*We have some Armenian in this chapter, although I am not a native speaker, so I had to go off of Google Translate. Sorry if it is wrong in any way*
Soldiers Of Light
Innocence Lost
Adam crouched down in a vent, on the top floor of a supposed derelict building in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. But of course, his Intel, and he himself, knew better that the building never was, or has been derelict. A smuggling gang resided there. They smuggled children, and drugs, sold, then them trafficked to the highest bidder. Of course, no bidding would take place in plain sight, or anywhere with CCTV cameras.
And so, Adam huffed, for the sixth time whilst in said vent, and craved a cigarette. It was only when Pritchard spoke that the man was jolted out of his thoughts.
"Adam, I am getting nine signatures on the building. Now that's odd".
Adam tilted his head to look between the thin gaps in the grate. He saw several men, two were clutching the arms of a tiny girl, the girl that he was there to rescue. He grew angry and had to bite his lip to stop a growl from forcing its way from his throat. Frank took this as a reply, and huffed in annoyance.
"Only seven men went up, and onto that floor. The child was with them, so that makes eight".
The ex-SWAT member laughed.
"Heh, you can count. At least you do that adeptly Frank. Seriously though, you've been dropping the ball lately. We really don't know this girl's name? It's your job too, Frank".
Frank groaned and gulped down some coffee. It of course HAD to go down the wrong whole, and he spluttered it everywhere, and coughed violently. He almost threw up, from the sheer force of his coughing. Adam was genuinely concerned now. The techie nerd sounded sick.
"You're not getting sick are you?"
Pritchard stopped coughing and swallowed down some bile. He grimaced and felt light headed.
"I regret to say this, but yes, I believe I am".
"Aw shit. I was around you for at least a few days, doing paperwork and now you are sick".
Frank coughed again and felt more bile work its way up his throat.
"Your Redbreathers should stop you from getting ill. Why do you think when people get cold here, and you walk past them, you don't get it?"
Adam smirked.
"A decent immune system, sleep, well when I find time to sleep, eating good food…..".
Pritchard was going to vomit, he could feel it. He felt clammy, and shaky. He stood up and walked out of the office door, but kept his comm in.
"YOU LIVE OFF OF CEREAL! That isn't good food! Just rescue the girl and don't come back here, go somewhere else. I am going to vomit now. Oh god".
Frank pulled out the comm unit, placed it on top of a bin, and marched into the men's toilet.
Adam did feel a little bad for his tech adviser, but then again, he was asking for it. Not sleeping at all, living off a diet of coffee and energy drinks. He looked like a zombie, and now, it seemed, he also felt like one.
Adam heard a groan, and so moved the grate up.
The men had moved, but now, a woman was in his sight, and his retinal HUD scanned her over. She was cuffed, and badly bruised, on her arms, and her left cheek.
So that's the ninth person huh. And who the hell are you?
Hadley squirmed, and grimaced. The tangy smell of her own blood mixed in with the smell of sulfur, in the air from repeated gunshots, fired towards her, missing by mere centimeters.
Warning shots. Gang warfare seriously pisses me off. Just shoot me and be done with it. This fucking hurts.
The agent had no choice, she had to use her own blood, as lubrication, to get out of the cuffs. Her guns were not far from her, and there were a few crates by them, so she could roll and get behind them, for cover.
Hadley took a deep breath, and started rotating her wrists. The blood flowed down only one wrist, so when she got that one free, she had to rub them together, to free the other one.
She inwardly cussed, when one of the men walked back over to her.
"Անգլերեն քած".
Hadley smirked and put her middle finger up. The man gasped, and she dived for her guns.
"Ով է քած հիմա? Fucker".
She grabbed her guns and shot the man, through his skull. She got behind the crates and their captor ran and hid.
Good, at least her Father was smart enough to teach her to do that.
She moved up from her cover and started shooting the men, one by one, picking them off, rather easily, considering these men were ex-soldiers, for the Armenian forces.
Adam heard shooting and looked around the wall. He started shooting the men as well, before getting out his baton, and smacking one, over the head with it. The man slumped down, dead, and Hadley stared him down, with wide eyes.
"How many people have I pissed off? Armenians, Russians, and now a man who looks like a reject from the Matrix".
Adam looked away, and drew his gun, putting it to the woman's head. She did the same to him.
"We think alike then. Good. These bastards kidnapped Cressida. She is my boss' daughter. They did it because I foiled a major drug deal. We're talking billions here".
Adam was shocked. "Billions?"
Hadley rolled her eyes. "Didn't whomever tinker with you augment your hearing? Yes, billions. Cressida, it's okay honey. Don't mind the big, armed to the teeth brute here. Who are you anyway?"
The little girl in question ran from behind the wall and straight into Hadley's arms. She noticed the little girl had a comm in her hand, and she smiled.
"Thank you sweetheart. Seriously though, who the heck are you?"
Her tech contact, Blaine got in on the conversation, the moment she put the comm in her ear and turned it on.
"Hadley? Shit, you're alright. I was getting really worried. That is Adam Jensen, works for David Sarif, of Sarif Industries. His contact is Frank Pritchard".
The man in question was now as white as sheet, but was out of the toilet. He picked his comm back up, and walked back to his office.
Adam heard him rasp, and frowned. "Frank….".
When he arrived at his desk, he quickly traced Blaine's signal, and looked him up, and Hadley.
"Hadley Groves, works for British Intelligence, and Blaine Jackson, ex US military, former US agent for the FBI".
