Songs: Arctic Monkeys - Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High; grandson - Stick Up
"They've changed guards an hour ago. You can move in now. Be quiet, we've got your back, if anything should go wrong." I whispered into my ECHO. We were only a small group that had gone to free the prisoners. There had been many people that had volunteered, but we couldn't have too many of them with us. The bigger the group, the more likely we'd be discovered and this was a stealth operation after all.
Our plan was fairly simple: Anouk and Sasha would sneak up on the guards at the side of the camp that was closest to where they kept the prisoners. From what we had seen they also had the keys, so it would be a double win. They'd silently cut their throats quickly, so no one would be alarmed. Then they'd go on to free the hostages and everyone would just disperse quietly into the woods and gather back in the village.
Mordecai and I were posted at vantage points so we could have most of the camp in our scopes. We were basically just back-up, in case something went wrong. We'd be picking off attackers from a distance, before they could get to any hostages or to Anouk and Sasha. Hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.
Brick, Tina, Mikhail and Anna (the woman who owned the guest house and was a surprisingly good shot) were currently on stand-by, somewhere close enough in the forest. If things went really badly they'd be heading into the fight as well to help out. If things went any worse than that... well, that was tough for us.
"Alright, we're slowly moving in. We can see the guards now. Splitting up now and circling around." Anouk whispered.
I sure hoped this would go alright. From what we knew there were no more than 20 loyalists out here, they did however have some backup stationed deeper in the woods. They would change guards every four hours, so currently there were at least 8 people more or less awake.
Since it was the middle of the night, they hopefully weren't very aware of their surroundings for now. The thing was that all of us were just as tired and it was pretty tough to focus. We had had copious amounts of black tea, before we ventured out, to help us stay awake, but coffee would probably have done a better job at that. However, it seemed that coffee wasn't that easy to come by on Aeres.
That was apparently why Anouk loved it so much - she could only have it on special occasions when she was at home. She'd usually bring back a whole lot of coffee supplies whenever she went off planet, but once they were running low, she'd have to save on coffee for a good while.
"I can see you from my vantage point, you gotta move in quickly now." I heard Mordecai say over the ECHO. I looked through my scope and could see Anouk hiding behind a few crates. The guards wouldn't be able to see them, but if they were on high alert they would be able to hear them if they gave off any loud noise.
"Confirmed. I can see you, Anouk. There seems to be no way to get close enough without being seen, so you'll just have to be fast and make sure they don't raise any alarms." I agreed.
"Alright, we'll try and be fast. You watching our back?" Anouk asked quietly. I could barely make out what she was saying.
"Sure thing. We're ready up here. Brick, are you guys ready, just in case?" I wanted to know. I hoped this whole thing would be over soon. My nerves were starting to show and it made me fidgety.
"Ready and on stand-by." Brick echoed back.
"You're good to move in." Mordecai said. I looked through my scope and saw Anouk talking to someone. I assumed it was Sasha, they were on a different frequency, just in case anyone stumbled over our communications.
After that, everything happened really fast. Anouk and Sasha jumped out from their hiding spots and quickly came up behind the guards. Before they knew it, they had a knife at their throats and a hand over their mouths. They seemed to try and struggle against Sasha and Anouk, but there was no point.
The two of them quickly slit their throats in one single motion. It was quite scary how easily those two had just murdered a man up close and in cold blood. It was one thing to shoot someone from a distance, but slitting someone's throat while they were struggling? That was a whole other beast.
But there was no time to get lost in thought about that. I just hoped the two of them - and especially Anouk - would be okay after that. I wasn't even sure if I would be. Then again, if this was Pandora and those guards were bandits I probably wouldn't think twice about it. Having very little qualms about murdering people felt weird.
The two of them waited a good while until the guards' bodies started to slump down as they had bled out too much and had gone unconscious. There were blood sprinkles all over Anouk's hands, arms and face, but she only quickly wiped her knife on her clothes and put it away quickly.
"Okay, the two main guards are gone. Did anyone notice anything?" Anouk asked, whispering over the ECHO. I started quickly checking the rest of the camp. Seemed like no one had taken notice. The other guards seemed far enough away not to have noticed anything. If any of them turned around while Anouk and Sasha were freeing the prisoners, we'd have a problem, though.
"Looking good on my end, but you'll have to pray none of the guards will turn around. You have to try and get the prisoners out of there quietly." I echoed, hoping everything was alright on Mordecai's end, too.
"The two guards closest to you look like they might have noticed something. They've started talking a lot, gesturing over to you. Be careful." Mordecai said after a while. Shit, that wasn't good.
