Chapter Three:
It was dark, incredibly dark. Hardly a sound filled the basement where Elise was trapped. A dripping noise sounded steadily to her right…and nothing. She had to move fast. If she did not get out within 10 minutes, she would be dead. The cause of death? Unknown. In fact, she might not even be reported for weeks.
A dehumidifier clicked on – filling the concrete space with a fan-like whooshing. She moved quickly. Her heart throbbed against her chest. The plink…plunk of the drip could still be heard, but quieter footsteps would not resound to hearing level. She felt along the cool wall…a metal box the size of a filing cabinet obstructed her path momentarily. The dripping noise was fading…a change in acoustics, the dehumidifier's sound was different ahead – more hollow. A hall? A stairway?
Elise held her hands out – meeting no barrier. Thunk. Her foot hit a stair. She scampered up the well and quickly unlocked the door with a pick. A glance at her watch informed Elise that she had accomplished her task well under the time limit. She hurried up to Jason's office.
Through the cracked door a deep voice in conversation caused Elise to halt and listen. She had been expecting Jason to be by himself – having been watching his tv where he was monitoring her practice escape.
"We'll take over her training for a few days. You've had a week, it's time to raise the intensity level, I think. When we're done you can complete the training." It was Conklin's voice, and it sent chills through her spine.
"I don't think that will be necessary." Jason's voice responded firmly.
"It's not about what you think." Alex Conklin was not to be argued with. Not even by Jason Bourne.
Footsteps indicated that Alex was leaving, and Elise quickly hid herself around the corner, waiting for his tall body to disappear before coming back to the door. Her hands shook as she turned the handle and cautiously peered inside. Jason sat at his desk with his head in his hands. He looked up as she pushed the door open, and blinked hard. His expression changed from weary to business like between the flicker of his eyelids.
He turned back to the monitor, quickly reassessing his previous occupation. If she had come in a few seconds later she never would have guessed what had just transpired.
"You did well. That's it for tonight. Tomorrow…" He looked at her for a moment, letting the weariness start to show for a second, and then took up the files on his desk, breaking the short trance. "Meet here tomorrow, same time."
Elise did not speak as she left. Her feelings were shooting in thousands of different directions, but the one that rose above all the rest was fear. Fear of the unknown. Whatever new training she was to meet in the morning scared her, and she wanted out. A new level of intensity might be just enough to make her crack – and maybe that was what they wanted.
A glance at her clock triggered another memory. Jason had a meeting with that woman in five minutes, and Elise wanted to know what was going on. Maybe the topic of their conversation would hold some clue to the unspoken mystery that filled this building, as thick as smoke. How could she listen in without getting caught?
She walked slowly down the corridor, looking for the office she had seen the woman disappear into earlier. She found it at the end of the hall. Parsons, Nikki. There was no clue as to just what part Nikki played in this office. What card she held in this wild game. But there was only one way to find out.
The light was off in the office, and if Elise managed to temporarily block passage to the room, the scheduled meeting might just take place in a more public spot. A range of ideas filled her head, and she settled on something simple. The minutes were quickly counting down. She slipped inside, with slight difficulty from her pick, and unscrewed all of the light bulbs, just slightly enough to appear that they were out.
Just as she had hid herself around the corner, the clicking of heels clipped along, the door was unlocked, and the light switch flipped several times.
"What's wrong?" She hadn't been listening for Jason's voice, and it surprised her.
"Oh – nothing. My lights just went out." Nikki responded.
"No problem. We can talk downstairs." Shoot! They were coming her way. Elise scrambled into the nearest open room – the men's bathroom. Thankfully almost everyone had gone home for the night, and no one else remained on that floor. She waited a reasonable amount of time for the two to pass and then followed.
Her luck proved sure when she opened the door of the stairwell to hear their voices echoing from the bottom. Not private at all.
"I haven't seen much of you lately. I thought things were going to be different since your last mission." She was saying.
A pause. And then, "Things are different, Nikki. Just not in the way that I expected. I didn't know they were going to bring someone new onboard."
"I did. They've been planning it for awhile. I just didn't know that they'd choose you to be the top man on this assignment." There was a pout in her voice.
"Well, I have a week off of the job, starting tomorrow." There was resistance in his voice…resistance and uncertainty.
"Good. You deserve some time off. Come on, if you don't have to come in we can stay out late." She urged.
"You still have to come in." He countered.
The door opened, and their voices faded as it slammed shut behind them. Elise turned on her heel and headed to her quarters. The conversation had not been of the genre she had anticipated. Jason had never given any sign of being involved before. Then again, there was never much talk about personal life coming from him. She sighed and prepared for bed – only to toss and turn in disarray over the next day's dawning.