Author's Blabbing: Thank you so much to those who have reviewed!!! Both old
ones and newbies! It makes me so happy that people could care as much about
this story as I do. Chapter 21 will be along shortly probably next week or
just after. Things are beginning to thicken!!! Heheehehehe!!! Oh and I hope
Elizabeth isn't reverting into a Mary-Sue, please be brutally honest and
tell me if she is... but umm give me reasons and just not blatant flame cause
otherwise I won't be able to fix it! Oh and you may have noticed that the
chapter title for 18 changed. Yes the newer one is far less corny and has
far more meaning, if you want to know why just check out a song entitled
"If you're not the one" by Daniel Beddingfield, than if you truly get Will
and Lizzie you'll know why I did what I did!!! Hehehe, anyway on to the
story!!!
*****
Will saw Elizabeth's hesitation and was instantly worried. He knew he should have pushed harder for her to go first, should have put up a fight, but he figured she would have just pushed him to go ahead even more. He honestly could have stabbed himself for his stupidity now, for Elizabeth was petrified, frozen on the ledge and he thought of no way he could reach her. But he still had to try.
"Elizabeth!" He called to her across the way. Her spell was momentarily broken and she looked up at him with sheer terror in her eyes, Will had to distract her from the fall long enough to give her courage. "Look at me!"
"I am looking at you!" Elizabeth's voice was high-pitched and filled with tension and fear. Will had to do something fast.
"Put you legs over the rope," he commanded urgently, they had precious little time before the agents were going to break through the glass. He saw the large ugly one had picked up a chair and was now smashing it against the door furiously. Already tiny cracks were spider-webbing to form larger, weaker ones. Will estimated that they had little over a minute before they would be able to crash through the door. "Elizabeth we need to hurry!" He added as an afterthought.
"I can't do it!" Elizabeth said as she tried tentatively to pick on foot off the balcony before replacing it firmly after it had gained no more than two inches of height. She began to shake and Will could almost feel her fear as she stood tottering on the ledge.
Will knew that Elizabeth could do this, had seen the courage in her before, he just had to instill in her, the faith that he had in her abilities. "Elizabeth you can do this, I know you can! Please before they break through, you have to get over here!" Will was becoming more anxious as he saw small pieces of glass break from the door and scatter over the balcony.
He saw Elizabeth glance back at the door, and felt her fear double as she saw the agents beginning to crash through. She looked back at him now and he could see the inner struggle as she attempted to push down her fears. Will didn't know if it was his faith or her realization that the agents were horrendously close, but he could have leapt for joy as he watched her shake the remainder of her fear and grasp the rope firmly. As nimble as a kitten she leapt into the air and prepared to wrap both legs around the rope, but the agility of her take off didn't transfer into the landing and as she brought her legs together Will saw the door finally give way as it smashed under the pressure.
The noise was tremendous as shattered glass flew threw the air, and Will's heart stopped as he watched Elizabeth's legs slip and come crashing down to the railing. As if in slow motion he watched as her feet slid out from under her, sending her sliding over the side. At that moment he lost track of everything except the thought of her falling through the darkness while he failed to protect her. It was only when she was able to grab the side of the railing, preventing her from being lost to oblivion that Will began to breathe again. But her legs were now dangling in mid-air and all that prevented her from the fall was the strength of her arms, which Will knew, since being injured were rapidly failing.
"Elizabeth!" his voice tore at the darkness as if commanding it to leave him, but his voice had no authority and now Elizabeth was trapped with that horrendous brute Stam advancing on her and he was powerless to stop it.
"Well isn't this fun!" The horrendous brute said as she stood over Elizabeth, mockingly.
"Get away from me you ugly puss-oozing tyrant!" Will heard Elizabeth call out indignantly as she struggled to regain footing.
Will watched as the agent grabbed Elizabeth's hands and began to shake her around like a rag doll. Elizabeth began shrieking and trying desperately to hold onto the railing, and Will was filled with a wrath he had seldom felt before. There the agent stood, hurting the woman he loved, disrespecting, terrifying and harassing her, Will would not stand for it, not now, not ever.
Unsheathing his sword he called to the brute and prepared to attack. "Excuse me, but I must protest and ask that you cease your actions this instant if you do not wish to face a horrid and brutal death." Will yelled across the alley.
