A tapping on the thick Plexiglas behind her made her jump.
“We took that little toy away from you,” said the stout man. His round face and upturned nose reminded Olivia of a pig. He dragged a metal chair across the floor to sit in front of the cage.
“I want to talk to your boss,” Olivia stated, looking around. Her mind was trying to identify how to get out of the situation.
“I’m sorry. What?”
She stared at him, focusing hard through the glass. It was more difficult to use her ability with only sight, “I want to talk to your boss. I have a complaint about my accommodations."
"You really aren't in any position to be making demands." He sat down heavily in the chair and leaned forward to look at her.
"And you’re a little short and fat to be the one who gives the orders?”
He laughed. “No, I can assure you that I am the one in charge.”
She could see the truth. The confidence in the statement shined through.
“You must be Mr. Gerrard,” she stated, her hands working at the cuffs behind her back. They were too tight. No way to get them off by slipping a hand out.
“Doctor. Please call me Doctor Gerrard,” he said.
“Yeah, sure, Doc. How about you open this door and we can talk like civilized human beings.”
He shook his head. “No I don’t think so. I would think that a young lady like yourself would be a bit more careful about what she says aloud. You are obviously not a civilized human being. You broke one of my personal guard’s arms and his knee. Animals do that sort of thing.”
“Animals cut holes in little girl’s heads and hook them up to strange boxes.”
The man sighed. “Regrettably, we needed to take Dr. Sanders’ work to the next level. How much do you know about her work?”
“Enough to know that you paid that ex-Yakuza to kidnap those kids for you.” She was fishing for information, teasing out what she knew for the extra bits that he would tell her.
He blinked. The look of concern on his face betrayed his worry over the accuracy of Olivia’s statement. “How did you come to know of this?”
“The Yakuza sang like a canary. Admitted to everything. Told me that you were experimenting with the little girls to open the Vault of Knowledge. Told me that you guys were deciphering the data compression.”
Dr. Gerrard laughed. “No he didn’t. He didn’t know those things. He was just a thug we paid to get us what we wanted, and he did a great job.”
“What about Doctor Sanders? She must have done a bang-up job helping you cut up those kids. You probably needed someone to help you with the installation of the plugs in their heads,” Olivia pushed.
The doctor looked up at the two henchmen at his side. “Kill her, please. She knows too much. Whoever she was talking to on the microphone likely has already told the police.”
The two men stepped past him as the doctor rose to his feet, addressing her. “I have no idea who you are, and I don’t care. You know too much. And you’re a bit too old for me to use in my little experiments.”
“Too old? That’s no way to talk to a lady.” Olivia stepped to the back of the cage as one of the men unlocked it and swung the door open.
“Oh, you’re not a lady. You’re an animal. One that is going to slaughterhouse, my dear.”
“Screw you,” she snarled, backing into the corner as the first man stooped inside the small space.
“You want us to do it here?” said one of the thugs.
“No. No, do it like the other ones. Get rid of her in the river.”
Olivia could smell the sweat on the goon as he inched inside the cage. His hand came up to grab her. Kicking out with her flat shoes she caught him in the nose. Blood spattered over the straw, and his hands came up. Cursing, he stepped back, giving her enough space to charge forward. She landed her shoulder in his gut. Blinded, the man staggered and fell out the door knocking down the second man, who had stood too close.
Stepping over them both, she bolted. Getting to a nearby door, she tried to open it.
Gerrard stood watching calmly. “You’re just delaying the inevitable, my dear.”
Olivia ran toward him; she could at least use the little man as a hostage. At the very least kill him so that he wouldn’t hurt another kid.
Something the size of a fridge tackled her from the side, knocking the wind out of her and pinning her against the wall. She tried to fight, but the man landed a solid haymaker. She could feel her teeth loosen and blood spill into her mouth.
The man stepped back, and the electrical arc of another round of tasering flowed across her body. It seemed to go on forever. She could hear laughter as they tased for a moment, then let her breathe for a moment, then tased her again. Her body refused to listen to her brain.
“Enough, we don’t have time for this horseplay. We are on a timeline. Get her out of here,” Gerrard said as he stepped over her limp body.
Chapter 12
Olivia woke to the sensation of a wet and slimy material smothering her face. Turing her head to the side brought some relief. The darkness around her closed in as she realized that she was encased inside a bag. What concerned her was it was the familiar heavy material of a body bag.
Closing her eyes, she tried to control her breathing to drive down the panic.
Her own humid sweat had condensed on the inside, and she was sure that it had pooled underneath her. With hands were still bound behind her, she listened to the rumble of the vehicle that she was in.
Somewhere there were two voices talking back and forth. She couldn’t make out the words over the noise of the van's tires.
Anger rose in her. How many little girls had they dumped this way? How many had they fit at once into this same bag before disposing of them? She gritted her teeth and breathed deep before opening her eyes. She was going to make them pay.
Wriggling her shoulders low, she exhaled and pressed her rear over the cuffs, forcing her shoulders to relax. The pain of stretching muscles in her shoulders equaled the sharp, cutting sensation of the cuffs digging into her wrists. Thankfully, the bag was wide enough, and she was thin enough that there was room to maneuver.
