The Black Anna
Oo000oo000oO
A fanfiction
By Zombie Boy.
Oo000oo000oO
Hate your face, hate your lies and the blank look in your eyes
Hate your needs, hate your wants, hate the way you love to taunt
Hate your voice, makes me cringe every time I hear you speak
100 ways to hate, by Five Finger Death Punch.
Oo000oo000oO
It was raining. Correction, it was pouring buckets.
Riding in the passenger seat of a GAZ, Meg took the last drag on her cigarette and exhaled a blue cloud of smoke as she wondered when the rain was going to end. She had just spent the last two months in equatorial Africa, where it was currently the wet season.
It was raining like this there, too.
"It keeps raining like this, I'm gonna start mildewing." Meg thought sourly as she stared out through the windshield.
"I'm never going to get used to those."
"What?" Meg asked, looking over at the drivers seat where her partner sat.
"I said I'm never going to get used to those." Eric said and pointed.
Meg saw a truck coming at them in the opposite lane and realized that it was one of the automated trucks that Stivers had been building, part of the machinery that was demolishing and decontaminating Chernobyl, rolling along with a load of rubble in the bed.
"Oh." Meg said. "Those things."
Eric looked at his partner out of the corner of his eye. "You okay?" he asked.
"I was just wondering when this rain is gonna let up." Meg told him.
"Probably about five minutes after we leave." quipped Eric.
"Probably." Meg agreed. "Here's my stop."
"I see it." Eric said.
Ahead of them a series of shipping containers came into view through the rain. Easing over, Eric pulled up in front of a blue one.
"Here you go." Eric said.
"Thanks." Meg said, and pulled the hood up on her poncho.
Getting out of the GAZ, Meg headed for the shipping container. The container had a door set into the end with an electronic lock. Digging around under her poncho, she produced a key card and pressed it against the lock for a second.
There was a beep and thunk, and the door was unlocked. Pulling it open, she hurriedly stepped inside, glad to be out of the rain. Letting the door slam shut behind her, she felt around for the light switch, found it, and flipped it on.
Overhead fluorescents flickered on, revealing the interior of the container. In contrast to the exterior, which was corrugated and slathered in industrial paint, the interior was carpeted and drywall covered the walls and ceiling.
Shucking her poncho, Meg fired up the heater then sat down at her computer while she waited for the heater to warm up her quarters.
Oo000oo000oO
An hour later, after everything had gotten warmed up, she had taken a quick shower, changed into a fresh pair of panties and tank top then put on a pot of coffee, Meg sat back down at her computer to check her email.
Opening her email account, she saw that she had a massive amount of unanswered email, and right at the top-
"The hell?"
Scowling slightly, Meg leaned forward slightly.
"New member of the Griffin family..." she muttered, a scowl forming on her face. "Oh, hell no."
Her rage began to build as she read the email from her mother. According to it, her ... brother was getting engaged to his girlfriend, Anna. She remembered Anna – she worked at the veterinary clinic. Nice. Polite.
Blond.
Meg's pupils shrank to pinpoints and her hands clenched into fists, her nails carving shavings from the surface of the desk. Red clouded her vision and her pulse pounded in her ears.
Grinding her teeth together, Meg closed her eyes, took control of her breathing and took several deep, calming, breaths, forcing the rage down and regaining control.
"Calm." she said. "Calm."
Taking a deep breath, she exhaled slowly.
"Calm." she said.
Her features calmed and she opened her eyes. Taking a breath she again looked at the email.
"I have to fix this." she said.
Shaking out a Lucky Strike, she lit up, took a drag and exhaled.
"How to fix this ..." she mused. "How to fix this."
Oo000oo000oO
Fishing the last of her Luckies out of the pack, she crumpled it up and tossed it into the trash. She was in a bit of a conundrum. Correcting the situation with her brother would be easy enough. But the hard part would be getting approval for it. Chris and Andrew had her and Eric running themselves ragged, doing jobs and raising money.
They had been doing this ever since B3S had acquired the Chernobyl exclusion zone and formed Outer Heaven. Doing so had seriously drained their capital, collected over near two decades of doing very insane, very dangerous work.
Outer Heaven wasn't broke, not by any means. But they did have a shortage of ready cash at the moment, and that's where she and Eric came in. They, and almost every other team, were out in the field, doing jobs, earning cash.
