Derek had lost track of how long he had been at the labs. As he turned away from the filing cabinets, he pulled his blackberry from the pocket in his jeans and cursed as he noticed the continuous red light.

The fucking thing had crashed!

He pulled the back from the device, re-seated the battery and waited while it rebooted. He prayed that Jazz hadn't been trying to call him.

"Yes, boss. We're on our way there now. ETA…" Jazz looked at the GPS. "…about fifteen minutes. Have you got a lock on his location?"

Casey glanced at Jazz biting her lip anxiously.

"So he's still in the main building. That's good. Are we going in?...Why not? Yeah…yeah, I know but… okay. You're the boss."

Jazz hung up.

"What?" Casey asked anxiously, her eyes on the road ahead because she was doing 10mph over the speed limit.

"He's still in the building." Jazz noticed her frown. "GPS chip in his blackberry." He explained.
"I though he had it disabled." Casey pointed out.

"He changed his mind. Seemed to think there was a possibility you might get lost while using it or something."

"That's ridiculous!"

"Oh Casey! That's only the half of the ridiculous "let's keep Casey safe" procedures he has in place."

"Well…if it helps us keep track of him, this one at least, I'm glad about. What else did Spike say?"

"That we won't be going in unless absolutely necessary. Apparently, they can't get the paperwork in order."
"Is he serious?"

"Yes. But I also think he's not alone. In his office I mean."

"And if he is?"
"Casey. Derek's my partner. I'm not about to hang him out to dry."

"Good. Because if you are, you can get out of the car now."
"Well I'm not. So put your foot down, girl. We have some catching up to do."

"I thought you said if the locals pulled me I was on my own."

"I lied."

It was as Derek was searching the large desk in the centre of Smythe's office that his phone suddenly leapt into life. It buzzed repeatedly and when he pulled it from his pocket again he was horrified to find 40 missed calls and more than 30 text messages. He was about to read them when the cough sounded through the room.

"I think you'll find they are trying to tell you that I've left the wake and I'm on my way." The voice said from the doorway.

Derek knew he was screwed.

"By "they" you mean…?" He asked, turning around to find the expected form of Quentin Smythe standing in the doorway.

"Your incompetent partner and that annoying doctor girlfriend of yours." Quentin elaborated.

"Jazz isn't incompetent." Derek answered.

"And Casey?" Smythe raised an eyebrow.

"…can be annoying. But, normally only when you deserve it." Derek shifted on his feet, changing his balance ready for flight.

The professor nodded. "I'd noticed." He said in a normal tone of voice which then rose unexpectedly. "I wouldn't if I were you. Run…I mean. I may not carry a gun myself, but I make it a point never to go anywhere without someone who does."

And with that a large shadow appeared behind the scientist. A large, black shadow whose body filled the door space.

Derek's eyes widened in recognition.

"You!" he exclaimed, remembering a previous encounter in his old apartment. The man mountain looked even more intimidating this time, probably due to the angry look on his face.

"I've been looking forward to this." BBG said to Smythe. "This is the guy that almost brained me – twice."

"Technically that was my girlfriend – and you were trying to kidnap me at the time." He answered arching an eyebrow. "I thought you worked for Papillion."

The professor sighed. "He works for me. He always has done. It just suited me to "lend" him to that annoying insect. Now I think the time has come for us to take this to a more appropriate place: one where we won't be disturbed by any annoying visitors."

Smythe stepped towards the large bookshelf against the wall, fiddled for a moment and then stood back as it swung out into the room, on a hinge.

Derek whistled.

"Impressive."

"I thought so. I got the idea after a trip to Amsterdam in my youth. I'd recommend the Anne Frank museum but frankly you won't be alive long enough…excuse the pun."

He smiled coldly as he stepped back and Derek saw that behind the bookcase there was now a slim, flimsy door-shaped panel. Smythe pulled it open revealing a thick metal door beyond.

An elevator.

He pushed a concealed button and the metal door slid open silently.

Derek started as he was shoved from behind. In his distraction at the idea of secret doors and elevators, he had failed to see the man mountain approach. He wouldn't make that mistake again.

"Shall we?" Quentin asked with mock politeness. His hand was extended towards the elevator which looked as though it was designed to take four passengers at the most. Given the size of BBG, it would be a tight squeeze.

"Search him." Smythe ordered before they stepped into the box. BBG complied, removing both of the weapons Derek had hidden about his person. The latter sighed. He hated being unarmed.

When the three of them were in the elevator, Quentin leaned forward to close the door and then the metal box began its descent. The movement was smooth and graceful, in complete contrast to the other elevators in the building. Clearly this one was carefully maintained and the cage within it was also new.

