Chapter Fourteen
"I told you this was a bad idea!"
"Oh, lecture me later, will you!?"
The pair, hands joined, ran full-tilt down the hallway, keeping their eyes firmly forward, neither of them with any particular desire to see exactly how close Burgess was to catching them. Simply knowing he was behind them and giving chase was more than enough to keep their feet flying. With the adrenaline pumping in their veins they weren't even beginning to pant yet, but they both knew it was a temporary state; they had to get away from here now. Of course, the fact that they were on the twelfth floor did rather make things a little bit more complicated.
Coming back to the elevators, Nadia took a stab at the call button and groaned when nothing happened. "He's locked the elevators, now what are we supposed to do? I don't think I'm capable of running down twelve floors' worth of stairs. Not without stopping, anyway."
Thomas smiled grimly. "It wouldn't matter if you could. If he's locked the elevators, he must have people watching the stairwell."
She winced as what he said sank in. "Then what do we do?"
He sighed, giving her hand a squeeze as the floor began to resound with their pursuer's heavy tread. "I don't know, but we can't stay here!"
Dashing to the stairwell, they began their descent. Burgess' thundering steps spurred them onward, but perhaps what helped them the most was the simple monotony of going down flights of stairs; it allowed them to think and flee simultaneously. After six floors, the pair were approaching the limit of what they could run without a breather and had seen nothing but grey steps and black railings. Nadia, doing what she did best, acted on instinct. Instead of continuing their mad dash downwards, she shouldered the door to the sixth floor open. Thomas, without the spare lung capacity to question her decision, followed closely on her heels. Besides, any idea was better than pushing themselves too hard only to have Burgess catch them once they collapsed.
Emerging back into the dull-grey carpeted halls they had passed through earlier, Nadia paused, frowning. Her instinct hadn't provided her with a second step; what was here they could work with? All she could see were stupid, nondescript doors! Seeing panic setting in, Thomas took her hand, his more meticulous nature having had time to catch up with his partner's impulsiveness. He went to the first door he came upon that would take them in towards the centre of the building's structure and was infinitely relieved to find it unlocked. Slipping inside, he shut the door, leaving both he and Nadia in the dark. Sweeping an arm upwards across the wall, he found what he was after as he felt his forearm collide with the light switch. With the room's lights flickering to life, he nodded in satisfaction as the details of the room came into view; large metal shelves bearing folded uniforms, hard-hats, work boots and other construction paraphernalia. A storage room. Two particularly large shelves walled in a roughly ten-by-ten space; their corners met at one end, while the other came within a foot of touching the main concrete wall the entrance was set in. Smaller shelves were arranged within the square space and narrow aisles ran between these, the only means of getting around in the cramped space. Tight quarters, to be sure, but neither of them seriously believed that it would slow Burgess down and, even if it did, there just wasn't enough room to play hide and seek with him. Not if they intended to win, anyway. Nadia, determined to keep her panic at bay, looked on the bright side; at least they had a few moments to catch their breath before the big man started checking doors and noticed the light on from under their particular one.
"Okay, Thomas, good, we're out of the halls, we've bought ourselves some time. What are we going to do with it?"
"Well, first we... uh..." He trailed off, frowning, before sighing. "Nope, I've got nothing. Your turn again."
She looked at him incredulously for a moment, before giggling just a little in spite of herself and the situation. "My turn, is it? All right, challenge accepted."
Scanning the room, her eyes rested on the gap between one of the larger shelves and the concrete wall. Chewing her lip thoughtfully, she moved to it and shifted a pile of uniforms to allow light into the area beyond it; instead of a concrete wall separating this storage room from whatever was next door, she saw a second storage space nearly identical to the one they were currently in. She felt a fresh hunch coming on and turned to explain it to Thomas, but froze as the sound of the doorknob beginning to turn reached her ears. Seizing Thomas' hand, she pressed herself against the concrete and squeezed past the end of the shelf, pulling him along with her. Emerging in the darkness of the opposite side, she placed her free hand along the wall and just kept going, feeling her way through the failing light.
Burgess, entering the segment of the room they had just left, cursed softly to himself when he found the room empty. But the light had been left on; was it a distraction, perhaps, or were they trying to hide from him? Seeing one pile of uniforms had been shoved against the pair of construction boots beside it, he moved to investigate. Leaning in, he peered through the empty space and caught the barest glimpse of white-clothed movement squeezing past the 'wall' shelf on the far side of the next storage segment. Smiling thinly, he turned on his heel and exited back into the hallway, turning off the light as he went.
