Many thanks to Cee for the edits.
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Sean leaned against the window and watched the wind skitter some garbage across what used to be the central quad of the school. He switched his focus further out into the distance and grimaced, as all he saw were trees; the mountains that would have livened up the view were obscured. Deciding that it would have been hell to go to school here, Sean moved away from the window and sat down on the narrow cot he'd been allocated. He pulled his bag from underneath the cot and withdrew a small box. Sean opened the lid and looked inside.
"What's that?"
Sean put the box down and looked up. He relaxed when he saw it was David. Sean complained, "You could have knocked."
David rolled his eyes and merely held up the two cups of coffee. "Got some coffee."
Sean took one of the cups and took a sip. He held the box up and said, "This is our ticket out of here. I flick this switch and it sends out a signal. The buyer will be looking out for it. He comes here, makes the deal, and we're on our way to a lot of money."
David grinned and then sobered. He asked, "But what about Mancini? I mean…."
Sean tossed the box up in the air. "Mancini knows we're the conduit to the buyer. If he gets rid of us, then he won’t know how to contact him. Besides, he told me to switch it on this evening. I'm bored. I want to get back to Cascade and start thinking about spending my part of the profits." Sean flicked the switch. "We'll be back in Cascade by this evening."
David looked worried. "What if Mancini's pissed? I mean …."
Sean rolled his eyes. "What's he going to do? Call the GDP in to mediate? No, this way he won’t be expecting the buyer and won’t ask too many questions when the buyer arrives and won't find out about the deal."
David looked around him and whispered, "Thought you weren't going to mention anything about that. I mean with the … woman, the sentinel."
Sean smirked. "I can handle her. Anyway, we just need to distract her, give her something else to think about." Sean bent down and hid the homer in his bag and then lay back on the cot. "When you were in the kitchen, did you see her?" David shook his head. "No," he paused, "I did hear one of the guards talking, something about the boss being out of it for the morning and that the girl's in her room."
Sean raised his eyebrows. "Oh?" and then his face fell. "Her room's bound to be next to Mancini's. Damn, and I wanted some fun too." Sean stood up and stretched. "Lets get a beer and some food; maybe we'll get lucky."
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Blair waited until Tina had finished her mug of soup and hunk of bread, and when she'd placed the used mug with the others, he said, "Are you ready? They'll be coming soon."
Tina nodded and nervously licked her lips. She asked, "You want me to get close to her, find out what I can about her and then?"
"That should be enough for now,” Blair said, “don't push it. We don’t know who the guide is yet. If he's at all suspicious…."
Tina nodded. "I'll do my best." She closed her hand over Blair's briefly. "They'll be coming soon anyway, right?"
Blair nodded; he knew who she meant. "Course they will." Just then the noise of the outside bolts being thrown back sounded throughout the room. Blair muttered, "Okay, you're on." He indicated to the others to kneel.
Frank stepped through. "Okay, folks, bathroom time. Let’s do it like the last few times and we'll all be happy."
Tina swallowed nervously and then said, "Ummm … excuse me."
”Yeah?” Frank replied. Tina shifted on her knees nervously. "It’s a bit embarrassing but…."
"But what?" Frank snapped.
"The others, Blair told me there was a woman here. I.…" Tina hung her head submissively. "I sort of need her."
Frank sniffed, and glanced around the rest before asking, "Why?"
Tina paused and said, "It’s, you know, well, my time of the month, and I had some … in my purse but .…" She stopped and then added, "Please."
Frank rolled his eyes and said, " What do you think this is? A resort?" After a moment's thought, he said, "Okay. You'll come first. Follow me."
Tina got up and followed Frank out of the room.
Once the door was closed, Blair got up from his knees. Rubbing his hands, he wondered what information Tina would bring back with her. He looked over towards Dan. The commander nodded and smiled briefly before closing his eyes and resting his head back against the wall. Blair was buoyed up by what he saw was Dan's confirmation that he was doing the right thing. In the far corner, Mark and Martin were deep in conversation about something. Blair watched them for a minute until Martin caught sight of him. Blair coughed and turned away, his attention caught by Adam sitting on his own. Deciding to fill in his time by getting to know the young man, Blair moved across the room to him.
As he sat down, Blair said, "Hi there."
Adam returned the greeting cautiously. "Hi."
Blair rubbed his hands and said, "Thought I'd …."
Adam looked at him with wary eyes and said, "Ask me what it’s like for a guide to live within a GDP family?"
