by L. C. Mawson
She immediately regretted her harsh words, but she didn’t have time to deal with her brother’s issues. Not if she wanted to get them out of there alive.
Ty shut up at that, at least, and Mia led him through the various cars and bikes, keeping them hidden from the others.
Mia paused behind a motorbike, her heart thundering in her chest so loud that she was slightly concerned that it might give them away.
The bike was only supposed to be temporary cover between two large cars, but Mia found herself stuck as the guard closest to Tina kept shifting to the side, as if threatening to turn around.
If he or anyone else turned while they were behind the bike, there was a good chance that they would be spotted, but if they headed out to get behind the next car, and someone looked when they were moving, they would definitely be seen.
Mia suppressed a groan before deciding to chance it. The guard didn’t look as if he was going to head off anytime soon, or look away more firmly. But then, maybe he wouldn’t look their way, either...
Mia tapped Ty to ready him before grabbing his hand and sprinting towards the next car.
Mia ran as swift and silent as she could, keeping her eyes on her destination before spinning around to check that she hadn’t been caught.
She turned to see the guard staring right at her.
Her heart stopped in her chest, but then, he winked before turning back to Tina.
Mia’s heart restarted as she realised what had happened.
He was Tina’s brother. Jim. She hadn’t recognised him from behind.
“Are you okay?” Ty asked quietly.
Mia nodded mutely, forgetting that he couldn’t see. “Come on, let’s just get to the transport...”
The rest of the way was fairly simple, and Mia realised that Tina and Jim were keeping a close eye on the rest of the Enhanced, making sure they didn’t look their way.
As soon as Mia was inside the transport, Tina followed her.
“I’ll be on guard duty back here,” Tina assured her. “I should be able to keep attention from you.”
Mia frowned, looking around. “Which cell should we hide in? Which one will they use for Alex and the others?”
Tina sighed. “Unfortunately, I have no idea. I guess we’ll just have to pick one for you two to hide in and hope that it’s not that one...”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Alex
Alex awoke with a groan as something shifted beneath her.
The ground then proceeded to jolt violently, causing her to bolt upright.
It didn’t take her long to recognise the Enhanced transport she was in.
Gus and Jan were sitting next to her, both in similar states of groggy awakening, and all three of them shackled to the metal of the transport.
There were no windows, but Alex thought it felt like a ground transport.
She hoped it was a ground transport. If they had any hope of getting out of there, it needed to be.
In the small metal space with them were two well-armoured Enhanced guards.
Once she realised that Alex was awake, one of the guards made their way over to her.
“Are you okay?” she asked, brushing a loose strand of her auburn hair back beneath her helmet. “Are you healing properly, or do you have any serious injuries from the fight?”
“Why are you talking with the prisoner?” the other guard asked her.
The guard who approached Alex rolled her hazel eyes at the question, her olive skin crinkling at the brow. “Because part of guarding them is making sure that they stay alive for this trip,” she snapped back. “We’re not going to be able to get any information from them about whether or not they recruited anyone else for what they have been up to, or where the angel is, if they die from injuries from the fight.”
The male guard rolled his eyes, but the woman in front of Alex ignored him.
“Seriously, you alright?” she asked.
Alex refused to respond, other than with a glare.
“Look, I’m just trying to keep you alive,” the guard reasoned. “After all, if you die before we get you back, Mia would be pissed.”
The woman winked at Alex, and Alex dared to hope for a moment that it meant she was on their side.
“So I’ll ask again,” the woman continued. “Are you hurt or have you healed?”
Alex quickly took stock of her injuries. “There are no serious injuries left,” she admitted. “Nothing that would impair me, at least.”
The guard turned to Gus and Jan, who nodded in agreement.
“Good, I can’t carry this on my own,” the guard muttered before swiftly unlocking the shackles.
“Hey,” the other guard said as he stood up. “What are you doing?”
The four of them rushed him, knocking him out cold.
“Mia got back to the base just as they were heading out to capture you,” the friendly guard explained. “A couple of us helped her to smuggle her brother onto the transport. We figured that you wouldn’t be able to take the rest of the Enhanced in a straight fight, even with our help, so we thought that helping you escape afterwards would be easier.”
Alex nodded with a sigh. “You were probably right about that. We should have realised that they would try and ambush us if we went to see one of our siblings...”
“I’m sorry,” Gus told her. “This is my fault. It was my plan.”
Alex shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. If all of us can get out of this transport, we should have more than enough to reclaim the Russian base. They won’t be able to get to us once we have that.”
“An ambitious plan,” the friendly guard said with a smile. “I like it. I’m Tina, by the way. I don’t think we really know each other.”
Alex nodded. “I’m Alex. This is Gus and Jan. I assume you’re a friend of Mia’s?”
Tina nodded. “And her brother. After what happened to him... Well, I can’t say that I’m particularly happy about knowing that I am only one bad fight away from being written off entirely. If you’re building a safe place away from the Enhanced, I want in.”
Gus frowned. “Wait, you say that as if you didn’t know about our plan. Surely Effie and Jay must have reported in to say that we had already tried to fight them.”
