by Sara Schoen
My eyes must have been closed, because when my body stopped sliding on the ground they popped open. I was staring up at the open sky, filled to the brim with bright stars and a full shining moon that provided me with just enough light to see the building around me in the dim lighting. I heard footsteps near me. I popped up quickly, glancing behind me for whatever made that sound, but I didn't see anything. I glanced back toward the fence and to the small opening between the ground and the metal, unable to believe that I just did that.
“Get moving,” I heard a familiar voice behind me. I turned to see Raider approaching me quickly before he grabbed my arm. “You're going to go to that building, and follow Demon's route to the letter. I have knocked out most of the street lights along your route so that it will be easier for you, but you only have a few more seconds before the guards come back around and notice the lights are off. So be quick, but don't get caught. I will be following you until you get to the designated building, then it's on you unless you get in trouble. Got it?”
“Got it,” I said before Raider shoved me toward the building that Demon's route led past. I didn't look behind me to see if he was still there, knowing Raider he was already far ahead of me. After knowing him for a few days I could already tell that he didn't like rookies and he took plans very seriously. If someone deviated from the plan by a few seconds, I had a feeling he would be on their tail about it.
There were voices coming from behind me that interrupted my thoughts as I stepped into the shadow of the building. I attempted to react quickly without making it noticeable as I took Rum's training into effect. I ducked into the shadows that Raider had created for me by knocking out the streetlights, and used the breathing and stretching training Rum had taught me so I could slide into the splits to hide behind a long set of hedges. They weren't tall enough to cover me if I crouched or wide enough to cover me if I laid down, so unfortunately the uncomfortable position of the splits was my only option. I would be low enough for the bushes to conceal me, and be able to peek over the hedges if needed, and my feet would barely poke out beside the hedge so that they wouldn’t notice me unless they looked for me.
I groaned lightly as I made it to the ground. I hadn't attempted this move in years, and even with Rum's training I was stretching muscles I hadn't used in a while. It was uncomfortable, and very impractical if I needed to move quickly.
“Did you see that?” a voice asked as a light shined close to my hiding spot.
I felt my breath catch in my throat, in fear that I would be caught. They must have heard my groan. I was barely on the ground, they would be able to see me if I couldn’t get lower, and this mission would end abruptly and badly. I took a deep breath, as I had in training, and slowly lowered myself deep onto the ground and further into the shadows. The man that thought he noticed something had started to flash his light around me, coming in very close to my hiding spot. With each passing moment, the light slowly got closer and closer, until I was praying to anyone that I wouldn't be found. I was hoping Raider or Spit Fire would throw a rock or anything to distract them so I could escape, but that could also drag more attention to us. I was at their mercy.
“I have no idea what you're looking at,” another voice said. “I might, if the lights were working. I told them that these lights were going to go out soon, but they didn't think it was a big deal or they thought we would be gone by then. It just makes our job harder.”
“Who would come in here anyway? I think we showed that last group what happens when you mess with cartels, and especially the Cardoza Cartel,” he suggested as he continued to shine the light into the bushes. In a few more paces, he would be right on top of me, and if he decided to look behind the bushes I would be as good as dead.
To my horror, the man took a few more steps and stopped right next to me. The only thing separating us was about a foot of green leaves, which I prayed were thick enough that they would conceal me even if the men shined the light on the bush. If not, then I was about to be found, and there was nothing I could do to prevent it along with the fact that I didn't see Raider or Spit Fire coming to my rescue until it was too late.
Good-bye life, I thought as I tried to calm my shaking body and my racing heart. I was terrified because I accidentally broke concentration and that's what gave me away. He had clearly heard my groan when I went into the splits, which caused him to take an interest in my small hideout. I heard the scuffing of feet before a rock ricocheted past me. I had to bite my tongue to stop the shriek from escaping my lips, but I almost jumped as the rock caused a small rabbit to jump out of its hiding spot a few feet away from me.
“You're worried about a bunny, congrats,” his friend joked with a laugh as he walked away.
“I'm serious, I thought something was there,” the man said, obviously insulted that his friend didn't believe him.
I listened to their conversation as they walked away, waiting for a few more moments for them to completely pass me before I started moving again. I had almost been caught once already, I wasn't going to push my luck any further. So I stuck to the shadows, as I promised, and moved in sync with them. The shadows would bend and wave in the different amount of light available in the area I was in, so I needed to remain vigilant and watch their movements in hopes to predict or react quickly enough not to be seen.
I had followed the path that Demon had laid out for me, and I knew for sure because I accidentally strayed momentarily only to have Raider or Spit Fire throw a rock at me to move me back into place. With their not so gentle guidance I eventually made it to the main building in the compound where the job would be a little tighter and more difficult.
The closed quarters would prove to be a more daunting task, especially if someone came in. There would be fewer places to hide and even less room to fight my way out if I got lucky enough to have that chance.
