Ten

The light seemed unnecessarily bright.  Rooms like these never seemed to be designed for comfort, which was like adding insult to injury.  Or should it be injury to insult, in this case?

"They could at least put some comfortable chairs in here..."

The thought came randomly and with immediate regret.  With everything that is going on and the discussion about to take place, how could Allison be thinking about her own comfort?

Nine

The next time David heard the voices, they awoke him from his sleep.  His eyes snapped open and he sat up with a jerk.  He turned to get out of bed when he remembered his plan to ignore the voices.  He laid back down, rolled on his side away from the door and pulled the covers over his head like a child hiding from a parent's discipline.

He felt foolish and cowardly, but he did not budge.  He lay in that position for more than an hour after the voices had faded away.

The voices came more infrequently thereafter and David always went to his room and hid under the covers.  Every time the voices would just fade away and David felt reassured that ignoring them was his best option.

Eight

David didn't lose consciousness, but the flash of light blinded him momentarily.  There was a residue of the pain radiating down his arms and legs as he struggled to get to his knees.  He shook his head to clear the cobwebs as his vision began to return to him.  He looked around quickly and saw no one.  His shotgun lay a couple of feet away from him and he clumsily crawled over to it, picking it up and scrambling back around the corner.

"What the fuck was that?"  David said aloud, under his breath.