They hadn't had a break in eighteen months. That brought a memory to the surface of her thoughts. A girl that she'd had, on the job before their last one. It was in the Balkans. She'd been a black haired beauty, built like a muscle-bound ballerina of maybe eighteen years. Just the way she liked them when she was with girls.
She had been so supple ...
Meg really wished that she had more than just a couple of days off. She'd get a flight and go somewhere and find herself a girl or a boy, or both. But they didn't have the time.
Flicking her lighter to life, she lit her cigarette and gave the monitor a scowl. She also really wished that she could also take the time to take of the situation with her brother as well. But, she was needed to bring in cash ...
She glanced at the name on the sender bar and gave it a really nasty look for a second.
"You were too good to ditch that fuck for the million dollars Grandpa offered-" Meg stopped in mid thought. "Wait a minute."
Her father had tried to rip off her grandfathers vault. Which was buried beneath the Peweterschmitt mansion in Martha's Vineyard. And full of gold, cash, bonds, gems ...
A smile creased her face as an idea blossomed in her mind. Yes, that would do ...
"You should have taken the money, Mom." Meg thought. "Grandpa would certainly appreciate it, since I'm going to be doing what my father couldn't do and rip him off."
And then maybe she could take care of that thing. She doubted that she was going to get any time off soon, so getting laid was out of the question. But she had a piece of plastic and rubber that could help ease that problem.
Taking a drag on her cigarette, Meg flicked the ash off the end and got up. She had something to take care of, then she was going to put an op plan together for the Four.
Oo000oo000oO
Outer Heaven's Operation Center wasn't much to look at from the outside. It was just a group of shipping containers stacked together. Much like Meg's quarters, they had been cut and welded together to form a rough but serviceable building.
On top there was a forest of antennas and dishes, and out front there was a space for parking. The whole mess had been set up in what had been a soccer stadium. Pulling into the parking area, Meg parked the GAZ she was driving and pulled the hood up on her poncho before she got out and walked into the Op Center.
"It's like a cow pissing on a flat rock out there." she heard Stivers grumble as she came in.
"Yeah, it's forecast to be like this for the next couple of days- oh, hey, Meg." Andrew said as she came in.
"Hey Andrew." Meg said.
The interior of the Op Center was much like the outside: Rough but serviceable. Folding tables had been set up here and there as desks, worktables, etc. Fluorescent lighting lit the room and there were whole racks of servers lining one wall, and she saw Larry tucked into an alcove between a couple of the racks, hammering away at his computer.
Andrew and Chris were seated at their desks, which they had brought with them from Chicago. Andrew at his antique oak desk, and Chris at the plate steel monstrosity that he had welded up.
"I got a proposal for you guys." Meg said, grabbing her mug and walking over to the communal coffee pot.
"For what?" Chris asked, peeking around the piles of clutter that always seemed to congregate on his desk.
"A solution to our cash flow problem." Meg replied.
"Really." Andrew said. "Do tell."
Meg took a sip of her coffee and walked over to where she was standing roughly between the two men. "Okay, you guys know who my maternal grandfather is?" she asked.
"Yeah." Chris said. "Carter Pewterschmitt. Old, old, blooded rich New Englander. What about him."
Meg smiled slightly. "Did I tell you guys that he has a vault?" she asked.
"Meg, what kind of vault does he have?" Andrew asked.
"A big one." Meg said. "Filled with bullion, cash in unmarked bills, bearer bonds, and other assorted valuable things."
Chris dug a cigar out of his humidor and clipped the end off. "How do you know this?" he asked. "That's something you want to keep on the down low."
Meg shrugged. "Through my father." she said. "I don't know how that idiot found out about it, but he and his idiot friends tried to rip it off a few years back."
"I see." Andrew said. "So, how do you want to do this?" he asked.
"Eric and I go in, scout the vault, get everything we can on it and go from there." Meg said. "I was figuring that the magical's could do the actual job. They have the means to get in and out with everything and do it quietly."
Andrew nodded as he listened to Meg's description of hr plan. "Sounds good to me." he said. "What do you think, Chris?" he asked.
Chris sparked a butane torch to life and lit his cigar off of it. "Sounds good to me." was his verdict.
"Okay then." Andrew said. "You and Eric get on that." he added. "We'll reassign your next operation to someone else. Larry!"
"What?" Larry asked, still hammering away at his coding.
"You and Joss get your stuff. You're doing Meg and Eric's op." Andrew told him.
