I. Question
She would hear him. She heard everything, when she was listening, and she always listened to him. Always when it mattered, and it mattered now. It mattered a lot if she was listening, because he was handcuffed and locked in a closet. Being taken from his front yard and shoved into a van had been bad, but now he was scared because these people knew exactly what he was. They had lined the walls, floor, and ceiling with copper mesh, making a Faraday cage so he couldn't see. He was now sitting in the middle of the floor, as far from the walls as possible. Picking at the seams had been futile and he couldn't stand touching the mesh. It felt wrong. The metallic tang in the air tasted wrong and the handcuffs hurt and there was nothing he could do, except wait for Rachel to hear him.
"Rachel," he whispered, "Rachel, I'm here."
So, he waited. The scuffling outside the door was a moment of hope, but then he could make out the words.
"You didn't gag him? That girl could hear him!"
Lock turning, then light and color and the lightswere back. Bill's cell phone signal, not too far away. One chance. Jump forward at the men, turn 80 degrees south by the GPS satellites—
"RACHEL!"
Then he was lost in the dark.
II. Answer
Bill asked her to stay in the car. Rachel refused and for once he didn't patronize her or argue at all; he simply handed her a radio—Gary's radio, the one he was so proud of holding on their missions—and told her to wait for his signal. Hicks gave her a sympathetic look she didn't quite understand, and then they were gone.
Bill and Hicks took care of the men on guard, storming in like she hadn't seen before and, frankly, she was glad. Bill's incandescent fury and Cameron's cold focus reassured her, so for the first time in her life the sounds of gunfire didn't frighten her. She knew Bill and Hicks would take care of it. Instead of trying to follow the fight, she focused on Gary's heartbeat. It was so slow and steady compared to her own. Why? He should be afraid but it sounded more like he was asleep, drugged, or unconscious. The static of the radio startled her briefly, but then she was striding inside, following every beat to a locked door at the back of the house.
Once she rebalanced her senses, she was relieved to see that the hole they had stuffed him in was clean, though the metal on the walls was unnerving. Gary was just coming around again, shifting with a soft moan, as she eased the gag off him. Bruises blossomed on his face and she couldn't help running a hand through his hair and lightly touching his cheek to confirm he was there. Then she pulled back. He was sensitive about touching sometimes. She glanced back at a tense and quiet Hicks, who was watching from the corner while Bill checked the rest of the house. Hicks pulled out his cell to call Dr. Rosen.
Seeing the bruises on his face, she now fully understood what she'd heard in the car. The memory of those sounds made her nauseous all over again. Gary's shout—so loudcompared to his desperate whispers—then the smack of a fist and the click of his jaw snapping shut. The dull thud that had come next had stolen her breath until she realized he was still breathing and his heart was still beating.
Now she could see Gary as well as hear him, see that he was alive and mostly okay, but it wasn't enough. Her hands itched with the desire to touch him again. She took one last liberty, stroking his hand briefly as he blinked his eyes.
"Gary, are you okay? What hurts?"
"Soft," he murmured. "Soft doesn't hurt." The hand cuffs clinked as he pushed himself up. "My mouth and my head hurt. One of them hit me, the big one. Don't let him get away."
"Okay," she said, looking sideways at the bodies down the hall. Bill was putting zip ties on the wrists of some, and some he wasn't. "Um…The paramedics are on the way, a-and so is Dr. Rosen." The relief and anxiety were finally rebounding on her, her own adrenaline crash. Her head felt light and her stammer was back. In the next few seconds she would probably burst into tears. "Do you need water, or something? I'll—I'll go get some." She turned to go, but he reached out and caught her hand. He was shaking.
"No. Stay." The trembling in his hand reminded her that she needed to be strong now. Somehow, the warmth of his hand reminded her that she could.
"Okay," she said. "I can stay. I'll stay." She coaxed him forward out into the room and away from the horrid box. She pulled him to sit on the floor with her. He still held her hands tightly. "I'll stay."
