0 comments/ 6735 views/ 0 favorites How I Met Your Mother Ch. 03 By: Starscream_UK Thursday, 9:34 am His fingers fumbled with the lid of the bottle of water. Eventually, they managed to open it and pour the cool liquid down his throat. As Andrew Hargreaves swallowed, he noticed his wife watching him. "Save some for me," she said. Andrew screwed the lid back on and handed it to her. "So, having trouble keeping up?" "Me? No – I'm just enjoying the view back here." He replied, smirking. "Your bum does all sorts of wonderful things to me." "Cheeky," Leah quipped, handing him the bottle back. "Precisely!" Andrew replied. "Okay, three more laps around the running track, then we'll head home. What time have you got to be in work today?" "Twelve," Leah replied. "Tom wants a senior staff meeting this morning but a couple of the others aren't back until lunchtime, so there wasn't any point getting in early today." "Okay," Andrew said, taking off before Leah had chance to react. "Quickest on the last lap gets the first shower!" **** 10:47 am The idea of individual showers had turned into a joint effort within thirty seconds of Leah running the hot water. As Andrew threw a towel across to her from the pile in the airing cupboard he found himself thinking out loud. "I miss naked Tuesdays." "What?" Leah said as she wrapped the large bath sheet around herself. "We haven't done that since…well, since the kids were born." "I know – that's what I'm saying – I miss it." "I don't miss the fear of you leaving a nasty mark on the sofa." Leah replied as she scuttled past Andrew on her way to the master bedroom. "White was definitely the wrong colour for that." "Yeah – shame about that, that sofa was comfy." Andrew plodded along behind her, drying his body off with his towel as he walked. "So I take it that naked Tuesdays are off the agenda for the foreseeable future?" "At least until the kids have left home." Leah replied. She glanced over at Andrew – who was now studying his face in the mirror and staring at something. "What are you looking at?" "The volume of grey hairs in my head is increasing exponentially." He sounded concerned. "Christ, I'm only just thirty-five and I'm starting to go grey like my Dad!" "Andy, if you carry on doing things to me like you did in the shower this morning I couldn't care less if your hair is grey, blue or pink!" Leah said as she walked over to him. Wrapping her arms around his stomach and practically welding herself to his back, she looked around his shoulder at their reflection in the mirror. "Seriously, I thought the hand rail was going to break at one point." She kissed his shoulder. "So, what are you doing today?" "I need to go through my notes for the convention speech I'm giving at TerrorCon later. Then Diane wants me to get together with her and that new assistant of that she hired for me at some point today. Christ knows why she's hired her – I can't see why I need one." Andrew replied. Leah reluctantly pulled away from him. "I can – if you didn't have me organising things you'd forget where your clean socks are each day." "I have clean socks?" The mock expression of shock on his face made Leah laugh. "Wow – what's next? Man walking on the Moon?" "Shut up." She said. "All I'm saying is that I don't think it's a bad idea – besides, you're not Diane's only client. She's your agent and editor – not your slave." "Well, here's a crazy idea, why don't I pay you to be my assistant?" Andrew said. Leah opened the bottom draw of her tallboy and pulled out some underwear. "Think about it – you can make me cups of tea all day long, get me a sandwich whenever I need one, unlimited blow jobs on demand…" "Mmm, you're really selling the role to me baby," Leah giggled. "I'm not sure I can do tea and sandwiches on demand though." "And I thought that the blow jobs would be the stumbling block!" "Oh, I have no problem with the blow…" her phone began to ring. It wasn't Leah's personal mobile; it was her office-issued one. She leaned across the bed and scooped it up from the bedside table. "Hargreaves…mhmm…right…okay…I'll see you soon then." "I didn't think you had to be in work until midday?" Andrew sounded concerned. "Something has cropped up – Alison is on her way over to pick me up." There was a new sense of urgency in the way Leah was getting ready now. "So, there's food in the freezer…" "Don't worry about it – we've been through this before, I know what I'm doing," Andrew reassured her as he grabbed a pre-packed silver suitcase from the wardrobe. Leah looked at it for a minute. "No, no, I don't need that." She said, grabbing her blouse and throwing it on without buttoning it up. "Can you get my grey suit out for me?" "Okay," Andrew knew what the grey suit meant – it was usually the one Leah wore if she thought there was a risk of any trouble. "One lucky suit coming up." "I keep telling you it's not my lucky suit," Leah replied as she snatched the trousers off the hanger. "I just feel comfortable in it." "I'll go and stick the kettle on. Alison won't be here for twenty five minutes yet." Andrew said, leaving Leah in peace to get ready. **** Leah finished the drink and put the mug in the sink at the same time as the doorbell rang. Andrew was standing in the hallway by the door, holding Leah's jacket for her. "Be careful." He said as she snatched the jacket from his hand. As soon as it was on she wrapped her arms around him and kissed him deeply. "I will. Love you." "I love you too." He said. Without another word he opened the door. Alison was standing on the doorstep. Andrew nodded to her, acknowledging the fact she was there without saying anything. He watched as they walked down the drive to the dark grey Range Rover waiting for them. Leah glanced over her shoulder once at him before she got in and the vehicle drove away. Andrew waited for a minute before closing the front door. Then he went upstairs and vomited in the bathroom. **** "At 8:32 this morning we received confirmation that a cargo flight operated by Global Supply Systems inbound from Tbilisi had landed at Stansted Airport with a suspicious package as part of its cargo manifest," Tom Benedict's voice was distorted over the speaker phone in the Range Rover. "I'm sorry, what sort of package are we talking about here?" Alison asked. "One of the handlers noticed that the crate was written up incorrectly – the item weighed in excess of sixty pounds when it should have only been forty-five. He reported it to his supervisor who had the local authorities open it up to determine if there was an additional import duty that needed to be levied." Tom added. "I'm sending the images to Leah's Blackberry now." A few moments later the small device in Leah's hand beeped and a series of images flashed up on the screen. Contained within the wooden crate was a cylindrical tube that was attached to a large auto-loader device. In turn, that was fed by a magazine that appeared to be calibrated to hold something roughly the same size as an over-sized shotgun round. Attached to the main body of the device was a small hand-held element that looked like a weapon from a cheesy science fiction show. "Jesus…" Alison muttered. "A Dragunov AGS-30." Leah said. "You recognise that?" Tom asked. "You might say that." Alison groaned. "It was a prototype semi-automatic grenade launcher developed by the Russians in the late 1990s as a successor to the AGS-17," Leah said. "Its original spec was around the concept of a portable urban pacification system, but it was soon clear that its scope extended way beyond that." "It's capable of firing thirty millimetre, programmable smart grenades up to seven hundred metres. It's got a rate of fire of sixty high explosive rounds per minute. The little ray gun looking gizmo is a remote laser targeting device; it can store up to twenty independent targets at once." More images of the device flashed up on the Blackberry as Leah continued to explain the origin of the weapon. "The Russian company designing it ceased production once it was revealed in the testing phase that it was prone to over-heating, but they lost five of the working prototypes before they went out of business." "Look's like Jovan's ghost has come back to haunt us." Alison muttered. "Where was this being shipped to?" Leah asked Tom, partially ignoring Alison's statement. "There's no forwarding address – the shipping manifest said that the purchaser was going to pick it straight up from the airport this afternoon." "How long until we reach Stansted Airport?" Alison asked Michaels, who was driving. "About forty-five minutes." He replied as both women felt the surge in power as he pushed the accelerator down. **** Hagley Hall May 2001 "Ladies and Gentlemen please raise your glasses to Mr and Mrs Andrew Hargreaves," Bryant Mayhew raised his glass in a toast to the couple as they made their way towards the dance floor. As Andrew held Leah's hand, he saw the look of joy on her face. "I can't believe you're actually getting me to dance to Elton John's The Way You Look Tonight," Andrew whispered into Leah's ear. "Nothing you say right now will spoil how happy you've made me today," She replied as they danced. "But if you want to get lucky tonight then you'd better watch what you say about the choice of music for our first dance." "Oooh, threats Mrs Hargreaves?" Andrew mocked her. "You really think that once you've had a few drinks you'll be able to resist me?" "Contrary to popular belief Mr Hargreaves, you are not as charming as you think you are," Leah quipped as Andrew pulled her closer to him. "Hey, doesn't matter, you signed up to obey me. Remember that part of the wedding vows? You're my woman now; you've no say in the matter." Leah could hear the humour in his voice as she pulled back and saw the huge smile on his face. "I knew we should have written our own vows." Leah replied with a smile. "But in case you've forgotten, that door swings both ways." "I better be careful what demands I start making then huh?" Andrew responded as Leah put her head on his shoulder. "I love you, you know." "Yeah, kind of figured that." She replied. "Now kiss me before the song finishes." **** Three songs later and Eric Douglas was on his way to getting seriously drunk. As he sat at the head table nursing his drink, Leah sat down next to him, wrapped her arms around him and planted a kiss on his cheek. "What was that for?" "Consider it a thank you for being here." Leah replied. She noticed the glum look on Eric's face. "What's wrong?" "I…I think that Alison is having an affair." The words just blurted out of Eric's mouth. "I'm sorry, I should just shut up, and you don't need this today…" He started to get up out of his chair. "Nonono, come on, sit down," Leah said, grabbing his arm and virtually dragging Eric back into his seat. "What makes you think that?" "It's all these trips she keeps going on, you know, for her job," Eric sounded upset. "Eric, listen to me." Leah said. "Whenever we've been working away together Alison has never done anything that would lead me to think that she's being unfaithful to you." Eric took another swig from the flute of champagne. "I know she's not the easiest person in the world to get along with, but I do know that she loves you. Now get up and dance with me." At the same time on the dance floor, Alison was in Andrew's arms as he twirled her around the floor. "Thanks for sorting all this out while Leah was away – it means a lot to both of us." Andrew said. "Don't mention it – consider it my wedding gift to you both in lieu of a new toaster," Alison replied. "What I said about upsetting her stands though – I can still make you disappear!" "Stop it, you'll make me laugh and I might step on your toes…Hey, looks like Leah's finally getting Eric to his feet." Andrew said. Alison looked over his shoulder. "I'm surprised he can still stand at this point – he hates weddings." She replied. "He's usually well on his way to getting drunk by now." Alison realised that Andrew was looking at her. She found his gaze slightly uncomfortable. "What?" "You haven't told him, have you?" Andrew said. Alison scowled. "How do you do that?" "Answer me." Andrew said, ignoring Alison's question. "Look, I admire the way how Leah and you are completely honest with each other," Alison replied. "It's brutal but it works for you guys because you know you can trust each other, but that's not the way I'm wired." "He still thinks you work for a bank for Christ's sake," Andrew said. "At least tell him you work for the Foreign Office or something like that – you know, just in case." "I appreciate the concern and I don't want to sound funny Andy, but what's it matter to you?" "It matters because I happen to like Eric and if the