Black Market Merchant

Lisa was very disapproving of how these numerous, nearly naked teenaged to middle aged women were being treated; even though she understood why. In total there looked to be roughly sixty to eighty women. It was hard to tell the exact numbers because many of them were being tasked with manually moving the products, glass equipment and boxes all around the room. They were all barefoot in their undergarments, as well as in perfectly clear plastic ponchos, in order to allow the guards watching them to be sure they were not going to try and steal the meth they were working on or anything else of value.

Lisa knew that these provocatively dressed ladies were being subjugated to work here and forced to be dressed in this way, because not one of them looked happy or willing. It was also hard to hide one’s shame with so many leering Mad Dog men watching every motion they would make and retain a happy look. Lisa could even see that the women charged with moving the boxes were the best looking on the posterior end, this was so that every time they had to bend over to place a box on the floor any guard watching them was guaranteed a saucy view of their a**. While the others with more, hmm, young and prominent features were put closer to the ends of the worktables. Undoubtedly so that the guards could have the best views of the best women.

Lisa was put off by this distasteful display when a thought came to her mind. Looking to her left her assumption was correct, Wayne was also gawking obviously hard at the sights below. Lisa rolled her eyes dramatically seeing his newfound lustful gaze.

Wayne’s mouth was basically falling off its hinges as his eyes darted all around the room. From the wide and shiny eyed glances, he was making, Lisa could tell he was not accustomed to seeing women dressed in such a manner. He probably hadn’t even seen a woman in a two-piece bathing suit either. The first thought that crossed her mind was, “Virgin”, and if not for the seriousness of the moment she would have laughed and picked on him.

Not wanting someone under her charge being tempted by such a sight and accidently make a careless noise, Lisa was going to make him stop. Not only because it was not right to look at an unwilling woman, but because they needed to find a way out of this duct and find where the serum was coming from. After all, that is why they were here in the first place.

Lisa reached over to Wayne, Lisa slapped the bottom of his chin closed and forcibly turned his head by his chin to make him look at her. From the fast blinks Wayne made it showed he was quickly made aware of his lewd mistake. Graven faced, Lisa shook her head from side to side vigorously to state her displeasure at what he was doing. Lisa then made a series of hand gestures and from what Wayne could interpret, she was going to make him pay once they got back to the base.

Wayne nodded with a pleading expression that he understood and clasped his hands together in a praying fashion as if to ask for an apology. However, Lisa was not in the mood to negotiate. Lisa then pointed with her thumb further ahead in the duct to state that they were moving onwards.

As the two of them left the slated duct window, Wayne was still behind Lisa and chanced one more glance at the naughty sight below. Lisa didn’t even need to look back, she already knew he would do it. Reaching behind her, Lisa grabbed him by his still damp shirt and gave him a tug just strong enough that he wouldn’t lose his footing but get her unhappy message across. Wayne gulped knowing he was royally screwed now.

The duct from this point on immediately decreased in height. Before the duct was just under head high for Lisa, but after passing the slatted window it dropped to half that height. The two of them now had to crawl carefully on their hands and knees to proceed.

This decrease in height meant two things too Lisa. One was that the room they had passed was likely the largest room and it needed of the most air. The second was it was entirely possible that the rooms below could likely be separated from the others in the underground compound. It was possible that they had ended up sneaking into the wrong air duct!

Bothered by these thoughts Lisa knew they had to get out of the duct to search for more concrete clues as to the location of the serum. As the dim light of the next, much smaller, slated duct window came closer to them, Lisa hoped that they could get out there unseen and unheard. The only sounds to be heard in the duct was the soft whistling of the wind blowing by them, their hushed and slight labored breaths, and particularly the unwanted movements of the aluminum duct bending below them.

Lisa stopped to peer in through the slated window and Wayne nearly bumped into her from behind. Luckily, he caught himself from doing so. If he had hit her rear, she might have never let him survive. To create some space between them, he backtracked and scooted backwards in the duct. Suddenly, the harsh squeak of metal on metal squeaked out from under them!

Lisa snapped her head back to look at him in the dim lighting. Wayne urgently shook his head as he remained frozen in place. If they fell through now, it was not going to end well. There were a lot of armed guards back in the big room, more then even Lisa would have wanted to fight with.

Looking back into the room below Lisa knew it was their only bet to get out. It wasn’t an ideal place to break out into, but it was all they had. The room below was an office room lit by a single yellow glowing lamp that exposed an unorganized pile of papers, files, and a random assortment of indistinguishable baggies. Now the room was unoccupied and silent, which was all Lisa needed.

