Disclaimer—See Chapter One
A/N: I'm still not sure how long this story will be, but am slowly working my way through my outline! Thank you again so much for your patience while I slowly get it written. Thank you so much to Rain, blackpanther2288, CatJerica, Mayra, Fiery Feral, Mxfan214, AussieMXfan, Shal35, Anamalia-Fear. Once again, your comments and encouragement blow me away. Thank you! Redhead2, glad to see you were able to get caught up despite all the interruptions. :) Thank you so much! Tunder28, you must be a speed reader! Almost as soon as I post a chapter, your review comes popping in. I love that. :) Thank you! I'm so sorry for the long wait, I'm trying to do better! Kitty Invictus, I'm glad to see you're back! Thank you for your reviews, I always love reading your thoughts and reactions to things. (Happy Belated Birthday by the way!) I'm about half way through the next chapter, so will again post as soon as I am able. I didn't end on a cliffhanger on purpose with this chapter, so I tried to be a little more kind this time at least! Not to say there won't be more cliffhangers to come…that just wouldn't be any fun. :) There is a lot of dialogue in this chapter, so I'm not too happy with how it turned out. But I hope the emotion keeps the momentum still going anyway. Some of the parts in italics come from episode 222 (for you, Ana!). My goal has been to take some of the themes that are just touched on in 222 and to explore them a little more, so you'll see that attempt in this chapter. Thank you!
Traveling On—Chapter Eleven
Nothing made sense anymore.
In the roaring of sound through leaden ears, Adam whispered the words burned into his heart.
It had begun.
Years ago when those same words had been uttered by a sickly little boy with a shocking mop of curly hair, Adam had dismissed them. The babies he had worked so hard to save would grow to become ordinary men. That was his goal after all; correcting abnormalities to make them normal.
Nothing more.
Little did he know back then how much he would be proven wrong.
He blinked, confused, feeling pain seep in beyond the hazy edge of drug-induced comfort, blinking again when the rasping voice was suddenly silenced. The words hadn't made sense back then, and they still didn't make sense now. He realized as the world around him slowly came into focus that he was back at Sanctuary, laying in one of the beds within his own lab. He searched his memory, remembering being in the boat, nothing more. He lay still for a moment, feeling strangely disconnected from his body.
Until he tried to move.
And then a whole new set of pain ricocheted up and down his body, feeling his pulse in the agony that radiated out from his chest. His legs, arms, and neck felt like they were going to leap off his torso of their own accord. The world dipped to the right and for a second, Adam thought he was going to pass out. The lab door rattled open, and he felt the reverberation in minute detail as it tingled its way through his limbs and heard the gasps all around as his team entered the room, rushing to his side to catch him as he almost slipped from the bed. He gagged, fighting to breathe. How had it come to this? That their roles were so grossly reversed.
Nothing made sense anymore.
Careful. He silently begged as hands gently pushed his legs back into place and settled a light blanket across his waist, blacking out before he could hear their response.
"What the hell was that?" Shalimar watched Jesse as he checked Adam's vitals, hands shaking as she smoothed the cotton blanket over Adam's slack body, fingers skimming over his forehead, noting the beaded lines of sweat across his flush brow. She could feel Brennan's eyes on her, but refused to look at him.
"We were accessing the files from the first disk," Emma explained, crossing over to one of the computers in the lab, hesitating briefly before scrolling through it. "Jesse opened one of the files, and it was like it somehow took over Sanctuary's systems." She closed the file and then reopened it, waiting. Nothing happened.
"The disk Alex got from Dr. Shaw?" Brennan dragged his eyes from Shalimar, crossing over to stand behind Emma, peering over her shoulder at the screen. "I thought it was destroyed."
"The disk itself was destroyed," Jesse spoke distractedly, frowning as he watched Adam's heart rate. "But we found the files on Sanctuary's computers. Adam must have saved it before we left on the mission."
"Replaying it must have triggered that recording again, the same one we heard in the helix." Emma shook her head, scrolling through the information. "But I don't understand how—"
"Or why." Brennan gravely pressed his lips together.
"Something about that voice…" Emma abruptly pushed back from the computer, knocking into Brennan.
"Emma?" His hand fell on her shoulder in concern.
She shrugged it off, turning away. "How's Adam?"
