Renegades, page 31
11
The guards turned Chuck out into the yard after his meeting with the Commander and he immediately fell to his knees. The alarm stirred up by the news of Volo’s enumeration was only dampened by the failure of his appeal to save Jemma’s and his own life. He had nowhere left to turn. Garrett. Garrett is our only hope now. But he would have to intervene before tomorrow.
Chuck had closed his eyes and could hear light footsteps approaching. He looked up to find tears streaming down Jemma’s face. She knew the answer just by observing his reaction to the meeting.
“Garrett’s our only hope now,” Chuck said.
Jemma kneeled down next to him and draped her arms around his neck. “If he knows about it, he has to come. We saved him! He has to save us!”
“We have another problem, too. Volo. They’re going to enumerate him.”
Jemma sat up and looked at Chuck with wide eyes. “What? Why? He didn’t do anything that we didn’t do.”
“He was in charge. He was our leader. His punishment is more severe. They want to make an example of him. At least, that’s what I think.”
“We have to tell him! We have to…”
“We have to kill him, Jem. It’s his only way out.”
Chapter 14
Prisoners
1
Directly behind the bridge of Lance 5 was an officer’s lounge, and Reggie sat alone at the single oak table that could seat as many as eight people. The room was designed to promote relaxation. The walls were painted a rich cream color and adorned with dark wood trim. Two black metal sconces adorned each wall and emitted a warm but sufficiently bright light. On opposite sides of the table were a coffee bar and a liquor cabinet with selections from such foreign lands as Scotland, Russia, Kentucky, and Mexico.
On the table in front of him was his second cup of coffee, a sharpened pencil, and a notepad. The front page of the pad had been almost completely filled with his scribblings, but at the bottom of the sheet was a number, 5.6, that he had traced through many times, so it appeared bold.
Reggie heard footsteps approaching as he sipped his coffee. Ander appeared in the doorway.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Reggie said. “We need to talk.”
Ander walked to the coffee bar and prepared his own cup. “About?”
“About this ship. We took damage, Ander. A lot of damage. We are going to run out of fuel.”
Ander stirred his beverage and turned toward Reggie. “How? Didn’t we have the cells loaded before we left? How are we going to run out?”
“We have plenty of plates, but they’re decaying far too quickly.”
“Is that because of your modifications?”
Reggie laughed. “No. There was an efficiency loss of 11%, but even still, we should have had enough fuel to make it all the way to Aila and then halfway back to Orris. At this rate we’re… well, we’re not going to make it to Aila at all. At least not without more fuel and major repairs.”
Ander sat down across the table from his technical expert. “What if we stop now? Stop and make the repairs now?”
Reggie shook his head. “No, we’d have to wait a few days before the reactor would be safe to enter, and the whole time we were waiting, the plates would still be decaying. It would be a waste. We need to get as far as we can with what we have and then make a plan. We have to get to the Milky Way, Ander. There is nothing out here to mine, almost nothing at all.”
“How long, then. Before we have to stop?”
“Five days. A little more than five. When the reactor reaches seven percent, the Lance will drop the envelope to conserve power. At that point, we’ll be without warp capabilities, but hopefully we’ll have traveled far enough that we can get into a system and find the ore we’ll need. Ideally in meteoroids.”
“Can’t we recycle the plates? I thought this was something these Lances could do to partially replenish their fuel.”
“Yes, and we will. But I don’t know how efficiently that will work. I don’t want to rely on it. We should prepare as though that solution will be insufficient for our needs.”
“What about the antimatter? Why can’t we use it for fuel?”
Reggie shook his head again. “There is nothing on this old ship that can use antimatter. I brought that to help us build our new world. It’s useless until we get to Aila.”
Ander sat back hard in his chair. “So, we wait until the ship takes itself out of warp speed, assess our location, and then go to the closest star?
Reggie nodded. “Yes, but we’ll stop before that. I’ll want warp capability in case we need it.”
2
Becca, Jerrick, and Petra walked through the old agricultural fields of Lance 5 as part of the brief tour Becca was giving them. All the fields were plowed over, the soil exposed and dry, since there had not been any generated rain in over a month.
