*
After sleeping about twelve hours, I woke up feeling much better. I still had a headache, but compared to yesterday this was nothing. I figured I could live with it. I got cleaned up, got some food into me, and then submitted to Chris checking me yet again. He declared me well enough and then called my mom over.
"You need to sleep." he said to her. "He has to learn to do his own shielding, again."
"I know." She turned to me. "Be glad we're pretty much alone out here. This is not going to be fun."
She dropped the shields she'd imposed on me, and every mind in the room was suddenly in mine and all of them knew it. Good thing they were able to quiet their minds enough to keep me from being overwhelmed. I was surprised that my dad even knew about the technique, but then I realized Mom must have taught it to him. I ignored them and focused on finding my center. Back to basics. Ground and center, then rebuild those shields. It took longer than I hoped, but not as long as I feared. Everything seemed the same, yet it was different. Like everything was a bit brighter, a bit more real than it had been. It would take some getting used to.
Mom knew when I was done and nodded in satisfaction. "Good enough. I doubt you'll have trouble holding them now. You've been doing it for long enough. If you have any questions, ask one of us."
Dad came over then and gave me a smile. "Good morning, Ben. Better, I take it?"
"Yes, Dad. I'm fine. Anything I can help with?" I had been sitting on my ass for long enough. I wanted to do something now.
"Actually, yes," Mom answered through a yawn. "Mr. Chou said there were supposedly secret passageways in this building. See if you can find them. Just keep in contact, okay?"
"Sure, Mom. Get some sleep." I could tell she was exhausted and, knowing her, she hadn't slept since we had arrived.
"Now that I know you're okay, I can." She walked over to me and hugged me. "You had me scared for a while there, Ben."
I hugged her just as tightly, realizing again how tiny she was. When did I get so much taller than her? "I had me scared, too," I whispered.
She stepped back and looked at me. She must have seen something, but just shook her head as if she couldn't believe it. "Find those passageways for me. I'll be conscious again in four hours. I expect results."
"Yes ma'am," I said, surprising myself. It wasn't often she used her work voice with me, but I wasn't offended. More like proud. She was treating me like one of the team.
With one last quick hug she headed off to the room we'd picked to camp in and curled up on a pile of blankets. She was asleep within moments. Now I just had to try and find something that might very well not exist.
This main building was two stories tall, with rooms all opening off of the courtyard. These rooms seemed to be mainly individual prayer rooms and it was obvious after poking about in a few that we were not the first people to use the place for shelter. There was an air of peace about the building that was wonderful. It made it difficult for me to understand why anyone would persecute the creators of such a place.
I found the staircase that led up, but it was just more rooms like those below, perhaps less used, but all neat and clean with little dust or blown-in snow. I leaned out one window that overlooked the garden and tried to figure out what felt 'wrong' about this place. I mean, it was a monastery, right? Therefore people lived here, right? Yet, there was nothing resembling kitchens, or private rooms, or storage, or anything that I would have expected based on the little I knew.
All these rooms were pretty much open to the elements and extremely cold this time of the year. You'd have to be damn tough to live in these rooms for five months of freezing temperatures. Maybe the monks didn't abandon the place, maybe they all froze to death.
I shook my head at that thought.
All right, Mom asked me to solve the problem for a reason. Which meant that the rest of them had tried with what abilities and equipment they had and found nothing. So, if they wanted me and my wild talent to solve it, I should probably stop trying so hard. That was the weirdest thing about it. The harder I tried to use it, the less likely it was to work.
Instead of actively searching I began to wander wherever my feet chose to take me. I admired the carvings on the walls, the remains of artwork that had faded over the years. I made my way back downstairs and admired the stream running through the building. The water was incredibly pure and came from a natural spring not far from the monastery itself. At some point the monks had diverted the flow of water into and through the building, possibly for a drinking water supply, perhaps just because it sounded nice.
I followed the stream out the far side of the building where it emptied into a pool. I stared at the pool for several minutes before I realized that it should not be maintaining a steady level. The water was constantly flowing into it, so it should be overflowing, unless it was being drained off to somewhere below.
These people were very intelligent. It was just a matter of solving the riddle. I wandered back in and over to the staircase that led up on this side of the building. Down, I kept telling myself, they must have gone down into the mountain, but how?
I leaned against one of the columns that supported the second story and felt something shift behind my back. Turning about, I pressed one of the bas reliefs carved into the column and it moved. Pressing harder, I heard something shift and scrape behind me and turned to see a section of wall open. I walked over and stuck my head inside. It was a dimly lit stairwell and I decided to check it out. No need to disturb everyone else for a possible dead end. I searched about a bit and set a piece of wood in the doorway to keep it from closing completely. I've seen too many movies where exactly that happened and then the poor schmuck had to walk through every nasty thing the writers could think of to get back out, if they got out at all. I really didn't need to live a cliche.
The stairs led down to an open area with several wooden tables and chairs that were still in astonishingly good condition. This was the real monastery. The dim light wasn't quite enough for me and I wished I had my mom's eyesight. To her this would be bright as day. I looked around and found the kitchens. The chimneys were ingenious, and from what I could tell the smoke would be almost completely dispersed as it rose, thus keeping this place from being spotted by the smoke in the air. I found more stairs going down, which led to the small rooms that the monks must have lived in as well as more rooms that were for worshipping.
There was more artwork down here, as well as the remains of the previous tenants. Abandoned clothing, bedding, cookware, the stuff you 'd expect to find left behind when a large group is forced to leave in a hurry. I found where the water from the pool above went. They had running water in the kitchens, as well as a remarkable bathing room. There were several pools full of water that were constantly renewed, like above. There were fireplaces as well -- perhaps it doubled as a primitive sauna? Then I realized the trick. Since the water was spring water it maintained a constant, if chilly temperature. You start the fires and heat the rocks. Once hot, you drop them into the pool, which would eventually heat the water. Simple and effective.
I walked about a bit more, searching, and then stopped myself. Searching wouldn't work. So I began to wander again. I noticed that my eyes had adjusted to the light and I could see much better now, although the colors seemed a bit washed out. I eventually ended up at what seemed to be a dead end and looked about for a moment. Remembering the trigger for the door upstairs, I found the same figure on the wall here and pressed it. The entire wall slid open, revealing a long sloping tunnel. I had the sudden feeling that this was important.
I dug through my pockets and came up with, nothing. Crap. Well, I'd just have to remember where it was, now wouldn't I? I walked back out to the main area at the foot of the first set of stairs and sent to Chris, *I found something.*
*Where are you?* Chris asked me.
*Downstairs.* That got his attention.
*W...w...what?*
I hadn't known you could stutter mind-to-mind, and I laughed. *I'll meet you at the right-hand staircase.*
I headed up, meeting more than just Chris when I shoved the door open. The wood had been a good idea after all.