"I think he'll be out for a while now," Jesse turned from the older man, sinking into a chair. He sighed, tiredly scrubbing his face. "That voice must have really agitated him; he was obviously trying to move."
"How much you want to bet it's connected to another one of his damn secrets," Brennan huffed, eyes skimming through Dr. Shaw's notes, but seeing nothing of importance.
Shalimar growled lowly at his words, rising, the pointed heels of her boots drumming angrily into the smooth tile as she crossed the room.
"Shalimar—" Brennan breathed in frustration, eyes closing as she brushed past him. His fingers reached for hers, but missed, and the door slammed shut behind her.
Jesse raised his brows, looking at Emma. The psionic mutely shook her head, eyes warning him not to comment as Brennan rose and followed after her without another word.
The door to the garage swung open suddenly and unexpectedly, disturbing the rain that insisted on its constant drizzle. Shalimar barely noticed, driven out into the cold dampness with the heat of hurt and fury. The more she thought about it, the more her hurt turned into anger, and she turned sharply away from the beach and up the mountain toward the treeline instead. There were too many memories the other way. Behind her, the water roared moodily, stirred up by the storm, and the sound urged her on.
He was behind her; she could hear him jogging after her in the sloshy mud. She couldn't believe it.
"Shalimar—"
She whirled around, still backing up away from him. "Leave me alone, Brennan." She sputtered. "Isn't that what you told me to do? Go?" He still followed, and she turned again, increasing her speed. She didn't know where she was going, she wasn't thinking. She just wanted to escape. He was following her for some reason. Guilt. Anger. Whatever he wanted, she wasn't in the mood to give it to him. She was headed crookedly through the trees up the mountain, struggling as she sloshed through weeds that came up past her knees.
She felt his hand on her shoulder.
She froze and faced him, her eyes pure venom. "Don't touch me!"
His hand pulled away from her as from fire, and her heart broke. She realized the only thing she wanted was for him to take her in his arms. The hurt entered her face and she couldn't stop the tears this time. "Don't touch me," She repeated softly, turning her face away before he could see her cry.
She pounded on through the grass. Away. Away. Away.
"Shalimar! Just…just stop!" Brennan pleaded.
She froze again a few feet in front of him, hanging her head low and balling up her fists.
Brennan swore under his breath. He couldn't believe he had messed it up so badly, so quickly. Because he couldn't control his temper. He had no idea what to say, and he had to say it now. "I shouldn't have said that. I didn't really want you to leave."
Her back stiffened, refusing to answer.
"You were right, ok? I should have told you about your father. But you have to understand, I was just trying to protect you—"
She heard him step closer, whirling around. "Do you really want to have this conversation again?"
He paused, blowing out his breath in frustration, struggling to explain. "This wasn't me doubting your abilities again, Shalimar, or trying to keep a secret from you. I just—I just couldn't bear to see you hurt again."
"And this is better?" She gestured with one hand, the rain falling miserably between them.
He closed his eyes against the onslaught, panicking when he heard her turn to leave again. "You left me."
She stopped, tired. "What?"
"In my dreams, I was responsible for Adam and Emma dying. I shut down and wasn't there for you. I hurt you, Shal, and you left me."
She turned slowly back around, looking at him. He stood, head down, alone. She bit her lip.
"You told me that sometimes love wasn't enough." He looked up, and she was shocked by the rawness of his eyes. "I don't want that future for us."
She sighed, stepping closer. "Neither do I, Brennan."
He surged forward, grasping her elbows. "I can't lose you, Shal."
She smiled suddenly, softly, reaching up to push the wet hair off his forehead. "Then you have to learn to let me go."
"Yeah." He sighed, eyes closing at her touch, springing back open when her hand fell limply to her side, groaning, one side of his mouth lifting in chagrin. "It's hard."
"Brennan, I know you feel like you failed your mother when she died, that you didn't do enough to protect her." She saw his eyes flicker in surprise, taking a breath. "And I know that it's hard for you to trust people with everything you've been through, I know all that, and I understand, I do." She stepped back, turning away. "I'm just asking that you understand my side of it as well."
"So what is your side?"
"What?" This time it was she who turned in surprise.
He stood with hands on hips, a hint of challenge. "Why is it you seem to know all about my past, but I know almost nothing about yours?"
Her eyes narrowed. "What has that got to do with anything?"
