The Gathering Storm

"What do you mean?" Sheila shrugged.

"I mean that "honor among thieves" is a little fantasy that helps people sleep at night. It really doesn't exist, especially at this level." She paused, "Someone is holding a leash on our dear DA, and I'm certain he'd be pleased to get it off."

"But he'd have to know that would lead to his being arrested." Sarah said.

"Not…for certain." Tom pointed out. "Right now, he may or may not know the entire story…but if Dr. Possible is still a wanted felon, if her daughter is simply someone she dragged along…he may believe, or convince himself, that he can get out of this—who would believe their word or the words of their protector?"

"Who would?" Nana asked. "He could be right."

"Not… all the way." Sheila said. "Even if it never came to a trial, I think his hopes of making AG are now dead, dead, dead." She paused, "At least I hope so."

"And if he feels they're being held over him, it's comfortably certain that there may be evidence that would convince people." Tom paused, "Just because we don't know of any other examples of his… little perversions, doesn't mean someone else doesn't have evidence… twelve years is a very long time."

"So you think he'd help you?"

"Help himself, and try to use us as hitmen, I expect." Sheila said. "But that's fine. She paused, face screwed up in concentration. "But this could get very dangerous… which is why I'm putting you on an airplane back home."

"home?" Wade asked, in shock. "But I've…"

"Helped." Sheila paused, "Helped lots, Wade." All the snark was out of her voice. "But there's a third alternative to our little plan—he may decide that if he can tidy up the agents involved—all of them, his problem will go away." She sighed, "It's stupid, but if he has been as clever as we think, then he's also never been in this kind of situation, and I can't ignore the chance that he might decide to do something spectatuarly stupid." Now she looked directly at Wade. "And that was not on the list of things your mom signed you up for. You can help us via long range, but not at close range."

"But I'll be days before I can get back to the set up at home—you need me!" Wade said desperately, and nearly on the verge of tears, Sheila realized. She stomped her incipient weakening of resolve hard.

"He could stay here." James said, unexpectedly. "He could help, and I'd be happy to discuss encryption with him." Sheila paused, thought about it, almost opened her mouth to say no, and then saw Tom, looking at her, giving a quick, almost imperceptible nod.

"Fine—but I'm putting a car out front, and if anything, I mean anything happens, you all do exactly what those agents say—which will be go with them to the federal buildings subbasement." She paused, "It's that, or I send you off in a jet plane. OK?"

"OK." Wade said, then, impulsively, reminding her that the Genius was only 11, he turned, "But I'm not afraid." Sheila looked at him, and remembered how terrified he was of people and spaces, and here he was offering to go with them. Still terrified, she could see.

But being part of a team does that to you…

"I know." Sheila said, "But that's why we have older heads along, to know when you should be afraid, Major Mathematics."

"Okay." Wade said, "And I have a way we might be able to find Dr. Possible if you can localize her…"

"How?" Tom asked.

"I can feed in the pictures of her here, using bone and face recognition software, and tap into local security camera feeds—if she walks past on, the computer will recognize her."

"What about Kimmie?" James asked. Wade shook his head.

"No, her face would have changed too much with age." Sheila frowned.

So it will be useless for finding the one person we know is alive. Still, it was a chance… but on the other hand…

"Can you do a search in DMV records?"

"DMV records?" Wade blinked, "They'd never let her get a license or ID, would they?"

"Of course they would." Tom said, "Trust me, one thing that is guaranteed to get a cop interested is if you don't have ID. With all the computer systems, it'd be crazy not to get a legitimate one—under another name, of course…but the photo would be…"

"Yeah." Wade said.

"And even if the address is faked, or not current." Sheila said, "It gives you a smaller area to check." She paused, "And helps us keep Mr. DA in the dark for now…"

"Wouldn't it be better to let him know? He might slip up?" James asked.

"Because we may not be correct—if Mr. DA has a way to control whoever is holding Kim and your wife." If she's alive, "He may decide that dead people tell no tales." James didn't twitch. Now that he was over some of his shock, Sheila saw that there was a first class brain working there.

"So we look for…" Tom looked at Wade. "How long will it take you?"

"All night." Wade said, "There are a lot of pictures and it takes a lot of processing power."

"Maybe not."

"Oh?" Wade and Tom looked at James.

"I have clearance to order jobs on the supercomputers at the Space Center." He shrugged, "There… probably a lot more powerful than anything the FBI has available."

"Can you do it from here?" James nodded. Sheila looked at him and Wade.

"Than what are you waiting for?" She asked, "Go."

"What's going on?" Cindy asked. She'd been going to see her daughter…or at least to try and see her daughter. Sometimes…sometimes Kim was almost like the old Kim, if you caught her in the right mood, or at the right time. Sometimes you could barely see the hooks Tono had placed in her soul. But now there were some of Tono's thugs standing in front of her.

