Good afternoon! Hopefully everything is going well for you! Here I am with yet another update, quickly as promised. Your reviews give me life, so keep 'em coming! In the meantime, enjoy chapter eight and thank you, as always, for reading! :)
Eight
It's hot and humid and sticky; that's the first thing Sara notices as she slowly comes to. The air is thick and heavy as it enters her aching lungs; her hurried breathing the only thing she focuses on a while, still groggy and disoriented, the day a complete blur. Her head is pounding and there's something running tantalizingly slow down her hairline; she's not sure if it's sweat or blood or a sick combination of the two, but it's collecting in a shallow pool on her collarbone. Her body feels as though it's been set on fire. There's a faint tug on her wrists when she writhes in pain and she realizes she's bound to whatever fixture they have her sitting upon. Thick, unrelenting duct tape is anchoring her here and no matter how she twists and tugs, she can't get free.
Her eyes flutter open, then, and her vision is blurry and distorted. She blinks once, twice, three times before it goes clear. There isn't much before her; a thick slab of duct tape is over her mouth, she feels it now, so she can't shout out even if she wanted to. There's a window on the east wall covered by a cheap, floral-printed curtain; the glass is broken and achingly hot air is flowing in, long and slow. As far as she can tell, she's the only thing in the room; the wooden floorboards creak and squeak as she wriggles around again, trying to get a good look at her empty surroundings. It's an old house, to say the least; that much she can tell. Glancing out the window, Sara can see nothing but trees, cattails and browned grass that's long overdue for a trim.
She hears voices, then, on the other side of the door and instantly quiets. A man and a woman, she believes, are arguing back an forth, speaking in hushed whispers as if they were afraid someone would hear them in this abandoned house in the middle of nowhere. Her stomach growls, then, and she remembers she hadn't eaten lunch; by default, neither had the children, and she hopes to God Sofia and LJ have found them, now. She prays they're alright, that they're safely removed from their unsafe environment, but it hurts too much to think that she's not with them and she has to force herself to stop. The voices are getting louder and closer; she strains to hear what they're saying and before long, they're right outside the door.
"Come on, Stace, I don't think you're thinking rationally."
"What is there to think rationally about? We get what we need out of her and then we kill her."
"And what if she doesn't want to talk?"
"Then we kill her sooner."
"See, that's where you're being irrational. We don't have to kill anyone."
"Murphy, you know if we kill her, we'll get to Scofield in a heartbeat."
"Stacy, she's got kids."
"So? You think they'll be the only kids without a mother? That's life."
"I'm not killing anyone."
"You couldn't, anyway. You don't have what it takes."
"Look, I didn't sign up for this. When Edison approached me-"
"When Edison approached you, it was with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. You took it. Now, you have to pay your dues and suffer the consequences! These kinds of things come with being part of this operation, Murphy. It's about time you get it through your head."
The door suddenly opens with a jolt and Sara is staring back at two Company operatives; Stacy is a fiery redhead with a ruthless personality to go with it. Her eyes are cold and hard and she's wearing an expression that screams there is nothing and no one out there that she cares about; something that comes only when one loses everything. Murphy, her sidekick, is standing behind her, and this speaks volumes about who's in charge here. Sara recognizes him instantly; sandy-haired and wearing the Harry Potter glasses- he's the one who had knocked her unconscious. She recalls even then how he'd looked nervous and unwilling and how he'd apologized just before knocking the sense out of her. He looks as if he's simply along for the ride, as if he wishes to do no harm to anyone.
She makes a mental note of this. She could use it to her advantage.
"Ah, welcome back to the land of the living," Stacy sneers. "We brought you a little snack."
She crosses the room and digs her nails into the skin of Sara's cheek, yanking off the duct tape maliciously and definitely taking some of Sara's skin with it. She hisses in pain and Stacy smirks, "It's not much, but the kitchen's been out of service for years. Much like the whole house."
A stale crust of bread is shoved into Sara's mouth and she coughs and sputters and chokes on it before spitting it onto the ground. She isn't going to take their charity. Stacy frowns and turns to Murphy, "Clean that up."
Murphy glares at her but does as he's told, muttering, "Queen Stacy and the rest of us are all her worker bees…"
"Watch your mouth," Stacy sneers and then Sara finds her voice.
"What happened to Tattoo?" She utters. "The guy that brought me here. What happened to him?"
