The Smithsonian Information Center is a pretty cool looking building in Washington DC, but has no botany department (as far as I know, that is. That was purely for this story. For a cool view of the building, Google Smithsonian and once at the main site, click on the museums link. The building should be the last one listed.)

Serpent's Kiss
An Alternate Timeline Real Adventures of Jonny Quest Fic
by Time Guardian

Chapter 4

Old Enemies, New dangers
-----------------------------

Smithsonian Information Center, Washington DC-

Dressed entirely in black, Phil Corvin stepped onto the grounds of the main information building of the Smithsonian institution. The fact that it looked like a castle wasn't lost on him - it seemed like this whole twisted plan seemed to revolve around historical landmarks and old buildings.

Melana had told him that this was where he was supposed to find some plants. Grumbling, he assumed a confident position, and strode up the walkway to the front entrance. The sun was setting, and he had only escaped from the federal prison he was in hours ago, but it felt good to be back in action.

He saw two employees flanking the entrance, cordoning off the area and putting up the closed sign for the night. The doors themselves still seemed to be open.

Phil plastered a smile on his face and quickly walked forward. "Excuse me-"

The younger of the two, a woman in a blue Institue uniform, stepped forward. "Sir, tours ended over two hours ago."

He grabbed for a black case from his pocket and quickly flashed what would hopefully pass as believable ID. "Race Bannon, Intelligence-one. We have reason to believe that a robbery attempt will be made tonight on your institute."

The other employee, an older man, took a long hard look at the ID and scoffed. "Mister - Bannon is it? I have been working at the institute for about twenty years now, and in all of that time, we have not had a single-"

Phil shook his head, and grabbed for some items from his back pocket. he didn't have the time for this.

He palmed a yellow phial from his pocket and smashed it, holding his breath.

The two employees had no time to react. Coughing, they both sunk to the ground, and Corvin quickly stepped over both of them. When his contact had offered up the little phials of gas, he thought the Zin sisters had gone nuts, but seeing them in action quickly changed his mind.

His target was on the second floor.

Quickly rushing up the stairs, Corvin ducked around two startled guards and then broke into a full run to the end of the hall. When he saw the sign that proudly proclaimed 'Botany Department', he knew he had found the right place.

Phil ducked into the nearby doorway, and was greeted by the sight of rows and rows of plants.

Great, like finding a needle in a haystack.

He heard noises from the hall. The guards were coming, and he was running out of time.

It was then that Phil noticed the different labels on the different plant beds, and each were separated by region. Perfect.

He ran up and down the rows until he found the plants from the South American region. Soon, he saw the plants that Melana had described in her phone call.

"There he is!"

Corvin ducked behind the elevated plant rows as gunshots rang out through the room. He risked a quick hand up to grab two of the pots, and brought them down close to him.

Now to get out of here.

He kept low, reaching the end of the plant row he was on. Phil couldn't see any sign of the guards that were shooting at him, which was just as well. They were probably searching the rows, trying to converge on his position.

There was a metal door in the corner from where he was. It was unmarked, but if it wasn't locked, maybe it would take him someplace better than here. Phill decided to take the chance.

Standing quickly, he ran at the door, and found that it gave easily, only for a siren to start blaring all around him. Great, trust him to find the fire exit. Quickly, he climbed up the flight of stairs he found and soon was greeted by what looked like a old skylight.

After finding no visible signs of a way to open the skylight, Phil made one by kicking out one of the panes of glass. He quickly scrambled through, carefully avoiding the jagged glass.

It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the low night of the night, and the illumination of the various spotlights places all over the roof. That was when he spotted the helicopter that he was told about was hovering about a foot away from the top of the roof. Quickly, Corvin edged his way over to the rope ladder that dangled down. A big man dressed entirely in black seemed to stand guard over the ladder. When he approached, the man grabbed the two pots that were in Phil's hands, and placed them into a large bag that he had beside him. "Thank you for your assistance, Corvin. Melana and Anya ask that you wait in Washington for further instructions."

"Wait my ass," Phil growled, "What am I supposed to do, wait around here till I get my head shot off?"

