* Part 2*
Neither of them was very awake the next day at work, but they lucked out in that there was nothing major requiring their special talents. While Darien and Hobbes did a little catching up on past paperwork, Alyx went down to the lab to work on a few of her own projects. When she finished her work in the Keep, she headed up to her office to work on a few other things. She still had ongoing research into her former husband, general work that she helped Eberts out with -- he'd e-mailed her a list -- and she downloaded some interesting reports on various subjects to read later.
Darien sauntered in around one o'clock and sat down on her desk, toying with a kinetic energy sculpture she had there.
"'Sup Dare?" she said, glancing up at him.
"Want to go grab some lunch?" He wasn't meeting her eyes, so she knew something was up.
She powered down her laptop and put it in her bag. "Sure." She tossed her backpack over her shoulder and waited for him to lead the way. He left the building and went to her car. Although she did wonder why they were not taking his, she didn't ask and slid in the driver's seat.
They ended up at one of the beaches she frequented, after picking up some deli sandwiches and sides. Darien was lying on his side with Alyx leaning back against him. He was toying with a plastic fork while Alyx stared off at the water, with her shoes off and her feet buried in the sand.
"What's the problem?" she asked finally.
"Bobby suspects something, and we have a stake-out tonight. So our little date is off," Darien told her, squinting up at her.
"Hmmm. I'm not on the stake-out, obviously," Alyx said, drawing her knees up to her chest. "What's got Bobby's paranoia up?"
"He tried to call, then stopped by my place looking for me last night. Your car was still there, so he figured something was up." Darien sighed. "He's suspicious as hell, but I'm not sure what set him off."
Alyx turned to look at him. "Does it matter?" She shifted to lie along side him. "It just makes it a bigger challenge now, doesn't it?"
Darien reached out and tapped her on the nose. "You were supposed to try and talk me out of it."
"Right, like I could. You're torn between hurting Bobby by going ahead and the thrill of dodging Bobby to get the job done," Alyx summed with a smile. "I told you I'd help. I will."
"Can you play hooky for the afternoon?" His hand had moved to caress her face, his thumb tracing the outline of her lips.
"Of course. Why?" Alyx closed her eyes and just allowed herself to feel.
"'Cause I'm supposed to be catching a nap and I thought company might be nice." Darien watched her response to his touch and smiled. He leaned in and gave her a quick kiss. "Come on."
They packed up the leftovers and the blanket and headed back to her car. After she dropped him off at his car, they drove separately back to his place. When Darien walked in, Alyx was already sprawled on his bed with her shoes discarded on the floor. She had changed into a pair of shorts and oversized T-shirt. He tossed his jacket over a chair, kicked off his shoes, and jumped onto the bed with her, much to her delight. She laughed at his pure silliness.
"When's Bobby picking you up?" she asked him through the laughter.
"Eight," he answered, snuggling closer to her.
"Then you had better sleep." She spooned back against him and he wrapped his arms about her.
"What will you do?" He actually sounded drowsy.
"Oh, me? I'll just be. Now sleep. You want to ease Bobby's suspicions, not add to them." She curled her fingers about his and relaxed as he mumbled something into her hair and began to drift off. She encouraged his sleepiness until he was truly asleep, then did exactly what she'd said she was going to do. She just lay there and enjoyed his presence, letting herself drift. Going over anything that presented itself in her mind.
Alyx opened the door at the second knock. "Hey, Bobby." She stepped out of the way and he walked into the apartment. "He's just about ready."
"Kid, are you always here?" Bobby asked. It was obvious he was fishing for something.
"No, Hobbes. She has a life," Darien said as he came out of his bathroom. He walked over to Alyx. "See you tomorrow?"
"Only if you're conscious," she gave him a shove. "Go on. Have fun waiting for something to happen."
"Fun, right." But he followed Bobby out to the van.
They were on their way to the docks, where they were supposedly going to be watching a warehouse for a shipment of illegal animals. Emphasis on 'supposedly.'
"What is going on, Fawkes? You're up to something, and I'm betting you've gotten the kid involved in it as well." Bobby kept glancing over at his partner as he drove.
