BREATHE
The first thing that Lucas became aware of as he began to slowly regain consciousness was the coldness of his surroundings.
At the moment his brain was too foggy to think very much of anything. It took him even quite a few seconds to work out what cold meant.
The next thing he realised was that he was laying on something very flat and hard. He didn't have the energy to open his eyes and see what it was though.
He went to bring his left arm across his face to rub some of the grittiness out of his eyes. It was only then that his eyes snapped open to the sound of a rattling chain and the feeling of restriction against his wrist.
His left wrist was shackled with a large rough looking metal handcuff which was in turn attached to a masonry wall with a shortened chain.
Lucas was shocked that somebody would restrain another human being in such a way. Being handcuffed or shackled was not exactly what he had in mind when he left the hospital.
It was now that the thoughts of his friends and family back at the SeaQuest started to come back to him. Somehow he had to get out of here or at least try and let them know where he was being held captive.
Lucas tried yanking on the chain a couple of times but all he seemed to get in return for his efforts was a chafed wrist. The bracket part of the crude hand cuff was at least two inches wide. Like the sort they would have used in medieval times.
He tried to pull again.
"You can yank it all you like kid, but you ain't going to get very far," came a voice from the other side of the room.
Lucas started at the voice, unaware that somebody else had been in the room observing him. When his eyes settled on the man named Carl that he could vaguely remember being in the room. Now the man was standing there with some sort of hand held video recorder in his hand, recording every thing that had been going on. Lucas didn't quite know how long he had been standing there or just how much or what he had recorded.
"Why are you keeping me here?" Lucas now asked the blatantly obvious question.
"Let's just say we are making a home movie to send home to your folks," the man said as he continued filming Lucas captivity. A few more yanks on the shackle on his wrist helped to paint the picture even more.
"You can't do this to me," Lucas said in frustration as the shackle still continued to chafe the skin around his wrist.
"Its getting very cold in here," Lucas now voiced, trying to evoke a small amount of compassion in the man. He tried to rub at his legs to emphasis his words and show honesty in what he was saying.
"Oh I am sure you're a tough kid, you can handle a little bit of cold can't you," the man said, knowing full well that Lucas had just been released from the hospital and was still recovering.
Unfortunately for Lucas, he coughed at the tightness in his chest that was just beginning to re-emerge once again. He tried to hide his fear about what the cold might do to make his chest hurt all over again. He didn't like the thought that it would hurt so bad like back at the beach.
"And just to make sure you do the right thing in here, once I leave here, there is a little camera way up in the corner of the room up there," Carl said pointing to the right hand corner of the ceiling. "We will be able to see your every move from up there. So no funny business."
Lucas wasn't quite sure what all the charades were in filming every thing he was doing. He could only imagine it would be used to force his family and friends to give these men something.
"Your going to be Mr Murphy's guest until he decides otherwise, so just do what your told," Carl said.
"Murphy," Lucas whispered to himself loud enough for Carl to hear. He thought he had recognized the driver of the car when he was kidnapped. Now his memory had name to put to the face.
He remembered what Murphy had done last time to the SeaQuest crew when he tried to take it over. He had outsmarted them for a while, long enough for the crew to take back control before he and his party were able to take over the vessel.
The teenager remembered the man tackling him to the ground back at the jetty. He had been told by the rest of the crew about what had happened at the hotel after that when Murphy had apparently come into their room and attempted to kidnap him from their. He didn't have any recollection of the events after the man tackled him. He remembered waking up with an awful headache and a bandage around his arm where the man had tried to stab him with a knife.
"I see you remember him," Carl said, not surprised that the kid had recalled his boss. They had learnt last time that the kid was pretty smart from what he had tried to fool them with on the SeaQuest. He might have been just released from hospital and might not be at full strength yet but he knew they had better keep a sharp eye on him just to be sure he stayed put.
"I am going now, if you want anything just yell but nobody will probably come running anyway," Carl said with a sneer.
"Can I at least have a drink of water please?" Lucas asked as his throat became very dry from the residual effects of the chloroform.
"Oh don't worry, you will have all the water you want in just a little while," Carl said with mockery in his voice. "Believe me, all the water you want."
By the time Carl left the room, Lucas's energy store was almost used up and he was not in any mood to play mind games with him or anybody else at the moment.
Lucas now glanced around the room a little more and tried his best to take in his forced surroundings.
The room appeared to be made out of large stone blocks. The stone blocks were now very stained from over the years and some of them seemed to be eroded away in places. The room looked like something out of a castle or such, hence the look of the stone walls.
About five feet above Lucas there was a small barred window with no glass. The place had obviously been built as some sort of prison in the past.
There was a stone curved stairway leading from the floor of the room up to a doorway, making the room lower than some of the others in the same building. It was then that images of dungeons from long ago started to creep into Lucas's mind.
The hard flat surface Lucas had awoken on was a crude sort of bed carved out of similar masonry as the walls and stairs. An old woollen piece of fabric had been laid over it's surface to aid as a buffer against the coldness of the stone slab. It wasn't helping very much as Lucas felt himself shivering from time to time but it was better than laying on just the cold stone.
Lucas gave in to his tiredness and laid on his side as best he could, unable to get his arm in a comfortable position due to the handcuff. He tried rapping his unrestrained arm around his chest and curl his legs up slightly in a bid to stay off the cold that seemed to be creeping into his body.
Lucas now looked around the room curiously and saw the main reason why the room felt so cold. When Carl had been in the room he had smelt the unmistakable scent of salty air, signalling they were very close to the sea at least. That gave him some sort of hope that the SeaQuest would be able to at least reach him quickly enough once they knew where he was.
Around the bottom of the walls of his prison cell, there seemed to be half a dozen rectangular openings where one of the stone blocks had either been left out deliberately or cut out after the wall was built. There was a similar number on the opposite wall. What they had been used for in the past Lucas didn't know.
Whatever the reason, the sea breeze whistled through the openings with a cold salty air. That sea breeze was why the room felt so incredibly cold.
The breeze was also able to blow through the window above where he lay.
Lucas coughed again for the third time since Carl had left the room. He knew that the cold and dampness of the air didn't help his chest or asthma any. He tried to move his body again on the stone bed. He was thankful that they had at least left the warm jacket on him.
Without realising what he was doing, Lucas put his unrestrained hand in to the pocket of his jacket. He was surprised to feel two items inside the pocket. In all that had happened over the last few hours, he had completely forgotten about putting any in his pockets.
He brought the items out one at a time, the first being his asthma inhaler. He thought briefly about having a dose, but although his chest was beginning to tighten, he didn't have any idea of how long he was going to be kept prisoner. He needed to hold off using it for as long as possible until he absolutely had to.
The second item he brought out, made him frown slightly as he tried to remember where he got it from. The frown quickly turned into a glimmer of hope. He remembered about the camera watching from above. He tried to use his body to the best of his ability to shield the idea from sight and hide was he was doing with it.
The item was Bridger's PAL Communicator that the Captain had handed Lucas when he went to help Commander Jonathan Ford with some boxes.
Maybe he could turn it on discreetly and the SeaQuest might be able to pick up on it to detect a signal coming from it and give away his whereabouts. He very quietly turned the communicator on, hoping it wouldn't make any noise so as to alert those watching on the other side of the camera.
Lucas now fell asleep with hope in his heart that his family and friends would find him very soon. His body was still shivering slightly from the cold and his cough had started to become more frequent and harsher sounding as time went on.
****************************************
Back at the SeaQuest:
"Here's the security video footage of the lawn areas outside and surrounding car parks Captain," Commander Ford informed Bridger as he came into the ward room. Most of the Senior Crew were currently seated there awaiting of any clues as to where the kidnappers might have taken Lucas.