Blair put his head on one side and grinned briefly. "I guess it’s a question you get a lot?"
Adam shrugged and then briefly smiled in reply. "Yeah, you could say that."
"So?"
Adam traced a circle on the concrete floor, keeping his gaze on the floor rather than looking at Blair. "I don't know how different it would be for a guide to live within a normal family. I can’t really answer their questions, so mostly people are disappointed."
Blair was intrigued. He asked, "So where did you live? I mean before you lived with your foster parents."
Adam shrugged; he looked off into the distance and then after a few moments he said, "You wouldn't understand. It's hard to explain." He avoided Blair's gaze.
Blair rolled his eyes. "Try me. I'm not an anthropologist for nothing."
After a few moments of silence, Adam quietly began to speak, "I grew up in a commune. Well, until I was about nine or ten or eleven. They don't know exactly how old I am. The adults there didn't believe in legal documents or niceties like registering births and such."
Blair asked softly, "What happened? I mean to the commune. How did you come to be with your fo… - parents."
Adam met Blair's gaze briefly and then he returned to studying the floor. "There was a raid. I don’t remember much, Dad… my foster father that is, said that something went wrong and most of the adults died; some of the children too. What I do remember is that she was leading us away from everything and we …" Adam paused, "That's when it went black. I woke up in a hospital and then they told me I had to go and stay with these strangers until I was ready to be a proper guide. I never saw M - anyone from the commune again. Dad tried his best to find out for me a few years later, but he said all the records were sealed."
"What are they like?" Blair asked.
"My parents?" He smiled when Blair nodded. "Oh, they're great. Really cool. I was really frightened when I went … home at first because of some of the things that the adults had said about the GDP. It was great having a mom and dad to myself. In the commune all the children slept in a cabin away from the adults, and we didn't really know who our real mom and dad were. Well, apart from Meggie. She knew who hers were, but then she knew everything that went on." Adam smile grew broader as he remembered, and he didn't really notice Blair's shocked expression.
"Meggie?" Blair repeated.
Adam, still oblivious, nodded. "Yeah. She wasn't the eldest, but she acted as though she were. We played together a lot. She was always telling me things like when she went into town with some of the adults and she said she'd even met her real father once. The adults told her she had a good imagination, said she was always making things up but…."
Blair swallowed and thought back to the gaunt figure that had treated his head wound and then to the pictures he'd briefly scanned in the police file about the Courcy kidnapping. It could be her, he supposed. But this Meggie had blonde hair – dyed according to Martin. Blair closed his eyes briefly. If it was Meggie Courcy, it made things a whole lot more complicated. Blair decided to change the topic and leave this topic as something to think about later. "So tell me how did you persuade them to let you get your ear pierced, and what did the trainers say?"
Adam laughed, "Well…"
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As soon as he had bolted the door behind him, Frank turned to Tina and said, "We're not going to be any trouble are we?" Tina shook her head. Frank gestured down the corridor. "That way." As Tina went past him, Frank grabbed her arm and dragged her along.
Tina noted her surroundings as she went along with Frank. The set of stairs he hurried her up wasn't the same set that they'd been brought down when they were originally brought down into the basement. As she made the top step she realised that these steps came out into a kitchen. A warm kitchen that was almost homely with its smells of soup simmering away on top of the stove and the scent of freshly brewed coffee.
"No dawdling, Guide."
Frank's voice jerked Tina out of her thoughts. She stammered, "I'm sorry."
Frank pulled her down a dim corridor that led away from the kitchen. He stopped outside a locked door, and reaching up, took a key from a hook. He unlocked the door, shouting, "Girl, sort the guide out." Tina found herself pushed into the room and then Frank growled out, "You'd better be ready when I come back for you." The door was shut and the key turned in the lock.
Tina forced herself to look at the young woman who stood across the room from her. She gestured to the door and said, "I…." she gabbled out the same explanation, "My cycle… since my baby, its been really irregular. I just wanted my purse." She stopped as she saw the sentinel start to sniff and realised that the woman was performing a crude sensory scan. Tina licked her lips as she wondered what would happen when the other woman realised she couldn’t smell blood. The sentinel moved nearer. Tina kept a careful watch on her.
"I… You don’t smell…." Tina tried to make eye contact but to no avail. "Your baby? From your sentinel?"
"No. My husband, he's…."
"You were allowed to keep it?"
