Chapter 6: Reconnaissance
Edgar, the brothers and I made our way down to the second floor. The second we reached the door that led to the hallway, I heard something. I tried to signal to Michael, who had begun to open the door, to stop but he did not see my arm waving at him.
I yelled as gunfire poured out of the hallway. Michael had managed to move out of the line of fire when he saw a man on the other side of the door. He pressed himself against the wall behind the door while Edgar and I moved in for the kill.
We leapt out of the doorway and began to fire our weapons in rapid succession. The man slumped to the ground, dropping his machine gun. I walked over to him and began to pick up the machine gun. I tossed my handgun to Michael.
"You can use this now," I said as I swung the gun strap over my head. I searched the man's pockets and pulled out two switchblades and some ammunition.
"We better get out of here," said Edgar, glancing uneasily up and down the hallway, "Someone on the first floor had to have heard that gunfire."
"Yeah, but we need to get into the ventilation system so we can do our reconnaissance," I said in protest, "We'll just have to move quickly."
The brothers exchanged uneasy glances, but said nothing as they followed me back down the hallway. I stopped abruptly when I saw a vent near the floor.
"We'll go through here," I announced.
"It's not too tight of a fit," said Edgar as he pried open the vent, "We got a good three feet of space in there."
"It's a good thing this building's so big," said Michael, "Otherwise the vents would be half that size."
I gave him a curious look, but remembered that he had once been a structural engineer. A sudden thought crossed my mind.
"Michael? How about you lead the way since you're probably more familiar with building structure than the rest of us? Maybe you could lead us to the lobby faster."
Michael nodded and made his way into the ventilation system. He crawled all the way inside and called for everyone else to follow him.
I went in next and Edgar and Lincoln followed behind me. We crawled through the narrow passageway turning multiple times. I realized at one point, with a pang of fear, that I had lost all sense of direction. I had to trust Michael to lead us to the lobby and to get us back out of here.
Soon, Michael stopped in front of me and held out a hand to tell us to be quiet. We could hear voices below us and the sound of people coughing and murmuring to one another. Michael picked up the tile between us and peered down below him.
I leaned over to look down too and gasped in surprise. The number of hostages was larger than I had originally realized. There were also quite a few men with machine guns standing around the crowd of about five-hundred people.
"Silence!" yelled a powerful voice.
I pivoted in the air duct to get a better look of the speaker. He was a man in his late thirties with a very expensive looking suit. He looked very confident and arrogant with his gunmen on either side of him.
"You will all live as long as you do as we say!" he shouted, "If anyone here has seen Michael Scofield or Lincoln Burrows and knows where they are, please stand up!"
I held my breath and glanced back at Lincoln and Edgar. Lincoln shook his head and whispered to me.
"We gave fake names at the desk," he said, "No one knows we're here."
I nodded in relief and looked back down at the man.
"Anyone?" he barked, "If you know something and you're not telling us and we find out, you'll be shot!"
Uneasy murmuring broke out from the crowd in the lobby. People glanced nervously at one another and at the man in front of them.
"Do you not believe that I will go through with it?" he challenged.
He glanced around and pointed at a man in his forties sitting near him. He gave a nod to the gunman on his right. The man raised the machine gun and aimed it at the man's forehead. The man began to cry out in fear and desperation while the crowd screamed in fear.
I shuddered at the sight and sound of those terrified people. Suddenly the sound of gunfire filled the lobby, echoing eerily off the walls. The man fell over, dead, and a pool of blood began to form rapidly around him.
I shut my eyes and looked away from the gruesome scene. I had killed more than a few people in my time, but I had never hurt an innocent human being or even killed someone in cold-blood like that. It unnerved me.
Edgar must have noticed this because he reached out an arm and gave me a slight hug. He gazed at me with sadness and understanding and I leaned into him for comfort. Michael looked distraught and Lincoln's jaw was tightened in anger and despair for the poor man below us.
"Anyone doubt me now?" asked the man with a sick grin on his face.
No one breathed a word.
"Good," snapped the man, "Then I'll be in my temporary office. If anyone has anything to report, tell a guard and he'll escort you. Nobody leaves until I find Scofield and Burrows!"
The man left the room and the guards began to yell at everyone to stay quiet.
Michael nudged me and nodded back in the direction we had come from. It was time for us to leave.
I nodded in understanding and turned to head back out of the narrow tunnel. I had suddenly felt closed in and claustrophobic after seeing that man get shot. I wanted desperately to get out of the tunnel and to breathe freely in open space. I crawled quickly and tried to remember where we had come from. With a sigh of relief, I turned and saw the vent we had crawled through a few minutes ago. I leapt out of the vent and leaned on the hallway wall, gasping for breath as a single tear fell down my cheek.
Edgar gave me a concerned look as he climbed out of the tunnel.
"You okay?" he murmured.
I nodded and handed him the radio.
"Call Gretchen," I said, breath still coming out in uneasy gulps, "Tell her what's happened…and tell her that we need that backup…now!"
PLEASE REVIEW!