Yes, this is the Benson mansion. A new mansion, one she's never been in. With a maternal instinct, Nilda sensed that the child was there. Of course, here: where else to keep a kidnapped child, if not in a safe and secure shelter?
The building, dimly lit and therefore barely visible between the trees, loomed like an impregnable bulk. It still needed to be reached: the territory of the mansion was surrounded by a four-meter lattice fence. The bars of the lattice ended in points painted white. Nilda wasn't sure the points weren't sharp, she had to assume otherwise.
Turning up the collar of her cloak so that the cameras would not recognize her, Nilda walked along the fence in the direction of the park. There's less chance of running into witnesses.
It was evening. There were few people who wanted to walk around the park at night. Several latecomers walked towards them, but they were random passers-by who were in a hurry to leave the deserted place. By themselves, bystanders are not dangerous. When meeting them, Nilda lowered her head, although it was impossible to identify her in the gathering darkness. In addition, she was wearing glasses that made her face unrecognizable.
Having reached the crossroads, Nilda stopped, as if in indecision, and glanced around at lightning speed. There were no people, no cars. Two lanterns lit up, snatching out two electric circles from the approaching twilight. It remained to be hoped that night surveillance cameras were not installed at the intersection. Usually they are installed in the darkest and least populated places of the fence, but not at the intersection.
“You will return my child, Benson!” Nilda told herself.
You can not engage in self-hypnosis: she is already furious.
In the blink of an eye, Nilda shrugged off her cloak, tossing it in a nearby urn. The urn contains rags of exactly the same color, so the cloak will not attract anyone's attention. If he returns this way, he will take it. Otherwise, it will not be possible to establish the location of Nilda by the found cloak. The raincoat is new, bought an hour ago in the nearest boutique.
Under the cloak was a black leotard made of a special reflective fabric. The likelihood that you will be noticed on security cameras wearing reflective clothing is much lower. Unfortunately, it is impossible to become completely invisible to the cameras.
Nilda arched her lithe body in a tight black outfit and jumped onto the grate, grabbing it with her hands and resting her feet on the bars in soft sneakers. Intercepting her hands and feet, she instantly reached the top of the fence, it remained to overcome the points. So it is: sharpened like combat daggers! It is good that the electric current is not passed: probably due to the fact that the place is crowded. Simply embarrassed.
Grabbing onto the extensions at the ends of the lances, Nilda kicked off with her feet and performed a handstand. Then she turned her body over backwards and unhooked her arms. Hanging in the air for a few moments, her fragile figure did not fall to the ground from a height of four meters, but caught with her crossed legs on the bars. Nilda straightened up and slid down the bars, immediately dropping to the ground and listening.
Quiet. It seems they didn't notice her. Until they noticed.
Behind the fence, not far from it, the city continued to live in the evening life. But now Nilda was not interested in the city, but in the mansion of her ex-husband. While Nilda was sliding down the bars, the lights in the mansion turned on: street lamps on the paths and lamps on the porch. There were no searchlights illuminating the building from the outside: the owner did not want to attract too much attention to himself.
Nilda slid like a flexible shadow from the gate to the mansion and hid in the unlit bushes. It was necessary to take care of the sentries, which certainly were.
A man in civilian clothes came down from the porch. From his bearing, Nilda realized that he was a former military man. The military man walked along the mansion, turned to the wall and addressed someone. It was only now that Nilda noticed the sentry hiding in the shadows. After exchanging a few words with the sentry, the military man - now Nilda had no doubt that he was the head of the guard - continued to walk around the mansion and soon disappeared around the corner.
Taking advantage of his absence, Nilda pulled a stiletto out of her handbag and slithered across the grass like a snake. With bestial instinct, guessing the moments at which the attention of the sentry weakened, Nilda made a jerk, stopping when the sentry standing against the wall lazily looked around the park area around the mansion. The head of the guard was inspecting the posts on the other side of the mansion - Nilda hoped that at that moment no one was on duty behind the monitors. Of course, she could be wrong. Then you should have hoped for tights made of reflective fabric.
Twenty meters remained before the sentry, but these meters were the most dangerous. The sentry was still in the shadows. Nilda couldn't see his face and couldn't get up to see it. At the same time, she could not get around the sentry from the side, since there were other guards on the other side of the facade. There are four people in all, apparently.
There was no time left, and Nilda made up her mind. She jumped to her feet and made a swift throw forward, right on the sentry. A surprised face emerged from the shadows and an automatic barrel slowly rising upwards, but that moment was enough. Nilda threw a stiletto, and it dug into the sentry's Adam's apple.