He made a sound of frustration in the back of his throat, shaking his head. "God help me, I love you, Shal. But you ask me to understand you, to let you go, but I don't know what the hell that means."
She looked away.
"You once told me that it goes both ways." He stepped closer, catching her chin, tugging gently. He was shocked to see the pain in her eyes as she reluctantly looked up at him. "You were right, Shal. I should have told you everything about my dream, about your father. I shouldn't have kept anything secret from you, especially with how I've been hurt so much by the same thing." He swallowed thickly; thumb tracing the furrow in her brow, the rain as it rolled down her face. "I'm sorry."
She nodded jerkily, leaning into him, and his arms rose around her, holding her against his chest. They stood still until he felt her relax against him. He fisted her hair, turning his face to the sky, eyes closing against the rain. When he finally spoke, his hoarse whisper caught her by surprise. "What did he do to you, Shalimar?" She stiffened, pulling away, but he tightened his hold. "No more secrets, right?" His words stirred softly against her hair.
She sniffed. "Brennan—"
He bent his face to hers. "When you're ready, I hope you can help me to understand."
She pulled out of his arms, walking a few steps away. He watched her silently. "You grew up alone, Brennan, but not because you were unloved." She wrapped her arms around herself, staring into the trees. The sky was dark, the air cool. It fit her mood. "Your parents died, and it was a horrible thing, but they didn't leave you by choice." She took a few more steps away. "Mine did."
Oh Shal. He felt the stab of pain in his chest, eyes following her as she almost disappeared into the fog.
Her words came back to him, carried on the wind. It was easier for her to speak to the air. "I grew up happy, loved, daddy's little girl, until I suddenly stopped being normal. At the hardest point in my life when nothing made sense and I couldn't understand what was happening to me, I was abandoned, institutionalized, conveniently thrown away so their life could go on without me."
"Shal—" He took a step toward the trees.
She was startled to feel his warm fingers on her lower back, turning into him as he pulled her back into his arms.
"I'm sorry."
She barely heard him, feeling the familiar hurt and anger coiling within. "I hate him, Brennan. You would do anything to get your family back, and I hate mine." She had to stop to catch her breath, to keep herself from shrieking. He wanted the truth, then she would tell him. She wanted him to hear it, every horrible word. She squirmed in his arms. "Does that shock you? I HATE him!" She met his eyes then, and saw something that astounded her.
He loved her more now. She didn't think it was possible. He was angry. Upset. Hurt. And hopelessly in love with her.
She stopped moving against him, unsure how to answer the look in his eyes. "I hate him," She mumbled, losing all conviction in her voice.
His eyes would give her no peace. "No, you don't." He said firmly.
"I do." She said weakly, beginning to succumb.
"No you don't. We're your family now Shal, you know that. But he's still your father. You don't have to see him ever again if you don't want to, but I can see it in your eyes, you still care about him. No matter how much it hurts, it's still there."
She exhaled sharply, as though all her breath had suddenly left her.
He felt her shift beneath his hands; saw the fear in her eyes. "It'll be ok, Shal. We'll figure it all out."
She stilled, sighing, finally turning her face up to his. "No more secrets?"
He cupped her cheeks tenderly, smoothing back wet curls. "No more secrets." He kissed her softly, a healing apology, and in the rain and the mud and the grass, they held each other tightly. And in the silence, it felt like recovery.
Floating candlelight flickered shadows across shallow water, marred only by the small foot that occasionally disturbed it. Jesse smiled at the scene as he rounded the corner, leaning against the wall, watching Emma from afar as she stared into the fountain. He was tired, watching Adam throughout the night in the lab. He knew Emma must be as well. Now that he had been able to remove the tube helping Adam breathe, he felt comfortable leaving him alone for a few minutes. Adam would awake soon, and he was in desperate need of a shower, but the sight of Emma had given him pause. She sat on the edge with one leg folded comfortably under her, shoulders rounded and hunched. He knew she often came to the fountain to relax and meditate. With the dimmed lights and floating candles and trickling water, she had told him it helped to soothe her often frazzled mind. He heard her sigh and frowned, studying her posture more closely. At the moment, she looked anything but serene. She looked…lost.
Emma frowned, moodily kicking her foot across the water, feeling a sense of satisfaction when water droplets arced across the surface, extinguishing two of the candles. She kicked again, hitting one more, straightening abruptly when she heard a soft step.
