Escape from Cimarron

He waited until the voices faded before he peered around the corner. "There's a door," he said and slipped around the corner.

"Into the basement." Clarice stepped around Steve and wiped the window on the door so she could see. A little shower of dust fell on her shoulder when she pushed the door open to look first left and then right.

"No-one's there," Sister Clarice ducked back into the tunnel, caught Steve's wrist and looked at his watch. "Forty minutes and counting before your friends get here. I have to warn the sisters and find out how to open the gate while you get Nita." She pointed to the right. "I'm going out through the courtyard. The cell they put your sister in is the other way."

Sister Clarice brushed dust and cobwebs off her habit as she hurried down the corridor and up the stairs. Her footsteps reverberated off the corridor's bare walls and exposed pipes, and they faded when a door closed behind her.

Steve turned the other way. He kept his eyes on every nook and corner he might use for cover and worked his way along the wall. He found one cell with a cot, a chair and a cross on the wall, and then another, and then he found his sister.

Nita knelt on the floor with her head and shoulders under a Novice's white veil. Her head was down; her hands were clasped in prayer, and her wrists were cuffed in steel. Nita was in chains, and a statue of Jesus with a hard-on looked down on her from a niche in the wall.

"What are you praying for?" Steve's voice was a quiet hiss.

Nita snapped her head up and hid her smile. "For the serenity I don't have." Her chains clattered as she climbed to her feet. She stepped toward Steve then yanked at the chains. "If I don't find some of that, then I'm gonna kill someone for what they're doing to me. Can you get me out?"

Steve had to tear his eyes away and shut his mouth. Aside from that veil, Nita wasn't wearing a Novice's habit. She had a black leather dog collar locked around her neck. Her feet were bare and a white sarong hung from the curve of her hips. His sister's torso was sculpted and her naked breasts stood out firm, smooth, and round.

Steve tried the latch. "Who has the keys?".

"Mother Superior has a set. She was here a few minutes ago to tell me I'm about to be blessed. Semenov's here."

Steve glanced both ways along the corridor. "This is a school. Don't schools always keep a set of keys somewhere?"

"The secretary's office. It's like two floors--no, three floors up."

Footsteps echoed in the corridor, and Steve ducked around a corner. Two robed men stopped in front of Nita's cell. They turned their backs to Steve, and Nita covered her breasts with her arm.

"They had to sedate her to get her in here," one said.

"I hope Semenov likes it rough," the other answered, "because that's what he's going to get."

Nita dropped her arm. "Why don't you open that door and come a little closer?"

The brothers both laughed, but one of them stepped to the bars and cocked his head for a better look, and Nita cleared her throat. She spit, and the brother jerked back. Nita growled, "Idiot," just loud enough for Steve to hear.

The phlegm-faced brother lunged at her through the bars, before the other put his hand on his shoulder.

"Pray for patience," he said. "We'll turn her soon enough." They hurried away, with their heads and their voices low.

Nita wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and Steve stepped out of the corner. "Friends of yours?"

"Ham and Pinky. They've been creeping after me since I was a sophomore. Get me out of here?"

"Half an hour, and all hell breaks loose," Steve said. "Which way to the secretary's office?" Nita pointed down the corridor and Steve made it onto the stairs without drawing attention. He took the steps two-at-a-time and stopped at the third floor and listened to a janitor talking to voices in his head while he worked.

The school was ready for the graduation ceremony. Large letters in festive colors spelled out "Congratulations Seniors" along the hallway. Stars glittered on the wall around a row of seniors' photographs, and balloons floated above their lockers.

The janitor pushed his cart to a corner and unloaded bags into a trash chute before he shut off the lights and left the hallway lit only by emergency exit signs. It was quiet but for a murmur coming from somewhere down the hall. Steve passed the row of lockers and a classroom full of empty desks before he reached a door with "Office" in gold letters on the window.

Steve rattled the latch and pushed on the locked door. He braced to smash the glass with his elbow then realized that the window frame was loose. He dug Big Baby Blue's keys out of his pocket and pried at the frame. The window pane fell out, and Steve trapped the glass before it hit the floor. He reached through the door, opened the latch, and looked both ways along the hallway before he slipped inside.

The seniors loved their secretary. Her desk was strewn with "Thank You Sadie" cards. White plush bears with red ribbons around their necks waited in Sadie's chair.