Hearing the door shut, the pair stopped to listen, just to be sure that it was not a trick. Craning her neck, Nadia could no longer see light coming in over the tops of the shelves; Burgess must have turned it off. Shrugging, she led Thomas toward the next shelf they had to squeeze past to continue on their way, when the door to the segment they were currently in was flung open. Burgess was framed in the light from the hall for a moment before he surged into motion and lunged after them. Nadia, already past, pulled Thomas through as quickly as he could go and the pair toppled to the ground on the far side of the shelf; barely an inch out of Burgess' massive arm's grasp. Snarling, the big man put his shoulder to the shelf and began to push, but it was too big and too heavily laden, even for him. Straightening up, he turned and charged out the door, his thundering steps clear even through the wall as he made his way around to their current door. Nadia helped Thomas up and took the only route she could think of; inwards, away from the outer concrete wall. Squeezing into the narrow aisles, they proceeded until they came up against the wall-shelf marking the rear of the storage segment. Getting down on their hands and knees, they felt along the items in the dark, trying to find some lighter objects. Locating a suitable spot, Nadia shoved a pile of traffic cones aside, while Thomas attended to a box of safety glasses. With an opening made, they crawled through their rabbit hole before turning to once again seal their impromptu entrance.
The light on the opposite side of the shelf they had just crawled through flicked on and they heard Burgess cursing loudly. Knowing they could not stay where they were, they pressed deeper inside; they found it was emptier behind the shelving units, which, as they could barely see, was quite fortunate. Worming their way to the direct centre of the storage area, they found a small open space in between six, evenly spaced pillars of metal and concrete; almost definitely support structures for the building. The space was, thankfully, lit by a dull orange bulb set in the ceiling between the pillars; it was enough for them to see each other’s outlines with, but details were not forthcoming.
Resting against one of the pillars, Nadia smiled shakily, though of course Thomas could not see it in the half-light. "Okay, so far, so good. It's your turn; now what? Oh and please be brilliant, I think I've just set the bar rather high."
Thomas chuckled dryly, taking his rest beside her. "Great. No pressure, then." Tilting his head to one side, he heard the faint sound of a door closing, though he did not know if it was Burgess entering from or exiting to the hallway. "Well, we can't stay here for long, that's for sure."
"In here, on this floor, or in this building?"
"Yes," he replied, shaking his head as Nadia giggled quietly in response. "There's no way the two of us can take Burgess." He paused as an idea struck him. "But maybe we don't need to. Come on
; and be thinking of some way we can get past the guards downstairs, please."
Taking her hand, he moved back to the shelf that marked the boundary between their hiding place and the storage area proper. Feeling his way along the shelf, he made his way as far along as he could, until he felt the concrete wall come up beside him; he needed to be sure they would emerge in the first storage segment they had entered. Placing his free hand on the shelf, he knelt down to get at the bottom shelf, Nadia crouching with him. They both froze when they felt a vibration through the cold metal, their joined hands involuntarily tightening their grip as objects fell from the shelf above them. Thomas gritted his teeth as a reinforced work boot hit him in the back of the head; he counted himself lucky that it had been the heel that had hit him and not the steel toe. The beam of a flashlight cut into the darkness above them, probing this way and that, but Burgess, being such a large specimen, had had to crouch to see through the shelf; he could not see straight down, putting them rather literally under his nose. The seconds passed them by in agonizing slowness, each tick a nail driven into their chests as their anxiety ratcheted up another notice.
He can hear us, Nadia hissed inwardly, stealing a glance up at the probing light. Hear us breathing, or our hearts beating, something! Please, please just keep walking!
It was not until a full two minutes had dragged by that Burgess, grumbling to himself, drew back from the shelf and stalked further along the row; he knocked a few random objects from their rest as he went for good measure.
Nearly collapsing from relief, the pair gathered themselves as quickly as they could and made themselves a path through the bottom shelf. Climbing through, they stood on leaden legs and supported one another to the door. Exiting into the hallway, they could only hope, with every fibre of their beings, that Burgess was far enough away not to notice the light entering the room.
Seeing the door to the stairwell was, at most, ten feet from them, helped to reinvigorate them; the pair wasted no time in making for it, just in case Burgess stepped out of the storage area and saw them, wasting all of their caution. Emerging back into the stairwell, they once again began on their journey downwards, moving as quickly as they could without wearing themselves out. They passed several floors in silence, focusing only on putting distance between themselves and Burgess, who they hoped was still searching for them up above.
Reaching the third floor, Thomas finally broke the silence. "So... have you figured out how we're getting past the guards at the bottom yet?"
Nadia shook her head. "Nope. Not in a risk-free manner, anyway, and I have to admit that's what I would prefer just now. Today has been far too stressful for even my liking."
