"I don't think this is a good plan ma'am." Frankie objects.
Cassie doesn't stop her preparations at all.
"Cassie, will you stop for a minute?" he asks whilst grabbing her hand.
She looks at him and he can see there's no changing her mind.
"You can't help me Frankie. You're injured. You need to stay here and take care of my children. They know you, you'll be fine." she orders him. "I'm going to get them out. You stay here and protect Abbi and Stu."
Frankie looks quite desperate now. "But I don't even know where the guys went, I have no idea where those bastards took them! How are you going to rescue them?"
Cassie smiles a sad smile. "The quickest way to get into a prison is to get captured yourself."
Cassie crawls on her belly across the square. The grass is wet with morning dew. The moon shines overhead. Her black outfit will be dirty in no time but that's the point. She'll be difficult to see like that.
She arrives at the office the guys broke into a little earlier. The window is above her head, and she quickly peeks in. There's nothing out of the ordinary. Everything is exactly like Frankie described. It looks like an unused office. She takes out Face's spare set of tools. The team always has a spare set of equipment nearby for when they need to make a quick escape. She gets the glass cutter out Face sometimes uses to break in places. It's fairly simple and she's seen him do it a thousand times.
Stick the middle sucker on the window. Draw a neat circle around it with the cutting bit. Use the sucking thing to make sure the glass doesn't fall out. She takes out the glass circle and sticks her hand through it. She unlocks the window.
She enters the room but leaves the window open for when she needs to make a quick escape. She ignores everything and goes immediately for the secret door. Speed is of the essence. She arrives at the elevator shaft and descents into darkness. She arrives down without a problem. She quickly ducks into the shadows behind a nearby crate and observes her surroundings. Now she's on her own, because Frankie didn't get this far. All he told her is that the team was heading further down the corridor.
Cassie takes a deep breath and leaves her hiding spot. She quickly makes her way down the corridor. She grips her gun tightly and cringes every time she makes a small sound. The corridor ends. There's an open door at the end. Several voices come from behind the door. She approaches it slowly.
Suddenly something that looks like lightning breaks out above her. Bright lights fall from the ceiling. It's too late to dodge out of the way and the lights hit her. It hurts like hell! It feels like she's being set on fire from the inside!
She drops down on the floor, feeling utterly stunned. She realizes the bastards dropped a net on her and that lightning came from an electrical charge. She still can't move though, her muscles won't obey her.
The door opens. Two goons point their pistols at her as a bigger jerk enters. He holds a remote of some sort in his hand and smiles at her.
"Did you think we're stupid lady? This must be the saddest rescue attempt ever."
"You're the saddest people ever, so I thought it was rather appropriate." Cassie quipped back. She learned that from the best.
His smile disappears and he pushes the button again. Cassie's bravado vanishes in a torrent of lightning and pain.
-
Hannibal stares at the wall. He tries his best to think up of a plan but that always gets more and more difficult when you're in pain. They beat him earlier, trying to get him to talk. Then they beat Face in front of him. Those images take him right back to the POW camp in Vietnam. The confinement, the beatings. These guys aren't nearly as bad as their captors then, but they are enough to trigger flashbacks. He breathes in and out, trying to calm his heartbeat. At least Frankie made it out, that's something. Hannibal doesn't know how that kid is going to launch a rescue mission though. Frankie is a good kid, but a tactical genius he ain't.
Hannibal sighs as he turns to his teammates. Everyone wears the evidence of their captivity. He sports bruises everywhere and Face can barely move his arm. Hannibal is convinced the brutes almost broke it. Everyone sits on the floor, their hands all bound behind their backs. Chains run from their bound wrists to a metal ring for each of them that's mounted on the wall. There is very little they can do in this situation.
All Hannibal can do is wait for something to change. He has to be ready for something different and be ready to take advantage of it. Right now, they have to wait. He looks at his pilot. Murdock doesn't look too good. He went insane in 'Nam and Hannibal can see his sanity is hanging by a thread. When that thread gets stretched too thin, it can snap all over again.
