Haley

“No time,” he said, snatching her hand. “Now or never. Let’s go.”

“Ow!” she said, yanking her hand back. “Gentle. You’ve already royally fucked up my life. The last thing you need to do is hurt me.”

“I’m sorry,” he said, instantly apologetic. “For everything. I really, truly am.”

“Sure,” she snapped. “You have one hell of a way of showing it.”

“I’m doing the best I can, the only way I know how,” he mumbled as she followed him into the hallway. “I’m not perfect, but I am trying.”

She frowned at his choice of words. It was like he was saying sorry to someone important to him, someone he cared for, and expected cared for him. Not a random woman he’d met that morning. Who was this guy? Was she making the right decision in going with him? He seemed so…honest, and forthcoming. He was hiding things, yes, but nothing to do with himself or his cause that would make her rethink her choice.

This is the stupidest thing you’ve ever done. Get back in your office and wait for the police to come.

“Listen, Maximus. I appreciate your words, but I think maybe I should wait for the police instead,” she said, hesitating, slowing her stride.

“Have you not heard anything I said?” he asked, rounding on her. His eyes darted between her and the hallway with an almost absurd rapidity.

“I have…but—”

“Please, Haley. You need to trust me. I understand you don’t want to, but if you remain here, you will be escorted to the police station, and then likely never seen again. It’ll come out that you died in a car accident or something tragic, but you will be killed. That’s just how the Institute operates. They’ve gone insane, and will eliminate anyone who stands in their way or speaks out against them. I’ve seen it firsthand during my time as their prisoner.”

She stared at him.

“I’ll explain later,” he said, his face getting desperate. “I promise, I’ll tell you everything you want to know. But for now, we need to run.”

“I…no. No. No. No. This is absolutely ridiculous! Absolutely not. The police are not the enemy. They’re not going to just ‘make me disappear,’” she snapped, using her hands to form quotes in the air. “That’s the kind of shit that only happens in movies or cheesy thriller books.”

Maximus just stared at her. “Haley.”

“No. Final answer.” She crossed her arms, pulling tight the robe she’d thrown on and stepping past him to the office across from hers. There was nobody in it, she knew, just spare things from the other studio’s production.

“This is madness,” he said from the hallway, turning to face her.

She just stared at him. His eyes glanced back down the hallway, and then he jerked into abrupt movement, practically flinging himself into the office.

“What are you doing?” she asked, stepping back in surprise.

“They’re here.”

“Well, shouldn’t you be going?” she asked, starting to feel irritated.

“Not without you.”

“You’re adamant, I’ll give you that much,” she admitted.

Maximus growled, looking around.

“What are you doing now?” She was starting to get tired of his antics.

“Hiding,” he rumbled, heading for the back of the room.

“You’re not seriously trying to hide there, are you?” she asked him as he struggled to conceal himself.

“Yes I am.”

“Defiant too,” she muttered. “Is there anything you aren’t good at?”

“Not making a scene,” came the muffled answer.

“Well, I can believe that. Here, at least let me help you cover yourself. Your ass is sticking out.”

She walked over and adjusted the…objects until he was hidden. Mostly.

“Close your eyes,” she instructed, and pulled a hat from elsewhere and put it over his face. “I can’t believe you’re doing this.”

“Thank you.”

“Whatever,” she said. “I just want you out of here.”

Maximus fell silent, giving her the last word as footsteps echoed down the hallway. Haley moved away from the closet and then sat on the corner of the desk that had been shoved against one wall, arms wrapped around her midsection.

The first officer stopped at her doorway, staring at the broken remains of the door scattered in front of him.

“Finally!” she said, trying to sound distressed. “What took you so long?”

Whatever the pot-bellied policeman was going to say, it died as he was taken by surprise by her speaking from behind. He turned awkwardly, hand darting to the gun on his out-of-control waist. Her throat tightened at the gesture, but he stopped when he saw her sitting unthreateningly.

“What happened here?” he demanded, regaining his authority, stepping into the office, his hands on his waist in what she was sure he saw as an officious pose.

She wondered at his stomach. It was very unlike most police officers she saw. There had once been a time when they were able to get away with looking so slovenly, but now, she was fairly certain most of the officers who looked like this were often confined to their desks.

“He broke in here,” she told him, trying to sound distressed. “He wanted to take me with him! But then he heard you coming and took off. Thank you so much.” She tried to appear grateful for the assistance he had not actually provided.

“Mmm, I see. Well,” the officer said, hiking up his pants. “Of course he did. Even he must know better than to mess with us.” He paused, looking up and down the hallway before stepping into the empty office she was currently in. “Which, ah, direction, did you say he went?”

Haley shook her head, still somewhat unsure of why she was doing all this. She’d just told Maximus that the police weren’t going to make her disappear. Now here she was, covering for him! Why couldn’t her brain get its priorities right. Turn him in. Tell the officer where he was hiding! Then she could be free of everything, and at last able to return to her normal job.

