On the Tenth Day of Christmas, my I-Man gave to me...

Bobby waited for the sun to begin its approach before he made his escape. He hoped the conflux of day and night would allow him to more easily slip out within the shadows and with luck get past the perimeter. Working as quickly and quietly as possible he balanced himself on the bedpost, his fingers just reaching the ceiling, enough that he could shift back the ceiling tile. Above him loomed a couple feet of space to allow for proper ventilation to be laid within a compound of this magnitude.

Taking a deep breath, he jumped from his precarious perch and caught the support stud, agilely pulling himself up and out of sight. He hadn't bothered to unhook the camera in his room, knowing they'd notice a screen full of static much faster than they would a minute of movement. Nobody keeps Bobby Hobbes captive for long! Bobby thought to himself with a smirk, but he'd still have to hurry if he was going to get very far.

It was a tight squeeze moving within the two feet of space the adjoining ceilings provided. Gratefully, one of the support studs seemed to follow the vent shaft, so he balanced himself between the two, careful not to touch the flimsy ceiling and so to speak slunk his way down.

After ten minutes of shifting and about six rooms further, Bobby was sincerely surprised that no one had raised an alarm yet. They're probably snoozing, he thought smugly, but wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth and quickly looked around for a good place to vacate.

There weren't any noises coming from the room below him, and when Bobby carefully lifted a ceiling panel to took a look, he was pleased to find it was someone's office and currently unoccupied. A moment later he was smoothly dropping back to solid ground. With a rueful look up to where he'd just come from, Hobbes smirked and murmured, "There's nowhere Bobby Hobbes can't go, my friend!"

Hobbes was about to make for the door when he noticed the charger stacked full of radios on the nearby cabinet. They were like none he'd ever seen before, a self made model he guessed, and worked within the black out, Hobbes suddenly realized as one crackled to life. Picking it up, Hobbes turned in over in his hand. The volume had been left on, but it was encrypted and nothing but unintelligent noises issued forth.

Bobby quickly began checking them all, realizing with each burst of static that chances were good his escape had been discovered. Yet, if he could find...as he flipped the volume switch on the last one, words came through instead of just noise.

"-no sir, adjacent rooms are empty."

"Continue searching each room anyway. Perimeter is on alert in case he already got that far." The second voice was Pierre's, Bobby was sure of it.

"Oh crap!" Hobbes quietly exclaimed and tucking the radio to his belt moved to peek out of the room. Just down the hall he could see his guards as they opened the doors and checked the rooms further down. He waited till they'd stepped just out of sight before slipping out of the office, racing unnoticed down the hall.

Remembering exactly where everything was from the tour the day before, it didn't take much effort on Bobby's part to get to an exit while avoiding any people he passed along the way. Reaching the side of the court where he knew the least people would be, he looked up the side of the wall then just slipped over it as a cat might leap agilely out of sight with the aid of a slightly protruding rock halfway up. The hardest part would be getting through the perimeter, Bobby thought sourly as he quickly entered the sounding forest.

The sun was now beginning its crawl up through the trees as Hobbes carefully moved from one shadow to the next. He didn't want to hurry through this, or he was liable to get himself killed. The snow unfortunately had stopped falling. Bobby would have liked the added element of cover, but in many ways, he was glad at the same time. For as the cold wind struck his face, his body instantly reacted, as if he'd been outside in the cold the entire night. It didn't make much sense, the jacket he had was thin, sure, but it still should have provided more heat than he was currently feeling.

Pushing it out of his mind, Bobby forced himself to focus on the task at hand. For this, Hobbes had turned the radio off, and now gazed about studying the other shadows in the trees. "There you are, my friend," Bobby murmured under his breath as he noticed one shadow turn against the wind.

Moving quietly, Bobby shifted his way through the lining foliage with a stealth and grace most wouldn't expect. He had just reached the electric wires that signified the edge of the perimeter when his silent escape was finally interrupted.

It was to both their surprise as Bobby stepped around a low bush and suddenly, quite accidentally really, stepped on the hidden man beneath. Each fell back, too startled to take action right away, but Bobby recovered the quickest and before the guy could call an alarm grabbed his gun and jerked it up, ramming it squarely into his chin.

He grunted, but his grip on the gun didn't lessen, so instead, Bobby twisted, pushing his shoulder into the guy's mouth to keep him as quiet as possible while they wrestled in the snow fighting for possession of the gun. It was Bobby's sheer determination, and a lucky slip of the hand, that jerked his elbow into the guy's temple and won out in the end.

