I'm back! Sorry I haven't been updating, I want to try finish this before the season 2 premiere.
Special thanks to Thunderblink4er!
Now on with the story!
Chapter 14 OutfoXed
The following morning Clarice wakes up with an arm wrapped around her. She smiles knowing that it's John. She was so shocked that he had chosen to come to her, Clarice thought all he cared about was Sonia and the Underground, but not her. Well, last night made something's clearer.
1) John still cares for her (but how much)? Clarice still wasn't sure.
2) She's not running from her problems anymore. No, she's here to stay and fight.
Clarice slowly moves his arm off her so she can sit up. She nearly steps on Zingo in the process, she looks over her shoulder to see if John is still sleeping she lets out a sigh of relief. Then her eyes widen as she feels his arm wrap around her stomach. John sits up as well with a smile on his face.
"Good morning." He says his voice is a bit gruff, but water will fix that. "Hey." She reply's back. "You weren't planning on walking out of here without me, were you?" He asks. "Yeah, I actually was." She removes his arm from her stomach and gets up. "I missed your snarky remarks." John says as he, too gets up. "I'm sure you did. Now if you will leave so I can go take a shower. I'll meet you in mess." John nods. "I'll be waiting." He says then kisses her on the cheek before leaving.
Clarice stands stunned for a few seconds before a small smile appears. With a roll of her green eyes she grabs her clothes and towel heading out of her room and too the showers. Zingo follows and stands watch as she cleans herself up thought the water isn't super-hot she doesn't mind just as long as she clean. After that's finished she dries off and puts her clothes on for the day. She brushes out the few tangles in her purple hair then sets off to the mess.
She then realizes that she beat John there shaking her head she grabs some fruit, a small bowl of oatmeal and coffee. After a few minutes John comes in with Lauren and Andy in tow he mods to the Strucker kids. Clarice waves as the sibling as they pass by. John takes a seat in front of her. She looks at him as he eats she notices that his hair is slightly still damp from his shower, fine to her he looks good.
"How are after what happen?" John stops eating. "Pulse, was my brother. I sound have gone back to look for him all those years ago. What happened to him, being turned into one the Hounds. I'm not fine with it." Clarice nods and takes a sip of her coffee. "Well, at least your being honest with me for once." John raises a playful brow. "And I haven't been before?" Clarice shakes her head. "Nope." John chuckles. Clarice then notices that he's focused. "What's wrong?" John gets up as does she. "Lorna, Marcos and Sonia are trying to calm Esme down." They put their dirty dishes in the sink and head downstairs to the vault together.
They find Sage and Sonia near the couch one is sitting the other is standing. Marcos sits on a desk while Lorna leans against the vault door they come in at the tail end of Esme's rant.
"We need to go after the Trask lab now. We have to rescue those people-"
She's cut off. "Have to? You're pretty new here to be telling people what they have to do." Lorna says as she walks passed the blonde and to Marcos.
"You don't get it! My family is in there. They're running out of time." Esme says as she walks over to Lorna.
"Okay, well, slow down." Marcos says as he puts a hand up to stop her from getting any closer.
"You got all that information from the woman they sent after us?" John asks.
"Yes. I mean, her mind was hard to read. Confused. But I got enough. The mutants in that lab, they were desperate. I-I could hear the screams. I could see the bodies. I could feel the agony when they turned that woman into that thing. And it's all happening in that building." Esme says.
"We know where this place is?" Clarice asks.
"I'm assembling a site map now." Sage says with a nod.
"So, why are we standing here?" Esme asks frustrated.
"Did you get anything on their security?" Sonia asks calmly.
Esme shakes her head. "No. It Her mind was too cloudy, but what does it matter? We are the last hope those prisoners have." She turns to John and walks closer. "You saw what they did to your friend. We sit on our hands, and that happens to more people."
"No one is sitting on their hands." Marcos says and stands up. "Now, we will make a move on that lab, but if we go in blind we die."
