Awakenings

A captor pushed her along with the barrel of his rifle. She stumbled forward, but continued to walk. After several more steps her other captor grabbed her by the arm and yanked her to the right. He shoved her through another doorway and she fell to the floor hard. Her knee twisted as she smashed it in to the steel plate. She winced in pain, but stifled her cry.

The two soldiers yanked her up to her knees. She finally cried out as half her weight fell on her injured knee. One man held her upright while the other yanked the blindfold from her eyes.

The same overly friendly guard from the trip leaned in close to her. His fetid breath made her want to gag.

“Sit tight, girlie.” He flashed a broad grin. “The boss has a visitor planned for you in a few bits.”

Both men laughed as they threw her back to the floor and walked to the door. A moment later, the solid steel door slammed shut and she was alone.

Annabelle collapsed to the floor, too tired to even weep.

*****

Wake up, asshole!

Freedom’s eyes shot open. He found himself staring up at a water-stained ceiling. The bed creaked as he moved. He could tell by the smell alone that he was in a motel. And not a very good one.

“’Bout damn time, Patton.”

Freedom turned to see Tilby staring down at him. The aging sheriff held the same narrow-eyed, clenched jaw demeanor he held during the fight.

“It’s been ten damn hours since your ass decided to take a nap. Me and your lady friend have been swapping out, watching you every couple hours to see if you wake up while the other one catches some Z’s.”

Freedom swung his feet out of the bed and his body up in to a sitting position. “Thanks, I guess.”

“Your welcome, even though you two screwed over months of my operation. Not surprising, considering its you.”

“I knew it,” Freedom said. “No matter what, I knew the feds wouldn’t let someone as tenacious and ornery as you go.”

Tilby nodded. “it doesn’t help us much though. As a deep cover up, I can’t just call up Langley. And my local contacts have been incommunicado. Something big’s planned, and they know how to keep everyone out. I don’t know how the communication blackout works, but I don’t even know if my message made it out. Even if it did, it could be several days before its decoded and then we’ll have to sit through the hours it takes to mobilize any kinds of acting force from the military. So for all purposes, we’re on our own here.”

Freedom smirked. “Come on now , Tilby. You know that’s just the way I like it.”

“Once again proving you’re insane.”

“It’s good to be on the same side for once.” Freedom held his hand out for Tilby to shake.

Tilby looked down at Freedom’s hand for several seconds before he shook it. Freedom almost sighed in relief.

“What do we know about this group in Tudor?” Freedom said.

“Not a lot. We know they are part of a larger group. A group that doesn’t have the federal government’s best interests at heart. We’ve got no clue who their leader is or why he’s organizing these groups.”

“We need to find out.”

Tilby nodded. “Your empathic girlfriend seemed to think she can use her powers to locate member of the group. She detected various degrees of influence on the people of Tudor.”

“Emotional manipulation?”

“Looks that way.”

Freedom sighed. How could a simple missing person turn in to a statewide conspiracy?

“What about the Montalvo girl?” Freedom said.

“She’ll have to wait. She hasn’t popped in to your brain so we’ll have to assume she’s still alive.”

“I don’t like it.”

“Sorry, Patton, but we don’t have much choice. We need to shut this organization down. Now.”

Freedom scratched his unshaven chin. “We need to get Iniri up and moving then. We don’t have time to waste.”

Tilby shook his head. “No need. Iniri thinks they’re on their way now. Grab your gun. We have some ass to kick.”

*****

“I don’t care how many problems it will cause! We need those generators sup and running by midnight!”

Atlas angrily slammed the phone shut as he paced in front of his monitors.

The door slid open across the office. Atlas glanced towards Liberator as he walked in to the room.

“Report,” Atlas said.

“Tudor is secure. The assailants didn’t find any of the machinery, nor did they do any damage outside the one murder. We’re blaming all of it on the Montalvo girl.”

“And the sheriff and his mysterious friends?”

“We still haven’t found them. Every cell now has been informed to be on the lookout, and I expect to have them in hand within twenty-four hours.”

Atlas picked up a remote from the desk and pointed it towards the massive screen in the center of his monitor wall. It switched from a Fox news broadcast to a computer database of some kind. After a moment, Sheriff Edward Tilby’s image appeared and information began to file down the screen. Atlas clicked another button and the scroll stopped.

“Now tell me, my dear Liberator, who does this file, a file hacked from the Pentagon mainframe by some of my best men, say Sheriff Tilby works for?”

“The Agency for Counter-Terrorism: Infiltration, Observation, and Negation.”

“In other words, ACTION. You’ve managed to let a goddamned agent of ACTION escape!”

”I’m sorry, boss, I didn’t—”

“Just shut your mouth, Liberator. I don’t need your apologies or your excuses. I want you to find and eliminate this so-called Sheriff and his friends before they expose everything. We only have a few hours to go until everything is ready. Don’t fuck it up now.”

“I’ll scramble every unit I can, sir. We will find them.”

Atlas nodded his approval. “I want you to take control of the Ankeny facility yourself. I suspect our foes are far closer than we expect, and it would be far easier to lure them in to our snare.”

“You’ve got it.”

“And Liberator?”

“Yeah, boss?”

“Don’t fuck this up, or I will be forced to kill you.” Atlas turned back to his monitors. “You know where the door is. Find your way out.”

*****

Iniri sat in the middle of her room, eyes closed. She could hear Tilby speaking to Freedom. Though it brought her joy to know, Patton would be all right, her focus lay elsewhere.

She concentrated on her empathic powers. She let them flow outward and across the nearby city. Her skin crawled as wave after wave of strong emotion emanated from the streets. Despair lingered in the run down neighborhood. Iniri found it almost overwhelming.

She could feel the continued approach of their foes as they moved in around the facility. The moved with an almost military precision, in numbers that worried her. Tilby told her again and again that she need not worry. He didn’t seem to understand that this wasn’t her life though. She didn’t spend her days getting shot at.

Her focus faltered as she looked in to the past. Everything about the last few days seemed like a blur. How could I let this happen to my life?

The door opened behind her. She let her eyes open. She smiled as Tilby walked in to the room.

“He’s ok?”

Tilby nodded. “He’s getting ready for our friends now. How much longer do we have?”

“Not long. They will be here soon.”

He stepped closer to her, only a few feet away. “How are you holding up?”

Iniri let herself fall forward in to Tilby’s arms. “I’m okay. Without your support these last few hours, I don’t know if I could have survived.” She looked up in to his eyes. “Thank you.”

Tilby smiled down at the young woman in her arms. “Don’t thank me. It’s my job, ma’am.”

Iniri laughed. She pulled his face down to her own. The kiss radiated with their passion.

Tilby pulled away. “Enough of that, for now. We agreed, remember? For Freedom’s sake.”

Iniri nodded.

“Come on,” he said. “We have a defense to prepare.”