She hurried into the office, nearly knocking over Agent Brockmann, who had been running through the hall with a cup of coffee in his hand. "Sorry, Agent Bristow!" He managed to say.
Sydney burst into her office. It was empty.
"Who are you looking for?" someone said from behind her.
"Julia," Sydney said slowly, turning around.
He was maybe thirty-five, olive-skinned, dark-eyed, with a chiseled face and a scruff of goatee. Sydney had never seen him before. He saw her apprehension and smiled. "Rock," he said.
"Excuse me?"
"Angus Rock. NOCRS."
"Oh. You're Finch's friend." Sydney sighed, glad he wasn't a kidnapper. "Where's my daughter?"
"She and Aimee are writing code in Marshall's office."
Sydney turned, brushing past him, and went down the short hallway to Marshall's office. Finch sat before the computer, typing busily. Julia was stretched out on the floor, sprawled across two floor pillows, fast asleep.
"Hi," Finch whispered. "What's going on?"
"We've got to move her," Sydney whispered in reply.
Finch nodded, as though she had been expecting this response. "Where?"
"As far as they can take her."
Jack appeared in the door. "Dr. Gupta is ready, Sydney."
A tall Indian man stood behind Jack, a leather doctor's bag in his hands. He nodded to Jack, then set his kit on a desk and opened it.
"This is for her own good," Jack murmured to Sydney.
Sydney nodded. She knew it, but it was still painful.
Dr. Gupta took out a large syringe and filled it from a glass bottle. He injected it gently into Julia's upper arm. Her eyes flickered briefly, but she did not awaken. Then Dr. Gupta took out a pneumatic injection gun. He placed it against Julia's neck and fired it. The girl's body shook, and her eyes opened. "Mom?" she said blearily, her eyes clouding over as she spoke. Her body went slack suddenly. Sydney and Jack caught her before her head hit the floor.
Dr. Gupta nodded. "The tracer will be up and running in a half hour. She'll stay asleep for six to eight hours, but she'll feel pretty limp when she wakes up. She won't regain full motor control for ten hours."
"Let's go," Jack said. "The truck is ready." He motioned to Rock, who was standing in the doorway. The man scooped up Julia and carried her from the room. Sydney and Jack followed.
At the back of the office complex, a large ambulance-like truck was waiting, parked with its back doors facing the exit doors of the complex. A uniformed man opened the back doors and helped Rock lay Julia on a stretcher. Sydney squeezed Julia's hand, then the paramedic closed the door and the truck was gone.
"It's best if you don't know her location until the tracer kicks in," Jack said crisply, heading back into the office.
Weiss and Nadia were in the break room when Sydney reentered the brightly lit office wing. She poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down next to Nadia, who smiled reassuringly. "My father told us about Julia," she said to Sydney. "She'll be all right."
Marshall came flying through the break room door. "Hey!" he managed to gasp. "Julia forgot her backpack! And.. uh… there's a malfunction with the tracer."
"A malfunction?" Sydney asked.
Marshall nodded. "It's not even supposed to be up yet, but it shows her location as somewhere over Anteca, New Mexico."
"Did somebody hack it?"
"Can't," Marshall said. "It can't be hacked or changed except by me. And I didn't do anything to it."
"Then she's really in New Mexico," Weiss said.
"What's in New Mexico?"
"A local cell of the Society of the Closed Fist," Marshall blurted.
"What?" Sydney and Nadia said as one. "Get a hold of Jack," Nadia continued. "We'll need to get a team out to Julia's location as soon as they land."
Marshall nodded and ran out of the room.