John nods and leaves the room Clarice goes to follow him, but is stopped by Lorna.
"Give him a minute." She says.
Clarice nods and looks at Esme. "Way to make a guy feel like crap." Esme opens her mouth then closes it. Clarice rolls her eyes and walks away.
As she walks up the stairs she sees Sonia go in the direction that John had gone in. She shakes her head and goes to the mess to get some water.
John stands in his office with his palms resting on the table. He knows who it is before she speaks. "Johnny, are you alright?" Sonia asks. He sighs. "How can I be "all right"? Maybe Esme has a point." He says as he turns around and sits on his desk. "But she's just a scared kid, who has no idea what she's talking about." Sonia says as she gets closer. "She was right about one thing. Pulse. I left him behind and they took him to that lab." Sonia shakes her head.
"That's not on you, Johnny. And continuing to blame yourself is not doing anybody any good. Besides, d-don't you think it's strange that she knew about Pulse? I mean, she just got here." John shrugs. "She's a telepath, Sonya. Maybe she picked it up off of me. It doesn't change the fact that I gave up on my friend and they turned him into a monster. I'll be damned if I'm gonna let that happen to anybody else." With that John gets up and moves around Sonia to the door. But his too emotional to notice Esme who had been watching them this whole time.
A few hours later Sage calls them all back. "I've been looking into the Trask lab. This place is out in the middle of nowhere. There is no information on it. But there is this." She types on her keypad and a picture shows up.
"A bar? What good does that do us?" John asks his arms crossed.
"I cross-referenced credit card activity with places near the lab, and this place is popular with Trask employees." Sage says.
"I could go in. Pull some information out of a guard or an operations person." Dreamer says as she leans against a bar. John nods.
"That's a good idea. I'll go for protection." Marcos says.
"No, I will." Lorna says as she steps out from behind Marcos.
"Are you sure, babe? I mean, you haven't really been sleeping well." Marcos says.
Lorna nods to him. "I'm okay." She walks over to Sonia. "Marcos, if you want to get information from a guy at a bar, you don't send a girl and another guy. We'll be fine." She smiles and so does Sonia. Marcos finally gives in with a nod.
Sonia and Lorna leave after a couple hours heading to the bar. John has been in his office the whole time after they left. He was going over the landscape of the area. Once Lorna and Sonia get back it's nightfall and they decide to go over the plan in the morning. John stays up in his office with the new information that they gave him trying to figure out how to take out the Trask Lab and save the mutants without having any difficulty. He was so focused he didn't even hear her come in.
"You're doing it again." He looks up to see Clarice leaning against the doorframe. "Doing what?" He asks putting his pen down. "You know, when your so focused at the task at hand you forget what time it is." Clarice says as she takes a seat in the chair in front of him. John looks at his watch it's nearly 4a.m. "I'm not always like this." Clarice stands up and shakes her head. "Yeah, keep telling yourself that." John stands up too. "Why aren't you asleep?" He asks as he rounds the desk. "Zingo needed to go out. I saw your lights still own I thought you fell asleep in here." Clarice says with a simple shrug.
"Right, well let's go." John says as he moves pass her and out the door. "Hold on, you're not sleeping in my space." John stops and turns around. "Why not?" Clarice turns the light out in his office and walks over to him. "Because, now is not the time. I would distract you from getting your plan in order. Plus, I could to without having Sonia glaring at me all the time." John shakes his head. "Alright. Well goodnight Clarice." He heads off to his room. "I think you mean good morning fearless." With that she walks downstairs and settles in her space and goes back to sleep.
That morning...
Everyone, but the Strucker family meets upstairs in the 'lounge area.'
"Sonia and I have been going through the memories she got from that guard and it does not look good." Marcos says.
"What are we up against?" John asks as he walks over by the chair that Sonia is sitting in.
