No I in Team
"Brave, unconcerned, mocking, violent—thus wisdom wants us: she is a woman, and loves only a warrior." —Friedrich Nietzsche.
5. Grace Under Pressure
Location: The inside of a lorry
En route to Trezzano sul Naviglio
23:30 HRS
The air in the back of the truck was blessedly cool, and blessedly silent to James' ears. The faces of Team X, as they sat on two opposing benches, were cast into shadow as much as they were illuminated by a dim light suspended from the roof of the large vehicle. In the semi-darkness, Maverick and Dukes checked over their weapons, making sure everything was working correctly. Victor was sitting with a happy little smile on his face; he was always happiest, when the prospect of violence was before him. Bradley, meanwhile, was taking deep, calming breaths, trying not to let the others see his nervousness. Wraith was tapping his foot to some internal rhythm, and Wade was lovingly caressing the katanas Talon had provided. The woman herself was sitting cross-legged on the end of a bench, her eyes closed and her face serene. The weapon she'd picked for herself was a simple pistol, now holstered at her waist. Damn, she's good-looking, James thought.
A small smile played across her lips.
"Hey, Talon," Wraith said, interrupting her meditation. The smile vanished from her face, and she opened her emerald-like eyes. "I got a question for you."
"Go ahead."
"Where did you get all your intel?"
"A good spy never gives up his secrets," she smiled. "And I'm the best spy in the world."
"But how do you know your information's correct? I mean… you said that Bertelli's responsible for blackmail and murder, on top of the weapons smuggling. How did you find out about that?"
She smiled and tapped her nose.
"How sure are you that Bertelli's in his safe-house?" Maverick asked. "If he's got more than one, couldn't he be in any of them?"
"He's in the one I've described."
"Have you seen him there, with your own eyes?"
"No."
"Then how do you know you've got the right place?"
"Because I bloody well said so!" she snapped with irritation.
"A little touchy, don't you think?" said Maverick. He seemed to be enjoying getting under her skin. "I just want to make sure we're acting on correct information."
The truck—or lorry, as Talon called it—lurched to a slow halt, and Talon's radio crackled with static.
"This is as far as we can go," Stryker's disembodied voice said. "We're about a mile from Bertelli's safe-house, but I can't risk taking us any closer. There's plenty of cover for you to make the rest of the way on foot."
"Acknowledged," Talon replied. "We'll head out now and wait in position. Our attack will occur at exactly twelve o'clock, unless we hear otherwise from you. Good luck, Major."
"And to you."
James followed Talon to the back of the truck, and Wade followed him. The back doors were opened, the three slipped out, and then the doors were closed again from the inside. The small team stepped off the road so that the truck could turn around and head back to the centre of Milan, where the second team's mission would go down. Wade waved as the truck—which had the image of a bottle of olive-oil painted on the side—disappeared from view, then Talon led them into the undergrowth on the opposite side of the road, and they set out across the countryside.
"Can I ask you a question?" James said to her.
"I'm not going to tell you where I got my intel from," she said firmly.
"I wasn't going to ask. But I wanted to know… why did you suggest Maverick go with the second team, instead of with us?"
"Your marksman?" Talon asked, and James nodded. "He doesn't like women."
"I knew it!" Wade said, smiling wickedly in the moonlight.
"I don't mean it like that," she continued. "I doubt he would have followed my instructions, and he would not have cared if Bertelli's wife was hit by a stray bullet. I would have liked your teleporter to have come with us, but I can understand why you assigned him to the other team."
James stopped in his tracks, and both Talon and Wade, who'd kept going, turned and looked at him.
"We have to get going, Captain," the woman said. "We need to be in place as your men arrive at the Corona Building."
"How did you know?" he asked, ignoring the urgency in her voice.
"Know what?"
"About Bradley? About what he can do? And what Wraith is? How did you know that Maverick doesn't like women?"
"Like I said before, I'm the best spy in the world."
"That's not good enough, Talon," he said. He didn't like being kept in the dark. "If someone's told you about us—"
She cut him off. "Nobody's told me about anything. I haven't even spoken to my handlers in the SIS since they asked me to meet you and procure your items. I prefer to work alone."
"You should definitely rectify that," Wade said. "If you want, I could—"
"Stop talking," Talon said. And, for a wonder, he did.
Logan narrowed his eyes, and took a step forward. Little incongruities were starting to make sense; how she'd known about the team; how she knew where Bertelli was, and the things he had done; why she'd smiled when he'd thought she was attractive; how she knew that his team comprised of mutants, yet didn't bat an eyelid when most people would recoil in fear.
"You can read minds," he accused. "You're a mutant."
A tiny smile curled the corners of her lips. "I prefer the term 'special operative,' but yes, telepathy is my ability. Reading thoughts, sometimes emotions, displaying images inside a mind, a certain degree of mind-control, and for the love of God, would you stop doing that?!" she said, whirling around to Wade with a scowl.
"Doing what?" he asked, a too-innocent expression plastered on his face.
"Projecting mental images at me! My God, man, is that all you ever think about?"
"No, I think about lots of things. I was just checking that you really can read minds. I'll stop now. Wait, one more. Okay, that was the last one, I promise."
