How is everybody doing? I just wanted to say that this story is coming to an end very soon. There's only one chapter left and then an epilogue.
Thanks for all the comments, they encourage me to write. The amount of love I get for this story is amazing.
Chapter 20
"Do you think she's a double agent?" Santana stroked her imaginary beard while Brittany typed in a cryptic language.
"Oh, I'm quite sure of that. Did you know that every time Rory escaped our hands, Sugar was in the room?" Brittany sat back and let the computer do the work.
"When did she first arrive on the scene?"
"Sugar? She was with us long before Rory. I think this is something way bigger than just Rory and his uncle." The search showed fifty percent completion. "So, this is where I need your help. I don't believe Sugar Motta is her real name because it's nonexistent. There are no traces of it anywhere in the news or blacklists. What do you think her real name is?"
Santana was stumped. How in the world was she supposed to know? "Ummm, Nancy Drew?"
"Very funny," Brittany rolled her eyes. "It's fine, I have no idea yet either but once these results come up I'm sure to find out."
"How long is this going to take?" Santana yawned and laid her head on the small bit of surface not covered with equipment. "Can we do this in the morning?"
"It is morning Santana, see three am." Brittany pointed to the computers time device.
"Fine, I'm going to get some coffee so I can be useful." She got up and left a lazy kiss to Brittany's lips.
Once Santana was gone, Brittany brought up BlueJelly and scanned the message board.
I'm back; do you have anything for me? Brittany typed. She hoped that the other hackers could make some sense of the foreign language data she had come across.
Goobre - got nothing. It's pretty straight forward business dealings.
HawKing - Nothing either, although I traced one of the stories to a scandal. Dude was having elicited affairs with his father's secretary. Denied of course. But probably true.
Bonghead – Found the name of his mistress Lol. Also nudes.
HawKing – She can't have been happy with his second (fourth?) helpings. What's her name?
Goobre – Mary Queen of Sluts?
Bonghead – Shut up its Garcia Attom. And I'm sure she gets off on his money more than his d***
HawKing – Give me the nudes!
Bonghead – Gay gay gay … check your inbox
"ugh," Brittany grumbled. Thanks guys. She typed and thought nothing of their conversation.
Gutenturd – Hey, got smthing u might like off a Deutsch site. Rumor has it there was money laundering off Flanagan Enterprise in 2001, secretary was suspected and fired. It was intended that she be brought to court but she escaped the country. She was also suspected of other crimes of the same nature.
Brittany made the connection instantly and changed the search target to Garcia Attom.
"So what have you found?" Santana plopped down in the seat beside her and stretched her legs out onto the computer desk. Brittany had been engrossed in making the connection between the information that she hadn't noticed Santana's return.
"Is that some gamer's forum Britt? Because I swear to god if you've been a secret gamer all this time… we could have had some very good Saturday nights."
Brittany shut down the page so fast she almost exited her search engine as well. "What? Umm no, I…that was…I was reading about the latest gaming technology because I like codes and things it's good to expand my programming knowledge." She smiled, hoping that her excuse had been convincing.
"Yeah, okay. You in a chatroom or something? because I can hear the pinging. The other geeks are calling for you. Tell them your wife will kick their asses in Call of Duty if they try to hit on you." True to Santana's word, another string of pinging sounds erupted.
"Fine," Brittany recalled the page.
"Holy shit is that…!"
Brittany's hands flew to cover the monitor but because it was so big, parts of it still showed.
"Babe, I don't know what this is but your hands aren't covering much. I can still see the man's privates which is disgusting. At least cover that and not the boobs."
"Santana," Brittany whined as she withdrew her hands, baring the pictures in all their glory. "This isn't what it looks like."
"Are you ashamed of looking at porn?" Santana laid a hand over her heart in faux shock. "Because, I'm not surprised after what we've been doing all day, you'd want to get in the mood for more. Although, it's a little surprising that you like to look at straight porn."
"I'm not looking at porn!" Brittany shouted. You idiots are gross, take those down NOW. She typed
Goobre – just joining the fun?
Bonghead – told HawK to keep them to himself PErV
HawKing – sharing is caring dudes. Enjoy the spoils of your hard work Bong.
