"Hi Naima" Jay said answering the front door, pleased to see her and the 2 kids standing there, Jay could clearly see the outline of the kids bathers underneath their clothing
"Hi Jay, how are you doing" Naima asked giving the man a hug
"I'm good, well you two certainly need to stop growing, each time I see you you're getting bigger and bigger" Jay said to Meelah and RJ, it had been probably 4 months since he'd last seen the pair
"Hi uncle Jay" they both said with a smile
"Come on in, Zah you've got visitors" Jay called into the house before moving out of the way to allow them in
"How's she going with Jess's first spin" Naima asked
"Hasn't really said much, she's asked the how long is Jess going to be away for, where's she going, but obviously Jess can't disclose any of that" Jay said closing the door, there was unwritten rules everywhere in this life
"Hopefully Meelah and RJ will help distract her mind and learn the new routine" Naima said helping RJ take his shoes off
"I think that's Jess's plan" Jay said as he led the trio into the kitchen where Zalie was busy helping Alie cut up some ingredients into different bowls
"Hi, you must be aunty Naima" Zalie said seeing her standing there with Meelah and RJ
"I am, its nice to finally meet you, and these are my 2 little kids, Jameelah, she's the same age as you, and this is RJ" Naima said introducing Zalie to her kids
"Hi, everyone calls me Meelah" Jameelah said as soon as her mum had finished talking
"Zalie, but most people call me Zah, your daddy is uncle Ray isn't he" Zalie asked Meelah
"Yep" she responded
"He's out of town with mummy to" Zalie asked
"Sure is, tell you what, why don't we all go and get in that pool, Boompa to" Jay said asking the kids, greeted by cheers as the 4 went to quickly change before heading off outside
"Come on Cerbs" Zalie said calling to him, sure they were going outside, but Alie was cutting up some ham and chicken to go on the pizza's for tea, giving Alie a quick dose of the puppy dog eyes, she handed him a piece of chicken and he quickly followed the others outside
"Think someone is enjoying their retirement, need a hand" Naima said with a grin
"Nope, all done, and he is just a bit isn't he, thought we'd do homemade individual pizza's for tea and cook them in the oven outside, homemade individual pizza's was one of Alie's staple recipes for entertaining especially with kids as everyone done their own toppings
"Sounds amazing" Naima said quickly glancing over the ingredients in the bowls, she could easily put together one for RJ who could be a little fussy with his eating at time, she quickly helped Alie get the bowls into the fridge before following her outside so they could sit and watch the kids
"Think the kids are enjoying themselves" Naima said laughing as Jay launched himself into the pool earning a thunderous applause from the 3 children
"All four of them, you gonna keep them in line for us Cerbs while Naima and I get tea ready" Alie asked after spending 20 minutes drying the saturated pooch with a towel, it was getting late and the kids would need to be getting out to have something to eat, Cerbs barked happily for a few seconds before going back over to the pool and jumping up on a bench and stood watch over the pool
"That's our boy, how you been anyway Alie, staying long" Naima asked as they headed inside and started to get the ingredients out ready for when the hungry mob came in
"Been busy, thinking about talking Jay into setting up more of a permanent base here, I love Sydney don't get me wrong, but this is my nipotne, we downsized not to long ago, how about yourself, everything okay" Alie said updating Naima, Naima felt as close to Alie as she did Alana from the moment they met
"Same old, trying to hold the show together, what the hell" Naima said hearing a commotion outsideand Cerbs barking
"Alie can you get her neb" Jay called carrying Zalie into the house and sitting her on the couch, clearly she was having trouble breathing, Meelah and RJ stood back a little scared of what was happening to their new friend
"Is Zah going to be okay" Meelah asked concerned, Zalie was sitting there snuggled up hard against Jay who had spent the last 15 minutes rubbing her back while Zalie was breathing some gas through a mask attached to her face
"She'll be fine Meelah, its just that there are times when her lungs don't work as well as ours do so she has trouble breathing and needs to have special medicine through the mask to help her breathe normally again" Alie said explaining the situation as best she could
"It's called asthma Meelah, and lots of people get it, Zalie just suffers a little more than others though and she has to be careful, she needs to play in areas where the air is nice and warm and theres not a lot of flowers" Naima told her
"Is that why you have her play equipment and the pool undercover like it is and have those plastic curtains around the place" Meelah asked curiously, she hadn't met another kid before who had their play area set up like Zalie's
"Yep, so she can still play outside" Jay said as the mask beeped, he gently took it of and gave Zalie a sip of water to rinse her mouth
"Her play area is really cool because even when the weathers yucky and most kids are stuck inside, its still going to be warm enough for her to swim and play on the equipment" Meelah said
"Thats right, tell you what, next time the weather is really yucky and your stuck at home you can come around here and play" Alie said as she quickly grabbed the stethoscope that they carried with Zalie's asthma reliever bag and listened to her chest
You don't need me to call an ambulance or anything" Naima asked concerned as she saw Alie listen