For a moment Bobby just laid there atop the unconscious guard, panting for breath and suppressing the on-going shivers that wracked his frame. Why was he so cold? He sighed in the silence of the snow with exasperation, but once again just pushed the thought away. Hobbes rolled away from the prone guard, keeping low and out of sight. He knew from sliding through these guys that the next guard down wouldn't be that far away and if their skirmish had gone unnoticed, it'd be a miracle.

Miracles that day seemed to come in twos, for there was no sound from down the line of trees, and other than taking the gun and a knife from the guard's possession, Hobbes also found a little black book full of key codes. Apparently the radios weren't used only for communication.

Smiling widely with his new found hope, Bobby easily jumped the electric fence with the aid of a tree and was soon making his way in the direction the beep from his reset radio indicated. The codebook had marked it as tracking mobile scopes, but Bobby was almost certain they were talking about the pigeons. And the pigeons he knew were looking for his partner. He just needed to get there before anyone else did.

Darien came to beneath a warm mat of...fur? He could feel the cold ground beneath him, but the heat that radiated around him more than made up for it, although it was hard to breath and every breath felt strained and came with a clump of hair that threatened to choke him. Not to mention the weight pressing down on his chest, he thought miserably. Darien tried to shift in this new foreign world, soon discovering movement was near impossible.

Yet as his system slowly began to wake, his mind also began to stir to some semblance of logic. The pounding from the day before had finally receded to a light ache, more like the ache caused by dehydration, which he didn't doubt might be a factor in his new condition. Memories, too, flooded back into place, although they didn't help explain his current situation. That is, until he remembered the dogs.

Involuntarily, Darien groaned. There were a few undeniably canine sounds in response and all at once the warm mass departed and Darien found he could once again move, if stiffly.

The dogs swarmed dizzyingly about him, far too excited for Darien's liking. He groaned again, sitting carefully up and drawing his knees to him. Cold noses and wet tongues sought his hiding face till Darien finally grumbled, "Okay, okay," and pushed the nearest one away.

Taking a breath he got a good look around him. Most of the dogs seemed to be watching him, tongues lolling out of their mouths, while the rest immediately began playing and wrestling in the snow. Darien drowsily wondered where all their energy came from. He felt like he'd been asleep for days. Not far from the truth there, he reminded himself, then carefully stood up.

He remembered the clearing, but nothing else he remembered seemed help him in figuring out which way to go next. "Just great," Darien grumbled out loud. The nearest dog barked. Darien looked at them, shivering slightly as his body began to adjust to the cold again. "You guys by chance wouldn't know where to go, would ya?"

The same dog barked in reply, then turned, heading into the trees. Instantly the entire pack ceased whatever they'd been doing and took off into the trees after the first. "Hey wait up!" Darien called after them, trying to follow as quickly as his stiff joints would let him, but the dogs seemed more intent on running than on waiting and Darien, with only two legs and sore ones at that, quickly fell behind. Still, the trail was easy to follow in the freshly laid snow and Darien continued on, blindly hoping the dogs were leading him back the way he'd come.

Claire growled with frustration and circled the table once again. It was no longer covered with the small equipment but was extravagantly covered with an entire lab set up.

Alex walked into the room in time to hear the quiet obscenities the Keeper was expressing. Raising an eyebrow Alex asked mildly, "Problem?"

Claire spun around, relief and anxiety playing across her face in an instant. "No. Did you find him?"

Shaking her head, Monroe unconsciously knocked a bit more snow off her boots. "It's slow moving with Chrysalis and Arnaud dogging us. I came back to check on things here," she said, then motioned to the table. "How's it going?"

"Fine, fine," Claire replied absently, biting on her lower lip, deep in thought.

Alex realized she wasn't going to get a straight answer from the Keeper unless she asked for it and bluntly stated, "So what's got you in a tiff?"

"I'm worried about the guys-" Claire began, but Monroe just waved that away.

"Other than that!"

"It's that..." Claire paused, giving Alex a sidelong look, then finally told her, "I'm grateful the Official thought to send up supplies. I really am! I wasn't sure how I was going to make some fresh counteragent, and with this... it should be ready by tomorrow. Only..." and once again she paused, looking as if she might be embarrassed by what she was about say. "The boxes they came in had fifty cents written on the outside, like boxes you'd find things in at a garage sale."

For a moment Alex just looked at the woman, then carefully told her, "Claire, I don't think the Official would sell your equipment."

"Wanna bet?" The Keeper replied, her voice dripping with sarcasm, but in the next instant she sighed and immediately apologized. "I'm sorry, I'm just a bit tense."

