HE STOOD UP, using my body as support, but not before he almost dragged me down with him.
"Where are we going?" he asked.
"Nowhere for now," I muttered, looking around the floor for lingering shadows. That was the thing about death, it never quite left. Walk into any funeral house and it'll be easy to tell, death was there and it would never leave. Perhaps that's why I never visited the four graves a few towns over. I did not need to. Death was everywhere. The graves were just a reminder.
I pulled him towards me and dug my nails into his chin. "Tell me the truth. Is there anyone is those rooms?"
He glanced at the locked rooms, before our eyes made contact. His chocolate brown eyes bored into mine, but the stare-off did not last long. He removed his eyes from mine as if they burnt him. The gray contacts I wore were irritated with the amount of strain I had put on them, but even my eyes hadn't been burning red, they would not have been able to hide the demons I carried with me. They were ever-present, a replacement for the light in my eyes, which had been stolen from me a long time ago. It became clear to me, by the way he was shielding his eyes, he had saw them.
"No...only the four of us guarded the second floor."
"Open them," I demanded.
His eyes met mine again, a clash of metal. "What? Why?" he sputtered.
"I don't believe you—open the doors. Now." I bit my tongue to distract myself from the stabbing pain in the back of my head. It would cover my entire skull soon, like a hoodie, if I wasn't careful. I thought back to the morning: had I taken my medicine? I knew the answer before I had finished retracing my steps. I hadn't.
"I-I can't!" he exclaimed. There was a bewildered look on his face, draining the life out of him before my eyes. "I don't have the keys!"
I kept calm. "Who does, then?"
His face was feverish as his eyes trailed towards the corpse. "M-Micah has them—I swear!"
I released his arm and muttered under my breath. "You better be telling the truth."
Leaving him to watch, I dragged my limbs toward Micah's body. I fell down beside him, being careful to avoid his eyes, and fumbled through his pockets. He was still warm. Taking one look at him, ignoring the bright red circle on his forehead, it was simple to think he was only asleep. Bile rose in the back of my throat, and I gagged. Touching dead bodies had always been my weakness. Besides a wad of cash, a pocket knife, a couple of rubber bands, and a wallet without a driver's license, I found not much else.
"I thought you said he had it!" I barked.
"He does! I swear," he said, sweat dripping down his spiked hair. "Check his shoes. He sometimes hid important stuff down there."
It was unlikely that he hid the key inside his shoe, comfort being the primary reason. In a crime show, once, I had seen the detective discover a note hidden in the heel of a man's shoe. As it seemed the most logical, I hauled myself toward his feet. I twisted the heel of his left shoe, but it did not move to reveal a hidden stash of keys. Growing desperate, I slipped his right shoe off his foot and analyzed it. It's heel, too, did not budge. Inside of it, however, right above the heel, the padding was extra soft.
Using his pocket knife, I cut into his shoe and peeled back the layers of padding. Underneath, I found two keys joined together with a single circular keychain.
"You got lucky," I told him. I bent down and picked up the chain attached to his handcuffs. "Now, let's see if this even works."
Rushing to the nearest door, with him trailing behind me, I inserted one key at a time until I got the perfect match. Once I heard the satisfying click of the door unlocking, I turned the doorknob and entered the room.
"Told ya," Connor said, standing behind me as I surveyed the small room. "The surveillance guys didn't come in today."
I didn't respond as I took in every feature of the room and committed it to memory. The walls were lined with different kinds of television and computer screens, of all sizes and shape. Three long tables trailed around the room. Strewn across them were wires, keyboards, and all kinds of computer and surveillance equipment. The only oddity was the black screens. Everything had been turned off, and on the floor above, I had not seen a single camera. What does this mean? I questioned, but since this was not a priority, I let it slide for the time being.
Half-sprinting, I rushed to the other room. Connor struggled to keep up with me, given his handcuffs, but did not trail too far behind. Separating the key that I had already used, I unlocked the door with the second one and shoved it open. It, too, was empty.
"This is the food storage," Connor said as he entered behind me.