The murmur Steve heard in the hallway had a rhythmic pulse in the office. He ignored it and opened one drawer and another before he noticed the keys arranged on hooks by the window. He lit his cellphone to read their neat labels. At the bottom was a single ring with a half dozen keys. Its label read "Basement."

Voices resonated in the darkened hallway. Steve pocketed his phone and ducked behind the desk. The closed door to Mother Superior's office was on his right, and a second door stood open to his left. He rolled into the open office as quietly as he could, and the voices stopped outside.

"Do you have everything you need for the reception?" It was a man's voice. "How many guests are you expecting?"

A woman answered. "Thirty-three--no, thirty-two--graduates and about a hundred guests. I rounded up to a hundred and fifty, because it's better to have extra."

"What happened to the door?" the man asked. "Get Brother Felix to fix this window, and I'll stay here. We can't leave the office open."

Steve couldn't wait, so he glanced around for a way out. There were white walls and white cabinets with dark counters, and an antiseptic scent clung to everything. He was in the nurse's office. Steve looked for a way out: another door, the window, an air vent, the ceiling--the acoustic-tiled ceiling.

Steve put the side chair on the nurse's desk, climbed onto it, and lifted one of the hanging tiles. He used his phone to light the space above the tile. It was crowded with steel trusses, air ducts, and wiring, but it was a space.

Steve pushed the tile aside and jumped to grab a truss with one hand. He pulled himself up into that dark space and hung from the truss while he slid the tile back into position. That rhythmic murmur was louder. There were grunts and gasps. He could make out a woman's voice.

The hanging ceiling wouldn't hold Steve's weight, so he hung from the truss and carefully crossed from one truss to the next, around an air duct and across Sadie's room. Those sounds were no longer a murmur. They came from just a few feet away where light leaked around the ceiling tiles over Mother Superior's office.

Steve worked his way along the truss until he reached the ceiling tile at the corner of the office, and he lifted it just enough to see inside.

Mother Superior was twice blessed. Two hooded brothers held her between them in the middle of the room. Her legs wrapped one brother's waist; her veiled head laid back on the other brother's shoulder, and she gasped at the ceiling in time with their repeated penetrations.

Brother Back glanced at the clock on the desk. "Isn't it about time for us to get Miss Cox?"

Mother Superior groaned and tightened her grip on Brother Front's shoulders. "Semenov can wait. We're not done until I say we're done."

Steve let the ceiling tile settle back in place and stretched to reach the next truss. He shifted his weight to it so he hung over the hallway and reached again, but he flinched when Mother Superior let out a squeal. His gauze-covered hand slipped and he landed on the hanging tiles.

The ceiling tile bent under Steve's weight for just a moment, and he braced himself for a fall. The tile gave way, and he grabbed at anything he could find to slow himself down and get his feet under him. He landed on his feet in the hallway in a shower of dust and broken tile.

Steve shook dust out of his hair and out of his shirt, and when he looked up, he found the monk who'd stayed to wait for Brother Felix. His mouth fell open for a moment. "Who are you?" he asked. "What are you doing here?"

There was no time for small talk. Steve shoved the brother back through the door with the heel of his hand in his face, and he left the balloons above the lockers bobbing in his wake. Two more monks were on the stairs, so Steve passed the stairway to the corner where the janitor left, and he surprised a nun with another brother coming up the hallway.

"Did someone call a damned meeting?" Steve asked. He flung open the trash chute the janitor used. He gripped the top of the door frame and swung himself feet-first into the darkness. The chute went down and that's where he was going.

Steve stopped his fall with his knees against the bricks at one side of the chute and his back against the other. Voices from above followed him, and he chimneyed his way down. He passed the second floor and had his foot on the first-floor door when someone pulled it open.

A man's voice asked, "What's going on in here?" Steve flashed past him as he plummeted down the chute and into the trash hopper at the bottom.

Steve found himself buried in old, leaking trash bags. He fought his way up for air and checked his watch. He had ten minutes to go. He staggered into a corridor where voices echoed down a stairway at the end, and he turned around. He recognized the door to the utility tunnel and he passed the bare walls and open pipes past the empty cells before he reached his sister.

Nita bolted up from the cot and stopped. "What's that smell?" She wrinkled her nose and stepped back.