"Good work," my dad said.
"We'll check it out." Chris said for himself, Manda, and Rose.
"Wait." They paused. "I found another door that leads into a tunnel. I didn't follow it, but I can show you where it is."
Chris nodded. "Maybe you better." He got this faraway look in his eyes. "We'll let Mom sleep. She should be perfectly safe up here."
"Damn straight. She was exhausted," Rose said in agreement.
Together we walked down into the dim light of below and I showed them everything I had discovered.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alyx woke slowly, with arms wrapped about her. She could feel warm air being blown gently on the back of her neck as Darien lay dozing with her. She realized she'd slept longer than she had intended and that only happened when she truly needed the sleep. It was nice to lie here with him curled about her, and she finally felt warm. That was about the only disadvantage of this place. Even with the fireplace, the room never really got warm with the open windows letting the cold air blow right in.
Shifting a bit, she found one of his hands and wrapped hers about it.
"So you're finally awake," he whispered just behind her ear. "We were beginning to wonder."
"I was tired. It happens on occasion," Alyx commented, rolling over to face him. "Good..." She thought for a moment. "Evening. Where is everyone?"
"Downstairs getting warm and clean," he answered with a straight face, waiting for her reaction.
"Down.... You guys have been busy. I take it Ben was successful." She snuggled closer, not wanting to move just yet. This was not nearly as much fun as one would think considering she'd gone to sleep still in her heavy winter coat and mittens. Even with all of that, and several blankets, she'd barely been warm enough. She'd just been too tired to care.
"Very successful. The guys who built this place were amazing." He kissed her then, warming her even more. "Come on, there's stuff you need to see. Including what might be a back door."
"Back door?" she shivered a bit when Darien threw off the covers and moved away. She noticed that her stuff was all that was left in the room and that the fire was nothing but embers.
As they packed up her stuff, Darien said, "I was supposed to wake you a while ago, but...well...You looked so peaceful, I decided to join you instead."
Alyx checked her internal time clock and discovered she'd slept an extra couple of hours. "I probably needed it anyway."
"I know you did. You've been pushing yourself too hard again," Darien said with his arms full of blankets.
She shrugged her pack over one shoulder. "Same old, same old. Now show me this 'downstairs' you guys found."
Darien led the way across the courtyard. With his elbow, he pushed the bas relief that was the trigger for the door. "Your palace awaits, or something like that."
Alyx poked her head in the doorway and adjusted her eyes. Walking down the stairs with Darien behind her she found some of her children sitting along one of the wooden tables eating and going over whatever intel they had managed to collect during her unconsciousness.
"Hey, Mom," Rose called out as she neared. "Feeling better?"
"I'd feel better still with some food and a shower," Alyx said with a sigh.
"Food coming right up," Chris said, filling a bowl they'd scrounged from the kitchen. It was more stew, but she was too hungry to care. "And you can have your turn in the bath when Manda is done."
Alyx paused, her spoon hanging in the air. "Bath? Did you say bath?"
"Uh, huh," Darien said, sitting beside her on the long bench. "Even warm water."
"Ah, gods, don't tease me about this. Really? A bath?" Alyx was not believing this at all.
*Yes Mom. A bath.* Manda's voice was filled with pure contentment. *Give me twenty and it's yours.*
"Thank you, whatever gods helped create this place," Alyx said to the ceiling.
That got everyone laughing for a few minutes.
"Dare mentioned a back door," Alyx said when she finished eating.
"We think," Rose said. "We thought you might want to check it out, since you had the nap."
"Once I'm human," she said, nodding. "Where is our good luck charm, anyway?"
"Here, Mom." Ben poked his head out of a side room, where he'd been admiring the engineering of the fireplace.
"Can we get some more light in here?" Alyx asked suddenly, getting to her feet and going to Ben. Behind her someone turned on some more lanterns. "And none of you noticed this?" She waved her hand at Ben.
Chris came over and looked at his younger brother, noticing what Alyx had. "Ah, sh... No we didn't. It must have come on gradually."
Ben got this really worried look on his face. "What's wrong?"
"Feel up to another set of lessons?" Alyx asked him.
"Now?" he just wanted to know what was going on.
"Yes, now. It's important, Ben," Chris said.
Ben nodded stiffly.
"Close your eyes and relax. We do this mind-to-mind these days," Alyx said, laying a hand against the side of his face.
He wasn't sure what was going on, but he did as he was asked. He felt her inside his mind.
*Pay attention, love. This is important.*
So he did. She did...something and he watched/felt her do it.
*Now you. Do just what I did.*
Still not quite understanding, he complied. Copying what she had done. He felt weird. Like he was not himself anymore.
*Perfect. Now here's the rest. Go over it later.* She dumped the rest of the information into his head just like she'd done for his father a week ago. Then she slid back out of his mind.
"Okay, now drop the quicksilver," she said aloud.
His eyes flew open and he realized his eyesight had gone to quicksilver sight, just like he'd experienced a few times in his life. This was not part of the plan. Not what was supposed to happen.
"Ben. Relax and use the information your mom gave you. Freak later," Darien said to his frightened son. He wasn't feeling too steady himself. This was completely unexpected.
Ben did the best he could and managed to relax after a couple of minutes. The triggers for the quicksilver were almost instinctive, and once he stopped fighting with himself he was easily able to let it flake away. "Ummm. Did I have Phase II done when I wasn't paying attention?"
Everyone laughed.
"What's going on?" Manda said as she walked into the room.
"Ben has decided to join the ranks of those who can quicksilver," Rose answered in a wry tone.
"Nuh uh," Manda said in complete disbelief.
"Uh huh." Rose tossed right back. "Show her, Benny."
Ben looked a bit nervous, but realized he had to try this sometime. He held out his arm and, after taking a deep breath, successfully quicksilvered it. Much to Manda's astonishment.
"But how?"
Alyx turned to Chris. "Must be because I had my full powers when I had Ben."
"Good a guess as anything. You must have passed the Phase II trigger on to him as well." Chris was staring off into the distance, thinking. "I'm going to have to do some research on this."
"You know what this means don't you?" Darien said quietly.
"What, Darien?" Rose asked him for everyone.
"Dani has fully active quicksilver," he pointed out.
"Aw, crap," they pretty much said as one.
"So now what do we do?" Rose asked.
"Same thing as before. Get her out of there," Darien answered. "The sooner, the better."
"You sure you want to do this?" Darien asked, shining the light down the dark tunnel. "What about Ben?"
"Dare, he's fine. Rose can run him through the training exercises, and they need to sleep anyway," Alyx said with a sigh. "I know it's tough, but he needs a chance to get used to what he can do now without his parents hovering over him."
As she stepped into the darkness and began to walk she pulled out her computer pad and added the tunnel to the map. Assuming it ran straight and exited somewhere the other side of the mountain it would dump them.... She shook her head. If this was right, it would cut two days off their walk time, at least. "Dare, our surprisingly brilliant son may just have shortened our trip. And given us an escape route." She showed him the computer pad.
