Simon
“Sam!” he whispers frantically, still unable to reach her. What the hell is going on? He has been calling her for the last fifteen minutes since heading out of the camp and back into the woods. He can see the apartment complex but is still about a half mile from it. “Sam, damn it. Answer me!”
Simon picks up the pace and actually starts sprinting as he comes closer to the apartment building. After he crosses the street, he continues on straight and almost gets spotted by a group of men who are yelling to one another from a distance. He slams himself against the façade of a brick building and slinks into a doorway’s overhang. He doesn’t think they saw him. He takes a peek and watches them walking away. They sound angry, but he can’t hear what they are saying. He counts three.
Simon moves out again, keeping tight against the building with his sniper rifle with the silencer raised and at the ready. When he comes to the parking garage, he goes down the ramp and checks to make sure the Jeep is still in the same place, which it is. Then he picks up the pace and jogs to the same door he went through earlier with Sam. Halfway up the stairs to the second floor, he hears voices above him. Simon stops and raises his rifle. The door to the stairwell slams open, crashing against the wall with a loud clattering of metal against cement blocks.
“You stupid shit!” someone yells.
The distinctive sound of radio static comes next before someone answers, “No, I told you she went up to the roof. Did you look there?”
The person in the stairwell with him replies, “No, asshole. We went outside. I’m out on the street. Vance said to check there.”
“Fine, I’m coming,” the other one says through the radio.
“Meet me on the top floor, and we’ll search it again and then go to the roof, over,” the first one orders.
The other confirms their plan and cuts the transmission. The person above him darts noisily up the stairs getting further and further away from him. He waits another few moments until he hears a door above open and shut, which lets him know the man has gone through it. When it is silent again, Simon moves out.
“Sam!” he whispers into his throat mic again and doesn’t get an audible response.
He knows he can’t keep going up the stairs because the other people are also using them, so Simon opens the door to the second floor and peers cautiously around. It’s as silent as the first time he’d come through. Wasting no time, he jogs quietly to the other end of the hall. He has to find another way to get upstairs, another stairwell or even a damn elevator shaft he can climb. He doesn’t know for sure, but he’s pretty certain these people are talking about Samantha.
Simon rounds a corner to his right at the end of the hallway and catches a flash of movement at the other end. He slows and proceeds more carefully. Whoever it was seemed small but fast, so he’s on high alert of being shot. Getting killed isn’t going to help her. His mind bounces back and forth between pursuing the person and questioning him and heading upstairs to find Sam.
“Simon? Where are you?” she says into his earpiece as if she is trying to be as quiet as possible. She also sounds scared.
“I’m in the apartment building,” he says, breathing a small sigh of relief at the sound of her voice. “There are people in here.”
“No kidding, stupid! I’m trying to hide from them, but I fell and hurt my ankle so I can’t go fast,” she says in a rush.
“Where are you?”
A pause before, “I think I’m on the second floor. I just came out of a tunnel.”
A tunnel? He has no idea what she’s talking about but doesn’t want to take the time to figure it out right now. There are people on this floor. She’s in danger.
“I’m on the second floor, too. Where are you?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” she whispers as if her fear is escalating.
He tries to speak in a slow and calm tone to help her, “Go to the nearest apartment door and get a number.”
“’Kay,” she returns in a tiny, frightened voice. “These people are after me, Simon.”
“It’s ok. I’m here now. Nobody’s getting you. Just stay calm and get me a number so I can find you.”
“’Kay,” she whispers.
It’s like every nerve and muscle and tendon in his body is being stretched to its maximum tautness as he waits for her to find a way for him to locate her. A soft clicking sound at the other end of the hall catches his attention, and Simon presses back into an open apartment doorway. With night-vision gear, he can risk taking a peek unless the other person is wearing the same. It doesn’t matter; he has to look because this person could be after her. While he’s worrying about getting her out of this building, he’s also trying to keep track of numbers, their numbers. He’s not sure how many they’re dealing with.
“Two-twelve,” she whispers, although Simon can hear her without the earpiece. If she’s within earshot, then she’s close.
“Sam?” he whispers down the hall.
“Simon?”
“Yes, it’s me,” he says, revealing himself and rushing toward her. Sam crashes into him and holds tight. She’s shaking like a leaf. She must’ve been the small person he’d just seen sneaking across the hall and disappearing through the door. Simon pulls back and cups her face with both hands. “Are you ok?”
She nods, but a few tears slip down her face. Simon grabs his extra rifle from her back, takes her hand, and says, “Come on.”
“Wait,” she pleads and tugs hard. “This way.”
