Astral

I waited a full five minutes after my captors left the room before I even moved. After that five minutes, I slammed my hands straight down tearing the the binding on my wrists. Hands free, I bent over and unbound my ankles rolling my hands and feet around getting the blood flowing again, both hands and feet tingling as the feeling returned to both.

Waiting for my joints to be fully ready for use, I reached into my mind splitting my astral and my physical body and glided my astral body over to the door. Passing through the door into the hallway, I came face to face with a guard. Looking to my left, another stood stretching his legs. Turning to my right, another two stood talking quietly. None of them noticed me however as I was not physically there. Extinguishing my projection, I returned to my physical body flexing my hands and feet to make sure they had regained all their movement. Feeling that my body was back to normal, I stood up and walked to the door. Slowly and quietly I touched the door handle and turned slowly. The handle turned al little and my hopes rose that the door had bee left unlocked, but another a few centimeters of turning the knob stopped and held fast no matter how hard I tried to turn it. Slowly I surged it back to the resting position delicately letting it go making sure to not let it make a peep of noise. Door knob back in place, I walked back a few paces and the printed straight at the door slamming my shoulder into the door right beside the doorknob and with a splintering crack the door slammed open thudding into the guard right in front of the door. Using the impact to redirect me I surged toward the guard to the left before she could fully draw her pistol. Disarming her, then grabbing her on the back of her shirt, I used her as a body shield taking bullets as the other two guards fired at me. Each shot a clip, and as soon as they paused to reload, I dropped the dead guard and quickly shot each guard twice in the face. The whole encounter was over in a few seconds and the gunfire would have alerted anyone in the halls.

Quickly I split my bodies again, I searched down the hall behind the two guards with my astral body. As my astral body scouted the hallway subconsciously, I shot the fourth member as he recovered from the door hit then removed his body armor placing his gun in the chest holster, then moving to the two who had been talking. As I reached them my scouting astral body reached a dead end and I ended the projection feeling my bodies join together again, then projected it down the hallway the other way subcounsiously scouting for me again. Focusing on my physical body I took the gun and hip holster off one guard and slung the last guards assault rifle over my shoulder, and loaded extra ammo into my vest and pockets. As I finished my scouting astral projection came to a split in the hall and I extinguished it bringing my bodies together as one the walked briskly down the hall gun in hand.

As I came to the split in the hallway I creep toward the corner on the right side. Just behind the corner I projected out around the corner seeing without being seen. Seeing that the hall was empty I glid down it searching for the end, or an exit finding that the hall was blocked by doors just around another corner. Drawing my projection back, I scouted down the left fork seeing that it was clear for about a hundred feet. Placing my projection on my shoulder looking backwards I headed down the hall leaving the projection in the back of my mind to protect my rear. Coming to the next corner I swung my projection off my shoulder and looked down the hall. Standing in front of a door sporting a flashing green exit sign were six men all armed with assault rifles resting at their sides. Slowly but methodically I edge my physical body right next to the corner and brought my pistol up right behind the corner then moved my projection to be behind the gun sighting the shot for my physical hand moving the gun so that it was barely visible I aimed for one of the people at the back and fired hitting them square between the eyes, then sighted and shot another before they knew what had hit them, aimed and sighted for a third time and fired hitting the third in the shoulder, not a kill shot but enough. Then as I sighted a fourth time, the others started to shoot back forcing be to spring backwards to avoid being shot. Three down I thought, three more to go. Looking down at my vest I had taken off the door guard I noticed I had three grenades trapped to the front. Taking one out, I used my projection to see where I needed to throw, then lined it up stepping a few feet back and to the other side of the hallway then pulled the pin and threw the grenade so it bounced off the wall and rolled right to their midst while they kept unloading round after round. A couple seconds later the grenade went off and the gunfire ceased leaving the hall eerily quiet. I saw with my projection everyone was dead and I extinguished it stepping around the corner as one body. The door was still closed and I stepped over the dead guards to try the handle. Surprising me it was unlocked and I projected though the door to see another door sporting a high tech key card reader. I projected though the second door and saw everyone outside running right to left obviously alerted by something, extinguishing my projection I grabbed a key card off a guard and using it slipped out of the door and walked calmly the opposite way as everyone. Seeing a truck pulling in I made a beeline for it, and when the man stepped out I slammed the butt of my gun into his temple knocking him out cold and grabbing the keys from his hand as he fell. I then hopped into the drivers seat and slowly drove back the way he had come in. Approaching the gate he had com in through the guard stopped me however yelling “He’s in the truck!” alerting everyone to my presence. Knowing all plans of stealth were gone now I slammed my foot down on the gas kicking up dirt and rocks as I accelerate straight at the closing gate. The guard who had yelled had to leap out of the way to avoid being hit, and then I smashed through the chain link gate just as it shut flinging the two guards closing it into the air with the force of the hit and sped off down the road with the guards scrambling to get their vehicles to chase me.

I had no idea where I was and no idea where I was headed. I sped through the backroad as it wound through the trees not daring to split my bodies fearing I needed all my attention as one to keep from crashing.

After about five minutes of uneven dirt road surrounded by thick trees suddenly the road veered right and opened up onto a paved highway. Not knowing which way to go I chose right as I was still braced for a hard right from the previous turn. As I skidded onto the asphalt I caught a glimpse of the perusing trucks through the trees and sped up a little more startling the driver that unsuspectingly came around the corner in front of me. Flying down the road at about a hundred and ten I caught the name of the next town on a sign as it wizzed by in a blur “Pagosa Springs, 5 miles.”

Five miles later and still ahead of my pursuers, I entered the town and pulled into the first gas station I saw pulling in behind the semi truck filling the underground gas reservoir effectively hiding my truck from the road. Opening up the sole of my shoe and taking out twenty dollars from a secret compartment filled with emergency cash, I hopped out of the truck and ducked into the store just as my pursuers came into sight. The man behind the counter looked at me in my bullet proof vest and armed to the teeth knowingly but didn’t say anything. “Twenty at pump three, please” I said casually as we both ignored my getup and the cars speeding by outside. “And, is there an airport nearby?” He regarded me as he took the money and proscessed my transaction before handing me a receipt and replying “Keep going east on the highway for about two and a half miles, then take a right at the Speedway gas station. From there follow the signs for the airport.” “Speedway gas station” I replied and hurried out to fill up the truck.

Delegating my physical body with the task of filling up the truck, I projected my astral body out after the cars to see where they had gone. They had reached the end of town and were heading back slowly one or two of the group slitting off every now and then to look behind building or search a parking lot I had about ten minute before they got back to me I guessed and sped my projection back to me then launched it straight up surveying the backroads around me. Seeing a rout I could use to circumvent their movements I extinguished my projection just as the pump slowed for the last bit of my twenty dollars. As soon as it was finished pumping I put the nozzle back closed the gas cap and hopped back in starting the truck and pulling out onto the road then turning onto the side street I had picked and headed into a neighborhood.

Little did I know one of the group hunting me had suspected I might go into the neighborhoods and was on course to intercept me.