Chapter 162 – The Crucial Detail Part 2 – Ellie Daniels

Holly backed away from me before I could protest her plan. She stepped behind one of the stacks of boxes and disappeared from my sight as she rounded the corner. I was forced to find cover by myself. What was Holly thinking? I was too vulnerable to survive on my own.

Maybe she didn’t realize how badly my leg was injured? The moment I stood back up I felt a rush of pain worm its way up my leg. I was able to limp towards the closest wall, like Holly insisted, but not at any respectable speed. I kept low to avoid giving myself away to the remaining kidnappers.

“Over here!” One of the men shouted not far behind me. “Both of the guys are dead!”

“Dead?!” The other man shouted from his side of the building.

“Dead!” The first man confirmed. “That little girl must’ve grabbed one of their knives! She won’t get away from me! I know where she is!”

“I’m on my way!”

Was he bluffing or did he have serious reasons for saying that? It could be that he wanted to intimidate me. Or it could be that… I looked down and realized that I was leaving tracks on the floor behind me. I must’ve stepped in one of the dead men’s blood as I limped away.

“Shit!” I whispered beneath my breath.

I limped only a few feet further before the closest kidnapper came into view. He pulled a knife from out of his pocket.

“There you are!” He shouted. “You must’ve put up a hell of a fight! How did you manage to…?”

Holly appeared from behind another stack of boxes and buried her knife into the man’s side. The man screamed in pain and reflexively slapped Holly away with the back of his hand. He hunched over, holding his side in pain as he tried to recover. His eyes were full of shock and panic as he laid eyes on Holly.

“What happened?! What’s going on?!” The other man yelled in the distance. “I’m on my way!”

Holly rubbed the blood away from her bruised lip to little effect. Her hands were so bloody that she did nothing other than smear blood across her cheek. The kidnapper in front of us was right to be frightened. Holly looked absolutely demonic with her entire track jersey covered in blood.

The man started to recover and gripped his knife tightly. It looked like he was going to yell something to his partner. Holly fiercely sprinted right at him. The kidnapper probably wasn’t expecting to be charged by someone practically half his size. He was alert though, unlike his two dead friends.

He thrust his arm out towards Holly as she approached, hoping to slice her and stave off her charge. Holly ducked beneath the attack with such agility that she was able to follow up with a slice of her own. The cut didn’t go deep, but it was just hard enough and in the perfect spot to exacerbate his first wound.

The man was forced a few steps back to try giving himself some breathing room from Holly’s attack. Only now, his back was against the wall. Holly knew that she didn’t have long to finish this. I could hear this kidnapper’s companion running in our direction.

“Help!” The man shouted. “There’s another-…”

Holly went on the attack once again. The man dropped his knife and tried to grab her instead. He succeeded in arresting her momentum by grabbing her shoulders in the middle of her attack. Holly kicked him in the shin, loosening his grip just enough for her to cut his wrist.

The man let go and pushed Holly away to hold his bleeding wrist. Holly was thrown to the ground and, in no time at all, was back up on her feet. His eyes grew wide in surprise when he saw how quickly Holly was able to recover. Holly was agile and fast, much more so than the average person. They had no clue what they were dealing with.

These men were all large and strong, but Holly was too slippery for any of them to adequately get the upper hand against her. If she didn’t have the knife on her then this would be a different story. She was a force to be reckoned with while she was holding that knife. The man prepared himself as Holly went on the attack again.

He put his arms up to instinctively guard his face as Holly approached. Holly aimed low instead. She targeted the first wound she inflicted in his abdominal region. The man was late to get his hands on her. She thrust the knife deep into the center of his gut before tearing the knife out at a horizontal angle.

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The final kidnapper rounded the corner just in time to see his friend go down in a spray of blood. Holly stood up to face him. She had even more blood on her face than before. Literally half of her face was covered in it. She looked nightmarish, even to me. I was too stunned to say anything to her while she was like this.

The final kidnapper was shaking as he stared at Holly. Perhaps, from his perspective, she felt almost supernatural. None of them knew that Holly was already coming for me and Suzy when they abducted me. To him, she must’ve seemingly come out of nowhere.

To top that off, she managed to take down three men larger than her. He wasn’t around to know that she never had to fight more than one at a time. He also didn’t know that she got the jump on her most recent opponent. Holly must’ve represented a far more dangerous threat in his mind than she probably did in actuality.

The man was paralyzed with fear. Holly didn’t wait for him to make a move. She went in on the offensive. She must’ve assumed that he was just stalling for a plan. She couldn’t see the fear laden in this man’s eyes. I could only see it because I was watching from the sidelines. Holly was in a killing frenzy.