The brutish Stam looked condescendingly at Will before leaving Elizabeth to struggle on her own. "What did you say Pretty Boy?" She said with a slur of hatred and disgust.
"I knew you lacked the intellect to understand my statement," Will said. "I said get away from Elizabeth or I'll skewer you like the pig you are!"
Stam chortled with evil mirth, it was like watching the convulsions of a dying cow and Will was thoroughly disgusted. "Oh yeah Pretty Boy!! What are you going to do!? Throw your sword at me!" Again she chortled and Will cringed with revulsion.
Now it was Elizabeth's turn to chortle, and to Will it was ringing bells in comparison. She had regained footing and was now standing on the bottom of the balcony railing. "You really haven't seen the movie have you!" She snickered again before being silenced by a backhand from Stam, which sent her flying and left her dangling from the railing once more.
For Will that was the final straw, his rising anger burst forth. "Close your eyes Elizabeth, I don't want you to see this," Will spoke with such ferocity that even Stam was taken aback, momentarily stopping her pursuit of Elizabeth to look up at Will with shock in her face.
"My eyes are closed Will!" Elizabeth called back.
Will let his anger go in a flourish of movement, he threw up his sword and caught the hilt in his upturned hand. Than using more force and precision than anything the repugnant and disgusting Stam could fathom he threw the sword over twenty feet, sending it straight through her oversized and foul gut.
It took a moment for the brutish agent to realize what had happened, and then slowly she looked down at the sword that went clear in one end and out the other. The pain registered first as she let out a howl that roused the deepest sleep of any animal within five hundred meters in any direction. It was filled with loathing and disbelief. After the initial outburst however, she remained silent and looked first at Elizabeth and then at Will, with sheer hatred. Slowly she pulled out her gun and aimed it level with Will's head.
Elizabeth was the first to notice, "Will She's got her gun! I don't think she means to listen to the General's orders anymore. Get out of here!" She screamed across the alley.
Will was frozen, he knew that any sudden movement would cause the bull to fire, and knew that he wasn't about to leave Elizabeth hanging from a balcony. He stared at his death head on, prepared to face it.
A shoot rang out, Elizabeth screamed and Will screwed his eyes shut, prepared for death. It wasn't until Elizabeth tore the night with another scream that he opened his eyes, staring at disbelief at the scene before him and then tearing the night with his own cry.
"Nooooo!!!!" He said as he watched The General push Stam, who had been shot in the back of the head, off the balcony tumbling right over Elizabeth and losing her grip on the railing. For a split second that seemed like an eon she fell into the blackness and then was caught, by the collar of her jacket by General Grippa who was now seething with anger.
"You made me kill my best agent Elizabeth," he said through gritted teeth. "Don't make me kill my best analyst too."
"Stop!" Will yelled across the way.
The General looked up as though he'd just remembered Will was there. The look in his eye told Will that he intended to use his new 'leverage'. "Listen here," the General said with malice on his tongue. "If you don't want Elizabeth to end up a smear on the pavement like Stam, I'd suggest you make your way back over here." He finished coolly.
"Don't listen to him!" Elizabeth screamed as she hung dangling from his arm like a helpless puppet. "Get out of here Will, go see my Jack Sparrow! If the General gets you it's all for naught, RUN!"
Will knew that Elizabeth wanted him to run, wanted to give her life to save his, but he couldn't let her do it. Yet neither was he resigned to the thought of losing her to the General. He was paralyzed with indecisiveness and the visual fear tipped the General off.
"Will you're a reasonable man, and I'm sure you care about Elizabeth very much," The General's tone had reverted back to the slick smoothness it was before.
"Don't listen to him!" Elizabeth yelled again.
"Please Will I already have agents climbing the building, you won't get five feet from there without being tackled to the ground. So you can come quietly over now, and spare Elizabeth, or you can be a hero and get tackled five seconds after she falls to her death, it's your choice,"
Will wouldn't let her come to harm, not while he could prevent it. Hanging his head in shame he made his way slowly across the line.
*****
Elizabeth saw Will coming back and glared up at the General. "You slime, you stink, I don't even have words in my vocabulary to express the loathing I have for you."
"Elizabeth you really should learn to relax," The General whispered down at her. "That way you could enjoy your last moments with Will instead of wasting them."
