Whatever happened to...

Christina stepped out of the limousine, and looked up at the skyscraper that housed Network 66. It was an old familiar feeling, evoking nothing but dread and fear. She leaned back against the limo, overcome with dizziness.

Breathe, breathe, breathe... I'm going to faint or vomit or maybe both... I'll vomit on the way down, that's it!

Harriet stepped beside her, clapping her hands together.

"Well, this is very good for you. I know this is so good for you to be back here after all this time. It will be very healing for you!" Harriet turned to Christina, the smile stuck to her face. "I had no knowledge any of that happened. It was not until that moment in the basement of network 66 when they found you and the others... " Harriet crossed her arms and looked up at the building. "If I had any indication I would have pulled you out of there myself."

"Enough! That's in the past and the past is as dead as... "

Christina stopped herself, feeling it just wasn't worth it.

Harriet frowned. "I'm sorry. You're right. It's in the past, now let me guide you into your bright and wonderful future!"

Christina nodded. "My future now. I'm writing the narrative."

But in her heart she wasn't entirely convinced of that.

And it was just stuck in her mind, she remembered herself being dragged up the steps by her arm. Ned Grossberg towering above her, and she was helpless to fight back; she was under his control and things were only going to get worse.

"Let me know when you want to talk about it," Harriet told her.

Christina pulled away and headed up the stairs. She was long past the point of being weary of all the fawning, and was quickly becoming angry. The glass doors to the building automatically swung in and she stormed inside. It was fast becoming harder to breathe. But one thing could be said, Ned Grossberg would never torture her again.

"Facts are lovely things!" she whispered to herself. Just then she bumped into a short heavy-set man, who looked at her and tried to smile. "Christina Spencer!" He tried as best as he could to give a great, big, genuine smile, and then step back trembling slightly.

"She gave him a half smile, a gentle smile. You're Edwin Chubb."

"I... I am. You remember me... "

His voice was submissive in tone and his eyes radiated with guilt.

"All in the past! Harriet came up beside them, another annoying huge grin on her face. "You might call this an entirely new network 66. The sins of the past are being corrected and with great haste. The only tragic part is what happened Ned Grossberg, that he could not stand trial and pay for those awful crimes he committed against you!"

Wrapped in a cloak and shivering from the cold Christina huddled near the dumpster looking on as Kyle brought the bat down again and again.

The fringes were an ugly place, the smell was atrocious The homeless huddled around fires burning in barrels, and an an old woman pushed a shopping cart in her direction,and it was filled with dead rats. There were screams from a primitive surgical station inside of a camping tent, a dog ran past her, chasing a bigger dog.

Then she turned back, and Kyle brought the bat down again.

She was wary now, the truth was coming into harsh focus, like a secret kept in the dark for so long was suddenly brought into the light, and the consequences were like a hammer of reality, shattering the fantasy she worked so hard to build.

"Whatever happened to him? She asked pointedly.

Harriet shrugged. "Did himself in... apparently fear of prison... or guilt? He cut his own throat."

Christina turned on her heels quickly, and grabbed Chubb by the hand pulling him over to a vending machine

He stood and watched shuffling his feet nervously as she made her purchase and pulled out a bottle of water

"Here," she said handing it to him.

He took it carefully. "What's this for?"

You brought me a glass of water... I'm returning the favor."

"I did what I could. I'm sorry for what I couldn't."

"It's in the past!" she reminded him sternly.

he look down avoiding eye contact with her yeah he nodded I remember

X-X-X

"Wizkid! That's the only way to describe this. Thomas Cheviot you are a genius!" Bryce set down his analyzer, grinning with satisfaction. The patches Christina built for him contained her own traits and turned him into a savant of sorts. Even Bryce had to admit; Christina had real potential!

Annie McKenzie sat beside them resting her head in the palm of her hand.

"So... all mutants are geniuses then? She was smiling a little bit, thinking back on how her dad, Murray was disappointed his only child had a 2.0 GPA

Bryce went back to his computer again, inputting more information.

"Well that's not a hard-and-fast rule. Kyle has average intelligence."

Max flashed onto the screen. "Christina gave me legs! Look at these legs aren't these the best legs you have ever seen in your life?"

"They're nice," Annie said, frowning now.

"Would you like some flowers? Max asked her and in his hand materialized neon red roses. "I'm almost to the point where I can come out of the computer... Don't tell Edison he'll be mad… but I could be a hologram, and the roses would be holograms too, but you can still hold them they might make you feel better."

A negative test would make me feel better!" she said concern in her brown eyes.

Now it was Max's turn to frown. "I want the fantasy girl to be okay. Then I'd feel better." And with that, Max flipped off the screen

Fantasy girl? Annie asked Bryce.

He looked at her blankly. Oh! His pet name for Christina." He shrugged "I think he's in love with her."

"Oh," she said.

Then she frowned "Could we... um... not talk about her?"

There was a knock at the lab door "It's me! Got another drop off!" Kyle said on the intercom. Bryce opened the door and let him in. Kyle shoved the box into his arms "Here you go!" He said in a cranky tone.

"Hey I need your help for an experiment this afternoon," Bryce told him. "with my big machine.

"Big machines invented by geniuses with glasses and no sense of fun scare me," he laughed. Then he noticed Annie and gave a small wave.

She smiled big. "I'm Annie McKensie. My dad works here."

He smiled helplessly. "Oh!? So does mine; he runs this charade, actually. Uhh... well... your dad... is the finest person at Network 23! Tell him I said that!"

"Will you help me now?!" Bryce demanded.

"Your cousin is really nice. He talks about how awesome you are!" Annie laughed a little.

Kyle nodded. He quickly slapped Bryce on the shoulder. "Well let's check out your big machine, eh?!"

