HOPE...RISING

PART SEVEN (CONCLUSION)

Rachel lay beside Hope, watching the child’s breathing slow to a steady pulse, falling into the heady embrace of slumber with complete abandon, once she convinced the little one that she wasn’t going to make her sleep, that maybe Hope could tuck her into bed instead.  This Hope

did with sweet deliberation, lay down beside her, and was out before her mother could count to five.  But Rachel remained wide awake, too worried about the maneuvers plotted below by the others, too alert to the real possibility that it would be a long time before they would see their farmhouse, too fearful of Cort’s own vulnerability in all of this, to be amused by the baby’s surrender.

They had to get Hope as far away as possible.  They needed to strike one last time. Hope looked so soft and vulnerable pillowed in the soft comforter.  Cort is taking awful long…

And all she could come up with was a huge hole in her heart at the thought that Deidre was right.  Things would never be the same.

Cort opened the door quietly, watching the two beloveds of his heart as they lay on the bed. Rachel's back was to the door and she didn't seem aware yet that he was there. Closing it

behind him, he tiptoed to the bed, standing beside it a moment, staring hard as though imprinting their image on his brain. What Terry had just described was very dangerous, but

it had to be done, it must be done or these two would never be safe from Sid. He lifted his right hand, holding it a while palm down over them, as though in blessing. Indeed, it was what he was doing. He was placing a seal of his love upon them, asking for protection for them should he not return. Then he knelt beside the bed, sliding an arm over Rachel's hip, burying his face in her side.

~

Deidre paced her bedroom…their bedroom, hers and Terry’s…half packing things into a suitcase, half sitting to hold her head and wonder if she shouldn’t go down and stop them. 

There was no stopping them, though, just like there was no stopping Sid.

There had to be a way.

But the only obvious way was to scatter to the winds.

So they would flee.  Towards what?  For Terry and herself, the financial ruin alone could send them spiraling into parts unknown.  For the others?

The door handle rattled a bit, a pause, and then Terry gently pushed the door open, looking in

to check for her.   Seeing her sitting on the edge of the bed, he came in and shut the door behind him, face quiet and grim.

“It’s time, luv,” he finally said, after they looked at each other for long minutes.

The space between them opened up in a chasm, then, or so it seemed, and all that mattered was that she reach the safety of his arms, and that she grasp him before he fell away.  She launched herself wordlessly from the bed and they stood leaning against the door, arms wrapped tightly around each other, her head buried in the crook of his neck.  No tears, no words of recrimination.  Just one last breath before setting things in motion.

~

 

“I’ll bring the car to the back alley,” Bud said, flipping his keys as he stood. Silence fell in the wake of Terry and Cort ascending the stairs to let the girls know they were ready to go.  No one really looked at each other.  Caroline seemed placid, but he had a feeling something was brewing there.  He’d seen the look in her eyes when Terry blandly put her off.  Maximus looked studious himself, if only because he was looking forward to taking some real action against Sid. 

Bud had a sick lurch in his stomach, though.  For all their long talks and plans in the past, the dreams of exacting some sort of retribution against the man that had brought them painfully into a world they’d never fit in, the justice of it all had no good feeling to it.  In his imagination, the breakaway had been clean, unfettered, complete.  With this…

“Yeah, I’ll come with you,” John muttered and headed for the door.

“You gonna call…” Bud began but John cut him off. 

“She knows.  She’s already gone.”

Bud looked back at Maximus, who was watching them. 

“See you then,” was all he could manage and followed John out the door.

~

Maximus sat on the couch, looking up at Caroline, who had perched on the far arm and was staring at her fingers in her lap.

"Come," he whispered, holding out a hand.

She blew out a breath then finally reached her hand toward him, her fingers curling through the tanned strength of his. Slowly her eyes followed her hand and she met his level gaze. "Since that day in the woods, in the fog, when Marcus and I found you...have you an idea, Maximus, what you have come to mean to me? What the loss of you now would do to my life?"

His lips curved just barely. "I know," he replied softly. "Come."

She slid off the arm, down onto the couch and he pulled her to himself. "You risk much," she murmured, lifting one of his hands to her face, burying her cheek in it.

"Sometimes there is much worth the risking."

Again she lifted her eyes to his. For her, nothing was worth the risk of losing him. He read it there, for it was clear in her gaze. "I will come back to you."

