Slavery, Deliverance, and Faith: Part Eight

By Dyce


Disclaimers in previous chapters. Previous chapters can be found at http://www.geocities.com/minisinoo/dyce.html Rated R for violence and adult themes.

"What do we do now?" Jonny whispered nervously. They'd gotten to the nearer end of the hall outside their cells, and were about to step off into the unknown territory of the Facility. He and Kyle had always been blindfolded or hooded when they were moved, presumably so that if they escaped, they wouldn't know where to go. He sidled closer to Kyle.

Kyle patted his shoulder comfortingly. "We go up," he said calmly, sniffing the air.

Annie nodded. "We're underground," she explained. "Containment cells in places like this are always right at the bottom." She looked left, then right. Both options offered featureless beige corridors, one much longer than the other, that seemed to have regular openings going off them before they terminated in blank walls. Behind them, the corridor they were in did the same thing. "Uhm... I think we go that way." She pointed down the shorter one.

"Why?" Kyle asked curiously.

"Because the shortest way is probably the way out. They're not going to walk all the way from there," she pointed down the longer way, "just to get to us. We're probably pretty close to one of the exits, assuming we're the only prisoners here."

"We are," Kyle said firmly. "All the others disappeared about a month ago."

"Right. So that's probably the way out," Annie said patiently. "Anyone need me to remind them how walking goes?"

Thus prompted, they shuffled slowly and warily down the hall. It felt strange to be walking, and Jonny realized with some surprise that however long he HAD been there, it had been long enough for him to lose a lot of muscle tone. Kyle was shuffling a little too.

"Hey-" Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and he only just didn't scream, nearly knocking Kyle over in his frantic scuttle away from that hand.

Everyone stopped and looked around, and Jonny's face burned. Geordi, especially, was looking baffled. "What?" he said uncertainly.

"I... you surprised me," Jonny muttered. "We're *escaping* here, you don't just come up behind someone like that!" He'd known Geordi was there, of course. Intellectually. But that didn't mean he could handle being suddenly touched, especially by a strange guy, especially a strange guy who was taller and much more muscular than he was, who he wouldn't be able to fight if he...

"It's okay," Kyle murmured, obviously knowing exactly what Jonny was thinking. He laid a pawlike hand comfortingly on Jonny's shoulder. "Nothing's going to happen. We're going to get out, and we're going to be fine."

"S'right," Annie said softly, almost as if she guessed too. "I've busted out of two places just like this before. Piece o' cake."

"I've gotten shot every time so far," Marie pointed out, a bit sulkily. "I don't call that a piece 'f cake."

Annie sighed, giving her a Very Patient Look. "But this time you got LESS shot," she pointed out. "So see? Improvement."

"I'd prefer not getting shot at all," Marie said firmly, as they reached what was probably the exit. It was a large, very sturdy looking metal door. Without handles or keypads, just a palm-lock. "Any ideas how we get out?"

"Sloppy," Annie sniffed disdainfully. "If they wanted it to STAY shut, they'd have put in a retinal scan and a thermal imager as well. This is nothing."

"Really," Geordi said sceptically. "And how're you going to get past the palm-lock?"

Annie smiled a bright, nasty smile. "One of the guards at least has to be keyed to the door," she said sweetly. "We'll use their palms."

"You want us to drag three bodies all the way..." Marie closed her eyes and gulped. "No. You don't. You're just going to go back and get the *hands*, aren't you?"

"Can you think of a better plan?" Annie asked reasonably. "If anyone can think of a better plan, I'm all ears. I don't WANT to go around pulling the hands off'f dead bodies if I don't HAVE to."

There was a short, unhappy silence.

"All right, then just stay here. I'll be right back." Annie headed back down the corridor. "You don't have to look, if you're squeamish."

* * *

"There *has* to be a way down," Logan growled, kicking the wall. "*Nobody* builds an underground complex this big that's only three levels deep."

Creed nodded, growling unhappily. Neither of them liked being in places like this to begin with. And now that they were actually thinking, instead of just reacting instinctively, they'd remembered that they didn't actually like each other all that much. And on top of all that, someone had tried to be *clever*, and had hidden the way down to the lower levels.

If he found out who it was, he was going to find that person's spleen and make them eat it.

Logan looked around, frowning. "We shoulda left a couple of them conscious," he said regretfully, of the six attack teams and other assorted Employees of Evil that were currently lying around in various stages of stunned-or-dead. His personal dislike of killing people stopped right at the door with these places. Anyone who voluntarily worked in a place like this deserved to die.

