They retreat back to the drainage tunnel, Rachel, Anea, Touch, Arch, and Dill. Rachel feels heavy under all her gear. The added weight of the shotgun didn’t help. Touch is behind her, tightening down straps and checking for loose gear that could make unnecessary noise on the move.
He hadn’t looked directly at Rachel since they abandoned the van and crawled into this tunnel the first time. His shoulders were slumped, and there were a few moments after they abandoned the van when he seemed hesitant or clueless. Even now, Rachel notes a few times his hands are skittish and timid as they run over her gear.
He’s suddenly off his game.
Rachel occasionally catches Anea staring at Touch with her wide eyes. She can see it too.
He finishes off by picking Dill up and setting him in the top of the main compartment of her pack, before buckling the thing closed. Rachel feels Dill squeeze his head through the top of the bag as he peers around the stale and moist smell of the concrete tunnel. Rachel walks around Touch and starts strapping his swords to the side of his pack, sheathed in their black leather.
“What’s on your mind?” Rachel asks. Anea watches in silence.
“Uh, nothing.”
“Don’t give me that. Not now. Something’s up.”
“… I-I’m sorry.”
He never apologizes. That’s the second time in twenty minutes.
“Sorry?”
“I messed up. I went in without a plan. I fucked everything up.”
Rachel finishes securing the rifle, then spins him around and looks her friend in the eye.
“What’s done is done. Everything worked out-”
We got lucky, Touchstone screams to himself. That’s what saved them. He put himself and his only friend at the mercy of dumb fucking luck.
“-so, what’s the plan on getting out of here?”
He sinks down to a wooden crate and buries his head in his hands.
“I don’t know. I don’t have one. There’s so much I don’t know about this place. I don’t know what to do.”
“Look at me.” She says. “I know you. You have a plan for everything. You mean to tell me after all this time, after all your outings, you haven’t been gathering information and thinking up plans for this very scenario and at least a dozen others?
Cut the shit, Touch. Your pity party comes later. What are all the ways out of this city?”
Touch looks up as if to say something, then sinks back into his hands.
He takes a deep breath in and a deep breath out.
“Docks. Roads. Countryside.” He says. “Technically air as well, but we don’t have a pilot, nor do I know their anti-air defenses.”
Rachel can see the gears turning again. His confidence returning a little with every word. He sobers up and stands tall.
“Enforcers already occupy the docks. They most likely have patrol boats scouring every inch of the water.
Next is the roads. With the city on lockdown, the enforcers are most likely the only ones on the road. If we want to drive out, we need to hide and get smuggled out after they lift the lockdown. Same with the docks.
That leaves the countryside. They’ll be spread too thin out there.”
“Okay,” Rachel says. “country it is. How do we get there? And the whole city is surrounded by an electric fence, right? I can just cut through it, but is it alarmed?”
“Only the high end. There are holes cut in several places on the other ends that enforcers are paid not to notice, not that those will help us now.” Touch pulls up a map on his tablet.
Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.
Arch runs around in circles, Touch throws him a large chunk of his favorite food.
“If we break out here,” He points to the farmland surrounding the east side of the city, “The hills and the crops should conceal us until we reach the trees, and this private farm up here. Though it’s likely to be guarded by private security, who’ll be on alert by the time we arrive. But it might be better than taking on enforcer patrols. From there, we take this road and we should be good.”
“If we all work together,” Anea speaks up, “Touch leading, me guiding, and you watching our backs, I think we can sneak through the city, no matter how tight the security is.” She looks at Arch, who finished his treat, and crouches down to pet him. “What does he do?”
She lets out a small yelp and jerks her hand back as Arch gives her a little zap.
Touch offers a sadistic smile. “Shocking, isn’t it?”
---
“To review, for those just deployed:” a voice crackles from the radio on Charles’ chest, “three suspects, a male gray skinned mute, an Asian woman, and a black adolescent female with minor empathic abilities are still at large. Most recently spotted by civilians in Zone 3.
They are armed and extremely dangerous. Use of lethal force is authorized only if weapons are visible. This includes the adolescent female. There is a bonus for their capture. But don’t risk it. If you have the shot, take it.”
“Ya hear that Charles? They might be coming our way. Should we get everyone together?” Johnathan, the grenadier of the squad, says through his thick plastic face visor. The two were patrolling a particularly troublesome city block full of alleyways and trash.
Charles grabs the next door and makes sure it’s locked, per lockdown protocol.
“No, I don’t want them slipping past us. We can all converge when we spot them, unless Ty says otherwise.”
Suddenly, a crack and a flash and a scream bounce off the brick and glass of the alley behind Charles.
“The fuck!'“ Charles jumps around just in time to see his friend crumple to the ground like a stiff rag doll. His heart leaps into his throat and he jumps back when he sees a dark gray man out of the corner of his eye. He turns to see the man pointing a handgun right at him. For a moment, all he can see is the gun, then the stone man puts a finger to his lips.
I’m going to die.
The gray-skinned man motions with his gun. Charles takes the hint and drags the sling to his submachine gun up over his head with trembling arms and sets it on the ground. He remembers the pistol at his side and sets that on the ground as well. Charles rises slowly with his hands in the air.
A familiar voice crackles on the radio.
“Check in.” Ty says.
“All good here, boss.” Gutierrez says.
The gray man stares at Charles, eyebrow raised, then he straightens the arm leveling the pistol at his chest. He cocks his head at the radio on Charles' chest.
I have to go for it, right? But he’ll kill me if I try. I don’t wanna die.
Charles takes a deep breath. He has to do this. He pushes the button for the secondary channel.
“All good.” He takes his finger off the button.
A pause.
“All clear.”
“Okay. Proceed.”
The stone man finally speaks.
“Let’s go.”
“Wh-what?” Charles stammers. Then, a small black girl, bulging from an over-sized enforcer vest, walks out from the alley corner behind the stone man. Followed by a young Asian woman wielding a shotgun in her hands, wearing a black-purple hoodie, a large hiking pack, and a chicken poking its beaked face out of the top of the pack.
Charles spots a red-brown blur crawling over Jonathan’s body. A fox. It skitters over to the stone man, panting.
“I know,” the stone man says to the fox. “Just one more. Climb up and rest for now.”
The fox climbs up the man’s clothes and dives into his backpack.
For the first time, Charles takes note of the stone man’s gear: black hoodie pulled tight over his thick, swollen frame. Black cargo pants, smaller gray pack, swords and rifle strapped to the sides.
The Asian woman levels the shotgun at Charles’ chest while the stone man kicks all the guns across the dirt.
“You sure about this?” Rachel says, looking to the girl.
“Yeah, he’ll play ball. Trust me.”
Charles can smell the breath on the stone man as he speaks.
“You never saw us. You blacked out right after checking in, you understand? You woke up just like your friend here. You know how much trouble you’d get in for letting yourself be taken hostage without a fight? Making false radio calls? Putting your entire team at risk? Right?”
Charles nods. He was right. Charles could be imprisoned or executed for the false check in alone. If he lived, he had to keep his mouth shut.
“Good.” He says, “Arch.”
The last thing Charles remembers before blacking out is that fox’s head peering over the stone man’s shoulder.
Then darkness.