“Not exactly, but he’s already been involved in defusing a few conflicts. The males seem to respect him and he is an excellent strategist. Always was anticipating every move before it was made — on both sides,” Roar explained.
“Alright. We’ll approach him and see if he’s interested,” Law answered.
“We need to put security on the female’s barracks,” Stone blurted.
“Why? Have there been problems?” Law asked.
“No, but they’re afraid. Just watch them, they’re always on edge. Think maybe if they had a security guard outside their place they may feel a little less jumpy,” Stone said.
“Okay. We can speak to them and see if that’s something they’d be interested in. Anything else?” Law asked.
Six pairs of eyes looked back at him with no comment.
“Think about life outside Alliance. What may we need to help things run properly?” Law said.
“Delivery drivers,” Worth said. “If anybody wanted the job, we could have a few delivery drivers to meet deliveries up front and deliver them to whoever ordered them. Amazon loves us by now, I’m sure.”
“Good idea,” Law said, making notes on all the suggestions from their meeting as they were made.
“These males need something to do. All these people here doing jobs for us, while we just walk around and do nothing. How about we find out who wants to work construction, who wants to cook and work in the cafeteria, who wants to do grounds upkeep, who wants to work security — we’ll need a whole team, who wants to work in the rec center? Why can’t we take over the jobs ourselves, so we’re not just all wandering around with tempers rising when we get bored?” Crave asked.
Law looked at the male. “Very good point. We’ll do that. We’ll come up with a listing of possible jobs and find out who’d like to do what.”
“We’ll need teams to perform rescues as those that rescued us begin to head back to their regular jobs, too,” Rise said.
“We need to make laws, too. Rules that everyone has to abide by. It’ll stop so many flareups as we all struggle to find our places,” Ice said. “And the security force would carry them out and enforce them.”
“This is good, my friends. We’re making real progress here. I’m pleased you’re all sitting here beside me,” Law said.
<<<<<<<>>>>>>>
Nina lay in her bed in the room that had been assigned to her temporarily in the medical clinic. She listened to the sounds of the other people inside the clinic, and closed her eyes, trying to sleep. Behind her, on his roll-a-way bed, Acker shifted, reminding her he was there. Nina turned over, facing his bed.
When she opened her eyes in the darkness, her gaze met his, and he smiled at her.
“Having trouble sleeping?” he asked.
Nina nodded. “I usually do, though. It will come eventually.”
“It won’t be long and we’ll be in our own place. General Ferriday liked the idea and said he’s getting started on it right away. It’ll be just me and you in our own home, then you’ll be able to sleep better, I think,” Acker said.
“That will be nice. Just us and the quiet,” Nina agreed.
Nina turned over again and punched her pillow irritatedly before flopping down onto it.
“Want to come sleep with me again? I know you hate hospital beds,” Acker offered.
Nina turned to her back and looked at him. “You don’t mind? It is a small bed…”
“Not at all. I sleep better with you near me,” he said, lifting up the side of the sheet and the blanket that covered his bed.
Nina threw back her covers and slipped out of bed, took the few steps to the roll-a-way bed and tucked herself in next to Acker as he covered her and curved his body around hers with his arm holding her to him gently.
Nina sighed and allowed her eyes to drift closed.
“Sleep well… sweetheart,” Acker said, dropping a kiss on her shoulder.
Nina opened her eyes again at the noticeable pause she’d picked up on between him wishing her a good sleep and the word, ‘sweetheart’. He still didn’t know her name. No one did. She’d never told them. She knew she could trust Acker, and absolutely did, with her life even, she’d just never confided her name to him and he’d never pressed her on it. She closed her eyes and settled in for sleep. “Nina,” she said softly.
Acker lifted his head from the pillow they shared. “Nina?” he repeated with a slight smile on his face.
“I’m Nina.”
“I’ll protect you forever, Nina,” he promised as he laid his head back down beside hers.
<<<<<<<>>>>>>>
It was late afternoon when Lethal and his males finally sighted a building they thought could possibly be the facility they were housed and abused in.
“There,” Lethal said on a snarl. “Right there. That has to be it,” he said, looking down at a building that resembled an old hospital or institution of some type. The building was old, and somewhat unkempt, but from the looks of it, was in total working order. It was surrounded by a high chain link fence with razor wire crowning the top of the fence, all the way around the property.
“How do you want it?” Smitty asked.
“Find a place to set us down that’s close enough that we can get there quickly, but far enough away that we won’t be detected. Then we lie in wait until after dark,” Lethal said with a rumble in his chest.
Smitty risked a glance at Lethal over his shoulder, and his eyes rounded at the change in Lethal. His hazel eyes had gone black, his canines showed from between his lips, and he seemed to have inflated — actually looked like someone shoved an air hose up his ass. “You alright?” Smitty asked.
“I’m fine, just find a place to set this helicopter down,” he answered.
Twenty minutes later, Smitty had set them down in the country side in a pasture surrounded by wooded areas, just as requested.
