'Red sun rises like an early warning
The Lord's gonna come for your firstborn son
His hair's on fire and his heart is burning
Go to the river where the water runs
Wash him deep where the tides are turning'

-Delta Rae, "Bottom of the River"


Chapter Twenty-Eight: Grace and Forgiveness

"You did well, Blake."

Once praise like that was all he had ever wanted. Now his heart gave a flutter, the beat of a dying bird's wings, and lay still in his chest. He kept his eyes on the command board in front of him. "Thank you, sir."

The central control for the entire secret facility was smaller than it seemed at first glance. The main area was completely devoid of anything interesting, save an oval conference table and some chairs. A small set of stairs led to another landing, where a huge, screen dominated the wall. The screen flickered to each part of the facility in turn. Along the walls of the second landing giant computers bleeped and blinked, flashing red and green in turn.

Gray leaned back against the wall with arms folded over his chest. He did not take his eyes off Blake, who was making a conspicuous attempt to stay busy and avoid looking at his father. "What was he to you?"

Is, Blake thought, a treacherous word that he had to swallow back. "A friend."

"A friend," Gray repeated slowly, drawing out the word to indicate exactly what he thought of that. "He was a RED, correct?"

Is. "Yes."

"Interesting. I didn't realize REDs and BLUs were allowed to fraternize."

"We weren't," said Blake, fingers coasting over the keyboard. "Not officially."

"So you befriended a RED unofficially?"

"Uh…I suppose so, sir." The back of his neck prickled. Blake spun in his seat to see Gray standing right behind him. Automatically he lowered his eyes.

A dry hand came under his chin and forced his gaze upwards. Gray remained expressionless as he tilted Blake's head from side to side, studying his features. "It makes me wonder—" his voice was soft "—what else you've done unofficially."

"Nothing." Blake's mouth was dry. What did Gray want from him? What more did he have to do? "Nothing, sir."

"Good—"

A harsh coughing fit cut Gray short. He doubled over and clapped a hand to his mouth, heaving so hard he shook. His knees buckled. He would have hit the floor if not for Blake, who lunged forward and caught his father with both arms. Blake winced as Gray heaved again, splattering bloody spittle over the both of them. He eased Gray into his chair and crouched down in front of him. "Are you going to be all right?"

"Generally, boy," Gray gasped, "blood from the mouth indicates I will be the furthest thing from all right." He balled his bloodied hand into a fist and pressed it into his thigh. Frustration rolled off of him in waves.

"Oh." Blake sat back on his heels, unsure of what to do or to say.

Gray considered him as he got his breathing under control. "I am dying, boy."

Blake looked up sharply. His heart leapt into his throat. "No—no, you can't be—!"

"I am. I am running out of Australium and when it's gone for good—" He allowed the implication to hang in the air between them. Gray's lips thinned as he looked over the pale and panicky Blake. Not much a successor, but a successor all the same. "When I die, my entire empire—my legacy, the legacy of the Mann family—will fall to you." His breath quickened again. "That is why I must be certain of your loyalty. Your loyalty to me. You—aremine. Mine alone. Do you understand?"

Blake nodded.

"Good."

For a time there was silence between them, broken only by the occasional beep of the monitors on the walls and Gray's uneven breathing. Blake gnawed at the bottom of his lip, deep in thought. Something had just occurred to him. If he was a Mann after all—if this was his legacy, his family—than he had a right to know his history. "Can I ask you something?"

"What sort of a something?"

"I was wondering if I could…I mean—if it's all right, I don't want to overstep my bounds—"

Gray glared at him. "What, boy?"

"Can I ask you," said Blake meekly, "about my mother?"

This was the last sort of a something Gray had expected. He frowned. Why on earth would he care about that? She was twenty-five years dead and Blake had never known her besides. What did it matter? What did she matter? He narrowed his eyes at Blake. "Why?"

"I…never knew her," Blake rubbed at the back of his neck. "I was just hoping that maybe…you knew something about her."