"Is that, Sugar Motta?" Santana planted her feet on the floor and leaned in for a closer look. "And Flanagan. Oh my god, it's them, that red hair is not deceiving me!"
"Her name is actually Garcia Attom. Long story short, she's a criminal who stole off Flanagan Enterprise and has probably been working closely with Rory."
Just then the search engine chimed that it had completed its task.
"Bingo," Brittany said, saving all the news articles to her hard disk back at home. The data also went directly to her handheld computer.
"We hit a goldmine Britt, but that means that Quinn and Puck could possibly be in danger. They went to help her after she supposedly got blackmailed by Rory. They're walking into some sort of trap if those two have been working together all along. We have to tell them somehow." Santana began to panic.
"That also means we aren't safe here. We have to go Santana." Brittany shut down all the computers in a hurry. She had a sinking feeling that some terrible things were already in motion and finding out now might be too late. "They know where we are."
The two Lopez's sprinted up the stairs to their room where they threw all their belongings into the knapsacks they brought with them. "Try ringing them." Santana shouted over her shoulder as she tightened the bag's opening in one swift pull.
"There's no answer." Brittany pressed redial but received the same automated answer, the number you have dialed is not available at this time.
"Whatever, let's get out of here." Santana threw her backpack on and rushed to help Brittany with hers.
"How are we going to leave Santana? We're in the middle of nowhere with no vehicle to escape in. If they're close, we could be visible for miles on the ground." Santana contemplated for a minute, taking in the fine facility they called home for the past few days and how much she would miss the carefree way she could spend her time with Brittany without anyone in the world disturbing them.
"I got it!" Her eyes widened. The mind sparking thought awoke her more than the coffee she'd downed a few minutes prior. "Look at this place Brittany; it's like state of the art. I doubt they don't have any hidden pods or garages where they keep cars. Hell, this place probably has a helicopter pad, maybe even a jet. We just have to find it."
"That sounds possible but it could take us a while to find it. Do we have that kind of time?"
"Well, what other option do we have? I'm not escaping on foot over miles of endless open space. That's riskier than if we hid somewhere in this facility while Flanagan's men crept all over it looking for us."
"That's only if they're close. I bet we can make it into the woods in half an hour if we sprint." Brittany crossed her arms.
"And then what? They'll find us eventually and that means if we're trekking all the way back to town we have to carry supplies. That would slow us down." Santana pointed out. "Look, we're wasting time discussing this. I'm going to look for a map of this place." She promptly left the room without saying another word.
Brittany sighed and gave up on doing anything that wasn't Santana's idea. It sounded pretty good in her head too, but she had a bad feeling that their enemies were nearer than they thought. That made her queasy and even more eager to leave before they got here.
She decided their best bet to finding some sort of guide through the facility would probably be found on the systems storage. She trudged back down to the computer room and powered the computers again, counting every second that passed by under her breath. She searched for the blueprint of the facility and found it immediately in one of the back-up drives. Pulling it up, she hurried to the big screen and tried to make sense of the levels and hall ways. She placed her finger on the entrance and traced a path to the computer room, familiarizing herself with the map. Then, she checked the legend for the name of any holdings for automobiles and aircrafts.
Just as Santana had said, the facility had a garage and a large hidden runway for planes along with a helicopter pad. "Genius," Brittany found the quickest route to their desired destination. It was all the way in the west wing, opposite of where she was currently standing. From her calculations, Brittany figured it would take her five minutes to find Santana and another fifteen for them to run full speed to the other wing. Twenty minutes. Brittany saved the map to her handheld palm and quickly donned her backpack once again.
"Santana," Brittany called out after ten minutes of running up and down stairs and searching the floors. They only had one phone which was in Brittany's pocket. If only Santana would pick up one of the facilities phones or use the intercom to communicate with her, Brittany grumbled inwardly. Her wife could literally be anywhere at this point. Deciding that continuing her search for Santana wouldn't be any more fruitful than it had been till now, Brittany began running in the direction of the hanger. She went down to the ninth floor where there was a hidden passage leading all the way to the hanger.
It didn't take long for her to surface into the expansive holding area. Brittany stopped to catch her breath as she exited the elevator that shot her all the way up, from her guess, higher than ground level. She walked past rows and rows of aircrafts to the large doors that opened up to skies. She found the button that would awaken the heavy steel doors and watched them move up till a large gaping hole showed itself in the hanger.