"Her,” Tina corrected automatically. “I have some pictures in my purse."
Tina stopped speaking as the woman didn’t reply but just went to the slim metal locker that stood next to the small window. Tina began to hope when the woman opened the locker and rummaged in it for a few moments and then came back holding a small bundle in her hands.
Offering the bundle to Tina, the woman said, " "He'll probably check. If he can see …" The sentinel looked anywhere but at Tina. "If he can see, he won’t go any further."
Tina reached out for the bundle and saw it was some clean underwear as well as what she had asked for. Taking the opportunity, she reached out for the woman's hands and begged, "Please help us, please."
"I…I can’t, I'm sorry. Get changed. He'll be back soon; you don’t want to see him angry, please." The young sentinel turned her head away.
Tina sighed and began to change.
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The hyena lifted its head off the ground and looked around, but despite the fact that his guard dog had disappeared, there was nothing in view to disturb him, so the animal put his head back down and went back to sleep.
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David and Sean watched from the stairs as Frank and Stuey had a conversation. They watched the older man gesture with his gun towards the kitchen and the younger guard nod and look at his watch. "What are they saying?" David whispered.
Sean rolled his eyes and made a shushing gesture as he concentrated on trying to hear what the two men were saying. When the two gangsters had disappeared, Sean turned to David, and smiling, said, "We've got one each. Frank said something about taking the female guide to Meg for something. Said something about the kitchen, couldn't catch exactly what."
David bit his lip. "When I was down getting the coffee this morning, I saw Frank appear down a corridor that came off the kitchen. That was when he said that the girl was in her room."
Sean smiled and walked down the last few steps and headed off towards the kitchen. David followed him. Once the pair was in the kitchen, David pointed out the narrow corridor, and they made their way stealthily down the corridor. It was with a triumphal grin that David pointed out the key hanging on its hook beside the locked door.
David checked his gun and clicked off the safety. Sean nodded and whispered, "Just you wait and see, but Mancini's girl will make your head explode with what she will do for you. I'll take her first; you take the guide. We'll swap later." Sean then reached for the key.
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Tina straightened her skirt, and aware of the stare of the sentinel, said quietly, "Thank you."
The sentinel shifted on her feet. "I … I haven’t done anything. " She glanced to the door, cocking her head as she did so.
Tina watched carefully and took note of the way in which the sentinel worked; somehow it seemed less polished, more instinctual than Niven, almost as though she hadn’t been taught how to use her senses properly. She asked, "What can you hear?" Tina wasn't prepared for the sentinel to grab her shoulders and push her to the wall. Tina opened her mouth to ask what was going on and then she saw the man who'd shot Jonas and another man walking through the door. She plastered herself against the wall behind the sentinel. Instinctively, she laid a hand on the woman's back. Tina felt the woman tense immediately; she guessed that the sentinel was listening to her heart rate that was currently racing. With an effort Tina focused on the conversation.
"You can’t touch her. Frank will be back soon.," said Meg.
"Who do you think is bankrolling this operation? Your boss? Your guide? She's as much mine as you are."
Tina looked around the sentinel's body at the man that was speaking and decided that he obviously didn’t know what he was doing messing with a bonded pair.
"What do you mean?" asked Meg. Tina watched with horrified fascination as the killer stepped up and stroked the sentinel's chin. She could tell from the way the woman's back was tensing that the sentinel didn’t liked it one little bit.
"Hasn't he told you? The buyer's not only interested in the guides but you too. He's asked me to negotiate a sum for you. Mancini's -"
"No, we're bonded. He told me the bond is for life. He wouldn't."
Tina watched as the man ran a possessive hand over the sentinel's thighs.
Sean laughed harshly and commented, "Read me, Sentinel, am I lying?"
Tina reflexively tightened her hand on the sentinel's shoulders. She whispered, "Don’t believe him. He killed a guide, one of us." She paused for a moment and then weighing up the threat of the moment said, "Link to your guide, Sentinel, link to him, bring him here."
The sentinel half turned to look at Tina and began to open her mouth.
Sean saw his opportunity and told David, "You take the sentinel and I'll take the guide. We'll swap afterwards." He reached for Tina.
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The hyena jerked awake as its guard dog, howling, barking and growling, bounded into the hyena's inner sanctum.
Before he was quite awake and without knowing exactly what he was doing, Mancini jumped from his bed and started dressing as he headed for the bedroom door. Something had gone terribly wrong.
TBC
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