"Is this right?" he asked as he looked over her work.
"We'll have to see, now won't we?" Alyx said, taking back the computer pad.
They walked in silence for a while. The tunnel was fairly clear considering it hadn't had a visitor in who knew how long. It was dry, with minimal dust and, thankfully, few cobwebs. Those they did find were lacking owners. It also wasn't nearly as cold as they had thought it would be. It wasn't long before they had both peeled off their heavy coats and stuffed them in the pack they had brought.
"Okay bub, you're worried about something. Talk," Alyx said, breaking the silence and actually startling him, they'd been quiet for so long.
"I can't believe I didn't notice," Darien muttered.
"No one did. No one expected it," Alyx reminded him. "I thought I saw something earlier, but I figured it was lack of sleep on my part."
"You realize that we went and did exactly what the Official wanted all those years ago. They don't even have to spend money on Phase II. The kids'll do it by themselves." He started running his hand through his hair. "What about the girls? Will this happen to them?"
"Probably? I can't even tell you why it happened to Ben." She turned slightly to look at him. "I never intended this to happen."
"Damn. That's not what I meant. I'm not blaming you. Not blaming anyone." He moved closer to her and threw and arm over her shoulders. "I'd rather he had a bit more time to be a kid is all."
"He'll have all the time he needs. No one is going to make him do something he's not ready for." She chuckled. "He's gonna be trouble with the girls. Thought he was bad enough with those blue eyes, but he's gonna be devastating with the silver."
"Oh, really? And why would you think this?" Darien asked with a smile.
"'Cause his dad is," Alyx answered honestly. "I haven't decided which I like better, the silver or your sweet brown." She leaned against him as they walked. "How are you doing, with the gland and all?"
"Fine. If it had been like this the first time..." he began, but she interrupted.
"You would have been gone. Arnaud would be dead. There would have been an amazing number of mysterious bank robberies before you retired to a beach to chase pretty girls in bikinis," Alyx stated truthfully. "Everything would be different, and we would not be walking down this dark tunnel right now. Hell, I don't even want to think where I might be right now."
"You're probably right, about me anyway," Darien said with a grin.
"Watch your head," Alyx suddenly said, and Darien ducked just in time to avoid the newly lowered ceiling. The tunnel took a slight jog to the right; Alyx pulled out the computer pad and made the adjustment.
"This is uncomfortable," Darien commented as he walked hunched over through the tunnel.
"I've been expecting it," Alyx muttered. "If you notice, the walls aren't as neatly finished as they were."
Now that she had mentioned it, he did notice. "How much longer?"
"If it comes out where I think, a few hours." Alyx said, looking up from the computer pad to him. "We are walking through a mountain range after all."
"Oh, goody. This is going to be fun," Darien complained. He knew it wouldn't be long before his back began to cramp.
"Just wait. I expect the tunnel to get lots smaller before we get to the end," Alyx told him with a snicker.
"Wonderful. Just wonderful."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Okay, kiddo. You need to get some practice before getting some sleep," Rose said to Ben as they sat in the main room.
"Shouldn't Mom be running me through this stuff?" I asked her with no small amount of trepidation in my voice.
"Normally I would agree, but on this occasion I think she did the right thing." Rose quicksilvered her hand and waited for Ben to attempt to do the same. "Her emotional state would probably be too big an influence on you, and the one thing we've been very careful to do is not tie the quicksilver to emotion."
"Why is that?" I asked as I copied what she did.
"'Cause it's a pain in the ass, that's why." Rose said, surprising me with her crass choice of words. Usually they tried to avoid swearing around me. She must have caught on to what I was thinking. "Darien had to deal with it being tied to emotion and adrenaline levels. Some of the stories are amusing, but others aren't. We have secondary protocols set up for self-preservation, but main control has to be conscious. You don't want to quicksilver just because you're nervous your first day of college do you?"
I shook my head, feeling a bit overwhelmed. I wasn't ready for this responsibility yet. And yes, I knew that quicksilver as well as my other gifts were a major responsibility.
"Look, little bro, as far as this family is concerned you just grew up. You are now at full power and it's just a matter of training to see exactly how far you can push it. Until you hit that 'wall' you can't go beyond, we won't know exactly how strong you are." The entire time she was talking she kept me running through the quicksilver training. From large to small. From external, quicksilvering the bowl or table, to just simply making things frosty. I could feel the pattern Mom had set in my mind, so following what she was doing turned out to be easy.
It was work, though, and after about a half an hour I was beginning to feel the effects. I mean, I knew it was work, but Mom, and more recently Dad, made it look so easy. "This was not part of my plan," I grumbled.
"The best laid plans of mice and men and all that." She rubbed her forehead. "Now I know how Mom felt. Makes me wish I was an ordinary telepath."
"What's it like? Mom's tried to explain it to me, but I still don't quite get it," I asked her, hoping to distract her both from her pain and my training.
"I don't know if I can. I just feel...everything. Suddenly even the wood of this table and the rocks of the walls are 'alive', giving off energy that I can sense. I can tell that I won't be able to interact on the same level as Mom. I seriously doubt I'll be able to do that 'air shield' trick Mom does." She shook her head. "I can't feel to that fine a degree. Mom can feel air molecules. However..." She trailed off. On the table, the bowl began to rattle and then lifted off and hung shakily in the air for a moment before falling back with a clatter. "Urf. That's gonna take some practice." She looked up at me. "That's part of why Mom and Darien volunteered to check out the tunnel. They didn't want to embarrass you by worrying while you practiced."
I shrugged. "Mom and Dad are cool. They wouldn't interfere too much."
"True, but they'd want to. That emotion thing again." She tapped the table top with her finger. "We've had it easy, training-wise. Mike had already taught Mom, so he knew what was needed when we started to show our abilities. Though Manda threw him quite a bit. You do know he trained Mom, right?"
I nodded. Oh yeah, I knew that story. I knew how Mom got involved with the Agency, how she met Dad. How what they did to her nearly killed her and did cause the deaths of dozens of others. Dad told me that it took years before my mom felt it was safe to use her powers at all. What they did to her all those years ago came back to haunt them. Yeah, they succeeded, but at what cost? Guess the world should be lucky that she's as good a person as she is, because if she decided to use her powers to get what she wanted, to fulfill her every whim, there wasn't much that could be done to stop her.
I then began to wonder if this, me and my brother and sisters, were the ultimate goal. What they did to my mom has resulted in a segment, small as of yet, of the population having extraordinary powers. Powers that could be passed on to their children. Provided the abilities didn't weaken in succeeding generations, it wouldn't be that long before we, or rather they, would become a significant portion of the population. And we now knew that there was no longer a dependence on science to realize the full potential.