situation was reversed I'd rather know a watered down version of the truth than have the reality hit me like a brick if something happened to Leah." Alison could see the earnest expression on Andrew's face. "At least I could, you know, prepare for it." "God you're sickeningly good, aren't you?" "Yes he is, and he's mine," Leah said, gently sliding in between Andrew and Alison. "Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to dance with my husband again." **** 9 weeks later Late in the July afternoon, the sun scorched the Mediterranean shores below. Exhausted from a day of sun worship, water sports, and souvenir shopping, crowds of tourists began gathering at the outdoor cafes and taverns, which lined the city's waterfront. The scent of fried seafood began to drift throughout the harbour where a multitude of yachts and other pleasure craft were moored against the pier. On the deck of one of those boats was an attractive brunette woman wearing a triangle top and string bottom bikini. Facing inland, she casually sat up and leaned her body backward against the palms of her hands. Looking comfortable, her right leg extended straight out in front of her, whereas her left knee was bent at a forty-five degree angle. She then tilted her head back, letting the bright rays glisten off her sunglasses, while her dark tresses of hair dangled downward. Another woman, tanned but this time blonde stepped out from behind the cabin door. Barefooted, the newcomer walked out onto the deck wearing a pair of snug fitting blue jeans and a black, lace tank top. "You need to put some more suntan lotion on your shoulders," said the second woman. "Otherwise you'll burn." Upon hearing the voice, Leah rolled over on her stomach. Bringing her hands behind her, she then undid the top of her bikini. "Can you put some on my back then?" said Leah as she held up a tube of sun-screen. "Hey, what did your last slave die of?" Alison joked as she picked up the tube and squeezed. "I had them shot on a charge of insubordination." Leah smirked. Slowly, the lotion oozed out and fell onto Leah's back producing a curvy trail of white cream crossing over itself in a manner reminiscent of a moebius strip. Alison then placed her hands on top of Leah's shoulders, and began to rub them over her warm, sun soaked skin. Alison's hands smoothly slid over Leah, delicately etching themselves into the lean but firm muscles along her torso. Leah smiled, indulging in the way the massage relaxed her. By the time Leah's back was covered with a glossy shield, Alison applied a coat over the back of her legs as well. "You know, you're almost as good as Andrew at doing that," Leah quipped. Alison retaliated by smacking her playfully on the back of her legs. "So are you all set for tonight?" "Indeed I am! How do I look? Do you think mi amore will like me like this?" replied Alison as she stood up, leaned back against the rail of the boat and modelled her appearance. Leah lifted her head up and rested her chin on top of her right hand, which was propped up on its elbow. The bewitching gaze of her green eyes and free flowing blonde hair made Alison seem desirously untameable. Her lace top pressed against her skin and was hemmed at the ribs, showing off her flat waistline while the faded blue jeans she wore rode below Alison's navel, complementing the effect. Slung across her hip and below her belt loops was a thick, metallic lariat decorated with crystal and ornate patterns. "You look like a tramp." replied Leah with a giggle "That's right! Just the way he likes me. Maybe I'll even let him get lucky tonight," answered Alison with a sly grin on her face. "This undercover work can be so taxing." "Whatever you do just be careful," said Leah as she pushed herself up off of the deck. "Don't worry Leah, I can take care of myself." said Alison as she sat down on a bench, crossed her legs and strapped her feet into a pair of stiletto sandals. "Besides, I'll have you watching over me like a guardian angel." "Only for a short while – after that you're on your own." Leah reminded her. "I'll be fine," Alison said, hugging Leah and casting a glance at her watch over her friend's shoulder. "Okay, I've got to go." Moments later Leah leaned forward on the rail and watched Alison head down the pier towards the town. As usual male onlookers' heads began to turn. It was amazing how easy it was for Alison to get men eating out of her hands, thought Leah. The swinging motion of her hips always caught the attention of the men nearby, while her flirtatious smile and wave dazzled them. By the time Alison reached the waterfront a large crowd of people were parading down the walkways. At one of the outdoor cafes Alison could see Jovan sitting at a table. The sunlight reflected off his bald head and she could imagine his small, beady eyes eagerly pouring over every woman that walked in or out of the café. Looking every bit the part of a Balkan mobster, dressed in an ill-fitting suit that looked like it hadn't been dry cleaned in a month, he had a bottle of cognac in front of him, a cigarette in one hand, and his cell phone in the other. Sitting along side him were several large boned men in military haircuts; both of them looked displeased to be sitting in public rather than out breaking legs. Undeterred, Alison came up from behind him. Because the bodyguards knew her, they made no attempt to stop her from nearing their charge. Instead they contently stared at her navel and very fit midsection. I could have killed him right then, Alison thought as she playfully blindfolded Jovan with her hands. "Guess who?" "Ah! It's about time you arrived," answered Jovan as he sniffed the fragrance of her perfume and placed his cell phone on the table. Reaching back up, he grabbed a hold of her wrist and guided the back of her right hand to his lips. After he kissed her hand, Alison leaned forward and kissed the side of his mouth. Once her lips made contact, the tip of her tongue protruded forward and tickled the inside corner of his mouth. In response Jovan turned his head toward her and tried to envelop her lips completely with his mouth, but before he could, Alison coyly moved her face away. "Come on Jovan there will be plenty time for that later," she said as she sat down next to him, and poured herself a glass of water. Not before too long a waiter brought out their dinner trays and a vintage bottle of wine. Meanwhile, out in the harbour Leah stood behind the wheel of the boat and gently steered it away from the pier. Once she reached her not too distant destination, she dropped anchor and went back into the cabin. When she returned she was carrying a black briefcase. Walking to the front of the boat she knelt down on the deck and pressed the case snaps with her fingers so that the top popped open. Inside the case were the parts of a high calibre rifle. Going about her business, she efficiently assembled the weapon. Turning around in the opposite direction she looked through the scope of the rifle out into the sea until her eyes found the two bottle shaped buoys she had thrown over board earlier. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 03 Calmly pressing her cheek against the butt of the rifle she then placed the tip of her right index finger on the trigger and squeezed off two near-silent rounds. A smile of satisfaction formed on her face when the bullets shattered their targets. Like a fisherman waiting for a prize catch to take the bait on the hook, she patiently lay next to her weapon until her target presented itself. Back on the waterfront, Jovan and Alison entered an elevator at a seaside hotel accompanied by two of Jovan's bodyguards. As the door closed the two men came up from behind Alison; one began patting her down so as to check for any possible concealed weapons while the other checked her small purse. "Come on boys all you had to do was ask, I'll be glad to give you a closer look if you really want one." responded Alison as her eyes defiantly glared at the two men while she teasingly began unbuttoning her pants. "You know how it is, one can never be too careful these days especially with women!" joked Jovan as he motioned the two bodyguards away from her. "Don't worry Jovan, I promise not to bite unless you want me to," said Alison as she allowed her pants to drop slightly enough to reveal the black lingerie she was wearing underneath her jeans. After they reached their floor the entire group moved out of the elevator and into the hall until they came to the Presidential Suite. Typical, Alison thought to herself as her target struggled with the key card between his fat fingers, delusions of grandeur. While the two bodyguards remained outside, Jovan and Alison entered. Before the door closed Alison mischievously looked back at the two bodyguards and puckered her lips, blowing a kiss to both of them. Once the door closed she pressed her body against Jovan's and wrapped her arms around him. Immediately, he reciprocated and the two of them exchanged kisses. Suddenly, before he was content, Alison stepped away. "It's too hot in here. I've got to open up those windows before I burn up," said Alison, dropping her purse on the bed as she walked over to the wood shutters then opened them up, exposing a seaside view. "Yes, that's better," commented Alison as she felt the cool sea breeze blow against her body. Placing the palms of her arms on the window pain she pushed herself up until she sat on the edge. Casually she crossed her legs and slowly unstrapped her sandals until they fell off her feet onto the floor. Jovan for his part was entranced by Alison's beauty and stared at her lustfully. "So what do you want to do now?" she asked in a sultry voice. Moving off the windowsill she walked up to Jovan who had just sat down on the edge of the bed. "Mmm, you're awfully quiet over there Jovan, at a loss for words?" Alison purred. Jovan nodded, enthralled by her. "Ok you've been a good boy. So I'm going to give you something to remember me by." Slowly she began unbuttoning her jeans building up Jovan's anticipation with each snap. Then she turned her back toward him and slightly bent forward, and wiggled her way out of the jeans like a snake shedding its skin. Looking back over her shoulder at Jovan she could see the gratified smile on his face as he leeringly admired her. When Alison stood up straight, her jeans plummeted to the ground. Gracefully she lifted up her feet until they cleared away from the jeans. "Have you thought about what you want me to do to you? Any last requests?" Alison couldn't contain her smile at her choice of words as she reached back, pulled on the elastic of her black panties, and snapped it back against her flesh. Turning back around, she unbuttoned the top of her lace top, making her cleavage visible. Then she got down on her hands and knees and began crawling toward Jovan, halting in front of his shoes. She then lifted her neck and back up until her face was parallel to his groin. On her knees she reached out with her hands and began to undo his pants. Taking as much time as possible her right hand pulled down on his zipper allowing her left hand to fit through the opening. Delicately massaging his masculinity through his underwear, she began gently scratching him with her fingernails, making him stiffen with excitement. Alison heard Jovan's sharp intake of breath, his anticipation increasing when he saw her lower her face down. "Soon you'll be in heaven baby. Just close your eyes and think of me." Jovan's body tingled as he felt her cool mint breath blowing between his zipper. Alison's eyes mischievously gleamed as she looked up, and saw Jovan with his eyes closed and mouth gaping open waiting for the carnal gifts he believed she would give him. Just then Jovan's head suddenly jolted forward as if he had been clubbed from behind. As his head slumped down blood began flowing from a gaping hole in the back of his skull. As his body began to wilt, Alison stood up and caught him before he collapsed to the floor. With little effort she carefully lowered him down to the mattress. "Sorry Jovan, but you're really not my type." Then she gazed out into the sea where she knew Leah was watching, and blew her a kiss. She quickly searched Jovan's cooling body and found a pistol tucked in a holster under his left arm, just as she was expecting, and his precious cell phone in his right hand pocket. Checking that the pistol was actually loaded, Alison took a moment to pull on her jeans and return her sandals to her feet. She headed straight for the door of the hotel room. Opening it, Alison stepped out. With the pistol in her right hand she pushed the gun into the one bodyguard's neck and fired once