Rating:R
Syl stood in the living room, her face cast towards the ground, the color
drained from her expression. Logan sat in the swivel chair in which he did his work for
Eyes Only, well, used to anyway. All that was left from the sweat and toil of 8 years of
attempting to reform the United States of America was the disjointed, scorched, bullet
ridden mass of twisted metal and cackling wires, of the now mutilated and useless remains
of his computers and assorted electronic equipment. Sweat dripped down his brow as his
arms drooped along his sides. "There got to be something we can do. My boo is alive. We
got to do something to get her back!" Cindy's cries were despondent and wracked with
the feeling of hopelessness and despair permeating every orifice of the once beautiful
room. Syl suddenly got angry. "Don't you think that if there was something we could do,
we'd do it already! But there's nothing we can do. The best option we have is to write
both Max and the others off as a loss. The sooner we accept that, the better."
Cindy glared daggers at her. "What the fuck is wrong with you fool?
Don't you care?" Syl inhaled deeply and started to count to ten. If that irritating girl
wasn't Max's friend, she would be tempted to break her jaw. She took a second or two to
force her emotions under control and began to state with a forced calmness "Of course I
care. Max and the others were my family. I'm just doing the rational thing here. To try to
get them back would be nothing short of suicide. The only thing we can do now is to
accept what has happened and move on. This isn't easy for me either." Logan pulled his
head up from his neck and opened his mouth. "I'm afraid she's right. There's nothing we
can do." His gaze came to rest on the electronic corpses of his equipment resting in a
crumbled heap before him. "With or without the informant net." "So we just gonna give
up?" She stared at the both of them, a mixture of both contempt and challenge issuing
from her face. "Now that's something I know my boo would NEVER do."
Syl's self control began to rapidly slip away from her. "How can I possibly
get this simple concept through your fucking idiot head? THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN
DO! JUST LET HER GO!" Her tone softened as Cindy's gaze weakened a bit and her
jaw began to slack, as if acknowledging defeat in the face of the harsh, merciless, and
ultimately undeniable truth. "Max is gone. Let her go." Syl didn't notice the teardrop
flowing down her face until after she had finished the sentence. The other woman merely
stood in shocked, unreadable silence for a seemingly indefinite period of time.
As suddenly as the massive gulf of silence and freshly released emotion
washed over them, Syl rushed forward and clamped her hand over Cindy's mouth as she
began to speak. She lifted a steady finger to her lips. Cindy's mouth stopped moving in
mid-syllable. Logan suddenly stood erect on the other side of the room, eyes wide and
fully alert. His gaze met Syl's and the look he recieved in turn confirmed it: they had
company. Thank god for an X5's enhanced senses. Syl crept silently to the blown open
doorway, engaging her ears to their maximum hearing level, the soles of her feet fully
attuned to sense the vibrations of an enemy footfall, all of her faculties in full gear, as if in
anticipation of a sudden attack. Both sets of eyes belonging to the other two people in the
room followed her every inch of the way. She made her way into the hallway, out of their
field of vision. Then there was a abrupt crash of a body hitting the floor, and the sound of
a foot connecting with someone's leg.
Brin really didn't know why she had come back here, back to good old
Fogle Towers. There was a small chance that she could find supplies there, something she
could use, money or some other valuable that would aid her in her quest to get them all
out of Manticore's reach. But that chance, she admitted to herself with all honesty, was
rather negligible. After debating it internally within her mind, she came to the conclusion
that He was the reason she had come back to this place. Come back to that smoking,
blasted apartment. She needed to know who this man was who had meant so much to her
sister. More importantly, she needed to know why. Who was he? A friend? A lover? What
did he mean to her that his loss would take such an effect? And part of it was to satisfy her
own damn curiosity. She wanted to know the man behind Eyes Only, he who had fought
so bravely and had died for a cause she did not understand. For whatever reason, here she
was, taking the elevator to the penthouse floor, possibly a pointless waste of time, time
she could use to help get them the fuck out of the country. Hell, the more she thought
about it, the more stupid the whole idea seemed. |You know better soldier. Giving to your
irrational emotions will only get you and members of your squad killed. They taught you
better than this, dammit!| She was so preoccupied with her thoughts and self deprecation
as she walked down the hallway that she didn't even notice her feet being swept under her,
suddenly sending her whole body crashing onto the floor.