Quentin explained. "This elevator shaft has been in existence for over a hundred years. It used to be a dumb waiter I believe; at least until my forebear decided to dabble in other areas. Then it became appropriate for him to have access to the lower sections of the property without the knowledge of certain unwelcome visitors. It is a concept that I understand only too well."

Derek nodded; his mind running a mile a minute as he tried to figure how he was going to get out of this. Then it occurred to him that he actually didn't want to be out of this situation just yet: he wanted to know what the hell was going on.

So for the minute he played ball.

The elevator continued its downward journey. It was quite slow but it was also silent. As if sensing Derek's interest, Quentin jerked his head towards the control panel.

"The priority is discretion." He said. "There are people here who have worked in this building for twenty years and don't know there is a third elevator."
"Where does it go?" Derek asked after a minute.

Smythe laughed. "Yes. That is the million dollar question, isn't it?"

"There are the gates up ahead." Casey said as they turned from the road onto the dirt track. Unlike Derek, they didn't require stealth. Despite Spike, they were going onto the site one way or another. If Casey had her way it would be in a blaze of glory and flashing lights.

"Okay. Pull over there and I'll call Spike."

Casey did as requested, switching off the engine and turning in her seat.

"We're here." Jazz announced into the phone. He listened for a few minutes. "What do you mean you've lost him?" He eventually exclaimed. "How?"

Casey's eyes widened. She tapped Jazz on the shoulder but he brushed her off.

"That's impossible!" Jazz pointed out. "He can't be there one minute and then not the next. Is the equipment faulty? The techs say not…are the techs faulty?" There was heavy sarcasm in Derek's friend's voice. "Yeah, yeah…I know. But they aren't out in the field having to listen to their sorry-ass explanations."

Casey tapped him again. Jazz held up a solitary finger to hold off her questions.

"Well tell them to find him. We're going in. I know I don't have the paperwork. I'll improvise."

Jazz ended the call and turned to Casey, tapping the phone against his chin. "The GPS chip stopped broadcasting about five minutes ago. It was sudden so they think he is still in the vicinity but they can't be certain. It's probably that he's entered a dead spot in the building."

"So they don't know where Derek is?"
"No. They don't. But we don't need them and their technology anyway. We'll go do it the old fashion way."

"Meaning?"

"It's time to sneak in."

Derek was in awe. He had left the elevator and was currently standing in the entrance hall to a whole new world. The elevator had descended, of that he was certain. How far was a bit more unclear. However great the distance, it was nothing to the difference between the world above ground and the world below.

If the previous levels had been a tribute to all that was good about Victorian England, this new place – which he was still unsure of its true location – this new place was a tribute to modern Canada.

Everything which he had expected to see in the mansion somewhere above was clearly located here in its uncharted depths.

The foyer which greeted them as they emerged from the elevator was smart, clean and decorated in a modern minimalist style. The immaculately smooth pale grey walls reflected light from the concealed lighting which Derek assumed was recessed into the ceiling somehow, although he couldn't see it. To his surprise there was another elevator a short distance away which clearly led upwards to the building above.

Quentin noted the direction of his eyes, and the surprise on his face.

"There are six elevators in total." He said. "These two are the only ones that lead into the mansion. The others are more serviceable: larger and located at the other end of the complex where its main entrance is."

"Main entrance?" Derek queried.

"Oh yes. The Victorian mansion is just a "front" or rather, should I say instead that it is a "back"? The Victorian side is the legitimate face of my research: a poor, inadequately resourced research project that occasionally dishes out minor, barely significant discoveries. The section you are in now however is the reality of my work. Here is where the genius happens."

The professor started to lead the way down a series of corridors. They were all brightly lit, spotless and set into some of the walls were large smoky-glazed windows providing an eye into the rooms beyond. There were conference rooms, offices and as they moved further into the complex the rooms widened and developed a more "scientific" look.

After several minutes walking the rooms Derek saw were fully-fledged laboratories: their interiors almost sparkling with modernity and sophistication. They paused by one lab for a moment and watched as white-coated technicians walked well-rehearsed patterns around the room, opening industrial refrigerators, pressing buttons on large grey equipment and tapping eagerly on impressive computers with large screens.

"Impressive isn't it?" Quentin commented. "I do love showing people around this side of my work. This is after all the bread and butter of my operation. If people could only truly appreciate what we achieve here…" His voice trailed away. "It's impossible, of course. There are very few people I allow down here: only the people who work here and the very occasional "investor". The government and the legitmate side get shown the "front" of my operations in the big house. Down here is, literally, the Underworld. The people I show around here are the people key to my "retail" business: just one or two individuals in the world who need to see a portion of the reality."

Derek frowned. "But surely your secrets are only your secrets while your staff is loyal?"

