Fucking hell.
Okay, clearly, I’m not getting any sleep right now. I throw off the blankets and go over to the closet.
I was going to wait at least another night, but anticipation mustbe literally killing me or things wouldn’t be this bad. You would have thought that watching River get beaten by a hot, muscled woman would have distracted me, but nope!
I pull on my black sweater and wrap the black scarf around my face. I layer on tights as well as black jeans. December in this area? It’s freezing cold. At least I won’t stand out if anyone spots me on security cameras.
The gloves and beat-up backpack are the last of my accessories. I mean, I’ve got the knife and my lucky charm too, of course. I’d love to be able to lift a full grown man the way that fighter—Bobbi?—had done, but since my arms are noodles compared to hers, knives will have to do.
My phone says it’s close to three a.m. I leave it on my desk before I sneak out of my bedroom. Samantha’s door is closed, and I hope she’s sleeping soundly.
She used to wake at the slightest noise even before she’d been kidnapped, though.
I tiptoe out and make sure to turn the latch as I close the door to our dorm to minimize the chance of Samantha hearing.
The halls are mostly quiet. I hear moaning through one door, which means whoever it is must be fucking in their little kitchen. I hope she’s having a good time with her guest.
Once I hit the stairwell, I sprint down the stairs.
Nobody stops me. I mean, why would they? They don’t know what I’m about to do.
I go to the closest parking lot and find a model I know how to hotwire. It’s harder these days to find instructions online on how to do it, unless you know the right people—and good thing I know the right people. This one is a simple hatchback. I check the glove compartment to find out whose car it is.
“Okay, Theresa. Sorry about this. I’ll bring the car back, I swear,” I say to the air.
I’m not hallucinating Theresa.
I drive the car over to the science labs. This part is going to be trickier, but I’m committed.
I’d scoped out the entire place earlier, watching which TAs were going into which labs. I managed to swipe poor, frazzled Elliot’s keycard. He’d been ranting on and on about how underappreciated he was. Not in so many words, but I could tell he was not a fan of his supervisor.
His supervisor is going to really hate him too, after this.
I use the keycard to let myself into the graduate biology lab, keeping my head down so the cameras can’t see my face.
It would have been smarter to call up Anastasia and have her help me disarm the cameras, but that would have been a future-me problem, and tonight-me is itching for action.
There’s no camera in the lab proper, which seems like a security issue. I guess they don’t want any corporate espionage though. The greenhouse doesn’t have cameras either, only some easily bypassed locks.
I find an animal carrier in the storage closet and take it over to the large rat cages. Almost all of them are white, and they’re sleeping adorably in their individual cages. Most have labels on the cages, mentioning what they’re being tested for.
“Hey, buddies,” I say to sleeping rats. One of them hears me and pops its head up. The label says it’s being used for some genetic testing, which means it probably doesn’t have a highly virulent disease that will mutate when transferred to humans and turn us all into zombies.
That would be kind of funny, though.
I open the cage and take him out to put him in the carrier.
Actually, I feel kind of bad about how uncomfortable that carrier probably is. I go and find a towel so the ratty can rest while I gather up more of its friends.
I would love to take every single one of these rats with me, but in the end, the carrier only holds about ten or so. The rats startsqueaking at me, and they really, really don’t like it when I lift up the carrier.
“Don’t worry,” I say to them. “I’m not feeding you to a snake. You’re too big for Echo anyway. You could probably take her in a fight.”
I carry them out of the lab and out to Theresa’s car. They fit nicely into the passenger seat, and I even hook the carrier in place with the seatbelt to prevent the rats from being jostled as I drive.
“I’ve got a secret mission for all of you,” I say to the rats. “I know you’re all domesticated and you’re docile from all the handling, but if you could please, please bite a few people? That’s all I ask.”
A few of the rats squeak in response. Or maybe they’ve been squeaking the entire time.
