Chapter 29

The gas grenades that had been launched at the house were doing their job, and every room inside the house was covered with a thick haze. As a matter of fact, the haze was seeping out through the cracks that are normal to any house, and beginning to make the yard hazy. Nate instinctively started to move toward the house, and Doc caught him by the arm.

"You aren't wearing a mask."

"A member of my team might be in there. I have to know."

"If they are, we'll bring them back. That's a promise."

With those words, she turned and ran toward the house. Nate watched her disappear, and then he made a quick decision and careful to wait until she disappeared into the smoke, followed her.

As soon as Nate got near the house, he started to cough. He pulled his jacket up over his face and continued on into the house. Once inside, he could see nothing of where he was going through the smoke and dust, and he found his jacket was doing little to keep the soot and grime out of his lungs.

Nate stumbled down what he determined to be a hallway, and ran into the wall a couple of times before he stuck his hand out and used it to guide himself toward the back of the house. He opened two doors as he came to them, only to get a face full of smoke and gas each time a door opened. He leaned against a door that appeared to be locked. Putting his shoulder into it, he pushed, and the door popped open, sending a plume of smoke and dust into the hallway. The open door helped the air move somewhat, and he saw Parker lying on the bed. She appeared to be unconscious, and her face was swollen and bruised. She seemed to be having some trouble breathing. Nate tried to move toward her, and found himself feeling as though he was carrying a heavy weight. He sank to his knees and as the darkness rose up to meet him, he fell slowly forward and sort of melted onto the floor.

(0o0)

Vance immediately dispatched men to every room in the house. They had all studied the layout and knew, even without the benefit of visibility, where every room in the house was. They had orders to ventilate the house, and as the smoke cleared, to round up anyone they found in any room and bring them to a central location. Doc's men would make a sweep behind them, stabilizing anyone who might not be able to be moved, moving them on to the central location as they became stable enough to move.

As one, almost every window and door in the house opened. A second later, every fan or other type of air moving device came on, and in mere moments, the gas and the smoke had started to clear. As it did so, she walked through at Vance's request to survey the damage. Stepping into the hallway, she thought she saw a figure at the end, lying on the floor. She jogged down the hallway and stopped right in front of where the figure was lying, half in and half out of the last room on the hall.

She stared at him for a moment, and then took off her goggles so that she could get a better look.

"Oh, Nate," she said, eyes tearing up from the effects of the gas that still lingered in the air. She signaled her men to gather him up and take him back to the centralized location some of her men were even now setting up as a treatment facility. Then, she stepped over him as they moved in behind her and moved on into the room. She saw Parker on the bed, and realized that she must have been who Nate was worried about. She knew she would need to have a talk with him later on about following orders during a military mission, but it was neither the time nor the place for that at the moment, and she had other things she had to do, so that would wait.

Noticing the young woman's breathing was labored, she moved over next to her, placing the ear pieces to her stethoscope into her ears as she came. She listened to the tiny thief's heartbeat, which was strong and steady. Her lungs didn't sound as good, however, and Doc spoke into her wrist communicator, ordering her carried back to the central treatment location, and ordering oxygen for her.

Five minutes later she walked back into the room her people were setting up as a makeshift treatment area, and was surprised to see ten women sitting there with various injuries in need of treatment. As she set about helping the medics and the other doctors she had brought with her see to various patients, she was somewhat surprised to see other women being led in, each having some injury related to barbed wire. Finally, she asked, "What's going on?"

"The man who rescued us when we came out of the tunnel—he told us to come here."

"Tunnel? What man?"

Shelley stepped into the room next, prodding three well tied men ahead of him. He spoke quietly.

"While we all ran in the house, Eliot apparently ran around the house and it seems he found some of these women and their captors trying to escape through a tunnel in the woods beyond the property line. He sent the women back, knowing the team would be here to make sure they were safe. When I realized that the gas had taken care of everything in here, and Eliot wasn't here, I went to find him to see if I could help him. He asked me to bring these men back here. They need medical attention, so Vance sent them in here before he has them picked up and put in the stockade."

"They look fine to me. How was Eliot when you saw him?"

"Determined. There are twenty five women in all, and he was backtracking the tunnel to make sure no one was in there trying to wait us out, and escape after we leave." Shelley looked at the woman who had spoken up about "the man in the tunnel" and asked her, "Can you show me where the tunnel starts in the house?"

Biting her lip, the woman nodded and rose without a word. Shelley followed her. She moved back down the hall to the last bedroom, and flung open the door to the closet. Moving inside, she touched a shelf a certain way, and the whole shelving unit slid silently aside, revealing a largish hole in the wall. Eliot stood on the other side, looking surprised, as he was not expecting anyone to open the tunnel for him from the inside.

He stepped through and said, "Thank you," dragging Kelley behind him. Moving out of the closet and back up the hall toward the main living areas, where he knew he'd find Vance, he didn't spare a care for what walls he might be running Kelley into, or what injuries he might be giving the man. Doc could fix it, if he turned the man over to her, and if he killed him instead, well, then it wouldn't really matter, would it?