Mom used to joke that mankind had played god all those years ago and ended up with more than they ever bargained for; her.
But it wasn't just her anymore. It was all of us.
I could only wonder what the future would bring.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Darien stood up straight with a groan. The tunnel had finally opened back up and he was eternally grateful for it. Alyx moved up behind him and began to rub the muscles of his lower back. He sighed as the cramps eased. "Do that forever and I am yours."
"Does that mean if I stop I have to give the ring back?" Alyx said as she continued to work on his poor back.
"Smart-ass," he muttered at her.
The last couple of miles had been nasty. The hand-hewn rock had devolved into a natural passageway that was tight, low-ceilinged, and generally uncomfortable. There had been places they'd had to squeeze through, even going so far as to empty the pack partially to fit it through. Good thing Darien was still in good shape or he might not have made it through at all in several places. Both of them had scrapes and cuts from some of the passages. But that had been the worst of it. The passage had opened back out into a semi-natural tunnel with more than enough clearance for him to stand.
"Better?" she asked him, distracted.
"Ummm, yeah. What do you see?" He knew that tone of voice.
"Not see, smell. Fresh air. We're near the end," Alyx said, moving past him.
"Good. I need a break," Darien commented as he followed her.
"We still have to go all the way back," Alyx said, a bit dryly.
"Don't remind me. Please," he groaned.
Alyx stopped before him. "Well, what have we here?"
Darien looked at the solid blank wall before them in dismay. "A dead end. Damn."
"Nope." She took one of his hands and held it near the wall. "Feel."
It was just barely noticeable, but it was a breeze. "Fresh air.''
She nodded. "Our door." She turned and looked about and Darien did the same. They knew what to look for now, and after a couple of minutes Alyx crowed, "Got it." With a grinding of rock on rock, the door canted open. Alyx carefully moved to the doorway and peered outside. Darien stood behind her and looked over her head.
"Anything?"
"Not nearby. Let's check it out." Alyx slipped through the doorway and outside into the night.
After a moment's searching, Alyx found a stray branch to keep the door from closing entirely, then walked out into the night air. It took about half a second to decide that it was very, very, cold out and that it might be prudent to put their coats and gloves back on. The doorway was partially sheltered by a rock wall which kept it from being seen unless you were standing in just the correct spot. Once they were bundled up, they made their cautious way out past the wall. They dropped to the ground almost immediately and crawled forward through the brush to verify what they had seen.
"How close are we?" Darien whispered to her. She dug in the pack and pulled out both the computer pad and a pair of binoculars for him.
"Half mile or so. Damn, this is near-perfect." She rolled onto her back and changed her eyesight to look for energy signatures. "Hot shit. We're inside their initial perimeter security."
"There's not a lot of movement down there, but I think they have people and dogs patrolling." Darien commented as he looked through the glasses.
"Sounds about right. Yeah, I can see them now. Looks like they patrol closer to the building itself." She suddenly quicksilvered and after a moment Darien followed suit.
*Spoke too soon on that one,* she sent to him.
Less than a hundred feet away, a rather heavily armed and heavily dressed gentleman walked by with a rather vicious looking dog on a leash. The dog paused and looked up the hillside to their location. Darien felt Alyx do ... something and then the dog whined and moved on. When they were well out of range Alyx said quietly, "I miss this."
"I thought you did this for a living," Darien commented with a small laugh.
"I meant with you, silly. I miss working with you. It's just not as much fun," Alyx said, looking down at the installation.
"It's been, what, almost ten years since I left and you just now mention it?" Darien also was watching the place. With what he'd been doing the last several years, he was eminently qualified to break into this place. "I've gotten more experience breaking into places like this since I left the Agency that I ever got while working for them."
"I know. Weird, huh?" Alyx looked over the entire valley that the installation was nestled in. The valley was one of those perfect bowls that were sometimes hidden in mountain ranges and had probably once been grazing land for the locals' herds. It was remote, well protected, and huge. Alyx keyed in every bit of information she could think of or guess at. This was not going to be easy.
"We need to get back," Darien said resting a hand on her back. They were lying close enough together that, even invisible, they each knew where the other was.
"I want to try something first," Alyx said. The she closed her eyes and focused on Dani. The range was at her extreme, especially if she were deep underground, but she thought it worth trying anyway.
*Dani?* she sent to the tentative contact she'd made.
*Who... Wha... Mom?* Dani's mind voice sounded very weak, distorted. *Mom!*
*Easy, Dani.* Alyx tried to comfort her daughter. *Report.*
*I'm drugged to the nines with inhibitors and sedatives. Kept under twenty-four hour guard,* she sent, with anger now tingeing her words.
*Quicksilver?* Alyx asked her.
*Untouched, but the whole place is rigged with thermals.* A hint of terror then crept into her voice. *They're pumping me full of fertilization drugs. They want to harvest.*
*As we suspected. How long ago did they start?* Alyx tried to ease her mind.
*Five days,* Dani replied.
*Dani, can you hold out for a bit yet? We need to go back and get the rest of our group before we attempt a rescue.* Alyx would rush the place now if it was necessary, but was hoping to have the entire group together to do this.
*How long? My temper is wearing thin, and I'd rather die that give them access to my genes.* Dani sent back her anger coming back to the fore.
*Forty-eight hours at most,* Alyx sent to her.
*That I can do,* she sent back with relief. *What took Johnson so long?*
*Johnson doesn't know,* Alyx sent. Darien's touch on her shoulder warned of potential trouble. *I have to go. I'll try to maintain a light link, but there are some distance concerns.*
*Go. Get back as soon as you can,* Dani urged her, then broke her end of the link.
Alyx came back to herself and whispered, "Dani's drugged, but okay. We need to get back."
"You bet we do." His hand appeared for a moment pointing down the hillside where several of the patrolling guards had converged and were talking, pointing up the hill towards their location. "Time for a strategic retreat."
Without argument, Alyx moved and they made their way back to the tunnel entrance, not feeling entirely safe until the stone door had shut behind them.
"Damn. Forgot how much I hate that part." Darien let out his breath and dropped the quicksilver. "Although I have to admit this new gland is nifty. Ummm. You planning on returning?"
"What? Oh, sorry." She let the quicksilver fall away. "Just making sure they didn't track us to the door. I want the element of surprise when we come back." She shrugged out of the coat and gloves. "You ready to make some time? We need to get back ASAP."
Darien groaned. His back was not going to enjoy this, and then they'd be doing it again to get back to here.
Alyx caught his look of anticipated discomfort. "You could wait here, but it may be twelve hours or more before we head back."
He shook his head. "I'm in. Right now I'm envying you. You barely had to bend over."
"One of the rare occasions my height has been an advantage," Alyx laughed. "Come on, I want this over with."
They got moving, and even with the difficulties they made it back in half the time.
