Colony 4: River 5, by DarkBeta

(River, Morning of the Second Day)

Breakfast was pie (apple, peach and rhubarb), cake (chocolate and carrot), and reheated fish. Not, fortunately, in that sequence. The picnic supplies were almost gone. Waverly’s son-in-law was an enthusiastic angler, but he would find supplying meals for thirty-one difficult. The Americans would complain. Loudly.

Napoleon might not, nor the other agents, but the prospect was disheartening. Illya didn’t want to see children hungry. Again.

“Mr. Kuryakin, a word?”

“Yes, sir.”

“The continuing lapse of communication implies that UNCLE is unable, for whatever reason, to locate us. In order to contact them, we’ll need to reach safer surroundings on our own.”

If his suspicions were correct – and a night’s sleep hadn’t dissipated them – UNCLE lay at an unreachable distance. Illya thought about trying to explain this to the man who, more than anone else, created the organization. He couldn’t find the words.

“Yes, sir.”

He’d speak to Napoleon. His partner might disbelieve him, of course. If he could be convinced though, he’d know how to convince the others.

“Our previous transportation is now unsuitable, and we can’t expect the children to go cross country.” Waverly gestured at the four vehicles, each hemmed in by brush and full grown trees. “Please use your naval expertise to check out the waterway as an alternative.”

“Excuse me, sir. You want me to build boats?”

It was impossible. Ridiculous. At the same time, he found himself evaluating tools and materials. Certainly there was wood enough. Green wood, unless they collected deadfalls or driftwood. Mrs. Waverly had brought marshmallows, biscuits and chocolate bars to conclude the feast with something called ‘summer’ cooked over a bonfire, so the party had hatchets at least.

“To design transport for just under twenty passengers, yes. I doubt that’s beyond your engineering talents.”

The night had been cold. The vegetation here was spring-like, perhaps even early spring. The water level was still high, even if the floods of thaw were done. Were they done?

“No, sir. I’ll do what I can.”

Rafts would be easy to build, but unmaneuverable. He expected wild currents downstream. Napoleon spent enough of his leave racketing about with boats. Perhaps he had some idea of the construction of a keel. Illya’s eye rested on the cars, where Waverly’s daughter and her two children played on the ground. The engines were useless in their present state, but nonetheless a source of power.

Absently he noted that Waverly planned to leave behind a third of the castaways.

ooooooo

“Get out. Get away. You have to leave me behind,” Donato said.

The rookie said the same thing every time he woke up. He wasn’t awake very often. Otto, one of the remaining operatives from the overland attack, took up another complaint.

“We still don’t know what they hit us with. Some kind of sleep gas, like the darts? ID never said they’d have anything like that!”

He glared at the four girls from Intelligence and Diversion again. For a while yesterday Minette and Clara had tried to defend their department. Miss Devane didn’t bother justifying the debacle, Ran didn’t talk much anyhow, and after a while the other two gave up.

“It took the nephews by surprise too. I don’t think it’s anything they cooked up.”

Otto’s squadmate Harm seemed like someone who’d argue up was down just for the fun of it. Caisse didn’t feel any happier, to share an opinion with him. Csaba should have reined them in hours ago, but he was silent. He’d lost half his squad in yesterday’s attack. At least Caisse’s team was still alive, even if prisoners.

They had been given some pretense at shelter, plenty of water and a little weak coffee, cold fried fish, and – grudgingly – small sandwiches slapped together from picnic leftovers. Caisse had waited for a second attack. Surely a reserve force had been assigned to so important a target!

He hadn’t been told that, of course. What use was a reserve that could be anticipated? Nighttime, he’d thought. After dark the third group would move in, and take down UNCLE, and rescue them.

Dawn ruined his hopes. They were on their own. They had to escape UNCLE’s inquisition and brainwashing themselves. (No one came back from UNCLE, not the same. Their deepest beliefs would be combed into bland conformity.)

The tall agent in a funny hat was on guard again. He was far enough away to take down two or three men if they rushed him, but that meant he was too far off to hear much if they kept their voices low.

“I’m top-ranked here, right? I’ll take command.”

Rod and Maclan nodded, of course, and even Donato managed a weak, “Yes, sir.”

Caisse had his eye on Csaba, the only operative likely to challenge him. The survivors of the overland squad looked to him for instruction. Csaba shook his head, a brief, small gesture.

“Yes, sir,” Otto and Harm agreed.