Simon nods and allows her to lead, but when they come to the door she just went through before, he steps in front of her. Listening first, Simon enters, and Sam allows the door to shut quietly behind her. Then she locks it, which he must admit sounds slightly comforting when it engages home. He looks around at the space and realizes it’s some sort of maintenance tunnel about eight feet wide. Ductwork hangs down, the walls are cement block, some covered with metal grating, and the floors are bare concrete. This is not a part of the building the owner would’ve wanted the inhabitants exploring, which explains why it locks from the inside.
“What’s going on? What happened?” he asks, trying not to sound desperate.
“I don’t know,” she says. “I was just upstairs waiting for you and couldn’t get ahold of you.”
“I know, sorry.”
“Couldn’t you hear me?”
“No, I’ll explain later,” he says.
She sighs and explains, “I thought I heard you out in the hall and opened the door. I figured your headset wasn’t working. But it wasn’t you. There were two men out there. Then the one yelled to the other because he spotted me.”
“Damn it.”
“I locked the door and tried to go out through the laundry room, but others tried to come in that way.”
“How’d you get away from them?”
“That access panel in the master closet. Remember?” she asks, to which he nods. “I climbed up through there. It was like a narrow tunnel for service workers or something. But then I fell down a long chute. I think I sprained my ankle.”
“Can you walk?”
She smirks. “I can run if I have to.”
Simon smiles and touches the side of her cheek with the backs of his knuckles. “That’s my girl. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
“I was just trying to stay in the service areas. The tunnel spit me out across the hall, so I saw this door and went through it.”
“I know. I spotted you, but I wasn’t sure if it was you.”
“I don’t know where this goes. Should we call for backup?”
Simon considers this. Already was considering it before she even suggested it. “I don’t think so. Not yet. I’ve counted three, plus you said there were two to four upstairs. Could be the same ones.”
“Simon, one of them said something about the President.”
He nods. “Yeah, they’re from the camp across the street. I’ll explain that later, too. Let’s just get moving.”
“I’m with you.”
He tries not to let her words mean more than they likely do. She’s just scared. “Stay close.”
“Yep,” Sam answers.
He goes first down the narrow hall, careful of corners and intersections. They come to a set of steel stairs where Simon listens first before proceeding. They travel down two flights and come to a series of tunnels.
“We should be close to the car garage. It was on this same level.”
“’Kay.”
Simon takes a knee, removes his silencer for the pistol from his bag and screws it on the end. Then he slings his rifle and pushes the lever on the pistol for the safety, knowing one waits in the chamber at the ready. When he stands again, Sam jerks his sleeve.
“Did you hear that?” she whispers fiercely.
He doesn’t answer but pauses, straining to listen. There is a ping-ping-ping as if water is dripping somewhere. Then he hears whatever Sam must’ve heard. Distant voices muffled by the many walls within the massive building. He’s fairly confident they are on the same floor as them and have likely found a way into this maintenance area from the other end of the apartment building. After listening for a few more moments, the voices sound like they are drawing nearer. That coupled with the loud clang of something being dropped or bumped, metal on metal, probably hitting the floor lets him know they are getting closer. When he was younger, something like this would’ve scared him, sent a shiver up his spine. Now, however, the only thing that could cause that sort of fear is the thought of Sam being hurt or taken from him.
“Sam, hang on,” he states and walks briskly to the other end of the hall, ducking so as not to hit his head on a low piece of metal ductwork. The short hallway ends in a dead-end and turns right into a breakroom of sorts. There is a metal table with four chairs where the workers might’ve taken their lunch breaks. Steel lockers with faded and worn name tags line the wall behind the table. A very small office with a half glass door is to their right, tucked into the corner. Probably the maintenance supervisor’s office. He whispers, “In here, Sam.”
“No, I’m not staying here by myself.”
“You’re hurt, and you’re going to slow me down,” he states, hoping she’ll feel like a burden to him. Simon knows it’s the only way he’ll ever get her to stay put. “Under this desk. Hide here. If anyone but me comes through this door, shoot them and get out of here. Radio for K-Dog and find a place to hole up and hide till he can get to you.”
She bites her lower lip, something she does when she’s either troubled or scared. Tonight, it’s probably both. She doesn’t argue, for which he is thankful, but does climb under the desk and places her rifle on the floor. Simon hands her his sniper rifle, as well, but keeps his M16 on his back in case he needs more rounds than his pistol could provide. Then he nods and leaves.
He shuts the door behind him and heads toward potential danger. He’s certain she won’t be found because the other entrance to this area they locked, and he assumes that there aren’t more than two ways of getting in here. Rounding the corner to the hallway they just left, Simon creeps forward with his pistol out front in a two-handed grip.
