Evenfall (154 page)

"What the fuc--" The man exclaimed, startled by the noise.

"Don't fucking
move
!" The woman shouted, yanking her gun out and pointing it in Sin's general direction. "Identify yourself,
now
!"

He had two choices. Pull a Boyd and pretend to be a guard so that he could avoid confrontation and go about his business without trouble or he could get rid of them both and possibly cause more problems for them later. However at the moment the possibility of the first choice didn't even cross his mind and he reacted automatically, springing forward to grab the woman's throat with one hand and her wrist with the other, twisting it violently until it cracked and she released the gun as he simultaneously sent a booted foot crashing into the man's groin.

The man doubled over with a groan but didn't go down, instead reaching for a knife that was strapped to his thigh. He slashed at Sin clumsily, still slightly thrown off from the pain he was in but was disarmed almost immediately, even as Sin continued to pin the woman to the wall by her throat. "Hands up or I'll break her neck," Sin said calmly, keeping the knife to the man's Adam's apple. It'd be easier to shoot them both but he was still trying to go for half assed stealth and an attempt at negotiation would work more in that favor.

The man grimaced and put his hands up, glaring up at him briefly before moving his gaze quickly to the woman. They seemed to be communicating with each other silently, making it appear as though they knew each other fairly well. "What are you doing here?" He asked finally, voice slightly pained. "Who are you and how did you get in?"

Sin ignored their questions and asked one of his own. "Where's your prisoner?"

The woman scoffed, voice strained as he tightened his grip. "We would rather die than talk."

The pride in her tone at that declaration matched the Janus mentality perfectly. Before he could respond in any way, she suddenly twisted in his grasp and brought her knee up in an attempt to disable him in the same way he'd disabled her partner. The other man spun away from the knife and took off running down the hall just as Sin stumbled from the contact. She dove for the gun again when his grip loosened but he dropped to the floor and swept her legs from beneath her just as he whipped the knife at her partner. It sailed through the air with deadly precision and the force of the throw sent it plunging into the back of his head just as he lifted his own radio to alert everyone else. The man dropped to the floor before he could send a message and Sin's eyes narrowed at the woman in disgust right before he crushed her windpipe.

He stood up, feeling mildly annoyed by the situation and looked around quickly for a place to hide their bodies. The hall was mostly dark as much of the house was and so he settled for dragging them back around the corridor and into a darkened corner, partially hidden beneath the long floor length curtains. A quick frisk of their bodies turned up another
key ring
, this one including a keycard. He frowned at them for a moment before shaking his head in irritation. He didn't know if he was annoyed because his attempt at negotiation had failed or if he was annoyed at their ridiculous almost fanatical religious devotion to Janus. When he refused to talk it was more because he was protecting people, not an ideology, and even then he knew if he did talk they'd kill him anyway. He had no respect for anyone with such blind sensibilities.

The hiding space was poor at best and he knew it was only a matter of time before their bodies were found and his presence discovered so he moved quickly towards the direction they had come. There were two doors in the corridor they'd emerged from and he tried them both but they were locked; one with a key and the other requiring a card. He knew full well that there could be any number of bad things on the other side but he didn't really have the patience to sit around trying to plan a better way of going about it, so he stared at each door for a long moment before deciding that the one with that required a card was more likely the one where anything of note would be hidden.

The stolen card worked and the door emitted a soft beep before clicking and allowing him to enter. He flung the door open  quickly, ducked to the side and immediately had his guns in hand to take out anything that appeared to be mildly threatening. But all he found was an empty room with a dome shaped ceiling and shelves upon shelves of books. The room was extremely quiet but he still slipped into the shadows as he slunk silently throughout the room. It was neither small nor large and it didn't appear to be anything special; but if that was the case, why would it require a keycard to get in?

His eyes narrowed slightly as he did a full lap of the room and found nothing but it was that which made him even more suspicious. There was a small lamp turned on in the corner of the room but it was still cast largely in shadow, so he used that to his advantage and looked around closer, searching for false walls or anything hidden. Once again he found nothing and had almost decided to give up entirely but on a final search of the room, something about the floor caught his attention.

