Page 105 of Freedom Mine
Chapter Twenty-Three
ALLI
“For the last time, you shouldn’t be here,” Jace said to Alli as they neared Garitt’s compound. “If we get caught, we could all be enslaved.”
“I’m well aware of the penalty for kidnapping. We all are, but I’m staying. Besides, this is my choice, not yours. I’m free now, or have you forgotten that?”
“Like that would make a difference? You’d go regardless.”
“It’s my last chance to see Kayo. To say goodbye. Once that transport leaves. . .” She swallowed, unable to say the words. Once she was aboard the transport, there was literally no turning back. Security prevented it.
“Are you sure we can’t force him to sell Kayo to us?” Masher asked as he smeared the last of the charcoal on his face.
“And how do we do that?” Jace asked. “Carry him unconscious to the Office of Slave Registration and say, ‘Oh, he’s drunk but he gave his permission to sell this one slave, so go ahead and scan his chip’ and finalize the transfer?”
“Sounds easier than getting him to agree to go on a transport,” Ranth piped in. “Either way, I brought the harkifa meds. Before we drop him and Blue at the port, I’ll sedate him enough so he’ll be able to walk. . . more or less.”
That was the plan, at least the easy part of it. Not only would Alli have to do all the talking, but she’d also need to keep a drugged Garitt under control as she led him into the port and onto the transport. Then there was the little matter of somehow avoiding how not to get herself hauled off when he failed the retina scan.
She told the guys she had everything covered, that she had a plan in mind. Truthfully, she was scared shitless and not sure what she was going to do or say if Garitt didn’t cooperate with her. Just the thought of being near him terrified her, but if she let Jace or the others know that, they’d scrap the entire plan. This was Kayo’s only chance, and she refused to let her fear of Garitt keep her from helping Kayo.
“If he fails the retina scan. . .” Liet spread his hands. “Then what happens? Are you sure about this, Jace?”
“Sure as I can be, given the evidence.”
“Evidence,” Masher said with a derisive laugh.
She and Jace had fought an uphill battle trying to convince Masher, Liet, and Ranth of their theory, not to mention her plan to entrap Garitt. Standing at the border of the two properties in the middle of the night rehashing what she had thought they’d already settled was making her edgier, but she couldn’t exactly order them to shut up and follow through. This wasn’t a military group, well, some of them had been military, but here they were volunteers risking their lives.
Liet was pacing the fence line. They still hadn’t crossed onto Garitt’s property. “It doesn’t make sense killing your owner, stealing his chip, and then not paying for your own freedom. Once you’re free, you reinsert your original chip so your retina scan and chip match and confirm you’re free. You can head off-planet at that point.”
“Unless you damaged your own chip removing it,” Jace said. “They’re fragile. They broke my first chip trying to implant it. I had to stay in holding longer while they coded a new one with my name.” He turned to Alli. “We could be wrong.”
Gods, no, if Jace started doubting their plan and she lost his support, they had no chance of rescuing Kayo. “He’s not the original Garitt. I’m sure of it,” she said with as much confidence as she could muster. “We proceed as planned.”
“It’s still a huge risk, more to you than the rest of us,” Jace added, looking her straight in the eyes. “Garitt will never see us take him, but he’ll recognize you unless you can divert his attention. If he creates a scene at the port, you won’t be able to hide or escape.”
“This plan stinks,” Masher said. “One of us should take him, not Blue.”
Alli considered the hulking man who she was sure could crush stone with his hands. With that charcoal on his face, he looked as if he was born for covert ops. If anyone could easily drag Garitt through the port and hold him up to the retina scanner, it was Masher, but Garitt would look like a kidnap victim being forced aboard a transport if Masher, or any of the men for that matter, carried him.
“A woman’s less suspicious,” Jace said, echoing her thoughts. “The guards will think she’s trying to help a sick friend. Or a drunk one. You, Masher, would draw every guard’s attention and then some. It has to be Blue.”
Masher scowled. “How are you gonna get away, Blue?”
“I won’t be coming back,” she said, crossing the border to join Masher on Garitt’s property. One by one, the others joined her, committing themselves to the plan. “Once I get him to the scanner, I have to continue onto the transport, or they’ll get suspicious. It will work, Masher, as long as he’s not lucid enough to contradict me.”
“And if Garitt has a stolen chip, you think the authorities will simply hand Kayo back?” Ranth whispered as they passed through the harkifa pasture.
Alli and Jace exchanged a look. “The law was unclear about that,” she said.
Jace motioned them through the fence, lowering his voice as they followed him through. “I have a petition in place to take him back and to pay the courts the amount he was enslaved for, in case they feel they’re being cheated somehow, though technically Garitt already paid off all the creditors. The only one cheated would be Garitt, but if we’re right and he’s a slave, he’ll have no rights.”
“Lot of ifs in this plan,” Masher whispered.
“It’s not perfect,” Alli agreed. But it was their only shot. Jace hadn’t shown her the vid, but he had warned her that Kayo wouldn’t last much longer in Garitt’s hands.
“Quiet down,” Liet said, as they neared the compound. Garitt’s guards were due to pass soon. He and Runner had been watching and recording their schedule for three days. Once the guards passed by this section, Alli and the men had forty minutes to find Garitt and get out.
