Tumgik
#‘i’ve heard that a traitorous scumbag is staying here’
chuutoro · 2 years
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
when will she step on me…
4K notes · View notes
anicastes · 2 years
Photo
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
But I’ve heard that a traitorous scumbag is staying here.
22 notes · View notes
fandom-puff · 4 years
Note
Hi hon! Can I request a smut imagine? I was thinking about a Sirius Black x reader thing. it’s after aszkaban and the reader is a lot younger than him, and he’s kinda like but I’m old are you sure and she’s just like you’re sexy and you really aren’t that old, and then smut and some fluff? Thank you! Also I’ve been loving your work ❤️
Hey! Thanks for requesting this- I hope you enjoy it- and your compliment made me all fuzzy and happy :)
Gif creds to owner
An Old Dog Like Me
Warning: smut, age gap
Tumblr media
“FILTHY SCUM INFESTING MY HOUSE!”
you sighed as the portrait of Mrs Black began screeching at you. It wasn't your fault the door had swung shut thanks to the wind.
“Oh, shut it, you old tart!” you yelled back at her, riling her up even more as you wrestled with the motheaten curtains.
“STUPID LITTLE GIRL, DISGRACING THE HOUSE OF MY FOREFATHERS!”
“Believe me, Mrs B, your house was disgraced as soon as you put up this wallpaper! Now shut up, for god’s sake!”
the kitchen door swung open and half the order looked out, wands raised. you blushed slightly and nodded to the screaming portrait. “Sorry. Door slammed. Someone help?” you said bashfully. Most of the order was much older than you and you had been trying to make a good impression. You heard a hearty laugh.
“I’m quite enjoying listening to you slagging my dear old mumsy to be honest, love,”
A tall man with glossy shoulder-length hair pushed through the crowd of order members. “Sirius Black-”
“BLOOD TRAITOR! SCUMBAG! FRIEND OF MUDBLOODS AND WEREWOLVES!”
“Blood traitor, scumbag, friend of muggle-borns and werewolves. Well, werewolf. Only know one and he folds his socks,” he grinned and shook your hand quickly. “Oh yes, and heir to the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black. Yay me,”
You grinned back at him and together you managed to close the curtains. You, however, ended up toppling into Sirius's arms when they finally gave way.
“Only known me ten minutes and you’re falling for me,” he laughed and you playfully hit his arm.
“Sod off,” you giggled, blushing slightly. “Thanks for helping, Mr black,”
“Please,” he said, clasping your shoulders. “Never call me that again. Only McGonagall calls me that, and she hasn't done THAT since I earned my 250th detention in seventh year,” he grinned.
“Alright then...” you smiled.
Over the next few weeks, you spent more and more time at Headquarters. It even grew to the point when Mrs Weasley insisted on clearing out a room for you to stay in after you nearly fell asleep face-first into your toast.
It was late one night in mid-November and you were sat at the scrubbed wooden table, nursing a cup of tea. “Sirius, I know you’ve been stood in that doorway for the past five minutes. come and sit with me,”
He smiled and pushed away from the door. “Sorry, love, you looked peaceful,” he says gently. You smile softly.
“I was. Still am,” you say, patting the seat next to you. He hesitated but sat next to you, and you rested your head on his shoulder. “Want a Cuppa?” You asked gently and he shook his head.
“No, thank you, love,” he murmured. “You look done in. Long day at work?”
“Absolute nightmare...” you launched into a ramble about work, and sirius made jokes about the colleagues you ranted about.
You smiled softly at him, laughing at his jokes and grateful for his company, nuzzling closer to his side despite yourself. He slung an arm around your shoulder.
“Sirius,” you mumbled. “Thank you,” you smiled softly, leaning up to press a quick kiss to his cheek. You saw his Adam’s apple bob.
“YN… are you… do you… was that a friendly kiss?” He asked. For once he was tongue tied.
You snorted. “Yeah. It was a friendly kiss, sirius,” his face dropped slightly. “This, however,” you pressed your lips to his. He reciprocated, stroking your cheek gently.
“YN…” he murmured into your mouth as you moved into his lap. He stroked your thigh gently. “We can’t do this… you don’t want an old dog like me… I’m over ten years your senior,”
You pulled away and stared him in the eye. “I don’t give a shit,” you said firmly. “You’re nice and kind and sweet and…” you blushed slightly. “Bloody hell, you’re fit as fuck… for an old man,”
He feigned offence. “Oi! Less of the old, little minx,” he grinned.
“Come on. Let’s,.. go upstairs,” you blushed, pulling him up. He grinned and let you pull him up to your freshly cleared out bedroom. You kissed him again, arms around his neck as he began undoing your top. You pulled apart for a brief moment so you could tug your shirt over your head as he shed his waistcoat. He groaned at the sight of your chest in your pretty bra. “Come here love,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt with one hand and reaching for you with the other. You giggled.
“Sirius.., we could use magic to get these clothes off,” you smirked and he grinned.
“You little genius ,” he smirked. With a few flicks of your wand you were bare before him, and he was standing in his underwear. He groaned at the sight of you and you grabbed his hands, pulling them to rub on your breasts. You sighed at the contact as he kneaded the supple flesh, attaching his lips to your neck. “Fuck me love,” he groaned, flicking his tongue over your pulse point as you palmed his throbbing bulge.
“Oh don’t worry. I plan to,” your whispered, knees buckling slightly. You pushed him backwards to lie on the bed and you slowly eased his underpants down, whimpering at the sight of his long cock. You stroked him languidly, from root to tip, wrapping your hand around his shaft and pumping him to full attention until he grabbed your wrist.
“Carry on like that, love, and I won’t last long,” he warns and you giggle, moving to straddle him. Slowly, you seated yourself atop his cock, and he squeezed your hips, most definitely leaving fingertip shaped bruises on your skin. You began to ride him, gyrating your hip and pushing your breasts to his face, Moaning lowly as he latched onto a breast and flicked his tongue over your nipple.
He began thrusting up into you, groaning at the sight: you, got and flushed, getting yourself off on his cock. He hummed, grabbing your waist and flipping you over, having had enough of your slow pace. Pistoning his hips, he leaned to kiss you, nipping your lip as you cried his name. With a grunt, he came, cock twitching inside you, and his pubis creating a glorious pressure on your clit which had you spasming around him as you moaned.
You were like jelly, barely forming a coherent sentence as he charmed away the mess and snuggled under the covers with you. But you felt protected cuddled against the hot, hard chest of Sirius black, his chest hair tickling your face slightly.
905 notes · View notes
belphegor1982 · 4 years
Text
As of now, I can officially say this is chapter 8 of a total of 24 because I finished writing the damn thing. I promise I’ll shut up about it, but it just feels so damn good!!
FAIRY TALES AND HOKUM
Summary: 1937: Two years after the events of Ahm Shere, the O’Connells are “required” by the British Government to bring the Diamond taken there from Egypt to England. In Cairo, while Evelyn deals with the negotiations and Rick waits for doom to strike again, Jonathan bumps into an old friend of his from university, Tom Ferguson. Things start to go awry when the Diamond is stolen from the Museum and old loyalties are tested...
Chapter 8: One Long Night (on AO3 here)
“If I knew where we’re being forced to stay, I’d complain to a responsible person. The service leaves much to be desired if you ask me, and I’ve never drunk such a godawful tea.”
“That might be ‘cause this is supposed to be coffee, Jonathan.”
A pause, long enough for Rick to lift his eyes from his cup and raise an eyebrow at his brother-in-law. The Englishman was squinting at his cup the way someone would at a particularly complex mathematical equation. When he finally looked back at Rick, there was something in his slightly slanted eyes that could be interpreted as a wry smile.
“That explains it, then.”
Rick downed the last remnants of his cup in one gulp, refraining from shaking his head. Those Brits. Never happy without their sacrosanct cup of tea after a meal. And before. And every time someone knocked on the door. For eleven years now he had been living in England, but no matter how hard he’d tried this weird habit, if only for Evy’s sake, he could never, ever get used to it.
Unfortunately, for him English coffee was simply a disgrace to the name.
Still, he and Jonathan were pretty lucky that whoever was keeping them locked up had thought to send them food and drink. Although Rick really had to admit that he had seldom tasted anything as insipid as this stuff. Even back in England.
At least the smell of the now-empty plates was gone, as one anonymous goon had come a few minutes earlier to take the empty trays away, leaving only the yet-unfinished ‘coffee’ cups.
A full stomach was always good news. Between leaving the orphanage and meeting Evelyn, Rick had had a taste of a couple of prisons. Very few wardens had ever sent him a tray of basic but decent food. Usually, if they ever did, the food looked as if it had been there for over a week. Or more.
“You shouldn’t complain about the food, really,” he called over his shoulder to Jonathan, all the while making himself as comfortable as possible on the floor and crossing his arms behind his head. “Be happy they bothered to send us some. Even if it was lousy.”