"Hobbes, what the hell are you talking about?" Darien did his best to sound confused and exasperated at his friend.
"Fawkes, I know you too well. You've been bored out of your mind lately with work, yet you're spending less time with the kid, not more, and you keep coming to work tired. It seems to be running in cycles." Hobbes pulled the van to a stop, partially hidden by some crates a short distance from the warehouse they were supposed to be watching. "You weren't home last night and this morning you were a zombie. What are you planning now?"
"Hobbes, take your meds. You're even more paranoid than usual," Darien commented as he climbed out of the van to get a better look at the warehouse. Yeah, it was a low blow, but he had to try and distract him somehow.
"Fawkes, don't pull that shit with me." Hobbes climbed out with a pair of binoculars to stand next to Darien. "I will find out, one way or another." He lifted the glasses and focused them on the particular warehouse they were watching. "Remember Liz Morgan?"
Darien groaned. Was Bobby never going to let him forget that one? He decided to try a different tactic. "Hobbes, do you really think I could hide something like that from Alyx?"
"Hide? No. Con her into helping? Maybe. And the kid don't need to deal with crap like that." Bobby had lowered the glasses to look at his partner, hoping to catch a look of guilt or remorse on Darien's face, but he was out of luck this time. Either Darien was telling the truth or his ability to lie had improved.
Darien kept his look bland. "Can we just do this stupid stakeout, Hobbes? Another night doing scut work for Fish & Game." He leaned against the crates and looked over the quiet dock area. It looked like it was going to be a long boring night.
Bobby watched Darien for another moment and then shook his head. "Yeah, well, so long as it ain't snakes."
Darien somehow didn't laugh, even though he wanted to. "Bobby, I swear there is no way I could make Alyx do anything she didn't want to do."
"Yeah, well, keep it that way. Or I'll be forced to hurt you," Bobby said, sounding as gruff as he could. Overall the kid had been a good influence on Fawkes, but as Bobby well knew, his partner was a thief at heart. If he was determined to cause trouble, there was nothing and no one that could stop him. Except Bobby Hobbes, of course.
Alyx hung out at Darien's place for a couple hours, doing a bit more research about Nate Richards and the building they were planning on breaking into in the near future. On the off chance of being able to avoid breaking in, she tried to access the main computer via the internet. She was successful, sort of. There was a dedicated server for the web site information, but it was separate from the business computer and she could not access that one from here. She would have to be there in person to get the information.
Next was trying to figure out how to defeat the security without using her abilities. There were some things she couldn't help but do. Even if she did nothing to them, she would still know where all the electronics were. The cameras, the motion and sound sensors, the laser grids. Even if they were not on the schematics she had, she would still know where they were. That would help, anyway. Darien had no idea some of the jobs the boss had given her in recent weeks. Breaking into a place to steal information was nothing new. Hell, the first job she'd done for the Agency had been a snatch and grab for computer intel. It was the 'no powers' dictate she was having trouble with.
She had never doubted Darien's abilities, but for him to have done what he had without using any quicksilver, no matter how tempting, impressed her. There were days Alyx did doubt her own abilities, even after all this time here. Yeah, she had learned everything she needed to work for the Agency, to get the job done, but in many ways it was nothing more than another face she wore. Just one more part she played out of the dozens she had been over all these months.
The only times she felt like herself, or how she saw herself, was when she alone with Darien. She was slowly pulling herself back together, finding out exactly who she was and who she wanted to be. She was discovering that she liked the person she saw in the mirror, the person she saw reflected in Darien's eyes and mind.
She shut down her laptop and packed it away. She wasn't going to need it for what she was planning to do tonight. Grabbing Darien's spare car keys, she headed out to do a bit more scouting. She needed to check out something she saw on the blueprints, something that might cause a problem when the time came to actually do the job.
Alyx parked in a completely different location than the night before -- no need to have his car associated with the area. She parked near a bar a few blocks away and walked inside, intending to have a quick drink. Luckily she didn't look all that out of place there; in fact, the bartender never even asked for her ID when she ordered. Maybe it was the fact that she ordered whiskey straight, or maybe he regularly served underage kids. It didn't really matter.