It was still dark out, but the hanger was high enough for Brittany to see the beginnings of a sunrise on the horizon. The cool outside air filled her lungs and she realized that she had missed the great outdoors immensely after being cooped in the facility for two days.
"Nice view huh?" A voice came from behind her, almost startling her into toppling off the side of the mountain in which the hanger and runways was embedded. Santana stood arms akimbo, panting heavily.
"Yeah, how did you get here?" Brittany wondered.
"Instinct." Santana smiled smugly. "I figured that any hanger would have to be well above ground for the planes to get up in the air. The wing we were in, opened up to flat plains like you know so I went to the opposite wing. I might have gotten lost, a little bit." Santana admitted. "But hey, I found it without a map!"
"Impressive," Brittany rolled her eyes. "You know, I was worried for you. Couldn't you have called or something so I knew where you were?"
"I was looking for our escape from lock down! Sorry if I didn't think to call you."
Brittany knew it wasn't the time or place to be picking a fight but the way that Santana seemed to disregard her well being hurt her. "So what were you going to do? Find this place and then find a phone?"
"There's one in this hanger, probably in the control room up there." Santana pointed to a large glass window overlooking the entire area.
"Fine, since I seem to just be a sort of after-thought to you. Do what you want." Brittany swung on her heels and walked down the aisle until she found a plane that she liked. She had extensive training in piloting aircrafts because apart from being an intelligence master, the company she signed up for required their assassins to handle aircrafts for overseas missions as well.
"Brittany, it wasn't like that! I was thinking about us getting out of here okay?" Santana followed Brittany to where she was dragging a ladder towards her chosen aircraft. She situated it at the doors opening and stomped up the steps, closing the door before Santana could reach the top.
She knew she was being mean but Santana's answer had really annoyed her.
Behind closed doors, Brittany closed her eyes and ground her teeth. She shouldn't be doing this. It wasn't Santana that had made her mad, just the whole situation.
What if she couldn't find her again? What if Rory's men got a hand on her and she didn't know where Santana was? It was the overwhelming fear of losing Santana that had made her paranoid and angry.
Heaving a defeated sigh, Brittany pressed the release button for the door expecting Santana to be outside.
"Santana?" She stuck her neck out and scanned the area for any signs of movement but there were none. "I'm sorry, I'm not mad at you." There was still no answer.
She made heavy plonks down the steel stairs till she was on ground level again. She turned 360 degrees but still there was no Santana. A real fear settled into her stomach. It made her uneasy and over alert. She felt that perhaps it was no longer just her and Santana in the giant facility. Something was happening and she didn't want to know what that was all alone. Throwing all caution to the wind she shouted for Santana.
It was only a minute before she could breathe a little easier. After running from one end of the hanger to the other, Santana came down the stairs from the glass loft up above. Her face was pale and her expression was one of worry.
"They're coming. And they've got Quinn, Puck and Mike."
"They can't do this, they're going to fucking pay!" Santana bellowed into the hollow space. Its echo rang three times as loud. "Lives are just a game for them! I still don't understand why He is doing this!"
"Santana, tell me what they said." Brittany held her by the shoulders to keep her from lashing out.
"He said he knew where we were and that he was here. He's here with a whole damn army. He said to be prepared. There's going to be a signal, we have to find them or every half hour he's going to kill someone."
"Well what are we waiting for then?" Brittany sprang into action.
"Britt?" Santana made no effort to move. "What are we going to do?"
"Find our friends of course!" It was a no brainer decision so why was Santana so hesitant.
"We can't just do that Brittany. You could get hurt!"
Brittany was on a brink between melting over Santana's concern and wanting to kick her for underestimating her ability to survive.
"It's a risk but that's what our whole lives have been about Santana. You know nothing comes easy, and certainly not our freedom from our pasts. But that's why we have to fight all the more. It's worth it. Come on they were there for us when we needed them, now they need us. And Santana, I have your back. We're going to kick their asses. We'll go together. I'm never letting you out of my sight again. I've got you."
"Okay," Santana said quietly, taking in every promise Brittany had offered her. She knew that there was no way she was going to let anything happen to Brittany either over her dead body. "We need a plan."
