Greetings and welcome back to another installment of Unlikeliest of Victors!

I've been on a roll with my writing which is fantastic. I'm technically up to eight complete chapters, but I haven't had time to edit accordingly. Writing this chapter was a lot more fun than the last one for whatever reason. I hope it shows.

So please, sit back, and enjoy.

4

If I wasn't running fast before, I certainly am now. Somewhere in my head the logical side of my brain was screaming at me to abort, to go home, to curl up in a corner. There are dozens lives on the line right now though, my friends and grandfather among them. If I let the Peacekeepers handle things, people will die.

It is this that drives me forward. The shouts behind me are useless and my father's panicked voice falls on deaf ears. I tear away from the armored convoy, turn a corner and I cross the open terrain to ascend a heavily forested hill heading straight towards the dam. The impulse wears off and I start to have misgivings. I could back off now but I'm too afraid of what could have happened to Benjamin and Cassandra. Yes, I guess I'm worried about what could happen to Electra as well.

Up ahead to my left there's a clearing at the top of the hill which overlooks the dam. The dam runs northwest/southeast and the path I'm picking out now will take me to the southeast corner of the dam facing roughly west and, with any luck, the other Messengers.

I reach the top of the hill and scale a tree quickly. I turn around to look behind and spy a dozen Peacekeepers, my former pursuers, heading back to the Coal Plant, probably on orders from their superiors. I can't make out much by the dam because the wind is rocking the trees so that I can't see behind the swaying branches. I climb down and move to a better position on towards the east that overlooks the dam.

From here I can see that the Peacekeepers have every entrance and exit to the dam locked down from a clearing at the top of another hill. It doesn't look like they have other units flanking it from behind. Smoke and flames are rising from the security checkpoint which explain the explosion I saw earlier while the power-plant substations on either side of the dam are untouched.

I move into the shadows of the trees again and pick a path moving far away from the Peacekeepers. The last thing I need is for them to mistake me as an insurgent. Eventually I manage to make it past them and I exit the trees much farther away onto the shores of the reservoir created by the dam. It's roughly 3:30 and the shadows have started to elongate behind the trees. I make sure to stick to these to get to the backside of the dam. I pass the dam completely before I start to circle back ground starts descending all the way down to the banks of the river. On the backside of the dam is an aged ladder that climbs all the way up to the quarter-mile long top deck. I'm surprised I've gotten as far as I have. I expected someone to have blown my head off with a gun awhile ago but I'm not complaining. The ladder was a long climb up the sheer face of the dam and it doesn't look like maintenance has bothered to patch a few places.

I gulp nervously. The only thing to do is climb and trust that the ladder will hold my weight. "Katherine Emerson you are such an idiot!" I think furiously to myself as I tentatively start climbing upwards. Idiot or not, the time for panicking and emotion was over. It was time to think logically and act quickly. Neither the Peacekeepers, nor the District Six rebels would likely grant me that luxury.

I reach about midway before the ladder starts groaning slightly. Part of it has rusted away and I wouldn't guarantee it holding someone heavier than I am. I speed quickly past this section. I make the mistake of looking down and swoon a little bit. It's a long way down to the jagged gravel below.

There's only eight more feet to go though. I scale the ladder and scramble over the edge when the opportunity presents itself. There's a shed of some sort shielding me from the view of anybody in the dam so I take a moment to catch my breath and scan my surroundings. Except for the hum of the dam and the roar of the water, I can't see or hear anybody on top of the dam. Odd.

I'm suddenly startled by Harry's voice over the dam's PA system again.

"I'm back! Did you miss me? I appreciate you not attacking this dam. It makes things so much easier for all of us. If you agree to our demands, then you have our promise that they will be returned to you alive and your dam unharmed."

"Fat chance." I said under my breath. There's no way they would let Peacekeepers leave alive.

"Otherwise, we see no purpose for further communications and we will blow the dam to further the goal of our movement. If any of you try to intervene we'll kill the hostages and then blow up the dam. You have five minutes to make your decision to continue or not. I will know you have agreed to these terms when the Peacekeeping forces take twenty paces back."

Where were they being held? If the other messengers were among the hostages, they had to all be in one place. Some place where they could be easily seen but protected.

Suddenly it occurred to me.

