I’ll call the police.’
One peep and you’re dead, said the look Franz gave her.
Yet Nele had no clue how she was going follow his silent command.
She was feeling that first tug in her abdomen. That surge of labour pain was about to flood her any moment, at which point she wouldn’t be able to stop from screaming out loud in pain, into the open barn. Even if Franz did follow up on the threat he whispered to her:
‘If you don’t keep still, I’ll have to suffocate you.’