There were cabinets hanging on the walls, on all four sides. Underneath them were kitchen tables, with fancy countertops. It looked less like a food storage room for a gang and more like the kitchen of a wealthy household, minus the kitchen appliances. Only a microwave and a coffee-maker was present, but they looked brand new. Untouched and clean. There were no weapons laying around, either. Only canned foods and nonperishable items.
"Ya should've believed me," he said, but from the vagueness of it, I couldn't tell if he was talking about the lack of other men on the floor or his advice in the stairwell. "Ya just wasted time."
I frowned. "It's never a waste of time to double-check." Being meticulous, after all, had always saved my neck before.
"Can ya tell me now? Who are ya? And why are ya here?" he asked, throwing one question after another my way.
I ignored him as I walked out of the room. After killing three men, I had finally reached my goal. All that was stopping me from entering the electricity room was a keypad with a lock code. I turned around to face Connor. "What's the code?"
This time, he was useful. He scratched the side of his head, and bit his lip, before remembering it. "Oh—yeah! It's 3-2-0-9. That's the date they set up shop in this shitty building."
I entered the number and watched as the keypad blinked green. The door was unlocked. Pulling the door handle, I entered the room. It was only large enough for one person to stand, and it had all kinds of bells and whistles that surpassed my knowledge. I searched my bag for my night-vision glasses. Taking them out, I placed them on the edge of my forehead.
"Don't freak out," I told him as he quizzically watched me move around the room, fumbling with the knobs and switches. "And...whatever you do...don't scream."
He gulped, his throat constricting. From behind his collar, I could see his collar bones jutting out, protruding his flesh. Without warning him, then, I turned off the electricity supply of the building. The lights did not shut off all together, in one giant sweep of darkness. Instead, it was like dominos falling, one by one. Surrounded by darkness, I pulled down the glasses over my mask and turned them on. Now, I had the upper hand.
"What's next?" Connor asked.
Looking through the glasses, everything was colored differently. I walked up to him and took control of his chain once more. Wrapping my palm around it tightly, I towed him towards the food storage room. He had no other choice than to follow me blindly. Inside, I searched for an adequate place to tie him too, but when I found none, I decided to improvise. Chaining him to a cabinet door, making sure the lock on his handcuffs and chain was secure, I patted his head.
"Your job's done. Sit tight...it might be a while before you leave this room again."
He felt around the room before snapping. This was the final nail in his coffin, and he could not handle it. "Don't leave me here! I-I'm claustrophobic! Don't lock me in here—Don't do this to me, please!"
The heart was a fickle thing, always changing its mind, but I had learned to control it. His wave of panic at the thought of being trapped in a room coursed through me, igniting a small fire of pity in the pit of my heart, but I hurriedly threw water over it. "Should've thought of that before you joined a gang, kid."
I slammed the door on his pleas and walked toward the middle of the floor. I increased the volume of my radio. "Don. Phase two is complete. Initiating phase three. Over."
The radio crackled to life. "OK. What do you need me to do?"
"Use your thermal-vision binoculars and see if there's anyone on the first floor...I need to get to the basement as fast as possible. Over."
"Wait..." There was static, followed by his gruff voice. "There's no one there. Over."
"Are the guys back?" I asked.
He responded, negative. "I'm worried. It's too quiet...they're way too understaffed, Angie."
"I can't back out now, Don. If that's what you're asking me to do."
There was a pause, and then, "Don't do it, Angie. I'm starting to think it's a trap."
I shook my head to remove the thoughts that were beginning to wonder into my mind. "Listen. I'm gonna do this, no matter what. I'm going for the basement—I'll talk to you when I'm out. Stay alert. Out."
I silenced the radio before he had a chance to intercept. In the middle of the second floor, there was a thin firefighter pole that led directly into the first floor. Gripping it, I hooked my legs around it and slid down its length. Jumping off a few feet off the ground, I spun around. Don was right—there was no one here.
Not wasting anymore time, I ran toward the stairwell opposite from the one I had been in a while earlier. This one was a direct entrance into the basement, but in my haste, I forgot one small fact.
"Who's that?" There were two men guarding the basement door, and they had heard me coming down. They were quick to draw their weapons, aggressive like Joel. "Come out!"