"The observation deck!" I exclaimed but quickly silenced myself.

I hadn't been there many times running messages, but I knew that the observation deck consisted of a row of hardened glass windows that were supposedly "bullet resistant." On rare occasions, the river would swell with the melted snow from a hard winter or we we would get an exceptionally bad storm where the reservoir would overflow. The observation deck was treated accordingly so that it could withstand the force of the rushing water on both sides yet still maintain visibility with the rest of the valley, no small feat of engineering.

That meant I'd have to somehow sneak down five levels and find them.

I shook the jitters out.

"Come on Katie. You can do this. You'll just have to out-think them."

But...how? These were rebels that had come up with a bold enough plan to be able to seize the dam right from underneath our noses. There was also the other matter of the bombs themselves. If I could disable the bombs somehow, then their entire plan would unravel and they would have no more bargaining power other than the hostages. Doing so relied on a lot of what-if's.

I sighed to myself. Guess I would have to start with the bombs instead and wing it from there.

The Operations Center had a maintenance stair case that would take you all the way down to the lowest level. It was seldom used because it was such a long trip in the dark but I wondered if any of these rebels used it.

To get to Operations meant backtracking up a set of stairs to the higher levels where the buildings were located. There were enough objects on top of the dam that I could pick my way across without exposing myself too much. I found a window in the Operations Center devoid of glass before I picked my way carefully through and into the building. It was darkened, the only light provided by other windows devoid of glass. Despite my efforts to tread carefully, my boots still made crunching sounds as I tiptoed around. There was a streak of something that I suspected was blood, but its owner was nowhere to be seen. At an empty desk of a security guard I found a flashlight in one of the drawers and quietly crept over to the staircase hidden behind an unassuming door.

I tried the door. It didn't budge. Locked.

A frown crossed my face and I scrutinized it closer. The keyhole and the door didn't show signs of abuse.

Speaking of which, where was the key?

I knew the person at this desk would have a master key and a spare master key hiding somewhere. I went back to the desk and looked for spaces tiny enough to conceal an object. The desk contained more than a few niches which complicated things further.

It took a few minutes, but when I dropped underneath the desk I found it almost instantly with the beam of a flashlight, hiding in the empty space between one of the drawers. I opened it and removed the drawer and the key. The door took some effort to unlock but I opened it and descended into the darkness flicking on the flashlight.

The thought came to mind that they could be watching me on camera but if that was the case I would have been surrounded and captured by now. Right? They must have taken the grid offline. Best not to take any chances. I closed the door behind me and descended as fast as I dared down the staircase.

Where would they put the bombs?

I thought about how I would do this if I were in charge of this operation. Obviously as a smaller group, to intimidate their enemies and make the Capitol think twice about taking hostile action they would want to display the bombs publicly, yet still have them protected. It would be just the right motivation to make a superior foe pause for a a time.

Assuming this was their methodology, that meant only one of three places. The observation deck (which housed flood control operations), the top level, and the walkway entrance. I could rule out the observation deck because if they wanted to damage the dam that was not the place to do it. It was too far above the current waterline and protected by the windows. I could also rule out up top with the same criteria. They could have put it in the sub-stations but that wouldn't accomplish their goal, the plant had backup systems in case one of these went down.

Even though I was well-within the dam at this point, there were still loudspeakers hidden somewhere in the dark that suddenly came to life. Really, did the volume need to be so loud on these things?

"You have chosen wisely. Our terms are this. You are to arrange a face to face call with President Snow where at which point we will call for the President to abolish his government and call for a new one where the Capitol does not rule supreme. The Hunger Games are to be banned, and the District's will be allowed to conduct business on their own terms."

Did this guy really think these conditions were going to be met? I wondered as I reached the walkway level after another minute and attempted opening up the door. There was a heavy amount of rust preventing me from doing so.

"If you do or violate any of these terms we will activate our largest bombs housed in the lower levels provided by yours truly, Scarlet Fist of District Six. They will activate destroying a large part of the dam. This will also trigger a chain reaction that will blow apart the water diversion system and flood District Five, destroying the power supply of the nation of Panem."

An insane peal of laughter rang out which caused me to jump again. Maniacal, devoid of emotion, Harry was actually having fun with this game he was playing with the Capitol. Did the rest of his men know they were following a psychotic monster?

