Hall's Law: anyone who isn't paranoid simply isn't paying attention.
William Raines was an exceptionally reserved man. The sweeper at his side had never once seen him lose his composure. He was always in control, always poised to maneuver through the politics of the Centre unscathed, ever ready to set things in motion. He knew a person's actions before they even occurred, and he always knew how to react accordingly. This night was no different, indeed, when Willie had told the man that their wayward pretender had called Mr. Lyle's office (repeatedly), he had nodded his head in agreement as though he had expected nothing less. They passed the secretary out in front of Mr. Lyle's office, and she hurriedly scrambled out from behind her desk to catch up with the two men, talking a mile a minute as she tried to explain.
"I tried calling your office sir, but you had already left. It's the girl, she's been calling once every five minutes for the past half-hour demanding Mr. Lyle."
Raines only nodded in acknowledgment of the information as he passed through the doors to Mr. Lyle's office. Willie silently took up a post outside the door after shooing away the secretary. It didn't need to be said that this conversation was privileged, and neither he, nor the young Asian girl, were quite privileged enough to be a party to it.
On the other side of the door, Raines sat down at Mr. Lyle's desk; he turned on the computer, adjusted the monitor, took a jaded look at his watch and waited for the next call.
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Riley watched as the call patched through for the fifteenth time that hour. Will and Riley had gotten the Major and Jarod out of the house rather easily, by having Riley imbibe a bottle of ipecac and faking a fever (it was easy enough to hold up the thermometer to her flashlight while Major Charles went in search of some medicine.) No medication was to be found of course, as earlier the day before, Will and she had gone through every nook and cranny of the house. They had found two partially filled bottles of Aspirin, a bottle of something called Nyquil, a pink bottle of Pepto Bismol that Riley recognized as something Miss Parker took occasionally, and some Tylenol gel-caps. All of which they had promptly thrown in the trash.
Jarod and the Major were now driving to the closest town, a good 15 miles away, in order to fill the prescription that Jarod had forged earlier that day. Riley hoped that the torrential rain pouring down outside might encourage them to drive slower than normal, as it had already caused Jarod to decide to go with his father to the town, rather than leave the older man to navigate the slick roads on his own.
They had left over half an hour ago. She was running out of time.
Will appeared in the doorway for a moment, wearing a questioning look on his face. "Have you managed to speak to anyone yet?"
Riley shook her head in the negative with a frustrated sigh. "I'm beginning t-to think this isn't going to work." Part of her hoped it might not. She had disobeyed; she had run away; she had broken the biggest taboo that had ever existed in her drab little world. Whoever picked up from the other end of the line was bound to be furious with her. She was going to be in terrible trouble.
"Jarod and Major Charles could be back any time now. If you keep trying, make sure you can get off the line quick." Will cautioned her, giving a slightly worried look out the window, as though he expected headlights to show up at the end of the driveway at any moment. "I'll go keep a lookout." He said, moving off into the back bedroom, her room, which had the best view of the front of the house.
Turning back to the computer Riley could see that the machine had made it through almost all of Jarod's numerous encryptions and reroutes. It gave off a happy beep at the end of this process and Riley could hear ringing on the other end of the line. She was almost surprised when, halfway through the second ring, the person on the other end finally answered.
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The girl looked surprised to see him, terrified to see him, and yet desperately hopeful in spite of this. Good.
"M-Mr. Raines I-"
He held up a hand to halt her explanations and she broke off mid-sentence, looking as though she wanted to continue but knew better than to disobey him. He scanned her appearance, her eyes had dark circles beneath them as though she hadn't been sleeping, and she was shivering, she might have a slight fever. She coughed as he was looking at her, and it sounded as though she had contracted some kind of chest cold. Raines had suspected her immune system would fail easily, but he hadn't anticipated for it to happen this soon. Riley was never meant to live outside Centre influence, and her sheltered life was taking its own toll on her now.
She was sitting cross-legged, as was her habit, in a computer chair. The clock behind her read 8:15pm, two hours earlier than the current time in Delaware. Mountain Time then, that certainly narrowed down the search. Her eyes had dropped to the floor after his silent admonition earlier and now she peered timidly out from the curtain of hair that shadowed her face. She knew she was in the wrong here, knew that she was currently in the most trouble she had ever been in her life. Despite this, she would rather be home and in trouble than elsewhere and not, just as they had always programmed her to be.
