Back at The Pit, a distraught Fred Dukes was in the weight room under the supervision of Sergeant Slaughter and General Hawk, trying to work off his frustration.
All things considered, it could be going worse.
"I can't believe it!" Fred raged, red in face. "They took Lina! THE HELLIONS TOOK LINA!" Roaring, Fred picked up the nearest thing he could grab and hurled it against the wall.
Of course, it could be going a whole lot better too.
Unfortunately what Fred threw was a barbell and it smashed through the wall of the men's shower.
"Oh for crying out loud!" Lifeline shouted as he tried to cover himself up. "And we just got the water running again!"
"This is getting ridiculous!" Alpine agreed as he and about a dozen other men ran off in search of a towel or pants while being ogled by the base's women.
"Blob! I know you're upset but you've got to calm down!" Hawk told him, eyeing the remaining barbells uneasily. "You can't tear apart The Pit whenever you feel upset!"
"Yeah, do it to Cobra's bases!" Slaughter agreed. Hawk glared at him. That was not the message he was trying to get across.
"We're doing everything we can to get Lina back." Hawk assured Fred. "Trinity is interrogating the prisoner now. Hopefully he can either lead us to the Hellion's base or we can trade him for Lina."
"Gimme five minutes alone with him and I'll find out where Lina is!" Fred growled.
"We'll leave that as Plan B for now." Hawk said diplomatically. "I'm going to go see how it's going. If there's any news, you'll be the first person I contact, okay?" Fred nodded numbly. "Good. Try to stay calm." General Hawk said before leaving.
With some trepidation, Hawk made his way over to the triplets' room in Misfit Manor, where the prisoner was being held. Hawk poked his head inside. The triplets, in their lab coats, had tied the prisoner down and from the look of it had been going through their standard tactics: lipstick, hair-curlers, electro-shock…the usual.
"Any information?" Hawk asked as he stepped inside. The girls shook their heads.
"Nothing useful." Quinn replied. "Unless you want to know how to curse in Irish Gaelic."
"We're taking notes for dad." Daria said.
"We're helping him expand his horizons." Brittany chimed in.
"Nothing about Lina?" Hawk asked. The three girls shook their heads.
"Damn." Hawk sighed. "We'll have to risk using our deep cover agents in Cobra and the Hellfire Club to see if they know anything. In the meantime, keep working on the prisoner. Nothing unethical. Just unpleasant enough to get him to cooperate." The girls nodded.
"He's stubborn." Quinn admitted. "It's like he barely knows were he is!"
She wasn't far wrong. Phelan's clones had the ability to 'withdraw' themselves from the outside world until they were practically comatose so they could 'commune' with his fellow selves. His clones, by the same token, could do that to the original. Phelan had put himself—so to speak—in a state where he could stay in close contact with his clones and relay information to and from them.
Vladimir had ordered Phelan's clone back at the Hellion's base to have the original Phelan say nothing of value…until he told him to anyway.
The Misfits didn't realize it, but they had given their enemy the perfect spy into their home, right in plain sight.