(yeahh! its literally been months now i just have to present it and i'll be done!)
Jessie tugged at the knot around the man's ankles one last time before moving up to his pockets. "I don't see anything," she told them guiltily. "They must have had it memorized."
Charlotte nodded and looked back at the door. "Well. Rick, I think you're probably the most capable of getting through this by force." Charlotte was good at hand-to-hand because of her reflexes, but brute strength had never been a natural talent.
(Congrats! Good luck presenting it! ^^)
"Alright," Rick said. Standing up, he walked over to the door to size it up. "I'll try to be quiet, but stand by in case somebody's on the other side."
Upon closer inspection, he discovered—just as Charlotte had—that the door wasn't reinforced. Unsheathing his knife, he used it to pop the keypad's casing open, then cut the wires beneath. He'd been working off a hunch, and luckily it paid off. There was a whirring sound, and the deadbolt on the other side of the door disengaged as it lost power. After that, all it took was a well-aimed diagonal strike to shatter the simpler mechanism within the doorknob. Creaking in protest, the door swung slightly open and Rick caught it before it could give them away. "Got it."
Charlotte slid up next to the door, right up against the wall with her gun pointed up in a pose she had always loved for how professional it felt.
The door made a faint popping sound before Rick struck it, and it swung open. Charlotte smiled at him, her shoulders loosening for just a second before tensing back up.
"Okay," she murmured, walking slowly into the building with her gun out in front of her. A long grey hallway stretched out ahead, punctuated by a couple doors similar to the one they'd just entered– from here, Charlotte could tell the furthest one opened onto a staircase.
Jessie turned to face Slash and waved him inside.
Slash looked around one more time, then slunk over, shifting back into his human form. "Smells bad in here," he muttered, sticking close to the group.
Rick wedged the door closed behind them, then glanced at Charlotte. "D'you think we could use Slash's nose to find your kids? He tracked down Jessie pretty easy…..and it sure would make this job go faster."
(sorry!! I had a couple big exams this week and that kind of took all my focus)
Charlotte stared at the hall ahead, trying not to let herself be daunted by the sheer amount of ground they had to cover. The size of their task was slowly settling.
"Yeah. Slash, you're up." Anything to help them. There was no room for weakness.
Jessie couldn't help a little swell of pride– Slash was going to help! Her friend could do something very productive, and it made her happy for him.
(no worries! Hope it went well! ^^)
Slash nodded eagerly and stepped forward, but Rick caught his arm before he could get started.
"We're still tryin' to be sneaky here," he reminded Slash. "If we see or hear somebody we ain't lookin' for, we avoid 'em."
Slash resisted the urge to roll his eyes and nodded, going up to stand at the front of the group, near Charlotte. "I know I'm searching for kids, but what are they like? Do you think they'll smell mostly like Jessie?"
Charlotte looked down as Slash came up to her. "Definitely not. Whatever Jessie smells like, Will and Tess will be more metallic and… clean," she added with an apologetic glance at Jessie. "They've been back here for years, so they're going to fit in with this sort of environment much more than anything like the forest. Tessa will be around 16, and Will around Jessie's age."
Thinking about them hurt. She couldn't even bear imagining what had become of them with only Axel to care for them, if it could even be called caring.
Slash nodded and took in a deep breath, sorting through the scents in the air all around him. He didn't enjoy it. Everything was stale and inorganic and reeked of humans. Even the draft from the doorway didn't help—it only stirred up older smells of fear, aggression, and exhaustion. Slash narrowed his eyes against the overpowering message to 'keep out', instead stepping forward and stubbornly focusing on the scent of younger humans.
"I think I can find them," he said eventually, trying not to sneeze. "There's definitely something here, just not very close to us. Maybe if we open some of these other doors I'll be able to trace it easier."
Charlotte nodded and waved Jessie and Rick forward for them to walk forward with her and quietly open all the doors in the hallway.
“Let’s take one door at a time in case we need to knock some people out.”
She went for the first door and stopped right next to it. She looked over at Rick as Jessie stopped in front of Charlotte on the other side of the door.
Open the door, she mouthed at Rick.
Rick picked up on Charlotte's plan and, keeping his knife drawn, stealthily approached the door. Grabbing the handle, he listened closely for a moment before turning it and pushing the door open, then swiftly stepping back so he could see inside without getting in the way of the girls.
(I’m gonna do a bit of a speed through this part? Just so that we can keep the pace?)
Jessie deftly rolled against the doorframe into the room. It was empty, save for a dirty table, a pile of papers and a metal cupboard. With Jessie’s lack of reaction, Charlotte followed the girl into the room.
“Okay, let’s move on. Let’s just get through these rooms and move on. They covered a few more rooms, a couple storage rooms and one seeming interrogation room, and got to the last door. Charlotte stood in front of the door, Jessie at her side, and kicked it open. The man inside jumped to his feet but before he could reach for anything Charlotte fired a shot into his shoulder. Thank god she had put a silencer on the firearm, or else they’d have attracted a lot of attention.
(Probably a good idea ^^)
Even with the silencer, the noise of the scuffle was loud enough to make Rick flinch and glance over his shoulder. Slash, however, didn't hesitate to carry on ahead as he followed the scent trail. At the far end of this room, he found another door which, judging by the much more interesting smells on his radar, would eventually lead to the base's food supply.
"Maybe the kids are eating breakfast fight now," he suggested in a whisper.