That statement cowed Elizabeth immensely. Something wasn't right she could feel it. Elizabeth glanced up at the General, who was staring down with that same, far-off disappointed look in his face. "You really would have made it far Elizabeth." Elizabeth could feel the grip of the general's hand on her jacket loosen and she dropped a few centimeters. Will was now just a foot and a half away, oblivious to the General's deception.
And Elizabeth was too late to call out, she knew it was coming and was powerless to stop it. Though it only took a second, it seemed to Elizabeth that hours passed by as she slowly felt the general's grip slip and tried to yell out to Will. The only thing she was able to squeak out was a yelp as she felt the cold wind envelope her.
Down into the blackness she fell, looking up to take one last glance at Will, it was funny, almost surreal, knowing she was going to die. In her head she imagined Will would swoop out and catch her like a hero would, and that together they would escape into the night and live happily ever after. She knew she must have been close to death, because she could swear that Will actually was coming down to save her, the light glinting off of a knife in his hand which he had used to cut the rope, the General yelling furiously for the men who had come up from the street to race down again. It was almost nice to think that her last thoughts would be of Will and his heroism.
But those weren't her last thoughts, she had many more, as Will finally caught up and came crashing into her. Together they swooped down on the clothesline to the alley floor, crashing on top of one another with the jolt. It was then that Elizabeth had most of her thoughts, with Will on top of her and his face not half an inch from hers. But those thoughts were ended quickly as he pulled her to her feet, suddenly snapping her back to reality.
"Thanks for catching me!" she said a little breathlessly, after all she had just been dropped three stories, caught by a Pirate and then had him flung on top of her. "I thought for a second you were some angel coming to get me!"
Will smiled slightly. "Well there might have been if I hadn't figured that the General most likely wasn't one to be trusted."
Suddenly a group of agents burst around the corner, interrupting an otherwise tender and playful moment. Will looked to Elizabeth and then walked over to the body of Stam and pulled out his sword as if ready to make a final stand, but Elizabeth had a better idea. She grabbed Will's hand and ran toward the agents. They hadn't expected this exactly so were stunned momentarily as the two ran past. The moment didn't last long however and soon the agents were tearing after Will and Elizabeth, the distance between them closing rapidly.
But they failed to recognize one thing, Elizabeth had spent all of the time since she was employed by the government, well over seven years, searching and hiding out in shops and tunnels in her neighborhood, one tended to do that with government organizations running your salary. She had known of an abandoned building in the area that had an emergency passage to the other side of the street. It was here she took Will, tuning a corner suddenly and then shoving him into the doorway. She dragged him to an old closet and shoved him in, shutting the door and placing a hand over his mouth. They were very close now, as the closet held little room for movement. Elizabeth's heart was pounding from more than the stress of running and hiding from government officials, she didn't know what to do with Will now. Was it ok for her to stay with him now, because her life was forfeit anyway?
She didn't have much time to contemplate as she heard the agents enter the building. Slowly she moved her hand up the wall behind Will, looking for the seam in it. As if guessing what she was doing, Will shifted noiselessly in her arms and began feeling along the wall as well. The agents were getting closer, and just as Elizabeth thought her plan had failed, Will found the seam and slowly pushed the trapdoor open. She followed it through and shut the door, cutting off what little light remained leaving both of them groping their way through the darkness.
"Do you think the agents know about this tunnel?" Will whispered in the darkness.
"I don't know," Elizabeth said moving in front of him. She didn't, and she was worried that all of this was for nothing and they'd emerge from the tunnel only to be greeted by dozens more agents a lot more grumpy than before.
"Where will this take us?" Will asked innocently.
"The tunnel runs for about a mile," Elizabeth started. "Before coming out in the basement of a run down Chinese restaurant," she chuckled slightly despite the tension of the situation. "They actually make killer Egg-foo- yun and I could defiantly use some of that right now."
"One more question," Will said silently, as if searching for some sound that was inaudible previously. "How did you find out about this tunnel?"
Elizabeth thought for a moment, she had known about this one for some time, shortly after her parents had died Bradford had called her... at that she paused. Bradford knew about the tunnel! If Bradford was connected to Elizabeth he would be forced to tell the General about Elizabeth's whereabouts! He may already have been captured by the General and made to give up the information, he may be in danger, might even be dead.
