Legacy: chapter 8

"Have you spotted them yet?" Allie asked Ka'len as the two walked along a sidewalk through a local neighborhood. The point of walking was to lose their pursuers, but so far, there had been no pursuers to lose. Maybe Mary had already attempted to prove herself, although Allie needed no proof of her change.

"I have not." Ka'len said, eyeing another passing car suspiciously. Allie knew that the part of town several blocks up the road in the direction they were currently heading turned very rough, very quick. The question Allie mulled over was: how far should they go before calling her mother for a ride? She wasn't afraid for her own or Ka'len's safety.

What worried her was that if any low-life scum were to attack them, she would have to defend herself. Using her abilities to injure or kill another human being would be about as hard as swatting a pesky mosquito. That fact was what bothered her the most. The awesome, almost absolute power within her was terrifying at times. A saying she remembered hearing and repeated often was: power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely. It helped her to stay calm in trying situations and not just zap something. It also reminded her of the promise she had made herself: that she would never, under any circumstances, use her power to kill any living creature; injure, only if her own life was threatened, but never kill.

She sighed, "I should have asked for a cell phone the second I got here. First place with a pay phone I'll call my mom."

Ka'len listened to her then looked to the cars lining the street, "Could we not use one of these?"

"Kay!" Allie gasped, "You want to steal a car?"

Ka'len forced a smile onto her face, "I attempted to make a joke. It did not work…"

"Oh… oh! That was good, very good!" Allie tried to laugh, "seriously, that's a good sign, your learning."

"Yes, perhaps I will understand this place eventually."

"I know you will," Allie laid a hand on her friends shoulder, "there's a lot here that you can never learn studying research records."

"Agreed, I have learned more from your 'television' in two weeks then I learned in the time I studied for this mission."

"Really?" Allie looked surprised, "and I thought TV was mind poison…"

Ka'len shrugged, "portions of the broadcasts are inconsequential refuse; 'talk shows' I believe you called them…" she cut it off as Allie started laughing, "have I misspoken?"

"Not exactly," Allie said giggling, "you just sound… like a robot off some movie when you talk."

Ka'len frowned "Is my use of this language incorrect?"

"No, no. It's just unnatural." Allie said, "Like what you just said; I would have said: 'what's wrong with how I talk?' or something like that."

"I believe I understand…"

"No… try it." Allie corrected.

"I… think I understand."

"See, better already and you only changed one word."

"I see. You wish me to substitute less complicated words."

"Exactly! Practice, rephrase what you just said…"

Ka'len focused for a moment, then: "you want me to use smaller words?" she looked to Allie for approval.

"Very good, now do that every time you say something and you will be fitting in before you know it."

Several minutes later a phone booth came into view, right in front of a dirty, rundown old bar. Great… Allie thought, "you wait here, I'll go call her." She left Ka'len and ran down the sidewalk toward the phone.

The piles of books and papers on the table around Lisa grew taller with each passing minute. Instead of wasting time with idle entertainment she had pulled out her term paper materials and started in on it again. She enjoyed this work, it was much more tedious then the other things she could be doing, but something about it felt much more rewarding. Like she was actually doing something for once.

She reached out for her mug, found it empty. With a sigh, she laid the poor quality, black and white copy of a journal article she had been marking up with her highlighter down and headed off to the kitchen for a refill.

Coffee was the one bad habit she had managed to hold onto after Allie returned. She knew she was addicted to the stuff, it just didn't seem like a big enough deal for her to make a point to quit. Besides, it helps so much when your tired… or just need that good old oral fixation like Lisa was craving at the moment.

In keeping with her normal luck, the coffeepot was empty. She had forgotten to start it back up again when she finished off the last cup. Lisa sat her mug down on the counter, precariously close to the edge, and reached up to get the box of filters and a can of coffee, not decaffeinated. She had considered switching, to cut down on the caffeine. But what's the point of taking away the only thing that kept her drinking the nasty tasting stuff?

