Page 99 of Fire and Ice

Rick grunted.

She lowered her voice further. "I have a plan."

***

"Hurry up, Rick," Maia whispered. She kept a blade under the sole of her shoes for situations exactly like this. Rick had been working on her restraints for over twenty minutes. Since the blade was small, it was taking a while adding to the fact that with his hands tied, the whole task was challenging. "Ow, ow, that's my arm."

"Fuck, sorry," Rick said apologetically.

"I got it, I think I can work them out," Maia rubbed her hands free and quickly took the blade from Rick to work on his ties. Once free, they both worked on their foot restraints, loosening them but not quite removing them.

"You ready?" Rick asked.

Maia nodded. She lay down on her side in a fetal position with her front facing the door. Her unbound hands were hidden behind her back.

Rick sat back against the wall also with his arms behind him.

"Hey, you out there! I need some help!" Rick called out. "I think something's wrong with her."

Stepan poked his head through the door. "What do you want?"

"I think Sergei kicked her too hard. I think she has internal bleeding."

Maia moaned softly but remained very still.

"We don't have a doctor, there's nothing we can do."

Stepan closed the door and walked away.

The two prisoners looked at each other, chagrined.

"Okay, that didn't go over very well," Maia muttered.

"I guess that old trick had been overused," Rick replied dryly.

Just then they heard footfalls shuffling quickly back towards their room and they moved back into position again. The door opened. Stepan walked through with another guard. They spoke in Russian, but Maia understood.

"Maybe the doctor can help her."

"She is a chemist not a medical doctor."

"Let's just take her, huh?"

"Shouldn't we ask Sergei first?"

"He's in an important conference call and asked not to be disturbed. If she dies, he won't be happy."

The other guard gestured for Rick to move back. Stepan bent down to pick Maia up. When he was close enough, she struck. She flipped into a push up position and swept her feet under him causing him to fall on his back.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that Rick had surprised the other guard.

Not giving Stepan time to recover, she bore down on him with the weight of her body and jabbed her elbow into his larynx. While he gasped for breath, Maia got on top of him and broke his neck.

Rick, in the meantime, had subdued the other guard by rendering him unconscious.

"You can't leave him alive," Maia said flatly.

"Sorry if I'm no cold-blooded killer," Rick snapped back testily.

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