"Tessa?" A voice responded, in the darkness. She choked back a sob, relief flooding through her like novocaine.

"It's me. I'm here," she said, hobbling slightly as she walked blindly further into the dark. "Where are you?"

"Tessa," the voice said again, that familiar voice. But she had never heard it sound like this, not even when she ran out onto the street when she was seven and was almost run over by a carriage. The fear in it cut her like the scalpel. "You shouldn't be here. How did they find you? Are you hurt?"

"It's okay, dad, I'm okay. I'm not hurt," she said, as the pain in her thumb shot all the way up through her arm. She followed the sound of his voice through the dark, her eyes adjusting slightly, slowly. There was something on the wall with a different texture, something that gleamed ever so slightly. Chains. She moved closer to them, almost blind, feeling her way, her good hand tracing the rough stone of the wall. She could make out the shape of her father's head, just barely. She thought his hands might be chained up above it. She crouched down, reached out, tried to find his face with her hands.

"My Tessie," he said, and his voice, always composed, was shaking. "I never could have guessed there would come a time I wasn't glad to see you."

Tessa half laughed, half sobbed.

"Hi, papa," she said, hiccuping a little. His beard was scratchy under her fingers. "I missed you."

"Johnny, I need you to do something for me."

Johnny Dogs must have known Tommy's expressions well enough to not ask questions. Charlie Strong's yard was drenched in rain, flowing in rivlets into the canal. The fires of the factories still burned, off in the distance, but the smoke was smothered by the downpour.

"What is it ya need me ta do, Tommy?"

"I need you to blow up a car," he said, slinging on his holster, stowing his pistol, checking the chamber of another, standing by a rain splattered vehicle. The brim of his hat was no longer doing any good keeping the water out of his eyes, so he grabbed it off his head, threw it onto the ground without sparing it a second glance.

"Which car, Tom?"

"That one," he said, gesturing without looking. He slid the other pistol behind the back of his belt.

Johnny's eyes were wide. "When?"

"Right now," Tommy told him, sliding into the front seat of a car the color of fire. "There's a kit in the back. And a machine gun."

Johnny did not ask what the machine gun was for, looking like he would rather not know. "Who else is with us, Tommy?"

"Just me and you, Dogs," Tommy said, and he turned the ignition.

Tessa was yanking on the chains, the noise clattering, echoing off the walls of the small room.

"It's no use, my dear. They're bolted to the wall. You need to get out of here," her father pleaded, and she could see the outline of his face now, the line of his nose. "Go, while you still can!"

"I'm not leaving you," she said, trying to pry the lock with the blade of her tiny knife.

"Damn your mother for giving you her stubbornness," Leonard said, leaning his head back against the wall in a familiar display of exasperation over his daughter. "This is not a game, Tessa, there are men upstairs who will kill you. I'm surprised they haven't arrived already."

Tessa thought about Ada stomping in a man's skull with her high heel. "I'm not playing games today. I'm going to get you out."

"Tessie! We can't get out. They have men at every entrance. We'll be shot on sight."

"Then we had better not be seen," she said, and the scalpel slipped and cut her wrist. "Fuck," she said, forgetting to monitor her language in her father's presence, although, given the circumstances, she felt it was more than warrented.

"Someone's coming," her father whispered, and she hadn't heard the footsteps over her curse. A light appeared across the room, past the open door. Tessa stood, moved as quickly and as quietly as she could to the other side of the darkened cell, scalpel in her hands and back pressed against the damp wall.

Angry, raised German voices grew nearer.

"I'll check the prisoner. Go look upstairs."

"Arnholt said to wait outside, to not enter within the hour, no exceptions-," Tessa heard Beck's quavering voice respond.

"Did you hear what I was hearing? Something is fucking wrong. Go check the prisoner or I'll put a bullet in your head," said the other voice, and she realized with a sudden rush of terror that she recognized it too. Romanoff. From Ignatius Hospital. He was coming closer.

"What are you doing, old man? Don't you know we have your daughter? Not a good time to get brave," he was saying, his footsteps thudding. Leonard glanced at Tessa, his lips moving soundlessly. She shook her head, imploring him. Don't look at me. Don't let him know I'm here. Romanoff was carrying a gas lamp, its swinging light illuminating the basement past the broken door to the cell.

"What the fuck did you do to this door?" Romanoff asked, before she could even see his face, his blonde hair appearing only a few feet in front of her, but he was faced away, looking at her father. He hadn't seen her.

"Who else is here, you English fuck? Where are they?" He crouched down and grabbed Leonard by the lapels, nearly lifting him off the floor, the lamp forgotten behind him, just out of the doorway, just far enough away that Tessa was still in shadow.

Leonard didn't respond, his mouth firmly closed, his eyes fixed on a spot past Romanoff's shoulder. Romanoff slapped him.

"I asked you a question," he said, roughly, and when her father did not respond, he reached into his coat and pulled out his gun. "You know, your little girl took my gun off me. Stole it from under my nose. I'll kill her for that, after I've had my fun with her. The only reason I haven't killed you yet is because of Arnholt's orders. But I don't see him here, do you?" He sneered into her father's face, his teeth bared like a dog. "So if I would you, I would fucking answer. You have five seconds, or I blow your brains against this wall, orders or no."

Her father closed his eyes. Romanoff started to count.

"Five."

"Four."

"Three."

"Two."

Tessa moved behind him, completely silent, somehow, completely steady, somehow, like she wasn't in control of her own body, and in one motion, slid her scalpel across his throat.

Romanoff gasped, spluttered, sprayed blood across her father's face, slapped a hand to the gushing wound on his neck. He was raising his gun. Tessa watched him do it, immobile, frozen. In the basement of an old farmhouse, somewhere outside of nowhere, a shot rang out.