"Well, the lab is hardened against mutant attack. They have motion and infrared sensors connected to heavy-caliber guns that are mounted all over their building." Sonia says.
"Guns? I can handle guns." Lorna says from her spot on the table.
"I know, but it is way too dangerous when there's this many, at this range." Marcos says. Lorna rolls her eyes, but she knows he's right.
"Clarice, can you get us past their defenses?" John asks.
She shakes her head. "No. It's too far. I don't know the first thing about the inside of that place." John nods Clarice continues, "I could blink us into the middle of a concrete wall."
"Well, there has to be something." Esme says her arms crossed. Clarice goes to sit on the arm of the chair Sonia sits in.
"I did find one vulnerability. There is a power substation a few miles away. If we took it out, we could get into the lab before their systems came back on line." Sage says.
"So, what are we waiting for?" Esme asks.
"We don't have enough heavy hitters to attack both places at once. And we're checking with the other stations now." Marcos says.
"Well, how long is that gonna take, because my family-" Esme's anxious comment is cut off.
"Esme." John says.
"Listen I understand." Marcos says.
"Esme. Believe me. This means as much to me as it does to you. But we are gonna get one shot at this. We can't miss." John says. Esme thinks about it for a second, then she looks back at Marcos who nods. Then back a John her face serious then she walks away.
A few hours later everyone including the Struckers meet downstairs across from the monitor room.
"We need you to do the same thing to the substation transformers that you did to the prison convoy bus. We know it's a lot to ask, but now we just don't see another way." Marcos says.
"Look, we want to help, but why does it need to be Lauren and Andy?" Reed asks as he gestures to his kids.
Marcos shrugs, "Well, because we need everyone else with combat powers to assault the lab. Now, we think that we can take down that power substation without putting them at any risk."
"So, exploding high voltage transformers is the safe job?" Caitlin says from her spot on the couch.
"In this case, yes." Lorna says from her chair.
"Sage hacked the security cameras. The station only has a handful of guards. Clarice will get everyone in. Sonia will guide them." Marcos says while Clarice and Sonia nod to one another.
"We've been through every option. This is the only one that works." John says.
"I'm down." Andy says from his couch seat.
"Let's do it." Lauren says.
Caitlin nods looking at her husband.
"Okay. But Caitlin and I need to be the ones monitoring the security." Reed says.
"If our kids are there, we are, too." Caitlin says.
Lorna nods. "Look, Sage will set you up, show you what to do." They nod.
"All right, everybody get ready. We move out in an hour." John says. Everyone moves to go do what they need to before heading out. No one noticed the satisfied look on Esme's face as they left.
Clarice goes back to her space to find Zingo on her bed with her toy. "Well, you made yourself look comfortable." she sits on her bed with her. She brushes her hair out a bit then gets up to grab the ring from her small table. She slips it on then back off. There and knock at her doorframe. She looks to see John.
"Hey." She says. He walks in and gives her a set of keys. "So, these are for the van you'll be driving to the station." Clarice nods and puts the keys in her pocket. "Are you okay?" She asks. "Yeah, I just." He trails off then glances at the ring in her hand. "Here." She hands it to him. "Why are you giving me this?" He asks taking the ring. "Well I don't want to lose it and I think you can keep it safe until I get back." Clarice says with a smile. John nods putting it in his pants pocket. Then he hugs her. "Hey, I'll be back. We all will." Clarice says. "I know." John says as he releases her slowly. Clarice with her arms still wrapped around his neck gives him a kiss on the cheek. "I gotta go. We'll see each other later." She releases him giving Zingo a gentle rub before she heads out. John sighs and then he feels Zingo nudge his leg. "I know she will be fine." He pats her on the head then heads out too.
He meets up Marcos, Lorna and Esme upstairs. Having put everything that they needed in the cars they head out Esme rides with John while Lorna and Marcos ride in the other. Once they reach the spot they park and get out.