Creed nodded reluctantly. "One, anyway," he agreed. "Should look around again. Maybe we missed one."

They'd missed three, all minor grunts. Two were hiding in a closet, the third had managed to scrunch herself into the small space under a coffee-room sink.

That one seemed the most terrified, and Creed picked her up by the neck, snarling. "Tell me what I wanna know, and you live," he growled. "How do we get down to the lower levels?"

"No... lower levels..." she choked, clawing uselessly at his hand.

He shook her, with almost clinical precision, until exactly two seconds before she passed out, then loosened his grip just enough to let her get a gulp of air. "I'm gonna ask one more time, frail. How. Do. We. Get. Down. To. The. Lower. Levels." He bared his teeth at her. "If ya lie, yer dead."

She squealed softly in terror, pointing down the hallway. "The broom closet... the back pushes open, it's a door..."

Creed shrugged, shook her one more time, and dropped her. "We'll be back if it ain't there," he growled, stepping over her as she trembled and snivelled on the floor.

Logan followed. That wasn't quite how he'd have done it... but the girl was still alive, so best not to quibble. The secret door was right where she'd said it would be, letting out onto a narrow hallway with several more doors letting onto it - probably concealed on the other side, like the closet-one - and one small elevator. It had a palm lock. Shit. "How the hell are we gonna get that open?"

Creed eyed it critically, then grinned nastily. "This here's a low-budget op," he noted, casually ripping the front panel off the lock to expose its innards. "Equipment ain't exactly top-o-the-line. I've seen this model before, an' it's easy to fool. Just find... these..." He reached in, and pinched two wires together. There was a snap and a hiss and a fat blue spark, then the elevator opened. Creed grinned again, ignoring the faint scorched smell coming from his fingers. "Piece o' cake."

Logan raised an impressed eyebrow. "I'll remember that," he noted, padding into the elevator. He looked around. No cameras, no nozzles to spray gas or bullets, no visible panels behind which those might be hidden. "Very low budget. Guess they can't all be super-rich private powerbases."

Creed nodded, joining him in the elevator. There were... according to the buttons... fifteen levels to choose from, starting where they were, at three. He shrugged, and pressed the button for level seventeen. Odds were that that was where the kids were, in the containment levels right at the bottom.

* * *

The kids, as it happened, had made it up to fifteen, only getting shot at once. Annie had handled it again, although out of consideration for the others she hadn't killed anyone this time. Just beaten them up, broken a couple of limbs, then tied them up with their own clothes.

And stolen the guns, of course.

She'd offered to let Kyle have one, but he'd politely refused. Eyes that were designed to chase down a fleeing deer didn't do well at aiming a projectile. Especially at something that wasn't moving.

He was worried about Jonny. What would happen to him if they escaped? Did he have a home to go to? Would he, Kyle, be allowed to go? He vaguely remembered having parents, a home, but it was all so distant, and he didn't remember any details. Anyway, he wanted to go where Jonny went. Who would take care of Jonny if he didn't?

And he wished Annie hadn't tucked the severed hand into the back of a stolen belt. It kept giving him macabre little waves when she walked.

"It should be around here somewhere," she was musing quietly, opening doors and peeking inside. "I hope. Most of these rooms have been sorta put in mothballs..."

Kyle nodded. "Operation got way smaller a while back," he agreed. "Dunno why. Lots of people left." They both lifted their noses and sniffed. They'd decided... well, he and Annie had, nobody else was much good for decision-making at this point... to backtrack the trail of the three guards Annie had killed. They, presumably, had known the way out, and since even an injected power-inhibitor couldn't do anything to change a purely physical mutation like a sensitive nose, he and Annie could follow the trail easily. So could Geordi, he suspected, but Geordi was too busy trembling and complaining to be useful.

Marie ouched thoughtfully as her arm was jostled. "About.... six months ago?" she asked tentatively.

Kyle shrugged. "Maybe."

"Annie shut down the AT Corporation six months ago," Marie said thoughtfully. "This might be a... what's it called? Thing that doesn't actually properly belong to a company, but sort of gets funded by it?"

"Subsidiary," Annie said absently, opening another door. She shut it again quickly. "Eyuch. Don't look in there, guys."