With each twist of her body, the tension increased until at last her hands slipped by. Once past the sticking point, with her hands bound behind her knees, she brought each leg up to her chest, one at a time, to slide them through the shackled loop.
Massaging her wrists, she felt the deep furrows. The plastic cuffs had done everything but broken the skin.
Inside the confines of the bag, she reached up and found the top of the zipper. Slipping a finger into the hole, she pulled, and it stuck tight, letting the dull, throbbing orange light in. They had locked the zipper closed by using another plastic zip tie.
Moving quickly, she brought her feet up to her hands.
As she slipped off her right shoe, she felt for the small incision in the heel. The tiny razor blade was still embedded in the heel. Carefully prying the rubber apart, she widened the tiny slit into a large opening. Careful not to drop the thin blade in the dark, she plucked it out of the material and discarded the shoe. Pinching the blade tightly between her forefinger and thumb, she set about the task of freeing herself from her bonds.
It only took a moment of sawing at the center of the plastic cuffs before she felt them separate. The relief of having her hands free was short-lived as she felt the van turn and slow down.
Olivia took a deep breath and calmed herself. She slid the blade a short distance down one side of the bag, carving open a small slit. It spilled cool air inward, and she gulped it down.
The hole was enough to look out to get an idea of where she was. She could see the back doors and the rear interior of the cargo van. Slices of orange light from nearby street lamps panned across the walls. Turning inside the bag, she sliced another hole on the opposite side, large enough to peer through.
Two men sat behind a protective cage in the front seat. Her first hope had been
to go on the offensive and subdue or kill both of them. With the tiny blade in her hand, the powerful idea of slitting one of the guards’ throats was a tempting one. However, with the protective cage between her and them, there was not much she would be able to do.
Her second plan would have to be for an escape.
Rolling back the rear side of the bag, she widened the hole with the tiny blade, running it down the full length. The humidity escaped, and mercifully cool air flooded inside. Taking a deep breath, she waited, listening quietly for the van to slow.
Eventually, the light reflecting on the back of the van carried a dim red hue, and the van rolled to a stop. Silently rolling out of the bag toward the rear, she came up in a crouch. Her hand grabbed at the latch, finding it locked. She searched for a moment, looking for a handle. The interior latch had been broken off. Her fingers pried at the sharp plastic that remained, straining to lift it.
“Hey!” came an angry cry from the front seat. The two men unbuckled themselves and turned to look. “Stop!” one yelled out. Olivia ignored him. It a full second of fumbling with the broken latch in the dim light before the door disengaged.
Pushing the door open with her shoulder, she stumbled out onto the wet asphalt of a small road. Stopping for a moment, she searched for a safe haven to run to.
A concrete retaining wall covered in graffiti rose along the road to her left. Off in the distance was the wide open space of the road. To her right was a short concrete wall, after which lay an unkempt green space full of knee-high grass and trees. From here she could see the wall of the Quarantine Zone topped with its familiar pulsing red lights.
The side doors of the vehicle behind her swung open, and the man on the driver’s side looked around for witnesses. Olivia wasn’t going to wait around for them to execute her at the side of the road.
With only one shoe, she sprinted for the tall grass and trees. She felt the wet asphalt under her foot as she hurdled the meridian in stride. The elasticity of the thin dress reached its maximum stretch, and fibers tore up from the small slit, freeing her to widen her stride. Crossing the empty two lanes to her right, she knew she was on open ground. Only speed would allow her to survive.
The continuous pop of the gun behind her and to her right was followed by the crack of bullets as they zipped by her. Chips of stones and asphalt splintered in small craters on the short wall ahead. Pouring on the energy, she closed the gap to the short concrete wall.
Olivia knew that if she could make it to the other side, the short wall and sloped grassy embankment would provide some level of cover while she strung together another link in her escape plan.
Nearing the wall, she began her second hurdle. Jumping, she lifted her legs and slipped out of the spotlight of the overhead lamp. In the darkness she landed gracelessly, stumbling and rolling. Her sliding path toward the bottom of the hill flattened a path of grass but vastly increased the distance between her attackers and herself.
Olivia pulled her aching body to her feet. It only took a quick shoulder check as she ducked into the trees to see one of them climb over the embankment in pursuit. The other had jumped back in the van and peeled away, paralleling her direction on the nearby road. In the darkness of the green space, she realized she was still being hunted.
Her only tactical advantages were the long black dress and the fact that there was no moonlight. Her eyes were already adjusted to the darkness from the bag, and she wormed her way under downed trees and around ancient broken fences. Bolting past an overgrown rusted playground, she realized she was close to the edge of the Quarantine Zone. Military guards worked checkpoints. If she could make it to a checkpoint, her pursuers were unlikely to continue their chase.
Bullets cracked overhead randomly as the would-be killers fired at the moving bushes she was jostling. The thick bush opened up to flat ground.
Breathing hard, she pumped her arms and legs, taking long, practiced strides. Time spent running and staying in shape was paying off. The wide, muscular man behind her was likely not making such good time.