"I suppose it would be generous of me to give you some information regarding the explosives under your feet as well disguised with some of the stealth plating used on your Capitol's hovercraft. If you attempt to move or deactivate these bombs they will activate. If you activate one, you activate them all. If you move from this location at all, approach the lower levels of this dam, or remove any weight from any of the bomb locations, you will die. I give you 30 minutes to start an audience with President Snow."

With a heave, the bolt on the door crunched into the unlocked position and I wrenched the knob as far to the right as it would go. The door squeaked open and the roar of 12 massive generators somewhere in beneath me filled the room with noise and drowned out the rest of his words. It wasn't deafening, just made isolating the sounds of approaching danger that much harder to detect.

This door emptied out into a dimly lit small janitor's closet. Proceeding quickly through this room, I found myself looking left to right at an enormous stretch of concrete and stone. The end of the dam, a wall that climbed out of sight, was visible to my left while the right end was barely distinguishable. Yellow work lights placed in regular intervals would have colored the whole place yellow-gray but evidently there had been a firefight of some sort. Some of the lights, particularly where I was standing, were shot out with fragments of glass and wire mixing with an enormous number of brass casings which littered the floor turning some places into potential slipping grounds.

My eyes caught instantly on what had to be one of the bombs. It was a good distance away near the first of the openings in the side of the wall of the dam that allowed access to the outer walkways. It was an enormous industrial crate covered with wires and a red manual detonation button or so it was labeled. It was stuffed in plain sight in the doorway in front of the back wall which was covered in an array of pipes. Occasional gaps in those pipes would allow workers access further back into the dam.

I froze when I suddenly heard voices close by heading in my direction. I bolted back into the shadows with beating heart and waited.

Eventually two men walked by in front of me carrying handguns. Their demeanor, despite the situation going outside, was laid-back. They were actually laughing and joking around.

"Man Harvey's got them this time." the taller of the two said.

"What?"

"I said Man, Man Harvey's got them this time!" his partner voiced a little louder.

"It's Harry you idiot. Speak louder, it's hard to hear."

"Whatever. How are they going to figure out there's only two bombs to be worried about?

"They won't because Harvey's got them thinking they're covered in that stealth plating.

"Oh, that's why Butch and the others had to steal that crate."

"Yup, too bad we spent it all on operations at home."

"I wouldn't say so." he changed topics. "Hey, if Boss calls and asks for those bombs to be moved, how are we going to do it without activating them?"

"Were you not in on this part of the operation."

"No, Lewis sent me to replace Jared, he took one in the noggin."

The taller one sighed. "Shame. He always had an issue with keeping his head low. Well, to move the bombs, should we need to, you hit the activation button which will trigger a response on the console. Fill in the correct answer and we can disarm it without blowing ourselves to kingdom come.

"Wait answer? What kinda code do you have on their? How do you know which is which?"

"It's a riddled bomb. Answer wrong and we go boom. I marked the two to distinguish them dim-wit. Harry left the job to me to create the riddle."

"You?"

"Me." The man said with no small degree of pride. "Want to hear them?"

"Fine."

"They took the cameras offline so we should be good."

"Just tell it already."

I craned myself closer so that I could catch every word.

"Fine. So a machinist in Six is caught stealing extra parts to make a weapons to fight the Capitol. He's convicted and given the death penalty. The judge allows him to say a last sentence in order to determine the way the penalty would be carried out. If the machinist lies, he will be hanged, if he tells the truth he will be beheaded. The machinist speaks his last sentence and to everybody's surprise he's released. What did he say?"

The other man began laughing.

"I don't know. Good thing I'm not the Capitol. What's the other one?"

"Okay. You'll love this one. Two Gamemakers are meeting at a bar to talk we'll just call them Marcus and Brutus."

"Very original."

"Shut up. Anyways they go to talk about overthrowing the President and they order vodkas on the rocks. Marcus downs his first and then orders another which he also downs. He decides to wait before he orders another one. Meanwhile Brutus who had been sipping his suddenly fell forward dead. Both men were setup to be killed but why did Marcus live and Brutus die?"

"What? Was their body composition different or something?"

"Nope has nothing to do with it. The answers to both are-"

A third man suddenly entered into her view and said something urgently to both. Their attention was away from me which gave me an excuse to move closer.