"Nothing. Go back to your room."

"What about my daug-" Cindy found herself spun around, and pushed down the corridor into her room, tossed into it so hard she nearly fell. Turning, she reached the door just as it was locked.

Just as it was locked from the outside.

Kim was trembling. Tono had called her in, along with Yori and some others. He didn't look pleased.

"Kim-san…" Tono said lightly. "Tell us of how you removed Mitchell, as an obstacle to the harmony of our family?" Kim blinked, and told him again.

Why is he?

"And you left no evidence?"

"None, Tono-sama."

"Than why is the FBI currently in possession of your own DNA?" Tono quietly said, "Recovered from the site?" Kim went cold.

Impossible… It can't be… She paused, and shook her head, looking at the floor.

"Tono-sama… I do not know." She said quietly. "I cannot think of anything that I left behind…"

"Perhaps you were a little careless…perhaps you have become…used to the kindness shown you?"

"No!" Kim burst out. "Never, Tono-Sama…I'm not my mother!" Tono sighed, looking at Kim and Kim felt her eyes fill with tears. "Please…I'll…I'll make it right, somehow."

"Possibly…" Tono said, "You wish to show your loyalty?" Kim looked up at him, eyes shimmering.

"Anything." She breathed. Tono nodded, and looked to his side. Another one of his men was there, holding a bamboo shinai He quickly put out a small pan of reddish fluid and carefully, his hands gloved, ran a cloth up and down the bamboo, impregnating it with the fluid. Kim felt an involuntary moan of fear come into the back of her throat. She closed her eyes.

She had dissa-failed Tono. She deserved this. She deserved more. Even Yori looked…disappointed at her. She'd failed her oldest friend. She'd been weak… like mother.

Kim undid her top and pulled it off, then her bra and walked to the table, bending over it, gripping it with her hands, already pale with fear.

"I…I'm ready, Tono-sama…" Tono nodded, and his assistant, without a moment's pause or word, brought the shinai down on Kim's back with a cracking sound. Kim gasped, but more in fear than pain. There was more to come.

Tono watched, outwardly calm. How to punish Kim had been a problem—too much and she would be scarred, useless. To little and well…her training had inured her to a great deal of pain.

Fortunately, there were…ways around that. The shinai had been impregnated with a drug that had the effect of vastly enhancing feeling. In a few minutes, Kim's skin would be irritated by the mere caress of the air to say nothing of the strokes of the shinai. It would feel as if her back was being laid open, and salt rubbed in the wounds, all without a single damaging scar.

One guarded one's merchandise from unneeded harm, after all, and it would not do to break such a useful tool prematurely.

Tono let his thoughts move towards the question of what to do. The FBI was being coy about this—and evidently had one of their better agents on it. A Sheila Go. He had viewed what was known about her, her time with the team of poorly named "superheroes" and her actions since.

A rogue. Someone unwilling, or unable to play the game of politics and thus always a worker, never a leader.

But such were dangerous. The hooks that most often allowed him to gain control, such satisfactory control, were often bound up in ambition, greed… this one appeared to be where she desired to be.

Could Sheila be working with his tool? Carstairs had shown no such ability before… yet he had to know, did know the threat Tono held over him.

Yet this seemed to be calculated, if anything to raise suspicion. No. Whatever was happening now, the initial entry of the FBI was just cursed bad luck. If anything, it had been his fault—he should have either kept Kim isolated, or killed her, not used her. But she'd been so useful…

The strokes were continuing as Tono thought. Kim's anguished whimpers gave way to short, desperately stifled screams. Yori looked uncomfortable as Kim's body shuddered and arched under the blows. Her skin was approaching full sensitivity, Tono know. Should he?

No. She had failed, and would know the full price of her failure. Kim's cries began to get louder as the pain overrode her desperate attempts to control them, shame adding to her anguish.

In her room, Cindy Possible stood stone still, like an ivory statue. The ventilation shaft brought the knowledge of what was happening to her daughter to her, in the form of her echoing screams. The only sign of life was the tears slowly crawling down her face, and the blood dripping from her hands where her clenched fists had driven her fingernails deep into the skin of her palms.

Now Kim wasn't screaming any more. She was whimpering like a broken backed kitten. Her fingers were still clutching the edges of the table, now because she no longer had any real control over them. Her legs had gone out, leaving her sprawled, body twitching and shaking from reaction as the length of bamboo came down again and again, filling the room with the sound of it striking her back, a counterpoint to Kim's mewling. Even some of Tono's bodyguards looked uneasy, even ill. Tono remembered their faces. Such weakness had no place by his side.