"Got it, we'll try and stay in the shadows." Sasha answered. The two of them moved into the shadows of some tents. It made it more difficult for us to follow them, but it also meant other people were less likely to see them. It still made me worry, though. This girl was my daughter.
Even if she wasn't my daughter, she was only 19. That was way too young to go around killing people in cold blood in some guerilla war. Or to be out hunting Vaults. Hunting Vaults was dangerous as fuck. Why the hell did I drag her into this? She shouldn't even have been here with us.
"Okay, we're close now. Is everything clear?"
Anouk's voice brought me back to reality. It was probably the lack of sleep that made me beat myself up like that. And it wasn't good. It was distracting me. Distracting me way too much.
"Nothing yet, it seems. You have to keep them as quiet as possible, though. Two of the guards seem pretty alert. If the prisoners suddenly get chatty, they'll get suspicious." I told them.
"Alright, noted. That'll be difficult." Sasha answered. I could see the two of them carefully approaching the cells that held the prisoners. Most of them were asleep, so Anouk carefully snuck up on one cell and tapped one of the prisoners on the shoulder. He woke up startled and quickly looked around him. Anouk gestured for him to be quiet. She looked like she was talking to him.
I quickly looked over at the two guards who seemed even more suspicious now. Fuck, this was going to end badly. I just knew it. There were about 30 prisoners, all stuffed together in 4 small cells. None of them were lying down to sleep. They'd all wake up quickly and then it would be difficult to keep them quiet.
The prisoners themselves ranged from young men over women with children, and older ones. Seemed like those guys didn't spare anyone. One woman even seemed to be pregnant. Being penned up like that couldn't be healthy for any of them. If those guys were after the support of people, what the hell were they thinking? Or maybe they weren't after support. Who knew.
"The guards are getting suspicious, I think they are about to check up on you. Get the prisoners out of there as fast as you can, so none of them get hurt." Mordecai echoed. I saw the first few prisoners quietly sneak out of their cells. One of the guards close to the cells was carefully making his way towards the cells.
"He's coming. Open up all the cells and tell them to head out into the forest as quick as they can. There is no point in worrying about being quiet anymore. We'll take care of the guard checking on you." I quickly said to her and aimed my rifle at his head, so I could take a shot as soon as he would see the prisoners.
"Don't take him out too early, Nova. We need to buy time, so people can escape." Mordecai said to me over the ECHO, as if he knew that I was getting nervous and restless. I couldn't screw this up. I couldn't screw this up and put my daughter's life in danger any more than it already was.
"Now!" Mordecai suddenly echoed. Before even realizing I had fired a shot at the guards head and took him out before he could even open his mouth to say anything. The shot however would alarm everyone else.
About half of the prisoners had made it outside of the camp so far. Now they were starting to panic and run. The other guards turned around and saw the prisoners escaping. There was shouting and shots were being fired. One prisoner, an old man, fell to the ground, bleeding. Fuck.
"Get out of there quick! We'll take care of the guards until you're far enough outside the camp." I said to them.
"Got it. We'll take care of anyone who's in close range." Anouk said, pulling a gun from the holster around her hip. She quickly ushered the rest of the prisoners out of their cells and was at the back of the group. Sasha was leading them out of the camp and through the forest.
I saw another guard approaching, two of them. I quickly shot both of them, the first one with a clean headshot, the second one I had to try twice. Some of the other loyalists had started waking up and came out of their tents, but Anouk seemed to be well able to handle them by herself. They had almost made it out of the camp now.
"Do you need back-up?" Brick echoed us suddenly, out of the blue.
"We're dealing with the situation alright, but there are some elderly prisoners and children, they will need help getting through the forest quickly." Anouk answered him. I heard another shot and Anouk started swearing under her breath.
"Fuck, are you okay, Anouk?" I asked.
"I'm fine, just grazed my shoulder a little. I think we're far enough outside the camp. We'll make a run for it now, if you can take care of the guys following close behind us?" she replied.
"Sure thing. I can see them." I told her as I aimed at one of them through my scope. Thank God he was stopping to aim, which meant I could get a good shot at him. I looked out for the other guy and saw him fall down already.
"We took care of them. You should be alright for now." Mordecai echoed. I took a deep breath and finally relaxed a little. Now all we had to do was make our way through the forest without getting lost.
"Great. We'll regroup at the saw mill. There's no doubt they'll be after us, so we better stay there and stay alert, so we can fend them off." Sasha said to us.