Chapter 6— "Equals and Opposites"
The Paladin, European Airspace
President Caldwell contacted them via her private channel with them on the SMI.
"Answer it, Charlie," said Sam.
One of President Caldwell's advisors, this one a younger female one, showed up on the screen.
"Nice to see you again, President Caldwell," said Sam.
"Is this Sam Fisher?" said the advisor.
"Perhaps. It depends on if this is President Caldwell."
"She doesn't want to risk being seen talking with Fourth Echelon," said the advisor. "She trusts me enough that she's tasked me with talking to you about a lead her administration uncovered in Hordafylke."
Sam said, "How did she discover this lead?"
"Because of Irving Lambert."
Sam's eyes went wide.
He started to have flashes of when he shot Lambert between the eyes while Lambert was tied to a chair in New York.
"Because of the ongoing investigation into the links between Fourth Echelon and Caldwell's administration, there have also been leaks of information we haven't been able to stop, including vast amounts of data from Third Echelon's old archives… some of which were from Lambert's files."
Sam looked at Grim.
"I remember now," said Grim. "Lambert had tons of files stored on his computer. The one he gave me the access codes to. Due to the incoming attacks on Washington, along with Third Echelon's emergency self-destruction security protocol cutting the meeting short, I only had time to play the one for you that told you the truth about his betrayal… and his search for the mole within Third Echelon."
"And those files were still intact somehow?" said Sam. Looking at Grim, Sam said, "Why didn't we have access to them?"
"We did. I just didn't have permission from Caldwell to share them with you at the time, Sam."
Sam grimaced.
"It was probably because of Megiddo that the files got leaked again," said Briggs.
"So, what is this lead in Hordafylke, and what does it have to do with me, Lambert, and the recent leaks?" said Sam.
"The terrorist group in Hordafylke is operating under the same geothermal energy shell company as the one that was used by the Islamic sleeper cell you uncovered while in Reykjavik, Iceland. We're sending you some of the files now."
As the files flooded the SMI and the screens of the Paladin's computers, Sam couldn't help but remember the desperate situation he was thrown into then. John Hodge, a new Third Echelon agent Sam helped train, was killed by the terrorists, all while Sam had no choice but to sit in the shadows and watch. It was bad enough that Lambert made him come along on a mission without even letting him know what he was getting into.
But even after having to hack into the terrorist's ICBM all in a matter of minutes and having to shoot his way out of the facility, then climb up a rope aboard the Osprey before it detonated—a feat of madness that was near impossible in itself—it was what part next that broke Sam.
Climbing aboard the Osprey in the middle of words, Sam got a call.
"…what's going on, Lambert?"
"It's Sarah. She's… Christ, Sam, I don't know where to begin…"
Just a matter of those few words was all it took for Sam's psyche to unravel.
Furious, Sam took off his trifocal goggles and threw them off the side of the Osprey, where they fell into the Atlantic Ocean and sunk into its abyss, along with a piece of himself he never truly got back.
Charlie said to himself while looking at the files, "Shit… Well now I definitely know Sam was the guy who took down the JBA…"
Briggs, Sam, and Grim eyed Charlie for a moment as he said this.
"Jesus…" said Briggs. "The Engineers… multiple of the founding members, some of which were ones that we hunted down and captured after the Blacklist attacks?"
"They were part of the same Islamic group," said Sam. "When Lambert and I failed to wipe that group out due to the problems it caused in Iceland, the Engineers absorbed them."
"It looks like Lambert knew more about the operation than he was letting on about," said Grim. "He knew that the mole infiltrating Third Echelon had a huge interest in hunting down this group. Similarly, I'm starting to think that Abstergo… or rather, Lucas's faction within Abstergo, has a similar fixation on the Engineers."
Sam looked back at Grim as she continued. "By taking you out of the field and giving you status as a non-official cover agent, Lambert was trying to get you onto the trail of John Brown's Army, Megiddo's domestic false flag terrorist organization in America… but he was also trying to get you off of the trail of this organization simply so Third Echelon couldn't get their hands on them."
"I don't understand…" said Sam, looking at the files. "Why do you think he'd want that? There's so much about this Abstergo conspiracy that I still don't understand… and I feel like I'm being left out of the loop in terms of the intel!"
Caldwell's advisor said, "The files say that these terrorists were able to get their hands on an ICBM all under the radar of international intelligence, to the point that we stopped them from launching it just in the nick of time. No one even realized they were a threat at the time. And according to the interrogations of some of the Engineers, they said they were planning to use it on targets that would cripple Megiddo… send the world into a state of anarchy."
"Do you think they were bluffing?" said Briggs.
"Why would they be bluffing?" said Charlie.
"Something still doesn't make sense about the relationship between Megiddo and the Engineers," said Briggs.
"I know…" said Charlie. "I mean, are they working with each other? Or against each other? It's like they're constantly breaking up with each other and getting back together again right after."
Briggs said, "Was Abstergo trying to find a way to control the Engineers? Get leverage over them like they did the JBA?"
Grim realized, "It makes sense. If they wanted the Engineers to work for them, but the Engineers were unwilling, then they'd need leverage over them. They did the same thing with Sam."
Sam frowned, and said to Grim, "If you and President Caldwell don't already happen to have the answers to these questions in your treasure troves of secrets you've kept from me, then I'd say that the best person to answer all our questions regarding the Engineers and their relationship to Abstergo is Sadiq. This schism that's happening in Abstergo… Sadiq and Lucas are at the center of it somehow."
"Well, Sadiq is no longer under Caldwell's jurisdiction, Sam," said the advisor.
"I know," said Sam, "Sadiq contacted me and explained that too."
The advisor raised their eyebrows. "Sadiq contacted you?"
"He wants me to break him out of the prison train taking him across the Chunnel."
"Caldwell would advise against that, Sam," said the advisor.
"Says the intern?"
"Combining this new revelation from the Third Echelon files with an Engineer sleeper cell going active in Hordafylke… along with members of the Collective Force PMC being identified by surveillance footage in Norway around the same area? You'd likely be able to find actionable intel there."
"That, or a trap," said Sam.
"Whether you're a part of US intelligence anymore or not, Fisher, it's better than negotiating with, let alone working with, a terrorist," said the advisor.
"She has a point," said Briggs.
"Anyway, I'm getting a call from Caldwell. I'll need to let her know about this…" said the advisor. "I'll call you back. Just don't go after him yet, Sam. The mission in Hordafylke is your priority."
"Good. Do that," said Sam as the advisor hung up, "because we seem to be getting flooded with calls right now too."
Now Vic was contacting them on the SMI.
"What's up, Vic?"
"Sam," said Vic, his voice sounding somewhat panicky, "did you happen to get any actionable intel on an Engineer sleeper cell in Norway, especially from Caldwell?"