After killing about half an hour, she made her way to the back of the bar and the so-called 'ladies room.' She quicksilvered and walked out the back door into the alley behind the bar. This was where she had the advantage over Darien; she had no concerns about how long she could stay invisible. They had yet to even make an effort at seeing what her limit was. She walked the distance to the parking lot behind the target building and approached the electrical conduit out back. Once sure there was no one near, she flaked off the quicksilver and knelt down to examine the lock. It was a big sucker, designed to be resistant to lock picks and bolt cutters. Darien hadn't seemed worried about it, so he must know how to defeat this kind of lock. She, on the other hand, was going to have to cheat.
She didn't want to make it obvious that someone had been here, so she dared not destroy the lock. Instead, she carefully felt her way into the locking mechanism and, at first, did nothing more than examine it. These could be tricky. If done wrong it would damage the mechanism, and then they would know someone had been here. Once she was sure she could unlock it without damaging it, she did so.
According to the records, the various utilities had keys to this tunnel, as did the maintenance crews for the building itself. But if work needed to be done beyond the security gates in the tunnel, the local utilities had to call for access, which made Alyx a bit suspicious about the security gates. That's why she was here.
She checked for any security around the entrance. When she discovered none, just as the city blueprints said, she moved the lock, opened the door, and slipped inside, closing the door behind her. Concentrating, she moved the lock back into place and closed it just enough for it to appear to be secured. She was pretty sure the guards wouldn't actually walk out here and rattle the damn thing. That's what she was hoping, anyway. She wasn't all that sure she'd be able to unlock it from this side, but if they found it unlocked they would probably set off an alarm or two. She really, really wanted to avoid that.
Staying on the ladder for the time being, she checked ahead for any obvious security systems and discovered none. The only power she could sense was running through the assorted electric and phone lines. Climbing down to the bottom, she pulled out the small flashlight she'd brought with her and turned it on. She didn't want to risk drawing attention to the place by turning on the lighting -- someone somewhere might notice -- and it was too dark for even her eyes to adjust to anything more than a very dim gray on gray view. Quicksilver sight wasn't much better in this case. No ambient light, no sight.
Once down in the tunnel itself, she knew it was going to be very tight for Darien. While the floor was flat, a majority of the space was taken up with a variety of cables that were held in place along the wall and part of the ceiling, greatly reducing the diameter of the tunnel. It was tight for her. There was enough room for a worker to sit in reasonable comfort while testing cables, but to walk any distance would be a royal pain in the ass. Good thing Darien was skinny; he was going to have to crawl through here, and there was a couple hundred feet of tunnel to get through.
Arriving at the first security door a few minutes later, she had her fears confirmed. This side of the security door was completely blank. She could see where the hinges were, but they and the lock keeping the door shut were on the other side. There weren't even any screws or bolts she could get at. Everything seemed to have been integrated directly into the metal of the door itself. This was going to be a problem. Next she probed gently on the far side of the door and encountered the first security hurdle. The lock for the gate was electronic, and she wasn't sure how they would disable it from this side. The hinges were wired as well. In fact, the entire frame of the door was wired, so that even if they tried to insert a wire between the door and frame to deactivate the lock, they would set off the alarm first. Damn. Richards must be hiding something major for his security to be this tight.
She spent a few minutes grumbling to herself about thieves and their weird sense of honor, then took a deep breath. Checking the door itself she discovered that, except for the frame, it was not wired. Even so, she was unsure how they were going to get through it. Blasting it with explosives would probably not be a good choice. Maybe a welding torch?
She relaxed back against the wall for a moment to think. She could come up with an easy half dozen ways to get in using any combination of their skills or powers, but she was drawing a bit of a blank on how to get in without them. That's why Darien was the one in charge, but he'd need this intel for him to know what to do. The two other gates were probably set up in a similar manner.