in an upward direction. Not hesitating for a moment, she swung her left hand outwards, striking the other bodyguard forcefully in the throat. Alison looked back at her first target – he was lying on the blood stained carpet, a few twitches going through his legs as the last neural responses fired along the nerves in his body. Satisfied that he wouldn't be bothering her, Alison turned her attention back to the second bodyguard. He was on his knees, clutching at his throat and trying desperately to breathe. Alison stepped up to him and grabbed his head, one hand under his chin and the other gripping a tuft of hair. She twisted it sharply to the right, and then back to the left to be sure of fully dislocating his skull from his spine before letting his body fall to the floor. Content that her work was done here, Alison returned to the room, reached into her purse and pulled out her cell phone. "These three are toast," She said. "So, did you remember to put my wetsuit on board the boat?" "Of course I did." Leah replied. "I'll pick you up at the back door in five minutes." "Better make it ten," Alison said, looking at the two bodies in the hallway. "These two puppies look like they are dead weight." **** "According to the data on this cell phone Jovan was expecting his shipment early tomorrow morning," Leah said as the laptop continued to decrypt and translate the data stored on the memory of the phone. "And they are moored somewhere out here, just outside the territorial water restrictions." "Nice. So they sit out here in international waters and then the handover takes place tomorrow morning with no one around to stop them?" Alison said. Leah nodded. "That appears to have been the plan." She said. "Lucky we're here to throw a spanner in the works." "So, how was the honeymoon?" Alison asked as the boat glided to a slow stop under the dark Mediterranean sky. They had been running dark for the last twenty minutes with the engine at a minimum, trying to mask their approach. "Great – I didn't think a book signing tour could actually be fun, but it was." Leah replied as she starting to get into her wetsuit. "I can't believe we spent three weeks going down the East Coast of America without going stir crazy and then spent the last week in the Florida Keys just chilling out." "God, stop gushing, you're making me sick." Alison replied. "Eric and I have split up." "What? Why?" Leah felt like she'd been punched in the stomach. "Why didn't you say something sooner? Jesus, I feel terrible, here I've been wittering on about how great my husband is the last week…" "Stop it – you're happy, you're allowed to witter," Alison interrupted her. "I didn't say anything because it didn't feel right. I'm not sure it's really sunk in properly yet." Alison said. "He…he thinks – no, he's convinced himself that I'm having an affair with someone, although who it is I have no idea." "Have you tried to talk to him about it?" "No, every time we try he just gets paranoid and we end up screaming at each other." Alison replied. "It's probably for the best, in the long run…" Neither woman spoke for a minute. "Okay, seeing as we're confessing things then I guess I should tell you that this is my last operational gig." Leah broke the silence. "What? You're taking the analyst's job?" Alison asked. Leah nodded. "What am I going to do without you?" "You'll manage," Leah said. "I was going to mention it on the flight home. It's more money and I won't be jetting off places at a minutes notice, plus we can start thinking about a family…" She sounded almost apologetic. "We?" Alison almost choked on the words. "You've really thought this through haven't you?" Leah nodded again; the expression on her face conveyed her feelings far better than any words could. "I…I'm not sure I can do this anymore…you know how we agreed that the best way to approach this is like you've got nothing to lose, facing it without fear, well, I feel like I've got something to lose now…" "Leah, you don't have to explain yourself to me, jeez, I fully understand what you're talking about," Alison said, walking over and hugging her friend. "And I'm happy for you – it's just sad that this is going to be our last time out together." They held each other a little longer than they normally would. "Okay, I've got to get my game face on," Leah said as she broke away from Alison, wiping something away from her face. "Otherwise something could get screwed up." **** Crouched down on the deck of the Novi Sad, sheathed in the form-fitting wetsuit that she had used countless times before, Leah took stock of the sight before her. Casually walking around the deck was one of the members of the group of Balkan arms dealers that she and Alison had been tracking for nearly a month now. After compiling all the evidence of their activities, Leah had approached their supervisor with the details; Jovan Miskolav was acquiring weapons from one of the former Soviet states and selling to the highest bidder. Whilst this wasn't uncommon – and in fact tolerated in some circles – the Department had taken exception to the particular individuals that Jovan had chosen to do business with. After Leah had spoken to Tom his reaction was simple. Take them out and dispose of the package. As she crouched low on the deck, she watched as the man – called Velimir – paused to light a cigarette. She took advantage of the delay – allowing the condemned man his last earthly pleasure. Stretching her legs, Leah braced herself as she saw the small white stick slowly burning down. I'm glad that Andrew doesn't smoke She shook her head, trying to dismiss the thought and try to remain as detached as possible. These men were killers and would have no qualms about doing the same to her if things went wrong. Leah reminded herself of that fact as she stayed in the shadows. As Velimir finished his cigarette, Leah pounced like a cat upon a mouse. Her lithe, athletic figure sprung from its hiding place. Clamping a hand across Velimir's mouth to prevent his screams, Leah grabbed the back of his head with her other hand and twisted sharply. She felt the familiar sensation of the vertebrae snapping as she caught his body before it slumped to the deck. Dragging him to the edge, all anyone would have heard was a soft splosh sound as she lowered the dead man into the water. Could have been a fish, Leah thought as she turned her attention to the rest of the boat. Cautiously making her way along the deck, she could hear the sound of two voices – unmistakeably male and both sounding in high spirits. Grateful that her rubber clad feet made little noise, Leah approached the direction of the voices carefully. Peeking around the edge of the fibreglass hull of the boat, she saw Tomislav and Milan standing by the rear of the boat, both taking no notice of the fact that their other companion had yet to return. Leah took a deep breath, trying to clear her mind of any other thoughts. Just be fast and precise, deal with the situation as efficiently as possible; don't think, just act; remove the emotional aspect of it all, she coached herself as she considered her options. As both men were currently facing away from her, she had the element of surprise by approaching them in their blind spot. Covering the short distance between them in a matter of seconds, she went for the nearest – Tomislav – first. Slamming both of her hands down on either side of his neck, he crumpled to the ground, momentarily stunned by her attack. Milan turned, trying to make sense of what had happened by swinging a fist towards their lithe attacker. Leah blocked the blow easily and drove two quick punches into his chest and a third into his face, breaking his nose. He stumbled back as Leah returned her attention to Tomislav. He was on his hands and knees, getting his feet slowly. Leah's wetsuit-clad leg rose majestically upwards before she sent it crashing powerfully down on the junction of his spine and skull, splintering the bones upon contact. His body hit the deck and twitched spasmodically, the last few signals from his brain moving down his body before the connection was permanently disabled. Milan tried to wipe the blood that was streaming from his nose as he looked up – just in time to see Leah's foot slam into his face. The force of the blow lifted him off his feet and into the air. Moments later, he felt the cold water strike his body just before he lost consciousness for the last time. Something about the way the moon reflected off the water made her pause for a moment. It then struck her that on the last night of their honeymoon, they had sat on a quiet beach on Bahia Honda and watched the sun slowly sink beneath the waves. They had been snorkelling during the day and saw a pod of dolphins swim by them, shortly followed by a nurse shark. Andrew couldn't stop talking about the shark as they sat on the beach that night. He told her about their life cycles and how he had this trip plotted out in his head to swim with the Great Whites off the coast of South Africa in a shark cage, but how the insurance costs were prohibitive at the minute. Leah marvelled at how the ocean looked so flat that night with the moonlight bouncing off the shallow waves. It was like a sheet of glass floating above the sand. Tonight it was a different expanse of water, but the effect was still the same. Keep it together Leah, she berated herself, this is how things go wrong and you end up getting hurt – focus on the matter at hand! The interior of the boat was split into two parts according to Leah's informant. There was the primary cabin in the main section of the hull – and Leah reasoned this was where they were probably storing their cargo – and a smaller secondary area that adjoined the deck. As she opened the door she saw two men inside. Both of them were oblivious to Leah as they were going about their tasks – it appeared that they seemed to be cooking something on the small stove. One of them – Zoran – glanced up at Leah for a moment before doing a double take. His eyes almost popped out of his head as he took in the shapely female figure clad in the slick black wet suit. Leah leapt into the cabin – her foot striking Zoran squarely in the chest and knocking him backwards. His companion – Mirko – launched himself towards Leah, only to run straight into a powerful high kick. The force of the blow was deceptive, Mirko realised as he found himself sprawled across the small table that they ate at, As the plates scattered beneath him he had just enough time to see Leah following up her initial blow, grabbing the lapels of his jacket and pulling him up off the table. The last thing Mirko saw was the palm of Leah's hand flying towards his face. Zoran managed to pick himself up off the floor and turned towards the door that led to the main cabin. Suddenly, a female arm wrapped itself around his throat from behind and began squeezing. He tried to yell for help, but Zoran couldn't make a sound. Leah calmly increased the pressure of her lethal chokehold. The man's face turned blue as the lethal brunette continued strangling him. His efforts to free himself from her grasp were in vain; his fingers slipping off the neoprene arm that was wrapped around his neck to deadly effect. When she was sure he was dead and the last few spasms had wracked through his body, Leah let the corpse crumple to the ground. "All done," she muttered as she approached the door to the main cabin. The sound of movement behind her made Leah stop dead in her tracks. "Aww, you didn't save any for me," Alison said as she entered the cabin. "Well if you hadn't spent so long getting into your wetsuit then maybe I wouldn't have had to clean house all on my own." Leah shot back at her with a grin. "What's in the bag?" "Oh, this and that, you know, a few bits and pieces I thought we could use." Alison replied. "So, what's behind door number two?" "I'm hoping it's what we're looking for." Leah paused as Alison handed her a silenced pistol. Grabbing the large steel handle and twisting it, the heavy metal door slid open. Alison stepped in first and began to sweep around the hold with Leah backing her up. "Looks like we're clear," Alison said, lowering her firearm. Both of the women turned their attention to the pile of wooden crates in the centre of the hold. "Please tell me that the phone had some sort of inventory on it." "Three crates of assault rifles," Leah began reciting them from memory as she moved around the boxes. "Two boxes of grenades, a cache of small arms and six surface-to-air missiles," she was counting up the numbers as she walked around them. "And one Dragunov AGS-30." "I've never heard of one of those before." Alison said as she began looking in each crate. "And by the looks of it, it isn't here." "I think it was here," Leah said from the other side of the hold. Alison looked over – Leah was kneeling next to an empty wooden crate. "But it looks like someone got here before we did." "And left the crew and all this stuff behind? I don't get it." "Neither do I," Leah said, picking up a pair of the thermite charges Alison had bought on board. "But we can worry about that once we've sunk this little warship. Come on, let's blow this place and get out of here." **** The following morning the waterfront was swarming with police and local media. By the time Alison and Leah had packed their bags and were waiting for their taxi back to the airport, the furore had begun to die down. As they lounged around in the hotel, Alison picked up on some of the discussions the locals were having. "Well, it appears that some sort of drugs war erupted last night," She said with a grin on her face. "They've found three men dead in a local hotel and a boat blown up just outside the harbour." "It's shocking what goes on in these quiet coastal towns these days." Leah joked as she got up. "I'm just going to the toilet – don't let the cab go without me." She walked through the lobby and into the hotel bar to the public toilets. On her way back from the bar, Leah took a small diversion via the bank of pay phones that were situated at the far end of the lobby. For a minute she contemplated using her "official" phone, then discarded the notion when she thought of the pile of paperwork she'd have to complete once she got back home. