Title: Fighting Back
Author:![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
pemphredouk
Pairing/Characters: Michael, Sara, Lincoln, LJ,OC, Alex, Sofia Gretchen and Whistler
Rating: Probably NC-17 after the first few chapters
Summary: Michael and Sara discover things, good and bad about themselves as they finally start fighting back. All locations mentioned in the story actually exist and can be found on the google map I've made to accompany this fic. It can be found Google Map of Road Trip here.
I'm going to try and get the next chapter out before my trip to LA (excited squeeeee) and then there will be a break until I get back, catch up with RL and recover from the dreaded jet lag. I hope the trip will give me lots of inspiration for MISA in LA....It's about time that damn plaster cast came off and they need some downtime where they can relax and get to know each other even better.....
Chapter 22: Eagle Mountain, CA
“Perhaps there’s another Gas station here?” Sara asked, desperate to chase away the sense of hopelessness that was slowly overcoming her. She looked over to where Michael had been pacing between two of the pumps, his head down, his face frozen in a frown of intense concentration, clenched knuckles pressed hard against his mouth.
“This will be the only one.” He answered more abruptly than he had planned, “Look around you, this place is a ghost town” he added ruefully. Sara knew he was right, the gas station was at the crossroads of four streets, three of which were lined with identical rows of small houses bordered up and lifeless in the mid day sun. Their windowless facades staring back at them like a legion of the blind.
“Let’s try and get back to Desert Center.” she suggested, fighting against the weariness she could hear in her voice. “You said it was only thirteen miles….”
“We can’t risk it. If we run out of gas on the road back we’re sitting ducks.” He shook his head and replied with a tone that suggested he had already considered and discounted that particular option. Sara sighed and started to bite her bottom lip as she picked at her nails.
She sensed him stop, and looking up she saw him stare off into the middle distance for a moment before reaching out with his foot to sweep away the sand covering a metal plate he had just noticed. He dropped to his knees, brushing away the remaining grit with his hands. A smile slowly lighting up his face.
“Gah I’m so stupid” he muttered and he sat back on his haunches for a moment his hands splayed out on his jeans. Then after wiping them together to brush off the small sand particles that still clung to them he stood up. He walked purposefully over towards the padlocked door of the gas station building and rattled the door a few times, but the padlock held firm so he turned and started to look around the forecourt area.
“What are you doing?” Sara asked, sensing his activity meant he once more had a plan.
“We need to get into there.” He replied, nodding at the office. “Look around and see if there’s anything we can use to smash the padlock. The windows are no good, those are metal shutters they’ve bolted to the frames.”
Sara was so grateful for having something positive to do that she climbed quickly out of the passenger seat and began to earnestly search the area around the pumps.
“Why do we need to get in there?” She asked,
“Those are plates covering the underground storage tanks, if power is lost, gas can’t be pumped in the normal way so there’s always a manual override. If we find that, we can hand pump the gas out.” He was speaking quickly, excitedly, knowing exactly what he had to achieve now, seeing the steps laid out before him as clearly as if they were on a Gantt chart back in his old office in Chicago.
“How do you know there’s any gas left down there?” She asked, letting her trainer casually scuff the surface of the nearest plate. Noticing how the number on the plate matched the number on the pump to her right.
“I don’t but I hope there will be a few gallons left, enough for us to get to the next place to fuel up.” and he bent down to retrieve a large piece of wood from behind one of the pumps.
Marching back to the door he took several swings at the padlock. The noise of the wood crashing against the metal clasp was loud and Sara thought she could hear a slight echo as the sound reverberated around the forecourt before being swallowed up by the immense openness of the mountains around them. The padlock was barely scratched and Michael let out a disgusted cry when he tossed the broken wood aside and a slither of it pierced his skin. He pulled the large splinter impatiently out pressing his lips against the entry wound and sucking the few drops of blood away that had already started to form.
“We need something heavier, ideally metal.” And he renewed his search of the area. By the door were three newspaper racks. He tried to move one, but found it had been chained to a rail attached to the wall of the store and pushed it over in frustration. The plastic window burst open spilling the contents across the dusty ground. He leant down and picking up the chain in his hands attempted to pull the machine away from it, hoping to loosen the rail which seemed like a perfect tool to use on the padlock. But it stood firm, and he dropped the chain with a strangled cry of exertion.
“Damn”
He stormed back to the car, angrily licking the hand that was still bleeding.
Sara has reached the area in front of the store window again and looked down to see one of the newspapers that had tumbled out of the dispenser flap about in the breeze. She bent down and picked it up, and walked back towards the cooling shade of the pumps. She quickly turned it over from the sports and weather summary on the back to the front page curious to see what the date was. What she saw was a huge mugshot of Lincoln staring back out at her, and next to it, a grainy still of a CCTV picture of him pointing a gun into the window of a parked car., the stark headline stamped across the top
“Death sentence for Burrows as murder is caught on camera”
She gasped but it was drowned out by the blast of a gun and her mouth fell open as she looked up in shock. Michael was just feet from the store door his hand outstretched and shaking slightly as he gripped the handle of the gun. There was an intense silence that seemed to last for much longer than the couple of seconds it actually was then a clatter as the remains of the padlock fell to the ground.
“Sorry I should have warned you” he murmured rather sheepishly.
“Someone could have heard that.” Sara replied, although her mind was now wrestling with the inextricably linked images of two brothers and two guns……separated by three years of hope and despair.
“There’s no one here Sara just us two, don’t worry.” And it was only then he saw what she had been looking at in the paper.
“Well I guess that answers our question, this place must have closed down three years ago.” and he nodded at the mug shot of his brother.
“That was the day I almost gave up hope.” He tucked the gun into the waistband of his jeans and moved back to the door releasing the clasp and pushing it open gingerly.
Sara skimmed the headlines, her eyes drawn back again and again to the chillingly blank expression on Lincoln’s face. How had he felt, knowing he was innocent, knowing he was facing his own death? She couldn’t even start to imagine how it would have affected Michael, the Michael Scofield she knew so little about. The one before his tattoos, before Fox River.