"You don't know that. You can't promise that."

He knew she was right. "I will be careful, then."

"Careful is good," she said, attempting a smile, but failing.

"You will stay with Rachel and Hope until I return?"

She looked away, not answering. "I will do what women do when their men go off to battle."

He took it as a 'yes'. She meant it, though, as what she, as a woman, would do when he went

off to battle. She could not wait here. She simply could not.

He put a hand behind her head, guiding it gently toward him, setting his lips softly, warmly,

atop hers, then yielding to the need to surround her with himself, his kiss grew deeper, fuller. And his kiss was like a flame through her soul, reminding her of all she had to lose, all she

would not allow to be lost, and she returned his kiss with utterly abandoned passion. It would not be the last. She would not let it be.

~

Thermite.  Sparklers.  Crowbar.

Not to mention the masks and eyeglasses he had stashed in his duffel for all the men involved.  Black clothing.  Black masks.  Equipment, supplies, accoutrements: all for setting off a deathtrap, all of this incendiary, in more ways than one.  The thermite, lit by the heat of the sparklers, would create the exact amount of heat needed to burn the titanium shell down.  A more destructive device would have been more satisfying, he had explained to the others, but

the goal was to melt away the core item that sat like a time-bomb of its own.  Destroy that, and all else would follow, as titanium burned well enough on its own. 

The four of them, he, Bud, Cort, Maximus, all crouched in the velvet dark of a cluster of trees

in the rear section of the campus, not too far down the road from the little blue house that had contained so many happy memories for them all.  John had departed well before to perform his plan, which was the least suspected because it was his turn for the night-watch.  Terry glanced down at his watch…five…four…three…two…

From deep within the main glass building, and spreading quickly throughout until the klaxon seemed to pulse eerily in the night, an alarm bell rang out.  If it had gone off in the day, a flood of personnel would have streamed from every door.  As it was, only the medical clinic and various security spots seemed to evidence occupation, and despite the shrieking urgency of the alarms, there was no real hurry in the people that sallied forth toward the designated safety spots.

And Terry had positioned himself exactly where there would be no one coming out.

Moments later, security lights flickered on and off, on and off.  Some stayed on.  Some did not.  Once again, the lights where they were to enter were conveniently cut.

Bud, Cort, and Maximus had donned their black ski-masks, clutched their own small parcels

for carrying.  None of them said a word as Terry led the way, swift across the grassy medians and to a door surreptitiously unlocked.

As he'd pulled the ski mask down over his face, Maximus was instantly back in the moment under the great arena when he'd chosen the helmet, had set it in place to hide his features.

His heart felt just as steeled now with that same determination to do what he had to do, what

he must do.

Caroline had watched them leave, then quickly changed into dark brown slacks and a slightly lighter brown shirt. She had nothing like what the men were wearing. This was the best she could do. Then she slipped out the kitchen door, went around to where her station wagon was parked, and headed toward the headquarters of NanoCorp. Her face was set, grim, as she drove. She had no idea what she could do other than watch, but if she managed not to be seen, there might just be...something. It was better, better by far, than twiddling her thumbs.

No one was in the corridor.  Each one of them had been equipped with a flashlight, which they now all turned on in the lightless passage.  Even in the mere minutes of being shut down, the building felt muffled, stifled, hespering a breath.  Terry checked corners, peered around, motioned forward and slowly, the four of them made their way to a corridor that had been avoided and sealed away as if it had never existed.

Motioning for them to put on their masks and goggles, Terry threw down his duffel and began rifling through it – crow bar, hammer, pick.  He and Bud nodded at each other and began to tear away the wall they had so carefully stitched up.  Maximus and Cort stood nearby, watching, listening for any stray persons who might have decided not to heed the call of emergency.  Bit

by bit, the wall came away, chunks thrown aside until a good sized hole revealed the cursed gleam of the titanium shell.  Sid’s bunker.

"You think he's in there?" Cort asked, pausing to wipe sweat off his brow with the back of his arm.

"We shall find out soon enough," Maximus replied, with an attempt at a grin because it was his dialog.

Cort dipped his head in acknowledgement. "Just so long as it's no danger to the cavalry," he replied.

Bud turned from what he was doing. "There is no cavalry. Not this time. Just us. We're all we've got."