“During our flight to Orris, these fields were always in use. They would plant and move to the next field over and plant that one, and then when it came time to harvest, they would do so, then plant a different crop. It was an endless cycle, but it kept us all well fed. There wasn’t a lot of variety, but there was plenty to go around.”
Jerrick shrugged. “If we run into a problem, we may have to use them again. But we don’t have any seed. We’d have to scavenge what we could from our food supply and hope for the best.”
Becca smiled. “I don’t think so, Jer. If there was a need, we would just go over there,” Becca said, pointing to a long, single-story brick building that looked out of place among the fields. “That’s the seed store. I don’t imagine they emptied the store, since they don’t appear to have removed anything at all from the Lance.”
“Well, that’s good to know,” Petra said. “It’s too bad we can’t grow meat.”
“Reggie probably can,” Jerrick and Becca said simultaneously, and all three laughed.
“In all seriousness, we brought livestock. It’s all up in the residential area now until we can get it to the range or pens. It’s slow moving, though.”
Petra smiled. “That is really excellent news. I’m still trying to gain weight.” She turned to Becca. “This might be a dumb question, but what about fish? Did you have a way of raising fish?”
“Yes, we did. Let’s go to the fisheries next. I want to see if they’re still stocked.”
3
Ander emerged from the two large doors leading to the loading dock on Lance 5 and stepped down into the living center. He wanted to check on the progress of his secret project while Becca was out giving the tour to Jerrick and Petra, but that meant finding the small, runt of a man among the crowds. A stack of crates to his left served as a lookout, and he stood atop the highest one to better view the bobbing heads of the foot traffic below him.
After observing the new inhabitants of Lance 5 for only three minutes with no success, Ander opted to walk the street closest to him, hoping Ehgrim would find him. He walked past the post office, what appeared to be a long-forgotten butcher shop, an equally forgotten leather goods retail shop, and finally the jailhouse.
“Mine first, ‘bassador Wex! Here!” Ehgrim called, running down the grassy hill next to the jail. “Mine first,’bassador Wex. Come! Follow!”
Ander shook his head but was happy to find his portly operative. He followed, as Ehgrim requested, up the hill and around to the back of the jailhouse. He was getting a sick feeling in his stomach. The jail was too open, too public, too visible.
Ehgrim pulled the back door to the jailhouse open, and Ander’s fears were realized. The three large crates were just sitting in the short aisleway between the eight holding cells.
“You idiot! Anyone could walk in here and see these!”
Ehgrim’s smile melted off his face and was replaced by dread. He grabbed at the loose material of his shirt above his belt buckle and kneaded it with both hands, looking up at Ander with tears in his eyes.
“Ugh! Get these crates emptied! Break them down and get them out of here. I want this aisleway clear! And hang some sheets up on these bars when you’re finished. I don’t want anyone peeping at what’s behind them. Do you understand me?”
“Muh, muh… Muh mine first, yes, yes. I’ll hang sheets. Huh, hang sheets.”
“Do it fast, Ehgrim. I want this done. And when you’re finished, I want you to lock all the doors. The front one too. Gather all the keys in the office and bring them to me. After that, stay away from this building. Do you understand that?”
“Away. Yes, mine first. Away from the jail. Yes. Mine first. Yes, locked up tight,” the short, fat man said and picked up a pry bar off the floor. He started prying the wooden crates apart.
4
With the tour complete, Becca returned to the bridge to find it empty. She turned and walked into the officer’s lounge where Reggie was still seated with large, unfurled schematics in front of him. He was writing on his notepad and rubbing his temple.
“Hey, Reggie, what are you working on?”
“I’m re-familiarizing myself with the reactors on these old ships. Trying to determine what would cause the plates to decay so quickly without inspecting it for myself. Becca, we’re going to have to make a stop in a few days and repair the reactor. I’m going to need your help.”
Becca nodded and made a cup of coffee for herself. “Why? What’s going on?”
Reggie explained what he had discovered, addressing every detail. As he talked, Becca heard Ander on the bridge speaking to someone out of sight and heard a jingling like coins or keys. Under normal circumstances, it would have been enough to cause her to question him, but as she was heavily engaged in the conversation with Reggie, the thought slipped to the back of her mind.