The sobriety of the thought stopped Elizabeth, and Will, unseeing bumped into her from behind. "Bradford showed me." She whispered.
"And do you think that he would give up our location?" Will asked.
"I hope not, I guess we'll just have to wait and see." Elizabeth shuddered at the thought of Bradford at the hands of the General, the thought of his betrayal hadn't even crossed her mind.
But it should have, as suddenly a voice was heard in front of them in the passage. "Elizabeth!"
Will was immediately suspicious, drawing his sword and trying to move in front of Elizabeth. But Elizabeth knew the voice and trusted it, she moved forward to find Bradford without hesitation, glad of a friend in the darkness.
"Bradford!" She called back, glad that he wasn't somewhere being tortured by the General. "You need to get out of here, the General knows! We have to escape!" She groped along the sides of the tunnels heading toward his voice, while Will protested in the background.
"I know, I came to warn you, but I saw the General going into the building, I figured you'd use this escape. Is Will with you?" Bradford's voice was calming to Elizabeth, he was somebody who had the capability to hide her and Will, could take them to safety while they waited out the storm.
"Good, good, can you get us out of here?" She had found him in the darkness and was holding onto him tightly.
"Elizabeth?" Will called out into the darkness. Elizabeth was so elated that she'd almost forgotten Will was still behind her. Frantically she went back and found him, half dragging him up to Bradford. "I don't think we should trust him Elizabeth, he never calls you by your full name, something's amiss," Will whispered as she pulled him along.
To Elizabeth it was nonsense, Bradford would never betray her, he was her friend. She was about to tell Will to stop worrying when she felt his grasp slip from her fingers. She reached out to grab hold once more, but her fingers felt nothing but the blackness before her. She became frantic, she swung her hands to all sides and began to pace back and forth.
"Will!" She called into the darkness. "Bradford! Where'd you go!?" She refused to take account of what happened. She wasn't betrayed, they were playing a joke, Bradford hadn't taken Will, she was just paranoid. She was perfectly fine.
Than a pair of strong arms enwrapped her from behind and a bitter smelling cloth was put over her mouth. She was surprised and so breathed in fully the noxious fumes on the cloth, sending her reeling. The arms tightened their grip as she slipped from blackness to blackness, she heard Bradford's voice whispering somewhere far above her.
"Sorry Elizabeth, it was the only way." His voice sounded as though it came from fifty different places.
She had been betrayed, a second time.
*****
Will saw Elizabeth's hesitation and was instantly worried. He knew he should have pushed harder for her to go first, should have put up a fight, but he figured she would have just pushed him to go ahead even more. He honestly could have stabbed himself for his stupidity now, for Elizabeth was petrified, frozen on the ledge and he thought of no way he could reach her. But he still had to try.
"Elizabeth!" He called to her across the way. Her spell was momentarily broken and she looked up at him with sheer terror in her eyes, Will had to distract her from the fall long enough to give her courage. "Look at me!"
"I am looking at you!" Elizabeth's voice was high-pitched and filled with tension and fear. Will had to do something fast.
"Put you legs over the rope," he commanded urgently, they had precious little time before the agents were going to break through the glass. He saw the large ugly one had picked up a chair and was now smashing it against the door furiously. Already tiny cracks were spider-webbing to form larger, weaker ones. Will estimated that they had little over a minute before they would be able to crash through the door. "Elizabeth we need to hurry!" He added as an afterthought.
"I can't do it!" Elizabeth said as she tried tentatively to pick on foot off the balcony before replacing it firmly after it had gained no more than two inches of height. She began to shake and Will could almost feel her fear as she stood tottering on the ledge.
Will knew that Elizabeth could do this, had seen the courage in her before, he just had to instill in her, the faith that he had in her abilities. "Elizabeth you can do this, I know you can! Please before they break through, you have to get over here!" Will was becoming more anxious as he saw small pieces of glass break from the door and scatter over the balcony.