The noise he got as an answer was halfway between a sniff and a snort, but he didn’t hear Jonathan change position. His brother-in-law had not moved from his spot against the wall since Ferguson left, and even if he seemed to be reverting back to his old self, there was still something on his face that bothered Rick. It was like a remnant of the haunted sort of look he’d gotten when Ferguson had pointed that gun at him in the afternoon, and Rick could not help the peculiar feeling that this was completely out-of-place. As he’d said to Evy, he and Jonathan weren’t the best of friends, but, as he’d said to Jonathan, the man was family. When all the family you’d ever had only had five people altogether, including yourself, you did everything to keep it as is. Besides, for all his faults, his brother-in-law was a pretty decent guy. Anyway, nobody should ever get that look on their face. Nobody. Ever.
Although Rick was never good at voicing concern or suchlike to anyone that wasn’t Evy, he had tried, earlier, to ask Jonathan if he was okay.
“Oh, don’t worry, Rick, old chap,” had come the reply. “I’ll be fine. I’m an Englishman, remember – Ye Olde stiff upper lip and everything.”
And that had been about all Rick had to make do with.
Every now and then, it occurred to him that while Jonathan talked a lot, there was also a lot he didn’t talk about. Not without a bottle of good single malt on hand, anyway.
Jonathan did not, for once, seem keen on making conversation, and Rick was left to his own grim thoughts. This could either be taken as a good thing – no risk of boredom – or a bad thing – as if the situation wasn’t glum enough – but anyway, he had much to think about. Like who the hell were those men and why they had taken the two of them.
He didn’t know exactly what had been Ferguson’s part in this, but it sure looked like he was in it up to his neck. In, but not at the head of things. Even if Rick had seen him give orders earlier to the gunman, the chief Oddball from the black Lincoln had not spoken about him the way an inferior in rank would.
One thing was certain, though. If Ferguson belonged to the real British Antique Research Department, then Rick O’Connell was a six year old ballerina girl.
Then again, according to what Evy had told him, Ferguson had been knocked out cold in the diamond’s room just as Jonathan had.
Rick shook his head. The more he thought about it, the more obvious it became. Even if he could not explain it, he had a feeling that this damn diamond was at the heart of things. Everything bad that had happened since they arrived in Egypt had come right after the robbery at the Museum.
If the diamond heist and their kidnapping were linked, as Rick was starting to believe, then there had to be some kind of organisation behind both deeds that used the British Antique Research Department as a front. He didn’t know who was behind this bunch of spooky weirdos in black, but it was not Ferguson. The American’s gut instincts had very rarely deceived him, and he had a hunch that the means displayed meant a great influence, which Ferguson didn’t seem to have. A great influence always meant great power. And Rick had long ago noticed that the more power some people had, the more power they sought.
According to what he knew about the guy, and what he had seen of him so far, Ferguson did not seem to be this kind of man.
Rick had been fairly surprised at Ferguson’s reaction when that Oddball had cocked his gun against Jonathan’s temple. It had all happened very quickly: the punch, his own amused blink, Ferguson’s bewildered look from the ground… Then there had been something that had felt like an icy hand grasping at his guts as the black-clad man’s gun flew to Jonathan’s head. The look on the gunman’s face had sent a chill – a slight one, but a chill all the same – up Rick’s spine. He knew the kind, having met a few like this in the Legion. This was a man who was just doing his job. His gesture had been a hundred percent professional. And Rick knew for certain that he would have pulled the trigger in perfect cold blood had Ferguson not leapt on his feet and pushed the gun away in a heartbeat.
Either Ferguson had received very strict orders, or else there was still a part of the lousy traitor that cared about his old buddy’s – or rather ‘mate’s’, as those damn Brits ever seemed to make a point of doing nothing like everybody else, least of all talk – life.
Part of Rick – a pretty small one, his cautious, often battered sense of optimism – preferred the second option. But if you asked the realistic part of his brain and what logical rationality had rubbed off on him from Evy, both were possible, the first surely more so than the last.
Rick blinked at the blank ceiling, wondering what to make of all of this. One thing was for sure: he wouldn’t want for all the world to be in his brother-in-law’s shoes right now. He’d been pretty pissed each time Beni had let him down, even if in the long run he had grown rather used to it. At least the little scumbag had never played the ‘best of buddies’ act convincingly. Sure, they’d had a few good times in the Legion, and a few good scares too, but there was never anything personal involved. Rick had known the only thing he could count on the guy for was an eventual stab in the back, and it had worked out. More or less.
Funny how things turned out eventually. From the first second he had seen Ferguson, Rick had had a feeling that the two Brits weren’t friends for nothing. They were as different as can be physically, but they did share not only a whole bunch of memories and the same nationality but also the same sense of humour, a certain ironical take on life… And a fondness for that undrinkable British beverage that could only be explained by blood legacy. That, plus Scotch.
Well, with everything they had in common, Rick would have thought that whatever friendship united them would last. At least a bit.
Guess I was wrong.
Rick shifted slightly on the floor. Beside the fact that he didn’t like silence all that much, he was slowly but surely getting bored. And tired.
“Hey, Jonathan?” he called over his shoulder. As nobody answered, he said with a crooked grin, “Lazy bum. Sleepin’ already, are ya?”
He got no reply, and propped himself up on his elbows to see if everything was all right behind him. It appeared so, he noted with a smile that was not entirely a smirk: Jonathan was sound asleep, still sitting with his back against the wall, his chin resting on his chest. He was even snoring slightly.
“Right,” Rick mumbled with a small laugh. “Thanks for the company.” Unsurprisingly, his brother-in-law didn’t bother to reply. The American put his head back on the floor, and went back to staring at the ceiling. “Well, even if you’re out of it, I’m sure you’ll agree with me when I say we really are screwed.”
“I beg your pardon?”
Rick gave a jump, quite a feat considering the fact that he was lying flat with his back on the ground. There was a reason for that. The voice he’d just heard had absolutely nothing to do with his brother-in-law’s. He didn’t know where it had come from, or who.
Only that it belonged to a woman.
“Who are you? And where the hell are you?” asked Rick, sitting straight and alert, now fully awake. He peered across the room, his eyes squinting and his brows furrowing. Nothing. It still appeared that he and Jonathan were the only occupants of the cell.
He used to believe in ghosts when he was a kid, because the older kids at the orphanage always liked to scare the younger ones with stories. Then he’d grown out of it. Sure, there were things in this world nobody could explain yet, but dead people generally stayed dead.
Of course, his first encounter with the actual undead had made him revise his judgement. After his first trip to Hamunaptra, having seen what he’d seen, he had kept his eye out for anything – anything – unlike Evelyn, who used to reject every irrational theory outright.
Rick’s opinion about strange phenomenons had been last updated at Ahm Shere. Walking, talking mummies existed, as did green little murder pygmies, and Jonathan’s common sense – though this last one was occasional.
Ghosts do not. That he knew of.
“There’s no need to be rude, sir,” came the voice. It had a British – make that English – accent, and there was something sad in it, like a sigh. What on Earth could an English ghost possibly be doing down there? “I’m just an accidental neighbour. I’m talking to you through this little air vent down the wall. Can you see it?”
So much for ghosts. Rick looked past the sleeping Jonathan, spotted the vent, and walked over to it. “Yeah, got it.”
The vent was so small that he was not surprised he had missed it at first. Rather happy to see that rationality was kicking back in – and trying not to think about Evy’s triumphant ‘I told you so!’ if she’d been there –, Rick sat in front of it, trying to make out something on the other side of the wall. His attempt failed. The vent was too tiny, and the room was definitely too dark. “Who are you, and what are you doin’ here?”
“Is this your way of introducing yourself?” The woman’s words were stuck-up, but her tone wasn’t. Evy had something like that in her voice on early mornings. “Well, I suppose I should introduce myself first. I’m Elizabeth Ferguson, and –”
“Ferguson? Wait –” Rick frowned, every internal alarm bell blaring in his mind. “Is Tom Ferguson your husband or brother or –”
“Tom is my husband, yes. Have you seen him recently? Is he all right?”
Mrs Ferguson’s voice had shifted from tired to laced with fear and concern. But you could easily fake fear and concern. In fact, Rick was torn between lashing out at the woman and asking her again what the hell she was doing there while her husband was the one that got the two of them in a cell for no apparent reason, and sympathising with her for having married such a jerk. He picked neither and forced his voice into an even tone.
“Oh, he’s fine, all right… and yes, I saw him recently. Look, this may come as a shock to you, but –”
“How do you know him, anyway? I certainly don’t know you.” Mistrust was suddenly plain in Mrs Ferguson’s low voice. Pushing back his impatience, Rick rolled his eyes and bent closer to the air vent.
“Of course you don’t know me – I didn’t know your husband a week ago. But my brother-in-law did. Now may I –”
“Who are you? What’s your name?”
Now the woman was really ticking him off. Wishing she would let him finish his sentence this time, Rick snapped, “Right. I’m O’Connell – Rick O’Connell. Got locked up in here by men with guns for a couple of hours, and your husband’s the reason why I’m here and not at home with my wife and kid. How’s that for an answer?”
There was silence on the other side of the wall, long enough to make Rick feel a little bad about his somewhat harsh reply. If what this woman had been saying so far was the truth, she apparently did not wish to be there any more than he did, and he’d just gone and thrown this piece of news right into her face. After all, she couldn’t really help it if her husband was a two-faced bastard.
Ah, well. Evelyn teased him on his somewhat rough manners often enough.