"The bombs are offline at the Coal Plant. They must have figured out how to defuse it!" the third man said panicked.

A small surge of elation runs through me. That number code had worked out after all. That was one plant saved. One more to go.

"So the first remote doesn't work anymore?"

"Nope and our glorious leader doesn't feel confident enough about the backup remote's signal strength. The other one broke and the spare apparently has a bad antenna. It's not waterproofed either.

"Go talk to the others. Make sure our backup plan is ready to go. I'll go see if Howard needs any help."

"Fine."

All three of them quickly left and I was left perplexed.

What on Earth was a Vodka on the Rocks? My grandfather occasionally on Holidays cracked open an alcoholic beverage and drank while the kids were only allowed iced apple cider. Just thinking about drinks made me thirsty. My throat still burned from traces of bile and the exercise from sneaking inside.

It was hard to concentrate because of the sound of the generators and the softer sound of the spillways operating at full force farther off.

Perhaps one had a terminal illness? No, it was clearly stated that there was poison. It didn't answer the problem of what the answer to this riddle was. On the rocks...not sure why anybody would want to put rocks in their alcohol. Did it refer to something hard-ish?

I stood there in the shadows for another five minutes. Eventually I came to the conclusion that it had to do with how quickly he drank. But what?

I needed a glass of ice water. The inside of this dam was hot and humid and I needed something to quench my parched throat.

Suddenly, in a moment of realization, I had it.

"Ice." I breathed slowly.

Brutus must have drunk poison frozen as ice.

Because Marcus drank so quickly, he was unaffected because it didn't have a chance to melt whereas the other Brutus decided to sip it and let the ice melt. That had to be it! I felt another thrill of euphoria as the answer laid itself out to me.

I dared myself to go over and look at the bomb. Taped to the side next to the button was a number 2 so at least I was at the correct bomb...I hoped. A keypad with letters sat next to the button.

Would the bomb go off if I pushed the button?

Caution withheld my hand from it for a moment.

"Nothing ventured, nothing gained." I breathed before seizing my courage and hitting the button.

To my enormous relief, I didn't perish in a fiery explosion. Instead the device prompted for a numeric code. I tried the number code I heard Harry give to the others at the coal plant and to my relief it proceeded to another screen.

An access menu with two options detonate and disarm popped up. I selected the appropriate option and was directed to anther screen that prompted for the answer to the riddle.

I held my breath as I typed in slowly I-C-E.

I hit enter and again waited for it to explode.

Instead, the screen turned green and a message confirmed it was offline. A whole host of options appeared on the screen including one to set a new code. I smiled and entered in a random stream of numbers and letters before setting the code. I heard the voices coming back and I retreated into the shadows again as the men's voices could be heard coming back.

"Think they're actually going to listen to us?" the first man asked concerned.

"Doesn't matter if they don't Trevor. he wants those bombs out of view now. The Peacekeepers have seen them long enough anyways. We'll send a message to the Capitol regardless."

"Not with a disabled bomb you won't." I smiled. Then it turned to horror.

"Oh no." I whispered.

I had changed the code. They were going to activate the bombs if they moved them bombs and they were going to realize my ruse in moments. I didn't know what I had entered in on the keypad so changing the code was impossible.

The men were standing a few yards off from the bomb, still at ease, unaware of the fate that awaited them.

"So, let's get started."

"Did you not hear orders? We're waiting until AFTER the countdown! Why can't anybody listen to orders? Huh?" the third man snapped. "Next time I come back it'll be time. Understand?"

"Fine." the other two grunted and I felt another surge of relief. This man had bought me some time.

I clambered onto some of the pipes and slowly began to creep past them making sure to keep my movements even and my body low to stay out of sight. I needed to move fast. My schedule was now very much limited.

"Do you think we're actually going to do that Oscar?" Trevor asked.

"Move the bombs?"

"No, blow the dam."

"What have you gone soft or something?" the man named Oscar asked in disgust. Of course we are. The other Districts are going to be hurting for power and the Capitol will of course take it's share before giving the scraps out. It should be the first thing to get the ball rolling. All we need is for someone else to take the movement and go forward." Oscar reasoned.

"But, terror tactics, do we really need to resort to them?"