She could hear Michael moving around inside the darkened room, and she approached cautiously, then halted for a moment, looking behind her as she did, suddenly getting a prickly sensation down her neck – a feeling like they were being watched….she shrugged the feeling off, the gun had just been so loud, it had just made her nervous...Michael was right, this place was deserted she was being silly.
~~~~~~
Eric plodded down the long deserted hall, his footsteps echoing in the emptiness of the cavernous room. The sunlight seeping softly in through the high windows set in the roof was enough to light his way and his torch was off and hanging from his belt. He looked neither to the right or left, knowing this building so well he had no need to make a closer inspection of the tiny airless rooms leading off the hall. They gave him the creeps anyway, made his claustrophobia rear up and he’d avoided them as much as he could from his first day here.
The barred door at the end was open, all the doors were open, he’d quickly tired of the endless regime of keys, it was crazy, why lock them when there were no prisoners left? There was just him and the odd desert critter that found its way inside the cool walls of the prison blocks.
He climbed up the metal steps leading to the observation gallery, huffing and puffing, aware that he was getting older, fatter and if his damn doctor was right closer to a heart attack with every meal choked with saturated fat he thoughtlessly demolished.
Fuck the doc, eating was one of his few pleasures, and he would rather die happy and fat than thin and miserable.
He pulled open the door and slid into the large leather executive chair that faced the bank of CCTV screens with a sigh of relief. His hand stroked the expensive leather and he smiled once again as he remembered dragging the chair all the way from the Warden’s office in the main block, determined to take a few perks in what was a pretty crap job. He was the security guard, for Eagle Mountain, which required him to make the hot dusty drive over every other day to make sure the place hadn’t been vandalised, as if anyone would notice…the place was a dump anyway.
The mine buildings were boarded-up, even he didn’t go in those. The houses, well yeah there was the occasional attempt to break in by kids but they were all empty, stripped of everything that had a monetary value so most never came back. It was just the prison that needed watching. Five of the blocks were empty but one was used as storage by the company, stock piles of prison cots and mattresses, kitchen equipment, prison uniforms anything they used in their fourteen other prisons around the country. The dry desert air of Eagle Mountain had created a blazingly hot hell-hole for the inmates while they had been the residents but once they had been moved out, it was found to be the perfect place to store mattresses and other perishables.
He rocked back in the chair and raised his feet to the table, his eyes scanning disinterestedly over the ten monitors in front of him. They were such cheapskates here; they hadn’t even invested in cameras which could scan 360 degrees so he was stuck with the same ten fixed aspects. The mining administration block and car park, the mine itself a view to the west and one to the north…always worth checking as kids seemed to think it was a great game to try and roll stolen cars over the edge and see how many tiers they would fall before coming to a halt in a tangled mess of metal.
There were seven cameras for the prison itself, one each for the blocks, and one of the yard and he barely glanced at them whilst he reached for his clip board and started to scratch out in a blue biro the result of his visit today. Doors intact, windows intact, animal infestation zero, solar generator working…he worked his way down the list and sighed he was supposed to be a security guard not a frigging janitor,
Roof leaks…he sighed how the hell was he supposed to know?…it hadn’t rained for two fucking months,,, he printed None next to the question.
Minutes later he was finished and he relaxed back in his chair and turned the small TV on that was resting on the table alongside the flickering black and white screens. His focus was on the latest series of Cops, smirking at the hapless criminals trying to outrun the guys in the patrol cars…he loved this programme and for once he didn’t sink into the bitterness that his own chosen career wasn’t as exciting. He had a uniform, a company truck and a gun, and his eyes flicked over to the holstered gun hanging from the hook on the wall. He enjoyed wearing it more than he should do he thought, loved the sense of power it gave him, even if the only thing he’d ever shot with it was a crow. He turned his attention back to the TV and became completely lost in the show. If he’d have let his eyes wander just two screens across to the one showing the exercise yard he may have noticed at the far right of the screen, on the forecourt of the gas station…just visible in the distance beyond the fence...the back wheels of a vehicle…a corolla.
~~~~
The inside of the store had been stripped bare; just a few wire display stands were left leaning drunkenly against the back wall. Michael was already behind the counter, fumbling about in the drawers and searching the low shelving. Sara moved carefully across the room, trying to ignore the musty dankness that seemed to hang in the air.
“It must be here somewhere.” he muttered
He turned to a large free standing shuttered cupboard behind the counter,
“Perhaps it’s in there, can you see anything to prise it open with?”
“Why don’t you just shoot it.” Sara responded with a smirk
“Very funny Tancredi.” he replied, “That was the only bullet, the rest are back in the car. Have a look over there; we need something to lever this door off its runners.”
He removed the gun from his waistband and pushed it into the pocket of his jacket, which he then slipped from his shoulders before folding it onto the counter in front of him. Sara was amazed he’d worn the heavy cord jacket for so long and wondered if he wouldn’t also find the long sleeved t-shirt impossible in the heat of the desert. His reluctance to bare his tattoos to the world seemed to be strong enough to withstand any physical discomfort from being overdressed in extreme heat. Given she was the only audience for them at the moment she shook her head silently at his reticence to strip down to something more appropriate.
Sara moved across the dark room, and picked up a large metal bar that had been propped up behind the door.
“What does the manual switch look like anyway?” she asked as she made her way slowly back to Michael
“It’s a long lever, it forms part of the handle of the pump.” and he reached out for the metal rod Sara had found, he was about to wedge it onto the side of the cupboard when he stopped and looked at the metal in his hand.
“Sara this is the handle you’ve found it!”
“Ah…I did? Yeah…I knew that…” she replied and smiled so you don’t need to attack that cupboard now…
No….and he turned and strolled out back into the sun.
Michael had quickly raised the plate up and reaching down pushed a small lever to switch the pump to manual operation. Then locating the socket for the handle he pushed it into place, smiling as he heard a satisfying click. Then he started to pump the handle backwards and forwards, being instantly rewarded by a creaking resonance that suggested things were stirring feet below them in the tank.
“Sara move the car over to pump three.”
