Trail of Silver Skulls Ch. 15

In the pre-dawn darkness before the morning light, Anna lay awake in her cell. The warehouse was quiet around her, empty and devoid of sound. She could hear her heart beating quietly in her chest as she listened for the signs of approaching footsteps. In only a few more hours she would be well on her way towards the border to be sold along with Rachael as a slave. The moment they crossed the international line, there would be no turning back. This would be the last chance she would get.

Moving slowly, Anna reached under the thin cot she was laying upon and retrieved the key she had stolen the day before. After an entire month of suffering, this was the moment she had been waiting for. Her fingers moved down to the chastity belt around her waist fumbling in the dark as she searched for the latch holding it shut. Finding a small hole in the metal, she slid the key inside and turned it until she heard a click. The latch popped open, and for the first time in over a month, she was free.

Anna paused, all five of her senses pushed to the absolute maximum while she held her breath in the darkness. If they caught her trying to escape again, there was no telling what the cartels would do to her later. Even if she had already experienced everything Eric could do to her and more, her new master might not be as merciful. Despite her fears however, the warehouse remained silent and empty. Anna let out the breath she had been holding and continued.

Despite how heavy the chastity belt always felt around her waist, the metal itself was surprisingly light and it lifted away with little difficulty. Anna shivered as she felt fresh air blowing over the almost permanent wetness that was now almost always present between her legs. Her clit throbbed in the confines of its hood but she ignored it and moved her hands down towards the opening of her pussy instead. A single touch was all she needed but there just wasn't enough time. As she slid a single finger inside, her walls clenched down tight against the first bit of proper stimulation they had received in a while. Her pussy wanted nothing more than to be filled right now and it made its desires known by clenching down as she tried to push her finger further inside. Even with just a single finger, Anna could feel herself climbing closer towards the orgasm she had been denied for so long.

Not yet, a voice said inside her head, not just yet. She had to focus on the device inside her right now. Even after all the training Eric had put her through, there was no way she could withstand a full on orgasm without making any sound and Anna forced the temptation of relief away from herself. If they found her like this right now, everything would all be for nothing.

With agonizing slowness, Anna moved her finger about until she found what she was looking for. Grabbing the string hanging down inside her, she pulled and felt a sharp pinch inside her. A moment later, she was left holding the device that had controlled her for so long in her hands. Shaped like a small plastic pill, the tiny thing was no bigger than her thumbnail. Still, Anna placed it down against the hard concrete floor and stepped down on it just to be sure. She heard a crack, and then with her hands still shaking, she slid the chastity belt back around her waist and locked it with the key.

"Anna?"

Anna's head jerked around so fast the world spun before her eyes. Half a dozen feet away in an identical cell, Rachael rubbed her eyes as she sat up in on her cot. Anna froze in place as the other girl stared at her through the darkness of the warehouse. For a terrible second, she wondered if she had been caught. Even if Rachael had known that she intended to escape, she hadn't yet told the other girl about the key.

"Did you hear that?" said Rachael, "I thought I saw something moving in the dark."

"Must have been the wind," said Anna, "Or maybe there was a bird knocking at the window."

Rachael looked at her through the bars separating them and Anna swallowed on a dry throat. Outside, there was not a single wisp of wind anywhere to be heard and the birds wouldn't be awake until another hour or so.

"Or maybe the driver got here early," said Anna.

"Oh," said Rachael.

At that, Rachael looked away and Anna almost let out a sigh of relief. It seemed that was all Rachael could say though and Rachael lowered her head as she sat up and pulled her knees against her chest. Immediately, Anna felt a sense of guilt in her mind. Even through the early morning darkness, Rachael seemed like she was doing her best not to cry. Moving closer to the bars, Anna put her arm out through them as she reached out towards the other girl.

"Hey, don't think too much about it," said Anna, "Besides, it might not even be that bad."

"What's so good about being a slave?" asked Rachael.

"Even being a slave might have its benefits you know," said Anna, "Our next Master might even be better than Eric. He'll probably be rich you know. He has to be, paying that much money for someone like us. We'll probably just get to sit around and do nothing as the mistress of some millionaire."

