Later that morning...
Thursday, June 29th, 2017
07:12 GMT+1 (06:12 GMT June 29th)
Hamilton Road, High Wycombe
England, United Kingdom
Everyone was very tired as they all but fell out of the Range Rover.
Rosa tapped a code into a lockbox secured to the large brick-built period property set two-dozen yards back from the main road. She retrieved a bunch of keys and she proceeded to use two of the keys on the stout-looking storm doors which opened up to reveal a solid wooden front door which required the use of two further keys. They passed into a neatly decorated reception hall where Rosa simply pointed up the dark oak staircase and the three youngsters slowly trooped upstairs. Rosa followed along behind and she guided Cara into a bedroom which looked out over the front of the property while Wanda took a corner bedroom which also overlooked the front garden, leaving Hahn to take the opposite corner bedroom which looked out into the back garden. All three children simply flopped onto a vacant bed and fell fast asleep. Rosa chuckled as she made her way back down the stairs to where Leo was bringing in the last of the luggage. As Leo locked both sets of doors, he spoke to Rosa.
"Safehouse, ma'am?"
"Call me Rosa, Leo."
"Yes, ma'am – er, Rosa."
"We should have a few hours of peace now they are all sleeping," Rosa said as she stepped through a comfortable family room and into a modern and spacious kitchen. "Yes, this is a safehouse. It is maintained by a caretaker who I notified yesterday – we have fresh food and the dust sheets have been removed."
Leo nodded as he peered into a very full fridge.
"We can have two days to rest and then we need to get down to business. Firstly, we need to look after the three children – Dieter will go bananas when he hears nothing from Osborne and Longford, but it will take time before he sends a team after us. Dieter has no idea about this safehouse or the three others which I have around the United Kingdom. Now, I would suggest that we both get some rest before the monsters awaken."
Leo chuckled as he walked through the kitchen area and into a space fitted with a large Velux roof window and floor-to-ceiling quadruple folding glazed doors where he dropped onto a two-seater couch in the corner and then promptly dozed off leaving Rosa to sink into another two-seater sofa in the family room where she too dazed off.
A few hours later...
Wanda was the first to awaken.
The girl looked around her, struggling to understand why she was waking up in a strange room . . . then it hit her like a sledgehammer – she wasn't even in her own country! However, any further thoughts or curiosities were overridden by her need to make use of the bathroom. However, as she checked out the doors leading off the landing, she found a door leading to a toilet in its own little room, but then she glanced to her left and she saw something truly amazing . . . something muscular . . . pure perfection in her young eyes . . . eyes which took in the varied injuries and scars which marred the otherwise perfectly tanned skin. She...
"Just admit it, Wanda, you want his dick between your legs."
Wanda froze in place as the object of her sexual desires turned and stared at the teenaged girl whose face was burning a bright crimson and who wished that the floor would just open up and consume her. Leo looked past the stricken girl to see Hahn, a massive grin on his face as he enjoyed his sister's intense humiliation, then he laughed as he walked past Wanda who was trying desperately to become invisible as her entire face burned. Once Leo had vanished into his bedroom, Wanda turned on her brother who fled the scene. Wanda then vanished through the door bearing the sign 'Lavatory' and slammed said door.
"What's going on?" a tired Cara asked from her bedroom door.
"Wanda just found a topless Leo," Hahn grinned. "She had an episode."
Cara peered surreptitiously around the landing and into the bathroom hoping to catch sight of said desirable vision as Hahn burst out laughing.
..._...
A short while later, the three children were digging into bacon butties
Wanda glared silently at her brother as he crammed half the bacon-filled roll into his mouth. Hahn was always happy when he was eating something ridiculously unhealthy.
"Where have you been all my life?" Cara sighed as she took another bite out of her butty. "This is so awesome!"
Leo chuckled as he shovelled some freshly grilled bacon onto a freshly buttered roll for Rosa.
"Sauce, Rosa?"
"Give us the HP," Rosa said, surprising Leo. "I got a taste for the stuff before Cara was born," Rosa explained as she liberally covered her bacon in the spicy brown sauce.
"Ewww!" Cara and Wanda said together.
