Chapter One
Cracking his knuckles, Birkhoff looked over the techs busily working on their random tasks, surveillance and research assignments at their stations. It was a good morning- there were no active missions, Amanda hadn't tried anything in a few weeks, so things were fairly peaceful in Division- as peaceful as they could be. For once it wasn't confusing to be there- it felt like they may actually be accomplishing what they were setting out for.
Nikita and Michael were in Ryan's office having a meeting- probably about the dirty thirty- Alex and Sean were doing all kinds of random tasks that needed doing now that Division had a spare moment. They were currently down a in the weapons cache, taking inventory according to Birkhoff's tablet. Birkhoff sat down in his chair and leaned back, thankful for the peace. "Birkhoff, I have something!" one of the techs called for his attention, putting his screen up on the main display. "Something has triggered a motion perimeter alarm up on the farm."
With a groan Birkhoff got up and walked over to the tech's station. Sure thought there was a big red bar across his screen showing the alert. "Pull up the alarm." Birkhoff directed.
A map filled the big screen. The alarm that had been triggered was right next to the farm, if not in it. "Pull up the cameras." Birkhoff walked closer to the screen.
The camera image filled the screen and when it focused, Birkhoff nearly collapsed from shock. When he recovered, he keyed his earpiece and said to Nikita and Michael, "Guys, we've gotta talk." His eyes never leaving the screen.
Sean and Alex carefully made their way up to the barn. They both had their guns drawn; watching for the smallest sign that someone was around, that some trap was set. When they got to the door, Alex covered Sean while he opened the barn door. He checked around the entryway, and then signaled for Alex to follow him in. There was no sign of anyone around, so they carefully approached what had been placed in the middle of the barn. "What the hell is that?" Sean asked, in shock.
"What does it look like?" Alex questioned him back.
"But what is it doing here?" Sean was completely confused.
"I guess we wake it in to Division and find out." Alex replied.
Ryan, Owen, Michael, Nikita and Birkhoff were all waiting as Sean and Alex made their way into Ryan's office. For his part Birkhoff hadn't told the others what was up there, he wanted them to see it for themselves to make sure they believed it. Alex walked in first, followed by Sean, carrying the basket they had picked up behind him. "What is it?" Ryan asked in a panic, "Did Amanda try to bomb us?"
Sean shook his head no and pulled the basket out from behind him to place it up on the coffee table. Everyone could now see the basket's contents. "What is that?" Nikita asked, looking into the basket in shock.
In the small basket was a pink blanket and a small baby with a little bit of dark blond hair, asleep. "Why did someone leave a baby in the barn? Do we know who did it?" Michael asked.
Birkhoff tapped a couple of buttons on his tablet, pulling up the surveillance video on Ryan's big screen. They watched as a man who appeared to be homeless, by the dirty, tattered clothes he wore, put the basket down and ran. It was obvious someone had paid him to leave the basket and run. After watching the video, Michael made his way to the basket and carefully lifted the tiny girl out. "I don't think Haley was ever this tiny." Michael reminisced about his daughter.
"Hey, there's something under her." Sean reached into the basket, pulling out the manila envelope.
Everyone waited as Sean untied the envelope and pulled out a bunch of papers. He glanced over them quickly before quickly commenting, "Oh no."
"What is it?" Nikita asked as the group watched Sean scan the letter.
"Amanda." Sean replied with contempt clear in his voice.
"Read it." Ryan suggested.
Clearing his throat, Sean began to read, "After three peaceful months I'm sure you've probably forgotten all about me. Trust me I have just been building up my defenses."
Everyone rolled their eyes. Amanda was being cocky and assumptive per normal. "What does this have to do with a baby?" Birkhoff asked.
"You're probably wondering what the baby has to do with anything. Her name is Aviana. She is a couple weeks old," Sean read as Michael continued to rock Aviana in his arms. Birkhoff found it weird to see the trained assassin cradling a baby in his arms. Everyone in the room was surprised when Sean suddenly complained, "What?"
"What is it?" Nikita asked.
Sean cleared his throat and took a breath before continuing to read. Everyone could tell by his reaction that this wasn't going to be good news. Birkhoff could feel the hair on his arms stand up on end. "Aviana is related to one of you."
The room froze in a mixture of shock and fear. How could the baby belong to one of them? None of them had the time for a relationship except Michael and Nikita, and if they'd had a child, it would have been kind of obvious. "What?" Ryan asked in a panic, expressing all their feelings.
"As you know, I have had all of you in custody. Whether for ten minutes or a week, you've been my captive. While I held you, I stole a little of your biological material, the disgust was clear in Sean's voice as he read that information, "Then, with the help of one of my loyal workers, one of you became a parent. I'll send you her birth certificate in a few weeks, until then you will have to sweat over who Avi looks like or belongs to. Love, Amanda."