"I don't know...," said Rachael.

Despite her words though, her face seemed to grow a little less heavy and crawling towards the side of her cell, she stuck her hand out as well. As Rachael reached out through the empty space in between, Anna caught hold of her hand and held it tight.

"Whatever happens, I'll do my best to protect you. You'll be safe," said Anna.

"Promise you won't leave me," said Rachael and Anna smiled back at her.

"I promise," said Anna.

As the first rays of the pre-dawn light broke over the horizon a little later, it slipped through the window of the warehouse and reflected off the broken glass at the top to shine down on the two girls laying in their cells. Their arms were still linked, stretched out through the space in between. Only one of them was still awake however, the other having fallen back asleep.

Looking up, Anna brought her hands over her eyes to block out the morning light of the sun. Turning over a small key in her fingers, she held it up against the light. With the device now out of her, the purpose of the key was now fulfilled and holding on to it was a liability. She turned her head to look at Rachael sleeping besides her.

"No matter what happens, I won't stop until both of us are free," said Anna.

Reaching back her arm, she threw the key into a nearby bin. There was a soft clink of metal upon steel as it fell and then the key vanished beneath the pile of junk laying within. Despite having just lost the only way to remove the chastity belt around her waist however, Anna could only think about the freedom waiting for her ahead.

-----

"Up you go," said Eric.

With her hands cuffed behind her back, Anna lifted her foot up to step up into the back of the battered old van. The paint on the outside had long been worn away, patches of rust peeking through what once used to be a white coating outside. Stepping inside, she sat down on one of the seats. Besides her, Rachael shifted a little to the side to give her more room. With so little space available, it was a tight fit and Anna felt herself being pressed up against the edge of her seat as Mark stepped up behind her followed shortly by Carlos and then Tom. All three of the men carried rifles, the sleek black barrels gleaming under the early rays of the morning sun. Looking down at them, Anna felt a sense of unease though for the most part, Mark and Carlos seemed unsure how to even hold theirs properly.

Tom however drew the charging handle of his gun back half an inch to check the chamber and Anna saw the yellow gleam of a brass cartridge as the extractor drew it out. Releasing the bolt again, he looked up at her and smiled as the recoil spring pushed the round back inside with a snap.

"Want to try holding it?" he said.

Anna tried to shake her head but found that she couldn't. She had almost forgotten about the guns and their very presence reminded her of all the uncertainty and unknowns in her plan. Thankfully, before she could think too much about it, Eric cut Tom off as he called out from the front of the van.

"Shut it, Tom" said Eric, "You can tease her all you want when we're fifty miles over the border and you've bought her as your slave. Until then, I want you keeping an eye out for your cop friends."

"Touchy," said Tom, "You cartel lot are no fun, like a bunch of virgins on their first op."

Eric took the front seat next to Juan who shifted nervously in the driver's seat. A middle-aged and slightly balding man, he looked like a piece of gum that had been left out for too long in the sun. Peering out from underneath his shallow brimmed straw hat, he glanced back and forth between the slaves sitting in the back and the road stretching out in front of him. His fingers tapped a broken rhythm on the steering wheel of the car.

"We leave?" asked Juan in heavily stilted English.

"As soon as we're all loaded up" said Eric, "Passports, immigration documents, fake IDs, unless you want to spend the rest of your life in prison, you better hope the guys we hired did their job well."

"What about the evidence we're leaving behind?" said Tom.

"There's a couple drums of gas rigged up to a timer in the main hall. Then moment we cross the border, this place is gone," said Eric.

Eric shuffled through a stack of documents, looking through each of them as he lay them out on the dashboard. Satisfied they were all accounted for, he packed them away into a large bag before reaching over and giving Juan the signal to start.

"Good, we go," said Juan, "We go now."

He turned the key in the ignition and the engine choked as it tried to come alive. For a moment, it seemed like it had died but then it burst into life with a sickening cough and the heavy hum of its pistons filled the air. Slowly, he pulled out of the compound and down a side road before making it onto the main highway that lead south. Anna looked out the window as the warehouse grew smaller behind them before it finally disappeared all together. For an entire month, she had lived there as a slave. Now, she was on her way to a place that was much, much worse.