Minutes later she was standing next to the car, the nozzle in her hand as Michael continued to pump the handle expectantly, but not a drop of gas had even dribbled out of the nozzle.
“Maybe they emptied them?” She suggested, looking at the sweat-coated brow of Michael as he worked the long metal rod with a growing look of desperation in his eyes. But before he could reply she suddenly became conscious of a strong smell of gasoline, and the first few hesitant drops spattered into the dusty ground, instantly darkening it with angry wet circles.
She pushed the nozzle into the tank and seeing Michael hadn’t noticed yet she cried out across the forecourt,
“Scofield you’re a genius we have gas!”
He looked up from his exertions and wiped his arm across his forehead, gathering up the droplets that were about to fall on the thin cotton of the shirt. His lips curled up into a relieved smile. He had begun to doubt his plan, and had failed to come up with another one. He bent his head down and rocked the handle faster, they were back on track…they could fill up here…head up and over Eagle Mountain and pick up Highway 10 miles past the roadblock …they would be in the relative safety of LA with Bob and Jen before nightfall….
~~~~
Cops had finished and Eric flicked through the other channels with barely disguised frustration. There was no cable at the prison, just a rather weak antenna that picked up some of the local stations, thus limiting his viewing dramatically and he clicked his way through his reduced options with impatience. A large fly had somehow navigated the corridor and walkways of the prison complex and was now buzzing annoyingly around the small Comms control room. It landed on the TV and he swatted it away with his hand. It continued to buzz around and he reached for his newspaper, rolling it up quickly and then he scanned the room, the fly had gone quiet…it must have landed somewhere. He spotted it crawling across the monitor that was trained on the derelict exercise yard. He reached forward out of the chair….the newspaper shaking slightly in his hand as he held it above the screen. But just as he was about to bring the paper baton crashing down on the hapless insect a movement on the screen caught his eyes and he missed it by inches.
The fly was already forgotten, his eyes now glued to the screen as he saw the unmistakeable shape of a person move about the forecourt before disappearing into the building. Kids probably, breaking into the gas station - the fuckers. He dropped the newspaper and reached for his holster, he’d scare the shit out of them, and buckling it as he made his way out of the room he couldn’t help but smile, finally something for a real security guard to do.
~~~~
He’d been pumping now for fifteen minutes and decided that even though it was only trickling up from the underground tank they should have enough in the car so he stopped. His shoulders and upper arm ached and he rotated it slightly trying to relieve the dull ache that had been building for the last five minutes. He switched the lever back and dropped the metal plate back into position. Sara had already crossed the forecourt to retrieve one of copies of the newspapers that were still flapping on the ground. She returned to the car curling her long legs into the driver’s seat. Michael was walking back to the open door of the store, turning and shouting behind him
“Just getting my jacket, start the car lets see how much gas we’ve pumped”
Sara dutifully turned the key and watched as the small dial crept slowly around the extended arc of the gauge. She had flipped the radio on as well and let her head sink back against the headrest, her eyes closed as a rock ballad spilled out of the car and into the sticky mid day heat.
She didn’t hear him, she didn’t even see him but suddenly she felt a rough hand on her arm and her eyes flew open.
“Get out of the car.”
The gun was just a couple of feet from her face, and she watched it with mounting fear and apprehension as he raised it slightly, his hand shaking.
“Get outta the car now lady…”
She nodded and struggled to climb out still puzzling where this man had appeared from; there was no patrol car, no sign of anyone else. He wasn’t a cop, but his uniform suggested he had some kind of authority around here. She wasn’t sure if he’d seen Michael and she was terrified that if he appeared at the door of the store the man would turn and shoot first and desperately tried to think what to do to prevent that happening.
“Put your hands up, turn and face the car slowly…no funny business ok” the man snarled at her. Although now the initial shock had worked through her system she thought his voice was trying a little too hard to sound confident especially since he had a gun…
“Listen the car had run out of gas and…”.
“Shut it.”
Michael should have appeared by now, he only had to grab his jacket from the counter, ten seconds tops and it had been more than that…he must know, perhaps he’d heard him?…he would without doubt be planning something and her brain started to run through the options she had, what would he expect her to do? What was he thinking and how could she help him?
Sara under the directions of the armed man was now standing against the car, he’d moved behind her, just a couple of feet back and she could hear his heavy panting, the guy wasn’t very fit.
“We only needed a little…we figured no one wanted it now.” She made her voice sound pleading; maybe she could still talk her way out of this.
“We…?” And he hesitated a little,
“Yeah my boyfriend and me”
“Where is he?” And he looked quickly to his left and right…
“He’s over at that first house,” and she nodded in the direction of the house next to the gas station separated by a wall of concrete panels. “He wants to try and take some gas with us just in case and wondered if there would be some kind of container….”
Eric was now looking over to towards the house, but moving to get a better view meant he had turned his back to the front of the store and the open door.
“Listen officer….we don’t wanna get into trouble for this.” and Sara’s voice took on a lilting...suggestive tone….
“Brad doesn’t mind sharing you know…” and twisting her head she fluttered her eyelashes in such an obviously flirting manner she wondered briefly if she’d overdone it when she saw the surprised reaction on the guy’s face…Behind Eric she caught a shadow move in the door and her heart started to pound in her chest so loudly she couldn’t understand how he couldn’t hear it.
Eric was sweating and it wasn’t just the heat that was causing it. His collar felt tight and his mouth was dry. His arm was beginning to tense up and he changed the grip slightly on the handle, the weight now feeling uncomfortably heavy in his palm. He was still trying to get a better view of the house taking a couple more steps to the left, keeping the woman in his peripheral vision. He’d no way of restraining her, and anyway what if they were just lost as she said…if he really thought she was up to no good he’d have to call for the local cops anyway and the CB radio…was back in his truck, his cell phone still on the desk in the Comms room….
Damn he’d messed this up, he should have hung back and thought this one through a bit more. He was dragged back from his rambling thoughts by the woman’s voice again, and his eyes were drawn back to her …how long her legs were, how her tight jeans accentuated her thighs and the soft curve of her ass….