"But I got to get this coding done-" Larry protested.
"I'll take care of it." Chris told him.
"Alright." Larry said. "I'll send you what I got done so far."
"Thanks." Chris said.
"Anyways." Meg said. "There's one more thing." she added.
"What's that?" Andrew asked.
"I have some personal business to attend to while I'm in the area." Meg answered.
"I thought you already whacked everybody you were gonna whack before we left." Chris groused.
"This is a new development." Meg explained. "My brother's gotten engaged."
"Oh." Andrew said. "I thought he was single."
"No, he has a girlfriend." Meg explained. "She's a veterinarian. A little ... blond thing."
Chris and Andrew both caught the hesitation in her voice when she mentioned the girl's appearance.
"Just don't get caught." Andrew told her.
"I won't." Meg said.
Oo000oo000oO
Forty eight hours later, Meg and Eric landed in New Brunswick, aboard a Fedex 757-200. When they landed at the Greater Moncton Airport, they slipped out through the cargo part of the airport.
They got a room at a nearby hotel, then the next day Eric set to work procuring them a vehicle. While most people would have headed for the nearest parking garage, he headed for the hotel bar. Meg, however, stayed in their room.
It didn't take him long to find a rabbit. Said rabbit was a cute little brunette middle manager in an insurance company that was there on an extended business trip to the area named Carla C. Myers, 35, of Hope, New Mexico.
She was 5' 7', 130lbs, recently divorced with no children. And by the look in her eye, she could suck start a snowblower.
And she had a rental car.
"So what is it you do for a living?" Carla asked as she stirred her martini with the toothpick skewering the olive.
Eric gave her a very charming smile. "I'm a consultant." he said.
"What kind of consultant?" Carla asked, leaning forward slightly and giving Eric a look at her cleavage.
Eric looked at the 'vee' made by the pair of very large C cups and decided that any man who would want to divorce those had to be gay.
"You could say that I'm a domestic security consultant." was Eric's answer. "I basically travel the world working with foreign governments, helping with crime & terrorism prevention."
"Sound's exciting." Carla commented and took a sip of her martini.
"It can be, occasionally." Eric said with a nod. "Mainly though, it's just a blur of dingy motel rooms and questionable food."
"Oh."
Eric, of course, was leaving out a few crucial details from his description of his duties. Like the fact that the work he did for those foreign governments usually involved the wholesale slaughter of the terrorists and criminals.
"So." Carla said, looking at the time on her cellphone. "It's getting kind of late. Your room or mine?"
Oh yeah, he picked a good one.
"Yours." Eric said. "My partner's in my room."
"Partner?" Carla asked, arching an eyebrow.
"We work in pairs." Eric explained. "Usually one of us does the talking while the other roots around in the field with the locals."
"Ohhh..." Carla said as she opened up her purse.
"Please, allow me." Eric said, taking out his wallet.
"Oh, aren't you the gentleman..." Carla said with a mischievous smile.
Eric smiled back. "I certainly can be." he said.
Oo000oo000oO
"Ssssooo... " Carla said as the door to her hotel room clicked shut behind them. "What do you want to do first?"
Eric smiled. "This." he said, and slipped the blade of his stiletto between her ribs and into her heart while simultaneously clapping his hand over her mouth. "Sorry, babe." he said into her ear. "But I need your car."
Carla gurgled weakly and shuddered, then went still. Leaving the knife in her, he lowered her body to the floor, then took out his cellphone.
Oo000oo000oO
Meg was sitting on the bed in a tank top and her panties in the lotus position when her phone's screen lit up. Opening her eyes, she reached over and picked it up where it was lying next to her CZ 82.
"Hello." she said calmly.
"Meg, it's Eric." her partners voice came over the line. "We got a ride. Get moving."
"Where are you?" Meg asked as she unfolded herself from the bed.
"Room 404." Eric answered.
"I'll be there in ten. I need to get my pants and my boots." Meg said.
"Meditating again?" Eric asked.
"Would you rather I not?" Meg asked.
"Good point." Eric said before he hung up.
Oo000oo000oO
True to her word, Meg arrived at Room 404 exactly ten minutes later. Eric opened the door without her even needing to knock.
"Come on in." he said.
Meg stepped in and looked around the room. Other than a large wheeled suitcase in the middle of the room, it was empty. She immediately focused her attention on the suitcase.