The seat started to vibrate underneath her as Juan pulled into the left most lane, pressing down on the accelerator until they were well past the speed limit and then a little more. An unfortunate car tried to merge in front of them only to swerve away at the last moment as Juan sped past it in a blur. In the back of the van, Carlos and Mark grabbed for their seatbelts as they were thrown about. Only Tom managed to keep his balance as he braced himself against the doors, still holding his rifle in one hand.

"Slow down," he called out over the noise of the engine, "You'll have every patrol car in the county on us in record time."

"No, we go fast," said Juan, "I know road"

Another car swerved dangerously close out of the way and Eric leaned over to shout in Juan's ear.

"Slow down," he yelled, "The only reason why we called you so early is because we got made. If we get caught now, it'll be over for all of us. I'm not going to prison because you can't drive."

It was hard to tell if Juan understood but he nodded once and the van slowed down though only barely as he eased up on the gas. Even as the surrounding landscape became visible again however, the needle still remained above eighty on the dashboard. Tom looked nervously around as he tried to spot the betraying red and blue lights of a patrol car.

"Still too fast," said Tom.

"No, too slow," said Juan.

He glanced out the window up at the sky and then back down at the road again. Eric frowned at the behavior.

"What you mean?" said Eric.

"Drone, look up," said Juan, "I do this many times, always drone."

Anna glanced out the window and stared up into the deepening blue of the sky. Even without a single cloud above them however, she couldn't see anything flying up there at all. She looked again, her eyes scanning over the endless sea of light blue without any result. She looked back at Juan who seemed almost desperate even as they dodged past another car that was in the way.

"Too high, can't see," said Juan, "But drone see us, we go fast."

As the car sped down the highway, Anna leaned back in her seat and took in a deep breath. She could feel herself bouncing up and down on the worn out suspension as they passed over even the smallest bumps in the road. Despite the calmness around her though, adrenaline rushed through her veins and she tried to calm the shaking in her hands. With every mile they got closer to the border, time was running out. For now, she had gotten the device out of her and was free from the control of the remote. The only thing left for her to do now was to figure out what to do next.

-----

"Papers please," said the guard.

"Lovely day today, isn't it?" said Eric.

With not even a single cloud in the sky, the hundred degree heat bore down upon the small border outpost with the full force of the sun. Even in the distance in between the outpost and the van, the very air seemed to shimmer as if it had spilled out the mouth of a furnace. The guard looked up with a scowl on his face. Only the cactus and those who drew the short straw would be out here on such a lovely day.

"What did you say?" said the guard.

"Sorry, it was just a joke," said Eric, "I didn't mean it that way."

The guard however didn't seem to find it funny at all. Marching up to the car, he stared through the open window and for the first time since Anna saw him, Eric seemed to lose some of his usual confidence. It was hard to see much else though as she lay on the floor with a false cover thrown over her body. Her lungs struggled to draw in the hot and sticky air as she desperately tried to keep her breathing even. Under any other circumstances, she would have already screamed for help a long time ago were it not for the end of the rifle pressed against the back of her head. The muzzle brake shifted a little as Tom shifted in fake sleep, a blanket thrown over his body and the gun he held. Outside, the conversation continued as Eric talked with the guard.

"For a comedian, you seem to be a little lost this close to the border. Are you a citizen?" said the guard,

He had a nametag on over his chest rig with a smiley face drawn on the top right corner. The phrase 'Hello My Name Is' was printed across it with 'Richard' scrawled in angry letters below. Not a single bit of the smiley face carried over to the guard's real one. The sunglasses he was wearing didn't help much either as the mirror lenses hid his expression from view. Eric quickly took on a serious expression on his face.

"Yes sir," said Eric.

"And your friends?", said the guard.

"All accounted for, sir," said Eric.