"All right, this is it. Gate's up there." Marcos says as he hands John another bag before sling one over his shoulder.
"We'll go check it out, see what we're dealing with." John says.
"Sounds good. We'll get the party favors." Lorna says.
John and Marcos head out and up the small hill they set their bags down.
"That is a long stroll from the fence to the building." Marcos says. "Well, we knew it wouldn't be easy." John says. "Yeah. Says the bulletproof guy." Marcos says as he pulls out a tiny pair of binoculars. "This would have been so much easier if we had Pulse with us." John says. "Yeah." Marcos agrees. "He could've taken out every automated gun in that place." John continues. "Course, we'd be hearing tales of his awesomeness for months." Marcos says as he turns around and sits next to John. "Yeah. I miss him." John says as he looks at the ground. "Yeah, me, too. But John, you weren't the only person that left him there that night. That's on all of us, not just you. And today, we get to make it up to him." Marcos says and John nods. Then his phone goes off he opens it and answers. "Were in place."
Meanwhile a few miles away from the power substation...
"Copy that. We're en route. We're almost at the power substation. Okay, be safe out there." Reed hangs up.
"What we're doing here, it's a parent's worst nightmare." Caitlin says.
"We can handle-" Andy is cut off.
"Andy, we know. We know you can. We're doing this because we trust you." Caitlin says.
"Hey, Struckers, heads up. We're here." Clarice says as she hits the breaks. Then she moves toward the back of the van. Reed dials Sage.
"Yeah." Sage says. "We're ready." Reed says. "Okay. Bypassing firewall. And you should have picture in three, two, one." Sage says and the laptop screen show the inside. "Okay. It's working." Reed says. "I looped the camera feeds so security won't see our team. But they'll notice eventually, so be quick." Sage says then the call ends.
"Okay, guys. I'm gonna need some room here, kid." Clarice says as she starts to open up a portal.
"Uh, yeah." Andy says and moves out of her way. "Bye Mom."
"Okay." Caitlin nods.
"We got this." Lauren says.
"Um, guys? It's a little trickier than holding an elevator. Can we hurry this up please?" The Struckers look over at Clarice to see that she's trying to keep the portal open for as long as she can. Andy goes through first, then Lauren, and Sonia. Clarice closes the portal. Following Sonia, they open a gate and get inside.
"Hey. Can you hear me okay? We made it inside." Sonia says into the earpiece.
"We can hear you just fine." Caitlin says.
"All right, we're going in." Sonia says. And the four walk down the hall.
"Hold on. There are some workers in the hallway in front of you." Reed says.
Sonia and the rest stop and wait. Clarice faces away from the door.
"Okay Okay, you're clear." Caitlin says.
Sonia opens the door and they wait Sonia looks left and then right.
"Sure, you know where you're going?" Lauren asks.
"Um, pretty sure. The guard I borrowed the memory from had only been here a few times, so it's a little hazy." Then she turns to the left.
"The transformer we need to take out is in the middle of the building." Clarice says as they conitue to walk.
"So why didn't you just portal us there?" Andy asks.
"Hold up, there's a conference room on your right." Caitlin says.
They stop.
"Can you make a portal through a hundred walls into a room you've never seen before and land safely next to a high-voltage transformer?" Clarice asks.
"Okay your clear." Caitlin says. They move.
"No." Andy says.
"Yeah. Neither can I." Clarice says.
"Incoming, door to your left." Reed says.
They stop and just as Reed said a guard comes through the door.
"What are you doing here?" The guard asks. "Oh, did they not call? From the front desk?" Sonia asks. "No, I didn't get a call. Hang on just a sec." The guard says as he reaches for his walkie. "Come on you remember me." Sonia says then she breathes pink smoke in his face. "Or maybe you don't remember." Sonia says the guard looks at her then at Clarice and the Strucker kids.
