42, Breakout
“History shows us that as civilizations collapse, cities become slums where war lords rule with violence until the sanitary conditions become so bad that disease wipes out most of the population. That’s when cities get abandoned altogether and nature reclaims them.” Master thief Owens looked through his night vision binoculars and saw no guards stationed outside of the main driving entrance into the Siberian prison.
“What about the folks that flee from the cities? Do they die from getting sick too?” Master thief Anastasia Boothausen was enjoying the conversation as she inspected her climbing gear. It was midnight on a cloudless new moon night, but she could see in the dark as easily as if it were mid day. She found her equipment satisfactory and nodded to herself.
“Yup. The first wave of mass migration out to the countryside usually dies due to malnutrition and being unprepared for weather. Stay dry or die.”
“Jesus, Owens, you’re just a ray of sunshine.”
He missed the joke. “Thanks, Ana. I can tell you that the second wave of exodus happens as the remaining political factions become increasingly ineffective. As the refugees pour into the countryside, they’re met with fierce resistance from the rural populations, but the healthiest of the city folks almost always overwhelm the closest rural villages and towns.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah, for everyone involved.” Owens cracked his neck from side to side and did a few light jumps to warm up for his athletic endeavors ahead. “Whatever survivors remain, it takes generations for them to eek out a feeble existence from the depleted top soils and damaged ecosystems that allowed the cities to become so big and powerful in the first place.” Owens scurried over the forty foot tall cinderblock wall that enclosed the prison complex like he was Spiderman.
Boothausen followed with the same ease, as if the razor wire on top of the wall was a soft ring of yarn. “Sounds awful.”
“Societal collapse isn’t for the weak of heart.”
The two Americans scurried down the perfectly smooth cinderblock wall like children going down a slide. They both landed lightly on their feet and dusted themselves off. Boothausen was genuinely enjoying this chat. “Do you think about this kind of shit a lot?”
“Not really. I read a twelve book series on the rise and collapse of nations that had to be the most comprehensive academic study ever made on the subject. It covered every civilization you can think of from the Maya to the Romans, all the way up to the Soviet empire falling in the 80’s. For the life of me I can’t remember who the author was.” The two agents were running full speed towards the prison but chatted as casually as if they were sitting down to afternoon tea.
“Twelve books on the collapse of ancient civilizations? Are you shitting me?” Boothausen reached into her belt and pulled out a gadget that resembled a hand gun with a grappling hook sticking out of the barrel without breaking stride. Owens was hauling ass but realized he was having a tough time keeping up with her.
“I didn’t read them for fun, I promise.” Owens pulled out the same gadget and aimed it at the roof of the prison. “I lost a bet.”
“What kind of bet do you have to lose where that is your punishment?”
“My friends are fucked up. You already know this.”
“Is it my place to ask what the bet was?” Boothausen stopped at a long, open part of the prison wall. She pulled the trigger and the tri-hooked metal claw flew effortlessly to the roof where it found purchase on the top ledge immediately. Owens followed suit with the same casual effort and perfect result. Without any discussion on their actions, they shimmied up the attached ropes as easily as someone smiling at a joke.
“Sports. I don’t know shit about them and I was drunk. I don’t even remember what team I bet against or even what sport I was betting on, but I remember that O’Connor wouldn’t let me bet any other prize. He insisted if I lost, I had to read some of his bullshit books.”
“What was he betting if he lost?”
“He had to be in nature for a week straight with me and go fishing every day, but he wasn’t allowed to read or drink alcohol the whole time. No booze or books!”
“Has Doc ever been sober enough to even read a book?”
The two agents laughed as they gathered the ultra thin ropes and lightweight grappling hooks to stash back in their belts. “You’re killing me, Ana.” After a good chuckle, Owens plainly stated, “I don’t know anyone who reads as much as that man. He’s an enigma.”
Flabbergasted, Boothausen replied simply, “No shit?” It was hard to imagine Dale O’Connor, demotions expert extraordinaire, as anything but a clueless drunk.
Owens saw her confusion. She clearly didn’t know the team yet. She would soon enough. “That man has had deep and meaningful conversations with the most interesting people in bars throughout the world. I appreciate whatever he has to say, even if his breath reeks like a whiskey distillery.”
The two agents made their way across the roof until they found an air intake vent. It was hardly eighteen inches by eighteen inches. Boothausen looked at her mentor. “Ladies first!” She bent down and ripped the cover off of the vent with ease. In less than a second, she’d contorted her body and jumped feet first into the tiny opening. The thief slipped into the metal vent like a worm creeping through a hole.
Owens stuck his face in the vent but didn’t follow. “I’m gonna try the vent on the other side of this roof. First one to bust out our crew drinks for free when we’re out of here.”
Boothausen was already a dozen feet into the air shaft. Owens could hear her voice shout out, “You’re on!”