"We're wasting time," Talon said, and she set off once more towards the nearby woods. James, after aiming a warning look at Wade, hurried after her. He realised, now, why she preferred to work alone. If she heard thoughts as sensitively as he heard voices… the poor woman must be constantly inundated by unwanted thoughts and emotions coming from others. In an attempt to not be part of the problem, he emptied his mind and tried to think about nothing.
Their small group moved swiftly and with very little noise. Talon led the way, and seemed to know where she was going, because she never once stopped to consult the map she carried in her small bag. They covered the mile to Bertelli's safe-house in about seven minutes, which left them almost ten minutes ahead of schedule. If everything was going smoothly with the truck, Stryker's team would be reconnoitring the area around the Corona Building, looking for the best way in, and the best place for Stryker to wait for them to complete their mission.
James spotted a group of small trees or shrubs a couple of dozen metres from Bertelli's safe-house, and pointed them out to Talon. She nodded, and let him lead the way. They hunkered down behind the bushes, and Talon opened up her backpack, taking out a pair of binoculars. After she'd looked through them, she handed them to James. He was impressed; he hadn't even given a moment of thought to bringing binoculars.
He looked through them. Despite the fact that it was midnight, several lights were on within the safe-house, and a few floodlights were lit in the surrounding grounds. It ruined his night-vision, but that didn't matter, because the guards had been stupid enough to illuminate everything he needed to see. If there was any doubt that these guards were plain city-thugs, it quickly fled his mind. Trained soldiers knew better than to light a place up like that.
"I don't see Bertelli, or his family," he said, finally handing the binoculars to Wade, so that the former mercenary could see what he was getting into.
"They've probably been in bed for hours. Sleeping soundly, I'll wager," Talon replied.
"Can't you just… you know… mind-control Bertelli into handing himself over?"
"If it was that easy," she said, her tone wry, "I would have done it months ago and saved all of us this hassle."
"So why's it not that easy?"
She sighed. "I don't have the ability to control minds, per se. What I do is a form of… well, almost hypnotic suggestion. But it's vocal, so I have to speak my commands. Also, the success of that particular ability depends upon the willingness of the subject to believe and obey what I tell them. For example, if I was to tell Wade here to completely strip his clothes off, he'd be naked in ten seconds. But if I told him to believe that he's a six year old ballerina called Beatrice… well, he wouldn't be quite as willing to do that. He'd mentally fight the command, and most likely be able to shake it off. That's why I asked you to send your marksman, Maverick, with the other group. His dislike of me, of women in general, would likely be stronger than my power of suggestion."
"Wait a minute, I'm confused," said Wade. "Am I still supposed to be wearing my clothes?"
"So you use the power of somebody's belief to reinforce your suggestion?" James asked.
"Pretty much. I read their minds to find out their point of weakness, and then make a suggestion based around it."
"And I'm totally okay with that," Wade said. "You can read my mind any day or night."
"So," Logan mused, trying to figure out how this power of Talon's might work to the team's advantage, "if you were capable of issuing suggestions to the guards, would you be able to get them to turn on each other, or hand Bertelli over?"
"I sincerely doubt it," said Talon. "None of them will want to attack each other, and certainly none of them will want to hand their employer over; their fear of Mafia reprisal outweighs their fear of us. I might, however, convince some of them to leave. I could suggest that they have better things to be doing, for example. In my experience, most men, no matter what they're doing at the time, think they could be doing something more interesting."
"Like this?" Wade asked. His eyes narrowed in focus as he aimed a thought, and Talon frowned.
"I suppose. But I don't see why anybody would need that much champag—oh wait, now I see. Yes, thank you for that rather colourful image."
"The bubbles are what make it so much fun."
James shook his head. Children. He was working with goddamn children. The sooner this mission was over, the better off they'd all be.
o - o - o - o - o
Location: Corona Building, Secret Mafia Headquarters
Milan
23:55 HRS
John Wraith sat at his ease in the back of the truck. Dukes was to his left, and Bradley to his right. On the opposite bench were Zero—no, Maverick, he recalled—and Victor. Victor was a hard one to understand. He was capable of civility, yet left Wraith with the impression that a beast was lurking permanently in the corners of his mind, waiting for everyone to turn their backs so it could strike. From the first moment he'd lain eyes on Victor, he'd made a promise to himself not to turn his back on that one. There was just something… wrong… about his whole demeanour. In combat, even simulated combat, he was like a rabid animal, barely recognising friend from foe. Unlike Maverick and Wade, there was no style or finesse to Victor's fighting; just pure, brute strength and base instinct.
For the second time that night, the truck halted. The engine was left running, but when Stryker knocked on the rear doors, Maverick hurried to open them for him. He was worse than a dog sometimes, that one. A dog running to lick his master's hand. Disgusting, really.
"We're here," Stryker said, climbing into the truck and pulling the doors to behind him. "I've reviewed the maps provided to us by Talon, and have worked out our best plan of attack. I believe we can bypass the ground-level security entirely by having John teleport everyone to the top floor."
"Aren't there cameras on the top floor?" Wraith asked.
"There's cameras on every floor, but Bradley should be able to take care of them."