Even she couldn't just blast a hole in the door. Well, she could, but it would be messy. She had enough fine control to manipulate locks and such, but she couldn't gently tear out a section of the door. Melt, maybe, but the metal of the door was awfully thick and there was a chance she'd melt the power cables before the door gave, and they would still have to wait for it to cool before they could get through. Not that it mattered; he wanted to get through without using any fancy extras. She was seriously beginning to wonder if it would be possible. Maybe they should just climb in through a window.
Finished here, she made her way back out, returned everything to the way it should be, and made her way back to Darien's car. Sitting in the driver's seat, she mulled the situation some more. She knew there had to be a way in, but she just couldn't see it. She was too used to doing things a particular way, using the skills the Agency had taught her -- not all of which were orthodox -- but still, this was not something she'd specifically encountered before. Maybe she should talk Darien into more than just lock-picking lessons. Learning a few new ways to sneak into places could only help with her work at the Agency. Right?
She drove back to Darien's place, dropped off his keys, and grabbed her backpack. She was home fifteen minutes later. Seeing that it was still early, she chose to do a light workout before going to bed. She wanted to sleep tonight instead of tossing and turning. She had to learn to sleep alone again; since Jess' visit she'd been having serious trouble sleeping alone. She was still having nightmares, nightmares she'd only told Darien about. Nightmares that had brought up a lot of old and painful memories.
She used up her energy against her punching bag, running through the full gambit of punches and kicks that she had learned over the years. By the time an hour had passed she was sweat-soaked and had worked off the majority of her excess energy. After stretching out she headed to the shower. She spent several long minutes doing nothing more than letting the cool water run down her body and bring her body temperature back down to something resembling normal. She did her best to begin relaxing, slowing her body's systems down so that she might actually fall asleep quickly. She needed to; she truly was tired and, even if she was awake at four in the morning, she could always head into work early. Maybe she could meet Darien for lunch, if he was even awake by then.
When she crawled into bed a short time later it was with every intention of sleeping peacefully.
Darien yawned and stretched, trying to convince his body that it did indeed want to be awake at -- he checked his watch and groaned -- almost three in the morning. Even with the nap he had taken that afternoon he was getting tired. Mainly out of boredom. Bobby had dozed off about an hour ago and they'd run out of coffee just after one, with no hope of getting more. So he was very surprised when lights appeared from around the far end of the row of warehouses and rumbled in his direction.
"Finally," he muttered. Moving to the van he gave Hobbes a quick shake, waking him.
"Fawkes?" he muttered. "What?"
"Company," Darien answered hooking his thumb in the direction of the warehouse.
Hobbes nodded and got to his feet, full consciousness returning quickly now that there was actually something to do. He picked up the binoculars and watched as two cars and three trucks pulled into the building. The big bay doors shut behind them. "Well, it looks like something is going down, anyway." He looked over at Darien. "Lets get you wired up and you can check it out."
Darien nodded and moved back to the van, where Hobbes dug out the headset and handed it to him. As soon as they had tested the system, Darien was on his way to check out what exactly was going on inside. The warehouses were set in pairs, to allow vehicles access from the side as well as the ends and also to reduce traffic congestion. Their target had the oversized alleyway facing them and this is where Darien headed. He stuck to the shadows and made his way to the side of the building where he knew, from staring at the ones nearer to their position for the last several hours, there were windows he could use to get a look at what was inside, or perhaps even gain entry into the building.
The first set of windows were blocked with crap piled inside the building, so he moved further down the alley to the next set. From there he could see a couple of the vehicles that had driven in. Standing around nearby were half dozen guys discussing something, but he had no idea what. Trying the windows, he eventually found one that swung open and he tried to overhear what was being said.
"Well, Fawkes?" Bobby asked in his ear.
Darien moved away from the window, not wanting his voice to carry into the building. "Not much. They're just talking." He turned slightly to watch the men inside, but they were pretty much doing the same thing. They weren't even unloading anything.
"Find a way in and check it out," Bobby advised him.
"Working on it. Just don't want any more surprises than necessary." Darien moved down to the next set of windows, hoping to get a different view of the interior, but this window was partially blocked and revealed nothing useful to him. Grumbling under his breath he made his way back to the window he had opened, fully intending to quicksilver and sneak inside.
