Silvia Rea was not having the time of her life at all. Her boyfriend had overheard her complaining to a friend about her unemployment and had wrangled a job out of his boss. So now she was stuck as a secretary to a fat, evil-tempered oil driller. For peanuts, it had to be said.

The job did have one upside though. That wasn't really very much of an upside. She could hear everything he did or said through the paper thin walls of the mobile trailer they worked in. One conversation in particular had disturbed her greatly.

She had been idly playing card games on the shaky old computer she was expected to use when the foreman slammed the door back. A tall, balding man in a crisp suit strode in, nodded curtly to her and barged straight into the office.

"Byroc!" she heard his voice snap, "You fired someone recently, yes?"

"Yeah, man called Herald Johnson?" came the surly voice of her boss.

"Indeed. Well, he has gone to the Foundation for Law and Government, Byroc. He knew about the illegal oil."

"The Foundation for Law and Government?" Byroc sounded scared.

"Yes, I need Mr. Johnson taken care of. I have taken the liberty of bribing a Foundation member. They have told me that FLAG's operative teams are going to interview him this afternoon."

"They mightn't believe him. His family owned the land that you…"

There was a touchy cough.

"That you aren't drilling on at all, but some other bastard is and they think it's you."

"Not good at all, Byroc."

"Sorry, sir. Anyway, he did just get fired. They might think he's just out for petty revenge."

"I don't care, Byroc! You have enough contacts. Get someone to kill Johnson now!"

With that the business man stormed out, not even glancing at Silvia.

She was now rethinking what she had heard. Admittedly she wasn't one of the sharpest tools in the shed, but she did have a great sense of morals.

They were going to kill someone.

She was the only one who knew.

And Byroc couldn't have had him murdered yet, because he would have to call someone, and Silvia would hear the conversation.

That someone had just been fired.

His details would be on the computer.

She could call these FLAG people and tell them.

Right….

Silvia pushed the door open.

"Sir, can I have the day off?"….

"I can't believe you made me do that."

"Karr…."

"That was just cruel."

"Karr."

"I mean you could have gone the other way."

"Karr!"

"It was only half a mile longer."

"KARR!"

"Yes?"

"Stop whining for five minutes and show me where we're going, please!"

Karr growled slightly and put the map up. He subconsciously set his timer as well. Five minutes would undoubtedly give him more to complain about.

Gradually he noticed something missing. He couldn't detect his twin Trans-Am anywhere nearby.

"Where are Kitt and Michael?" he asked.

"They left ten minutes ago. You were too busy bickering to notice."

"Why'd they go?"

Jessica frowned for a second.

"D'you know, I can't actually remember. Damn my short term memory. Something about Devon and a phone call I think."

Karr made another note about his partner; she was insane and forgetful. What a great mix indeed. Hmm, still three minutes left until he could piss her off again.

"...Karr, what are you thinking?" Jessica asked after a moment of silence, for some reason having a feeling Karr was plotting.

"Nothing." One minute, oh this was going to be good.

"You are a horrible liar ya know." Bingo.

"I STILL can't believe you did that though!" Jessica groaned as Karr showed her the 5 minute timer at zero on his screen before she rubbed a hand on her face.

"Ooh this is going to be a long drive." she muttered, which was drowned out by Karr's incessant whining.

"What? Why?" came the growled response, as Byroc rubbed his face thinking.

"Never mind, just go." He snapped before Silvia could respond. Before he could blink she was out of his office grabbing her stuff and getting out of there. She had things to do.

She ran out at full pelt and chucked all her stuff into her car, sprang in herself and screeched off, nearly running over the foreman in the process.

After tearing down the road for ten minutes, she pulled into an old petrol station and ran to the phone booth outside.

The operator answered brightly,

"Can I help you?"

"Erm, yes, can I get a call through to the Foundation for Law and Government please?"

"Of course, just hold on a minute."

Silvia waited what seemed like an age, before a male English voice spoke,

"Hello, this is the Foundation for Law and Government, can I help you?"

"Erm, yeah, I'm Silvia Rea. I wanted to tell you that a guy called Herald Johnson is going to be killed by someone."

She immediately regretted how casual it sounded.

"What? Well, thank you very much for that information, madam. We appreciate your help greatly."

There was a click and the line went dead. Silvia put the phone back and sighed. What if she was too late? Herald could be dead by now. She could only hope not.

Back at the Foundation, Devon was pacing like a caged animal, Bonnie desperately trying to calm him down.

"Listen, Devon, it could be a hoax for all you know. And Jessica and Karr are already heading to his house."

"Yes, but..." Devon paused and wiped his forehead, "I've already sent Michael and Kitt off on that other lead we got, and they haven't reported back. And if it is true, Jessica could very well come across a mercenary on her first case with us. Or even worse, a corpse."

"She worked in law enforcement before Devon, surely she has seen one," said Bonnie with the assured air of someone who's job wasn't going to lead them anywhere a dead body.

"Oswald promised me she hadn't and anyway… Bonnie, she was a mercenary before, working for the government. She didn't kill anyone up close and personal, they used her to poison people they didn't like, but she was on the wrong side of the law. Others may know her. It could put us and her at a liability."

Devon threw his hands up in despair.

"Call Karr then," said RC, who had been listening silently to the conversation until now, "You've seen the way he follows her around. He'd do anything for the woman."

The other two set him with sceptical looks.

"No, really," he continued, "He's obviously figured common sense out as well as logic. He acts nice to this girl, protects her with everything he's got, and in return no one will shut him down and if he gets hurt helping us, then we'll help him out."

"Good...point, Reginald, very good point," said Devon sitting down in his chair and dialling the number.

"Karr? Don't patch this through to Jessica."

"Ok…"

The AI sounded nervous, he didn't have his partner's cynicism or sarcastic remarks to hide behind anymore.

"We've received a call, Karr, saying that the man you're going to visit is going to be killed. I'm worried that Jessica might get caught in the crossfire and get hurt, or maybe see the body."

"Right." Why's he telling me this? She's not easily disturbed. She'd be fine.

"Scan the area around Mr. Johnson's house before you let her out. If there's any sign of a disturbance don't let her out, understood?"

"Affirmative." I'd let her out anyway. She'd cope.

"Thank you, Karr, I appreciate it."

"It's nothing." Since I'm not going to do it anyway.

The silver and black Trans-Am stopped outside a modest looking apartment block. Karr did the preliminary scans and found….

One well armed man creeping towards Herald's rooms.

"Jessica, there is a man carrying a gun, heading for our informant's flat," he barked.

"Thanks mate," she snapped to attention and sprang out of the car and ran for the building. Herald's was only on the second, she could get there in time if she tried.

Taking the stairs two at a time, she skidded onto the second floor corridor, just in time to see the man charging through the door.

Vainly wishing she had a gun, she sprang to and caught him by a foot. He turned, cocked the pistol and two bullets lodged themselves very firmly in her shoulder. Trying to ignore the pain, she grabbed the nearest thing, which turned out to be a rather heavy door stop, and smashed it into the side of his head. This turned out to be quite effective and the man slumped out cold.

A petrified looking young man stuck his head out from a closet.

"Erm.. Can I get you anything?" he quavered.

"An ambulance would be preferable," Jessica muttered darkly, before she slid to the ground too.

Voila! Thank you Storm, if you hadn't written that middle bit, I couldn't have updated yet. Go you, go you!