Chapter 6

The next morning, they woke up as per usual to do their morning workout.

Mark informed everyone, “Those guys are going to take me at some point today. Just so our stories are straight, I took a Gator up to the high lake just to think about everything that had recently happened. I found a ramp that appeared out of nowhere, went to investigate, and woke up several days later looking like this. When they take me, please do nothing that would put you in their crosshairs. So let’s just pretend like nothing is wrong and let them make their move.”

Kat started the workout video, and they did their workout just as usual.

One guy came out eventually and watched the workout. The other two came out of their rooms once the smell of bacon was in the air.

Breakfast went off without a hitch. Everyone’s alarms went off and everyone went about their normal chores of taking care of the horses, checking the fence lines using the normal Gator, and then turning out the horses.

They finished the chores and then came in to get a cup of coffee. One guy had left to get their vehicle, while the other guys were going through the checkout process.

As soon as Mark entered the lobby, they made their move.

They flashed some ID badges, pulled out weapons, and they did the whole, ‘Mark Phoenix, we have orders to detain you regarding an incident that happened near here. Come with us peacefully and no one will get hurt.’

“OK, I’ll go peacefully.” Mark said to the agents, as he raised his hands in the air. They handcuffed his hands behind his back and as they were taking him out of the lodge, he turned to the family and said, “It’s going to be OK. I’m sure this is all a misunderstanding.”

The agents escorted him out to the SUV and, once behind the black windows, they put a black cloth bag over his head and drove off.

Mark thought, “Cricket, track where they take me.”

“Why did you let them take you? With your enhancements and skills, you could’ve easily overpowered three men.”

“I’m curious to see what they think they’re on to, plus it throws them off the trail of everyone else. When they take blood samples from me, can you make sure they don’t get any medibots or identibots?”

“The medibots will avoid extraction as their assignment is to you. They may get some, but once they are out of your body they dissolve. You currently don’t have any identibots in your system.”

“OK, keep Solara apprised of where I’m at.”

“Actually, the medibots are also a tracking system, so we already know exactly where you are!”

“Didn’t you say those were only temporary? How long will they last?”

“It depends on the being they’re in, what you get exposed to and various other factors. For most humans they will last about three months, but you’ve actually got an additional supply as your tattoos are supplemental medibots.”

Mark addressed his abductors, “I have no idea what you think you’re going to gain by kidnapping me, but do you really think you need to keep a bag over my head?”

“Keep quiet, Mr. Phoenix,” was all they said the entire trip.

After over 2 hours of driving, the vehicle stopped at a checkpoint and they were asked for identification.

They drove into a building and stopped, but they kept the bag over his head and guided him across what sounded like an empty warehouse and into a room with a metal door. They sat him on a chair, shackled his ankles to the chair and handcuffed his hands to a table, before taking the bag off his head. They left and locked the metal door behind them.

Mark looked around. It was a brightly lit white 10-foot-square room, an obvious two-way mirror, two stainless steel chairs and a stainless steel table with a bar in the middle, to which they handcuffed him. There were two cameras in the room, one on the ceiling and the other on the opposite side of the table.

He waited for what seemed like forever—but no one came in to see him.

Finally, when he started getting thirsty, he said, “Can I get some water? Food? Anything? And can someone please tell me what I did and why I’m here?”

Within a few minutes, a man in black came in with a water bottle, placed it in front of him, opened it, put in a straw and left. Mark listened for the cracking of the sealed lid, but he had heard nothing, so he was fairly sure they had tampered with the water.

“Get a drop on your tongue and I’ll do an analysis.”

Mark sucked just enough up the straw to get a drop on his tongue.

Cricket said, “The water contains Sodium Amytal, or truth serum, as they call it.”

Deciding to forego the tainted water, he spoke to his watchers, “Can I please get some water that doesn’t have Sodium Amytal in it?”

After no response for a while, he tried asking again.

This time someone spoke through a speaker. “This will go much smoother if you cooperate.”

Mark snickered. “Me? Cooperate? I have been very cooperative so far! You kidnapped me in front of my friends and I went peacefully. You brought me to your secret hideout, and you’ve kept me locked in this room, watching me and waiting for me to drink some drugged water and haven’t asked a single damn question. How is that considered uncooperative?”

Cricket said, “Mark, those tattoos around your legs and arms can get you out of almost anything. Just think what you want them to do and I’ll make them do it. They are made of medibots.”

Mark thought, “No! Leave the cuffs, they have cameras everywhere and I don’t want to give them reasons that might make them keep me even longer. Will it be safe drinking that water?”

Cricket answered, “Of course. It’s harmless to you, the medibots will neutralize poisons or any foreign material.”

Mark announced, “Fine! I’m not sure what you are after or you think I have, but I’ve got nothing to hide, so if this will move things along for you.”

Mark was actually quite thirsty, so he drank the entire bottle, “There, I hope you’re happy, now ask some fucking questions or let me go!”

After several minutes, a man in black came into the room and sat on the chair across the table from him.

The agent asked, “What is your name?”

“Mark Atlas Phoenix.”

“Do you know where you are, Mark?”

“Where did they take me?”