The youngest mutant nodded. "Sure, cameras are no problem. But the moment they go dark, it's going to attract attention."
"Could you loop the feedback, so that it shows an empty room on the monitors?"
"Technically, yes," said Bradley. "But it takes focus to maintain that sort of loop, and I'm not sure I'll be able to hold a camera loop and hack into a computer, decrypt all the information, and then upload it to a foreign spy satellite all at the same time."
"However long you can give the team would be an advantage," Stryker said. "I'm confident that you can do it, Bradley."
"Alright. I'll try."
"Now," Stryker continued, "I've no doubt that there will be armed men on the top floor. John, do you think you could get Zero and Bradley into the room at the same time, so that Bradley can loop the cameras the moment Zero starts shooting?"
"Yeah, I'll give it a try," Wraith agreed. "Never tried teleporting more than one passenger before. I'm sure it'll be interesting."
"Good. Once you're in, come back to pick up Victor and Dukes, and then stay with Bradley. Victor, Dukes, the two of you are responsible for keeping any Mafia guards occupied. Zero, you'll keep anything from approaching Bradley whilst he works. Crippling-shots only for any company security guards, if at all possible."
Maverick nodded, and Stryker looked at his watch.
"Alright, we have two minutes to go. Bradley, as soon as you're done with the data transfer, give the word to John. I want everyone out of there ASAP, so we can head back to pick up the second team. And Bradley, if we're pursued during our get-away, I'll need you on traffic control."
"Yes, sir," Bradley said.
"I'll have my radio with me at all times, so if there are any problems at all, contact me immediately. I can't help you if I'm in the dark." Stryker looked once more at his watch. "Okay. Show time. John, you're up."
Wraith stood up and stepped forward, and Maverick and Bradley joined him. He put a hand on each man's shoulder and teleported them to the top of the Corona building. He felt them physically pulled through space behind him, causing him a greater than usual physical stress, but when they rematerialised both men were unharmed.
Immediately, Maverick's guns came up and started shooting, as Bradley closed his eyes and began to loop the security camera feed. At the same time, lights came on, giving Wraith a good look at what was happening. Two Mafia thugs were bleeding and likely dead on the ground, and a third took a head-shot and went down as a spray of blood burst from his head, painting the nearby wall a deep scarlet.
"Cameras are looping," Bradley said, and he hurried towards what appeared to be a large computer mainframe. "Starting the hack now."
Wraith teleported back to the truck, staying only long enough to report that all was proceeding as planned, and then returned to the top floor of the building with Victor and Dukes in tow. Both men took up defensive positions, one near each door, and settled in to wait. Dukes was carrying a large rifle, similar to the one strung around Wraith's neck, but Victor has shunned any weapon in favour of his own claws and natural healing ability. The elder of the two brothers didn't like guns all that much, preferring to throw himself into the thick of any fight and get his hands dirty.
The initial commotion and sound of gunfire had not gone unnoticed by those in the building. A group of men came rushing up the stairs from a lower floor, and a few more poured out of an elevator, weapons blazing as they approached. Maverick took his shots where he could, and Dukes opened fire with his semi-automatic. Victor merely rushed forwards and met his antagonists head on, using his huge hands to swipe for the throats of his aggressors.
Wraith turned away from the show of unbridled aggression, switching his attention instead to Bradley. There were a few beads of sweat forming on the young man's face, and his brows were knitted into a frown. As much as Wraith wanted to ask how the data transfer was going, he knew that Bradley needed to focus all of his concentration onto his task. Distractions would only delay him, and the agonised screams of dying men were distraction enough already. Each pained cry made the young mutant flinch, but he didn't open his eyes to see what was happening.
"I'm into the computer mainframe," Bradley said quietly. "God, it's so complex."
"Take your time, Bradley," Wraith said, trying to keep the man calm. "There's no rush. We're handling things just fine. It's better that your job's done right, than done fast."
Bradley nodded, and frowned even more. A few stray bullets hit the wall not far from the pair, and Wraith glanced across the room.
"Hey, Maverick, are you letting them through on purpose just to hurry us along?" he called.
"Sorry," Maverick said, but he didn't sound particularly sorry. "I'm better at shooting bullets than I am at stopping them. Maybe you should have Victor stand in front of Bradley. I'm sure that'll hurry him along just fine."
Wraith grumbled under his breath as Maverick continued aiming around Victor and Dukes. Then, without warning, an alarm began to sound throughout the entire building, and the white lights took on a blood-red hue.
"I had to let the cameras go," Bradley explained before he could be asked. "Before I did, I disabled all the elevators and the security locks on the doors. They'll have to take the stairwells to get up here. Should buy us a few extra minutes."
"Use them wisely, my friend," said Wraith.
"I got guards incoming!" Dukes shouted. "We're not supposed to hurt them, right?"
"We're not supposed to kill them," Maverick corrected. "Aim low on the legs; shoot their feet off and they won't be able to advance."
Wraith shook his head. Shoot their feet off. Just like that. But then, that was Maverick all over. All he cared about was getting the job done. Unlike Victor, he didn't revel in the carnage; enemies were just people standing in his way. If they got out of his way, then that was all well and good, but if they remained in his line of fire, he'd shoot them and not even blink. He was about as cold as they came.
