Chapter 17: Thank Goodness for Rusty Pipes and Broken Bones
August 13, 1986 9:00am
"Hey, Lee, look at what just came over the wire!" Francine shouted across the bullpen as Lee entered.
Lee looked up, circles readily apparent under his eyes. Francine, oblivious to her friend's current state, bounded over. "Look at this!" she proclaimed, excitement apparent in her voice.
Lee listlessly took the paper from her and glanced at it quickly. He looked up at her, the first signs of hope showing in his eyes. "Do you think this is it?" he asked quietly.
Francine shrugged her shoulders, "Well, since we haven't been able to locate your contact, we can't be sure. But it seems like it could be it, right? At least it's a lead."
Lee smiled slightly, "And at least it's something for me to do." With that he grabbed the paper and left the bullpen.
August 13, 1986 9:23am
Amanda looked up at Cobra trying not to show the fear she was feeling, but she could feel the pressure of the tears behind her eyes.
"Tell me what you know!" he yelled as his fist came down and made solid contact with her stomache. Amanda groaned and tried to roll away, but was tied too tightly to the pipe.
With one final kick, Cobra stormed out, glancing behind him to add in a cold tone, "Sooner or later you will talk. I have no problem waiting," before slamming the door behind him.
August 13, 1986 9:31am
Putting the best smile he could manage on his face, Lee approached Eddie. Looking up from his juice, Eddie caught Lee's eyes and smiled. "Join me for breakfast?" he asked.
Lee sat down opposite him and handed him the paper Francine had given him. "Know anything about this?" he asked.
"Why you want to know?" Eddie asked, concern on his face.
"Since when do you care?" Lee countered, placing his credit card on the bill sitting in front of Eddie.
"I heard some things… Some things I don't like. That's all."
"Like what?" Lee asked, feeling his pulse speed up a little.
"Listen, Lee, this ain't nice people who are dealing with this," Eddie said.
Lee laughed. "Are they less nice than normal?"
"They got a woman this time. And from what I heard she's not an agent."
Lee sighed, running his hand through his hair. "She's a friend of mine," he said softly.
Eddie laughed, "Like me? Maybe it ain't as bad as I thought."
Lee looked up and this time the pain was clear in his eyes, "No, a friend from when I was a kid. She has two little boys."
Eddie whistled, "Wow! Lucky them, huh?"
"What do they want?" Lee asked.
"Well, more information. The stuff they got was good, but they want more."
"So this is true?" Lee asked, "They know the locations of our testing grounds in the US for biological warfare?"
"Good stuff, as I said. But now they want names."
"Amanda doesn't have any names," Lee sighed, "She only helps out part time. And even I don't have any names; this wasn't a case of ours."
"Well, buddy, the problem here is that Cobra thinks she does. And Cobra is not a nice guy."
"Where is she?" Lee asked, his eyes widening.
"That I don't know.
August 20, 1986 4:32pm
Amanda groaned as she woke up. She wasn't sure what day it was or how long she'd been in Cobra's care, if you could call it care. What she did know was that he wanted something from her that she did not have. She wasn't even sure what it was. Every morning he'd come in, deliver her some oatmeal and laugh as she tried to eat it with her arms tied, stick a syringe in her arm, and leave. When she awoke in the late afternoon, her memories of the morning were fuzzy, but there were vague recollections of questions being asked repeatedly. Earlier she had thought she was probably being beaten during these questioning sessions as she had more bruises than she recalled from the evening, when Cobra would come back in, ask her for names, never clear on what names he was looking for. Now, though, the beatings had all run into one another, and it was hard to tell when she awoke which bruises were fresh.
She took another look around the basement. There was no question that she needed to escape. With the meager amount of food she was given, being drugged daily, and beaten more than that, it was unclear how much longer she would survive. She had a constant thirst that made her fear she was being dehydrated.
She had planned out an escape, sort of. Each day, when she came to, she realized her best bet was to escape at night. She had one or two hours after she awoke before Cobra would come in and begin the evening questioning. For these she was never drugged, which meant when he left she was sore, but awake. Two days ago she had noticed a small air duct near the ceiling on the other side of the room. She was fairly certain she could fit through it, although it would be tight. Getting up there would be tricky, though, as the only access she had was to shimmy up the pipe for the hot water heater. With her hands tied, that would be impossible and given her injuries, likely difficult even with use of her hands.
However yesterday, she had had a breakthrough. If she maneuvered about a 100 feet to the left, there was an area where the pipe was beginning to rust. This led to some rough pipe and given the time, she could wear away the ropes. It would take awhile though, and while Cobra didn't check her ropes, he batted her around enough to notice if they were loose. She had determined that if she got started on them now and wore them away a small amount, Cobra wouldn't notice. This would also give her plenty of time to maneuver back to her original place on the floor, so he wouldn't notice that she had moved. She thought, if she was lucky, she'd have time to get the rest of the way through the ropes, up the pipe, and into the air duct with a few hours to spare before Cobra came back. She could only hope that those few hours would be enough to get through the air duct, into the forest, and far enough away that Cobra couldn't find her.
August 20, 1986 9:04pm
Pushing her way through the air duct, Amanda paused. She was exhausted and sore, but she had to push on. She was fairly certain she had some broken ribs from this evening's "questioning" session and worse yet, she had broken her leg her first time up the pipe. She had lost her grip and fallen to the ground when she was nearly at the ceiling. This did confirm what she had thought before – Cobra stayed very far away when he wasn't with her, as otherwise he would have heard when she fell with a thump, particularly as she'd been unable to stop the small scream that passed her lips at the pain.
Struggling on, she decided to be thankful that her only injuries to date were broken bones and hoped that continued to be her worst problems.
To be continued…