"Do they go right back to before we pulled up in the transports?" Bridger asked as he got up and placed the video cassette in the slot below the large screen in front of them.
For the next few minutes, the crew watched in total silence as they watched themselves arrive at the harbour, unload the vehicles and then begin the process of loading their luggage aboard the SeaQuest.
Most of them centred their attention on watching Lucas amble across the lawn at a slower pace than the rest of them. They all kicked themselves inwardly for not being more alert. They had been just as angry as Captain Bridger when they had learned that Murphy and his colleagues had escaped from jail.
Now that Bridger had seen the footage a couple of times, he could clearly recognize the driver of the get away car as Murphy. The other two kidnappers had to be the other two that escaped from the prison with him.
"Lucas didn't have much of a chance to fight that guy off did he?" Miguel commented as he noted the size and strength of Carl. "That guy is huge compared to him."
"Yes and it doesn't help the situation that Lucas was only just released from hospital either," Kristen said. "Lord knows he is no condition to be carted off anywhere. His condition still needs monitoring over the next week and his strength is not anywhere near normal yet.
"Did anybody notice the number plates on the car?" Tim O'Neill asked as he tried to figure out how to track down the kidnappers and Lucas. They knew who they were now at least, but they still had no way of knowing where they had taken.
"I looked for that first Tim," Ford replied. "There weren't any plates on the car that I could see." knowing that it left a closed avenue for finding the kidnapper's car. They had a description of the vehicle, but it helped no one right at this time. The kidnappers could have changed cars ten times by now and there were many similar looking cars to the one they had used to drive off with Lucas inside.
Before they could view the footage another time for clues - a signal from the console in front of them chirped telling them that there was an incoming video-link message.
Bridger did the honours of allowing the message to be transmitted on a second large screen in the room. "Admiral Noyce," he greeted Bill Noyce, still seething about the lack of concern afforded to him or especially Lucas about Murphy's prison escape.
"Nathan, I am sorry to interrupt your meeting, but the U.E.O. has just received a video tape containing images of Lucas. I haven't seen them yet myself - though you would want to be the first to see them and know what the kidnappers are demanding for his safe return," Bill now said in total seriousness.
Noyce knew he had screwed up badly about not telling Nathan and Lucas and although these meagre efforts didn't make up for any of it, he was determined to help the SeaQuest crew where he could to locate and rescue the teenager as soon as possible.
"Okay Bill, I guess you had better play it then," Bridger said running a hand down his face with nervousness over what they were about to see. He didn't know if he wanted to see what Murphy had done to the teenager already. He didn't know if any of the other crew members were quite prepared for it either.
Without any more to say, Bill allowed the tape to begin. The tape began just before Lucas had started to regain consciousness. The crew could see the teenager laying on a hard flat looking crude bed.
While they waited to see the images of him waking up, they tried to take careful note of the room he lay in for some clues as to where he might be being held. They could see the small barred window some five feet above him but due to the narrowness of the opening together with the bars obscuring their view, it wasn't possible to pick out any features on the outside that would help them identify the area.
The crew now looked back to where Lucas was laying as a groan coming from his lips, signalled that he was slowly coming out of his drugged state. They watched him lift his hand up towards his eyes and rub at them in an attempt to open them.
They could now hear the sound of the chain that was attached to the handcuff around his wrist. When Lucas had lifted his hand towards his face, they had been clearly able to see the restraint around his arm and attached by the chain to the wall beside him.
"How can they do such a thing to him?" Ben Krieg demanded to know, scarcely able to sit at the table much longer without getting up and leaving the room in frustration. Out of all of the crew except Bridger, Ben felt the most responsible.
Ben had seen what was going to happen before the guy even got his arms around Lucas but he had been too far away to prevent the teenager being dragged back towards the car. He had been too slow he said to himself as he shouldered most of the blame for not being more alert.
"That is horrible to keep somebody chained up like that," Katie had to agree, her heart going out to her teenager friend who was less than aware of his surroundings at the moment.
"He must have a killer headache," Miguel voiced out loud as he watched the screen to see Lucas put a hand to his head a number of times and wince at the throbbing that was present.
The crew now heard the conversation between the man behind the video camera and Lucas about his force captivity. They could see Lucas pulling on the chain in an attempt to loosen the iron shackle from around his wrist.
Bridger couldn't contain his angry outburst when Lucas admitted to his kidnapper that he was cold. The man had completely ignored the kid's plea for a little bit of warmth and compassion. The Captain knew that after only just being released from hospital that being cold for too long was the last thing the teenager needed.
The cough that escaped his lips a few seconds later had both Kristen and Bridger very worried about what Lucas's condition might be by the time he was rescued. Their concern was written all over their faces and very real.
The crew then noted everything else the kidnapper told Lucas including about the other video camera high up in the corner of the room recording his every move. They knew that they were the intended friends and family that Murphy intended to torment with his home movies of the teenager's ordeal.
The comment about "all the water he wanted" was as puzzling to them as it had been to Lucas when Carl replied to his request for a drink of water. They didn't quite know what Murphy had in store for Lucas by that remark but somehow knew that Lucas wouldn't be very happy about it. Somehow they just had to be that more determined to find and rescue him before any of Murphy's plans became reality. Everyone in the ward room continued to watch the video tape of Lucas's captivity and now saw Carl behind the camera leave the room. The footage that appeared after his departure must have come from the one up in the corner of the room that Carl had pointed out earlier.
"Captain Bridger," came a voice over at the end of the tape. Bridger assumed that the droll tones belonged to William Murphy.
"As you can see he is being taken care of reasonably well for the time being," Murphy now said.
"Reasonably," Ben cried out in anger. "He's been shackled to the wall with a chain," he said, his temper boiling over at the man's casualness of Lucas's captivity and harsh treatment.
Of course the tape was pre-recorded and Murphy was unaware of the angry outburst from the Lieutenant and Lucas's best friend.
"How long he remains in his current surroundings is entirely up to you and the U.E.O.," Murphy said as he began his list of demands in order to have Lucas released unharmed and go free.
Bridger listen to the recording very carefully so as to hear the demands. He wasn't about to give in to a terrorist and kidnapper like Murphy but he didn't want to see Lucas's life put at any further risk either.
"I want a U.E.O. launch delivered to a destination of my choosing. You will told when to make the drop off. In the mean time the young man will remain my guest. And until such time as I see that things that have been done to my satisfaction, then he will remain in his prison cell and chained to the wall as you see now," Murphy now stated.
"If you choose to involve any authorities then the young man will be the one to pay for your actions and deception. I will not hesitate to have him killed should I think you have crossed me at any time Captain Bridger. I will ship his body back to you in pieces," he said ominously.
Kristen and Katie Hitchcock had tears in their eyes at the man's callous words and the men in the room felt a lump rising in their throats at such cold and calculating comments. All of them felt incredibly helpless but to do as the man was demanding in order to save Lucas.
Murphy stopped talking and the footage once again went back to the pictures of the prison cell and Lucas chained to the wall.
Admiral Noyce promised Nathan that the U.E.O. would co-operate were possible to ensure Lucas's safety. He gave assurances to the Captain that a reply message would be forwarded to the kidnappers, telling them that the launch would be ready when they advised of the drop off time and destination.
Noyce now terminated the link with the SeaQuest to carry out the return message. Bridger thought it was a little bit late for the U.E.O. to offer their full assistance now. It was like shutting the gate when the bull had already escaped. Where were they yesterday before Lucas was taken and drugged in the back of a car?
The crew now watched as Lucas lay back down on the makeshift bed and tried to get as comfortable as the stone slab underneath him would allow. It was during this as they watched Lucas pull the objects out of his jacket pocket that an idea struck Tim O'Neill.
