No, meheeners, it isn't just because you're sick! You're absolutely right. The plot has been plodding along behind all the Spike/Faye/Ezekiel happenings. However, I did put in a lot of hints that should have moved the plot along at an excrutiatingly slow, but still moving, pace. I'm not entirely sure people have been spotting them, though.

This leads me to believe I've made them far TOO subtle. Since I know what's going to happen I've probably written things in such a way that I'm being too cautious with giving away too much and instead I'm dropping hints that are far too cryptic for anyone to understand. It's my own stupid fault. :)

But I don't want to make any assumptions. I'm curious to hear any theories or ideas you guys might have about what's going on. If you have picked up any hints, perhaps you could let me know which ones. I'm sort of flying blindly through all this and I don't want to bore or frustrate you people into avoiding my writing like the plague.

Did anyone else read that series 'Fearless' by Francine Pascal? Last night I was thinking about how I stopped reading after No. 20 or 21 because it seemed to be going on forever and I couldn't figure out how the main character could be so stupid when she was supposed to be a genius.

When I read meheeners' review, it totally punched me in the stomach. Dear, God! I'm turning into Francine Pascal!

So I'm begging you all...Help!

Here's the next chapter that was bumped up for our poor, sick friend! :) Hopefully I don't upset the flow. But I think meheeners, and all of you for that matter, deserve some plot development!

Feel better!

ssg.x.



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I hardly know which way is up
Or which way down
People are strange God only knows
I feel possessed when you come round
People are strange
I feel possessed when you come round

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The large man with the one arm entered the room with a strange look in his eyes. He nodded silently at him before tentatively approaching Faye's small, still body in the hospital bed.

Roscoe suddenly felt as though he didn't exist. The tin man and the sleeping girl seemed worlds away from him.

Roscoe worried momentarily that he might be a relative. He suspected this through his silent observations of the concern on the man's face. Fatherly almost. The jerky movements. The fingers of his good hand clumsily, but gingerly, reaching out to smooth the hospital sheets bunched up and twisted about her tiny waist as she slept.

Roscoe felt silly when he remembered this man was far too young to be a relative of hers.

He was becoming paranoid. He had to stay focused.

It was too soon for relatives and the original plan already had so many bends and bumps in the road he worried this latest one might be the one that would fuck things up beyond repair.

The one that would demonstrate his expendability.

Still. It would be somewhat of a relief.

He had taken the job on a lark. He had wanted the excitement. It would have been his greatest role yet.

But she wasn't supposed to show up at his door that night.

That was not part of the plan. As it turned out, they found it to be convenient. He could keep an eye on her. She had nowhere else to turn so eventually she'd spill some of her secrets. In a way she had inadvertently saved his life.

Well, that's what he believed, anyways.

If he had become useless to them, he wasn't entirely sure they wouldn't kill him. He had originally thought he was helping with some sort of police investigation but as he got deeper and deeper into this he suspected he may be batting for the wrong team.

When she disappeared after that night, he was terrified they'd come for him. He had failed. He'd watched -- hell, he'd STARRED in enough spy movies to know the operatives always died once they'd become useless to the mission. Maybe he was blowing this whole thing out of proportion. Maybe this whole situation wasn't nearly as dire as he was making it out to be.

For what felt like eons he'd felt as though he were walking on eggshells. And when he was finally contacted, in a fit of crippling fear he suggested he'd throw a party at his place and invite some of the cast and crew members in the hopes that she would be curious enough to come out and make another attempt at getting more answers. He thought he might be able to think of a way out of this before the event actually took place.

He would never know if that was meant to be the night he died.

The hours crawled farther and farther away from any chance she might show up that evening and just when Roscoe was beginning to contemplate ways of getting out of that apartment and off this planet alive, she fell into his lap like a gift from God.

Or the devil. He still wasn't sure whose side he was on.

And they were pleased.

And that bought him more time.

Roscoe could breathe a little easier for a while.

And then Spike.

Spike was not part of the plan.

But lucky for Roscoe, this particular bump in the road might actually work to his advantage.

He had his ideas as to why Faye was unconscious when he found her. He was almost certain he had managed to successfully pull off at least part of his assignment.

But all the other things. That man. His hands grasping her wrists. Her top ripped open and hanging from her limp, exposed form. The bruises and...

Roscoe felt his stomach heave when he thought about it.

When he thought about her being hurt or scared or sad.

When he thought of what he himself was doing to her.

What he was going to have to do to her.

That was another thing.

He wasn't supposed to care about that girl so damn much.

That was most definitely not part of the plan.

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++Lyrics taken from 'I Feel Possessed' by Crowded House