"Yes," said Sam, "we just did. Why, Vic? What's wrong?"
"Don't act on it, Sam," said Vic. "It's a trap."
"What?" said Briggs.
"What's going on, Vic? Talk to me," said Sam.
"Abstergo's catchin' up to me and my boys, Sam, that's what!" said Vic. "I got a request from a client who's a higher-up in Abstergo, to have Paladin Nine hunt you and the others down not long after the shit-show in Italy. Not knowing what else to do, I accepted the contract. I think Abstergo must've seen my drone help you escape from them in Hong Kong, because now the client's middleman asked me to meet him in person at his decadent penthouse in Stockholm… not far from the same place we disguised and fixed up Fourth Echelon's plane.
"The client turned out to be Lucas, Sam. I just met with that sick fuck in person and we talked over drinks and a meal. Either I barely managed to bluff him, or he knows I'm bluffin' him, and let me go for now. Regardless of which, he's usin' me now to get to you, Sam, and it's only a matter of time before he corners me! Hell, if my boys hadn't been extra careful not to leave any evidence you were there behind in the safe house in Stockholm, Paladin Nine would probably already be cooked. And I know you need me and my boys to help you take this son of a bitch down and get your daughter back."
"I see, Vic," said Sam. "If Lucas and Abstergo have you under surveillance, maybe it's best you cut contact with us for a while."
"All right," said Vic, "but what about Sarah?"
"That depends on if you've gotten any leads so far."
"We were followin' up on one on a human trafficking ring based in the Moluccas that might've gotten their hands on Sarah. They've done business with Abstergo's clients before. Unfortunately, the lead went dead, and the other members of Paladin Nine's board of directors are sayin' it's gonna cost the company too much to pursue it, not to mention that they're confused as to the reason we're pursuin' it. Frankly I hope that particular trafficking ring isn't the one that the Engineers used to kidnap Sarah, because they're brutal in how they treat their human cargo."
Sam grimaced.
"I'm sorry, Sam. I've tried everything, but I think I have to give up on searchin' for Sarah. Things are lookin' pretty bad right now."
"It's all right, Vic," said Sam. "You did your best."
"Anyway, good luck findin' a lead of your own, Sam. Hang in there, pal," said Vic as he hung up.
The others looked at Sam.
"It keeps coming back to Sadiq…" said Sam. "Charlie, Grim, can the SMI figure out where he's being kept?"
Charlie said, "Not as far as which CIA black site. But news of the Engineers' captured members including Sadiq has been made public on WNM."
Looking at the WNM news footage regarding the Engineers being talked about at a G20 summit in Paris, Grim said, "Sadiq wasn't bluffing. They're loading him onto a secure train aboard the Chunnel to be taken to MI6 for interrogation since he used to work for them as an agent."
Sam said, "Briggs, do you think you have any potential connections or information from the Company you could use to figure out the location of the black site Sadiq is being held at?"
Briggs said, "To be honest, Sam? I burned most of my connections with the CIA after I broke you into and out of Gitmo back during the Blacklist attacks… and what little I would've had after that now hate my guts for trying to nuke Rome. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if their new rising star Hisham is spreading lies about me to my old colleagues right about now and destroying my credibility even further."
"You did shoot him, to be fair…" said Charlie. "Hold on! I think I managed to find it…" Manipulating the SMI's screen, Charlie said, "A CIA black site built into a set of partially excavated catacombs. Codename Archangel. It's been seeing a ton of activity coming in and out of it ever since the summit, mainly convoys of armored trucks. They're likely carrying prisoners on them."
"Is there any way to identify which truck convoy might be transporting Sadiq onto the train using the SMI, Charlie?"
"I'm analyzing the traffic routes and movement patterns they're using to transport the prisoners. That and trying to flag any potential license plates, makes, and models of trucks that come in or out. Regardless, the trucks look like they're all heavily armored and are often guarded by convoys of smaller vehicles…"
Grim glimpsed at Sam briefly without him noticing before looking back at Charlie as he continued analyzing the information as it came up on the SMI.
"I can't find Sadiq's convoy…"
"And as long as you don't see his face, you never will," said Grim.
Sam looked at Grim.
"What are you implying, Grim?"
"The CIA are going to do everything they can to make sure he's not seen outside of the site and the trucks he's being carried on. We could flag down every set of trucks that come out of that site, but we'll never know which one is Sadiq's. It'll take too long, and by the time Sadiq actually is ready for transport across the Chunnel, either we'll have exposed ourselves and gotten captured…"
"…or it'll be too late," said Briggs. "I hate to break it to you Sam, but Grim's right."
"No, no, just give me time, I can figure this out!" said Charlie.
"So what, you're saying we should try to break into a high-security, high-speed train underneath the middle of the English Channel and get him out that way instead?" said Sam. "That won't be any easier."
Charlie said, "I've pulled up the schematics to the train's security systems… Calling it a train is inaccurate; it's more like a fortress on wheels. You're talking high-grade titanium plating on the train exterior, RFID tag-triggered door locks, security cameras, laser tripwires, motion detectors, as well as sentry turrets built into the interior walls in case an alarm is triggered…"
"Each of the guards on the train are one of the best the European intelligence community has to offer. Well-trained, heavily armored, and equipped with enough ammunition for their rifles to kill every single prisoner on that train single-handedly if the possibility of their escape becomes real. Sam's right. Breaking into this train is going to be impossible."
"It doesn't matter," said Grim. "We're pressed for time now. The summit in Paris is over. WNM says the world leaders who attended the summit have agreed to send Sadiq to England where he'll be taken into MI6 custody. It's likely only a matter of hours before Sadiq's transported to the train. By the time he reaches England… he'll have disappeared."
Sam frowned and looked around as the advisor called back.
Sighing, he thought for a moment before he made his decision.
"President Caldwell's assistant," said Sam.
"I informed the President about the situation with Sadiq," said the advisor. "She still believes that you should—"
"—according to one of our own sources, the sleeper cell Caldwell's intel sources picked up is a trap." said Sam. "Hordafylke's a no-go."
"Then what's your next lead? Do you even have one other than—"
"—about the Sadiq bit…" said Sam, "I have a favor to ask of President Caldwell."
"Is this one that would potentially risk her being exposed as helping Fourth Echelon?"
"Perhaps," said Sam, "but it's also one that would give her some credibility. I want her to have me taken to a CIA black site in France."
"Wait, what?" said Briggs.
"Are you nuts, Sam?" said Charlie.
"From the sound of the other members of Fourth Echelon, it seems like you're developing this plan as you go, Mr. Fisher," said the advisor. "I doubt President Caldwell will do this for you just to help you break out Sadiq and find your daughter."
"We have intelligence encoded in a dialect that only Sadiq knows how to translate. Intelligence that will help us locate the Red Mercury bombs in the wild. That much was confirmed with what we have translated so far, as well as additional intelligence we received about it in our prior mission. Whether any of us like it or not, we need to nab him and make him talk if we want to neutralize the Red Mercury threat."