"Take a look at that other tape just before Lucas gets taken," he said in an excited tone. Ben didn't know what the man was seeing right at first but if he had an idea about how to find Lucas, he was certainly willing to listen. Ben pushed a number of buttons on the console in front of him so that they could split the T.V. screen into two halves and see both tapes at the same time.
The tape from the kidnappers didn't reveal too much more and they couldn't see the objects that Lucas was trying to shield with his body from his captors. Tim had a pretty good idea though what at least one of the items was.
"Is this where you want it Tim?" Ben asked, trying to line up the tape exactly as O'Neill was asking.
"Take it back to just before the Captain goes to help Commander Ford with those boxes," Tim now instructed Krieg.
"Play it a lot slower too, frame by frame if necessary," Tim also added.
"What's the point of all this Tim?" Bridger now asked as they all looked at the tape Tim was watching intently. All he could see was a slower version of what he had seen before. His patience had already run too thin today and he wasn't pleased about having to watch it all again at such a slow speed.
"There it is," Tim now said with confidence in his voice as he got up from his chair and pointed to a small object being passed from Captain Bridger to Lucas. They all watched a little further to see Lucas place the item in his pocket without really taking any notice of what was handed to him.
"What is it?" Miguel asked before the Captain could answer. The frame by frame images made the pixels on the screen obscure exact details of smaller items on the tape. Tim now pressed a few more buttons on the centre console until the image came back to normal speed and was a little more sharper.
Captain Bridger had already guessed at what Tim had seen. "My Pal Communicator," Bridger said with and air of hope in his voice that they now had a real piece of information as to how to track down and rescue Lucas.
"They give off a small electronic signal that could be detected and followed to a source," Tim said, explaining just how the communicator would help.
"Get on it right now Lieutenant," Bridger now said, anxious to see if their theory was right. Tim scurried off towards the Bridge to try and get a fix on the communicator. Of course he knew that the communicator would need to be working to allow him to get a fixed position. That's were the other crew members in the ward room came into play.
"Commander Ford, get a rescue team together and be ready to move at a moment's notice," Bridger now said to his second in command.
"Yes Sir," Ford said determined to make sure that such a team was ready when Captain Bridger gave the command.
"The rest of us have another important job too," Bridger informed the others left in the Ward Room. He hadn't forgotten that Tim would firstly need a signal from the communicator to be able to pick up the frequency that it would emit. They would have to try and assure that there was a constant and continual signal for as longer as possible.
Bridger now got another pal communicator so that he could try and contact the one Lucas was shielding inside his jacket pocket. By now the footage on the tape from the kidnappers had finished and there was nothing but a static filled screen left for them to see. They could no longer see what was happening to Lucas inside his temporary prison.
Bridger now tried to get Lucas's attention through the communicator. He knew he would have to warn the teenager to keep his voice low and his actions restricted if they were to avoid the camera above him realising what was happening.
"Lucas," Bridger whispered into the small device. "Lucas can you hear me?" he now asked.
Lucas had fallen into a troubled sleep shortly after Carl had left the room. The residual effects of the chloroform and his own weakness was just too overwhelming and his body now demanded some sort of respite.
At first Lucas thought he must have been dreaming the fact that he could hear Bridger's voice. It was definitely something he wanted to hear more than anything, but he seriously thought his brain was playing tricks on him.
On the second attempt from Bridger, Lucas opened his eyes, thinking that if it was a dream, it was being particularly persistent about calling out his name. Once he opened his eyes, he could see that the pal communicator was indeed talking to him. He could scarcely believe his luck.
He briefly tried turning his head on an awkward angle and looking warily back towards the camera in the corner of the room. He too realised like the Captain that he couldn't afford to give away the fact that he was making some sort of contact with the outside world so as to alert them to his current whereabouts.
"Captain....." Lucas whispered, his voice a little hoarse and barely audible to the crew listening on the other side.
"Lucas is that you, oh thank God," Bridger said in a small pang of relief. At least they had made contact with the missing teenager. "Are you okay? Don't worry we are on our way to get you out of there," he added, blurting out the words all at once. He caught himself briefly making sure that his voice remained very quiet.
"Hi Captain," Lucas now said, trying to keep his composure. "I am okay, for the time being but please come and get me soon, its very cold in here," he added, noticing his body beginning to shiver again from the coolness of the room.
"What are you going to do?" Lucas now asked, wanting to know if there was anything he was expected to do while he waited to be rescued.
"We are trying to get a fix on your position by using the communicator frequency. Keep it on if you can without being caught. Try not to let them know you have got it if you can, pretend to go to sleep or something or at least try and act as though you are," Bridger said.
"I don't think I have to fake that somehow," Lucas said as he began coughing again for a few seconds. "I feel down right lousy at the moment Captain," the teenager admitted.
"Just hang in there a little longer Lucas. I promise you we are coming just as soon as we can," Bridger said trying to reassure the boy. He could see an unasked question on Kristen's lips as he looked across the other side of the table.
"Do you still have your asthma inhaler with you Lucas?" Bridger asked for Kristen. Westphalen smiled her thanks back to the Captain for his intuitiveness.
"Yes," Lucas replied. It was plain to hear from his voice that the boy was quickly tiring again.
"Come soon please......," he said as his words faded away and his eyes began slowly drifting closed again. His hand was still wrapped limply around the Pal Communicator.
"Lucas?" Bridger whispered gently wondering if the kid was still awake or not. When he got no reply he knew that sleep had stole him away temporarily. He wasn't about to wake the kid up again when he knew that Lucas needed rest so badly. He just hoped he could keep
the communication line open long enough for Tim to get a fix.
Tim O'Neill came back into the Ward Room with the details of his tracking,, "I think I have a location Sir," the man said with both hope and fear in his voice. "The signal is quite weak, it took longer than I thought to try and work out where it was coming from. On my estimates it will take about an hour to get there if we go fast,"
"You heard him Commander, full speed please according to the co-ordinates he gives you," Bridger said with a sparkle in his eye. They were on their way. He said a silent prayer that Lucas would be able to wait that hour until they got there.
"The team is prepared and ready to go," Ford now advised, providing details of the planned rescue that he had been making when he left the Ward room. Ford now headed out the door with Tim O'Neill ready to get underway as fast as they could.
Bridger and the rest of the crew had thought Lucas was asleep for the time being. Their beliefs were quickly shattered by the sound of Lucas's voice coming through in a scream at something dreadfully wrong happening.
"Lucas what's wrong?" Bridger shouted down the communicator. By the sound of fright in Lucas's voice, he knew it was no time to be tip-toeing around. "Lucas?"
"The whole room is filling up with water Captain," Lucas shouted back, sounding a little bit away from the communicator. "The tide is coming into the room and it's filling up with water." He couldn't emphasis how scared he was right at the moment.
"Commander Ford make that full speed much faster right now," Bridger now ordered to the Bridge. "Lucas is in grave danger."
A few minutes earlier in Lucas's prison cell, the teenager had been asleep just at the crew assumed. His fitful doze was quickly disturbed by the sound of water gushing in through the openings along both sides of the room.
Lucas had jumped up in a start and was now standing on the stone slab in an effort to stop the water from approaching him and getting to high. He still had the Pal Communicator clutched tightly in his hand.
He was almost squeezing the life out of it due to his fear of how high the water might rise. He couldn't help but think he had been in a similar situation some time ago. He remembered then how high the water had gotten and how he had just made it out alive in time.
The tide had changed and there was nothing Lucas could do to stop the water from coming in. At the moment is was still only about a foot deep in the room but he knew that the room would soon start to fill rapidly. He didn't know how high the tide would rise. How long did it take someone to drown? "Captain the water is rising," Lucas said in a panicked voice. The water was now lapping at the top of the stone slab and threatening to soon submerge his shoes and feet.