“So isn’t this where you search me officer?”
Sara couldn’t believe the guy was buying this…
Eric couldn’t believe the woman hadn’t realised he was just a security guard…
“Um…yeah I guess.” and he lowered the gun, fumbling as he put it back in his holster. He stepped back around the car towards her and for the first time an inkling of recognition seemed to start burrowing its way up towards his more conscious thoughts. Didn’t she seem a little familiar?
“Should I spread my legs?” She asked in a ridiculously teasing way and incredibly he seemed to lap it up..
“Yeah.”
But before he could even start patting her down a voice boomed out across the forecourt
“Hands in the air now or I will shoot.”
Eric responded by lifting both his hands unquestioningly He knew as soon as he saw the grin on the woman’s face that he’d been stupid, Because now he did recognise her, she was the woman who was on the run with the Fox River guy, the one with all the tattoos who had just murdered someone according to the news that morning…the one he was sure was standing behind him pointing a gun at his head. He’d had a chance to capture them both, be the local hero and he’d well and truly blown it. His moment of glory had turned into abysmal defeat in the second it took for his arms to reach towards the sky...
~~~~
The automated voice on the satnav for once sounded reassuring You are 210 miles from your destination. Michael flicked the switch and leaned back, turning to watch Sara as she negotiated another tight bend on the mountain road. They’d not spoken since leaving the guard bound and tied into the large leather chair in the Comms room. The journey through the deserted halls and corridors of the prison had affected them both. For Michael it had brought back so many unwelcome memories of Fox River, the stench of desperation that still seemed to permeate through the bricks. The harsh echoing sounds of their feet on the concrete, so many things he had hoped never to experience again. Once Michael had seen the bank of monitors in the Comms room he knew that their car would be captured on tape and with no way of wiping them blank he had to do something. If the police knew what they were driving they would be picked up long before they reached the safety of Yellow Hill road.
But every minute he’d spent tying the guy to the chair reminded him of those last desperate moments in Pope’s office, when he’d had to gag and bind the old man….justifying his temporary imprisonment in the closet with Lincoln’s need for freedom, A mans life for a few hours tied to a chair….He’d tried so hard not to think about it, but the look of fear on the security guards face as he’d turned slowly and recognised him had appalled him, his self loathing seemed to twist him in like a knife and caused him to almost consider stopping it all right there…he could pretend all he wanted, it was easy and getting easier to say that they had no choice, that Sara’s life was as much at risk as his now but deep down he knew…he had a choice, he’d always had a choice and every time his decisions hurt someone else was another step along a road of no return.
They’d walked quickly back through the prison to the car now drawn up outside the main door to the central block. Michael had cursed himself for being so careless when they had first seen the prison, if they’d driven for another hundred yards along the fence they would have found the open gate, seen the fresh tire tracks and the path worn across the yard by frequent use. Realised that there could be someone in the buildings and been more cautious. Blowing the padlock off the gas station door had in hindsight been a rather reckless thing to do.
They drove off, the fuel gauge pointing comfortably to three quarters full and made their way slowly out past the mine. They turned onto the small dust track that wound its way up and around the peak before crossing down to join a single track road across thirty empty miles of desert. Just as they passed the last mine building Michael had asked Sara to stop as he copied down the telephone number on one of the Securion notices hanging on the wall. Once they had reached LA he would call them, from an untraceable call box of course, and let them know one of their guards needed some assistance…..
They stopped four hours later for food at a small service station on the Pomona Freeway just west of Sunnyslope. It was reassuringly busy and free of cops and Sara had returned to the car with plenty of supplies. They chose a quiet corner of the large car park and sat next to each other at one of the metal picnic tables placed around the perimeter of the paved forecourt. After they’d eaten Michael took Sara’s arm in his hand, and as the light started to fade and blur the colours of the evening he added the last few days journey to her cast in a series of detailed lines.
“This road trip will end in LA.” he murmured and Sara who had been watching a small bird build up its courage to hop closer to the picnic table and the payload of crumbs beneath it turned with a start, immediately misunderstanding his words.
“Why?”
He lifted her arm gently,
“Because I’ve run out of cast…”
“Oh” and she smiled, “It needs to come off soon anyway,” and reaching for his hand she clasped it, her fingers curling around his in an attempt to both offer and receive reassurance.
Michael seemed to relax a little, and suddenly it seemed easy to talk again. The whole experience at Eagle Mountain had disturbed him…from the theft of the gas to taking the guard prisoner had once again reminded him that a fugitive’s options rarely allowed him the luxury of staying on the right side of the law. His innate morality was fighting and apparently losing a battle against the mantra of self indulgent justification
Sara as always seemed to understand without the need of his words what he was thinking.
“We didn’t have much choice back there Michael, you know that right?”
He said nothing but after a few seconds nodded slowly.
“The guy will be fine, and when we reach LA we can make the call, they’ll find him before nightfall.” She added.
“I know.” his voice dropping to the low whisper he used so often when emotion overtook him
“I just wish…”
“Hey… remember once you told me it wouldn’t always be like this…”and her hand started to stroke his arm softly,
His lips curled up into a warm smile
“Turning my own charm back on me huh Tancredi…that’s clever…”
“Of course.” She replied and leaned her body into his; she sighed as he swept one arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer.
“And I have to say you play the hussy disturbingly well….but why was I Brad?”
Sara smiled
“First name I could think of honey…” her voice once more taking on the seductive edge she’d used so effectively earlier in the day….
He chuckled and pulled her even closer. She turned her arm a little as her eyes followed the latest lines he’d drawn. The towns were all there, Phoenix and the school, Ehrenburg, the roadblock marked by just a small x, Blythe and the airport, Desert Center then Eagle Mountain.
“The flowers are pretty.” she murmured, her finger running over the small bloom he’d added next to Blythe.
His eyes for a moment seemed to flicker with something, a nervous blink, before he took her hand and kissed the fingertips.