“Look, Mrs Ferguson, I didn’t mean to go off on you. I’m just pretty angry. I mean, your husband’s a friend of my brother-in-law’s. The two of them went to the Museum and they were in the Diamond of Ahm Shere’s room when it was stolen –”
“Hold – hold on, Mr O’Connell,” cut in Mrs Ferguson, in a rather subdued voice. “Do you mean the Cairo Museum? And what is this diamond you’re referring to?”
Once more, Rick was sorely tempted not to trust her. She could very well be faking ignorance to draw information from him. Then again, she was the only person he could talk to at this very moment. He knew better than to lose time trying to wake Jonathan. The man could sleep like a log at the best of times and looked like death warmed over anyway.
“There was this big diamond from Ancient Egypt in the Museum of Antiquities, and Jonathan and your Tom got knocked on the head while it was stolen –”
“I take it that this Jonathan is your brother-in-law?”
Rick rolled his eyes. “Do you ever let people finish their sentences? Yes, he’s my wife’s brother.”
“I’m so sorry, Mr O’Connell,” came Mrs Ferguson’s sheepish voice. “I’m not usually so rude, I swear, but I do tend to be rather short when I’m afraid.” A pause. “And I must confess I’m somewhat afraid right now.”
All right. So maybe she was being sincere after all.
“I used to know a Jonathan, you know,” she continued, and if Rick’s ears weren’t deceiving him yet, she was smiling slightly. “When I was in university. Tom and him were rather close friends at the time, and we used to meet in an Oxford pub for chats and drinks… I have very fond memories of those times. What’s your brother-in-law’s surname?”
“Carnahan.” He heard a tired, but happy little laugh. “Is he the Jonathan you were talking about?”
“Yes, the very same. How is he now?”
“Well, he’s…” Rick glanced behind him. “He’s asleep.”
There was silence on the other side of the wall, followed by a slight shuffle as Mrs Ferguson came closer to the air vent. “Jonathan Carnahan is here? In the same room as you?”
“Yep.”
“And he’s… asleep?”
“That’s right.”
For a few seconds Mrs Ferguson was silent, then she asked, sounding utterly confused, “Would you be so kind as to tell me exactly what happened to land the both of you in here?”
Rick pondered answering her for a little while. He looked into the space in front of him, then at the sleeping form of his brother-in-law, then at the air vent. Finally, he scratched the back of his neck and edged closer to the vent. “Okay. I’ll try to make it short, but I have a feeling it’s gonna take a while. Just warn me when you start to fall asleep.”
.⅋.
“Alex, dear, are you sure you’re not sleepy?”
“No, Mum, I’m not. Please, stop asking me that.” Alex shook his head conspicuously for effect, and his mother squeezed his hand briefly, not slowing down her pace.
It was not entirely true. Alex was aware that he was blinking a little too much than he should, and he was forced to admit that his head felt a bit heavy. But there was no way he’d admit this to his mum. Even at this hour in the evening, he had his pride. Besides, concern for his dad and uncle mingled with the beginning of excitement. He had not had a proper adventure in ages, and this sure looked like the start of a hell of one.
Although Cairo by night was certainly quite some adventure by itself. It was different, much creepier than in the dazzle of the day. Everything appeared to be a threat: the drop in temperatures, the small white houses all turned a similar dark grey, the pavements only lit by the little pools of bleak yellow light falling down from the street lamps, the lengthened shadows stretching over the walls and the streets… And you had to be extra careful to avoid the heaps of camel droppings when they were a little too close to the pavements.
Alex O’Connell had found himself looking into the newly-acquired eyes of the mummy Imhotep. He had faced a fierce red-clad warrior who would have taken sheer delight in strangling him. He had resurrected his mother at the Pyramid of Ahm Shere. Without exaggerating too much, he could consider himself a fairly brave boy of ten.
Yet he was perfectly content to cling at his mum’s hand and not let go as the both of them trotted along the darkened, colder streets.
“Don’t worry, Alex.” His mum’s voice made him look from the dark in front of him up to her face. “There’s nothing to fear.”
How could she possibly…? Alex shrugged and shook his head. Maybe this thing about mums knowing everything was true, after all.
“What are we gonna do exactly, Mum?” he asked, keeping his voice as low as possible. “Are we just going over to Dr Hakim’s and throw pebbles at his windows till he opens the door?”
She slowed down and looked at him, the expression on her face difficult to tell for sure in the dark. “Now where did you get this idea from?”
Alex hoped that his innocent smile was as efficiently lit by dim street lamps as it was in the light of day. Over the years, he had observed both his dad and uncle getting away with a lot with his mum on charm alone. As the two of them were quite different, Alex would only have to pick which tactic would be best for the occasion. Now, at the ripe age of ten years and one month, he had fairly well mastered a get-away smile of his own, something which he was rather proud of. And the best thing was that it worked with all three members of his family, most of the time.
It was his mother’s turn to shake her head, and Alex knew he had won this one when he saw a smile on her face. No matter what happened, his mum always smiled in the end, and this was one of the things that he loved most about her. Not all the other mums were like that.
“Bah. I don’t want to know.”
They had left the outskirts for Downtown Cairo, and were now walking along better-lit streets of smoother pavements. The light made the tall buildings appear taller, and you could actually see fifty feet ahead of you. It didn’t feel very different from London. Clearly the neighbourhood was wealthier and better-kept than the ones they’d seen so far, even if it still felt spooky and very eerie to be there by night.
As they walked past houses, Evelyn counted the numbers on the façades, finally stopping in front of a rather elegant-looking two-story house and heading decidedly to the door.
“I hope he’s not gone to bed already, or he won’t be in a good mood, I’m afraid,” Alex heard her mutter, before she rapped at the door. “Dr Hakim? It’s me, Evelyn O’Connell. I apologise for coming over so late, but the matter is important. Would you please let me in?” Nobody answered, and Evelyn came closer to the closed door, looking hesitant. “Dr Hakim? Are you awake at all? I swear this is serious –”
The door opened on her last word, and both she and Alex opened their mouths in surprise.
“The matter must be important indeed, to make you come here at this hour of the night, and with young Alexander, no less,” came the deep, gently lilting voice of Ardeth Bay.
“It’s good to see you, Ardeth,” eventually said Evelyn after she recovered from her surprise. The Medjai leader’s smile mirrored her own.
“It is always good to see you too, no matter the circumstances. Please come in.”
Evelyn did so, followed by Alex who, even if he wasn’t going to admit it, was rather happy to leave the dark streets.
They walked up a flight of narrow stairs to find themselves on the threshold of an old-fashioned door, which Ardeth opened for them before slipping quietly behind them. The first thing Alex did was, as his dad had taught him, to scan the room for ways out and possible dangers. Most of the time, when they were on a dig, Mum and Dad left Alex in the entrance room of a pyramid, where he did not risk heat-stroke. However, upon crossing a threshold, Rick never failed to check out a room before setting a foot in it, something Alex had taken on quickly after seeing what could happen if one was not careful enough in a pyramid.
The room was flooded with warm amber light, quite unlike the cold street lamps, and looked quite cosy with the thick carpet on the floor, the deep armchairs around a low table, and the exposed beams along the ceiling. Sure enough – this was the Cairo Museum curator’s house, after all – an imposing library full of old-looking books covered an entire wall, and further in the room stood a big desk covered in maps, stationary, and an impressive collection of pen holders.
But the comparison with any ordinary house stopped here. There was Ancient Egyptian stuff all over the room, going from framed pieces of parchments hung on the walls, to canopic jars neatly arranged on a chest of drawers, through various-sized statuettes on the bookshelves, and chests around the coffee table like footstools. There was even a small sarcophagus against one wall. Looking at it, and at the various items filling the room, Alex wondered how it was possible that none of these remains had caused any catastrophe at the time of their removal. Like waking up an evil mummy, for example.
Dr Hakim rose from his armchair to greet Evelyn and Alex as Ardeth closed the door behind him. “Good evening, Dr O’Connell, please do take a seat. You are welcome to do so as well, young Master O’Connell.”
“Thanks,” said Alex with a quick, rather uncertain glance at the severe-looking man. He watched as Ardeth sat in the armchair beside him with a slight rustle of black robes. The man caught his gaze, and a small smile pulled at one corner of his lips. Alex slightly relaxed into his armchair. He couldn’t tell why, but this smile somehow always managed to make him feel better, no matter the occasion.
“I’m truly sorry to disturb you at this hour in the evening, Doctor,” his mum was saying to Hakim. “But my husband and my brother have disappeared, and I think it might be linked to the theft of the Diamond of Ahm Shere.”
Alex’s eyes were back on Hakim as he leaned back in his armchair and nodded. “Ah… yes. We are already aware of Messrs O’Connell’ and Carnahan’s disappearance.”
Evelyn’s eyes widened. “What do you mean, ‘aware’? What happened? Where are they?”
“Evelyn, please,” said Ardeth, and he didn’t so much as flinch as Alex’s mum turned one of her fiercest gazes on him. Alex’s respect for the Medjai leader increased. Even Dad would sometimes be wary of that Look. “Almost everything we know has been gathered this afternoon by word of mouth. We haven’t had time to do anything else yet.”
