Chapter 26 Doc
DOC
The clubhouse wasn’t a safe place to be any longer, and my place had been burned, so we went to Ranger’s second-hand shop that he ran in town.
He had a host of old ass gaming systems and electronics that he piddled around with in his back shop, but one of the things he outfitted his store with was the ability to turn this place into a bunker.
It was the safest place for us to hunker down while we executed the second phase of our plan.
“Almost there,” Ranger said as he slowly eased the joystick in his hand to the right.
The screen we were watching tilted while trees passed beneath the camera on the drone he was flying.
“And you’re sure the heat sensors are going to work?” Cap asked, hunched over the man’s shoulder.
“Absolutely, this is just a test flight,” Ranger said as he wrapped the drone back around.
“I want the sound to draw people out. Drones aren’t completely silent, but if within enough of a range, it can definitely be heard.
I’m almost done with the wraparound, and then we’ll let her rest for a few minutes to cool off. ”
“Then the heat sensors?” Cap asked.
Ranger grinned at him. “Then the heat sensors.”
“Good job,” Cap said as he patted Ranger on the shoulder.
“Are you going to raise up the drone during the second pass through?” Brutus asked.
“Yep,” Ranger said, popping the p. “I’ll get it high enough to where the sounds of the drone will be masked by the swaying of the treetops with wind and stuff. I just want them out and looking for the source of the sound. Doesn’t mean they’ll find it.”
“Good thinking,” Ghost said with a nod of his masked head.
Everyone knew he meant business when he ditched the balaclava for the full-head mask that he wore.
“All right,” Ranger said as he released the joystick to tap a few keys on his keyboard, “you guys ready for the heat sensor show?”
We all huddled around him while he sat at the desk in the back of his shop, staring at the computer screen. We watched the drone footage rise higher and higher into the air until it looked almost impossible that we’d ever see anything with the heat sensors.
“And for my next trick,” Ranger said.
He flipped a button and the cool and heated tones of the heat sensor registered on the screen in front of us.
At first, flying around only revealed the wildlife.
It made sense, since we were flying over the state park.
There were packs of deer and birds flittering about.
Things skittered along the forest floor, and while we couldn’t identify what those were, we saw them.
The little yellow and red dots, morphing and rushing about until they disappeared.
“Why do they disappear suddenly?” Cap asked.
“Burrowers,” was all Ranger said.
Ah, so no ground penetration.
Got it.
I stayed silent. Even though the guys asked questions every once in a while, I just kept my eyes glued to the screen in front of us. And for a while, I thought this was going to be a fruitless venture.
Until three massive heat signatures popped up, all of them, walking around in some sort of circle.
“There you aaaaare,” Scout singsonged.
It was always terrifying whenever Scout felt like singing. He had this haunting voice that I just knew could make a grown ass man wet himself in the middle of the night.
“Holy fuck, that’s people,” Ghost said, like he thought this shit wouldn’t work.
“Three of them to be exact,” Ranger said as he dipped the drone down just a smidge.
“Are they inside something?” Cap asked. “Or walking around outside something?”
“What landmarks are around?” Wrecker asked. “Can you show us?”
Ranger raised back up so far that the heat signatures disappeared. But the amazing bird’s eye view made Wrecker gasp.
“Holy fucking hell, that has to be where—”
“That’s where Ariel and I were held,” Cap said. “Lower back down. Go back down, Ranger.”
He did as our president asked without a huff or a puff. He slowly lowered the drone back down until the three blobs came back into view. Still circling in that same pattern.
“The fuck are they doing?” Brutus asked.
“Walking around the perimeter,” Cap muttered.
“That’s what I wanted,” Ranger said as he snapped a few screenshots on the computer screen. “I wanted them to come out and search for that noise.”
“Got a map,” Scout said.
“Go back up. I want Scout marking these places on a map,” Cap commanded.
“Absolutely,” Ranger said.
Pulling back out helped Scout to easily identify where on the map we were in the state park. He circled the area with a big red marker, and then looked at Ranger and nodded his head.
“All right, let’s see how many more we can find,” Cap said.
We stayed like that for a while, watching Ranger fly the drone over the state park. It took us a while to come across another set of heat signatures that were human versus animal, and this time, Wrecker was the one whose eyes bulged.
“That’s it,” he said. “That’s where Amanda and I were. Holy fuck, Range, you found it.”
“Scout,” Cap said.
