Rogue Sign

by Elin Wyn

  After Aryn had fixed her disguise, she grabbed her bag and nodded. “Ready.”

  With a nod, I opened the door to our room, looked to make sure no one was there, and motioned for her to follow me. The kitchen, while potentially the worst option to leave through, was the most likely to be empty at the moment.

  As we quickly made our way down the hall, I kept my ears as attuned to foreign sounds as I could.

  Aryn truly was good at sneaking around. I barely heard her steps behind me as she crept along the halls. We came upon our first intersection inside the building, Skud’s office in the hall to our left, the kitchen in front, and the hall to our right leading to the stairs down deeper into the underground of the station and building. I made sure no one was around, then led us to the kitchen.

  We weren’t very lucky, there were at least four, maybe five, voices coming from inside. With a silent curse, I motioned Aryn back. I got close to her so I wouldn’t have to whisper very loudly. “People inside, we need to find another way.”

  She nodded and mouthed the words ‘drunk guy.’ I understood instantly.

  We made our way back to the intersection, took the hallway that led towards Skud’s office, and skulked our way down the hall. We were only a dozen yards down the hall when footsteps echoed, coming towards us. I glanced around quickly, saw a maintenance closet, and hurriedly dragged Aryn inside.

  I stashed our packs, just in case, then started looking at the cleaning supplies. Aryn followed suit. Hopefully, if the owner of said footsteps opened the closet, whoever it was would see us looking at cleaning stuff and assume we were getting ready to clean again.

  Endless punishment had its uses after all.

  The footsteps were loud as they got closer, then they began to recede. Whoever it was had just walked by and never thought of looking in here.

  “That was close,” Aryn whispered.

  I merely nodded and grabbed our gear, cracked the door open slightly, and peeked out. The hallway was empty.

  “Come on,” I whispered. We made our way down the hall as quietly as we could, my own footsteps sounding like thundering drums compared to Aryn’s whisper-like steps. I envied her. I had never had to learn anything like that, so even my best attempts at silence were loud in comparison.

  Twice we were forced to hide in a dark alcove or another closet, but we weren’t seen or heard. There were no alarms, no yells or shouts, and no running footsteps to show that we had been discovered trying to sneak out. Things were working out so far.

  We were only a dozen feet away from the exit where I had taken our dead friend, and we only had to wait behind a pillar for one person to leave the door.

  “What do we do?” Aryn mouthed as we waited. I didn’t like the odds. I was too far away to run up on him, he would surely yell out before I was able to subdue him.

  Even if I walked up nonchalantly, there were too many things that could go wrong. If I tried to subdue him, I might not be fast enough. If he was under orders not to let anyone out, again, he wouldn’t let me near the door.

  I shrugged and thought for a moment. We could make our way back and try Skud’s office. We knew the way out there, but his office was surely guarded, or occupied. I started to hand Aryn our stuff when she tapped my arm and pointed past me. The door guard had begun to pace, and I recognized that particular kind of gait. He was struggling with whether or not he should leave his post to use the bathroom, and the need to relieve himself was winning. All we had to do was wait just a bit longer.

  He finally decided that wetting himself would be a bad idea and left the door, heading away from us towards the bathroom down the hall. I motioned for Aryn to follow and we made our way to the door. We were just inches away from getting out. I put my hand on the handle, twisted it, and opened the door.

  As the door closed behind us, my hopes vanished in an instant

  Skud stood there, his hand out as if he had been reaching for the door. Laz and a few others stood behind him. He looked at us, confusion changing to anger as he saw the packs hanging from our shoulders.

  With a simple motion of his hand, the men jumped forward and grabbed us before we could make a break for it. “Want to explain what this is?” Skud asked, his voice eerily calm and low.

  “We were heading out to look for the women. I wanted to atone for my screw-up earlier,” I offered.

  “Mmm.” He looked at Laz. “Do you believe them?”

  “No, I don’t,” Laz said with a shake of his head. “I wonder if they’re responsible for him.” He pointed down at the body of Aryn’s attacker.

  “Well?” Skud asked.

  There was nothing I could do but keep up with the same lie.

  “Found him passed out drunk in our room. I took him out of there and some of your guys said he got drunk a lot, had me put him here,” I explained. Most of that was true.

  “Uh-huh. Was he dead before or after you put him out here?”

  I started to repeat myself, but he cut me off with a wave. “Take them down to the bottoms,” Skud ordered. “It time we found out what’s really happening.”

  The men holding us wrenched us around and dragged us back inside.

  Scro.

  Aryn

  I tried not to let my fear get the best of me when I heard the bolt slide across the door, effectively locking us in. The exposed piping that covered most of the walls groaned and hissed. Even though I heard the bolt lock into place, I ran up the short flight of stairs and yanked on the handle anyway.

  “You stay till we figure out questions to ask you,” Skud yelled. “Then when we’re satisfied, we kill you.”

  I yanked and slammed and screamed and banged as if I could claw my way through the thick metal from willpower alone. My hands ached. My fingernails felt like they were going to splinter, but I didn’t stop.

