Dangerous Love (ONC 2019 - LGBTQ)

20. Resolution

☆ Dedicated to lhansenauthor - another wonderfully supportive person on Wattpad! ☆

"Harlan." Someone was calling his name. Insistently.

Harlan groaned and opened his eyes. His head thumped like the worst hangover but at least he was still alive. He sat up very slowly and tried to remember where he was. A faint glow illuminated the cave walls and then he saw Patrick and Rik, both sitting on the ground with a chain around their ankles, staring at him with hope in their eyes.

"Are you okay?" asked Patrick at the same moment Rik burst out with, "The lock didn't open! It must be hours after 16:00 by now."

"Just a sec, let me get my head together," said Harlan. "Is there any water?"

"Well there is," said Patrick, looking toward the bottles, "but I don't know how long we have to make it last."

"I'll just have a mouthful," promised Harlan, getting unsteadily to his feet. "Tell me what happened," he asked Patrick, who filled him in, while Harlan spent a fruitless couple of minutes seeing whether he could break the lock or the chains. He brushed an apologetic kiss over Patrick's lips. "I'm sorry, I can't get you free."

He looked across at the dirt-filled exit. "I'll just have to dig my way out and go for help."

~~~

Hetha and Lisa were back at the forest campsite, picking up the last few items that had been scattered around, glad of the small fee Patrick's tour company had offered for the job.

They watched the evening VidNews on their wristcoms with dismay. Rik and that lovely man Patrick were still missing. A day after the ransom had been paid. Nobody had ever heard of such a thing. Hundreds of people were searching the containers around Syden, spurred on by the promise of a million credits for whoever found the boy. Maddon had decided he could hardly offer less to Rik's rescuer than the kidnapper.

Lisa looked thoughtful. "You know, Hetha? When that shuttle took off, I remember being a bit surprised. The direction seemed wrong to me, a bit too far west from where I'd expected. I'm probably clutching at comet tails but it might be worth having a bit of a look around up there. The searchers might have missed something significant."

"You think so?" asked Hetha, doubtfully.

"I just have a feeling we'd regret it, if we didn't go and look," said Lisa. "It won't take long."

~~~

He had been digging for hours.

Hot and sweaty, Harlan would have given a year of his life for a decent excavator. The more rubble he scooped away with his hands, the more fell into the space. He suspected the landslide had been a last minute addition to the plan, one designed to keep him trapped. But it wasn't going to work. He'd keep digging for hours, days, if necessary. Kam had made a fatal mistake leaving him alive.

He took a mouthful of water—Patrick and Rik had insisted he take one of the bottles for himself—stood and stretched his back, then kept digging.

~~~

"This is where they turned off," said Lisa, heading confidently down the narrow track. Hetha sighed and followed.

"How much further?" asked Hetha, a while later, pausing to survey the boulder strewn area ahead. She wasn't as young as she used to be.

"We're still on the right trail," said Lisa pointing to an indentation in the ground. "Look."

She allowed Hetha a short rest then carried on, head down, as she studied the ground for tracks. The trail was no longer obvious. Luckily, there had been no heavy rain since the young men were taken, and she made slow but steady progress, until Hetha caught her arm and stopped. She was pointing at a flattened area off to the left. "Look over there, past that landslide! Doesn't that look like a flyer hovered there for a while?"