The floor was made of marble tile and when the moonlight hit it, there was a slight shine. However one tile in particular didn't have that shine and upon close inspection, he realized that if he actually tread on it without attempting to move silently,  his boot made a  slightly  hollow sound. It didn't take long to figure out that that section of the flooring was false and it took even less time to open it. The opening led to a steep staircase that led down to a sub level of the building that hadn't been on the blueprints. It wasn't surprising; it had even been one of the scenarios they'd discussed since it was built on top of a hill and the possibility of Clemons building the house into the hill had made a lot of sense. However it hadn't been a scenario that either of them was looking forward to.

Finding a separate wing was a lot less daunting then finding a staircase that led down into the unknown and as he descended, it occurred to him that he had no cover, no backup and no idea what lay below. And even as that realization set in, he realized he didn't fear it... it just made him excited. "Target area possibly in sight," he muttered, transmitting to Boyd once again. "Will verify shortly."

===

The halls were empty and dark as Boyd passed through them, stopping at each corner to listen closely for any movement or sign of life. Regardless of the amount of money and power Clemons had, he still had to abide by certain rules; keeping the entire complex lit inside and out at all times, for instance, would have maxed out the amount of power reserves probably available in the area and also would have likely been far too expensive even for a man of his caliber. It was possible he would have been able to access that much electricity in the city but his location made it too difficult. That worked out for Boyd, really, since it meant there were more hallways with little to no lighting, and more shadows to hide in to avoid security.

The majority of the guards were congregated outside patrolling the grounds. So far, the guards had all been a variety of ages and ethnicities, which worked in his favor if he wanted to, but judging by the interactions he'd overseen and overheard, they seemed to know each other pretty well which would make it far more difficult to pretend he was one of them. At least they wore casual clothing, allowing him to blend in if he ever happened to be briefly overseen in a hallway. It was probably lucky that Sin had contacted him before he got too far into the complex, where it was quieter and he wouldn't have felt as comfortable responding. He still couldn't believe he'd asked about what he was supposed to be looking for in the guest house; did the man never listen to anything Boyd told him in preparation for missions? Sometimes he swore Sin did that just to annoy him.

From what he'd been able to tell from the blueprints Owen had provided them, there were several places that could have been candidates for suspicious activity. It was difficult to tell for certain, since time had passed since the blueprints were created and all manner of construction had occurred since then. Even if common sense had not told him so, Boyd could tell that much just from memory of the specs; he'd already run into a few places where rooms appeared to have been expanded or merged. He took note of anything that seemed especially different but for the most part he dismissed the discrepancies as they were in areas that didn't make sense for Clemons to have built an interrogation center to house people like Thierry.

The lightning illuminated the halls and doorways around him, casting into relief the pale cream walls, the expensive paintings, and the occasional tapestry. Rain pounded against the window panes and the few skylights that were dotted across the building. He would have preferred to navigate the inner hallways where there was no chance of being seen from outside, but the main house was relatively well constructed and the only way to access the area he wanted to explore was to travel the outer hallways. It was probably built that way for exactly this purpose, to force intruders to expose their position, and he took care to keep hidden, move cautiously but quickly, and do his best to avoid any chances of being detected.

He was nearly to the main access to the wing he wanted to explore when he heard a quiet footstep down a hall at an intersection ahead of him. He stopped immediately and crouched against the wall, hidden by the shadows and a nearby table. He could hear the guard getting closer to the intersection; he nearly entered the hallway Boyd was in when a soft sound of white noise came presumably from a radio the guard had. The guard paused at the entrance to the hallway, just out of view, and Boyd crouched down further by the table, noting that it had a few lower shelves filled with decorations which served to provide him further coverage. He glanced over them quickly, noting that a glass figurine on the lowest shelf nearest him would work as a weapon if he needed it. He adjusted his gloves and slid his hand by the figurine, barely breathing as he heard the guard say lazily into the radio, "Yeah?"

Static answered the man's question at first, then a younger man's voice could be heard asking, "Hey Darren. Anything exciting?"