Bridger already had his thoughts go back to the other time that Lucas was remembering. That time the teenager had been taken and held as hostage amongst a group of international delegates in a room that was hidden underneath an island resort. They had managed to find them and rescue everyone, but he remembered how scared Lucas had been to go near any sort of water for some time to come after that ordeal.
Above in a room watching the whole event unfold before him. He had known exactly what time the tide would start to fill the room. He knew that the kid was in no real danger of drowning. Mostly due to the fact that the water wouldn't get to the ceiling of the prison cell due to the window half way up. Once the water reached that height, it would soon drain away just as quickly through the bars back down the rocks to where it had come from.
Carl had been busy watching the screens in front of him and listening for any approaching objects. He had also been listening to some communications about the area and had been able to pick up on the fact that the SeaQuest was heading their way very quickly.
"Boss, the SeaQuest is one her way here," Carl informed Murphy as he continued to listen. "They are still about an hour out, plenty of time for us to get the kid and make a break for it out of here," he added, trying to tell Murphy that it wasn't a lost cause just yet.
Murphy was still fixated on watching the scenes from the prison cell and seeing the teenager squirm even more the higher the water started to get. He had heard the man beside him say that SeaQuest was on her way. That wasn't totally unexpected. In fact he had factored it into the equation that the Captain would be astute enough to figure out where they were eventually.
"How did they find out so quickly?" he said out loud. Although he was expecting them, he hadn't thought they would be there just yet.
"That's why, damn a communicator of some description," Murphy now roared with disgust as he continued to watch the frightened teenager. It was only now that he realised the kid had something gripped tightly between his fingers. Upon closer inspection he could see that the object was the thing that had caused the SeaQuest to find them just that bit too early.
"Why didn't you check what he was carrying on him?" Murphy now demanded of Frank and Carl in the room. "Now they know where we are because you failed to do your job properly," he barked.
"The tide should turn again before they get here," Frank said, hoping to lessen Murphy's wrath. "Should be enough time to get him out of here before they come ashore to rescue him."
Although Murphy wasn't particularly happy about it, he knew he would be forced until the tide subsided somewhat to allow them access to the room again and get to the kid. If they tried to open the door now they would flood the entire building.
Murphy promised himself that he would be ready by the time the infamous Captain Bridger got there. He would be sure to leave a reminder to the Captain of what happened when things didn't go according to his carefully laid plans. The kid would have to pay somewhere along the way.
"C-Captain, i-it's very cold in h-here," Lucas said through chattering teeth as the water was now about waist deep. His body from his legs down felt totally numb from the impenetrable cold from the water.
"I know your cold Lucas, I promise we are only a little way out. You need to hold on just a little bit longer." Bridger said trying to keep the kid somewhat alert.
"I don't know how much longer I can stand up in this water," Lucas admitted, the strength in his legs draining out from the cold. The chain around his wrist was beginning to pull as the chain stretched to its limit.
"P-Please come get m-me out of h-here," Lucas begged through still chattering teeth.
The pain in Bridger's heart when he heard the pleas was almost too much to bear. He couldn't stand to here such torment coming from the one person he loved like a son.
"We will be there in less than half an hour," Ford said to Bridger, trying to give his Captain some sort of hope to hold onto.
Back at the prison cell, the tide had begun to turn and the water level drop just like Frank said it would to Murphy.
By the time the three kidnappers entered to the room, the water was back to being only a foot deep again. Lucas had collapsed onto the stone slab, and he lay in a trembling, limp and unconscious. His strength was totally spent and the cold had made him very lethargic and tired. The constant coughing had made him exhausted. His legs had been trembling both from the cold and the overwhelming sense of fatigue he had from being forced to stand up so long in the cold water.
When the water level had dropped enough so that he was safe from the threat of drowning, he had collapsed into the heap that could be seen now.
"I don't think we need to worry about giving him anything this time," Murphy signalled as he turned the teenager over slightly and started going through the kid's jacket pocket to find out what other things he had on him.
"He looks pretty much out of it doesn't he," Frank had to admit.
To be perfectly honest, the kid looked like death warmed over. They could see a touch of a bluish tint to this pale lips, signalling just how cold the teenager was. His breathing was sounding very harsh and the clothes he wore were now soaked and hanging onto his thin frame.
Murphy grabbed the Pal Communicator from the teenager. It had fallen beside his body when he collapsed. Murphy doubted it was of much use to anybody now since being waterlogged. The SeaQuest were hardly going to be able to get a signal now. But they again he didn't think they would need to rely on it now. The SeaQuest was already heading full steam towards them.
"You won't be needing this either kid," Murphy said to the unconscious teenager as he took out the inhaler from his jacket. Just then a idea struck him as to what sort of message to leave Captain Bridger when he and his rescue team got there.
Carl now picked up the kid's limp body at Murphy's request and the four of them prepared to leave their temporary hide out in search of a much more secluded hiding place. The place Murphy had in store was totally different. He was sure that the SeaQuest wouldn't find that place no matter how hard they tried.
Ten minutes after the hour Commander Ford said it would take to get there, the SeaQuest came to the place they knew Lucas was being held. At some point they had lost the signal from the Pal Communicator but Bridger assumed that was because it got wet as the water level in the room rose.
Bridger of course made sure that he was part of the final number to go in for the rescue. Doctor Kristen Westphalen also accompanied them in case her medical skills were needed for the teenager. Ben was part of the team as was Miguel. Tim O'Neill and Commander Ford opted to stay behind in case they were needed in another capacity.
It took a couple of minutes once inside the derelict building to find the room they thought might be the one to hold Lucas. They had already tried a couple of rooms higher up in the building but had been disappointed to find them empty and falling apart around them.
As they went further into the building, they came to a door that seemed to lead to a room lower than the others in the building. Hence the threat of being inundated by the surge of tidal waters.
Ben and a couple of the rescue team now began trying to batter down the door with renewed vigour and hope that Lucas might be on the other side.
Finally the door's hinges gave way to the constant hammering and the door fell open to reveal the room the crew had seen on the video tape. It was definitely the right room. From where they stood at the top of the stairs, they could see the barred window they had identified on the tape.
They could also see the stone slab Lucas had been forced to use as a bed during his time of captivity. The sight that made their hearts drop though was that the chain and shackle were hanging down from the wall with no sign of Lucas anywhere.
No matter which corner of the room they scanned, there was no sign of the kidnappers or the missing teenager they had come to rescue.
Bridger stopped when he saw something laying on the floor in the middle of the room. He hurried down the stairs and knelt in front of the pile of what looked like broken pieces of something.
To add to his sense of helplessness in finding and rescuing Lucas, he could see that the broken pieces had once belonged to the Pal Communicator . He picked up a second piece of broken plastic and quickly saw to his horror that it had once made up Lucas's asthma inhaler. Now it was broken in to four of five pieces like a jig saw puzzle.
Lucas was now somewhere in the hands of people who were ruthless enough to leaved him without his necessary medication.
The other crew members stood by with fear and anger also written across their faces but they couldn't find the words to make this scene seem any better.
"Damn it," Bridger shouted out loud and hurled the small broken piece of plastic across the other side of the room.
TO BE CONTINUED...............
Hi folks, updated again - I reposted the first part of the last chapter with this part because I thought it helped the story flow better.
As to what is going to happen at the end .... well the votes are in but I am not telling you just yet....... I think I have found a way to incorporate most people's ideas and suggestions.
I always loved the episode with the dome filling up with water - just wished something more would have happened in that one. That's what gave me the idea for this - it wasn't hard to guess what I was going to do with the water.
Sorry but some time is going to have to be put into my other fandom - time to go and do some Joe hurt scenes or Jules is going to be hunted down by a posse of angry readers.
Nearly finished this story.........