“So, we’ll stop when we’re at ten percent? We’ll still need warp ability to get to the system,” Becca said.
Reggie nodded. “Ten or twelve, yes. It wouldn’t make sense to do it sooner, because any course correction now would be infinitely small.”
“Do you think we’ll make it? Will the reactor last long enough?”
“Yes, my estimates put us well within the outer arm on the near side.
Becca ran her fingertips over a brass plate embedded in the hard wood of the table. It had been engraved: Hendall Timber & Mill, Easton, WA, November, 2068. Several coats of lacquer had smoothed over the plate so she could not feel its engraving.
5
“Hey, Jerrick!” a voice called. It was Todd’s voice, but Jerrick could not see where he was.
“Jerrick, up here!”
Jerrick looked up to find Todd on the top of the hill behind the jailhouse, beckoning to him. He trudged up the hill, still tired from his excursion with Petra and Becca.
Once at the top, Todd stepped over to the back doors of the jailhouse and turned the knob, pulled, turned the knob more, and jerked the handle back and forth, all to prove that…
“It’s locked,” he said. “The front is, too. I already checked it. And the windows are useless. It’s so dark in there, you can’t see anything at all!”
Jerrick stood, contemplating how he might break in, when he placed his hands in his pockets and felt the knuckles of his right-hand crash into the set of keys he had picked up to let Todd out of his cell. He held them up for Todd to see.
“It might be easier than we think,” Jerrick said. Only one of the double doors had a lock and knob on it, and he tried the keys. The second one worked. The two men stepped into the newly cleared aisleway between the cells to find the bars all draped over with sheets. Jerrick shrugged at Todd, who shrugged back and started pulling the sheets down.
Although removing the sheets offered a little more light, it was still difficult for Jerrick’s eyes to adjust. When they did, what he saw startled him. Bags. Large black plastic bags cinched closed at the ends.
He suddenly felt sick to his stomach.
“They look like… bodies,” Todd said. “We should tell someone. The tall guy. The leader.”
“You mean Ander, and I have a fairly good idea that he already knows about it, Todd. Someone had to set this project in motion.”
Jerrick reached between the bars and placed a hand on one of the lumpy bags. His heart raced. It felt like a shoulder.
“Then who? We have to tell someone.”
“Yes. We do. But we have to be smart. We have to tell the one person Ander has no power over.”
6
Becca stared into her empty cup while Reggie prattled on about secondary heat transfer systems. The two had gone through the primary reactor process map thoroughly, and each had suggested potential causes for the accelerated decay. She was still listening to Reggie but thought he had gone far beyond the meat of the exercise and was wading into seriously abstract possibilities.
The door to the bridge opened with its telltale squeak and then clicked shut again. She looked up to the doorway that led to the bridge, expecting to see Ander, but it was Jerrick. She smiled at him, but he stared at her with a stone-faced seriousness and did not speak.
“We’ll have to pick this up later, Reggie,” she said, and Reggie nodded without looking up from the schematics. She stood and walked onto the bridge, where Jerrick was waiting.
Jerrick’s face was paler than usual, but his cheeks were flushed. He did not speak, instead taking her hand and glancing briefly at the door leading to the loading dock. Becca nodded slowly and allowed herself to be led off the bridge to the staircase that ended on the dock floor.
As they reached the bottom of the staircase, she broke her silence. “Jerrick, what is going on? What is this?”
Jerrick stopped and turned toward her. “I don’t know exactly, but I have a really awful feeling, Becca. You have to be with me when we investigate this. I can’t have you thinking I was involved with it, whatever it is. It’s not worth trying to explain it. Just come with me and see for yourself.”
Becca sighed and shook her head. “Okay, let’s go.”
While they walked, Jerrick filled her in on what he knew at that point: the temporary holding cell for Todd, the crates, and then the locked doors and sheets hung to darken the room. As they approached the jail house, they found Todd sitting in the grass close to the road and away from the prison.
“Are you coming with us, Todd?” Jerrick asked.