He raised an eyebrow. "Ignoring my reflex to point out that it was to be expected since we broke into a corporate building, I notice you specified your idea was risky. Meaning, of course, that you do have an idea, I hope?"
She sighed. "It's not exactly an idea. I mean... this stairwell is our only way to get downstairs that doesn't involve jumping out of a window. And as much fun as playing cat-and-mouse with Burgess all night sounds, I'm pretty sure we want out before he catches up to us."
He nodded. "That goes without saying."
"Why don't we just walk out?"
He stared at her, raising an eyebrow dubiously. "You're serious?"
Nadia shrugged. "Sort of, yeah. I mean... Burgess didn't see us running through the halls and he couldn't have gotten a great look at us in the storage room, being as dark as it was."
He raised his other eyebrow, not following where exactly she was going with this. “What’s your point? He knows we're here, he just has to catch us now."
"My point is that the guards downstairs are expecting two intruders. But we're in uniform. And, if I'm right, Burgess hasn't gotten a good look at us, so it's possible they don't know what to look for."
Catching on, Thomas grinned. "So we act casual and just stroll on out. I like it. If it works."
She smiled grimly. "Risky as it is, I think it's our only chance."
Concentrating on getting to the ground floor, the pair continued on their way down. They had only two more floors to descend, but it became steadily harder to press onward the closer to the bottom they came. Neither was quite sure how they would muster up the courage to walk through the door into the main lobby without seeming suspicious to the dozen or more guards they suspected were presently there. The problem was abruptly taken out of their hands as they turned to descend the final batch of steps and found themselves facing at least half of those dozen individuals waiting at the bottom.
"Halt!"
Doing as the baton-armed individuals ordered, Nadia and Thomas froze in place. One of the guards, an Asian woman looking to be somewhere in her thirties, whose dark brown hair poked out from under her cap as a ponytail, approached to scrutinize them. Sizing them up, she frowned at them even as she looked them over.
"I don't recognize you two, are you new?"
Thomas felt himself nodding vigorously, while Nadia instead found her voice. "Yes. That is, yes ma'am. Sir. Uh... it's our first night."
She chuckled. "Ma'am makes me feel old, Sir will do just fine. Well, let's see what we've got to work with, shall we?"
She steered the pair down the last few stairs and past the other guards. Emerging through the doors and into the lobby, the pair swallowed hard as they saw another dozen guards standing around to back those in the stairwell up, should it be necessary. Leading them off to the side, but still within sight of the crowd of security personnel, she stopped directing them forward and stood back.
"Let's get a look at you now. Those caps aren't supposed to hang low like that; nobody can see your faces properly..."
Neither of the pair was in a terrible rush to show anyone in this building their faces. Unfortunately, they could not think of a single, believable reason to keep them as they were, either. Slowly raising their hands to do as she asked, they, and everyone else in the room, froze as a chime sounded from one of the elevators. Fanning out around the lift in question, the guards waited anxiously for the doors to open, gripping their batons tightly. When they did, however, it was the hulking shape of Burgess who filled their vision. Snapping to attention, the guards backed off as the glowering giant stalked into the room.
Turning his gaze on the Asian woman, she instantly saw he was in a fouler mood than she had ever wanted to see him in. "Murakami!" He barked, pointing at the floor in front of him, not even bothering to add a 'come here' to the gesture, much less a 'please'.
She inclined her head, but remembered what she had been doing. "One moment, chief, I'm just seeing to these..." Turning, she found the pair gone. "Rookies?"
Turning back to face her boss, she found him looming over her. "What rookies."
A chill ran down her spine simply from the deadpan tone of his voice. It sounded cold, flat and emotionless; like he was fully willing, and capable, to pop her head off without so much as a warning, much less any regret.
"Just some newbies on their first night, chief, I was about to check their identification to make sure they were who they said they were. Must have slipped off when we all turned to see you coming in."
Burgess stared at her for a moment, his expression going from utter neutrality to a frantic anger and back again, before he did the last thing she expected; he began to laugh. She had no idea what he found so funny, nor why he called off the lock-down he had put in place less than half an hour before. Neither did she know that her new recruits had run all the way to Nadia’s car without stopping, ignoring the weird looks they had been given by those they passed who wondered where a pair of security guards were going in such a hurry while carrying armfuls of clothes; nor that they had driven back to her apartment with absolutely no regard for the speed limit, with Nadia muttering quiet apologies to her mother every other minute. It was only through pure luck that they did not encounter a red light for six blocks. Though that they stopped for.
In Icarus' Shadow Page 25