"You stuffed her in the suitcase?" she asked.
"Oh, I can't put one over on you, Meg." Eric said and tossed her a set of keys. "Here. I'll pull the case. You look for the car."
Meg looked at the keys in her hand and looked at the key fob. "That'll be easy." she said. "Just beep it." she added, tapping one of the buttons with her thumb.
"Thank God for small favors." Eric said and grabbed hold of the suitcase's carry handle. "Let's go."
Oo000oo000oO
A quick elevator ride later and they were in the parking garage and began to walk up and down the aisles of cars, Eric pulling the suitcase. It took them half an hour to locate the car. After loading the suitcase into it, they started driving, heading south on Route 95.
Heading south, they drove for several hours, getting close to the border two and a half hours before dawn. They ditched the car about ten minutes from the border, taking a gravel turnoff and driving off towards a small lake.
Parking near a boat ramp, they produced rags and bleach from their NDS bags and quickly wiped the car down, then ran a hand held vacuum over the seats before shoving the car into the lake.
After making sure that it was completely submerged, they got their bearings and started walking, heading for the border.
"I really wish we could have kept the car." Eric whispered as they picked their way through the woods. "It've been nice to just drive across the border."
"Yeah, but we're on watch lists, remember?" Meg whispered back.
"Yeah, I know." Eric said. "It sucks-"
Both of them froze when they head a twig snap ahead of them. Drawing their sidearms, they crouched down and waited for whatever it was that made the noise to come into view. They didn't have long to wait; There were several more twigs snapping mixed with the sounds of something crashing through the underbrush, and then a man came stumbling into view-
"What the hell?" Eric exclaimed aloud and stood up. "Steven King?"
"Oh!" Steven King said, startled by Eric's revealing himself. "What are you doing here?"
Eric gave him a slightly confused look. "Uh, crossing the border." he answered. "What about you?"
"Oh." King said, brushing leaves and small twigs from his jacket. "I'm out here trying to commune with the dark eldritch gods for my next book idea."
"Oh." Eric said. "Wait, you commune with the dark eldritch gods?"
"Of course I do." King said. "Where else do you think I come up with this stuff?"
"That, explains a lot." Eric said.
"Doesn't it?" King said with a grin, then his expression turned serious. "You aren't going to ... tell anyone about this, are you?" he asked.
Eric grinned. "Not even our bosses." he lied.
"Oh, that's a relief. It's been nice talking to you.' King said, and whistled. "Come, Bubbles!"
Eric and Meg watched as King hopped on a Shoggoth that came slithering out of the underbrush.
"Hi Ho Bubbles, and away!" King cried as he galloped away on Bubbles.
Meg and Eric were silent for several seconds afterwards.
"Well." Meg said. "That was informative, wasn't it?"
"Uh huh." Eric agreed with a nod. "I knew he didn't get it from selling his soul to Satan."
Oo000oo000oO
Zacharias J Bentham, owner and proprietor of Johnny Jay's Tow & Salvage looked up when the bells on the door jangled, and saw that the front office of his salvage yard had been invaded by a couple of city folk, a man and a woman.
The man was a heavyset, brown haired, man with the musculature of a power lifter, and excluding the air of a Wall Street banker. The woman had a healthy figure, but was also on the heavyset side.
She also had brown hair, darker than the mans, with a scarf tied over it. Her face was framed by a pair of round framed glasses, with a pair of violet eyes that were the emptiest he had ever seen.
"Good morning." the stranger said. "We need a car."
Zacharias arched an eyebrow at the man. "Mistah, I think yah whant tah-" he started to say, but was interrupted by the stranger.
"We need a car." the man repeated, putting his hands on the counter and leaning forward to loom over him. "No questions asked." he added, reaching into the bag slung across his shoulders and taking out a wad of bills. "Two grand."
Staring at the money for several moments, Zacharias considered his options and measured up to the two strangers.
"No questions." Zacharias repeated, and reached for the money.
The man let his hand linger over the money for a moment before he let Zacharias take it. "Just to be sure that we're on the same page, we won't have to get into details on what will happen if you talk?" he asked.
"No, we wohant." Zacharias said as he took thee money. "So, what do yah whant?" he asked.
The man leaned back from the counter and put his hands in his pockets. "A sedan." he said. "Four doors if possible, late model. In good running condition is a must. As inconspicuous as possible."