A single well-placed punch knocked the entire slated window out from the duct and clattered onto the metal office floor much more noisily that she wanted. Hoping no one had heard that, Lisa rolled out of the half meter wide gap in a sleek fashion to grasp the ducts edge with her fingertips. Then she lowered herself as if coming down from a pull-up to gently stand upon the ground. She quickly turned around to the single door of the room and locked it. Meanwhile, Wayne lowered himself backwards, feet first, out from the vent and unceremoniously plopped to the metal floor just barely quieter than the busted slated window.

Remarkably nothing happened. For now, it seemed they were in the clear. Still staying silent, Wayne and Lisa communicated with only using hand motions as they decided on their next move.

“Alright, now what?” Wayne motioned while giving an exasperated shrug.

“Search the place for anything with serum mentioned on it or a map of this place.” Lisa signed back before walking around the desk to start skimming through the papers.

Wayne nodded and picked up a folder labeled: “New Management”. Opening it he saw at the top three pictures with the individual images of the Triplets and all three were crossed out. Scanning the content below he quickly found it was all useless to them. Then flipping to the next page were another three pictures of three more individual men. This time they were not crossed out and one of them looked vaguely familiar to him.

Lisa seemed to be having no luck as she kept picking up random reports of the underground facilities maintenance upkeep or lists of unfinished bookkeeping documents that were dated from months ago. She was feeling frustrated when Wayne held out the folder that he was looking at too her. Taking it, Wayne then pointed at the familiar looking man wearing a cowboy hat. Lisa knew of this man as well; he was with Martinez in the Warehouse Arena booth when she fought. It was Rodney.

Quickly she looked over the two other men and knew of one but not the other. The one she knew was a man Hanna had described as being present during the murder of her parents. A man wearing orange tinted glasses and a lazy expression. Now Lisa had a face and a name for another culprit, Branch.

The third man wasn’t all that noticeable. He looked weaselly and slim, with a thick mustache that covered his entire upper lip, and a thin scar was running down his left cheekbone. This Central American looking man was named, Tio. As unimpressionable as he appeared, Tio was still marked as one of the top three that was now in charge of running the operations here and that was a good thing to know.

Looking up from the folder Lisa gave Wayne a thumbs up. Wayne smiled in reply, hoping that his find might have redeemed him some. However, that look instantly faded as the door handle behind them started to turn before thumping to a loud stop due to being locked!

There was nowhere for them to hide! Other than the desk and a few cabinets, the room was empty. Their only chance was to fight.

“Come on now.” A male voice grumbled from the other side of the door. “Did he really lock the place up before he left? I didn’t think that that man had any brains in that smoked out hippy head of his. You got the key?”

“I think so.” A second voice replied. The sound of keys on a ring could be heard as the gangster fiddle with them.

Hearing it, Lisa knew they only had moments. She then quickly pointed at Wayne to get under the desk and to wait. While in turn Lisa tiptoed to get behind the door for when it opened.

“Here it is.” The second voice remarked as the sound of the key turning the lock rose the tension of this moment.

The door opened with a light squeak of the hinges and the two men casually entered the office. Wayne wanted to make his move now before they got to close to him. His breathing was getting shorter and labored as he could hear them getting closer with ever menacing step. Reaching to the back of his pants he grabbed the handle of his pistol.

“Why hadn’t Lisa made her move yet!” Wayne thought starting to panic. “They are seconds way from finding me.”

Just as he was about to popup and start shooting, Wayne heard something heavy hitting flesh which was then followed by the sound of a body collapsing.

“What the…!” The first voice called out as he turned to see what had happened.

However, Lisa was already bearing down on him. All it took as a single swift punch square in the jaw, and he was out like a light. The two men that had entered were now unconscious at Lisa’s feet.

Wayne looked carefully over the desks edge to see that Lisa had indeed won and was now patting down the two men. “What are you doing?!” Wayne whispered unable to even consider making hand motions to communicate thanks to his racked nerves.

“Getting their keys and these arm bands.” Lisa whispered back. “Put this one on. I have a plan to get around here without sneaking about.”

Wayne grabbed the black and red arm band marked with a snarling dog as Lisa tossed it to him. “What do you mean?”

“We are going to pretend to be part of the gang!” Lisa replied tightening the band on her arm with an excited grin. “Just let me do the talking and everything will be simply fine. Trust me!”