Part Three: The Search
Author's Note: This chapter has scenes of torture that some may find disturbing. There is nothing graphic, I don't think, but I would find it personally painful to watch - hence the warning.
Ron had been sitting around the table joking with everyone in the aftermath of their meal. The conversation was occasionally peppered with comments that Steve had made into his earpiece. Everyone laughed along, glad that the agent was sharing the words with them.
Suddenly Ron jerked, then jumped up from his chair. He raised a hand in an attempt to shush everyone. The room fell into an immediate and complete silence as he pressed a hand to his earpiece, trying to hear what was coming from the other end of the connection. No one dared make a sound, or even a movement, hanging onto Ron's every flickering expression.
As he turned and headed suddenly from the room, Mark moved from his seat and followed. Panic flooded his system. "Ron . . . . what happened? What did you hear?"
Ron shot a look over his shoulder as he continued on to the spare bedroom that housed the surveillance setup. "Something's happened." He raised a hand to halt Mark's next question as he entered the room and addressed the agent sitting before three laptop computers. "Did you get it?"
"Some." The agent had pulled a set of headphones half off of his head and was adjusting his equipment in apparent anticipation of Ron's next request. Words shot between them in rapid-fire succession.
"Com Net?"
"Gone."
"Visual?"
"Jammed."
"Ear piece audio?"
"That's all."
Ron swore viciously. "Play back audio."
The surveillance agent pointed the mouse toward a box on the screen and clicked the button. There were sounds of something being tapped against porcelain with running water in the background. The water was shut off, and Mark had clear imagery in his mind of his son's nightly ritual.
There was silence for several seconds, then a soft grunt before Steve's voice, in a whispered tone, echoed around the room. "You're going to owe me big time, Wagner."
"This is where we lost Com Net and visual," the tech agent spoke quietly against the other sounds coming from Steve's location. At that point, Mark noted that several of the smaller windows on his laptop went dark with the words "searching . . . " flashing in their corners.
His attention was quickly drawn away from the blank screens as a hollow wooden thunk echoed around the room, followed by a sudden loud crash and an "oof!" of a body hitting the floor. Mark startled at the unexpectedness of it, though he had known that something bad was going to happen. Before he could emotionally separate himself, other sounds came; unidentifiable scrabbling noises, then the unsettling sound of flesh pounding into flesh, followed immediately by a loud ricocheting clank that again sent a bolt of adrenaline through him, causing him to jump.
What followed seemed to be another punch. Though it seemed more distant, each was a sharp stab to his heart as he knew who was on the receiving end of such treatment. Mark's ears registered the loud bony thump that followed, seeming as if something had fallen atop the audio source. Then the scrabbling sound as if the microphone was being dragged across the floor, and then harshly resounding of flesh against flesh again. This time the impact was accompanied by an audible sigh of surrender.
That heavy thump that could only indicate a body being dropped to the floor coincided with Mark's heart tumbling to the level of his toes. Though he was sure that he couldn't take much more, he continued to listen to the dragging noises that followed until they were interrupted by a gentle bump. There was a soft slapping and then the dragging continued and faded into the distance. Then there was silence.
Mark turned toward Ron in utter shock. The other man was on a cell phone, talking quietly on the opposite side of the room. He hung up, his expression telling the story before he even began to speak. "He's been taken." He seemed to be having a hard time meeting Mark's eyes as he confirmed that horrible truth. "We have a team mobilizing at the site. It's a . . . house a few miles away. We'll find him, Mark. I promise you that."
Mark looked numbly at the agent. "You can't promise me anything."
Something flickered beneath the surface before Ron shoved his phone back into his pocket and headed toward the door. "We're going to do everything we can. I've got to go to the site."
"I'm going with you," Mark insisted, intending to follow. "I need to see the scene. I could --"
"No, Mark," Ron cut him off with an emphatic gesture. His voice gentled a little as he continued, "You can't. If you're seen anywhere near there it will arouse suspicions that could only make things worse for Steve and would completely blow our cover."