"I'm fine." She spoke without turning around. She didn't have to look to know it was Jesse behind her. Are you ok? His mind was screaming the question so loudly; she almost forgot she was the only one that could hear it. She smiled to herself when she next felt his surprise, realizing she had answered him before he had even been consciously aware of the question.
"You scare me sometimes." Jesse shook his head as he shot her a grin, nudging her with his shoulder, settling beside her on the fountain's edge. He reached, catching her fingers and pulling her hand into his lap, sighing when she failed to respond. "Hey, what's wrong?" He tugged gently on her fingers for emphasis.
"Nothing...everything…" Emma shook her head, at a loss to explain.
"You're worried about Alex?" Jesse rubbed his finger against the smoothness of her ring.
"Alex, Adam, Brennan, Danny, this psionic…" Emma made a face, leaning her head against Jesse's shoulder.
"Yeah." He chuckled under his breath in understanding chagrin. They were silent for a while, listening to the trickling of the water. Jesse stared absentmindedly at Emma's toes as she arched her foot, dashing the flame out on another candle. Beneath the water, her foot looked impossibly small, and he shifted slightly, tightening his hold on her. "I'm worried about you, Emma." He finally broke the silence.
"Me?" She lifted her head, looking casually away. "Why?"
"Do you really have to ask?" Jesse raised his brows, gently challenging her. He watched her profile in the candlelight when she stayed silent. "I know something is bothering you, beyond the unknowns of this mission. It took me a while to see it, but I know you've been hiding it for a while now."
"Jess—" She pulled slightly away, turning her face back to him after a brief hesitation, smiling brightly, teasingly, as she ran her fingers lightly up his shoulders.
"No, not this time." He refused to be distracted. He hadn't always recognized the defensive mechanism in the past, but he did now. "We need to talk about this, Emma."
"There's nothing to say." She abruptly dropped her hands.
"I think there is." He waited, but she refused to be baited. He sighed, reaching over and recapturing her hands. He slowly spread her fingers, sliding his own in between one at a time with a gentle caress. "I think you've changed, but you're afraid to let the rest of us know about it."
"We've all changed this year—"
"Yeah, but the rest of us can't kill with just a single thought." He heard her sharp intake of air, felt her mental blocks rising like a slap in the face, but he kept up the gentle stroking of her fingers. "I can't even begin to imagine what that kind of power feels like, but just because you can, doesn't make you an evil person, Emma."
"Are you sure about that?" She turned to face him suddenly, letting him see the darkness swimming in her eyes.
He smiled tenderly, lifting a hand and palming her cheek, meeting her eyes head-on. "Yeah."
She nervously licked her lips. "I've done things, Jesse." Her voice was a dry whisper.
He watched her eyes shift uncertainly, dropping. "Look at me, Emma." He gently commanded. "Feel me. Do you sense any fear or derision from me? From any of us? We've all done things we're not proud of, but that doesn't mean those actions define us."
"Jesse—"
"Let me finish." He shook his head in determination. "I've thought about this a lot, and I think there's a little bit of that darkness in each of us, but I also think that's why we're so good at what we do. We understand how power feels."
Emma closed her eyes, nodding in resignation. "Sometimes too much." She flinched as Jesse soothingly stroked her fisted hands with the pads of his fingers. She hadn't even realized her hands had clenched so tightly.
Jesse continued as if she hadn't interrupted him. "I also think Adam knows that and it's one of the reasons he's so filled with guilt. As much as he hates what his work has done to us, he also needs us to finish what he invariably started. It's always been the biggest irony of Mutant X, our using the very same powers that we're fighting against. But the fact that we have that power, that we understand the darkness, doesn't mean we are the same." He managed to relax her hands, tracing the marks left on her palms where her nails had dug into the flesh. "It's about choices, Emma, it always has been. And you've already made that choice, whether you realize it or not." He paused, waiting until her eyes opened, leaning over, invading her space until their faces were inches apart. "You make it every time you save one of us, and you made it when you told us about Alex despite the pain you knew it would cause…hell, the very fact that we're having this conversation in the first place." He lifted his hand, resting it on the nape of her neck, tugging gently, closing the distance between them. He rested his forehead against her, whispering. "Choices, Emma."