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 03 "Andrew, it's me," Leah said. "Look, I'm late." "That's okay, I'll just push the dinner reservations tonight back an hour or so…" "No, I mean I'm late." Leah repeated, emphasising the last word. "Oh, right. Okay." Andrew said. "Oh – right!" Leah could almost hear his eyes opening a little wider as he finally understood what she meant. "Err, what do we do now?" "I'll make an appointment to see Dr Ingram tomorrow, just to confirm I'm right." Leah hesitated for a minute. "You're…you're okay with this, right?" "Okay? Shit, yes – I'm more than okay with it, I mean, it's what we've been trying for over the last six months," Andrew said. "I was just starting to get worried, that's all, and to be honest I'm…ecstatic. I just wish you were here in person to tell me." "Well, it's still early days, but…" Leah added. Alison was gesturing towards her in the corner of her eye. "Look, I've got to go but I'll see you in a few hours." "Okay Princess – I'll get one of those home pregnancy kits from Boots on the way over to the airport." Andrew said, the line breaking up slightly as Leah heard him moving around and scooping up some keys. "If you must, but I don't want you going out of your way okay? I'll see you soon, love you." **** E-Centre Convention Facility TerrorCon 2009 Thursday 1 pm "…well, in order to answer that question I think it helps to understand the motivation of the Esoteric Order of Dagon in the first place," Andrew said as he addressed the hall of fans. He had been on stage since midday and the talk was helping to take his mind off the sudden change of events that morning. "Let's be absolutely certain about this point – unlike every other cult in the Cthulhu Mythos, the EOD have no long term goal other than the return of Cthulhu, and they are under no illusions as to their status in their God's endgame." "Which is?" one of the guests asked. Andrew allowed himself to smile as he held the microphone in his hand. "They end up as dead as the rest of us – except they die in the knowledge that they wrought this destruction upon mankind." He said. "In many respects, the Order is the ultimate doomsday cult in the Mythos – they don't see their actions in anything other than absolute terms, it's either success or failure on their part." "But how do they compare to, say, the First Church of Starry Wisdom or the Brotherhood of the Bloody Tongue?" "It's interesting that you mention two of Nyarlathotep's cults there," Andrew said, walking around the stage towards the direction of the young woman who had raised the question. "I mean, if there's a God within the Mythos that you can negotiate with, then it's The Messenger of the Outer Gods." Andrew paused for a moment as he stooped to pick up a bottle of water from the corner of the stage. "But even that is only going to buy you a small window of time; after all, The Messenger has his own plans as well that he puts in motion." Andrew looked out across his audience, still not quite believing that all these people were here to hear him speak. "But if I was going to break it down into simple terms, the EOD want destruction right now – many of the other cults are prepared to wait and have been patient for quite some time." He noticed someone signalling to him from the side of the stage. "And, I'm being told that my time here today is up, so I think that's a good place to wrap things up. Now before I go I just want to thank you all for your support over the years, and remember la! Cthulhu fhtagn!" Sections of the audience responded to him in kind as Andrew walked off the stage, waving at the people. Stepping out into the wings, he was met by Sarah Covington, the assistant assigned to him by the publishing company. Her wavy brown hair was tied back into some sort of loose ponytail and she was dressed in a rather expensive looking suit. She handed Andrew a sheet of paper. "Okay, here's the list of the signings you're doing this afternoon," Sarah said. Andrew nodded as he tried to take in the details. "And then you have your Zombie seminar All Flesh Must Be Eaten: Putting the Living into the Living Dead at four today." "Groovy," He replied. "So I have, what, thirty minutes for lunch?" "Sort of, Diane wants me to go through a series of revisions for your latest manuscript with you. I thought we could do it over lunch." Sarah said, then instantly blushed. "Oh god – I mean we could go over the revisions at lunch." "It's okay Sarah, I know what you mean," Andrew chuckled. "That's fine – I just need to call my wife and check how things are at home." **** Craig Farnsdale sat in the interviewing room with his hands wrapped around the coffee cup that had long since gone cold. Having been isolated in the room for nearly an hour, he was beginning to feel like his bladder was about to explode. The door opened and the two women walked in whom he had met at the airport cargo terminal. He decided that the brunette was more attractive than the blonde – although he also thought that there was something decidedly more threatening about the blonde's demeanour. Of course, he hadn't had chance to think about this the first time he'd met them this morning as they were both aiming guns at his head. "Okay Mr Farnsdale, your story checks out." Alison said. "I told you, I don't know anything about the cargo – I just pick it up from point A and drop it off at point B." Farnsdale said. "Mr Farnsdale, where exactly is point B in this case?" Leah asked. "Newcastle – place called West Jesmond." "Newcastle? The Tyne and Wear one?" Alison asked. Craig nodded. "Yeah – Fog on the Tyne and all that shite." He added. "Some sort of boarding house, bed and breakfast place I think. The address is on the delivery chitty." "Mr Farnsdale, thank you for your help and co-operation today," Leah said. "However, if you could just hang around here in the police station while we proceed with our enquiries that would be a huge help." "Whatever sweetcheeks," Craig said. "Any chance I can get another cuppa and a paper?" **** As she left the interview room Leah felt a buzzing sensation in her pocket. She grabbed her personal phone and answered it. "Hiya," she said, seeing Andrew's number on the display. "Hey, you okay?" "Yeah, yeah I'm fine – how's it going?" she said, gesturing to Alison to carry on ahead of her. "Good." Andrew answered. "Mom's picking the kids up – I popped into the school and told the head mistress. Do I need to pop back home to get your suitcase out?" "No, no – definitely not." Leah said. "I might be done sooner than I thought, but I'll let you know, okay?" "Sure – I'll speak to you in a bit then." "Okay. Bye." Leah ended the call and headed towards the first floor where they had a room set aside to use. As she closed the door behind herself, Leah saw Michaels setting up a conference call with their office in the city. The speaker in the middle of the room screamed out a high-pitched squeal for a minute – everyone winced at the noise. "Sweetcheeks?" Alison joked. "Stop it." Leah warned her. "Tom, the truck driver seems clean – however we have a delivery address in Newcastle upon Tyne that warrants closer examination as soon as possible." "Good work," Tom replied over the loudspeaker. "I'll have a team ready and they'll pick the three of you up in thirty minutes." "Actually sir, I think that Michaels and I can handle it," Alison said. "There's no need for Hargreaves to be dragged along when she's not a Field Op any longer." She winked at Leah. "If you're sure you can handle it Irving then that's fine by me." Tom replied. "Okay, good work people – call me when you're on the road." The speaker squealed again as the call was disconnected. "You didn't have to do that." Leah said. Alison shrugged her shoulders. "Hey, I dragged you out here on a whim this morning because I needed to know that someone I could trust had my back – but the heavy mob is being rolled out now so there's no reason why you need to hang around any longer than is necessary." "Are you sure? I mean, I feel like I'm running out on a fight…" "Don't talk wet – we've got this," Alison said. "Besides, Michaels is a better shot than you." "Seriously?" "Seriously." Michaels said as he got the keys out for the Range Rover out of his pocket. "Just drop the tank off at the depot before you go home tonight." **** E-Centre Convention Facility TerrorCon 2009 Thursday 4 pm "There are certain things that we all take for granted in life," Andrew said as he looked out across the audience. "The sun rises and sets each day…the football team you support will always find a way to blow the crucial game in some bizarre manner…Starscream will try to usurp Megatron…shit happens," He walked around the stage, gauging the reaction on people's faces. "But, ask yourself this; when was the last time you bought something you actually needed, that you literally couldn't live without? When was the last time you had to make a decision on something that wasn't motivated by the desire to accumulate possessions? How many hours are there in a day when you aren't spending it glued to the television or the computer screen?" The room was silent. "That's the critical point that you need to consider when we look at the whole concept of a zombie holocaust." He moved back to the centre of the stage. Above him a screen began to roll down into place and the light in the room dimmed slightly. "That's the critical nature of Infection. You see everyone from Romero to Raimi to Kirkman, Brooks to Wright & Pegg, has their own interpretations of what things will be like when everything falls apart." "Most of you know me as that guy who writes Cthulhu Mythos stories – and I'll admit that I've touched upon the nature of the undead in those with Glaaki and to some extent the Brood of Eihort, but this is my stab at writing something really dark and I thought you might like to see it as a work in progress…" The screen behind Andrew burst into life with the words Week Three. A moment later, the speakers in the room roared into life. A gravely voiced announcer in an American accent filled the room. Pirate Radio Broadcast, Week 3 "Okay, Brother and Sisters, you'd better listen close. If you got no fear of God you better get some, and quick. "The government is hauling people away in cattle cars. They're takin' 'em up north to some kind of tent city. I don't know what it is, but I saw the barbed wire and trenches around it. "All I know is that the whole place is surrounded by those…the…I mean…the dead. There were so many of them falling into the trenches that the rest were just walking across on top of them. And the shooting! "I swear to God Almighty as my witness that they soldiers were busy shooting a lot of the people INSIDE the fence. They were shooting them in the head and loading them into trucks and driving them away. And them d-dead folks just kept a'coming. There weren't no end to 'em that I could see. "I don't know what's going on out there, but I know I've gotta do something about it. All y'all that got a gun and a stout heart meet me tonight at Harvey's Propane in Chillicothe. We'll go up there and see what we can do about