Gray snorted. "I knew something about her. That's how you were conceived, after all."

He rolled his eyes when Blake flinched, but despite himself he began to recall the dark London avenues of twenty-five years ago. The war had just ended. People had been trying to pick up whatever parcels of their lives they could from the rubble and the ruin. He'd been young, then—or, at least, younger—and restless as any weapons manufacturer in the prospect of peacetimes. He'd been wandering the streets at night, brooding over his perilous fortune and the unfairness of it all. A few whores, gussied-up young women who'd taken to entertaining servicemen on leave, had tried to catch his attention, cooing and cackling from doorways and street corners like a bunch of crows. He'd hated them, that much he could remember clearly, hated their too-wide smiles and their short skirts, hated that they stood for humanity's oldest profession. But he'd been younger and restless and there were a few notes in his pocket, and he'd found a girl he could hate a little less than the rest for a night.

He could never forget her features, much to his annoyance. How could he? She was here now, staring back at him. Curly blonde hair and bright green eyes, rounded features that made her less intimidating to approach than the rest. She'd been a vapid, bubbly thing that chewed too much gum and laughed too loudly, but she'd had a pretty enough name—Hope, was it? No, not Hope—and not Faith either, but it had been something like that—

"Her name was Grace," Gray said at last, inexplicably weary. "Grace Porter."

It had been one night, a few hours, one reckless impulse that he could chalk up to the times and set aside. Or so he'd thought. But eight months later, somehow, the stupid gum-chewing little tart had tracked him down, heavily pregnant and begging for help. For the sake of her child. For the sake of their child. Idly, only mildly curious, he'd asked her about the sex of the baby.

The girl had stammered over her answer, saying something about the way her distended stomach hung low and old wives' tales, before tentatively replying boy.

He had heard heir.

It was the first thing about her that really interested him. He'd given up hope for a male heir. He already had Bianca, a giggly little girl that was the result of another ill-fated fling, living with some distant relatives of her mother's. He was busy enough trying to build his empire and take back what was rightfully his. He couldn't be spending time raising a brood of children or procreating on the chance that somehow, maybe, he'd get a son. He had accepted that the Mann name would die with him. The blood would be carried on by his gray-eyed daughter.

But now, now, here stood a back-alley whore named Grace—there was some irony in there somewhere—with a swollen stomach and frayed clothes, saying the words he'd thought he'd never hear. A boy. Your son.

My heir.

How could she be sure, though? Gray had demanded of her. That was the snag. How many men did she see in a week, in a day, across the span of a few hours? The brat growing in her belly could have belonged to any of them. She couldn't answer that, not readily, and finally admitted she'd had to narrow it down to a handful of men. Even now, her hesitant answer sent a flare of hot disgust through his chest. Wanton women and weak men, was it any wonder he wanted to wipe the slate clean?

Still, though…he hadn't been able to shake the faint hope that there was a Mann in her stomach. So he'd agree to help her initially, at least until it could be proven, or disproven, that the child was his. It didn't occur to him until later that the child would be a bastard born out of wedlock, and no true Mann either way.

Well…he'd been a trueborn Mann, hadn't he? And look what happened to him. The world was cruel. If the boy was a Mann, he would find a way to survive it.

And he had survived, though the mother had not. It had been a difficult birth, an ugly, bloody mess, and his son had committed his first murder at the tender age of twenty-five minutes old (that had to be some sort of record, Gray had idly thought at the time, as far as homicide in the Mann family went). She'd had strength enough to name him "Blake". And then she died.

Displeased at first—he'd wanted to name the child Zepheniah, or at least something more colorful like Tanner—he'd asked the nurses after the meaning of the name Blake, intending to change it after figuring out just what the fool girl had been thinking.

One had told him it meant white. Another had told him it meant black.

Gray let the name stand.

