"Back To You" (Aqualad x OC)

Part Nine

Equinox had steeled her stomach for what lay inside the storage room, but that still didn't keep her from going pale. She tried to hide it, though, she was the one who insisted that they return. These were her sisters, friends, innocent women and girls who needed their help. And they were going to get it for them

Cages were stacked on top of one another like prison cells, trapping each individual in a space barely big enough for someone Aqualad's size to sit up in. A few guards patrolled on mobile platforms, that stretched to reach the cages on the higher levels.

"There's one vehicle entrance on the far end, the vents we came in, and the access staircase next to us," Nightingale said, scanning the room with the computer built into her glove.

"Where would the vehicle entrance go? We're too far underground," Equinox said.

"Below sea level, in fact," Aqualad said.

Nightingale plugged into into the abandoned computer station, looking out over the rows of cages. "The whole base is connected by the halls we saw, all of which are big enough for their vans. The vans are used to bring prisoners into the base to be catalogued, and to send smaller...shipments out." She growled at their way of treating human beings like goods.

"There's three entrances: The vehicle entrance we saw, a passageway into the bar in Angelsport above, and one that opens right into the river."

"Maybe they have a submarine?" Equinox said.

"And that would be how they get larger groups of prisoners out," Aqualad said.

Nightingale flipped through a few more files, downloading as much as she dared to risk detection in their system.

"An operation this big, the whole town must be involved," She sighed.

"What do you know of Angelsport?" Jackson asked Miiyahbin.

She shrugged. "It was a trading post back in the days when the French first settled. They just wanted to trade, and they did so with the permission of the Cree Elders and the Midayo. After the English drove the French and other Europeans out of North America, it was abandoned. I remember coming here for a field trip when I was in Elementary school, but that was the last time anyone from Moose Factory came out here.

"Well, came out here and returned," She added in a mumble.

"The closest highways are on the other side of the Island. They're pretty well hidden, I'll give them that." Nightingale shut off the computers.

"Okay, we've got schematics, we've seen where they keep their prisoners, but we need to get out of here before we get found."

Equinox and Aqualad had no further argument. They slipped out of the secondary control station before the guards found them, making their way back to the vent they'd entered.

"Miiyahbin?" A voice whispered, carried to the Midayo warrior by the winds she worked with.

She spun as Aqualad carefully removed the grate, and caught sight of an arm, squeezed between the bars of a cage, reaching out to her.

"Heather," Her best friend. She sprinted to the cage and started unlocking it without hesitation.

"Equinox!" Nightingale hissed. Aqualad was running after her. She blew off the lock with help from the winds before he could reach her, tugging Heather from the cage.

"Go," She urged, pushing her towards Aqualad. Heather was bruised, and dizzy. Aqualad hesitated for a moment before lifting the Cree girl in his arms, carrying her back to the vent.

They could hear the guards on the next aisle over, wondering about the commotion as their actions garnered the attention of hundreds of other imprisoned women.