“Already got it marked,” Scout said. “I’m ready to go when Ranger is.”
“I want to fry them,” Wrecker growled.
I looked at his hands and saw his knuckles turning white. So I turned away from the screen and walked towards him.
“Hey, take some breaths,” I said as I stepped in front of him, blocking his view of the screen as well.
“I’m fine, Doc,” he said through gritted teeth.
I reached down and wrapped my hands around his fists. “You and I both know you’re not okay. So take some breaths with me.”
“Doc.”
I leveled him with a look. “That’s an order from your physician, Riley.”
Wrecker looked over at Cap, but Cap was much too busy hovering over Ranger’s shoulder and mumbling commands and requests. His gaze gravitated back to mine, and the tick in his jaw told me that he surrendered.
I squeezed his fists softly. “Take a deep breath in through your nose.”
His nostrils flared and his chest jumped.
I knew it.
He was on the verge of a flashback.
“You’re not there,” I said with a shake of my head. “No one has Amanda. She’s safe with King and the guys, and you’re here, ready to plot revenge on the men that touched her.”
Wrecker’s eyes hardened. “No one touches her. Ever. Again.”
I shook my head. “Never again. That’s what we’re here doing.”
He nodded as he drew in another shaky breath. I finally felt his hands releasing. “Yeah. Right. That’s… that’s what we’re doing.”
“You’re not there. Say it.”
“I’m not there.”
“Amanda is safe.”
He cleared his throat. “Amanda is safe.”
I nodded as I felt the rest of his fists relax. “She’s safe, and you’re safe, and by the time we’re done, the entire town will be safe. All of the towns around us will be. We’ve got this, and so do you.”
His shoulders finally relaxed. “Yeah, yeah. Right. Sorry.”
“No sorries,” Cap said. “Just breathe.”
“Got another one,” Ranger said.
“Another what?” Wrecker asked.
He tried turning toward the screen, but I released his hands and caught his shoulder.
I turned him back to me and gave him an inquisitive look, but he simply shook his head.
I quickly checked his pupils to make sure they weren’t dilated like they were when I first clocked him balling up his fists, but his eyes returned to normal.
I nodded and turned my attention back to the screen as well.
“All right, another what now?” I asked.
“Another building with heat signatures.”
I furrowed my brow. “Wait, really?”
Ranger nodded. “I expected the three. The two that Cap and Wrecker were in, and the one we’re still trying to establish in terms of where Marla came from. But I’ve come across a fourth one.”
“Fucking hell,” I muttered as I hunched back over Ranger’s shoulder.
“And the worst part?” he asked as he pointed at Scout’s map. Scout handed it to him and Ranger held it up for all of us to see. “None of these places are close. They’re all spread out as fuck. We’ll never be able to attack properly.”
“Which is why we aren’t attacking,” Cap said as he reared back up, stretching his arms over his head. “Ranger.”
“Yes, boss.”
“Keep doing flyovers of the state park. However many of these installations they’ve got thrown up in that place, we need to know about them.
But you’re right. Whatever part of me hoped we could still storm in there and kill all of those assholes went out the window when we dropped a circle on that third building.
Nothing is close. Everything is separated by miles.
We wouldn’t have enough men, even with King’s crew, to take them on fully. ”
“Were we even considering that?” Brutus asked. “Since we’re working with our contact in the DOJ to gather information?”
Cap just slowly turned and leveled him with a look, which made Brutus hold up his hands in a mocking sort of surrender.
I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen Cap look at anyone like that, much less Brutus.
“Captain,” I said to draw his attention back to me
It worked. “Yes, Doc.”
I tilted my head. “All of us have a reason to want every single heat signature we come across dead. But we’ve got to play this smart. The plan was never to infiltrate and kill. It was always to infiltrate and gain information. We can still do that here. We’ve still got the upper hand.”
Cap’s body was pulled taut with tension. “Explain.”
I just shrugged softly. “They don’t have a clue that we know how many places out there they have.
Nor do they have a clue that we are finding locations for them.
They hear something, sure, but they won’t find it, and then they’ll just keep on trucking.
Ranger could keep doing silent fly overs.
He could get a gist for their routines. When they switch people out.
How they’re getting to all of these places in the state park in the first place.
There’s a lot that we could gather, staying in the background.
Stuff that the DOJ could definitely use. ”
My words seemed to disarm him, at least a little bit.
It was rough, working with a bunch of hotheads.