"If you were a terrorist, where would you hide your hostages?" Brittany began to think. She knew they didn't have much time till some sign was sent to them and the clock began to tick.
"There are like two thousand rooms here!" Santana exclaimed as she paced rounds on the floor.
"I know, but think. Which room would you choose?"
"Ummm, let see. There are ten floors overall. Eliminate the first floor, they aren't hiding in the lobby, and the fourth floor with all the sports facilities. The Area is too big, it'll take too many men to keep it secure; they'll want as many men as possible prowling the halls for us."
"Okay so that leaves eight. I'm sure they aren't hiding them on this upper level floor so we can cut that out. Remove the gaming slash theater floor and ballroom – there are no exits and from what I know about Rory, he needs an out every time."
"So that leaves six floors." Santana drew a quick map, crossing out the floors they'd eliminated. "Usually, I'd make the basement my first bet but I don't think Rory is going to go that deep only to trap himself if he gets in trouble. Besides, I don't think he even knows how to get there much less get inside. It needs a code that only the engineers have and there are none handy here at present."
"Okay, five left. Four of those are bedrooms and the last is the library."
"He's not in the library. That's a nightmare of a place for keeping guard. The bookshelves provide way too many chances for surprise attacks."
"So one of the bedrooms, that's floors three, six, seven, and eight." Brittany had barely finished her sentence when the lights went out.
"That's the sign." Santana's voice was shaking with nervousness and excitement.
"How'd they get to the source of electricity? I thought all controls were in the basement."
"Quinn, they must have made her do it."
"We have to go now. They're probably still making their way out of the basement, we can follow them back to where the others are being held hostage."
"Good thinking. I've got your back." Santana said and readied her ammunition.
Since the power had been cut, they had to find a different route out of the hanger. Brittany quickly noticed that there was an exit through the mechanic shop off to the right of the main area.
The hall was narrow, rather like a tunnel with no light at the end. By now, their eyes had adjusted to the dark and Santana could make out the neatly painted walls. The air smelled of gasoline and other oils used to maintain the planes.
"Are you sure this doesn't lead to a dead end?" Santana whispered unnecessarily. The closed in space made it sound like she was speaking in her normal voice.
"There are always stairs for places like this along with a service elevator." Brittany said nonchalently. "They're used to haul up parts or heavy things."
Sure enough at the end of the path a door presented itself. It opened easily without a squeak as if it had never been moved on it's hinges before. "This should lead all the way to the nineth floor above the basement according to the blueprint. Where do you think they are now?"
From Santana's estimate, Quinn and her abductors would already be making their way up to the eighth floor. "We're going to be too late." She announced as they descended two floors lower. "They've already made it to eighth which means that they could already be back in the holding room."
"Not necessarily," Brittany huffed as she jumped two stairs at a time. "From my approximations, we're on third already. Let's check it. If the patrol is thin than we know it's not that floor, leaving us with a block of 6, 7, 8. Much easier to handle. We just have to follow the guards." Brittany winked and pressed the metal handle of the door. Giving it a strong yank, it gave way easily not uttering a single whine.
"Do you hear anything?" She whispered. Santana replied negative. They walked down the corridor, guns ready, listening for anything that might be an enemy. Brittany turned briefly to look at Santana when a gunshot went off. For a minute she believed they'd been ambushed and that she might be bleeding somewhere. But she felt no pain, only a quivering of excitement that they were now closer to finding their friends. "Santana?" Her voiced raised slightly as she ran her hands quickly over her body, searching for any fluids.
"He was in front of you." Santana looked her in the eye. "We're okay."
Brittany turned around and dropped on her knees beside the still figure. She checked for a pulse but felt none. "He's gone." She confirmed and stood again. "I don't think they're being held on this floor. The shot would have alerted any other stalkers nearby."
Hurriedly, Brittany and Santana left the way they'd come, descending the dark stairs past the fourth and fifth floor to the sixth. As they arrived at the door of the sixth level, it burst open catching them by surprise. On the other side was an equally shocked armed man. Getting over her initial reaction, Santana raised her gun and fired before the man could shoot at them. Brittany stepped over the dead body and fired at the oncoming mass of Flanagan's lackeys. Santana ducked low and shot from behind sending a wall of bullets into their bodies, all this before any of the men had a chance to shoot.
