They continued on without much difficulty for most of the day typing characters that conveniently fell on the lawn or in the cafe. But at 6:30 it was time for the open bracket which was deep in the kitchen where only cooks roamed.
"Well, here we go," Paul muttered as they walked through the staff only entrance into the back of the kitchen. They received a few confused glances from the kitchen workers as they walked behind the front counter, rounded a corner, went beyond the sizzling grills and found themselves in a back room with shelves and refrigerators. In the center of the room on the floor was a silver square.
"30 seconds," Paul whispered.
"Hey, what are you doing in here?" boomed the voice of a huge man who now stood in the threshold of the room.
Priscilla and Paul looked up at a giant chef.
"I came here looking for you," Paul spoke quickly. "You gave me a sub with extremely old lettuce! And it was soggy!"
"That's not possible!" the chef retorted.
Paul and the chef shouted back and forth until their faces were inches apart.
"You know what," Paul said suddenly. "I was wrong. I'm sorry. It was a fantastic sub. I don't know what I was thinking. Forgive me, sir." Paul extended his arms and hugged the chef pulling him another half a foot closer to the silver square just as the time ticked to 6:30.
"Carry on!" Paul said and they hurried away leaving the chef his red face wearing a befuddled expression.
"That was creative," Priscilla remarked when they were in the clear.
"Definitely 280 pounds," Paul replied.
For 7:30, the silver square was in the medical room. All that they had left to type was the word, "False" and a semicolon but this was where things would prove difficult for the duo.
"What is the medical room for?" Priscilla asked. "For any ailments the prisoners have?"
"Basically," Paul replied. "I think it is just a small clinic with a doctor and a couple of nurses. I've only been in there once a while back so I really have no idea how it's laid out or what we'll have to do to get to that F."
They walked into the medical room and the nurse behind the front desk greeted them. "Hi, can I help you?"
"We are not feeling well," Paul said.
"Both of you?" the nurse replied.
"We think we might have food poisoning from old subs," he said.
"Follow me," the nurse said rising.
She lead them down a short hallway and extended a hand to a room. Paul came to the entrance of the room. "Yeah, this room will not work,” he proclaimed. “I'm afraid of tigers," he said pointing at a picture of a tiger on the wall.
The nurse wore a blank expression for a moment, then shrugged and sighed. She pointed them to a room across the hall.
"Much better," Paul said, looking around the room.
"The doctor will be in shortly," the nurse said, closing them in the small room.
"Where's the square?" Priscilla asked.
He walked to one of the walls and put both his hands flat against it. "They've added this wall to cut this room in two," he said. "There's the square," he pointing down where the wall met the floor. A sliver of the square was visible though most of it was under the wall.
"What are we going to do?" Priscilla asked.
"I'm thinking," he replied his wide eyes scanning the wall up and down.
"We have one minute," she said.
"I'm not sure if we're going to make that," he said. "We're going to have to come back when they are gone."
He suddenly departed from the room making Priscilla hurry to follow. He walked back down the hall towards the front desk. Barely breaking stride, he snagged something that was clipped to a nurse's uniform which was hanging in an open closet.
"We're good to go, thank you," he waved at the nurse at the front desk as they passed.
"That was fast," she replied believing the doctor had somehow seen them already.
"What did you grab off that uniform?" Priscilla asked when they were back in the cafe.
He held up the id card of a nurse who was apparently taking the night off.
"I'm pretty sure these unlock the door," he said. "They close at 9. That still leaves us enough key captures to complete the code with one to spare.
"What do we do until then?" Priscilla asked.
"Just wait I guess," he replied sitting down at a table in the cafe.
"I really do hope we can pull this off tonight," Priscilla said putting her head in her hands. "I need to get back."
"I know, I do too now," he said.
"What do you mean?" she asked lifting her head.
"I just got a message from my teammate,” Paul said. “We have an opportunity to do something that we've been trying to do for months.”
"And what is that?" Priscilla inquired.
"We've been trying to break someone out of a different prison. I miss her," he said.
Her. Priscilla paused. He's probably talking about his significant other, she thought. She could tell by the way in which he said, “I miss her.” And it was then that she was hit in the face with reality that she didn't want him to have a significant other. She had denied it till now. She hadn't even considered anyone else since Sadier's death. It's for the better if he has someone already, she thought. It wouldn't have ever worked out anyway. After escaping she would go back to Galaxy Waterfall and he would go on his way and they would never cross paths again. I better hush these emotions now before it gets harder, she thought. Unfortunate timing though as nearly 2 hours of talking lay ahead of them.
"What was the last thing you remember before waking up in your cell?" Paul asked.
"A really long ride in the back of a van," Priscilla recalled. "I knew I was being taken west when I started seeing huge mountains out the window. There were 5 others about my age in the van but I didn't recognize any of them. All boys."
"What happened after that?"
"Well, the next thing I knew I had a hood on my head so I couldn't see where I was being taken. Two people were dragging me. They eventually put me on a bed and pulled off my hood. It was dark. They left and locked the door behind them. I fell asleep. I remember when I awoke, it was still dark. I jumped up and found myself in my cell."
Paul shrugged and nodded.
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