Splinter Cell: Traitor

Chapter 14

Teresa ---------------------------------->

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Abigail

ALLEYWAY

                Sam held me at arms length by the shoulders.  I could just make his face out in the dim light.  He looked concerned.  He was pretty beaten up.  Probably from the fall into the quarry.  He was slightly hunched over and he was favoring his right leg.  I didn’t say anything after the three words spilled over my lips.  The words I never thought I would tell Sam.  I never thought in a hundred years that I would tell Sam that I had quit from Third Echelon, that I had given up and taken the easy way out.  Right now, I had to prove that he was real and not some hallucination.  I hit the inside of his elbows with the blades of my hands, making him bend his arms in, pulling me closer to him and I embraced him, the tears started flowing.

                “I, I, I tho, thought, you, you were dead,” I sobbed.  He groaned lightly and I could feel the bruised ribs under the layer of rock hard muscle.  I could feel the scratch of his week unshaven stubble against my cheek and his soft hair against the back of my hand.  My chin rested on his shoulder and my other hand was around his waist, squeezing as tight as I could.

                “Just because I am not dead, doesn’t mean I don’t feel pain,” he said tapping my shoulder.  I knew he wanted me to let go, but I couldn’t.  I felt if I let go, he would vaporize and I would never see him again.  He would just melt into the shadows and become one of them.  I couldn’t lose him, not again, not like everybody else in my life.  My mom, dad, aunt, uncle, Sarah, Regan, foster mom after foster mom, I had lost them all at one point, but Sam had been there when he could.  Even when it wasn’t safe, he would at least call.  I couldn’t lose him.  He was all I had left.  Sam eventually gave in and his arms slid around me.

                “I’m sorry, I couldn’t come in.  I just couldn’t come in, not yet.  There’s too much to do.” He whispered.  I smiled, sniffled and slowly released him. “Why did you quit?”

                “That jackass Kovac, he said I was sleeping with you then he put me on Operational Suspension.  I told him what I would do next time he did that.  Gabe and Lian held up their deal.” I said with tears choking my voice.  I laughed and sucked back some tears.  “Some Splinter Cell I turned out to be hun?  Give me a gun and a terrorist and I am good, give me an insult and a paper pusher and I can’t do shit.”

                “You are a perfectly good Splinter Cell, hell you are almost as good as me.  I was never good with the paper pushers either,”

                “You’re fifty-five and you can still kick my ass,” I said.

                “I said almost,” he shrugged.  I laughed again and sniffled. “You look good.”

                “Thanks, I feel like shit,” I said.  I smiled and looked at him.  My hand was beginning to throb from that man’s skull.  I shook my hand out and he smiled.

                “His skull a little hard?”

                “Something like that,” I said and my phone rang.

Hansen

HOTEL ROOM

                A plain manila envelope slid underneath my door.  I walked over and picked it up.  Opening it up, I slid out ten, four by six, glossy photos.  They had been taken with a long range, high definition camera.  The first was Abigail in the market.  The second was her typing something on her OPSAT.  The third was her walking down a set of stairs.  The fourth was her holding a gun to a mans neck with a knife in his side.   The fifth was her shoving him away.  The sixth showed her being grabbed around the neck by a man.  The seventh was in night vision showed it was Fisher who was holding her.  The eighth showed him holding her at arm’s length by the shoulders.  The ninth showed her throwing her arms around him but no reaction from him.  The tenth was the kicker with him hugging her back.