"I hope they're still asleep," Rick replied, looking at his watch. "If they're up already, that means soon everyone else will be too. Let's keep movin'."
Slash nodded and nudged the door open, checking for hostiles before slipping into the branching hallway beyond and choosing the central path.
(okay cool)
Charlotte shut the door behind them all and ushered Jessie towards the door Slash had found.
"The kids will probably wake up with the other guards in a bit less than an hour, I'd estimate. It'll be a shift change," Charlotte murmured just loud enough for everyone to hear.
The group quietly made their way across the hallway, similar to the last one except for it had the one door and a whiter light.
"Do you smell anything?" Charlotte asked the Deorn. She scanned the hallway and stopped at the singular door to see it was a staircase. Facing the stairwell door was another hallway.
"I don't think they'll be downstairs," Jessie thought aloud. "Our rooms were always on the second floor."
Slash sniffed the air and nodded. "They're not downstairs," he confirmed. "At least not right now."
Rick patted his shoulder. "You're making this a lot easier, son. Good work. charlotte, I think we should switch up the marchin' order a bit since these halls are narrow. You go first with Slash so you can recognize the kids and keep 'em calm once we track 'em down, and I'll take up the rear so I can watch our backs. Fair enough?"
Charlotte nodded, a knot rising into her throat. Hearing someone else mention the kids made it all very real, if the strong metallic smell and harsh lighting had not.
She shouldered open the door, her gun still in hand, and took the stairs slowly, carefully. It was perfectly silent and she waved for the others to follow.
The top of the stairs were closed off by another door. She indicated for Slash, who was shorter and wouldn’t be seen, to check and see if anyone was in the hall.
Slash tested the air carefully, then nudged the door slightly open and peeked through. He didn't see or hear anyone immediately, but he could tell that the deeper they got into the building, the harder it would be for them to avoid people entirely. The smell of human activity was quite strong by now.
"Nothing yet," he whispered back. "We can keep going. I think we're getting close, though."
Charlotte nodded and mouthed a thank you at him. She walked out into the hall cautiously and checked both sides as if she was crossing the road. This hall was bright with natural light and felt warmer. Slash was right: people were around. Ahead of her the short hall led into a big room that she could not tell the nature of. Behind her, the hall branched out into 3 different directions.
Jessie followed Slash and Charlotte out into the hall a moment later. The familiarity of the layout struck her instantly. “The dorms are definitely down that,” she whispered, pointing towards the fork. “That big room on the other end is a training room and armoury.”
Slash didn't know what dorms, training rooms, or armories even were, but he could smell that the kids were in the direction Jessie pointed, so he headed there.
Rick sheathed his knife, hanging back. A sudden worry had struck him—here he was, a huge, military-clad man with tattoos and scars and enough weapons to supply a whole platoon. What if the kids saw him and assumed he was an enemy? He didn't want to scare them or make things worse for Charlotte. Guiltily, he wavered at the crossroads. "Why don't you three go ahead," he called softly. "I'll keep watch here in case somebody shows up, alright?"
Charlotte, who had been halfway to the middle of the fork, stopped in her tracks and whipped around. From where she was, with Jessie and Slash ahead of her, Rick stood completely alone. She bit her lip– a lookout wasn't a bad idea, if she was being honest with herself, and it'd be better for everyone if her feelings weren't getting in the way of tactics. But if something happened to him, and he'd been alone and helpless to the group of soldiers who'd bear down on him, she would never forgive herself.
She tried to calm her pounding heart.
"You have to be careful," she told him, in a tone that sounded too close to pleading for her taste.
"Careful as a mama crocodile," Rick promised, flashing a smile. "Now go on, your kids are waitin'."
Slash turned around so they wouldn't see him roll his eyes. "Yeah, let's hurry and get them before everybody else wakes up. Rick's, like, huge. He can take care of himself."
Charlotte let out a bit of a laugh. "I like that expression," she said, probably too quietly for Rick to hear. She nodded at him, feeling reassured, and followed Slash. The Deorn was right, there were other things to focus on.
"Alright then. Which way are we going?" she asked him. Jessie was looking around, trying to recognise which way the dorms were.
Slash took in one last deep breath to be sure. "Well….there are girls one way and boys the other. So I guess maybe we're going both ways?" The thought of living in a cramped enclosed space with a bunch of other boys his age made him very uncomfortable, but he'd learned by now that humans seemingly weren't bothered by crowded environments. "I dunno if you ever told me whether we're looking for girls or boys."
Charlotte frowned slightly. "Sorry. Two of my children are here, Tessa and Will. She's 17, and Will is the same age as Jessie."
"He's younger," Jessie piped up. "He'll only be 14. I'm already 15."
Charlotte looked over at Jessie. "Sorry," she said again. Then, to Slash, "There you have it. A 17 year old girl, and a 14 year old boy."
"M'kay. Well, girls are that way–" He pointed to the right. "And boys are the other way. I can't tell any specifics other than that from here." He paused. "Do you think the girls will care if I walk in there?"
Charlotte couldn't help a bit of a smile despite the stress of the situation. "They might. How about you stay here, act as a lookout, and me and Jessie will start with the girls' rooms?"
Jessie nodded at Charlotte in assent, biting down hard on her lip. She'd never had a perfect relationship with Tessa, but she'd always loved her. She had no idea what to expect.
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