Bobby had the binoculars to his eyes, trying to see what the hell was going on at the warehouse, when his cell phone went off in his pocket. Wondering who the heck it could be at this hour, he pulled it out with one hand and answered. "Hobbes."
"Bobby, don't let Darien go in that warehouse," Alyx's voice drifted out from the phone.
"Kid? What are you talking about?" Hobbes did not need the kid playing jokes on them, not at this hour.
"Bobby, don't screw around. Keep him out of that damn warehouse." The urgency in her voice was obvious. "Please, Bobby. Just for a little while. Call him back."
"All right, kid. Calm down." Without hanging up the phone, Hobbes spoke into his mic. "Fawkes, hold up a minute."
Darien twitched as the quicksilver that was about to flow was suddenly stopped. It left him with a horrible crawling sensation all over his skin. "Hobbes, don't do that." He kept his voice to a whisper even though he wanted to shout at his partner. Ah, the sensation felt worse than swallowing a sneeze. And very uncomfortable as well.
"Fawkes, just hang back for a bit," Bobby said to him. He was starting to think the kid might be right. He could hear some engines nearby, but could not yet see the vehicles making the sound. "Clear out and head back here."
"Hobbes..." Darien sounded more than a touch irritated.
"Now!" Hobbes barked at him. He heard Darien mutter something derogatory and then give his reluctant agreement. Bobby focused back on the phone. "Kid, you still there?"
"Yeah, Bobby." Her voice was still tight.
"He's on his way back." He wasn't sure what was going on with her, but there was no way she would have called if there wasn't a reason. A real reason.
"Thanks, Bobby," she said, relief evident in her tone, and then the line went dead.
Bobby put the phone back in his pocket as Darien walked up to him. The headset now dangled down his back and he did not look happy. In fact he looked pretty pissed off. "What the hell was all that about, Hobbes?" He was finally going to actually do something and Hobbes, on some seemingly unexplained whim, decides to call him back. This was annoying, even for Hobbes.
Bobby was still listening to the deep rumbling of what must be a large truck and watching for it. "Do you trust your partner Fawkes?"
"Hobbes, if this is some weird loyalty test..." Darien trailed off and turned around as he too heard the vehicle. A moment later, a huge, heavy-duty, military-style truck appeared from around the end of the row.
It drove up slowly towards the warehouse they had been watching and lined itself up with the doors. The engine revved, once, twice, and then the driver floored it and smashed his way inside. Shouts and then gunshots quickly followed. Both Bobby and Darien looked at each other for a moment then back at the warehouse. The sound of gunfire increased, and continued for several minutes. There was an eerie pause and then the entire warehouse exploded, sending flames and debris billowing into the night sky. The explosion was so violent that the crates they had parked the van behind shattered, burying the two men and the van under debris.
When they crawled out from the wreckage several minutes later, neither seriously hurt, they simply looked at the destruction in astonishment.
Darien found his voice first. "I don't know and I don't care how you knew, but I'll never argue with your orders again." All Darien could think of was the fact that if Bobby hadn't told him to come back to the van, he would have been inside when the place went up in a ball of fire.
Bobby shook his head. "I'd love to take credit for saving your ass, but it wasn't me. The kid called and told me to get you out of there." Sirens could now be heard in the distance. "Somehow I have the feeling they were smuggling something more than animals."
"No shit," was Darien's enlightened comment. He was still staring at the fire, trying not to think about how close he'd come. He was also not trying to think about the fact that the Official must have known what these guys were really transporting, and that his failure to tell them about it had nearly killed him. Maybe Alyx was right about doing the scut work. It might be boring as hell, but it was a lot safer.
Hobbes moved out into the open, heading for the fire crews and police vehicles that were arriving. Whatever had happened here, the Agency was a part of it and he still had the duty to find out what had happened and report back to the Official. On this occasion he was not all that thrilled that they had been kept in the dark. Fawkes could have been killed if he'd been in there went the place went up. Quicksilver or no quicksilver.