Mark wilted, forced to accept the possible truth of Ron's statement. There was nothing he could do. He hated the helpless feeling that settled over him, and was simply unable to accept that he would have to go on and do nothing in the search for his son. He listened only halfway when Ron turned toward Mikhail. He had nearly forgotten the other man was there.
"You have the panic button," Ron was saying. "I want you to hit it if anything, and I mean anything, out of the ordinary happens. Agent Macey here has my contact number. Call if anyone needs to speak with me."
"Video is coming back up," Agent Macey announced to no one in particular.
Alertness shot through Mark's body at the words. He looked sharply in Ron's direction.
"Please share the video and other data with Dr. Sloan," Ron told the agent, though his gaze never left Mark's. He then completed his exit.
Mark wasted no time in joining Agent Macey near his laptop. He quickly obeyed the younger man's instructions to sit before one of the many computers which had taken over nearly every available surface.
The tech clicked a number of keys on the keyboard and gave everyone a crash course in some of the commands that would cause the images to react in the way that they wanted. Mark listened distractedly, then settled in front of the chest of drawers, barely aware that the others were doing the same in front of their own monitors. He quietly began to observe the things that Steve had done just before the mission had gone horribly, horribly wrong.
~*~*~*~*~*
Steve awoke with a start, fight or flight reflexes on full alert. He found himself seated in a hard backed chair, icy water drenching him from head to foot. The dousing had to have been recent because he could feel the water as it ran from his hair and into eyes which struggled to focus in the absolute darkness. He instinctively tried to wipe it away, but found that his arms were tightly secured to the sides of the chair. His ankles, he discovered, were bound in a similar manner to the legs of the chair. He knew without checking that his gun was gone. Not that he would have been able to use it in his present situation, anyway.
Ignoring the pounding in his head, and the uncomfortable sensation of swelling on the left side of his face, he struggled to get himself under control. To get out of this situation he was going to have to think. And he wouldn't be able to do that if he allowed himself to fall into panic mode. Suddenly he heard a sound which competed with that of his still heavy breaths. He cocked his head to the side as he tried to identify it.
It was the gentle click of shoes moving across cement. They echoed hollowly, giving him the impression that they were in a large room of some kind. Maybe a warehouse. The footsteps moved closer in the darkness, coming to a stop just in front of him. Steve was certain that the foot falls belonged to a man. Silence descended. He could hear nothing except for the sounds of his own soft breaths as he breathed purposefully through his nose in an effort to prevent the other man from knowing of his anxiety.
He squinted into the darkness, trying to see something, anything, that might help him to get a better grasp of his situation. But the silence remained, and still the person who had come and stood before him did not move.
He wanted to speak up, ask what the person wanted, but he knew that this game was psychological. He couldn't know if they were aware that he was a decoy or not. He could feel that the bandages that Jess had placed were still present as they had only been made more itchy by the addition of water. Any words he spoke could tip his hand. After a time, the silence stretched, and Steve began to breathe more easily. His inhalations and exhalations were much more controlled. He could do nothing more than wait.
Suddenly, there was the sound of movement in the darkness. A red pin-point of light appeared and shown in his direction. Steve realized with growing panic that the target end of the dots were illuminated on his chest, just above the bandages. He'd barely breathed a sound of protest before he felt the slight sting of something sharp entering his body. The mild pain was followed immediately by the indescribable feeling of high voltage being forced through his muscles. He wanted to cry out, but he couldn't. He couldn't move or think as he was held captive to the power of his tormenter. And when it was over, he collapsed against the chair, his mind numbly battling the fear of what else might be in store for him.
He could do nothing as he heard the footsteps approaching and felt the probes being removed from his skin. He knew with sinking certainty that his captor was using a taser gun, and he also was aware, based upon the demonstrations that the LAPD had organized on the use of that devices that it would be a few minutes before he recovered. It had been the subject of much humor during the training sessions, but there had been nothing there to prepare him for this situation.