- This is for my child! said Nilda, finally cutting the sentinel's throat.
The sentry was not guilty of kidnapping the child, but Nilda was furious.
There were two ways to get inside the mansion. First, you can cut the glass in the basement and immediately start looking. However, Nilda chose the second way: deal with the guards first. The stabbed sentry will soon be discovered, then it will become more difficult to look for a child. The rational solution is to wait until the head of security finishes his rounds and returns through the porch to the inside of the mansion. Before his return, according to Nilda's calculations, there were ten seconds left. The security room is probably at the entrance. If the guards are neutralized, there will be no one to protect the inhabitants of the mansion.
Deciding so, Nilda slid to the porch and froze on half-bent, like an animal before a jump. She didn't grab the guard's machine gun, preferring to use a silent stiletto. A year after giving birth, Nilda fully recovered and did not feel her body, obedient and impetuous. With proper skills, edged weapons are much more reliable than firearms.
As Nilda expected, the head of the guard, having circled around the building, appeared from the opposite facade. Nilda, crouched behind the porch, waited.
The head of the guard climbed the porch and pulled the heavy two-meter door towards him to enter. At that moment, a blurry shadow rushed towards him from somewhere under the porch. The shadow pricked the head of the guard on the back with something sharp. He wanted to cry out in pain, but could not: it turned out that the second hand of the shadow was squeezing his throat. A blade flashed, and the head of the guard choked on the warm salty liquid.
Nilda grabbed the corpse by the hair and dragged it inside the mansion, blocking their entrance.
So it is: the security room is to the left of the main staircase. Nilda pulled a second stiletto out of her purse and slid in the direction of the room. The guards are waiting for the commander to return - they will not immediately react to the opening of the door. Unless, of course, the camera is installed directly at the entrance, and Nilda has not already been discovered.
With stilettos in both hands, Nilda kicked open the door. Five. The three were leaning over a laptop in animated conversation. The fourth is making coffee. The fifth is behind the monitors, but he has his back turned and does not see who has entered. Each has a holster under the armpit. In the corner there is a metal cabinet - probably a weapon cabinet. But the closet is probably locked: it will take time to unlock. Two of the three who are leaning over the laptop look up, and the expression on their faces begins to slowly change...
Nilda rushed to the nearest coffee maker and slashed her face. The man screamed, clutching the wound with his hand, but Nilda no longer paid attention to him: she would finish him off later. She rushed to the two for the laptop, who were trying to draw their guns. She took out the first one almost immediately, thrusting the stiletto under the ribs. The second staggered back and hit Nilda on the arm, but not hard - the stiletto could not knock it out. Nilda made a distracting movement. The enemy reacted and got caught, getting a stiletto in the chin. The blow was struck from the bottom up, raised to the ceiling with a point, and entered the larynx. The third opponent managed to come to his senses and also draw a pistol, but Nilda knocked out the pistol with a side kick. The gun bounced off the wall. However, the enemy did not run after the pistol, as Nilda had hoped for, but from a turn planted the girl in the thigh, with his foot in an iron-shod boot. Nilda groaned and, straightening up, stabbed the scoundrel in the stomach with a stiletto. The stylet went through the muscles and stuck in the spine.
Without looking at the future, Nilda rushed to the last remaining unharmed enemy. He barely turned around in his chair and opened his mouth to - scream, apparently. With a knee, Nilda sealed his mouth, along with his cracked teeth. The enemy flew headlong into the monitors and didn't even flinch when Nilda slit his throat. Then she killed the rest, still breathing, and removed the second stiletto from the corpse's belly. She still needs a stiletto.
“The wrong one you messed with,” Nilda told the lifeless bodies. “We had to think about who to kidnap the child from.
Then Nilda turned off the monitors and alarms and looked out the front door. The front door was quiet. But the thigh, after being hit with a boot, ached. The bruise will be half the leg, probably: but that's okay, I've never been in such alterations. Now it's more important to determine where Benson is holding the baby.
Nilda, still limping, climbed the stairs to the second floor and found herself in front of a suite of hotel-type rooms. No, they are too similar - the owner probably lives further away, in more secluded and individual apartments.
Hiding the second stiletto, now unnecessary, in her purse, Nilda slid further down the corridor. And she was almost knocked down by a girl who jumped out of the room. Nilda knew from her clothes that she was a maid. A sharp movement, and the girl flew back into the room. Nilda followed her, stiletto in hand.