“You are currently in a vacant warehouse on the southeast side of Calgary, just off 52^nd Street.”

“I’m in a warehouse on the southeast side of Calgary, just off 52^nd Street,” he answered as if they drugged him, giving them just enough information to make them think they weren’t as smart as they thought they were.

The man’s eyes went wide as he looked at the mirror, then continued, “What happened recently out near the ranch?”

“My wife left me and I had just moved out to the ranch. I hadn’t been up the high lake trail in a while, so I took a Gator just to spend some time alone and think about everything I’d gone through. I was driving around the meadow and ran into something that I couldn’t see. The next thing I know, I woke up sitting in the Gator’s seat, I drove back to the ranch and that’s when they told me I looked younger and that it had been days since I left.”

“What do you think happened?”

“I don’t know, aliens maybe? I’ve never believed in them before, but this happened to me somehow, and I can’t explain it.”

“Would you mind if we took a blood sample?”

“Go ahead, maybe you can figure out what happened!”

The man in black got up and left, as a man in white came in and took two vials of blood and then left the room, but that guy left him a Gatorade, and he had to peel the seal off that bottle.

After another hour, two more guys dressed in black came in and escorted him to his cell, with a security camera in the ceiling’s above the toilet corner, likely to give him a bit of privacy when using the toilet. Beside the toilet was a sink with a styrofoam cup and a hand towel. On the opposite wall was a metal cot bolted to the wall with a basic futon type mattress on it, a pillow and a sheet. There weren’t bars on the cell, just a metal door with a sliding peek hole about head high and another slider hole at the floor.

After a few hours, the bottom slider opened, and they slid a paper plate with a hamburger and some fries. It smelled and tasted like a quarter pounder meal, sans the drink. Famished, because he missed lunch, he ate the burger and fries. At least they up-sized the fries!

After a few hours, the place went dark—no light anywhere.

Cricket suggested, “Get some rest, I’m watching over you.”

The days turned to weeks and the weeks turned to months.

He never heard any noise from outside the facility, which was odd, because in a city sirens are unavoidable. So the place had to be majorly sound-proofed or he was underground.

Lights on and off was the only thing that differentiated day and night for him as the lights must have been on a timer, since they turned on or off at the same time every day.

He also never saw any natural light in the hallway, although he only got quick glances each time they opened one of the door sliders or the door to take him out, and they always put a bag over his head each time they escorted him out of his cell, so he really only ever saw a couple of rooms, but none of the rooms ever had any natural light.

They took him to the interrogation room down the hall nearly every day. Basically asking the same questions, just worded differently or in a different order, and every once in a while they would either withdraw some blood or take him to another room to run some test.

Most of his time was spent alone in his cell, under the unblinking watch of the ceiling camera. He did try to cover up the camera once with some toilet paper, but they were in there almost immediately to clear it. The lack of any social interaction, sounds or natural light would have driven most people crazy, but Cricket kept Mark up to date with what was happening at the ranch and she kept everyone at the ranch aware of his situation.

After a couple of weeks, Cricket figured out how to interface his visual and auditory senses with one of the drones at the ranch. That drone was left uncloaked and left under Mark’s control. It took a few days of trial and error, and Cricket’s intervention, until they figured out how to sever the connection when Mark’s attention was needed elsewhere. They eventually linked it to his eyes and brainwaves. If his eyes were closed while his mind was awake he could interface with the drone, if his eyes were closed and he was sleeping, there would be no connection.

Using the drone, Mark could now see and hear through them, but attempts at communication were difficult. Initially he could only send words to a display screen, then Solara added a text-to-speech type system that was very robotic and unnatural, but Cricket and Solara worked tirelessly to refine the program until it was fairly close to his natural voice.

To his captors, it just looked like he meditated or slept a lot.

No further spies or abnormal activity had happened at the ranch, so the men in black had kept their word. The surveillance teams had come into the ranch the day they took Mark and questioned everyone, but that was it.

After each meal he always complained about not getting anything other than water to drink, until one day they gave him a medium Coke with his meal.

After drinking the Coke, Cricket informed him, “They are likely going to release you soon.”

Mark asked, “How do you know they’re going to let me go?”

Cricket explained, “There was a tracker in the drink, they probably had it in the straw. You would have sucked it up and swallowed it whole. Do you want me to disable it?”

“No! If the signal disappears, they’ll probably keep me here even longer. See if you can figure out how to manipulate the signal, but don’t disable it.”

Sure enough, about an hour later ... after being locked up for over two months, they were letting him go.

Mark complained, “Seriously? You’ve had me for two months, you’ve taken I don’t know how many vials of blood, had a few dozen question periods, all of which asked the same questions, and a couple of them even used a polygraph. You’ve put me through x-rays, MRI and CT scanners. Plus I don’t mind fast food now and then, but making someone eat it 3 times a day is tantamount to torture. You didn’t even give me the fucking drinks! Who knows what you’ve done to my health?”

They returned his heated hoodie before they handcuffed and shackled him and put the bag over his head, led him out to the vehicle and started driving.

