~Day 31~
Liam had been gone for about half an hour when I finally locked my phone and threw it on my lap. I had been sitting there busying myself with a game on my phone while he went in for questioning. It was absolutely nerve-wracking and I had finally tired myself out from playing solitare. I placed my head in my hands starting to feel jet-lagged from the long flight.
"Cameron Woods?" a male voice said, rounding the corner and appearing in front of me. He had orange buzzed hair and blue eyes.
"That's me."
"Nice to meet you Woods, I'm Detective Ferris, I've been assigned to your case." Thank god. He stuck his hand out for me to shake as I stood up.
"Nice to meet you too," I said as he guided me back around the corner he came from. We walked down a small hallway into a small room with a table and two chairs. We sat down on either side of the table facing each other.
"Alright, well as you know, we're reopening your case, so I would just like to hear your story again of what happened up in the air," he explained making me nod my head and try to remember every single detail without changing my story. I explained it to him, it almost taking 30 minutes in total due to some questions he had. Afterwards he filtered through the stack of papers on the table before turning to a page. "Well, your story lines up again, so thank you for that it makes my job a lot easier," he said making me chuckle. I was so glad I didn't get stuck with that other investigator again, hopefully he was being nice to Liam. "Alright, so with some new evidence uncovered in your case I need to ask you some more detailed questions."
"Ok, shoot," I said taking a sip of my water.
"You stated you believe the cause of your crash was a missile attack. What color was the missile?"
"Black."
"Did it have any markings on it?"
"No, none that I could see. I only got a quick glance at it," I said trying to remember if there were any distinct symbols on the missile that I could've missed.
"Alright, well I have 3 pictures here, I'm going to lay them all out in front of you and I want you to pick the missile that hit your jet," he explained making me nod my head. He grabbed the 3 pictures out of his portfolio and set them out in front of me. One of them was black with 4 wings surrounding the tail, the second one was black with a red dot on either side, and the third was black with 2 wings on the end but was much smaller than the other two. I contemplated knowing for sure it was one of the 2 black ones, before pointing to the first one.
"Alright, any indicators on why you chose that one?" he said, placing the other two back into his stack.
"Well it was black without markings, and I know for a fact I wouldn't have been able to see that short fat one coming at me given its size," I said remembering seeing the length of the missile coming towards us, it was much bigger than the one in the image.
"Awesome, well I want to thank you for coming down here today. That is all the questions I have for you now, I'm going to dismiss you for lunch and we will meet back here afterwards," he explained as I stood up to shake his hand. Upon walking out into the waiting room I saw it was empty making me frown. I was hoping Liam would be there so we could talk about our interrogations, but knew they were probably going to keep us separated.
"You can follow me Woods," one of the guards said as I followed him out the door and into the hallway towards the exit. When we reached outside, the sun was fully up and the tarmac was completely empty, no jets flying in or out which was unusual to see. We walked pretty far across the pavement when I noticed something odd come into view. I squinted trying to see what I was looking at when I realized it was the corner of the base that had been bombed. My eyes went wide see how much damage the base had actually sustained. It was way worse in person. The entire area was roped off and it was covered in black ash.
"Oh my god," I whispered to myself as I jogged a bit to catch up with the guard, falling behind from staring at the damage. "I have to get over there," I mumbled knowing I was going to be curious the whole time I was here until I got a look. The guard lead me into a smaller building next to the jet hangars. I followed him inside down a long hallway until reaching a room.
"You have 30 minutes for lunch, we will come get you when that time is up," he said opening the door for me, of which I came face to face with Liam sitting at the table with a tray of food in front of him.
"Liam!" I exclaimed, my face breaking out into a huge grin as I walked into the room trying not to sound too excited in front of the guard. Liam's head snapped over to mine, once seeing me a huge smile adorning his face. The guard then shut and locked the door behind him signaling it was probably his break time as well. I walked over to the table as Liam stood up, engulfing me into a hug.
"How did everything go for you?" Liam asked, pulling back from the hug and looking at me with wide concerned eyes, knowing how much I had been dreading the questioning.
"It went really well, I feel like I was finally heard for once," I said genuinely surprised at how the whole situation had gone. We pulled away from our hug as I sat down across the table from him, absolutely starving. "I can't believe they let us in here together, was that investigator a hard ass again?"
"He definitely tried to show he didn't believe I word I was saying, but I think they've realized they've put the entire country of England at risk and need to save their asses," he explained making me nod my head as I took a bite of the sandwich on my tray. "I had to identify what the dash looked like when we crashed, apparently they have information on that from the box."
"I had to identify the missile," I added as he nodded his head. "When do you think we'll get to leave?"
"I haven't a clue. I don't know what they plan to do with us once this whole situation is over."
"Well one way or another I'm getting over to that destroyed artillery shed before we get out of here," I grunted, looking up to see Liam with his eyebrows furrowed. "What? You don't want to go investigate the scene.
"Of course I do, how do you think we'll manage being out of their sight long enough to get over there though?" Liam asked making me pull a thoughtful face before looking over at the door. I smirked evilly, standing up and tiptoeing over to the door. I peered out the window seeing no guards down either side of the hallway.
"He said we had 40 minutes," I said peering down at my watch to check the time. "We still have 30 left," I grinned making Liam stand up.
"Alright let's go, I know a way over there," Liam said unlocking the door and proceeding out into the hallway. He ushered me over to the other side of the wall making sure to stay hidden. We walked down the hallway quickly staying on the lookout for anyone that would recognize us. We exited out of the building through the back, walking down a long alleyway Liam knew about until reaching the edge of the tarmac. I could see the yellow tape surrounding the scene in the distance. We moved closer, stopping behind a building when we heard a voice. "Stay here," Liam ordered as he peered around the corner.