JULES
The first thing that Lucas became aware of as he began to slowly regain consciousness was the coldness of his surroundings.
At the moment his brain was too foggy to think very much of anything. It took him even quite a few seconds to work out what cold meant.
The next thing he realised was that he was laying on something very flat and hard. He didn't have the energy to open his eyes and see what it was though.
He went to bring his left arm across his face to rub some of the grittiness out of his eyes. It was only then that his eyes snapped open to the sound of a rattling chain and the feeling of restriction against his wrist.
His left wrist was shackled with a large rough looking metal handcuff which was in turn attached to a masonry wall with a shortened chain.
Lucas was shocked that somebody would restrain another human being in such a way. Being handcuffed or shackled was not exactly what he had in mind when he left the hospital.
It was now that the thoughts of his friends and family back at the SeaQuest started to come back to him. Somehow he had to get out of here or at least try and let them know where he was being held captive.
Lucas tried yanking on the chain a couple of times but all he seemed to get in return for his efforts was a chafed wrist. The bracket part of the crude hand cuff was at least two inches wide. Like the sort they would have used in medieval times.
He tried to pull again.
"You can yank it all you like kid, but you ain't going to get very far," came a voice from the other side of the room.
Lucas started at the voice, unaware that somebody else had been in the room observing him. When his eyes settled on the man named Carl that he could vaguely remember being in the room. Now the man was standing there with some sort of hand held video recorder in his hand, recording every thing that had been going on. Lucas didn't quite know how long he had been standing there or just how much or what he had recorded.
"Why are you keeping me here?" Lucas now asked the blatantly obvious question.
"Let's just say we are making a home movie to send home to your folks," the man said as he continued filming Lucas captivity. A few more yanks on the shackle on his wrist helped to paint the picture even more.
"You can't do this to me," Lucas said in frustration as the shackle still continued to chafe the skin around his wrist.
"Its getting very cold in here," Lucas now voiced, trying to evoke a small amount of compassion in the man. He tried to rub at his legs to emphasis his words and show honesty in what he was saying.
"Oh I am sure you're a tough kid, you can handle a little bit of cold can't you," the man said, knowing full well that Lucas had just been released from the hospital and was still recovering.
Unfortunately for Lucas, he coughed at the tightness in his chest that was just beginning to re-emerge once again. He tried to hide his fear about what the cold might do to make his chest hurt all over again. He didn't like the thought that it would hurt so bad like back at the beach.
"And just to make sure you do the right thing in here, once I leave here, there is a little camera way up in the corner of the room up there," Carl said pointing to the right hand corner of the ceiling. "We will be able to see your every move from up there. So no funny business."
Lucas wasn't quite sure what all the charades were in filming every thing he was doing. He could only imagine it would be used to force his family and friends to give these men something.
"Your going to be Mr Murphy's guest until he decides otherwise, so just do what your told," Carl said.
"Murphy," Lucas whispered to himself loud enough for Carl to hear. He thought he had recognized the driver of the car when he was kidnapped. Now his memory had name to put to the face.
He remembered what Murphy had done last time to the SeaQuest crew when he tried to take it over. He had outsmarted them for a while, long enough for the crew to take back control before he and his party were able to take over the vessel.
The teenager remembered the man tackling him to the ground back at the jetty. He had been told by the rest of the crew about what had happened at the hotel after that when Murphy had apparently come into their room and attempted to kidnap him from their. He didn't have any recollection of the events after the man tackled him. He remembered waking up with an awful headache and a bandage around his arm where the man had tried to stab him with a knife.
"I see you remember him," Carl said, not surprised that the kid had recalled his boss. They had learnt last time that the kid was pretty smart from what he had tried to fool them with on the SeaQuest. He might have been just released from hospital and might not be at full strength yet but he knew they had better keep a sharp eye on him just to be sure he stayed put.
"I am going now, if you want anything just yell but nobody will probably come running anyway," Carl said with a sneer.
"Can I at least have a drink of water please?" Lucas asked as his throat became very dry from the residual effects of the chloroform.
"Oh don't worry, you will have all the water you want in just a little while," Carl said with mockery in his voice. "Believe me, all the water you want."
By the time Carl left the room, Lucas's energy store was almost used up and he was not in any mood to play mind games with him or anybody else at the moment.
Lucas now glanced around the room a little more and tried his best to take in his forced surroundings.
The room appeared to be made out of large stone blocks. The stone blocks were now very stained from over the years and some of them seemed to be eroded away in places. The room looked like something out of a castle or such, hence the look of the stone walls.
About five feet above Lucas there was a small barred window with no glass. The place had obviously been built as some sort of prison in the past.
There was a stone curved stairway leading from the floor of the room up to a doorway, making the room lower than some of the others in the same building. It was then that images of dungeons from long ago started to creep into Lucas's mind.
The hard flat surface Lucas had awoken on was a crude sort of bed carved out of similar masonry as the walls and stairs. An old woollen piece of fabric had been laid over it's surface to aid as a buffer against the coldness of the stone slab. It wasn't helping very much as Lucas felt himself shivering from time to time but it was better than laying on just the cold stone.
Lucas gave in to his tiredness and laid on his side as best he could, unable to get his arm in a comfortable position due to the handcuff. He tried rapping his unrestrained arm around his chest and curl his legs up slightly in a bid to stay off the cold that seemed to be creeping into his body.
Lucas now looked around the room curiously and saw the main reason why the room felt so cold. When Carl had been in the room he had smelt the unmistakable scent of salty air, signalling they were very close to the sea at least. That gave him some sort of hope that the SeaQuest would be able to at least reach him quickly enough once they knew where he was.
Around the bottom of the walls of his prison cell, there seemed to be half a dozen rectangular openings where one of the stone blocks had either been left out deliberately or cut out after the wall was built. There was a similar number on the opposite wall. What they had been used for in the past Lucas didn't know.
Whatever the reason, the sea breeze whistled through the openings with a cold salty air. That sea breeze was why the room felt so incredibly cold.
The breeze was also able to blow through the window above where he lay.
Lucas coughed again for the third time since Carl had left the room. He knew that the cold and dampness of the air didn't help his chest or asthma any. He tried to move his body again on the stone bed. He was thankful that they had at least left the warm jacket on him.
Without realising what he was doing, Lucas put his unrestrained hand in to the pocket of his jacket. He was surprised to feel two items inside the pocket. In all that had happened over the last few hours, he had completely forgotten about putting any in his pockets.
He brought the items out one at a time, the first being his asthma inhaler. He thought briefly about having a dose, but although his chest was beginning to tighten, he didn't have any idea of how long he was going to be kept prisoner. He needed to hold off using it for as long as possible until he absolutely had to.
The second item he brought out, made him frown slightly as he tried to remember where he got it from. The frown quickly turned into a glimmer of hope. He remembered about the camera watching from above. He tried to use his body to the best of his ability to shield the idea from sight and hide was he was doing with it.
The item was Bridger's PAL Communicator that the Captain had handed Lucas when he went to help Commander Jonathan Ford with some boxes.
Maybe he could turn it on discreetly and the SeaQuest might be able to pick up on it to detect a signal coming from it and give away his whereabouts. He very quietly turned the communicator on, hoping it wouldn't make any noise so as to alert those watching on the other side of the camera.
Lucas now fell asleep with hope in his heart that his family and friends would find him very soon. His body was still shivering slightly from the cold and his cough had started to become more frequent and harsher sounding as time went on.
****************************************
Back at the SeaQuest:
"Here's the security video footage of the lawn areas outside and surrounding car parks Captain," Commander Ford informed Bridger as he came into the ward room. Most of the Senior Crew were currently seated there awaiting of any clues as to where the kidnappers might have taken Lucas.
