Author's Note: Hi, hello! Chapter 12 is here! Sorry it took so long. A mix of life obligations, lack of motivation, other fics and honestly lots of things kept me away from this story but I'm back now. Spoilers, but this is another Cadel chapter. Don't worry though, after this we'll be back with Saul and Prosper. Chapter 13 is already partially written too! Nowhere near done yet but still, it shouldn't be too long.
So yeah. Read enjoy and I'll see you at the bottom.
12. Failure
Meanwhile, As Saul and Prosper were riding their train and as Fiona was just arriving at Judith's house, yet more action was taking place in Trader's base of operations.
By this point in the morning, anyone with any access to any sort of news source was well aware of Prosper's return, as well as the fact that (former) Detective Saul Greeniaus was working with him. Cadel had come to know this himself during another one of his spying sessions in the ventilation system.
It had been almost some sort of watch party. The way so many of Trader's goons crowded into one dimly lit room to watch the news coverage. Among the crowd were Com, Dot and Niobe who didn't look all that interested. Niobe probably because she was too busy thinking about getting in bed with Trader and the Daniels because they never seemed interested about anything.
"What can you tell us about Prosper's criminal empire before his false passing, Oliver?" asked a brunette with vivid blue eyes and deep red lipstick. Now that an hour had passed a new show had come on and with it, a new host. Right now, she was in a video call with two other people. A middle-aged aboriginal Australian woman in a nice suit and an old man who seemed to be on the verge of retirement if his wrinkly, spotty pale skin and wispy white hair was anything to go by. The man was the one to answer the anchor's question.
"Well…well, Prosper English w-wasn't always in charge, Annie," the old man stammered. "Before it was h-h-helmed by the infamous geneticist Dr. Ph-Phineas Darkkon. But once he died of cancer Prosper took over everything. Although by that time he'd already b-been arrested."
"I remember those days," Trader said smiling broadly, although his smile looked fake, plastered on. "Just because he was in jail didn't mean he couldn't do any damage. In fact, that was right around the time he got me locked up."
Despite the fact that he was their boss, nobody seemed to be paying attention to Trader's tirade. They all just continued to stare almost blankly at the television, watching the news reel with no emotion whatsoever.
Trader did have a lot of emotion though, and his mouth twisted into a cruel smirk as he watched the news interviews, no doubt thinking of all the suffering Saul Greeniaus and Prosper English were going through right that very moment.
"Well, now I'm going to sic law enforcement on them!" He said in a voice filled with triumph. "We'll see how they like them apples!"
So, this is what Trader and his cronies had meant by turning Saul and Prosper into wanted men.
Cadel turned away from the opening deep in thought. This was no doubt a part of Trader's petty revenge plot against Saul and Prosper. But what purpose did it serve? There was clearly no intention of getting the two of them arrested. Not when the purpose of Cadel's kidnapping was to lead the two of them to where he was.
Was it some sort of overcomplicated way of leading Saul and Prosper to Trader. Had he somehow wormed his way into the legal system? Gotten a small network of officers to work for him? Or perhaps gotten clearance that gave him access to some very special police privileges?
But Cadel dismissed this theory. It was such an over complicated idea that Trader would have to be an idiot to think up something so convoluted! Trader was bitter and mad and crazed, but he wasn't stupid. Cadel had enough information on him to calculate the chances of him creating an overcomplicated plan and the results had come up as negligible.
The more likely theory – and the one that Cadel accepted – was that this was just one of many ways Trader would make Saul and Prosper's lives harder as a way of getting back at them for their perceived wrongdoings.
Not that it mattered anyway. Trader's great plan was about to blow up in his face.
That was if Cadel's plan didn't blow up in his first.
In the hours since Cadel had first entered the magical world of the ventilation system, he had been conducting an intense information gathering operation. With nothing else to do, Cadel had worked tirelessly for hours constructing a 3D model of Trader's headquarters in his mind. Such a model would help him to examine the complex system that was Trader's criminal operation. The people, the building. It all had to be considered. Every weakness was exploitable.
And at least one had to be a golden ticket out of here.
Cadel's money was on the plumbing system.
Throughout his excursion into the vents and from the time he spent in his own cell, he had examined the many pipes and faucets through with water flowed through the warehouse. It wasn't long before he realized that the old copper tubes weren't structurally sound or at least in desperate need of repairing. Such a weakness, he knew, would be easy to exploit.
And one burst pipe could cause a chain reaction. Just one leak and the whole warehouse would be flooded in a few hours.