"Liam-no what if you get caught?" I protested as he put his finger to his lips.
"Just stay here a minute," he said again making me roll my eyes with a huff. I watched as he disappeared around the building making the sound stop abruptly. I sucked in a quick breath knowing he had to have been caught.
"Payne! What the hell are you doing here?!" A voice laughed making me furrow my eyebrows.
"Hey Malik, how's it going?" I heard Liam chuckle making my eyes go wide, he hadn't been caught he heard Malik. I slowly walked to the edge of the building to see for myself as I saw Malik shoving his phone into his pocket. "Ronnie come- hey there you are," Liam grinned as I walked up to him and Malik.
"I thought you just got our asses caught," I jeered making Liam laugh.
"No, I mean unless Malik here wants to tell on us," he joked, turning back to Malik who had a smirk on his face.
"What actually are you two doing here? Did you sneak on base?" He asked in all seriousness making Liam shake his head.
"No, they re-opened our cases and called us back down for more questioning, which I'm assuming was due to this," he said gesturing towards the destroyed building.
"Oh shit really?" Malik asked with wide eyes making me nod my head. "They really are serious about this then."
"Yeah but they've had us guarded since we got here, we snuck away to come get a look before we get booted," I explained making Malik nod his head.
"Well I can get you in quick, only Squadron Leaders have access to this part of the building now," he said nodding towards Liam as we walked towards a back door into the building. Malik swiped his key card, unlocking the door to let us in. We walked down a narrow hallway before being met with broad daylight instead of what used to be a locked artillery shed. The area was still taped off, making us stand back from a distance, but the damage was immense. Lights and pipes form the ceiling were scattered across the floor, now black and ashy. There were crates still stacked up on either end containing what I assumed were guns and bullets.
"This is absolutely insane," Liam said, breaking the silence as he looked around at the room.
"They took out more than half our reserve, we have more being delivered tomorrow," Malik explained making Liam shake his head.
"What's the plan of action now? Stay to defend or are they negotiating?" Liam asked making my eyes go wide at the thought of war negotiations.
"They said they'd have a decision by tomorrow, were still working out the details," Malik explained making me drop my head. I looked down at my watch in the process, my eyes going wide once I realized what time it was.
"Liam! We have to get back, that guard is going to be there in less than 5 minutes!" I exclaimed making Liam snap his head over to mine.
"Fuck-ok we'll talk to you later Malik, we have more questioning to attend," he said, practically grabbing my arm and dragging me back outside before Malik could even respond. We ran along the backs of the buildings, making it back in about half the time it took us to get there. We walked inside, staying close to the wall as we turned the corner. Upon walking into the hallway we saw the two guards standing outside the door making my breath hitch.
"Hey there they are!" One called pointing down the hallway at us. We continued down the hall towards them, Liam walking a bit in front of me out of protection. "Where were you two?" the guard asked making me stop in my tracks.
"Went to find the restrooms," Liam said nonchalantly making me pull the most confused face ever. Since when did he become such a good liar? The guards believed the fib somehow, probably just glad we saved their asses from detention since we came back.
"Alright well you're wanted back at interrogation so let's get going," they ordered leading us back outside the building and onto the tarmac. We walked back over to the building in silence, Liam and I too wary to say anything in front of them again. Once back inside, we were taken into separate rooms once again, with Detective Ferris entering back into my room.
"Nice to see you again," he said taking a seat down in front of me at the small table. "Well, after much deliberation, the team has come to the decision that your case was mishandled," he said practically taking my breath away. "The statements you have provided today have matched with evidence we have obtained, proving your innocence in the crash," he explained further making me nod my head.
"Okay, what does this mean?" I asked confused about what them admitting their error meant.
"Well, you are being reinstated into the RAF."
"Are you serious?" I asked immediately out of shock.
"Yes, we will need you to sign some paperwork first, the paperwork will take 1-2 weeks to be approved, but you would be placed back on base after it goes through," he explained making me nod my head. It was a lot to take in.
"Is Liam being reinstated too?" I asked, not wanting to make a decision until I knew whether he was being allowed back as well. Detective Ferris looked at me, probably deciding whether or not he was allowed to share that information with me.
"Give me a quick minute," he said, standing up and walking out of the room. Now I was nervous, I didn't think he'd stand up so abruptly when I asked that leading me to worry they weren't letting Liam back in at all. A few minutes later he came back but with someone following behind him. A smile broke out on my face when I could see it was Liam. They both walked into the room with Liam sitting down beside me. "Alright, I got permission to have you sign your contracts together," he said making me smile.
"Are you sure you want to do this?" Liam asked me making me furrow my eyebrows. "The other detective told me we could defer assignment for 6 months if we weren't ready." I looked down at the paper in front of me. 1-2 weeks was really soon, but 6 months was so far away. If anything were to happen in the time leading up till my deployment I would be so guilty.
"Yeah I'm ready, let's get back to work," I said as we both took the pens in our hands and signed the documents. Detective Ferris watched over us as we signed them, showing us where to initial on each page. After we were done he took the papers from us, walking out of the room to send them off.
"I have a feeling we're going to be thrown back into absolute mayhem," Liam said making me scoff and nod my head.
"I know, hopefully in 2 weeks they'll have some more details on the situation with the artillery shed so a detailed plan can be made." Just then, Detective Ferris came back in with more paper in his hands.
"Alright, you two are being sent back home on the next flight tonight, here are your boarding passes," he said making me groan. Two 15 hour flights within 24 hours? I was going to die of utter exhaustion before I made it back to base. "We'll see you soon."