It was early afternoon, but it was breakfast for them all as they became acclimated to the new time zone. After they had eaten and downed a large mug of tea each, the three children vanished out into the garden to get some fresh air. The day was cool but the sun was shining which allowed them to enjoy the large garden which had many bushes and shrubs rising up to over ten feet in height around the borders and providing privacy as they wandered across the perfectly manicured lawn. Wanda walked with Cara and she was wanting answers to the many questions racing around in her head.
"Why are we on the run from my father?" Wanda asked.
Cara grimaced as she responded.
"I don't know all the facts, but Uncle Dieter has done some bad things and he is up to something really bad, right now," Cara replied.
"What about Otto?" Hahn asked as he walked over to the girls.
"Dad insisted that Otto stay with him at the ranch – he should be safe," Wanda commented.
"I hope Dad stays safe," Hahn muttered to himself as he left the girls talking while he enjoyed the garden.
Rosa had overheard the comments and she figured that there going to be some rough days ahead of them all before it was all over – one way or another.
16:35 GMT+1 (15:35 GMT June 29th)
St Thomas' Hospital
The Fifth Floor, Children's Wing
Surgeon Commander Blake Schneider Royal Navy felt like he had stepped back in time.
Yet again, he had seriously injured children who needed his attention. Two days earlier, he had arrived at the hospital with fourteen year old Laurel Booth. They had both flown directly into London Docklands Airport and thence by blue light ambulance to the hospital. Two hours in an operating theatre had ensured that the girl would definitely live and she took up residence in the very same room and bed previously occupied by one Scarlett Radford some eight months previously. Not too far away, the room previously occupied by Harper Sharp at that same time was now occupied by thirteen year old Amber Dawson who had arrived, just the previous evening, after a daunting nine hour flight from Ascension Island followed by an hour in another blue light ambulance. Amber had then spent seven hours undergoing major surgery to rebuild her badly torn body. Blake himself had assisted for the final three hours of that surgery which had ended in the early hours of that very morning.
Needless to say, Blake was shattered and he had promptly fallen asleep on the badly-worn couch in his office, only to come awake after twelve hours of sleep to check on the two children and hope that there would be no more arrivals.
16:35 GMT+1 (15:35 GMT June 29th)
Hamilton Road, High Wycombe
Lynn Collins was glad to be finally doing something constructive.
Together with Lauren Edwards and Hunter Graves, she was heading out of London in a borrowed Jaguar XJR 575. Lauren had used her superior age – she was over a year older than thirteen year old Hunter – to get the front seat and she was loving it. Not that Hunter was slumming it in the rear, either, as he sank into the plush stitched-leather rear seat and gazed out of the double-glazed, armoured side window. Lynn, though, was in her element as she drove the car east along the M40 south of Beaconsfield. She loved to drive, and she loved to drive company property, especially when she was not paying for the petrol. They were on a mission – exactly what the mission entailed was slightly unknown but had relied on a very brief briefing from Erika in Los Angeles – of protection, although whom from whom, Lynn was not entirely sure.
They were not alone, as about a mile back, in an armoured Range Rover, Natasha King led her own team consisting of Jordan Montgomery and Lizzie Edwards. They were to remain separate and associated with Lynn and her team as armed backup – 'watchers watching the watchers' as Lizzie had put it. They were a 'family group' just like Lynn, Lizzie, and Hunter which was hoped to lessen the chances of discovery by those they were to be watching, or worse, by those who may be out to do those they were watching harm. The two thirteen-year-olds sat in the backseat together talking – the pair enjoyed their time together and got on rather well. Lizzie had managed to get past the missing leg issue with a simple comment: 'I don't go out with boys because of their legs; I go out with boys because of their...'; a comment which had earned her a swift rebuke from her mother, Emily, while Lauren had simply laughed herself silly. Needless to say, the two sisters were behaving in a much more professional manner – mostly.