Tina shook her head. “Not that I’m aware of. Effie and Jay aren’t due to report in for another week or so, and my brother, Jim, who is with us as well, works in communication. If they had reported in early, he would have known.”
Gus folded his arms, his frown deepening. “That doesn’t make sense.”
Jan shrugged. “Unless you wounded their pride. I mean, you did get away, didn’t you? I know that the older Enhanced are working from much older genetic technology, maybe they’re self-conscious about that. Either way, it can only be a good thing.”
Gus nodded. “I’m not complaining. If anything, this is some of the best luck we’ve had since we went rogue.”
Alex turned back to Tina, well aware that they were still moving and on a time limit.
“So, what’s the plan? Where are we?”
“Still in France,” Tina explained. “You weren’t out for that long. Though we don’t have much time. Mia is keeping her brother safe in one of the empty cells. It was kind of nerve-wracking, hoping that they wouldn’t place you three in that particular cell, but thankfully, they left it alone. If you go to her, I’ll go and get Jim. He’s driving, so we’re going to have him stop the transport by feigning engine trouble. Hopefully, by the time they realise nothing is wrong, the seven of us will be long gone.”
“So what first?” Gus asked.
“I’ll check outside to make sure that no one is there, and then move you all over to the cell with Mia and Ty. Once you’re all there, I’ll head up to the driver’s cabin, and Jim will know to start feigning engine trouble. As soon as the transport stops – and I mean as soon as it stops – you will need to get out of here and head to the nearest public place. Jim and I will slip away as quick as we can to
meet you. Hopefully, by the time anyone realises that we’re gone, we will be well on our way.”
Alex nodded. “Okay, then let’s go.”
Tina indicated for them to step back, out of the line of sight of the door, before she tentatively opened it and looked outside.
“Can you feel that rumbling?” she asked, apparently to someone outside the door.
“No, I don’t feel anything,” another voice answered.
Tina frowned at him. “Could you go and see Jim? Make sure that everything is okay with the engine.”
“I’m not supposed to move from here.”
Tina rolled her eyes. “It’s fine. There are only three prisoners, and one of them is still unconscious. We’ve got this. I’m more concerned about whether or not the transport breaks down.”
Alex heard footsteps, and she assumed that they belonged to the guard that Tina had just sent away.
Tina sighed as soon as the guard was gone. “I had hoped that I would be able to go to Jim myself,” she muttered. “I don’t like the idea of him having to catch up with us on his own...”
“But you did plan for this eventuality, right?” Alex checked.
Tina nodded. “Yeah, we did. Jim will keep Ken distracted while I help the rest of you escape. He will have twenty minutes to catch up with the rest of us, but if he doesn’t make it... We’ll leave without him.”
Gus frowned. “I’m not comfortable leaving anyone behind.”
Tina shook her head. “If we don’t, there is a good chance that we’ll be caught. If Jim can’t get away in time, he’ll just go back with the other Enhanced. They might be suspicious, since he is my brother, but it shouldn’t be too bad. And we will have someone working for us on the inside.” She gave a weak smile. “Don’t worry, we planned for every eventuality here. Planning an escape like this wasn’t going to work if we didn’t have redundancies.”
She let them out of the cell, and across the small metal space. She knocked on the door across from the cell in a rapid pattern before opening it.
Mia was sitting there, next to her brother, who was wearing bandages around his head, covering his eyes.
Alex wondered how bad his accident must have been for him to still be healing.
“Is everything going according to plan?” Mina asked, her voice more than a little frantic.
Tina nodded. “I had to send Ken to tell Jim to get a move on, instead of going myself, but everything else is fine.”
Mia nodded, seeming more than a little relieved. “I was never happy with you splitting off from us anyway.”
Tina folded her arms. “Even if I stay with you, Jim is still separated from us.”
“He’ll be fine,” Mia assured her. “You’re the one who let the others out of their cell. You would have been the one in trouble had you been caught.”
Tina looked away. “That doesn’t mean that I am happy about leaving my brother behind. As you should understand better than anyone.”
Mia gave her a reassuring smile. “You’re right, I’m sorry. But we do need to get out of here.”
At that, the transport lurched before coming to an unnatural sounding stop.
“And that’s our cue to leave,” Tina said as Mia went to help her brother up.
“Are you sure that was Jim doing that intentionally?” Ty asked as he got to his feet. “It didn’t sound good.”
“Yeah, I’m sure,” Tina assured him. “Jim told me that he could stop the transport in such a way that it might actually cause some real damage. Or at least sound like it...”
“Either way, we should go before someone comes to check that the prisoners are still secure,” Mia reasoned.
Tina nodded before going back to the door, peeking her head out to see if Ken had returned.
“The coast is clear,” she told them, before leading them out into the small metal area between the cells.
Tina made her way to one end of the transport, where there was a large, heavy door. She quickly produced a key, before opening it, and revealing a stretch of road behind them.
Thankfully, it was getting dark, and there were no cars to see them.