Dead whore or no, however, he was not about to play father to some squalling red-faced little brat, especially one he still was unsure of being his after all. He'd dumped the baby on the doorstep of an orphanage, and then showed up a few weeks later offering his patronage to the rundown little building and its collection of snotty imps. He had watched Blake Porter grow from afar, assessing his every action and personality trait, searching for some hint of himself in the child. He saw the other children shun the dreamy, absentminded Blake, watched him weather the damning rumors that his mother had been a whore, was pleased to find out that Blake had taken to tinkering with his toys instead of playing with them. He was shy but inquisitive, the reports told him, and a young genius when it came to repairing things like the coffee pot or the toaster.

He'd watched as the years melted by and Blake Porter remained alone. The chance of the boy being adopted by some hapless dopes had worried him at first, and so he'd paid the orphanage triple to steer prospective parents away from Blake, away from the earnest green-eyed little boy with a big smile. As Blake grew older Gray's watchfulness lessened. No one wanted a shy older child with a mouth half-full of baby teeth and gangly limbs that didn't fit his frame. No one wanted an awkward teenager with a face full of pimples and peach fuzz.

No one, Gray found to his satisfaction, wanted Blake Porter.

At seventeen he'd grown too old for the orphanage. His grades, fortunately, had been satisfactory enough for university, even to apply for an apprenticeship. He'd left the orphanage for good, reportedly with a bunch of small children wailing about how they'd miss their beloved Blake (so he was popular with toddlers, at least).

University was no kinder to him than the orphanage had been. He was still awkward, dreamy Blake who tried too hard to be your friend, whose easy genius earned him the ire of his classmates, whose threadbare clothes and secondhand supplies made him an open target. The world was cruel, but Blake survived it just as his father had—alone, unaided, and with only his wits for company.

Blake had flown too high on his own, though. Too high, too fast, too far, his talent for engineering far outstripping his father's. The boy was Radigan Conagher come again. He could build phones, computers, radios, wind-up toys and diesel engines. What he lacked for company he made up for with raw skill. He was on the track to success.

If the boy was Icarus, who flew high and far, than Gray was Daedalus, watching for the moment when his son fell and drowned.

It came. Sooner than he had thought, given Blake's academic success, but it came all the same. Gray could not have timed it better himself. The killing blow came as a final project for the end of his apprenticeship to be presented to the engineering masters. Blake had gotten too ambitious with his plans for a solar-powered engine, desperate to impress, and the engine had exploded. Another apprentice had been hurt in the ensuing blast, badly, and Blake's engineering career had ended before it ever began.

That was when he had stepped in. He'd graciously paid off the damages Blake's mishap had incurred, presented himself as a mysterious benefactor to the baffled young man. He'd soothed Blake's fears about his uncertain future, bolstered him with petty flattery about his skills, offered him a place and an apprenticeship at his company Gray Industries. The twenty-one-year-old—desperate, lonely, aching, looking so much like his mother—had agreed to sign his life away in an instant.

But now he was getting lost in memories, like some dull-witted old man. He blinked to refocus on the present. Blake, now twenty-five, was still crouched down before him, silent and expectant.

"Her name was Grace Porter," Gray said to the wide-eyed Blake. "She was a whore. And you have her eyes. That is all you need to know. Now go." He flicked a dismissive hand towards the door. "I'm sure I'll find some use for you later."

Later came sooner than Blake thought.

He sat in the Engineer's workshop with legs propped up on the workbench. The life-extender the RED Engineer had built for his father was on the workbench next to his feet. Gray did not trust Dell Conagher, and so had told Blake to inspect the life-extender for any hints of sabotage.

At least that was what Blake was supposed to be doing. But he was too deep in thought to even consider looking over the life-extender. He sat still, staring into the dark without really seeing anything. A wrench twirled through his fingers.

Grace.

His mother's name was Grace.

His heart swelled in his chest. If he ever had a daughter, he decided right then and there, he would name her Grace. I have her eyes. He closed them to picture her. He could see green eyes and blond hair, just like his, but otherwise the woman in his mind had vague, fuzzy features he couldn't really make out. She was warm, though, warm and bright like he'd always hoped she'd be.