"Hey, I'm not a fan either if I'm honest. Playing nice has never worked though. You show me a time where it worked. Did being nice save my son from being executed? Did being nice get my wife some medicine when she needed it?

"Well-"

"Look, it's the nature of rebellion. It's unpleasant, yes, but it'll be for the benefit of all."

I was almost behind them when they turned and I stuffed myself in a crevice between two pipes. I failed to realize there was a sharp edge on one of the pipes and I sliced open my palm by accident. I was barely able to withhold the yelp of pain.

"What was that?" Trevor asked pulling out a gun from his coat pocket. The noise wasn't missed by them.

"Relax." Oscar said pushing it back inside. We would have seen if anybody was coming. I doubt anybody could squeeze in back there.

I grimaced. Well, they were right about that. I had no idea how I had jammed myself into hiding, but I wouldn't recommend it to anybody in the future.

I kept myself frozen in motion until they turned around.

"Fancy a look outside?" Oscar asked. "I think you need some fresh air."

"Sure. Just make sure you don't stick your head outside so much."

The two turned again and left. I popped out of cover again moving as fast as I dared. Ahead I could see the bomb further down behind another one of the open doorways. A glint of metal caught my eye and I saw a pipe wrench leaning against the wall. I picked it up with some effort and tested it. It was a little heavy but I at least had a weapon.

I sprinted down the rest of the corridor without much effort and paused when I drew closer looking for the guards. The pipes on my right stopped and allowed a staircase to a second level to descend. I scrambled onto it and the maintenance walkway six feet up and crept along further. After a minute they came into view and shrank back. They were beneath me. These two men were a lot more alert than the others and kept pacing back and forth. They didn't make a sound but sat attentively on either side of the bomb.

I sat puzzled. Where there really only four men watching the bombs? Where there that many hostages? Were they that confident that they held all the cards? I used some of the precious time allotted to me to watch and make sure I was indeed correct in my observations. When no other men showed up, I cautiously moved forward slightly.

"Hey, I gotta use the john." the one on the right announced. Think you'll be good?"

"You've gotta be kidding me." his companion groaned."We're in the middle of combat and you decide now is a good time?"

"Hey!" his companion said defensively. "You try eating some of Gary's food for a while and see what that does to your digestion.

"You have a point." the other admitted begrudgingly.

"Look, we got twenty minutes until time's up and the Peacekeepers are sticking to their side. I got more than enough time."

"Just go do your thing. I don't want you to be gone for that long. There's only the four of us down here remember?"

The other man put up his hands in surrender before chuckling.

"I suppose Harry's finally got one up on the Capitol. It won't make up for all the dead back home but it's a start."

"Oh for the love-just go! GO!"

A set of hurried footsteps trailed away from the bomb.

To my right I spied a ladder a little ways off that led down to the ground below. Taking the wrench in my hands I carefully climbed down the slick rail and approached him from behind. I judged how much force it would take to knock him out for a few minutes.

One of my footsteps splashed in a puddle of water that dripped from a pipe somewhere above that was deeper than what I judged it to be. He turned around at the noise and his eyes met mine. We both stared at each other for a moment. His confusion turned to anger in a second as his brain put two and two together.

"Hey!" he said startled.

He didn't get much farther than that when I reflexively delivered an overhead swing and he crumpled to the ground. The sound was thankfully muffled by the roar of the dam. I dropped the pipe wrench and instantly felt sick. I checked him for a pulse and briefed a sigh when I felt one. He would be out for a few minutes, long enough for me to do my work. I withheld my urge to vomit again and scrambled over to the bomb.

My mind switched to trying to figure out the first riddle. What did the machinist say that released him?

As it turned out, this wasn't nearly as hard as the other riddle. The machinist must have said something to the effect that he would be hanged. By doing so he would be telling the truth yet lying at the same time. It would create the catch-22 cycle needed for the Judge to release him. I doubted though in real-life the Capitol would act in a similar way, they had the tendency to execute first and ask questions months later.

I activated the interface and followed the steps until the bomb displayed the prompt. This time it provided me a 17-character count I needed to fill. I figured how to word it ("I shall be hanged") and the bomb glowed green like the last one and disarmed itself. Again I set a different code on the bomb and locked it. It was risky, but hopefully they would have the sense to check first before they moved it.

