Everything had changed so quickly

The day after Jasmine had called Syndrome, three proud looking lawyers had come to visit. With a look of smugness on their faces they told the girl exactly what was going to happen in the upcoming appeal. They had only stayed a short time, but upon leaving the conference room Jasmine had immediately noticed a difference in her surroundings.

The guards no longer mocked her or pushed her around and the manacles that were usually clasped around her wrists were forgotten. She was brought books, a reading lamp, extra blankets, and a guard appeared every few hours to ask if she needed anything. They let her squirrel in and brought her mugs of real tea (not the lukewarm flavored water the cafeteria served) and everything was "Yes Miss," and "No Miss," and "Can I do anything for you Miss?"

Sipping Earl Grey tea while reading T.H. White's The Once and Future King, Jasmine realized that this must be what real power was like. Power could turn anything to your advantage, making the terribleness of jail a halfway decent experience. Finishing her tea and having the guard fetch her another cup, a smile crossed Jasmine's face.

Maybe working for a super villain wouldn't be so bad after all.

Despite the fact that Syndrome was fixing the system in her favor, Jasmine still spent a month in jail while her case was being appealed. Laura visited daily, undeterred by the fact that Laura's home was in California and that it had to be costing Laura and her family more then they could afford to keep her there in a hotel. The pretty blond woman cried whenever she saw her little sister dressed in the orange jumpsuit. Jasmine wished she could tell her sister that everything was going to be fine, but realized she couldn't. How could she tell Laura that the reason she was going to be set free was because she had pledged her loyalties to a bad guy?

Instead, Jasmine told her sister jokes about the goings on in the jail, exaggerating stories until they seemed like comedy routines and making up other tales when nothing interesting happened. The siblings talked a lot about the appeal, Laura doubtful that it was going to work while Jasmine tried to tone down her words of certainty.

The first day her appeal was presented to the judges, Jasmine received a phone call from her parents. Full of long pauses and awkward silence, her parents had finally hung up after telling her that they loved her no matter what. Jasmine couldn't help but wonder if they were lying to her, or just to themselves. After all, they hadn't raised a finger to help her in her defense, letting a state lawyer handle her case instead of hiring someone better.

And she never did hear a word from her Grandparents.

Holding hands the day the three judge panel left to deliberate, Laura turned to her sister, a hopeful look in her eyes. "Jas, if everything works out… Would you want to come and live with my family and I for awhile?"

Jasmine smiled softly at her sister, remembering Christmas cards of the little suburban home with Laura, her husband, their three children, and their family dog standing in front. Things would be different if she went with Laura. Briefly, Jasmine fantasized about doing it, turning her back on Syndrome and moving to the west coast. In California, Jasmine would play with her beloved nephew and nieces every day. She would be able to get a job and start a new life. "I can't," she finally sighed, squeezing Laura's hand tighter. "I already have somewhere I need to go once this is all over."

Laura frowned, looking concerned. "It… It doesn't have anything to do with Eddie, does it?"

"It has nothing to do with Eddie," Jasmine assured her. It wasn't exactly a lie. Her job with Syndrome didn't have anything to do with that man exactly, just with supers in general.

Looking deeply into her little sister's green eyes, Laura hesitated. Jasmine had the same look in her eyes as Cynthia did whenever the super was about to go out to patrol. The look that said 'I'm going to do something you won't like and I'm sorry.' Wrapping her arms around Jasmine's shoulders, Laura hugged the girl tightly. "I love you so much, you know that?"

Resting her head on her sister's shoulder, Jasmine hugged her back. "I know."

It took two hours for the judges to return, their gravels banging as the court room erupted in sound at the words 'not guilty.' Hugging her sister tightly Jas grinned at her, not noticing the the relieved looking couple that was quickly exiting the room before they were spotted.

"I don't know what I would have done if those men had they not overturned Jassy's sentence," Mr. Baxter said to his wife as they hurried towards the car.

"I know what I would have done," the smaller woman as his side said gruffly. "Leveled the place with a few screams, grabbed Jassy, and gone villain. Our baby is too sweet for jail."

Harold Baxter smiled lovingly at his wife as he opened the car door for her. "Denise, how long do you think we'll have to pretend to disapprove of our daughter before the NSA forgets about this whole incident and moves on to something more important?"

"Hopefully soon," Denise sighed, her voice full of longing. Buckling in, they sped off on the long car ride back to Illinois. "After all, I want all of my babies and grandbabies filling our house by Christmas."


Arriving just as Jasmine was about to get into the dark car that was going to forever take her away from the jail, Laura had practically tackled Jasmine, knocking them both to the ground as she cried into her sister's shirt. Jasmine had held Laura tightly, wiping her tears away until her sister stopped crying. She helped the older woman to her feet and hugged her tightly. "Oh Laura," she sighed happily, "everything's going to be alright."