He saw Elizabeth glance back at the door, and felt her fear double as she saw the agents beginning to crash through. She looked back at him now and he could see the inner struggle as she attempted to push down her fears. Will didn't know if it was his faith or her realization that the agents were horrendously close, but he could have leapt for joy as he watched her shake the remainder of her fear and grasp the rope firmly. As nimble as a kitten she leapt into the air and prepared to wrap both legs around the rope, but the agility of her take off didn't transfer into the landing and as she brought her legs together Will saw the door finally give way as it smashed under the pressure.
The noise was tremendous as shattered glass flew threw the air, and Will's heart stopped as he watched Elizabeth's legs slip and come crashing down to the railing. As if in slow motion he watched as her feet slid out from under her, sending her sliding over the side. At that moment he lost track of everything except the thought of her falling through the darkness while he failed to protect her. It was only when she was able to grab the side of the railing, preventing her from being lost to oblivion that Will began to breathe again. But her legs were now dangling in mid-air and all that prevented her from the fall was the strength of her arms, which Will knew, since being injured were rapidly failing.
"Elizabeth!" his voice tore at the darkness as if commanding it to leave him, but his voice had no authority and now Elizabeth was trapped with that horrendous brute Stam advancing on her and he was powerless to stop it.
"Well isn't this fun!" The horrendous brute said as she stood over Elizabeth, mockingly.
"Get away from me you ugly puss-oozing tyrant!" Will heard Elizabeth call out indignantly as she struggled to regain footing.
Will watched as the agent grabbed Elizabeth's hands and began to shake her around like a rag doll. Elizabeth began shrieking and trying desperately to hold onto the railing, and Will was filled with a wrath he had seldom felt before. There the agent stood, hurting the woman he loved, disrespecting, terrifying and harassing her, Will would not stand for it, not now, not ever.
Unsheathing his sword he called to the brute and prepared to attack. "Excuse me, but I must protest and ask that you cease your actions this instant if you do not wish to face a horrid and brutal death." Will yelled across the alley.
The brutish Stam looked condescendingly at Will before leaving Elizabeth to struggle on her own. "What did you say Pretty Boy?" She said with a slur of hatred and disgust.
"I knew you lacked the intellect to understand my statement," Will said. "I said get away from Elizabeth or I'll skewer you like the pig you are!"
Stam chortled with evil mirth, it was like watching the convulsions of a dying cow and Will was thoroughly disgusted. "Oh yeah Pretty Boy!! What are you going to do!? Throw your sword at me!" Again she chortled and Will cringed with revulsion.
Now it was Elizabeth's turn to chortle, and to Will it was ringing bells in comparison. She had regained footing and was now standing on the bottom of the balcony railing. "You really haven't seen the movie have you!" She snickered again before being silenced by a backhand from Stam, which sent her flying and left her dangling from the railing once more.
For Will that was the final straw, his rising anger burst forth. "Close your eyes Elizabeth, I don't want you to see this," Will spoke with such ferocity that even Stam was taken aback, momentarily stopping her pursuit of Elizabeth to look up at Will with shock in her face.
"My eyes are closed Will!" Elizabeth called back.
Will let his anger go in a flourish of movement, he threw up his sword and caught the hilt in his upturned hand. Than using more force and precision than anything the repugnant and disgusting Stam could fathom he threw the sword over twenty feet, sending it straight through her oversized and foul gut.
It took a moment for the brutish agent to realize what had happened, and then slowly she looked down at the sword that went clear in one end and out the other. The pain registered first as she let out a howl that roused the deepest sleep of any animal within five hundred meters in any direction. It was filled with loathing and disbelief. After the initial outburst however, she remained silent and looked first at Elizabeth and then at Will, with sheer hatred. Slowly she pulled out her gun and aimed it level with Will's head.
Elizabeth was the first to notice, "Will She's got her gun! I don't think she means to listen to the General's orders anymore. Get out of here!" She screamed across the alley.
Will was frozen, he knew that any sudden movement would cause the bull to fire, and knew that he wasn't about to leave Elizabeth hanging from a balcony. He stared at his death head on, prepared to face it.
A shoot rang out, Elizabeth screamed and Will screwed his eyes shut, prepared for death. It wasn't until Elizabeth tore the night with another scream that he opened his eyes, staring at disbelief at the scene before him and then tearing the night with his own cry.