“Oh, and we bust Murdock out last!” Owens added.
Boothausen’s faint voice carried through the vent. “Duh!”
Owens grinned, then realized he was racing a master. Anastasia Boothausen could do things that made him wonder if she could bend time and space. He’d have to dig deep to get to the imprisoned team members first.
He sprinted across the roof to the furthest air intake. He silently but violently ripped off the vent cover and slipped in. Most human child bodies wouldn’t even be able to fit into an air shaft that small, but Owens slipped in easily since he could fold his shoulders, collar bones and hips up to where he looked like a human slice of pizza. He could also tolerate pain better than any human on Earth.
He wiggled like a snake through the vent shaft and found himself looking through an air grate at a dimly lit room. He pushed the vent cover and it fell to the ground with a mighty reverberating clang. “Damn,” he muttered as he dropped silently to the floor of a room full of desks, chairs and various office furniture clutter. In one motion, he picked up the vent cover and threw it in a perfect arc that made it reconnect to the air ducting. Somehow it stuck in place, almost as if by magic.
Owens instinctively flattened his body perfectly behind a desk as the door to the room opened with a loud creak. The person looked around and didn’t see anything out of order, so he closed the door and walked away. Owens put in an ear piece, then lifted his wrist watch to his face.
“Fish Man, checking in,” he whispered.
The voice of Von Stryker spoke in his ear. “Fish Man? Are you being for real right now?”
“Look, we need code names in case someone is listening to this frequency.”
“I’m afraid to ask, what is my code name in your fucked up imaginary world?”
“Ginny.”
“Well that’s original.” She ended her broadcast signal as she muttered to herself, “fuckin’ Mulroony,” but she knew nobody in their crew would mistake that code name. The woman didn’t drink often, but when she did, she reeked of limes and gin for days afterwards. CIA director Mulroony had nicknamed her “Ginny” one time a decade earlier and it had stuck to her like the stench of fermented juniper berries.
“Ginny, Fish Man, this is Ninja checking in.” Boothausen had a snarky grin to her voice.
Owens liked Boothausen’s nickname. “I like it. Report!”
“I’m outside of the control room for the whole prison and I’ve slipped some flavorless medicine into their water cooler, as well as every bottle of water in their break room. Within ten minutes of taking even one small drink, they’ll all have diarrhea for hours.”
Owens shook his head in appreciation of the greatness. “You are amazing, lady. Good work. I’m in some old office that clearly has turned into more of a storage room than anything. I’m gonna search the west wing as soon as I figure out where I am.”
“Let me know when you’re ready for the blackout.” Von Stryker held a contraption in her hand that had one red button only. She didn’t push it yet.
Boothausen’s voice filled their ears. “Two of the monitor guards took a break at the water cooler and will be running to the bathroom shortly. The other two are making coffee and I slipped some of the pooper juice in the water too. They’re gonna have a terrible night.”
Owens couldn’t help but giggle. “Good one.”
“I’ll have the control room to myself in fifteen minutes or less. They’ll never know we’re here until our agents are out and gone and we’re flying away in their plane. I figure this is way quicker than checking every cell, one by one.”
Owens felt sheepish because searching every cell one by one was his exact plan. He didn’t mind spending hours sneaking around prisons, but this time was different because it was his friends who needed busting out. He knew Boothausen was the best. “Ninja, you’re right, and for real, well done.”
“Thanks, Fish Man.” Boothausen thought his nickname was ridiculous, but the praise he’d given her made her feel awesome.
Pilot Porter’s chipper voice filled their ears. “Fly Girl checking in.”
Special agent Mikayla Doniak’s voice joined them. “Shooter checking in. I’m with Fly Girl and I’ve got her covered as we make our move.”
“We’re in position to steal the getaway ride.” Porter and Mikayla Doniak had snuck up through a drive gate while an armored truck exited the campus. The two women simply slipped past the gate before it automatically closed. There were no cameras on this part of the prison because the Soviets never once feared anyone trying to break in, let alone break out. “The runway and hangar look empty with no guards. This will be easy.”
Doniak added, “that is, assuming we don’t have to shoot our way out.”
Boothausen said, “Two of the four guards will be on the toilet for the next hour or two, and the other two guards just took their first sips of coffee. Fish Man and I have a bet who can locate our agents first. It’ll be me and when I do, we’ll go to black out.”
Owens spoke up. “Ninja, I think you’re brilliant beyond words but I’m still gonna search the west wing.”
The next ten minutes went by with total radio silence. Owens slipped in and out of shadows, sometimes crawling upside down on the ceiling, sometimes slithering on the ground. There were lots of cameras in hallways and corridors but they never detected him. He made it to the west wing and looked down the long row of jail cells. They were five stories tall and packed together like sardines.
