Chapter 26 : A New Kind of Adventure - Part 10 : Search, Find, and Rescue
I woke up in a dark place. Where am I? Is this a dream? Everything is dark, not a single thing was there. Then, there's an enormous bright white light. It almost blinding me in the process. There, stood a boy with a familiar blue rooster helmet, grey hoodie, and green short facing away from me, his arms crossed. Wait, I know who he is, but it's impossible.
"A-Alex?" I tried to call him.
He turned around to face me, he greeted me with a warm smile and a pure sea blue eyes, "Hey Lily." He said.
"Alex!" I quickly went to hug him, I hugged him tightly. I thought he was dead, but he isn't. I let a tear of joy and happiness fell from my eye. I was happy to see him again, his body is soft. And there's a white outline at the edge of his body. I realized he's got an inch taller than me. But, no way that he's dead now. He's right here, and I'm hugging him now.
"Where have you been? I've miss you so much." I asked.
"I didn't go anywhere. The Empire has taken me somewhere. And I'll give you two clues. A prison, and a plain." He answered.
"What do you mean? But, you're here. With me."
"I know you miss me, but-"
"Took ya a bloody long time to talk to that girl, is she your girlfriend?" Someone accented voice cut him off, I saw a man in army uniform with red beret hat and light brown mustache appeared from the light.
"No, she isn't my girlfriend. And a minute please." Alex replied.
"Who is that?" I asked Alex.
"Well, he's my great grandfather. He fought in World War II, he done the same thing as I did to you Lily." Alex answered, "When many of his men are wounded and they were surrounded by enemies. The truck arrive and they entered the truck, bringing the wounded one first. Unfortunately, the truck has a capacity of 10 soldiers, and there's 11 soldiers in his unit, including him. He decided to stay behind while the others escaped. He was captured and executed by the enemies, and he was memorized as hero for the others." He explained.
"Oh, I'm sorry for your great grandfather Alex."
"You don't have to, and looks like I'm going to share the same fate as him."
That really hit me hard on my heart, "No, you are not going to die Alex. I'm going to save you no matter what."
"Then you must act quickly, time is ticking and my execution is in 3 days. You must find me before the time comes."
"But-"
"Lily," He cut me off, "I know you didn't want me to die, but if I did. I always be at your side, no matter what. And soon, you will able to find me."
That words, that voice, it's him saying it all along! How could I be so stupid? But, how did he do that? If he could do that, that means he's already dead and became a ghost, and then haunting my mind. But, he said that he still alive. Maybe that voice just a hallucination in my brain.
"Now I need to come back, goodbye." He said before waving a good bye to me.
I tried to grab him, but I fell through him instead with my face first hitting the ground or whatever it is. As he getting closer to the light, I know I couldn't get to him, all my effort to grab him is all nothing but a failure. I just buried my face to my knee and cried a lot, tears flowing down from my eyes and wet my knees.
I looked at him one last time while rested my chin on both of my knees. He turned his head to me while walking to the light.
"Should I?" He asked his great grandfather.
His great grandfather nodded, he walked back to me. He knelt down beside me and patted my shoulder to comfort me.
"Hey, don't cry. And you just going to make me cry too." He said.
"But, I never able to meet you again." I whined.
"Don't worry, you will meet me again. Only time will tell." He gave me a warm smile, "And don't forget about the gift I gave to you."
"What gift?"
"You'll find out yourself. Now I really need to go, my great grandfather is waiting for me." He replied.
He quickly left to catch up to his great grandfather, he waved one last goodbye to me before vanishing at the light with his great grandfather. The white floor quickly crumbled into pieces and I fell into the dark abyss of nothingness as the darkness welcomed me in its arms.
I awoke from my dream and suddenly hit the cold floor with my nose first and a loud thud. I turned around and saw I was still on my room, hugging a bolster, everything looks fine. I actually fell from my bed. Sweating and breathing heavily, and a tear fell from my eye. Thank god it's only a dream, but it felt so real. I grabbed the bolster and sat on the bed, thinking about the dream I just had.
That was weird dream, at the same time I felt the dream was real and a message was sent to me. Alex told me to not forget about the gift he gave to me, what gift? The question keep wandering at my head, I tried to find the answer. But my eyes locked at my bag at the lamp table next to my bed. Wait, I think I know what he means.
I turned on the lamp at the lamp table and I could see my bag clearly, I grabbed and opened it. Revealing the content. There's my globe, a mirror (I always keep it whenever I need it, you know, girls stuff), Alex's brown journal book, the golden starite shard (Forgot to give it to Uncle Maxwell earlier, I should've remembered), and his magic notebook. I quickly grabbed the notebook and quickly thought what I should write on it.
