Randy Terri's Arc

Chapter 10 of 11

Randy led her through the dispensary's back door and into the storage room where he kept inventory locked behind chain-link fencing. He pulled two folding chairs from the corner and set them facing each other. The woman sat without hesitation, her jacket still zipped, her hands resting on her knees like she'd done this kind of conversation before. Randy stayed standing. He needed to see her reaction when he told her what the prisoner's situation actually was. "Your brother's in a cell on sublevel three," Randy said. "There are seven doors down there, all steel with observation windows. He's behind Door Four. Someone's been keeping him alive for at least six years, maybe longer. They're feeding him. Monitoring him. And whoever's doing it knows I went down there, which means they'll know if you do too." The woman pulled a worn leather wallet from her jacket and flipped it open. Inside was a newspaper clipping with Randy's face on it — the same missing person report she'd shown him at the counter, but this one was the original, creased and faded from being carried for years. She'd been looking for him specifically because he was the last link to her brother. She'd tracked him across two hundred miles and six years just to get to this moment. "I found your truck three days ago," she said. "Parked at a clearing east of here with fresh tire tracks leading back to this farm. I set up a tent near the road and waited to see if you'd go back. When you didn't, I came here." She folded the wallet and put it away. "I'm not asking you to go back down. I'm asking you to tell me how to get in, and I'll handle the rest." Randy pulled the camera from his pocket and scrolled to the photograph of Door Four's window — the pale hand pressed against glass. He turned the screen toward her. "This is what he looks like now. If you go down there and the watcher catches you, they won't just lock the gate. They'll make sure you don't come back up." He paused. "But if you're going anyway, I'll take you to the entrance. Not because I owe you, but because your brother told me to run when I opened that door. He didn't say stay away. He said run. That means he knew someone was coming." The woman stood and extended her hand. Randy shook it once, firm and deliberate. He'd just committed to taking someone back to sublevel three, directly against the watcher's warning. The watcher would know. They'd see the tent, the truck, the second set of footprints leading underground. Randy had traded silence for action, and whatever came next would be on him. But the prisoner had been waiting six years for someone to find him, and Randy wasn't going to be the reason that person turned around at the door. "We leave tonight," Randy said. "After dark. Bring a flashlight and something to pry with. The deadbolt on Door Four is corroded, but it'll take force to break it again."