The two groups on the ground were, in turn, being observed from high above by Trevor Lai and his adopted son, Ewan, who flew aboard the McDonnell Douglas MD530F helicopter known as SCOURGE. The machine was painted a glossy dark blue all over the main fuselage and tail while the underside was painted a matte duck egg blue. No weapons were carried but she retained the under fuselage multi-function FLIR turret to allow for easy monitoring of what was going on below them on the ground. With the weapon wing removed, the rear bench seat had been reinstated along with the glazed rear doors which allowed the single-engine helicopter to potentially carry a total of five. Trevor and Ewan both wore black flight suits and black flying helmets which simply added to the mystique over the aircraft which bore the military registration ZZ528 painted in dark grey on either side of the fairing below the main rotor and above the cabin. As the two vehicles approached High Wycombe, SCOURGE descended and touched down in an open piece of farmland from where they could see anyone approaching from any direction. Trevor shutdown the engine and then he closed his eyes for a doze, even as the rotor blades slowed to a stop.
"You can have the first watch, Ewan," he muttered.
Ewan chuckled as he kept a wary eye out the bulbous nose of the helicopter and via the mirrors fitted to the sides of the helicopter.
That same time...
North of Heathrow Airport
Siobhan Longford was beyond pissed.
Her colleague was in hospital and unlikely to recover – that was a big problem. She had had to endure several hours of intensive police interrogation, after which she had been released – that had just been mind-numbing. But worst of all, she had lost the two children whom she was supposed to be protecting, and she had lost all track of Rosa Müller, her bitch of a daughter, and that cunt, Evans. She wanted revenge, and she wanted something positive to tell her employer who had to be beyond pissed; she had missed two check-ins already. Finding someone who did not want to be found was not easy, but not impossible. However, Longford knew full well that finding Rosa Müller was going to be a tough one, but find her, she would.
After a brief examination of a road map, the woman jumped into her rented Vauxhall Insignia and she headed towards the northwest of London.
Sometime later...
A few miles northeast of High Wycombe
Miranda Frost was quite a few steps ahead of the suffering Longford.
Indeed, Frost had been able to travel via a more direct flight making use of a private jet which had deposited her at the Northolt Jet Centre in northeast London, in time to get to Heathrow and tail her subjects. Rather annoyingly, she had lost track of the Range Rover in which they were travelling, at the so-called 'Magic Roundabout' which was located in the very centre of the town. The confusing road layout and the heavy traffic had allowed her quarry to slip away. However, she knew that they had to be somewhere nearby – why else would they have left he M40 motorway? As a result, she had no choice but to drive around and around the large town looking for the Range Rover or one of several faces which could give her a clue as to the location of Rosa Müller's safehouse.
She wanted to return to Dieter with Rosa's head and Rosa's job – more would be nice but that would do for the moment.
The following afternoon...
Friday, June 30th
16:15 GMT-7 (23:15 GMT June 30th)
Napa County, California
United States of America
Napa City is the largest city and the county seat of Napa County and is set in the very heart of the Napa Valley wine region.
Nestled in amongst the many vineyards which stretched across the Napa Valley, one hilltop vineyard, just beyond the northern outskirts of Napa City was being turned into a fortress. Deep within the main villa, Dieter Mannheim and Anton Renke were standing around a large wooden table, planning their defences. Outside, the wounded Gunther Schmidt was guiding his men into their positions – he had upwards of eighty men surrounding his hilltop villa.
"It's not enough!" Dieter complained to Renke bitterly.
"We have enough men..."
"No! They got to me, in my own home!"
"Dieter! I think Anton knows what he is doing," a voice chided the man.
Dieter turned to face his wife of twenty years. Karri Mannheim was stunningly beautiful. Dressed as she was in a white blouse with dark blue jeans, her long legs were accentuated for all to see, as was the rest of her curvaceously formed body. If Dieter had something like a conscience or a moral compass, Karri was it. Not that Karri Mannheim, or Karri Stein as she had been born, was innocent of anything nasty. No, Karri had been recruited by Dieter some years before Rosa had come on the scene. Karri was a very nasty piece of work but she had shied away from that world of death and violence when she had become pregnant with Otto. She had then assisted her husband from their early headquarters until Wanda and arrived and then Rosa had been moved from operations to support as Dieter's personal assistant. Though Rosa and Karri generally got on – they had fought alongside one another on a few occasions – Karri had had cause to believe that Dieter had, once or twice, been unfaithful with Rosa as the opposing party, but there was absolutely no proof other than a woman's intuition. Indeed, Karri was certain that the dates did not add up for Cara's supposed conception but again, there was no proof, just her own intuition.
