Basement Floor
Lex steps out of the elevator and glances around. When only silence greets her, Lex grows impatient.
“Which way?” she calls softly.
“That I do not know,” Scorvo says.
“Are you kidding me? You don’t know?”
“I can’t be expected to know everything. I am a yautja, not a god!”
“You’ve got that right. Left. We’ll just go left. In the movies, it’s always left.”
Lex strolls down the hall in a huff. Scorvo’s steps are calculated and much slower. However, he is careful not to lose sight of the ooman female. The clothes she now wears are quite form-fitting, showcasing her voluptuous figure. Scorvo does everything possible to keep his mind on the task at hand. Even so, it proves to be especially difficult.
Lex stops beside a door with block letters scrawled across the middle: “Danger/Peligroso: Bio-Hazard”. She stands on tiptoe to peer through a small pane in the door.
“I see large metal drawers everywhere. Looks like they’re all labeled. Can’t make any of them out though. Could be some kind of morgue for deceased test subjects.”
“That is not the room we need. My cha’l brother would not be kept there.”
“How do you know that?”
“Since we walked onto this floor…I have felt a strange tug on my mind. It is as is my brother calls to me…From wherever he is. It grew stronger…The further we walked down this hall. I believe we are getting closer. We should keep going in this direction.”
“You’re the boss,” Lex says, stepping away from the specimen room.
Loud laughter causes both Lex and Scorvo to freeze in their tracks. It is coming from the corridor ahead, and getting closer. Lex surveys the area, looking for a place to hide. The women’s restroom seems as good a place as any. Darting into the bathroom, Lex is grateful that Scorvo is fully cloaked when he barges in behind her. A solitary woman stands at the sink, applying a fresh coat of lipstick. She offers Lex a thin smile, smacks her lips together, and heads for the bathroom exit. Lex watches the woman leave with a relieved expression. She whirls on Scorvo.
“You didn’t need to follow me in. It’s not like anyone would have seen you.”
“Where you go…I go. It is the safest way.”
“Okay. Fine.”
Lex opens the bathroom door and peeks out. Two guards are standing approximately five meters away. Both men are heavily armed. Lex bites down on her lip and studies their weapons. She keys in on the guard closest to her position.
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“I want his gun!” Lex says.
“Why?” Scorvo inquires in a surprised voice.
“Because it’s big. And it has a grenade launcher. What he could possibly need it for, down here, is beyond me. Probably a prepper. One of those guys who thinks he can solve everything with a gun. Thrives on overkill. We could really use that if we get in a pinch. Especially, since I had to leave my pistol behind. We could knock down a couple of walls, completely obliterate our opposition. Yeah. I so want his gun.”
“Knock down a couple of walls? Obliterate the opposition? These are not the ways of an ooman female. I am constantly surprised by you, Lex.”
“I’m not like other girls,” Lex says with a wink. “Besides, your brother taught me nearly everything I know. Until the Antarctic expedition, I’d never even fired a gun. First bullet I ever fired, I put a bullet in my friend’s brain. Since then, I guess I stopped giving a damn. I’m at the range twice a week. And explosions…Eh. Just a bigger version of the Fourth of July.”
Lex is only half kidding. Sebastian’s face floats to the forefront of her mind. His goofy grin. That stupid bottle cap.
In the hall, the second guard wraps up conversation and strides with purpose in the direction Lex and Scorvo originally came from. The guard with the grenade enabled weapon remains where he is.
“How do we get his weapon?” Lex whispers.
“Not we. Me!” Scorvo says. “You will remain here.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I am going to disarm the ooman. Don’t worry. I have no plans to kill him. The more people go missing, the greater chance questions will be asked. The right questions could lead to our discovery. Stay here. I will get the weapon.”
“Yes, but how?”
“When the ooman goes to evacuate his waste…He will put down his weapon. I will take it.”
“Uh…He’s gonna notice.”
“Yes, but by then…We will be much closer to our destination. The ooman has not evacuated solid waste in quite some time…And he smells heavily of ooman caffeine.”
“Wait. You can smell that?”
“And other things. A yautja’s sense of smell is at least thirteen times better than an ooman’s.”
“Wow. How…Oddly specific. You still haven’t explained how you’re going to convince said pooper not to divulge that someone has stolen his prized weapon.”
“He will not. Not right away. Pride will not allow him to. He will berate himself. He will search high and low. And then, he may consider the possibility of reporting the theft. But I sincerely doubt he will report it. It would mean a failure on his part. He does not look the part of an ooman who likes to fail. In the meantime, we will continue to search for Scar.”
“You seem to know us oomans pretty well,” Lex sarcastically retorts.
“I’d like to believe so.”
-
-
Detective Mackey has returned to his desk. He flips through a manila file folder with an intense energy.
“You know what, Dave. I had Clark run the plates on that pickup parked out at the ranger station. Truck belongs to a young woman named Laura Mattley. Problem is…There’s no record of a Laura Mattley…Until about eleven years ago. It’s like she just fell from the sky. I mean…All the paperwork after that lines up. We’ve got her current address, social security number, driver’s licenses, I.D.’s, and a scant work record. She even does a little singing…At some club called the Jukebox. But, the woman is forty-three years old. Where was she before eleven years ago?”
“Yep. That is weird,” Deputy Newsome says.
“I want to go out there?” Mackey mutters, twisting his mouth unattractively in thought.
“Out where?”
“To the woman’s house. Something isn’t quite jiving, Dave. Who fell into that river? And why? Laura Mattley is African American. The clump of hair I found on that tree…Came from an African American. Probably a woman. The hair had been relaxed recently.”
Detective Mackey presses both index fingers against his upper lip and stares into space.
“She’s involved in this somehow. Why else would her truck still be there? Question is…Why wasn’t her truck thrown up in a tree too?”
“Good question.”
“Let’s go, Dave. I’ve got a feeling we’re going to find a lot of answers out at the Mattley place. Come on. Hopefully, I can convince Riley to supply me with a search warrant. Nah. Forget that. We’ll just call it a wellness check.”
“Sounds like a plan to me," Dave says with a casual shrug.