Frost (Bxb)

Chapter Twenty-Two

We didn't really get too far into our journey before we began hearing sirens, alerting the staff of my absence. The noise was so loud that for a moment, I cried out and stopped moving, covering my ears in hopes of blocking out the sound. Joseph behind me covered his ears as well, the sounds of the alarms like an explosion against our eardrums. My eyes were closed tightly, my teeth gritting together painfully as the sirens wailed on. I could faintly hear some of the workers scrambling from wherever we were, things smashing to the ground as if someone were throwing something. The noises were all too much and I nearly passed out.

However a nudge from Joseph had me glancing back at him. I saw the desperation in his eyes and in that moment I knew we had to move on. We had to deal with our ears being assaulted with the wail of the alarms. I began moving forward, sweat dripping from my brow, my body aching to pain nearly unimaginable, my heart hammering in my chest. I was only being fueled by adrenaline as we crawled through the tiny space. I saw some light ahead, and glanced back at Joseph to tell him.

"Let's not jump out just yet. Look through the cracks and let me know what you can see."

I nodded, scooting closer to the grate that covered the vent, squinting through the small openings to see a large empty room. "I see an empty room," I explained, tilting my head to see if I could get anything else. I saw a desk to the left, a woman sitting there as she typed away on her computer. "Wait, it's not empty. There's a woman at a large desk doing something on the computer."

"Do you see large glass doors that lead outside?"

I looked, but only saw a large metal door that was nestled on the other side of the desk. I sighed in defeat, shaking my head as I glanced back at Joseph. "No. There's only a metal-"

I heard a couple of beep sounds and turned my attention back to the almost barren room on the other side of the grate. The metal door that was beside the woman at the desk, opened up to reveal a rather...wrathful looking Issak, whose face spoke murder as he stomped inside.

"Caren, secure a lockdown on the entire building. Level five. Subject Z has escaped." While the woman nodded and immediately did his bidding, Issak's eyes scanned around the room, falling onto the vent we were in. I gulped and gasped, backing away with hopes that he didn't see me, sighing with relief when he tore his gaze away and walked over to the desk. He whispered something to the woman, and I strained to hear, but no avail I heard absolutely nothing. I sighed, maneuvering around to where my face was next to Joseph's, the man looking at me with curious brown eyes. "Issak's saying something to the woman at the desk, but I have no idea what, unfortunately. Though...I did see him looking over here, so I'm a little worried."

Joseph cursed, dragging a large calloused hand down his face. "Great. I should have known it wasn't going to be this easy." He nibbled at his bottom lip, an action I was strangely captivated by, and scratched the back of his neck before he continued. "Until we know for sure that Issak already put two and two together, we should probably stay put. If we're extremely lucky, then he doesn't know where we're at, and we're panicking for nothing."

"I have a feeling we're not going to be so lucky," I muttered with a frown, maneuvering until I was comfortable...well, as comfortable as I could get with my back against one side of the vents, my legs bent to my chin in front of me. "I guess the only thing we can do is wait and see."

Joseph nodded and copied my position, wrapping his arms around his legs as he leaned his head onto his knees. "This sucks. I hate just sitting here, waiting for the inevitable. I have a feeling Issak knows it was me that whisked you away."

I bit my bottom lip, rubbing at my arms. "Jo? I know this is random, and stuff...but ah...what exactly is the plan once we get out of here? Issak's probably going to ground all ships in order to seek us out...so-"