A clanking sound comes from a long passageway off to his left, so Simon goes in that direction. He hears male laughter next. Proceeding cautiously, yet quickly, Simon makes it to the end of the hallway and pauses. He can hear them more clearly now.
“Yeah, she went through the fuckin’ ceiling,” one of them comments. Simon is sure they mean Sam. “I tried to get up in there after her, but I didn’t fit.”
“She must be pretty small then,” someone else states in a manner that seems lascivious.
“Don’t get any ideas, Mitch. Not like last time. The President don’t want us gettin’ any ideas like that, remember?”
“Yeah, yeah, but what he don’t know won’t hurt him. We never know when he’s gonna just pop in. It’s been over a week already. Busy man like that ain’t got time for what we do in our free time. Besides, don’t stop him from hittin’ it with some of the sluts when he comes to our camp.”
“True. We need to find her first.”
One of them laughs. “Won’t be too hard now. We’ve got all the exits blocked.”
“Only one on our team tonight who’d even say anything is Miranda, and even she might not.”
“Still. I don’t know if gettin’ a piece of ass is worth gettin’ red filed. Don’t forget, boys. I work for him when he’s around. I’ve seen him workin’ on those files. They ain’t good.”
“Nah, the President would never do that to us,” the first one says with more confidence. “Besides, I’ll cover for you, and you can cover for me. I swear she’s gotta be down here somewhere. If she’s down here, we’ll just keep it secret for a while longer. I can be fast. We’ve searched everywhere else, and we found where that tunnel came out. This is the only place she could be.”
“Let’s keep lookin’” a new voice suggests. “We ain’t got all night. I’ve been walkin’ around with blue balls for weeks.”
“Fuck yeah,” the first one says. “Let’s do this!”
Simon backs away and conceals himself behind a thick, eighteen-inch steel pipe coming up out of the floor and looping back down into it a few feet away. It’s probably some sort of ventilation, probably for sewer hookups. Then he takes a piece of chipped cement the size of a pebble and flings it hard at the square, galvanized ductwork coming down from the ceiling. It makes the exact amount of ruckus he requires. They will be drawn to that sound like moths seeking light. Then to top it off, he uses the butt of his pistol and bumps it twice against the steel pipe, creating a different but new sound. He waits in silence. He takes up a one-kneed stance and counts the seconds.
It doesn’t take long. Within three seconds, he hears multiple sets of footsteps rushing towards him. They are so inept, one of them even whispers to another and laughs as if the excitement of finding Sam is too much to contain. Their words are unintelligible but no more stealthy than their movement.
He lets them round the corner so he can draw them in before acting. Once three of them have breached his hallway, Simon takes careful aim and squeezes the trigger, ending one with a headshot. The round is subdued but still somewhat loud in the tight, echoing quarters of the underground service area.
“What?” a man cries out next to his buddy and is thrown sideways against the wall as his friend slams into him from the impact of the headshot. “What the…?”
His question goes unanswered as Simon hits him square in the chest with two, quick shots. He goes down, but Simon realizes too late that he’s wearing a vest. Instead of worrying about the stunned man, he takes aim at a third and shoots him in the back of the skull as he tries to make his escape. The other, a fourth, gets away.
Simon rises from his squatted position and pursues. As he steps over the first body, he shoots the stunned one in the face, not caring if it is cold and calculating. They were no less cold and had plotted to rape Samantha. They cannot be allowed to live. Maybe not everyone at the camp is like these men, and he certainly can’t go out there and kill all of them like this, but these men must be dealt with expeditiously. So he pursues.
Simon comes to the corner and does a squatted low peek. Nobody shoots at him, so he keeps going. He moves fast but guardedly so as not to be shot and killed. Getting killed is at the bottom of his priority list tonight. Sam needs him to get her out here and out to safety again. He almost makes it to the other end of the tunnel when someone hits him from the right side. The man must’ve been hiding in an alcove Simon hadn’t anticipated being there.
He is shoved into the cement block wall against the metal grating covering it, and his night-vision goggles are knocked away. He doesn’t drop his pistol but is unable to use it as the man takes a second to punch him in the jaw before he can reset himself into a fully standing position. Simon hits the wall again, and this time the pistol goes flying from his hand. He tries to pull the rifle around in front of him when he notices the man’s hand raise. He has a knife, something long and lethal that looks like a kukri. He jumps backward away from the psycho when he slashes at Simon’s chest. The man stabs, this time in a more forward direction, and Simon slaps down his wrist, grabs it, twists it, and disables him. The knife is dropped, but the danger is still alive. The man knows this is a fight for his life and lunges himself into Simon, taking them both to the concrete floor. Now his rifle is beneath him, trapped by his own body weight and the weight of the man on top of him.