"Do they go right back to before we pulled up in the transports?" Bridger asked as he got up and placed the video cassette in the slot below the large screen in front of them.
For the next few minutes, the crew watched in total silence as they watched themselves arrive at the harbour, unload the vehicles and then begin the process of loading their luggage aboard the SeaQuest.
Most of them centred their attention on watching Lucas amble across the lawn at a slower pace than the rest of them. They all kicked themselves inwardly for not being more alert. They had been just as angry as Captain Bridger when they had learned that Murphy and his colleagues had escaped from jail.
Now that Bridger had seen the footage a couple of times, he could clearly recognize the driver of the get away car as Murphy. The other two kidnappers had to be the other two that escaped from the prison with him.
"Lucas didn't have much of a chance to fight that guy off did he?" Miguel commented as he noted the size and strength of Carl. "That guy is huge compared to him."
"Yes and it doesn't help the situation that Lucas was only just released from hospital either," Kristen said. "Lord knows he is no condition to be carted off anywhere. His condition still needs monitoring over the next week and his strength is not anywhere near normal yet.
"Did anybody notice the number plates on the car?" Tim O'Neill asked as he tried to figure out how to track down the kidnappers and Lucas. They knew who they were now at least, but they still had no way of knowing where they had taken.
"I looked for that first Tim," Ford replied. "There weren't any plates on the car that I could see." knowing that it left a closed avenue for finding the kidnapper's car. They had a description of the vehicle, but it helped no one right at this time. The kidnappers could have changed cars ten times by now and there were many similar looking cars to the one they had used to drive off with Lucas inside.
Before they could view the footage another time for clues - a signal from the console in front of them chirped telling them that there was an incoming video-link message.
Bridger did the honours of allowing the message to be transmitted on a second large screen in the room. "Admiral Noyce," he greeted Bill Noyce, still seething about the lack of concern afforded to him or especially Lucas about Murphy's prison escape.
"Nathan, I am sorry to interrupt your meeting, but the U.E.O. has just received a video tape containing images of Lucas. I haven't seen them yet myself - though you would want to be the first to see them and know what the kidnappers are demanding for his safe return," Bill now said in total seriousness.
Noyce knew he had screwed up badly about not telling Nathan and Lucas and although these meagre efforts didn't make up for any of it, he was determined to help the SeaQuest crew where he could to locate and rescue the teenager as soon as possible.
"Okay Bill, I guess you had better play it then," Bridger said running a hand down his face with nervousness over what they were about to see. He didn't know if he wanted to see what Murphy had done to the teenager already. He didn't know if any of the other crew members were quite prepared for it either.
Without any more to say, Bill allowed the tape to begin. The tape began just before Lucas had started to regain consciousness. The crew could see the teenager laying on a hard flat looking crude bed.
While they waited to see the images of him waking up, they tried to take careful note of the room he lay in for some clues as to where he might be being held. They could see the small barred window some five feet above him but due to the narrowness of the opening together with the bars obscuring their view, it wasn't possible to pick out any features on the outside that would help them identify the area.
The crew now looked back to where Lucas was laying as a groan coming from his lips, signalled that he was slowly coming out of his drugged state. They watched him lift his hand up towards his eyes and rub at them in an attempt to open them.
They could now hear the sound of the chain that was attached to the handcuff around his wrist. When Lucas had lifted his hand towards his face, they had been clearly able to see the restraint around his arm and attached by the chain to the wall beside him.
"How can they do such a thing to him?" Ben Krieg demanded to know, scarcely able to sit at the table much longer without getting up and leaving the room in frustration. Out of all of the crew except Bridger, Ben felt the most responsible.
Ben had seen what was going to happen before the guy even got his arms around Lucas but he had been too far away to prevent the teenager being dragged back towards the car. He had been too slow he said to himself as he shouldered most of the blame for not being more alert.
"That is horrible to keep somebody chained up like that," Katie had to agree, her heart going out to her teenager friend who was less than aware of his surroundings at the moment.
"He must have a killer headache," Miguel voiced out loud as he watched the screen to see Lucas put a hand to his head a number of times and wince at the throbbing that was present.
The crew now heard the conversation between the man behind the video camera and Lucas about his force captivity. They could see Lucas pulling on the chain in an attempt to loosen the iron shackle from around his wrist.
Bridger couldn't contain his angry outburst when Lucas admitted to his kidnapper that he was cold. The man had completely ignored the kid's plea for a little bit of warmth and compassion. The Captain knew that after only just being released from hospital that being cold for too long was the last thing the teenager needed.
The cough that escaped his lips a few seconds later had both Kristen and Bridger very worried about what Lucas's condition might be by the time he was rescued. Their concern was written all over their faces and very real.
The crew then noted everything else the kidnapper told Lucas including about the other video camera high up in the corner of the room recording his every move. They knew that they were the intended friends and family that Murphy intended to torment with his home movies of the teenager's ordeal.
The comment about "all the water he wanted" was as puzzling to them as it had been to Lucas when Carl replied to his request for a drink of water. They didn't quite know what Murphy had in store for Lucas by that remark but somehow knew that Lucas wouldn't be very happy about it. Somehow they just had to be that more determined to find and rescue him before any of Murphy's plans became reality. Everyone in the ward room continued to watch the video tape of Lucas's captivity and now saw Carl behind the camera leave the room. The footage that appeared after his departure must have come from the one up in the corner of the room that Carl had pointed out earlier.
"Captain Bridger," came a voice over at the end of the tape. Bridger assumed that the droll tones belonged to William Murphy.
"As you can see he is being taken care of reasonably well for the time being," Murphy now said.
"Reasonably," Ben cried out in anger. "He's been shackled to the wall with a chain," he said, his temper boiling over at the man's casualness of Lucas's captivity and harsh treatment.
Of course the tape was pre-recorded and Murphy was unaware of the angry outburst from the Lieutenant and Lucas's best friend.
"How long he remains in his current surroundings is entirely up to you and the U.E.O.," Murphy said as he began his list of demands in order to have Lucas released unharmed and go free.
Bridger listen to the recording very carefully so as to hear the demands. He wasn't about to give in to a terrorist and kidnapper like Murphy but he didn't want to see Lucas's life put at any further risk either.
"I want a U.E.O. launch delivered to a destination of my choosing. You will told when to make the drop off. In the mean time the young man will remain my guest. And until such time as I see that things that have been done to my satisfaction, then he will remain in his prison cell and chained to the wall as you see now," Murphy now stated.
"If you choose to involve any authorities then the young man will be the one to pay for your actions and deception. I will not hesitate to have him killed should I think you have crossed me at any time Captain Bridger. I will ship his body back to you in pieces," he said ominously.
Kristen and Katie Hitchcock had tears in their eyes at the man's callous words and the men in the room felt a lump rising in their throats at such cold and calculating comments. All of them felt incredibly helpless but to do as the man was demanding in order to save Lucas.
Murphy stopped talking and the footage once again went back to the pictures of the prison cell and Lucas chained to the wall.
Admiral Noyce promised Nathan that the U.E.O. would co-operate were possible to ensure Lucas's safety. He gave assurances to the Captain that a reply message would be forwarded to the kidnappers, telling them that the launch would be ready when they advised of the drop off time and destination.
Noyce now terminated the link with the SeaQuest to carry out the return message. Bridger thought it was a little bit late for the U.E.O. to offer their full assistance now. It was like shutting the gate when the bull had already escaped. Where were they yesterday before Lucas was taken and drugged in the back of a car?
The crew now watched as Lucas lay back down on the makeshift bed and tried to get as comfortable as the stone slab underneath him would allow. It was during this as they watched Lucas pull the objects out of his jacket pocket that an idea struck Tim O'Neill.