After a few moments, I know what I should write. I wrote an adjective to Alex, 'Alive'. I learn to write some adjective from Alex, when I borrowed his notebook at Maxwell's birthday party. I did this to make sure Alex is alive.
...
It has been two days since I had that dream, and no sign of Alex from the Alliance. I still remembered the clue Alex given to me in my dream. A prison, and a plain. Well, I could conclude the clue into a meaning of a prison in a plain. But, where is it? I could go into the Payper Plains to search for the prison with my globe, but 'mother' said I couldn't because of my wounds. They aren't healed yet and I can't go anywhere, I need to stay in the house and rest until I was fully healed, guess I'm going to miss all the information and action. Man, this is suck.
Meanwhile, at the Alliance base...
"Sir, do you have any idea to gather us here at 5 in the morning?" Gary asked Simon and Uncle Maxwell, who has gathered Captain Frank, Jennifer, Yusuf, and Felix in the base at 5 AM in the morning.
"Yes, and I have two reason. First, we have a new recruit. His name is Corporal Dunne McCoy." Simon answered, pointing to a man with tan skin, who wears dark blue uniform, black bulletproof vest, a white helmet with a goggles on it, and a scarf tied on his neck next to him.
"Second, I have a good news. We probably found Alex." Uncle Maxwell announced, a nervous murmur could be heard from the group, "Sarah has hacked into every prison in Capital City, Falcon City, and Paradise City. Including some cities that have prison. We found prisoner 2-5-0 in Payper N. Penitentiary. Just delivered 3 days ago. We also got an intel from the Empire that the prisoner 2-5-0 is one of the Emperor's worst enemy. Everyone will go with Shadow team and the rest of the kids to infiltrate the prison stealthily, free prisoner 2-5-0, and escape the prison. Understand?" Uncle Maxwell explained.
"Yes sir." Everyone replied in unison.
...
Payper N. Penitentiary
17:45 Local Time
"Hey Simon, do you have any idea why we brought Sarah with us?" Felix asked, he prone to the grass next to Simon and the others.
"Duh, we need her to hack into the security camera to gave us the info about where prisoner 5-2-0 is remember?." Simon answered sarcastically.
"Ugh, this uniform is itchy." Sophia complained to her dark green camouflage uniform. Which is also used by everyone.
"It does same to me too." Maxwell replied, scratching his right arm.
"Stop complaining you two." Captain Frank said to them, "Sniper on the tower, take 'em out" He said to the radio.
The enemy Sniper was silently brought down by one of the Shadow Team member, "One down."
"Damn, there's too much guard on the front door." Jennifer complained, "And we don't have enough Snipers to take them down."
"Everyone. Me, Sarah, and Yusuf will go into the vent and disable the security camera. The rest of you will stay here undetected and wait for our instruction, understood?" Captain Frank said.
"Yes sir." Everyone replied in unison.
"Good. Sarah, Yusuf. Come."
"Okay." Sarah replied nervously, clutching her assault rifle tight in her hands.
They walked closer to the other side of the prison to find a large vent to sneak into.
"Hey Sarah, wanna hear something hilarious?" Sophia asked.
"Sure." Sarah answered.
"This morning, I saw 'father' begged and pleaded to 'mother' for us to come into this mission. It's really hilarious." Sophia explained.
"Really?" Maxwell asked.
"It's true, I got the video. Since no one there and I brought my phone with me. I can show you when we finished this mission." Sophia answered.
"Cut the chatter you three. I found the vent we could go into." Frank said into the radio.
Yusuf removed the vent cover and the trio entered it. They crawled across the vent and into the security room. When they found it, Yusuf kicked the vent cover open and dropped Sarah first. She landed in loud thud in the ground, two guards in the room quickly alerted of her presence. She grabbed her gun and hesitantly pointed the gun at one of the guard and pulled the trigger. Unleashing a long burst of bullet, killing the guard. She aimed the gun at the last guard and pulled the trigger. She was knocked back because of the gun strength. The long barrage of bullet hit the guard until there is the sound of 'click' from the gun.
Frank and Yusuf jumped down from the vent, "Nice job Sarah." Frank commented.
"Yeah, you just spent a 120 Ollars worth clip to kill two guards." Yusuf said.
"Whatever." Sarah replied, rolling her eyes.
"Quick, hack into the console and disable the security cameras." Frank said to Sarah.
Sarah sat on the chair and typed on the keyboard, disabling the security censors and alarms. "Alright, Sarah has disabled the securities. Knock the front door." Frank said to the radio.
"Roger that." Simon replied.
There's some loud gunfire on the radio for a moments, "Front gate cleared. Entering the prison." Simon said.