“When exactly were you planning to tell me?” Evelyn’s voice was edging dangerously close to anger. Alex had more mixed feelings. For the moment, the most prominent was curiosity. He was dying to hear what the two men had to say.
“Just before you knocked on the door, we were discussing the hour in the morning when we could go to your house without waking you up and tell you everything.”
“You could even turn up at midnight, or five, I wouldn’t have minded,” said Evelyn, not much calmer. “Now what do you know, exactly?”
They told her and Alex pretty much the same story Satiah had, up until the point where Rick, Jonathan and Mr Ferguson had driven off in someone else’s. Alex smirked at that. Despite everything his mum said about how a respectable citizen should be law-abiding and honest, his uncle’s little skills had come in handy more often than she cared to admit. Not to mention that she often conveniently forgot that, whenever she entered a tomb, it was because she had broken into it in the first place.
“But if they did escape, why haven’t they returned yet? What happened to them?” The question his mother had just asked had been running in Alex’s mind for a while, and he had a hunch that it had been the same for his mum.
Hakim frowned a little at that, looking grim. “Well, according to eyewitnesses, they drove all the way to Dr Wittgenstein’s excavation camp near Giza, and the car stopped in the middle of the tents.”
“Why would they stop?” Mum’s voice was suddenly much lower.
“The men pursuing them – we do not know who they were, but it appears that they looked quite the professionals – were shooting at them. One must have hit a target.”
Alex’s insides turned abruptly into ice, and his mum’s face went pale. “Oh, my God… You mean…?”
“Nobody was hurt, it seems,” added Ardeth quickly. “But when I went there to investigate a few hours ago, I found that the car had fallen from a height of six or seven feet, and one of the tyres had been perforated by a bullet.”
Evelyn was silent for a minute, long enough for Alex to chime in. “And…” he asked, rather hesitant and uncertain all of a sudden as Hakim’s beady eyes fell on him. “What happened? After they stopped, I mean?”
He was almost afraid to hear the answer. And when Ardeth looked at him with something on his face that was hard to tell, he got not a little bit scared.
“Well,” said Ardeth, shifting his gaze from son to mother, “the man called Ferguson drew a gun and pointed it at Jonathan.”
Silence fell like a slab of solid lead. Alex was vaguely aware that he had his mouth open and was probably looking like an idiot, but he didn’t give a damn right now. Beside him, Mum had also her mouth slightly open, her eyes showing sad surprise. She blinked, then shook her head slowly. “Oh, dear… Something like this had to happen. I saw something like this coming, but…”
“What a jerk!” Alex burst, startling his mother. “Stinking turncoat! We saw him the other day at the bazaar, and he acted all friendly-like, the damn git –”
It was a mark of how shocked his mum had been that she only stopped him there with a sharp “Alex! Language!”
Alex cast her the most sheepish glance he could, still quite angry. The guy had been so nice and funny whenever he’d met him, and that had been all an act? Lousy traitor. Not for the first time, Alex wished he would grow faster. That way he’d be able to punch the wind out of that goddamn two-faced scumbag who had betrayed his uncle and kidnapped his dad.
“I hope Dad punches his head off,” he muttered, and his mother threw a warning glance at him, but nothing else. When he slipped a glance to Ardeth, though, he thought he saw something like amusement flash briefly on his face.
“So Tom Ferguson was working with those men…” Evelyn had recovered from her surprise and was now back to musing out loud, as she often did when she thought about something. “They must have been well organised to set up such a stunt. Who were they? What did they look like?”
“They were described as a handful of Englishmen, dressed in black and wearing felt hats,” answered Ardeth. “About six of them, looking as if they were quite trained for this sort of thing.”
That reminded Alex of some bad guys in some gangster films he’d seen, the ones with the big guns, big scars and smooth, shiny cars. Of course, his mum was never too keen on him seeing those sorts of movies, insisting that it was surely too scary for him. He hadn’t told her yet that some stuff that had happened to him in real life was much, much scarier than everything he had seen on a screen so far.
A silence followed Ardeth’s words, then Evelyn shook her head, frowning. “This doesn’t make any sense. Who would kidnap Rick and Jonathan? Why them?”
“You told us earlier that you thought this had some kind of link with the Diamond of Ahm Shere,” Dr Hakim said, his eyes keener than ever. “This happens to be our opinion as well. What could motivate such an action, unless it be the need for information?”
“Hang on,” interrupted Alex, who had a hard time keeping up with Hakim’s elaborate phrasing. “That means that whoever’s taken Dad and Uncle Jon wanted some information about the diamond, doesn’t it? But if they have the diamond now, what’s the use?”
“This is what we were wondering as well,” said Ardeth with a slight smile of his own, and Alex felt a mix of pride and annoyance that this was not getting them very far.
And then, at this point, Mum’s eyes began to shine with the funny glint that meant things were about to get interesting. “Tell me, Ardeth… Just how far does the link between the Diamond and the Oasis of Ahm Shere go?”
Ardeth and Hakim shared an equally appreciative glance; then the Medjai leader looked at Evelyn, his warm black eyes smiling at her. “So you remember, after all. I might have known.” His eyes took on an intense look, as they did whenever he was telling a story of the ancient times. “The link between the two is powerful. Without the Diamond the Oasis cannot exist. And of course, without the Oasis, the Diamond is pointless, just an ordinary gem.”
“Don’t you need the Bracelet of Anubis to find the Oasis?” Alex piped in, feeling that as long as the Pyramid and especially the Bracelet was being discussed he could have a word in. After all, he was the one who’d got almost killed by it last time. Besides, his mum didn’t seem to mind very much.
“It’s a little more complicated than that,” explained Ardeth, apparently ignoring Dr Hakim’s annoyed frown at Alex. “The Bracelet was indeed a guide, a precious one, and as such it was protected fiercely by each succeeding Pharaoh’s best guards.” There he glanced quickly at Evelyn, and Alex remembered what his mum had told him about her past life as Nefertiri, Pharaoh Seti’s daughter. An actual princess from Ancient Egypt, a fighter trained to protect precious artefacts. Alex still had trouble wrapping his head around that. It seemed impossibly cool. “But the Diamond and the Oasis are very intricately linked. For millennia people have believed that the Oasis hid an entire pyramid made of gold, and when the knowledge about the resting place of the Army of Anubis faded from memories, it was what lured many men into seeking the Oasis. You may remember that quite a number of men found their way there, and we saw what became of them.”
While Ardeth talked, Alex picked up a thick paper clip from Hakim’s desk nearby to keep his hands busy as he listened. He always loved exciting stories. That – coupled with his parents’ passion, of course – had been what drew him to Egyptian history.
“Some of these men must have come near enough to see the Diamond gleaming at the top of the pyramid in the distance, but not dared to come closer, thus spreading the word that the whole pyramid was made of gold, inside and out.
“As time passed, history became legend, and the Oasis disappeared from popular memory. However, there were always men foolish or greedy enough to attempt the pursuit of the Oasis of Ahm Shere. Legends involving gold are often those that last longest.
“But nobody ever unveiled the secret of Ahm Shere… until the last Year of the Scorpion, when the Bracelet of Anubis was uncovered by you, Evelyn, and your family. We all know what ensued.”
Alex listened raptly, still fiddling with the paper clip. At Ardeth’s last words, he straightened in his chair and blurted out, “When I was with Imhotep down in that oasis, he told Hafez something about the Bracelet being some sort of key to the Scorpion King… What did he mean by that?”
“Young man, did nobody teach you to listen to your elders and keep quiet whilst they speak?” said Hakim severely. Alex just stared back at him, undeterred. Of course the rules of proper conduct demanded silence from kids. But he had never been one to keep silent when he had a question.
Besides, from the look on his mum’s face, it seemed that she had Thoughts on the matter.
“Dr Hakim,” she said, her voice quite polite and cool – a little too much so, “I have the greatest respect for you and your work, but Alex is my son, and I believe I should be the one to decide whether to tell him off or not if he misbehaves. And I do not think that asking questions that are relevant to this conversation can be considered as misbehaving.”
Wham. Way to go, Mum. Alex refrained from beaming at his mum – perhaps that would have been a little too much. She did not often defend him this fiercely; when she did, it was always very effective.
There was a rather awkward pause, as Hakim stared at Evelyn, his black eyebrows raised in surprise; and as a grinning Alex turned his eyes to Ardeth Bay, he saw that the Medjai, by his own distinctive standards, seemed to be trying hard to force down a smile.
“So,” Alex asked, as if nothing had happened, “what did Imhotep mean?”
“Exactly what he said. Not only was the Bracelet a guide, showing its bearer the way to Ahm Shere by means of visions and clues, it was also the key to revive the Scorpion King.”
“Can the pyramid – and the oasis – exist after the death of the Scorpion King, then?” asked Evelyn, her eyes shining with curiosity again.
“The Scorpion King and his army have been kept five thousand years while the Oasis and the pyramid were never hidden from human eyes,” said Ardeth. “Despite what happened after Rick O’Connell killed the Scorpion King, it is my opinion that the Pyramid is still there as we speak, buried under the sands, dead as a house abandoned by its only master for millennia.”
A heavy silence followed these words. Evelyn had noticed Alex fingering the large paper clip and motioned discreetly at him to put it back where he had picked it up. Alex absently put it in his pocket instead. Nobody would miss one when there were dozens just like it on the desk, and it could always come in handy sometime.