"Nooooo!!!!" He said as he watched The General push Stam, who had been shot in the back of the head, off the balcony tumbling right over Elizabeth and losing her grip on the railing. For a split second that seemed like an eon she fell into the blackness and then was caught, by the collar of her jacket by General Grippa who was now seething with anger.
"You made me kill my best agent Elizabeth," he said through gritted teeth. "Don't make me kill my best analyst too."
"Stop!" Will yelled across the way.
The General looked up as though he'd just remembered Will was there. The look in his eye told Will that he intended to use his new 'leverage'. "Listen here," the General said with malice on his tongue. "If you don't want Elizabeth to end up a smear on the pavement like Stam, I'd suggest you make your way back over here." He finished coolly.
"Don't listen to him!" Elizabeth screamed as she hung dangling from his arm like a helpless puppet. "Get out of here Will, go see my Jack Sparrow! If the General gets you it's all for naught, RUN!"
Will knew that Elizabeth wanted him to run, wanted to give her life to save his, but he couldn't let her do it. Yet neither was he resigned to the thought of losing her to the General. He was paralyzed with indecisiveness and the visual fear tipped the General off.
"Will you're a reasonable man, and I'm sure you care about Elizabeth very much," The General's tone had reverted back to the slick smoothness it was before.
"Don't listen to him!" Elizabeth yelled again.
"Please Will I already have agents climbing the building, you won't get five feet from there without being tackled to the ground. So you can come quietly over now, and spare Elizabeth, or you can be a hero and get tackled five seconds after she falls to her death, it's your choice,"
Will wouldn't let her come to harm, not while he could prevent it. Hanging his head in shame he made his way slowly across the line.
*****
Elizabeth saw Will coming back and glared up at the General. "You slime, you stink, I don't even have words in my vocabulary to express the loathing I have for you."
"Elizabeth you really should learn to relax," The General whispered down at her. "That way you could enjoy your last moments with Will instead of wasting them."
That statement cowed Elizabeth immensely. Something wasn't right she could feel it. Elizabeth glanced up at the General, who was staring down with that same, far-off disappointed look in his face. "You really would have made it far Elizabeth." Elizabeth could feel the grip of the general's hand on her jacket loosen and she dropped a few centimeters. Will was now just a foot and a half away, oblivious to the General's deception.
And Elizabeth was too late to call out, she knew it was coming and was powerless to stop it. Though it only took a second, it seemed to Elizabeth that hours passed by as she slowly felt the general's grip slip and tried to yell out to Will. The only thing she was able to squeak out was a yelp as she felt the cold wind envelope her.
Down into the blackness she fell, looking up to take one last glance at Will, it was funny, almost surreal, knowing she was going to die. In her head she imagined Will would swoop out and catch her like a hero would, and that together they would escape into the night and live happily ever after. She knew she must have been close to death, because she could swear that Will actually was coming down to save her, the light glinting off of a knife in his hand which he had used to cut the rope, the General yelling furiously for the men who had come up from the street to race down again. It was almost nice to think that her last thoughts would be of Will and his heroism.
But those weren't her last thoughts, she had many more, as Will finally caught up and came crashing into her. Together they swooped down on the clothesline to the alley floor, crashing on top of one another with the jolt. It was then that Elizabeth had most of her thoughts, with Will on top of her and his face not half an inch from hers. But those thoughts were ended quickly as he pulled her to her feet, suddenly snapping her back to reality.
"Thanks for catching me!" she said a little breathlessly, after all she had just been dropped three stories, caught by a Pirate and then had him flung on top of her. "I thought for a second you were some angel coming to get me!"
Will smiled slightly. "Well there might have been if I hadn't figured that the General most likely wasn't one to be trusted."
Suddenly a group of agents burst around the corner, interrupting an otherwise tender and playful moment. Will looked to Elizabeth and then walked over to the body of Stam and pulled out his sword as if ready to make a final stand, but Elizabeth had a better idea. She grabbed Will's hand and ran toward the agents. They hadn't expected this exactly so were stunned momentarily as the two ran past. The moment didn't last long however and soon the agents were tearing after Will and Elizabeth, the distance between them closing rapidly.