I glanced around for any guards or cartel members before I moved out of the comfort and concealment of the shadows. Quickly, I kneeled down and looked at the lock on the door. It was just a regular key lock, which I had practiced with on the wall at the agency. This will be easy, I thought with a smile as I pulled the lock pick out of my side pocket. I pulled off the protective covering that was to prevent me from stabbing myself with it by accident while getting here, because the last thing I needed was a stab wound from my own lock pick. I slipped the lock pick into the door and worked quickly until I heard the pop of the lock releasing.
A heavy sigh of relief escaped my lips as I pushed the door open slightly, just enough to create an opening for me to slip through. Now that the first part is over it's only going to get harder, I thought to myself as I slipped into the small opening I created. I slid in and shut the door behind me once I was crouched beside the door so that I could investigate the main room. Quickly looking around the room I tried to determine if anyone had entered before Raider and I got here, I didn't see anyone, but what caught my eye was a little red light.
My head tilted to the side in curiosity, something about that light tickled the back of my memory and told me that it wasn't good news. I had seen it recently, every time I walked into a place I would see that same red light. Where was it? I asked myself. That's when it hit me, it was like the security system that the Ricker's had in their home. Whenever the alarm system was set there was a red light that would shine and flash at times to tell me it was set. I would always set it off at home because it was a motion sensor. I had tried to avoid it at home while sneaking out a few times, but I couldn't do it until recently.
I knew that I couldn't crawl through it because our sensor was so sensitive that Charlotte's cats set it off when I was pet sitting for them. If I just walked past it there would be no hope because it was set to a height well under my five-foot six frame. So if I couldn't walk or crawl, the only way to get past it was to go up. Pulling on the sticky gloves that I had kept in my back pocket, I glanced up to see just how high the ceiling was. The gloves slid smoothly onto my hands and without hesitation I
stuck the gloves onto the wall and prayed I wouldn't get stuck like I had in Ms. De Luca's closet warehouse.
I attempted to determine the sensor's range of motion as I had done at home and determined where it wouldn't be able to see me. If I could make it to the corner of the room then go up and over the sensor I would make it out scot-free. With a knowing smile I slowly made my way to the corner, just under the sensor's range and scaled the walls smoothly. At least I didn't get stuck this time, I thought to myself as I made my way across the room. I passed over the motion sensor and made it out of the room without setting off the alarm, or so I thought, and made my way toward the offices in the back of the building to retrieve the files. Hopefully I will be out of here soon, I thought as a chill raced up my spine and put me on high alert.
Chapter 19
Once I had made it past the main entrance I glanced around to make sure there was no one here. I didn't see any lights on or hear voices as I slowly made my way through the hallway. When I was sure that there was no one near me, I dropped from the ceiling. The landing hadn't been as graceful as I had hoped, despite Rum's last minute training to help with my clumsy footing, but I had managed to not get stuck to the ceiling. I put the gloves back in my pocket, in hopes that I wouldn't need them again for the rest of my time here.
From what I could tell there was no one in this building, and hopefully that meant that this was going to be easier than the team or I anticipated. The lights were off and most of the doors were closed, but not locked. I assumed that it was because, as Spit Fire had said, everyone was getting ready to make the big move somewhere else in the compound. They assumed they were safe, that no one would attempt to break in after the previous failed mission, but they hadn't been expecting me. I was dedicated to finding this information and bringing it back to Sharp Shooter, then I could have a new life and help others instead of hurting myself and those around me.
Maybe I won't need Raider's help after all, I thought to myself preemptively as I started my search. I knew that there was at least one room in this building that was going to hold all the files. So one by one, I went into each of the offices and tried to look for anything that would be useful for us. I was told I could take anything and it would give us some information, but unfortunately most of the offices had been cleaned out. Most times, the entire room had been emptied and packed away in preparation for the move. There was nothing at times, not even a desk or a scrap of paper left behind, when I made it into some of the rooms. If there was anything important in these offices, we lost it.
When these guys moved, they moved, I thought to myself as I continued my search.
I would pull open drawers and cabinets in some of the offices that still had furniture in them, only to discover nothing except cobwebs and dust. After a while I was discouraged to even look in the stripped offices because there was nothing left in them. I kept going through a few more offices that had been packed way, just hoping for anything that would be useful, but eventually I gave up. I had to move on, mostly out of fear that I would get caught the longer I stayed in the building, but also that I needed to stop wasting my time and find what I needed. When I decided that the bare rooms would be a waste of my time, I was able to speed up the search for a room with more potential.
By racing past empty offices, I gave myself time to thoroughly search the ones that had something left in them. I had opened countless doors in the long hallway in my search. When I made it to the end of one hallway, I was led to another long corridor of doors. Eventually, I lost track because I was fully engulfed in the maze of corridors and doors. It reminded me a little too much of the agency building, and I was sure I wouldn’t like that if I was about to get caught.