*
After sleeping about twelve hours, I woke up feeling much better. I still had a headache, but compared to yesterday this was nothing. I figured I could live with it. I got cleaned up, got some food into me, and then submitted to Chris checking me yet again. He declared me well enough and then called my mom over.
"You need to sleep." he said to her. "He has to learn to do his own shielding, again."
"I know." She turned to me. "Be glad we're pretty much alone out here. This is not going to be fun."
She dropped the shields she'd imposed on me, and every mind in the room was suddenly in mine and all of them knew it. Good thing they were able to quiet their minds enough to keep me from being overwhelmed. I was surprised that my dad even knew about the technique, but then I realized Mom must have taught it to him. I ignored them and focused on finding my center. Back to basics. Ground and center, then rebuild those shields. It took longer than I hoped, but not as long as I feared. Everything seemed the same, yet it was different. Like everything was a bit brighter, a bit more real than it had been. It would take some getting used to.
Mom knew when I was done and nodded in satisfaction. "Good enough. I doubt you'll have trouble holding them now. You've been doing it for long enough. If you have any questions, ask one of us."
Dad came over then and gave me a smile. "Good morning, Ben. Better, I take it?"
"Yes, Dad. I'm fine. Anything I can help with?" I had been sitting on my ass for long enough. I wanted to do something now.
"Actually, yes," Mom answered through a yawn. "Mr. Chou said there were supposedly secret passageways in this building. See if you can find them. Just keep in contact, okay?"
"Sure, Mom. Get some sleep." I could tell she was exhausted and, knowing her, she hadn't slept since we had arrived.
"Now that I know you're okay, I can." She walked over to me and hugged me. "You had me scared for a while there, Ben."
I hugged her just as tightly, realizing again how tiny she was. When did I get so much taller than her? "I had me scared, too," I whispered.
She stepped back and looked at me. She must have seen something, but just shook her head as if she couldn't believe it. "Find those passageways for me. I'll be conscious again in four hours. I expect results."
"Yes ma'am," I said, surprising myself. It wasn't often she used her work voice with me, but I wasn't offended. More like proud. She was treating me like one of the team.
With one last quick hug she headed off to the room we'd picked to camp in and curled up on a pile of blankets. She was asleep within moments. Now I just had to try and find something that might very well not exist.
This main building was two stories tall, with rooms all opening off of the courtyard. These rooms seemed to be mainly individual prayer rooms and it was obvious after poking about in a few that we were not the first people to use the place for shelter. There was an air of peace about the building that was wonderful. It made it difficult for me to understand why anyone would persecute the creators of such a place.
I found the staircase that led up, but it was just more rooms like those below, perhaps less used, but all neat and clean with little dust or blown-in snow. I leaned out one window that overlooked the garden and tried to figure out what felt 'wrong' about this place. I mean, it was a monastery, right? Therefore people lived here, right? Yet, there was nothing resembling kitchens, or private rooms, or storage, or anything that I would have expected based on the little I knew.
All these rooms were pretty much open to the elements and extremely cold this time of the year. You'd have to be damn tough to live in these rooms for five months of freezing temperatures. Maybe the monks didn't abandon the place, maybe they all froze to death.
I shook my head at that thought.
All right, Mom asked me to solve the problem for a reason. Which meant that the rest of them had tried with what abilities and equipment they had and found nothing. So, if they wanted me and my wild talent to solve it, I should probably stop trying so hard. That was the weirdest thing about it. The harder I tried to use it, the less likely it was to work.
Instead of actively searching I began to wander wherever my feet chose to take me. I admired the carvings on the walls, the remains of artwork that had faded over the years. I made my way back downstairs and admired the stream running through the building. The water was incredibly pure and came from a natural spring not far from the monastery itself. At some point the monks had diverted the flow of water into and through the building, possibly for a drinking water supply, perhaps just because it sounded nice.
I followed the stream out the far side of the building where it emptied into a pool. I stared at the pool for several minutes before I realized that it should not be maintaining a steady level. The water was constantly flowing into it, so it should be overflowing, unless it was being drained off to somewhere below.
These people were very intelligent. It was just a matter of solving the riddle. I wandered back in and over to the staircase that led up on this side of the building. Down, I kept telling myself, they must have gone down into the mountain, but how?
I leaned against one of the columns that supported the second story and felt something shift behind my back. Turning about, I pressed one of the bas reliefs carved into the column and it moved. Pressing harder, I heard something shift and scrape behind me and turned to see a section of wall open. I walked over and stuck my head inside. It was a dimly lit stairwell and I decided to check it out. No need to disturb everyone else for a possible dead end. I searched about a bit and set a piece of wood in the doorway to keep it from closing completely. I've seen too many movies where exactly that happened and then the poor schmuck had to walk through every nasty thing the writers could think of to get back out, if they got out at all. I really didn't need to live a cliche.
The stairs led down to an open area with several wooden tables and chairs that were still in astonishingly good condition. This was the real monastery. The dim light wasn't quite enough for me and I wished I had my mom's eyesight. To her this would be bright as day. I looked around and found the kitchens. The chimneys were ingenious, and from what I could tell the smoke would be almost completely dispersed as it rose, thus keeping this place from being spotted by the smoke in the air. I found more stairs going down, which led to the small rooms that the monks must have lived in as well as more rooms that were for worshipping.
There was more artwork down here, as well as the remains of the previous tenants. Abandoned clothing, bedding, cookware, the stuff you 'd expect to find left behind when a large group is forced to leave in a hurry. I found where the water from the pool above went. They had running water in the kitchens, as well as a remarkable bathing room. There were several pools full of water that were constantly renewed, like above. There were fireplaces as well -- perhaps it doubled as a primitive sauna? Then I realized the trick. Since the water was spring water it maintained a constant, if chilly temperature. You start the fires and heat the rocks. Once hot, you drop them into the pool, which would eventually heat the water. Simple and effective.
I walked about a bit more, searching, and then stopped myself. Searching wouldn't work. So I began to wander again. I noticed that my eyes had adjusted to the light and I could see much better now, although the colors seemed a bit washed out. I eventually ended up at what seemed to be a dead end and looked about for a moment. Remembering the trigger for the door upstairs, I found the same figure on the wall here and pressed it. The entire wall slid open, revealing a long sloping tunnel. I had the sudden feeling that this was important.
I dug through my pockets and came up with, nothing. Crap. Well, I'd just have to remember where it was, now wouldn't I? I walked back out to the main area at the foot of the first set of stairs and sent to Chris, *I found something.*
*Where are you?* Chris asked me.
*Downstairs.* That got his attention.
*W...w...what?*
I hadn't known you could stutter mind-to-mind, and I laughed. *I'll meet you at the right-hand staircase.*
I headed up, meeting more than just Chris when I shoved the door open. The wood had been a good idea after all.
"Good work," my dad said.