They were headed north, so Mark hoped maybe they would return him to the ranch, but once they transitioned to driving on gravel roads, he suspected they were just going to dump him in the middle of nowhere. After about 10 minutes of driving on gravel roads, they stopped and let him out of the vehicle. Once he was a couple of steps away from the vehicle, they removed the bag from his head, and simply drove away; leaving him standing on a gravel road with his wrists and ankles still shackled.

This would make hitchhiking nearly impossible! There was a bit of a nip to the cool air, but at least they left the charged battery pack in the jacket.

As he watched the SUV drive away, he looked around and asked Cricket, “I can’t believe they left me out in the middle of nowhere and even left the shackles on me. Get these things off me, then ask someone to come pick me up.”

The tattoos on his legs and arms came alive, the shackles were unlocked immediately, and they returned to their patterns on his body. Mark jumped and did a 180 from the edge of the road into the dried grass of the ditch, then walked a couple hundred metres down the ditch so he didn’t leave any obvious tracks. Luckily, the day was mild for January and there was very little snow in the ditch.

During the drive, Cricket had informed Mark that she couldn’t detect a tracking device or any tampering with the heated jacket, and that she had figured out how their tracking signal worked and could manipulate it. That had started Mark thinking about a way to get back at the men in black, who wasted two months of his life and had seriously put a damper on his revitalized sex life.

As he walked down the ditch, he wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he soon found a small culvert that ran under the road, and it was big enough for him to fit into.

Cricket had been monitoring the plan he had been formulating in his mind, so she was mostly aware of what he was planning, it’s just that he had so many scattered thoughts, so Mark thought, “If they want to waste my time, how about we send them on a wild goose chase and waste their time! How fast can a ship fly in atmosphere?”

Cricket said, “I thought you didn’t want to draw more attention? What you’re talking about confirms that you’ve interacted with aliens.”

Mark said, “I’ve already told them I’ve interacted with aliens! In fact, they asked me that very question many times, so I doubt they’re going to leave me alone, no matter what I say or do. So, I might as well shuffle the deck and see what hand fate deals me next. Something tells me now that you’re in my mind, and the ship has woken up, the status quo is going to change soon, anyway.”

Cricket answered, “To answer your earlier question, the cargo ship could do a maximum of about 2,000 km per hour using primary thrusters, but it wouldn’t be practical to do so. I don’t have any details for other space-faring ships.”

Mark instructed Cricket, “If I swallowed the tracker it’ll go through my body in 24 to 48 hours. Manipulate the signal to show me flying from my current location to a location near central Victoria Island and have me stay there for a few hours. Then plot a course from there to a remote location in the interior of Baffin Island for a few hours, then plot a course to Ottawa, Ontario, but only have me stay there for 1 hour maximum, then take me to a remote location somewhere in the middle of Ellesmere Island, where my signal will stay. I’m sure my brief stop in Ottawa will draw some attention, then when I go to Ellesmere Island, maybe they’ll scramble the military from Alert? Show me as travelling at ship speeds when I’m going from place to place.”

Cricket almost sounded giddy, “This is going to be fun!”

Sure enough, back at headquarters, they were diligently watching his tracking signal. As soon as the signal started going north at high speed, they had the drop off team head back to check, since they were only a few kilometres away.

Mark was still close enough to hear them arrive, do their search and radio their superiors. It took all of his willpower to not laugh as he imagined the chaos in their headquarters when they radioed back saying he was no longer there and that there were no tracks—just the shackles lying on the ground where they dropped him off.

Suspecting he had actually left with aliens, they only performed a cursory search of the immediate area. Once they left, he lay there in the culvert and had a nap while waiting for his ride, fortunately he had a couple hours of heat on the high setting of his hoodie.

He also had Cricket give him a shave and a haircut. He hated being scruffy, but had told her to let it grow while in their custody to make it look more normal.

A couple of hours later, Cricket woke Mark up and told him Kat was approaching, so he crawled out of the culvert and waited for her arrival.

Kat stopped the truck and Mark jumped into the passenger seat as Kat said, “I’m so glad you’re OK! Did they torture you?”

Mark smiled. “No just interrogated me many times, took a gallon or two of blood and did a bazillion tests. The only torture was the needles and the complete lack of privacy or showers.”

Kat laughed. “I seriously doubt they took gallons of blood, maybe a pint or two, but it will replenish itself. If you never got any privacy or a shower you must have a pretty good case of blue balls right now! Do you need me to pull the truck over? I won’t object to getting fucked by that monster between your legs, you can put as much cum in me as you want.”

“While the thought of unloading two months of pent up cum deep inside you is tempting, I haven’t had a shower in a couple of months and I really think I should do that before anything else.”

“I understand. Plus, you should probably fuck my daughter first since she is your girlfriend. I do expect you to fuck me at some point!”

A couple of hours later they were arriving at the ranch, with Kat pulling into the open workshop, so Mark could access the tunnels without anyone seeing him.

There was a shower in the workshop, but Cricket notified him that there was a better shower in the residence, so Mark made his way to the lodge via the tunnel.

Once he met up with everyone, he told everyone he needed to stay out of sight for at least a day as he was busy taking those guys on a wild goose chase, but he was expecting them to resume watching the ranch.