Day 4
Jimmy checked off the last location on the map they’d been assigned. He was tired and so were his two companions, S’vram, one of the military people and Betty Reed, MPD. It had taken all night to go through the list of locations Colonel Foster had given them. The only breaks they’d taken were for coffee and deli sandwiches.
It was now morning. Jimmy knew he should check in at work, but he also knew that Perry knew he was helping in the search for Lois and Clark. Clark had been missing seventy-two hours now and Lois had been taken twenty-four hours ago.
“Nothing,” Betty Reed complained, brushing red curly hair away from her face. “Any suggestions?”
Jimmy looked at the map and the list of addresses one more time. “You know, considering the type of location we’re look for, there’s a couple places right near here the colonel missed.”
“Where?” Betty demanded sharply.
“The Wincote building over there has sub-basement and a bomb-shelter that doesn’t show on the regular floor plans and so does the Wannamaker building.” Jimmy saw the dubious look in Betty’s face. “Remember who I work with? Bomb-shelters are lead-lined, so anytime we’re looking for something someone doesn’t want Superman to find, we start with the old bomb-shelters. There’re bomb-shelters under both those buildings that weren’t on the list.”
“Which one first, Wincote or Wannamaker?” Betty asked, peering at both of her companions.
“Flip a coin?” Jimmy suggested, pulling a quarter out of his pocket. “Heads Wincote, tails Wannamaker.” He tossed the coin and caught it, placing it on the back of his free hand.
“Wincote,” Betty said, looking at the coin.
0 0 0
The cell was even colder than she remembered. Clark had passed out from the pain, to his tormentor’s fury. When even being doused with ice water failed to rouse him, their captors threw them both back into the cell.
Clark had started shivering again, and she tried to prop him up against her chest, to get his bare back away from the cold, damp stones. His back was bleeding again and Lois wondered once more how much of the torture he could take. How could they have possibly mistaken him for this Kal-El person? Why were they doing this? Why did they think Clark would know anything about Superman’s people? Why did they think she knew anything?
“Lois,” he murmured. He was finally conscious after how many hours? She had to bend closer to hear him. “The next time they come, they’re going to cut me open. Please, please don’t let them dissect me like a frog.”
“What do you want me to do?” she asked. She knew she couldn’t stop them, but his pain, his terror, was killing her. The cold was seeping through the scrubs. Her legs were nearly numb again.
“Make sure I’m dead . . . please, don’t let me be alive when they come,” he said. He couldn’t keep his voice from shaking. “I’m begging you . . .”
“Kal-El, I don’t know if I can.”
“Please, Lois, if you ever cared, please do this for me, please. They’re going to cut me open, alive and conscious, if they can. I don’t want to die like that.” He laid his head back on her shoulder and closed his eyes again. He couldn’t stop shaking.
She looked around for a weapon, but nothing had changed from the last time she’d looked around. She looked down at the bloodied shirt she was wearing and began tearing a strip off the bottom, using her teeth to start the rip.
She twisted the strip in her hands and placed the strip around his throat, above the toque around his neck. She knew from his breathing he was conscious, but he made no move to stop her. She twisted the fabric tighter around his throat and he went limp.
“I’m so sorry,” she murmured through her tears. He wasn’t breathing as she laid his body on the floor, the fabric strip still tight around his throat.
0 0 0
An alarm went off in the sub-basement Russell Meyerson had commandeered for his temporary command post. He peered at the security camera monitor and swore to himself. No one should have been able to find them. All references to this location had been deleted from the city planner’s office database. No one else should have been interested.
He turned to Anton Braxton, the interrogator he’d put in charge of Lane and the alien. Braxton was not the man’s real name. Meyerson didn’t know his real name, only that he’d come over from somewhere in the Eastern Bloc soon after the KGB was put on notice by the Russian government to clean up their act. Braxton was obviously one of those ‘acts’ that had needed to be cleaned up.
“Take care of the alien and his girl friend, then evacuate the base. I’ll send word when it’s time to regroup,” Meyerson said, heading out the door.
Braxton watched after his superior for a long moment, then pulled his automatic pistol from its holster, double checking the ammunition clip.
He stepped out into the hallway.
“Police! Drop it!” A female voice yelled. He turned to see a woman with wild red hair holding an automatic pistol in both hands. He fired off a shot and she returned fire. He felt a burning in his chest and looked down to see blood on his blouse. He was dead before he hit the floor.
Betty swore to herself as she went over to the body, checking for a pulse at his throat. Nothing.
“Okay, let’s check this place out,” she ordered, getting to her feet. There were several corridors to check, all with doors on each side. She directed S’vram to take the middle one, while she took the furthest one, the one the dead man’s companions most likely took off down.
She assigned Jimmy the corridor nearest where they’d come in.
Jimmy was nearly running down the corridor, check each door. All but two were unlocked, store rooms, hurriedly abandoned sleep areas, an eating area with still steaming coffee in the mugs. The first locked door he was able to make quick work of, glad the police detective he’d been assigned to was not around to see how fast he could pick a door lock.
He opened the door and peered inside. There was a table and two chairs. A pulley and cable arrangement hung from the ceiling and there was blood splattered on the concrete beneath the cable. Jimmy started to feel sick to his stomach.
The second locked door was different than the others. It was reinforced steel and the lock was harder to pick than the first one. He opened the door, suddenly fearful about what he might find inside.
“Lois? LOIS!”
She was kneeling beside a bloodied, dark-haired man. She was holding tightly to a strip of cloth around the man’s neck. He wasn’t moving, he wasn’t breathing.
“Dear God, Lois, that isn't Clark?”
Lois looked up at Jimmy, tears running down her face.