Cadel returned to his room swiftly, careful not to make too much noise as he travelled through the claustrophobic metal tunnels. Just like always, nobody seemed to notice his presence. It was all too likely that nobody in Trader's operation knew about Cadel's excursions at all.
Cadel returned to his concrete prison, climbing down to the floor via the metal bed frame which had a permanent place under the ventilation grate. Without anything to support it, the mattress lay bare on the concrete. This wasn't the only change that Cadel had made to his prison since he'd first arrived. In one corner was a small pile of half-finished chip bags and water bottles. He supposed he subconsciously knew he'd need food reserves someday during his captivity, though there was no way he could have predicted this would be how he'd use them.
Cadel rolled up his sleeves and got to work.
It was time to clog the toilet.
Cadel decided to use the chip bags for his great escape plan. It didn't take him long to calculate how much would be needed to break the plumbing system and he quickly got to work stuffing them in the toilet, keeping an eye on the door as he did so. He knew it would be disastrous for one of Trader's guards to peek his head in, only to see Cadel performing a deliberate act of sabotage. But nobody checked on Cadel as he worked, and he was able to complete his plan.
By the time he was done the toilet bowl wasn't a pretty sight. Potato chip crumbs and grease swam amongst the filmy plastic bags. Cadel scrunched up his nose at the sight.
"Well, here goes nothing," said Cadel. And with that, he flushed the toilet.
Cadel was expecting the plumbing to stutter, make some rather unpleasant noises as it forced down the plastic. He wondered if it would even go down at all. What he wasn't expecting was for the plastic to flush down flawlessly. A few seconds of gurgling and the water was crystal clear again.
"What the-!?" Cadel shouted, staring down the toilet bowl in astonishment. He couldn't believe the plastic bags had failed to have any effect. Had he severely underestimated the strength of the pipes and the toilet? Had his calculations been all the way off?
Cadel sat down on the cold hard concrete absolutely defeated. He knew he could always come up with a new plan. But how long would that take? Days? Weeks? There'd be no way he'd be able to stop Trader's plans for Saul and Prosper if he took that long. Tears began to well up in his big blue eyes. He could feel the panic settling in again…
Crack!
Cadel's head snapped up. His eyes darted around the room, looking for the source of the sound but he couldn't find it. But wait! What was that over there? Cadel squinted his eyes, zooming in on a small crack in the wall. Had that been there before? He couldn't tell.
Crack! Crackity crack, crack!
There it was again! Yes, he noticed it now. Little cracks and big cracks, all forming in the concrete wall around him. And there was another sound, like tin rattling around. Cadel whirled around to see the old copper pipe trembling like a scared baby bird as it made ominous groaning noises.
Splash!
Suddenly Cadel was hit with a spray of water. The pipe had burst! Cadel tried and failed to hide his smile. His plan had worked after all! But he had to get back to work. This was still the easiest part. The hardest part, actually escaping Trader was just about to begin.
So, Cadel put on a straight face and started banging on the door.
"Help!" He shouted, fists pounding on steel. "Help! The room is flooding!" Raised voices were heard from the other side of the door. No doubt water had started leaking into other parts of the warehouse as well, at least if all went according to plan.
It wasn't long before he heard the lock jingle and the door opened.
"Oh, thank you!" Cadel shouted, beginning his act. "I thought I was going to drown in there!"
"Holy crap!" Shouted one of the guards, his eyes going wide at what Cadel had done. "How does this even happen!?"
"A bad case of diarrhea and a bunch of faulty pipes is how," another one said. Then he pointed to Cadel. "You! Did you clog up the toilet, you little shit!?"
"What!? No!?" Cadel tried his best to sound appalled, making his blue eyes as big and wide and innocent as possible. This seemed to work for the guards quickly dropped their suspicions.
"I bet it was old Lou who did it," the second guard said. "That guy's always explosive in the bathroom."
Now that Cadel had been laid off the hook the guards were ignoring him. Well, that was fine. Ideal actually, because now he had an opportunity to escape. He quickly took off running down the best and most discrete possible escape route with which he had familiarized himself during his trips through the vent system.
The warehouse was truly in an amazing state. Everywhere he went there were cracks in the wall, through which water escaped like lava from a volcano. Everyone was in an uproar, shouting at each other as they desperately tried to stop the flood. Cadel was sure the water would be absolutely everywhere within thirty minutes.
As for his escape, it was going off without a hitch. It wasn't effortless – oftentimes he had to duck and hide when one of Trader's panicked henchmen would come into view – but he wasn't noticed even once. His ticket out, a window that led out onto the bottom floor, was drawing closer and closer. Already he could almost tase the freedom.