it…" Internet Bulletin Board Post "Don't come near Wichita Falls. Everyone is dead as far as I can tell. I haven't seen a living person in three days. I'm not getting out of here alive. I know that now. There are still helicopters. I hear them at night. It helps to listen to the helicopters. I don't hear the dead people when I listen to the helicopters. I just wish one of the helicopters would come down and take me out of here. I knocked a hole in the roof and hung up a sign that said "HELP! I'M ALIVE". But they haven't stopped to help me. I don't know what I'm going to do. Somebody help me, please? Mommy and Daddy are trying to get through the back door and they're smashing it up with my bicycle. I'm going to have to go hide in the attic. I won't be able to talk to anyone then, so yell loud when you get here." JennyTheToadPrincess11 Unauthorized use of University Police radio frequency, University of Kentucky, Louisville "Do not approach our location. Repeat. Do not approach our location. This is an automated signal that we will begin if we are overrun. If you can hear this message, do not approach the Health Science Center or surrounding areas. If you can hear this message we have been overrun by infected individuals and will already be dead. You cannot help us, but you can help yourself by staying away. Do not approach our location. Repeat. Do not approach our location…" World News Network live broadcast "Bill. Bill? I don't know if you can hear me. The roar from the crowd is almost deafening. We've moved to the 15th floor balcony above Platte Avenue. I don't know if you can see the picture, but there are people packing the streets as far as we can see in either direction. "Some of them are carrying banners Cathy. Can you see what's written on them? Are they…? Are those effigies…? . "Yes, Bill. The crowd is burning eff - Ohmygod! They aren't effigies - they're burning bodies in the streets. At the corner of Platte and Anderson they're throwing people into a pile and using gasoline to set them ablaze. Oh god some of them are still moving, Bill. "Bill? Did you get that? There's a police helicopter over the crowd, an officer on a bullhorn ordering them to disperse. The crowd is moving. Wh-what? The crowd is shooting at the helicopter now. The helicopter is smoking. Its smoking and it's moving away. We can hear more gunfire. Yes, the gunfire is increasingly in intensity. I think it's the Army. I think the Army is -" *static* ***SIGNAL LOST*** The lights gradually rose up and the screen slid back into the ceiling as the audiotape finished. People applauded, some cheered. Andrew looked out at the crowd – then he saw one face amongst the audience that made him smile. Leah was standing at the side towards the front, not far from where Sarah was standing as well. She was applauding along with the rest of the crowd. "Thank you, thank you – however, that's just the beginning of it," Andrew said, struggling to make his voice heard even with the microphone. "I want to thank the people at Audioville for helping to put that little presentation together. I wasn't convinced to begin with, but it seems to work. Now, I was going to open it up to the floor for a little Q&A session…" **** "I can't believe you made it," Andrew said as he hugged Leah after the end of his time slot. "I thought…you know." "Well I'm here and everything's okay," Leah replied, kissing him quickly. Andrew noticed Sarah lurking in the background. "Shit – introductions!" He said. "Sarah Covington, this is my wife Leah; Leah, this is Sarah, my new assistant." "It's great to meet you, Andrew's told me so much about you," Sarah said. Leah smiled. "Well, not too much I hope." Leah replied. "Otherwise that could be embarrassing," She looked at Andrew. "So, how long until you're done here?" "I've just got to pack up the gear here and run through a couple of last minute…" Andrew began to say. "It's okay – I can handle it – it's only a few further revisions, we can go over them next week." Sarah butted in. "You guys get out of here." "You sure?" Andrew asked. Sarah nodded. "Thanks. Thanks a lot." "Great – let's go get the kids from your Mom's and get something to eat." Leah said as she guided her husband towards the exit. "I'm starving and I need a foot massage." **** West Jesmond Newcastle-upon-Tyne 7:43 pm The door frame jarred against the brickwork as the lock was shattered by the battering ram. Before the door had chance to complete its enforced trajectory towards the wall, heavy-set men and women, fully clad in protective coveralls and bearing automatic weapons, barrelled into the narrow property. The air was filled with voices screaming out pre-determined warnings and call signs between the swarming sea of black figures that oozed into the property from both front and back. Like a wave of unstoppable water, every available space inside the house was quickly filled with a human presence. As the sound of boots striking stairs echoed through their ears, Alison and Michaels entered the property, both wearing body armour that matched that of their counterparts as they marauded through the house. Michaels bolted towards the stairs, disappearing from sight as he went to the first floor. "All clear on this floor ma'am," One of the police officers reported back to Alison, who nodded in response to the man. As she pushed the front door too she saw the pile of unopened post that had been pushed up against the skirting board. She stooped to pick it up – the post marks of the oldest pieces were nearly a month old. "This place is empty." Michaels said as he walked back down the stairs. Alison held up the post. "It appears that it's been this way for about a month now," She added. "Looks like this was just some sort of drop-off address." "Don't these old terrace homes usually have a cellar?" Michaels replied. Alison nodded. "Yeah – usually the staircase is located under the stairs…" she pointed towards a small door that had remained unopened up to this point. "Sergeant, two of your men please," Alison said as she directed the officer's attention to the door. He gripped the handle and twisted it, pulling it open. Michaels stepped in front of Alison and sniffed. "What's that smell…?" 76 Burrow Street 9:18 pm The evening seemed to fly by once they had gotten home. After spending an hour playing with her two children in the garden before bathing them and putting them to bed, Leah finally ventured into the living room to find Andrew sitting on the sofa, typing away on his laptop. Leah got on the sofa with him and pushed herself into his body, as Andrew snaked his right arm around her shoulders. "So, still going with Jenny the Toad Princess I see?" Leah said as she read the screen. "Yeah – it went down well today and I figure it adds that bit of gut-wrenching horror to it all; it just sort of drives it home to the reader just exactly how bad things have got." "Please remember that Cassie loves that character and if she hears about it she'll be heart broken." Leah said, beginning to get fidgety. "Do you have the remote control at all?" She asked, looking around the sofa to see if it was wedged down the arm as usual. "No, it's in the kitchen I think. Scott was trying to start the microwave with it." Andrew put the laptop on the end of the sofa and got up. "I'll go and get it…" As he walked away they both heard the sound of Leah's other phone ring. "Shit – what the hell can that be now?" she said, looking at the clock on the wall. Andrew found the remote and aimed it at the television, switching it on. Leah grabbed the phone from the base unit where it was charging up. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 03 The television screen flickered into life. Andrew was only partially paying attention to it as he tried to string his thoughts together. "…explosion is believed to have been as a result of the detonation of a large quantity of highly combustible material in the basement of the residence. The property was used as a guesthouse in the West Jesmond area up until recently. Again, breaking news here of an explosion…" The images of a hole in the row of terrace houses made Andrew look up at the screen – fire fighters were trying to contain the blaze; a sea of blue and red flashing lights illuminated the paramedics as if they were in some sort of surreal disco as they wheeled people to the rows of ambulances waiting to move out of the narrow street. It looked like at least one of the vehicles that had been parked in the street had been flipped over by the force of the blast. Then Andrew heard the sound of something falling to the floor in the hallway. He got up to investigate. "Leah? You okay…?" Andrew saw his wife slumped on the floor, tears running down her face and the phone lying a few feet from her. She looked up at him and could barely speak. In the blink of an eye he had rushed to her side and wrapped her in his arms. Between the sobbing Leah managed to blurt something out. "…Its Alison…she's…" How I Met Your Mother Ch. 04 How I Met Your Mother: Picture Perfect Newcastle City Hospital Special Burns Unit Saturday evening Beep...Beep...Beep Most of the words had gone straight over Leah's head. She had been sitting in the hospital waiting for word on Alison's condition for most of the day. Within an hour of receiving the phone call, Andrew had booked a hotel in the city centre and packed her and the kids in the SUV. Driving through the night, they'd arrived in Newcastle at sunrise. After dropping off the bags and checking into the hotel, they had gone en masse to the hospital. Eventually, Andrew had taken Scott and Cassie back to the hotel for some rest. Leah had preferred to be alone at that point – her feelings inside swinging from one extreme to another with little or no control. As she had sat there in the cold plastic chair there was only one word that described how she truly felt. Helpless. "She has third degree burns across 35% of her body, focused down the left hand side of her torso, arm and leg," The doctor said as Leah looked on through the window at the room beyond. She couldn't remember his name – it was Terrence or Terrell...Travis! Dr Travis – that was it. Leah reached for the handle, only for the doctor to stop her. "I'm sorry, you can't go in there without the proper equipment and clothing - it's a sterile clean room. She needs to be isolated for the next few days to allow the eschar to form safely without the risk of any microbial growth beginning. Once we're past that stage we can manage any infections with antibiotics." "So...will she live?" Leah could barely hear the words that came out of her own mouth. "With skin grafts and extensive physiotherapy, she should recover in time, although the next twenty four hours will be critical to her cardiac functions," Leah looked confused. "Cardiac function in burn victims is always inconsistent in the first forty-eight hours after the injury occurs – it slows down to begin with, then increases to cope with the hyper-metabolic needs of the body. Once she gets through that we can sort out her transfer." Doctor Travis explained. "Although, the viability of the foetus is another question entirely." "Foetus?" Leah asked. "Alison is pregnant?" "Yeah," Travis replied. "Nine weeks. We detected elevated levels of chorionic gonadotropin glycoprotein hormones in her blood work. I assume that she was nulligravida, right? She's never given birth before?" "Yes, yes," Leah confirmed. "Wait a minute – transfer? What transfer?" "Once she's stable she's being moved to the Edwards Clinic down in London. It's a private facility – really top notch at dealing with burn victims." Travis said. "I'm sorry; I thought someone had told you – you're listed as her next of kin." "No, no they hadn't," Leah said. "Who arranged the transfer?" *** The television was filled with flashing images of violence and destruction. Two pairs of eyes sat across from it, mesmerised by the tale that was unfolding before them. As they sat in the bedroom of the hotel, Scott nudged his sister. "This is so much better than the other one we watched at home." "Yeah," Cassie replied without looking at her brother. "I like the flying ones though." "Really? I like the truck and the sports car." Scott said before they both lapsed into silence again, punctuated by the odd gasp. The door to the hotel suite opened and Leah stepped inside, shaking her coat to try and dislodge the last few remnants of the rain shower she had been caught in after leaving the Metro station. She hung her coat up and dropped her bag next to it before returning the key card to her pocket and looking for Andrew. "Where are the kids?" "In the bedroom watching cartoons on the DVD player," Andrew said as he threw a tea