  “Aryn!” Kovor called but his voice sounded like he was submerged in water on the other side of the room. I didn’t hear him come up behind me. I didn’t even know he was there until I felt his arms wrap around my waist. He pulled me away from the door, lifting me off my feet so he could carry me down the stairs.

  “I’m going to get us out of here,” I rasped. Kovor set me down, placing himself directly between me and the door so that I couldn’t see it past his broad shoulders.

  “We’ll figure something out,” he assured me. “But I’m not willing to use you as a battering ram to do it.”

  “Do you have a better idea?” I demanded. “Before they torture us and kill us?”

  “No,” Kovor admitted. “But we’ve got nothing but time to come up with one.” He gestured to the empty room.

  “We don’t know how much time we have.” My words sounded darker than I intended. Kovor frowned and reached out to stroke my hair as if it brought him comfort.

  “What do you think Skud’s going to do?” he asked. I put my hands on my hips and began to pace as I tried to predict Skud’s thoughts.

  “He still doesn’t know everything,” I said. “All he knows is that we want out and that we’re a liability to his operation if we talk to anyone. If I were him, I’d lock us down here for a few days to scare us into staying in Enclave.”

  “I’m sensing a ‘but’,” Kovor prompted.

  “But I think Skud’s panicking. Thanks to us, he’s in a situation he’s never been in before. He lost the Mermian women, he’s lost another team member, and now he’s got us trying to sneak out,” I continued. “He might kill us just to prove to the other members that he’s not incompetent.”

  “You have no idea what he’s going to do.” Kovor’s chuckle was hollow.

  “Not one bit, but none of the options are good.” My smile held no humor. My bottom lip quivered. “I’m so sorry.”

  “For what?” Kovor tilted his head to the side.

  “For dragging you into this.” I blinked back tears. When did I turn into such a crier? “You wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to infiltrate this stupid organization.”

  “If
I remember correctly, you were dead set against me coming along. You can’t say you dragged me into this.” Kovor tucked me under his arm.

  I leaned into him and rested my head against his chest. I listened to his heart, letting the steady rhythm soothe me.

  “I should’ve knocked you out with a frying pan as soon as we left the captain’s office,” I muttered. Kovor’s laugh was genuine this time.

  “That’s your go-to method for stopping me?” he asked.

  “As opposed to what? Hand-to-hand combat?” I snorted.

  “I don’t want you to blame yourself for this.” His voice regained its seriousness. “None of this is your fault. It’s Enclave’s, it’s the Terror’s, and it’s the Dominion’s fault.”

  “It’s a shame,” I sighed. “Anyone who knew me on Mars could’ve guessed that this is how I’d go down.”

  “Don’t talk like that.” Kovor cut me off. “We aren’t dead yet.” I continued as if I hadn’t heard him.

  “This isn’t how your life is supposed to end. You’re supposed to die decades from now, in a comfortable bed, surrounded by a huge family who loves you,” I finished.

  “No one is going to die,” Kovor insisted, but I could hear the doubt in his voice. Any moment now, Skud might return to put bullets through our heads. Or he might never come back and leave us to starve to death.

  “It’s such a shame,” I said again. “Just when I start to like you, I lose you.”

  Kovor cupped my face in his hands and gently tipped my head up so I looked into his eyes.

  “You haven’t lost me,” he assured me. “I’m right here. No matter what happens, I’m always going to be right here.”

  “I believe you.” My words surprised me as much as they surprised him.

  “I never thought I’d actually win you over,” Kovor grinned as he brought me in for another embrace. I locked my arms around him and hid my face in his neck.

  “Neither did I,” I joked.

  “If we die today or starve to death in a week, I want you to know that I’ve never been happier,” Kovor murmured low in my ear.

  “Me, either,” I admitted. Fat tears welled up in my eyes and spilled over before I could stop them. Instinctively, I tried to close off my feelings, but then I realized there was no point. I let my tears fall freely. Kovor wiped them away with the pad of his thumb.

  “I’m going to get you out of here,” he swore. “But just in case.” He tipped my face up once more and brought his mouth to mine. Heat pooled in my belly and fire shot through my veins. I snaked my arms around his neck and rose onto the tips of my toes. He hesitated, surprised by my forwardness, but quickly sank into the kiss.

  His hands wound into my hair and his tongue pushed through my lips. I grabbed fistfuls of his shirt, eager to be as close to him as possible. I might never get the change to do this again. I wanted to taste all of him, savor him.

  It was just as well that men were in incredibly short supply on my home planet. Some women longed for the old days of courting, dating, falling in love. I’d never cared for any of those old stories. Sometimes I thought that if there were as many men today as there were before the birth rate dropped, I still wouldn’t care.

  That was before I met Kovor. I knew with absolute certainty that there wasn’t a human male alive that could compare to Kovor. Maybe I was never meant for human males.

  “The first time I saw you,” Kovor spoke between kisses, “I thought you were the most beautiful creature in Dominion space.”

  “Why didn’t you say anything?” I gasped before his mouth devoured mine once more. Kovor laughed against my lips.

  “If I’d told you when you were in the cargo bay, do you think you would’ve been receptive?” he asked. I laughed at the thought of it.

