Title: Total Recall, Chapter 13
Author: CSIphile/redwing
AN: This ones a little longer and starts….well you'll see.
AN2: Thank you for the thirteenth time for all the reviews; this is one of my best reviewed fics ever. So keep it up everyone!
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Chapter 13: Beacon Hill
Instead of heading for his morning run, 494 is instructed to go to the Director's office. When he arrives, he notices his sparring partner standing at ease outside the door, obviously also waiting for Olivet.
Easing up to her, he says nothing, but notices that any marks from last night are all but faded; only a small cut on her lip is visible. She also seems to be ignoring him -- 452 doesn't even turn her head to acknowledge his presence. Staring at the wall, 494 is now worried that she said something to the Director about their seemingly shared memories, something he wanted to keep to themselves. Well, maybe you should have mentioned that to HER, you idiot.
"You suppose we are in trouble for the fight last night?" Her voice startles him.
"Not likely, they do it all the time here." He looks her up and down. "And neither of us seem to be the worse for wear." Did she say something? Anything? Maybe to another X who told on them. Dammit, what the hell where you thinking, 494, never…
"I didn't say anything to anyone about…yeah."
Whoa, is mind reading in her "cocktail"?
"I…I didn't think you had," he stammers.
"Yes, you did. I could…feel it." Finally, she turns to him, and whispers so only he can hear her. "What did they do to us?"
"I don't know. But I think we need to find out." He pauses. "And we need to keep it on the DL -- just you and me, ok? Maybe it's nothing, but if it's something….I don't want to end up in re-indoctrination."
"Agreed."
He smiles at her and returns to staring at the opposite wall. They remain silent until they are escorted into the Director's office, standing at attention in front of his desk.
"494 and 452 as requested, sir!" 494 spits out, quickly.
Olivet regards the X5s carefully; they seem to be getting along well, but not too well. They are at the tops of all the training exercises and classroom activities. They are becoming the soldiers they would have been had they not escaped three years ago, much more quickly than he anticipated. Their handler has reported there is no indication their memories are returning, although they could be hiding that from him. Olivet doesn't trust them one bit, so he has kept them on a relatively tight leash until now. Now he will really test them.
"I have an information-gathering mission for you. It's a two person operation, but relatively simple. Should be easy enough after your last blown assignments." He pauses, and opens a file folder. "You'll drive to a small city outside Seattle, Washington."
No response from either of them. Good.
"A company called AmGen is located in Beacon Hill. They are getting dangerously close to being able to reproduce Manticore's efforts, but we aren't sure how close. We want you two to go in and copy part of their database. We have a man on the inside who is going to hold up the guard rotation at 2 am tomorrow morning. You'll have approximately 20 minutes to retrieve what you need. All the mission specifics are in the file. You dispatch at 1700 hours. A convoy will get you to within 10 clicks."
"Yes, sir!" They snap in unison, and exit the room.
*~*~*~*~*~*
"Ten clicks my ass," he mutters, stepping over another downed tree. "More like 15. Man, the quality of Manticore's intel is getting poor."
"Shut up and walk, would you?" she snaps without turning to him.
494 is walking a few paces behind her, somewhat cranky that their intel was…off. They would be adding another 20 minutes to get to the destination at this rate. They don't want to risk running the last five miles since they are on AmGen grounds, and blurring might cause them to miss a security measure and set off alarms.
He trots a few paces to catch up to her. "Yeah, yeah."
494 looks up into the clear night sky; there isn't a cloud to be seen, and out here where the only lights were the few from the darkened facility, you could see for miles. That is, if they weren't surrounded by trees of the great Northwest. A hand on his chest stops him.
"We're here. Which building?"
Instantly, he reverts into to solider mode, recalling with perfect precision the layout of the facility. "Northeast most. So…there." He points to a 10-story-tall building nearest them.
"Let's go."
Silently, the two transgenics approach the fence surrounding a relatively small five-building campus. 494 looks at his watch: 1:40, they are right on time. According to their source, their location is at just the right angle to not be covered by the security cameras, but the cameras stationed to either side of them at the corners might dissuade a regular burglar. The two transgenics easily jump the eight-foot electrical fence, and wait on the other side, watching the north camera carefully.
When the green light blinks, the two rush across the lawn, coming to a stop at the base of the building they want. Quickly, they look around for something to climb up the side -- a drainpipe, electrical conduit, anything. Zooming in, she sees something that will work, and signals 494 to follow her.
He is standing right beside her now; there's almost no space between them. She shudders slightly at the feel of his body that close. She felt like this last night too, when he helped her to the showers. His presence making her feel, something she hasn't done in a while.
"Tell me you brought a rope," he whispers, and stops -- looking at her.
Suddenly, another memory hits, and she closes her eyes -- this one almost causing her pain as it rips through her mind.
It's daytime. They were standing at a drainpipe of some kind. He was standing beside her; they were both looking up in frustration -- they needed to hurry. She's waiting for them, waiting to be rescued. They need to get up there before he opened the door.
"Tell me you brought a rope," he asked with no small amount of sarcasm.
"Just shut up and climb," she responded, and started up, with him right behind her.
"452? You ok?" he asks, quietly. Her face is contorted in pain and confusion.
Finally, her eyes open. "Why…did you say that?"
"What? The rope? I don't know -- it just came out."
Her face loses the emotion and becomes a blank slate. "Just climb, ok?" she says shortly, and begins to shimmy up the side of the building, hanging onto small spaces in the facing for balance.