She nodded back, her own fingers tangling into his short hair, wanting so badly to believe. Jesse did. And his belief could be strong enough for the both of them. She sought his mouth, pushing all other thought away, save the way he made her feel at this very moment. Choices. She groaned, melding her body into his until their even the reflection of their watery shadows in the flickering candlelight looked as one.
Brennan let the hot water of the shower pound down over his shoulders, erasing the evidence of his run through the mud and weeds, hands braced against the tile. He had mostly meant to give Shalimar some space when he left her in her own room, but had found the confusion in his own mind demanding an outlet as well. And so he lingered under the water, even when it turned cold and his body began to shiver. More had happened in the past few weeks than in the past few years of his life. He had thought joining Mutant X was the biggest life-altering event in his young years, next to the death of his mother. And while in some regard, it still was the pivotal moment that saved him, the last few weeks had changed him. Somehow the past and present had collided to make him more aware than ever of the fragility of the future. By one small choice, he might not have followed up soon enough on what had been a routine assignment of placing someone into the underground. By some strange twist of fate, his dreams had shown him in time what that seemingly small choice would have made of his life. So many paths, so many possibilities. So many choices. The future of the team, the fate of his family, the fortuity of his relationship with Shalimar. It all hinged on choices. There were so many paths they had chosen, so many roads they had already traveled. And now he was chasing dreams in hopes of finding the right one. He had not been lying when he told Shalimar no more secrets. And not just for the reasons she might have thought. And not just because they were better together or because her influence allowed him to go further without falling off the edge of reality. He almost smiled as he remembered the first time he met her, hearing her footsteps coming up behind him, and choosing to close his fist on the building sparks, suddenly seeing the possibility of letting the enemy flee. It had been enough. Her smile of approval as he blew out the dust from his fingers, her laughter as he turned his back on the danger and held out his hand to his future. It had been a choice. He doubted she would ever know how important that had been.
Because two are only stronger together, if they are each whole in and of themselves.
And she had allowed him to heal himself and become whole. Even when she was not beside him, he still knew she was somewhere, ready to come charging to the rescue, waiting for him to come back. The thought that this might someday cease to be was the root of his worst nightmare. He couldn't take the risk of losing her, of losing any of the members of his family. And so he chose to believe and chase the road of his dreams. He sighed, turning off the water. Time was passing; he had procrastinated long enough. He stepped from the shower, pausing to shake his head, water droplets flying everywhere, striking the mirror and slowly running down the fogged glass as he walked past and into his bedroom.
"How are you guys doing?"
Brennan's voice broke Jesse and Emma apart. They glanced over at him as he stood leaning against the wall behind them, Emma's face red, but Jesse's arm keeping her firmly against him.
"What? Am I interrupting something?" Brennan's broad smile belayed his innocent tone as Jesse glowered at him.
"Did you need something, Brennan?" Emma slid discreetly off Jesse's lap, turning in his arms and leaning back against his chest. She took in Brennan's damp hair and crossed arms, frowning slightly. "Are you ok?"
"Yeah." He quickly dismissed her concern, pushing off the wall. "Just trying to make sense of everything."
"I think we all are." Emma acknowledged, feeling the edge of his thoughts.
"Where's Shal?" Jesse stood to his feet, holding out a hand to Emma. She bent, cupping a hand into the fountain, pouring water over the remaining candles. The room darkened as the last of the small flames went out.
"She's changing." Brennan pushed his hands into his pockets. "We thought we would check on Adam and try to figure out the next steps."
"Sounds good." Emma accepted Jesse's hand, smiling up at him as brushed his lips across her knuckles. Amidst all the latest uncertainties, some things she was surer of than ever.
They walked toward the lab by mutual assent. "Do you think Adam's—" Emma's voice trailed off as Shalimar's raised voice could be heard echoing down the hallway. She cast a look over her shoulder at Brennan, but he was already pushing past her and Jesse. He paused with his hand on the door, eyes staring through the tinted blue glass as her words became coherent.
"…Because those parents didn't see her fitting in, instead of loving her for what she was, they threw her into a psychiatric institution."
Brennan heard Emma's gasp behind him, fingers letting go of the door knob. Though Shalimar was talking to Adam, she sensed them and turned, seeing her family, knowing they could hear her. Shal, are you sure? He locked his eyes on hers through the tinted glass.
She smiled slightly. Yeah, it's time. She took a breath, turning back toward Adam as he lay watching her. The older man's eyes were pained, and Brennan knew it was from more than his physical injuries. He sighed, keeping his back to Emma and Jesse, resting his forehead against the glass as Shalimar continued.
