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I stood and flopped my arms at my sides, still gasping for breath. "Well, what the fuck, Drake? We’re dead? Is that it?"
"Not yet." His voice was strangely calm. "We follow the fence to the northern perimeter. There’s a two foot portion of the fence that’s not electrified."
"What does that mean?" I asked as we jogged in that direction.
"A tree fell on the fence about two weeks ago in a storm. Busted it up. We didn’t have the time to get all the supplies we needed, so we sent our assistants out to do a quick repair. We were going to reconnect it to the electric before the next cycle."
"The next cycle? Jesus Christ. I’m still not sure why I’m not more angry at you."
Drake looked over as we ran. "Does that mean you aren’t mad at me?"
"Absolutely not. If we get out of this alive, you’ll still have some explaining to do."
After going almost a mile, Drake took my hand and led me to the side, further from the fence.
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"I don’t want to cross over too soon," he whispered. "If he thought about it, he could have headed this way and beaten us to the opening." A small hemlock tree had branches hanging low to the ground that along with some thick blackberry bramble created a natural tent or cover from prying eyes. Drake and I sat down and stared off into the forest.
After nearly ten minutes I finally leaned over and whispered. "So, what are we waiting for?"
"Through those trees there," Drake pointed, "is the broken section. We want to see if they come to look for us here. If they don’t come after a while, we know they either forgot about the section or have already come and gone."
"Are there any cameras around here? He could see where we’re hiding that way."
Drake didn’t meet my eyes, only continued staring into the branches beyond our small hovel. "None around here. All we have is one on the actual broken section itself. We’ll have to risk that, but there’s nothing for it."
"Well, while we’re waiting, tell me how this shit worked for you guys? How did it work?"
For a while I thought he wasn’t going to answer and I’d have to push, but finally, he ran his tongue along his lower lip then smiled sadly. "Like I said before. We traded off. One cycle, he would be in the house, and I’d be Sam. The next time we’d swap. I preferred being in the house, which meant a lot of the time I stayed in for multiple cycles. Was in there more often than he was. It suited him fine, especially after about a year ago. He was in the house and one of the dolls, uh, I mean residents, I guess, stabbed him in the leg. He’s got a nasty limp from nerve damage. Once that happened, he was more than happy to stay in the control room more often."
I nodded, unsure what to say next. Finally, I pointed to his leg. "How’s that doing?"
He winced and straightened his leg. "Sore, but I’ll be fine."
A few moments later my hand found his, lacing his fingers in mine. Drake looked down at our hands and a faint smile formed on his lips. "I think it’s safe. Are you ready to give this a shot?"
"Yeah," I said.
"Okay," he pointed through the trees again. "When we get through, a mile and a half beyond the fence we’ll come to a small farm house. That’s the basecamp. It’s where we would meet before each cycle. There’s a vehicle there, extra gasoline, weapons, and I have a backup cell phone as well. Once we get there, we have two options."
"And those are?"
"First, we grab what we can and run. Second, we grab what we can, come back here and blow his fucking brains out. What do you want to do?"
I looked into his eyes, and remembered Clint screaming in the dark, and Claudia’s sightless eyes staring at me. Setting my jaw, I nodded. "Let’s kill the fucker."
"Good girl," Drake said with a hungry smile.
He took my hand and stood, again favoring his injured leg. Rather than making a run for it, we crouched and crept through the forest keeping an eye and ear out for Sam and his assistant. Drake was tense and apprehensive as we approached the fence. I heard and saw no one. Rather than filling me with confidence, it worried me. The fenced off area was huge, a couple miles, so they could have been anywhere. Still, the fact that we hadn’t even heard any noise since escaping seemed a little too good to be true.
Drake tore off his sweatshirt and slung it up over the top of the fence covering the barbed wire and double checked to make sure there really was no current going through before helping me climb. The sharp steel of the fence dug into my fingers as I climbed. Unbidden, memories of Ashley writhing and burning flashed through my mind. I pushed the thoughts away, and moved as fast as I could.
When my feet finally hit the dirt on the other side, an almost overwhelming sense of freedom flooded me. I looked at Drake through the wire of the fence and grinned like an idiot as he began his own ascent. It took him longer with his injured leg, but a minute later he stood with me, free.
There was still a time crunch. God only knew what Sam would do if and when he found out we’d made it beyond the fence. We jogged at a steady pace, heading in the direction Drake led me. The bleeding in his leg had slowed which I thought was a good sign.
Twenty minutes later, the forest finally thinned out to reveal an overgrown lawn and a small white farmhouse sitting at the end of a long gravel driveway. The opposite side of the property had a dirt path leading into the woods, heading back in the direction of the house.