"We all are," Alex quickly agreed, then frowned as she saw Claire absently pick up and begin to eat one of the quickly disappearing oatmeal cookies. "How many of those have you had?"

Claire looked over from her minute study of the bubbling contraptions startled. "Oh, I don't know, six."

"Have you eaten anything else?"

The Keeper shook her head, "No, been too busy." She finished off the last bit and commented around the mouthful, "You know, I would never have expected you'd been a good cook, but these are quite tasty, Alex." But then quickly added as if realizing what she'd just said. "Not that I don't think you can cook, mind you."

Monroe smirked, trying to cover a huff of disbelief, but then replied nonchalantly, "It's the butterscotch."

Claire looked at her in surprise. "As in the liquor?"

Alex shrugged. "It's my father's recipe."

Just then Jim came running in out of breath. "Agent Monroe, we found Agent Fawkes' trail. The rest are following it, but you said to come tell you if-"

Alex interrupted him impatiently propelling him back towards the door before he could even fully get his breath back. "Come on, let's go!"

The Keeper took a step after them but stopped, looking back at her bubbling potions and sighed in frustration.

Darien wasn't sure how long he'd walked, though he guessed it'd been a couple hours at least. Still, so far he hadn't come across anything or anyone, not even the dogs.

Shivering, he stuffed his hands further into his pockets and hunched his shoulders forward to conserve heat. For a tall and lanky person, that wasn't an easy thing to accomplish. After a while he spotted a broken stump and sank down onto its precarious edges. His legs ached more now than they had when he first woke. Sighing deeply from the release of pressure he bent to try and rub a bit more life into them. That's when he realized he wasn't alone anymore.

Slowly looking up, Darien met the gaze of the seven pigeons, the same seven pigeons he'd seen, when? The memory wouldn't fit exactly into place, but he didn't need it to know this wasn't right. Despite the protest of his feet, Darien stood up again and continued on the path, glancing over his shoulder from time to time as he walked.

The pigeons were flying from tree to tree behind him. They were definitely following him. It was just too creepy. Not knowing exactly why he felt so strongly about it, Darien knew he needed to get away from the creatures. The question was: how?

Glancing at his tattoo he noted it was only just over half full. He hadn't done much quicksilvering since this whole trip began, but he also wasn't sure how soon he'd be able to get a shot of counteragent. Especially since he was currently lost in a forest full of terrorists. He made a grim face, and the peculiar thought that the pigeons were terrorists in disguise firmly planted itself in the forefront of his mind. "I've been hanging around Hobbes too much," he grumbled out loud, but the thought didn't want to go away and only reinforced his decision. He'd have to take the chance.

Making sure he was looking casual about it, Darien began to scoop up balls of snow as he walked. As soon as he had one in each pocket and one in each hand, Darien stopped walking. He took a breath, murmured, "Here goes," and turning sharply quickly picked out the cluster of pigeons. Then practically running straight for them, he began to throw his snowy ammunition.

The birds scattered in a wild frenzy from the sudden attack, a couple nearly missing the assault of snow, but none went down. Darien hadn't really planned it that way, and at the moment of chaos had let the quicksilver flow. Now, he crouched hidden as he watched the birds circle.

A few of them cooed, and to Darien they sounded sincerely confused. He kept watching, hoping they'd leave soon before he used so much quicksilver he went red eyed. Gratefully, after a couple more sweeps around, the pigeons apparently decided he was gone and took off flying down the beaten path left by the dogs.

In a shower of flakes, Darien stood and once again checked the tell-all snake. He still had a day or so, but in his book, that wasn't much comfort. He regarded the path he'd been following with apprehension; it looked like that way was out for now, but he wasn't too sure about just walking off in any other direction either.

Looking around he spotted a tree that looked doable and proceeded to climb it. After a series of carefully chosen expletives and strategic placement of feet, Darien reached the top. For miles it seemed all there was was forest, the mountain peaks looming ahead, but then off to the right he spotted a wooden peak. It could be anything, he realized, but at least it was man made. Deciding to take the chance, Darien carefully picked his way down, and keeping an eye out for the pigeons, headed in the direction of whatever it was he'd seen. If he was lucky it'd belong to the good guys.

Hobbes shivered; he knew his body temperature had dropped dramatically since he'd left, but he didn't care and kept going. He'd been listening in on the Canadian's conversations over the radio and from what they said the pigeons had found Fawkes but had lost him again. At least that meant he was alive, Bobby reassured himself.

"I doubt he'd continue following the dogs," Pierre's voice stated via the radio.