“Yeah, I didn’t want to be in there alone, though,” he stood and looked at Becca. “I’m not a prisoner anymore, in case you were wondering.”
Becca smiled and extended a hand to Todd. “Becca Rose.”
Todd shook her hand. “Todd Bixly.”
“Come on, let’s get this over with,” Jerrick said, and marched up the hill to the back of the jailhouse.
Becca watched as Todd chased after him, and she began the effort of climbing the hill herself. When she reached the end of the building, she turned the corner expecting to find the two men, but only found an open door. She approached it and peered into the jail. Both were standing between the cells and staring at her through the doorway.
“This is as far as we got. Once we saw this, I knew I had to get you involved, Becca. Look,” Jerrick pointed into the cell to his right. Black plastic bags were piled two high, three in some places.
Becca scanned the rest of the small jailhouse to find all but one cell had been filled with the bags. She suspected there were about twenty-five or thirty in the first cell, which put the total at well over a hundred and fifty bags. Maybe as many as two hundred.
She looked at Jerrick and pointed to the cell door lock. “Can we open these?”
Jerrick looked surprised at first, and then recognition broke across his face. “Yeah, right here, yes.” He fumbled in his pocket for a moment before bringing out the keyring. He tried several keys before finding the right one, but finally the lock turned, and the door rolled open.
Becca kneeled down on the concrete floor before the closest bag and took a deep breath. The openings of the bags had just been crimped and knotted, and she carefully undid the large knot. When long, sandy brown hair first slipped out and then hung down from inside the bag, Todd fell to his knees and Jerrick let out a loud grunt. Becca covered her face with both of her hands and breathed deeply and quickly. After a moment, she recovered from the initial shock, and she pushed the bag back to reveal the cold, pale face of a young girl, perhaps fourteen years old.
“Oh!” Todd said, and then vomited in the aisleway of the jailhouse.
“So many,” Jerrick said, and gripped the bars of the cell to steady himself.
Becca stood, her heart raced, and she felt tears welling in her eyes. Ander.
“Monster,” she said, and looked up to find Todd darting for the door.
The guards turned Chuck out into the yard after his meeting with the Commander and he immediately fell to his knees. The alarm stirred up by the news of Volo’s enumeration was only dampened by the failure of his appeal to save Jemma’s and his own life. He had nowhere left to turn. Garrett. Garrett is our only hope now. But he would have to intervene before tomorrow.
Chuck had closed his eyes and could hear light footsteps approaching. He looked up to find tears streaming down Jemma’s face. She knew the answer just by observing his reaction to the meeting.
“Garrett’s our only hope now,” Chuck said.
Jemma kneeled down next to him and draped her arms around his neck. “If he knows about it, he has to come. We saved him! He has to save us!”
“We have another problem, too. Volo. They’re going to enumerate him.”
Jemma sat up and looked at Chuck with wide eyes. “What? Why? He didn’t do anything that we didn’t do.”
“He was in charge. He was our leader. His punishment is more severe. They want to make an example of him. At least, that’s what I think.”
“We have to tell him! We have to…”
“We have to kill him, Jem. It’s his only way out.”
Chapter 14
Prisoners
1
Directly behind the bridge of Lance 5 was an officer’s lounge, and Reggie sat alone at the single oak table that could seat as many as eight people. The room was designed to promote relaxation. The walls were painted a rich cream color and adorned with dark wood trim. Two black metal sconces adorned each wall and emitted a warm but sufficiently bright light. On opposite sides of the table were a coffee bar and a liquor cabinet with selections from such foreign lands as Scotland, Russia, Kentucky, and Mexico.
On the table in front of him was his second cup of coffee, a sharpened pencil, and a notepad. The front page of the pad had been almost completely filled with his scribblings, but at the bottom of the sheet was a number, 5.6, that he had traced through many times, so it appeared bold.
Reggie heard footsteps approaching as he sipped his coffee. Ander appeared in the doorway.
“I’m glad you’re here,” Reggie said. “We need to talk.”
Ander walked to the coffee bar and prepared his own cup. “About?”
“About this ship. We took damage, Ander. A lot of damage. We are going to run out of fuel.”