Zacharias thought for a few moments, then smiled. "I've got just the thiang." he said, getting up out of his chair. "Follow me."
Oo000oo000oO
Fifteen minutes and some creative paperwork later, Meg and Eric were the proud owners of a somewhat beaten up and slightly rusty, but still serviceable nine year old Ford 500, white in color, with an odd oder coming from the backseat.
"Sorry ahbout the smell." Zacharias said. "The last ownah was a teenagah."
"That explains the used condom on the floor behind the seats." Eric said. "There a gas station nearby?" he asked.
"Yah." Zacharias said and pointed down the road. "Ahbout a couple of miles that a ways."
"Thank you." Eric said as Meg finished up from where she had been affixing license plates to the car. "Lets go." he said.
Zacharias watched as the couple got into the car and drove off. He watched as they disappeared down the road, then shrugged before going back into the office.
Oo000oo000oO
"So, what are you going to do to her?" Eric asked out of the blue.
Meg opened her eyes and saw the greenery Maine flowing past them on either side of the road.
"To Anna?" Meg asked.
"That's the one, yes." Eric said.
Meg thought for a second. "Destroy her." she answered. "Destroy her so that my brother will never have a happy memory of her again."
"Ohhh." Eric said with a nod. "Hey, I heard on the news that they pulled eighty three bodies out of that lot."
"Oh." Meg said. "I wasn't that far off."
"I told you that was a bad place to put them." Eric chided her. "But to be fair, nobody ever really expects a water main to go bad on an adjacent lot and that they have to dig up all the pipe."
"Yeah." Meg said, and flexed her fingers. "You know, it's been over a year and a half since my last one." she mused. "I haven't did one since Connie."
"What about the dozens of people we've whacked in the eighteen months?" Eric asked.
"They don't count." Meg said, still idly flexing her fingers. "They were part of the job. Connie was for me."
Eric chuckled. "I oughta introduce you to Kenny sometime." he said. "You'd love him. You can kill him and he keeps coming back. Unfortunately, he's a bit too masculine for your taste."
Meg smiled slightly and briefly clenched her hand into a fist. "Thank you." she said, and then reached behind the seat to where a foam cooler sat and pulled out a bottle of water.
"Hey, get me a soda, would you?" Eric asked.
"Okay." Meg said.
Oo000oo000oO
When they got close to the border with Rhodes Island, they pulled over at a gas station to top off the tank and to switch drivers because Meg knew the way to their destination much better than Eric ever would.
"So, where are we headed again?" Eric asked as he shoved the nozzle of the gas pump into the filler neck and started to fill it with ethanol.
"Winnapog." Meg told him. "It's a little bedroom community, just outside of Quahog."
"Don't you think we'll stand out?" Eric asked. "I mean, I'm from a small town. Tow new people come in for length of time ..."
"Don't worry about." Meg told him. "Winnapog is on the sketchy side. In New England, you have the rich part, like Martha's Vineyard, where everyone with money is. Then you have the people who run the shops and stores that the rich people and tourists use. They live Quahog.
Winnapog is one of the non scenic parts of Rhodes Island. It's where the farm workers and maids live. The people who do the scut work for the Vineyard and Quahog live. It's also where the townies and the Vineyard people get their weed."
"I see." Eric said. "So it's like Lowerton." he added.
Meg nodded. "Pretty much." she said.
With a clunk, the handle on the nozzle went all the way back, signalling that the tank was full.
"Well, we're gassed up." Eric said. "You want me to get it?"
Meg nodded. "Yeah." she said. "Get me some jerky while you're in there." she added.
"Will do." Eric said as he put the nozzle back on the pump.
Oo000oo000oO
Winnapog was reached without incident, and after finding a rather shabby but still clean motel on the outskirts of town, they stocked up on food at a local store and went back to their room.
"Pawtucket Patriot Ale?" Eric asked, holding up the can out of the thirty pack and giving it a quizzical look.
"It's good." Meg told him from the bathroom. "It's a local beer."
"Obviously." Eric said, and cracked the tab on it. "So, the question now is, where do we hit first?"
"My family's house." Meg said as she came back in. "Hit it during the day, when just my mother is home. By the way, the bathroom's free."
"Thanks." Eric said and flipped to the next channel on the TV. "This sucks." he said. "There's no porn."
"This is a fleabag hotel, Eric. What do you expect?" Meg asked as she tossed her bra and her jeans on her bed and sat down on the corner."