"You've upset a lot of people here Riley." He growled, the sibilant hiss of his words having a marked affect on the pretender, cutting her down as though he had doled out a physical blow.
"I-I'm sorry Sir," She murmured quietly, head still turned to the floor, "I, I didn't mean to—
"You disobeyed a direct order. You ran away Riley."
"I... I'm sorry Sir. But Miss Zurbin—"
"I understand; you thought you were doing the best thing under the circumstances Riley." He commiserated with her, "Though that does not condone the action." He told her sternly. On the other end of the line, Riley hunkered down in her seat, as though doing so would protect her from Mr. Raines harsh words. She had known she would be in trouble, but she had not imagined that his disapproving tone would be able to hurt her quite this much.
"I'm sorry Sir." She couldn't think of anything more to do than apologize.
"Your project belongs directly to me Riley, and you should know, that as such I would have had the opportunity to defend your actions in the Renewal wing in front of the board members." He paused for a breath, and Riley quelled under his disappointed gaze. "One woman's paranoid ramblings are not enough to terminate a project with as much potential as you." He told her. "Having you run away afterwards though Riley, does very little to help me prove that your project is a worthwhile endeavor."
She slouched down further in her seat. How could she have been so stupid? Of course there would be an appeal process.
"C-Can you still pull the termination directive off, Sir?" She asked him quietly, almost hopeless of ever being able to come back home.
She listened as he gave a frustrated sigh. "Yes, I can." He told her shortly. "Though doing so may take a bit of a show of faith from you."
"Like what?" She asked him timidly.
"We'll come to that later Riley. There are some things I need to know first."
Riley straightened up tentatively in her seat, now that he no longer sounded angry, only irritated.
"The night in the Renewal Wing Riley, have you been tempted to kill anyone since that night?"
Riley's hopes were dashed again at that question. Killing the sweeper in the Renewal wing had gotten her into this mess, what would happen if she admitted that she had wanted to kill again?
"I-I just want to come home Sir. P-Please--"
"That doesn't answer my question Riley." Mr. Raines sounded annoyed. "Have you been tempted—"
"Y-Yes" She realized a second too late that she had interrupted the man, but he seemed to ignore her rudeness for once in her life, possibly, because there was nothing he could do about it from roughly 1,517 miles away. She looked at him timidly, "You, You aren't going to tell anyone, are you Sir?"
"No." a wave of relief flooded over her at the answer. "No Riley, it would be best if that were kept between you and me." He said, "But I need to know, did you act on that urge?"
Riley latched onto the possible way to redeem herself quickly. "No. I—"
He held up a hand before her explanation though, posing another question. "Why not?"
She thought back, looking at Will down at the lake-bed, and the utter feeling of terror that welled up in her chest. "I-I thought you would be angry Sir."
He gave something of a noncommittal noise on the other end of the line as he watched her. She obviously didn't realize it, he thought, but her answers had been perfect, just as she had been taught. She had wanted to act on the emotions she must have been feeling, but she managed to restrain herself because she didn't have his permission. Perfect. "It's good to see you decided to think before acting for a change then."
Riley slipped down further into her seat again. She had thought his verbal chastisement might have been over, now it didn't seem to be. This was not how she had wanted the conversation to go. She had wanted to find a way to get the Triumvirate to back off Mr. Lyle. She had wanted to find a way back home, but even that didn't seem to be going very well.
Raines watched as she gave him a timid look from her seat, biting her lip thoughtfully as though deliberating with herself.
"W-When can I come home Sir? How long until you can have the termination order withdrawn?" She asked him.
"In light of your recent string of disobedient behavior Riley, it could be very difficult to have that directive cancelled this quickly." He paused for a breath, watching her spirits sink slowly at his response. "Not without negotiating some kind of a deal."
She looked up at him, hope etched across her face plainly. "What if I tell them I know where Jarod is?" She offered quickly, "I, I can give them his exact location Sir."