"Then let us hope it will prove to be enough," Maximus said, taking the pick from Bud's hand. He couldn't just stand and watch any longer.

"Doesn't matter, really," Terry interjected.  "This isn't about getting to him anymore.  This is about taking down the very thing that brought us all here.  Everything after is just...spilled milk."

More wall came away.  Then, out of the duffel came the plugs they had prepared, thermite packets that they attached at various points on the titanium wall.

“We have two minutes to get the hell out of here,” Terry reminded them, showing the long,

extra thick sparklers he had cut to size, and stuck one in each plug.  Then, out of one of the

bags, he positioned three small bundles in between the remaining wall and the titanium shell.  They shoved their tools back into their bags and made sure nothing was left behind.

He held up a lighter, pausing as the other three stood.  "Ready for a light show, gentlemen?" he asked, tossing one to Bud.

“Hooray for the red, white, and blue,” Bud muttered.  "Let freedom ring."

~

“Do you think she got lost?”  Rachel asked Deidre anxiously as she got back into the car after opening and closing the metal gate.  They were on the road that turned off the highway and led into the country property Terry owned, the place of their favorite lookout, a place they determined would have relative anonymity.  Thirty minutes of sitting outside the gate waiting for Caroline to show up had produced nothing but a series of cars speeding down the lanes and a couple of deer wandering their way into the night.  No Caroline following behind with the map they had given her in case she did get lost.

“I hope not,” Deidre said as she shifted gears and began the long juttering ramble down the dirt road.  A pure blue light infused everything as the waxing gibbous moon hung low next to Scorpio, taunting the constellation to whip its tail.  “We’ve waited long enough, though, I think.  Maybe Terry and Maximus are with her now.  I just hope the helicopter hasn’t already arrived,” she muttered nervously.  She was too fraught with her own concerns over what Terry was executing, trying not to let the tension in her eyes and neck bloom into a full blown headache, tried not to think about the worst imaginable fallout to come from this.  She knew she should be thinking about their part of the plan to get Cort and Rachel spirited away before Sid thought to look for them – the company helicopter was hovering somewhere over the city by now; but all she could think about was Terry tripping and getting caught in rubble…or a collection of police outside waiting to arrest him, or…or…

“Maybe I should call on the cell phone?”  Rachel offered, digging in her purse.

“No!” Deidre snapped and then collapsed in shame.  “I’m sorry.  I’m sorry for biting your head off.  I hate this no communications thing Terry wants us on, but its for the best.  We have to sit and wait.”

Rachel was staring at her, but not in anger or hurt.  There were a few moments of silence as she watched the red-head try her luck with speeding up their progress, but succeeding in creating

a huge cloud of dust behind them, the finer particles of which were beginning to make their way into the car’s ventilation system.  “And if no one shows,” she finally voiced.

“I don’t know,” Deidre said, and her voice cracked a bit.  “I’d rather think about that when the time comes.  Not now.”

“Spoken like a true Scarlett,” Rachel said, in a lame attempt to lighten her up.

“Scarlett had a plan for everything,” Deidre said, smiling back at her in the green glow from the dashboard.  “I’m lucky if I can figure out which muscle to move next.”

They slowly made their way through fields and up a meandering road that took them past a couple of hills and onto the level of the lookout point.  This had the feature of a wide open flat space before the hill dropped into a valley that was much deeper than it looked, especially in the night.  It was here that a landing area had been marked for the helicopter that would take them to their decided point.  Rachel had not been keen on the idea, but it was the most immediate solution and the one with the easiest alibi to fake.  The helicopter was already on its way back from a business trip – a little technological and personal finagling and it would seem its new route was all part of the normal business.  All Rachel could think about was the last time Cort was in a flight machine. 

They got out of the car, pulling Hope out while she was still in the baby seat.  The child was fast asleep, lulled by the car’s journey, worn out from the day. 

“It's beautiful out here,” she told Deidre as she returned from parking the car in a grove of

trees that would hide it from first view in case anyone came looking.  There was a slight breeze,

making the air chill as the night’s dew began to settle in.  A bank of mackerel clouds was beginning to creep across the northern part of the sky.  “I can see why you and Terry would want to come here as often as possible.”