Smythe smiled indulgently. "My staff is loyal, because I pay them well, but they also only see the small section of the operation that they need to. Their passes only allow them to enter their own space and each space is self-sufficient. It is also only one small part of a giant jigsaw – and only I have seen the lid of the box."

Derek was still confused. "But surely they are suspicious of what you make here. I mean…steroids."

The professor laughed. "Oh I don't make steroids. That's a costly process, fraught with legislation and red-tape. No. What I make is completely legal and above board."

Now Derek was really confused. If this was all legal, why the secrecy and why the connections to Sal and Papillion? Why the death and destruction of lives?

"I don't understand."

Quentin nodded to BBG and the big guy opened a door off to the left and shoved Derek inside following quickly behind him. Smythe entered the room and closed the door.

They were now standing in a large conference room. It was all dark leather and the uniform blue-grey walls and smoked glass of the rest of the "building".

"Yes. I can see how you would be confused. That is my whole purpose with my organisation. I make things appear so simple that 1+1 must equal 2. Yet it doesn't." He motioned for Derek to seat himself at the dark cherry-wood conference table. Derek complied and then the scientist too sat down. BBG moved to stand by the door.

"When I was young I had a friend. We played together before we were old enough to go to walk, we attended the same school, and eventually we graduated high school together. Joseph was my only friend. Even at a young age I was considered to be "gifted" and through my school years I was often teased, ridiculed and outright bullied. Joseph was not gifted or even bright, but he knew how to use his fists and he became my protector…my bodyguard. When I went off to college, Joseph got a job in the same town. There was no longer a need for him to protect me as such but we had got used to each other being around.

I was already in my pre-med training when Joseph got sick. He was diagnosed with a rare, genetic muscle-wasting disease and given less than ten years to live. There was no cure: standard steroid treatments were ineffective. I began to take care of him even as I continued my studies but though the process was gradual, I could see him wasting away in front of me. When then time came for me to decide my own future as a doctor, I chose endocrinology. I chose research. I wanted to find a more effect steroid treatment. I wanted my friend to live.

Initially, I had some success and for a few years, Joseph rallied."

Quentin paused and he glanced off into space. His face was different, less cold-hearted automaton and more bereaved man. Derek would have felt sympathy for the person before him if he wasn't aware of the people who had died because of Quentin Smythe – or the disastrous effect his research had had on Derek's own life.

"I had been working in endocrinology for about five years when Joseph died suddenly. And everything changed. I had lost the only friend I had ever had and now all that was left was my research."
"What about your family?" Derek asked. "You still had them."

Quentin frowned as though he didn't understand. "Family? What do they have to do with this?" He asked staring at his captive audience.

Derek felt a chill at the coldness in the eyes which watched him.

"For the next two years I worked hard but my focus changed. It became less about finding a new steroid and more about looking at how they worked in general. I looked at the conditions which improved steroid performance and the companion drugs which helped deliver those conditions. It was during this time that Steven joined me for his internship."

There was a shuffle near the door, and both men glanced over but it was just BBG shifting his enormous mass.

Quentin continued.

"Steven was always a bit of a chatterer but he was also exceptionally bright and intuitive – a rare combination. I had hopes that he would join me in my research." He paused. "But h had decided to go into Trauma and I was left to go on alone." There was a bitterness to his tone.

"Around the time Steven left, I was working on one of the steroid compounds and its various companions when I realised something remarkable. In the presence of one of the new companion drugs, the new steroid was completely invisible: bodily fluids containing both chemicals showed only the companion drug when its presence was tested. The steroid had "disappeared"!

Confused, I tried the steroid with other similarly structured companion drugs and could detect it perfectly well using the standard steroid tests. So I went back to the companion drug and tried it with a similar steroid compound.

The steroid became undetectable.

I tried it with a different steroid – one with a different structure altogether. The result was the same: it became undetectable.

Excited, I started trying it with every steroid compound I had in the labs. Every single steroid I tried it with became invisible when used in conjunction with the companion drug!"

Quentin Smythe had developed a simple drug that would render any and all steroids invisible under normal dope tests. Derek's eyes widened as the implication of that statement hit home. He thought about all of the sports where doping was a problem: weight-lifting, athletics, swimming and even high-level competition team games…like ice hockey. He thought about all the money placed in bets on those sports.

If someone developed a way for players to take a steroid and not be found out it would have far-reaching implications. Athletes could get away with cheating. Team owners could get away with doping their own players without even the players knowing.

Derek corrected himself: not if but someone had developed exactly that and the culprit was standing in front of him.

"So what happened next?" Derek asked coldly, wondering how a guy who had started in his field to find the cure for a close friend's illness could cross the boundaries into an illegal activity such as this. He guessed he could blame grief and the anger at the disease which made the grief necessary. It was possible, he supposed, that you could love someone so much that their death made you…

NO! He loved Casey with every cell in his body but even her death would not make him condone the actions of this man in front of him.