"I've accessed the data!" Bradley called. His words were punctuated by the blam blam blam of Maverick's pistol as he took out lower legs and feet of guards approaching from Victor's side of the room.
"Little help here," Dukes called.
Wraith glanced around the tall man, and saw another swarm of security guards rushing forwards. He teleported immediately to behind the group of men, and shouted, "Hey, over here!"
The majority of them turned to aim at him, and he teleported back to Bradley's side as Dukes opened fire, aiming low at the ground. Half of these men, Wraith suspected, were going to wish they were dead, when Team X was through blowing off their limbs.
"Where's that damn satellite?" Bradley muttered, his voice tired and angry.
"What's wrong?" Wraith asked.
"The British satellite. It's not where it should be."
"Talon," Victor growled from across the room. "She's betrayed us."
"No, wait." There was excitement in Bradley's voice now. "There it is. It's just moving into position. I'm trying to establish an uplink with the access codes Talon gave me. It worked! Beginning upload of data now."
"Great," said Dukes. "Can we get out of here?"
"Not until the upload's complete," said Bradley. "I have to manually keep this connection open myself, and we need to protect the mainframe until we go in case they just shoot it up to stop us taking what we need."
"You heard the man," Wraith said. "Just another couple of minutes."
"I have another wave of Mafia thugs incoming," Dukes said.
"Here, too," added Victor with a growl of pleasure.
Maverick reloaded his pistols, his face grim. "Alright. Let's make every shot count."
Wraith lifted his own gun. He'd hoped he'd get out of this one without having to shoot anyone, but fate seemed to have other ideas. He opened fire on one of the goons, and sent a silent prayer that Logan's team was doing better with their mission.
o - o - o - o - o
Location: Bertelli's Safe House
00:06 HRS
Bullets zipped through the air, tearing up trees, massacring flower beds, sending stone chippings flying off marble statues. James, taking cover behind a tree, glanced at Wade, who was sheltering behind a stone wall, and Talon, who was crouched behind the base of a fountain.
"Anything you could do to get these guys to stop shooting would be welcome," he yelled to the woman over the sound of gunfire.
"They won't be able to hear me," she yelled back. "Wait a minute… let me try something."
He had no idea what she was up to, so he merely waited. Though he would have been quite happy to rush forward and take out every one of those guards himself—their bullets would only cause temporary pain—Talon insisted that they treat this as a hostage situation, and not endanger Bertelli's family by engaging in wholesale slaughter.
An image slid into his mind, and he gasped in shock. Three bodies lay bloodied and still on the ground where the guards had been firing, and he recognised his own corpse next to those of Talon and Wade. Even though he knew it was an illusion, it still floored him for a moment. Then, as the guns fell silent, he realised what Talon had done. A mass illusion, designed to dupe the guards into thinking their aggressors were dead. Somehow, he knew that this illusion would only last a brief moment, and he mentally urged her to act before the guards could recover.
She stood up, exposing herself to the guards, and said, "You've just been given a promotion. Go home and celebrate."
One of the guards looked confused, but he wandered off wearing a dazed expression. It was working!
"It's your first anniversary," Talon continued. "You should be with your wife."
Another guard shook his head at the suggestion, as if trying to clear it from his mind. But then he tossed down his gun and walked away from the safe-house.
"I think you should visit your dying father," Talon said. "You'd never forgive yourself if he passed away without knowing how much you respect him."
One by one, the guards were falling like flies to her trap. But it wasn't enough. The image of the bodies was starting to fade in James' mind, and he saw several of the guards looking around in confusion as their minds cleared too.
"You aren't needed here! There are enough men to guard the safe-house tonight. Go home and have a drink!"
It was Talon's final suggestion before she was forced back down behind the fountain, but it took two of the men out of the fight as they lay down their weapons and walked away. Even over the sound of resuming gunfire, he could hear the British spy breathing heavily, and he knew she was starting to tire. It seemed her power, like Bradley's, drained her more quickly when she was forced to push her abilities.
"I count seven left," Wade called from across the courtyard. "I can take them."
"No, I can still convince more of them to leave," Talon replied.
"I don't think they'll fall for another false image so easily," James told her. "They'll be expecting it, next time. Besides, we're on a tight schedule. If we haven't wrapped this up by the time Stryker gets here, it could all go sideways."
Talon closed her eyes, her face appearing almost pained as she considered her options. He didn't envy her; she was out here, working alone, and had to answer to her own government if things went wrong. When she opened her green eyes again, though, they showed a focused determination.
"Very well," she said. "I've done all I can for the moment. You can handle the rest of the guards."
"Go, Wade," James said.
Wade smiled and stepped out from behind the wall, his katanas blurring as he moved. Bullets bounced and ricocheted around the courtyard, but one by one they found their marks, and when James counted seven dying gurgles of men who'd just been shot by their own reflected bullets, he peered out from around the tree and saw Wade standing unscathed a few feet away from a line of corpses. James had yet to figure out whether Wade enjoyed killing, enjoyed being challenged, or simply enjoyed playing with swords, but the end result was the same. If there was one thing Wade couldn't be faulted for, it was efficiency.