"Can you imagine being ten years old and scared out of your mind in a place like that? They pumped me full of enough thorazine to put ten kids under, but it didn't work on me. So when they found out they couldn't sedate me, they turned to beatings to keep me down. Three or four grown men laying into a little kid…
She hadn't told him that part before. A muscle in his jaw spasmed, stiffening as Emma placed a hand on his back.
"She needs to tell it, Brennan."
He nodded tightly, keeping his eyes on the tiny woman in front of him, vowing he would kill those men if he ever found them.
"My father knew, he told them to keep it up. Whatever it took to make me normal…
"He wants her to go to Naxcon." Brennan growled to Emma, eyes narrowing as he heard Adam tell her that they had to find a way in. He could tell by her stance, she was starting to waiver.
He couldn't take it anymore.
Brennan pushed open the door, barging angrily through, barely aware of Jesse and Emma as they followed behind him. "No, Adam."
Adam clenched his teeth, fighting the pain and guilt. "Someone connected with the company is playing with secrets that could destroy the world as we know it. We have to find a way in."
"He's right, Brennan." Jesse spoke up for the first time, reaching apologetically for Shalimar. "I'm sorry, Shal."
She smiled sadly at him, letting him know she understood as she turned back toward her mentor.
"I'm sorry too, Shalimar." Adam's eyes pleaded with her to forgive him. He cursed the weakness in his body that kept him flat on his back, helpless. "If there was any other way—"
"I know." She caught his hand, sinking into a chair by his bed, resting the back of his hand against her cheek.
"Shal, no—"
"It's ok, Brennan." Emma interrupted him, speaking softly.
"But we can't go to Naxcon—" He trailed off, meeting Shalimar's eyes as she looked up at him from across Adam's body.
"We'll go together," Emma continued reassuringly, missing the look between them. "We won't let anything happen."
"No—"
"Brennan and I will go," Shalimar smoothly countered, "You and Jesse should try to find out more about that compound, we still have to find Danny."
Brennan closed his eyes, groaning. He wanted to protest, but he knew she was right. At least this way Adam and Emma would be protected from Naxcon. He shivered, eyes opening again to find Shalimar as she bent over Adam. But at what cost? She had told him over and over again that he couldn't protect her. He turned away, feeling defeated. He was preventing one nightmare only to walk into another.
"Brennan."
He turned back around at Adam's weak voice.
"Shalimar told me about Alex; we'll get to the bottom of this, I promise."
He smiled painfully, crossing the room to stand behind Shalimar. "Thanks, Adam." He felt Jesse and Emma as they flanked around him on either side, breathing in their support. They were an odd family, created from bits of different pasts, but somehow it worked. Despite their differences, without the emotional support they derived from each other, he strongly suspected they would have burned out long ago. They were tired, they were discouraged. But they were not burned out. They relied on each other, had managed to get behind each other's walls. They could not do their job like they did if they hadn't. They fed on each other, purposely throwing themselves into the battle again and again, walking knowingly into situations that were going to cause them pain. Because the damage that their relationship allowed them to heal from engendered a responsibility to go places that others could not. No matter the cost. Because they knew they could and survive. They had become more than family. It was as complicated and as simple as that. Brennan closed his eyes, praying this coming road wouldn't be the one to destroy what they had so painstakingly built.
His life had become one long routine. Everyday it was the same. He knew it better than he knew the back of his own hand. And right now, it was more stringent than ever, a massive company deadline looming over all their shoulders. Which is why when at precisely two o'clock Nicholas Fox rose from his desk, expecting to be handed the days productivity reports, he was shocked to find the outer room of his office empty.
"Damien?" He didn't even try to hide his irritation as he called for his personal assistant. He was not happy when things did not go according to plan.
But Damien was nowhere to be found.
In the quiet lobby of the building, Brennan and Shalimar spun defensively at a faint noise behind them, but they were not in danger. The woman that stood gaping at them, paper cup of coffee in her hand, seemed to be having enough trouble breathing, let alone offering a threat. Her mouth gaped like a fish trying to breathe air. Once. Twice. Shalimar glanced once at an equally confused Brennan then made the mistake of moving toward the shocked woman.
Her mouth opened again.
Then she screamed.