Raines felt smug at Riley's easy bid to betray her own rescuer. She would do anything for them, anything to come home. Of course, the Triumvirate had expected to find the two pretenders together. The Centre had known that if they were to find her, they would find Jarod; the two pretenders had escaped together, and Jarod was not the type to abandon Riley afterwards. It was hardly a surprise to find that Riley knew exactly where he was. "Jarod's location may not be enough Riley. The Triumvirate expects you to tell them his location regardless. Once they have him back, your existence will once again be... obsolete... in their eyes." He told her. "In order to fully revoke the order, you will have to prove to them that they need you here. I would have to be able to promise them something more."
He watched as she bit her lip. She was hesitating; he could see her weighing her options. He knew that she was withholding information from him; Riley was not naïve when it came to bargaining—she had been watching Lyle and himself as they worked for the greater part of her life. He would almost feel disappointed if she had not used those skills she had picked up. Mind, the fact that she didn't trust him enough to give him all of her information right from the off was a bad sign. "I," she paused again, deliberating internally. "I know where Jarod's father is as well." She told him quietly.
"And is there anything else?"
She was chewing her lip again, hesitating from telling him what she knew, again.
"I, I don't—"
"You know you aren't supposed to lie to me Riley." He growled threateningly, and she seemed to shrink fractionally further down into her chair. He watched as she gave a worried glance over her shoulder at the closed door to the room before twisting back around.
"G-Gemini Sir. He's here too." She told him quietly, her gaze once again falling to rest on the floor. The computer chair she was sitting in swiveled slightly from side to side and he could tell that she was fidgeting beneath the desk. It was always so easy to tell when she was feeling anxious or guilty, never mind that she should not be feeling either about this. He watched as she continued to squirm under his gaze.
"Something on your mind, Riley?" The growled inquiry should have alerted her to his frustration with her behavior, but it made little difference in her answer.
"I... Sir, H-He's nothing like Jarod, and, and I don't think—"
Riley knew what would happen to Jarod and his ill-fated companions once they returned to their proper home. Raines could recall her asking the question the very day she had learned of the assignment. And now she was trying to protect the boy from the same treatment. She had managed to attain friendship in someone her own age for the first time in her life and now she was being led by some misguided sense of loyalty. He would have to stop this now. "He is insubordinate, Riley. And whatever friendship you've managed to build with him ends now-- tonight."
Her head snapped up with an expression of disbelief written plainly across it. "B-But Sir... It isn't like that! He's not—and running away wasn't even his idea! That was Jarod—"
"This is not a time to argue with me Riley." Raines snarled at her. "He lacks the sense of loyalty you have for the Centre; otherwise he would have tried to turn himself in months ago. He is obviously a bad influence."
"B-But Sir— He's just angry! Jarod, Jarod told him that you..."
"Jarod sticks his nose where it doesn't belong, entirely too often."
"You made him believe that, that his parents— and for that matter, why didn't you tell me?"
"What?" He ground out, fury evident on his face at her rebelliousness. For once in her life, she didn't heed the warning.
She stood up from her seat with an angry energy. "What? You don't think my..." she swallowed visibly, "origin... is any of my business?" She asked him incredulously, "I had a right to know!"
"I would stop there if I were you Riley... You're beginning to make me think that you require some reeducation as well."
The anger behind her eyes clashed with fear and she sank back down into her seat, jaw clenched shut in unvoiced anger.
"We will talk about this once you return home." He told her firmly. "In the meantime your disrespect will not be tolerated. You seem to have forgotten easily how the Centre provided you from birth with a safe home, away from the danger in the rest of the world Riley. This behavior is some way to repay that gesture."
Riley wanted to argue that that wasn't fair. But she felt stirrings of guilt in her stomach despite this. He was right. He was always right. "I apologize for my behavior Sir. It was unwarranted." She said quietly, eyes directed down toward the floor. Shoulders sagging slightly as whatever fight she had in her collapsed completely.
"The Triumvirate will be pleased with your information Riley." He told her.
"We can use The Major against Jarod in order to ensure his cooperation Sir. I've simulated all the possibilities." She said quietly, still not meeting his eyes.
Raines nodded at the information. It was good to see that she had managed to think about this matter fully before attempting contact with them.
"S-Sir?" she asked him cautiously, bringing her eyes up tentatively to meet his gaze. He nodded for her to proceed with her question. It wouldn't do to cause her to withdraw from his hostility before she had given him her location.