A voice Bobby had marked as the leader of the team trying to track down his partner returned, "Where did the dogs come from anyway, eh?"

"Never mind. What's in the vicinity of Agent Fawkes' last known location?"

"There's the water tower. ETA 10 minutes."

Hobbes stopped in his tracks. He'd passed close to a water tower a while back and he knew he was getting close to the flying spies. Even as he listened to Pierre command his troops to head for the tower, Bobby was sprinting in its direction as well.

Darien circled around the wooden structure, trying to keep an eye on everything at once and only succeeding in making himself dizzy in the effort. He didn't like walking out into the open, but he knew staying at the forest's edge would do him no good either.

The wooden tower had turned out to be nothing more than a water tower, but to his luck, there didn't seem to be anyone there, and further more, there was a telephone booth half buried in a snow bank next to the ladder heading up.

It took a bit for him to hand shovel the snow out of the way enough to get the door open, but once he did and had the phone in hand he suddenly realized he didn't know who to call. He wondered numbly if the Official would be able to do anything from San Diego, and had just started to dial the number anyway when the glass around him suddenly shattered into a million pieces.

Darien instinctually ducked, and when he turned around he saw several men in camouflage white walk out of the trees, all of them with guns pointed right at him. "Ah crap!" Darien murmured. He partially raised his hands to show surrender, but in the next moment let the quicksilver flow.

There were several exclamations of surprise, but contrary to most, whom, when surprised held back in shock, these guys, let several guns go off in reaction. The sound, like a loud crack of thunder, reminded Darien far too much of an execution line up.

Later, with reflection, Darien would put it down to his ill-fated luck: if something bad were going to happen, it'd happen to him. Pain burned through his forearm, the force twisting and throwing him to the snow even as he bit out a sharp cry. The quicksilver shed as his concentration folded before the new invader to his body and he gripped with frozen hands at the wound, feeling the sticky blood pulse out between his fingers.

Blinking back tears, Darien rolled slightly as the men surrounded him, their guns still trained. Then one man, regarding Darien with wide eyes, raised a radio to his mouth and stated, "Sir, we have him."

Bobby heard the announcement just as clear and wanted to yell with frustration, but he continued on to the water tower. If he got there fast enough maybe he could interrupt them and still save his partner. Yet when he did arrive, it was ten minutes too late, and the base of the tower was once again empty.

He fell to his knees when he spotted the pool of red in the snow. Still, needing to be sure he felt a bit in his fingers, but there was no mistaking it was blood. "Crap!" Hobbes cursed harshly, fighting off the shivers as well as the dread that surged within him, but he gave up soon after and just let himself shiver. For several minutes he just stayed like that, staring at the blood with dull thoughts. He'd been so focused on just getting Fawkes it was hard to think about what to do next.

Numbly, he looked up at the sun. He didn't have a clue what time it was, and wondered idly if those crazy scientists had already begun their plans for Fawkes. Bobby shivered harder with the thought, and frowning, stubbornly pushed himself to his feet. He'd just have to bust his partner out of that wacko house! "Bobby Hobbes doesn't bail on his partner!" He bit out to no one in particular.

Yet as he reached the edge of the clearing he realized he had to stop and leaning heavily against a tree tried to pull his breath through a suddenly tight chest. The cold that had set in hours before had taken full advantage of Bobby's small bout of depression and was finally forcing itself to be known. The world swam before him and he unconsciously slid down into the snow, instinctually curling into a fetal position as he did. "Fawkes," Hobbes murmured trying to get his thoughts to focus. It didn't seem to help, and a white fog settled on his mind.

Fawkes gulped nervously. They'd brought him to the hidden base in the side of the mountain, which he quickly discovered was really some insane secret science lab. And although they'd cleaned and wrapped his arm, they had stripped him of his normal clothes, giving him a pair of simple white cotton pants to wear instead, and chained him hand and foot. He was currently seated on a stool surrounded by way more odd machinery than he cared for.

He recognized Pierre and Rena who were directing the operation, but the eight scientists, who were prepping needles and swarming about him like a bunch of giddy school kids, quite frankly scared him! "Ah...you guys know what you're doing, right?" Darien asked, not even sure what was going to happen. Were these people interested in milking him or just taking the gland, cause either case he knew felt like hell but at least the one wasn't fatal.

"Of course we're sure," One of them responded with an encouraging smile, then promptly stuck a needle in Darien's shoulder. "We're certified doctors, after all."

"Or is that certifiable?" Another of them stated, and to Darien's horror they all laughed at the joke.