She went through the deeply ingrained motions of changing the filter, filling the tray, filling it with water. Lisa had gone through this routine so many times that the movements were almost reflexive, every one pre programmed into her procedural memory. However, her mug being so close to the sink and so close to the edge of the counter was never a factor in any of these movements. A thoughtless movement knocked the cheep ceramic cup off balance. It teetered on the edge for a second. Then it fell, slowly. Lisa watched the whole thing; she could see every minute detail of its decent. It seemed to move slower as the seconds passed. The one thing Lisa wanted more then anything was for it to stop in mid air so she could grab it. She didn't care about this particular mug; she just really didn't feel like cleaning up the mess that was moments away.

Its decent grew slower still, now it was as if it was being lowered gently by some unseen hand. Lisa was aware of time passing normally around her, but all her attention was so totally focused on the mug that everything else was secondary, only the mug in the center seemed to have any substance in reality.

Then the mug stopped.

Frozen in time and space mer inches off the floor.

It took several seconds for the realization to occur to Lisa. But a bird flying by the window, seen out of the corner of her eye, showed her. The mug really was frozen in place. How?

Allie was gone, Ka'len too… so how could…

Oh my god! Lisa's hands started to tremble. She tried to look at something else, anything else, but her eyes would not respond. They were fixed on the mug. Along with some other previously dormant and unreachable part of her subconscious mind which was keeping it in the air. By my own will…Lisa realized. She wanted it to stop, and it did just that.

The phone rang, startling Lisa and breaking her concentration, sending the mug the rest of the way to the floor. Only resulting in a chipped rim instead of little pieces of ceramic all over the kitchen.

Lisa's mind raced as she tried to rationalize what had just happened, what she had just done. The ringer on the phone sounded again, making her jump again. And she realized that time, or her perception of it, was off. It seemed that minutes were passing between each ring of the phone when in reality only a few seconds passed.

After three more rings, and three more startled jumps. Lisa remembered to answer the phone. She stumbled toward it, her legs seemingly still stuck in that punctuated time zone. Her hand reached out for the handset, but as she brought it up to her ear her whole arm started shaking violently. She reached up with the other to steady it.

"He—hello! Hello…" she accidentally shouted into the phone. The other end was silent for a while then Allie spoke.

"What's wrong?" she asked, her voice muffled and distorted.

"Allie! Allie… Allie…I need to talk to you… like now!"

Again there was a long pause from Allie, then: "calm down, tell me what's wrong."

"I… I just…" Lisa hesitated.

"You just what?" Allie asked.

"I just did something!"

"What do you mean, 'something'…" Allie paused, Lisa could hear her gasp over the phone, "you mean… you…"

"Yes! Yes, yes… I really need to see to you!"

"Mom, please calm down, it's alright. We..."

"It's not alright!" Lisa steadied herself on the counter as a piercing pain started to spread throughout her entire head. "God… now my head…"

"Headache?" Allie asked, "that's normal, it goes away pretty quick… listen, I'm running out of quarters here and we kind of need a ride."

"Where are you?"

"The corner of 51st and Franklin."

"I'll be there in a minute…" Lisa paused, realizing where that intersection was. "What are you two doing there!?" she asked excitedly.

"Avoiding someone, I can explain on the way…"

"I still don't know if this is such a great idea." Keith's voice came over the radio beside Mary as she busily hacked away at the keyboard in front of her. On the screen of the computer was a satellite map of Seattle, small dots representing Keith and the other agent's locations moved slowly along the roads around the position Mary had calculated for Allie and her little friend.

"What are you talking about?" Mary keyed up the hand mike, "its working great."

"I don't mean the system, I mean leaving you there all by yourself."

Mary grinned, "I'm touched that you're so concerned for my safety."

"The mother's leaving the house," another voice came over the radio, interrupting the conversation. Mary made note of that agent's location.

"Roger that agent Peterson, keep an eye on her." Keith's voice answered.

What a bunch of idiots… Mary rolled her chair back across the dirty old wooden floor of the third story 'headquarters' toward a file cabinet. In the third drawer she found what she was looking for. The personal files on the members on that special ops team Keith kept threatening to call in. Mary was starting to develop a theory about Keith's true motives; she might find her proof in these files.