Had Grace Porter loved him? She must have, on some level, even though she had never known him. Well, not really known him, but still. He couldn't say for certain what sort of connections a mother made with an unborn child, but he liked to think that maybe she had talked to him, sung to him, rubbed her belly to soothe him when he kicked. Those were all things mothers did, right?

Right?

Something deep and inexorable ripped open within him then. It was the pain of a loss of something he had never had. Blake pitched forward, gasping and rubbing at his aching chest. Hot tears sprang into his eyes.

He wanted—what? Who? A dead mother he'd never known, a distant, dying father with a cruel streak, a half-sister who had always begrudged him his claim to Mann Co.? The Mann name gave him a sense of belonging, gave him a place to be, but it didn't give him any comfort. He thought it would, he thought it would finally give him that elusive family he'd been waiting for all his life, but now he knew it wasn't to be. The look on his father's face when he'd asked about his mother told him that.

There was only one person who had ever loved him like a son. There was only one person he could think to go to when he felt like this.

On some impulse he reached into his pocket and withdrew his secret vial of Australium, clutching it like a secret lifeline.

"Ah, so he's a liar and a traitor and now a thief, too. Will the wonders never cease?"

Blake jumped a mile and spun to glare at the Viper. He clenched the vial of Australium tightly in his hand; there was no point in trying to hide it now. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to gloat," the Viper said as he entered the workshop. He angled his head to the side. "Although it seems I've stumbled upon something much more interesting than your deepening sense of self-loathing. Does your father know you have that?"

"No," Blake admitted. He didn't see any point in lying about it.

"Ah." Lithe as a cat, the Viper hopped up onto the workbench beside the life-extender. "You know your padre would be pleased to see that. He needs Australium desperately."

"I know."

"So what do you have it for, then?"

"I…don't know." Blake ran his thumb down the side of the vial. What did he have it for? Why was he saving it? His father needed it to survive…

The Viper studied him. What he was searching for Blake did not know. "Did you know Australium has healing properties? It's a key ingredient in the Medigun formula."

Blake allowed a little irritation through his haze of self-pity. "I know." Engineers were privy to the medical advancements of Medics. How else were they supposed to account for the healing mist in dispensers? Or if a Medigun broke, for whatever reason? The Medigun formula had trace amounts of Australium in it, enough to act as a stimulant and an agent. "But too much can kill you."

"That it can." The Viper nodded. "Your father is poisoning himself slowly with his life-extender. Poetic, one might say, that which saves us can also be the death of us. I'd say that vial," he pointed to Blake's hand, "has enough in it to save one man. Maybe two, but definitely one. It's going to be up to you to decide which man."

Blake's heart missed a beat. "I don't understand your meaning."

"Oh, I really think you do. Haven't you heard the saying? He who saves one life saves the world? Or something like that. It's a nice phrase, really." The Viper pursed his lips and looked to the ceiling in sudden consideration. "But I don't know how true it is. No one will thank you for saving the life of a ruthless warlord, for example."

"My father is not a ruthless warlord," Blake said, a little too defensively.

"Not yet, no," the Viper's tone had a steel edge to it, sharp as his dagger, "but I can think of another man who has a far more pressing need for Australium's healing than Gray Mann."

For an instant Blake stopped breathing. He looked the Viper up and down, wondering if this was a trick, another test set up by his father to prove his loyalty. "Why do you care?" he asked, careful to keep his voice neutral.

"Because I quite like being alive, thank you very much. I may be an evil man but I am not a man who would usher us into oblivion," the Viper said. He hopped off the workbench to stand in front of Blake. "And neither, I should think, are you. You may be lost, Blake Porter, but you have not strayed too far yet. You can begin to make things right."

Fresh tears stung at his eyes. He wanted to believe the Viper, wanted desperately to believe him. "How?"

"By doing the hardest thing of all."

"What is it? I'll do it—whatever it takes—" Whatever it was, it couldn't be any harder than what he'd already done.