She swallowed, and then proceeded in a slightly more confident manner. "Before I tell them anything, I need to know that the Triumvirate will drop all charges on Mr. Lyle, Sir."
It surprised him to find that she knew about the current state of affairs in the Centre. Of course, he couldn't agree. If Lyle resumed his job at the Centre, Raines would no longer be the sole mentor in Riley's program.
"I'm not sure that that is possible Riley," He told her, "Mr. Lyle is under review by the Triumvirate for—"
Raines cut off halfway through his sentence as the doors to the office opened at that moment, giving way to a large African man. Riley watched his entrance with some trepidation, the idea of dealing directly with the Triumvirate very nearly made her nauseous. The newcomer wore a dark suit, set off by a brightly colored sash worn over one shoulder that reminded her distinctly of Miss Zurbin's vibrant dress. His head was utterly bald, and the lights in the room actually reflected dully off the top. Riley caught a glint of gold around his wrist, which glimmered and revealed itself to be a wristwatch. There was a dim scar running across his nose, as though a pair of glasses had cut into the skin there. Mr. Raines appeared to be as surprised as she was by the burly man's entrance into the room, an occurrence that she could not remember having ever witnessed before; in her experience, nothing surprised Mr. Raines.
Mr. Raines stood up quickly at the big man's entrance and directed him over to a far corner of the room, not bothering to excuse himself from the conversation he had been having with Riley. Riley watched him go with a slight tingle of frustration, as he maneuvered the man across the room and out of her hearing range.
"I was just notified that your pretender contacted us Mr. Raines, over half an hour ago. Why was the Triumvirate not advised of this sooner?" His gritty voice grated against the ears when he spoke, and black eyes seemed to bore holes in the person he aimed his glare at.
"I felt it necessary to assess the situation with the girl before bringing in the Triumvirate." Raines lied easily, "She is more likely to be open around a person whom she knows." He told the man, who continued glaring, though did not press further. Raines would find himself in trouble over this later, though it was best if the two men did not argue the point between themselves here in front of the subject, never mind that they were out of her earshot.
"And does she wish to return to the Centre, as you anticipated?" He asked Raines.
"The subject is willing to bargain for the termination order to be revoked in exchange for the locations of Jarod and Major Charles." Raines wouldn't mention Gemini yet... better to wait for that until he was sure he would have complete control over the project. He couldn't allow the Triumvirate to try to give him over to Sydney again.
The African man nodded in answer, the directive was a simple matter at this point. Raines had been allowed to speak in front of the Triumvirate in Africa over a week before, and the order had actually been cancelled then. Zurbin wasn't pleased. Several of the board members weren't, actually, and he personally worried that some minor coup d'état within the upper stratum might not run its course through them, but for the time being, the girl was safe from any danger, exempting herself. It had been decided that the girl would not be notified of this change in her status, so that they could use the knowledge to their advantage should a communication such as this occur.
The bulky man walked back over to the computer screen where the video phone conversation was taking place. "I understand you're willing to trade the locations of Jarod and his father in return for a full pardon, from us. Correct?" He spoke directly to the pretender, and though she seemed a little surprised by the interaction, she hid most of her bewilderment well.
She nodded at him cautiously, "Y-yes, and in exchange for, for another thing."
"Oh?"
"I want all charges against Mr. Lyle dropped. Today." She told him forcefully, and he could see this would be one issue the child would not budge on. Having been Mr. Lyle's interviewer for the past seven days or more, he had actually anticipated this particular demand. He would have felt something was wrong had it not made its way into the bargain.
"I believe we can manage that." He told her. This was the truth actually, the board had reached the decision earlier in the evening that Mr. Lyle was innocent of the charges brought against him. The man had yet to be notified, but he had actually been cleared for the past hour.
He noticed the old dog Raines seemed to tense next to him at this statement, as though raising bristling hackles, but he ignored it. Raines must recognize the fact that now with Mr. Lyle found blameless, he would return to his former position within the corporation. Raines would no longer be the sole mentor within the girl's program.
In his own oh-so-humble opinion that situation could not possibly be better. He had been witness to the debacle that Raines had called a simulation, bringing the terrified teenager in front of the Triumvirate, thinking that would compel her to find their AWOL pretender more quickly. If it had not been for Lyle's timely appearance the elder man would have only ended up embarrassing himself further than he already had.