"All clear," the former merc called.
Talon peered over the top of the fountain, narrowing her eyes when she saw the bodies. She, James decided, was the biggest mystery of all. Why had she been so determined to send the guards away? They were Mafia. Criminals. Causes of or accessories to all manner of crimes and suffering. Had she wanted to minimise the body count because she found unnecessary killing distasteful, or because she'd been ordered to keep this low-key by her handlers?
"Good work, Wade," James said, joining the man in the courtyard. Talon followed close behind, and he turned to her. "All that's left now is to find whichever room Bertelli's cowering in, and haul his ass out of here. Do you think we can expect to encounter much more resistance?"
"No, I think—my God." Her green eyes widened as she looked past him, and he whirled around to find two men marching three children and a woman out of the house at gunpoint. One of the men had the youngest boy by the collar, a pistol pointed at his head, whilst the kid's older brother and sister looked on with pale-faced confusion. The woman, clad in a white nightgown, was sobbing. Tears streamed down her face, and a litany of unbroken Italian spilled from her mouth. When he recognised the man holding the weapon to her head as Stefano Bertelli himself, James let out a wordless snarl of anger.
"Get back," Bertelli shouted, his Italian accent heavily influenced by his time spent in America. He made a stabbing motion towards the woman with his gun. "Get back and let us pass, or they will die."
"If you don't let them go, I'm going to gut you myself," James snarled. He felt the bone claws extend from his hands, and one of the children let out a shriek.
"Logan, no!" said Talon, reaching her hand towards him as if to stop him from stepping forward. "He'll do it without hesitation. He'll kill his own wife and children to stop us from getting to him."
"If we let him slip through our grasp, we might never get another chance," Wade pointed out. "And next time we catch up with him, he may have surrounded himself with a hundred hostages. Better to strike now."
"It doesn't have to end like this," Talon said quietly. She turned her gaze to the last Mafia goon, the one with a gun pointing at the head of Bertelli's youngest child. "You won't hurt that boy," she said. "You won't hurt him, any more than you would hurt your own son. How would it feel, to point a gun at your son's head? To have him look you in the eyes and plead with you not to kill him? To see the fear of you etched into his face?"
"My… my son?" the man asked. He looked down at the tearful boy, and then in disgust at the gun in his hand.
"Stop this!" Bertelli screeched. "Stop it right now, or she dies!" His wife, held by her husband in a choke-hold, started sobbing even more loudly. "Alessandro, shoot the English woman!"
"But… my son!"
"Your son is not here, and if you do not do as I say, you will never see him again! Point your gun at the woman, and pull the trigger!"
Alessandro obeyed, pointing his pistol at Talon.
"Put your gun down and go home to your son," she said, her green eyes boring into the man's face. "Nobody else has to die here tonight."
"Alessandro, shoot her!" Bertelli insisted. "Shoot her, or this will be the fate of your son!"
There was a loud thunder-like crash, causing everyone in the courtyard to flinch. James saw Bertelli's wife slump to the ground, a spray of red peppering the ground from the bullet-hole in her head. The crimson blood started pooling even before she hit the dirt. It spread out, covering the woman's white nightgown, and from there, it completely dominated James' vision, descending like a red curtain draped around his mind.
Time slowed, and everything happened at once. The children started screaming. Bertelli reached for the one of them—the girl—to replace his dead hostage. James launched himself forwards with a roar of anger, drawing back his fist in an attempt to knock Bertelli out before he could harm anyone else. As he covered the distance of the courtyard, he heard the sound of another gunshot, and realised Alessandro had finally pulled the trigger of the gun aimed at Talon. James' fist collided with Bertelli's jaw, sending him flying backwards, the pistol falling from his hand. From somewhere behind he heard a tiny sound; chink. As Bertelli collapsed and his gun bounced away, Alessandro's head suddenly spurted scarlet drops of blood, and he too crumpled, his eyes glassy and lifeless before he'd even hit the ground.
Time returned to its normal speed. Bertelli was groaning on the ground, barely conscious, and his jaw looked dislocated. James turned to Alessandro, to confirm that the man definitely was dead. Finally he looked at his team-mates just in time to see Wade sheathe the katana that had deflected the bullet meant for Talon back to its source.
"So, what does that get me?" Wade asked the woman.
She ignored his question, pushing past him to hurry to the crying children. When she reached them, she knelt down in front of them.
"Shh," she said, the sound strangely soothing. "I know you're scared, but everything will seem better in the morning. Don't worry, I'll see to your mother. I can see how tired you are. Go back to sleep."
She caught the young boy as he collapsed into unconsciousness, and James moved just in time to catch the other two. Their small bodies were limp in his arms, and he wondered whether they slumbered truly, and what they dreamt of if they did. Surely, after tonight, they could dream nothing but nightmares. Could they?
"What are we supposed to do with the kids?" he asked Talon.
For the first time that night, she looked tired. "I'll take them back to England with me, put them into witness protection. Hopefully give them something resembling a normal life, until this whole thing has gone to trial."