The Viper crouched slightly so that they were eye-to-eye. He clasped both hands around Blake's clenched fist. "You need to talk to him."

Everything hurt.

It hurt just to breathe.

Sniper took slow, easy breaths, trying to pace his breathing as best he could. It would be so easy to succumb to the pain, to completely lose his mind down here in the dark, but he wouldn't give Giancarlo the satisfaction. He would stay calm. However much it hurt to do so.

Can't just sit here goin' mad. Gotta focus. Gotta take stock of what's damaged.

His leg was definitely broken, not as bad as it had been after the Mundymobile crash but broken all the same. Ruefully he wondered if he'd ever be able to walk fully on that leg again. Fiery pain crept up and down his left shoulder, which felt as though it had been shattered to splinters even if it was still very much a part of his body. He couldn't feel his left hand. His throat was so raw it hurt to swallow. And there was a gnawing, twisting sensation in his stomach that he might have been able to place if he hadn't been so damn tired.

Giancarlo had left his face alone for the time being. That was a small mercy.

Sniper twisted his good hand around a little, testing the knots that kept him tied in place. The coarse rope burned against his skin but did not budge. Sniper cursed low under his breath. It didn't matter, he tried to assure himself, it didn't matter because Spy would come. Spy would find out where he was. He was probably on his way here now, in fact, pissed off and cursing up a French storm. Somehow, someway, Spy would come.

Footsteps sounded in the dark. Sniper's breath quickened. He jerked from side to side, ignoring the pain lashing up his back, and snarled loud as he was able. "Come on, then, ya smug wanker! I'm ready fer round two!"

There was no answer. Instead something heavy plunked down beside him. Sniper sucked in his breath, mind racing with possibilities, but before he could prepare himself for the inevitable there was a faint hiss. A familiar cool mist settled over his skin. Doc, Sniper thought as his injuries healed from the inside out. Or Engie? That was a dispenser healing him, he knew it.

One arm sprang free of its bindings. Sniper couldn't stop his pained cry as sensation seared back into the deadened limb. His stiff fingers curled around the canteen pressed into his hand. Water had never tasted so good as it did when he shoved the canteen into his mouth. He gulped it down, desperate to ease his constricting throat. The stabbing pain in his stomach remained, but now that Sniper could concentrate he recognized it (with some wry amusement) as simple hunger.

The canteen was halfway empty when Sniper finally had the presence of mind to look at his savior.

Porter.

Blake didn't flinch when Sniper spat a mouthful of bloody water at him. Instead he just sighed and wiped his sleeve across his face. "I deserved that," he said in a dull voice.

"Get out of here, Porter," Sniper growled. "I only got one hand free but that's all I need to wrap around yer throat."

The murderous look on Sniper's face turned his insides to mush, but Blake remained where he was. "No," he said. "I need to talk to you."

"Talk to me?!" Sniper was too weak to shout, so he settled for a furious hiss instead. "Talk to me about what?! How ya—why ya—"

Blake nodded. "Yes. I…I need you to understand."

Sniper stared at him. He wanted to hate Blake, he wanted so very much to hate Blake, but he was tired and hungry and sick to his stomach. He didn't have the energy for proper hate. Didn't mean he couldn't at least try, though. He scowled. "Ya think everything will be forgiven if I listen to whatever sob story ya cooked up?!"

"I didn't say excuse," Blake snapped. He grimaced, regretting his tone immediately. "Just…understand."

Sniper was quiet for a long minute. He searched Blake's pale face, trying to draw from that deep well of hate he knew he had in him. Somehow he couldn't find it. All he found within him was grief and exhaustion. Finally he jerked his head forward in a fraction of a nod.

Blake found another chair and dragged it over to sit across from Sniper. He collapsed down into it heavily, as though the weight of the world was on his shoulders. "Gray Mann," he said, "is my father."

Sniper's eyes widened. He looked Blake over once before snorting. "Yeah. I can see the family resemblance all right. So, wot was it all fer then, those crocodile tears of yours? To gain my trust and spill all ours secrets to dear ol' dad?"

