When she comes to, the first thing she notices, even before the feeling of movement as the car turns down the off ramp, is pain. Her head aches abominably, and it's not just the side effects of the tranquilizer, though she recognizes that in the dull, throbbing stiffness of her muscles and the dryness in her mouth, as though she'd swallowed a whole bag of cotton balls. It feels like something's gone after her cerebral cortex with a tiny hatchet, like some grim biological rendition of The Sorcerer's Apprentice. The light, when she manages to crack her eyes open, feels like an assault, and she can only just make out the shape of the man beside her.

"You know, there are easier ways to get a girlfriend," she quips, her voice a rusty croak, covering her desperate struggle to recall anything between feeling her legs begin to buckle and this, here, the strange car and the strange man.

Or is he? There's something naggingly familiar as her eyes adjust - grudgingly - to things like input and light again.