"Wade, take these two," James said, nodding at the children in his arms. "I'll grab Bertelli, then radio Stryker and tell him to meet us here rather than on the road. It might take us too long to get there on foot, carrying everyone like this."
He waited until Wade had taken a child over each shoulder, then picked up the unconscious Mafia boss and slung him over his back like a sack of potatoes. Talon, with the third child securely in her arms, nodded, and they set off to the end of the mansion's long drive-way. Not one of them looked back at the line of corpses.
o - o - o - o - o
Location: Abandoned Air Strip, Bologna
13:22 HRS
James watched in silence as the airplane was loaded up with its cargo. Bertelli was lapsing in and out of consciousness, the pain in his jaw stirring him from the concussion to his head. Whenever James heard the man's groans, he clenched his fists and pushed down the writhing animal that wanted to erupted from within him and kill the bastard who'd shot his own wife in cold blood.
The trip to Bologna had been a twelve hour nightmare of un-air-conditioned hell. Neither Stryker nor Talon had wanted to risk taking the truck back through Milan and along the main road to Bologna, which meant taking it instead on a long loop of winding minor roads skirting around the edge of the Apennine Mountains—no easy feat, for so large a truck.
As the hour grew later, the temperature grew hotter, until finally, at midday, the inside of the truck felt like a furnace. Talon, who'd chosen to sit in the front with Stryker, ordered the truck stopped once every hour, to open the back doors and allow fresh air to come rushing in. All for the benefit of the still-sleeping children, of course. Had it not been for them, James suspected she would have been quite content to let Team X suffer in the heat. Not that he could blame her for that; they were grown men, and capable of tolerating harsh conditions… for a time.
Whilst cutting back across the width of the country towards Bologna, the truck had been stopped by a police patrol who claimed to be searching for a group of armed thieves. James, crouched in the back of the truck with his team of mutants, a Mafia crime lord and the guy's three sleeping children, had thought there would be more fighting at that point, but Talon—who turned out to speak fluent Italian—had managed to use her abilities to convince the officers that the truck was merely carrying a shipment of olive oil, and that the men really didn't want to upset her employer by making the delivery late. In the face of a hypnotic suggestion that the truck was actually a Mafia front vehicle, the patrol had let it pass without further question.
Now, two planes were waiting on the runway. The small, inconspicuous twinjet engine plane had been loaded with the three children and some of Talon's belongings, and was waiting to take the spy and her cargo back to England. The larger plane was being fuelled for the Atlantic crossing, and was due to take off as soon as Team X was ready. Bertelli had been manhandled aboard and secured by Dukes and Maverick, whilst Stryker was off talking with one of the pilots about the predicted weather conditions and expected landing time in America.
The rest of the team were preparing to leave. Wraith and Victor were stowing the bags of weapons in the cargo-holds, and Bradley was already aboard, probably napping to recover from the intensity of last night's action. Wade sat basking in the sun on the edge of the truck, a vacant look in his eyes and a happy grin on his face. James spotted Talon leaning casually in the shade against the wheel of her twinjet as she oversaw the loading of the plane, and he joined her.
"So," he said, because he really couldn't think of anything else to say. He felt suddenly drained, as if all the tension he'd been holding ever since arriving in Italy was pouring out of his body now that the danger was over. "What's next for you?"
She shrugged, and continued to survey the runway, looking at everything and nothing at once. "See where my government feels the world's best spy would be best placed, I suppose. Maybe I'll end up in Russia. I think I'd like that; I hear it's cold there."
"Will you get into trouble for Bertelli's wife, and the casualties at the Corona Building?"
"Maybe a little. Nothing I can't handle." She smiled at him. "I'm very good at getting myself out of trouble, one way or another. Don't worry about me. But what about you? First proper mission with your team a complete success… thanks to a little help from the world's best spy. Where do you think you'll be going next?"
"To be honest, I have absolutely no idea what to expect next," he admitted.
"You'll be fine, Logan," she said. "You'll make a good leader. You have a competent team. Not too shabby… for a bunch of cowboys."
"That's an interesting choice of words," he pointed out. "A 'competent' team. Not a 'good' one?"
"The word 'good' has a moral connotation that just does not work in this context. Your team aren't good—they're a broad spectrum of grey. But they're your shades of grey. Make of them what you will."
He nodded. A spectrum of grey. That was the best phrase he'd heard yet, to sum up Team X. From Bradley, an idealistic dreamer, through to the cold and aloof Maverick, right down to the volatile, animalistic Victor; his team had a little of everything, and it made him wonder about his own place within it.
The fuel pump was removed from the US plane's tank, and both Wraith and Victor climbed aboard. James saw Wade still sitting in a happy, vacant daze, oblivious to everything going on around him.
"Do I want to know what you're doing to him?" he asked Talon.
She smiled, green eyes dazzlingly bright in her slender face. "Just saying goodbye, and giving him my thanks for saving my life." She stood up and offered her hand. "Goodbye, Logan. It's been a pleasure working with you."
"Take care of yourself, Talon," he replied, shaking her hand. Her grip was surprisingly delicate. "Maybe we'll meet again someday."
"Perhaps. Anything's possible."