"I know, my love, but you are here, and so is Otto."
"You have how many machine gun nests? Seventeen! Two special sites which would give the ATF seizures if they knew you had them, not to mention the dozens of cretins putting their size thirteens in my flower beds! How many Claymores are out there, honey?"
"A few..."
"Try eighty-nine!"
"You heard what happened to the Genovese, didn't you," Dieter retorted. "Their home destroyed and everybody wiped out in less than an hour! Almost two hundred dead, for God's sake!"
"Okay, Dieter!" Kerri growled. "Just stop fretting and let Anton and Gunter sort things out."
"I need a drink..."
"No! You've downed half a bottle of Johnnie already. You can't fight drunk, Dieter."
Dieter muttered something which had Anton Renke chuckling as Karri strode off to check on her son.
..._...
Karri knew that her husband was doing his very best – under the circumstances.
It was very obvious that the near-death-experience had rattled the man, and Karri was no stranger to near-death-experiences having been almost caught and killed in Europe so many years before. Since the birth of her children, she had chosen to take life a day at a time and to keep danger at arm's length – not easy considering the life which they had created for themselves and their children. For the most part, their three children had no idea about their parents' past. Okay, Otto had figured out that his father had his fingers in some rather unsavoury pies and being the intelligent young man he was, he had identified that his own want-for-nothing lifestyle did not come from one hundred percent legal income. Otto was old enough to understand and come to terms with that; he had confided in his mother which was why she and his father had allowed him to stay with them in Napa while his younger siblings were sent to perceived safety in Europe. It was also very clear to Karri that her eldest son was able to figure out that everything was very serious, and the seventeen year old was keen to help.
As such, Otto wore a ballistic vest under his shirt and also body armour on his torso. The youth had learned to shoot at a very young age so he also carried a holstered Beretta 92F at his hip. The young man was moving around with Gunther Schmidt, assisting the wounded man as he checked, double-checked, and re-checked everything. Otto was a fast learner and he swiftly picked up on his tasks as he ensured that the seventeen medium-calibre M60 machine guns were each provided with a thousand rounds of 7.62-mm ammunition. He had also learned how to safely inspect the Claymore mines and their varied methods of detonation. The deadly anti-personnel mines could be triggered by electronic command over several hundred yards of cheap 'commo' wire which led back to the command centre in the main house. Each mine could also be triggered via all-but-invisible trip lines. All of the deadly devices were sited in such a way as to protect the men guarding the Mannheim family and shred any invaders. Everybody kept to pathways marked with small white wooden stakes with white-painted tops to avoid stepping into the death-zone marked by the mines.
As for the deadly looking tubes stacked up in two locations which had overriding views of the valley and skies all around, Otto grinned as he considered the surprise any would-be-attacker would endure should they try to attack the hill-top villa.
16:30 GMT-7 (22:30 GMT June 30th)
Marine Corps Air Station Miramar
San Diego
It had taken many hours of meticulous planning to bring together the required forces for the assault on Dieter Mannheim and some (extremely) high-level support had provided two key weapon systems, one belonging to the United States Air Force and another belonging to the United States Marine Corps to ensure that the assault minimised friendly casualties and also assured success in taking a key opponent off the worldwide board.
The plan was a bold one, but it was hoped that the sheer brute force and surprise of the attack would bring off a success. However, Erika was experienced enough to know that any outcome was possible but she had eagerly accepted the assistance from the United States military. Therefore, that morning, they had set off south towards San Diego where they had found Team San Diego waiting for them with their gear packed. After the usual banter, the two teams consisting of Erika (Mist), Chrissy (Venom), Sky (Bane), Kieran (Domitor), and James (Paradox) as Alpha Team with Guinevere (Lilith), Nicholas (Trauma), Juno (Lilim), and Logan (Riptide) as Bravo Team all boarded a large non-descript bus which had arrived to collect them. As for Madeline (Crypto) and her little brother Connor, they would remain in Los Angeles as Overwatch for the operation.