"Are you going to complain? Now?" Steve fumbled with one key and another before one worked, and he threw the door open.

"Not complaining but Stevie! Eew."

"That's complaining. It's garbage, OK? Give me your wrists." Steve held Nita's soft hands and tried one key, then flipped through all of them. "There's no cuff keys here." He stepped back and listened to the sounds from one direction and then the other. People were coming from both sides. "Stay here."

"You think I have a choice? What are you doing?"

"Making room for company." Steve unlocked one empty cell and then the other. He threw the last door open just as Nita looked past him and squealed, "Stevie!" It was his only warning.

Steve planted his feet. He deflected a monk's headlong charge, and his ring of keys slid across the floor. He grasped the man's robe and twisted so his momentum carried him by. He turned him in the air and rode him down.

The monk's back hit the floor and his head slammed onto the concrete. Steve rolled over him. He jumped to his feet and spun to face a second brother following close after the first. Steve ducked his head and drove his shoulder into the monk's ribs. He lifted him with one arm under his thigh and threw him backward into the open cell.

The monk on the floor struggled to his feet with his hand on the back of his head. Steve grabbed his arm and heaved him through the cell door. The two brothers tangled in a heap, and Steve slammed the door behind them.

"Impressive, Mr. Cox." Steve spun around to face the woman's voice. Mother Superior watched from behind Brother Front and Brother Back. She slapped a dog leash in the palm of her hand and said, "Nita only had one person on her guest list, and we were never able to reach you. This misunderstanding could have been avoided."

Steve glanced at the keys clipped to Mother Superior's cincture and then at the brothers as they stepped closer. "This isn't a misunderstanding," he said. "This is a disagreement."

Brother Front glanced down the corridor past Steve, and Steve heard men rushing up behind him. He turned his back to the closed cell, grasped the robe of the first monk to reach him, and shoved him into Brother Back.

The three of them went down, and Steve rolled off the pile. He spun around as Brother Front dove to tackle him, and the last brother smashed his forearm into Steve's jaw.

Mother Superior stepped around Brother Back on her way to Nita's cell and said "Lock him up when you're done with him." Steve heard something else through the fog in his head and the pants and grunts of the men on top of him. He heard the roar of Harleys overhead.

"Bitch!" Nita yanked at her chains. "Come closer. I fuckin' dare you."

Mother Superior stopped and gave Nita a cold look. She tapped one of the monks on the shoulder with her dog leash. "Brother Ignatius will take care of you." The brother scrambled to his feet and Mother Superior jerked her head toward Nita. "Hold her down."

Steve growled under his breath. He gathered his hands under him and flexed his shoulders, and he shook the monks off. Brother Back was the slowest to get away. Steve clutched the front of his robe and Mother Superior jumped back when he slammed him into the metal bars of Nita's cell. Brother Front jumped on Steve from behind, and Steve threw him off.

Brother Back sunk to the floor, but Steve pulled him up. He shoved him into the last open cell as Brother Front staggered to his feet. He grasped the monk's hood and held his head down. Steve slammed his knee up into his face, and Brother Front fell backwards over Brother Back.

Steve threw the cell door shut, spun around and found the last two monks backing away. He found Sister Clarice, too. She waved her hands as she talked to Mother Superior. "Bikers in the Abbey!" she said. "They want sex!"

Mother Superior rolled her eyes. "Then give it to them."

"Well, sure," Clarice said. "The problem is that now Mr. Semenov is mad. He wants to leave, and Father Thomas is trying to stop him."

Steve wiped blood from the corner of his mouth and pointed at the two brothers. "You two should go help Father Thomas."

Mother Superior watched the monk's robes billowing behind them as they ran, and then turned her wide eyes on Steve. Tattered, bloody gauze hung from the hand he wrapped around her throat. He took the dog leash away from her, gave the leash to Nita, and freed the key ring from Mother Superior's cincture.

"I don't want to keep Zeke waiting," Clarice said. She hid a little snicker, and told Mother Superior, "You might have to spread your legs a little wider than you're used to."

"Not on my account," Steve said, and shoved Mother Superior at Clarice. "Give her to Bear. He'll know what to do with her."

Clarice pulled Mother Superior away, and Steve fumbled with the little cuff keys until Nita huffed and said, "Give me those. You have man-hands, and you're thinking more about my tits than about what you're doing."