Boothausen’s voice filled their ear pieces. “The last two computer monitor guards just left the control room and it looks like one of them has already had an accident in his pants.” Her maniacal laugh was quiet and soft but very contagious.
“Yup. You are brilliant, Ninja,” Owens said, trying not to laugh too. “I’m at the grand entry to the west wing now. You win, lady. Lemme know what you see.”
Two seconds later, Boothausen said, “Found ’em. Fish Man, they’re all on the second story, halfway in on the left side, all of them in separate cells right next to each other.” Sounds of furious typing on a computer were followed by, “I’ll have their doors unlocked in two minutes.”
“Dammit!” Owens realized he was speaking loudly and dropped his voice back to a whisper. “I mean, I’m glad you found them, but fuckin A, that was fast!”
With no hesitation, Boothausen joked, “That’s what she said.” Owens now no longer tried to hide himself from the cameras. Her jaw dropped as she watched how quickly Owens ran down the hallway. “Speaking of fast…”
There were random guards walking up and down the isles of jail cells. It was well after midnight and the inmates were all sleeping, so there was no action or movement as the guards leisurely walked their rounds. Owens did his Spiderman bullshit across the ceiling as a random guard walked by with his head down. A second guard was only a hundred paces behind. Owens reached down and tapped the guy below his shoulder blade and in less than a blink of an eye was again flat to the ceiling. The startled guard flipped around in fear but saw no one. He looked in all directions to see where the tap came from. By the time the guard looked up, Owens went unnoticed since he had silently and effortlessly scrambled along the ceiling behind a ledge of outcropped concrete several cells further away.
“Thirty seconds ’’til I pop those cells open. Ginny, are you ready?” Sounds of Boothausen’s aggressive typing could still be heard in the background.
“Dreaming of gin. Fly girl, are you ready?”
“We’re actually in the plane and starting up the electronics. It’ll only take a few minutes to warm up the engines. We are ready.”
Mikayla Doniak spoke up in their ears. “I’m bored to tears sitting in the doorway of the plane. There’s literally nothing going on. These guys are way understaffed and far too relaxed for such a big prison.”
Von Stryker couldn’t help but grin. “The Russians always figured Siberia was impenetrable as it is, so they never took the same precautions they did with their big city prisons.”
Owens found his teammates in their cells. All three of them were sleeping. “Let’s hope they’re not drugged,” he muttered into his ear piece.
“After I open the cells and Ginny cuts the power, I can be to you in less than three minutes,” Boothausen added.
“Give me a minute. I have an idea,” Owens said hopefully.
He slowly lowered his body back down from the ceiling. Boothausen could now see his full form on a video screen from the control room. It looked like he was made of taffy as his body peeled almost perfectly flat. When he’d completely dropped back to the ground, she watched him reach into his pocket and then flick something into one of the cells.
“Hey fucker, wake up!” Owens’ attempt to awaken special agent Bradley McVandalay was instantly successful.
“Owens? Am I dreaming your voice or are you really here?” McVandalay muttered groggily.
“Call me Fish Man while I’m in here. Let’s get you and the crew out.” He tossed McVandalay a small handgun and added, “Use this until we can get you your real gun back in your hands.”
“Holy shit dude, you have balls of steel.”
Owens couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re not the first pretty boy to try and butter me up with your sweet words,” he sarcastically joked. “I’m gonna wake up the other two and we’ll get you out of here.” Owens had no problem waking up Sargeant Schuman, but he tossed object after object right on Murdocks face to no avail.
“Let me guess,” McVandalay whispered, “Murdock is passed out.”
“Yup. Is he drugged?”
“I doubt it,” McVandalay grumbled. “I’ll wake his ass up or carry him out of here, either way.”
Owens grinned. “You’re a legend, Cubs Guy.” He lifted his wristwatch to his face and whispered, “Ninja, open the doors at your convenience.”
A loud buzzer rang followed by very loud clicking sounds that reverberated up and down the hallways. Owens could hear every jail cell unlock with insanely loud volume and all the jail doors slid open automatically until it reached the cells of McVandalay, Murdock and Schuman.
“Shit,” Boothausen muttered. “I think I unlocked every cell in the prison instead of just those three.”
McVandalay seemed to sense the immediate problem. Despite his grogginess, he looked at Owens and said, “We’re gonna have a riot in less than a minute. We have no time to waste.”
“Ninja, get to the plane. We’re good and we’ll meet you there.”
“Roger, Fish Man. Ninja out.”
Owens nodded at McVandalay and Schuman then spoke quickly back into his watch. “Ginny, make it dark, darlin.”
Outside, Von Stryker hit the big red button on her contraption. Two seconds later, the entire prison campus went dark as groggy prisoners were waking up to the confusion.
In the distance, four prison guards sat with their pants around their ankles in a pitch dark bathroom as they silently prayed to the god of their understanding to please, please, please let the brutal intestinal purge come to a merciful end.