“I didn’t see,” she admitted. “I was too busy hiding under the desk. I’m just thankful he’s gone.”

The office nodded in understanding, but despite the supposed reassurance she was supposed to feel from his presence, there was something in the way he looked her over that made Haley feel sick. He wasn’t seeing a witness or a person to protect when he looked at her. He had simply seen a job.

“Well, you’re going to need to come with me then,” the officer said, stepping closer.

Haley pulled the robe tighter around her and shook her head. “No, I want to stay here. I don’t want to leave.”

“I’m sorry, miss, but I’m going to have to insist,” the officer said, his expression darkening as the supposed timid woman he had likely come to expect resisted his orders.

“Uh-uh,” she reiterated, shaking her head. “I’m staying. I have a job to do.”

He advanced on her, arm outstretched. “So do I,” he replied. “Now, come along peacefully please. I don’t want to have to do anything I might…regret, you see.”

Haley hopped off the desk and backed away, but the officer was quicker. His fingers wrapped around her arm. She tugged hard and twisted, until she was between him and the exit, but it made no difference.

“Let me go!” she said, astounded at the assault on her person.

The police were supposed to be her friends. They were to protect her from people that came along trying to harm her. Not kidnap her! Maximus, it had seemed, was right. These police officers were in the pay of the Institute, doing only as they were told, regardless of what was right or wrong.

“Is there a problem here?”

Haley spun as another voice spoke from the hallway. She brightened as another police officer, a taller, far more in-shape and proper-looking one, appeared. Okay, now she could actually feel better about herself.

“She’s proving difficult to work with, Nash,” the officer holding her arm grumbled.

Her stomach dropped as the newcomer looked at her, his mouth scrunching up unhappily. “Is that so? How rude of her to resist such a polite request.”

The fat cop chuckled nasally. “Well, I think I just told her to come with us instead.”

Nash smiled uncomfortably and stepped into the room, closing the door behind him. “Come on, Frank, I know why we’re doing this, and I’m not going to fight it. But we don’t have to be assholes about it. We’re supposed to be the police, the people who help people like her.”

Frank just snorted. “Whatever. Cuff her, and let’s go.”

Haley chose that moment to attempt to break Frank’s grip on her. She succeeded, and ducked below the swinging arms of Nash as he tried to wrap her up in a bear hug. Then she slipped away from the slow-moving Frank, and dashed for the door. She twisted the handle, but before she could pull it open, a big hand slammed against it, holding it still.

“Sorry,” Nash said from behind her. “But you’re going to have to come with us.”

She turned, slowly, until her back was against the door. The two officers were both facing her, with Frank standing in the middle of the room, looking like he was breathing hard from all of ten seconds worth of work. She was trapped. There was nothing she could do. They were going to get her.

Behind the officers, a pile of wildly colored clothing and children’s costumes shivered, and then a horrifying beast rose up from their midst. Human from the neck down, the bright-orange-colored chicken head perched atop a muscular neck would normally have made her burst into hysterical laughter. But now, as the apparition moved forward stealthily, Haley just smiled.

“No, like I said. I don’t think that will be happening.”

“Just knock her out already, Nash,” Frank complained.

A growl filled the room. “I wouldn’t do that,” a new voice spoke harshly in frigid tones.

The two officers spun, reaching for their sidearms, but it was too late. Haley watched as a giant fist descended on Frank’s head, effectively knocking him out via a whack-a-mole style hit to the head. Nash was a bit quicker—his hand actually made it to his weapon. But then the chicken’s human-styled hand, bigger even than Nash’s, closed around it and squeezed. She heard something break, and hoped it was the gun. Nash tried to scream in pain, but a second massive hand clamped down over his mouth, holding it tight until Nash turned red, then blue, and finally collapsed unconscious.

“Are you sure you want to wait for more police now?” Maximus asked, his tone not quite registering with an “I-told-you-so” tone, though it was damn close.

“No,” she said immediately. “I still don’t fully trust you, but of the three people in the room, two tried to force me to go with them, and one is giving me all the chances in the world to make the wrong choices. So, this time I’m going to make the other choice, and I’ll go with you, despite the insanity of it.”

The orange chicken head nodded. “Good. But there’s bound to be more of them out there. We’ll need to sneak by them somehow.”

“It sounded like it,” she admitted. “What are we going to do?”

Maximus thought about it for a few moments. “Is there an exit that way?” he asked, pointing at a wall in her office. It took Haley a second to realize he meant down the hallway in that direction, away from where her show’s set was located.

“Yeah, lots,” she said. “This hallway joins our studio with the other one.”

“The other one?”

Haley looked up at him, as if it should be self-explanatory, then leaned to the side to look past him at the pile of giant costumes he’d hidden himself among.

“Right,” Maximus said, reaching up to pull the orange mask off.

“No, wait,” she said, raising a hand to stall him. “I have an idea.”