The advisor looked at Sam.
"If it helps, intern," said Sam, "I'm going to be in France when I'll be captured."
"What makes you think Caldwell will do that for you, Mr. Fisher?"
"She won't be the one who captures me. Again, I just want her to make sure I'm transferred there."
"What? Then who's going to capture you?"
"Leave that part of the plan to the professionals, intern," said Sam. "Just make sure that Caldwell's people smile to the cameras and say that they have credible intel that I'm associated with the Engineers. Caldwell will work out the details from there to assure that I'm put on that train with Sadiq."
"This is insane…" said the advisor, shaking her head before she put a hand to it to calm herself. "Give me a second to talk to Caldwell again."
"Take your time," said Sam.
Grim said to Sam, "What if Lucas pulls strings to make sure you aren't placed with Sadiq? Or just outright kills you… or worse, does to you what he did to me?"
"Not to mention the thousands of other things that could easily go wrong with this poor excuse of a plan," said Briggs.
Charlie said, "I'm not sure this is a good idea, Sam…"
Sam said, "Charlie, can you create an EMP device of some kind that would let me disable train security from the inside?"
"Yeah, but how would you smuggle it in?"
"It's going to have to be small enough that it can be injected into my blood," said Sam.
"Gross," said Charlie. "I'll… I'll try to dummy something up."
"Good," Sam said to Charlie before turning to the others. "President Caldwell gave me full authority to run Fourth Echelon before she disavowed it. I'm taking full advantage of that authority now."
Briggs said, "How would we even manage to break you out?"
"I'll have to disable the train security at a point where there's a gap in security between one of the tunnels running next to it aboard the Chunnel."
Grim said, "Briggs and I would have to board one of the adjacent trains and then jump off."
"Wait a second," said Briggs, "on top of having to jump off a high-speed train, and time everything well enough to make it so that we can board your train, that would mean we'd literally have to fly all the way to the UK while you're getting taken to the black site after being captured!"
Charlie said, "This is going to require the type of planning that would take weeks… We have hours."
"Make it happen as best as you can," said Sam as he called Vic again. "We've got one shot at this."
As Vic picked up, he said, "Sam? I thought you told me to cut contact with you!"
"Vic," said Sam, "you know how Lucas wants you to capture me?"
"Uh… yeah?"
"Change of plans," said Sam. "I want you to capture me too now."
Nice, France
Sam was sitting on a bench on the boardwalk by the coast of France, waiting for Vic's men to show up.
He called the others via his OPSAT. "It's close to time. Are Vic and his men on the way?"
"Looks like they're stuck in traffic," said Charlie.
"Shit," said Sam.
"You think Lucas will buy his alibi, Sam?" said Briggs. "If he hasn't figured out he's working with us already."
"I don't know," said Sam, "but this should at least buy Vic and his men some time away from Abstergo's prying eyes."
Charlie said, "Sam… one other thing. If- once… we get Sadiq, how are we going to manage to get him to tell us anything? I mean, we've tried to before after we captured him the first time. He hates us."
"Charlie's got a point, Sam," said Grim. "Sadiq may be a lost cause."
"I'm about to be captured, publicly condemned and accused of crimes against humanity, and then locked up in a CIA black site," said Sam. "There's no turning back now. Speaking of which…"
Sam looked at a nearby church in the center of town. "You said they got stuck in traffic, Charlie?"
"Yeah," he said.
"How soon do you think they'll be here as of now?"
"Roughly twenty, thirty minutes? Some people are protesting and blocking the streets in Nice due to certain controversial decisions made at the summit about the global economy and climate emissions."
"Just like in Hong Kong… The world really is going to shit," mused Briggs. "I guess it makes more sense when you're being hunted by an evil megacorporation running the world from the shadows."
"Why'd you ask, Sam?" said Charlie.
Getting up, Sam said, "I'll be right back."
Sam walked into the church.
Forgot it was Sunday, he thought as he walked in, sat down, and listened briefly to a priest who was finishing reading something from the Book of Revelations in French.
Sam looked at the art on walls and stained glass windows of the church when he heard someone sit next to him.
"Are you a new member of the church?" said one of the priests working for the church.
"I'm just a tourist," said Sam.
"I figured I'd ask," said the priest. "May I ask your name?"
"Sam… Sam Burns."
"Nice to meet you, Sam," said the priest. "You look like you've seen many things, been to many places in this life."
"What makes you say that?" said Sam. "It's not because I'm old, is it?"
"No. It's a sadness I can see in your eyes. Perhaps you have sins you wish to confess?"
Sam sighed.
"You need not be afraid. As someone who works for the church it is not my place to judge, nor to coerce."
"I'm not afraid of my sins, or talking about them if I need to," said Sam, "I'm afraid of who my sins have hurt the most. I've sinned countless times. Despite that I like to think that I care about people despite that I've sinned against them so much, and I'm always ready to sin against any of them if I know I must due to the nature of my work… there's one person I care about more than anyone or anything else in the world. And now the people I've sinned against are angry, and they took her from me out of retaliation. I'm never going to see her again. That much I know. I'm not here to confess. I'm here to pray for her and her safety, that somehow… somehow… despite how bad things are looking for her right now, she'll be okay, that things will get better for her, and that she'll live a good life."
"I… see…" said the old priest. "You sound like a good man. A troubled man, but a good man nonetheless. This person you care about… if by some chance you ever get to see them again, would you be scared of them and what they thought of you?"
"I… don't know…" said Sam, the light in his eyes fading a little.
"If they truly understand how much you care about them, then perhaps they care enough about you as well that they're willing to forgive you. Regardless, you mustn't give up hope. Your soul is redeemable. Part of understanding Christ's love—true unconditional love— is that no matter how awful the things you've done, he will always be there for you. All you have to do is embrace him. And once you do, nothing can harm your soul. Not pain, not loss, not the fires of Armageddon, not even the devil himself, for his destiny lies in the lake of fire. Know that his love is worth it. Even after the world is cleansed of sin by the battles of Armageddon, and a new heaven and earth comes into existence, what ultimately heals the world and its peoples won't be the River of Life or the Tree of Life… it will be the word of Christ that he is coming home, and coming home soon."
"Christ's love is unconditional?" said Sam.
"Yes."
"People say a father's love is supposed to be unconditional. If a father isn't ever there for their kid…" Sam sighed, and got up from his seat. "I need to go."
Clutching his forehead with his hand as he got up to leave the church, he briefly saw the red dot of a laser sight on his hand before a sticky shocker hit his hand.
Screaming and desperately trying to pry it off along with the next one that hit him in the chest, Sam's vision became blurred and he stumbled backward into the very center of the church, where he was surrounded by commandos, and one beat him over the head with the butt of his rifle to knock him unconscious.