The guard, Darren, made a soft noise to himself then walked into the hallway Boyd was hiding in and idly glanced up and down the hall. He paused there but didn't seem to notice Boyd several feet away from him, and luckily no lightning flashed to show his position. Finally, Darren turned and said in disappointment into the radio, "No." He started to walk back down the hallway he'd come from while the other man replied over the radio, "Same here," and they started a short, quiet conversation about how nothing ever happened. Boyd could hear the sound of the radio getting quieter as Darren walked away but he still waited in the shadows for a few seconds longer, not wanting to risk getting caught if it turned out the guard had noticed him and was trying to deceive him into moving into the open. He could hear the guard turning down another hallway and the sound of his footsteps and radio faded. He waited another moment then stayed crouched as he peered around the corner. Darren was long gone and he took that opportunity to quickly continue on his way.

The house was almost eerie in the scattered light from the thunderstorm outside. As he moved silently through the hallways, the thunder rattled the windows and made it harder to hear if anyone was around him. Construction had changed much of what he remembered from the prints but he was able to navigate away from the windows, away from the lightning, and reach the muffled darkness of the inner hallways. Due to that, he had to be extra careful as he wound his way deeper into the wing, stopping every few hallways to think of the blueprints and consider where he was in relation to where he wanted to go.

He only saw one other guard as he walked and she had been far enough away that she hadn't noticed him before she passed into another hallway. In a way, it was quite lucky that the mansion had been built the way it had, because the number of sprawling hallways and large rooms provided so much space for guards to patrol that Boyd was able to slip through places they weren't watching.

It took him longer than he'd wanted to arrive at the first place he wanted to look into. The hallway was dark and empty, and the room that had seemed to have some sort of suspicious excess space appeared to be a normal guest room without anything that particularly stood out. The area that may have contained some sort of extra space for a secret passage turned out to just have an especially large walk-in closet. It was possible something less innocuous had taken that space before, but as he quickly but thoroughly searched the room and the rooms surrounding it, he didn't find anything out of ordinary. When they remodeled the complex, that must have been one of the areas that was affected. Without wasting another second, he moved on to his next target.

The second area he checked had pretty much the same result; two rooms had been joined and whatever had attracted his attention in the blueprints was no longer relevant. He barely spent any time there and moved toward the next, paying close attention along the way for any guards or other areas that seemed suspicious. He slid his way through the shadows, pausing any time he thought he heard movement. Following the route in his mind led him through a dark hallway filled with empty, silent rooms seen through open doorways. He glanced in them as he passed; partially to verify no one was in there, and partially an automatic tendency to check for weapons in the area. They appeared to be a series of sitting rooms and studies that were primarily empty, with some heavy, comfortable furniture in the corners. He had a few items with him but as usual they were the sorts of things that could be overlooked or would be used as a last resort.

He was halfway down the hallway when he heard the sound of quiet footsteps at the intersection ahead of him. He had just enough time to throw himself into the nearest room, where he moved around and crouched between the open door and the wall. He kept himself far enough away from the wall that he would not be seen through the space between the door and door frame, although from his angle he could see a small slit of the hallway between the hinges. The hall was about as dark as the room was so it wasn't likely that he'd be noticed but he wasn't going to take chances.

The steady footsteps drew closer and he could see a beam of light appear in the bit of the hallway he could see. The light moved fluidly along the ground, then jerked up across the opposite wall of the hallway, dipping into the room there where he could see a heavy couch with expensive-looking fabric. The light then shifted along the floor and turned toward Boyd's room just as he could hear the guard coming upon him. He stayed very still and held his breath, listening intently for even the vaguest indication that the guard was going to stop there, that the guard knew he was in there, that he would have to fight.

The gait of the footsteps sounded familiar; he was fairly certain this was the same woman who he'd almost run into before. It seemed to take entirely too long for her to pass and each second that dragged by made Boyd think even faster; the room was too dark to make out anything but as the light flashed across the wall he noticed a small decorative statue on a far table he would be able to use as a blunt force weapon if he needed to, and if he could reach it in time. But the guard didn't pause, she just let the light flick across the room and moved on. They probably never expected anyone to actually make it through the tight security outside so the guards inside didn't seem to spend too much time being paranoid, such as actually checking behind doors. Boyd waited until a few seconds after he heard her turn a corner before he let his breath out quietly and wasted no time in continuing on his way.