“It doesn’t tell us,” Evelyn said after a little while, frowning, “what the men who have taken my husband and my brother have in mind.”
“No, it does not,” Hakim agreed in his low-pitched, gently accented voice. “Whatever their purpose may be, if they manage to find a way inside the Pyramid, they will find nothing but dead stones – just an empty shell.”
Silence filled the room once more, while Alex’s mind was filled with fresh questions. The one he turned and turned again in his head was what the hell those guys, whoever they may be, had taken Dad and Uncle Jon for. The one he wanted to dwell upon was what these same guys would do if Hakim’s words proved true. No, he definitely didn’t want to think about that.
The two Medjai started to elaborate theories which would explain the weird men’s hidden purpose, while Evelyn kept silent, her face still sombre. Alex looked past Hakim at the window in front of him. The curtains were open, and he could see a patch of ink-black sky, where he looked in vain for stars. Clouds must be darkening the sky and making it impossible to see anything.
It wasn’t lost on Alex that this reflected their current predicament perfectly.
.⅋.
The ground was shaking. Not just shaking, but rattling and rolling too. Rick was aware of regularly bumping against something that felt like a wall, and that made his whole left side hurt from shoulder to hip. Now that was something new. He sure could recall times when he had gone through far worse and not been really bothered by bruises afterwards. Mmh. Guess I’m getting a little old for this shit.
“Um. Are you awake?” came a tentative voice he quickly identified as Jonathan’s.
“More or less,” Rick muttered, rolling onto his right side and trying to get a bit steadier on the ground. Then he noticed the rising heat that he had blissfully been unaware of in his sleep. “What’s the time?”
“Come on now, Rick,” came Jonathan’s voice again behind him, sounding kind of relieved, “that’s hardly the proper question one would usually ask in circumstances like these.”
Yeah, sure. Damn this elaborate phrasing first thing in the morning. But Rick had a hunch that wherever all this crazy stuff was heading to, it was not going to be quite ‘usual’. Hell, he was almost glad to hear the slight touch of sarcasm in his brother-in-law’s voice. How could things get more unusual after that?
“So what would be the proper question, then?” he drawled, opening his eyes to assess their surroundings.
“Why, I might be wrong, of course, but I do think that ‘Where are we?’ would be more accurate.”
Rick sat up and looked at Jonathan. “Well you are wrong. It’s pretty obvious where we are. We’re in some kinda truck, and it’s driving off to God knows where. Oh, and it’s a pretty bad road. But I’m sure you knew that already,” he added with a smirk.
A particularly nasty jolt of the truck followed, as if to back his words. There was a pause, and Rick almost snorted at his brother-in-law’s miffed expression, almost a pout. This was one of those rare times he could observe genuinely close similarities between Evy and Jonathan. Sister and brother were such polar opposites that it was almost easy to forget that the two were siblings at all.
“To answer your first question, old boy,” Jonathan said after a while, a little stiffly, “it’s about half past eight in the morning.”
“Why didn’t you wake me up?”
“I’ve just woken up myself a few minutes ago. And I didn’t want you to get cranky from lack of sleep. You did look like you needed it.”
“I’m never cranky.”
It was Jonathan’s turn to smirk. Rick ignored him and ran a hand in his hair to scratch the back of his head, careful of the lump from the day before. He had just remembered something.
“Hey, there was a woman on the other side of the wall, last night. Said she was Ferguson’s wife.”
Jonathan’s slightly slanted eyes went suddenly as round as saucers. “What, Lizzie? You mean Elizabeth Ferguson was here?!”
“Yep. So it’s true you two knew each other, huh?”
A slight smile somehow made its way on the Englishman’s bemused face. “Y—yes… We used to hang around together at university. With Tom. So,” he added a little too quickly, “what the hell was she doing down there?”
“Well, it seems that whatever Ferguson’s been messing with, it’s pretty serious. She said she’d been taken from her house someplace in England and brought here for guarantee. You know, blackmail. Sounds like she’s really scared for her husband, and that those guys have given her every reason to be.”
“They didn’t… hurt her or anything, did they?” said Jonathan, alarmed. Rick shook his head.
“No, they didn’t. I mean, she thinks they drugged her, because she only started to hear us last night, but otherwise she sounded fine to me.”
Jonathan nodded. “Good.” Then he rested his chin on his knees and fixed a point somewhere near Rick, frowning slightly. “That’s good.” Something flickered over his face, and the frown deepened. “So that was the ‘choice’ he was talking about, then.”
“What’re you talking about?”
“Nothing.”
After half a second of thinking, though, Rick knew what he meant. Ferguson did have a choice: betrayal or widowerhood. Tough one. With a very slight wince, Rick realised that if himself had been forced to deliver a former school buddy – or orphanage buddy, as it were – to odd guys to save his wife, he sure as hell would have done it without even thinking.
On the other hand, what Ferguson had done had really been dirty, even with the best excuses. He had manipulated and fooled nearly everybody, gained their relative trust, only to two purposes: getting his hands on the Diamond of Ahm Shere and bringing the two of them to his bosses.
Nearly everybody. Rick felt a surge of pride about his wife – Evy’s misgivings had been justified, and Ferguson had not managed to twist her around his little finger like that – mingled with annoyance. He was none too pleased with himself for not having seen that there was something shifty about that guy too eager to please.
Then something peculiar crossed his mind. “Lizzie? Gee, you guys must’ve been pretty close if you got so familiar with a girl. And I thought you Brits were supposed to be gentlemen.”
Jonathan’s right eyebrow shot up, his face set in marble. “I’ll have you know that there was never anything improper between us, O’Connell, if that’s what you were talking about. And Englishmen are not ‘supposed’ to be gentlemen. They are.”
Rick couldn’t help but grin impishly. “That’s what I meant, kind of. So there was definitely something, then.”
One single brown eyebrow crept up even higher as Jonathan cocked his head forward and said, his voice even, “Pray tell, what exactly makes you say that?”
Rick’s sly grin widened. Despite the bumps and holes in the road, this was getting funnier and funnier. “Because usually, when you speak of somebody ‘belonging to the fairer sex’, as Evy would put it, you brag endlessly for a while and then forget the girl in the following month. You still haven’t forgotten her after several years, so… well, no need to be Sherlock Holmes to see that it’s unusual with you.”
“How very astute,” deadpanned Jonathan, probably painfully aware that his ears were turning a delicate shade of pink.
It was hard enough for Rick to keep a straight face, but as he pictured Evy’s face had she been there to see her brother so embarrassed about a woman, he had to look down and pretend to take a great interest in his shoes to hide his laughter.
When he finally felt safe enough, Rick looked up again, to find a pair of dead serious blue eyes narrowed at him. “I completely fail to see the funny side of this.”
Whoa. One odd thing with Jonathan was that, the more embarrassed he was, the more stuck-up his phrasing would get. Rick eventually cracked and let out a loud guffaw, while his brother-in-law rolled his eyes.
“Oh, bugger off,” he muttered, the corners of his mouth finally pulled in a reluctant grin.
Rick was still in pretty high spirits when the truck slowed to a stop and the back doors were pulled open. Blinding white light rushed in, along with the dust and heat of the outside.
“Gentlemen, I will ask you to get down,” came a smug voice Rick knew only too well. Sure enough, when his sight adjusted to the change in brightness, Oddball Number One was standing in the open doors, his black suit a hole in a rectangle of light. As Jonathan got up behind him, looking uncertain, Rick stared at the newcomer, his eyes narrowed.
“You didn’t say the magic word,” he drawled.
Three gunmen seemed to appear out of thin air behind Number One, and aimed guns at the two of them. Number One smirked. “If you please.”
Rick shrugged and started to make his way down, followed by Jonathan who cast a swift glare in passing at Number One from narrowed blue eyes. The latter looked back at him just as coldly.
To Rick’s surprise, they seemed to be in a town – in Giza, more specifically, as he just had the time to realise before the goons who were holding him at gunpoint made him enter a house very close to where the truck had been parked. He didn’t know this part of the city very well, but he had been there a few times before and had a good memory.
They crossed a couple of rooms, which looked like any local house’s would, then the guys in black made them walk a small flight of stairs down to a sort of basement or cave, which looked a lot like the one they had left earlier.
“Again?!” Rick stared at the four men in disbelief. “You guys never heard of a little something called originality?” Number One stared at him, his eyes narrowed behind his small glasses, and his mouth set.
“And whatever were you expecting, Mr O’Connell?” he asked, his voice just as soft as his eyes were cold. “A stone dungeon? Or a bullet in the back of your neck, perhaps?”
“Ah, I don’t mean to interrupt or anything,” said Jonathan behind Rick, his voice steadier than the American would have thought it to be in circumstances like those, “but if you bothered to keep us alive so far, I reckon it’s not for art’s sake, now, is it?”
Good point. Except that if they keep sending us what they call coffee, we’ll drop dead before we know it.
“Although you seem to have a peculiar conception of art, Mr Carnahan, there is something in what you’re saying,” Number One said, sounding remarkably like a hungry toad that had a fly in sight. “But it’s not for you to know. Now, if you would step in, please.”
