Kaveh’s main concern for a while had been when, not if, he was going to piss himself. He’d been in similar situations to this before—not tied to a tree exactly, but he had been detained with no bathroom accessible. In that earlier case, he’d had to soil the corner of the room he was sharing with his photographer, and they’d agreed to endure the stench of urine in the hope that it wouldn’t come to having to endure the stench of that other form of waste humans are wont to produce.

In that earlier case, his hands had not been tied, so going some thirty-six hours locked in a room in Tabriz had not presented such a dire predicament. Even though he could still move his hands, the way Ortega had tied him up had made it impossible to reach his fly. But that wasn’t the worst part—the twine around his neck, that was the worst part. She’d tied it so tightly that even a slight nod cut off his blood supply, and he hadn’t been able to move his head in however long she’d been gone, somewhere in the vein of three or four years, by his estimates (or maybe a couple of hours). There was a pretty good chance he’d die of strangulation before he really had to have a come-to-Jesus moment on the whole pee issue, and then, then, well, at least he wouldn’t have to bear the burden of that restraint.

Then he heard footsteps and tried to tune in to whether or not the steps were human. He couldn’t remember what the alien footfall sounded like; there had been so much commotion, he didn’t remember seeing them walk, except for once when Ortega had pulled the giant white one aside and asked if she could talk to it alone for a sec. Which, incidentally, what the fuck?

The footsteps grew closer, and now he could hear breathing. Definitely human, unless the aliens had the ability to shape-shift, too, which, sure, why not? They apparently had the ability to lift humans off the ground with their minds. Whites versus Blacks, big alien superpowered battles, and he had been unconscious for the best part, apparently? Probably an Autobots versus Decepticons situation. Maybe Ortega was an alien, too, a robot drone that took the form of a person he recognized, and the aliens had chosen this semi-obscure figure in his life just to fuck with him.

He could sense her crouched in front of him now, so close he could feel her breath on his skin, steeling herself for . . . something. Probably not a point-blank shot—people don’t crouch for that, they stand like three feet away, shaking finger slithering its way over the trigger while they say things like, “It didn’t need to come to this, Roxanne. You made me do this!”