"Holly?"

"Yes, Mayor?" She looked up at him, leaning out the door of his office. He looked a bit shaken and confused, with a sheet of paper in his hand.

"Why did you badge into the building on Shatter Day?"

A cold chill ran down her spine, and she hoped that it didn't show. Fuck. He knows. He found out about the recording. Bluff. "Did I?"

"The security log says you did, about 6:30pm."

"Oh, right. I forgot the certificates for the award ceremony in my desk. So I stopped in to get them before the banquet."

"Oh." He looked slightly relieved. "Did you see anyone here, or hear anything?"

"It sounded like you were talking to somebody in there, but I didn't catch any details. I was in a bit of a hurry, so I just grabbed the certificates and left."

"Did you see anyone else? Outside the office? Did anyone tailgate in the door behind you?"

"No, I don't think so, but I was kind of preoccupied."

"Thanks, Holly."

"No problem, Mayor."

He went back inside his office, closing the door firmly, and she exhaled slowly.

Ferb rolled his suitcase in to the hotel suite, closing the door behind him. He'd let Vanessa know as soon as he'd landed, and she'd said she'd meet him here shortly. He was looking forward to it quite a bit, since he hadn't been able to get back east for 6 weeks, since Valentine's Day.

"Hey there," Vanessa's voice came from the bedroom. An eyebrow raised, he leaned in through the open door.

Vanessa lay in the bed, the sheets pulled up to her armpits. Above the sheets, her shoulders were bare, and her long brown hair spread out across the pillow. She leaned up on her elbows, making the sheet slip down a bit but not enough to reveal anything.

"Hi," Ferb said. "I wasn't expecting you quite so soon."

"I missed you," she said. "So I got Sergeant Calhoun to let me in."

Ferb loosened his tie, pulling it free of his shirt. "I missed you too," he said as he unbuttoned his shirt. "Mind if I join you?"

"I'm rather looking forward to it," she said.

"General?" Higgs said, leaning in through the open door.

"Yes?" Archer said, looking up at her.

"You wanted to know if multiple targets were away at the same time. Romeo One and Tango One are both in Toronto."

He sat up. "Really. Where?"

"Tango One is in his apartment. Romeo One is in the Royal York Hotel with Ms. Doofenshmirtz."

"Hm. What's the security on each of them?"

"No security on Tango One. Romeo One has a four-man military police squad protecting him."

General Archer smiled. "Okay. Prep snatch teams, then." Finally, the first thing that's gone my way in months.

His Council-issued phone buzzed in his pocket. "I need to take a call, Higgs. Close the door, please?"

She nodded and left, closing the door behind her.

"Acid Test," he said into it.

"Jumping Jack. I think I know who our leak is. I'm going in to look for more evidence."

And that's the second.

Holly packed her work for the day up. Quitting time, finally. The Mayor had stepped out an hour earlier on a personal matter, so she didn't have any reason to stay late tonight.

She was halfway to the elevator when the door opened with a *ding*, and Mayor Abercrombie stepped out, accompanied by a young man wearing lieutenant's bars. She recognized him - Lieutenant Rockwell was the Mayor's escort whenever he needed to work with the military.

"Holly...why'd you do it?" the mayor asked, a pained look on his face.

"Do what?" She looked around, as surreptitiously as she could. The staircase down was about five steps in front of her, while the mayor and the lieutenant were about three times that far beyond it. The other offices nearby could only trap her in place.

"You know what I mean, Holly. We checked the security footage. You were in the office for twenty minutes. You weren't just grabbing the certificates and heading out, were you?"

"I had to look for them," she said nervously.

"We searched your apartment and found this," he said, holding up her burner phone. "The recording is on the card." He sighed. "Why, Holly?"

Here goes nothing, she thought as she leapt forward, running for the staircase. The soldier pulled out a futuristic gun that looked like something from a TV show, and fired. The shot hit her in the chest, and she felt the world fade away as she slid to the floor.

"That went well," Ferb said as he walked out of the DRDC building with Vanessa and Doctor Tjinder.

"Yes, it did," Vanessa said. She was coolly professional here, just a glint in her eyes to hint of their deeper relationship.

Director Blanchard had agreed to their plan for the next level of Obelisk testing, and had updated Ferb on the tumbler shields being deployed to major Canadian cities and military bases. After a long, fruitful discussion, he'd sent them off with congratulations on a job well done.