She made her way to the side of the plane and climbed the steps into the cabin. One of her entourage pulled up the steps behind her, and the door was sealed closed. The small plane's engines were started up, and it began to roll forwards, to the start of the smooth tarmac runway. James watched as the engines reached their full power, and then the plane was travelling forwards, engines screaming as the wing-flaps tilted and the plane lifted off the ground.
The sound of the small plane began to fade as it peeled off, beginning its two-hour flight back to London. When it was nothing but a speck in the sky, James walked over to Wade and snapped his fingers in front of the man's face until his eyes began to focus once more.
"Aww, what'd you do that for?" Wade complained. "We were just getting to the champagne."
"C'mon, Romeo," he replied. "We've got a long flight back home." And there was a beer with his name on it, waiting in the cool fridge in the rec room of Bunker Five.
o - o - o - o - o
Location: Military Air Strip, USA
22:05 HRS
Stryker sat enjoying the silence in the cabin as the plane touched down on American soil once more. He'd had his reservations about this mission—would Bradley be able to handle the data extraction? Would Victor manage to hold himself back from wholesale slaughter? Would the SIS operative have the necessary intel to allow them to carry out their mission?—but despite everything that could have gone wrong, the mission had been a success. There had been deaths, yes, but he considered those collateral damage. Some casualties were to be expected during an operation of this nature, and the team had performed admirably. They weren't perfect, not yet, but one day they would be.
The engines grew quieter as they were down-powered, and Team X began unbuckling themselves from their seats. Bertelli, propped up between Zero and Dukes, was unconscious again. When he'd woken up halfway through the journey complaining of pain in his jaw and head, Stryker had given him a sedative to knock him out for the remainder of the journey. The Mafia boss was less of an annoyance when he was unconscious.
He wished he could have brought the kids with him too, but he suspected trying to pry them out of Talon's claws would have been too much trouble. True, he could simply have ordered a couple of Team X to take the children—Victor and Zero would not have been averted to a little child-snatching—but he wanted to maintain good relations with the British government, and attacking one of their spies, even if she was a mutant, would have put their backs up and made them far less inclined to help out again in the future.
Besides, next to Bradley's data, the testimony of a few children was irrelevant.
"MPs will be waiting to take Bertelli into custody," Stryker said to Logan.
Logan merely nodded, to indicate he'd handle the exchange. Team X's captain had been silent on the journey back from Italy. Not that he was much of a talker in the first place, but he'd been even quieter than usual. He looked like a man who was running things through his head, trying to work them out methodically and logically. Stryker suspected Logan wasn't happy with the death of Bertelli's wife—he was the type of man who took failure personally when he was in charge. It was that made him such a good leader; such a good tool. Emotional men were easier to control; their behaviour could be anticipated better than those who felt beholden to nothing, who possessed no moral compass.
The cabin door was opened, and Stryker left the plane, followed by Team X, who had to carry Bertelli out between them. Sure enough, a dozen uniformed military police were waiting to take custody of the prisoner. Each one of them was armed with a rifle, but Stryker suspected that, after Logan's treatment, Bertelli wouldn't be in any state to object to imprisonment. Two of the MPs approached Dukes, who was practically carrying the Mafia boss, and produced cuffs and shackles. Yes, there was certainly no question of Bertelli escaping this time.
"Major Stryker, sir," said a voice. Stryker saw an airforce lieutenant approach through the crowd of MPs.
"What is it, lieutenant?" he asked, knowing he sounded curt but not caring enough to do something about it. He was tired and hungry, and looking forward to the trip back to Bunker Five so that he could get a few hours of shut-eye before writing his reports to Washington.
"I'm sorry to disturb you, sir, but whilst you were away, your wife contacted the switch with an urgent request to speak to you. Bunker Five relayed that message to us, so that I could advise you upon your return."
"Did my wife say what she wanted to speak to me about?" It was very unlike Sarah to contact him at work. She only had a generic switch-board number; she didn't even know where Bunker Five was.
"The message we received was 'family emergency.' I'm afraid I didn't get any more than that from Bunker Five, sir."
"Do you have a phone I could use? Somewhere private?"
"Of course, sir. Please follow me."
He left Team X and followed the young lieutenant into the airbase. He was led down several blessedly cool, winding corridors, to a communications office. Two airmen were manning it, but when the lieutenant gestured for them to leave, they stepped out of the room.
"This phone has a direct outside line," the lieutenant said, handing a black receiver over. "Take all the time you need, sir."
Stryker waited until the door was closed, then dialled the number of his home. Home. The word was a mockery of what that house was to him. He spent most of his time at Bunker Five. The military installation was more home to him than the house where his wife and son lived. And for the first time, he was truly beginning to regret that fact.
He started counting the rings, tapping the receiver with his finger, trying to push down the nerves which wormed their way through his stomach. It was late night… perhaps Sarah was already in bed, sound asleep. Or perhaps not. His mind automatically started coming up with worst case scenarios. Sarah had been in an accident. Sarah and Jason had been in an accident. Jason was in hospital. Jason was in a coma. Jason was, God forbid, dead.
"Hello?" Sarah's voice was quiet, croaky, assaulted by static on the line, but it was the most wonderful thing Stryker had heard in his whole life.