"Smut." was Eric's response. "And lots of it."
"Like I said, this is a fleabag hotel." Meg repeated. "It's a roof and a bed."
"Eh, whatever." Eric said. "Let's eat."
Oo000oo000oO
Lois Griffin sighed and kept on with her dusting. Some days she could almost swear that the dust bunnies were breeding behind her back-
"Huh?" she said, her train of thought derailed by the sound of the back door opening. "Brian? Is that you?" she asked.
Not getting an answer, Lois frowned and put down her feather duster and headed into the kitchen. Stepping through the door, she saw that the back door was ajar and swinging back and forth slightly from the breeze coming in from outdoors.
"Huh. I could have sworn that I closed that door..." Lois mused as she started towards the door. "Must have forgo-"
Pain exploded in her head as something hit her from behind and the last thing she saw was the linoleum of the kitchen floor rushing up to her face, then unconsciousness claimed her.
"Hello mother." Meg said calmly, standing over the prone form of Lois. "Long time no see."
Reaching into her bag, Meg took out a roll of duct tape and set to work binding her mothers hands behind her back and taping her mouth shut – something she'd been wanting to do for years.
Once she had her mother secured, Meg then went to the end cabinet under the counter and took out one of the cloth grocery sacks that Brian kept in there. Unfolding it, she then pulled it over Lois's head.
That taken care of, Meg then opened up several of the other cabinets and dumped the contents out onto the floor to make it look like someone had ransacked the kitchen looking for something.
Smiling a nasty little smile, Meg then went upstairs to her fathers closet. Opening it up, she found herself looking a large disorganized mess that had been more or less shoved into the closet with no thought put towards organization.
Meg frowned as she looked at the mess. "No, he wouldn't put in that part..." she said to herself, and then looked up at the shelf, where there was a collection of shoe boxes. "Bingo." she said.
Retrieving the stepladder from it's usual place in the linens closet, Meg unfolded it and climbed up so she could see the shoe boxes. Digging out a flashlight from her NDS bag, she clicked it on and played the beam across the boxes.
"Here we go..." Meg said when the beam fell on the fourth box, which had 'vault stuff' scrawled across it in marker.
Taking the box, she opened it up to check it and saw that it was filled with notes and diagrams from Peters attempt to crack her grandfathers vault. Putting it in her bag along with the flashlight, Meg the proceeded to pull the rest of the boxes on the shelf out and dump them out onto the floor.
Getting off the stepladder, Meg folded it back up and put it back, then returned to her fathers closet and dumped the rest of it out onto the floor as well. Finished with that, she then proceeded to go into every room of the house and upend everything that was within easy reach.
Meg did take some other items besides the box of her fathers notes. From her parents bed room she took her mothers jewelry collection, along with her brothers new address from her mothers Rolodex, from Chris's room she took his portable game system, and from what had been her room but was now an office that she figured was now Brian's she took a small baggie of pot.
"Brian, you're smoking crap." she muttered, opening the bag and sniffing the contents. Resealing it, she stuffed it into her NDS bag and went back downstairs. When she entered the kitchen she found that her mother was coming to.
"Nnnnh... what happened?" Lois's voice was muffled by the bag. "Why am I tied up? What's going on? Who's there?" she asked when she heard Meg's footsteps.
Meg paused, then strode over to her mother in two easy steps and gave her three vicious kicks. Lois cried out in pain as the blows struck, and Meg smiled when she heard a rib give way on the last kick.
Satisfied, Meg then turned, and walked out the door.
Oo000oo000oO
Parked in the alley that ran along the back of Meg's parent's place, Eric watched as Meg hopped the back fence and landed in a crouch. She straightened back up, dusted herself off, and walked over to the passenger side of the car and got in.
"You got what you were looking for?" Eric asked.
"Yeah." Meg answered as she took her pack of Luckys from where she had stashed them in the sunvisor and shook one out. "Let's go."
Eric started the car and put it into gear. "I take it there were no complications?" he asked.
"Not unless you count me cracking my mother's ribs." Meg replied as she lit up.
"Why did you do that?" Eric asked.
Meg took a drag on her cigarette and exhaled a blue blast of smoke. "Because I felt like it."
"Oh." Eric said with a nod. "Okay then. You want to get lunch?"
Meg took another drag on her cigarette and thought for a moment. "Yeah." she said. "I know a good place. We can pick up a hooker afterwards and split her."