bag into a mug. "Cuppa?" "When were you going to tell me?" Leah asked. Andrew looked at her. "About what?" "About Alison being transferred to some private clinic back in London." Leah hissed. "And about the fact that you're paying for it." "Leah, look, I can explain..." "You're dead right about that," Leah spat at him. She walked over to the other side of the room and closed the bedroom door. "What's going on?" "You remember three years ago when Ruth had that car accident?" Leah nodded, recalling the incident with Andrew's youngest sister. "Well, she ended up in the Edwards clinic to treat the burn on her leg and they did a fantastic job on it – after we saw Alison this morning I thought I'd see what I could do..." "You haven't answered the question Andy," Leah pushed him. "Why?" "Because..." he looked out of the window for a minute, seeing the rain pouring down outside. "Because if this happened to you and I wasn't around to look after you, I'd like to think that Alison would have tried to do the same for you." He looked at Leah. "Because she's your best friend and the godmother of our kids; because it's the only thing I can do to help and it's the right thing to do under the circumstances." He shook his head. "Look, we don't need the money at the minute and the advance I received for Infection was more than enough to cover our day to day needs along with paying for Alison's treatment." "What?" Leah suddenly felt sick, realising her initial gut feeling had been wrong. "I...I thought you were going to say...Jesus, I thought you were having an affair with her..." "What? Where the hell did you get that idea from?" the shock was clearly visible on his face. "Look, I love you and you alone, always have; always will." "She's...she's pregnant," Leah said, sitting down on the sofa. Andrew was visibly surprised. "I know she hasn't been seeing anyone recently – and as far as I know you're the only guy she's spent any time with outside of the office...and I know she's not that crazy when she's on the job...I just overreacted – I leapt to a conclusion...everything is so fucked up right now...I'm not thinking straight..." Andrew sat down and put his arm around Leah, pulling her towards him as she put her head on his shoulder. Andrew felt tears beginning to soak through his shirt. "Shush, shush. It's okay baby," he cooed. "Come on; get it all out of your system." "It should have been me Andy," Leah said, letting her emotions boil over. "I should have been in there with...I..." She finally broke down in Andrew's arms. She couldn't tell how long she stayed there, but by the time she heard Andrew talking quietly in her ear, Leah's legs felt like jelly. Leah held onto Andrew as tightly as she could. "Okay, you need to get some rest," Andrew said, helping Leah to her feet. "It's been a shitty day for everyone and you've barely slept since last night." "Mommy, what's wrong?" Scott's question startled Leah. She tried to wipe away the tears that were streaming down her face as she saw her two children standing in the room, looking at her with concerned expressions etched on their young faces. "It's okay Scott, Mom's just abit upset about Aunty Alison's accident," Andrew said. "Now, let's get Mommy tucked into bed and then we'll order something to eat shall we?" Scott and Cassie followed behind Andrew like two puppies following their mother. They watched while Andrew helped Leah into bed, then clambered up either side of their mother and held her with their tiny arms. Leah was asleep in minutes. Andrew went back into the other room and picked up the telephone. "Yeah, this is Mr Hargreaves in room seven one four, I'd like to place an order for room service..." **** Sunday morning "How much ice cream did the kids eat last night?" Alison asked as she handed the suitcase to Andrew. He shrugged his shoulders. "Not sure – I lost count after the third bowl." He closed the boot and looked at his wife. "Right, now are you sure you're going to be okay?" "Yeah, I'll be fine." Leah replied, her hands shoved in her pockets. "Tom wants me to hang around for a couple of days while they conduct the investigation into the explosion. I'll be home by Thursday at the latest." Andrew hugged her, and then looked her in the eye. "Well, whatever you do, just make sure you come back in one piece." "What?" Leah tried to disguise the realisation in her voice that he knew exactly what she was planning on doing. "We've been together for nearly eleven years – you can't hoodwink me that easily anymore Leah," Andrew said. "Just stay safe and remember that we need you too." "Don't talk like..." "We need you Leah," Andrew's tone was as forceful as he could muster under the circumstances as he repeated himself. He then walked around the side of the car to open the driver's side door. "I've left something in your bag for you to read, you know, should you happen to take any flights anywhere." Leah opened the back door and looked at Scott and Cassie buckled into the back seat. "Be good for your Dad while I'm away." Leah said as she leaned in and kissed Cassie, then Scott. In turn, he tried to wipe the saliva from his face. "Mom!" He moaned. "Bye Mommy – love you." Cassie said as Leah withdrew. She paused for a minute – an urge began rising up inside her to simply get in the car and go home with Andrew. "I love you too." Leah said, closing the door quickly before the urge overwhelmed her completely. **** The top floor of Pilgrim Street Police Station had been completely taken over by the team despatched from London to oversee the investigation into the explosion in West Jesmond just over twenty four hours ago. As Leah made her way through the hordes of people scurrying about, she caught sight of Tom as he was gathering together several of his senior staff members that were present. Tom Benedict was a career man. He had long since abandoned field work in the early 1990s in order to climb the ladder of the department and it showed in his appearance. Overweight and with a hair line that had long since gone the way of the dinosaurs, he managed the team with a flair that belied his appearance. As he caught Leah's eye he gestured for her to come over to the office he had commandeered. "Hargreaves, how you feeling?" "I'm fine sir," Leah lied. "I'll admit that I'm a little upset about events but..." "Go home." Tom interrupted her. Leah's jaw dropped open. "What?" "You heard me, go home," He repeated. "You're too close to this to be objective – if I need to I'll get Tompkins to drive you." Tom then went into the room and closed the door behind him. Leah was shocked – and she could feel the anger building up inside her at being suddenly shut out. Her first reaction was to open the door and tell Tom exactly what she thought about his decision. However, instead of letting it get the better of her, Leah turned around and found herself a small computer terminal in a distant corner of the office. After logging on she did was she did best. She began to hunt. **** August 2000 Clearwater House Publishing Annual Dinner Event "Okay, how bored are you?" Andrew asked as he joined Leah by the buffet table. They had just sat through a reading of the first five chapters of Antoine Fortune's new novel, The Captain's Wife, by the celebrated French author himself. It had been billed as a tale of romance and adventure on the high seas of the seventeen-century. After the third page, even Andrew had found his mind wandering. "Bored enough that I've already figured out five different ways to kill the Frenchman," Leah said as she held up a small sliver of wood. "All with this toothpick!" "Fantastic, you'll have to tell me those later," Andrew said as he directed Leah away from the food. "Look, I want you to meet someone – you'll love him." He guided her across the room filled with authors, agents and various corporate sponsors. As they wound their way towards the rear of the room, Leah could see that Andrew was directing her towards a table that was occupied by a bear of a man. He stood up as Andrew approached. "Andrei," He said – Leah instantly recognised his accent as Russian. "Is this who I think it is?" "Innokenty Annenskij, this is my fiancée, Leah Bennett." The big Russian nodded to Leah and gently took her hand and kissed it. "Leah, this is Inno, the big Russian." "Pleased to meet you Mr Annenskij," Leah said. Inno waved away her formal greeting. "Please, call me Inno – everyone else does." Inno insisted as he pulled a chair out for Leah to sit at. Andrew joined them a moment later, carrying a small tray of drinks in his hands. "Inno here has been telling me some very interesting things about his former life in the old Soviet Union," Andrew said. Leah could see the gleam in his eyes. "Namely around the Dylatov Pass Incident of 1959." "Another one of your wild goose chases, right?" Leah said, smiling wildly at Andrew. "Like going to look for Bigfoot and the Mongolian Death Worm?" "Ha ha ha!" Inno's laugh made everyone around him look at the occupants of the table at the back of the room. "You should come to Siberia – I could show you Alma that make Bigfoot look like monkey in zoo." "Get me the administrative access documents and I'm there big man!" Andrew said, handing a shot glass of vodka to Leah and then one to Inno. "Inno here used to be a diplomatic attaché to the Russian embassy in Washington and London back in the seventies and eighties." Leah eyebrows rose visibly, immediately seeing through the terminology Andrew used. She knew that Andrew had picked up on her non-verbal signal. "That's why I'm here – to hand over final copy of manuscript to Diane." "So that's how you too know each other – you have the same editor." Leah said, relief audible in her voice. "Not entirely," Andrew said. "Inno here lived across the street from me when I was a teenager. He'd moved to England following the collapse of the Soviet Union." Leah looked at Andrew with a strange, strained expression on her face as Inno threw his hands in the air. "Perestroika! Pah!" "What? You didn't think that the retired gentleman to our left was trying to recruit me as a double agent or something silly like that?" Andrew said as he knocked back the vodka at the same time as Inno. "Another drink?" Leah followed suit a moment later. "Da! Another drink!" Andrew got up from the table and disappeared. Leah and Inno shared a look. "So, what were you? KGB?" She asked. Inno smiled. "Da! Colonel in the end," Inno smiled at Leah, looking at her as she sat in the chair, dressed in the long black evening gown she'd picked out for the evening. "You're MI5, MI6, right?" He said with an air of expectancy in his voice. "How could you tell?" Leah replied. He waved his hand again. "After thirty years, you develop – how you say – sixth sense. I see the way you walk, the way you look at things – you never lose that sense, that understanding of how things can go bad quickly. You look at things, people and evaluate them, up here." Inno said, tapping his forehead. "So, Andrew and you...?" "Are an item, yes." Leah said, sensing something in Inno's voice that she wasn't anticipating. "Does he know?" He seemed almost protective towards her fiancé. "Yes, yes he does." Leah said, starting to warm to the man sitting next to her. "We don't have any secrets between us." Inno's smile grew even wider. "My wife the same! Married for twenty-five years – never a secret between us – exactly way it should be. You will make good Russian marriage!" Inno beamed as he saw Andrew making his way back from the open bar. "Andrew's a good boy – I knew his father you know." His voice was low – conspiratorial almost. Leah sudden felt that some grand revelation was about to slip from his lips. "He was a good man – built my garage for me. Fantastic craftsman. Such a shame when he died. Andrew was so lost for awhile..." Inno seemed to drift off for a moment; his eyes seemed to mist over. "But he start to write – I read something printed in the local newspaper and I offered him my help." "Help? You were trying to get me to ghost-write your memoirs at the age of nineteen." Andrew said as he lined up six shots of vodka. Inno's booming laugh flowed again. "Yes – and now I write them myself." Inno knocked back a shot. "Now, we drink and celebrate my success. I drink to my book!" "Okay," Andrew said, looking at Leah. "We'll drink to your book big man." **** Two hours later, Inno was stumbling along the corridor of the hotel he was staying at with Leah trying to keep him upright. Despite the amount of alcohol the Russian had consumed he still had a solid grasp of his faculties. "Old regime cruel, harsh, but you knew where you stood with them," He said. Leah propped him up against the wall as he searched for