Eric passed over a stack of passports to the guard who flipped through them as he held them up. They were fake of course, but outside a laboratory it was impossible to tell. Still, the guard carefully read over each page as he ran a scanner over the information printed there.

"Looks like it checks out, Richard", a second guard called over from the booth to the side.

"I dunno, it says they were issued over five years ago" said Richard, "They look a bit too new to be that old"

"The names comes up green," said the other guard, "Maybe they lost then and had them replaced."

"All of them?" said Richard, "Sounds a bit too convenient to me."

He peered back into the car with a frown.

"Who did you say you were again?" he said.

"Thomas Hoffman," said Eric, "Just going on a little tour down south. Tourist stuff, you know."

"That's an interesting group of friends for someone to be crossing the border with. You lot don't look too much like tourists to me," said Richard.

He glanced pointedly at Juan who tightened his grip even more on the steering wheel. Off in the distance, the sun reflected brightly off the river that marked out the border and Juan stared dead ahead at the road that lead up to it. A bridge lay at the end, an old construction of steel and wood that looked like it had been built more than a hundred years ago. Once they were over that bridge, they would be out of the jurisdiction of the country. The guard thumbed through the information on the passports one more time comparing them against each other as he looked through again. He looked over to the south to where the bridge lay just ten miles away. Anna could almost see the wheels turning inside his head.

"Why don't you step out of the car so we can ask some questions," said Richard.

There was a split second pause as Anna felt her heart skip a beat. Then, Eric broke out into a smile. He looked up at the guard standing right before the rolled down window of the van.

"Sure, no problem," said Eric.

Before the guard could respond, Eric shifted in his seat and reached down to undo his seatbelt. His right hand dropped down and out of sight as he turned his body away and the guard stepped forward with a frown. His words seemed to come out in slow motion as he started to register what Eric was doing.

"Hey, keep your hands where I can see..." he began to say, but by then it was too late.

The rest of the words cut out as the guard stared up at the barrel of the gun thrust into his face. Eric pulled the trigger and the guard reeled back in shock, falling over backwards the ground.

"Juan!" said Eric.

Juan didn't need to be told twice and the van lurched forward breaking through the barrier blocking their way as he slammed the accelerator all the way down to the floor. The smell of burning rubber reached inside as the wheels screeched against the road. Still laying on the floor, Anna felt herself being thrown backwards from the sudden acceleration and besides her, Rachael screamed as they were crushed against the rear doors of the van. The false floor above them shifted as Tom jumped to his feet to lay down a stream of automatic fire at any pursuers. A torrent of brass casings rained down and a moment later Tom cursed as the magazine ran dry.

"Get down," he shouted and Anna heard the returning crackle of gunfire as incoming rounds embedded themselves into the frame of the van.

Reaching over, Tom picked up a fresh magazine to replace the empty one in his rifle. He slammed the bolt home to chamber a new round and jumped up to return fire again.

"How long, Eric?" he yelled.

"It's seven minutes from here to the bridge," Eric yelled back from the front.

"No, five! We do five!" said Juan.

Juan stepped down harder on the gas as he coaxed another inch of speed out of the van. The engine whined in protest as it spun up to its maximum operating speed and the needle on the dashboard spun as it shot deep into the red. The bridge was just ahead of them now, closer than ever as they approached the final stretch of road that lead up to it. As the van flew over a bump in the road, Anna felt herself growing weightless as she was thrown up into the air. The false floor above her lifted away and for just a moment, she saw the an endless line of patrol cars chasing behind them. Then, she came back down again, her momentum carrying forward halfway down the length of the van and into something soft.

Anna looked up to find Carlos curled up next to her, both his hands wrapped around the bottom of the closest seat. Incoherent prayers spewed forth from his mouth like a broken record. A trail of sparks flew over their heads as a stray round glanced off the side and he curled together even tighter around himself. A second round hit, and the van started to drift to the side as black smoke spewed out from underneath the hood.

"Keys!" said Anna.

"I don't want die, please god, I don't want to die," he babbled.

Anna lunged forward and headbutted him in the face. It hurt, but it was enough to make Carlos let go for a moment