Abstergo Black Site, Paris, France
"…you're telling me Mr. Coste found him hiding in the middle of a church, in plain sight?"
"His story lines up with the news and eyewitness reports. Still, I don't like it, Lucas… Are you sure you can trust Paladin Nine?"
"Whom I choose to put my trust in is none of your concern, Mr. Hamza. However, for your sake you should do everything you can to earn mine."
"Yes, sir."
"You failed to catch him and his team back in Tuscany. And Hong Kong. Continuing to fail is only going to cause what little trust I have in you to wither away further. Find out his team's whereabouts. Use whatever interrogation methods you need. I can't guarantee your family's safety from the Selection if you don't get me what I need."
"I'll find them, and hunt them down."
"I'll leave you to it then. Be quick about it… otherwise, it'll be up to MI6 to do the job for me instead of you. First though, I want to explain to Mr. Fisher his situation. Wake him up."
Sam could barely hear the voices through the bag that was on his head and the ringing in his ears from being zapped, hit on the head with the butt of a rifle, and heavily drugged.
Then a bucket of freezing water was tossed onto his head and the bag was taken off, waking him up completely and bringing him back to his senses.
Sam was in a T-shirt and boxers in a dark and dirty cell, with his wrists and ankles cuffed to a chair. His feet were placed in a tub of freezing water.
"Lucas," said Sam. "You know your fancy suit you're wearing and the copious amounts of hair gel you use make you stand out a little too much in a black site full of terrorists."
"Resorting to dry humor to protect your soul from the horrors of admitting the sins you've committed, Sam?" said Lucas.
"You're talking about my trip to that church?" said Sam.
"More or less," said Lucas, "but Hisham's going to be the one interrogating you, not me."
"I assume that means you're here to gloat that you won."
"Not quite," grinned Lucas. "I'm trying to figure out what I should do with your daughter now that Sadiq's men handed her over to me."
Sam frowned.
"Of course, if you just tell me where your friends are now, I promise I won't do anything bad to her. In fact, her life would likely be much better if she lives under my custody than it ever was when she lived under yours."
"You flatter yourself."
"All of that time you spent fighting terrorists abroad, Sam… did you ever stop and think if what you did for your country was worth it? After all, most of your work just ended up benefiting Abstergo and its various subsidiaries. The American military industrial complex loves to exploit the blind patriotism of soldiers like you and their families. Did you ever wonder if you would've been better off spending time making sure Sarah had a healthy childhood?"
"Tell me where she is and I might let you live, Lucas."
"Splinter Cells sure are good at making idle threats."
"This threat is far from idle."
"Right… forgive me for not recognizing the source of your arrogance," said Lucas. "The reason I don't believe you're a threat isn't because you're tied to a chair, because you lack any weapons whatsoever, or because you're in a facility full of armed CIA personnel and advanced security systems that vastly outnumber you and are tracking your every move via the RFID chip in your neck. No, the reason I don't believe you're a threat, is because…"
Lucas then beat Sam hard in the face with a single fist.
Sam's vision blurred and his resolve faltered immediately; he nearly blacked out because of that. He had a nasty bruise on his right cheek.
"…you're an inferior being."
"Damn it…" said Sam as he coughed out blood.
"I could kill you with one punch," said Lucas. "Definitely knock you out with one. The human body is a fragile thing. When the human body takes damage, the human body feels pain. When the human body feels pain, the human mind feels fear. Fear is a learning process. We designed humans to be that way. To be a slave race. Abstergo was founded by the Knights Templar. They believed that they were doing God's work by creating a peaceful world. But the Knights Templar and their ambitions were a mere byproduct of their predecessors, the Order of the Ancients."
"Like the Instruments of the First Will–the organization that helped me subvert Abstergo–and unlike the Templars, the reason the Order carried out their work wasn't because they believed in enforcing peace… They didn't need to believe anything. No, they understood the same truth that the Isu knew. That humans are tools built to serve the Isu, nothing more. And because they understood that humans are not very easy to control, let alone by so few other humans, they knew they had to use humans' fear of pain to force them into submission, so they'd accept their roles as tools."
"Of course…" said Sam, breathing heavily, "…right. You're not just a human being, you're also an Isu. You're not just Lucas Richards… you're Odin."
"Did Grim tell you that?" said Lucas with a smirk.
"You tell me," Sam said, before gritting his teeth as he added, "because lately she's been acting more like Freyja."
"Whether you accept it yet or not, Sam," said Lucas, "your life as a free man as you knew it is over, and your new role is to help us find your friends. Do this for me, and your daughter will survive my Selection. The more painful you have to make the process for yourself… the more painful it likely will end up being for Sarah to adjust to her new life."
"I'm going to see her now. She's being held by a friend of mine in Indonesia named Hoyt Volker. A human trafficker and drug smuggler with a private army. Like me, he has a lot of friends in high places, and he'd be happy to send her to some of his sickest rich clients."
Sam frowned as Lucas paused for a second. "Come to think of it, you went to Indonesia on a mission, right? To intercept Suhadi Sadono? The leader of the Darah Dan Doa? An Indonesian guerrilla group… that was ironically trained by the CIA to fight off communists during the Cold War."
Lucas grinned. "Yes… That's right. Hisham pulled up the file the CIA had on your involvement with stopping Sadono's plans while he was in cahoots with Norman Soth. It's somewhat ironic that you first met him on a train heading from Paris to Nice, and that I captured you in the same places."
Sam looked at Hisham and frowned. "So… Norman Soth was never the only one in the CIA… I never should've trusted you, Hisham."
"Your loss," said Hisham.
Lucas laughed. "Abstergo still has influence over the Darah Dan Doa's remnants, and I know they hate you after what you did to them and their leader. I imagine how Sadono treated Douglas Shetland was a major motivator to why you chose to go and stop his 'Pandora Tomorrow' attacks, just as it was a major motivator as to why Shetland turned his back on America and developed his own plans for the world…"
"Chaos Theory…" Sam grimaced. "Abstergo wanted to absorb Displace… They eventually did, and turned it into Black Arrow before they used them for the Third Echelon conspiracy to kill President Caldwell… You were trying to find leverage on Douglas back when you captured him during the embassy raid in Dili!"
"Your friend Shetland wasn't wrong about America, nor was he wrong about his math. A system like human civilization is so mathematically complicated that just the slightest little disturbance can send it toppling… Someone has to enforce peace by making sure disturbances never occur. Douglas decided to become one of those little disturbances instead of joining us, and he paid the price for it. By your own hand, naturally guided by us. Anyway, I'll make sure to tell Hoyt Sarah's father is a friend of the Doa."
Turning toward the door, Lucas said to Hisham before exiting Fisher's interrogation room, "Take care of him."