She rolled back over to the computer, moved the keyboard out of the way and laid out the small stack of folders. Opening the first one reviled nothing; she had never seen the young man before, so she moved that folder to the side. The next one showed her exactly what she was looking for though.

"Captain Lou Johnson…" she uttered the name under her breath as she stared at the picture. He was one of the ones that had gone on the 'ship' with her that night, she could remember his face clearly. It seemed he had recently been promoted from lieutenant.

The next folder was a shock, and it confirmed all her suspicions. "Major Brian Pierce… Major…" Mary said aloud. That kid must have been very busy to go from lieutenant to major in five years. She read down the page further, learning that he was the leader of this small team.

It was clear now that she and all of these airforce personnel were being used in some complex game. Why else pick Pierce to be the team leader? He had spent a lot of time with Allie and got quite attached to the girl; he even helped them all escape. What was Keith really planning?

"The mother just stopped, the two girls are getting in the car." Another voice said over the radio. Mary sighed, pulled the keyboard back in front of her.

Its time to play traffic control for the children…

"What do you mean, 'do I know where Skyview is'?" Lisa asked, "I thought you wanted to go home."

"This is very important." Allie told her

Lisa looked over at her, saw that same you-know-I-can't-tell-you look in her eyes that she had had ever since her return. "Okay… but what am I supposed to do… I'm a little freaked out right now."

"Tell me exactly what happened." Allie said

"I, I was just making coffee and I knocked a mug off the counter and it stopped in mid air…"

Allie interrupted her; "did you want it to stop?"

"Yes…"

Allie looked back to Ka'len, both girls had an excited gleam in their eyes. "The hypothesis was correct. Being around us awakened her abilities."

"You mean you knew this would happen?" Lisa asked.

"No, we knew there was a strong chance of it happening." Allie said.

"And you didn't bother to warn me?"

Allie shrugged, "other things came up. It's not as big of a deal as it seems."

"Not a big deal!" Lisa yelled. She didn't think it was possible, but she was actually angry with her daughter. Allie sensed this too.

"Would it have still happened if you would have known it could happen?" Allie asked.

"No… I could have…" Lisa thought for a second, only becoming more frustrated that Allie was giving her riddles at a time like this. "I don't know! I guess it would have."

Allie grinned, "correct, it was inevitable. So weather you had knowledge of it or not is not of importance, it would have happened anyway. The only way to stop it now is if me and Ka'len leave."

"No!" Lisa's eyes pleaded, "I don't care what happens, your not leaving again…"

"I was only stating the fact." Allie said soothingly, "I already told you and dad that I'm here to stay."

Lisa took a deep breath, focusing her attention back on the road as she noticed a street sign. They were close to where ever it was that Allie needed to go. "Okay, just… you have to help me, with all this alien stuff… I'm clueless."

"You stopped the mug, you know how to use it good enough for now."

Lisa looked over, "but I didn't stop the mug. It was like my mind had a… mind of its own."

"Yes, the upper areas of consciousness have a certain independence to them," Allie smiled, "it just takes time to learn how to control it…"

"Allie," Ka'len spoke up from the back seat, "we are being followed."

"What!" Allie spun around to look out the back window, "where?"

Ka'len simply pointed behind them, but an invisible synchronizing force guided Allies eyes right to the green car about a block down, that was indeed following them.

"Your right…" Allie turned back around.

"What do we do?" Lisa asked.

Allie didn't answer; she was already searching for the answer to that question. "There!" she pointed to an alleyway on the opposite side of the road, "turn in there!"

"But…" Lisa hesitated, tapped the breaks a little.

"Do it! Trust me…"

In a moment of pure adrenaline, induced by that force Allies voice could carry when it needed to, Lisa spun the wheel to the left, sending the car sliding and lining up perfectly with the alley. What was supposed to be a gentle tap of the accelerator sent the car plunging into the dark, narrow passage. Only to squeal to a stop halfway, further passage blocked by a dumpster.

"Now what!" Lisa said excitedly, glanced over at Allie who was the image of calm.

"Relax," Allie said, "they cannot see what is not there."

"What…" Lisa turned around and watched as the green car screeched to a stop on the street and a man got out. He looked straight at them but did nothing but scratch his head in confusion. A feeling Lisa shared with him at the moment. Allie opened her door and stepped out.