"Works for me." Eric said as he hung a right and turned onto the street.
Oo000oo000oO
"Well, that was refreshing." Meg said as she watched Dawn, the hooker that they'd hired walk away on unsteady legs.
"That it was." Eric said. "She certainly enjoyed herself."
"You certainly enjoyed her." Meg commented. "Especially burying yourself in her."
Eric chuckled as he started the car. "I cannot tell a lie. I am an ass man." he said. "So, now that it's getting late, what should we do?"
"Go back to the motel room, clean up, and wait for nightfall." Meg answered. "Then go hit the Vineyard Water & Power station."
"Might as well." Eric said as he put the car into gear.
Oo000oo000oO
That evening, long past the time the sun had gone down, Meg and Eric were holed up in some brush, doing surveillance on the Martha's Vineyard Water & Power station. Both were clad in dark clothing with their vest's on. On their left fore arms were bracers with what looked like a computer embedded in them, and they were wearing helmets that had a hinged mask on them.
"Not much security." Eric commented in a low voice. "I see a couple of cameras, some motion activated floods. Not even a security guard."
"It's a municipal maintenance yard." Meg pointed out in the same low voice. "And this is Martha's vineyard, Eric. They don't have to worry about things like people breaking into the municipal facilities."
"Until now, that is." Eric quipped. "It looks clear to me. You ready?"
"Yeah." Meg answered.
Flipping down their masks, the pair then activated their active camouflage. There was shimmering effect, and then the two of them appeared to no more substantial than heat haze.
Their first obstacle was the chain link fence topped with barbed wire that surrounded the facility. That was easily bypassed by them jumping over it, the enhancements that they had gotten when they had become full members of B3S making it ridiculously easy for them to do that.
The second obstacle was the cameras and the motion sensors. Even though they were technically invisible, they would still show up on them as a distortion and they were trying to avoid leaving any traces that someone had been in there.
Meg and Eric's solution was to simply skirt the cameras fields of vision and time their movements to the camera's sweeps.
As for the motion detectors, that was a much more easily defeated problem: their optical camouflage made it almost impossible for the detectors to "see" them. However, there was one caveat.
While the detectors couldn't see their movements, anything they touched or interacted with potentially could. In other words, a patch of gravel disturbed by their footfalls, or a piece of litter that they nudge with their foot, or even an opening door could trip the detectors.
So they just watched where they stepped and took it slow. Thus, using these methods, they were able to get up to a side door without getting detected.
The door was a steel security door, with a locking doorknob. Meg picked it in a hair under forty five seconds, and they were in.
Inside, they found themselves looking at a long, beige, nondescript hallway. In other words, standard government issue for pretty much the entire company.
"Somewhere, in this haystack, is a needle." Eric commented with a somewhat sour note in his voice. "I hate bureaucracy."
"It's better than having to do this in Quahog." Meg pointed out. "There, all the records are in City Hall and we'd have to deal with Mayor West."
"That's true." Eric said. "Well, I don't want to be here all night. Let's go find the boss's office. If what we're looking for is not there, there should at least be a listing of where they keep them."
"Agreed."
Oo000oo000oO
The boss's office was easy enough to find. They simply looked for the biggest office with the most expensive chair and desk in it. A quick search revealed that what they were looking for wasn't in there, but Eric had a flash of inspiration and checked the secretary's desk.
"Eureka!" he said, flipping open a directory and running through it. "If there is one good thing I have to say about bureaucracies, and the asinine idiots that inhabit them, they always leave a paper trail. We want room 42."
"That'd be down the hall and to the left." Meg said, looking at a floor plan of the building that was on the wall.
"Lets go then." Eric said, flipping the directory closed.
Three doors down and to the left Meg and Eric found the records room, which was the size of the Griffin family's living room, and lined with various gray metal cabinets. In the center of the room there was a metal table.
"Okay." Eric said, crossing his arms as he surveyed the room. "We need to find the catalog for this room. Other wise we could spend days in here before we found anything."
Meg frowned for a moment as she surveyed the room. "I'll take right, you take left." she suggested.
"Agreed." Eric said, and they got to work.
Working quickly, Meg walked down the right side of the room, looking at the labels helpfully stuck on the tops of the cabinets.
"Sanitation, sewer plans, Cooper Street, blocks 1040 through1100-" Meg paused. "Eric... I think I found what we're looking for."