I hid just a few inches out of sight, but my lack of response only made them more antsy. Before I could figure out my next move, a swarm of bullets flew past me. I ducked out of the way just in time. When they ran out of bullets, I seized the moment and leaned into view. Whistling at them, I watched as they raised their heads toward me and, then, with precision, shot each of them. I missed the first guy by an inch, barely grazing his skull. The second guy fell, a chunk of flesh flown off his head. As his companion took a moment to admire his fallen buddy, I shot again. And again. And again. I reloaded my gun. The first guy was long dead.
As far as I knew, two more men were supposed to guard the door from the inside, in the case of an intruder. When I flung open the door, however, I found no one. As I walked inside the basement, I expected to find a whole team of men surrounding the two main leaders of the Klein Brothers gang. Instead, I found darkness and pin-drop silence. Even with my night-vision goggles, I saw nothing.
It's too quiet, Don's word loomed ominously over my head. The noose was cutting off my air supply. I could not breathe. He was right, I thought. Then, as I took another step forward, my foot collided with a wire. Suddenly, the door clung shut behind me and the lights turned on.
I screamed. Not because of fright, but because the light burned my eyes. I snatched the night-vision goggles off, but with it, my mask came off as well.
"Who do we have here? A little girl!" A man with the voice of a demon spoke, stepping out from his hiding place. "Felix—do you see this?"
Everything was bathed in a harsh glare, preventing me from seeing anything. Moist tears fell from the corners of my eyes as I furiously rubbed them. Covering my face with my hands, I tried the breathing routine Dex had taught me—breathe in for five seconds, and then exhale slowly. Repeat until satisfactory results are achieved. Luckily, it worked. Gently, I pried open my eyes as if I was a blind patient just recovering from an eyesight restoration surgery. It took me a minute to adjust to the lighting, but when I did, I found myself surrounded.
"You know...when Jack kept going on and on about some intruder hijacking our hideout, I thought the ol' man was talking about a real threat, but...this? She's just a teenager!" Felix exclaimed. His group of men, all faceless and clothed in black from head to toe, snorted and snickered, like a posse of immature, adolescent boys.
I turned my head to get a good look at all the potential threats in my path. I couldn't tell who was who, with the masks and the identical costumes, which meant I was in violation of my first rule. I was in uncharted territory. If I didn't know who I was up against, I did not know their weaknesses nor their strengths. I took a step back and crossed my arms.
"I'm only gonna ask this once—where are the Kleins?" I demanded, keeping my eyes trained on the two men prancing around as leaders. Every word out of my lip was forced, and though my body was tense, I did not fidget. I had to keep my cool. They were the predators now, and I the prey. A whiff of fear, and they would pounce.
Felix was the right-hand man of Jack, while Hunt, short for Hunter, was the Beta in the Klein Brothers pack. Although they stood in front of me as a united front, I knew the power struggles ran deep. If only I could exploit that...
"Ha! She"—Felix pointed at me—"thinks she's in a position to make demands! She cracks me up." He wiped an imaginary tear from his face.
I pressed my lips into a thin line, and examined my nails. They were sharpened into weapons, just the way I like them. They wanted to provoke me by destroying my self-esteem. Well, two could play at that game. "You all think you're so tough...Shame. Arturo thought the same..."
The amused smiles vanished from their faces, replaced by grim frowns. There was no more laughter, no more insults hurled my way. Instead, the jovial mood was consumed with a more sinister atmosphere. One of death and destruction—the toys of Chaos. I shivered.
Hunt stepped forward. "You destroyed Arturo's gang? Single-handedly? That's—That's ridiculous!"
I checked my reflection in the clear gloss of my nails. "It seems you've all heard of me, then...and...what I'm capable of."
He leaned back, slightly, and crossed his arms. A snake lurked in the corner, his beady yellow eyes watching my every move. Like it, Hunt's demonic eyes bored into my soul. I felt as miniscule as a microorganism, being examined under a microscope. I had never seen a man who terrified me more than Hunt. He should've been in the Guinness book of World Records, seriously.