"We'll check it out." Chris said for himself, Manda, and Rose.
"Wait." They paused. "I found another door that leads into a tunnel. I didn't follow it, but I can show you where it is."
Chris nodded. "Maybe you better." He got this faraway look in his eyes. "We'll let Mom sleep. She should be perfectly safe up here."
"Damn straight. She was exhausted," Rose said in agreement.
Together we walked down into the dim light of below and I showed them everything I had discovered.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Alyx woke slowly, with arms wrapped about her. She could feel warm air being blown gently on the back of her neck as Darien lay dozing with her. She realized she'd slept longer than she had intended and that only happened when she truly needed the sleep. It was nice to lie here with him curled about her, and she finally felt warm. That was about the only disadvantage of this place. Even with the fireplace, the room never really got warm with the open windows letting the cold air blow right in.
Shifting a bit, she found one of his hands and wrapped hers about it.
"So you're finally awake," he whispered just behind her ear. "We were beginning to wonder."
"I was tired. It happens on occasion," Alyx commented, rolling over to face him. "Good..." She thought for a moment. "Evening. Where is everyone?"
"Downstairs getting warm and clean," he answered with a straight face, waiting for her reaction.
"Down.... You guys have been busy. I take it Ben was successful." She snuggled closer, not wanting to move just yet. This was not nearly as much fun as one would think considering she'd gone to sleep still in her heavy winter coat and mittens. Even with all of that, and several blankets, she'd barely been warm enough. She'd just been too tired to care.
"Very successful. The guys who built this place were amazing." He kissed her then, warming her even more. "Come on, there's stuff you need to see. Including what might be a back door."
"Back door?" she shivered a bit when Darien threw off the covers and moved away. She noticed that her stuff was all that was left in the room and that the fire was nothing but embers.
As they packed up her stuff, Darien said, "I was supposed to wake you a while ago, but...well...You looked so peaceful, I decided to join you instead."
Alyx checked her internal time clock and discovered she'd slept an extra couple of hours. "I probably needed it anyway."
"I know you did. You've been pushing yourself too hard again," Darien said with his arms full of blankets.
She shrugged her pack over one shoulder. "Same old, same old. Now show me this 'downstairs' you guys found."
Darien led the way across the courtyard. With his elbow, he pushed the bas relief that was the trigger for the door. "Your palace awaits, or something like that."
Alyx poked her head in the doorway and adjusted her eyes. Walking down the stairs with Darien behind her she found some of her children sitting along one of the wooden tables eating and going over whatever intel they had managed to collect during her unconsciousness.
"Hey, Mom," Rose called out as she neared. "Feeling better?"
"I'd feel better still with some food and a shower," Alyx said with a sigh.
"Food coming right up," Chris said, filling a bowl they'd scrounged from the kitchen. It was more stew, but she was too hungry to care. "And you can have your turn in the bath when Manda is done."
Alyx paused, her spoon hanging in the air. "Bath? Did you say bath?"
"Uh, huh," Darien said, sitting beside her on the long bench. "Even warm water."
"Ah, gods, don't tease me about this. Really? A bath?" Alyx was not believing this at all.
*Yes Mom. A bath.* Manda's voice was filled with pure contentment. *Give me twenty and it's yours.*
"Thank you, whatever gods helped create this place," Alyx said to the ceiling.
That got everyone laughing for a few minutes.
"Dare mentioned a back door," Alyx said when she finished eating.
"We think," Rose said. "We thought you might want to check it out, since you had the nap."
"Once I'm human," she said, nodding. "Where is our good luck charm, anyway?"
"Here, Mom." Ben poked his head out of a side room, where he'd been admiring the engineering of the fireplace.
"Can we get some more light in here?" Alyx asked suddenly, getting to her feet and going to Ben. Behind her someone turned on some more lanterns. "And none of you noticed this?" She waved her hand at Ben.
Chris came over and looked at his younger brother, noticing what Alyx had. "Ah, sh... No we didn't. It must have come on gradually."
Ben got this really worried look on his face. "What's wrong?"
"Feel up to another set of lessons?" Alyx asked him.
"Now?" he just wanted to know what was going on.
"Yes, now. It's important, Ben," Chris said.
Ben nodded stiffly.
"Close your eyes and relax. We do this mind-to-mind these days," Alyx said, laying a hand against the side of his face.
He wasn't sure what was going on, but he did as he was asked. He felt her inside his mind.
*Pay attention, love. This is important.*
So he did. She did...something and he watched/felt her do it.
*Now you. Do just what I did.*
Still not quite understanding, he complied. Copying what she had done. He felt weird. Like he was not himself anymore.
*Perfect. Now here's the rest. Go over it later.* She dumped the rest of the information into his head just like she'd done for his father a week ago. Then she slid back out of his mind.
"Okay, now drop the quicksilver," she said aloud.
His eyes flew open and he realized his eyesight had gone to quicksilver sight, just like he'd experienced a few times in his life. This was not part of the plan. Not what was supposed to happen.
"Ben. Relax and use the information your mom gave you. Freak later," Darien said to his frightened son. He wasn't feeling too steady himself. This was completely unexpected.
Ben did the best he could and managed to relax after a couple of minutes. The triggers for the quicksilver were almost instinctive, and once he stopped fighting with himself he was easily able to let it flake away. "Ummm. Did I have Phase II done when I wasn't paying attention?"
Everyone laughed.
"What's going on?" Manda said as she walked into the room.
"Ben has decided to join the ranks of those who can quicksilver," Rose answered in a wry tone.
"Nuh uh," Manda said in complete disbelief.
"Uh huh." Rose tossed right back. "Show her, Benny."
Ben looked a bit nervous, but realized he had to try this sometime. He held out his arm and, after taking a deep breath, successfully quicksilvered it. Much to Manda's astonishment.
"But how?"
Alyx turned to Chris. "Must be because I had my full powers when I had Ben."
"Good a guess as anything. You must have passed the Phase II trigger on to him as well." Chris was staring off into the distance, thinking. "I'm going to have to do some research on this."
"You know what this means don't you?" Darien said quietly.
"What, Darien?" Rose asked him for everyone.
"Dani has fully active quicksilver," he pointed out.
"Aw, crap," they pretty much said as one.
"So now what do we do?" Rose asked.
"Same thing as before. Get her out of there," Darien answered. "The sooner, the better."
"You sure you want to do this?" Darien asked, shining the light down the dark tunnel. "What about Ben?"
"Dare, he's fine. Rose can run him through the training exercises, and they need to sleep anyway," Alyx said with a sigh. "I know it's tough, but he needs a chance to get used to what he can do now without his parents hovering over him."
As she stepped into the darkness and began to walk she pulled out her computer pad and added the tunnel to the map. Assuming it ran straight and exited somewhere the other side of the mountain it would dump them.... She shook her head. If this was right, it would cut two days off their walk time, at least. "Dare, our surprisingly brilliant son may just have shortened our trip. And given us an escape route." She showed him the computer pad.