They reached the cars waiting for them. Vanessa had to go back to the office for the afternoon, while Doctor Tjinder was going to visit his parents and Ferb had some shopping in mind. He'd love to get Vanessa something nice, and hadn't had much opportunity in Suffield. For some reason, he didn't think the exchange would have what he was looking for.

"I'll see you for dinner?" Vanessa said.

"Indeed," Ferb said.

She smiled and gave him a quick kiss before trotting over to her little sports car, sitting in the visitor parking nearby. Doc headed over to his own utilitarian sedan, a silver Honda Accord. Ferb wistfully thought of his Shelby Cobra, left behind in the underground parking garage at Fletcher-Flynn when he fled the country. Shaking his head, he climbed into the SUV that was waiting for him, driven by Sergeant Calhoun with the rest of his men riding along.

"Where to, Mr. Fletcher?" Sergeant Calhoun asked.

"Is there somewhere around the hotel where I could do a bit of shopping?"

"Eaton Centre's near there. What are you looking for?"

"Something for Ms. Doofenshmirtz."

"Might want Bloor-Yorkville, it's a bit fancier," Corporal Newsome said from the back seat.

"Oh, that sounds good. Let's head there," Ferb said.

The sergeant drove skillfully through the early-afternoon traffic before ruthlessly using his military credentials to get them a preferred parking space. The security team flanked Ferb as he wandered the shops. He felt uninspired by what he saw, unsure what would be a good gift. Jewelry seemed like a cop-out, lingerie was a bit too much a present for himself, and he wasn't sure enough of her size to get her other clothing. She had enough money that there weren't many things she would want but couldn't get herself if she wanted to.

He was pondering this when Corporal Newsome quietly said, "We're being followed."

Ferb hadn't noticed them, and managed to keep himself from looking around to see them.

"I see them," Sergeant Calhoun said. "Requesting backup. Mr. Fletcher, we should go somewhere safer."

"The hotel?"

"That would be appreciated, yes," the sergeant said. He spoke briefly into his headset as they marched back to the parking space. "Wait here while we check the vehicle, please," he said, standing next to Ferb as the rest of the team looked inside and underneath the SUV.

"Clear," Corporal Newsome said, and they bundled Ferb into the truck and started back toward the hotel.

"Another squad will meet us there," Calhoun said, "and a third is tracking the folks following us."

"Sorry to cause trouble," Ferb said.

Sergeant Calhoun grinned. "You're not causing trouble. Bunch of Americans are. And we'll end it."

They reached the hotel, where Corporal Newsome led Ferb and the other two bodyguards back toward the elevator while Sergeant Calhoun parked the SUV. "Hold here, please," the corporal said.

A moment later, Sergeant Calhoun came walking back toward them, his eyes scanning the area constantly. "No sign we were followed. Delta Squad is already up checking the rooms."

They entered the elevator and rode up to the 15th floor. The hallway had two uniformed MPs standing guard by the door to Ferb's room. "Room is clear, sir," one of them said.

Sergeant Calhoun walked toward them, suspicious. "I don't recognize you, soldier. Where's Delta Squad?"

Ferb looked, and noticed that instead of the standard sidearm, they had DIMMERs holstered at their sides. "They're Americans," he said.

Before he could say it was a trap, both soldiers at the door drew their DIMMERs and fired, knocking out Sergeant Calhoun and another bodyguard. A door behind them popped open a moment later, and a third soldier leaned out, adding his fire to the mix. Ferb felt a shock in the middle of his back, and an instant later, his world blacked out.

Phineas was cuddling with Isabella on the couch, taking a well-earned day off and watching the Danville Dolphins lose the first game of the baseball season, when his phone rang. She leaned up, annoyance on her face, as he answered it.

"Hey, Vanessa," he said, recognizing the number on it.

"Phineas?" She sounded distressed. "Have you heard from Ferb? He was supposed to meet me for dinner tonight, but he's not answering his phone."

"No, I haven't. That's unlike him. Maybe it broke?"

"I suppose. He'd probably call to tell me, though."

"Call the hotel, see if he's there?"

"That's a good idea, thanks."

"Let me know what you hear, okay?"

"Will do." The line went dead.

"What's up?" Isabella asked.

"Vanessa can't get a hold of Ferb."

"Weird. That's not like him."

"That's what I said!"

Shaking her head, she lay her head back on his chest to watch the game.

He couldn't concentrate on it. He resisted the urge to call Vanessa back, certain she was doing everything she could to find Ferb.

His phone rang again, and he answered it before the first ring was finished. "What happened?"

