Chapter 28: "Tenacity"

Beverly Barlowe exits Anna's room, chatting with the agent trailing two steps behind her. After exchanging a brief hug, Anna strolls into the kitchen. Passing Karla in her running attire leading Beverly out the front door, she pours a hot cup of tea and grabs a handful of sweet biscuit cookies. With the team hovering in the living room, Anna takes her drink and glides into an open spot between Candice and Alice on the couch, laying her head back. An uncomfortable silence descends around her, and she sucks in a deep breath before speaking.

"I'm back."

As she's smothered in affection, Anna laughs and begs for them not to spill her cup of honey tea. Alice shifts uncomfortably watching Candice snuggle against her old friend the same way she lays against her at night. Suppressing a surge of jealousy, Alice excuses herself and retreats to her bedroom. Changing into her drab black and grey running gear, she recites how she's coming into a preexisting team, and she's the newbie. As she is finishes tying her shoe laces, Candice steps into the room and sits next to her.

"I wish I could say that we'll never do that again, but I'd be lying. We went through a great deal of stuff before you got here, and we're closer than when we first met…somewhere between BFFs and intimately close. Where exactly, I'm not sure, but you are the one I'm with right now. She has a great deal of coping to go, and I want to help her. If you read the reports from that blasted artifact forest world, you know I saved her life. I never made a significant difference in anyone's life before that day, and it changed me. For the first time in my meager existence, I feel empowered to change this universe for better or worse. To turn my back in her time of need is disgusting for a friend or fellow agent. If the situation was reversed, I would be having the same conversation with her about you."

Nodding, Alice takes a deep breath and lets the air dribble from her lungs.

"I know. I know that you two have a non-sex history, and that I'm coming into the scene a quarter of the way into the movie. I'm going out for a jog to clear my mind. I do my best mental sorting on the track or trails. It'll do me good."

As Candice jumps up to get changed, Alice immediately stops her.

"Alone. I need time to untangle my head without your sexy sweaty thighs glistening next to me."

Candice blushes and covers her face as she laughs hysterically.

Alice feels a warm surge flow through her and turns away. She's amazed that her anger and jealousy is blasted away with such a simple act, and she fights to scoop up the redhead and throw her on the bed and forgo her run. Sticking to her guns, she bends down and kisses Candice passionately before leaving. Candice slides onto the bed and smiles deviously.

"Don't be out too late. I'm not a night owl anymore."

Shaking her head trying to dislodge the sight from her short-term memory, she stands and leaves before she finds an excuse to do her run later tonight. Passing the laughing and festive members of her team, she rushes out the door and begins stretching. An unexpected rustling of leaves pulls her attention towards the lighted path. As her eyes scan the foliage, Karla suddenly appears next to her and she leaps four feet away without thinking. Karla, taken back, apologizes profusely.

"Whoa killer! I didn't realize you didn't see me! Hey! Mind if I join you?"

As Alice devises an excuse, Karla stops her.

"Great! How far you going tonight?"

Alice glares at her incredulously as she bites her tongue.

"I guess five miles. I needed a long run alone, but that's not going to happen."

Grinning, Karla stretches alongside Alice before they race off out of sight of the villas.

"Yah, I know what you mean. I like to walk in the gardens at night to clear my head, but a good run does the same thing for me. So how are you coming along in the team? I see you and Candice have hooked up."

Shaking her head, Allice takes off running, and realizes Karla will not give up or get the point.

"Yah, we really kicked it off. She's a really wild girl, despite what she projects. She doesn't hesitate speaking her mind when it's important to her."

Karla easily keeps pace with the long-legged runner, and shows no signs of tiring in her voice.

"That's probably the key reason Helena chose her to come. Everyone has skills and abilities which aren't truly unique, but the quantity and variety in each individual is why they get referred to the warehouse. They earmarked you after that one event."

Alice swipes a loose lock of hair behind her ear. The humidity only added to the sweat percolating across her brow.

"You mean the Johnny Torch suspect I took down?"

Karla gives a grunt of approval, and Alice continues.

"I still don't see what was the big deal was. Don't get me wrong, I like the career and work site change, but it was nothing."

Karla releases one of her annoyingly childish giggles before replying.

"Your instincts are why you're here, silly. Everyone has your skills abilities back home, but you have them all bundled up into a fantastic feminine package. Back on Earth, it doesn't matter and you were on our watch list for possible recruits, and we needed a woman here, so we called you and Morgan."

"Both of us?"

