Louis looked down at the iPhone in his hand.
“And your sure this is the number, right?” he asked Zayn. “Because I don’t want to burst in and it turns out it’s just some random warehouse.”
“It’s defiantly Niall’s. What I’m worried about is the tracker being off. I mean, don’t you think it’s a bit dodgy to have an accurate position finder where the only thing you need is a phone number?” Zayn responded.
Louis shrugged and when small bleep came from the phone he stood up, pointing to the right.
Following the direction the phone gave us we began making our way towards the location of Niall-or at least, the location of Nialls phone (Which we hoped was still with him). As the phone directed us further and further away from the residential part of town and more towards the industrial area we all began to feel slightly nervous. There were less people around here and the figures we did see appeared shady and moved quickly through the streets, almost always in the opposite direction to where we were going.
As we reached the heart of the industrial block we became surrounded by larger, derelict buildings created an eerie look to the place. Around here it really was more deserted. I hadn’t seen or heard anyone but us and the scurry of rats for the past ten minutes. I shifted closer to Louis, grasping for his hand and making sure the other two boys were always in sight.
In the dark glow of the moon everything around us became distorted. I became sure we were walking in circle, despite our pattern of movement making that impossible. The tall buildings loomed over us in a haunting manner and round every corner I expected to see a blood drenched murdered headed straight towards us.
After half an hour Louis stopped.
“The finder says he’s here.” He said. “But the location showing up is an old fish factory named ‘Salty Simon Inc.’. None of these buildings are right.”
We all looked around at the buildings surrounding us. There were two with “Block 39” Painted on the metal doors and another with ‘Keegan’s Wood Workshop’ sprayed on the old auburn brick. But none were fishmongers.
I felt a tap on my shoulder so I turned around and saw Zayn gapping towards to the darkness. As my eyes adjusted to the light i focused on a large building I hadn’t noticed before.
Well, large was an understatement.
It was huge. At least the size of six of the bigger warehouses, perhaps the size of a small football pitch, it was impossible not to notice now it had been pointed out. The state of the building was worse than most of the other derelict properties here with huge chunks of brick missing causing holes just small enough for a toddler sized person to fit through. The windows were boarded up with graphitized panes of wood and out of control weed was protruding from every crack in the buildings ancient framework. Most importantly, on the sign stretching from one end to the other in blue, chipped paint was a sign proclaiming the building to be ‘Salty Simon Inc.’.
I sudden began to feel like we shouldn’t be talking so loud. I expected P’s hiding place to be heavily guarded but this place looked deserted. What if she had installed security cameras or secret microphones? She could be preparing an attack on us at any minute!
“Louis,” I whispered. “It’s there.”
I tugged on his hand. He slowly turned round with a grimace on his face. As soon as he saw the building, he relaxed.
“That doesn’t look too bad. Let’s try and get in!” He shook my hand away before I could comprehend what he said and before I had time to stop him he was alright trying to yank open the heavy metal doors.
I hissed at him to stop but he continued and when the desired result of managing to open the doors was not achieved, he peered closer at the bolts and hinges. I marched closer to try and pull him away but he resisted and beckoned for me to look closer at the doors too. My efforts appeared to be futile so I joined him in staring at the door.
“What are we looking at Tommo?” I sighed.
“What’s different about this door to all the other metal on buildings such as this one?” he asked me as his eyes shone with the discovery of something important.
“I don’t know Louis. It’s shiny?” I said sarcastically. To my surprised the boy clapped his hands and nodded.
“Exactly Harry. What happens to shiny metal when it gets as old as this place clearly is? It rusts.”
I gaped. Louis was right. The door must be new if it wasn’t rusty.
Niall was defiantly here.
Distracted by revelation I didn’t notice Louis slipping away from beside me. It wasn’t until I heard Liam scream for Louis to get away I looked to his direction.
Louis being Louis, he was trying to squeeze through one of the small gaps in the bricks that were way too small for him. And unluckily, he was succeeding.
“Louis, get out from there! You don’t know what’s on the other side of that wall!” I screeched, but it was too late. I saw his feet disappear through the gap and I panicked for a second before his head popped back out and i breathed a sigh of relief.
“It’s just full of boxes, there’s no one else here. Come in!” He giggled and popped back into the room.
I scrambled to squeeze through the hole and although I had more difficultly than Louis being slightly taller than him I managed it fairly easily. Who ever had sealed the building with the new door clearly hadn’t been clever enough to think about filling the holes in.
“Harry, look in this box...” Louis called me over, gazing into the contents of one of the cardboard crates that filled the room.
I walked over and let out a gasp the second I looked into the crate.
Piled high were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of what was labelled as “Colt M 1911 Pistols”.
Louis left the box with me still staring and opened to neighbouring box, revealing stacks of “PM63Submachine Guns”. He looked shocked for a second before, to my horror, picking one up.
“What the hell are you doing? Put the gun down!” Liam whispered angrily.
Louis laughed and pointed the gun at the wall.
“Louis stop!” I protested. “We don’t need guns for this! It’s too violent, and anyway, you can hear a shot a mile away!”
Louis laughed again and pointed to a small cylinder attached to the gun. “It’s a silencer. Makes the shot not so loud. And anyway, i don’t want to actually use the thing, I just want to see if it’s real.”