"It just says 'Storage' on the door," Geordi said in a rather argumentative voice. Geordi was, as far as Kyle could figure it, about seventeen or so. Like most seventeen-year-old guys, he didn't take orders from thirteen-year-old girls with much grace.

"Yeah." Annie gave him a rather cold look. "Of people. BITS of people."

Nobody looked.

* * *

"They were here," Creed observed, a bit superfluously. "An' Annie was okay, at least."

Logan looked at the three bodies. Since there was only two reasons for three guards to be in the girl's cell, and both of them were, in Logan's book, entirely worthy of the death-penalty, they didn't bother him too much. Besides, it wasn't as if Marie or Clarice had done it. Annie was already a killer, and probably wouldn't even notice the addition of three more to her body-count. "Marie got shot," he growled softly, looking at the small smear of blood on the back wall of the cell.

"Not bad, though." Creed eyed the smear critically. "And she walked outta here. Graze to the arm or leg, I'd say. Scalp woulda bled more."

Logan nodded. He still didn't like Marie getting shot, even if it WAS only a graze. "Least they escaped on their own," he said, a bit happier about that part. "With... three others. All guys."

Creed nodded, already sniffing his way back up the corridor. "Scent goes this way," he tossed over his shoulder.

Logan nodded, and followed. So he didn't like Creed much. That wasn't important. What was important was finding Marie... and Clarice and Annie, although Annie would probably be fine on her own... and whatever other poor kids had been trapped down here.

They'd taken the stairs. Good. A nice clear scent-trail, and not quite as easily ambushed as an elevator.

* * *

"Just out of curiosity," Geordi said, trying not to sound nasty. "We've been looking for a tea-room?"

"Yup," the annoying little blonde girl said, around a mouthful of rather stale muffin. "Get some food into us. Get our strength up."

The guy who looked like her.... who was about Geordi's own age, he'd figured... nodded, still wolfing down any food that came within reach. So were all three girls. Only the scrawny kid with the thick brown curls was eating slowly, and sticking mostly to the rather soggy cookies.

Geordi sipped his hot, sweet coffee. All right, he'll admit that this was welcome. Coffee good. Hot good. Sugar rush, VERY good. But this was NOT, he knew from a vast collection of sci-fi novels, how a proper escape-from-the-labs-of-evil was supposed to go.

Besides, they were HIS friends.

"Shouldn't we keep moving?" he asked after a few more minutes. "I mean, they must have noticed that we were missing by now."

"Probably." The little blonde girl shoved one more cookie into her mouth and stood up. "Okay, guys," she said, in a small shower of damp crumbs. "Load up and move out."

Geordi halfheartedly picked up a muffin, wishing for pockets. The grey prisoner's coveralls had none, nor even a belt. Just a zipper up the front and an elasticized waist.

No underwear, either.

"Follow me," the increasingly irritating little blonde chirped, and padded back out into the corridor. Geordi followed, scowling. In his imagination, when he'd imagined adventures like this, HE'd always been the one to lead daring escapes and so on. Instead he'd thrown up a lot, gotten almost hysterical when she'd... when she'd.... taken care of those guards... and now he was following a little kid around like a big stupid sheep. And he was absolutely terrified, while SHE seemed to think this was all some big new game.

He shuffled along at the end of the line, seething with quiet resentment.

* * *

Logan and Creed found the storage room, too.

Unlike the kids, they went inside.

"These," Logan said with quiet conviction, "are some very, very sick puppies. Much worse'n you."

Creed nodded. "I might cut someone up 'casionally, just f'r fun, but... I wouldn't do this," he agreed. They both spoke quietly, almost in whispers. It would have seemed... wrong... to speak loudly in a room so full of death.

The whole room stank of formaldehyde, burning their throats and bringing tears to their eyes, a cold, sour smell that rolled off the walls in almost visible waves, deadening their sensitive noses. Coming from the walls.

Every wall was full of shelves.

Every shelf was full of jars.

Every jar was full of... bits.

Some of them had entire, tiny bodies inside, still curled like ammonites into themselves, eyes closed. Others contained pieces, kidneys and heads and other pieces not immediately identifiable. Some floated in solitary state, others were crammed in like pickles.

Logan looked away from a jar full of tiny starfish hands, nightmarishly clear through the clean, smooth glass. The whole room was so... clean. Pristine white, clear lights, and... jars. "Didn't think there was anything worse in the world than my nightmares," he whispered, mostly to himself. "But this is even colder."