“Yeah they are....aren’t they? Let's get started again, we have another sixty miles to go and I want to see the Pacific before today ends…
tbc
Author:
pemphredouk Pairing/Characters: Michael, Sara, Lincoln, LJ,OC, Alex, Sofia Gretchen and Whistler
Rating: Probably NC-17 after the first few chapters
Summary: Michael and Sara discover things, good and bad about themselves as they finally start fighting back. All locations mentioned in the story actually exist and can be found on the google map I've made to accompany this fic. It can be found Google Map of Road Trip here.
I'm going to try and get the next chapter out before my trip to LA (excited squeeeee) and then there will be a break until I get back, catch up with RL and recover from the dreaded jet lag. I hope the trip will give me lots of inspiration for MISA in LA....It's about time that damn plaster cast came off and they need some downtime where they can relax and get to know each other even better.....
Chapter 22: Eagle Mountain, CA
“Perhaps there’s another Gas station here?” Sara asked, desperate to chase away the sense of hopelessness that was slowly overcoming her. She looked over to where Michael had been pacing between two of the pumps, his head down, his face frozen in a frown of intense concentration, clenched knuckles pressed hard against his mouth.
“This will be the only one.” He answered more abruptly than he had planned, “Look around you, this place is a ghost town” he added ruefully. Sara knew he was right, the gas station was at the crossroads of four streets, three of which were lined with identical rows of small houses bordered up and lifeless in the mid day sun. Their windowless facades staring back at them like a legion of the blind.
“Let’s try and get back to Desert Center.” she suggested, fighting against the weariness she could hear in her voice. “You said it was only thirteen miles….”
“We can’t risk it. If we run out of gas on the road back we’re sitting ducks.” He shook his head and replied with a tone that suggested he had already considered and discounted that particular option. Sara sighed and started to bite her bottom lip as she picked at her nails.
She sensed him stop, and looking up she saw him stare off into the middle distance for a moment before reaching out with his foot to sweep away the sand covering a metal plate he had just noticed. He dropped to his knees, brushing away the remaining grit with his hands. A smile slowly lighting up his face.
“Gah I’m so stupid” he muttered and he sat back on his haunches for a moment his hands splayed out on his jeans. Then after wiping them together to brush off the small sand particles that still clung to them he stood up. He walked purposefully over towards the padlocked door of the gas station building and rattled the door a few times, but the padlock held firm so he turned and started to look around the forecourt area.
“What are you doing?” Sara asked, sensing his activity meant he once more had a plan.
“We need to get into there.” He replied, nodding at the office. “Look around and see if there’s anything we can use to smash the padlock. The windows are no good, those are metal shutters they’ve bolted to the frames.”
Sara was so grateful for having something positive to do that she climbed quickly out of the passenger seat and began to earnestly search the area around the pumps.
“Why do we need to get in there?” She asked,
“Those are plates covering the underground storage tanks, if power is lost, gas can’t be pumped in the normal way so there’s always a manual override. If we find that, we can hand pump the gas out.” He was speaking quickly, excitedly, knowing exactly what he had to achieve now, seeing the steps laid out before him as clearly as if they were on a Gantt chart back in his old office in Chicago.
“How do you know there’s any gas left down there?” She asked, letting her trainer casually scuff the surface of the nearest plate. Noticing how the number on the plate matched the number on the pump to her right.
“I don’t but I hope there will be a few gallons left, enough for us to get to the next place to fuel up.” and he bent down to retrieve a large piece of wood from behind one of the pumps.
Marching back to the door he took several swings at the padlock. The noise of the wood crashing against the metal clasp was loud and Sara thought she could hear a slight echo as the sound reverberated around the forecourt before being swallowed up by the immense openness of the mountains around them. The padlock was barely scratched and Michael let out a disgusted cry when he tossed the broken wood aside and a slither of it pierced his skin. He pulled the large splinter impatiently out pressing his lips against the entry wound and sucking the few drops of blood away that had already started to form.
“We need something heavier, ideally metal.” And he renewed his search of the area. By the door were three newspaper racks. He tried to move one, but found it had been chained to a rail attached to the wall of the store and pushed it over in frustration. The plastic window burst open spilling the contents across the dusty ground. He leant down and picking up the chain in his hands attempted to pull the machine away from it, hoping to loosen the rail which seemed like a perfect tool to use on the padlock. But it stood firm, and he dropped the chain with a strangled cry of exertion.
“Damn”
He stormed back to the car, angrily licking the hand that was still bleeding.
Sara has reached the area in front of the store window again and looked down to see one of the newspapers that had tumbled out of the dispenser flap about in the breeze. She bent down and picked it up, and walked back towards the cooling shade of the pumps. She quickly turned it over from the sports and weather summary on the back to the front page curious to see what the date was. What she saw was a huge mugshot of Lincoln staring back out at her, and next to it, a grainy still of a CCTV picture of him pointing a gun into the window of a parked car., the stark headline stamped across the top
“Death sentence for Burrows as murder is caught on camera”
She gasped but it was drowned out by the blast of a gun and her mouth fell open as she looked up in shock. Michael was just feet from the store door his hand outstretched and shaking slightly as he gripped the handle of the gun. There was an intense silence that seemed to last for much longer than the couple of seconds it actually was then a clatter as the remains of the padlock fell to the ground.
“Sorry I should have warned you” he murmured rather sheepishly.
“Someone could have heard that.” Sara replied, although her mind was now wrestling with the inextricably linked images of two brothers and two guns……separated by three years of hope and despair.
“There’s no one here Sara just us two, don’t worry.” And it was only then he saw what she had been looking at in the paper.
“Well I guess that answers our question, this place must have closed down three years ago.” and he nodded at the mug shot of his brother.
“That was the day I almost gave up hope.” He tucked the gun into the waistband of his jeans and moved back to the door releasing the clasp and pushing it open gingerly.
Sara skimmed the headlines, her eyes drawn back again and again to the chillingly blank expression on Lincoln’s face. How had he felt, knowing he was innocent, knowing he was facing his own death? She couldn’t even start to imagine how it would have affected Michael, the Michael Scofield she knew so little about. The one before his tattoos, before Fox River.