About half-way through the hallway maze, I found the only office that was locked. “Bingo,” I said to myself as I knelt down to inspect the lock. It was a simple door lock that you could pick with a credit card or a bobby pin. I had done it numerous times when I got locked out of my houses, so I knew how to do it, but sometimes that took too long. Luckily for me, I had a lock pick and I wouldn't have to waste time with the novice tools of the trade.
I produced the slender metal tools from my pockets and uncapped the protective coverings before I went to work on the lock. The lock popped open swiftly, and I was able to push the door to reveal the new room. A prideful smile spread across my lips as I silently congratulated myself for the speediness of the pick. I stepped in to see that this office had filing cabinets lining the walls and what wasn't covered with cabinets was covered with pictures. After all the other offices were open and had nothing in them, I figured that this would be the best shot I had for finding any information.
In my mind, there was no other reason as to why they would lock this one door, unless it was to trick me, but there was no way they could have known I was coming. I was in shock at how much was left in this room, but then again, I was at the end of a long maze of corridors. Maybe they hadn't had time to get to this room yet and locked it to keep it safe.
I walked into the windowless room and forced myself not to turn on the lights. I hated to work in the dark, but I had to in order to keep my presence a secret. I closed the door slightly, leaving it partially open so I wouldn't make noise by closing or opening it later. I dug through the pockets of my pants to find a small key chain flashlight and started a thorough search of the room. I immediately started to take down the photos to see if anything was behind them, silently thanking movies I saw growing up as I did so. The photos were of a wide variety of landscapes and scenery that didn't seem to hold any meaning in the room. Frankly I had no interest in the landscapes of valleys and meadows, but art, like beauty, was always in the eyes of the beholder.
I would look behind the frame and under the backing, then place it back in its spot and move onto the next. As I took picture after picture off the wall I was discouraged to find nothing. I had been through them all only to find dust and a few stray markings from a pen, but it had been worth the time to look in case there had been something behind them.
Maybe that was only in movies, I thought as I put the last photo back on the wall. I was attempting to leave the room as I found it, that way if I had to escape I could do it and not give myself away. I wanted it to be as if I had never been here so that they wouldn't be looking for me later if I was still on the compound.
Once all of the photos were back in their place, I moved onto the cabinets. I had been shocked to discover that they still used paper files, or that paper files still existed. Demon had been adamant that the files weren't on computers yet, but I had a hard time believing it, since most of them would have been moved to computers by now. At least that's what I thought, but then again some liked having paper in front of them and having a hard copy in their hands. It was like newspapers, some liked the paper, and others preferred reading it online. The debate would never end, but in this case, it was helpful to me if I found what I needed.
There were a ton of files at my touch, but when I opened one of the cabinets I discovered this wasn't going to be as easy as I originally thought. There were no labels on the manila folders for me to determine what I would need to take and what I could skip over. So I was forced to open cabinet after cabinet, searching through files of all different proceedings done by the cartel. The files weren't in any particular order from what I could tell, because the letter labels meant nothing it seemed. Each section started with a different letter tab, but unlike normal file cabinets that would have all the files with the same starting letter under the same tab, for them it didn't seem to matter what the file started with for where it was placed.
Their organizational system didn't make any sense to me, but then again it wasn't supposed to make sense to someone outside of the cartel. There were incorrect titles under the starting letter, and most times they didn't even have the same letter. There were a lot of Ms in the S section and a variety of letters scattered throughout the cabinet. I shook my head wildly, fighting the urge to fix the organizati
on as I pulled out random files and started to rip pages out. I chose ones that had titles which sounded promising, anything I thought we would need to know and a few I searched through at a glimpse to determine their information.
As I worked my way through the files, I found information on their distribution locations, names of members from comments or concerns from the individuals in charge, detailed records of exchanges and dealings, who bought drugs or weapons from them and for how much, and a list of possible locations they would be going that I found in the desk. I inspected the paper closely, to see if there was a pen mark that seemed to favor a certain destination. I tried to figure out why they hadn't marked a destination, but I guess it was just in case someone like me came along and found it.
They didn't want anyone to follow them, but we were determined to find them again after they moved. Even if I didn't find exactly where they were going, we would eventually find them again and someone else would be sent on this mission.
I sighed heavily as I squinted to see any marks that would designate a possibility of their new location, but there weren't any from what I could tell. Then again, I am standing in here with the lights off and no windows, I thought to myself as I stuffed the sheet of paper into my pocket with the others. Whenever I made lists and was deciding between two or more things there were little pen marks from me tapping my pen between the choices. Even they hadn't marked a destination to go, I was going to take it along with the other sheets of paper that I had ripped out in hopes of seeing it better in the light.