There was no one in the room except for the maid. The girl opened her mouth to scream, but Nilda punched her in the stomach and the girl suffocated.
- Where is the baby? Nilda asked, furious at the memory of the child.
- There, in the owner's office ... - the girl murmured, breathing like a fish thrown onto the beach by a storm.
- Where is the office?
- Further along the corridor, in the right wing.
Nilda stunned the maid with her fist, then added a few more times to be sure. There was no time to tie her up, and, left unstunned, the maid could scream, attract attention. At another time, Nilda would have shown pity, but now, when it was a question of a child, she could not risk it. They won’t marry with knocked out teeth, but otherwise, nothing, it’s okay.
So, Benson's office is in the right wing. Nilda rushed down the corridor. Branching. The right wing ... probably there. It looks like the truth: the doors are massive, made of precious wood - you can see it by color and texture.
Nilda flung open the door, ready to face an additional guard post. But there was no guard in the right wing. In the place where she expected to see the guard, there was a table with a vase. In the vase were fresh flowers - orchids. A delicate fragrance emanated from the orchids. Further on stretched a wide empty corridor, ending in an even richer door than this one, no doubt leading to the master's apartments. So the baby is there.
Nilda rushed forward to the child. At that moment, a sharp warning cry was heard:
- Stay where you are! Do not move! Otherwise you will be destroyed!
Nilda - realizing that she had been taken by surprise - froze in place. First you need to find out who is threatening her: there was no one in the corridor. Behind him there was a roar and the sound of a broken vase, someone massive was rising to his feet. So, he was hiding under the table, nowhere else.
"Turn slowly towards me!" Otherwise you will be destroyed!
Great! That was what Nilda wanted the most. Nilda slowly turned around in place and saw the combat robot-transformer PolG-12, on caterpillar tracks. Indeed, the robot was hiding under the table - probably in a folded form - and now it left from under it and straightened up, pointing both of its machine guns, large and medium caliber, at the uninvited guest.
- You don't have an ID. What is your name? What are you doing here? Answer or you will be destroyed!
Clearly, the fighting robot-transformer PolG-12 with the beginnings of artificial intelligence. Nilda hadn't come across anything like this before.
“My name is Susie Thompson,” Nilda squeaked, as confused and articulate as possible. “Some guys glued me together in a bar today and brought me here. And now I'm looking for a toilet. I really want to write.
- Where is your ID? murmured the artificial intelligence. - Answer, otherwise you will be destroyed!
- It's a pass, isn't it? Nilda asked. - The guys who brought me here issued a pass. But I forgot to put it on. She ran out to powder her nose for just a minute.
– Checking identification statement... Checking identification statement... Connection to the database is not possible.
Good thing I turned off the system, Nilda thought.
- The toilet room is on the opposite side of the corridor, the seventh door to the right. Turn around and head over there, Susie Thompson. In the restroom you can pee and powder your nose. Otherwise you will be destroyed! Your data will be verified after system restore.
The robot was still aiming both machine guns at her. It looks like the AI was rushed into it, otherwise PolG-12 would have taken notice of Nilda's black bodysuit and stiletto in her hand.
- Thanks a lot. Going.
Nilda walked towards the exit. At the moment when she caught up with the robot, she somersaulted over her head, relying on the upper part of the robot - one might say, the top of her head - and ended up at the transformer behind her back. And then she jumped on his back, thus being out of the range of machine guns.
- Fire to destroy! Fire to destroy! shouted PolG-12.
Machine guns rained lead into the corridor. The robot turned around, trying to hit Nilda, but she was behind him, moving along with the machine guns. The PolG-12 did not have a circular fire - Nilda knew about it.
Holding on to the top of the robot with one hand, Nilda tried to feel for some weak spot with her other hand, with the stiletto clamped in it. This would probably fit: a gap between armor plates, with wires protruding in the depths.
Nilda slipped the stiletto through the gap and wiggled it. As if sensing danger, the transformer changed its slope, and the stylet got stuck between the armor plates. Cursing and barely holding on to the robot, spinning in all directions and firing machine guns, Nilda pulled out a second stiletto from her purse and plunged the mechanical enemy into the joints. The robot spun like crazy. Trying to escape, he made a last and decisive attempt to put an end to the girl who was saddling him.
Having stopped senseless shooting, PolG-12 rushed forward and drove one of the tracks onto the wall. Nilda, at that moment cutting another bundle of wires, realized the danger too late. The robot rolled over onto its back and crushed the girl under its undercarriage. True, the robot itself was also finished: the backbone of the metal monster was damaged and stopped obeying commands.