Having been a senior member of the Triumvirate review board for the greater portion of his career within the company, he had been present through most of Raines' many evaluations. He had seen how most of his less scrupulous projects turned out, and had hardly approved of his recent proposal to enact another on this girl, his youngest subject. Engendering sociopathic tendencies within such a lucrative subject seemed to him, such a waste. Watching him with the girl, the African man found he much preferred Lyle's dynamic way of dealing with the subject to Raines heavy-handedness, and could recognize the profound difference between their results.
Of course, Zurbin and her allies, when he had taken his stand on the matter, jumped at the opportunity to oppose him. Little did any one of them know it, but Raines, Lyle, and this girl, were caught in the middle of a desperate tug-of-war occurring within the Triumvirate outfit. Whoever won would decide their fate, and that was a pretty pawn to have in this chess game they were playing. He, naturally, wanted this particular battle to go in his favor, and so it was imperative that the girl give him her information before Zurbin caught on.
"Now I need you to tell me where you are." He directed at the child, who nodded in acknowledgment of the statement. She began keying in figures on her end of the line, speaking as she typed.
"I can give you my present location, but we might not still be here when you arrive. J-Jarod plans on us leaving in the morning. I-I don't know where we're going, but I have a list of addresses that I know The Major stays in regularly." She told them quickly, eyeing Raines nervously when she told them that they may no longer be there. That piece of news was unfortunate, but it was still more than Zurbin had, which was always good news in his mind.
"I'm sending you the locations now."
The girl hit the return button when she finished typing, then the video connection cut out suddenly. He wondered at her rudeness for a moment, the audacity to hang up on a member of the Triumvirate, which he did not believe was her typical behavior, when the computer sounded a delighted little hum before a blinking icon in the corner of the screen appeared. Apparently, he had mail.
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"Have you intercepted it yet?"
The technician jumped slightly in his seat at her hard tone, before bearing down on the keyboard again and typing faster. "I've almost gotten the full document ma'am," He told her without looking around, "just one moment."
Zurbin took off the headphones she was wearing, and moved away from the bank of recorders taping the conversation taking place presently in Mr. Lyle's office.
It was bad enough that she and her supporters had been outvoted when it came to the thumbless man's guilt, but she would not be beaten again. The printer began spitting out the sheet of paper with all of the locations the girl had typed out for Raines and her own Triumvirate compatriot. There it was; 5907 Sterling Place, Crested Butte, Colorado. Zurbin moved over to the phone with a triumphant little smile and picked up the receiver, fingering the bandage wrapped around her gun hand and pushing the button for a line out, she rapidly dialed the series of digits that would call the Centre landing strip.
"Yes, I need the jet readied for a flight to the closest airstrip in the vicinity of a Crested Butte, Colorado." She told the attendant that picked up the phone, who said something entirely forgettable in argument, something along the lines of "the pilot has gone home for the night," or some such nonsense. It really mattered little to Zurbin, for with a few more well placed words, she had the captain roused and well onto his way to work for the night. She also had a sweeper team in Denver dispatched to the address listed on the paper, waiting for her arrival. Not a one of them would move on the house until she got there, she made sure; this capture would be hers alone. She would dispose of the girl, and she would bring Jarod back to the Triumvirate station in Africa. His little clone boy would be along for the ride as well.
"Mr. Raines and anyone with him is to be detained if they try to board a flight on the Centre tarmac, am I making myself plain?" She directed at the attendant on the other end of the line, who swallowed audibly in response while choking out yet another nonsensical argument, which Zurbin worked through with several more choice words. It was so easy getting what one wanted when one held pitiful lives in one's hand like putty.
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Riley spun around in her chair after exiting from the video phone application quickly, listening intently to the footsteps hurrying down the hall. Will rushed in a moment later, moving past her and over to the window. He creaked open the blinds and she could clearly see the headlights coming over the steep turn up at the head of the drive.
"They got back quick." He commented.
Riley agreed silently. It figured that Jarod wouldn't allow a small storm to slow him down. The pair watched Jarod and the Major step from the car and lope up the porch steps to come in out of the rain. Riley headed back into her bedroom and was already under the covers by the time she heard the front door unlatch and open. When the major entered the bedroom seconds later to check on her, he opened the door to find Riley seemingly asleep, with her back turned to the opening.