Hisham nodded, then walked toward Fisher and socked him hard across the jaw.
Yelling out and grunting, Fisher said after recovering from the blow, "Usually in an interrogation they tend to ask the question first. Just thought I'd mention it."
"Lucas already said what he wants," said Hisham.
"He should've stuck around if he wanted a shot at getting something out of me," said Sam, "because you don't hit nearly as hard as he does."
"I see," laughed Hisham. "That's not a problem. I have plenty of other toys I can use to get the truth out of you."
As Hisham went over to a table full of torture devices and started to turn on an electric battery, Sam said, "You never mentioned you had a family when you worked with me back when we were working undercover together in John Brown's Army, Hisham. Did you seriously sell out to a psychopath willing to nuke the entire world to make a profit just to save your family, Hisham?"
Hisham frowned, and said, "You would've done the same thing if you were in my position, Fisher."
"Yeah, well it certainly looks like he's having you try to make me do it," said Sam. "When the dust clears from the nuclear fallout of Lucas's Selection, they won't be able to look you in the eye ever again knowing the things you've done to ensure their survival. He turned you into a monster, Hisham."
"I don't care what they think of me. Knowing the things I do as a CIA agent every day is probably enough for them to think of me that way anyway. At least my family will be alive when the dust does clear, Fisher. I doubt you'll be able to say the same thing about Sarah if you don't cooperate. Survival of the fittest."
"We used to be the same, Hisham," said Sam. "Ordinary men with families who had a calling to serve the greater good. Disavowed by the very governments we served. Now look at us. Lucas turned us against each other."
"No," said Hisham furiously, "if you don't have the same conviction in your heart that I do now, then you never were. We aren't the same. And you know what happens when opposites get too close to each other, whether they were ever attracted to each other or not…" Hisham finished plugging in the electroshock cables to the battery, and then pressed the cables together briefly in front of Sam's face in an attempt to scare him before saying to him, "…sparks tend to fly. Painful ones."
Sam said, "If you're trying to intimidate me, Hisham, you could use a less cheesy physics metaphor."
"All right, Sam. You know what happens next if you don't comply. At least to yourself that is; whatever happens to Sarah is out of my hands. Where's the rest of Fourth Echelon?"
Sam grimaced, and spat blood on the floor. "Do your worst, Hisham."
He then began to scream as Hisham pressed the electrodes against his chest and the electricity became agonizing.
… … … … …
Hours later, Sam was feeling dizzy due to being drugged and electrocuted so much.
He faintly heard Hisham talking on his smartphone with someone.
"He isn't talking, Lucas. I've tried everything, MK-Ultra included. There are few people I've ever seen who were able to resist the worst of it. Looks like Sam's one of them. … … Should I utilize the Project Phoenix as well, make him like what you made Grim into? Perhaps he'd be a good Loki reincarnation variant. … … What? Why not? … … What do you mean 'he's not like Grim?' … … Bullshit. … … All right, so maybe some people have stronger abilities to resist their Isu alters than others. You would know way more about this shit than I would. … … Are you sure that's a good idea? … … I mean, I get the part about how you want Sadiq and the Engineers to be the one to take the fall for the Selection, but are you sure this is the way to go about it?"
"Right… you're worried there are people in MI6 who aren't falling for Abstergo's tricks. … … Of course… it's about that file Sadiq's after… and the Abstergo files. … … Only Freyja can open it? … … That's a clever way of making sure the world doesn't find out the truth about what Sadiq is… not to mention the Engineers. … … No need, you've convinced me. I'm sorry I couldn't make him talk. But give me some credit; he was never a very talkative man in the first place. It looks like he's going to act now instead. … … Right, I'll make it look good. … … What? What about the Assassin? … … He has your daughter? … You're saying she's the key to your real plans? … … What was his name again? … … Elijah? … … Whether he finds us or we find him, it'll be his end. Right, so you're having me go after him instead of Fourth Echelon now. … Your plan makes sense. Fourth Echelon's practically in your hands by now. You have my word. … … The last convoy's about to head out in a few hours. I need to go if Sam's going to make it to the train ride across the Chunnel. … … Of course, right. Goodbye."
After hanging up, Hisham put his smartphone in his pocket, walked over to Sam, and socked him in the head again, causing Sam to puke a little.
"Shit… I used way too much drugs on you…" said Hisham.
Sam had a vague memory resurface of when he was captured in Iraq and tied to a crucifix.
"Sam, stay with me!" said Hisham as he snapped in Sam's face to try and wake him up.
"Sam, you in there?" said Vic.
After shooting the militia keeping Sam captive and cutting Sam down, Vic carried him out of the burning building. "Shit, what the hell did they do to you, Sam… Come on, pal… I'm not breakin' the news to Sarah that she's an orphan!"
"Fisher?" said Hisham.
Sam gasped, his eyes wide open. He began saying something to Hisham.
"What?" said Hisham. "Are you speaking in… is that… Arabic? No… wait a minute… You're not… Are you?"
Sam was breathing heavily; his heart was pounding.
Hisham yelled, "Damn it, Sam… I don't have time left for this. We're putting you on the train with Sadiq."
… … … … …
High Security Prisoner Transport Train, The Chunnel
Sam kept hallucinating all the way through his ride on the armored convoy from the black site, until he found himself awake on the train, wearing a straitjacket and kept inside a cage-sized cell.
"You are very tenacious," said a voice in the cell across the room.
Starting to snap out of it, he woke up.
"Sadiq…" said Sam.
"I knew you'd come for me," said Sadiq, "but I had no idea you'd be mad enough to get yourself turned in just to come for me. Your face and neck are covered in marks from those electrodes the CIA uses with their batteries. I assume the rest of your body is too, but the straitjacket is preventing me from being certain.
"You were speaking in Arabic in your sleep," said Sadiq, "fluently, almost as if you were a native. Your profile did say you fought in Iraq with Victor Coste, but I doubt you would've picked up the dialects you were speaking in the regions you were deployed to. Have you ever taken Arabic language courses?"
"I learned it a while back," said Sam.
"That still doesn't explain some of the things you were saying," said Sadiq. "Several of your streams of consciousness reminded me of passages in a famous book your fellow Americans are so fond of alluding to as a means of promoting your way of life and the various bigotries associated with it… despite that most of them have never read it."
Sam blinked heavily, his eyes wide as he was still trying to process everything that had just happened to him.
"When's your team going to come get us, Fisher?" said Sadiq. "You can't possibly get out of the straitjacket by yourself. Oh, and if you're thinking of crossing the English Channel without a boat, you can't walk on water either."
Sam said nothing.
"So, are we just waiting for them, then?" said Sadiq. "Because if so, then that gives us more time to talk. Have you actually read the Bible, Sam?"
"I have."
"You're an exception among your fellow Americans, then. Do you believe in God?"