"The hotel says he went upstairs hours ago and hasn't left. There's no answer from his room phone, the room phone for his bodyguards, or from knocking on either door."

"What? That's..."

"That's bad. I'm going to check with the military next, and see if they can get in contact with his bodyguards."

"Thanks, Vanessa." The line went dead again.

"So?" Isabella asked.

"He's not in his hotel room, as far as they can tell."

They sat for a few more minutes, Phineas glancing at the phone, not even pretending to watch the baseball game. Finally, it rang again; he answered and put it on speaker.

"So?" he asked.

"He's gone." Vanessa sounded near tears. "His bodyguards called in to report that they were being followed, so they took him back to the room. But it was a set-up, and the Americans had already knocked out the guards who had been called in as backup, and then knocked out his bodyguards with those DIMMER pistols. The bodyguards were all tied up in his room. They're trying to track him, but no luck so far. They just took him." On the other end of the line, Vanessa started to cry.

"Are they trying to figure out where he was taken?" Isabella asked.

"Of course," Vanessa sniffed.

"Should I come out to help?" Phineas asked.

"No!" Isabella said. "They waited until Ferb was back east, because it's easier to get to him there. Don't you go too!"

"Yeah, you need to stay there where it's safe," Vanessa agreed.

"I wonder why they waited until now," Phineas said. "I mean, he's been back a few times, right?"

"Well, he hasn't for a month and a half or so, so maybe they just got everything in place?" Vanessa said.

"Or maybe...Doc went with him, maybe they wanted to grab both of them?" Isabella suggested.

"Doc's a Canadian, they wouldn't want to kidnap him would they?" Phineas said.

On the other end of the phone, Vanessa stopped crying suddenly. "They wouldn't. Let me check...I'll call you back in a minute."

They sat up. Phineas grasped Isabella's hand, squeezing softly.

"It'll be okay," she said. "We'll get him back."

"How?" Phineas asked. "We need to find him, and if they get him back across the border..."

The phone rang again. "And?" Isabella asked.

"You caught it, Isabella. Doctor Tjinder is gone as well. He never made it to his parents' house," Vanessa said.

"So what do we do now?" Phineas asked.

"They're saying that if we don't find them tonight, they'll probably be across the border. So I'll be flying out to Suffield tomorrow morning if we haven't recovered them yet."

"Sounds good," Phineas said. "We'll get them back, Vanessa. I promise you that."

Holly woke up in the small cell. She'd woken up here yesterday, after getting hit with the knockout gun in Danville. The cell was tiny and simple - a solid bed with no blanket and a lump at one end to act as a pillow, a one-piece toilet, a small sink, and a computer screen and keyboard built into a table with a chair in front of it. Food arrived through a slot at the bottom of the door, and had arrived three times before she fell asleep the day before.

She assumed it was the day before. There was no window. The computer had no indication of time anywhere on its display. Various propaganda shows were available, but that was it. She'd watched a few for lack of anything else to do.

The slot opened, and a tray was slid in. On it was a sandwich, which she picked up. Turkey and American cheese, lettuce, tomato, and mayonnaise. Not her favorite, but she was hungry enough not to complain. Not that she had anyone to complain to anyway.

Are they just going to leave me here forever? She wondered as she ate the sandwich. As she ate, the slot slid open again, and a hand pulled the tray back out. She thought about trying to make their lives more difficult by keeping the trays out of reach, but decided that was unwise, given that they may just stop giving her food until she returned the tray.

She finished the sandwich and went over to the sink to wash her hands and take a drink. With a sigh, she sat in the chair. She recognized most of the propaganda videos from her time in the military - all about the perfidy of the other factions, and the stalwart defense of freedom from the Central faction.

She turned off the screen and stretched herself out on the bed. They'd put her in soft pajama-like clothes, which she found a little bit creepy, especially the lack of underwear. She hoped the mayor hadn't been involved in that. He didn't generally find black women attractive, but after his latest slave had been liberated, he'd taken to eyeing her again.

The door clicked and swung open. Two guards in face-shielded helmets stood there. "Come with us," one of them said in a rough voice.

It took only a moment for Holly to decide to go along. She didn't want to know what they'd do if she fought back, and her options were better if she let them think she'd cooperate all the time. She stood and walked toward them; they hung back to give her room to enter the hall. The hallway was brightly-lit by fluorescent bulbs, but there were no windows, just four identical doors on each side. At the far end, a pair of closed double-doors showed light through frosted windows.

The guards led her through the doors, which led to another hallway. Doors along it had simple labels on them such as "Grand Justiciar" and "Grand Custodian". Halfway along the hall, they told her to stop and led her through a pair of double doors marked "Council".