Then he ran into Trader.
Well, he ran into Niobe, Dot and Com first. They burst through a door just as Cadel was coasting down a hallway and he had to dive into a closet to avoid detection.
"I can't believe this is happening!" Niobe shouted. "My hair is going to be ruined!"
"It's water," Dot deadpanned, and Com clicked. "And Com says you should really get your priorities straight."
"What does that mean!?" Niobe shrieked, but before either the Daniels could answer Trader himself came into view. Cadel's breath hitched. Being caught by one of the goons would be bad. Being caught by Dot, Com or Niobe would be even worse since they seemed to be so high ranking. But being caught by Trader would be an absolute disaster he couldn't afford. Cadel held his breath.
Please don't let Trader see me! Not now that I'm so close!
"My loyal subjects!" Trader said. He still looked quite put together, considering the state of his base of operations. "As you can see, we're in a bit of a sticky situation. But never fear! I've got a plan to fix all this!"
"And what sort of plan is that, Honeybutt?" Niobe asked, batting her eyelashes in an over-the-top way.
"We're going to all pull together and stop this flood where it started.
Com clicked.
"Com says that's an insane plan as there are multiple broken pipes all of which are spouting water all over the warehouse," Dot translated. "How are we going to do it in a timely manner."
It was a valid concern, but Trader only flashed his trademark white smile and said in reassuring tones, "You forget, Dot. We've got hundreds of people here all working for me. I'm sure if we can all pull together, we can save this operation. All we need is to gather everyone together. That's what I need all of you for. To galvanize everyone. Herd all the people to the far side of the building. I'll talk more in depth about my plan there."
"You've got that, Casanova," Niobe said, and she went off to do her duty. Com and Dot weren't far behind although Cadel did hear Dot mutter something about it being Com, not herself who had brought up the concerns with Trader's plan. Eventually Trader slipped away as well, and he was alone in the hallway once again.
Cadel couldn't believe his luck! Trader, in a remarkably silly plan was heading in the opposite direction than he was going in to escape and he was bringing everyone else with him! It was so convenient that Cadel was sure he couldn't mess it up.
He really should have realized that it was a little too convenient.
Cadel took off running in the opposite direction of Trader and his best henchmen. By now there was so much water in the base that it seeped into his socks and soaked the hems of his trousers. Cadel rounded one corner, and then another at breakneck speed, not running into a single soul as he did so. And then he saw it. A small little rectangular window, through which he could see the clear early morning sky. In reality it was a completely unremarkable window, but Cadel had never been more happy to see a window of any other sort.
The bright happy blue seemed to be calling him forward. He could almost taste the freedom on his tongue…
"Not so fast!"
Cadel yelped as a hand clamped down on his shirt and yanked him upwards. He found himself staring into the face of Trader Lynch which was contorted in rage. His light-colored cheeks were flushed red, his bright green eyes practically burning with anger.
"You think you're smarter than me!?" He shouted, shaking Cadel around in the air. "You think you can overpower me, huh!? Thought I wouldn't trace this whole mess back to you!?" He dropped Cadel who fell to the ground with a wet splash. The water mixed with his tears, soaking his face.
"Well, joke's on you, Cadel! I was getting ready to move on, anyway! And now you've destroyed all evidence of my criminal operation!"
"Move on?" Cadel echoed, his voice soft and distraught.
"That's right!" Trader wore a crazed smile. "This was only the first part of my plan! The second part shall take place just off the coast of a little-known country called Timor-Leste. I'll never be caught there!"
"Saul and Prosper would never get there either!" Cadel retorted with an amount of strength that surprised even him. "How could they when the law is looking for them! You'll never be able to accomplish your plan if you keep me out of reach."
"That's where you're wrong, Cadel," Trader said, and he put an arm around his little victim. "Honestly, It surprises me how you could underestimate the power of human relationships when you studied them for years. Parents, if they're any good and sometimes even when they're not so good would blow up the world if it would protect your child. Why, going to a foreign nation should be nothing for Saul or Prosper if they actually care about you."
Trader released Cadel, shoving him a little as he did so. He stumbled and hit the water again.
"Now, let's join everyone else on the far side of the warehouse," Trader said flashing his movie star smile. "We should probably leave for Timor-Leste before this place floods over."
Author's Note: Poor Cadel! He just cannot catch a break. :( But I do wonder about Trader's plan. What do you think he's got in store for our heroes (and anti-heroes) in the obscure Timor-Leste? Tell me what you think and see you soon!