Dodging a rusty trash can, she veered left, changing her trajectory slightly from the road and the pursuing van.
A small river to her right was probably what they had intended to dump her in. Empty shopping carts and oil drums dotted the banks. She could see why they had chosen this place. Secluded, quiet. It would have been a grand park long ago, but now it was probably a junkie’s paradise, far from the cops and the complaints of any residential neighborhoods. The thought that someone might have been dropping their needles here kept her away from any well-worn paths. The last thing she needed was to survive being hunted down only to contract some blood-borne disease.
A bright light blasted her in the face, blinding her. It forced her to slow to a stop.
A hand-held megaphone belted out words of command. “Stay back, this is a restricted area.”
“I need help,” she yelled at the light. There was a pause, and it panned down, identifying a small bridge crossing the moat of a river, beyond which what could only be described as the castle walls of the Quarantine Zone checkpoint stood. “Keep your hands where we can see them and step up onto the bridge,” came the voice again. Genuine concern could be heard in the man's voice.
From his perspective, she was a damsel in distress. An attractive woman in a torn dress with one shoe.
Moving forward, she could see that the van was distant and on the road to the right through the trees. It idled there, watching her.
Raising her hands, she moved up the slope toward the crumbling bridge. Someone had laid planks across the broken span.
“Move toward the light,” the voice came again.
She climbed up the rise toward the bridge and began walking toward the light with her hands raised. A rustle in the trees behind her caused her to turn and look.
Olivia felt it before she heard the single gunshot. Her lack of movement made her a perfect target illuminated by the light. The gunman’s bullet missed its mark but tore open the edge of her shoulder. It felt like someone had slapped her hard with a stick on the outside of her shoulder. She yelped in pain, and her feet stuttered on the wooden planks as she tried to dive for cover. Instead of landing on the other side, her foot missed the mark, kicking out the board. Her body weight flipped her over, and forward momentum took her spinning into the water below.
The fall felt as though it was taking forever, and she covered her face with her good arm. Knowing that she was about to land in the stagnant river, she gasped a deep breath right before impact.
Disoriented, she hit the water head first. Instinct took over, and she streamlined her thin form, letting the dark waters drag her deep. At the bottom, she scrambled to grab something to keep her down for a moment.
Fingers searched in the darkness, wrapping around a shopping cart. Calming herself, she kept her wits. There were a few pops, then more crackles, and the universe exploded into a one-sided gun battle as soldiers brought fully automatic weapons to bear. It sounded like strings of firecrackers set off. A few stray rounds cut into the water, cavitating but never punching very far.
The rounds from the Neotech thug wouldn’t penetrate this deep, and it was unlikely anyone would be able to see where she was.
The thug and his small pistol hidden in the grass were likely no match for automatic weapons . She waited until the short-lived exchange was over then pushed off from the bottom.
The patter of boots echoed above her, and she swam to their side. Climbing the muddy bank, she crawled through the thick muck before finding ground that was solid enough to stand. Rising, she ran a muck-covered hand through her hair. Soldiers with weapons drawn surrounded her.
“Hey, boys!” She grinned widely, trying to act as casual as possible. Her teeth gleamed in the dark. “Anyone have a phone I could borrow?”
A man walked up and held an image scanner to her face. It was the size of a hand-held tablet. Seconds later it beeped. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but we are going to have t
o detain you.”
“What?”
“Well, it looks like you are a person of interest in a number of legal matters, and the police will have to deal with it.”
“Really? Can’t you just let me go? Please. Look at me, I’m the victim here.”
The man turned the device around, and it listed notes from her run-ins with the police.
“It says mercenary and suggests that you may have worked as a contract killer?”
One of the five men standing in front of her grabbed her wrists, pulling them behind her back. She considered fighting him, but with the number of guns trained on her and the blinding spotlight, she opted to let him slip on the familiar plastic cuffs.
“Oh C'mon. I haven’t killed anyone... Well, today, at least. I think. What day is it?”
Olivia rolled her eyes as they led her away toward the barricaded check point.
“Don’t worry, ma’am, the police will sort it out when they get here.”
Chapter 13
Olivia sat on the wrong side of the interrogation table staring at the uniformed police officer as he listed her rap sheet. “It says here that five years ago you were involved with this ‘Black Anvil’ private military group?” He shifted his wide girth in the chair.
“Was. As in no longer affiliated,” she stated. She had been given the dignity of a jail shower. The holding cell’s guards had also been kind enough to provide her with a pair of oversized gray jogging pants, and a similarly coordinating sweat shirt.
“So why was Neotech’s private police chasing you?”
“I told you, because I found out about them using alien tech on that little girl I pulled out of the slums earlier this week. Seriously. Just call Gabe. He will explain it all. I was helping the police recover a little girl. She had a box attached to her, and it turns out that Neotech is experimenting on kids.”
“Well, Neotech is out of our jurisdiction. It’s a mega-block. They have their own police force. I am sure they are looking into the matter.”
Dark Crypto (Thorne Inc. Book 1) Page 13