“We’re hiking to the building we saw. We wait until after dark, give them time to get everyone settled in for the night, then we’re going in,” Lethal said.
“Agenda?” Valor asked.
“Kill all resistance. Take into custody any who give up, unless you have a particular memory of them abusing anyone at all, then kill them slowly. Except the doctor. We want the doctor, and his key personnel alive if possible. Take all documentation, computers, etc. we can find with us.”
“Why can’t I kill the doctor and the fucking guards I remember so clearly?” Scorn asked.
“We need to get all the information we can from them. Particularly on my female and any teams that may have been transferred out of here. We can’t find them, we can’t free them,” Lethal answered.
“Can I kill them later?” Scorn asked hopefully.
“Some. I get the doctor,” Lethal answered.
“Fair enough,” Scorn said.
“I’ll be right here. You need me, you need backup, you need anything at all, just speak. I can hear you if your helmets are on. If they fail, press the button on that body cam, I’ll be there,” Smitty said.
“We may need more than one helicopter to transport the squads and the females, depending on how many we find,” Lethal told him.
“Let me know when you’re sure and I’ll call them in. Like I said, I’ll be monitoring the transmissions in your helmets from here so stay on the same radio frequency. If something happens — you take your helmets off, become separated from them for any reason, your shoulder-cams can be manually activated. I’ll pick up on those, too if you decide to use them for communication instead of just footage. But I won’t come in until you call for me, unless I think you’re in trouble. Then I’m coming regardless,” Smitty said. Smitty held his fist up and Lethal looked at it, then made his own fist and bumped Smitty’s before leaving the helicopter. Each of his team followed suit; then, they all ducked low and ran from the helicopter toward the wooded area surrounding the pasture, disappearing into the trees in the late afternoon sun.
Smitty sat with his rotors still t
urning for sometime before deciding that it was safe to be here and cut the power to conserve fuel. He checked his radio frequency to be sure they were still functional and sat back to wait.
<<<<<<<>>>>>>>
It was almost 11:00 P.M. when Lethal, Scorn, Two, Steel, Valor, and Feral cut a hole in the fence behind the building they felt sure was where they came from and slipped silently onto the grounds. They all wore their helmets, darkened face shields down to hide their identities as they advanced on the quiet, still building. Two ran ahead of the squad and used the tools he took out of a small plastic box he retrieved from one of the pockets on his BDUs to pick the lock on the exterior metal door.
Once he heard the telltale click letting him know it was unlocked, he dropped the tools back into his pocket, lifted his weapon and silently led the way inside. The building was dark, no lights on anywhere. Which was a good thing since their helmets engaged with night-vision.
The tension in the men was palpable the moment they stepped inside. This was it. This was the facility that had made them what they were today. This was where the fuckers that had participated in their abuse, their suffering, the unrelenting fuckery of their lives, would all be found and made to pay for their actions.
Only, the building was empty.
They made their way through each corridor, each office, the training facility, the medical wing, the rooms, the huge cells the females were kept in, and finally the individual basement cells the squads were housed in. There were traces of recent activity left in them, but it was evident, the building had been deserted, and in a hurry.
The frustration was apparent as they realized they missed their opportunity to have their vengeance. But the one who was most affected was Lethal. His chest heaved with irritation as he realized there was no way to track his female. He didn’t even know if she was alive or dead.
“Search everything. Every fucking inch of this place. Every single fucking room. Anything that may give us an idea of where they went, if anyone survived at all. I can not just walk away without finding these fuckers,” Lethal snarled into the speaker in his helmet.
“We know if nothing else, the doctor and his flunkies are alive somewhere. If we can’t find your female, we can certainly find them,” Two said, patting Lethal on the back as he moved past him to toss another office for any information at all. They found computers that had been smashed, the hard drives battered into crumbling bits of steel and plastic. Found hospital beds, and medical equipment, left deserted as though no longer needed. And Lethal prayed it was actually no longer needed. He prayed that wherever the doctor and his people moved to, their captives were no longer with them, and they weren’t out trying to find new captives to subject to the fucked up torture every male standing in this empty building had all been exposed to.
Lethal walked into an office and noted the disarray. Papers were lying here and there as though they were dropped carelessly. “Each scrap of paper has to be read,” he instructed. Then noticed the filing cabinets and desks with some of their drawers hanging half out of them. “Pull out each drawer, make sure nothing is left inside of them. If we don’t have time to read each scrap of paper, bring them back with us. We can go through them later. Every single room in this place has to be searched.”
The males spread out, each taking a different room and tearing it apart for any clue, any evidence at all. They even tore apart each white medical coat they could find looking for anything at all in the pockets or seams. Stethoscopes were examined to be sure there was no name or identification of any type of them. “Lethal?” Feral called out, standing beside the IV stands with a stethoscope in his hand.
“Yeah,” Lethal answered, as the echo of his boots on the tiled floor let Feral know he was heading toward him.
“Each piece of equipment here has a serial number. Serial numbers can be traced. They may tell us who bought this shit,” Feral said.