"No," said Sam.
Sadiq laughed.
"What's so funny?"
"While there isn't an afterlife, no heaven or hell, no Judgment Day, no Lake of Fire, no Father, Son, or Holy Spirit… and there definitely is no Garden of Eden… the Bible doesn't get enough credit for how much history it's actually preserved. Rewritten, sure, but also, simultaneously, preserved. Concepts like angels breeding with humans… and their bloodlines continuing. 'The Nephilim.' The Order of the Ancients originally came up with the Christian Bible and the idea of a peaceful, submissive Christ to help gain leverage over the Jewish population after he was made a martyr by the Order. Part of what Christ really was… was what's called a Hidden One. The Hidden Ones killed the Order of the Ancients' members for a living, tried to liberate the rest of humanity while staying in the shadows. They believed the Order was evil."
"Lucas mentioned the Order to me," said Sam. "He shares its ideals."
"Ironic given another one of his incarnations wiped them out for good during the Viking era," said Sadiq. "History repeats itself a lot, but not always. There are constants and variables. Points where history might or might not be made that converge and diverge. The Isu called them 'nodes'. They were so good at mathematical calculations that they could create entire simulations of possible futures using their technology. They even developed technology that helped them communicate to people in the very futures they predicted, not just as if they're sending a message, but as if they're right there, talking to them! Even though they've been dead for millennia. It was certainly a messy and lengthy process, though. Your friend Douglas Shetland was getting somewhere with his own theory in that regard."
"You're saying the Isu… did all this?" said Sam.
"Part of the reason the Engineer sleeper cell in Hordafylke went active was to recover Yggdrasil. Isu technology. Very important to Abstergo's research, especially the Phoenix Project," said Sadiq. "You were wise not to fall for that trap."
Thinking of Vic, Sam said nothing so he didn't blow his cover.
"Did Grim tell you about the Isu technology of Yggdrasil? About how Odin created it as a seventh solution, a way for the Isu, or at least his Isu caste- the Aesir- to live beyond the Toba Catastrophe?"
"No," said Sam. "What's the Toba Catastrophe?"
"The solar flare. The one that wiped out the true Isu and most of their human instruments. Ragnarok. The Isu's own personal Megiddo."
Sam looked at Sadiq as he said, "Like how Abstergo and Lucas's Red Mercury plot will inevitably be your own Megiddo, Sam… likely along with the Megiddo of the entire human race, whether Lucas realizes it or not… and I suspect he doesn't… the Isu knew that their chance of survival was near zero, and that they'd have to resort to unconventional methods to live beyond it. The Aesir decided to develop Yggdrasil, and implant junk code into the DNA of human bloodlines that would cause reincarnations of key members of the Aesir to form in random individuals, in random generations, of said bloodlines. They figured since they built too many humans, and that the humans would outlast them due to how much they tend to reproduce, they could survive by implanting their own consciousnesses within the gene pool."
"Anyway, due to a power struggle… Odin wanted me to die in the catastrophe, and not live on. I had a trick or two up my sleeve though. Hence why I'm here talking to you."
"Loki…" said Sam. "Dr. Aswat was telling the truth. You're a Greco-Roman Sage."
"There's something I always wondered though," said Sadiq. "Lucas mentioned how Odin made a deal with a member of the Greco-Roman Isu caste. The Jotunn, as the Aesir called them. An Isu named Juno, and a member of the Capitoline Triad. Said Triad was responsible for developing the first six solutions, surprise, surprise, all of which failed… in their time, at least. Juno was getting impatient with the Triad, and she had a dying lover, Aita, whose survival depended on the seventh solution. If it weren't for Juno's help, the Aesir and Aita wouldn't have lived on as Sages… but I always wondered if there was another solution even after that… perhaps an iteration of the seventh."
Sam looked at Sadiq, going more and more into disbelief as he talked. "Due to the infighting between the Norse and Greco-Roman Isu castes, it's easy to forget that the Isu were everywhere on Earth during their time. Was there an ancient civilization on your corner of the Earth? Did they have a set of gods they worshipped? Chances are that set of gods was an Isu caste, and humans didn't know any better because they were slaves with inferior mindsets, traumatized out of their minds by the catastrophe after surviving it. Imagine living in a post-apocalyptic world, like in some of the fictional depictions of them, Sam, and you'll have an idea what it was like post-Toba. History was misinterpreted across generations, and history became a bunch of myths and religions.
"So, it's a bit ironic that out of all the possible Sages I could be talking to of other castes based on polytheistic human religions, here I am thinking I'm talking to a Sage of a monotheistic one that's so widespread!"
"What?" said Sam. Shocked, Sam said, "No, I'm… I'm not a Sage. I can't be!"
Sadiq smirked. He said, "I started to hear Loki's voice whispering in my ear when I was bullied by some older children from another neighborhood in my home country. One of them I was friends with at the time tricked me, mocked me due to my status as someone born into poverty. They took one of my most prized possessions at the time, a cloth doll that resembled a dog, and ripped it to shreds while beating me up. I loved playing with that dog. It was Loki who helped me stand up for myself. He gave me the strength to beat those other children up to the point that they weren't the only ones who were afraid of me."
"Did you see it? How that childhood story of mine closely resembles the story of how Odin betrayed Loki? Killed his son, Fenrir?"
"I see now… I think," said Sam. "It was the loss of your cloth dog. That was what triggered Loki's own memories, and caused his consciousness to manifest."
"Have you been seeing anything since they tortured you, Fisher?" said Sadiq. "Memories that resemble something from right out of a religious text perhaps? Either one that belonged to you, or one that belonged to someone else?"
"No… I—"
The time when Sam was captured in Iraq he had remembered.
Sam was nearly shot to death on a crucifix in an execution of various soldiers, several of which were in his squadron, inside a burning building.
Sam's eyes went wide, and he started to breathe heavily.
"Have you started hearing any voices yet?" said Sadiq. "If my hunch is right… that Jesus was a Sage, a reincarnation of the Judeo-Christian god in his time… Well, I have to say I'm curious what Yahweh's voice must actually sound like. Despite that Loki's voice alone nearly caused my human consciousness to lose hold of its sanity."
"No," said Sam, trying to calm down his breathing, and focus back on his mission again, "I haven't. The only one trying to get inside my head with his voice is you, Sadiq, and it isn't working."
"Give it time," said Sadiq with a grin. "Given that you're fighting against a man who is plotting to blow up the world, and his secret vast-reaching megacorporation of mythical proportions, that is literally named after the very hill where the battle for Judgment Day was prophesied to take place at… I wouldn't be surprised if something on your journey triggers hidden memories of your darker self, Sam."
Sam grimaced, and was about to tell Sadiq to shut up when he felt a throbbing in his neck.
"More memories resurfacing, Fisher? Perhaps I should start talking about the Anunnaki?" said Sadiq.