Fortunately, her reaction was quick. She wasn't going to let a repeat of the
episode of max throwing the cuffs onto her take place all over again. Normally, she would
curse herself for loosing her focus and not paying any attention to her surroundings, but
there was no time for that now. She needed to act fast if she didn't want to wind up dead.
Her left foot lashed out and struck her assailant in the kneecap, hard enough to shatter a
norm's bones. A grunt of pain from her attacker confirmed that it was a woman, but to her
surprise, the woman was still able to retaliate with a swift kick to the side of her head,
knocking her down and causing a surge of unexpectedly sharp and vivid pain. Her brain
reached a obvious and sudden conclusion. |Must be one of us. Few norms can hit that
hard.| A foot came down onto her chest to pin her to the ground, but she grabbed it and
twisted with enough force to flip her opponent around and bring her to the floor with her.
She sprang up and pinned the attacker's leg with her right foot, while painfully twisting
the other leg with both hands. She got a good glimpse of who she was fighting. |Long
blonde hair, blue eyes, familiar facial features... Syl?| She found her voice. "Stop it! I'm
not here to bring you in!" Ignoring her pleas, Syl slipped her leg from under her foot,
wrapped it around the foot that had pinned her, and twisted, causing her to fall foward on
top of her.
Lightning fast, Syl flipped Brin on her back and clapsed a hand around her
throat, other hand curled into a fist above Brin's face, knees on her stomach. Before she
could strike, Brin lashed out with both of her own fists, slamming them hard into Syl's
stomach, stunning her and then grabbing her by the collar and throwing her a good 15 feet
down the narrow hallway. She flipped backwards from her opponent and put up a
defensive stance about twenty feet away. Syl got up and prepare to attack once more,
when they both heard the cocking of a gun and a figure standing 5 feet behind Brin.
"Don't move."
Brin slowly turned her body 90 degrees to the left, and rotated her head to
evaluate the new threat that lay behind her. Her mouth opened slightly. They had been
trained to not show any emotion, to suppress feelings such as surprise and shock during
battle, but she sure as hell didn't expect to see a dead man standing up and pointing a
9mm at her. "What the fuck?!! I thought you were dead." Logan merely smiled. "Really
didn't expect you guys to be so pathetically sloppy. Did it ever occur to you to take a
minute to check my pulse?" Brin overcame the shock rather quickly and began to assess
the situation thoughtfully. Even in a confined space such as this, she could probably move
fast enough to disarm and kill the norm and still have time to meet Syl's charge. But then
again, that wasn't what she wanted, was it? Provided that she could convince them she
was on their side, they could be a vital source of help. After a couple seconds, she put her
hands above her head and kneeled down. "I'm not here for Manticore. I've decided that I
don't want to be a part of that anymore. You can relax. I'm not the enemy." Syl sneered.
"Sure, and I'm the fucking Easter bunny. You really expect us to believe that you had a
spontaneous change of heart and now you're one of the good guys?"
"Believe it or not, I'm telling you the truth. I defected from Manticore just
about an hour ago. Max, Jondy, and Zane are in a truck in the parking garage. "Why
aren't they here?" Logan asked. "They were heavily tranquilized upon capture. Don't
think they'll be up again for least a couple more hours." Another voice, one she had never
heard before, caused her head to shift in the direction of a young black woman. "Let me
guess, you want us to get all giddy and excited and run on down to the garage where a
million of your black helicopter boys be waiting for our stupid asses?" "I'm here alone."
She stated simply, face devoid of expression. "You don't trust me, go and see for
yourself." They paused for a moment, unsure of what to do. Logan's eyes narrowed,
focusing on the stonelike countenance of the enemy. "Don't you think that if I did have
troops with me, that we would just storm the damn place and not resort to tricks?" Her
eyes shifted to the ground. "Like I said, Max and the others are down there. They're in
reasonably healthy condition. And I'm guessing the only way you'll believe me is if you
see them for yourself. So, are we just gonna sit here forever, or are we gonna make up our
minds?"
