Ooh muchas gracias for the reviews everyone. Yes, being unemployed has its benefits like writing fanfiction for no money. Speaking of which, I forgot my disclaimer again! Argh! I swear I'll put it up soon. And as for timeline: it's general with the current show and all. There might be some tiny AU aspects but I'll let you when and where that is yet to be seen.
The light was there but then it disappeared. The footsteps got closer until Olivia heard loud squeaking, like an old door opening.
Still, it too dark and Olivia could barely see the tall shadow that stepped into their premises. Olivia was breathing heavily as she struggled with what to do. Until she realized that with half of her body crippled, she could do nothing but pray. Her good arm reached around to feel Ella's and just held on.
But the shadow took no interest in either of them. It stood by then and then turned until Olivia could hear clanging and then the shadow turned back to finally face her. Olivia caught a brief glimpse of something, like a reflective light.
It made sense. The figure in the room was wearing night vision goggles to avoid revealing itself. After the two stared at each other for a long time, the figure finally walked away and soon the squeaking was heard again along with the sound of chains.
As soon as there was silence again, Olivia began to relax but Ella was sobbing. "Aunt Liv, I'm scared. I wanna go home."
"I know, Ella. Me too."
Ella tried to hug her aunt until she heard her moaning. "Aunt, Liv. You're hurt."
"I'll be fine," she said. "I'm more worried about you. Are you hurt?"
"I'm cold and tired."
"Come here."
Ella felt around until her head was resting against Olivia's shoulder and an arm was wrapped around her. "It's going to be okay. Just go to sleep and maybe this will all be a dream when we wake up."
She heard her little niece sniffling. "Mommy's going to be very worried when she gets home."
"I know." Olivia didn't want to think about how this was going to kill Rachel, to know that her only sister and daughter were both missing. She could only focus on her current situation. Helpless as she was at this point, her main concern was protecting Ella and keeping her safe from whomever it was that was holding them here.
At around 1am, Peter was getting ready for sleep when he finally got a call on his cell phone. Surprisingly it was from Rachel. It was weird. These days, Rachel wouldn't be calling him unless she was trying to get in contact with her sister.
"Rachel?"
"Hey Peter?"
He could hear the worry on the other end. "What's wrong?"
"I was just wondering…are Olivia and Ella with you by any chance?"
Peter was surprised. "Um…no. Haven't heard from either of them."
"Neither have I. That's why I called. She called me around 6 and said she was taking Ella to dinner and a movie. I got off at 11 like I usually do but when I got back to her apartment, no one was home. Her car wasn't there. This isn't like her. She would never take Ella out this late. They always come home before I do."
"They never came back?"
"No. I've been calling her cell phone for hours. I think something's wrong." Rachel started to cry.
"Just hand on, Rachel. I'll be right over." Peter quickly called Broyles.
"Bishop, is something wrong?"
"Yeah," said Peter. "I think Olivia's missing."
It took a while for Broyles to confirm it. He could not get in contact with Agent Dunham despite all of his best efforts. And within that hour both Olivia and Ella became missing persons.
Everyone was now at the apartment with Rachel except for the two people who mattered to her the most. An entire operation was being set up in the living room. Broyles ensured the best in finding the two girls.
"Sir," said one of the agents. "We just got a call. Security found a federal vehicle in a mall parking lot past closing time. The license plate number is a direct match."
Rachel felt she was going to faint.
"Tell them I need security footage of the entire night, now."
"Oh god, Peter. This can't be happening." She was crying into Peter's shoulder.
"Rachel, I'm scared too. But don't worry. We'll find them."
Security footage from the parking lot was finally in their hands and they began surveying the earliest traces of Olivia and Ella found from around the hour when Olivia last called Rachel. They saw Olivia holding Ella's hand in the parking lot as they walked into the mall. But fast-forwarding the tape, the two never appeared again. They never returned to the vehicle not even long after all the other cars in the parking lot had left.
They looked at video footage from many other cameras in the mall but found no trace of Olivia and Ella other than being in the movie theater. They did however catch one glimpse of them rounding a corner but it couldn't be seen where they were going.
"This might be hopeless," said Broyles.
But Peter caught something. "Stop the tape."
The tape was paused a minute ahead. They could see a man with a large bin going the same direction that Olivia and Ella just headed. "Keep running."
The tape continued and after around 10-15 minutes later the man with the bin was heading back the same direction.
"Something's wrong," said Peter. The man in the video did not look like a custodian at all. The tape continued to fast forward the tape but Olivia and Ella never reappeared. "Do we have blueprints of the mall?"
"We can get them."
It took almost an hour but Broyles finally got his hands on a blueprint and located the area in the prints that matched the video surveillance. "There's only a restroom in that corner they just went in. But there's no exit there so they would've had to round back. And the restrooms doesn't have windows."
"So they never made it out."
They heard a thud and Rachel was on the floor pale as a ghost. "Rachel?" Peter hurried over to try and wake her up. "Rachel, come on!"
"That man with the bin is our guy," said Broyles. "I want him identified and found now!"
Peter managed to coax Rachel awake a bit after getting her some water. "Why?" she moaned. "Why would they want them?"
"I don't know," said Peter. But that was the question of the day, wasn't it?