Clutching the bag tightly in one arm, the man wrapped his other arm and legs around the ladder.

Corvin tried rushing the helicopter, but the pilot chose at that point to ascend higher. The downward rush of air coupled with the surprise cause him to tumble hard on the roof.

As he managed to stand, he watched as the helicopter took off with the flowers in question. They wouldn't let him come along? Fine, he would just have to make the best of his freedom.

Phil positioned himself on the roof behind one of the raised spires and took out the cell phone that his contact had given him. After activating the built-in voice recognition dialer, he waited for a few moments.

"Yes, Trans-American airlines? My name is Mr. Johnson. I need to book the next available flight to Maine."


The next afternoon, Jessie Bannon shrugged off a rainy sky as Mrs. Evans finally drove her home from school. After finding that she had aced her chemistry and Latin exams, Jessie was ready for an evening of computer games and ice cream, even though Jonny and Hadji were not there. She didn't mind too much - that meant more mint chocolate chip ice cream for her.

They walked into the foyer of the main house while Mrs. Evans shrugged out of her raincoat. "Jessie, make sure IRIS is set for the night before you do anything else."

"I'm on it," Jessie called out.

She quickly went into the living room conference area where the nearest terminal was located, built into the conference table. When Jessie reached the terminal though, she was shocked to find another message - this one sending a chill through her: Intruder Alert.

She didn't understand - there should be more noise than this. Dr. Quest occasionally tested the system for tweaking purposes, and she knew well enough from experience that noise it generated could be heard well from Lighthouse Point, which meant someone knew the system worked and disabled it.

-Corvin-

She looked around wildly and shouted. "Mrs. Evans!"

Normally the housekeeper would have brought them a drink while she got started on her homework, but silence greeted her call.

Jessie desperately typed in the commands she was taught, trying anything to get the system to respond properly, but the terminal sat there almost mockingly, and no additional noise could be heard.

Great, she thought, what do I do now? If I go look for Mrs. Evans, I could be walking into a trap, but still -

She stood up carefully, shifting her gaze left and right. A plan was quickly forming in her mind, but Jessie hoped that Corvin didn't bring any friends with him. She called out to the air, hoping that he was hanging on her every word.

"Mrs. Evans, tell you what, I am a little too full from lunch today, so I don't need a snack. I am going to go up to the lighthouse for a while, maybe even email Hadji. Don't wait dinner for me."

Jessie moved slowly and deliberately towards the stairs. She had a computer in her room; she could check out the security system, secure her room and wait it out till help arrived.

She had only gone up a few of the steps before she heard a voice.

"Tut, Tut Jessie. It isn't nice to lie to your elders."

Jessie looked around wildly, but didn't see anyone.

"Below you!"

A hand snaked out and grabbed her ankle. With a cry Jessie tumbled backwards and down the stairs. She landed hard on the floor, knocking the breath out of her.

Before she could react, Corvin's hand closed painfully around her arm, and Jessie found herself unceremoniously dragged to her feet.

Jessie squirmed in his grasp. "What do you plan on doing with me?"

Phil smirked. "Well, finding you here is a bonus, but I figured I'd borrow a plane from the good doctor and head on over to South America to have a nice chat with your father and Dr. Quest."

Jessie's eyes widened. "How did you-"

He shook his head and growled. "I hacked the house's security systems and Dr. Quest's itenary. It pays to have visited this place before. Keep up, will you? The Zin sisters pay well. They broke me out of prison, they had me pull a job for them, and now since I found out where the two people are going that ruined my life, I am going to settle things, once and for all."

Jessie had to do something, anything - there had to be something she could try on him that he hadn't seen yet.

Grinning, she came up with a split-second plan.

Jessie faked a swoon, and sank straight down on her knees to the ground. As she expected, Phil let go of her arm, and when he did, she made her move.

Crouching, she struck out with her right leg, knocking Corvin off of his feet. Jessie didn't chance a glance back, she turned and made a break for the front door. She had to get out of the house somehow.