“Motherfucker,” the man says, his spittle hitting Simon on the neck. He recognizes this man’s voice as being the last one who’d spoken up about raping Sam. Blue balls asks, “Who the fuck are you?”
His thick, beefy hands encircle Simon’s neck before taking a punch at his jaw. Simon partially deflects. He is used to sparring this way. They do this weekly at the farm to stay fresh. This man is not bigger than Cory, who is usually his sparring partner. However, Sam will never be able to fight this man off. That thought spurs him into action, and Simon unbuttons the snap on his dagger’s sheath on his hip. When the man shifts his weight again and tries strangling him once more, Simon jams the blade into the side of his neck. He immediately rears backward into a kneeling position and sits there grabbing at his neck with surprise and anguish. He shoves his own night-vision gear from his head and stands. He stumbles into the cement wall in a panic as he realizes his life is in jeopardy. Then he falls dead, facedown.
Simon wastes no time in case there are others. He rights his helmet, grabs his pistol once he spies it a few feet away, and takes the man’s radio. Then he presses the side button and talks.
“This is Mitch,” he lies as he jogs back toward the breakroom. “We found her in the building next door. Head our way. We’re on the fifth floor.”
Simon knows there is another apartment building or condo building beside this one and then nothing but an intersection on the other side. They’ll have no choice but to go next door. He hopes they aren’t so stupid they don’t know what he means. Within seconds, three other people call in on Mitch’s tip saying they are going to meet him.
When he opens the office door, she startles and lets out a tiny scream. Then she rushes to him.
“Simon!” she exclaims and throws her arms around his neck briefly. “What the heck happened? Why is there blood on your face?”
“Not mine,” he answers honestly, then realizes he should’ve probably lied. “Let’s move. We need to get out of here right now, Sam. I just bought us maybe five minutes.”
She nods and follows as he jogs through the tunnel system. As he’d hoped, it lets out near the underground parking garage. Unfortunately, they are on the wrong side, so they are forced to jog, lope, and shuffle to the other end because of Sam’s injured ankle. He feels terrible. If they weren’t in such a rush, he’d carry her. Unfortunately, he needs both hands on his weapon. She doesn’t even complain about it. Not once. He knows her fear is propelling her forward, one foot at a time, one sprained ankle being ignored.
He unlocks the Jeep and throws it in their gear while Sam gets in the passenger side and shuts her door. He hears her engage the lock. Once Simon is in, he hands her his M16 and keeps his pistol in his hand. Backing out, he leaves the lights off and relies solely on his night-vision gear to navigate their way out of the garage. He knows the building he sent them to is to his left, so Simon turns right and speeds away, veering around broken down and abandoned vehicles.
“Are you ok?” he asks as he presses the Jeep to thirty-five miles per hour through the city, which feels like seventy.
“Yes, yeah, I’m fine. Are you?”
“Yes,” he answers, angry with himself. “We need to stop so I can look at your ankle.”
“I’ll be fine. Are we going home?”
“I should look at it now.”
Sam vehemently shakes her head. “No, let’s just go home, Simon. I’m fine. Did we get enough information on them? Is it ok to leave the city?”
“Oh, yes,” he says with confidence. “I have a verbal confirmation that Parker thinks he’s the President and has those people in that camp convinced he is.”
“Really?” she asks, twisting in her seat to look at him.
“Yes,” he answers. “When I was sneaking around their camp…”
“Wait, you went into their camp? I thought you were just observing from afar.”
He smiles sheepishly and explains, “Well, it was safe. Mostly everyone was asleep. But I did get close enough to overhear a conversation where someone actually called Parker by his first name and then used the word President right after. It was a couple of women and some men talking.”
“What’d they say?”
“That Parker stopped by here and let them know that the time was coming near for them to be ready.”
His radio sounds off, first with static and then K-Dog’s voice comes over, “Hey, Professor, you readin’ me?”
“Got ya’ loud and clear, over.”
“Yeah, the boss is wantin’ someone to check out that other camp in the morning. I need to get back. He said for you and Little Peanut to stay at the cabin tonight and get on surveillance first thing.”
“Crap,” he states, knowing he means Derek when he says ‘boss’. Lately, people have been calling Sam ‘Little Peanut’, which is silly in his opinion. Little Angel would be better. “Your ankle. I’m going to tell them we can’t.”
