AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm back! I plan to return to my one-chapter-a-week schedule, there shouldn't be any other breaks for a few months.
Thank you Anonymous Guest for the review!
Chapter 149: An Eventful Night.
"To say that he was displeased would be an understatement. He was incensed, why he even felt that he was being toyed with."
-EmboldenRose, Tempest in a Teapot
At Nuthanger Farm, the officer was sitting in an armchair in the living room, his gun in one hand, a piece of shrimp in the other, slowing chewing. The woman, Banks Anya, was sitting in another chair, still handcuffed, and with a look of annoyance on her face. The farmer and his daughter were sitting on the couch, staring straight ahead. The kidnappers had not interacted with them for hours; they remained afraid, and the uncertainty wasn't helping.
Suddenly, loud music, the theme song of a long-cancelled TV series, started to play, coming from the officer's direction. This startled everyone, except Anya.
-"What the..." the officer started to say.
-"That's my cell phone," Anya said. "You forgot to give it back to me after you ordered that shrimp."
-"Oh." The officer reached into his pocket, pulled out the phone, and answered the call. "Who is this?"
-"My name is Eric Beaumont, what do you need?"
-"Eric who?
-"Eric Beaumont, I'm a prof..."
-"Never heard of you. You must have the wrong number."
He quickly hung up and placed the phone on the table in front of him. Anya was aghast.
-"You fool! That's MY phone, the call was meant for me!"
-"Whoops. Who's Eric?"
-"I don't kn...that's none of your business!"
Outside, Beaumont and his team was left confused by this turn of events.
-"Never had someone hang up so quickly before," Walker said.
-"His voice sounded so casual," Yates said. "Like he was relaxing at home, rather than in the middle of a kidnapping."
-"Call again," Debbie ordered.
Beaumont sighed, and gestured at Walker to do so.
The officer was about to take another bite of shrimp when the phone rang again. Recognizing the caller ID, he answered again.
-"You again?"
-"Stop answering my phone for me!" Anya shouted.
-"I'm a professional negotiator," Beaumont said over the line. "I can get you what you need."
-"Are you the police?" the officer asked, ignoring Anya.
-"No, I'm not from the police. My goal is to make sure everyone survives this ordeal. So, what do you need?"
-"I want a judge."
Outside, Yates whispered something in Beaumont's ear; the negotiator nodded.
-"Do you have a specific judge in mind?" he asked.
-"Yes," the officer replied, "the judge the owner of this house dealt with."
Beaumont pressed a key, muting the microphone, and turned to Debbie. She had a look of anger on her face.
-"Who is this judge he's talking about?" he asked.
-"He lied to me..."
-"The judge lied to you?"
-"No, not the judge, my husband! I told him not to press trespassing charges against those tourists. He told me he didn't, but clearly he did." Any previous sympathy she may have had for her hostage husband had vanished.
-"Is there anything special about that judge? Putting them in contact with the hostage taker may be our best option to ensure your husband and daughter's safety."
-"I can't help you with this. I didn't even know about this judge's existence until moments ago."
-"Right...Zara, try to find some information on this." As Zara got to work, Beaumont unmuted the call. "Sir, we're tracking down the judge you're looking for, and you will be able to speak to them."
-"No, I don't want to just speak with them," the officer said "I want them here, outside."
-"All right, we can make that happen. But first, I need to know, the people you have with you, are they safe?"
-"Oh sure, they're fine. Stubborn and whiny, but fine."
-"May we see them?"
-"Of course, just give me a few minutes to setup a video call. Electronics these days are junk, it's all gone downhill since the 90s."
As the kidnapper hung up, Beaumont and his crew looked at each other.
-"I have a bad feeling about this," Walker said. "Does he want the judge outside here, so he can shoot them through the window?"
-"If he does that, the police will storm the house," Beaumont said. "Surely he realizes that."
-"Which would perhaps indicate that he feels he has nothing to lose," Yates explained. "His whole attitude is so casual, so calm. He's not taking this situation seriously at all."
-"But the delivery boy said there were two kidnappers," Walker pointed out. "Maybe he's just the dim-witted sidekick."
-"We will have to try to talk to Ms Anya. It's her phone, but so far we've only heard from him."
At that moment, a slightly blurry image appeared on the display. It showed a teenage girl sitting on a couch. Debbie ran up to the display.
-"Lucy! Are you hurt?"
-"Mum, they killed Duster!" Lucy cried.
-"Because that dumb mutt tried to bite me," the officer interjected from off-camera.
-"You didn't shoot the cat, who DID bite you," the farmer pointed out.
-"He was just playing..."
While the officer and the farmer were arguing off-camera, Debbie continued talking with Lucy.
-"Never mind Duster, are YOU hurt?"
-"They haven't hurt me, or father. Just Duster."
-"I just want you to know that I love you."
-"I want to talk to her too," came a male voice, belonging to Debbie's husband.
-"I don't want to talk to him," Debbie said.
-"I don't care what she wants, I say I..."
-"That's enough," the officer said as he disabled the camera, leaving only audio. "Bring me the judge and we'll talk. Oh, by the way, I would also like some more shrimp, you know the order."
As the call ended, Debbie breathed a sigh of relief.
-"She's alive," she said. "She's still alive. Alive. She's alive."
-"Yes, and we'll make sure she leaves that house alive too," Beaumont said.
-"You will do what he asked?"
-"Yes, we'll get him the judge, and the shrimp." He signalled at his team to get to work on that.
-"It's getting late. I'll be in the barn; please wake me if something happens."
She went to the barn and closed the door behind her. Soon afterwards, Beaumont and his team heard a loud cry of frustration coming from that direction, as Debbie noticed what Hazel, Bigwig and Blackavar had done a few days before.
-"UGH, SOMETHING TORE UP THE HUTCH AGAIN! AND THERE'S ANOTHER RABBIT MISSING!"
Woundwort was standing on a rock, looking at his owsla. In hindsight, forcing them to train all night had not been a good idea. They were clearly too tired to care about what they were doing, and he witnessed some of the most useless fighting moves ever. While this was all plainly a waste of time, Woundwort kept them going, as a sort of punishment for their misbehaviour. But as the time went by, the boredom that had dominated his day slowly returned. As he saw the sun rising on the horizon, he finally had enough, and allowed them to get some much-needed sleep.
As Woundwort went back to his own burrow (or rather, what remained of it after he had dug himself out), he was startled to find someone was already there. He was about to attack when he remembered that he had specifically ordered this pretty rabbit sent there.
-"So, how are you enjoying this fine warren?" he asked.
-"Oh, it's you again." Lady May took a quick glance at the General's ugly face before looking away. "Honestly, it's worse than I expected. It's so dark in here, not to mention the ground is damp and the dirt will cling to my fur."
-"Yes, I'll admit this burrow is currently in horrible shape. But you can fix it up and make it an amazing place to live."
-"Why are you doing this to me? I said some negative things about you; while objectively true, most rabbits I know would have been furious."
-"You and I are more alike than you might think."
-"Eh...you may be sick and ugly, but you're still a rabbit, I guess. And I am too, despite what that Orchis keeps repeating. Say, do you know where I could get something to eat around here?"
Lady May's last comment made Woundwort realize something: he hadn't eaten all day, and he was getting hungry. The flayrah supply had most likely been destroyed by the flood, and there wasn't any grass in Darkhaven either. This left him with only one option: he hopped out of the burrow towards the two nearest rabbits, who happened to be Shale and Feldspar.
-"HEY! YOU TWO! GO GET ME SOME FLAYRAH!
-"We were trying to sleep..."
-"GO! NOW!"