5 minutes later, the four of them stepped out of the elevator and into the
parking garage. Both Syl and Logan had their guns trained on her at all times. Cindy had a
.44 tucked into her pants, just in case. They made sure Brin stayed in front of them, eyes
not once diverting from her every movement. "Any tricks, and the first bullet is going
straight into the back of your head." Syl stated with an icy firmness. Brin's expression
betrayed no response, seemingly oblivious to that last remark. Finally, they reached the
van. Logan's mouth dropped open when he glimpsed the contents of the passenger seat.
"My god." Max lay there, beautiful face passive and inert, as if she were having some
pleasant dream. They opened the back doors to find Zane and Jondy equally unconscious,
and quickly released them form their straps. Syl turned to Brin with a softened smile, all
hosility gone from her demeanor. "Guess you're on the level after all." "Let's get them
into the apartment." Logan said. "Then we can figure out what we're going to do next."
It was so damn hard to get good help these days. So impossibly,
ridiculously difficult to get people who wouldn't screw up and fuck up the project. |and
these people are supposed to be the best our military has to offer. Jesus fucking christ.|
Renfro's voice took on a soft, razor sharp edge, exemplifying the rising rage and disbelief
at what she was hearing. "What do you mean you lost them?" She struggled to keep her
demeanor under control as the terrified young trooper in front of her sputtered out the
story. "They-I mean—They just took off while we were waiting. There was nothing we
could---" To his sudden surprise and unspeakable relief, she smiled at him. She actually
smiled. "Sir, what—what should I do to rectify the situation?" She said in a sweet and
almost patronizing voice "Nothing. I'll get someone else to handle it." A giddy and
childlike grin spread across the young man's features. "Don't worry about it, corporal. We
all make mistakes time to time. You're excused." The soldier tried to disguise his
eagerness to escape the room as he half ran towards the door, stopping halfway to give a
short salute on his way out. When he had left, Renfro called out to the shadowy figure in
the corner behind where the corporal was standing. "Richardson." "Yes director."
"Arrange for the corporal and his friend a nice little--- retirement package." The ominous
man gave a hint of a smile and left the room.
X5-452 awoke to the sound of a man's voice. A voice that seemed oddly
familiar, and yet she refused to accept the impossibility that lurked in the corner of her
mind. |It's him. Lo—Eyes Only. Control yourself soldier! To let your emotions deter you
from your purpose is death!| She opened her eyes a quarter of the way to glimpse a
familiar visage. It was him. Same undeniable features flooded her senses, the deep blue
eyes, the scruffy beard, that charming, irresistable smile--- |No! Dammit, I've got to focus!
Where the hell am I?| She opened her eyes all the way and took in her surroundings. The
apartment. Was this a dream? A hallucination of some sort? God knows what her genetic
defects could do to her brain. She looked to the face above her, hoping to find a clue as to
what was going on. The man's lips were moving, words pouring out of his mouth, but all
she could not discern what they meant. It was as if no sound poured from the orfice. She
lashed out with her right hand, urging it to close itself around the man's throat and force
some answers out of him. But for some reason her hand would not move. She looked at it
to see it was securely strapped to the corner of a mattress. She had been taken prisoner.
|But how?| The last thing she remembered was someone pressing a cold
metallic object against the back of her neck, and then a wave of burning pain... |Must have
been a tazer.| The man hovering above her continued to speak, words that made no sense,
calling a name of some sort. She ignored him. |It must have been Brin| she realized. |But
that's simply not possible. She would never betray both her family and Manticore... would
she?| Her mind wanted to blot out such a horrible thought, that one of their own could
commit such a heinous act. She decided that for the moment, she would not wonder who
had betrayed them and why. Her primary objective needed to be to find a way to get out
of here and get back home. Countless Escape and Evade exercises flowed through her
mind. |I have to find a way to get back...|
2 weeks later....
Renfro wanted, needed actually, to break something. Smash the window
perhaps, or maybe... she drove the pencil she held into the desk, shattering the point and
causing bits and pieces of the fragmented lead to fly across the polished wooden surface.
She had little time left, and soon the committee would want to know why things weren't
proceeding as planned with two of her top X5's.... She was startled by the sudden ringing
of the phone. "What!" she barked. |wouldn't surprise me if someone called to tell me
things got even worse.|
"This is Captain Carter. I called to tell you that X5-452 just reported in.
she's being escorted onto the base at this moment."
It looked like things just got better.