Before either of them could do more than reach reassuring hands toward the terrified woman, her coffee fell from nerveless fingers and the newest intern to Naxcon Corporation kneed over in a dead faint. Both Brennan and Shalimar were seconds too slow in leaping to catch her and when two security guards barreled through the door, all they saw were two dark forms bending over the body of their fellow employee.
One guard tackled Shalimar just as she was rising to her feet. Instinctively, Shalimar grabbed the beefy man's arm, twisting and yanking as she stood up. The man flew through the air and slammed into the far wall. As the guard sagged to the floor, the other one reached for Brennan. He let him grab him, throwing him over his shoulder. Three seconds later, the second guard was face down on the floor.
Then the rest of the building came to life, pouring into the small lobby in righteous fury.
Nicholas Fox had planned to issue a stern memo to his staff by the time he strode down the hallway to the elevator banks, now ten minutes off his schedule and fuming to himself at the sudden disappearance of all his employees. He was already on his way to the lobby when a terrified scream echoed down the hall just as the elevator doors had opened, revealing the chaotic scene. A flash of blonde hair, and his mouth dropped open. Two more guards from the command center exploded into the hallway, but Nicholas reflexively grabbed one in an attempt to explain. The man's leg swung out to counter the pull and the other one tripped, taking all three of them down together. By the time they had sorted themselves out, two more guards went pounding past. In the space of the seconds it took him to make his way into the lobby, it had turned into a free for all.
Nicholas stopped dead in shock as bodies hurled through the air, slamming into desks and ricocheting off walls. He drew a deep breath, about to bellow out an ear-cracking order to cease when it occurred to him that except for pictures, he hadn't seen his daughter in almost twenty years.
She was beautiful.
And she was winning.
The father in him hesitated.
She was outnumbered and smaller than all of the men around her, but she had something they did not. She and the man that seemed to be with her had an almost preternatural sense of where the other was at any given time. Twice, he winced as one of the guards whirled and instead hit one of his own side. He couldn't decide what to do. The ex-marine in him was fascinated. The CEO was seeing paperwork and lawsuits if one of these idiots broke somebody. The father was horrified. Then the choice was taken from him.
One of the guards remembered that he was armed.
Shalimar must have seen him go for the gun out of the corner of her eye. The guard was focused on the other man with his daughter, and Nicholas was not sure if the guard considered the other man or his daughter the greater threat. Nicholas barely had time to curse as he saw the situation spiraling even more out of control. His daughter fairly flew through the air, putting herself between the armed guard and the dark-haired man with her. And then she seemed to turn direction mid-air, heading straight for the guard. The guard's head turned, his arm reached…
And Shalimar threw a perfect right cross that took the guard square across the cheekbone. She had the gun in her own hand before the man hit the floor. The dark-haired man reached her side, grabbing the lapels of the guard and Nicholas had just enough time to draw breath and yell.
"Enough!"
Everybody froze. Everyone except the new intern. In the sudden silence, the moan of the woman who had started it all echoed loudly and her eyes opened to fix wildly on her boss. Then they slid past him to widen even further in mortal terror.
"G…g..gh….ghost!"
Then her eyes rolled back into her head and she passed out again.
Nicholas looked over at his daughter and started to shake as he finally realized what the intern had seen. After a moment, he identified the emotion as nervous laughter. Both his daughter and her astonished partner were still standing defensively. It was doubtful that his intern had actually gone home last night. The current deadline had hit her particularly hard. Nerves stretched by too much caffeine and mind blurred by not enough sleep, all the exhausted intern had seen was the face of his daughter, looking exactly like the recent picture he had managed to obtain and hang in his office with the brief explanation to the inquisitive woman that she had passed away. He hadn't meant to lie, but sometimes a lie was easier than the truth. He hadn't planned on that lie coming back to haunt him...literally. He grimaced.
Too late now.
Damien was there and by the look on his face, had figured it out. His assistant was the only one who knew the truth about his daughter. He stared nervously at the woman who was his daughter, hardly believing she was standing before him now, clearing his throat as his bedraggled group of employees staggered painfully to their feet. By now, most had figured it out, recognizing her from the picture. Still, a formal introduction was only proper. Nicholas took another long look at the destruction surrounding them and considered it an appropriate punishment for his deception.
"Damien, everyone. Say hello to Shalimar Fox…my daughter."