Blake frowned. "I—no—those weren't crocodile tears—"

"Blakey-boy, you deserve an Academy fucking Award fer this."

Blake's eyes flashed. He clenched his hands into useless fists. "Please, please, Mister Lawrence, please just listen to me!"

Unfortunately for him, Sniper had suddenly decided he was not in the mood to listen. He twisted his free arm as best he could, trying and failing to break free. He glared daggers at Blake. "What did you do it for, Porter?! Fame, fortune—"

"N-no, he didn't—I don't want—"

"Then it was for this whole bloody company—"

"No! I don't care about Mann Co.—!"

"Wot do you care about, then?!" Sniper snapped. His voice was thick with contempt. "Aside from yourself?"

"FAMILY!"

That answer brought Sniper up short. He stilled in the middle of his thrashing to properly study Blake. And for an instant he was heartbroken, mouth twisting in sympathy and shoulders slack. "Family, huh?" His voice was hoarse. "Gray Mann don't strike me as much of a family man."

"He isn't," Blake admitted, miserable. "Not in the slightest. But…he's the only one I have."

"He ain't." He never had been. Sniper remembered the weight of Blake crushed against him, how hard he had sobbed into his shoulder. "Ya had us, Porter. Ya had me." On the last Sniper's voice cracked.

"I did. But not always. For the longest time, for as long as I could remember, I was alone. I didn't have a family. I didn't have anyone. No one would have cared if I lived or died. And I thought, when I was little, maybe it was just circumstance." Blake shrugged. "Next time. Next time would be my time. Next time they'd look at me and they'd see someone, something, anything. Next time." Next time never came. Not with the prospective parents who came through the orphanage, not with the other apprentices at school, not until Gray Mann had approached him had he felt anything like a sense of belonging. At first he'd thought it was chance, that other people were just luckier or smarter or more appealing than he was. But as the years slipped by and isolation grew like a chasm he'd realized the fault had to lay with him. He was defective, somehow. Broken. An idiot and a fool and a coward, a liar and a traitor and a thief—is it any wonder no one wants you just for you?

Blake wiped at the tears in his eyes. That's not true. The BLUs had wanted him. The REDs too. Sniper had been a stranger the night he'd sat next to him at the bar, but he'd been a stranger who'd drank with him and said a few kind words and passed a some crumpled notes into his hand. Lawrence Mundy Jr. was the very first person, as far back as he could remember, who'd been kind to him just for the sake of being kind to him. And it had made him feel…good. Like something. But he'd gone and ruined that. Just like everything else.

"Gray gave me…a place. A purpose. A name. I'd failed at everything else in my life. I already told you that once already, didn't I? Everything I've touched I've ruined."

A memory stirred in the back of Sniper's mind. "Ya told me ya graduated at the top of yer class. Early." It felt like ten years ago that Blake had sat down next to him with a wry smile and a loose bowtie. God, he'd been so damn cheerful then. What had happened to that vague, smiley young man? The one who'd turned against Giancarlo to save his and Spy's life? Whose side was this kid on?

"I lied," Blake said to his boots.

He'd lied about his age too, now that Sniper remembered. Trying to make himself look older, more mature, more impressive. On some level he understood. He hated that on some level he understood. "Ya been lyin' to me since the minute we met."

Blake flinched as if struck. "Not…not about everything. Not about a lot of things."

"Give me the truth about this, Porter. Why?"

Blake looked down at his hands, flexing his fingers in a slow rhythm. "No one wanted Blake Porter. No one needed Blake Porter. And then one day someone did. Can you imagine that? Not having to be alone anymore?"

There was a birthday card waiting for him in the mail, lovingly signed and doodled on by a sister. Sniper's stomach clenched. He could imagine the wonder of being wanted. He could image it just fine. "But they didn't want ya, did they? They didn't want Blake Porter. They wanted another Mann. Gray ain't gettin' any younger." And Bianca Mann, he recalled suddenly, had become Bianca Serafini. A name that did not hold half the weight as Mann.