He pulls out his gun and takes his walkie off his shoulder and walks close to them. Lauren looks ready to make a shield. But they have nothing to worry about the guard places both in the trashcan and walks way.
"Nice job Sonia." Reed says and they continue on their way.
Meanwhile outside of the Trask lab...
"All right, remember, once the Struckers take down the transformer at the power station, we only have three minutes to get the charges up by the automated guns and get inside of Trask." John says as they finish up.
"Don't forget about the part where if we're off by a few seconds, we all get slaughtered." Marcos says without thinking. "Marcos, not helpful." Lorna says. "I'm sorry, it's just, look, once we get in there, we don't know what we're doing or where we're going." Marcos says. "Well, that's why she's here." Lorna says as she gestures to Esme.
"First, we free the prisoners. Then we destroy the mainframes and the research." Esme says.
"Yeah, right. So, these prisoners how do you know they're gonna help us?" Marcos asks.
"Believe me, they'll help." Esme says.
Back at the power station...
"Okay, uh, the next few hallways seem clear." Reed says.
"Got it. Thanks." Dreamer says. They continue on and have no problem with employees or other staff until...
"Sonia, get out of there. Get out of there now!" Caitlin yells. "Get out of there!"
"Wait, I don't understand. What's going on?" Sonia asks and they all stop.
"Reed. Look!" Caitlin says.
"There is a Sentinel robot and arms teams in the building! Get out of there now!" Reed says.
"We got to go. Now." Sonia says. "What the hell is going on?" Clarice asks. "What about the power transformer?" Clarice asks as they run. "There's no time! Clarice, you gotta get us out." Sonia says. "I don't even know where we are in this building. I don't know which direction. The-the, there's too many hallways, I don't know." Clarice says as she trys to make a portal turning every which way to find a good direction.
"Hurry please!" Lauren says.
"I-I-I know, I'm trying. Okay. Okay, I got it!" Clarice says as she gets the portal opened half way.
"Guys! Guys! Hey, guys, guys!" Andy says and points to the Sentinel spider robot that just appeared.
"Andy!" Lauren says.
"Uh, yeah, m-move, move. Move!" Andy says and then taps into his TK and tries to shatter the robot, but he misses and rips open some piping. Clarice tries to make another portal, but there's no time.
"Run!" She says. They do but Clarice gets hit in the back by the spider. She falls to the ground it towers over her.
"Clarice! No!" Sonia says and starts to come back.
"Go! Go!" Clarice says and the trio run leaving her behind. It's not long before the Sentinel Agents come in a place a collar around her neck. Then take her to the van. Sorry John. She thinks as the doors close behind her. She only hopes that Sonia and the Struckers made it out. Not long after the van doors open and in come the Strucker kids and Sonia. This did not go like they planned.
Meanwhile at the Trask Lab...
Sirens were wailing and more agents were gathering around the lab.
"Hijo de perra. What happened? Did somebody see us?" Marcos asks. John listens to what the few agents are saying.
"We're on full lockdown!"
"Mutants tried to hit the power station."
"Sentinel Services caught 'em, said we might be next."
"No, they're not coming for us. We got to go. Operation's blown. Come on!" John says as they start to move. "What? What? No. No, we-we can't go, we have to get in there!" Esme says. "That's it. They have our team at the substation." John says as he comes back. "No, I'm not leaving!" Esme says. Marcos comes back to grab the bag. "Were going!" John says as he firmly, but gently grabs her arm. "Come on, it's over!" He starts pulling. "No! No, please, my family! Don't make me leave them behind!" Esme exclaims. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Come on." John says then he picks her up and carries her away. "NO! NO!" Esme screams as John takes her away once they reach the cars John quickly places Esme in the passenger seat the jumps in the drivers and they race back to Headquarters.
So, as always let me know what you thought about it. I also want to know who's side you would fight on; The Mutant Underground? Or the Inner Circle? Also how do you think John is going to react once he finds out that Clarice is not back at HQ? Until next time...