Stacy shakes her head. "He didn't bring you here. We brought you here. Olsen was just a pawn. He's been taken care of."
Sara glances away from them, saying, "I don't understand you people. You're sick."
"Yeah?" Stacy cocks an eyebrow, ripping a new piece of duct tape off and slapping it across her mouth. "When I want your opinion, I'll beat it out of you."
She turns on her heel and stalks out of the room. Murphy looks up at her and offers her a reluctant grimace. "If I were you, I wouldn't mess with her."
Sara rolls her eyes, wondering how much these two knew about her. Because if they honestly knew as much as they claim to, they would know that no amount of torture can possibly faze her, anymore.
"Look, would you calm down? I'm sure they're fine."
"Fine? You're sure they're fine?" Michael exclaims. "It's been almost a week since I've heard from them. No, Paul, they're not fine."
"We've been calling them nonstop for days," Lincoln adds. "No response on any front. Something's wrong."
Kellerman sighs and turns away from the database, still running names even days later. They've been holed up in this hotel room ever since leaving Lisa Tabak's house two days earlier. It's been a week and a half since they started this whole operation and with each passing day, the anxiety grows and grows for both Lincoln and Michael, neither of who have heard from their families affirming their well-being. They can't focus on the task at hand; they're too distracted and blinded by their worry to zero in on possible Company agents. Michael runs an exhausted hand over his face, the stress mounting and starting to close in, and Lincoln paces back and forth on the other side of the room, anger and frustration emanating from his every action.
"This is my wife and my children we're talking about," Michael states. "If they're in danger, I need to go help them. If something happens and I'm not there…"
"Sara's pretty capable of taking care of herself," Kellerman says, his hand automatically coming to his chest. "I still have the scars to prove it."
"That's not the point," Michael frowns. "If my family is in trouble, I need to help them. That's the bottom line. They're always going to come first, Paul. They're the most important people in the world to me."
"I've said it before and I'll say it again," Lincoln agrees. "In the end, the only thing that matters is family. I'm with you man; let's get out of here."
He and Michael begin to throw their things together and Kellerman immediately objects. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, where do you think you're going? You can't just leave; you have business to attend to."
"No, Paul, you have business to attend to," Michael answers smartly. "I'm sure you can figure the rest of this out."
"Yeah, this ain't our problem anymore," Lincoln agrees. "You want to take down The Company, fine. But leave us out of it."
"No, we had an agreement!" Kellerman insists. "You would help us out and then you'd walk away. You haven't finished yet!"
"No, we had an agreement last time," Michael corrects. "No jail time in exchange for obtaining Scylla. That was our incentive, our motive. But we don't have one now. This time, it's just a favor to you. Well I'm done doing favors for a government that profits by screwing us over. You want to take down The Company, you do it yourself."
Kellerman watches in shock as Lincoln and Michael continue packing. "You can't be serious."
"Serious as ever."
"You can't just quit."
"That's funny; that's exactly what we're doing."
"I never expected you guys to take the coward's way out."
"No," Lincoln snarls, turning to Kellerman and slamming him against the nearby wall, his hands curling around the man's throat. "Cowardly is not finishing this job in the first place. Cowardly is expecting everything to sort itself out and not arresting Edison and his crew because you assumed everything was alright. Cowardly is sending an innocent man to prison on a life sentence in order to get back at his father instead of confronting the right man in the first place!"
Kellerman coughs and gasps and Lincoln releases him, saying, "My family is in trouble and I'm going to help them. That is not cowardly."
Tensions are running extremely high; Alex and Sucre are watching the entire situation play out and wishing they had enough courage to go with them. But before any of them can react any further, there is a chiming sound from the corner of the room where the systemic database rests. All eyes snap towards the machine and Kellerman says, "It's finished."
Sucre asks, "We have the names now?"
"Let's find out," Kellerman replies, sitting before the system and clicking through the list. "Well we can cross of Owen Frank, the operative we killed outside of the airport last week."
"You killed," Lincoln corrects.
"And Thomas Underwood and Larry Hill, the two from Lisa's house," Kellerman states, crossing them off as well. "I checked their IDs after we killed them."
"After you killed them," Sucre says and Kellerman frowns.
"Semantics," He waves this off. "Just give me a minute here to sort through the names again."
He clicks a few times, deletes a few files and comes up with a list of seven names. "Gilbert Lawson, George Olsen, Eric Heath, Philip Norton, Richard Murphy, Stacy Breckenridge and, of course, Nathaniel Edison."