“No, don’t,” Sam says, grabbing his arm. “I’ll be fine. I’ll put it up tonight, and it’ll be fine by morning.”
He weighs this for a moment before answering K-Dog, “Yes, sure. We’ll do it.”
“Ten-four. I’ll let the major know, out.”
“Back to our discussion,” Sam reminds him. “What’s that mean? You said Parker told them the time was almost here.”
Simon makes a turn to the right and starts heading toward their cabin hidden away in the woods. The last time they stayed there, they were attacked by the highwaymen. It doesn’t bode well, but if Derek says to do it, he can’t really argue. He’s pretty sure that Parker doesn’t know of the location, not for either cabin. And the ones who attacked them are long since dead with the rest of the highwaymen.
“I can only assume he means the real President is getting close and that he’s hoping we all try to kill one another. One of the women said something about him telling her that the McClane family killed Isabella and Angelica.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Pit them against us. Word has gotten out that the McClane family runs Pleasant View, that General McClane runs Fort Knox, and Isabella and Sofia are missing. He just keeps twisting the story into whatever narrative he needs it to be.”
“What a freak,” Sam says with vigor.
“Yes, well, he certainly is an interesting person. That’s for sure. If he has everyone convinced we’re all evil, it’ll be an easy sell when he orders them to go to war with us and kill us all. He’s caused us so much trouble. We need to find him. I’m hoping Sofia talks tomorrow when we go to question her.”
“Yes, me, too,” she says and then frowns hard.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
Sam shrugs, “I don’t know. I just feel bad. I feel like she’s just one more pawn for him that he’s been using.”
“Yes, I know what you mean,” he agrees and swerves around a tractor-trailer on its side. “But Parker’s another story. If I get to him before anyone else, he won’t stand trial.”
“Simon!” Sam reprimands.
“What? He won’t. I’m just saying. He’s a piece of filth. He got a lot of innocent people killed. Look at little Tessa. She’s an orphan because of the actions of the highwaymen, the highwaymen who were being led by Parker and the senator scumbag. Other children in town have been taken in by families in Pleasant View because of the highwaymen and for the same reason as Tess.”
“And you put it all together,” she praises in the dark. “If it weren’t for you, we’d still be trying to figure it all out.”
“I doubt that,” he tells her. “Herb was close to figuring it out. He had some of it guessed right already. We worked on it together.”
He glances over to find her smiling smugly at him as if he is being too shy to accept the praise. Instead, he changes the subject and has her tell him in detail what happened after he left her in the building by herself. In hindsight, he wishes he would’ve taken her with him. He’d thought it was the safest option, leaving her. Derek had wholeheartedly agreed to the idea. He’d been the one to suggest it in the first place because he’d wanted Simon to get an up close and personal look at the camp. When she is done regaling him of her night’s adventures, Simon feels slightly sick to his stomach. No wonder she’d sounded so fearful on the radio when they’d finally made contact.
“How come you couldn’t hear me when I called you?” she asks when she’s done.
“Oh, that,” he says. “I couldn’t answer. I was in the middle of their camp, and you weren’t coming in very well. I think we were too far out of range or something. As a matter of fact, I was in Parker’s own tent.”
“What? Are you serious?”
He smiles remembering what he did. “Um, yes. He wasn’t there, unfortunately. I heard one of them talking about his tent. Didn’t take long to find it, either. It was the biggest one. You’d think he was some Arabian king in the desert or something.”
“Really? Why?”
“Oh, it was just over the top, ridiculous, pompous. You know, Parker style. But he wasn’t there.”
“Hm, too bad he wasn’t there.”
Simon chuckles, still thinking about it.
“What?”
He immediately states, “Nothing.”
“Simon, what? What’s so funny.”
“Not in a thousand years, Samantha Patterson.”
Sam begins realizing he’s holding something back. “Oh, no. What did you do, Simon?”
“That’s between Parker and me,” he answers firmly and doesn’t reply when she keeps hounding him to know. He could never possibly tell her, not the girl he’s in love with. He wouldn’t want her to look at him like that. He’d come across a dead raccoon in the woods and went back to carry it to Parker’s tent. He’d placed it just under the edge of the tent where his bed was located. In a few days, it ought to stink to high heaven, and it will take a while to figure out where the odor is coming from. Then, just for a backup plan, Simon ensured that even if they find the dead raccoon, there would still be an odor in his tent. Some dirty deeds like taking a leak on one’s enemy’s bed are not something a person should tell his future wife. He just hopes it dries before Parker comes back. That way, even after the dead raccoon is discovered, he won’t be able to tell why his bed still isn’t living up to his high standards or where the odd smell is coming from.