Sean looked up from the letter and everyone was just staring at each other and the baby in Michael's arms. She was far too little for them to guess who she looked like. It was somewhat safe to rule out Nikita- the baby showed no sign of her Asian heritage. "So now what?" Birkhoff asked. "We are not set up for a baby!"
"No, we're not." Ryan agreed in reply, "But we can't abandon her if she belongs to one of us."
"How do we figure out who she's related to?" Alex played with the baby's tiny foot through the blanket.
"We wait for the birth certificate?" Sean suggested as if it were the obvious answer.
"Birkhoff," Nikita turned to the tech, "Can you do DNA tests?"
Thinking for a moment, Birkhoff replied, "Yeah. It would take a few days."
"What do we do until then?" Owen finally broke his silence.
"Well, someone is going to have to go shopping for supplies." Ryan pointed out, "Then we take care of her in shifts."
"No way!" Birkhoff immediately complained, "Children and I do not mix."
"I second that." Nikita added, clearly uncomfortable with the idea.
"But the navy seal or ex-cleaner are good ideas." Owen sarcastically replied.
Ryan rubbed his temples. Everyone was arguing back and forth and there were just no good solutions. "Guys!" Ryan shouted to get their attention, "I know this isn't ideal, but fighting is what Amanda wants. We need to get through this."
Everyone stopped knowing that Ryan was right. "I will take the first shift, since I'm the only one with kid experience." Michael suggested.
"Sounds good." Ryan agreed. "Meanwhile, Birkhoff, have someone from medical come up to draw our blood and hers."
Birkhoff nodded and headed off to medical. When he got there, the only person around was Ella, a physician's assistant who had been arrested for a car accident, then made her way to Division. She had been pretty new when Division had stopped active recruiting, one of the last to come in, so Birkhoff didn't know her very well. "Hi recruit." He greeted her.
Ella looked up from the medication she had been measuring. "Birkhoff right?" she looked up at him with a friendly smile.
"Yeah." He replied.
"What can I do for you?" she asked, screwing the cap onto the medication, then put it back on the shelf.
"We have a sensitive issue that we need some medical assistance with." Birkhoff explained.
Ella looked at him slightly confused. "Can you at least tell me what kind of equipment I need to bring?" she asked.
"We need to draw blood." He told her. "Please don't spread it around until we make an announcement but there is a baby and we are trying to determine who her parent is."
The look of confusion just continued to grow. "Okay." She gave a smile, "I'm not even going to ask. Let me grab a couple things. How many vials do I need?"
Birkhoff quickly counted in his head- himself Aviana, Nikita, Michael, Sean, Alex, Ryan and Owen. "Eight." He replied.
Ella crossed the room and grabbed the supplies she would need. "I'll take some extra just in case." She told him. Putting everything into her medical bag, she asked, "Where are we going?"
"Ryan's office." Birkhoff replied.
Pulling the strap of the medical bag over her shoulder, she said, "Lead me on."
Birkhoff lead Ella up to Ryan's office. Everyone was still waiting there to get the blood draw done.
Ella had to laugh at the sight as she entered the room. She had never seen a group of people more nervous looking. In the middle of the room was Michael, holding the baby that Birkhoff had mentioned. No one was talking, the room was very quiet. Ella took it as a sign she should just do what she came to do. Putting her bag on the table, Ella pulled out her supplies. "Who's first?" Ella looked around the room.
"Let's do her blood draw first." Michael brought the baby towards Ella.
They put her down on the table and Ella carefully pricked her heel, surprised the baby barely even flinched. After she got the blood she needed and labeled the tube "baby", she bandaged the little girl's heel as she asked, "What's her name?"
"Aviana." Michael replied as Ella wrote it on the vial to be more accurate.
Placing the tube into the tray, Ella asked, "Next?" all of the adults just looked back at Ella.
When no one responded, Ella added, "Come on you're all adults."
Michael rolled up his sleeve so Ella could draw his blood. As she tied the tourniquet around his arm, she asked, "Do you want your tubes labeled by name or do you want me to track the results randomly."
Again they all looked nervously at each other. "Do it randomly," Birkhoff finally suggested, "That way I won't know the results when I run them."
Everyone nodded in agreement. "Sounds like a plan." Nikita agreed.
Carefully Ella took everyone's blood labeling them with letters and keeping a record or key for herself so they could figure out who the parent was. Ella handed the blood samples over to Birkhoff. "I'll get right on these." He replied, leaving the room.
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