No matter how childish it surely was, Rick sorely wanted to stomp on the guy’s feet as he walked in the room – but he restrained himself, thinking instead of the moment when he would get his hands on a gun and have a little fun with him. Or even just punch his teeth in. Oh yeah. No matter how long it would take, this guy would get what was coming to him.
This shiny, warming thought in mind, Rick turned back toward Jonathan and Number One, who was about to close the door with a falsely polite bow of his head.
“Gentlemen, till our next meeting.”
Rick gnashed his teeth. Sarcasm and kidnapping aside, there was something animal-like in him that hated the guy. Something visceral. Like a physical thing.
And then something rather unexpected happened. Or not that unexpected, all things considered.
Jonathan walked a step or two back toward Number One.
“I say, er, What’s-your-name?” he piped up. Rick could see the quiet sort of smirk that was right at home on his brother-in-law’s face, though it looked a little bit subdued right now. “Think you’ve dropped this.”
And he threw a worn leather wallet at Number One, whose expression turned rather dirty as he caught it in mid-air.
Rick grinned widely.
The situation hadn’t changed one iota, the two of them were still as weaponless as they had been twelve hours ago, and he still didn’t fully know why they had been brought there in the first place…
But the look on the guy’s face was hilarious.
.⅋.
Wish we could have seen more of Jon’s skills as a pickpocket in the 2nd film, because honestly, for a dilettante, the bloke is top notch. Stealing from a guy on fire? And later in the midst of being strangled? My hero :P
Also, it’s funny how a decade can change your outlook on things. When I started writing this story, my idea was (as stated in the 2nd chapter) that they were friends, flirted a lot, but it never went that much further. Now, though? Bit different. And I’m like “Okay, readers, what do YOU think happened? What are your headcanons and interpretations?” :3
2 notes · View notes
zrtranscripts · 7 years
Text
5K Trainer: Week 7, Workout 2
[gate siren, gates raising]
JODY MARSH: Runner Five, great to see you! Doc said it'd be okay for me to come out with you today, so – it's still okay with you, Doc?
MAXINE MYERS: Sure thing, Jody. Stay safe out there.
JODY MARSH: Oh, we're not going anywhere exciting, just to the fuel dump and back. One of those regular old runs you'll be doing by yourself in a couple of weeks, Five.
MAXINE MYERS: You never know when a zom'll be on your tail. Better get moving. Remember, this week we start with a ten minute brisk walk.
MAXINE MYERS: You're halfway done with your warm-up. Keep walking at a good pace, Five.
JODY MARSH: We're doing great out here! That's the one benefit of being a runner, Five: you stay in shape and you get time to think. It's boss. Plus, you hear a lot of stuff. People trust you.
I heard what you found out about Francesca, that she's at Bert Airfield now, not eaten by a zom. Doesn't that seem weird to you? I know Sam's been trying to raise Bert Airfield on the comms, but they tend to just tune out everything that's not properly encrypted. I can't help feeling that...
Listen, before this, before all of this, well, you know I worked in the city in finance? Just an analyst, nothing senior. But I was working hard, and the thing is, that whole world relies on gossip, did you know that? Rumors, that's what moves the market. Person A talks to Person B who says that Person C was overheard saying - ... so I know it's left me with a suspicious mind, but I take everything I hear seriously. Yeah, everything.
So there was this one thing I heard about Francesca. I heard the old Runner Ten say it once. She sends him out on a mission to get some particular foods, and then suddenly there were zoms and he needed shelter. 
She directed him to this place. Just a little shack, but she seemed to know exactly where it was, and he waited the zoms out until they got distracted by something else and shambled off.
But this shack, there was a trap door, and he looked in there - obviously looking for somewhere to shelter, right? - and inside: food, guns, water, supplies. Like she'd been siphoning off supplies and hording them for something. 
Anyway, when he tried to go back, he couldn't find the place at all. And he didn't tell anyone but me. It's not like he had any proof. But I believed him.
But why would someone do that? Why would someone steal stuff and hide it in the woods? Like the Major always says, we're stronger together.
MAXINE MYERS: You're going strong. Now we're going to go straight into a five minute free-form run. Remember to run as much as you can.
MAXINE MYERS: Two minutes done! You're both doing well out there.
JODY MARSH: Takes me right back, Doc! Remember when we trained like this together?
MAXINE MYERS: I remember you cursed me a lot more than Runner Five.
MAXINE MYERS: Three minutes, Runner Five. More than half done.
MAXINE MYERS: Just one more minute to go, Runner Five. Do as much as you can.
MAXINE MYERS: That's great, Runner Five! Now we're going straight into our run/skip drills. Start your first run now.
MAXINE MYERS: Looking good! Now give me fifteen seconds of skipping.
JODY MARSH: I always felt really stupid doing this, but it's good exercise.
MAXINE MYERS: Good! Now run for one minute.
MAXINE MYERS: Excellent work! Now go back to skipping, fifteen seconds.
MAXINE MYERS: Incredible work! Your effort's paying off. Now run for one minute.
MAXINE MYERS: Good! You've come so far. Now skip for fifteen seconds.
MAXINE MYERS: Excellent! Another minute of running now.
MAXINE MYERS: Fantastic! Now go back to skipping.
MAXINE MYERS: Time for your final run in this set of drills, Five. You can do it.
MAXINE MYERS: And now your final fifteen seconds of skipping. Get going.
MAXINE MYERS: That is great work, Runner Five. I hope you can feel how much you've improved, and how strong you are now. Now you're going to be doing three five minute free-form runs with three minutes for stretching between each set, just like last time. Get ready to run now, and go!
MAXINE MYERS: That's two minutes. Looking strong out there!
MAXINE MYERS: Just another minute to go.
MAXINE MYERS: That's fantastic, Runner Five. Now take those three minutes to stretch and recover.
JODY MARSH: I forgot how hard all that skipping is! Good to be out here, though, Five. As we're at the fuel dump, let's take a can each. Just put it in your backpack. Don't want to weigh ourselves down too much, but every drop counts back at Abel!
I've been thinking as we're running, about why anyone would might set up their own private supplies. I mean, apart from being a lying, cheating, greedy scumbag, which I don't rule out. 
But maybe if they knew something bad was going to happen, like a rocket launcher attack. If they'd heard something, or even if they just suspected that something bad might happen. I mean, you know Skoobs base was destroyed a little while ago. It's just got me thinking.
MAXINE MYERS: You two get ready to go again. Your next run starts in fifteen seconds.
JODY MARSH: Roger that, Doc.
MAXINE MYERS: Okay, time for your second five minute free-form run. Go!
MAXINE MYERS: Two minutes, Runner Five. You're bringing back fuel to Abel, this is vital work.
MAXINE MYERS: Just one more minute to go on this run, Five. Keep up the pace.
MAXINE MYERS: That's great! Stop now and take three minutes to stretch out.
JODY MARSH: I guess either way, if Francesca was the one stealing stuff from us, she's a traitor. We need to find some way to warn that airfield. And maybe it's something worse. I don't know. Quite a few small bases seem to have disappeared over the last few months. I mean, we presume it's zoms, but what if it's not?
MAXINE MYERS: Make sure you're standing up and ready to run. You're going to be going again in fifteen seconds.
MAXINE MYERS: Five, this is your last run of the day. Come in with that fuel, and finish strong.
MAXINE MYERS: That's two minutes. You're going well!
MAXINE MYERS: Just one minute left. Great run, Five!
MAXINE MYERS: Raise the gates! [gate siren, gate raising] Okay, Runner Five, you're done for today. Get a good stretch and cool down.
JODY MARSH: Been great chatting with you, Five. Got some of my own thoughts in order. And here's something for you, just in case you ever want to join me.
MAXINE MYERS: Don't drop one purl one, Runner Five. By the way, good work today. Take a day or two off now, and come back for your last training session this week.
1 note · View note
fatalezr · 3 years
Text
A form of justice - part 10 continued...
There was still silence as Mulvaney surveyed the room. "As you were" he said simply and wandered back to the private room. When the door shut the men in the room resumed their whispering and drinking.
"What the fuck?" Rebecca whispered to Kate.
"Just focus" she whispered back but Rebecca found her mind wandering. Now the pressure to finish the investigation had taken on a new life. It had been Locke who was shutting it down for his friend Kieran Mulvaney. He was a traitor to the force. Rebecca remembered the respect with which she had approached him during the interviews to become a Constable. He was unworthy of any of it. Another auction started up and another innocent woman was sold for the night for £57,000. Locke knew, Rebecca thought. He was here. He could stop all of this and yet he hadn't.
"And that concludes the first half of our auction" the butler announced loudly. Most of the men started up conversation again, returning to the bar and keeping the drink makers busy. The butler started to escort the remaining women out of the lobby.
"Precious, come with me" Madame Rouge said to Kate. Her partner's finger briefly curled and squeezed around her own before she was led off. It appeared Kate was being introduced to one of the men at the party. She noticed her flirtatious manner with the gentleman and very soon he was heading up the stairs with her. "Harmony" Madame Rouge called to her and beckoned her over. Rebecca re-focussed her mind. Her job now was to impress the man and take him upstairs. She walked over, smiling. Madame Rouge took her past the crowds of men near the bar and she felt their eyes wandering over her body as she walked. She kept her poise and supposedly flirtatious nature throughout until the Madame led her into the room next to the bar where she had seen the guards gathering earlier.