The bus had taken them south towards the sprawling Marine Corps Air Station Miramar where they had been waved through security and onto the capacious ramp which held many aircraft, a mixture of rotary-wing and fixed wing. However, that morning the sleek F/A-18C Hornet jets were of no interest, nor were the monstrous CH-53E Super Stallion helicopters. Instead, the attention that morning appeared to be concentrating on a single weird-looking object which looked like anything but an aircraft as it was towed out of an aircraft hangar. The bus stopped and a young woman stepped through the open door.
"Good morning, all!" the woman called out. "I am Captain Cameron Gale United States Marine Corps, but you can call me Cammie. I thought you guys might like to watch my bird transform."
"Bird?" Juno asked dubiously.
Cammie pointed over at the jumbled up machine which had stopped moving and the tow-truck which had been connected to the nose wheel by a towbar was disconnected and removed.
"What is it?" Chrissy asked.
"Is it broken?" Sky added.
Then both girls simply watched in awe as with a whine of hydraulics, the machine began to change shape even as they watched. The massive appendages which sat fore and aft of the soon-to-be aircraft began to turn, and the appendage overhanging the cockpit moved to the left side of the aircraft as a second identical appendage came around from the back end of the craft. In just seconds, it was obvious that the aircraft had a wing which swiftly moved into the more traditional location for an aircraft wing – across the top of the aircraft. At the tips of the wing, the two appendages moved from the horizontal to the vertical and then the black vanes attached to each appendage began to unfold to form a completed Boeing MV-22B Osprey. The monster tilt-rotor was menacing to look at as it sat on the concrete, the two monstrous Rolls-Royce Liberty AE1107C engines pointed vertically into the air with the twin triple-bladed thirty-eight-foot diameter rotor disks poised horizontally some twenty-feet above the concrete at each end of the almost forty-six-foot wing. Crewmen then began to remove red intake and exhaust covers from the engines and other points on the aircraft.
"That was so cool!" Juno exclaimed to general approval from everyone aboard the bus.
"Right!" Cammie said. "Let's get you all into a room where you will be told about the safety features of the MV-22B Osprey and you will each be fitted for your survival equipment. Driver..."
With that the bus moved off with Cammie taking a seat next to Erika.
..._...
The bus drove directly into a massive hanger, out of the bright sunshine, and Cammie waved them all off.
"Leave your kit on the bus – it's yours for the duration," Cammie advised as a US Marine corporal moved to stand guard at the door to said bus.
Cammie led the group – with Juno and James jostling to be in the front – towards an identical Osprey which was parked in the hanger fully deployed. She led the group around to the rear of the amazing aircraft.
"This is the ramp, up which you will board, and down which you will deploy. Unlike a traditional helicopter, you will not have a tail rotor to avoid and none of you are tall enough to have to worry about hitting your head on the tail. Inside, we have twenty-four crash-worthy seats which you will use tonight."
Juno and James were fascinated by the masses of exposed pipework and cabling which ran along and through the aircraft structure.
"You have three windows which can be used to make your escape should the aircraft come down too hard to relaunch," Cammie went on.
"You mean 'to crash', right?" Sky asked.
"Clever girl! Above the ramp here, you have another emergency exit panel which can also be used after an uncontrolled contact with the ground."
"I'm beginning not to like you," Sky growled.
Cammie ignored Sky as she continued with the tour up the inside of the aircraft.
"We have another access door to starboard and then we have the cockpit. Tonight, you will all deploy down the ramp when the loadmaster waves you off. Naturally, I will be in the cockpit, flying. At the ramp, there will be an M240D 7.62-millimetre machine gun for self-defence as we land or launch and for the approach something a little heavier is fitted to the underside of my Osprey which is not yet fitted to this bird."
"You say 'something a little heavier'?" James asked leadingly.
"No, no; I must keep my secrets," Cammie grinned. "Now, go get fitted out ready for tonight – I need to go see how my own bird is doing."
With that, the group was taken deeper into the hanger by four marines.
17:01 GMT-7 (00:01 GMT July 1st)
Safehouse C
Los Angeles
It was finally time.
"Connor, come with me."
