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A listener note, Against the Odds uses dramatizations that are based on true events.

Some elements, including dialogue, may be invented, but everything is based on research. Barbara Mackle presses her palms into the cold Georgia dirt and tries to get to her feet.

But she's woozy and weak. She's been drugged. She remembers that much.

She was asleep in an Atlanta motel room when two people burst in and forced her into a waiting car.

Then they drove her here.

But where is here?

She looks up and sees the dark silhouettes of pine trees.

In the east, the December sky reveals the palest hint of the coming day.

The beam from her kidnapper's flashlight illuminates her breath. God, she's freezing and so afraid.

Barbara is a 20-year-old college student, a junior at Emory University.

She should be in bed resting up for her last exam of the semester.

Instead, she's out here, shivering in her nightgown, socks, and a sweatshirt, which one of the kidnappers gave to her.

Her ankles are bound with a cord, and so are her wrists.

She can feel the cold ground beneath her thighs, but her feet are dangling.

She's sitting on the edge of something, some kind of hole in the ground,

but what is down there?

The man who kidnapped her is standing behind her.

She can hear him breathing. He's panting after carrying her through the woods from his car.

Finally, he speaks. I want you to slide down in there. She looks again into the

hole. It's so dark. She shakes her head, confused. Then she feels him pressing down on her shoulders. He's pushing her into the

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