A door opens further down. Hannibal hears someone being dragged across the ground. He doesn't think anything of it, it's not the first time they have drag people after a torture session. Marcus Gyle stops in front of their cell and smiles at Hannibal.
"Put her here guys." he grumbles at the 2 guys behind him.
The team suddenly look up in fright. Hannibal can feel an icy hand grab his heart and squeeze it to the size of a walnut. The two guys are dragging Cassie to the cell. They dump her to the ground and leave.
"Silence Captain!" Hannibal shouts at Murdock. He can see the pilot is at the edge of losing it, and has to stop him.
"Everyone, shut up!" Hannibal shouts.
This must be the only time Murdock doesn't listen to an order of his commander.
"Cas! Cassie! Honey are you ok?" he shouts as he pulls on his chains. Face and BA can see he's pulling with all his might, his wrists turning bright red from the pressure.
Marcus Gyle comes back, flanked by his two goons. "Well that was easy, wasn't it gents? Do it."
Murdock starts roaring in defiance and now even BA is slightly scared of him. He has never seen Murdock this mad. Angry mad, not crazy mad.
The 2 guys grab Cassie and wake her up by sticking her head in an emmer of water. She immediately starts thrashing and they look a Marcus for guidance. Hannibal looks on in horror as Marcus waits for almost 20 seconds before he nods at them. They pull her out of the water and Cassie gasps for breath. They punch her cruelly in her stomach and knock the air right back out. She's goes limp from the pain.
Marcus Gyle steps behind her and twists her arm behind her. Cassie groans softly. A little more and he'll break her arm, but he knows exactly when to stop for the pain to be at a maximum level without breaking anything.
"You guys take that one." he says, pointing at Murdock. He then sniffs Cassie's neck, and drags her along in front of the team. It takes three men to restrain Murdock as they drag him away, screaming furiously.
Hannibal, Face and BA look at each other in horror. Murdock will say anything to protect Cassie. Nobody will blame him if he tells them anything they want to know. Hannibal looks around. Now something has changed. Now he has to work with that change and think up a way out of here. But all he can think about is Cassie thrashing in a bucket of water.
-
His screams proceed him. The immediately recognize their friend screaming as loud as he can. Four men carry him along, holding him up by the arms and legs. The fifth guy quickly opens their cell and they manage to chain him up.
Marcus Gyle stands at their cell, looking very smug.
"He told us everything we wanted to know within 5 minutes, Colonel Smith." he addresses Hannibal.
Hannibal knows it's true because they hadn't given them their ranks or names. If he knows them now, that means Murdock told them everything.
"But you know, it's always fun to torture a girl with her man looking on, so we carried on for a while." Marcus said, smiling cruelly.
The sixth man drags an unconscious Cassie over the floor. She looks like she took quite a beating and she's dripping with water. They throw her inside her cel and turn the key.
"Enjoy the rest of your evening gents." Marcus sneers smugly and he turns away.
Murdock feels like his heart will break any second now. The walls of reality start to crumble around him. He can see the world that exists inside his own mind through the cracks already. For the moment his defenses seem to hold, but it all depends on Cassie. If she doesn't wake up, the walls will break. He focusses on her. He doesn't register anything else but her face. She won't see him like a broken gibbering wreck. She's his anchor to the real world, so he just keeps saying her name.
"Cas. Just hold on for me now please. Come on girl, don't you dare leave me alone. Come on Cas, open your eyes. Please Cassie please. Please don't die Cassie. Please open your eyes Cas."
Somewhere in his head, this evokes a memory from a time long ago. That was the moment he realized he wouldn't be able to go on if she'd die. He understands how that younger version of himself felt. He feels it just as strong now as he did back then.
She moves.
Suddenly, Murdock is silent for a moment. She moved, he's sure of it.
"Murdock, she moved."
Murdock turns to his commander, looking perplexed. Hannibal looks at him with a smile on his face. "She moved, Murdock."
"Cassie!" roars BA. The sound startles Murdock, who didn't expect that much sound coming from right next to him.
That did it, because their girl suddenly opens her eyes.