his room key. "New men – FSB – bastards!" he spat. "No respect..." "Where's your key card Inno?" Leah asked as they resumed their progress. She waved at the man down the hall who was struggling with his door, hoping that their odd couple routine didn't upset any existing guests who had already turned in for the night. "Come on, Andrew is waiting for me downstairs." "Here somewhere..." They paused again. As Leah helped Inno to stand upright she noticed that the man down the hall was looking at them, no, he was watching them. She leaned into Inno slightly. "We're being followed." "Told you!" Inno cried out. "No respect..." "Shush!" Leah said, handing Inno her purse. "Get my phone out of there and look through it for an entry marked Alison." "What, no..." Inno started to speak – Leah placed her hand on his mouth to keep him quiet. "No – oddly enough, this wasn't on the agenda tonight." Leah patted his chest. "Just don't fall over." She turned and began to walk back down the hall, acting as if she was drunk. Almost toppling over at one point, Leah looked as if she was going to walk into the tall man. He put his hands out to stop her, yet nothing could prepare him for what happened next. As she "fell" into him, Leah drove her knee forcefully into his stomach, doubling the man over. Stepping to the side, Leah slammed her hand in a knife-edge strike across the back of his neck. The man slumped to the floor. Leah knelt down and rolled the man onto his back, checking his pulse as she searched him. "...Is he...?" Inno was walking better now, suddenly more sober than before. "He's alive – I'm not in the habit of killing people just for the sake of it," Leah said as Inno handed her the cell phone. She pulled a pistol of Russian origin from out of his jacket and a small identity wallet. Leah looked at it as she called Alison. "You'll have to read that – it's all gobbledygook to me." Inno looked at the documentation in the wallet. "Diplomatic Service," He spat. "Pah! FSB!" Leah nodded as the call was connected. "Alison, it's me," she said. "We have an unwanted that needs to be looked after for a few days at the Cresswell Hotel...okay." Leah ended the call and looked at Inno. "You know what Inno, why don't you stay with us for tonight?" **** Pilgrim Street Police Station 2009 Two hours of trawling through data files and intelligence reports had left Leah with a mountain of paperwork at her side but no real leads. The house in West Jesmond had been rented by someone using the name John Banfield – however the fingerprints on the documents belonged to a man by the name of Milos Pelevin, or Johann Blanc, Jack White, Miles Furman or anyone of a number of assumed names that flashed up on the screen. After searching through numerous databases, Leah realised that the elusive John Banfield – which was the name she was going to stick with in her mind – was wanted by Interpol, the FBI and a variety of regional crime units across Europe. Primarily he seemed to be something of an ironmonger, dealing weapons through the black market, but it appeared he'd dipped his toes into people trafficking and money laundering as an unhealthy sideline. As she leaned back in the uncomfortable chair and ran her hands through her hair the telephone in her pocket began to buzz. She answered it without looking at the display. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 04 "Andrew, I'm a little..." "Not Andrew," the voice sounded so loud, even over the tiny speaker in the earpiece. "Inno!" "Inno, look, now isn't a good time..." Leah said. "Da, Andrew told me," Inno replied. Leah paused for a minute. She could hear Inno chewing on something – probably a sandwich. "Listen, I might be able to help you with your...problem if you can assist me with a situation I am faced with." "Okay," Leah said, intrigue getting the better of her. Or is it desperation? "What exactly did Andrew tell you?" **** Page 167 of Infection "I can't fucking believe you did that!" Alex screamed as she hit Bruce in the face with her fist. He fell into the mud that lined the riverbank with a dull splat sound. "I can't believe you'd be that fucking selfish!" She kicked him in the side – the tip of her boot dug into his ribs. "Alex, listen, we need to move..." Dan said, looking around nervously. "Let's just..." "What? No! No – I am not going to leave this until later," Alex screamed. "This bastard almost killed my kids!" She turned to look at Bruce. "You sick, selfish fuck!" Her words were punctuated with more kicks being driven into Bruce's stomach as he lay on the floor in a foetal position. "How could you do that? How could you drive the car into the river with the girls in there with you?" "Have you seen what's going on out here?" Bruce whined. "What's the point? What's the point to anything?" "The point is that they're your kids as well you stupid son of a bitch!" The volume in Alex's voice was provoking interest from around Them. Dan turned around and watched the tree line – he could pick out the faint sounds of their approach coupled with a barely audible low moan. "You've done some fucked up things to me while we were together, but this is the worst..." "Alex, we need to go now!" Dan said, grabbing her arm and twisting her to face him. "Look!" he pointed to the tree line. She saw them – shambling husks of what were once living, breathing people, now twisted into some corrupt parody of themselves. Grey skin already beginning to hang from the bones, eyes recessed into their skulls, limbs bloated as the blood within them coagulated and began to harden. They lurched from the trees, attracted to the sound of the verbal conflict. One of them lunged for a bird that was eating at the carrion remains of a rabbit – the bird simply flapped its wings and avoided the grasp of those lifeless hands. "If you care about your kids at all we have to get the fuck out of here now!" Dan's grip on Alex's arm was enough, combined with his tone, to convince her that he was right. "What about...?" she gestured towards Bruce, now crying as he lay in the mud. "Leave him," Dan said. "He made his choice when he drove the car into the river – if he's got a death wish then they," he pointed at the reanimated corpses moving ever closer. "will be more than happy to grant it to him." Dan released his grip on her arm. Alex looked over at the car – she could see the figures of her three daughters huddled together inside, soaking wet and wrapped in a blanket. She knew he was right – survival was their only goal and this was just stopping them from achieving it. "Okay, one last thing..." Alex reached for the pistol wedged in the back of Dan's trousers. By the time he realised what she was doing, she was already pointing it at Bruce. "Alex – don't!" A single gunshot rang out – followed by high-pitched screams. Dan looked down at Bruce – who was now clutching his knee, bloody pouring between his fingers. Alex handed the gun back to him. The undead were now in what could be described as reaching a fever-pitch, their moaning creating an unwelcome piece of background music to events. "You didn't say I had to make it easy for him to get away from them did you?" She muttered as she walked towards the car. Leah closed the draft copy of the book that Andrew had left for her and closed her eyes, trying to get some sleep. The flight would be landing in Dagestan in the next few hours and Inno would be waiting for her at the airport. **** "What happens when we decide to have kids?" Leah's skin was tingling as she lay in Andrew's arms, basking in the post-coital glow. She thought about rolling away from him, but at that moment, there wasn't another place in the world she would rather have been. She looked at the wedding ring on her finger and the dress hanging on the back of the door. "What do you mean?" She asked in response to his question. "Well, how much maternity leave do you get? Oh, and I should warn you that twins run in my family." "I don't know – I've never really looked into it," She replied. "I guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it." "The cake was nice," Andrew said. The sudden chance in topic threw Leah slightly. "What? The wedding cake?" "Yeah – what did you think I was talking about?" "I don't know – you just caught me off guard." Leah took a deep breath. "You know, you've never asked me." "Asked you what?" "About what I'm going to do in the future." "Okay, I'm going to seem incredibly thick now, but I have no clue what you're talking about." Andrew said, looking down at his wife as she rested her head on his chest. "You've never asked me to give up my job." "Why on earth would I do that?" Andrew sounded shocked. "You love your job and you're good at it." "But, if we start a family..." "Then we'll figure it out – you forget, I'm at home most of the time apart from the odd signing tour so I can look after the kids." He paused. "I'm actually looking forward to being a house husband." "Seriously? You're not going to tell me to give up my job and do something less...dangerous?" Leah twisted her body around so she was looking up at him. "Leah, I'm sure that there will come a time when you decide that you've had enough of what you do and you decide to walk away," Andrew was idly stroking her long brown hair. "But you have to make that decision for yourself, no one else can make it for you. If I roll up and say "You must resign" then it will just generate resentment between the pair of us. I didn't marry you because you're a doormat. You challenge me, you stand up to me – that's why we fit together so well – you put up with my crap and I put up with your crap." "What?" Leah laughed. "That's how you view our relationship?" "Yeah – in a nutshell." Andrew replied. "Now, do you want to go and get some breakfast?" "Can we just stay in bed?" The sensation of the plane landing jarred Leah back to the waking world, interrupting her dream. Once she had gathered her thoughts she made her way through customs and into the arrivals lounge. Just as he said he would, Innokenty Annenskij was waiting for her. Nearly 75 now, he walked with a stick but his personality was just as vibrant as always. He hugged Leah enthusiastically – but there was a sombre look about his face. "I hope this was worth three flights and sixteen hours travelling Inno," Leah said as they walked to the car waiting for them in the cold evening. "I am hopeful that I will have something for you within twenty four hours," Inno replied. His business-like manner was unusual – Leah realised that this was the Inno she hadn't met before. The retired Colonel was being pushed to the fore in one last hurrah. "However, my matter must take precedence." He seemed tense as he handed over some pieces of paper to her. The car pulled away from the waiting area, carefully negotiating the traffic around the airport. "A week ago my son was murdered, my daughter hospitalised and my granddaughter kidnapped," Leah looked at the photographs. "Sascha is recovering in hospital, however the authorities have failed to locate Irina yet." "Inno, I don't want to sound harsh, but you know that she's probably..." "No!" The big Russian barked at Leah. He was struggling to keep his emotions in check. "No – she is alive." He handed her another piece of paper – a photograph of a young girl holding a newspaper up. The date matched that of whatever time zone Leah now found herself in. Looking into that angelic face, Leah realised she could be looking at her own daughter. "They demanded a ransom, but I suspect this goes deeper than just this." "You think this is some sort of reprisal for your book, right? Like in the hotel all those years ago?" "Da. I have a jet standing by to take her and her mother away from all this." Inno picked up a bag that was sitting next to him. "I can't trust anyone else at the minute – Russian Mafia have their fingers in everything as well as FSB. This was all I could muster in the short time I had to prepare." Leah looked inside – two small grenades and what looked like a pistol sat inside. There also appeared to be some sort of dark coloured jumpsuit and gloves. "I won't need these," Leah replied, handing the grenades back to him. "It's better if I keep things quiet." She took the pistol out of the bag and attached the silencer that had been provided. "Inno, understand that if I do this..." "If you get my granddaughter back for me then I promise you that I will deliver the man you are after directly to you." Inno said. "If it's a matter of money..." "Come on Inno, you know me well enough by now - it's not about money – I'll get Irina back for you," Leah replied. "Although, I may need one further favour afterwards." "Whatever you ask, I will do my best to provide." He handed