"She's bluffing," Felix said, stepping up to the plate. He stopped right behind Hunt's shoulder though, with his hands clenched. "There's no way..."
Hunt raised his hand, effectively stopping Felix's tongue. "I can sniff out a liar from a mile away, Felix...She's telling the truth."
"You and your bullshit sixth sense, Hunt...look at her! She isn't even old enough to be in high school, and you think she somehow infiltrated Arturo's gang...what with his insanely tight security measures, and then killed him? This ain't a fairytale, Hunt."
Before they could engage in a more personal argument, I butted in. "Felix, hasn't your mother told you not to interfere when two adults are talking? Where are your manners..."
It was quite a sight to see. My arrow had flown straight across the room and hit bullseye. Felix melted and boiled to a livid rage, a melting pot of emotions. His pale skin glowed inhumanely red, his eyes in slits. With his face contorted in rage, he stepped towards me, his stature threatening, but Hunt stretched out his hand and caged him in. Felix was quick to transfer his rage from one person to the next, as he now turned towards Hunt and glared at him with the same hatred one reserves for their arch nemesis.
I was genuinely surprised how Hunt did not buckle under the pressure of such a glare and spontaneously combust. Judging by the roll of his eyes, this was a normal occurrence.
"You're gonna have to excuse him, darling. He's not used to being around pretty girls like you, y'know?" Hunt grinned, his sharp fangs glistening under the artificial lights.
"Flattery...will get you nowhere," I deadpanned.
He bowed, theatrically. "My apologies, darling. I guess I'm the one who's not used to coming across such a strong woman. You're quite the endangered species...so why don't you run along back to where you came from. We wouldn't want to hurt a woman of your caliber, am I right, boys?"
They all chuckled, privy to an inside joke. I felt awfully left out. "You're gonna let me leave...just like that?" I titled my head and blinked, as if I could not comprehend his generosity.
He was more than happy to play the bad-guy-turned-good charade, grinning like a wolf. "Yes, of course...darling. There's the door—you can walk out any time you'd like. Why, I'll even have one of my men escort you to the front door..."
He snapped his fingers, and one of the six men trapping me in a circle stepped out and stood behind me. I felt his hot breath fan the back of my neck. Yuck! I grimaced.
"Gibbs, would you do the honor of escorting her out of such a dangerous lair. It's not healthy for a woman to be trapped in all of this."
Gibbs gripped my forearm. I almost snapped my neck as I turned to look up at the man towering over me with his bulky frame—he was almost the same size as Joel. Using my own nails, I dug them into his tight fist and pried open his fingers. He scowled, but did not cry out in pain, presumably protecting his manhood. Men! Always so wound up with their masculinity.
As he took a step back, holding his wounded hand like a fragile child, I brushed off dust from my shoulder and coolly stared into Hunt's eyes. They were the windows to his dark, twisted soul. "If you're done with theatrics, can we get down to business?"
He smiled wryly at me, but did not say anything. I took that as a sign to continue. "From what I can tell, your bosses got wind of my presence in the underworld and ran away, leaving all of you, poor souls, to deal with me."
He opened his mouth, ready to squash my theories, but I persisted. "And! I'm sure, they thought I was here to steal or do something mediocre like that, but I'll have you know...I am no thief. And, I have no business with either of you. No—all I wanted was to have a civil conversation with Jack and Peter...you know, negotiate a deal with them...but it's okay. I like the chase.
"So...do me a favor, Hunt? When your bosses get their heads out of their chicken asses, give them my card, will you? Let them know that Angelina would like to meet with them—not their army of man toys, K?"
Hunt sneered at my offhanded way of talking, flashing his sharp teeth at me. "What makes you think you'll be able to leave here? We have you surrounded."
"Well..." I said, my hands twisted behind my back. "You've all been so busy hanging on to my every word, that you haven't even noticed me reaching into my bag...you're quite the oblivious bunch." I chuckled.
As I threw a bomb on to the ground and watched it land two feet in front of Hunt, I gleefully watched the realization hit all their faces. Hunt's eyes bulged out of their sockets as he teetered back, out of shock. Felix, on the other hand, now had the freedom to do as he pleased, and he chose, of all things, to hurl himself at me.