  “I would’ve punched you in the jaw.” I trailed a line of kisses along his chiseled jawline.

  “Exactly. I always intended on winning you over, but I needed you to want me on your own first.”

  “I want you.” I took his bottom lip between my teeth and bit gently. Air hissed through his teeth before his mouth collided with mine again.

  “Now I’ll have to save us,” Kovor murmured. “The first time I take you will not be in a grimy dungeon.”

  “Tease,” I purred in his ear.

  “Oh, most definitely.”

  We kissed and whispered to each other for so long, I nearly forgot where we were and how we’d gotten there. We explored each other’s bodies with our hands, memorizing every inch of each other.

  Perhaps I was delirious with desire, but I felt hopeful. Kovor and I would get out of here. I held on tight to that hope as Kovor and I curled up against each other in the corner farthest from the door.

  My eyelids were heavy and my lips were swollen from kisses. I couldn’t tell if I was actually kissing Kovor or dreaming about kissing him.

  In that strange space between awake and dreaming, I heard something out of place.

  “Kovor,” I murmured. He grunted beside me. At some point, we’d fallen asleep. I nudged him gently until he lifted his head.

  “Kovor, do you hear that?” I whispered in the darkness.

  His eyes glimmered as he listened. From somewhere nearby was the unmistakable sound of music.

  Kovor

  “Kovor, do you hear that?”

  I must have fallen asleep. The damn cell we were in was ugly, dank and dark, and the exposed pipes inside hissed and steamed at random moments. I listened, but at first all I could hear was my own heartbeat and breathing.

  I forced those sounds away and listened for anything that seemed out of place.

  There was Aryn’s breath, short and excited. She heard something that had gotten her hopes up. I pushed that sound away and listened harder.

  The gurgling of the pipes melted away, the occasional hiss of air coming through a broken seal disappeared, and the drip, drip, drip of water vanished as I got used to them all and pushed them aside.

  There was something else, it wasn’t my heart that was beating. My heart was calm, slow. I knew I couldn’t hear Aryn’s heartbeat, so that meant something else was going thump, thump-thump, thump, thump-thump-thump. I turned my attention to Aryn to see her smiling in the darkness.

  “That’s music,” she whispered excitedly. “How are we hearing music down here?”

  I shook my head and motioned for her to be quiet. If she was right and it was music, then that meant that the walls weren’t as thick as Skud thought they were. Maybe, just maybe, there was still a chance for us to escape.

  I listened again, trying to pinpoint where the sound was coming from.

  “We can get out of here,” Aryn said again.

  “Shh.” I snapped. “I need to listen.” I forced all sounds out of my mind except the thump-thump of the bass. Where was it coming from?

  I got up and went to corner of the cell just to the left of the door. I motioned for Aryn to stay silent and listened. There was no music coming from there. I searched my memory and tried to pull up a mental map. When they had dragged us down here, there was a door before this one, and I believed there was another door past this one, so that meant there was a room next to us. I slowly, and as silently as I could, moved my way down the wall towards the other corner of the room.

  The pipes made it difficult to hear, but I forced their sounds away as I searched for the source of the music. As I passed a pipe, I missed a gurgle and the pipe let out a hot blast of steam that caught me in the shoulder. “Ah!” I shouted as I jumped away.

  “Kovor!” Aryn rushed over. “Are you okay?”

  I nodded, but the grimace on my face betrayed me. My shoulder burned and I could already feel some of the skin bubbling. The pain was excruciating, but I tried to force the feeling away so I could concentrate. “We need to find the loudest point. Maybe we can get through the wall or…mmm…something,” I said as I waved my arm at the entire room, not entirely sure what the next step should be.

  She nodded but continued lookin
g at me. Her eyes were filled with concern as her hands held my arm, well below my shoulder, thankfully. “I’ll look over there,” she said, indicating the corner directly across from the door. “Are you okay?”

  “I will be, as soon as we’re out of here.” I kissed her on the head, then headed for the other corner. I grunted a bit as my shirt rubbed on my shoulder, but I forced the pain out of my mind. I listened, doing what I could to concentrate on only the music and the bass pumping through. It was muffled in our corner, but as I got more towards the middle of the room, the louder it got.

  I looked at Aryn as she moved closer. She put her finger to her lips and indicated her portion of the wall. She put her ear against it, then moved a step or two back and repeated the process. Then she moved forward past her original spot and listened again. She took a step back and put her head against the wall once more. “Here,” she whispered.

  I made my way slowly towards her, listening as I went. The music got louder, but right where she was, it was the loudest.

  “How do we get through?” she asked.

  I shook my head. I didn’t know, but we had to think of something soon. I made the mistake of leaning against the wall, the pressure sending blinding, shooting pain into me. My eyes went wide. “Of course,” I said, perhaps a bit too loudly.

  “What is it?”

  I smiled and looked at the pipe that had burned me. “We break through,” I said. I rushed over to a different pipe and kicked at it. The sound reverberated loudly through the cell, causing Aryn and me to look at one another, then rush away from where I had been.

  After a few minutes, and no response from outside the cell, we tried again. We searched around the cell for anything we could use to scrape at the walls, to dig through.