"Yeah," he says, and follows her quickly.
Despite the distraction on the ground, they arrive to the roof on time. They have three minutes before the guard should exit the floor. They are entering through a janitor closet two doors down from the executive office where they are accessing the information. That 20 minutes should give them enough time to get in, get the info and exit the same way.
They easily pry off the vent cover and crawl through a small heating duct ending in the closet. There isn't a lot of room to move with him standing behind her, and 452 is having a difficult time ignoring the heat from his body pressed against her back. She can even smell him in the small area, and a warm feeling rushes over her. This is so familiar, so…comfortable. She resists leaning back into him, and instead adjusts her ponytail -- anything to distract herself. She can hear the guard down the hall, shuffling his feet, coughing, pushing papers around, doing whatever it is he is overpaid to do.
494 looks at his watch and indicates one minute with his fingers. She nods and waits, rolling her neck slowly to ease the tension. His voice in the dark startles her.
"Star Wars."
"What?" she hisses.
"Have you ever seen it?"
"I…don't think so. Why?"
"Don't know, just thought of it."
"Time?" she questions.
"Thirty seconds."
She nods.
Thirty seconds later, they open the door to find the hall clear; the guard they had heard earlier had gone somewhere. With little effort, they move to the office. 494 accesses the computer, swiftly copying file after file. She stands at the door; it is open just enough for her to keep an eye out.
"Almost done?" she asks, quietly.
"Two minutes, I'm copying the last file. Still clear?"
"Clear."
Several minutes later, he announces he is done, and they retreat the same way they got in. They completed the mission with five minutes to spare. Easing out of the vent and back onto the roof, 452 takes a minute to enjoy the clear view; she can see Seattle to her left, the bright lights like a mirage in a desert. A dark shadow over the city catches her attention, and she zooms in on the structure.
The Space Needle.
She loved it here. The height. She can see the whole city. Be alone.
452 closes her eyes tightly against the sudden rush of memories.
Alone on the disk, the wind whipping through her hair.
She sinks to her knees, feeling 494 touch her shoulder, but she can't acknowledge him -- the pictures are running through her mind too fast.
He, 494, is there with her. Inside, she cuffs him to a pole.
"…You're hiding your instincts, every minute of every day, so no one will know what you really are. A soldier...a hunter...a killer," he hissed at her.
"Shut up!" she practically screamed.
She punched him, hard. To shut him up. Blood, he's bleeding, he wiped it off and grined at her evilly.
"See? What'd I tell you?"
452 lets out a gut-wrenching sob -- it's not the memories attacking her senses anymore, it's the emotions associated with them. 494 is urging her to get moving -- they have to get out of here, or else they will get caught. She can hear him….
She's sitting on the disk. It's crisp, but not cold. She can sense him there…
"I come here to be alone," she snapped at him.
Not the same person. The first 494 was cold, evil, soulless -- nothing like the man she knows now. Clones? For a moment, she has forgotten where they are until his voice reminds her.
"452! Move it, solider. We have to go NOW."
She struggles to her feet, her head killing her….when it happens again. But this time, she remains standing.
He sits next to her, bringing his knees to his chest, rubbing his hands against the chill.
"So, you got any deep thoughts you want to share? Any, uh, profound realizations about life?" His voice is soft.
"Yeah, love sucks."
As quickly as it started, it is over, and she leads the way back over the building. While before they were ahead of the game, now they are dangerously behind. If they don't put a move on, the camera will be back on before they can get to the fence.
Stealthily, they blur across the expansive lawn, coming to a stop at the fence not even a second before the blinking green light changes back to a solid light.
"Jesus, that was close," he hisses at her once they are a safe distance away. "What the hell was that about on the roof?"
"Nothing."
He stops walking and grabs her arm, roughly. "You're lying. You remembered something." His voice softens, as does his grip. "Tell me."
She pulls her arm from his grasp. "Yeah, ok. I remembered something. But…this time it hurt. The visuals were running through so quickly, I could barely grasp onto them. And when I did, I didn't like what I saw."
"What did you see?"
"Keep moving and I'll tell you. I'd rather not miss our pick up and end up walking to Idaho."
Once he starts moving again, she starts talking. "You…but it wasn't you. It was…weird, he looked like you -- twins or maybe clones. I know Manticore had a clone program. But I knew it wasn't you, the eyes were different. His were…lost, manic, evil, insane -- all that and more. Plus, the feeling I got from him was different. I loved him with my heart, but…more like a brother."
"I had a clone…493. I thought he was dead -- put down by Manticore when we were kids."
She pauses a moment to contemplate this. He just walks silently next to her.
"Then it was you, really you up on the Space Needle. It was…different. That's when I knew the first time it wasn't…you. You were…my friend."
He contemplates her words the rest of the 30-minute walk to the pick up location. Manticore didn't allow 'friends' -- only training partners and unit mates. But you would never make the mistake of confusing that with friendship.
Quietly, they get into the military-style Jeep that picks them up, and 494 hands over the disk he had copied to the handler. The older man places the disk in a laptop, and swiftly runs through the data.
"Nice job -- you got even more than we had hoped. I assume there were no problems."
The two transgenics don't even look at each other, before they respond in unison. "No, sir!"
"Excellent, you'll be debriefed upon arrival."
They nod and sink into their own thoughts for the seven-hour ride home, unaware they were so close to their friends and family.
tbc………………….