Melody rests her head on the cold table her silky blonde hair fanning out around her like a halo. She exhales her breath fogging up the steel topped table, she sighs not sitting up when the door opens and closes.
"Sit up." The officer says, Melody ignores him until he slams his fist on the table. Melody sits up her handcuffs at the small of her back clinking against the metal chair.
"Se habla español?" Melody says nothing as she looks up and to the right then shrugs.
"Tomb raiding in this country is a very serious crime." Her eyes falls onto the officer as she works her fingers into the back of her belt in the space between her cargo pants and the belt itself, wincing when she bends a fingernail back against the thick leather.
"We're also having a problem processing your identity. It seems Maria Reddick doesn't exist at least not until fourteen months ago but then we ran your fingerprints. Almost immediately we received a call from Interpol and they seemed very concerned with our safety though they didn't tell us much. So we dug on our own and found this..." Melody picks at the tape securing a hand cut plastic handcuff key to the inside of her belt trying to move as little as possible as the officer slides a wanted poster across the table.
"The fourteenth most wanted person in the world is nothing to shake a stick at."
"Now see I play it cool for a little while and they demote me out of the top ten. No respect these days." Melody finally says aloud with a smirk etching the corner of her lips.
"She can speak." Melody flips the key in her nimble fingers and blinks staring at him as she tries to work it into the lock.
"Yes she can." She turns the key and starts opening the handcuffs being as silent as possible. The officer gets up circling around the table he leans back against it and looks down at her .
"So you admit you are this Melody Jayne?" Melody only shrugs.
"Do you know what the problem is with retiring? Disappearing for two years and getting on with your life?" She asks cocking her head up at the man flipping the cuffs in her hands.
"What?" Her blue eyes focus on his as she smiles.
"People forget you're dangerous." Melody brings her hands forward jumping to her feet, she flips the hinges around and shoves the pointed ends into his ears clapping her hands to the sides of his head she drives them through his inner ears and into his skull. Blood runs down her palms and arms as she lets him slump to the floor.
Melody kneels pulling the pistol from his belt she stands up walking over to the corner of the room she grabs the small statue in a plastic bag marked evidence and shoves it into her backpack.
Melody drops her backpack onto the table and takes out a block of C4 she cuts it in half with a pocket knife then halves it again, shoving in the detonator and activating it. She sticks the small explosive to the underside of the table and shoulders her backpack dragging a chair over to the glass partition between rooms. Gripping the chair she hefts it and twists slamming the chair through it and shattering the glass.
Using the legs she breaks the sharper shards along the bottom frame and plants her right hand easily vaulting the waist-high partition. She jams the back of the chair under the door handle giving it a solid kick into place dropping her bag against the cement partition and crouching with her back against it.
Resting on her haunches she flicks open the trigger guard on the detonator and hears the interrogation room door burst open as officers file in. Melody covers one ear and thumbs the switch on the detonator.
The explosion rocks the room shrapnel, chunks of debris and body parts funnel through the partition filling the room with smoke. The blast forces the air from Melody's lungs like a punch to the stomach and makes her ears ring. Shaking it off she jumps the partition into the ruined interrogation room ducking under the flourescent light hanging by a single wire from the ceiling and over a body.
She opens the doors and levels the captured sidearm putting three bullets into the two officers trying to force the door she blocked with the chair. The shrill fire alarm blares in her ears as she snatches a gun and two magazines from the dead officers tucking one in her waistband bringing her off hand to the gun in her right hand she hurries down the hallway.
Melody rushes down the stairwell she hears the sounds of scurrying boots on the floor above her as she jumps the last four steps onto the landing gripping the railing she pivots and takes the next set of stairs two at a time. She puts her back to the corner and turns around it raising her gun she finds the hallway clear and runs down the long corridor.
Her boots stop silently at the far corner of the corridor, leaning around she sees a lone cop unlocking a locker and loading an FN FAL 50.42. Looking her over her shoulder she slowly moves into the room and raises her weapon as the officer straps the FAL around his neck and checks his sidearm.
"Don't move." Melody says gesturing with her gun as the officer stops.
"Gun, one finger." The cop complies letting the gun dangle from his palm his finger hooked in the trigger guard.
"Your buddies ran my passport."
"Yes."
"They're all dead. Now I need that passport so unless you'd like to join them..."
"It's this way."
"Smart man. Move, slowly." She follows him back out into the corridor and to a small room, the officer stops at the door and taps in a key code on the door handle twisting the knob she follows him into the room he points to a drawer at the desk. She gestures with the gun for him to stand against the wall.
Melody stuffs the passport in her back pocket and kicks the drawer shut.
"Your mobile." She says as he hands it to her with a trembling hand.