Deidre nodded, wiping her hands on her legs, more out of anxiety than necessity.  “We’ve sometimes toyed with the idea of building a house out here,” she said and then clammed up. 

She began pulling blankets out and wrapping one around Hope.  “That will keep her from getting sick.”

“Deidre,” Rachel said, knowing what her friend was thinking.  “It will be okay.”  Deidre stood and looked at her, silent.  “I just know it will,” Rachel added. 

Deidre nodded again and hugged her.

~

Sid, in his inner chamber, heard the alarms sound. "What the...?"

He flipped a series of switches which showed him the few remaining night workers evacuating the building. His eyes narrowed. Terry. It had to be Terry.  What the fuck was the K & R agent up to now?  Because of his recent transformations, he no longer needed a warp machine and simply willed himself into an outer corridor. Hearing footsteps, he ducked into the shadows of

a series of large potted trees.

It was a woman. Who? Ah, Caroline! Why would she be coming into the building, and coming

in alone, when the alarms were sounding? She must know something.

He watched her go down the long hall, turn a corner. It was obvious from the way she moved she did not wish to be seen. His face split into a wide grin. Maximus. He must be inside. She was following him and he did not know. He doubted he could have arranged anything more perfect. Soundlessly, he traced her path. She kept going more deeply into the interior of the building then halted just at the last corner beyond which lay the outer walls of his personal compound. His counterparts must be there in that hallway. How many of them? Maximus and Terry, for sure. Probably Cort. Possibly even Bud and John.

He warped himself into a tiny alcove at the far end of that hallway. Four of them. All but John. They were ripping off the outer walls of his compound, exposing the titanium underneath. He watched as they attached a series of things to the wall. Thermite. It had to be thermite. The bastards intended to get inside. The tight frown he'd worn as he'd observed them, now relaxed. There was nothing inside his compound that had any real value for him, not now. Brianna's body was safely buried on the island and he had no need of physical warp technology any longer. Let them do what they wanted.

His eyes lifted to where the tip of Caroline's face showed in the distance, traveled to where Maximus stood, leaning on the pick's handle, then back to Caroline. No, what he needed was right here. He warped back to just beyond Caroline, whose attention was entirely focused on

her General. In three steps he was upon her, his hand clapped like iron over her mouth. Then

he warped with her back into the potted trees near the glass wall where she'd entered the building.

She'd been watching Maximus, and her body had tensed when Terry said they had two minutes to get out of the building. She'd just barely started to turn when something clamped over the lower half of her face and she felt her feet lift off the floor. Whatever it was was over her nose, too, and she couldn't get air. She kicked frantically, but then the world dissolved into streaks of brilliant white light that hurt her brain and as she passed out, she had some vague, horror-filled thought that Sid was chuckling in her ear.

~

 

The sparks fell silently, lighting the hallway with an eerie finality – five in all blazed away, but Terry gave them no time to watch and see what happened.  He pushed them through the hallway, toward the door.  The reaction would take longer than two minutes, but he wanted to be as away as far as possible.  All that loomed ahead of him now was getting back to Deidre.

Terry did not realize how hot it had become inside the building until they were back outside.  The late night air felt moist and cool on his face.  Cort and Bud ran ahead, Maximus nearly beside him. They were almost within the confines of the shadowed woods when he saw Maximus look back, slow down and then turn to run back. 

“Don’t stop!” Terry commanded hoarsely, grabbing the General’s arm.  Maximus shoved his hand away.

“Caroline?” he said.

Terry looked in the same direction and there, in the first floor where a smaller atrium alcove looked out upon the back woods stood a figure plastered against the window-wall, face pressed against it.

Terry heard Bud roar, saw Maximus start forward when the first burst of explosions made the glass windows shudder, some crumbling into shards.  Then, a second burst,  bright yellow and green behind Caroline, and the thick glass, released of its long-standing restraint of steel, either cracked and collapsed or fell inward, burying whatever lay within, and a third burst, the third bomb, covered it all in a gust of fire.

ON TO PART 1 OF "A LOVE FOR A LOVE", THE MAXIMUS/CAROLINE/SID/BUD STORYLINE

ON TO PART 1 OF "THE FAR SIDE OF EXILE," THE CORT/RACHEL STORYLINE

BACK TO LIBRISCROWE

BACK TO PART 6

BACK TO NANOCORP INDEX