Then the lights in the room went off, and the throbbing went away.
Wait a minute… Sam thought, it's not because of the drugs and the torture… the EMP device Charlie injected me with… he activated it! But the train hasn't come to a halt.
Then Sam remembered. Charlie said it wouldn't be powerful enough to stop the train engine, and that it would be sheer luck if we got placed close enough to a spot where we could access a locking mechanism that would help open one of the train doors.
"What's happening Fisher?" said Sadiq. "Did your friends do that?"
"Stay quiet," said Sam. "You'll live longer."
They could hear a cargo door open, followed by some silenced bullets coming from somewhere near their room in the train car.
When the door opened, two shadowy figures wearing Splinter Cell outfits entered.
"Briggs… Grim," said Sam. "Glad you could make it."
"Come on, Sam," said Briggs. "Let's find…" Briggs then looked at the man across from Sam with his trifocal goggles, and grimaced underneath his mask. "…Sadiq."
"Glad you made it as well, Briggs," said Sadiq. "Though I can't say the same for you, Anna. Sam, didn't I tell you not to bring her?"
"Shut up, Sadiq," said Sam. "Grim, you're a Sage too. Open Sadiq's cage and cut open his straitjacket. Briggs, you mine since I'll be gentler."
"You're… you're implying that Grim is stronger than me even though she's an analyst…" said Briggs as he started to cut Sam free with his combat knife.
"Comparing yourself to others tends to lead to insecurity, Briggs," said Sam. "Just focus on your own strengths."
Briggs smirked, and said, "Right. You're free. Brought you your own suit and goggles in this spare backpack."
"Thanks Briggs," said Sam as Briggs tossed him the backpack, and he quickly slipped into his Splinter Cell Ops Suit and trifocal goggles.
Grim said to a frowning Sadiq, "Get up. We're going for a ride."
"Guys?" said Charlie over their subdermals, and Sam's OPSAT. "Bad news… the EMP charge I injected Sam with may have helped you get onto the train, but now that the train's backup generator's kicking in, you likely have a few seconds left before you're unable to get back…"
The lights came on.
"…off."
"It's a long way to London anyway," said Sam.
"The plan was to escape by jumping off and boarding the next train moving the same direction in the adjacent tunnel. We're going to miss the gap in the tunnels we planned the route to bypass through the security details in!" yelled Briggs.
"Then we'll have to improvise at the next gap," said Sam. "Charlie, can you find it?"
"Yeah," said Charlie, "it's roughly 10 minutes ahead… but if you don't manage to deactivate train security and partially slow down the train speed by then… you won't be able to jump off safely. On top of that, the schematics I pulled for the train say that the train controls have to be slowed from both sides of the train."
"We'll split up then," said Sam. "Grim, you and I are heading to disable train security and hijack the front. Briggs, you and Sadiq are heading to hijack the back."
"Sounds good," said Briggs. "Let's move."
Sam and Grim used EMP charges to temporarily disable security and the lights in each car they passed through, then shot as many guards with their silenced SC-20K and custom silenced SC light machine gun as they could while running past the rest while they were still stunned by the EMP charge's effects.
As they reached the train security car, Sam tried to open the doors, but they wouldn't budge.
"We're going to have to climb around," said Grim.
"Right," said Sam, "I've climbed a train before…"
They climbed to the roof of the train and used the adhesive glove gadgets Charlie got for them back in Rome to help them scale Abstergo's tower to keep them from flying off the side.
Several guards started to climb up from the sides of the train; also someone aboard the train was deploying quad-rotor drones with built-in turrets that were flying toward them.
Sam quickly made sure he had a firm grip on the train with one hand then released his grip with the other, pulled out his silenced Five-Seven, and shot the guards. Grim followed suit by shooting the drones.
As they managed to climb across the roof of the train, Grim then hacked open the locks to one of the hatches with Charlie's help using her OPSAT and his flash drive.
"Your shooting skills are practically the same as mine."
"Don't delude yourself, Sam, they're better now that I'm a Sage," said Grim as she unlocked the hatch.
As they quietly jumped into the train security car, Grim snuck up behind the security technician deploying the drones, and snapped his neck.
While she had Charlie hack into train security, Sam asked, "Completely hypothetical question here for you Grim… Say someone was already a Sage their entire life without even realizing it, and then all of a sudden their Isu alter's consciousness manifested out of nowhere… Would their physical capabilities increase due to that, or does it have more to do with the genetic component?"
"You're talking about nature vs. nurture?" said Grim while she and Sam defended the train room as they hacked into its security systems. "An Isu consciousness is just a consciousness, Sam. While it may nurture its host to become stronger through conversation with its host's human consciousness over the years… the triple-helix DNA is ultimately where the Sages get their demigod levels of strength from. They have a surplus of it, to the extent that even descendants of Isu hybrids don't have anywhere near as much due to hybrids reproducing more and more with ordinary human bloodlines… You either have a surplus of it or you don't."
"Strange…" said Sam.
"Come to think of it, not only have you been skeptical of the sciences behind the Isu and Sages that I've been telling you about since this whole mission with Abstergo started, but you've been downright uninterested in it until now."
"Can you blame me?" said Sam as he pulled out his SC-20K and peeked out to shoot several guards entering the room from behind the cover of a set of computer servers. "It's been days since I found out that everything I thought I knew about how the world works is wrong. I'm just starting to make the adjustment."
"I'm surprised you're adjusting at all given how resistant you are to change."
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that, Grim."
Grim pulled out Charlie's flash drive from the train's security systems hub. "So, what caused you to change, Sam? Why are you asking hypothetical questions about the strength of Sages and their consciousnesses?"
"I–" Sam paused. "Lucas is strong, Grim. If we end up fighting, he'd have the upper hand. I… I just wondered if maybe I need to… access…"
"What?" said Grim. Then, remembering the scars she saw on Sam's face, her eyes went wide.
"Lucas had you undergo Sage conditioning?"
"I'm not entirely sure what he did to me, Grim…" said Sam, "but if I am put in a desperate enough situation to stop Lucas… I wondered if going mad, and giving into the will of my Isu self would give me the strength to stop him."
"I wouldn't count on it, Sam," said Grim.
"Right," said Sam, "I'm glad you said that."
"Why?"
"Because I don't want to lose my mind."
"Right," said Grim. "Let's go hack the front of the train."
Sam nodded as they headed out of the current car they were in.
Briggs and Sadiq were at the back of the train, hacking into its controls, having finished fighting off the guards along the way.
"You're not really used to close quarters missions like this are you, Briggs?" said Sadiq.
"I prefer to take out my foes from a distance," said Briggs, looking away from Sadiq.
"You're still upset from when I did a number on you back at Site F?"