Lethal raised an eyebrow. “Holy fuck. Record them somehow,” he said, beginning to have hope again.
Then they all heard the same thing. Smitty’s voice speaking to them from the speakers in their helmets. “Just use your shoulder-cams. The numbers will be recorded along with whatever else you see.”
At that point the males began walking through the medical wing, searching for any serial number they could find and being sure to expose it to their shoulder-cams. Once they’d finished going through the entire building, gathered up the papers they could find, even walked the grounds looking for any evidence at all, they finally realized there was nothing else to search. “Smitty, we’re ready. This place is empty, you can come for us here,” Lethal said aloud into his helmet, knowing Smitty would pick up on it.
“Roger that. On my way,” Smitty answered.
They started out of the building with the little bit of evidence they’d been able to find. But Lethal stopped in his tracks. He had to go back to the cell one more time. He turned and started down the stairs that led to the basement cells again. He went straight to their cell block and pushed open the double doors, then walked slowly toward the cell that had been his. He stood in the open door for what seemed like hours, but was in fact only a few minutes as his mind played back scenes of himself with his female. Nina was her name.
“You alright?” Scorn asked from right behind him.
Lethal gave a single shake of his head, then stepped into the cell. He walked over to the bunk and lifted the pillow to his nose, inhaling, hoping for any lingering scent of his female. But there were so many scents there, it was hard to distinguish which was hers, his or some other poor soul’s.
“We’ll find her, Lethal. It just might take a while,” Valor said, standing outside the cell watching Lethal before turning his own gaze hesitantly to the cell behind him that he’d once occupied.
“If she’s alive,” Lethal answered. “I almost hope she’s dead. At least then she wouldn’t be suffering.”
“You think he killed her after he sold us?” Scorn asked.
Lethal thought about it, then shook his head. “No. That would have been too kind. He would have given her to anybody else he could, just to watch her break. Because he’d promised her she’d be mine, he’d have taken pleasure in watching her be abused by anyone that wasn’t me. I think he let her live just to watch her suffer. Because she was mine.”
“Then we will find her. If there’s anything left to find,” Scorn said.
The helicopter could be heard approaching the building, and the males hurried to be outside and waiting as it arrived. They stood close to the building and watched as it landed in the grass just off the parking lot blowing dust and debris up in its wake as it landed. Lethal and his males hunched over and ran for the open doors of the helicopter as Smitty waited for them to board. The last to board was Feral. He ran with his face down watching the ground and the boots of those in front of him so he wouldn’t get anything in his eyes from the winds created by the spinning of the rotors on the chopper waiting for them.
His steps stuttered as he watched something black and shiny get kicked up from the left boot of the male running in front of him. He stopped in his tracks as the others climbed on the helicopter and searched the ground for whatever it was that was kicked up then caught in the winds swirling the dirt and debris about. His gaze swung first left, then right, before going left again and squinting his eyes. There, right there near the edge of the black and gravel asphalt. He could see the shiny glint of something black with a red splash across it.
Feral hurried over to it, a grin on his face when he realized what it was. He snatched it up and gripped it tightly in his hand just as the others started shouting for him to hurry up. Feral ran back to the helicopter, eyes glued to the ground the whole time in case there were more, then climbed on board. Once settled he smirked at Lethal. “Got something for ya,” he said, holding his hand out with the object lying in his palm.
“What is this?” Lethal asked, reaching for it.
“That’s a fucking flash drive!”
Valor exclaimed. “Where’d you find it?”
“Flew up while we were running. Steel stepped on it and I saw it get lifted into the wind,” Feral explained.
“We gotta check for more,” Valor said, moving toward the door.
“We’ll hold here for a few minutes,” Smitty said, “go ahead, but make it quick.”
Chapter 25
“Morning, Sergeant,” Findley called out as Acker and Nina entered the building and got in line for breakfast.
“Hey, ‘sup?” Acker called back, raising one hand in the air to wave as the other was at the small of Nina’s back to guide her to the serving line.
“You about done with vacation? Ready to rejoin your crew?” Findley asked teasingly.
“Actually, I am. Won’t be long, a week at most and I’ll be back at it,” Acker answered.
“We’ll be ready for you,” Findley answered, walking over to them. “Morning, ma’am,” he said to Nina.
“Morning,” she answered, not quite smiling.
“You have got to be the most patient, most gifted woman I’ve ever met… to be able to tame this one,” he said, thumbing toward Acker.
Acker grinned. “Findley, go away. Leave her alone. She does not need any of your crap this early in the morning.”
“More like you don’t want me to tell her any of your stories,” Findley answered. Then focused on Nina again. “Whenever you want to hear ‘em, I got some stories, honey. So many stories.”
“You are not going to tell her a damn thing. Go away,” Acker said, shoving his friend good naturedly while chuckling.
Findley walked backward away from them, still looking at Nina. “I got you, just let me know when you have a minute, I’ll fill you in on all his most embarrassing moments.”
Nina did smile a bit then, before looking up at Acker who was desperately trying to make Findley go away.
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