"Enough." He said, and the beating stopped, as Kim sprawled on the floor. "Kim-san." He asked. Idlely, he wondered if Kim would be able to respond.

By what efforts, only she knew, she was.

"H…Hai…" She said, her voice rough from the screaming.

"I forgive you your failing." Kim couldn't walk, but she could crawl and she did, falling full length, once or twice, before making it to Tono, where he put his hand out and gently stroked her hair, like an owner might a dog. It covered her face in a scarlet tide, hiding her eyes from him. He pushed her back to a kneeling position and saw her face, pale and tear streaked, lips trembling as was the rest of her body. Maybe he had overdone it. She had very little control over her muscles right now.

"Tha…thank you, Tono-sama." Kim said, adoration in her pained voice. Tono smiled at that. Let her mother think about trying to talk to her. Kim was his, in life, and in all likelihood, in death, whenever that might occur. Send her away, beat her, and she would come back longing for the comfort of her collar and the prison he kept her in between missions.

"Yori…" He said.

"Hai?"

"Take her, clean her up and let her rest. I will speak to her tomorrow." When she would still be in pain at any movement, but best to speak to her while the penalties for failure, even unknowing, were still clear in her mind.

"I found it." Wade said, as the night moved towards the new day in Middleton. Ron, the Twins and Felix were staying at Ron's house. Sheila wasn't going to have more untrained individuals adding their… "help." Not if she could help it.

"What?"

"A 99.99 percent match." He said, pointing to the screen. "Cindy Patterson, registered out of Los Angeles" He paused, "paperwork is here…she's a native of Seattle Washington… same blood type…" and he said, "The picture's…"

"That's her." James said. His voice was soft, disbelieving. "That's…that's…"

"And the kid?" Wade paused, and looked at her.

"Sheila, I told you I can't…" Sheila shook her head.

"I know—Pull up every redhead from that same DMV, age 18."

"But Kim would be 17…"

"Trust me, they'd want to keep her 18 if possible—lots fewer entanglements." The screen started to fill with images of redheads. Sheila sighed, "Limit it for… 5'2-5'8 and no more than 130 pounds." She paused, "If we don't get lucky, we can open it up a bit more…"

"There she is." James said. Wade paused the flashing screen and looked, more than a little suspicious.

I am as well… a husband finding his wife isn't dead, and that his daughter isn't… She looked at the image of a girl, long red hair, looking at the camera, typical lousy picture… Sheila looked closer. There was something about her eyes…something cold and reptilian, even in the poor photograph.

"It is her…it's Kimmiecub…Nana…." Ann looked at the photo.

"It might be, James…"

"Address?" Wade paused,

"Different from Cindy Pa… I mean Possible."

"How much different…."

"Four blocks."

"It's her." Sheila said, all uncertainty vanishing. "They're staying in the same place or close together, but the ID is close enough so if someone stops them they don't raise red flags…oh, sneaky, sneaky bastards."

"Are you certain?" Tom asked, "It could be a coincidence."

"Could be, isn't. My hunch is that we've got our people…and my hunches are never wrong." She paused, "Well, except for that, and fortunately we hadn't filed for the marriage license."

"General Geometry." Sheila continued, "I want a complete readout on any organized crime activity in that area. Don't talk to anyone else yet, I want to let them know what I know when I drop in at the Federal building." She paused, "And use your computer fu—I want a flight for me at Middleton when I get there."

"What if there isn't a scheduled flight…"

"Then rent me a jet." Sheila said, over her shoulder as she turned…

And came face to face with Ann, James and Sarah.

"What are your intentions?" James asked.

"She's my granddaughter, and daughter in law." Sheila paused, and sighed.

"I don't know." She looked at them. "I will do my best, my absolute best to get them out." She held James' gaze. "But I won't lie to you. This could go bad. I give you my word I'll do my best. I won't give you my word nothing will go wrong…because I can't control that."

"And afterwards?" Ann paused, "Kimberly is evidently an assassin. What will you do with her?"

"I don't even know if she's competent to stand trial." Sheila said. "But no, I 'm not going to tell you I'll help her get off." She looked down at her feet. "You remember a sweet five year old. I don't know how much of that is left. You don't know how much is left. Until we know that…"

"I understand." Ann said. "Thank you for being honest." Then she paused, "And the others?" Abruptly, Sheila's smile was like something you would find on a deep sea shark.

"The others? I guarantee you they are dogmeat." The she turned, "Get that flight, Wade."
"It's time to go hunting."

We will have no truce or parley with you, or the grisly gang who work your wicked will. You do your worst - and we will do our best. Perhaps it may be our turn soon; perhaps it may be our turn now.

Winston Churchill.

TBC.