It didn't take him long to reach his next destination, which was a wing of the house that appeared to be primarily for entertainment. At first, Boyd couldn't see through the shadows well enough to fully grasp the way the wing was set up, but flickering of light caught his attention in one room and he paused, approached silently and peered in to see if a guard was inside. There was no one in the room, but he did discover a large aquarium that nearly took up the length of one wall. Exotic fish swam within, their scales brilliantly colored, their bodies and fins differing lengths and sizes. It was rather peaceful watching them move around so languidly, so he could see why Clemons had installed lighting around the tank to illuminate it even in the dark. The light cast shadows of the fish and water's movements across the room, washing up the walls and casting faint light even across the ceiling.

That was the reason he first noticed the unusual ceiling in that wing and walked into other rooms along the way to investigate. The ceiling had been constructed to be aesthetically pleasing but have little in the way of privacy; down the length of the corridor, large wooden beams passed over the tops of the walls dividing each room. It created a continuity between the rooms which was rather appealing, but also took away much of the privacy and made every sound more likely to be heard in other rooms. The wooden beams did not seem to hold any structural value; they seemed to be there only for aesthetics. The ceiling itself was scalloped and arced over the beams, leaving a few feet of space between the wood and the ceiling all the way down the hallway.

As a result, a person could conceivably get onto a wooden beam in one room and crawl over every other room down the hallway on that side, provided they were small enough to fit in the gap. Yet this wing had no reason for privacy as far as the layman would be able to tell; music rooms, sitting rooms, small art showings and libraries seemed to dominate the area and, somehow, having those wooden beams crossing overhead made everything seem that much more connected on a level more than the literal sense that they were. It encouraged a person to spend their time enjoying each room and then moving on to the next, following the path the wooden beams mirrored. In the play of light from places like the aquarium, the shadows of the beams spread across the scalloped ceiling and created a beautiful pattern that made the entire room seem interesting; from the wooden floors and Persian rugs to the design stretched overhead.

Boyd continued down the hall, keeping mental track of where he was in relation to the blueprints, and stopped in the room he remembered as being suspicious. This room turned out to be a small art gallery with Impressionist paintings displayed across the walls; Boyd knew enough about art from his classes to recognize replicas of Monet and Renoir as he passed them. Most of Clemons' rooms were decorated with art, the man seemed to have a genuine love for it, and this was one of two rooms dedicated to it that he'd come across; there was nothing seemingly unique or suspicious about the room itself and if he hadn't had access to the blueprints, he likely would have passed it by.

He looked around the room to see if he could detect anything that had changed since the blueprints had been created. He checked for anything such as faint cracks or some sort of indication that there was a hidden passage or access to another area. He remembered from the blueprints that the area where the numbers didn't seem to add up was in the southwest corner of the room, so when nothing stood out to him elsewhere, he looked there more intently while still listening closely for any sign that a guard was coming down the hall. It would be difficult to hide in the room if someone appeared; there was no door in the archway to the hall and the only furniture was a heavy-looking, tall-backed couch in the northeastern corner which was probably used by Clemons and his family members to sit and view the art.

Nothing stood out to him despite how hard he looked, so he stepped back a moment and went around the room again, noting that there was a small portion that was slightly discolored on the northern wall, but it was almost entirely hidden by a painting of a woman with a green umbrella, standing in a grassy field with the cloudy blue sky and a small boy shown behind her. Something about it seemed too obvious to him, though, which led him to believe that it was some sort of trap for a person who would suspect the room for whatever reason but did not have knowledge from the blueprints. The same thing was probably done in several other rooms across the complex, leading to traps or dead ends. Even if he wasn't certain there was anything in that room and he knew that construction could have cut off the possible access in the southwest corner, his instincts told him there was something there, that he just needed to search harder.