Tethered Twins

Chapter Twenty Seven

Emmie Keyes

March had been gone for 10 minutes and during that time he’d given us a box full of needles that we injected into the animals to temporarily put them to sleep.

When I walked over to Pixie she cowered in the corner of her cage and started to whimper as soon as she saw the needle. “I’m so sorry,” I said but I couldn’t do it. Whether it was her big brown eyes or the look of sadness on her face I didn’t want to subject her to another injection. I hid the needle in my jacket and told Gabe I’d finished with the animals.

We then loaded all the animal cages we could manually move onto a large platform at the end of the room. Grace remained on the floor. Every few minutes her back went into shock, sending her arms twisting around from the pain. She kept her eyes closed the entire time. It didn’t look good.

There were two cages we couldn’t move at all, which contained large monkeys. March said he had a plan for them so we left them not wanting to risk another broken back.

As we loaded the cage with Pixie the dog onto the platform, a large shutter in front of us lifted up and a bright light shone on our faces.

My initial thought was that the guards had finally found us but March said most of them didn’t even know this room existed. It seemed Tobias thought his experiment would be enough to stop us so sent him alone rather than risk exposing this room. It was his biggest mistake.

As the light cleared we saw the back of a large lorry in front of us. March jumped out of the front of it and shouted “Come on then,” as he grabbed a cage containing an animal and loaded it into the back of the vehicle, making sure it was secure.

He was going to help us save all of the animals. Another positive point for March.

Gabe and I grabbed cages and loaded them into the lorry. It was in plain view to anyone outside at the back of the building. We knew we’d have to act fast to not get noticed.

“What about them?” I asked, pointing to the monkeys. March headed to a control panel and pressed several buttons. The monkey’s cages were then lifted into the air and carried along on two separate tracks which ran along the ceiling. I looked upwards and watched as the tracks took the monkeys directly into the lorry in a space March had cleared.

“You’re amazing!” I said to March.

“You can thank Grace. I found the schematics on her phone. After that it was just a case of putting everything together. Gabe, look in the lorry.”

 Gabe found a stretcher in the lorry which he wheeled over to Grace. The three of us lifted her onto the stretcher and tied her down. Her eyes opened and she murmured “Gabe?” He smiled, happy to see some life in her again and he held her hand as we wheeled her into the lorry. We attached the side of her stretcher to a panel on the lorry’s inside wall so she wouldn’t move around as we travelled.

“Hey!” a loud shout came from in front of the lorry. It was one of the guards. Hearing the noise, March motioned for us to stay in place and he pressed a button that caused the back of the lorry to close. For better or worse, Gabe, Grace and I were trapped.

“Hello,” said March. “Just a routine delivery.”

“Documents please.”

March handed over some fake paperwork. I’d heard Gabe speak to Grace’s mystery contact and ask them to create it and March must have printed it off during his time away from the group. I wasn’t surprised that Gabe also knew Grace’s contact and it wouldn’t be long before I could start asking them for the truth.

 “Thank you. Have a safe journey,” said the guard.

As the lorry moved forward Pixie started to growl. It was a quiet noise at first but suddenly she started yapping over and over.

“You didn’t inject her!” said Gabe, knowing he would probably have done the same.

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t do it,” I replied as I handed Gabe the needle.

He went to inject her but the sight of the needle made her stop immediately.

The guard ran after our lorry and started banging on the side. “Wait!” he shouted. March stopped the vehicle and we stared at Pixie willing her to be quiet. We watched the guard through a slit at the side of the lorry.

 “One more thing,” said the guard. “We’re looking for a missing journalist in the building, she had blonde hair, a short figure, blue eyes, around a C cup bra size,” he motioned with his hands the bra size.

“The cheek!” I whispered to Gabe.

We quickly silenced ourselves and March confirmed he hadn’t seen anyone matching that description.

“Thanks anyway. Can’t be too careful,” said the guard, as he waved our lorry through out of the main gate. As March drove us away from the building we could see large displays that showed Tobias talking to the press, clearly unaware that we had escaped. His love for the media had failed him this time but he’d found me so easily once before that I knew it was only a matter of time.

--<><>--

Tobias Zen

Tobias watched as a large lorry pulled away from the building. He knew there were no deliveries that day. It had to be them.

After he’d finished his speech a guard stood waiting for him and took Tobias away into the basement area.

“We found him like this Sir. A lorry left the premises earlier and when we checked the loading bay we found him,” Jacobs motioned over to the dead body of the General. He had a hard time looking at it but Tobias did not.

Tobias looked at the corpse amazed by the handiwork. “She had help to do this, it seems like our little prisoner proved very helpful.

He’d already spotted that Gabe had escaped and that the animals had gone. A shame, he thought to himself. He was far beyond animal trials now and had planned to dispose of them this week now he no longer had a need for them. Tobias was far more interested in human trials now.

“I didn’t ring the alarm as you requested,” said Jacobs.

Quite right. thought Tobias. We can't afford another PR disaster.

“Thank you. You’ve done a good job. Tell the guards to return to their positions, the threat has been neutralised. And dispose of this body, as well as Frazier Kull.”

Tobias knew Frazier wouldn’t have survived if his twin was dead. Unlike his new obsession. Yes, there was something unique about Emmie Keyes.

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- Blagman