Liam shook his head at Louis but he ignored him, and pulled the trigger. I braced myself for a loud bang – but only heard a click.
“It’s real, but it’s not loaded.” Louis grumbled and put it back into the crate.
After convincing Louis that hiding the guns was unpractical and an unrealistic plan, we found our way to the door the other side of the room. Luckily this one was old and wooden and clearly hadn’t been replaced, and although there was a heavy lock holding it in place we merely had to push it with slight force it to make it fall off its hinges. I darted out to grab it before it hit the floor as it surely would have made a loud thud, and gently laid it on the ground.
Peering into the corridor we saw to our left a corridor turning right round a corner and to our right two doors. Making the decision it would be easier to check out the rooms to our right before heading off down the corridor we crept out, making sure to be quiet.
After pushing open the door slightly it was clear it wasn’t locked. However as the door inched more and more open light began to spill into the corridor and we glanced into the room before entering.
It was lucky we did.
To our surprise, the room was actually a small office. Sitting at a desk – well, chained to the desk - was a man in a white coat, sitting and scribbling and occasionally glancing up into a mirror in front of his desk which happened to be covered in complicated maths equations. Luckily for us only the edge of the door could be seen from the mirror but as the man glanced behind him towards our direction his eyes caught mine.
The first thing I noticed was how young he was. He couldn’t be much older than 19 though the stress plastered across his face aged him considerably. But secondly, I noticed his lips. He was frantically mouthing something to me, the same words over and over again, and it took me a minute before I could figure out what he was saying.
Run.
His eyes flicked to the left and I followed the line.
Two guards were sitting just meters away from the door. Although they were facing the opposite way, one wrong move and they would see us. I motioned to the other guys what I was seeing and backing away I began to close the door when the smallest of creaks squeaked from the hinges.
The guards instantly turned around and glanced towards us. I knew they had seen us from the shouts that filled the air but I had already grabbed Louis hand and sprinted off down the corridor. I could hear more people stirring from the other room and quickly took the opposite route from the noise.
Turning left past the few people starting to leave their rooms we hit a dead end. The only thing around was a door with a small padlock, but luckily it was undone so the four of us jumped inside and slammed it shut. Seeing the room filled yet again with more containers we crawled into the small space between the boxes and the wall, moving along until we hit another wall.
Through the gaps in the crates I could see to the centre of the room and noticed one box singled out from the rest. Small air holes had been drilled, and it was larger than the rest. Another two guards were also keeping control of the perimeter around the box, and every now and then a small whimpering noise could be heard.
One guard strode over to the other and nudged him with his gun.
“Did you just hear the transmission? We’re all to help search for the intruders. He is convinced it is the boys come for their friend.”
“Would that not mean it would be more important for us to stay here and guard the boy? This will be the first place they come.”
“You stay here and guard Horan then, I’ll go and find them, just don’t expect me give you any credit.”
Horan. So they were keeping Niall in a wooden box. It was the sickest thing I’d ever heard, and beside me Zayn let out a quiet sob.
The second the other guard left the room, Zayn slowly crept past me and through the gap towards the man left behind. Being a quiet as possible he came so close to the man’s back it was amazing he hadn’t been found out yet, and it was the only thing stopping me from making us all run again (well, that and Niall-in-a-box). And then, almost too quick to see, he covered the man’s mouth with one hand and yanked the gun out of his surprised grasp with the other.
In a few seconds the guard seemed to be losing consciousness and in the time it took for Zayn to half drag half walk him over to us he seemed to be completely out of it.
“How-“I began, but Zayn cut me off by showing me the little bottle of pills in his hand.
“Sleeping pills. I’ve been having trouble sleeping without Niall. Anyway, they should knock him out for a few hours, which leave us enough time to get Ni and get the fuck out of here.”
Liam, Louis and I nodded in response and came out from behind the crates to inspect the crate. Zayn ran forward, eager to be reunited with his lover – only to flinch at the last minute.
“It shocked me!” he growled. “It gave me an electric shock!”
“Zayn?”
The sound came from the box – the sound of a small, scared Irishman.
“Niall! Zayn cried. “I can’t get to you! I can’t let you out!”
A small shuffling nose came from the box and the lid slid up a little. The top of a bleach blonde head came up, far enough to see the blue eyes sparkling with tears.
“They told me if I tried to get out they’d kill me.”
Zayn began to cry slowly. It was heart breaking; seeing two of the strongest boys I know cry, and being so close to each other yet so far away... I couldn’t quite deal with the sight.
“Zayn, help me. Theres something round the outside stopping me from getting out and any one from coming in. “
Zayn knelt down, reaching out his hand to Niall. The small boy reciprocated his movements.
If it hadn’t been born out of fear, it may have been the sweetest moment I had seen in my young life.
****
A/N Right, sorry if this is shit/has loads of mistakes, but I've pretty much run out of inspiration. It took me about six hours just to right this, and there comes a point where you cant write any more. Personally, i cant wait for 16+17 because i know you'll really enjoy them.
Song for this chapter: Evanescence - Bring Me To Life. Idk bro, it just sounds right.
Sorry for the long authors note. Just need to say this stuff.
Taa bebbles
G xoxox