She could hear Michael moving around inside the darkened room, and she approached cautiously, then halted for a moment, looking behind her as she did, suddenly getting a prickly sensation down her neck – a feeling like they were being watched….she shrugged the feeling off, the gun had just been so loud, it had just made her nervous...Michael was right, this place was deserted she was being silly.
~~~~~~
Eric plodded down the long deserted hall, his footsteps echoing in the emptiness of the cavernous room. The sunlight seeping softly in through the high windows set in the roof was enough to light his way and his torch was off and hanging from his belt. He looked neither to the right or left, knowing this building so well he had no need to make a closer inspection of the tiny airless rooms leading off the hall. They gave him the creeps anyway, made his claustrophobia rear up and he’d avoided them as much as he could from his first day here.
The barred door at the end was open, all the doors were open, he’d quickly tired of the endless regime of keys, it was crazy, why lock them when there were no prisoners left? There was just him and the odd desert critter that found its way inside the cool walls of the prison blocks.
He climbed up the metal steps leading to the observation gallery, huffing and puffing, aware that he was getting older, fatter and if his damn doctor was right closer to a heart attack with every meal choked with saturated fat he thoughtlessly demolished.
Fuck the doc, eating was one of his few pleasures, and he would rather die happy and fat than thin and miserable.
He pulled open the door and slid into the large leather executive chair that faced the bank of CCTV screens with a sigh of relief. His hand stroked the expensive leather and he smiled once again as he remembered dragging the chair all the way from the Warden’s office in the main block, determined to take a few perks in what was a pretty crap job. He was the security guard, for Eagle Mountain, which required him to make the hot dusty drive over every other day to make sure the place hadn’t been vandalised, as if anyone would notice…the place was a dump anyway.
The mine buildings were boarded-up, even he didn’t go in those. The houses, well yeah there was the occasional attempt to break in by kids but they were all empty, stripped of everything that had a monetary value so most never came back. It was just the prison that needed watching. Five of the blocks were empty but one was used as storage by the company, stock piles of prison cots and mattresses, kitchen equipment, prison uniforms anything they used in their fourteen other prisons around the country. The dry desert air of Eagle Mountain had created a blazingly hot hell-hole for the inmates while they had been the residents but once they had been moved out, it was found to be the perfect place to store mattresses and other perishables.
He rocked back in the chair and raised his feet to the table, his eyes scanning disinterestedly over the ten monitors in front of him. They were such cheapskates here; they hadn’t even invested in cameras which could scan 360 degrees so he was stuck with the same ten fixed aspects. The mining administration block and car park, the mine itself a view to the west and one to the north…always worth checking as kids seemed to think it was a great game to try and roll stolen cars over the edge and see how many tiers they would fall before coming to a halt in a tangled mess of metal.
There were seven cameras for the prison itself, one each for the blocks, and one of the yard and he barely glanced at them whilst he reached for his clip board and started to scratch out in a blue biro the result of his visit today. Doors intact, windows intact, animal infestation zero, solar generator working…he worked his way down the list and sighed he was supposed to be a security guard not a frigging janitor,
Roof leaks…he sighed how the hell was he supposed to know?…it hadn’t rained for two fucking months,,, he printed None next to the question.
Minutes later he was finished and he relaxed back in his chair and turned the small TV on that was resting on the table alongside the flickering black and white screens. His focus was on the latest series of Cops, smirking at the hapless criminals trying to outrun the guys in the patrol cars…he loved this programme and for once he didn’t sink into the bitterness that his own chosen career wasn’t as exciting. He had a uniform, a company truck and a gun, and his eyes flicked over to the holstered gun hanging from the hook on the wall. He enjoyed wearing it more than he should do he thought, loved the sense of power it gave him, even if the only thing he’d ever shot with it was a crow. He turned his attention back to the TV and became completely lost in the show. If he’d have let his eyes wander just two screens across to the one showing the exercise yard he may have noticed at the far right of the screen, on the forecourt of the gas station…just visible in the distance beyond the fence...the back wheels of a vehicle…a corolla.
~~~~
The inside of the store had been stripped bare; just a few wire display stands were left leaning drunkenly against the back wall. Michael was already behind the counter, fumbling about in the drawers and searching the low shelving. Sara moved carefully across the room, trying to ignore the musty dankness that seemed to hang in the air.
“It must be here somewhere.” he muttered
He turned to a large free standing shuttered cupboard behind the counter,
“Perhaps it’s in there, can you see anything to prise it open with?”
“Why don’t you just shoot it.” Sara responded with a smirk
“Very funny Tancredi.” he replied, “That was the only bullet, the rest are back in the car. Have a look over there; we need something to lever this door off its runners.”
He removed the gun from his waistband and pushed it into the pocket of his jacket, which he then slipped from his shoulders before folding it onto the counter in front of him. Sara was amazed he’d worn the heavy cord jacket for so long and wondered if he wouldn’t also find the long sleeved t-shirt impossible in the heat of the desert. His reluctance to bare his tattoos to the world seemed to be strong enough to withstand any physical discomfort from being overdressed in extreme heat. Given she was the only audience for them at the moment she shook her head silently at his reticence to strip down to something more appropriate.
Sara moved across the dark room, and picked up a large metal bar that had been propped up behind the door.
“What does the manual switch look like anyway?” she asked as she made her way slowly back to Michael
“It’s a long lever, it forms part of the handle of the pump.” and he reached out for the metal rod Sara had found, he was about to wedge it onto the side of the cupboard when he stopped and looked at the metal in his hand.
“Sara this is the handle you’ve found it!”
“Ah…I did? Yeah…I knew that…” she replied and smiled so you don’t need to attack that cupboard now…
No….and he turned and strolled out back into the sun.
Michael had quickly raised the plate up and reaching down pushed a small lever to switch the pump to manual operation. Then locating the socket for the handle he pushed it into place, smiling as he heard a satisfying click. Then he started to pump the handle backwards and forwards, being instantly rewarded by a creaking resonance that suggested things were stirring feet below them in the tank.
“Sara move the car over to pump three.”