His worry intensified as he felt another prick on the surface of his skin. At first, his still reeling mind thought that it was another shock, then he began to feel a coolness spreading out from the site. He had been injected with something. The syringe was removed from his arm, and then the other occupant backed off. Sound ceased in the darkness, and Steve was forced to wait fearfully, wondering at the drug and whatever else might be in store for him.
His breathing was almost his own again when, without a word, the other individual reactivated the taser gun, sending the red dots in Steve's direction once again. The cycle started all over again, but this time, the sensations were far more intense as the voltage again invaded his system. It tore through his body, prohibiting any control over shaking that took him while the taser did its work.
When it was stopped, his head collapsed forward as his breaths left him with loud labor gasps. If not for the bindings holding him fast, he was sure he would have toppled out of the chair onto the cold, wet floor. Various muscles continued to twitch and burn as he remained helplessly bound, completely at the mercy of the man who seemed to have none. He couldn't move even as he heard him approaching, again removing the leads from his skin. Steve's worry grew as he realized that the sounds around him were becoming louder. The pounding of his heart seemed to thump roughly in his ears with discomfiting clarity, and his breathing seemed amplified. He had a sick feeling that due to the drug, things were about to get a lot worse. But he refused to give in, no matter what they did to him.
The man seemed unconcerned either way, as instead of moving back to his position in front of Steve, he began working at the detective's waist. It seemed as if he was connecting something. Steve remembered with a sinking feeling the other item that had been mentioned, but not demonstrated. The stun belt. A deep sense of dread invaded him, and he tried to struggle. But it was pointless. His muscles were simply not his own. He quietly began to panic.
~*~*~*~*~*
Mark had been staring at the tiny screen for hours, looking for some kind of clue as to what had happened to his son. There was video of the bedroom, and many of the other rooms of the house, but none of the bathroom that adjoined the room that Steve had occupied.
He couldn't find anything that indicated anyone else had entered the house aside from the three agents who were already present. But when the recovery team had arrived on scene it was discovered that all three of the agents had been incapacitated with some sort of gaseous substance. They had found that the method of delivery was a small, remotely activated canister fitted into a decorative piece near the table where the agents were playing cards.
The remains of the glasses that Steve had been wearing were found in the bathroom, the watch had been tossed onto the bed. A gun and an ankle holster had been discarded there as well. The agents who were handling outside surveillance had been taken out with the same type of gas as had been found in the house. The canister had been planted in the van's ventilation system. They hadn't seen a thing. As best the FBI could tell, his son had vanished without a trace.
But Mark couldn't, wouldn't give up. Forcing his eyes to focus, he reset the video and began to study it again. It was a scene he'd viewed dozens of times. Steve, as Mikhail, entered the kitchen behind another agent who watched him as he downed his placebo meds before he began to eat. Though the beard and the hair were all Mikhail Jener, the mannerisms were all Steve Sloan. Mark couldn't draw his eyes away as he watched him eat with his usual appetite until every morsel on his plate was gone.
As he watched, something tickled at the back of his mind. It was a vague memory and he struggled to pull it forth. He stood sharply upright when it hit. Everyone turned and looked in his direction at the sudden movement. The sounds of tapping keyboards stopped as they waited expectantly. It touched him to know that everyone was still crammed in the small room, searching for clues, including Mikhail.
Stepping around coffee cups, wires and laptops, he searched for the room's phone extension. Several pairs of glassy eyes blinked as they followed his frantic motions. "Phone," Mark said gruffly. "I need a phone."
Spurred into the action, the group began to search around among the explosion of the technology in the room. Seconds later, Mark accepted one from the tech who had gotten to his first. "I need to talk to Agent Wagner," he said.
"Hit star, then 2," the agent replied.
"Thanks," Mark grunted then pressed the appropriate buttons. When Ron answered almost immediately, he blurted, "I know who your mole is."