As Jasmine opened the car door, Laura had caught a glimpse of the red headed man that had passed her the first day she had visited Jasmine in jail. The one Jasmine had said was a reporter. She grabbed her sister's wrist and bit her lip, wondering what all this meant. The only answers she could think of weren't comforting.

"Be safe," she found herself whispering as she let go.

Kissing her sister on the forehead as if she was a child, Jasmine smiled and nodded. "I will."

And then she was gone, the dark car whisking her away as soon as the door had closed. Laura stood a long time in front of the jail, long after the car was out of sight, and cried. Then, she went back to her hotel room, packed her things, and flew home to her husband and family.

"Who was that?" Syndrome asked as the car drove, looking back to see the pretty blond woman staring after the car.

Gently scratching the mechanized squirrel's ears, Jasmine smiled brightly at her new boss. "My older sister Laura."

Syndrome frowned. He hadn't known that Jasmine had an older sister, especially one that had been concerned with out outcome of the girl's case. He had assumed since her parents and grandparents hadn't done anything to help his new side kick, that none of her family had really cared. "Does she know?" he asked, thinking about the complications a loving sibling might bring.

"Of course not."

"Good."

Smirking Syndrome shook Jasmine's hand. "Welcome to Nomaisan Island Technology."

"Glad to be here, boss."

Silence fell over the two and they sat there staring out of opposite windows, watching the scenery go by. He should probably talk to her, Syndrome thought to himself. There was still job responsibilities to assign, rules to go over, and plans to be made. Heck, the girl still didn't even know where she was going! All she had been told was that it was far away and that she was never to speak to anyone of the base's location. Of course that had been before, when Jasmine had still been in police custody. Now she was his.

Syndrome was about to turn to Jasmine and tell her of the island when the girl suddenly looked at him to speak. "Thank you," she said softly, an earnest look in her green eyes.

"For what?" Syndrome asked, slightly surprised.

"For everything. You saved my life. I swear I'll never forget that for as long as I live."

Hesitation filled Syndrome and for a very brief moment he felt guilty. After all, the death sentence he had 'saved' the girl from had originally been his doing. Without his interference she would probably have been acquitted. Probably. The light in the car vanished and Syndrome glanced out to see that they had just driven into an airplane hanger just as he had ordered. Opening the door, he helped Jasmine out, smiling slyly. "Don't thank me yet," he said with false modesty.

As they approached the sleek looking jet the stairs came down, Jasmine's mechanized squirrel dashing up them the moment they touched the ground. Nodding to his pilot and stewardess Syndrome went partially up the stairs before turning back to glance behind him. Jasmine hadn't followed. Standing there at the bottom of the stairs, on hand on the guardrail but both feet on the ground, she stared blankly at the plane as if she didn't see it there. "You coming?" Syndrome asked lightly, taking a step back and offering her his hand.

Jasmine's eyes focused on his hand and she took a long, almost painful, deep breath. "Yes," she said, grabbing Syndrome's hand tightly and following him up the stairs.

Syndrome smiled, urging her forward into the cabin while he hung back to briefly speak with his pilot. That done, he entered the cabin and stopped, gazing at his new side kick. It was a different person that met him there. Despite the loose fitting and plain prison issued t-shirt and jeans, Jasmine looked at home in the plush jet interior. Her squirrel had curled up next to her on the couch-like seat, still seeming alert as it rested. Absently flipping through some business magazine between sips of tea, the girl looked like a resting executive rather then a recently released prisoner.

Sliding into the seat across from her, Syndrome leaned back, grinning as he crossed his legs. A moment later the stewardess appeared, requesting that they buckle in for take off, and less then five minutes after that they were in the air.

Draining the rest of her tea, Jasmine scooted over to gaze out the window as the world got smaller and smaller beneath them. She'd always loved flying. She loved watching the way borderlines and cities faded away until they were only patches of different coloured land. "Where are we going?" she asked, looking up at her boss.

Syndrome smirked, putting his hands behind his head and leaning back further. "To paradise."


NSA Special Agent William Mallory was furious. "You let her get away!? How!?" he shouted into the phone.

The super on the other end of the phone didn't sound as sorry as Mallory would have liked. "The car drove her into a hanger and the plane was towed right out of it and took off. I can't follow a plane, Mallory. You'd need a flying super for that."

Mallory groaned in frustration and rubbed the bridge of his nose, resisting the urge to curse. "Please tell me you got a tracker on the jet."

"Wasn't issued one."

