Frozen In Time - Rescue
Part XV - Escape II Making For Freedom
Melanie felt the whole plan was collapsing around her. With too much information to sort out in too short a time, she did the best thing she could think to do at the time.
Turning back to the other two and without a word to the man standing in front of them, she quickly pushed Alex and Hes ahead of her back down the corridor as quickly as she could.
She expected the man to follow them, to try and plead his case. But to her surprise, as they took the corner back to the smaller hallway, she glanced back to see him simply standing in the corridor still, though looking a bit lost himself.
Without any explanation, Melanie herded her two companions back to the tunnel. Once secured there, she quickly pulled out her signaling device and quickly began executing a rapid series of clicks, each one systematically causing the small red light to flash briefly between each click.
"Mom, what are you doing?" Alex quickly whispered. "What are WE doing?"
At first Melanie didn't answer, but instead focused all her attention on the task of clicking the small button on the signaling device.
Alex watched her mother, quickly realizing she was repeating the same pattern on the small device over and over.
"SOS." Alex whispered, then turned to her mother.
"Hopefully the right person gets the message." Melanie whispered back. She quickly turned to the other two in the darkness when she stopped signaling on her end. "We need to move." She stated. "I don't know who this man is or who we should or should not be trusting. All I know is we can't get off the train by the cold lock anymore. It's too dangerous."
"Then how are we..." Alex started. But the small device suddenly started flashing in Melanie's hands.
In Snowpiercer's engine room, no one at first had seen the small box start flashing.
But Bennett suddenly chanced to look up and see the red light and it's repeated code for help.
"Something's up." He stated, rushing back to the helm to retrieve the box.
Layton was close behind him. "Why? What's wrong?"
Bennett held the box as he watched the code repeat. "That's Morse code. An SOS. Something's gone wrong."
"Does she say what?"
Bennett only shook his head in response as he quickly began tapping out his own sequence in answer to the SOS. After waiting a few seconds, the device lit up again, this time the flashes coming a bit slower.
Bennett tried to decipher the message, but shook his head several times. "It doesn't make sense. These aren't even words."
Standing next to them, Melanie's assistant calmly reached over and took the device from Bennett's hands.
"If I might." He offered.
Standing silently, Jackson watched the coded flashes with intense concentration.
But as suddenly as they started, the flashes stopped.
Jackson immediately began tapping the small button, sending his own coded message back.
Layton watched the man for a few minutes.
"Well?" He asked, at least four different emotions tied to his tone.
Jackson continued to watch the small device in his hands.
"There appears to be a problem." Was all he answered.
"We KNOW that!" Layton stated. "WHAT problem?"
The man turned an exasperated look to the train's leader. Why could this man simply never control his emotions?
"This is a very complicated code, Mr. Layton. I'll need some silence to decipher it."
Layton turned to the box. "But it's not doing anything!"
Almost as soon as the man stopped talking, the small box lit up again and began flashing the small red light at a more rapid pace.
As soon as the light stopped flashing, Jackson began tapping out his own code on the box, just as rapidly as the first one had come in.
"If this is Morse code, she still isn't sending anything that makes sense." Bennett put in, watching the flashes of light as he tried to form words from them.
"It is Morse code, Mr. Knox." The man explained as he tapped out the message, "but with a certain algorithm applied to it to keep anyone who might intercept it from being able to decipher it within more than an hour."
"And the algorithm would be...?"
Jackson gave the question a dismissive wave. "It's not important right now. What is, is that Ms. Cavill is indeed in trouble and needs our help."
Layton turned to the man. "In what way?"
Jackson stopped in tapping out a new message as he turned to him. "That, Mr. Layton, is what I am attempting to find out."
Inside the cramped tunnel, Melanie watched the message flash in front of her, her frown growing deeper at each word. The process repeated two more times as she messaged back and forth with her assistant, with Alex and Hes looking on in silence.
"Mom, what's going on?" Alex finally asked when the box stopped flashing any lights and Melanie sat staring down at it without putting in any code of her own.
Melanie gave a deep sigh. ""Frank says we should trust these people, regardless of what they may or may not have done."
"Frank Jackson?" Alex asked. "Your assistant? Why aren't you talking to Layton or Bennett?"
"Because this whole rescue was put together mostly by him." Melanie answered. "Frank made contact with the leader of the resistance and that person orchestrated having the people on Big Alice helping us. I'm guessing he knows them pretty well. He said he knew the resistance leader before the trains even left their stations."
Alex gave her mother a worried look. "What did you tell him?"
"I told him I didn't think we could trust the people on Big Alice. That they seem to have their own agenda. And that we're trapped."
"But he says to trust them."
Melanie nodded.
"So now what?"
Melanie turned back to the box and typed out a final message before turning to her daughter.
"Frank has never stirred me wrong yet, Alex. So we'll do it his way."
Just then a series of taps sounded on the door to the tunnel from the outside.
"Come on then, ducky." A too familiar voice called out. "Lets have a nice little Frank and Pat, you and me, hey?"