"No, she's breathing better, why don't you go and get changed out of your bathers now, and then you can show Meelah and RJ your games room, no running around and aunty Naima and I will get your tea ready" Alie said, allowing Naima to quickly listen to Zalie's lungs herself, make sure the attack was over. Pool time was over for the 3 but as Naima checked the time she realised they'd almost been in there almost 3 hours, they could all deal with some quiet time
"Okay Nonna, you like video games" Zalie asked sounding a little tired still from the attack, she'd been having so much fun she hadn't been paying attention to how excited she was getting
"You have video games like uncle Brock" RJ asked surprised, he'd seen adults play them, but he'd never been allowed to play
"She sure does RJ, in fact she probably has more than uncle Brock" Jay said to the little boy
X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X
"Hey Ray check this out" Jess called out showing him the video she'd just received of the antics in the pool, they'd just touched down so Jess had switched her phone back on, Alie obviously guessing that it would be a comfort to Jess to see the videos and have updates
"Knew they would enjoy themselves" Ray said laughing as the kids were squealing with excitement as Jay jumped into the pool
"Why does Zah calls your dad Boompa Bookworm" Sonny asked, he hadn't heard her call him anything, so he presumed it was his granddaddy name
"Cause he can make things go boom, so its Nonna and Boompa" Jess said mimicking the sound of an explosion
"Fair enough, just never heard of Boompa being used before" Sonny said, he couldn't argue with that logic
"Bet you never met anyone else like my dad before though either" Jess said with a smile across her face
"True that, they say what else they got up to" Sonny asked, he had a soft spot for most of his brothers kids, Zalie had been no exception
"In the pool for 3 hours before Zah had a asthma attack, then settled in the play room and were eating home made pizzas till 2100" Jess said just as they were interrupted by Eric
"Jess, got a flight for us yet" he asked
"Yes, Hassan's got us one, and he's done a slight reshuffle, everyone he's put on has a minimum of 3 years service period with Nova, and Davis is currently running down the passenger lists now" Jess said handing the details over to him
"Davis what's the numbers like for the flight" Eric asked her
"Passengers, we have 237 on board, not including us and 30 staff members, 4 pilots and 26 cabin crew across the 3 classes, economy is completely booked out at the 230 passengers, 177 of them are frequent travellers, the rest are first timers, out of that 230, we have 6 infants under 12 months and 23 who are under the age of 2 years and another 11 who are in the 3-4 year old age group. The 5 in business class are all frequent travellers with Nova, older men who are frequent travellers and all work for the same company for the last 12 years, tickets were booked 3 months ago" Lisa said running him through the numbers that her and Jess had already gone through, the big concerns were going to be any last minute changes to the passengers as there would be less chance to do a thorough check on them
"So they're a lower risk" Jason asked, those passengers were going to be located in the cabin right next to first class, the plane was 2 story, economy was on the bottom level with the cargo, but it was the business and first class cabins located upstairs
"Yes, then its Al-Tabari and his wife in first class" Lisa said
"We got the wife to" Ray asked surprised by that bit of intell
"Yep, plan is to do as Jess suggested, which is just sit back and enjoy the flight, if something happens then we'll intervene, once we touch down then CIA will arrest them as they're going through the airport based on the evidence that the children involved in the bombing were blood relatives, Al-Tabari has already agreed to cut a deal and will spend the rest of his life in a nice and cosy federal prison somewhere in exchange for everything he knows, he will turn Naila over and she'll face criminal charges for being involved in terrorism acts against members of the US military and all the rest of that jazz, so she'll silently disappear into our prison system, we've secured 8 seats on the flight, all in first class" Lisa said, Derek was going to have Alpha take lead and shadow the package in the airport, Bravo would handle the plane with Metal taking the last seat, Bravo had three different assault plans already layed out ready to go in case something happened, they were however on their own for that part with no way to contact TOC as soon as they were in the air
"What about potential hostage situation" Eric asked
"17 of the 30 staff have military conscription under their belts and they can seal a cabin off completely and release a sedative into the air" Jess said explaining the security system
"You don't by any chance know what the sedative is" Trent asked
"Ketamine" Jess said
"Good choice, I'm guessing they carry drugs to help reverse it as well if needed" Trent asked, last thing they needed was a repeat of the Moscow theatre siege, releasing the sedative had been the easiest way of knocking everyone out to minimise the casualties, but the aftermath when people started dying as no one knew exactly what was in the sedative or were prepared with the enough antidote
"Yep, they learnt that from the Moscow theatre incident" Jess said
"Right then, sounds like we have all our basis covered, god speed and good luck" Eric said as the teams disembarked and headed into the airport terminal, he wouldn't get a decent rest until he knew that plane had touched down safely at Dulles