I sighed when the interface winked off. The bombs were effectively disabled...for now. I was extremely fortunate to have made it this far without incident. There were already too many mistakes in this plan though. I needed to move faster if I were to accomplish my other objective of freeing the others.

My moment of victory again soured as I heard his partner's footfalls. I was very much exposed where I was standing now. He only needed to turn the corner to see me. To avoid this I moved closer to the wall and crouched behind the corner. I chanced a glance and confirmed that he was alone and at ease.

He came into sight, walked past me, saw the unconscious form of his partner and paled. I chose that moment to swing the pipe-wrench again. The man gave a cry that was swallowed upby the dam before he collapsed with a thud as well. I stood back shaking and took several deep breaths.

How could anybody intentionally hurt someone and not feel terrible? I wondered. This pipe wrench at the minimum had caused bruising. Head trauma was no laughing matter though. I could have broken their skull, given them a concussion, an aneurysm, paralyzed their body. He wasn't dead but now I had two unconscious men to deal with.

I set down the pipe-wrench and dragged him not knowing what else I could do. The physics made it hard to do (a 115-pound girl attempting to drag someone who was both double her weight and age is not a pleasant experience I found out) but I managed. I got him positioned somewhat close to the other man and as a final touch put the pipe-wrench in the first man's hand. It was a pitiful excuse for covering my tracks but it was the best I could do. Now I needed to somehow get the message out that the bombs were disarmed. That was of course assuming that there were no more I had to worry about.

There was another door at the end that took me to a staircase leading up, this one was actually trafficked by people. If I could reach the observation deck from there I could possibly access the PA system. I knew of no other place I could do so, the maintenance shaft didn't have direct access.

I skipped the elevator and proceeded cautiously up the stairs and tried to judge from below whether anybody had discovered my presence. So far so good. I read the level numbers as I climbed. The observation deck was level 22 and I was on level 10. I had a long climb ahead of me.

After two minutes of climbing I reached my assigned floor and I stopped to catch a breath. When I had done so I poked my head around the corner. Nobody was in here. There were a couple rooms I had to cross before I would reach the actual observation deck and there was guaranteed to be a number of guards in the quarter mile stretch overlooking the river and reservoir.

I crouched and walked into the room which was mainly full of computer equipment and desks. As I approached the door to the second room I heard voices. I froze but when the voices didn't get closer I continued. The door had a reinforced glass window allowing me to peer through. There was some sort of break room and it was full of armed men and a couple armed women. They were all dressed in the track worker's uniforms but some were exchanging these for mottled green and brown outfits that I deduced was to help them blend in to the trees. Were they planning on retreating?

Definitely don't want to walk in there. I decided.

I backtracked and made sure to stay out of sight of the window.

To my left there was a couple metal steps that led up to a door marked with a large exclamation point and a lightning bolt. That was where the electrical for the observation deck was. It was locked but I was able to use the same key I had snagged earlier to open it up. I opened up the door before carefully closing it/

I flicked the flashlight on and proceeded quietly. I surmised from the metal walkway that I was walking just above the ceiling of the observation deck. If I were to jump I'd probably fall through. There were metal girders every two feet that supported the structure of the ceiling and this room. If I were to balance myself on those I could peel back the ceiling tiles and see the room.

I gingerly slipped through the handrail and tested my weight on the girders. One foot, then two, then gradually my entire body settle on it. To test my theory about the ceiling I grasped two sides of one and lifted. It came away with ease and I opened it far enough that I could take in what was going on.

I balanced my body on the girder and stuck my head down. There was a group of 14 men with Harry in the midst. They were laughing over some joke that I missed and were pointing to outside.

To their right and a few feet away was a large assortment of power plant workers, local townspeople, a few Peacekeepers stripped of their weapons and gear, and a couple local officials, I felt a flash of anger as I saw my grandfather sitting nervously on the ground looking around at his four captors all holding rifles and looking pleased with themselves. I looked further into the crowd and I saw Benjamin, Cassandra, and Electra all sitting next to each other. Benjamin looked stoic, if not annoyed, Cassie looked around the room frightened, and Electra was a silently weeping mess.

I wondered why there weren't any guards on their right but then I remembered the room full of people. There wasn't any chance of escape that way.