"That was a mini army," Brittany cocked her gun back and reloaded. "We're probably close."
"Wait, quiet." Santana threw her hand over Brittany's mouth. From afar they could hear someone giving orders to another man. "Go see what that was, I'll hold the hostage."
"Quinn," They both whispered in unison, immediately holding their guns out in front of them in a 'ready to shoot' stance as they followed the sound. They came to a corner, Brittany peeked out from behind it. "There, one guy has got Quinn, they're moving up the stairs. Let's go."
As Brittany turned the corner, a shot rang out. The bright light of fire shot her eyes and blinded her for a second. In an instant, she was firing back at the blurring figure. "You get Quinn," Brittany told Santana as she advanced in the direction of her assailant. "Quick, before they can alert anybody else."
Santana dashed forward to the bottom of the stairs, only taking a brief moment to look over her shoulder at Brittany. She was caught in a difficult situation, one in which her mind was only now comprehending. On one hand, captor was dragging captive away up the stairs and on the other, Brittany was alone, chasing danger that could quickly multiply if others found out their location quick enough. She didn't want to leave Brittany but getting to Quinn could lead her straight to Rory.
"Brittany!" Santana shouted into the dark. "Are you okay? I'll come back for you. I promise." There was no answer, only a round of gun shots. Biting her lip, Santana turned on her heels and bounded up the stairs after Quinn and the man who held her captive. Now, she could make out the sound of Quinn shouting for the man to let her go. She must be resisting and slowing him down, Santana thought. That could be bad, if Quinn angered him enough, the man could shoot her through the head.
Picking up speed, Santana closed the gap between the struggling duo nearing the top of the stairs. In one swift move, she raised her gun and shot the man in the neck. He turned to look at her, face raging and blood boiling but then his face contorted into confusion and pain. His hand clasped the back of his neck where the bullet had entered and then he was swaying on his feet, letting Quinn go altogether. Grabbing the man, Santana pushed him up against the wall, smearing his blood all over it. She raised her gun one last time, pointed it at his head and knocked him out cold. There was no need to waste another bullet on him, unconscious he would bleed out and die in no time.
"Quinn," Santana said as she uncuffed her with the key she found on the man's body. She ripped off the blindfold and waited for Quinn's vision to focus on her. "Where is everybody else?"
"Game room," Quinn used Santana's body to steady herself as she stood up.
"Really? Britt and I thought Flanagan would choose one of the million bedrooms to hold you guys."
"Well, he couldn't resist the refreshments and entertainment while he waited."
"So stupid. How many men does he have left?" Santana asked. The longer she stood doing nothing the more anxious she became. There were no longer any sounds of shooting meaning that Brittany had finished the man off or that she was...no she couldn't be otherwise that man would have run back already. Still, not being able to see Brittany was beginning to give her a panic attack.
"I think he's got five men with him. The rest were sent out to kill you."
"Then we have no time to waste." Santana and Quinn began to move away from the stairs when a crackling sound came out of nowhere. "What's that?"
"Radio," Quinn replied, "Rory's communicating with his men."
Quickly, Santana ran down the stairs to retrieve the listening and speaking piece. She placed her hand over the mic, completely covering it from picking up sounds and she stuffed the earpiece into her ear.
"Updates, men." The voice Santana hated spoke. A leader informed that his team had heard noises above, they assumed it came from the sixth floor and they were on their way up now. Another said that he'd been called to regroup with the former team.
"They're coming," Santana whispered to Quinn. "They know where we are."
"Good," Rory continued. "I believe we lost a few comrades already, don't let those to blasted women get away with this. Howard...Howard..."
A groggy sounding voice replied, "Boss...they...she". Santana guessed it was the man Brittany had gone after and a deep fear set in.
"It's time," Rory cut him off, "and they will pay dearly. Kill the blonde girl."
Meanwhile, in a room on the sixth floor Brittany was lying on cold bathroom tiles in a pool of blood.
Cliffhanger :D
Anyone want to guess what happens? Oh and hats off to the person who sensed Sugar Motta was a sneaky sneak who ratted out on Brittana