While still under the robot, Nilda smashed its eyepieces with a stylet handle, then unscrewed the carapace and cut the central vein. The transformer is silent forever. Nilda's situation was not much better: she was buried under an iron corpse.
"Child!" Nilda remembered and rushed from under the iron corpse to freedom.
In the end, they managed to crawl out, but the leg was crushed and bleeding. This time, the left-right thigh was injured during a fight with the guards.
Nilda's stay at the mansion was declassified - only the dead would not hear such gunfire - so the escape route through the park was cut off. And so it is: in the distance, one police siren howled, then another. Nilda decided that she would leave by underground communications. But first you need to pick up the child who is behind that door.
Limping on both legs and leaving a trail of blood behind her, Nilda ran up to the master's office and opened the door.
The office was great. The ex-husband was sitting at a table against the opposite wall and looked at the newcomer with curiosity. For some reason, Nilda's eyes began to blur: her husband seemed a little hazy to her. Strange, she only has a pinched leg, little blood loss. Why does it blur in the eyes?
“Give me the baby, Benson,” Nilda called out. “I don’t need you, Benson! Give me the baby and I'll get out of here.
“Take it if you can,” Benson said, pointing to the door on his right.
Nilda rushed, but with a swing hit her forehead on the glass. Ah, damn! This is not blurry in the eyes - this is an office divided into two halves by glass, probably bulletproof.
- Give me the baby! screeched Nilda, thrashing against the wall like a moth on a glowing glass lampshade.
Behind the glass, Benson smiled faintly. A remote appeared in his hands, then Benson pressed a button. Nilda thought Benson was calling security, but it wasn't security. There was a roar behind Nilda's back. When the girl turned around, she saw that the exit was blocked by a metal plate that had fallen from above. Nothing else happened. Although it actually happened: a small hole opened in the side of the wall, in which yellow cat's eyes flashed with danger. Stretching out of the hole, a black panther came out on soft springy paws.
Nilda reacted instantly. Jumping up and jumping off the wall with her feet, she reached out with her hands to a huge chandelier hanging over her head. Pulling herself up, she climbed onto the chandelier.
Black Panther jumped in after him, was a moment too late and missed. Whining pitifully, the panther tried again and again, but could not jump to the chandelier on which Nilda settled.
The bulbs screwed into the chandelier were too hot. They burned the skin, leaving traces on it. Hurrying and regretting the machine gun that had not been taken from the security room, Nilda unzipped her purse and pulled out a lady's pistol from it. Panther was sitting in the corner, preparing for a new jump. Nilda, fixing herself on the chandelier with her feet, leaned over and shot the panther in the head. The panther growled and jumped. This jump was successful: the panther managed to catch with its claws the hand in which Nilda held the stiletto. The stiletto fell to the floor, blood gushing from the lacerated wound. Panther was also wounded: Nilda saw a bloody bump swell on her head.
Gritting her teeth so as not to lose concentration, Nilda took aim at the panther's head and pulled the trigger until she had shot the entire clip. When the clip ran out, the panther was dead.
Nilda, covered in blood, her hands burned from hot light bulbs, jumped to the floor and turned in Benson's direction. He, beaming with a mocking smile, applauded demonstratively.
“Give me back my baby, Benson!” Nilda screamed.
Benson shrugged, signaling that this was not to be. Nilda pulled an anti-tank grenade out of her purse, the last weapon she had left, and shouted:
- Give it back, or I'll blow it up!
Benson squinted and closed his eyes, signaling that an anti-tank grenade would not break through his bulletproof glass. Nilda thought that Benson might be right: now they learned how to make very good bulletproof glass. Damn those producers!
In the distance—probably at the entrance to the mansion—lots of police sirens were wailing. In half an hour the police will decide to storm. It was time to leave, but Nilda couldn't. Close by, in an adjoining room—separated from her by bulletproof glass and a door—was her child.
Glancing at the grenade clutched in her hand, Nilda made up her mind. She pulled the pin and, under Benson's ironic gaze, threw a grenade - not into the glass, as Benson expected, but into the hole from which the panther appeared. There was a rumble inside the hole. Without waiting for the smoke to come out of the hole, Nilda dived into it and advanced to the point of explosion. She threw the grenade far away - at least a meter beyond the location of the glass wall - so it should have worked.
The passage was narrow, but sufficient for him to lie across and rest his back against the wall. The explosion pretty much turned the interior: it only remained to squeeze out the last bricks. Fortunately, the wall was made of brick: if it was made of reinforced concrete blocks, nothing shone for Nilda. Resting her feet against the torn wall, Nilda strained her pained body. The wall didn't move.