The boy, who had only turned ten, just under three weeks earlier, dutifully followed his big sister through a door which had, until that moment, been locked to him and he had been told never, ever, to go through that door under any circumstances. For a moment, the boy was a little worried, but then he knew that Maddie had never lied to him, and she had never hurt him, not once. He trusted her more than he would ever admit. The dingy-looking reception area where he often spent his evenings appeared to be like just any reception area found in any number of businesses. However, the boy had felt that everything seemed just a little bit off. The five-year-old Dell PC and equally archaic telephone which sat on the cheap wooden desk for example. The room was not very appealing, but his sister had kept him occupied with food and drink, not to mention plenty of paper and other items of stationary to keep him occupied. Behind the cheap wooden desk was that door. For a moment, he was reminded of the theme tune to an ancient cartoon which his sister seemed to love streaming and Connor Tyler had a very creative imagination:
Somewhere in the dark and nasty regions where nobody goes
Stands an ancient castle
Deep within this dank and uninviting place lives Berk (hello!)
Overworked servant of the thing upstairs (Berk, feed me!)
But that's nothing compared to the horrors that lurk beneath the trap door
For there is always something down there in the dark, waiting to come out
Don't you open that trap door
You're a fool if you dare
Stay away from that trap door
'Cause there's something down there
Don't you open that trap door
You're a fool if you dare
Stay away from that trap door
'Cause there's something down there
Maddie noticed her brother hesitating and she grinned, figuring out that the boy was concerned about what might be through the forbidden door.
"It's perfectly safe, Connor – trust me!"
"If you say so," Connor replied, his eyes peering through the door into the darkness beyond.
There was a lot about his big sister that he did not know. The same applied to his new family: Erika, the weird twins, and the two boys. They were amazing and they had taken him into their home and made him feel very welcome. He knew that he had made the correct decision staying with Erika and Maddie, and he had not regretted one single minute of it. Connor was jerked back to the present as he entered a room he had never seen before; the room was dimly lit and was just as uninviting as that trap door, what with the empty walls and rubber-tiled floor. Unbidden, his fertile young mind conjured up the creepy thunder and lightning which always scared him in such situations. Then the door clicked firmly shut behind him and Connor jumped a mile. He watched as his sister took two steps and then reached out with her right hand which she pressed against a plastic-looking panel mounted on the opposite door which appeared to be more well kept than the outer door. His keen hearing identified the soft electronic clicking and then he saw green LEDs illuminate all-around said plastic-looking panel. Connor watched as Maddie hauled open the obviously heavy door which was really thick, he noticed, and must have been power-assisted as it had to way a ton – literally!
Then Connor simply froze as his senses reached capacity and then his brain quite literally exploded, emulating those explosive brains in Kingsman.
..._...
Only the boy's brain did not actually explode out of the top of his head – cool though that idea sounded.
Maddie smiled down at her stunned brother whose jaw was resting on his chest and his eyes were sticking out about eight inches from the rest of his face. Then she laughed as she thought how funny Connor looked. Then, after about three full minutes, Connor finally regained the ability to move and to speak.
"You are shitting me!"
Maddie laughed at her brother's outburst – it was her own, from just a few months earlier.
Connor stepped forwards and he began to spin around as he took it all in – what he saw was truly amazing. He stood in a wide corridor painted a pale blue with subdued but adequate indirect lighting while the floor was made up of black rubber floor tiles. To his left was a large room, the front wall of which was transparent and made from some really thick glass. The single door was made from the same really thick glass and it had a black pad embedded into the glass wall beside it. Beyond the glass were rack after rack of weapons extending back almost as far as he could see. The stunned boy struggled to count all the weapons that were arrayed beyond the glass. The armoury was ginormous, he thought, and straight out of his favourite computer game of all time: Call of Duty. The boy was surprised to feel himself salivating at the sight and he quickly shut his mouth before he started to dribble. There had to be every weapon that had ever existed laid out before him which had him thinking. Who would buy so much weaponry? Were they insane? What had his sister got herself into? What was he getting himself into? He felt his sister's hands on his shoulders, manoeuvring him down the corridor, away from the massive armoury.
