Chapter 15! Final chapter of the story :)
Unknown location
"Careful with this one, he has a bad heart."
"Oh, I know."
"Hmm. Just make sure he doesn't die on us. He's the only lead we have."
"He won't die. Trust me."
"Trust you?... Not a chance, I value my life too much. Let me know immediately if he starts talking."
"Of course…Sir."
"And don't forget, as long as you cooperate, you and your precious quarry stay alive. And who knows, if you manage to get something out of those two, maybe we'll let you have a little - supervised - session with him..."
His eyes opened slowly as he regained consciousness. Darkness. He could hear voices. But he couldn't see anything. Two voices. Quiet. Muffled. There was something over his head. Some kind of hood. He couldn't move. His heart was beating too fast. He was breathing too loud...
"He's awake."
Merde... / Shit...
He felt the hood being lifted from his face and the sudden brightness blinded him. He blinked a few times and inhaled deeply, trying to regain control of his breathing. He could not see his captors but he could feel their presence, right behind him. In front of him was a chair. Tied to that chair was the body of a man with a heavily bloodstained hood over his head. The dead man's head was thrown back, his throat exposed. He knew exactly who that man was. He did not need to see his face. The thin, white scar across his neck was enough.
Putain, c'est quoi cette mise en scène ?... / What kind of sick game is this?...
Thomas had been dead for months. But the man in front of him couldn't have been dead for that long. Maybe a few hours, at most. The dead man couldn't be Thomas. Unless…
He heard movement behind him and one of his captors appeared in his field of vision. His eyes zeroed in on the man's face. He had never seen him before.
"I think it's time for our last participant to join in..."
Américain... / American...
As he tried to make sense of the man's words, his captor walked up to the chair with the dead man, positioned himself behind it, raised his hand and stabbed a syringe he had not noticed before into the corpse's shoulder. To his utter surprise, the corpse jerked, as if it had received an electric shock, and started coughing.
Il est vivant… / He's alive...
He held his breath as his captor reached for the hood…
Merde…Thomas… / Shit...Thomas...
As he stared at his recently un-deceased partner's face and tried to wrap his head around what had just happened, the man who had removed the hood casually stepped away from the chair and made his way to the door at the other end of the room.
"They're all yours.", the American said, as he opened the door. "But remember, they'd better still be breathing when I get back. Even Réant.", he added before he stepped out of the room, closing the door behind him.
Several seconds of silence passed after the man had left the room. Thomas had obviously recognized him but he hadn't uttered a single word. He didn't look well. His sweaty brown hair stuck to his forehead and there was dried blood around his nose and mouth, contrasting with his uncharacteristically pale face. He also noticed that his partner was staring intently at his chest, for some reason. But before he could ponder Thomas's strange behavior, or look down to see what he was staring at, he heard movement behind him again. And a voice. A familiar voice. Probably the last voice he wanted to hear in his current situation.
"Glad to see you're feeling so much better, Maxime."
The man stepped into his field of vision. He had guessed right. Beard-guy. He had lost the beard, though.
"You're probably wondering what's going on." The assassin paused and smiled. A slight, unsettling smile. "Well, your friend Thomas, here, made the mistake of taking something that belongs to the organization. Apparently, you can help us find it, so your superior thought it would be a good idea to organize this little reunion."
Hein?... / What?...
"J'suis désolé, Max… dis rien... laisse-les me tuer, faut que tu les laisses me tuer... / I'm sorry, Max… don't tell them anything... just let them kill me, you have to let them kill me..."
The assassin clicked his tongue disapprovingly and put his finger to his lips.
"Shh, Thomas. We wouldn't want to overstress your partner's fragile heart, now, would we?"
He watched as the assassin went to position himself behind Thomas and put a hand on his friend's shoulder.
"But let's get to work, shall we? Tell me, my little friend, what's the most painful thing we could do to Thomas?"
Merde.../ Shit...
End of chapter 15. End of the story! Yeah, yeah, I know... I'm just terrible at killing off good guys :P I hope you enjoyed the story :)