Redemption

James made it to the final location and stood on the opposite side of the street, more determined than ever. It didn’t matter that this person had dirt on Iron Vale. This was about him securing his freedom. He stood opposite the nice two-story home with a big porch and from what he could see inside, a spacious living room. In the corner sat a stand-up piano. His finger tapped delicately against his quad. There were several lights on inside but no movement. James would catch her before she entered the house and would be on his way.

James heard her footsteps before he saw her. The target was on the opposite side of the street, he needed to move quickly. He emerged from behind the tree and started around the nearest parked car when a truck came speeding down the road, music blaring. James crouched behind the parked car, cursing. The truck whizzed by, and James looked up just in time to catch the target open the front door to her home. He missed his chance.

He would need to take his shot inside the house. He noticed a man coming into view of the front window, greeting the woman. James snuck around back, in through the unlocked back door, and found himself in the kitchen. He would need to be careful if he didn’t want any extra casualties.

The man and woman were still talking in the living room as James slowly stood up. He pulled a knife from the block to his left and took a step. As soon as his weight shifted, the floor let out a long squeak. The talking in the other room immediately stopped.

With the element of surprise gone, James took the knife and walked into the other room, they obviously didn’t have anything to protect themselves. The fingers on his left hand took over tapping his leg as he walked through the doorway with the knife in his right. He immediately stopped upon seeing the couple, the knife landing on the floor with a small clang. Before James stood the man that had witnessed his arrest, the man that had tried to stand up to the cops at his trial. The only one who even attempted to prove he was wrongfully convicted. He stood in front of the woman, his wife, the target, and after a few seconds his expression changed to one of disbelief and confusion as well as he recognized James.

After a long pause, James blurted “What did she do?”

“What do you mean what did she do, she hasn’t done anything. Why are you here, aren’t you supposed to be in prison?” the man, Sam, said.

James picked up the knife as he remembered his task, he couldn’t stay locked up.

“James, right?” Sam said. “No need for violence. Are you at Iron Vale?” Then to Heather, “I think it’s happening again.”

“What are you talking about, ‘again’? And why did you have emails and memos from Iron Vale?” James said.

“How did you see those? Were you following me?” Heather said.

Sam cut in, “look, we can explain this all if you just put the knife down, but we promise you don’t want to do this.”

James continued to interrogate them before they finally explained the case Heather had been working on. She had started compiling a case against Iron Vale several years ago. She had made some progress but was missing large pieces that were fundamental to the case. She knew that some inmates were released while others weren’t with almost no explanation. She knew that the few others who had looked into Iron Vale had gone missing, but the cases could never be tied back to them and there was no consistency to the murders. She also found that they had diverted massive amounts of energy to the prison, much more than the building theoretically needed, which made her wonder if they were electrocuting inmates. Though the biggest issue she found was that there really weren’t that many people that were questioning their practices. That’s where James’s stealth trial information was able to fill in the gaps. James’s grip on the knife had slowly been loosening as the pieces started coming together. The stealth trials were a ruse, just meant to take out anyone who stopped the prison from profiting. Finally, he caved completely. The three of them sat through the night creating a plan to get James out of prison while keeping Heather alive to continue the case.

James left Heather and Sam alone to say their goodbyes, and just before sunrise Heather and James left. It would take some more time for the plan to be complete, but Heather needed to disappear for it to have any chance of success. Turns out James wasn’t the first one to come after them. Sam and James helped to extract some of Heather’s blood in order to spread it through the house. They also put some on the upholstery of the car before James and Heather drove away. After leaving the city and driving some distance, they abandoned the car, said goodbye, and Heather continued on foot. Before faking her death, James had helped find an abandoned location where no one would find her, not even Sam. Heather would remain there until the plan was carried out, however long that took.

James found himself alone once more. He tapped his leg with his right hand as he reached behind his back with the other and pressed a button on his leash. Immediately he found himself back in the portal. He took a moment to himself before all of this became real. He would be a different person after walking through, but in this wall of plasma, he didn’t exist in the current world and nothing could happen to him, good or bad. He took a breath and a step, fingertips lightly tapping his thigh. The guards started approaching as he took in the dark cellar around him once again. To his left, the white lights began illuminating, ticking off percentages of the data accumulated that the judges needed to confirm or deny that he was a free man. All it took was a single piece of evidence to suggest Heather was still alive and the judges would keep him locked up. The guards lifted his shirt over his head and removed the leash. Through his white shirt he could see the last light illuminate green. He breathed out for the first time since stepping through the portal.

James was escorted into an elevator, given his personal belongings from a decade before, and strode out of the prison a free man. He saw Sam and Heather as they pulled up in a car having just become reacquainted just that morning, followed shortly by a dozen police cars.

“Isn’t this a welcome sight” James said smiling as the cops filed past him and into the building.

“One more surprise for you.” Sam said. “We had to make sure they wouldn’t travel back again, so I may have learned how to divert extra power to overload the machine, allegedly” Sam said holding a finger up in the air signaling James to wait. The ground started to lightly rumble and shake, followed by several muffled explosions coming from deep below their feet as they turned and walked back towards the car.