Minutes later she was standing next to the car, the nozzle in her hand as Michael continued to pump the handle expectantly, but not a drop of gas had even dribbled out of the nozzle.
“Maybe they emptied them?” She suggested, looking at the sweat-coated brow of Michael as he worked the long metal rod with a growing look of desperation in his eyes. But before he could reply she suddenly became conscious of a strong smell of gasoline, and the first few hesitant drops spattered into the dusty ground, instantly darkening it with angry wet circles.
She pushed the nozzle into the tank and seeing Michael hadn’t noticed yet she cried out across the forecourt,
“Scofield you’re a genius we have gas!”
He looked up from his exertions and wiped his arm across his forehead, gathering up the droplets that were about to fall on the thin cotton of the shirt. His lips curled up into a relieved smile. He had begun to doubt his plan, and had failed to come up with another one. He bent his head down and rocked the handle faster, they were back on track…they could fill up here…head up and over Eagle Mountain and pick up Highway 10 miles past the roadblock …they would be in the relative safety of LA with Bob and Jen before nightfall….
~~~~
Cops had finished and Eric flicked through the other channels with barely disguised frustration. There was no cable at the prison, just a rather weak antenna that picked up some of the local stations, thus limiting his viewing dramatically and he clicked his way through his reduced options with impatience. A large fly had somehow navigated the corridor and walkways of the prison complex and was now buzzing annoyingly around the small Comms control room. It landed on the TV and he swatted it away with his hand. It continued to buzz around and he reached for his newspaper, rolling it up quickly and then he scanned the room, the fly had gone quiet…it must have landed somewhere. He spotted it crawling across the monitor that was trained on the derelict exercise yard. He reached forward out of the chair….the newspaper shaking slightly in his hand as he held it above the screen. But just as he was about to bring the paper baton crashing down on the hapless insect a movement on the screen caught his eyes and he missed it by inches.
The fly was already forgotten, his eyes now glued to the screen as he saw the unmistakeable shape of a person move about the forecourt before disappearing into the building. Kids probably, breaking into the gas station - the fuckers. He dropped the newspaper and reached for his holster, he’d scare the shit out of them, and buckling it as he made his way out of the room he couldn’t help but smile, finally something for a real security guard to do.
~~~~
He’d been pumping now for fifteen minutes and decided that even though it was only trickling up from the underground tank they should have enough in the car so he stopped. His shoulders and upper arm ached and he rotated it slightly trying to relieve the dull ache that had been building for the last five minutes. He switched the lever back and dropped the metal plate back into position. Sara had already crossed the forecourt to retrieve one of copies of the newspapers that were still flapping on the ground. She returned to the car curling her long legs into the driver’s seat. Michael was walking back to the open door of the store, turning and shouting behind him
“Just getting my jacket, start the car lets see how much gas we’ve pumped”
Sara dutifully turned the key and watched as the small dial crept slowly around the extended arc of the gauge. She had flipped the radio on as well and let her head sink back against the headrest, her eyes closed as a rock ballad spilled out of the car and into the sticky mid day heat.
She didn’t hear him, she didn’t even see him but suddenly she felt a rough hand on her arm and her eyes flew open.
“Get out of the car.”
The gun was just a couple of feet from her face, and she watched it with mounting fear and apprehension as he raised it slightly, his hand shaking.
“Get outta the car now lady…”
She nodded and struggled to climb out still puzzling where this man had appeared from; there was no patrol car, no sign of anyone else. He wasn’t a cop, but his uniform suggested he had some kind of authority around here. She wasn’t sure if he’d seen Michael and she was terrified that if he appeared at the door of the store the man would turn and shoot first and desperately tried to think what to do to prevent that happening.
“Put your hands up, turn and face the car slowly…no funny business ok” the man snarled at her. Although now the initial shock had worked through her system she thought his voice was trying a little too hard to sound confident especially since he had a gun…
“Listen the car had run out of gas and…”.
“Shut it.”
Michael should have appeared by now, he only had to grab his jacket from the counter, ten seconds tops and it had been more than that…he must know, perhaps he’d heard him?…he would without doubt be planning something and her brain started to run through the options she had, what would he expect her to do? What was he thinking and how could she help him?
Sara under the directions of the armed man was now standing against the car, he’d moved behind her, just a couple of feet back and she could hear his heavy panting, the guy wasn’t very fit.
“We only needed a little…we figured no one wanted it now.” She made her voice sound pleading; maybe she could still talk her way out of this.
“We…?” And he hesitated a little,
“Yeah my boyfriend and me”
“Where is he?” And he looked quickly to his left and right…
“He’s over at that first house,” and she nodded in the direction of the house next to the gas station separated by a wall of concrete panels. “He wants to try and take some gas with us just in case and wondered if there would be some kind of container….”
Eric was now looking over to towards the house, but moving to get a better view meant he had turned his back to the front of the store and the open door.
“Listen officer….we don’t wanna get into trouble for this.” and Sara’s voice took on a lilting...suggestive tone….
“Brad doesn’t mind sharing you know…” and twisting her head she fluttered her eyelashes in such an obviously flirting manner she wondered briefly if she’d overdone it when she saw the surprised reaction on the guy’s face…Behind Eric she caught a shadow move in the door and her heart started to pound in her chest so loudly she couldn’t understand how he couldn’t hear it.
Eric was sweating and it wasn’t just the heat that was causing it. His collar felt tight and his mouth was dry. His arm was beginning to tense up and he changed the grip slightly on the handle, the weight now feeling uncomfortably heavy in his palm. He was still trying to get a better view of the house taking a couple more steps to the left, keeping the woman in his peripheral vision. He’d no way of restraining her, and anyway what if they were just lost as she said…if he really thought she was up to no good he’d have to call for the local cops anyway and the CB radio…was back in his truck, his cell phone still on the desk in the Comms room….
Damn he’d messed this up, he should have hung back and thought this one through a bit more. He was dragged back from his rambling thoughts by the woman’s voice again, and his eyes were drawn back to her …how long her legs were, how her tight jeans accentuated her thighs and the soft curve of her ass….