"Is this right?" he asked as he looked over her work.
"We'll have to see, now won't we?" Alyx said, taking back the computer pad.
They walked in silence for a while. The tunnel was fairly clear considering it hadn't had a visitor in who knew how long. It was dry, with minimal dust and, thankfully, few cobwebs. Those they did find were lacking owners. It also wasn't nearly as cold as they had thought it would be. It wasn't long before they had both peeled off their heavy coats and stuffed them in the pack they had brought.
"Okay bub, you're worried about something. Talk," Alyx said, breaking the silence and actually startling him, they'd been quiet for so long.
"I can't believe I didn't notice," Darien muttered.
"No one did. No one expected it," Alyx reminded him. "I thought I saw something earlier, but I figured it was lack of sleep on my part."
"You realize that we went and did exactly what the Official wanted all those years ago. They don't even have to spend money on Phase II. The kids'll do it by themselves." He started running his hand through his hair. "What about the girls? Will this happen to them?"
"Probably? I can't even tell you why it happened to Ben." She turned slightly to look at him. "I never intended this to happen."
"Damn. That's not what I meant. I'm not blaming you. Not blaming anyone." He moved closer to her and threw and arm over her shoulders. "I'd rather he had a bit more time to be a kid is all."
"He'll have all the time he needs. No one is going to make him do something he's not ready for." She chuckled. "He's gonna be trouble with the girls. Thought he was bad enough with those blue eyes, but he's gonna be devastating with the silver."
"Oh, really? And why would you think this?" Darien asked with a smile.
"'Cause his dad is," Alyx answered honestly. "I haven't decided which I like better, the silver or your sweet brown." She leaned against him as they walked. "How are you doing, with the gland and all?"
"Fine. If it had been like this the first time..." he began, but she interrupted.
"You would have been gone. Arnaud would be dead. There would have been an amazing number of mysterious bank robberies before you retired to a beach to chase pretty girls in bikinis," Alyx stated truthfully. "Everything would be different, and we would not be walking down this dark tunnel right now. Hell, I don't even want to think where I might be right now."
"You're probably right, about me anyway," Darien said with a grin.
"Watch your head," Alyx suddenly said, and Darien ducked just in time to avoid the newly lowered ceiling. The tunnel took a slight jog to the right; Alyx pulled out the computer pad and made the adjustment.
"This is uncomfortable," Darien commented as he walked hunched over through the tunnel.
"I've been expecting it," Alyx muttered. "If you notice, the walls aren't as neatly finished as they were."
Now that she had mentioned it, he did notice. "How much longer?"
"If it comes out where I think, a few hours." Alyx said, looking up from the computer pad to him. "We are walking through a mountain range after all."
"Oh, goody. This is going to be fun," Darien complained. He knew it wouldn't be long before his back began to cramp.
"Just wait. I expect the tunnel to get lots smaller before we get to the end," Alyx told him with a snicker.
"Wonderful. Just wonderful."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Okay, kiddo. You need to get some practice before getting some sleep," Rose said to Ben as they sat in the main room.
"Shouldn't Mom be running me through this stuff?" I asked her with no small amount of trepidation in my voice.
"Normally I would agree, but on this occasion I think she did the right thing." Rose quicksilvered her hand and waited for Ben to attempt to do the same. "Her emotional state would probably be too big an influence on you, and the one thing we've been very careful to do is not tie the quicksilver to emotion."
"Why is that?" I asked as I copied what she did.
"'Cause it's a pain in the ass, that's why." Rose said, surprising me with her crass choice of words. Usually they tried to avoid swearing around me. She must have caught on to what I was thinking. "Darien had to deal with it being tied to emotion and adrenaline levels. Some of the stories are amusing, but others aren't. We have secondary protocols set up for self-preservation, but main control has to be conscious. You don't want to quicksilver just because you're nervous your first day of college do you?"
I shook my head, feeling a bit overwhelmed. I wasn't ready for this responsibility yet. And yes, I knew that quicksilver as well as my other gifts were a major responsibility.
"Look, little bro, as far as this family is concerned you just grew up. You are now at full power and it's just a matter of training to see exactly how far you can push it. Until you hit that 'wall' you can't go beyond, we won't know exactly how strong you are." The entire time she was talking she kept me running through the quicksilver training. From large to small. From external, quicksilvering the bowl or table, to just simply making things frosty. I could feel the pattern Mom had set in my mind, so following what she was doing turned out to be easy.
It was work, though, and after about a half an hour I was beginning to feel the effects. I mean, I knew it was work, but Mom, and more recently Dad, made it look so easy. "This was not part of my plan," I grumbled.
"The best laid plans of mice and men and all that." She rubbed her forehead. "Now I know how Mom felt. Makes me wish I was an ordinary telepath."
"What's it like? Mom's tried to explain it to me, but I still don't quite get it," I asked her, hoping to distract her both from her pain and my training.
"I don't know if I can. I just feel...everything. Suddenly even the wood of this table and the rocks of the walls are 'alive', giving off energy that I can sense. I can tell that I won't be able to interact on the same level as Mom. I seriously doubt I'll be able to do that 'air shield' trick Mom does." She shook her head. "I can't feel to that fine a degree. Mom can feel air molecules. However..." She trailed off. On the table, the bowl began to rattle and then lifted off and hung shakily in the air for a moment before falling back with a clatter. "Urf. That's gonna take some practice." She looked up at me. "That's part of why Mom and Darien volunteered to check out the tunnel. They didn't want to embarrass you by worrying while you practiced."
I shrugged. "Mom and Dad are cool. They wouldn't interfere too much."
"True, but they'd want to. That emotion thing again." She tapped the table top with her finger. "We've had it easy, training-wise. Mike had already taught Mom, so he knew what was needed when we started to show our abilities. Though Manda threw him quite a bit. You do know he trained Mom, right?"
I nodded. Oh yeah, I knew that story. I knew how Mom got involved with the Agency, how she met Dad. How what they did to her nearly killed her and did cause the deaths of dozens of others. Dad told me that it took years before my mom felt it was safe to use her powers at all. What they did to her all those years ago came back to haunt them. Yeah, they succeeded, but at what cost? Guess the world should be lucky that she's as good a person as she is, because if she decided to use her powers to get what she wanted, to fulfill her every whim, there wasn't much that could be done to stop her.
I then began to wonder if this, me and my brother and sisters, were the ultimate goal. What they did to my mom has resulted in a segment, small as of yet, of the population having extraordinary powers. Powers that could be passed on to their children. Provided the abilities didn't weaken in succeeding generations, it wouldn't be that long before we, or rather they, would become a significant portion of the population. And we now knew that there was no longer a dependence on science to realize the full potential.