"Sarah, it's me."
"William? Thank God! I tried to get through to you so many times, but they kept telling me you were unavailable. They finally let me leave a message, but I wasn't sure they'd pass it on."
"It's okay, Sarah," he said, trying to comfort her. She sounded absolutely distraught. Normally she was stoic, unflappable. The wives of servicemen and officers had to be strong, to stand being separated from their loved ones, to cope with the possibility that one day, their husbands might never come home. "Just tell me what's wrong, and I'll make it right."
"It's Jason…" she said, and Stryker's heart lurched sickeningly. Jason was his pride and joy; Stryker had high hopes that the boy would carry on the family's military tradition by following his father into the army. Now, if something had happened to Jason… Stryker didn't know how he would cope. He waited for Sarah to continue, but she'd taken to sobbing, her words broken and heart-wrenching.
"Sarah, Sarah, start at the beginning," he said, trying to soothe her with his voice when all he wanted to do was take her in his arms and hold her until she quieted.
She took a deep breath, steeling herself, and then began with a shaky voice. "It was the day before yesterday. Jason was at school, and some of the other children were calling him names. Because of his eyes." Stryker nodded to himself. Jason's eyes—one blue, one green, but both perfectly normal—were a constant source of teasing from the other children at his school. "The teachers… they said Jason made them see spiders crawling all over their bodies. The children started screaming, panicking. Some of them were hurt."
"How did Jason get his hands on spiders, Sarah?" he asked, not understanding how his son could have pulled off such a feat.
"There weren't any spiders! The teachers didn't see a single one. But the children were tearing at their own skin to try and get the spiders off. The teachers thought they were having fits. They said Jason made them see spiders inside their heads, William. They think our son's a… a…"
"Mutant," he finished. His fear and panic had turned to an icy numbness that spread out from his stomach to the furthest reaches of his limbs. His son. A mutant? A freak of nature? No. It couldn't be. The teachers must be wrong. Maybe the children were lying, trying to get Jason in trouble. Children could be so cruel, at times. Yes, that was it. This was all some big misunderstanding.
"I don't know what to do, William," Sarah said. "The school won't let him go back. Jason just sits up in his room all day. He won't come out, he won't talk to me… he won't even eat. I think he's afraid we'll stop loving him because of what he is."
"It's okay, I can fix this," he said, with false confidence. "I'll be home tomorrow. We'll talk about this as a family. We'll get Jason the help he needs."
"I don't want to lose him," Sarah sobbed.
"We won't lose him. Everything will be fine. You'll see. Just try to hold things together until I get home. I'll make this right."
She sniffed, and he could almost feel her pulling herself together. "Alright. I'll see you tomorrow then. I love you, William."
"I love you too," he replied.
He hung up, feeling the numbness in his stomach spreading to his mind, his limbs taken over by a strange sort of lethargy. And as he sat on the edge of the desk, struggling with his numbness and fear, a tiny voice spoke up in the back of his mind, reminding him of Doctor Cornelius' words.
The propensity for mutation is passed along by the father. Your son is a mutant. A freak. You did this to him. You're flawed, at the genetic level. It's all your fault.
It was his fault. He was the reason why his son was a mutant. He collapsed into a chair, overwhelmed by the guilt, the shame, his chest feeling tight, as if a great weight was crushing it. What would his superiors say when they found out his son was a mutant? What would they do when they realised Stryker carried the mutant gene, that his child, and all of his children, were cursed? The once-proud Stryker line had been reduced to this.
He knew what had to be done. Nobody could ever know about this. Nobody could be allowed to find out. If they knew what his son was, they would accuse Stryker of having conflicting interests, of having sympathies for the freaks he commanded. No, this must be kept a secret, at least until a cure could be found for Jason. Possibly even longer than that. Stryker had to be stronger now, harder than ever before. He had to play the part of doting father. He had to put on his mask, get back out there and do his job, whilst pretending everything was okay. Pretend that his entire world hadn't just been turned on its head.
He stood up, and straightened his uniform. His wife needed him to be strong. His superiors needed him to be strong. His country needed him to be strong. So, strong he would be.
The lieutenant was waiting for him outside in the corridor. He stood to attention as Stryker approached.
"Everything alright, sir?"
"Yes, yes," Stryker replied, feigning a light mood. "You know how women are. The car breaks down and it's all tears and the end of the world. Women and motors, lieutenant; they just don't go together."
"Yes, sir," the lieutenant replied with a knowing smile. "Should I see to rooms for you and your team, sir?"
"No, that won't be necessary. My men will be returning to Bunker Five for a little R&R, and I have a few days of leave coming up. I'll leave the custody of the prisoner to you, lieutenant."
"Aye, sir. We'll see that he lives long enough to stand trial and answer for his crimes."
"Very good. Now, please have your transport vehicle meet us outside. I'd like my team to be back at Bunker Five as soon as possible."
The lieutenant saluted and left to make the necessary arrangements, and Stryker stood for a moment in the silence of the corridor. There had to be a way out of this mess. Some way to makes things right again. Somehow, he had to find a cure for his son. It was, after all, a man's duty to look after his family.