"Sarah, you're going to stay here. Me and Yusuf will going to search prisoner 5-2-0 with the others, don't forget to give us the feed from the security cameras." Frank said to Sarah.
"Got it." Sarah replied.
Frank and Yusuf exited the security room and headed into the cell hallways, where they met the others.
"Alright Sarah, where's the prisoner 5-2-0 cell is?" Gary asked.
"2nd floor, at the edge of the hallway." Sarah answered.
"Good, let's go." Simon said to the others.
Everyone went to the stairs and headed to the end of the cell hallway. Avoiding any guard from seeing them and in case, killing the ones who sees them. They split up into 3 groups to search the large 2nd floor.
"Prisoner 5-2-0's cell is on your right, breach the wall and get him as fast as you can. There's two heat signatures. Watch out, one of them could be prisoner 5-2-0." Sarah said to Dunne.
"Roger, breaching." Dunne replied, planting the breaching charge with Gary and Sophia.
They stood aside and Dunne pressed the detonator, the wall exploded and Dunne entered it with Gary and Sophia followed behind him. Dunne saw a guard with his throat slit by prisoner 5-2-0. Prisoner 5-2-0 quickly grabbed the guard's rifle and charged at Dunne. Dunne wasn't ready for that and easily knocked down by prisoner 5-2-0 and pointed his rifle at Dunne.
Sophia noticed this, and quickly rushed to help Dunne. She pointed her rifle at prisoner 5-2-0 head, the rifle met his forehead.
"Put that gun down." Sophia warned.
Prisoner 5-2-0 turned to Sophia, "Soap?" He asked.
"Alex?" Sophia lowered her gun, looking at his face.
"Oh my god! Alex!" She quickly hugged him.
"Yeah, it's me." Alex said to her.
"How do you ended up here?" Sophia asked, letting go of her hug and held both of Alex's shoulder.
"It's a long story." Alex answered.
"Damn kid, we need to figure out a nickname for you." Gary said.
"Like "Roach" or something?" Alex asked.
"I think that's a new nickname for you, since you're hard to kill." Gary answered.
"Alright, so it's Alex "Roach" Johnson then?" Sophia asked.
Everyone chuckled, including Dunne.
"Alright, first we need to go to the storage and to get my old clothes back first. This prisoner coat is itchy as hell." Alex said.
Meanwhile...
Sarah fell to the ground, after a guard restlessly beating her up. He clenched his fist and cracked his knuckles.
"Ready to get your ass kicked again?" He asked, Sarah looked at him. Her eyes full of fear, her face already red and some bruises on both of her cheek.
He pulled out a pistol and pointed it at Sarah's forehead.
"Get ready to meet death kid." He grinned evilly.
A phone ringed at his pocket, he answered it and put the phone at his ear.
"Hey Connor let's go bowling." A voice said to him from the phone.
"For a hundred times Rico, I don't have time to go for a fucking bowling!" Connor yelled to the phone.
"Okay, another time then. Call me." Rico replied.
Connor shut his phone down and pocketed it.
"Where was I? Oh yeah, get ready to me-" He was cut off when a red bullet hole formed in his head, he quickly fell to the ground next to Sarah.
Sarah caught a figure with a familiar blue rooster helmet and grey hoodie extended his arm to help her up, she accepted it and can't believe what she saw.
"A-Alex?" She stuttered.
"Yes, it's me. Your lovely brother." Alex replied.
"Alex!" She hugged Alex tightly, it's been 3 days since the last time she saw him. His hasn't changed, he wore the same old clothes he always wear. Except for the headphones, it was the different headphones that he wore right now. His old headphones is orange, but this one is grey color with a microphone on it. The one that he always wear on mission.
"Sarah, we really need to go now. Lily will be surprised when she saw me." Alex said, smile plastered at his face.
...
At the Hyphen Heights, Lily's POV
I was walking around on the living room, biting my fingers nervously. I waited for Sophia and Maxwell to return from their mission, I can't let them suffered the same fate as Alex. I really worried a lot about them, and about the prisoner 5-2-0 they were talking about. I was nervous about that prisoner. Uncle Maxwell said they have found Alex, and they went to Payper N. Penitentiary to search for him.
That prison is nightmare for me, everyone was imprisoned there. Even fairy tail character was imprisoned too, including Santa Claus. Maxwell was imprisoned too when he freed Bruiser. I mean, he did a good deed to collect starite to help me that time.
When the door opened, I sighed in relief to find Sophia, Maxwell, and Sarah returned.
"Any luck finding Alex?" I asked them.
They looked at each other and smiled, "Actually, we have a surprise for you Lily." Maxwell said to me.
Someone familiar stepped in and I gasped in shock to saw who he is.