He wouldn't disturb the girl; not when she had finally managed to get some sleep. She could take the prescription in the morning.
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He met Will in the hall as the boy exited his room, clad in pajamas and his hair tousled as though he too had been asleep.
"Looks like you made an early night of it." He commented in passing. Will nodded at him sleepily.
"Oh yeah," He said in a groggy sort of mumble, struggling past a yawn, "We've both been asleep since you left."
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Lyle was once again catching some much-needed rest with his head laid out across his arm, when the sound of highly polished shoes clicking against concrete floors roused him from slumber. He jerked his head off his arm, rubbing the sluggish look out of his eyes with the heels of his hands and straightened his tie, sitting up a bit straighter in his chair. Nothing more than a long shower and change of clothes would really make him presentable any longer, but he fixed his appearance up out of habit anyways. The large African man, his only contact for the better part of seven or eight days (he really wasn't sure which anymore), walked through the doorway. Lyle had not really expected anyone else.
The man carried a thick manila folder under his arm, and looked as though he, for one, had managed to obtain a satisfactory amount of sleep over the last week. Of course, it helped when you had a bed. The man started pouring them drinks from a tray set off on the other end of the table, and Lyle had to wonder how in hell he had not noticed it yet. It must have been brought in here while he had been sleeping. Lyle took the proffered drink without comment. His watch only read ten-thirty, but the damn thing was analog, and with no windows to track the daylight by, Lyle wasn't really sure whether it was ten in the morning, or at night. He hadn't really slept in the past week anyways, so Lyle didn't consider it drinking before noon. It was high grade alcohol and burned the back of his throat when he swallowed. The African man slapped the manila folder down on the table in front of them both and pushed it over in front of Lyle, who sent him a questioning look before flipping it open to peruse the contents.
"It is the entire written report of our conversations, as well as the conference between the Triumvirate board members." The man told him as he read. "You might take careful note of who to look out for in the future Mr. Lyle."
Lyle heeded the warning, looking over some of the snide remarks made by Zurbin during the meeting.
"In the meantime, I feel it is your place to know; the termination directive has been rescinded, your pretender contacted us roughly a quarter of an hour ago, and gave us her location. I believe Mr. Raines is on his way to collect her as we speak."
Lyle held up a hand to pause the man's speech. "My pretender?"
"Well I did assume that you would like to take up your old position here, once the subject is returned."
"Of course, but I did expect a bit of a fight on that." Lyle told him bluntly, too tired to think of a better way of saying it, or perhaps not saying it at all.
The large man looked ready to roll his eyes, except that the gesture would not be nearly dignified enough for him to pull it off. Instead he gestured towards the report with one hand, and took a swig from his drink. "Might I suggest you continue reading?" Taking the last swallow from his drink the man set his glass down with a muffled thud on the table and looked at his watch. "Well, Mr. Lyle. I'm certain you would like to go home, and I am certain that I have better things to be doing." With that he turned on his heel and left the room, the sweepers outside the door following suit. Lyle stood and watched them leave. The words "you're free to go." would have sounded more appropriate.
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Riley woke early that morning, padding around the house anxiously in her socks. She watched as the morning dawned slowly in a lightening of the gray sky by a few shades, the sort of morning that lasted all afternoon and straight on into evening without any change. It looked as though it would start raining again that day. It all mattered little to Riley. She was going home today. She was going home and she was going to fix things back to the way they were before. No more Jarod, no more overlapping simulations, and no more problems; everything would be as it had been before.
If the Centre made it here in time.
She thought they would. She hoped they would. But as Jarod roused himself an hour after Riley, and began packing his things diligently into a suitcase, and as Will and the Major both woke and began following suit, and sweepers had not yet arrived, it seemed to Riley that all of her planning had been for naught. She had nothing to pack; nothing she wanted to take with her to their next hideout. She spent the morning hunkered down atop one of the boxes in the garage, never fully giving up on the thought that the Centre would show up. After all, the Centre had a private jet, they could make the trip out to the closest airport in a matter of hours, and then it was just a short drive here, only an hour or more. But it was seven o'clock in the morning, and she had called in at ten o'clock the night before, and they still weren't there yet.