Creed didn't know what Logan dreamed about, but he could make an informed guess. And the runt was right. This... this was cold. He'd always taken pleasure in violence, in the kill, but it had been *personal*. Intimate. This not-caring, this casual dealing of death without being interested in it, without being involved in it... this was worse than anything he'd ever done. "Yeah," he grunted, turning away. Coming in here had been a mistake, with the strong stench of formaldehyde. They'd either have to wait until their noses started working again and they could sniff out the trail again, or guess where it had been going and gamble that they'd be right. Still, the kids couldn't be far ahead.

Nobody was putting his girls in no damn jar.

He'd kill them all first.

Yeah, kill 'em all...

No. Can't think about that now. Gotta focus. Gotta find the cubs, get them clear. Then he could come back and make sure of this place. He'd bring some supplies, too. Gelignite, maybe. He had a soft spot in his heart for the old ways, gelignite and dynamite and good, old-fashioned fire. They'd do nicely.

He padded down the bland, beige hallway, promising himself control today, but blood tomorrow...

* * *

The scent trail had led them into a largish round area that was obviously frequently used. At least a dozen corridors led into it, and there was a bank of three elevators on one side. There were also a couple of forlorn potted plants, a soda machine, and a 'Please Do Not Smoke' sign.

"Wow," Marie said, with a sort of horrified interest. "Even whacked out secret evil gene labs have these?"

"A coke machine," Geordi agreed weakly. "They have a COKE MACHINE. Don't you have to lease those things from some company or something?" He shook his head. "Does someone drive out here with a truck full of sodas to restock it once a month?"

"I don't know," Annie said, eyeing the machine thoughtfully. "It could be a secret door or something. A hidden secret door. Into their most secret labs."

Everyone shuffled nervously away from the coke machine. Annie ambled over to it. "Only one way to find out!" she said cheerfully, and did some sort of matial arts kick thing that hit the machine so hard that the front part broke nearly in half. Annie looked inside. "Soda. Still cold. Anyone want one?"

"YOU CAN'T HAVE ANY!" Marie and Clarice yelled in unison.

Annie gave them a hurt look. "Why not?"

"Because when you drink caffienated soda you go completely mental and start moving really really fast and try to fight everyone and...." Marie trailed off. "On second thoughts, knock yourself out. And give me one."

Soda was handed around.... although Kyle started sneezing a bit from the bubbles... and they began a close inspection of the elevators. According to the sign on the wall, this was level four.

"I didn't see any more stairs," Annie observed, sipping her coke. "I don't think there are any. All the scent-trails come here, to the elevators."

"What if there was a fire or something? Or if we cut the power down here?" Geordi objected. "They need stairs, don't they?"

Annie gave him a long look. "Geordi, if we cut the power, WE'D be stuck down here too. And there are no fire stairs. This is a secret evil gene lab. They don't have to pass a building inspection."

He subsided, scowling, as Annie moved close to the elevators and patted the wall authoritatively. "This'll be the cutoff point," she explained. "Only one of these'll go up to the surface. There's probably only one or two elevator shafts in the whole complex between this level and the next one. So they can seal the lower levels off, see? This is where all the labs and prisoners and incriminating stuff is, where it can be sealed off and hidden easily."

"How do you know?" Geordi demanded.

Annie shrugged. "That's how I'd do it. And I grew up in a place like this, I know how they think."

"Oh."

Marie gave the elevators a nervous look. Clarice hadn't said a word since they left the prison level, and was clutching Marie's hand as if it was a life preserver. Jonny was doing almost the same thing with Kyle, hunching over and standing so close that he was practically stuffing his head into the older boy's armpit. Annie was coping, but Annie would cope on a raft in the middle of the ocean with no land in sight and no water left. Annie was not, Marie thought uncharitably, bright enough to panic. Geordi, on the other hand, wasn't bright enough NOT to panic and it wasn't helpful, even if he *was* as exotically beautiful as one of those statues of ancient Nubian princes. Melting brown eyes and sculptured jaws were not what they needed right now. "Which one is it that goes up?" she asked worriedly. "And won't they know by now that we broke out? What if they're waiting at the top?"

"They probably will be." Annie hefted her stolen rifle with another bright, nasty smile. "Let's see how prepared they think they are." And, since there was no way of knowing which elevator was the one they wanted, she pressed all three buttons and calmly stepped back to wait.

(end part eight)