Nilda remembered her child so close to her and straightened up furiously. The bricks gave way and collapsed into the room. Shots rang out as Benson tried to get her out of the gun. But Nilda was ready for the shots, instantly moving to the side, for whole bricks. After waiting for a pause between shots, she, peeling off the skin on her shoulders, threw herself into a broken hole and rolled somersaults on the floor. Hiding behind a table, Benson fired several more shots, but missed.
The next shot did not follow - there was a misfire. Roaring, Nilda jumped up on the table and plunged the stiletto into Benson's eye. He gasped and dropped the gun, but Nilda had no time to cut her ex-husband's throat. She rushed to the door, behind which was her child. From the room came the cry of a baby. Yes, and without any crying, with one maternal instinct, Nilda felt: the child was outside the door.
However, the door did not open. Nilda rushed for the keys to the desk where Benson's corpse lay, but something stopped her. She turned around and saw that the keyhole on the door was missing. Must have a combination lock! But where? A plate with artistic painting hangs on the side of the wall - it looks like it is hiding something.
Nilda plucked the art plate from the wall and made sure she hadn't made a mistake. Under the plate were four digital discs: the code was four digits. Four characters - ten thousand options. It will take about an hour to sort through. But Nilda does not have this hour, so you need to guess the number that Benson set. What could Benson come up with? A vulgar self-satisfied blockhead who cares only about his billions. Probably something even more vulgar than himself.
Nilda dialed "1234" and yanked open the door. She didn't give in. What if the sequence is reversed? "0987"? Doesn't fit either. "9876"? Past. Why did she stick a stiletto in Benson's eye?! If the billionaire were alive, it would be possible to cut off his fingers one by one: I would have learned the cipher from the lock, and stretched out the pleasure.
Desperate that her baby was behind a door that couldn't be opened, Nilda pounded on it. But the door was not just metal - armored. It's time to feed her baby, they don't understand! The child is, of course, hungry!
Nilda ran to try and kick the door open with her body, but noticed a second plate of art painting on the other side of the door. How could she not have guessed! On the second plate were similar digital discs. The number of possible combinations has increased by several orders of magnitude. It was to be hoped that Benson hadn't bothered to compose a code of any complexity: it was not in his nature.
So what? "1234" and "0987"? No, the door does not open. What if it's even easier? "1234" and "5678".
There was a click, and Nilda realized that the cursed door had opened. Nilda burst into the room and saw her child lying in the cradle. The child was crying and holding out its tiny hands to her. In turn, Nilda extended her burned fingers to the child and rushed to the cradle.
At that moment, her mind blurred. Nilda tried to twitch, but couldn't - probably from severe blood loss. The room, together with the cradle, disappeared, and the horizon of consciousness was filled with a dirty gray veil. Voices were heard nearby. Nilda heard them, distantly but clearly.
There were two voices, both male. They seemed busy and focused.
“Two and a half minutes faster than last time,” said the first voice. Congratulations, Gordon, you were right.
The second voice chuckled in satisfaction.
“I told you right away, Ebbert. No revenge, no sense of duty or thirst for enrichment can be compared with the instinct of motherhood.
"Well," came the first voice, Ebbert's. - There is a week left. The strongest and most sustainable stimulus is set and tested, what are we going to do in the remaining days?
Let's keep experimenting. I want to try, for whom our baby will fight more fiercely: for a son or for a daughter. Now I will clear her memory, restore her skin and change her clothes.
Baby? Whom do the voices mean, don't they?
“Agreed,” agreed Ebbert. “We’ll have time to drive one more time during the night.” You take care of the baby, and I'll go replace the bionics. She ruined these. It makes no sense to sew up, it will have to be disposed of.
“Get some new ones,” Gordon said. Don't forget to have the room repaired. And replace PolG-12 just in case. The baby cuts the same wires for him. I'm afraid that our PolG-12 would develop a conditioned reflex. Take another from the warehouse, for the purity of the experiment.
Ebbert chuckled.
- OK. You just look at her. Lies like nothing happened. Such a goodie.
No, the male voices were definitely talking about her, Nilda. But what did the voices mean?
“Benson's visit is confirmed, expected in a week,” Gordon laughed. - He will have to meet our pupil. I think Mr. Benson will be quite surprised that he stole her child from her.
“He won’t have time to be surprised,” said Ebbert.
After these words, the voices drifted away, and Nilda fell into a refreshing and healing sleep.
Source: habr.com