The smoke bomb detonated, releasing a thick fog-like smoke that quickly spread throughout the basement. Quickly, I pulled out my gas mask and placed it over my face, just as Felix rammed into me with full force. I fell backwards into the wall as Felix balled his hands into a fist and landed one blow after another on me. Holding out my arms as shields for my face, I bent my knee and kicked him in the groin. Still reeling from his heavy-handed blows, my cheek, nose, and stomach being the main targets, I felt him topple down in front of me.
Reaching out, I felt through the smog until my hands landed on his head. Holding him in between my hands, I plunged my knee into his face. The sickening crunch of his broken nose filled me with satisfaction, but I did not have time to relish in it for another pair of hands soon found me.
Gripping onto the straps of my tank top—presumably one of the men who had been behind me—lifted me off the ground and hurled me in an unidentifiable direction. I fell on the hard floor with a groan, a pile of flesh and bones. Using agility as a weapon, I jumped back up using the force from my feet and hips, and pulled out another ball-type bomb from my bag. Praying that it was a grenade, I activated it and then threw it in his direction. A few seconds later, the fiery explosion of a human body being torn apart flew me backwards.
Feeling the wall, I guided myself towards my right, where I predicted the exit door would be. The gas was beginning to affect me, slowing me down. I could feel it enter my bloodstream through my mouth and nose, now that my gas mask was nowhere to be found, but I covered up my face with my hand to slow the pace. In my rush to escape, I completely forgot that the smoke bomb was a handcrafted weapon, made by one of Dex's buddies. It had a dual purpose—blind and disarm. Not only did it make it almost impossible to see through it, throwing everyone off, but it contained traces of a hypnotic drug that incapacitated anyone who came in contact.
Even walking felt like a difficult task, my legs dragging across the room like lead. Although all the bones in my body felt like bricks, my head was still clear enough to know that I had to get out of there.
"Don...SOS. Get out of the building. Meet me by the front door. We need to leave. Over."
He was quick to respond. "Angie! What's wrong? I'm coming down now!"
I tripped. Falling onto my knees, I felt around for the object that made me trip only to realize it had been Felix's arm. He was groaning in pain, possibly still clutching his nose, but I couldn't hear him very clearly. The smoke was getting to me. I scratched his hand, and he recoiled his arm in agony. Standing up once more, I put two and two together. If Felix was over here, it meant I was close to the door.
Revitalized with hope, I scampered along the wall, stumbling over Felix's legs. When my hand rolled around a cool metal knob, I almost jumped for joy. Pulling it open was a struggle, however. Felix had rolled himself in front of the door, preventing me from opening it with my weakened arms.
I kicked his legs, and any other body part I could reach. Sweating profusely, I grunted as I pulled open the door just wide enough for me to squeeze through. The fresh air flew into the basement, clearing my mind from the haze momentarily. As I got half of my body out, someone reached out from behind me and yelled in my ears, "You...gonna...pay...this."
I only caught a couple of words here and there, and I didn't stick around for much longer to find out. Shoving them with my empty hand, I squeezed the rest of my body through and shut the door. Not waiting to see if anyone would follow me, I kept my eyes trained on the way out as I jumped over the bodies of the guards I had killed earlier and sprinted up the staircase to the first floor.
Oxygen entered my body, and I gulped in the air greedily. Without my night-vision goggles, it would've been difficult for me to see anything on the first floor had it not been for Don. He opened the front door of the building, and stood in the doorway, allowing the natural light to guide me out. As Don grasped my hand and bolted for his car parked a couple of blocks down east, I dragged behind him, half running, half walking, out of breath.
"You look like a mess—I told you!"
Despite my ragged state, with blood trickling down my nose into my mouth and chin, I looked back at the building. From a glance, it looked the same as it had before I entered it, but only I saw the changes. It no longer stood proud, haughtily, as if daring any trespasser to mess with it. I had left my mark, and I was sure the Klein Brothers would hear of it soon.
"Don't mind the battle wounds, Don—the real war has yet to begin."
{...}