While they wanted to get somewhere public so that the Enhanced would think twice about chasing them down, escaping from what looked like an armoured police van probably wasn’t going to endear them to passers by.
Tina nodded to the treeline to the left. “We need to try and get through, into the trees where they can’t see us, without them catching sight of us in the mirrors. Move quickly, and keep low to the ground.”
The others nodded in understanding, while Mia kept a tight hold of her brother’s hand to make sure that he knew where to go.
They slipped across the space between the van and the trees carefully and quietly, with Mia and Ty going first.
Jan followed, and then Gus, leaving just Tina and Alex to join them.
Alex went to go and make her way across, but she was stopped by a yell behind her.
She turned to see that Ken had returned, and had grabbed Tina by the arm as she had been watching Alex prepare to go.
“So, you turned traitor too, have you?”
Alex hesitated. While Ken was distracted with Tina, she could make her way across to meet the others, and they could probably still get away.
Alex was still injured, and putting herself in the middle of the fight might mean getting herself captured.
But instead of leaving, she found herself striding forward and punching Ken straight in the jaw.
He let go of Tina, surprised, and Tina used that opportunity to knock him to the ground, before grabbing Alex by the arm, and yelling, “Come on, we have to go.”
Alex followed her, running to keep up as they made their way to where the others had been.
Apparently, when Ken had made an appearance, they had all done the smart thing and run away.
Alex and Tina simply kept running as far into the trees as they could, eventually slowing down as they tired.
“They will have made their way to the nearest public space,” Tina said. “Mia has a map of the area, and I think I know where they will have gone. I kept track of where we were on a GPS, ready for when you woke up.”
Alex nodded. “I suppose with Ken on high alert, there isn’t much chance of Jim catching up with us.”
Tina sighed, shaking her head. “No, I suppose there isn’t. We agreed that he should only try and catch up with us if things stayed quiet, so he won’t even make an attempt.”
“I’m sorry.”
“There’s nothing for you to be sorry about,” Tina said. “If it weren’t for you, I would still be back there. In fact, I’m not entirely sure why you helped. I mean, it would have been safer for you to just get away. What if they had caught you? I could have pretended that you forced me to help, and I probably would have only gotten a slap on the wrist even if they’d figured out I’d done it willingly. You wouldn’t get such kind treatment.”
Alex looked away. “I’m very good at talking big when I have to,” she admitted quietly, too tired to keep lying. “At saying that it’s time to make the hard calls. I am much worse at actually making those hard calls, however.” She shook her head. “I wasn’t just going to leave you behind.”
“Well then, I guess I’m thankful that your bite isn’t as tough as your bark.”
Alex looked away. “You won’t be if that’s what gets us captured.”
“Well, given that it was what stopped me from getting captured this time, I would just consider that part of the ups and downs of life.”
Alex nodded but didn’t seem convinced.
“Are you always this glum?” Tina asked. “We got out. We actually got out, and we got Ty out with us. I was sure at least one of us was going to get captured or killed during the escape.”
Alex’s fist tightened as she glared at the ground. “We wouldn’t have needed to escape if we hadn’t been captured. If I hadn’t let my want to see another of my siblings cloud my judgment. I should have rea
lised that it would have been a trap. I should have been able to escape.”
Tina shook her head. “Look, I’m not saying that trying to meet up with one of your siblings was the smartest plan anyone has ever had, but you couldn’t have avoided that ambush. And now you have even more people to help you. Cheer up, you won.”
Alex’s sullen look refused to lift.
“And if it makes you feel any better, I can go over the plan they had for capturing you. I was there in the briefing, and I have a perfect memory. There might be something in there that will help you evade them in the future.”
Alex finally smiled at that. “Yeah, that would make me feel better. I just... As much as Gus was on the inside, we couldn’t communicate much over the past year. I feel so helpless, having to just guess at how they might be tracking me. I mean, if Freya hadn’t had a sibling who could literally see the future, they would have already caught up with me. And now that we’re separated...”
“So, was Freya the Angel? The one you fell for?”
Alex groaned. “Seriously, does everyone know about that now?”
Tina gave her an apologetic nod. “Pretty much,” she said. “I mean, I wasn’t sure until you confirmed it just now, but you can’t deny that it’s one hell of a story. For an Enhanced soldier to fall in love with a magical being? And not just any magical being, an Angel? I mean, we all thought you had lost your mind, but in a romantic kind of way...”
Alex snorted as she shook her head. “Yeah, that about sums it up.”
“Must have been nice... To have someone you care about like that, I mean. I always kind of wondered what that would be like... But, you know, we’re banned from that kind of thing, and seeing what happened to Jan was all the warning I needed, you know?”
Alex nodded. “Yeah, I know. And it was. Nice, I mean.” Alex shook her head as her throat began to sting at the thought of Freya. “But it’s in the past now. Even if we get this base back, it’s going to be a long time before we deal with the Enhanced once and for all, and since they can track her, she can’t be anywhere near me. Which means that our relationship needs to stay firmly in the past. And I need to focus on the future... Like on how exactly we’re going to steal the space out from under Effie and Jay.”