"Well, yes. The longer you go without a limb, the harder it is for the body to remember how to use it when it's replaced, or at least that's what our research has shown. We pushed her application through in ten hours. Her resolve and tenacity is practically unheard of from someone in her situation. My recruiter was on post when it went down, and his instincts told him to check out her story. Wise choice, I would say. Even if we weren't looking for combat trained agents, I would have recruited her. She had 'it' as they say. You can have all the training and knowledge, but you need that spark which sets you aside from the rest. Everyone has that spark here; you don't get to this place if you don't have it."

By the second mile, they were still a mile from swinging back towards the villas. Karla easily outpaced Alice as she chattered endlessly, despite Alice out-striding her by at least a foot or more. Slowing to respond to Karla's constant stream of questions, Alice couldn't comprehend how the small girl was unhindered by her endless jabbering. With years of training and conditioning, Alice never concentrated on her breathing or stride; yet thanks to one obnoxiously talkative child-woman, she was devoting more attention to just that. In her head, she knew the "child" was easily five or six times her senior, but she couldn't wrap her head around the concept. Karla edges ahead as she continues to talk in bursts.

"When I came on, the world was a different place. The war was underway, and I was learning anatomy the hard way, through helping the locals patch them back together on the table. Afterwards, I got my degree by going to med-school in Chicago, and they sent me back here. They didn't have a medical school here yet, and I helped them set one up after a decade or so. Those were some interesting days I tell you. We didn't have these villas, running tracks, skyscrapers, OW…"

Alice watches in shock as Karla tumbles over her feet and collapses onto the ground. As she stops to help her, a painful sting erupts on her shoulder making her fall atop Karla unconscious.

Alice wakes strapped to a metal examination chair with her arms and legs tightly secured. Laid before her were dozens of dissection instruments, saws, and knives making her breathing erratic while an unholy fear descend over her. As she uselessly struggles to pull some slack out of the straps, a seven-foot tall bipedal alien enters the room and grins horribly seeing her fully conscious. In a wicked tone, he seethes at her.

"You're awake already? Well, they're not ready to begin your examination just yet. They are going to do your young friend first. Do you care to tell me who's child she is?"

Alice clamps her mouth tightly shut defiantly resisting the drugs swimming through her blood stream demanding she answer his question completely and truthfully. She's surprised she doesn't speak a word, despite her body trying to scream out the answer. The alien waits ten seconds before sighing dramatically.

"No matter, she'll tell us in a few minutes anyways. Seeing that we're going to exterminate you both afterwards, it really doesn't make a difference who is tortured to death and who is peeled apart while still alive."

He leans over and gloating.

"Care to guess how she's going to die?"

Anger burns through Alice's soul, as the memory of Anna's vile suffering flashes across her mind's eye and the alien continues to enjoy her bondage.

"I can't wait to review the tapes of your little friend's session. What we did to your agent Bering was child's play when compared what they have in store for this one. Oh! Child's play! That's a funny one! It seems they forgot the neutralizer implants. I'll be right back…don't go anywhere."

Laughing over his shoulder he leaves the room. As the door whisks open, Alice hears Karla's screams echoing down the hall. Unimaginable suffering weighs down her screams and cries making Alice's eye's burst in tears and she frantically pulls at the straps. Intentionally leaving the door open, the alien ensures she can hear the horrible suffering Karla endures, while Alien laughter bounces around. The alien returns several minutes later, as Alice's eyes are blurred over from tears. The door remains open as he begins attaching the electrodes to the base of Alice's neck and she feels her resistance slowly turned off one limb at a time. As Karla's screams echo into the room, a new fire burns in her soul.

Her tears, once making small rivers down her cheeks, suddenly vanish in a flash of heat over her face. As he makes a final attachment, the alien turn suddenly towards the door concerned. Ignoring Alice, he begins stepping away confused by the sounds coming from down the hall. Karla's screams had abruptly stopped, and it was obviously disheartening for him. With his usual malicious tone, he cheerfully comments to Alice.

"Oh…I hope she hasn't died prematurely. We have four more hours of this planned before we terminate her. This is for science, you know."

He briskly walks to the door and closes it. When he turns around to gloat over Alice, he flattens himself against the sealed door in horror. Sitting in her chair, Alice's fiery anger explodes setting the electrodes and straps ablaze. Frozen in terror, the alien can't rationally a plan to escape, let alone move. Alice steps easily out of her confinement and begins stomping towards the alien who turns and tries to fumble with the lock release. As he finally remembers how to work it, Alice grabs a hold of him around the neck and tosses him like a ragdoll across the room. His screams are primal as his neck smokes and he rolls in agony. With third degree burns from where she touched him, he crawls helplessly away as she collects him and lifts him off the ground by his chest. Screaming as her touch sears his skin, she tosses him once more across the room. Trying to get up from the floor, Alice can't believe he is actually begging for mercy and compassion. Using both hands, she lifts him up by his chest and neck making his scream and sizzle. Carrying him to the chair, she throws him down and it automatically slaps restraints over him and his limbs. Despite the smoldering flames on his clothes and body, he somehow remains conscious as Alice takes an electric saw and turns it on.