The female agent almost cackled. "Boys, really now? Bantering already? This will be fun. Also, Blaine, no need to start chewing your nails over me, you know I always work my way out of troublesome situations".
Blaine sighed. "You know how to get yourself in them remarkably well too, so yes, I do worry. You know, you'll scare the little one. Maybe tell her a story, calm her down.
"Blaine, please. Behave, I am in no mood for jokes. You know that I do not, and never have had, a maternal instinct".
Adam put his gun down, and so did Hadley. Cressida eyed him warily, before sticking her tongue out at him. He smirked at her gall, but found it cute.
"Big scary man frightening you is he? Shall I fight him off for you?"
The little girl giggled and moved her arms up. She wanted to be held.
Hadley frowned. "I can't honey, my arms are bleeding and I'll ruin your lovely dress. And you know Daddy won't be pleased if I do that now, will he? Listen, Adam? My helicopter was shot down, not long ago. Is there any way you could help us get to the British embassy? Refuel, on food and sleep too. We'll be safe there. My boss has contacts, so he has assured me that we will be fine. Sir?"
Two heaving sighs were heard in her ear, and she passed the comm to Cressida. Her Mother and Father were delighted to hear that their little girl was safe.
Her Mother, Rosalind squealed. "Oh Cressida! You're okay. We were so worried!"
Her Father, Edward was overjoyed. "Cressida, darling. Are you hurt?"
Cressida smiled. "Nope, Auntie Hadley helped me out, and a tall man in black".
"Man in black? Whom?"
Sarif managed to get in on the conversation, and at the right moment too. He did have impeccable timing sometimes, Adam thought.
"Ah, Adam's there too. He works for me. Sorry about that, Mr and Mrs Finch. Good to hear from you again, Edward. How's things in London?"
Edward sounded very unhappy. "Bad, David, very bad. First, a massive drugs deal is almost smuggled from Armenia, to the Russians. Luckily it was foiled, but then my daughter is taken, when we were on holiday in Greece. Now, here, the worry is that important documentation has been leaked about ongoing and closed cases. MI5 cannot afford a breach like that, it is far too severe".
David put his head in his hands.
"You know that I will help. I will do all I can to assist you. Faridah?"
The pilot picked up immediately.
"Yes boss?"
"Adam, Cressida and Hadley need picking up and taking to the British embassy".
"Got it. Jensen, I'm on my way".
When Malik arrived, Cressida looked terrified. Adam tilted his head at her. Hadley looked unhappy.
"Cressida gets travel sick, airsick too. Do you have a Dramamine tablet?"
The little girl shook her head.
Hadley groaned. "Oh dear. Now we have to deal with an airsick child, as well as the mysterious, quiet, man in black".
Adam rolled his eyes. He was quiet for a reason.
A damn good reason. Everything had gone to pot with Megan, and it made him sour, and nasty. He completely shut her out of his life, and so she had to move away from Detroit. For her sake, and for the sake of his mental state too.
He sighed at those bitter memories and got into the helicopter.
Take off was a bit of an uneasy one, and Cressida was fidgeting. Hadley tried to take her mind off the flying.
"You'll be back with Daddy tomorrow, and playing with your dolls".
The little girl's doe like azure eyes looked into her light grey ones.
"Are you going to be alright?"
She started to drift off, and that had the agent saying 'aww' in her mind.
"I will be. I'll get looked over, I promise. Sleep now, and I'll wake you in a little while, okay?"
She didn't receive a reply. She noticed Adam, with a slight grin on his face.
"Don't smile, please. You are beginning to frighten me. What's up? Or are you just gawking?"
His small grin widened.
"I might be…Anyway, I thought you said you aren't maternal. You're being awfully nice to little Cressida there".
Hadley clicked her tongue. "I'm not, but what am I supposed to do? Call her a little bitch? She isn't that bad, and besides, she is Edward's daughter. I would never talk to him like shit, so why would I do that to her, hmm?"
She had a point, though, Cressida seemed very young, and Adam figured that Edward would be around Sarif's age.
"Your boss had her late".
Hadley agreed. "Yeah, she wasn't planned, but you're right. He was forty-one and his wife was forty-three, when she was born. Wasn't expected at all, but she happened. Still, they are good parents. Whatever. Ugh, I am exhausted, wake me when we get to the embassy, okay? Thanks".
Adam felt a sense of deja-vu. Megan spoke to him like that, in the conversation they had, before she packed her bags and left Detroit. Then again, he had well and truly pissed her off, and it took a lot to do that. A hell of a lot.
But of course, he managed it, with relative ease. And it worried him. Whilst not the nicest person in the world, he certainly wasn't the nastiest either. But he had been a true horror to Megan, and he didn't wish to repeat that with Hadley.
Even if she did grate on him, and act all high and mighty.
He had to keep a cool head. For her sake, at least.
He still wasn't sure if, even after two years of not seeing his ex-girlfriend, with their explosive rowing coming to a head, if he was ready to deal with a bolshie woman, who seemed to have a stick rammed up her arse.
He did wonder why she acted like that though.
Adam closed his eyes and unwittingly, drifted off, into a world of nightmares.
His soul was even more tortured than he thought, and his soul was fragmented. Deep fissures in it weakened him, made him vulnerable.
And one thing that Adam Jensen really, really despised, was being vulnerable.
The first line of Armenian text translates as: "British bitch".
The second line translates as: "Who's the bitch now?"
Then again, I did rely off of Google Translate.