The room inside was dark, dimly lit by flickering candles. One wall was dominated by a raised desk with several seats behind it; on the front of the desk, a large TV screen was turned off. The rest of the room was bare except for a small stool in the center, with a small table attached to the front of it. The guards shoved her forward, leading her to the stool. They pushed her down to kneel on it, her arms resting on the table. One guard reached in front of the table, pulling up a pair of steel manacles. She started to try to stand up, but the guard behind her shoved her back down as the other guard locked her wrists to the table. She tugged at the manacles, rattling the chain, as she felt the guard draw a strap around her calves, fastening them to the stool.

Guess I'm not going anywhere, she thought.

On the wall in front of her, the TV screen flickered to life. Three hooded figures looked out at her from a dark room.

"Holly Sojourner Washington," one of them said, in a deep, gravelly voice that was obviously not his normal timbre. "You are accused of leaking the secrets of the Council of Sanford, to wit, recording a conversation between two members of the Council and transmitting it to members of the Anti-Slavery Front. We have investigated the charge. We find you guilty as charged. Your sentence is enslavement in perpetuity with no chance of release. You shall be placed under the ownership of the Council."

"This is bullshit!" she yelled. "Where's my trial?"

"They can't hear you," one of the guards said.

"You're probably complaining about not getting a trial," the hooded figure said. "You're right, you don't. You're right, this isn't legal. We don't care. You'll never be free again to complain. Collar her."

A guard, behind her, pushed her hair aside and locked a collar around her neck.

"Fuckers," Holly muttered.

"Silence, slave," one of the guards said, slapping her on the top of her head.

"You will be sent off to be an experimental subject," the hooded figure said. "Your good friend General Archer needs test subjects. Some of them may even survive. But probably not."

Holly glared at the screen.

"In an ideal world, we'd make an example of you, to teach others not to interfere with the Council of Sanford. But, that would involve letting people know about us, and we don't want that. So...we'll just make sure you never get a chance to talk to anyone about this. Consider yourself lucky. If Archer didn't need test subjects, we would have just given you to Mayor Abercrombie for a while. What was left after he was done would end up in a shallow grave."

Eek. Okay, yeah, could be worse.

"Guards, prep her to go to Archer's test site." The screen blinked off.

One of the guards clipped a leash to her collar, while the other unlocked the manacles. Forcing her wrists behind her, he handcuffed her before removing the strap holding her to the stool.

"Up, slave," the guard holding the leash said, giving it a tug.

Fuckers. I will make them regret this.

Somehow.

Ferb woke in a dimly-lit room. He blinked a few times, looking around as he sat up. An unfamiliar weight sat around his neck; reaching up, he realized it was a slave collar, or something extremely similar. Back in the States again, apparently. He was dressed in what felt like loose knit clothing which (he noted with a small amount of concern) seemed to lack underwear.

The room itself was spartan, at least what he could see in the dim light coming through the crack under the door. A dresser of some sort, a desk with a computer that was turned off.

He swung his legs off the bed and stood up, listening intently. There was no other noise - the room was oddly silent, more so than he'd expect. The air held a faint antiseptic odor.

He walked to the door, looking at it closely. It opened inward, but appeared to lock from the other side. He pressed on the handle as quietly as he could, and was unsurprised to find that it didn't move.

Nodding, he walked around the room, seeing if there was anything else he could work with. The bed looked like the base was a solid unit including the pillow, but a blanket sat on top of it. A dark shadow in one corner was probably a camera, he suspected. There didn't appear to be anything else handy that he could work with, so he lay back down on the bed, listening intently.

He saw the light under the door dim briefly, as if somebody were walking past, but couldn't hear any footsteps. Evidently the soundproofing in this room was quite good. He was a bit concerned about that, to be honest. A moment later, it dimmed again for just a moment.

He watched to see if anything else happened, but there was nothing. He lay back and tried to sleep some more, figuring that he'd need his strength when they came for him.

The light dimmed again, and stayed dim for a moment. Ferb pondered being ready to jump, but decided that he was not in a position to do that, and to wait until he better knew the situation he was in. Instead, he sat up, leaning against the wall, and faced the door.

The lights in the ceiling came on, and Ferb blinked at the sudden brightness. The room was much as he had expected, with clinical white walls and furniture. Ferb remained still, watching the door as it swung open slowly.

"I told you you'd regret leaving, Fletcher," General Archer said from the doorway.