Kenneth had seen a lot of men gut shot during the war, before his transfer to Ahnenerbe. It took the soldiers days to die, groaning and screaming in white hospital beds, the air around them rank with the smell of intestinal fluids. He did not want to join their ranks. "Immo,"

"Yes sir?" The doctor replied as two burly orderlies wheeled the gurney into the operating room.

"What are my odds?"

"It will depend on what I find when I operate, but my visual assessment would be; not good." Immo sighed as he watched Kenneth being transferred to the table with a concerned eye. The movement showed all too clearly the expanding bulge in his abdomen.

"You need not pretty it up for me doctor. I've seen this kind of wound often enough, back in the War. This body is…" Irons gasped, shock wearing off enough that he was beginning to feel the stabbing ache in his guts, "beyond recovery."

"You cannot know that," Immo protested.

"Give me credit enough to know my own flesh." Kenneth grimaced as he tilted his head to look down his body. What he saw did not reassure him in the least.

"The longer we stand here talking, the more likely your doom-saying will become truth." The doctor retorted, gesturing impatiently for the anaesthesiologist to put Irons under.

"I think your efforts will avail you little, but the situation may yet be salvaged." Kenneth paused, the idea still sounding radical, even in his own mind. "Can you transfer my consciousness into Subject Two?"

"Theoretically, yes." Immo hesitantly replied to the outré question.

"I did not ask for qualifiers. Yes or no, can it be done?" Irons snapped, waving the anaesthesiologist away. He wasn't going under until he had an answer.

"It has never been done, but there is nothing in the simulations that would indicate undue difficulty. There would be some disorientation and I suspect that some physical therapy would be needed. The real wild card is your condition. If you were in better health, I would foresee no problem, but as you are now…" Immo's Gallic shrug covered a host of scenarios, all of them bad.

"The risk is acceptable. After all, at that point my alternative is death. Any chance is better than none. Have everything readied, in case it proves necessary." With that final command, Kenneth dropped his hand and allowed the mask to be placed over his face.

His last thoughts were that it would be far more convenient if 'Kenneth Irons' died. He could work unhindered in a new body. There would be no questions to answer, no eventual trial for the damning things he had confessed to the detective, and best of all, a body that looked exactly like the one Sara was already so fond of.

Immo went to work the instant Irons eyes closed. He laboured long and skilfully, but in the end Irons had been correct. The body was too badly damaged to survive. He stepped back and held his arms up to signify that he was done. He could hear the blood drip from his elbows to the theatre floor.

One of his assistants sutured the opening while another wheeled in Subject Two. Knowing that they could handle the initial set-up without him, Immo went to scrub up again before starting the second, even more dangerous procedure. He wouldn't have been so worried if it had been a clone of Irons own body, but it wasn't. There was a chance that the transferred data would not be compatible.

True, neural mapping transfers had been done from healthy donor to those who, by virtue of paralysis, had none. Yet those had been isolated areas, not a systemic download, and there were not so many documented cases as Immo would like. He shook his head, trying to dispel the humorous but inappropriate classic horror-movie image of one of Irons new body parts rebelling on him.

If the transfer failed, it would not be something so simple or entertaining. More likely, Irons would be mentally unstable or suffer partial amnesia as areas of his memory did not 'write' across. Worst case scenario, the transfer would not work at all, rendering the clone unusable and Kenneth a vegetable for the last minutes of his life.

Clean now, and knowing his wandering thoughts for the stall that it was, Immo returned to surgery. It was time to reach for the last rabbit in the hat, and hope he wasn't out of tricks.

Outside the medical wing, Pezzini and Nottingham waited on opposite ends of a tastefully neutral room designed for just such a purpose. The silence was tense, and not solely from concern over the man in surgery. Both were feeling guilty, but Ian seemed to be taking it far worse than Sara. He was a silent shadow, rocking slightly in a corner, his gaze fixed on the door that led to Dr. Immo's domain.

Sara was pacing fit to wear a hole in the floor. She had just turned to begin another lap when the door finally opened. Doctor Immo stepped through the door; body slumped with weariness and grief.

Bypassing the detective entirely, Immo put a fatherly arm around Nottingham. "I'm sorry son, he didn't make it."

"This is my fault." Ian whispered. He closed his eyes, silent tears sparkling in the overhead light. He bowed his head and seemed to sink in on himself.

"No Ian, it was an accident. I was there, I saw the whole thing. No one is to blame." Immo had known that Ian would not take the news well.

He hated having to lie to Ian, but Irons had been very clear on what he wanted. The doctor stroked the distraught man's arm, but Nottingham seemed not to notice. In fact, he didn't even twitch when Immo drove the syringe into that same arm. Momentary oblivion was the only gift he had to give the boy he had watched grow up. By the time the sedatives had worn off, they would be alone, and Irons could tell him what had really happened.

"What did you do to him?" Sara started toward the physician the moment Ian slumped against Immo in obvious unconsciousness.

"It is a sedative only. He's had too many shocks lately, and I don't think he's slept in a couple of days. You heard him blaming himself. Ian is a very sensitive boy; he'll be beating himself up over this for a very long time. This way I know he'll at least get some rest before he goes completely off the deep end." Immo sighed and tried ineffectually to shift Nottingham. The 'boy' had gotten very heavy over the years.

"Like you said, it was an accident. Why would Ian think it was his fault? He didn't make Irons go for my gun." Sara looked down at the unlikely pair in confusion.

"What has emotion to do with logic, detective?" Immo looked up at the brunette with no little irritation. Did she know Ian at all?

"Yeah, yeah," Sara ran her fingers through her hair. "I know what you mean, but…"

"But nothing. I came in just in time to hear the relevant parts. I know perfectly well that Ian has a lot of issues to work through, you should realize it too."

"I…" Sara paused and looked down at the sleeping assassin, all the things they'd left unsaid over the past several hours choking her.

"Don't you have a report to write?" Immo couldn't help being snappish, he'd been in surgery so long that his patience was all used up. He just didn't have the energy to deal with the issues of a stranger, especially one who had proven to be the catalyst for this whole situation. It might not be fair of him, but he'd just spent hours trying to put an old friend back together, and he wasn't feeling very fair.

Pezzini looked startled at his comment, and then her face fell as she realized he was right. She had a lot of paperwork to do now actually, and she'd have to drop off her gun to ballistics. This was not going to look good at all on her record. Two civilians dead in as many months? The Review Board was going to stick an apple in her mouth and roast her over the coals.

At least she still had the tape. That might save her bacon, depending on if the White Bulls situation had been cleared up by the time she went before the Board. Sara was going to have to play that recording for someone else first though. Agent Myers needed to know what one of his people was up to.