"I'm upset about a lot of things you've done, Sadiq," said Briggs. "But stopping your plans and the Blacklist attacks was worth every punch and gunshot you inflicted on me that night."
"Are you sure?" said Sadiq. "Abstergo has a ton of influence in America; as the most decadent nation on Earth with the strongest military on Earth, naturally it would want to maintain its control over it."
"Yeah," said Briggs. "Good thing Sam managed to scare off Abstergo from doing that during the Third Echelon Conspiracy. He thwarted the weaponized EMP attacks on Washington, saved President Caldwell."
"And yet Abstergo still has people in high places, circling President Caldwell and her administration like vultures after framing her precious Fourth Echelon."
"Does your train of boasts have a caboose, Sadiq?" said Briggs.
"Did you ever wonder if the information I was looking for in Site F was information that would prove Abstergo's existence? Bring down Megiddo, the very enemy that even Fourth Echelon's leading man himself was afraid of facing?"
"You're working with Abstergo," said Briggs.
"And that's because after your team captured me, cut open my human legs, and hunted down my organization, President Caldwell handed me to Abstergo on a plate!"
Briggs glared at Sadiq furiously.
"The best part is that I would never have worked with Abstergo… let alone him… unless they had what I've always wanted more than anything in the world in their greedy hands, and used it as leverage over me. At least that's the second-best part."
"I'm not sure I should ask what the best part is."
"You should know, though. The reason Abstergo has what I want… is because of a past I share with Sam… or more specifically, him and his friend Victor Coste."
"If you've got a vendetta against either of them, I'll be happy to share your story with Sam."
"Of course, by all means do. But you may want to leave this part out for his sake. Sam's a relic of an ancient world, Briggs. He wants to save the world, and so for most of his life he's been following the orders of the very people ruining his life, and the lives of countless others. In order to save the world though, you have to allow it to change. Sam doesn't like change."
"Change? You're not talking about Lucas's plans involving the Red Mercury, are you?"
"More like he doesn't like the changes that his daughter will likely have to go through now that Lucas's people kidnapped her."
Briggs grimaced.
As the hack was complete, Charlie contacted everyone.
"All right, guys, the train is under my control now. I'm slowing it down now so you can get off safely. Hurry up before you miss the gap!"
Sadiq said to Briggs, "I'll explain the full extent of what I'm talking about once we're in London."
Briggs grunted, and they headed up to the roof of the train.
After both groups of two used the hook to zip across the gap and off of the prison train, they entered the gap in the train tunnel walls and regrouped.
"Briggs, Sadiq, you all right?" said Sam.
"Peachy," said Briggs.
"Are the instruments of Freyja and Yahweh all right as well?" said Sadiq.
"Yahweh?" said Grim. Briggs and her looked at Sam.
Seeing a train full of civilians on its way, the group of four then readied their two hook-lines, and zipped onto the roof of the train together.
Entering the train in civilian outfits, Sam said to Charlie over his OPSAT, "What now, Charlie?"
"Europe's going to be on a manhunt for us in a matter of hours…" said Charlie. "You're not going to like this."
"Chances are," said Sam with a shrug.
"To help throw the authorities as well as Abstergo off our tracks, I'm getting help from some friends from a hacker collective… the British division of DedSec. They're not exactly in good grace with the authorities… so it definitely reinforces the narrative that we're terrorists that the media has been trying so hard to push for lately."
"We're not coming back from this mission, Charlie," said Sam. "Because of what Lucas did to us, we're going to be rogue agents as long as we're still alive."
"I know that! It's just that so many people are out to get us right now that we're running out of allies. And we're going to need some if we're going to put a stop to Lucas," said Charlie. "Anyway, it's good that I had some mutual friends in DedSec that were willing to listen, because DedSec isn't fond of the Engineers, and we just broke their leader out of custody."
"Right," said Sam, looking at Sadiq. "Where should we take him?"
"DedSec is arranging for a mass hack. That'll cause enough chaos and create enough shadows once you reach the other end of the Chunnel to help you escape unnoticed. The van stashed nearby will get us to their safe house."
"Is this one of Vic's?"
"No, it's DedSec's. I thought we were cutting contact with Vic to keep him safe."
"We are," said Sam. "Good judgment there, Charlie."
Looking at his OPSAT, Briggs said, "We're getting close to London now. Your hacker friends better be good at what they do if this is going to work."
"Oh, they are. A lot of them are better than I am, actually."
"That's not very reassuring…" said Briggs.
As the train started to slow as it entered the station on the other side of the Chunnel, the team braced themselves for a fight.
"Make yourselves scarce," said Sam.
Inside the train station as they got off, there were armed guards everywhere searching for them, as well as posters with their faces on them.
"We're sitting ducks out here," said Sam.
"Not to mention that we've likely been caught on surveillance cameras by now…" said Grim.
"My buddies are working on disrupting the central OS surveillance grid right now… It's a model from the Blume corporation… nothing they haven't handled before," said Charlie.
The exits had been cut off now by guard checkpoints.
People who had just got off of the trains were now being searched; the Chunnel was in the process of being locked down. They were surrounded.
"Any time now, Charlie…" said Sam.
Then the entire train station went dark.
Amidst the chaos, Sam, Grim, Briggs and Sadiq managed to slip past security without harming anyone.
Upon getting out in the streets, they saw the van.
After getting in, they saw the driver was a muscular British man with tattoos, a five o' clock shadow, and a nasty scar on his forehead that ran to his left eye.
"You the fishes who's lookin' for a pond to swim in?"
"Charlie, who is this…" said Sam quietly.
"His name's Bruce… he's cool, he's with DedSec."
"Is your name Bruce?" said Sam.
"Depends on who's askin'. Are you the fishes that coleslaw mentioned?"
"…yes, I am the fish," Sam bluffed.
Bruce grinned and laughed, his teeth stained and yellow. "Bruce is a big fan of Sam Fishes. He heard about some of your courageous exploits from Charlie Coleslaw."
"Glad you consider us friends and not food, Bruce," said Sam. "Where are you taking us to?"
"DedSec hackers' den in Whitechapel. Coleslaw says you has a steak to grill."
Sam looked at Sadiq. "We do have a… steak to grill, as a matter of fact. Majid Steak. We're grilling him for intelligence on my daughter's location until he's well-done."
Bruce looked worried. "Fishes' daughter? Sarah Fishes? Is she in danger, Sam?"
Sam frowned.
"She is."
"Whoever put her in danger should know betta! No one hurts Sarah Fishes without facing Sam Fishes' wrath!" said Bruce. "Whatever help you need to find Sarah, you can count on Bruce, Sam."
"I'll take any help I can get," said Sam while looking at Sadiq with a frown. "Chances are I'm going to need more of it than I initially thought."
"How on Earth do you find these people, Charlie…" said Briggs, shaking his head sideways while putting his hand to it as they drove onward through London.