Ander stirred his beverage and turned toward Reggie. “How? Didn’t we have the cells loaded before we left? How are we going to run out?”
“We have plenty of plates, but they’re decaying far too quickly.”
“Is that because of your modifications?”
Reggie laughed. “No. There was an efficiency loss of 11%, but even still, we should have had enough fuel to make it all the way to Aila and then halfway back to Orris. At this rate we’re… well, we’re not going to make it to Aila at all. At least not without more fuel and major repairs.”
Ander sat down across the table from his technical expert. “What if we stop now? Stop and make the repairs now?”
Reggie shook his head. “No, we’d have to wait a few days before the reactor would be safe to enter, and the whole time we were waiting, the plates would still be decaying. It would be a waste. We need to get as far as we can with what we have and then make a plan. We have to get to the Milky Way, Ander. There is nothing out here to mine, almost nothing at all.”
“How long, then. Before we have to stop?”
“Five days. A little more than five. When the reactor reaches seven percent, the Lance will drop the envelope to conserve power. At that point, we’ll be without warp capabilities, but hopefully we’ll have traveled far enough that we can get into a system and find the ore we’ll need. Ideally in meteoroids.”
“Can’t we recycle the plates? I thought this was something these Lances could do to partially replenish their fuel.”
“Yes, and we will. But I don’t know how efficiently that will work. I don’t want to rely on it. We should prepare as though that solution will be insufficient for our needs.”
“What about the antimatter? Why can’t we use it for fuel?”
Reggie shook his head again. “There is nothing on this old ship that can use antimatter. I brought that to help us build our new world. It’s useless until we get to Aila.”
Ander sat back hard in his chair. “So, we wait until the ship takes itself out of warp speed, assess our location, and then go to the closest star?
Reggie nodded. “Yes, but we’ll stop before that. I’ll want warp capability in case we need it.”
2
Becca, Jerrick, and Petra walked through the old agricultural fields of Lance 5 as part of the brief tour Becca was giving them. All the fields were plowed over, the soil exposed and dry, since there had not been any generated rain in over a month.
“During our flight to Orris, these fields were always in use. They would plant and move to the next field over and plant that one, and then when it came time to harvest, they would do so, then plant a different crop. It was an endless cycle, but it kept us all well fed. There wasn’t a lot of variety, but there was plenty to go around.”
Jerrick shrugged. “If we run into a problem, we may have to use them again. But we don’t have any seed. We’d have to scavenge what we could from our food supply and hope for the best.”
Becca smiled. “I don’t think so, Jer. If there was a need, we would just go over there,” Becca said, pointing to a long, single-story brick building that looked out of place among the fields. “That’s the seed store. I don’t imagine they emptied the store, since they don’t appear to have removed anything at all from the Lance.”
“Well, that’s good to know,” Petra said. “It’s too bad we can’t grow meat.”
“Reggie probably can,” Jerrick and Becca said simultaneously, and all three laughed.
“In all seriousness, we brought livestock. It’s all up in the residential area now until we can get it to the range or pens. It’s slow moving, though.”
Petra smiled. “That is really excellent news. I’m still trying to gain weight.” She turned to Becca. “This might be a dumb question, but what about fish? Did you have a way of raising fish?”
“Yes, we did. Let’s go to the fisheries next. I want to see if they’re still stocked.”
3
Ander emerged from the two large doors leading to the loading dock on Lance 5 and stepped down into the living center. He wanted to check on the progress of his secret project while Becca was out giving the tour to Jerrick and Petra, but that meant finding the small, runt of a man among the crowds. A stack of crates to his left served as a lookout, and he stood atop the highest one to better view the bobbing heads of the foot traffic below him.
After observing the new inhabitants of Lance 5 for only three minutes with no success, Ander opted to walk the street closest to him, hoping Ehgrim would find him. He walked past the post office, what appeared to be a long-forgotten butcher shop, an equally forgotten leather goods retail shop, and finally the jailhouse.
“Mine first, ‘bassador Wex! Here!” Ehgrim called, running down the grassy hill next to the jail. “Mine first,’bassador Wex. Come! Follow!”