The men inside were all wearing the black suits the other guards were wearing. Some were smoking, some were playing cards and others had a drink with them. She noticed an array of weapons around the room. Pistols and handguns on tables, a couple of shotguns by the wall and even a couple of automatic rifles and submachine guns by some chairs. She tried to take it all in. It was a scary team and arsenal to be having to face. A head to head fight would not end well. "Gary?" called Madame Rouge. A tall man with brown hair stood from the chair and Rebecca recognised his face. She had been typing a report on one of his activities in recent weeks. He was Gary Kavanagh, one of Mulvaney's enforcers. A couple of the guards clapped as he stood. It appeared that Rebecca was to be his reward. He walked over to her and inspected her front, his tall frame allowing him to stare down at her breasts.
"Good evening" he said finally, offering his hand for her to shake. She took it and looked deep into his eyes.
"Good evening sir" she said, making sure to flutter her eyelashes a bit.
"Well lads" Kavanagh said and she recognised him as having a true East End cockney accent. "Don't wait up for me". His joke was met by laughter around the room. "Shall we?" he asked Rebecca and she took his hand to lead him out of the room, into the lobby and up the stairs towards her room. He said nothing as she led him to room number 9 and let him in. "Oh very lovely jubbly" he said, inspecting the room and in particular the mirrored ceiling. "I do love seeing my face whilst a beautiful pair of tits rides me"
Rebecca giggled. "Is that what you'd like from me sir?" she asked, running her hand over her breast in the colourful bra she was wearing. She walked around the side of the bed towards the draw where the sex toys were kept.
"No need to rush this just yet, darlin'" he said.
Rebecca had a thought and picked up a whip from the draw. It was time to take charge of the situation. She cracked it down hard on the bed. "In this room, I'm in charge" she said in a commanding voice. Kavanagh was startled.
"Alright miss, just let me do sumink first" He walked over to the corner where Rebecca's coat was and for a moment she was scared he was about to search and find her gun, but he reached up to the security camera and pulled a wire out of the back of it. "No need for the lads to see this". He winked at her.
Rebecca kept her dominant tone. "On to the bed now. It's time for your punishment"
Kavanagh grinned and took his shirt off. "Oh yes darlin, I been very bad". He went to lay down on the bed and patted the space next to him, inviting Rebecca to join.
"How bad have you been?" she said, pulling out a blindfold and some handcuffs from the draw.
"Well for starters I 'elped smuggle some of those whores here, and they're not nearly as pretty as you".
Rebecca hid her disgust at his remark and climbed on to the bed. She straddled Kavanagh. "Put your hands up" she commanded him. He did so and she handcuffed him over the top of the bedframe. He writhed in pleasure and she put the blindfold on him.
"Oh you are a tease" Kavanagh said, grinning. "'Ey, where you off to?" he said as she climbed off him.
"I've got a special punishment for you Gary" Rebecca said seductively as she crossed the room to her coat. She picked up her gun and checked the suppressor. "Trafficking women isn't very nice".
Kavanagh sensed in her tone that she was serious. "'Ey now, leave that out. Get back 'ere and give me a good time. That's what the boss fuckin' pays you for".
"Oh yes he does?" Rebecca replied sarcastically, "well my boss pays me to deliver justice". She raised her gun and fired. Pfft-pfft. Her shots hit him in the head and he went limp before having a chance to react. Blood spilled on to the bed sheets. She wanted to shoot him more for the horror he had inflicted onto the women he trafficked but knew it was prudent to save ammunition. She took a second to compose herself and then picked up her coat. She hung it over her arm and hand to conceal her gun and then opened the door to the corridor. She quickly checked left and right and saw no-one. She heard music and talking from downstairs at the bar area but headed to her right towards room 12. She knocked.
Kate answered the door breathing heavily and pulled Rebecca inside. The room was as blue as Madame Rouge had described, and the bed was inflatable. A man was lying on it, naked, tied up and still. Rebecca quickly looked around the room for the camera and saw that it was in a similar corner to her own and had also been disabled. "Who is he?" she whispered to Kate, pointing at the man.
"Financier" Kate answered. "Some twat from the city. He's not dead" she added quickly, "I just tired him out".
"In ten minutes?" asked Rebecca.
"What can I say? I've got skills" Kate winked at Rebecca with a devious look in her eye. "He'll have a hard time getting out of those restraints anyway". She had her gun in her hand. "And you?"
"One of the guys who does the trafficking. Gary Kavanagh. Dead. Kate...Nadja's with...she's with..." She couldn't quite bring herself to say it.
Kate nodded again. "And Mulvaney's here too. We've got to go for him Bec. We have to".
"But how? This place is swarming with his guards. How long before they come investigating the cameras?"
"OK here's the play. You go get Nadja. I'll create a diversion and get the girls this side. We'll meet downstairs. And Rebecca" she added "kill that treacherous son of a bitch". Rebecca nodded and Kate handed her a small earpiece. "Stay in touch. Good luck".
"You too". Rebecca wanted to say more, to tell her that she had no regrets and that if this was the end, she was proud to have stood by Kate for it but she could not. Mindset was important and she was not resigning them to defeat just yet. The two embraced tightly and Rebecca left the room putting the earpiece in as she did.
There was still no movement from the corridor. She walked to the end and crossed the top of the lobby quickly. A couple of men catcalled from by the bar but she kept her poise. There was another man in a black suit guarding the rooms to the left of the stairs who stopped her as she approached. "Where are you going?" he asked her.
"Special gift from the boss for room 3" she answered, running her finger on the guard's chest. "Don't want to keep him waiting now". The guard nodded and allowed her passage. She found herself in a corridor that matched the one to the right of the stairs where her and Kate's rooms were. She counted the door numbers and arrived at number 3. She steeled her nerves and opened the door.
The room was dark and had a dim red hue from the lighting. Nadja was lying tied up on the bed and crying. She had been gagged, with her hands tied to the top of the bed and her feet to the bottom. There was a sound of a thud as she was hit by Locke, who stood by the side of the bed with a paddle and facing away from the door. "Now then, don't cry pretty one, you know that just makes this better" he said. Nadja looked like she wanted to scream.
"Get your hands off her!" Rebecca cried, shutting the door as she did so to soundproof the room. She dropped her coat and raised her gun. Locke turned and looked at her in astonishment. He stared at the gun and laughed.
"Or what will you do?" he asked arrogantly, that annunciated English voice cutting through the air in a mocking tone. "Do you know who I am?"
"Oh yes" Rebecca said, "I know exactly who you are, you treacherous scumbag. How long have you been informing Mulvaney?"
Locke looked surprised at the question but then seemed to look at Rebecca again, as if seeing her for the first time. "Miss....Davidson?" he asked.
"Do you remember what you asked me?" Rebecca continued in her fury. "About what was the most important characteristic an officer could have? It was a moral compass. Where's yours pointed to?"
"Now Rebecca, don't...don't do anything stupid" Locke said. He edged towards where his jacket was on a chair.
"Well you know what else is an important characteristic to have" she said, and looked down the elongated barrel of her gun, "a steady aim". Locke lunged for his coat and ducking as Rebecca fired pfft-pfft, but her shots hit him in the side. His hand went inside his jacket pocket and Rebecca continued firing pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft. He gagged and cried out as the shots hit him in the chest and he collapsed on the floor. He looked up at Rebecca and opened his mouth to speak as she strode to his prone body. Pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, click, click. Rebecca emptied the rest of her bullets into his chest before collapsing backwards on to the bed, the mix of adrenaline and fury overwhelming her. Her breathing was heavy and she took a few seconds to control herself.
"Bec" came a voice in her ear from Kate. "Bec, can you hear me?"
She touched her ear back. "I'm here. Locke's dead. I'm with Nadja now". She picked herself up and began untying the knots around the bed.
"Roger that. I've got one of the girls from room 11. They had candles in that room and a lighter". Rebecca looked around her room. There was a full bottle of whiskey on the bedside table.
"I've got a bottle of scotch here" she told Kate.
"Burn the fucker down?" Kate asked.
"Burn the fucker down" Rebecca agreed. It would hopefully create their diversion and destroy a valuable business for Mulvaney. Rebecca freed Nadja from the gag and the young woman hugged her and thanked her for saving her.
"Thank you, thank you" she kept repeating.
"Nadja, we need to move now. Your friend is in room 1?" Nadja nodded. "We'll go get her then the others". Rebecca picked up the scotch and tore some cloth from the bedsheets. She picked up a lighter that was by the bed too and then stuffed some of the cloth inside the top of the whiskey bottle to create a makeshift Molotov cocktail. "When I tell you, you're going to light that cloth" she told Nadja, handing her the bottle and lighter. She stood up and reloaded her Glock with another magazine in the back of her suspenders. She chambered a round and headed to the door.
She cracked it open and immediately heard a commotion. There was the faint smell of smoke and she guessed Kate had already started a small fire. There was shouting from the bar area from guards. The guard at the end of the corridor saw her put her head out and walked towards her. "Stay inside, now" he ordered. Rebecca did not move until he reached the door. "Go on - inside!" he said but she only responded by jamming her gun into his chest and pulling the trigger twice pfft-pfft. He fell to the ground and she quickly fired -pfft- into his head.