He lets the names sit in for a while before saying. "Seven people, gentlemen. We're only dealing with seven people."
"Of those seven people, how many have recruited new operatives?" Alex asks.
"We won't know that until we reach them," Kellerman says. "But I'm assuming none of them have had a chance to recruit since they're still in the 'destroy anyone who opposes us' phase."
"So what do we do now?" Sucre wonders. "They could be anywhere."
"No, not anywhere," Kellerman disagrees, pointing to each of the profiles that list a current location. "Like I said, you can't hide from the government, folks. Edison's in Clearwater; we can save him for last. The others are spread between Raleigh and Durham, North Carolina."
He glances over toward Michael and Lincoln and says, "What do you know? Looks like we'll all be taking that trip back east, after all."
She doesn't know what time it is; she doesn't even know what day it is. But she's hungry and weak and being tied to a chair isn't the best way to get a nice eight-hour sleep. Stacy and Murphy hadn't really done anything to her; on the contrary, they seem to enjoy leaving her in complete solitary confinement. If this is their form of torture, Sara thinks, they may want to step it up a notch, because it's pretty bland and she's been through far worse. Just as she's thinking this, the door crashes open and Stacy stands at the threshold, her cold eyes boring into Sara's and searching for any kind of discomfort or psychological pain she may have caused. Sara feels pretty satisfied when Stacy comes up empty handed.
"I should've known better than to play the solitary card with you," Stacy says menacingly. "You're used to the abandonment by now, aren't you? Daddy cares more about his career and his image than his own family. Mom drinks herself to death. Junkie boyfriends get you hooked and addicted before leaving you high and dry. No stranger to heartache, are you, Doctor?"
Sara stares back at her, eyes blank, and Stacy chuckles. "Nah, not anymore, though, right? You really turned yourself around. Cleaned up your act, did some good for humanity. Got married, had a couple of kids… Everything's just fine and dandy, right?"
"Tell me, have you told your kids how mommy and daddy met?" Stacy sneers. "Do they know that their father was a convict and a liar who seduced their mother into thinking that he cared about her just so he could get what he wanted? Do they know that their mommy and daddy's courtship was an act of adultery, because their daddy was still legally married? Do they know that their mother had to a shoot a woman- their own grandmother- just to save their father's life?"
Sara, still, remains strictly calm. Stacy then asks, "What about you, Sara? Do you tell them about you? Do you tell them how you used to steal morphine from the hospital in order to get high? Do you tell them about that time you were so far gone you let a kid die right in front of you? Do you tell them about your AA meetings or your aggressive alcohol addiction? And let's not forget about the time you overdosed all because of their very own father. Do they know about that?"
"See, I know you, Sara," Stacy snarls. "I did my homework. And if you think I'm not going to use your every weakness to my advantage, you might want to think again. This can be very easy or this can be very painful; it's your choice."
Sara can't help herself; she smirks. Stacy frowns. "You got something to say?"
Leaning over her, she yanks her tape free once more and spits, "Say it."
"If you did your homework, then you'll know that this isn't my first time being tortured," Sara replies smartly. "My life's been threatened before. So if you think this is torture, think again. I've been through a hell of a lot worse; you might want to step it up."
Stacy reels back and smacks Sara hard across the face. "You watch your tongue with me, you little bitch, or there will be more where that came from."
She's split her lip; Sara can taste blood, warm and coppery, but she smiles wryly anyway. "Bring it."
She's sure Stacy has never tortured anyone in her life from the look of mixed confusion, frustration and anger she receives a moment later. Stacy reapplies the duct tape to her mouth and leaves the room without another word, taking her anger out, instead on Murphy, who suggests she give it a rest. She reams him out, screaming and blaming him for things that aren't his fault, before their voices grow farther and farther away, signifying they've left her there alone again. Sara groans a little as more hot air flows through the broken window, but pauses immediately in realization. Broken window. It's dark and dim in the room so she can barely make out her surroundings and maybe the hunger is causing her eyes to play tricks on her, but she swears she can see a small collection of broken glass on the windowsill.
Broken glass and duct tape do not make for a good combination; it could be her ticket out of here.
"What time do we land in Raleigh-Durham?"
"I couldn't book us on a flight to Raleigh-Durham; literally every flight on every airline is booked until Wednesday and I figured that would be too late. I booked us on the six-thirty flight to Fayetteville instead."