"What are you doing?" Lisa was whispering for some reason, "he'll see you."

"No, he won't… unless I wanted him to," Allie told her as Ka'len got out to join her. "This is far enough."

"What should I do?" Lisa asked.

"The university district is close to here right?" Allie answered her with a question.

"Yes… just down the street…"

"And this friend you told me about, Dr. Miller. Will you be able to find her there?"

Lisa looked at her watch, "she might still be in her office, why?"

"Go to her, me and Ka'len will find you when we're done."

"Why?"

"She may be able to help." Allie said, "we should go now."

"Help? But… what do I tell her…"

Allie tilted her head to the side, "what else? The truth."

The little dots racing around the map looked like mice franticly searching for a piece of cheese in a maze to Mary. She was finding it hard not to laugh at them. Judging by how close Allie, Lisa and that other girl were to her position last time they were seen she was almost one hundred percent sure what Allies destination was. Mary just wished the girl had picked a better time, like the middle of the night or something.

"Okay, everyone just stop for a second." Keith's voice came over the radio on the common channel. "They couldn't have just vanished into thin air. We need to regroup and get out bearings."

Yeah, no way they could have vanished… ever hear of a screen Mr. I- read-all-the-old-reports? Mary rolled her eyes. His stupidity was still enough to keep Mary entertained, even though she knew it was all an act, with her at center stage. That just made it all the more fun. Now that she knew he was playing her, she could play in turn just that much more effectively.

What would he do if his little piece of Allie bait turned against the girl she was supposed to attract? Mary laughed. She would have to run it past Allie when she got there, of course.

"Mary, direct everyone into a grid pattern." Keith said.

Mary keyed up, "ten-four good buddy," she giggled again, "everyone check in one by one and give your current location, starting with Agent Simmons."

"35th and Lockwood," a deep voice answered back. Mary typed in the address and a targeting rectal came down, centering over one of the dots.

"Okay Simmons, turn left onto Lockwood and go four blocks up. Take another Left onto 31st and hold for further instructions. Agent Peters, your next…"

A hand came around Mary's head and pointed to Simmons' dot, "you should have sent him here," Allie said.

Mary gasped, spun around, "how long have you been here!" her eyes shifted to the other girl standing behind Allie.

"'Ten-four good buddy'," Allie grinned, "nice touch…"

"I… you… why didn't you say something?" Mary asked, still breathless

"You were on that," Allie pointed to the mike in Mary's hand, "if I would have made a sound, my location would have been given away."

Mary squinted, "right… stupid question…"

Grabbing a nearby rolling chair Allie sat down facing Mary, "now, Miss Crawford. What do you have for me?"

Mary stared at her for a moment before remembering what she had said in their last conversation. "Oh… uh," Mary glanced around the room, her eyes falling on the folders she had discovered earlier. "I just found this, I think it's interesting." She pulled Pierces folder off the top and handed it to Allie.

Allie recognized the man immediately upon opening the folder, she looked back up to Mary, "what does he have to do with this?"

Mary smiled, "that is the question… I think Keith is using me to get to you. This, right now, is exactly what he knew I was going to do."

"And you still do it…" Allie tensed up, preparing to run at the first indication of a trap.

"No, no, no… it's okay," Mary said, sensing the tension in Allie. "He didn't want me to see these," she held up the whole stack of files, "now I know what he's up too, and so do you."

"So?"

"A feint within a feint…" Ka'len said, drawing both Allie and Mary's attention.

"Yes, exactly…" Mary said, turned back to Allie, "who is this?"

Allie tipped her head back at Ka'len, "a friend, that's all you need to know… I understand what you mean now, this can be used to our advantage."

Our… Mary focused her attention back on Allie. The girl certainly wasn't much for idle chatter, which was a good attitude to have considering her current location: ground zero of her enemy's headquarters.

"Yeah, I was thinking about that," Mary said, "he will think that I'm still in the dark, so what if I started doing the opposite of what he expects me to do…" a sly grin crept upon her face.

"You mean, play the obedient little soldier and try to help him as much as possible…" Allie started to share Mary's grin, "I like it."