Corvin's taunting voice came from behind her. "Jessie! Why don't you make it easier on yourself? Give it up. The doors are locked."

She reached the front door, and sure enough, she found it locked. The door was wired into the security system, so Jessie supposed that Corvin had locked every door he could get his hands on.

But there was one set of doors that weren't part of the system.

Jessie turned and ran for the French doors in the living room. She was happy to find that they opened easily, so she barreled right through the opening and onto the path that would take her up to Lighthouse Point.


She was nearly out of breath once she reached the door to the lighthouse. It was a thick heavy wooden door, and Jessie prayed that it would be able to hold off Corvin long enough.

Stumbling inside the light house, she shut the door and bolted it, then as an afterthought, she grabbed hold of a heavy table sitting nearby and dragged it in front of the door.

Once done, Jessie took the nearby stairs two at a time until she reached the lab.

Wham!

She heard a loud noise at the lighthouse door. Corvin was trying to break-in!

Jessie figured that she had ten minutes at the most. Quickly she took a seat near a terminal and grabbed the nearby phone.

There was no dial tone. Apparently Corvin had too much time on his hands while he was here.

Jessie then turned her attention to the terminal she was sitting in front of. After trying a few preliminary commands, she found that except for the security system, the rest of it was working. Quickly, she fired off a video message to the local police, and then she tried to call Hadji. She was quickly disappointed when she saw that it was Hadji's mother Neela that had answered the call.

Without any preamble, Jessie asked. "Is Hadji there?"

"He is enroute to New Delhi, meeting with officials from other provinces of India. Why, is there something wrong?"

Wrong? What could be wrong? A man who nearly killed her father and Dr. Quest was on the grounds and apparently she was next and was running out of time.

Jessie took a quick breath and did her best to sound calm. "No, there's nothing wrong. Tell him the next email from me will be late but I will catch up as soon as I can."

Before Neela could question the weird message, Jessie cut the transmission. The banging on the lighthouse door was growing more severe by the moment and she knew her time was short. If she wasn't going to be able to avoid meeting up with Corvin again, maybe she could even the odds. Dr. Quest would already be on his way to the pyramid by this time, so she wouldn't be able to get an audio message to him via the satellites, but-

She quickly typed into the terminal, bringing up a tracer program that Dr. Quest had a hand in developing. In addition to the research that Dr. Quest had asked for, Jessie decided to run a trace on where Jonny's supposed message had come from. It had taken the better part of the day, but when the results came back, she was shocked to learn that the message had come from a GPS unit, a type of model that isn't normally supposed to be able to send messages like the one they received.

Jessie smiled. It has to be Jonny. He's the only I know who would hack a GPS unit just to get a message home.

Using the address information she had obtained from the trace, she sent a quick message, and had just sat back in satisfaction when the door to the lighthouse splintered open.

She stood up, and looking around, chose to hide in the small space between the mainframe and the wall of the room. Jessie still had a full view of the main floor, and she willed herself to stay as still as possible.

Minutes later, she saw Phil Corvin step into the room. He looked around for a moment, and found the terminal that Jessie had been using. "Been busy have we? You know, it's way too late for anyone to help you now."

Jessie shook her head. She was getting tired of his taunting. "They know you are coming, Corvin. What do you say to that?"

She saw Phil smile and grab for a gas mask and a phial out of one of his pockets. "I think it's time to even the odds in MY favor."

Before Jessie could move, he quickly slammed the phial on the ground, and then put on his mask.

From her hiding place, Jessie stared in alarm as a yellowish vapor floated upwards from the broken tube. -I can't stay behind here forever.-

Holding her breath, she stepped out of her hiding place and lunged out at Corvin with a high kick, trying to gain enough room to get past him. Disappointment surged through her as he quickly grabbed for her leg and pulled. With her equilibrium broken, she fell hard to the ground. The breath that she had been holding escaped through a groan.

She had no choice, her body was screaming for oxygen. Jessie breathed in, and moments later she felt herself slip into a bottomless void.

Through the mask, Phil chuckled as he picked up Jessie's limp form. "Now let's go find one of Dr. Quest's planes, shall we?"