Chapter Three:

Of course there would be someone awake at the Foundation. Anna swore that they never slept. The legacy of Dr. Virgil Swann. She parked her car outside of the entrance and got out. She stood for a second and inhaled the air deeply and wondered how long it would be until Clark could do the same. She tightened her grip on her leather briefcase and went inside. She crossed the cavernous lobby, the heels of her shoes clicking on the Italian marble. She was used to the silence of the place, it was blessed after what she'd witnessed today.

"Nobody followed you?" Anna stopped dead in her tracks as Dr. Brigette Crosby, Dr Swann's successor appeared in the doorway. Anna looked at her.

"They never follow me" Dr. Crosby regarded her.

"Complacency doesn't suit you my dear," she responded and Anna could barely contain a sigh.

"Nobody followed me Dr. Crosby, I made sure of it"

"I knew that, I was just making absolutely sure" and she turned and began to walk along the corridor towards her suite of offices. Anna didn't need to be told to follow; she just did.

The outer offices were closed. Desks were empty, machines were silent. Anna followed Dr. Crosby into her own office. It was a huge room with equally huge windows that allowed sunlight to pour through in the daytime. Dr. Crosby's huge desk dominated the office and it was piled high with files and documents that demanded her attention. A tray of coffee found its own space in the organised chaos and she looked at Anna enquiringly. She nodded gratefully.

"Sit down Anna," she invited and watched her sink into one of the chairs opposite her, placing her briefcase carefully by her feet. Anna watched Dr. Crosby pour black coffee into a plain white cup and hand it to her. She curled her fingers around it, welcoming its heat.

"You've had a tough day today" Dr. Crosby guessed, sitting in her own seat behind the desk. Anna took a sip of her coffee and then nodded.

"They're animals, all of them. I've seen some things in my time but this…this was a special kind of barbarity" she kept her voice low but her eyes were filled with memories.

"If it's too hard Anna, it wouldn't be a problem to pull you out of there, nobody would blame you" Anna seemed to click back to the present. She fixed her boss with a steely look.

"I can't leave him there alone now. Whether he realises it or not, he needs me"

"Does he realise that?" the doctor enquired. Anna remembered the way he'd tried to curl his fingers around hers. She shook her head.

"He's barely conscious most of the time. I think when they start he goes somewhere else in his mind. But today… he cried, asked for his mother" unexpected tears crowded the backs of her eyes and she took a deep, deep breath as she regained control.

"Anna…"

"Don't you dare take me out of there. I can do this, I will get him out of there" she vowed. The doctor observed her over her own coffee cup and silence ticked between them for two or three seconds.

"All right Anna, as always, I have faith in you" Anna sighed in another deep breath.

"I want those reports," the doctor continued and Anna nodded. She stood up and carried her coffee cup into the outer office. She sat at one of the vacant desks and switched on the computer and set to work. Dr. Crosby came out a couple of hours later to see her working steadily, her fingers flying over the keyboard. There were no notes by the keyboard for her to refer to, which was one of the things she most admired about her, it all came from memory.