While she had been laying her plans, and still factoring in a need to escape the Triumvirate's grasp so long as there was a price on her head, Riley had calculated the probability of their reaching the house before its occupants had left. The figures had been high enough for her to be worried that sweepers would arrive before they had left. It was high enough. And the Centre knew exactly where they were, they hadn't had to go looking for a trace on the phone line, and they hadn't needed to chase loose ended clues to find them. That should have cut off a great deal from the time it would take to reach Colorado from Delaware. They would get here. They had to get here. Soon.
What if the Triumvirate showed up as well? It was unlikely, from her knowledge of Triumvirate dealings, that any member of their group would stoop to the position of captor. It would seem too degrading. But then, Riley's dealings with the Triumvirate as of late didn't follow any of the stereotypical ideals she had in her head before either. The man from the night before might come. It had taken the better part of the night for her to remember, but she recognized him. He had been a member of the review board she had stood in front of as a young child, the week after her run from the facility. He had stood at the back of a group of older adults; fairly young in comparison to the rest of them, in his early thirties perhaps while the others all seemed to be over the age of forty-five. She had stood, a scared child, hiding slightly behind Mr. Lyle's leg and holding his hand as she had been berated again and again by people she had never even met before. The young African man at the back of the party had caught her attention because he was the only one in the group that didn't appear to be blaming her alone for the escape attempt. In fact, of the five questions he posed through the duration of the two hour conference, four had been directed at Mr. Raines, and one at Mr. Lyle. And at the end of the ordeal, as he was passing out of the room, he had winked at her. Riley felt slightly reassured knowing that he was on the review board still, and had been one of the people handling her most recent escape.
She had to wonder what would happen when they did show up. Jarod and the Major would probably be sedated to keep them out of trouble. Will wouldn't be considered a threat, at sixteen he was still too young to be able to take on a Centre sweeper and win; he would be handcuffed, but probably kept conscious. If it was Mr. Raines heading up the sweeper team, then Will would most likely have the delight of sitting through the man's displeasure on the car ride to the plane, and then probably through the entire plane ride back home. She did not envy him the position, but it was his own fault for not calling the Centre himself. Riley would probably be in a similar condition; especially if Mr. Lyle came along. She and Will would not be placed together for the trip back, she knew, for fear of idle minds gravitating towards one another and getting into some sort of trouble; but she also knew that she would not escape the plane ride without receiving some of Mr. Raines' undue attention.
Will would never forgive her for this. He would never trust her again, and she could just imagine him glaring at her through the plane ride, fuming silently in his seat. Some sweeper would make a snide comment about it, either to him or to her, and she'd probably end up looking out the window for the duration of the journey, trying to avoid his eyes. She was doing the right thing, and it was in his best interest; he would understand that in time. They were never meant for the outside world.
Riley hopped down from her box restlessly and went over to check the small digital clock Will had set up over in the corner of the garage. The luminescent red markers pronounced that it was 7:15 in the morning. Walking hesitantly over to the bank of windows set into the top of the garage door, Riley lifted up the improvised blind from one and stood on tiptoe to peer out of it. Just looking outside at the scenery made her heart race but she ignored the tremor of fear clenching in her gut. She swept the landscape, looking for the familiar Centre-issue Towncars, but didn't find any. She dropped the blind with a huff of disappointment and resumed her seat on her box. Jarod had said they would leave at eight o'clock. The Centre had less than an hour.
Riley snapped out of a bored reverie with a jerk, some time later, listening to the muffled sounds of a conversation she could hear through the wall of the garage. Slipping off her box silently and out the side door to the garage, she could see two figures walking around the side of the house, headed for the back door that led into the kitchen. They stopped outside the door, hunkering down on the side with their guns drawn. It had started raining while she was inside, and the water on the grass muffled her footsteps. As she neared the pair she caught snatches of their conversation, and at the mention of Miss Zurbin's name, she crouched down around a corner, behind them, to listen in.
"Can't believe this— I'm in bed last night, with my wife, and I get some call telling me t'come into work. Some bigwig out from Africa wants da whole team t'be ready and waiting at her beck and call."