X-X-X

I'm in control! I'm in control! I'm writing my narrative, my own goddamn fucking narrative!

Christina leaned against the glass doors emblazoned with the numbers 66, seemingly mocking her, and found it was no different that when Grossberg led her her with his hand firmly gripping her arm.

This wasn't her narrative, was it?!

"Christina Spencer!" Mr. Bartlett gave her a wide unassuming grin. She didn't move from her place against the doors and he toned down his exuberance. "It's all right now," he said in a gentle, but noticably forced, tone "He's gone."

The strands of control over her own destiny were thin, like cheap string, and she was losing her grip. Her fantasy was dissolving.

My narrative... My fucking life... But since when was my life about what I want?

She looked at him with narrow eyes. "But how do we know for sure? I mean nobody's ever seen him since... Well, since… "

Bartlett shook his head sadly. "That poor, misguided man, such an insatiable lust for power... he was so ridden with guilt, we all were but he just… for lack of a better term, he opted out."

"Suicide."

"Exactly."

Christina watch him, her eyes narrowing a little more, as his head bowed in a false respect for the Dead.

She wanted to take his head and ram it into a brick wall over and over and over.

"Stop. Kyle you can stop now. Kyle, I think he's dead already!"

An old woman pushed past Christina, running over her foot with the wheel of a shopping cart but she didn't noticed.

Kyle dropped the bloody bat.

"Shouldn't have followed me, princess. You were not supposed to see this, princess!"

"I wasn't supposed to see a lot of things," she told him as she tried to wiggle her toes that had inexplicably gone numb.

Kyle kicked the bat aside staring down at the corpse of Ned Grossberg with no emotion on his face.

"I was wrong, princess. I was a real bastard. He wasn't going to physically hurt you or ever allow you to be physically hurt... but that's no excuse." He shook his head. "I just can't apologize enough, even now."

Christina moved next to him, put a hand on his arm.

"I accept your apology, bastard." she told him as she also glance down at the body.

"I'm a monster," was all he said.

She leaned into him resting her head on his shoulder. "It's okay, you're not the only monster."

She found herself unable to move... to blink, to cry and scream even though she desperately wanted to. The light of truth was so overpowering it seemed to send her hurtling back into the darkness she fought so desperately to escape.

"That's good to know," she finally choked out.

"We should probably get along and get those videos out to the public," she finally said. Mr. Bartlett nodded and Harriet smiled happily.

"Just think; in this place something that was so bad will be made into something so good!"

Harriet patted her on the shoulder with fake sympathy, and Christina only wanted to crush her hand into a million pieces.

X-X-X

Alone in the boardroom with Mr. Bartlett and viewing 20 PSA videos she was "allowed to approve" and that only portrayed her in a good light, she realized Theora was right.

Was there even such a thing as an honest politician? Sickening as it was, the only person that came to her mind was Simon Peller.

He hated her, he wanted her dead, even attempting to do so himself, and he was very clear about that.

And here she was now surrounded and inundated with lies; even worse, it was expected of her to validate the lies. All she was to them, was a trophy.

She hated being cold but found herself longing for the snowy lands of Norway. At least there, at least for a moment she was free. But because of an act of nobility with a good deal of self-righteousness She had traded her freedom for security and now had neither. But maybe that was just an inevitability.

Either way she only had one of two losing choices. Simon Pellar and his cruel honesty, or Harriet Garth, force feeding her nothing but bullshit and lies.

The hardest part of that was not knowing, which was worse.

For every action there is an equal, opposite reaction. Christina Spencer was going to have to make a choice, but one or the other, it would suck.

The videos ended. Mr. Bartlett smiled proudly. "What do you think, young lady?"

"I think you're a manipulative bastard."

He frowned then, became angry then. "Excuse me!?"

The truth came from her mouth, only moments after recognizing it herself.

"Kyle pointed you out... you followed us for two days. It was you who told Ned Grossberg all about me, and where to find me."

She stood up, looking tired and worn... almost defeated, but not quite.

There was one string left, so it seemed, and she clung to it as if her very sanity depended on it.

"It's between us. We are both fully aware, what happened to Ned Grossberg. It wasn't suicide. I was there, I watched as he was murdered."

He glared harshly at her.

"You're accusing me of lying? Are you so ungrateful for the sanctuary Miss Garth provided, that you dare to jeopardize that?!" His voice was rising with every syllable.

All she did was glare back. There was nothing left for her to be afraid of, was there? She really had nothing left to lose!

"I don't care. That'd be another charge I don't need. As for you... you're filth to me. I feel dirty having to be in your company."

She headed to the doors, the numbers, 66, seeming to stare at her and laugh scornfully in her face.

"Now where do you go, you insolent little beast? You really have nothing to fall back on."

"I know... and I will do my part to make sure Harriet Garth is elected... it's for the greater good. Just understand one thing. I'm not your lapdog!"

X-X-X

"You heard it... and you and you! Right?!"

Bryce hopped out of his machine. Kyle stood off to the sighed, scratching his head with confusion.

A jubilant Tommy stood next to a forlorn Annie.

"Yaaay, I heard ya!" he clapped.

"I heard nothing," Annie tried, but the despondent look in her eyes said otherwise.

"Liar," Kyle mouthed silently.

Bryce walked back from his excitement, motioned to Tommy to stop clapping with excitement, in respect for Annie who was obviously terrified at this revelation.

"It'll be ok," Bryce assured. We have a strong ally in Harriet Garth... whatever that means... Christina's the spokesman... woman-"

"Don't mention her name again!" Annie hissed, eyes. flaring and shaking fists clenched and bouncing on her sides. "Do not mention it again!"