“So isn’t this where you search me officer?”
Sara couldn’t believe the guy was buying this…
Eric couldn’t believe the woman hadn’t realised he was just a security guard…
“Um…yeah I guess.” and he lowered the gun, fumbling as he put it back in his holster. He stepped back around the car towards her and for the first time an inkling of recognition seemed to start burrowing its way up towards his more conscious thoughts. Didn’t she seem a little familiar?
“Should I spread my legs?” She asked in a ridiculously teasing way and incredibly he seemed to lap it up..
“Yeah.”
But before he could even start patting her down a voice boomed out across the forecourt
“Hands in the air now or I will shoot.”
Eric responded by lifting both his hands unquestioningly He knew as soon as he saw the grin on the woman’s face that he’d been stupid, Because now he did recognise her, she was the woman who was on the run with the Fox River guy, the one with all the tattoos who had just murdered someone according to the news that morning…the one he was sure was standing behind him pointing a gun at his head. He’d had a chance to capture them both, be the local hero and he’d well and truly blown it. His moment of glory had turned into abysmal defeat in the second it took for his arms to reach towards the sky...
~~~~
The automated voice on the satnav for once sounded reassuring You are 210 miles from your destination. Michael flicked the switch and leaned back, turning to watch Sara as she negotiated another tight bend on the mountain road. They’d not spoken since leaving the guard bound and tied into the large leather chair in the Comms room. The journey through the deserted halls and corridors of the prison had affected them both. For Michael it had brought back so many unwelcome memories of Fox River, the stench of desperation that still seemed to permeate through the bricks. The harsh echoing sounds of their feet on the concrete, so many things he had hoped never to experience again. Once Michael had seen the bank of monitors in the Comms room he knew that their car would be captured on tape and with no way of wiping them blank he had to do something. If the police knew what they were driving they would be picked up long before they reached the safety of Yellow Hill road.
But every minute he’d spent tying the guy to the chair reminded him of those last desperate moments in Pope’s office, when he’d had to gag and bind the old man….justifying his temporary imprisonment in the closet with Lincoln’s need for freedom, A mans life for a few hours tied to a chair….He’d tried so hard not to think about it, but the look of fear on the security guards face as he’d turned slowly and recognised him had appalled him, his self loathing seemed to twist him in like a knife and caused him to almost consider stopping it all right there…he could pretend all he wanted, it was easy and getting easier to say that they had no choice, that Sara’s life was as much at risk as his now but deep down he knew…he had a choice, he’d always had a choice and every time his decisions hurt someone else was another step along a road of no return.
They’d walked quickly back through the prison to the car now drawn up outside the main door to the central block. Michael had cursed himself for being so careless when they had first seen the prison, if they’d driven for another hundred yards along the fence they would have found the open gate, seen the fresh tire tracks and the path worn across the yard by frequent use. Realised that there could be someone in the buildings and been more cautious. Blowing the padlock off the gas station door had in hindsight been a rather reckless thing to do.
They drove off, the fuel gauge pointing comfortably to three quarters full and made their way slowly out past the mine. They turned onto the small dust track that wound its way up and around the peak before crossing down to join a single track road across thirty empty miles of desert. Just as they passed the last mine building Michael had asked Sara to stop as he copied down the telephone number on one of the Securion notices hanging on the wall. Once they had reached LA he would call them, from an untraceable call box of course, and let them know one of their guards needed some assistance…..
They stopped four hours later for food at a small service station on the Pomona Freeway just west of Sunnyslope. It was reassuringly busy and free of cops and Sara had returned to the car with plenty of supplies. They chose a quiet corner of the large car park and sat next to each other at one of the metal picnic tables placed around the perimeter of the paved forecourt. After they’d eaten Michael took Sara’s arm in his hand, and as the light started to fade and blur the colours of the evening he added the last few days journey to her cast in a series of detailed lines.
“This road trip will end in LA.” he murmured and Sara who had been watching a small bird build up its courage to hop closer to the picnic table and the payload of crumbs beneath it turned with a start, immediately misunderstanding his words.
“Why?”
He lifted her arm gently,
“Because I’ve run out of cast…”
“Oh” and she smiled, “It needs to come off soon anyway,” and reaching for his hand she clasped it, her fingers curling around his in an attempt to both offer and receive reassurance.
Michael seemed to relax a little, and suddenly it seemed easy to talk again. The whole experience at Eagle Mountain had disturbed him…from the theft of the gas to taking the guard prisoner had once again reminded him that a fugitive’s options rarely allowed him the luxury of staying on the right side of the law. His innate morality was fighting and apparently losing a battle against the mantra of self indulgent justification
Sara as always seemed to understand without the need of his words what he was thinking.
“We didn’t have much choice back there Michael, you know that right?”
He said nothing but after a few seconds nodded slowly.
“The guy will be fine, and when we reach LA we can make the call, they’ll find him before nightfall.” She added.
“I know.” his voice dropping to the low whisper he used so often when emotion overtook him
“I just wish…”
“Hey… remember once you told me it wouldn’t always be like this…”and her hand started to stroke his arm softly,
His lips curled up into a warm smile
“Turning my own charm back on me huh Tancredi…that’s clever…”
“Of course.” She replied and leaned her body into his; she sighed as he swept one arm around her shoulders and pulled her closer.
“And I have to say you play the hussy disturbingly well….but why was I Brad?”
Sara smiled
“First name I could think of honey…” her voice once more taking on the seductive edge she’d used so effectively earlier in the day….
He chuckled and pulled her even closer. She turned her arm a little as her eyes followed the latest lines he’d drawn. The towns were all there, Phoenix and the school, Ehrenburg, the roadblock marked by just a small x, Blythe and the airport, Desert Center then Eagle Mountain.
“The flowers are pretty.” she murmured, her finger running over the small bloom he’d added next to Blythe.
His eyes for a moment seemed to flicker with something, a nervous blink, before he took her hand and kissed the fingertips.
“Yeah they are....aren’t they? Let's get started again, we have another sixty miles to go and I want to see the Pacific before today ends…
tbc
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