Miss Devane shrugged. Agents of Intelligence and Diversion ranked higher than Assault and Coercion, but senior operatives didn’t risk themselves in a firefight. Her girls relaxed as they saw her defer challenge. And Clara, his Clara, looked at him trustfully.

“We need to escape and regroup before we try for Waverly again. I’m aborting the mission.”

“You can’t! If we try to go back without him . . . !”

Like Caisse, Rod had worked for THRUSH long enough to see the consequences of failure. Maclan leaned forward next to him.

“We still outnumber them.”

“What? There’s dozens of them,” Otto hissed.

“Only five agents. The rest are paper pushers, or civilians. Useless.”

Cynthia Devane gave Maclan a level look.

“Three of them have sidearms. Maybe more.”

“What if Waverly wants us to try for them?” Minette asked. “He’ll have an excuse to shoot us down!”

Harm folded his arms.

“They won’t shoot if we’ve got a hostage.”

“How about we grab that little blond? Solo won’t let us hurt his boyfriend, right?”

The only one who didn’t stare at Otto was Donato, who wasn’t tracking too well anyhow.

“Did I hear you right? You want to grab Kuryakin?” Miss Devane asked. “Idiot!”

“Boyfriend?” Ran asked, in honest confusion, but Miette and Clara were giggling too hard to explain.

“Maclan has a point,” Caisse said. “UNCLE doesn’t have men enough to keep an effective guard on us for long. They’ll make mistakes. Keep your eyes open, but don’t act yet. We’ll have a better chance later.”

Csaba’s group grumbled, but Clara smiled at him. Caisse lay back, making himself as comfortable as he could on the rocky beach. UNCLE had to be as aware of the problem as THRUSH was. The solution was straightforward and logical.

If he’d been in Waverly’s place, the prisoners would already be dead.

ooooooo

Jane kept Robin and Ginny next to her, up where the cars were stranded by the brushy edge of the forest. It was as far as she could get from the cluster of THRUSH prisoners.

They’d been given food. Last night Tommy and some of the agents had actually put a roof over their heads. They should have been tied to rocks and dropped in the river!

Horsetail ferns poked between the stones at her feet. They could be such a nuisance. Every spring they punched their way through paths or even macadam roads. She felt like that fern; as if she’d strained all her life against a concrete sky and then suddenly, inexplicably, it cracked and let her through.

Counting in years, it hadn’t been her whole life. Not even a quarter of it. Less than five years. For the first year of her marriage Rudi still pretended to love her. He only slipped after Robin was born. He had a hostage then. She was encourage to visit her family as often as she liked . . . but he kept the baby at home. He knew she wouldn’t tell anyone.

Maybe it was her whole life. Little Jane, who thought her husband loved her, who believed she was lucky and happy, who trusted her family and friends and believed their lies; that stupid girl was dead. Jane was someone else now.

Of course Daddy never noticed that anything was wrong. He was never around when they were growing up. Why should he be any use later on?

Mummy should have known. Even if Jane always had an excuse. Even if she prayed no-one would ask awkward questions.

“Robin’s on the bottle now, so Rudi said I needed a vacation from being woken up.”

“Doesn’t my eye look horrid? Robin kicked me while I was changing his diaper, the little bruiser!”

“His colic is so bad, we don’t think he should travel.”

“Rudi’s taking care of Robin so you and I can spend time with your new granddaughter.”

“Don’t make a fuss! I tripped over a jack-in-the-box and fell against the door. That’s all.”

She prayed even harder after Ginny was born. The thing about two hostages? One of them was expendable.

Now she knew why Rudi had been so distracted, why she finally got a chance to take both children when she ran. This must have been the project he was working on. Could he have planned even her escape, as a distraction for UNCLE’s U.S. director as the THRUSH plot got started?

She heard the secretaries talking. Eight people died. Maybe more by now, since Daddy hadn’t been able to check in with his office. She should be sorry. She’d grieve for them . . . later.

The shotgun was under a rug in the boot of the Rolls, where Emma put it. A box of cartridges was wedged under the wheel cover. They’d visited Mummy’s people for shooting in the Highlands, so Jane knew what to do.

Emma shook her head when she saw Jane holding the gun, but didn’t confront her. Jane didn’t care. She watched Robin and Ginny, and she watched THRUSH. She’d kept her children safe so far. If she had to she’d shoot the enemy herself.

(With two weeks instead of one to work on this, you'd think i'd come up with something better! oh, well. let the melodrama roll!)