Ander shook his head but was happy to find his portly operative. He followed, as Ehgrim requested, up the hill and around to the back of the jailhouse. He was getting a sick feeling in his stomach. The jail was too open, too public, too visible.
Ehgrim pulled the back door to the jailhouse open, and Ander’s fears were realized. The three large crates were just sitting in the short aisleway between the eight holding cells.
“You idiot! Anyone could walk in here and see these!”
Ehgrim’s smile melted off his face and was replaced by dread. He grabbed at the loose material of his shirt above his belt buckle and kneaded it with both hands, looking up at Ander with tears in his eyes.
“Ugh! Get these crates emptied! Break them down and get them out of here. I want this aisleway clear! And hang some sheets up on these bars when you’re finished. I don’t want anyone peeping at what’s behind them. Do you understand me?”
“Muh, muh… Muh mine first, yes, yes. I’ll hang sheets. Huh, hang sheets.”
“Do it fast, Ehgrim. I want this done. And when you’re finished, I want you to lock all the doors. The front one too. Gather all the keys in the office and bring them to me. After that, stay away from this building. Do you understand that?”
“Away. Yes, mine first. Away from the jail. Yes. Mine first. Yes, locked up tight,” the short, fat man said and picked up a pry bar off the floor. He started prying the wooden crates apart.
4
With the tour complete, Becca returned to the bridge to find it empty. She turned and walked into the officer’s lounge where Reggie was still seated with large, unfurled schematics in front of him. He was writing on his notepad and rubbing his temple.
“Hey, Reggie, what are you working on?”
“I’m re-familiarizing myself with the reactors on these old ships. Trying to determine what would cause the plates to decay so quickly without inspecting it for myself. Becca, we’re going to have to make a stop in a few days and repair the reactor. I’m going to need your help.”
Becca nodded and made a cup of coffee for herself. “Why? What’s going on?”
Reggie explained what he had discovered, addressing every detail. As he talked, Becca heard Ander on the bridge speaking to someone out of sight and heard a jingling like coins or keys. Under normal circumstances, it would have been enough to cause her to question him, but as she was heavily engaged in the conversation with Reggie, the thought slipped to the back of her mind.
“So, we’ll stop when we’re at ten percent? We’ll still need warp ability to get to the system,” Becca said.
Reggie nodded. “Ten or twelve, yes. It wouldn’t make sense to do it sooner, because any course correction now would be infinitely small.”
“Do you think we’ll make it? Will the reactor last long enough?”
“Yes, my estimates put us well within the outer arm on the near side.
Becca ran her fingertips over a brass plate embedded in the hard wood of the table. It had been engraved: Hendall Timber & Mill, Easton, WA, November, 2068. Several coats of lacquer had smoothed over the plate so she could not feel its engraving.
5
“Hey, Jerrick!” a voice called. It was Todd’s voice, but Jerrick could not see where he was.
“Jerrick, up here!”
Jerrick looked up to find Todd on the top of the hill behind the jailhouse, beckoning to him. He trudged up the hill, still tired from his excursion with Petra and Becca.
Once at the top, Todd stepped over to the back doors of the jailhouse and turned the knob, pulled, turned the knob more, and jerked the handle back and forth, all to prove that…
“It’s locked,” he said. “The front is, too. I already checked it. And the windows are useless. It’s so dark in there, you can’t see anything at all!”
Jerrick stood, contemplating how he might break in, when he placed his hands in his pockets and felt the knuckles of his right-hand crash into the set of keys he had picked up to let Todd out of his cell. He held them up for Todd to see.
“It might be easier than we think,” Jerrick said. Only one of the double doors had a lock and knob on it, and he tried the keys. The second one worked. The two men stepped into the newly cleared aisleway between the cells to find the bars all draped over with sheets. Jerrick shrugged at Todd, who shrugged back and started pulling the sheets down.
Although removing the sheets offered a little more light, it was still difficult for Jerrick’s eyes to adjust. When they did, what he saw startled him. Bags. Large black plastic bags cinched closed at the ends.
He suddenly felt sick to his stomach.