I looked back at Harry who had a bandage covering the left side of his face from where I had shattered his glasses. The other goons I had seen earlier were on other side shielding him from the front.

I looked for the PA system and saw a microphone mounted on a central console.

The door behind and below me opened.

"Hey boss. Want some more water?" a wheezy voice called out.

"No. That won't be necessary." Harry said distracted. "Wait," he paused. "What are you all doing over there?" he snarled after a moment. "Reinforcements are most likely to come from that side. I don't care what you're doing but get your ***** over to the other side right now.

The grunt fell silent and ran back to relay orders.

"And yet they refuse to concede." He said to no one in particular. "Well, they still have 10 minutes to go. And to think they actually fell for my bluff of there being bombs under foot."

The door opened and the dozen men I had seen earlier walked through.

"Next time think strategically." Harry said to the group as they walked.

More than a few of them threw rude gestures at him when his back was turned.

He walked over to the PA system.

"10 minutes." He announced before turning around.

I replaced the tile and moved down a couple girders before repeating the process. I was now almost directly above my friends. I looked down and Cassie's eyes caught mine for a second before she froze and scanned again looking for me. I stuck my head further out for a moment and she paled. She tentatively got Benjamin's attention and gestured to the ceiling. He refused to obey immediately but waited a few seconds before casually looking up as well. He froze and his aura of nonchalance almost broke.

"What are you doing?!" his eyes asked. He shook his head a fraction of an inch to each side.

I nodded and put a finger in front of my lips.

Again he shook his head.

I ignored him and he rolled his eyes before he had to quit communicating with me when one of the guards looked at him funny. I slid the tile back and I sat back and breathed again. All I had to do was get to the mic and announce that the bombs were offline. The only thing in between me and that mic was a host of armed men. I huffed frustrated.

I slid back another tile and observed the hostages. If I could neutralize the first one closest to the Peacekeepers perhaps they could even the odds a little. One of the attackers was positioned to where I could drop down on top. And my flashlight had enough weight to it to double as a weapon like the pipe-wrench...albeit less effectively.

Other than that I had no ideas of how I could effectively distract them without giving away my position and an excuse to riddle my body with lead.

I caught Benjamin's eyes again and gestured to one of the Peacekeepers. Unsure of my request he offhandedly pointed at one of the Peacekeepers and then gestured up. One of them looked up to cough and his eyes widened a little bit when he saw me. I slid the tile back so that the guards didn't catch sight.

I stood up and this time slowly removed the tile next to the one I opened. As I pulled it off looking directly down on the head of one of the guards. My heart began pounding again as this time I pulled it off completely. Hopefully the Peacekeeper could formulate a plan and take advantage of my sudden arrival.

Suddenly the door to the lounge opened again and another man ran in.

"Boss!"

"What is it?"

"Uh...sir? I don't think you're going to like this."

"What is it!?" Harry asked thoroughly annoyed.

The other man seemed to be hesitating. I suspected I knew the content of his message.

"I swear, if you don't tell me within the next five-"

"The bombs are disabled. Sir."

All sound and activity in the room stopped at once.

"What?" he hissed. The ice in his voice made my hands tremble.

"They're disabled!" the man yelped.

"I heard you the first time! How?" he demanded.

"I don't know!" the man said retreating backwards in fright. "Oscar just checked up on bomb number one and found the guards knocked out, the bomb disabled, and the code's even been changed!"

Harry swore.

"He told me that he had those bombs secured! Where is he now?"

"I...uh..."

"Never mind then, I'm going to kill that man myself. Put the men on alert and search the lower levels. I need those explosives online. Right. Now." He growled. "Do you understand?"

My hands were shaking so bad that I didn't realize the tile was slipping from my grasp before it suddenly dropped on the second guard who collapsed as the unexpected weight from above hit him. I gave a startled cry and I saw all eyes turn towards me.

Guess I was committed now.

In a moment I steeled myself and, defying all logic, reason, and my protesting brain, I jumped off the girder and into the room below.

And that's all I have time for! Another chapter should be coming soon so don't panic about hanging from the edge of a cliff for too long. This section of the story will conclude next chapter and I can't wait to put out more material and introduce the next mini-arc. It's going to be great!

Thank you to those of you who reviewed. It means a lot to me.

Yours in writing,
theotherpianist