Nita dropped her chains and her collar on the floor in front of the statue of Jesus with a hard-on before Steve could close his mouth and say he wasn't staring at her tits. She snapped her fingers under Steve's nose. "Just like that. How are we getting out of here?"

"Same way Clarice brought me in," Steve said and patted his pocket. "Dammit. Where'd the basement keys go?"

"There!" Nita dove for the keys on the floor, but Brother Back had already reached them through the bars of his cell.

The monk backed up and held the keys up for Steve to see. He tossed them on the cot and asked, "What are you going to do now?"

Steve groaned and looked around. "Why is it always plan B? We'll go up the stairs and out through the courtyard." He took a long stride back into Nita's cell, tugged on the chains, and took the statue of Jesus out of its niche. He hefted it, then slammed it into the eye bolts that held the chains to the wall.

"Stevie! What are you doing?" Nita asked, but Steve didn't stop to explain. He smashed the statue into the eye bolts until the masonry cracked and he could pull one out of the wall. He swung the chain in his hand and said, "This might be what we need to get out."

"Whatever." Nita tugged on Steve's wrist and said, "Let's just get outta here." He stopped at the utility tunnel to make sure it was still locked, and Nita tugged him away again. "How are we getting back to town?"

Steve grunted and didn't say more until they reached the stairs. "Do you always have so many questions?" He ran the stairs and stopped at the door to the courtyard.

"Out of my way," Nita said and slipped around him. She pushed the door open just as a biker slammed a monk against the wall. He slumped to the ground and Nita nudged him with her foot until he moaned. "It's Pinky. No-one deserves that more than him." She ducked back again when a chair flew past her head. "Friends of yours?"

"Since this afternoon." Steve looked through the window at the chaos in the courtyard. The front of the chapel rose behind a stage where "Class of 2023" was once spelled out above it in large red-and-white letters, and a white pavilion like a circus tent covered the courtyard in front of the stage. Now, the "C" was gone and the "L" hung at a drunken angle. A dozen eager sisters offered their services under the pavilion, and the few monks still standing fought the bikers who were trying to reach them.

Brother Ignatius stumbled to the door and Steve shoved the monk away as he led Nita out. Engine fumes hung in the air, and rock music pumped against the high courtyard walls.

Bear's voice boomed "Cox!" from under the pavilion. He bent Mother Superior across his bike and threw her tunic over her back before he looked up again. "Clarice said you sent this one for me." His grin got wider when he saw Nita, and she shrank back behind Steve. "Where'd you find that one?"

"This one's my sister," Steve said. "We're getting out of here."

Bear gave Steve a thumbs-up and bumped the volume on the heavy metal blaring from his bike's radio. Mother Superior clasped her hands to give thanks then squealed as Bear shoved his fat dick into her.

Steve pushed Nita toward the open gate, and she pointed out a white-haired priest and a round man in a suit who were in their way. "That's Father Thomas," she said. "I bet the man he's arguing with is Boris Semenov."

The round man was red-faced. Father Thomas leaned toward him and gestured as he talked, and a uniformed giant of a man listened over Semenov's shoulder.

Steve stopped and sized-up the giant. "And that would be his driver." Father Thomas pointed to Nita, and the driver looked up. He took one long stride toward them, then broke into a jog.

"Other way!" Steve said.

Steve pulled Nita around the pavilion and ran up the stairs to the stage to reach the other side of the courtyard. They skidded to a stop when two monks charged onto the stage from the other side. Steve ducked under the first and threw him off the stage then spun on the second. The monk backed up with his eyes on the chain swinging in Steve's grip, and he fell backwards off the stage.

Nita squealed, "Stevie!" and he was coiled to leap when he spun around.

The giant wrapped a huge hand around Nita's arm and jerked her back against him. "The boss wants what he came for," he said, and drew a pistol from his jacket.

Steve lashed out with the chain and it wrapped around the driver's wrist before he could bring his gun to bear. He laughed at Steve, yanked on the chain, and pulled Steve off his feet. Steve stumbled at the giant's feet, and Nita twisted out of his grip while he drew his hand back to slam the pistol down on Steve's head.

Steve got his feet under him, and the driver's blow landed on his back. He wrapped both arms around the giant's knee and drove his shoulder up into his chest. He forced him back off his feet and heard the man's ribs crack when he drove him down onto the stage.