Blake looked away. "I know."

"And ya were fine with that?"

"I had to be. Because—if there's one thing I've learned, only one—it's that nobody loves a nobody. And Blake Porter is a nobody."

"You were never a nobody, Porter." Sniper said softly. "Not to me."

Blake's Adam's apple bobbed in his throat and he had to look away again. "I…I'm sorry, Mister Lawrence. For everything. About everything. I just…I wanted you to understand why."

Sniper made to retort that this was a hell of a thing to try to understand, why he'd been shot at and trussed up and bound and beaten half-to-death, but he didn't have the heart to do it. He swallowed back the bile in his throat and took a deep breath. "Sorry ain't gonna make this right. Sorry ain't gonna fix this nice and easy! Don't ya see, Porter? What he is? What you'll be if ya follow him?" He waited for Blake to lower his eyes to the floor. "One day yer gonna have to stand in-between Gray Mann and something far more important than me. One day yer gonna have to make a choice between yer father and the world."

Blake didn't answer.

He was slipping away, the boy he had admired and cared for crumbling to dust under the enormous might of Mann. Sniper stared at him, aghast. For the very first time he could feel that well of hate bubbling up in his stomach. "Then you best hope I never see your face again, Blake Porter, or whoever the fuck you are," he said with a snarl. "Because if I do, I swear to God above I'm gonna tear ya limb from fucking limb."

The color drained from Blake's face. It must have occurred to him that even a caged dingo had teeth. He stood, trembling from head-to-toe, and backed away. "Mister Lawrence—"

"GO!"

Blake fled. He turned on his heel and ran. A faint, strangled sob followed from the dark.

Blake held it in until he stumbled into the safety of the workshop. It was only then, with the door shut behind him, that he stumbled to the floor with a cry of his own. He grabbed for the vial of Australium in his pocket. There was a little left at the very bottom, no more than a swallow. He breathed hard as he turned it over in his fingers. For a heartbeat he wanted to smash the vial against the wall and be done with it.

He wouldn't give it to Gray. Sniper would need more healing if Giancarlo came back. But Sniper had threatened to kill him if he saw him again. But he couldn't let anything happen to Sniper! But if he helped Sniper—was he betraying his father? But then, a voice in his head asked, what did it matter? Gray didn't care one fig about him personally. He was just another tool, another machine. And yet another voice, smaller and more insidious, whispered that if he betrayed Gray he would have nowhere else to go. No one would take him after all this. He'd be alone. Again.

You—are—mine, Gray said.

Ya had me, Sniper whispered.

Who did he belong to?

Whose side was he on?

The Australium throbbed in his hand. For an instant the odd brown stain on the wall was briefly illuminated. Blake blinked, rubbed at his burning eyes, and dragged himself up off the floor. He was too tired to try and sort out his scrambling thoughts.

The life-extender was still on the workbench. Blake gave it a half-hearted once-over. It looked fine on the surface. He unlatched it to study the sleek set of wires and bolts inside. His fingers, stained slightly from building the dispenser, flitted over the life-extender. The RED Engineer had done fantastic work, even set up a pulse-monitor so that the life-extender dispensed Australium in time with the subject's blood flow. This was the most complicated piece of machinery he'd ever laid eyes on, even more complicated than the robots…

His fingers froze over the Australium flow control. Blake furrowed his brow and leaned forward to be sure of what he was seeing. The calibrations Engineer had set were wrong. It was set to release double the Australium Gray needed to maintain his health…Engineer must have known that…why would he…?

Realization clicked.

Blake reclosed the life-extender without further inspection. Slowly, measuring every step, he turned on his heel and walked out of the workshop.

It was just the Viper and Giancarlo in the employee break room. Giancarlo was stretched out on the couch, deep in thought, and the Viper had taken to flicking knives at the well-spent target hung on the wall. His aim was off, and more than one knife buried itself deep into the wall instead. Not that the Viper noticed or cared; his attention was wholly on Giancarlo.