"Follow me" said Rebecca, and she led Nadja over the dead man's body. "Kate?" Rebecca said, touching her earpiece.
"I've got the girls on this side" her colleague replied. "There's a fire in room 11. Don't worry, I have a plan".
Rebecca tried to put her concern for Kate to one side as they reached room one. She did not bother to knock but instead quietly entered the room. The man in this room was sitting on the edge of the bed, forcing Nadja's friend to go down on him. Rebecca coughed to catch the man's attention. He turned his head and cried out in fright when he saw Rebecca aiming down her gun. "The fu-" he started to say.
"Keep quiet and keep your hands up" she commanded him and he complied. The woman did the same but stopped when she saw Nadja. They exchanged a few words in their native language. "Nadja, tie him up" Rebecca said. She indicated for her to grab some rope and a gag from one of the drawers in the room and within a minute the man was suitably restrained. "Kate, I've got the girls" said Rebecca, touching her earpiece.
"OK, time to go start the fire downstairs. I've got them trying to break into this room. Go! Now!" Kate sounded urgent and Rebecca hurried out of the room, keeping Nadja and the other woman behind her. She spied three of the guardsmen in the opposite corridor, knocking on the door of one of the rooms.
"Nadja, light the bottle" Rebecca said, and she did, handing it to her. She reached the landing above the bar and saw the crowds of men beneath her crowding round the bar. "Time to go" she told herself and she dropped the lit bottle from the landing to the bar area. It smashed and caught fire and she heard men shout as the flames spread and started to hit the carpeted floor and rest of the bar. The men in the corridor opposite turned towards the shouts and saw Rebecca. She raised her gun as they did with theirs but saw them crumple to the floor as Kate came out of the room, firing into their backs. They caught eyes and nodded.
Beneath them in the lobby there was chaos. Men were running out of the club, some clambering over fallen bodies to reach the door. One bartender seemed to be on fire, the other was running. There were a couple of guards attempting to get extinguishers and fight the flames. All around was smoke and Rebecca kept low as she hurried to the top of the stairs and met Kate. She had two women who had been sold in the auction earlier following her. "We've got to move! Quick!" said Kate and she led them down the stairs. The smoke was now disguising their movements. As they reached the bottom, they saw a guard. Before he could say or do anything, Kate fired pfft-pfft and he fell.
"Keep low" Rebecca told Nadja and the group hurried to the corridor that led to Madame Rouge's office and beyond. As they rounded the corner they saw the Madame herself barking at a guard.
"See to the girls, don't let them escape" she shouted at him. She caught sight of Kate and Rebecca leading the women behind them. "Fucking slu-" Pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft. Kate unloaded three times on to Madame Rouge whilst Rebecca hit the guard with her shots. Both fell to the floor, Madame Rouge still wheezing and her blood almost blending in with the rest of her red dress. Kate stood over her. "Fuck yourself" Madame Rouge said defiantly. Pfft. Kate's gun replied by burying a bullet in her head. She saw a bunch of keys in her hand she was evidently handing to the guard and took them. Rebecca led them again to the room where they had met Nadja and the other women earlier. Kate tried a few keys before finally finding success. She unlocked the door and the women awaiting auction still were inside. They cried out at one another, shouting in confusion as they saw Rebecca and Kate, both of them still in their lingerie but carrying guns and darkened by the smoke they had passed through.
Nadja shouted to the room and the women listened to her as she explained what was going on. As she spoke, Kate reloaded her gun. Rebecca listened at the door. She heard shouts coming from the corridor. "Kate, we've got company" she called and her partner joined her at the door. Rebecca kept her gun raised but sheltered herself behind the door. As soon as she saw the black suit of a guard, she fired pfft-pfft-pfft. The cry of pain she heard told her she had hit him but she ducked behind the door again as another man came into view. BAM-BAM. The loud shots of a gun were almost deafening and she saw the bullets hit the wall near where her head had been. She ducked low and stretched along the floor. The man firing had no chance to react to her position as she fired pfft-pfft and he fell.
"Take them - now" Kate told her, giving Rebecca the keys.
"Nadja, show me where they hold the rest of you" Rebecca asked and Nadja led her through some small passages as Rebecca reloaded her gun. She heard a gunshot in the distance, followed by a pause and then the cry of a man again and she guessed Kate had taken out another guard. Nadja led them to a heavy door in a dimly-lit corridor. Rebecca quickly tried a couple of keys to open the padlock that kept a heavy bar in place. She got lucky with the fourth key and she heaved the bar away from the door and opened it.
The room contained dozens of bunk beds. It was poorly lit, with only one small window letting the light from outside in. She saw a multitude of scared faces of women and children, most looking emaciated, several sporting bruises or cuts. Nadja addressed the room who looked afraid of their new visitor. "Momma" Rebecca heard a cry, and she saw an eight year old girl run to Nadja who picked her up.
"We need to go - now!" Nadja finished by speaking in English. The women and children started to put shoes on, some grabbing coats where they had them. Rebecca turned to see Kate jogging up the corridor to see them.
"There's more coming" she warned. "But I saw an exit - back this way". She kept her gun raised high and Rebecca followed suit. Her heart was racing. "This way" Kate told her. Smoke was starting to enter the corridor and they heard the roar of flames. Kate led them down the corridor they had come through before taking a sharp left. Rebecca saw some stairs up to a fire door and sprinted up the stairs. She pushed at the door and it moved slightly but did not fully open, as if being blocked. She took a few steps back and charged at the door with all her weight directed to her shoulder. The impact was painful but the door burst open and she saw she had pushed some bricks holding it closed aside with her force. The night air was cool and refreshing against the smoke from the corridor. She saw the lights of the city.
"Nadja!" she called, and the woman ran to her carrying her daughter. "Get into Stratford. Find a police station. You're free now". She pointed in the direction of where she knew the high street to be. "Go! Quick!" Nadja had tears of joy in her eyes and through an arm around Rebecca. She kissed her on the cheek.
"Thank you. You are an angel" she told her. There were shouts from inside and she heard Kate firing her pistol. Some of the women escaping screamed.
"Go!" Rebecca said to Nadja, who ran in the direction that had been pointed to her, the other women and children running up the stairs and following her. Rebecca headed down the stairs. Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta. She heard a burst of automatic weapon fire and saw Kate ducking behind the wall. She returned fire, her pistol stil; spitting pfft-pfft and a man cried out. There was a loud BOOM sound and bits of wall flew off as a shotgun was fired in their directions. BOOM it roared again.
"Mick, finish them!" a cold Irish voice said and despite the chaos she still recognised it as Mulvaney's. BOOM-BOOM. Mick's shotgun fired twice more and Rebecca hid with Kate. As soon as the firing finished, Rebecca kept low and rolled into the corridor. She fired up in the direction of the shots pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft-pfft. At least two of her bullets hit the man who was reloading and he fell. Pfft-pfft. Kate rounded the corner and shot twice as another guard rushed in to view.
"Rebecca, get out of here" she said, helping her get up. "Get to safety"
"What about you?" Rebecca asked.
"I'm going after Mulvaney" Kate said, a serious look in her eye and she sprinted towards the heavy smoke that now engulfed the corridors. Rebecca coughed as she inhaled some smoke. Her back and arm hurt through charging down the door. Fight through it, she told herself. She ejected the nearly-spent magazine from her gun and found her final one still in the back of her suspender. She jammed it home and set off in the direction of Kate. She headed back in the direction she had come, covering her mouth where she could with her hand. She could feel the heat as she approached the lobby - it was evidently still on fire and as she rounded the corner she saw flames all around her, some on top of burning bodies. The door that had been marked private was open and Rebecca slipped into that room. The heat was intense and there was fire around her but she picked her way around bits of fallen timber in what appeared to be a private office. There was a door to the outside that she saw. She could feel herself suffocating and ran towards it, spluttering and coughing as she did so.
She was in a private courtyard amongst some expensive cars. She ducked behind a black Bentley just as a hail of gunfire from automatic weapons shot in her direction from the opposite side of the courtyard. Ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta it rang above her, hitting the wall and the car that protected her. She looked to her left and saw Kate sheltering behind a silver sports car.
"Get the fuck out of here, go" she heard Mulvaney shout and she rounded the corner of the car to see him and and the two guards with machine guns getting in to a black Land Rover. A window above her exploded sending shards of glass into the courtyard. She fired in his direction pfft-pfft-pfft but only hit the car. A guard aimed his gun in her direction and fired a volley of shots ta-ta-ta-ta-ta.
She felt a searing pain and collapsed as a bullet hit her. Her head hit the concrete of the courtyard and the world started to spin. She heard a cry of "No!" from Kate and the pfft-pfft of her partner's pistol. Tyres screeched. The sky was lighting with the orange of the fire from the warehouse. In the distance she heard sirens. "Bec! Bec!" she heard Kate cry again, from closer this time. She felt Kate grabbing her hand, and then all went black...
0 notes
chuutoro · 2 years
Text
Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media Tumblr media
when will she step on me | SPY X FAMILY
update:
Tumblr media
well…. when you’re right, you’re right
4K notes · View notes