Darwin, Abu Dhabi, UAE

As the van lurched through the early evening traffic Darwin found himself wishing he could be anywhere else but where he was. He hated the desert, hated everything about. He hated the sand that would inevitably get in his boots, hated the dry heat, the lack of clouds in the sky. He admired what the Arabs were doing, raising a city out of the ocean, but despite the glistening sky scrapers and clean concrete it was still in the middle of a desert. If it was up to him they wouldn't have taken the job, but Wylie had assured him of it's ease so who was he to argue? He could stomach the desert for a few days. Besides, a job's a job.

"Hey…Dar…you there mate? You look a million miles away."

"If only," Darwin muttered under his breath."

"What was that then?"

"Nothing. I'm fine. Just wanna get this done and get out of here."

They drove on in silence for another mile or two, Darwin running the job down in his head for the hundredth time.

"Hey Dar, you ever wonder what Pop's up too?"

Darwin was about to say something but paused and shifted in his seat to look at his lanky twin. He was slouched over in the passenger seat smoking a cigarette, one long leg hanging out of the window, watching the smoke curl up and disappear into the air.

"You're serious?"

"Yeah, course I am."

"Wylie, why would I ever wonder what Pop's up too?"

"I dunno…was just asking."

He watched Wylie take a drag on his cigarette and run his hand through his brown hair then turned his attention back towards the road. They're destination loomed large just a mile or two in front of them.

"Well do you think they'd tell us if anything happened to him? Like if he was dead?"

"I doubt it," Darwin said after thinking a moment. "We aren't exactly their favorite people."

"Oh come on, you don't think they're still sore about that thing on Chimeria do you? After all this time?"

"Why wouldn't they be?"

"Cause that was forever ago," his twin said incredulously. "I mean they don't seem to mind us taking jobs. We've been doing that since we got here. Why wouldn't they let us know if Pop kicked the bucket?"

"Because Wylie, they don't him. They like us even less. There is a reason we were banished to this backwater shithole and it's not you going fucking megaton on Chimeria. That was just the excuse they were waiting for. Now get it together, we're here."

Here was the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority Tower, or more specifically, the adjacent parking garage. Their contact in the city had provided them with their cover, contractors hired to repair speed bumps in the tunnel that connected the parking garage and the tower. They showed the guard at the gatehouse their credentials and work order and he gave them directions to the tunnel and relatively good English. There was another gatehouse at the beginning of the tunnel, but again their credentials came through. The guards were actually quite happy someone was finally here to fix the potholes.

"That's the last one yeah?"

"Yeah," Wylie said, already slipping out of the blue jumpsuit he was wearing.

"Alright…what corner is the power station in again?"

"Just a tic," he said he pulled a blueprint of the building and flipped clockwise, then counter-clockwise, then clockwise again. "Eh, northeast."

"Take the wheel," and he did while Darwin slid out of his own jumpsuit.

They rolled past delivery trucks, armored cars, limousines, then down a ramp into a more sparsely occupied level, subbasement 4 according to the signs, and finally stopped next to large collection of turbines and generators. It struck him as odd that a single building would need as much power as this power station could obviously supply but he put it out of his mind. Darwin breathed a heavy sigh and rubbed his temples before turning to his brother again.

"Alright Wylie, run it down for me one more time."

"Standard smash and grab. Target's on the 13 floor."

"Target is?"

"Samuel Castro. Spoiled brat who wanted to rebel, ran off, joined a cult, daddy said come home, cult said no, daddy pays us to get him. Like I said, stan…uh oh…"

"Huh," Darwin said confused and then turned around to see what his brother was gawking at. A heavyset Arab carrying an Uzi who'd been smoking had just noticed them and was coming this way. He wasn't a guard, too well dressed. He was someone's hired muscle. As he drew closer he started shouting in Arabic. Arabic was easily the most widespread language Darwin had never bothered to learn. It was mostly due to his complete disdain for the area it was normally spoken in, but he made a mental note to learn it if they succeeded today.

"Wylie, you know what he's saying?"

"Ehhhh, something about papers and how we shouldn't be down here."

"Oh yeah papers! You want our papers," Darwin smiled at the man, kept smiling , and as he put a finger up to signal 'just give me a moment' the big man stopped. Darwin reached into the compartment between Wylie and himself and before the Arab could take another step he whirled around and put three .45 ACP rounds in the man's chest.

"Get him, I'll arm the bomb."

As Wylie hefted the man onto his shoulder with ease Darwin slid his Colt .45 into his belt and went to the back of the van. Throwing open the doors he did a mental check of van's contents. Wylie's M3A1, his Tavor, a varying array of 9MM handguns, grenades, flashbangs, a hatchet, a machete, a sawed-off double barrel shotgun, and there in the very back a prodigious amount of C-4 plastic explosive.

"Wylie," Darwin said as his brother through the dead man into the van, ", how much C-4 did you tell them to get?"

"Lots and lots! Oh look a hatchet! I call the hatchet!"

"You can have it if you shut your mouth and quiet down."

In silence they equipped themselves, sliding on Kevlar, elbow and knee pads, extra clips of ammo. It wasn't until they were almost ready to head out when his brother again brought up their father.

"Ya know, Darwin, you could use the conjuring ball and just call him. I know it's been 80 years and the magic's almost run out but maybe we could find a fairy or something and…"

"And what then eh," his patience finally at an end, ", we'll give Pop a call and see if he wants to come take a holiday on Earth? He doesn't like it here Wylie! The last time he was here he failed a contract and in a drunken stupor he knocked up mom!"

"Come on now Dar that's not the last time he was here. He came back and got us remember?"

"Yes Wylie I do remember. The assassin the Collective sent to clean up Pop's mess saw us and recognized immediately that we were half Britlingen. That's when Pop came back, under threat of his own banishment mind you, and took us away to be raised by the Collective."

"We had some fun growing up there though…didn't we?"

"You and I have a very different understanding of the word fun big brother," Darwin said clapping his hand on his brother's shoulder. "Now grab the gas masks and the parachutes and throw them in the duffle bag. Toss some of that extra C-4 and the detonators in there too while you're at it."

Wylie smiled at him, did as he was told, and the two of them strolled to the service elevator. Darwin checked the Sona-Scanner on his wrist and sighed. It was a cheap, low tech imitation of the one he had when he was with the Collective. Instead of a fully functioning three dimensional map it showed a two dimensional blue grid with anything making enough noise to be picked up showing up as a dot.

"1313 right?"

"Yup."

Darwin scrolled around until he found 1313 and the Sona-Scanner showed 19 dots on in the room.

"Alright…let's get on with it," Darwin said as he handed Wylie an Israeli M15 gas mask from their duffle bag and put on his own.

"Next stop, 13th floor."