Vent

chapter 10

The tunnels were pitch black, the only way to navigate it was either wear a night vision goggle or the little neon sticks we often use on concerts. We opted to save the neon sticks when the kids are already with us. They'll be the ones to enjoy them most. We moved with urgency and finesse as we navigated the tunnels towards the orphanage's kitchen.

Though to get to the kitchen, we needed to cross to the sewage and open the manhole under the kitchen's freezer room. It was the safest route we could possibly use. Hopefully they wouldn't detect us. We had to jump over a seemingly endless hole to cross to the sewage line. It was parallel to the tunnel only a foot lower and it had water trickling endlessly in it. Damp and the smell of mold suddenly hit my nostrils, it's not sickening but one can feel the suffocating humidity of the sewage.

I heard Noelle gagging. She had not been used to the smell of the sewage. It made me realize that we may be trained to endure, but the lifestyle that we had after our training had changed us in many ways we could never have imagined. Noelle had been pampered as an actress. It had been her life for more than half a decade. I doubt she would have returned to our country if the pandemic and the war hadn't happened. She was in France when the war broke, I wonder how she got out of there.

France was one of the first to embrace those beings. Accepting their defeat against them like being a vampire is the new trend. If only they knew the fate of their citizens, some were branded as livestock, some sold off as slaves, while others who rebelled were killed and fed to the chimeras, execution style. It was one of the saddest news I've ever heard.

A few more minutes, Queencie held her hand up for us to stop. We held our ground but leaned on the moist and mostly moldy walls, as if anyone or anything would emerge ahead and see us. We were moving by instinct, looking back and forth for anything that would be a danger to us. We had to be very careful or lose our chance on saving those kids. Queencie started feeling the wall left of her, then she started climbing up a metal ladder upward. We are under the orphanage's kitchen, finally. She poked a straw-like device on one of the cover's holes. She then looked down on us and pressed her communicator's mic ever so softly and uttered, "Coast is clear." She then climbed down, not strong enough to push the metal cover to the side for us to pass through.

I was the one to push the metal cover off the man-hole. A blast of cold air immediately hit my face. I removed my night vision goggles, resting it on my forehead. The wall of the kitchen's freezer has it's built-in dim lights, giving me enough illumination not to stumble on anything placed in front of the man whole. I looked around as I started climbing in, food stocks were organized on the shelves, while boxes of frozen meat were arranged on the floor. I had to push some of it out of my way. I motioned for them with my hand to follow in. Queencie was the first one to emerge. She moved in a cat-like manner towards the door and started working on the Freezer's lock. It was, after all, locked from the outside. Then I proceeded to help Chealsea and Noelle up the freezer room.

"This is a piece of cake." She murmured softly as the door made a clicking sound then gapped for us to see the empty kitchen outside. We need no words to communicate between ourselves. My team has developed unique hand gestures and eye contacts that enable us to be efficient in carrying out our plans without a hitch.

Chealsea had positioned herself in a corner wherein she had a view of the whole kitchen. She is in charge of guarding our escape route. She would shoot any hostile that would cross the threshold of her area. She signaled us that the coast is clear and we can move.

I peeked outside the kitchen door to make sure that we were safe. I then let Queencie walk ahead of me. We needed to get into the ventilation in order to quietly pass through two walls that are blocking a straight path towards our exit. We maneuvered quietly as Queencie navigated the area using the blueprint. I may be in and out of this orphanage but I never really noticed its ventilation system. How would I even notice anything when I am grieving a loss and nursing a broken heart?

Queencie stopped walking and pointed up the adjacent wall, I knew what to do. I had to help her get high enough to remove the screws. She stepped on my hands and I lifted her up. It was a good thing that she weighed next to nothing. She slowly unscrewed the cover and passed it to Noelle who ever so slowly placed it on the side of the wall. Queencie then proceeded to crawl inside the vent. I helped Noelle up as well. Noelle was the one to help me by giving me her hand as I use my legs as leverage to push myself up.

The ventilation was high enough for an adult to crawl on all fours, and wide enough for one person to pass at a time. We crawled in a very hushed manner not to alert any chimera. Honestly, they can detect the slightest noise or difference in smell. It made me a bit confused why they haven't noticed us yet. Are we that lucky to be still undetected? Or Are we crawling into a trap?

Noelle exited towards the first vacant storage room. She started making a clear path the kids can run through. She also placed all boxes strategically blocking the view of her makeshift path, in case someone would inspect the room.

Hopping into the next room, Queencie hurriedly barricaded the door. And worked on placing the explosives on the wall. I had to go into the next room. Mushka was already waiting near the ventilator. Queencie had sent her a message to prepare the kids. After unscrewing the covering, I quietly handed it to Mushka. I made a head count of the kids in the room and became deeply distressed.

I never expected that they had taken some of the kids already. "Where the hell is Alfonse?" questioningly I looked around the room. That guy should have been the one responsible for these kids. He was nowhere in sight. Mushka just pointed with her thumb towards the closed door. I sighed and rolled my eyes. He just had to play the hero. Musha started lifting the kids up to the vent for me to take. There were only nine kids in the room, most of them under the age of ten, the youngest is four years old. "Go to the open vent in the next room. Wait for us there, okay?" I told the first one who looked like the oldest one. "Wait for the others, please?" He nodded then crawled towards the open vent of the other room. Mushka then handed me the littlest one, a little girl. "Go to kuya." She was small enough to just duck to walk inside the vent.

After all the kids had been transferred to the other room, I joined Mushke inside the room by jumping out of the vent. I landed on my toes quietly. "Fonse was fighting those bats cause they took the nurse and the other kids. He ended up being taken with them." she started explaining in a hushed tone. It was typical for Al to play the hero but he was a wimp. "I think they're in the study room." I gave her a pistol to use. I don't want to talk, cause I was pissed off. The two of us needed to get those kids back. And I'll kick Al's ass later.