His partner nodded in sympathy. "Yeah, and then her frigid majesty doesn't even show up for another three hours..."
"God, what was her name again? Turbin?" The first man asked, sounding immensely pleased with himself for the hooked-on-phonics insult he had managed to create.
"Try addin' a Z nimrod."
The first man rolled his eyes, while lifting up his suit jacket over his head, protecting his balding head. "So, we're just s'posed to wait around, getting soaked,--"
"Oh quit griping." His partner snapped, sounding annoyed.
"Well, what were her orders then?"
"We're to man our positions at the exits, catch the pretenders when they try to escape, and bring the girl to her. Guess she's got somethin' special in mind for that one."
Riley listened wide eyed to this report of her betrayal. The termination order had obviously never been taken off, and now she had lured the Centre out here, just to be gunned down once they arrived.
Taking a half step back, Riley pivoted on her heel and dashed across the lawn heading for the dense cover of the woods. The sounds of her running footsteps crashing through the puddles dotting the muddy ground alerted the sweepers behind her and she heard as the second in the pair shouted instructions at his more sarcastic colleague.
"Stick to the door! I'll get the kid!"
The sounds of footsteps dashing across the lawn after her spurred her onward, though looking back; the man behind her was fast. Her chest hitched with suppressed bouts of coughing, and the shudders wracking her torso were enough to slow her down. He tackled her from behind and the sopping wet and muddy ground soaked through her shirt and the fronts of her jeans as she struggled to displace his weight. Her arms were held behind her and he yanked her up from the ground, placing her back up on her feet. She still struggled against the iron hold he had around her biceps, though she might as well have been fighting against a statue for all the difference it made. He pushed her down the driveway, the sharp stones of the gravel path poking the bottom of her feet through the thin bottoms of her canvas shoes. She could see at the bottom of the grade three black towncars, lined up at the bottom across the length of the drive, so that no car would be able to pass them; at least not via the road. The window rolled down as she was forced toward the front car, and Miss Zurbin was revealed, wearing a malicious grin that made Riley's stomach flip flop nauseously.
Zurbin's smile broadened when she took in the mud-splattered, and drenched pretender, shaking in rage and fear as she was directed within three feet of the car. "Well, Well, Well, look what the cat dragged in."
Riley's struggles increased ten fold as the woman stepped gracefully from the car, toting her gun in her hand.
"Keep her still, if you would." She directed at the sweeper behind her, whose grip slackened only momentarily, as he grasped for the first time what he was expected to do here.
Riley managed to wrench an arm free during this moment of realization, but the man had gotten her into a choke hold the next moment and was holding her tightly again. He now held both her wrists together in his free hand, behind her back. Riley sputtered and struggled for air through the arm crushing her throat, but her struggles only made his hold stronger.
Her futile struggling didn't stop as she heard Zurbin cock the gun and watched as she took aim. She was glaring down the barrel of a 9mm handgun, in the face of the most detested person she could think of. This woman had caused her pain, she had driven her from her home, and she wanted to harm her. Rage bubbling beneath her skin like liquid fire, Riley wrenched herself sideways as she heard the gun go off. Pain erupted in her right shoulder and the man behind her let her go with a startled 'umph' as the bullet tore through the fleshy part of her shoulder and straight into his chest cavity. Riley snatched his gun from its holster at his side, ducking around behind the man, who was looking down at the flowering red blossom on his shirt with a confused expression. The man stumbled when she pushed him forward into Zurbin, before falling to the ground, his hand covering his stomach helplessly.
Her right arm hung uselessly at her side as she aimed the gun left-handedly. She shot Zurbin's trigger hand easily, and the woman dropped the gun with a startled cry of pain, clutching at her hand and cursing. The next bullet went somewhere more vital. The artery in her leg first, which sent the woman tumbling to the ground, stripping away all of her elegant poise. Her stomach was next, the acids would seep into her chest cavity over a span of fifteen minutes; a horribly drawn out death under normal circumstances, but she would not live for even that long, so it didn't really matter. The next bullet went into her right shoulder, sporting the same wound as Riley. And the next, carved a small cut across her cheek, just like the scar Riley had received in their last meeting. The final bullet entered her brain through her right eye; the place Zurbin had been aiming all this time and still failed to pierce.
Oh how the mighty had fallen.