Melody tucks that in her back pocket as well then flips the gun in her hand, gripping the barrel she strikes the officer across the temple with the frame. He slumps to the floor she turns him over pulling the FAL from his neck and Melody steps over him closing the door behind her.
Hurrying down the corridor once again she jumps the two steps into the lobby as the sounds of boots echo behind her. Ducking behind a stone column she yanks the charge lever on the FAL and shoulders it peeking around it she flips the thumb switch to full auto and fires. Three officers tumble back off their feet as Melody pivots the rifle and fires again.
Melody fights the rifle's recoil as bullets erupts from the heavy barrel and the rifle begins climbing off of her targets, thumbing the switch back to single fire she selects a cop that rushes through the lobby entrance and squeezes the trigger the bullet punching through his riot helmet and splattering it with blood.
The receiver clangs open on empty and she curses tossing the rifle to the ground sending it skittering away as she draws both her handguns.
"Damn FAL's, never liked the things." She mutters as she leans around the column firing one gun then raises her off hand and firing the second gun before she takes off sprinting for the door.
She raises both guns and pumps five rounds between the two guns into the glass and leaps off her back foot curling her body she smashes through the window rolling to her feet. Firing over her shoulder she jogs over to a squad car and spins on her heel using her momentum to thrust her elbow through the glass.
Opening the door she drops into the driver's seat, ducking when bullets start pockmarking the windshield. Firing with her left hand she drops the gun from her right and twists the key igniting the engine. She presses the brake drops the shift lever into reverse and stomps the gas pedal as the squad car's tires squeal and leaps backwards slamming into another police car.
Melody curses as glass explodes around her the bullets shredding the fabric of the seats. Shifting into drive she rushes forward and runs over a police officer, shifting back into reverse she guns the engine and twists the wheel around the car the rear bumper scraping the other car as she sits up.
Twisting the wheel harder she whips the car completely around and shifts into drive burning rubber onto the pavement as she bursts through the chain link fence and spins sideways onto the road. Melody winces at the wound in her shoulder as it stains her green button down BDU shirt with blood, grunting in pain she leans up and pulls the stolen mobile from her pocket dialing.
"Hola."
"Jesse? MJ."
"Hey girl what's the deal? Your name is setting off alarms all over the net every system I monitor is lighting up like a Christmas tree."
"Great." Melody growls as she weaves around a car that blares its horn at her.
"What can I do?"
"How exposed am I?"
"Beyond. Your passports no good Maria Reddick is hot now, please tell me you have one of your backups." Melody tucks the phone to her ear and her knee under the steering wheel setting the cruise control she shrugs her backpack from her shoulders and drops it into the passenger seat.
Ripping open the bag she fumbles for the sewn over lining at the very bottom and digs her fingernails into the loose threading until she can tear it away. Retrieving two passports she flips them open.
"Eliza Carmichael and...Kimberly Gregson." Jesse quickly taps the keyboard on his computer, looking up and to the left at one of the four monitors lining the wall bordering the main center screen.
"Eliza's no good, that passport doesn't have a legitimate stamp for Honduras."
"Jesse, Kimberly has brown eyes and I didn't bring contacts."
"Ok, ok, ok. Let's switch gears here, where are you going?"
"I'm meeting Michael in Cabo."
"Well that's not so bad you could drive that."
"In a stolen Honduran police car? Not so much."
"Ok, ok um let me ping your cell here...ok. Listen, twenty miles east there's an old airstrip I've got a friend with a plane it'll be a tight landing for him but if you've got the cash on you..." Melody rolls her eyes as she fumbles through her bag again and takes out a banded stack of cash taking one corner she fans through it.
"I've got eleven and change, US."
"He'll do it for five, I'll call you back."
She drops the phone from her shoulder and weaves around a tractor as she bounces over a pothole and takes the first east moving road she finds.
Melody blinks looking up at the cloudless sky as she takes a piece of tape into her mouth and rips a piece free taping the bandage to her skin. Her head turns back up to the sky when she hears the growing buzz of an aircraft as a Velum grows in the distance. It takes a long smooth trajectory and eases out of the air bouncing onto the dirt runway mostly overgrown with weeds and shrubs.
The pilot turns the plane around and lines it up for takeoff as he gets out the propeller slowly turning to a stop. He drops off the wing and walks up to her, looking at her in her bra her bloody shirt laying beside her as she finishes taping up the bullet wound to her shoulder.
"You're my ride I take it?" He asks and Melody nods, dropping the roll of tape back into her small field med kit and zips it back up tossing it into her bag.
"You're not gunna die on me are you?" Melody shoulders the bag and tucks the five thousand into the pocket of his unbuttoned and dirty Hawaiian shirt.
"Not today."