"Take a look at that other tape just before Lucas gets taken," he said in an excited tone. Ben didn't know what the man was seeing right at first but if he had an idea about how to find Lucas, he was certainly willing to listen. Ben pushed a number of buttons on the console in front of him so that they could split the T.V. screen into two halves and see both tapes at the same time.
The tape from the kidnappers didn't reveal too much more and they couldn't see the objects that Lucas was trying to shield with his body from his captors. Tim had a pretty good idea though what at least one of the items was.
"Is this where you want it Tim?" Ben asked, trying to line up the tape exactly as O'Neill was asking.
"Take it back to just before the Captain goes to help Commander Ford with those boxes," Tim now instructed Krieg.
"Play it a lot slower too, frame by frame if necessary," Tim also added.
"What's the point of all this Tim?" Bridger now asked as they all looked at the tape Tim was watching intently. All he could see was a slower version of what he had seen before. His patience had already run too thin today and he wasn't pleased about having to watch it all again at such a slow speed.
"There it is," Tim now said with confidence in his voice as he got up from his chair and pointed to a small object being passed from Captain Bridger to Lucas. They all watched a little further to see Lucas place the item in his pocket without really taking any notice of what was handed to him.
"What is it?" Miguel asked before the Captain could answer. The frame by frame images made the pixels on the screen obscure exact details of smaller items on the tape. Tim now pressed a few more buttons on the centre console until the image came back to normal speed and was a little more sharper.
Captain Bridger had already guessed at what Tim had seen. "My Pal Communicator," Bridger said with and air of hope in his voice that they now had a real piece of information as to how to track down and rescue Lucas.
"They give off a small electronic signal that could be detected and followed to a source," Tim said, explaining just how the communicator would help.
"Get on it right now Lieutenant," Bridger now said, anxious to see if their theory was right. Tim scurried off towards the Bridge to try and get a fix on the communicator. Of course he knew that the communicator would need to be working to allow him to get a fixed position. That's were the other crew members in the ward room came into play.
"Commander Ford, get a rescue team together and be ready to move at a moment's notice," Bridger now said to his second in command.
"Yes Sir," Ford said determined to make sure that such a team was ready when Captain Bridger gave the command.
"The rest of us have another important job too," Bridger informed the others left in the Ward Room. He hadn't forgotten that Tim would firstly need a signal from the communicator to be able to pick up the frequency that it would emit. They would have to try and assure that there was a constant and continual signal for as longer as possible.
Bridger now got another pal communicator so that he could try and contact the one Lucas was shielding inside his jacket pocket. By now the footage on the tape from the kidnappers had finished and there was nothing but a static filled screen left for them to see. They could no longer see what was happening to Lucas inside his temporary prison.
Bridger now tried to get Lucas's attention through the communicator. He knew he would have to warn the teenager to keep his voice low and his actions restricted if they were to avoid the camera above him realising what was happening.
"Lucas," Bridger whispered into the small device. "Lucas can you hear me?" he now asked.
Lucas had fallen into a troubled sleep shortly after Carl had left the room. The residual effects of the chloroform and his own weakness was just too overwhelming and his body now demanded some sort of respite.
At first Lucas thought he must have been dreaming the fact that he could hear Bridger's voice. It was definitely something he wanted to hear more than anything, but he seriously thought his brain was playing tricks on him.
On the second attempt from Bridger, Lucas opened his eyes, thinking that if it was a dream, it was being particularly persistent about calling out his name. Once he opened his eyes, he could see that the pal communicator was indeed talking to him. He could scarcely believe his luck.
He briefly tried turning his head on an awkward angle and looking warily back towards the camera in the corner of the room. He too realised like the Captain that he couldn't afford to give away the fact that he was making some sort of contact with the outside world so as to alert them to his current whereabouts.
"Captain....." Lucas whispered, his voice a little hoarse and barely audible to the crew listening on the other side.
"Lucas is that you, oh thank God," Bridger said in a small pang of relief. At least they had made contact with the missing teenager. "Are you okay? Don't worry we are on our way to get you out of there," he added, blurting out the words all at once. He caught himself briefly making sure that his voice remained very quiet.
"Hi Captain," Lucas now said, trying to keep his composure. "I am okay, for the time being but please come and get me soon, its very cold in here," he added, noticing his body beginning to shiver again from the coolness of the room.
"What are you going to do?" Lucas now asked, wanting to know if there was anything he was expected to do while he waited to be rescued.
"We are trying to get a fix on your position by using the communicator frequency. Keep it on if you can without being caught. Try not to let them know you have got it if you can, pretend to go to sleep or something or at least try and act as though you are," Bridger said.
"I don't think I have to fake that somehow," Lucas said as he began coughing again for a few seconds. "I feel down right lousy at the moment Captain," the teenager admitted.
"Just hang in there a little longer Lucas. I promise you we are coming just as soon as we can," Bridger said trying to reassure the boy. He could see an unasked question on Kristen's lips as he looked across the other side of the table.
"Do you still have your asthma inhaler with you Lucas?" Bridger asked for Kristen. Westphalen smiled her thanks back to the Captain for his intuitiveness.
"Yes," Lucas replied. It was plain to hear from his voice that the boy was quickly tiring again.
"Come soon please......," he said as his words faded away and his eyes began slowly drifting closed again. His hand was still wrapped limply around the Pal Communicator.
"Lucas?" Bridger whispered gently wondering if the kid was still awake or not. When he got no reply he knew that sleep had stole him away temporarily. He wasn't about to wake the kid up again when he knew that Lucas needed rest so badly. He just hoped he could keep
the communication line open long enough for Tim to get a fix.
Tim O'Neill came back into the Ward Room with the details of his tracking,, "I think I have a location Sir," the man said with both hope and fear in his voice. "The signal is quite weak, it took longer than I thought to try and work out where it was coming from. On my estimates it will take about an hour to get there if we go fast,"
"You heard him Commander, full speed please according to the co-ordinates he gives you," Bridger said with a sparkle in his eye. They were on their way. He said a silent prayer that Lucas would be able to wait that hour until they got there.
"The team is prepared and ready to go," Ford now advised, providing details of the planned rescue that he had been making when he left the Ward room. Ford now headed out the door with Tim O'Neill ready to get underway as fast as they could.
Bridger and the rest of the crew had thought Lucas was asleep for the time being. Their beliefs were quickly shattered by the sound of Lucas's voice coming through in a scream at something dreadfully wrong happening.
"Lucas what's wrong?" Bridger shouted down the communicator. By the sound of fright in Lucas's voice, he knew it was no time to be tip-toeing around. "Lucas?"
"The whole room is filling up with water Captain," Lucas shouted back, sounding a little bit away from the communicator. "The tide is coming into the room and it's filling up with water." He couldn't emphasis how scared he was right at the moment.
"Commander Ford make that full speed much faster right now," Bridger now ordered to the Bridge. "Lucas is in grave danger."
A few minutes earlier in Lucas's prison cell, the teenager had been asleep just at the crew assumed. His fitful doze was quickly disturbed by the sound of water gushing in through the openings along both sides of the room.
Lucas had jumped up in a start and was now standing on the stone slab in an effort to stop the water from approaching him and getting to high. He still had the Pal Communicator clutched tightly in his hand.
He was almost squeezing the life out of it due to his fear of how high the water might rise. He couldn't help but think he had been in a similar situation some time ago. He remembered then how high the water had gotten and how he had just made it out alive in time.
The tide had changed and there was nothing Lucas could do to stop the water from coming in. At the moment is was still only about a foot deep in the room but he knew that the room would soon start to fill rapidly. He didn't know how high the tide would rise. How long did it take someone to drown? "Captain the water is rising," Lucas said in a panicked voice. The water was now lapping at the top of the stone slab and threatening to soon submerge his shoes and feet.