Mallory did curse then, grumbling about those idiots in Tech who couldn't get a damn thing right. Five years. It had been five years since the NSA had returned in full force and those damn Techs still couldn't do a decent job of things! Briefly, he mourned the glory days gone past. Now there had been some inventing. However, when the Super Recollection Act had been passed and the NSA formally disbanded, all the Techs had left to find other jobs. Jobs that most of them hadn't wanted to leave. Turned out that private sector paid more then government. Who would have thought?

"I'll have their heads on platters," Mallory swore before returning to the issue at hand. "The girl, Jasmine Baxter, did you at least see who she went with?"

The super hero named Quill sighed. "I already told ya, Mallory, I never saw him or her. The gal left the jail, got attacked by her sister, then got into the car with the dark tinted windows. Never even got a good look at the driver. If you wanted to see who she went with you should have sent a super with X-ray vision or something. I only can shoot spikes out of my skin, Mallory. Green spikes."

Resisting the urge to snap at Quill and tell him that he had tried to get a better super, but hadn't been able to on such short notice. Instead he thanked Quill then hung up, slamming his headset back onto the phone cradle.

Something had gone terribly wrong with this entire case. Prisoner number 44458- Mallory stopped. He had promised himself he would stop thinking of people as numbers and start treating them like people again- Jasmine Baxter had been intended to serve as an example to the villain world. Young and pretty, with no previous criminal history, the NSA had used her to show what they would do to anyone who dared kill a super. The idea being that if they cracked down this hard on such a sweet looking girl, just think of what they would do to a super villain or a hardened criminal.

After winning the case, the NSA had loudly demanded the death sentence, thinking that there was no way that they would get it. The girl was too nice to die while everyone agreed that her boyfriend was a jerk. Actually, Eddie (or should he say Restoration since that was the only name the man answered to now) had been placed under Mallory's jurisdiction and the agent had quickly learned to hate the man with a passion. Not being able to die was all very well and good if you were that person, but the power was essentially useless to the NSA. That didn't stop Restoration from designing quite possibly the most gaudy super suit ever and claiming half of New York city as under his direct care. Oh no, the man seemed to live to make headlines with his stupidity and cause Mallory hours of overtime work… But that was a different problem.

Thinking that their proclamation that only the death sentence would do would only be considered a scare tactic, even the NSA had been shocked when the judge ruled that the girl was to receive death. Several agents, Mallory included, had lost several nights of sleep upon that decision. Anxiously, they had worked to see if they could somehow subtlety get the verdict changed, sentencing the girl to prison time until death. It had almost been a relief when the girl had gotten new competent lawyers instead of the state loser that had been appointed.

However, the lawyers had been strange. Sweeping in with a vengeance that left everyone in a state of awe, they too quickly brought the case to appeal. Thinking that this was their chance to get the sentence lessened, the NSA fought hard to keep the non-guilty verdict but tried to soften their words so perhaps the panel of judges would rule the verdict correct, but the sentence unfair. Instead, the lawyers wiped the floor with the NSA, saying all the right things at the worst times and otherwise making them look like fools.

Soundly defeated and annoyed, the NSA had grudgingly believed that the lawyers had succeeded. There was no way the verdict would be overturned, but the girl would spend five to ten years in jail instead of the twenty to life the NSA really wanted her to serve. But the judges came back saying that the verdict had been overturned and the girl was now free to go. The NSA went into a state of shock.

Instantly, damage control went into play. Trying to figure out everything that could have possibly gone wrong, the NSA realized several things that weren't right. The lawyers bank accounts revealed that they were obviously being paid for doing this case, but the one paying the bills couldn't be found. Spying on the girl in the jail cell had revealed that she had been living a life of practical luxury compared to the rest of the prisoners. The three judges that had reviewed the appeal and came up with the not-guilty verdict had each received a hefty 'campaign donation' a few weeks before. The entire deal screamed of bribery and foul play, but no sting puller could be found.

Careful study had proved that Jasmine didn't have the finances or the connections to pull this off on her own. Calls to her parents (friends of Mallory's from before the Act passed) revealed that they had nothing to do with her new found luck either.

Someone else was involved.

It was driving the NSA crazy as they tried to figure out who.

The final insult had to be the jet whisking Jasmine away though. If she had remained in New York there was a chance this mystery person could be found, but the involvement of the jet dashed this hope. Mallory was a practical person, he knew that if this person had the cash to buy judges and keep a private jet they wouldn't be caught by something as simple as the registration. Sure enough, upon checking, the private airfield used had no record of any planes taking off at that time. They had no registration from anyone owning a jet of that description, no name, no flight plan, nothing.

Passports wouldn't hinder a person like that either, Mallory knew. The plane with the girl and the mystery person could be anywhere in the world by now.

Closing the file Mallory sighed, knowing that nothing more could be done. Until the girl was spotted or reappeared her rich friend would not be found.

It was like chasing an invisible man.

Mallory hated those types.