Chapter One

Breakfast at the Green Dome

A/N: NEVER trust anyone in here who wears a black top hat!

Nancy Drew stared at the man in front of her in a black top hat and trench coat. Black slacks, black boots …she didn't trust him. "What do you mean, Frank's dead?" she hissed. "He's smarter than that."

The man leaned against the doorframe; his eyebrows almost touching and a permanent line between them, giving him a look almost like one she had seen before on a man she hadn't trusted. Behind her, her and Frank's ten-year-old son, Brett, was listening. "Look, Mrs. Hardy, your husband died in the line of duty. We couldn't rescue him in time. The building he was in went up in flames."

He woke slowly, feeling dizzy and slightly nauseous. Wondering why he was still in the apartment he shared with Nancy and their son Brett—since the last thing he had heard was the hissing sound of gas being pumped into their apartment by means of the keyhole as he packed his things—he swung his legs over the edge of the bed.

The blue lace curtains Nancy had sewn and hung in the windows were closed. He unsteadily got to his feet, and, making his way over to the nearest window, opened them.

He expected to see the busy streets of downtown Bayport. Instead, he saw a courtyard with a fountain. Lined with greenery. Deserted.

His eyes widened in shock. How had he gotten here? How long had he been unconscious? Long enough to be transported here, evidently. Wherever here was.

The man, who was in his late thirties, opened the door and stepped out, not into the hallway he expected, but into fresh air and a green-trimmed walk. He went quickly down to the fountain, and discovered there was more there other than what he could see through his window. But he turned back, looking the way he had come.

The dwelling he had stepped out of had a sign near it: Number 12. Private.

He made his way along the green on the other side of the fountain, noting white squares painted onto the grass in one area of the green. A chessboard? Perhaps.

He walked slowly back to Number 12's imitated apartment, puzzled.

The front door swung open with an electronic hum shortly after he had re-entered his dwelling, admitting a view of the bustling walkers in the courtyard and an elderly man, dressed in a suit that was almost comical in the manner of which it had been patterned. Rounded collar on the dark blue suit-coat, trimmed with white. Grey turtleneck shirt underneath, beige casual slacks. Dark blue tennis shoes, again trimmed with white and with white laces. A broad-brimmed, yellow straw hat, its top squat and flat. And a pin upon the pocket, round and—again—white, with an old-fashioned bicycle. With a canopy. And a number in a boldly typed, reddish font: 2.

The man smiled. For some reason, the man who thought he was Number 12 felt cold.

"Where is my family?"

The question was involuntary. Abrupt.

"You are in the Village," the man (Number 2?) said, ignoring his companion's words. "I would like to invite you for breakfast at ten. In the Green Dome."

Number 12 stood in front of Number 2's console, eyeing the peculiarly rounded chair that had risen up from the floor to greet his arrival. Like a big black ball, halved and hollowed and decorated with pillows. They try to make this place seem like home. But it's not. WHERE IS THIS FREAKHOUSE?

"Where am I?" Number 12 asked. He was still dressed in his business clothing: a stark contrast to Number 2's comical suit.

"The Village," Number 2 said again.

"Why do you have a number? Number 2," he observed.

"Here we have no names. Only numbers," 2 said. As if reciting from memory. As if it had been drilled into him countless times.

Number 12 leaned in towards his captor. "I am not a number," he said, his words strangely familiar. Why? "I will not be filed, stamped, pushed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered! My life—is my own. I am a man. A free man. Frank Hardy. Where are my wife and son? My brother? My parents? My real home, not the home you have imitated for me?"

"You quit. Walked out," his companion said, tracing the triangular handle of his umbrella and acting as though he had not heard a word the dark-haired man calling himself Frank Hardy had just told him.

"I didn't walk out," Number 12 growled, his dark eyes flashing. "I resigned."

"Against your superior's orders," Number 2 pointed out. "You know too much."

Number 2 pressed a button on the silver-grey horseshoe console with his umbrella, a large, primary-coloured thing with a plain but peculiar handle. And a small, round table, suitable for one occupant, rose up from a hidden cavity in the floor.

He pressed a second button with his umbrella, this time summoning a chair near the table. All this summoned furniture, of course, appeared outside the console, near where Number 12 was standing.

The metal doors, which led into the silver-grey chamber, slid open, revealing a short, portly old figure wheeling a cart laden with dome-covered trays. The cart was wheeled up to the table, and its contents were unloaded.

Number 12, suddenly realizing how hungry he was, lifted some of the domes. Steam rose from underneath them, and through it he could see the trays' contents: poached eggs sprinkled with ground black pepper, bacon, toast. The portly man-dwarf who had brought in the cart was now placing a teapot upon the already full table, wedging it in between the eggs and bacon. And a clean plate was set before Number 12, along with a set of silverware and a teacup.

He poured the contents of the teapot into the cup; discovered from the aroma that it was his preferred flavour of coffee. Looking up, he saw that Number 2 was watching him carefully.

Number 12 sat in the chair, cradling the warm teacup in his hands. "What is this place?" he asked, though he thought he knew what the answer would be.

"Your home," Number 2 replied. "It is where people like yourself are taken after they have served their time." He paused. "We call it 'your home from home.'"

"A prison," Number 12 said. It wasn't a question, but the man in front of him perceived it as one, and looked at him peculiarly; though he didn't reply.

"I want to know where my family is. Why I am here," Number 12 insisted bluntly after he had finished eating. Cautiously, of course, for he still didn't trust Number 2.

The latter was watching him with pursed lips, his chin resting upon his hands, which were, in turn, resting upon the triangular handle of his umbrella. "You are here because you quit," Number 2 said.

"I didn't quit," Number 12 growled again. "I resigned. Where is my family?"

Number 2 sighed. "They have been told you died."

Number 12 stared at him. "And how did I supposedly die?" he asked icily.

"A fire. You were trapped, wounded by one of the men you were chasing, in a building that suddenly went up in flames," Number 2 informed him.

"Nancy won't take that for an answer," Number 12 stated. "Joe won't, either. They'll find me."

"You have too much confidence in your family and friends."

Number 12 shrugged. "They will find me," he insisted. And he got up and left, the metal doors to the circular room in which Number 2 resided opening, then sliding shut after him.

"I think," Number 2 said quietly to himself, still resting his chin upon the triangular handle of his coloured umbrella but now watching the large screen on one side of the silver-grey room that now showed Number 12 walking briskly down the path to his dwelling, "we have a challenge."