"The catalog?" Eric asked.
"No, the sewer plans." Meg answered, testing the drawers.
The drawers were unlocked and Meg rifled through them before she found a manila file folder marked 1070.
"Here we go." she said, pulling out the file.
While she had been going through the drawers, Eric had pulled out his laptop and plugged in a portable scanner so when she found the folder they were looking for, they'd be ready to go.
Setting the folder down on the table, she opened it up and began passing pages to Eric, who began scanning them in. It took them several minutes, but soon they had the contents of the folder scanned onto Eric's hard drive.
When they were done, Meg put the papers back in order and returned the folder to it's proper place in its drawer, then they retraced their steps back out and got the hell out of there.
Oo000oo000oO
"Eric, pull over." Meg said.
"Why?" Eric asked as he braked and eased the car over to the curb.
"That Cherokee is for sale." Meg said as she grabbed her NDS bag. "I'm going to need transport, remember?"
"Oh, right." Eric said, snapping his fingers as Meg got out of the car.
Kicking the door shut behind her, Meg approached the Jeep SUV and looked at the "For Sale" sign in the windshield and read the number listed on it. Pulling out her phone, she dialed the number and listened to it ring.
"Hello?" an adolescent male voice asked when the other end picked up.
"Hi!" Meg said cheerfully, sliding into a false persona "I"m Tami Conner, and I'm calling about that Jeep that's for sale in your front yard?" she asked.
"Oh." the male voice said, perking up. "You want to buy it?"
"Yeah, actually." Meg said. "Assuming it's in good shape. I'm standing here now looking at it, and it looks like it's in good condition."
"Oh it is..." the voice said. "You said that you're in the front yard?" he asked.
"Yeah." Meg said.
"Cool. I'm home right now." the voice told her. "I'll be right out."
While she waited for the owner to come out, she took a walk around the vehicle and gave it a once over. The Jeep was a 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee, red in color with gray body cladding.
It had alloy rims with two sets of mismatched tires, Coopers on the back and Good Years on the front. There were plastic wind guards on the front windows, and the interior had seen better days.
She heard the door open and Meg turned around to face it.
"Hi!" she said. "Warm, be warm." she told herself mentally. "You're a nice girl, as far as he knows."
"Hey." the guy who had came out of the house said. "I'm Colin Burke." he added, extending his hand to her as he came up to her.
"Tami." Meg said, shaking hands with Colin.
"So, you want to take a look?" Colin asked.
Meg nodded. "Yeah." she said.
"Okay." Colin said, and took his keys out. "Let me start her up for you."
Meg listened as the SUV was started up for her. The engine ran good, and there were no bad noises coming out of it.
After letting it run for a couple of minutes, Colin shut it down and looked at her.
"So." he asked. "What do you think?" he asked.
"Well, it runs good." Meg said. "Does it have any kind of problems?" she asked.
"It uses a little oil, about a quart every three weeks or so." Colin said. "The transmission and transfer case were replaced right before I got it from my parents."
"Hmm." Meg said, nodding. "So how much you asking for it?"
"Two grand." Colin said.
Meg made a show of looking at the truck, and mulling it over before she nodded. "You've got a deal." she said. "You take cash?" she asked.
"Yeah." Colin said with a nod. "Though why are you carrying two grand in cash?" he asked.
"Why not?" Meg asked. "Besides, I've him along too." she added, pointing over her shoulder at where Eric was sitting in the 500, waiting.
Eric saw her point at him, and he smiled and waived.
"I see." was Colin's response. "So, two grand?" he asked.
"Two grand it is." Meg said, and reached into her bag.
And a few minutes later, Meg, aka Tami Conner, was the proud owner of a well traveled and well loved 2004 Jeep Cherokee.
Oo000oo000oO
"And that's everything." Eric said as he stuffed the last little bit of his gear into his bag. "You gonna be okay?" he asked Meg.
"I'll be fine." Meg said. "Finding someplace for the magical's to work out of isn't going to be that hard to find around here, especially in Winnapog."
"Okay then." Eric said, heading for the door. "See you in a week and a half."
"See ya." Meg said.
The door clicked shut behind Eric and Meg found herself standing alone in the hotel room. Taking a deep breath, she exhaled slowly. She only had a couple of days availible.
It was time to get to work.
Oo000oo000oO
End, Part One.