Melanie glanced at the box once more to see if there was any answer to her last message. But a more insistent pounding came on the door.
"Ain't riskin' no bird lime for ya', missus."
Melanie sighed as she turned to the others.
"Frank said to trust them." She repeated as she reached for the mechanism to open the door.
As the door slid open, Melanie found herself facing an extremely disgruntled looking 'E'.
"Now look here, you lot!" She started right off. "I about had it up to ma' fife and drum with all ya'. Been Isle of Wight with ya', I have. Yet here you are, causin' my poor china plate Barney Rubble because you still be thinkin' I'm givin' ya' pork pies."
Melanie quickly turned to Hes,
"Says she hasn't been lying to us, and we're the ones causing trouble for her."
"I'm sorry." Melanie replied, turning back to the girl. "It's just...things were not adding up."
The girl gave her an incredulous look. "Adding up? What are ya' now, Baked Bean? A calculator?"
"You knew about Wilford's plot to kidnap Hes." Melanie replied.
To her surprise, the girl didn't hesitate for a second past a bored look. "Aye."
"And you did nothing to stop it."
The answer came just as quickly. "Nay."
"Why not?!"
The look remained. "Why should I?"
Melanie stopped for a moment to process her answer. "What?"
"Why should I risk my china plates because your Sweaty Sock went bowl of chalk with the wrong person?"
Melanie turned to Hes, who answered the silent inquiry past a deep frown at the girl. "Says it was my own fault." Was his abbreviated translation.
"You knew Wilford was going to abduct Hes and you did nothing to stop it because you wanted him on Big Alice." Melanie directly accused the girl.
The bored look returned. "Now why would I want a big, Sweaty Sock on ma' train."
"Because of what he could do for you."
"Cause me a tic load of Barney Rubble?"
"Hes could make things you could use or trade. Wilford would give a great deal, I'm willing to bet, for just one tool Hes could make."
"Missus," the girl stated in a low, level voice as she leaned in a little more towards Melanie, "I couldn't give two scraps 'bout what your blacksmith can or can not do. I didn't stop his abduction by old man Wilfrod 'cause it didn't involve me. Only regret I had was one of ma' mates got caught up in it and all. Nearly got himself Father Ted, he did, all 'cause I was careless. Past that, ya' can keep your ole Sweaty Sock, for all I care. Personally, I can't get the lot of you off this train fast enough. Now, lets go."
Melanie gave a small sigh as she stepped out of the tunnel, followed closely by Alex and Hes.
"Where are we going?" Melanie asked.
The girl didn't bother turning back to her. "Goin' back to see 'D'. Says he's got a plan. Like to hear it."
"His plan is to get back to Snowpiercer by way of the border."
Melanie thought the girl would at least give some reaction to what she herself considered a somewhat ludicrous at best plan. But instead 'E' kept walking, only tilting her head slightly at first to the suggestion.
"Got some merit." She finally replied. "Like to hear his take on that."
"He said the guards at the border..."
But that was as far as Melanie got when the girl rounded on her.
"Do you work for me!?" She suddenly asked in a solid tone. When Melanie didn't answer right away, the girl went on. "Are you one of my china plates? Did I say, 'Hey, missus, what's your opinion on this mess?'." The girl set a hard stare on Melanie. "No! So my give and take to you is to shut your north and south and just listen for a change."
Hes immediately to step up to her, staring her down.
She met him with the same solid stare. "Want a go, Sockey?" She asked. "I said I would take ya' along in a scrap any day. I'll just as well take ya' on in a scrap."
A stern look from Melanie had the blacksmith stepping back. But not without one last warning stare set on the girl.
Back at the cold lock door, the guard was still holding his post, seem to stand exactly as Melanie and the others had left him.
"I'm sorry to have had to call you back." The man quickly said as soon as he caught sight of the girl. "But they started talking these crazy ideas..."
The girl quickly waved him off. "None of that." She stated. "And 'crazy' is a good label for this lot from what I can tell."
"They were heading to leave by the cold lock." The man went on to explain. "Told them that was a dangerous route to go."
The girl turned back to Melanie and her companions for a moment. "Aye. Old man Wilford expects it. Thinkin' that be how you got on the train."
"I thought a better route would be the border."
The girl gave the man the same skeptical look Melanie had. "The border? What makes you think old man Wilford's boys are goin' to let this lot just waltz back over to their train, hey?"
"Because Mackey, Somers, and Bell are three of the guards. They went on the raid to abduct this one." He added, nodding to Hes. "They know what's waiting for them no matter how this ends. They need to get off this train just like I do, ma'am, if they're aimin' to survive."
The girl seemed to consider the information for several moments.
"They're not us." She finally replied. "What can you say for them?"
"We talked after we came back from Snowpiercer." The man quickly answered. "They're scared, like me. They know Wilford's got his sights set on them. They were already making a plan to get across the border when Wilford ordered them to the guard unit there."
"Are they plannin' to fight?"
