Disclaimer: I don't own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.
A/N: The idea for this chapter was provided by the marvelous pocketsevens ages ago – I finally found a place where it fits perfectly! THANK YOU!
Chance knew Ilsa was right and he also knew that she had just put into words what the others were thinking. Ames had basically tried telling him the same thing, just not with words. The way she kept looking at him, cautiously watching… silently wrapping her arms around his shoulders when he had sat watching over sleeping Ash last night... brushing a gentle kiss against his forehead…
She had firsthand experience with his vulnerable side, knew how difficult it was for him to deal with situations he couldn't fight his way out of. As long as there was a chance to escape, as slight and as crazy as it was, he knew what to do. But once something was final, unchangeable, definite, he was at a loss and his instinct told him to run.
Truth to be told, after the ordeal with the bearded guy, Winston and Aunt Suzie in the bank, he had gone into hiding at the ashram not simply to protect those he was close to. He had just as much, although at that point in time he hadn't realized it, tried to protect himself – from more hardship, from more sorrow, from more terrible losses. This time around, he couldn't run. He needed to face his insecurities, worries, fears to somehow help his son.
He needed to admit that he was feeling all these things… to show Ash that he wasn't alone. But ugh, was that hard… last time he'd been in a roughly similar situation he had developed those strange yips and risked life and limb in the Christof tournament because he'd been so worried about Winston and not been able to tell him… Winston had made it easy on him, in the end his old friend had voiced what had been bothering him so much… things with Ash would be a lot more difficult. And they still needed to convince him to see a doctor.
At the moment Ash was upstairs again, lying on this bed, exhausted from punching the sandbag. "Leave me alone", he had hissed at Carmine as the dog had tried joining him on the blanket, and from the tone of his voice Chance had known he had not simply meant the animal but his father, too. The door to his room slammed shut so hard that it made Ilsa's glass desk rattle downstairs spoke for that interpretation, too.
Chance decided to let his son be for the moment. He understood his need to be alone for a while, he really did. Later he'd sneak in and sit by his side again. And anyway, he was a little busy right now…
With Guerrero still being away, possibly out of town, it was up to Chance to support Winston in the van with the help of the computer in the conference room. Thanks to Ilsa, the van was very well-equipped, but for some of the more complicated operations, such as hacking into a military satellite, for example, they just needed the extra power of the main computer. And tonight's operation was definitely going to be one of the more complicated ones. After much discussion they had decided to do a Coney Island…
… … …
"Ilsa Pucci? Did you just say ILSA PUCCI? World famous billionaire and philanthropist?" Sam Hackett, the research institute's manager almost couldn't believe it – it was a rather slow afternoon, two more hours to go till shift chance, he'd spent the morning in a meeting with people who definitely had too much time on their hands and too little of a social life and had only just contemplated for twenty minutes the question why the leaves of his rubber fig always seemed to attract more dust than the leaves of his peace lilies.
And now, all of a sudden, ILSA PUCCI was paying the institute a visit!
Oh, good lord, maybe she could provide them with some extra funding? Ever since the change of management a couple of years ago, their financial situation was precarious, mildly put. It was still a mystery to him how the former upper level management had been able to make so much profit…
"What can we do for you, Mrs. Pucci?", the manager asked with his broadest smile and his most subservient voice.
"Thank you for making room on your surely tight schedule so spontaneously for me, Mr. Hackett", Ilsa smiled back at him, friendly but non-committal, just like she had practiced it at a million charity events. Right behind the manager was the safe that most likely contained the file Diane Evensong needed so desperately. They had already ruled out all other storage places.
"A tour of our laboratories maybe?", Hackett suggested. "Or would you like to refresh yourself a little first? My secretary makes fantastic coffee…"
"Actually, Mr. Hackett…" Ilsa fought the urge to take a deep breath. She needed to deliver the next line casually. "I would very much like to see the institute's boiler room."
It was written all over Hackett's face that he wanted to do nothing more than blurt out "The BOILER ROOM? What the hell…?" But she was Ilsa Pucci and he was a research institute manager who needed money. She could have asked him to remove the office kitchen's fridge from the wall and look behind it and he would have happily agreed. So they made their way downstairs… to the boiler room, the room in the building that was furthest away from the manager's office.
At night the building was protected by a rather high end security system… a Coney Island was the best strategy – Ames would slip in with a stolen key card as soon as Ilsa had lured the manager away, crack the safe, retrieve the file in question and leave again. Easy gig, unless….
"Uh-oh…."
"Define uh-oh", Winston in the van immediately tensed up. Why couldn't things go smooth at least once?
"They upgraded the safe. I can crack it, but I'll only be able to delay the alarm for a couple of seconds. I can't completely circumvent triggering it…"
Winston sighed. "Chance? Any ideas?"
"Ilsa, get ready to write a huge paycheck. Ames, once you've got the file, get ready to beat a hasty retreat."
Ames cracked the safe… Damn it, the thing was full of files, which one… ah, luckily they were labeled quite meticulously. Just as she grabbed the right one, the telephone on the manager's desk began to ring.
And so did all other telephones in the building. Just like the workers' cell phones… When their owners took the call, they all heard the same thing… a Russian sex hotline, in full swing.
Ames was already halfway down the stairs when the alarm began to sound… the automatic signal that was supposed to alert the next police station was turned off, thanks to Winston's skills. And none of the workers could call the police thanks to Swetlana, Nastassja and her colleagues blocking the lines with their calls… Chance had done a very good job linking all the institute's telephones with the Russian call center.
Ames made a clean getaway. Ilsa's was a little costly, but nobody suspected she had anything to do with the break-in. The manager was quite puzzled by the whole thing anyway. "I have no idea what those files contained. They were leftovers from the former management and we haven't had time yet to look into them." He didn't mention that representatives of the highest level of management had explicitly forbidden to look at those files "since it would be a waste of time and resources".
In the van, on their way home, Ilsa couldn't resist, she wanted to know if the answer to Diane Evensong's illness was really in the file. Maybe they could help her after all. She knew some very competent doctors, if they knew what to look for...
Together with Ames she looked into the folder… and gasped.
"Does that mean what I think it does?", Ames whispered.