Mom used to joke that mankind had played god all those years ago and ended up with more than they ever bargained for; her.
But it wasn't just her anymore. It was all of us.
I could only wonder what the future would bring.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Darien stood up straight with a groan. The tunnel had finally opened back up and he was eternally grateful for it. Alyx moved up behind him and began to rub the muscles of his lower back. He sighed as the cramps eased. "Do that forever and I am yours."
"Does that mean if I stop I have to give the ring back?" Alyx said as she continued to work on his poor back.
"Smart-ass," he muttered at her.
The last couple of miles had been nasty. The hand-hewn rock had devolved into a natural passageway that was tight, low-ceilinged, and generally uncomfortable. There had been places they'd had to squeeze through, even going so far as to empty the pack partially to fit it through. Good thing Darien was still in good shape or he might not have made it through at all in several places. Both of them had scrapes and cuts from some of the passages. But that had been the worst of it. The passage had opened back out into a semi-natural tunnel with more than enough clearance for him to stand.
"Better?" she asked him, distracted.
"Ummm, yeah. What do you see?" He knew that tone of voice.
"Not see, smell. Fresh air. We're near the end," Alyx said, moving past him.
"Good. I need a break," Darien commented as he followed her.
"We still have to go all the way back," Alyx said, a bit dryly.
"Don't remind me. Please," he groaned.
Alyx stopped before him. "Well, what have we here?"
Darien looked at the solid blank wall before them in dismay. "A dead end. Damn."
"Nope." She took one of his hands and held it near the wall. "Feel."
It was just barely noticeable, but it was a breeze. "Fresh air.''
She nodded. "Our door." She turned and looked about and Darien did the same. They knew what to look for now, and after a couple of minutes Alyx crowed, "Got it." With a grinding of rock on rock, the door canted open. Alyx carefully moved to the doorway and peered outside. Darien stood behind her and looked over her head.
"Anything?"
"Not nearby. Let's check it out." Alyx slipped through the doorway and outside into the night.
After a moment's searching, Alyx found a stray branch to keep the door from closing entirely, then walked out into the night air. It took about half a second to decide that it was very, very, cold out and that it might be prudent to put their coats and gloves back on. The doorway was partially sheltered by a rock wall which kept it from being seen unless you were standing in just the correct spot. Once they were bundled up, they made their cautious way out past the wall. They dropped to the ground almost immediately and crawled forward through the brush to verify what they had seen.
"How close are we?" Darien whispered to her. She dug in the pack and pulled out both the computer pad and a pair of binoculars for him.
"Half mile or so. Damn, this is near-perfect." She rolled onto her back and changed her eyesight to look for energy signatures. "Hot shit. We're inside their initial perimeter security."
"There's not a lot of movement down there, but I think they have people and dogs patrolling." Darien commented as he looked through the glasses.
"Sounds about right. Yeah, I can see them now. Looks like they patrol closer to the building itself." She suddenly quicksilvered and after a moment Darien followed suit.
*Spoke too soon on that one,* she sent to him.
Less than a hundred feet away, a rather heavily armed and heavily dressed gentleman walked by with a rather vicious looking dog on a leash. The dog paused and looked up the hillside to their location. Darien felt Alyx do ... something and then the dog whined and moved on. When they were well out of range Alyx said quietly, "I miss this."
"I thought you did this for a living," Darien commented with a small laugh.
"I meant with you, silly. I miss working with you. It's just not as much fun," Alyx said, looking down at the installation.
"It's been, what, almost ten years since I left and you just now mention it?" Darien also was watching the place. With what he'd been doing the last several years, he was eminently qualified to break into this place. "I've gotten more experience breaking into places like this since I left the Agency that I ever got while working for them."
"I know. Weird, huh?" Alyx looked over the entire valley that the installation was nestled in. The valley was one of those perfect bowls that were sometimes hidden in mountain ranges and had probably once been grazing land for the locals' herds. It was remote, well protected, and huge. Alyx keyed in every bit of information she could think of or guess at. This was not going to be easy.
"We need to get back," Darien said resting a hand on her back. They were lying close enough together that, even invisible, they each knew where the other was.
"I want to try something first," Alyx said. The she closed her eyes and focused on Dani. The range was at her extreme, especially if she were deep underground, but she thought it worth trying anyway.
*Dani?* she sent to the tentative contact she'd made.
*Who... Wha... Mom?* Dani's mind voice sounded very weak, distorted. *Mom!*
*Easy, Dani.* Alyx tried to comfort her daughter. *Report.*
*I'm drugged to the nines with inhibitors and sedatives. Kept under twenty-four hour guard,* she sent, with anger now tingeing her words.
*Quicksilver?* Alyx asked her.
*Untouched, but the whole place is rigged with thermals.* A hint of terror then crept into her voice. *They're pumping me full of fertilization drugs. They want to harvest.*
*As we suspected. How long ago did they start?* Alyx tried to ease her mind.
*Five days,* Dani replied.
*Dani, can you hold out for a bit yet? We need to go back and get the rest of our group before we attempt a rescue.* Alyx would rush the place now if it was necessary, but was hoping to have the entire group together to do this.
*How long? My temper is wearing thin, and I'd rather die that give them access to my genes.* Dani sent back her anger coming back to the fore.
*Forty-eight hours at most,* Alyx sent to her.
*That I can do,* she sent back with relief. *What took Johnson so long?*
*Johnson doesn't know,* Alyx sent. Darien's touch on her shoulder warned of potential trouble. *I have to go. I'll try to maintain a light link, but there are some distance concerns.*
*Go. Get back as soon as you can,* Dani urged her, then broke her end of the link.
Alyx came back to herself and whispered, "Dani's drugged, but okay. We need to get back."
"You bet we do." His hand appeared for a moment pointing down the hillside where several of the patrolling guards had converged and were talking, pointing up the hill towards their location. "Time for a strategic retreat."
Without argument, Alyx moved and they made their way back to the tunnel entrance, not feeling entirely safe until the stone door had shut behind them.
"Damn. Forgot how much I hate that part." Darien let out his breath and dropped the quicksilver. "Although I have to admit this new gland is nifty. Ummm. You planning on returning?"
"What? Oh, sorry." She let the quicksilver fall away. "Just making sure they didn't track us to the door. I want the element of surprise when we come back." She shrugged out of the coat and gloves. "You ready to make some time? We need to get back ASAP."
Darien groaned. His back was not going to enjoy this, and then they'd be doing it again to get back to here.
Alyx caught his look of anticipated discomfort. "You could wait here, but it may be twelve hours or more before we head back."
He shook his head. "I'm in. Right now I'm envying you. You barely had to bend over."
"One of the rare occasions my height has been an advantage," Alyx laughed. "Come on, I want this over with."
They got moving, and even with the difficulties they made it back in half the time.
*