The man shrugged. "Likely. But don't know for sure."
The girl turned the man by the shoulder and shoved him off. "Go find out. Message me back what they say."
The man took off down the corridor without another word.
When the girl turned back to Melanie, she already had a string of questions for her.
"Won't they notice the guard is missing from this post?"
"Would if he was." The girl replied. Reaching into a pocket, she pulled a small box out. It was similar to Melanie's signaling device with the exception her's was black and had a green and red light on top of it.
Melanie watched the girl tap out a series on the red button, then wait.
Within a few moments the green light lit up, then went dark again.
The girl turned back to Melanie as she popped the box back in her pocket.
"That's that. Should have someone coverin' this hole in a tick."
"So now what?"
"Now we wait to hear from 'D'". Ain't goin' up against Wilford's guards without knowing I at least have my back covered."
"It would still be three against eight." Melanie pointed out.
"Four." The girl replied, raising her hand, then pointed to Hes, "And Sockey makes five. Likely count him as six, too, given how he fights."
"What about weapons?"
"We'll get 'em as we go. Guard drops a pole, best to pick it up. That's a good part for you and your dustbin lid to play in this if we go forward. Look to get weapons. Use 'em against any guard you can."
"Maybe I can get some extra help." Melanie offered.
"Oh! Can ya' now?" The girl asked skeptically. "And how would we be doin' that then?"
Melanie was already reaching into her pocket and quickly pulled out her own signaling device. Holding it in her palm, she pressed the red button to get the attention of her own team on Snowpiercer.
"Here! What this?" The girl asked, snatching the device out of Melanie's hand before she even saw her move.
"It's a signaling device similar to yours. It's how I communicate with Snowpiercer." Melanie replied, seeing the red light suddenly start flashing on the box.
The girl watched as the red light completed it's message, then quickly tapped out a short series of clicks on the device.
Melanie tried to watch the light flashes to decipher the message, but she quickly realized the code was not the same.
The little box quickly sent back a reply to 'E's' message, which Melanie got the impression the girl was none to happy with as she frowned at the little box. Before the message even finished, the girl was tapping out her own message, essentially overwriting the other.
When she finished, the little box then went dark for a few moments. The girl watched it intently until a short message suddenly flashed out on the box.
For a few moments the girl stood staring at it with a frozen expression. Then just as suddenly as she took it from her, she thrust the box back at Melanie.
"Wants to talk to you." Was all she said as she stepped away from the group.
In Snowpiercer's engine room, Jackson was carefully watching each flash of light on the small box in his own hands. Layton and Bennett stood nearby, waiting to hear what the decoded message was.
A deep frown settled on the man's face.
The code was different.
Watching the flashes, Jackson quickly deciphered the code, then sent back a curt reply to it.
Almost immediately the little box began flashing out the same code, getting the same reaction from Jackson. As he began tapping out his reply once more, the little box suddenly began lighting up on its own, showing a message coming in at the same time he was trying to send one out. With an irritated sigh, he stopped his own message and waited.
"Is something wrong?" Layton asked, watching the events.
Jackson turned a flat expression to the man. "A minor issue. I will have it corrected in a moment."
Turning back to the box, Jackson again tapped out a short, curt message, then waited Within a few moments, the little box began flashing again, this time communicating its message in Melanie's code.
As the box went dark, Layton stepped up to the man.
"Well?"
Jackson turned to him. "It appears there has been a change of plans yet again."
"Change of plans?"
"Where as it appears Ms. Cavill and her company are again safe for the moment, they are not able to return to Snowpiercer by way of the cold locks as we planned."
"Did she say why?"
"She did not."
Bennett stepped into the conversation. "We knew it was risky from the beginning." He stated to Layton. "Wilford is likely suspicious and Melanie got wind of it."
Layton turned back to Jackson. "So now what?"
Jackson turned back to the box and sent out a new message.
The answer was a long one and Layton and Bennett stood silently in front of Melanie's assistant as he deciphered it.
Jackson finally turned back to them when the little box went dark again. "She says she feels the best route is by the border."
"The border!? She can't be ser..."
But Jackson quickly stopped Layton. "Ms. Cavill states she has it on good authority that three of the guards Wilford currently has stationed on his side of the border will likely turn on the others. But it would still be seven against eight, and Wilford is likely to send re-enforcements."
Layton turned to Roche, who had joined them in the engine room recently. "Then maybe we need to turn those odds in our favor by sending some of our own re-enforcements."
Jackson gave the conversation a passing glance, then started tapping out the message on the box. After waiting a few minutes, the light started flashing out a return message again.
"What is it?" Layton asked.
"She wants to know how many?"
Layton turned to Roche.
"I've already got ten men at the border. I can put fifteen more as back up." He answered Layton. "If they want a fight, we'll give them one."
Layton gave the man a nod. "Just be sure they understand the main goal here is to protect Melanie, Alex, and Hes and get them back on Snowpiercer."
Roche gave an answering nod as he left to instruct his own guards.