"Don't worry Agent Fawkes, when you wake again you'll feel like a new man!" Another told him.

"Like many new men in fact!" Another stated and once again they all laughed. Darien made a small sound of distress. Then one of them said, "So the gland really makes you invisible? Oh, to see that!" At Those words they all regarded Darien with far too much excitement, even for mad scientists.

Pierre cleared his throat, and with a few guilty looks the scientists turned back to the task at hand, once again repeating to Darien that things would be fine, giving him the rest of the shots.

All at once this felt far too familiar as the drug took its place, forcing every other thought to the back of his mind and submitting him to the numbing state of unconsciousness. The last time he'd had a series of shots that ended in knocking him out had also resulted in a month long coma and him waking with a beast inside his head. He couldn't stop himself from wondering if this time he'd wake at all.

"Robert! Bobby come on, wake up already!"

Hobbes recognized the voice through the numbness, it helped to focus a few of his mixed thoughts and he cracked his eyes to see two females worriedly looking down at him. Neither of them the one he'd prefer right before his death, for he was sure he was going to die in this state. "Rach," he breathed out to the woman who'd been calling him.

She sighed with deep relief but didn't relent in trying to shake him into movement. "Robert, come on, we need to go."

"Coming," he murmured automatically, but he already knew he couldn't move, it was taking the last of his energy just to talk to them. He could feel hands around him trying to coax him to his feet, but after a second they stopped, and Rachel tried again to get his attention, surprising him with the tears that glistened in her eyes. He didn't think he'd ever seen his sister cry and wanted to tell her that, but other thoughts kept demanding attention and it was getting too hard to focus on anything.

"Bobby, listen to me. You can't leave me, do you understand?"

Bobby only nodded, but the other thoughts, the more insistent thoughts protruded. "Fawkes."

Alex was quick to question in return, "Where's Fawkes? Do you know?"

"Too late," Bobby told them, his voice cracking with grief. He could feel it burning in him, as painful as the cold.

"What do you mean?"

"Time," Bobby bit out, trying to get a clear message through, but the fog was sweeping his mind numb once more, and once again he felt like this was it, this was the end.

"What? The time? It's ten after noon." Alex responded frustrated with a quick glance at her watch.

Bobby only repeated, "Too late," and then the ocean of fog took over and he closed his eyes again, unable to respond further.

Rachel shook him, getting no more response and bit out angrily, "No. Damn it! Bobby, come on!"

"He's suffering from hypothermia," Alex said knowing they wouldn't have much time and put a hand on his pale face, but she pulled it back a second later and corrected herself. "No, he's burning up! We have to get him to the Keeper, quick."

Hobbes heard them and idly wondered what they were talking about, he was dying. They should just let him die and go get Fawkes back. He wanted to tell them that but found it impossible and after a few more minutes even those thoughts sunk into the abyss.

From the edge of the clearing, Arnaud and the five Chrysali watched and waited, making sure they didn't give their positions away prematurely. "Do we attack?" One asked calmly. This was the perfect time, while the Agency group were vulnerable and caring for their fallen agent, but Arnaud shook his head.

"No. I think not. They don't mean anything to us." They stayed there until all of the Agency personal had left, then carefully stepped out into the open. First examining the spot of snow saturated with blood, Arnaud then went over to the booth and stepped inside through the shattered panel. The phone also had a bullet through it and there was no doubt as to what had happened.

One walked over, waving his men off to check the other sides of the tower, just to be sure. Arnaud stood in the booth looking deep in thought. It was actually just nice to be able to see the man, One thought to himself. He'd never admit it to anyone, but seeing Arnaud invisible all the time personally gave him the shivers.

"It looks like your Canadian friends snatched Fawkes." One stated blandly when he realized Arnaud wasn't about to say anything.

"Yes," Arnaud drawled out still thinking. Then told One, "No doubt the Agency is going to try and get him back. We're just interested in what's inside the compound."

"If we wait till the Agency attacks them then we should be able to slip right in from the other side," One replied, picking up on Arnaud's train of thought.

De Fohn nodded, then smirked drolly. "Either tonight or tomorrow."

One looked at the busted phone. "And if Fawkes made a call out?"

Arnaud just waved it off. "Doesn't matter, no one can get here for a day anyway."

One called back his men and the group left, leaving the water tower in solitude once again.

...Ten Minutes Late
Nine Dogs a Running
Eight Wacky Scientists
Seven Pigeons Watching
Six Oatmeal Cookies
Five Chrysali
Four Balls of Snow
Three Missing Disks
Two Foreign Spies
And Arnaud in a Telephone Booth