But they failed to recognize one thing, Elizabeth had spent all of the time since she was employed by the government, well over seven years, searching and hiding out in shops and tunnels in her neighborhood, one tended to do that with government organizations running your salary. She had known of an abandoned building in the area that had an emergency passage to the other side of the street. It was here she took Will, tuning a corner suddenly and then shoving him into the doorway. She dragged him to an old closet and shoved him in, shutting the door and placing a hand over his mouth. They were very close now, as the closet held little room for movement. Elizabeth's heart was pounding from more than the stress of running and hiding from government officials, she didn't know what to do with Will now. Was it ok for her to stay with him now, because her life was forfeit anyway?
She didn't have much time to contemplate as she heard the agents enter the building. Slowly she moved her hand up the wall behind Will, looking for the seam in it. As if guessing what she was doing, Will shifted noiselessly in her arms and began feeling along the wall as well. The agents were getting closer, and just as Elizabeth thought her plan had failed, Will found the seam and slowly pushed the trapdoor open. She followed it through and shut the door, cutting off what little light remained leaving both of them groping their way through the darkness.
"Do you think the agents know about this tunnel?" Will whispered in the darkness.
"I don't know," Elizabeth said moving in front of him. She didn't, and she was worried that all of this was for nothing and they'd emerge from the tunnel only to be greeted by dozens more agents a lot more grumpy than before.
"Where will this take us?" Will asked innocently.
"The tunnel runs for about a mile," Elizabeth started. "Before coming out in the basement of a run down Chinese restaurant," she chuckled slightly despite the tension of the situation. "They actually make killer Egg-foo- yun and I could defiantly use some of that right now."
"One more question," Will said silently, as if searching for some sound that was inaudible previously. "How did you find out about this tunnel?"
Elizabeth thought for a moment, she had known about this one for some time, shortly after her parents had died Bradford had called her... at that she paused. Bradford knew about the tunnel! If Bradford was connected to Elizabeth he would be forced to tell the General about Elizabeth's whereabouts! He may already have been captured by the General and made to give up the information, he may be in danger, might even be dead.
The sobriety of the thought stopped Elizabeth, and Will, unseeing bumped into her from behind. "Bradford showed me." She whispered.
"And do you think that he would give up our location?" Will asked.
"I hope not, I guess we'll just have to wait and see." Elizabeth shuddered at the thought of Bradford at the hands of the General, the thought of his betrayal hadn't even crossed her mind.
But it should have, as suddenly a voice was heard in front of them in the passage. "Elizabeth!"
Will was immediately suspicious, drawing his sword and trying to move in front of Elizabeth. But Elizabeth knew the voice and trusted it, she moved forward to find Bradford without hesitation, glad of a friend in the darkness.
"Bradford!" She called back, glad that he wasn't somewhere being tortured by the General. "You need to get out of here, the General knows! We have to escape!" She groped along the sides of the tunnels heading toward his voice, while Will protested in the background.
"I know, I came to warn you, but I saw the General going into the building, I figured you'd use this escape. Is Will with you?" Bradford's voice was calming to Elizabeth, he was somebody who had the capability to hide her and Will, could take them to safety while they waited out the storm.
"Good, good, can you get us out of here?" She had found him in the darkness and was holding onto him tightly.
"Elizabeth?" Will called out into the darkness. Elizabeth was so elated that she'd almost forgotten Will was still behind her. Frantically she went back and found him, half dragging him up to Bradford. "I don't think we should trust him Elizabeth, he never calls you by your full name, something's amiss," Will whispered as she pulled him along.
To Elizabeth it was nonsense, Bradford would never betray her, he was her friend. She was about to tell Will to stop worrying when she felt his grasp slip from her fingers. She reached out to grab hold once more, but her fingers felt nothing but the blackness before her. She became frantic, she swung her hands to all sides and began to pace back and forth.
"Will!" She called into the darkness. "Bradford! Where'd you go!?" She refused to take account of what happened. She wasn't betrayed, they were playing a joke, Bradford hadn't taken Will, she was just paranoid. She was perfectly fine.
Than a pair of strong arms enwrapped her from behind and a bitter smelling cloth was put over her mouth. She was surprised and so breathed in fully the noxious fumes on the cloth, sending her reeling. The arms tightened their grip as she slipped from blackness to blackness, she heard Bradford's voice whispering somewhere far above her.
"Sorry Elizabeth, it was the only way." His voice sounded as though it came from fifty different places.
She had been betrayed, a second time.