Giancarlo twisted a dying purple wildflower between his thumb and forefinger. His expression was oddly melancholic. Taking his frustration out on the RED Sniper had done little to cheer him up, it seemed.

The Viper studied Giancarlo out of the corner of his eye. Revenge meant little, he supposed, when your loved ones were not there to bask in it with you. He wondered if Giancarlo still believed in his wife's innocence in the whole scheme. "I'm certain she's all right, Gian," he said as a means of testing the waters. "Bianca is very intelligent, and resourceful besides."

Giancarlo didn't look up from the flower. "I know she's all right," he said. "It's just—"

He hesitated, actually hesitated, and the Viper knew the end times must have been upon them after all. "¿Qué?" he prompted, genuinely curious now.

"If she has…sided with them—" Giancarlo's grinding teeth were practically audible "—Mann will want revenge."

The Viper idly flicked another dagger into the target. "And this bothers you because…?"

"Porca puttana, Castillo, are you joking?! She is my wife! I love her! If anything were to happen to her—" He stopped short of saying what, exactly, he would do. Instead Giancarlo grimaced and looked away.

If he hadn't recently witnessed Giancarlo beat the shit out of a defenseless captive the Viper might have been touched. As it was he just tilted his head to the side and smirked. "Ah, a hitman with a heart. How romantic. He may spare her, you know. She is his daughter." He didn't believe it, not for an instant, but he was curious as to what Giancarlo thought.

"Conosco i miei polli, Castillo!" Giancarlo snapped. "I've worked for the man long enough to know where he draws the line…and where he does not. He does not…" A muscle in his jaw jumped "…care if Bianca is his daughter or not. He is apathetic to humanity." He held up his robotic hand and flexed it to show what Gray Mann cared about.

And therein lies his great weakness, I should think. "And what will you do? If your meal-ticket asks you to deal with your wayward wife?"

Giancarlo didn't answer.

Perhaps that was for the best, for at that moment Gray entered with hands folded behind his back. He was smiling thinly, which was never a good sign. The Viper eased up against the wall. Giancarlo remained sprawled out on the couch.

Gray stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of his disinterested employees. "They're coming," he announced.

Very dramatic. You could have had a career as an actor, Mann. The Viper flipped one of the throwing knives through his fingers. "Who? The British?"

"The Americans. The Russians. The Australians. And the REDs. It's all over the news." Gray reached for the television remote and flicked it on. The solemn-faced reporter appeared, detailing the breaking news of a coalition of former enemies. A coalition of former enemies spearheading an effort to stop an international arms-dealer-turned-terrorist…

Giancarlo got to his feet in an instant. "What are we going to do?"

"We're not going to do anything. We're ready for them."

"Are we?" the Viper asked lightly. His heart thundered in his chest. He had had a vague plan to grab the Sniper and abscond before things went south—but suddenly things hadn't just gone south, they'd gone to Antarctica for an extended vacation. He'd just have to improvise from here. "Very well. I'll take the Australians, you can have the Russians, and, hmm, Giancarlo, I'm feeling generous, so you can have the Americans."

Giancarlo managed half a smile, but Gray just looked annoyed. "You're forgetting that we have our own force to be reckoned with."

"The robots," the Viper said with a hint of derision.

"The robots." Gray nodded, completely serious.

Something about how damn calm Gray was about this made the Viper uneasy. "And how, exactly, do you plan to use a bunch of rattling buckets to stop the combined might of the world's three superpowers?"

Gray's smile was without any humor. "That is for me to know and for them to find out."

The Viper could feel the color draining from his face. He sheathed his knife, avoiding Gray's eyes, and looked to Giancarlo to ask what he thought.

He didn't get the chance, for Giancarlo had turned on his heel and walked away.


ANGUISH.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter. Thanks to Bel for the beta work, and to Terminal Nostalgia for helping me get facts about British universities straight.

See you soon!

Chaos