Page 48 of Steel & Thunder
“Ayah!” The orc shouts at me as I sprint across. I hear both sets of feet break into runs as they give chase. Think David...
The walls are still too high for me to climb, but the cells are shorter. No time to hesitate, I repeat my wall-jumping trick from outside, this time managing to catch the edge of the top of the cell. Ha! I pull myself up as fast as I can. I’m in the clear!
Then a hand wraps around my ankle and yanks me backward.
I shout as I fall and land on my ass, but I’m up in a flash. I take off again and duck down another row of cells when a massive body tackles me to the ground from behind. Hands grab my wrists as I struggle to get free, the weight on top of me not making it easy to do anything, even breathe. The body kneels up, pulling my hands behind my back, and as I hear the two voices talking again, I feel manacles being locked around my wrists. Dammit!
No longer being held to the ground, I’m pulled up and turned around to face my new captors. I don’t recognize them, but they sure seem to recognize me. Actually, scratch that, one of them—the one that didn’t tackle me to the ground—is the same orc I talked to when I was in the cell here, with the bald head, big beard, and huge tusks. The one who took me to the arena. The other guy I don’t know. He’s taller than the orc holding me, a little thinner too but still way bigger than I am. He’s got dark brown hair in nearly the same style as Ironstorm, and his bright blue eyes flicker in the light of the torch in his hand.
“Avakesh va Kritar Uzi’gar.” The orc holding me sighs once he gets a good look at my face. I think I actually recognized some of those words.
“Where are my friends?” I’m not in any position to be making demands, but that hasn’t stopped me so far.
The orc says nothing, only narrows his eyes, looking me up and down. His eyes lock onto my right hip and the metal key ring poking out from it. I try to swing out of his reach, but it’s no use; he pulls the keys from my waistband. His face looks even more displeased than it did a second ago. But rather than say anything, he turns to the orc behind me.
“Kaj’ik Avakesh katu, mibaj va Kritar.” The orc turns and jogs away, the sound of the door signaling his full exit. I don’t know where he’s going, but I have some ideas.
I’m fucked.
I’m marched inside the building and led into an office with a desk. My jailor walks me to the side of it and forces me to my knees, making it clear that I am to remain there while he takes a seat and we wait. It’s at least twenty minutes before I hear the sounds of someone approaching. The orc in a chair stands just as Captain Ironstorm bursts into the room, looking furious. I want to stand, but his gaze pins me to the floor.
“What is going on here?!” Yeah, he’s pissed. I open my mouth to again demand for my friend’s location, but the new orc enters the room behind him and cuts me off.
“Orim went out back to grab some equipment and saw something. Called me out to help him look, and we caught this one making his escape.” He crosses his arms. “Not sure how he got in, but he nearly made it back out. I found these on him when we grabbed him.” He holds out the ring of keys, hanging from his two fingers.
Ironstorm takes the keys in hand, looking from them to me, his face souring even further. The hand holding the keys clenches into a fist, and I half expect a solid ball of metal to be sitting there when he reopens it. “Why would you do this, David?”
“Where are my friends?” I demand again through gritted teeth.
“In their cells.” Ironstorm’s eyes narrow.
“Bullshit.” I spit back. “Every cell out there is completely empty.”
“Their cells are inside.” He looks incredulous. “We don’t keep people locked up outside overnight.”
“You kept us out there when we first got here!” I shout from my spot on the floor.
“Because we are in the middle of changing the locks on the cells, as I told you earlier today!” he shouts back at me.
“I tell him cells being fixed.” Great, the third orc wants to pile on too.
“Prove it!” People can say whatever the fuck they want. Doesn’t mean I believe them.
With a huff, Ironstorm yanks me to stand before roughly pushing me out the office door and across the hall.
“Remain silent,” he warns with a growl before pressing his wristband to the lock and opening the door.
This new room is more of a long hallway with barred cells on either side. We walk silently down the hall, and I see most of the cells are empty. There’s one that holds a snoring orc, but it’s the next two that contain all four of my friends, Nate and Adam on one side and Liss and Corrine on the other. They’re all asleep, but Adam stirs as we approach.
“Nnng, David?” he asks groggily. “Ev’ry thing okay?”
“Yes, go back to sleep,” Ironstorm tells him, quickly turning me around and leading me back into the office.
“Satisfied?” he sneers, pushing me into the center of the room.
I don’t have a response. He wasn’t lying about my friends being inside, and I guess “Orim,” or whoever that other orc is, wasn’t lying on that first day either.
But so what? That doesn’t change anything that is about to happen to them. A work camp is a work camp. I couldn’t just do nothing!