"This isn't personal right? It's for science."

Driving the saw through his neck, his blood and fluids splash in every direction but Alice remains untarnished thanks to the flames covering her. After a minute, she realizes he's dead and discards the saw into his lap. Reaching the door, she hammers uselessly until the last of her rage subsides. Sinking to the floor, all she can do is cry. Many minutes pass until a heavy lurch rocks the ship, shaking her out of her self-pity. As she rolls onto all fours, the door suddenly beeps and slides effortlessly open. Standing in her running attire and covered in all makes of fluids including her own blood, Karla wearily breathes a noticeable sigh of relief.

"Thank God you're still alive. I got here as fast as I could. Are you okay?"

Incredulously, Alice stares at the broken and battered child.

"Am I okay? I thought they...they hurt you bad or something. I heard…"

Alice begins to reach out and hug Karla, but is surprised when she steps away from the embrace wearing a look of shame and distant pain. Bluntly, she dodges the comment.

"We've got to go now. The engines are rigged to blow and the avionics bay is on fire."

As Alice starts to ask questions, Karla grabs her hand and pulls insistently dragging her out the ship and down the path. Alice immediately notices Karla hobbling and unable to run. After several feet, Alice shakes her head and scoops up Karla in her arms. Running, she makes it over a hill before the ship suddenly explodes. After a controlled tumble and debris landing all around them, Alice picks up Karla again and resumes running frantically. Thanks to Candice's tutelage of the local astronomy, she finds the "Bunny" nebula and uses it to navigate back to the villas. The locals never named the constellations like humans did, so she took it upon herself to make up her own.

Alice ran for fifteen minutes, until she passed a Famori patrol. After directing them to the wreckage site, she realizes Karla is unconscious and insistently tells them she has to go. They seem to understand and make a call on their radio, but Karla resumes running to the villa using the lighted path. Minutes later, she is intercepted by Helena who scoops Karla into her arms and runs towards the medical shuttle waiting on the ramp. Despite Allice insisting she's okay, she's thrown into their warehouse shuttle and taken to the hospital.

"I don't see why you're all worried about me! I'm not the one who was unconscious!"

Shaking her head, Candice is visibly shaken and grabs Alice's head in her hands. Forcing her to look down into her lap, Alice's face turns white seeing her arms, legs, and the lower half of her shirt covered in dark red blood from where she held Karla. Candice hesitates from grasping Alice as she's overcome by the sight of so much blood. The shuttle leaves the pad and rockets after the first shuttle minutes ahead of them. Jumping beside Alice, she tears the bloody clothes off of her, has her lie back, and she does a cursory evaluation.

Taking out some cleansing wipes, she breathes a sigh of relief finding no wounds or scratches on her lover, and takes out a sealed package of coveralls from an overhead bin. Ripping the package open, she has her throw the bloody clothes into a trash bag, and helps her redress. Candice can't believe how her strong and resilient lover was suddenly a wounded and reclusive soul. Wrapping her arms around Alice after she dresses, she tries to comfort her as she shivers in the realization of what she just experienced. She's shaken back to reality when a nurse gets her into a wheelchair and pushes her into a private room.

Leaving Candice worrying outside Alice's room, Myka finds the nurses station and travels up eight floors to the surgery units. It takes her five minutes of searching to find Ward 81-015. She can't fathom why they utilized a strict number-based system, and then put the rooms in an expanding spiral from the center, even though the rooms weren't physically arranged in that manner. Finding Helen sitting in a chair with her knees tucked tightly against her chest, Myka reads the pain in her eyes and fights from bursting into tears. As she stops in front of her, Helena leaps up from the chair and into Myka's arms. Holding her, Helena finally finds the strength to speak.

"She's lost a lot of blood. She's on her third pint, and they're still sealing up her internal injuries. I'll throw up if I have to repeat what they told me they found so far. We need to go on the offensive now. I'm sick of our people being singled out and tortured to death for their whims of supposed research. The Famori have assured me countless times that she'll pull through unscathed, but I'm worried what would have happened had Alice not got her to us in time. Did she say how she got away?"

Shaking her head, Myka sighs heavily.

"No, but she's too shaken up to talk right now. Alice is staying with her, and promised she'd debrief her. Do you have any ideas about an offensive campaign?"

Helena nods subtly.

"A few, but I need to get a round table meeting to gather everyone's thoughts. Claudia and I have been talking about this since we escaped our ordeal, and I nearly lost my best friend tonight. As of this time, we're taking the hurt to them."