He wasn’t even able to guard himself properly when Holly stabbed him. The knife landed in his arm as he put his hands up to defend his head. Holly pulled her knife out and prepared to strike again. The man dropped to the ground and put his hands over his head.

“Wait!” He screamed! “Mercy! Mercy…!”

Holly stopped attacking and gave the man a suspicious look.

“Mercy…?” She asked in a skeptical voice.

“Mercy…” He said. “I surrender, so… Please…”

“You four targeted my friends and you want mercy?” Holly asked.

“We only wanted to ransom her… We…”

“That’s not what I heard you say when you entered this building… That was you, right? Not your dying friend over there…? Why should I give you mercy?”

The man tossed his knife to the ground and put his hands up in the air. The knife clanged loudly as it rolled a few feet away from him.

“I’ll stay here and wait for the police.” He said. “I surrender.”

Holly gave the man another dubious look.

“You’re lying.” She said. “Turn out your pockets.”

The man did as Holly asked him, revealing that he had no other weapons on him that we could see. I started to stand up upon seeing this.

“We should let him live.” I said. “He can confess his side of things to the police when they get here. The police can’t be far.”

Holly walked over to the man’s knife and kicked it away. She turned back to the kidnapper and pointed her knife at him. He raised his hands back up.

“I don’t trust you.” Holly said.

“This isn’t worth dying over…” He said.

“You would’ve killed my friend Ellie if it wasn’t for me!” Holly shouted. “I don’t trust you for even a second!”

The man lowered his hands to hold his bleeding arm. I walked over to Holly and put a hand on her shoulder. She jumped in surprise and spun towards me.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to…” I started to say.

“It’s… okay…” She said in an unsteady voice. “I’m just on edge right now.”

“We should go outside to wait for the police.” I suggested.

“And let this one escape?” Holly asked. “No chance. They tried to kill you.”

“He’s bleeding pretty badly. I don’t think he’s going anywhere on his own.”

Holly turned towards me and nodded.

“Alright… You go stand out front and wait for the police.” She said. “I’ll make sure he doesn’t run off.”

Normally I wouldn’t agree to something like this, but I didn’t have any room to complain. Holly just proved that she could handle herself in a fight. This man wouldn’t be able to overpower her with his arm bleeding so profusely. Holly must’ve struck through a vein when she stabbed him.

“Okay.” I said. “I’ll be back as soon as they arrive.”

Walking outside took me a long time due to my injury. I limped away, each step feeling more painful than the last. I’d need medical attention soon. I could already hear the sirens approaching in the distance before I even made it out of the building.

One of the police cars were pulling up just as I stepped outside. I waved them down and they slowed to a stop just in front of me. They asked me a few questions about who I was and how I was doing. They were especially worried about my injuries.

I put all that aside to tell them about the situation with Holly and the kidnappers. They were surprised to hear that I was saved by another high school student. Opal already mentioned to them that Holly was heading in that direction, but they didn’t expect that Holly would be capable of killing the kidnappers.

And to be honest, neither did I.

I was grateful that she was able to save me, but I was seeing Holly in an entirely new light today. One of the officers helped me walk back inside. I explained that Holly was still with one of the kidnappers and that the man was bleeding profusely. We all walked back inside expecting to find the two of them waiting where I left them.

Only, the final kidnapper was dead, the same as his friends.

Holly was staring down at the knife sticking out of the man’s neck with a look of contempt. I was frozen in shock. The two police officers walked over to Holly to start asking her questions about her involvement. Holly was barely responsive, in a state of shock herself. Soon, more police officers rushed into the scene.

The police officers escorted Holly to their car. She was going to be taken away for questioning about her side of things. Meanwhile, my dad was the one to take me to the hospital. He drove over after receiving a call from Opal. He drove so fast that a police officer caught him speeding. The officer gave him an escort after hearing his story.

My leg had to be put into an uncomfortable below-knee cast. Opal, Suzy, Zara, and several of my other friends from school came to visit me in the hospital. Holly was still being scrutinized by the police. They believed that she killed those four men in my defense.

It was the brutality of the scene that gave them pause. They also wanted to know why she endangered herself by getting involved, rather than waiting for the police. It raised questions about rather she was justified in her actions or not. Ultimately, she did rescue me, so it would be hard to legally justify charging her with anything.

They didn’t know the truth about the final kidnapper. Holly killed an unarmed man who threw down his weapon and surrendered.

Only I knew the truth.