Bridger already had his thoughts go back to the other time that Lucas was remembering. That time the teenager had been taken and held as hostage amongst a group of international delegates in a room that was hidden underneath an island resort. They had managed to find them and rescue everyone, but he remembered how scared Lucas had been to go near any sort of water for some time to come after that ordeal.
Above in a room watching the whole event unfold before him. He had known exactly what time the tide would start to fill the room. He knew that the kid was in no real danger of drowning. Mostly due to the fact that the water wouldn't get to the ceiling of the prison cell due to the window half way up. Once the water reached that height, it would soon drain away just as quickly through the bars back down the rocks to where it had come from.
Carl had been busy watching the screens in front of him and listening for any approaching objects. He had also been listening to some communications about the area and had been able to pick up on the fact that the SeaQuest was heading their way very quickly.
"Boss, the SeaQuest is one her way here," Carl informed Murphy as he continued to listen. "They are still about an hour out, plenty of time for us to get the kid and make a break for it out of here," he added, trying to tell Murphy that it wasn't a lost cause just yet.
Murphy was still fixated on watching the scenes from the prison cell and seeing the teenager squirm even more the higher the water started to get. He had heard the man beside him say that SeaQuest was on her way. That wasn't totally unexpected. In fact he had factored it into the equation that the Captain would be astute enough to figure out where they were eventually.
"How did they find out so quickly?" he said out loud. Although he was expecting them, he hadn't thought they would be there just yet.
"That's why, damn a communicator of some description," Murphy now roared with disgust as he continued to watch the frightened teenager. It was only now that he realised the kid had something gripped tightly between his fingers. Upon closer inspection he could see that the object was the thing that had caused the SeaQuest to find them just that bit too early.
"Why didn't you check what he was carrying on him?" Murphy now demanded of Frank and Carl in the room. "Now they know where we are because you failed to do your job properly," he barked.
"The tide should turn again before they get here," Frank said, hoping to lessen Murphy's wrath. "Should be enough time to get him out of here before they come ashore to rescue him."
Although Murphy wasn't particularly happy about it, he knew he would be forced until the tide subsided somewhat to allow them access to the room again and get to the kid. If they tried to open the door now they would flood the entire building.
Murphy promised himself that he would be ready by the time the infamous Captain Bridger got there. He would be sure to leave a reminder to the Captain of what happened when things didn't go according to his carefully laid plans. The kid would have to pay somewhere along the way.
"C-Captain, i-it's very cold in h-here," Lucas said through chattering teeth as the water was now about waist deep. His body from his legs down felt totally numb from the impenetrable cold from the water.
"I know your cold Lucas, I promise we are only a little way out. You need to hold on just a little bit longer." Bridger said trying to keep the kid somewhat alert.
"I don't know how much longer I can stand up in this water," Lucas admitted, the strength in his legs draining out from the cold. The chain around his wrist was beginning to pull as the chain stretched to its limit.
"P-Please come get m-me out of h-here," Lucas begged through still chattering teeth.
The pain in Bridger's heart when he heard the pleas was almost too much to bear. He couldn't stand to here such torment coming from the one person he loved like a son.
"We will be there in less than half an hour," Ford said to Bridger, trying to give his Captain some sort of hope to hold onto.
Back at the prison cell, the tide had begun to turn and the water level drop just like Frank said it would to Murphy.
By the time the three kidnappers entered to the room, the water was back to being only a foot deep again. Lucas had collapsed onto the stone slab, and he lay in a trembling, limp and unconscious. His strength was totally spent and the cold had made him very lethargic and tired. The constant coughing had made him exhausted. His legs had been trembling both from the cold and the overwhelming sense of fatigue he had from being forced to stand up so long in the cold water.
When the water level had dropped enough so that he was safe from the threat of drowning, he had collapsed into the heap that could be seen now.
"I don't think we need to worry about giving him anything this time," Murphy signalled as he turned the teenager over slightly and started going through the kid's jacket pocket to find out what other things he had on him.
"He looks pretty much out of it doesn't he," Frank had to admit.
To be perfectly honest, the kid looked like death warmed over. They could see a touch of a bluish tint to this pale lips, signalling just how cold the teenager was. His breathing was sounding very harsh and the clothes he wore were now soaked and hanging onto his thin frame.
Murphy grabbed the Pal Communicator from the teenager. It had fallen beside his body when he collapsed. Murphy doubted it was of much use to anybody now since being waterlogged. The SeaQuest were hardly going to be able to get a signal now. But they again he didn't think they would need to rely on it now. The SeaQuest was already heading full steam towards them.
"You won't be needing this either kid," Murphy said to the unconscious teenager as he took out the inhaler from his jacket. Just then a idea struck him as to what sort of message to leave Captain Bridger when he and his rescue team got there.
Carl now picked up the kid's limp body at Murphy's request and the four of them prepared to leave their temporary hide out in search of a much more secluded hiding place. The place Murphy had in store was totally different. He was sure that the SeaQuest wouldn't find that place no matter how hard they tried.
Ten minutes after the hour Commander Ford said it would take to get there, the SeaQuest came to the place they knew Lucas was being held. At some point they had lost the signal from the Pal Communicator but Bridger assumed that was because it got wet as the water level in the room rose.
Bridger of course made sure that he was part of the final number to go in for the rescue. Doctor Kristen Westphalen also accompanied them in case her medical skills were needed for the teenager. Ben was part of the team as was Miguel. Tim O'Neill and Commander Ford opted to stay behind in case they were needed in another capacity.
It took a couple of minutes once inside the derelict building to find the room they thought might be the one to hold Lucas. They had already tried a couple of rooms higher up in the building but had been disappointed to find them empty and falling apart around them.
As they went further into the building, they came to a door that seemed to lead to a room lower than the others in the building. Hence the threat of being inundated by the surge of tidal waters.
Ben and a couple of the rescue team now began trying to batter down the door with renewed vigour and hope that Lucas might be on the other side.
Finally the door's hinges gave way to the constant hammering and the door fell open to reveal the room the crew had seen on the video tape. It was definitely the right room. From where they stood at the top of the stairs, they could see the barred window they had identified on the tape.
They could also see the stone slab Lucas had been forced to use as a bed during his time of captivity. The sight that made their hearts drop though was that the chain and shackle were hanging down from the wall with no sign of Lucas anywhere.
No matter which corner of the room they scanned, there was no sign of the kidnappers or the missing teenager they had come to rescue.
Bridger stopped when he saw something laying on the floor in the middle of the room. He hurried down the stairs and knelt in front of the pile of what looked like broken pieces of something.
To add to his sense of helplessness in finding and rescuing Lucas, he could see that the broken pieces had once belonged to the Pal Communicator . He picked up a second piece of broken plastic and quickly saw to his horror that it had once made up Lucas's asthma inhaler. Now it was broken in to four of five pieces like a jig saw puzzle.
Lucas was now somewhere in the hands of people who were ruthless enough to leaved him without his necessary medication.
The other crew members stood by with fear and anger also written across their faces but they couldn't find the words to make this scene seem any better.
"Damn it," Bridger shouted out loud and hurled the small broken piece of plastic across the other side of the room.
TO BE CONTINUED...............
Hi folks, updated again - I reposted the first part of the last chapter with this part because I thought it helped the story flow better.
As to what is going to happen at the end .... well the votes are in but I am not telling you just yet....... I think I have found a way to incorporate most people's ideas and suggestions.
I always loved the episode with the dome filling up with water - just wished something more would have happened in that one. That's what gave me the idea for this - it wasn't hard to guess what I was going to do with the water.
Sorry but some time is going to have to be put into my other fandom - time to go and do some Joe hurt scenes or Jules is going to be hunted down by a posse of angry readers.
Nearly finished this story.........
JULES