"And we're getting to Raleigh how?"
"There's a bus station fifteen feet from the airport. It's only about an hour between cities; we'll get there as soon as we can."
"As soon as we can is not soon enough."
"Well you know what, man, I tried. You're welcome to walk, for all I care!"
"You know what, Paul? You wouldn't be saying any of this if it was your family out there, so why don't you shut the fuck up?"
"Linc…"
"No, I'm sick and tired of him treating us like we're a bunch of-"
"Hey papi," Sucre interrupts. "Anyone else hear that?"
The arguing ceases immediately and all five men are silent. There is a dull ringing sound coming from one of the duffel bags by the door; it's a moment or two before they put two and two together. Michael says, "That's the cell phone. They're finally calling us back."
Lincoln crosses the room in two enormous strides, digs through Michael's bag and answers the phone in one fluid motion. "Hello?"
"Lincoln?! Gracias a Dios, you're finally answering. I tried calling for hours and had the wrong number and when I finally figured it out, the phone was dead and so I sent LJ to get a charger but then we had to find an outlet and ay Dios mio, I don't know what to do."
"Sofia," Lincoln breathes in relief. "Thank God. We've been worried sick. Are you alright?"
"Yes. Wait, no. Yes, I'm fine, but no, we're not alright."
"Sofia, is LJ there with you?" Lincoln asks, throwing a cautionary glance at Michael who's waiting slightly impatiently for news on his family as well. "Sara? The kids?"
"Todo era una locura. De sangre, armas, cuerpos ... No sé dónde están, Lincoln!"
"Sofia, put LJ on the phone, please," Lincoln says impatiently.
There's a shuffling on the other end before LJ picks up, "Dad! Dad, we're sitting in the parking lot of a gas station and Sofia's freaking out and we don't know where to go or what to do next."
"LJ," Lincoln closes his eyes in relief. "You're alright. Thank God. What happened?"
"We were at Ben's house, like Uncle Mike said. Sofia decided she was going to make empanadas to thank Ben for his hospitality or whatever. She said she needed help at the store so I offered to go with her. We were gone an hour, maybe, but when we came back… Dad, when we came back everything was a disaster."
"Hold on, LJ," Lincoln says, placing the phone between himself and his brother. "I'm putting you on speaker, okay?"
"Yeah."
"What happened?"
"I don't know. There were police everywhere. They said we'd just escaped a triple homicide."
"A triple… A triple homicide," Michael's pale as a sheet, asking, "LJ, are they alright? Tell me it wasn't them."
"It wasn't. It was your friend, Ben, and two other guys we had never seen before."
Michael breathes a sigh of relief. "Thank God. Oh, thank God. LJ, I need to talk to them. Put Sara on the phone."
"LJ," Kellerman calls from afar. "Hi, this is Paul Kellerman. I'm sure you remember me and we can get down to brass tacks later, but first, can you describe the men to me?"
Lincoln and Michael stare at him, looks obviously reading that there was a time and a place and this isn't it, but LJ answers uneasily, anyway. "Uh… sure. One guy had a tattoo of a snake down his neck. The other was kind of chubby with a buzz cut… But that's all I saw."
"That's all I need, thank you," Kellerman states. "Gentlemen, these men would be Lawson and Olsen, which means we're now working with five men. I swear, this gets easier and easier."
Ignoring him, Michael again pleads, "Sara. I need to talk to Sara, LJ."
"Uncle Mike… She's not here."
He freezes. "What are you talking about?"
They hear Sofia once again say, "No sé dónde están!"
LJ hesitates before saying, "When we got back, there were three bodies, that's it. No sign of Sara, Noah or Zoe. They're gone."
Lincoln watches as his brother's face crumbles in terror. He says nothing more; his eyes widened, his mouth slackened, he's despondent. Lincoln then asks, "Where are you now? What are you guys doing?"
"We don't know where they are, exactly, but we've been looking for them. We're staying at a different hotel every night trying not to stay in the same place for too long. It could take a while, though. Durham's a big city."
"Wait, Durham?" Lincoln asks. "I thought you were in Raleigh."
"We were. But we found this cell phone in Ben's mailbox and underneath it was a piece of notepad paper. It only had one word on it- Durham."
At this, Michael looks up again, somewhat hopeful. "You found the note with the phone, you said?"
"Yeah, why?"
"She's helping you," Michael smiles proudly. "She's trying to tell you where they are."