“They look like… bodies,” Todd said. “We should tell someone. The tall guy. The leader.”
“You mean Ander, and I have a fairly good idea that he already knows about it, Todd. Someone had to set this project in motion.”
Jerrick reached between the bars and placed a hand on one of the lumpy bags. His heart raced. It felt like a shoulder.
“Then who? We have to tell someone.”
“Yes. We do. But we have to be smart. We have to tell the one person Ander has no power over.”
6
Becca stared into her empty cup while Reggie prattled on about secondary heat transfer systems. The two had gone through the primary reactor process map thoroughly, and each had suggested potential causes for the accelerated decay. She was still listening to Reggie but thought he had gone far beyond the meat of the exercise and was wading into seriously abstract possibilities.
The door to the bridge opened with its telltale squeak and then clicked shut again. She looked up to the doorway that led to the bridge, expecting to see Ander, but it was Jerrick. She smiled at him, but he stared at her with a stone-faced seriousness and did not speak.
“We’ll have to pick this up later, Reggie,” she said, and Reggie nodded without looking up from the schematics. She stood and walked onto the bridge, where Jerrick was waiting.
Jerrick’s face was paler than usual, but his cheeks were flushed. He did not speak, instead taking her hand and glancing briefly at the door leading to the loading dock. Becca nodded slowly and allowed herself to be led off the bridge to the staircase that ended on the dock floor.
As they reached the bottom of the staircase, she broke her silence. “Jerrick, what is going on? What is this?”
Jerrick stopped and turned toward her. “I don’t know exactly, but I have a really awful feeling, Becca. You have to be with me when we investigate this. I can’t have you thinking I was involved with it, whatever it is. It’s not worth trying to explain it. Just come with me and see for yourself.”
Becca sighed and shook her head. “Okay, let’s go.”
While they walked, Jerrick filled her in on what he knew at that point: the temporary holding cell for Todd, the crates, and then the locked doors and sheets hung to darken the room. As they approached the jail house, they found Todd sitting in the grass close to the road and away from the prison.
“Are you coming with us, Todd?” Jerrick asked.
“Yeah, I didn’t want to be in there alone, though,” he stood and looked at Becca. “I’m not a prisoner anymore, in case you were wondering.”
Becca smiled and extended a hand to Todd. “Becca Rose.”
Todd shook her hand. “Todd Bixly.”
“Come on, let’s get this over with,” Jerrick said, and marched up the hill to the back of the jailhouse.
Becca watched as Todd chased after him, and she began the effort of climbing the hill herself. When she reached the end of the building, she turned the corner expecting to find the two men, but only found an open door. She approached it and peered into the jail. Both were standing between the cells and staring at her through the doorway.
“This is as far as we got. Once we saw this, I knew I had to get you involved, Becca. Look,” Jerrick pointed into the cell to his right. Black plastic bags were piled two high, three in some places.
Becca scanned the rest of the small jailhouse to find all but one cell had been filled with the bags. She suspected there were about twenty-five or thirty in the first cell, which put the total at well over a hundred and fifty bags. Maybe as many as two hundred.
She looked at Jerrick and pointed to the cell door lock. “Can we open these?”
Jerrick looked surprised at first, and then recognition broke across his face. “Yeah, right here, yes.” He fumbled in his pocket for a moment before bringing out the keyring. He tried several keys before finding the right one, but finally the lock turned, and the door rolled open.
Becca kneeled down on the concrete floor before the closest bag and took a deep breath. The openings of the bags had just been crimped and knotted, and she carefully undid the large knot. When long, sandy brown hair first slipped out and then hung down from inside the bag, Todd fell to his knees and Jerrick let out a loud grunt. Becca covered her face with both of her hands and breathed deeply and quickly. After a moment, she recovered from the initial shock, and she pushed the bag back to reveal the cold, pale face of a young girl, perhaps fourteen years old.
“Oh!” Todd said, and then vomited in the aisleway of the jailhouse.
“So many,” Jerrick said, and gripped the bars of the cell to steady himself.
Becca stood, her heart raced, and she felt tears welling in her eyes. Ander.
“Monster,” she said, and looked up to find Todd darting for the door.
