The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 60

Ellie walked up to the second, inner gate. It was solid and metal, and the fence to either side of her was thick metal too, what looked like sheets of old roofing iron set vertically into the ground. It wouldn’t stop a bullet, she thought, but it was high, and would be difficult to climb, and the wire along the top was substantial as well.

It wasn’t even worth trying climbing over, Ellie had thought as they walked up. Even if she and Sameh lifted one another, they wouldn’t manage. To climb over, they would need to bring the SUV up and climb onto it to even have a chance to get over the fence, and that would be very difficult under fire.

The gate was the only way in.

Ellie walked up to the gate, and stopped in front of it. She banged on it, hard, and shouted, “We’re here.”

The was another camera set up here, a better one, and in plain sight. Ellie saw it, but she didn’t look up at it. She didn’t look up, quite deliberately. She looked at the gate instead, trying to seem natural, impatient, and like she was in a hurry to do her business, while also keeping her face down and her arms folded, so they couldn’t see her, or what she was wearing very easily.

She stood there, waiting, but nothing happened. That was a bad sign. She thumped again, a little worried, hoping she was just being looked over again, more carefully.

She must have been, because after a moment the gate was pulled open from the inside.

It opened inward, swinging from one gatepost, like the outside gate had. It only swung a meter or two, though. There was a young man was standing there, a forgettable young man. The everyday of Měi-guó, Ellie thought. Normal clothes, like she had been seeing all over the town, normal hair, cut fairly short, and some straggly facial hair. Everything about this young man was forgettable and normal, and Ellie wasn’t quite sure how accidental that was.

Forgettable was an important thing in an insurgent, and that made her suddenly suspicious. It made her wonder if this place was a little more credible than it had first seemed.

The young man was standing in the gateway, looking at Ellie. Standing there holding the gate a little way open, half-blocking the opening with his body. He didn’t seem to be blocking it on purpose, Ellie thought. Not like she would have. He just seemed to be standing where he had happened to end up after he pulled the gate open.

“You could have closed the other gate…” he was saying, irritably, as he opened the gate.

Ellie stepped forward, towards him, and then stepped forward again. She got close enough to him that she was crowding him, and close to the gate as well. She moved into the space between the gate and the gatepost, where he was too, and in doing so she bumped against him, nudging him backwards, pushing him backwards so he stumbled, slightly off-balance, surprised.

He stumbled, and said, “Hey,” but he seemed offended rather than worried. He seemed offended, and like he was about to shout at her, and get angry.

Not like he had realized anything was wrong.

Ellie was satisfied. She had moved enough that she was standing where she wanted to be standing. She was in the gateway now, blocking it with her own body, making it difficult for the gate to be closed, and the man in front of her still hadn’t realized anything was wrong.

He was too busy being offended she’d bumped him, rather than thinking about why she had.

Ellie drew her sidearm, quickly. She hadn’t risked taking it out earlier, in case it was visible on a camera. Now, she drew it, and kept it down beside her hip, and fired twice towards the man’s legs without aiming, just pointing it by instinct in what felt like the right direction. She needed to be quick. She needed to incapacitate him as quickly as possible, and didn’t want to take the time to raise the weapon and aim properly.

She fired once, and missed.

She fired again and hit him with the second shot.

She knew she’d hit him. She saw that she had from the way his expression changed, the way his face suddenly showed pain. He was hurt, and shocked, so she stopped firing and glanced down to check where she’d hit him.

It was his knee, right on his knee, which would be a fairly serious injury. Enough it ought to stop him moving for a while, anyway.

He was hurt. He wasn’t a threat. He was already starting to hop, to lift the injured leg, and take his weight off that foot. He was already starting to open his mouth, to shout, to be surprised, to raise the alarm.

Ellie pushed him backwards, roughly, so he fell over, and then looked around, scanning for danger, raising her sidearm in front of herself to aim as she did.