Clearly, this man's actions were triggered by something else: Ambition? Arrogance? Greed?

Quentin Smythe shrugged. "For me of course, I had discovered a solution to a problem. I am a scientist so I was ready to move on to another problem. But then I looked around at my surroundings: the dilapidated Victorian mansion, the cost-cutting the lab faced. I thought of the millions of black market money my discovery could generate and the injustice that meant that it went to where it wasn't needed just desired.

And then I realised I could do something about that. With a few connections in the right place I could tap into those millions. I could get the funding I wanted. I could achieve the goals I wanted to achieve. So I started making discreet enquiries. That's when I met Sal."

In the end it was Casey who decided how they would approach entering the lab. She waited until Jazz confirmed that there were back up cars in the vicinity and then she reversed out from where they were parked. It was a sudden, jerky movement and Jazz who had unbuckled his seat belt dropped his phone in shock.

"What are you doing?"
"Protecting my family." Casey said with a wry smile. Then before he could react, she had swung the car around and was driving towards the main gate of the lab compound.

"Casey…" Jazz warned. "We have no legal authority for this."

"Arrest me!" Casey said and stamped on the gas.

The stripy red and white barrier didn't stand a chance.

"Fuck!" Jazz said. "There goes my rental collision warranty."

"Sal." Derek mused. "Where is he?"

Quentin shrugged. "Right now? I'd say he was floating somewhere between here and Mexico."
"He's dead?" Derek exclaimed sitting up suddenly. BBG took a step into the room but Quentin put up a hand to stop him.

"The relationship between us was one of mutual benefit. When he started to become less benefit and more nuisance I took steps. I know how these guys work. Over the years I've taken steps to protect myself from their ambition. I've planted my own people in their organisations and made sure I've known exactly what I was getting into."

"Which was?"
"Supply and demand. As it always is. Sal was a drugs peddler but he was slightly more intelligent than most. He immediately saw the advantages in the arrangement that I was proposing. I'd considered other people but their greed would have made them negotiate a higher cut of the profits. It was important to me that the split was 60:40. The effort was mine, the risk was mine. Sal was already in the business, I was not. I needed the money for my research. Sal was lucky to be chosen and for many years he recognised that."

"And then?"

"And then he got bolder and started to demand a bigger share of the cut. He might have got it too, but he started to make bad decisions."

"Like killing me?" Derek asked.

Quentin laughed. "Oh no! That was one of the decisions we agreed on. You were a liability and you needed to be got rid of."
Derek breathed in deeply and slowly. "So what did you disagree on?"

"Initially, I disagreed with his contact with that mindless moron, Papillion. I mean can you believe anyone with half a brain would give themselves such a stupid nickname? His real name, you know, was Fred? I know you have him on file as something else, but he'd changed his identity many times. I guess he saw himself as some sort of James Bond-type villain. The man was a fool even I could see that. Sal did too, but he let Fred get close enough and told him stuff that I really didn't like. I was forced to take steps to get rid of the insect.

Even then I would have accepted Sal's failings. But he made a decision that I really couldn't agree with."

"Which was?"

"Not to tell me that you were still alive. I had to find it out from Steven."

There was quiet for a moment.

"Let me get this straight. Sal knew that I was alive from the sighting at the airport but he didn't tell you, so you didn't know I was alive until Steven came asking questions?"

"It took me a while to realise even then. Steven asked awkward questions and let slip that he was asking on behalf of Dr McDonald. I asked myself why she was so interested after all these years. After Steven's death I dug into Casey's recent life and found she'd moved to Ottawa but was currently in London. I put a tail on her, and that's when I learnt that you had lived. I confronted Sal who confessed that he was aware of this fact.

He didn't live much longer."

"You killed him?"
"Me? Oh no. One of my associates…yes."

"What had Sal been planning?"

"For you? Nothing. He reasoned that eventually the police would give up on the case and move on. He thought you would be grateful to live another day. He thought you would give up."

Quentin looked Derek in the eye. "I knew otherwise."

"Why did you kill Steven?"

"A stitch in time. Steven was dangerous to me in a way that Casey wasn't. I knew Casey would push for information because she was emotional about losing you. Steven would push for information because he cared about her. But he failed to realise where I knew that he already had some of that information. He had been working in the lab shortly before my discovery. It would not have taken long for him to make the leap."

Derek opened his mouth to say something, but before he could get the words out an alarm sounded. Quentin Smythe frowned.

"Give me the gun!" He snapped at BBG. "And go find out what that's about."

Wordlessly, BBG nodded and complied.

Quentin pointed the gun at Derek as the big guy left the room.

"Don't worry. Just because I don't carry the damn thing doesn't mean that I don't know how to use it."