Then his jaw dropped, yet again, and Maddie tried not to laugh, as they walked past another, almost identical, glass-fronted room filled with piles of military-style equipment stacked neatly on steel racking, the boy's mind was really struggling with sensory overload at that point, and he did not thank that he could handle anymore, but then they reached the end of the corridor and they passed through another armoured security door and stepped into a large area with a red-painted concrete floor and all the equipment that the average auto-workshop would possess. The boy grinned from ear to ear as he stared at the awesome collection of four-wheeled vehicles and motorcycles – all sparkling under the bright LED lighting. All were very expensive, and all heavily customised. Then he stopped dead as he cast his eyes over the captivating lines which made up the rear end of the Chevrolet Camaro 2SS which sat on massive tyres and just exuded power. It was not just the beautiful lines which had caught his eye, it was the licence plate at the rear of the vehicle: SWIPE. It couldn't be . . . no way!
"Maddie?" the boy began, sounding very worried. "Where are we? Why are we here?"
Maddie took her brother's hand and she pulled him past the motorcycles and through yet another security door into what appeared to be a set of comfortable offices and then the boy suddenly needed to visit the bathroom very badly.
..._...
The face was shocking as it was displayed on the seventy-five-inch high-resolution TV screen mounted on the wall.
Actually, it was not a face, but it was instantly recognisable. It was the purple which sealed the identification for the boy, not to mention the pink highlights and the piercing purple eyes which bored deep inside his psyche and he felt fear, but then a voice spoke from beyond the purple devil.
"Give it a rest, Mindy; you're scaring the poor boy half to death!"
It was a man's voice and soon a smiling face quickly set the boy at ease.
"Hello, Connor, my name is Dave, Dave Lizewski – and you've already met my wife, Mindy."
"Hi, Connor," a more friendly looking face said as a woman appeared to stand beside the tall man. "Sorry if I scared you – just having a bit of fun..."
"Your idea of fun and everyone else's idea of fun are so far apart it's unreal!" a girl's voice piped up and then a face appeared. "Hi, I'm Stephanie, and these are my parents – what a life!"
Stephanie then vanished from sight and Connor just stood there, stunned and confused.
"Connor, your sister has a very important job," the man, Dave, went on. "Maddie joined us at the beginning of November, last year, for a very important task, and she excelled at that. Your sister is a member of Fusion in Los Angeles, and she goes by the codename Crypto. Don't take that lightly, Connor; your sister is a key member of Fusion in Los Angeles. We are letting you into a very important secret as we believe that you are both old enough and can be trusted with that secret. You say the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time, then people die. Anonymity protects those we care about, that is why we wear masks."
"Does that mean I can..."
"No, Connor, you cannot become a vigilante," Dave said quickly, cutting the boy off.
"Was that girl a vigilante?" Connor persisted.
"Yes," Dave replied honestly, "but Stephanie's a special case – a very special case."
"I heard that!" a voice chimed in from beyond Dave.
"The world is facing some very bad people, and tonight, Erika will be leading an operation to take out one of those who threaten world stability," Mindy said. "Your sister has a very important task to perform, and she will need to know that you won't get in the way. I want you to follow every instruction you are given without a moment's hesitation, understand?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"I have heard a lot about you, Connor Tyler, and I hope to be able to meet you next time I am over that side of the country," Mindy finished.
Connor was a little unsure about that, but he simply nodded, awed at the responsibility which had been laid upon his young shoulders.
..._...
Once the screen had gone blank, Connor turned to his big sister.
"Was that really – you know who?"
"Kick-Ass and Hit Girl? Yeah."
"Woah! Talk about zero-to-hero!" Connor exclaimed.
Maddie laughed at the Disney reference before she responded with an indignant tone. "Hey!"
Connor grinned up at his big sister.
"You're awesome, Maddie – if only Mum and Dad knew..."
"They would never believe you; I was their Mulan and they knew that I could never amount to anything!"
"But you made something of yourself, Maddie – you're a Fusion vigilante . . . WOW!"
"You want to see where I work?"
"Cool!"
Maddie led the boy to a steel door and she triggered the electronic lock and the she pushed the door open. Connor found himself facing a weird-looking mesh door with two coloured metals tightly interwoven. Once the steel door behind them had clicked shut, Maddie pressed her palm against another pad and the lock for the mesh door was released. Then Connor laid eyes on the biggest computer setup which he had ever seen in his life.
"Figures!"
Maddie had to laugh at that comment – the room was just so her!