"The first thing I think I should do is advise him to call in this airforce team."

Allies eyes lit up, "yeah! I want to see Mr. Pierce again. So I can think him for what he did…" her demeanor quickly switched back to serious, "what I need more then anything though, Miss Crawford, is time."

"Please, call me Mary." she told her. Mary was getting tired of the 'Miss Crawford' thing. Too formal. "How much time?"

Allie sighed, looked up at the ceiling as if an answer were painted there. "Two or three years," she said after a short period of deliberation.

"Two or three! For what?" Mary asked, "why did you come back anyway?"

Allie had come up with the figure based on the deep space transit time of the large diplomatic transports, but she could not tell Mary that. Ka'len, however, knew the transit times by heart. Allie failed to notice that her friend had fallen completely silent and motionless after the statement, a sure sign that she was going through a complex cycle of calculations based on the figure and her supposed 'mission'.

"I can't tell you… yet." Allie said, "I just need it. Maybe I could cause something to happen…"

"No…" Mary put up a hand to stop her, concentrated hard for a minute, "Keith's 'division' of the NSA is not a legally existent branch of a government agency, a shadow organization."

"This helps…?" Allie asked, lost about what Mary was implying.

"Yes, it makes things very easy. All that I have to do is leak word about this secret government operation, with U.S. military assistance in a civilian area and with very shady reasons behind it and this whole place will be crawling with reporters in a matter of hours."

Allie became agitated, "I can't have that kind of attention aimed at me, not yet…"

"Oh, don't worry about that, we'll learn of the leak with enough time to destroy most of the evidence… which will make it all the more of a national news scandal." Mary grinned at the brilliance of her plan; Allie didn't seem that excited about it.

"Can you think of any other way?"

Mary thought, "sure, there are other ways… Keith could have an 'accident' while cleaning his gun… but none are as easy."

"I don't want anyone to get hurt…" Allie said, "but I also don't think we need that kind of media attention..."

"It was just a suggestion, I would never really do it" Mary lied through her teeth hoping Allie couldn't read her mind or something. In truth Mary would love nothing more then to kill that bastard Keith in the most painful way possible. She really had no idea why she felt such a strong hate for him. Keith was just… Keith. Did she need a reason to want to kill him?

"Perhaps Mary's idea should be 'plan B'." Ka'len said

Allie looked back at her, "my thoughts exactly," she turned back to Mary, "for now I think you should try you idea: acting like you really want to catch me." Allie nodded toward the stack of files still sitting on the desk, "and call in the army people… let's see what happens."

"Right," Mary agreed, "no need to make any rash decisions… I'm not entirely sure how serious Keith really is about this whole thing. It seems that all his ideas involve more surveillance."

"He read the stuff about your old project?" Allie asked.

"Yeah, every report," Mary said. Allie grinned.

"Then maybe he's afraid of what I might do to him." she said, then glanced past Mary at the monitor and Her face lost all traces of a joke.

"Maybe…" Mary turned to the monitor. Several of the dots had converged on the building.

Ka'len moved to a window, "they are here." She said, looking out on the three cars that had pulled up out front.

"But why?" Mary asked.

Allie reached out and placed a finger on the radio, smoke started to rise from it. "You had technical difficulties, they are here to check on you."

Mary looked at the piece of smoldering equipment; "I don't…" she looked back up where Allie had been, found nothing. Ka'len was gone too. Mary sat in a daze for a second or two until foot steps could be heard in the nearby corridors, "oh shit!" she remembered the files.

In a flurry, almost without thinking. She grabbed the stack, flew over to the file cabinet, jammed them back where she had pulled them from and slammed it closed. She then looked around, making sure there was nothing else she left out, and her eyes fell on a fire extinguisher in the corner.

Perfect! She grabbed it, headed back to the smoking radio. Keith came through the door just as Mary unleashed the first blast from the extinguisher.

"What the hell happened here?" Keith demanded, "you've been out of contact for ten minutes."

Ten minutes… "Uh, this stupid thing screwed up, I though it had it fixed but then it caught on fire."

"Oh," Keith's expression softened, "I'll put in an order for a new one then…"