her a small map. "Now, my sources tell me that Irina is being held in a farmhouse just outside Kizlyar..." **** Tuesday Andrew sat at his desk and typed away furiously on the keyboard. His mind was trying to focus on what he was doing rather than thinking about his wife was possibly doing. He had spoken to Inno after Leah had landed without her knowledge to check that she had arrived safely. He hated the idea of not telling her that he knew exactly what Inno wanted her to do and what he was offering in exchange, but he couldn't fault the man for going outside the normal authorities under the circumstances. There was a tap on his shoulder. Andrew saw Cassie standing in her pyjamas, holding a small, green cuddly toy in her hand. "I had a nightmare Dad. Baby Cthulhu didn't stop it this time." She rubbed her eyes as Andrew looked up at the clock on the wall. 11:45 pm. "Aww, come here Princess." Andrew lifted her up onto his lap. "Do you want to watch some YouTube clips?" Cassie nodded. Andrew repositioned her on his lap so he could operate the keyboard at the same time as hold onto her. "Okay, just remember, if Mommy finds out about this then she'll kill Daddy, so it's our little secret." Cassie nodded. "Okay – shall we start with Denis Leary's MTV Unplugged?" "I like the song with the rude words." Cassie said. Andrew chuckled. "Yeah, I like that song as well..." **** It's been awhile, but I can still do silent – and I like the dark. Lurking in the bushes that ran along one side of the farmhouse, Leah watched and waited. Inno's intelligence suggested no more than six men. Three of them seemed to be prowling around the exterior – one lagging behind the other two. As he walked past the bush two hands reached out – one clamping across his mouth, the other grabbing his shoulder. By the time he had been dragged into the bush his companions were ten feet away – there was a dull snapping sound that neither of them took much notice of. Tom once saw me in action in the field and told me that I had a green thumb for violence. I think he meant it as a complement – but I always thought it was more like a warning. All I know is that it stung like hell at the time. It still does. My daughter has a green thumb for roses. Her feet were swift – Leah covers the ground from her hiding place to the two men in a few seconds. There's just enough room between them for her to slip right by them. The shocked expressions on their faces are soon wiped out and both her hands flash out, striking with deadly force in knife-edge strikes, crushing their tracheas in a sudden burst of movement. Both men died within thirty seconds of each other, their brains starved of oxygen by Leah's simultaneous attack. Yes – I can fight and yes, I'm good at it. But the hurting – I never enjoyed that. I know others who do. If you're gifted in a terrible discipline then every time you face someone, you face them in the knowledge that you can break bones. Displace their arms in their sockets. Blind them. Cripple them. Kill them when necessary. No matter how joyous and loving a life I lead - it's always there; the worm inside the apple. Shake hands with a new person and I instinctively take note of the nerve clusters and pressure points. Go out with friends for dinner and I know how easily I could take them out in less time than it takes to order the wine. It took Leah a few minutes to drag the bodies out of sight. Less time than it took to kill them. Make love to a man who you'd give your life for – who has demonstrated he would do the same for you in a truly grand manner - and seeing him so exposed – so vulnerable... I'm sick of it. Creeping into the house, careful not to alert anyone to her presence, Leah's senses were at their peak. She had withdrawn the pistol from the makeshift holster on the side of the right leg of the jumpsuit – which was marginally too big for her – and swept through the ground floor of the building. As Leah moved level with a closed door, she paused to listen. There was the sound of water running, coupled with a flushing noise. Pressing herself against the wall next to where the door would open, she waited. Her ears picked out the sound of the bolt sliding across, and then the door opened. Leah's leg swung up, striking the man in the stomach. As he doubled over from the strike Leah drove her fist into the back of his skull, just at the critical junction of the spine. He fell to the floor with a small grunt, his lifeless eyes looking out at the world. You can't compartmentalise a lifetime of learning where to place your fist to cause maximum damage just because you might be in polite company. And when you're fighting for your life all those practice runs want to come to play. There's a part of me that's like a sword – and sooner or later it wants to be unsheathed. My training isn't about restraint – it isn't about remorse. I remind myself that every bone I break, every life I take here gives Inno's granddaughter a better chance to see tomorrow. I can't think of these men as human – not with what I have to do. I've become what I least wanted to be. Can I forgive myself? Dragging him back into the toilet – and almost retching at the smell – Leah finished sweeping around the ground floor. It was empty. A green thumb for violence? Screw you Tom, I never wanted this. I have all I ever wanted at home. Is that enough? I have a man at home who I love more than anything and two children who are beautiful – a picture perfect family. Can I walk away from this? Can I step back from the precipice, from a fall that is finite and complete? They hadn't even bothered to disguise the entrance to the cellar. Lifting it up, Leah advanced into the dimly lit room. She heard two voices – both speaking in Russian. As she reached the bottom of the stairs Leah noted that both men were looking at something on the table, their backs towards her. She then saw the frail figure of Irina in the corner of the room. There was a rope attached to her ankle that was secured to the wall and her hands were tied together in front of her. The young girl's eyes went wide – Leah put her finger to her lips to try to prevent her from screaming. The girl seemed to understand, whether by instinct or some sort of experience, that Leah wasn't here to hurt her. Leah then gestured that she should cover her eyes with her hands. Irina heard two sounds that were almost like someone coughing. The next thing she felt was a pair of hands untying the rope from her ankles and wrist. Irina looked up at the brown haired woman dressed in black from behind her hands. She smiled at her. "Your grandfather sent me to collect you," Leah said in Russian, remembering the phrase Inno had taught her in the car before she had left. "He's waiting for you." Irina offered no resistance to Leah as she picked the child up. She could feel the girl shaking in her arms as Leah left the farmhouse. By the time she had reached the car, the girl was clinging to her like a limpet. Any doubts Leah had about her course of action that night were wiped away the moment she saw the expression on Inno's face when she opened the passenger door with his granddaughter in her arms. **** Kizlyar 12 hours later "Andrew, it's me," Leah knew the time delay meant it was still early in the morning back in England. "I haven't got long because I'm at a payphone," "You're on your way home then?" "Almost – I have one more thing to sort out, then I'll be back." Leah replied. "Look, you were right." "About what?" "About needing to decide for myself about when it was time to quit." Leah said. "I love you baby and I'll be coming home soon – for good." She listened to Andrew as he reciprocated her feelings and then hung up. As she walked away from the phone booth a car pulled up. Leah opened the passenger door; Inno was squashed into the driver's seat. "Did you make your phone call?" Inno asked. Leah nodded. "Good – now I take you to Mr Banfield." **** On the outskirts of Kizlyar, just on the edge of the border between Dagestan and Chechnya, was an old military compound. The signs that adorned the approach to it clearly indicated that it had once been one of the Soviet Union's foremost radar bases. However, like the cold war, the passage of time had not been kind to the building. Many of the outhouses were lacking roofs; graffiti adorned the walls, demonstrating everything from support for the old communist regime, the town's local prostitutes and the fortunes of the two football teams supported by the population of Kizlyar. As the sun began to dip below the horizon, Leah found herself inside one of the buildings that still had a serviceable roof. In the middle of the room a hooded figure was shackled to a chair. As she studied him, Inno handed her a set of keys and the pistol she had used the previous evening. "We have five minutes." He said. "I will be waiting in the car." "I'll be done in two." Leah replied. Inno nodded and walked out of the room. Leah approached the figure and pulled the hood from his head. His mouth had a piece of duct tape across it, stifling his screams. She recognised the face from the file she had compiled. Thin features, dirty blonde hair and eyes that were momentarily squinting from the daylight in the room. "Okay – let's make this quick," She said, folding her arms in front of her and making sure he saw she was armed. "You go by the name of John Banfield right?" He shook his head. The butt of the pistol cracked against the side of his skull. "Don't bother trying to lie to me, Mr Banfield, White, Furman or whatever name you're currently using – I know exactly who you are." Leah walked around behind him and pressed the barrel of the pistol into the back of his skull. Banfield moved his head from side to side, trying in vain to move away from it. "You know, I spent half of the flight getting here thinking about how I'd kill you," Leah whispered into his ear. "Should I shoot you? Should I choke the life out of you? Break your neck perhaps? Or should I set you on fire, so you suffer the same way those people suffered with your little jury-rigged booby trap back in Newcastle?" She pulled the gun away from the back of his head and walked round to face him again. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 04 "However, my husband made a good point in his own special way," Leah said as she dangled the keys to the handcuffs in front of Banfield's eyes. "There are worse fates than death." She grabbed the chair and rotated it ninety degrees so that Banfield was facing the window. Through the broken pane of glass they could both see a stream of headlights winding down a narrow road that led to the old military complex. "That's an FSB snatch squad that's been tipped off that you're here." Leah hissed. "They seem to have received some evidence that you were responsible for supplying the Chechens with the weapons used in the death of the Russian Foreign Minister two months ago." She walked behind the chair again, pressing the pistol into the back of Banfield's head once more. He heard a clicking noise – then his hands were free. They went straight to the duct tape. "Not just yet," Leah threatened. Banfield's hands moved slowly to his sides. A scrawny built man, Leah knew he wouldn't pose a threat to her even if he escaped the cuffs that attached his ankles to the chair. She walked back around into his field of view. "I understand that they have a nice little cell lined up for you in one of their compounds in the north of the country. I'm a fair sort of person – I've decided not to kill you and I'll even give you the chance to see if you can escape the FSB before they arrive." Leah threw the keys to the shackles to him. "However, I never said it would be a fair race." Just as Banfield caught them, she bought the pistol up and fired once. The bullet struck him in the kneecap. Banfield's eyes were wide as his screams were deadened by the duct tape. He writhed on the chair, swinging back and forth until he ended up toppling over. Leah took another look out of the window – the column of vehicles was getting closer. Without a backwards glance, Leah left, the sound of Banfield's agonisingly desperate attempts to free himself filling the room. **** Wednesday 11:30 pm The sound of the door closing was greeted by silence. Leah put her suitcase down in the hallway and slipped off her shoes, finding the wood beneath her feet both familiar and cool. As she padded along the hallway Leah could smell the feint aroma of Colombian coffee sitting in the percolator. Opening the door to the dining room, she saw Andrew hunched over the computer, his fingers dancing around the keyboard. He looked over his shoulder at her. "Hey, you're back!" Andrew got up out of his chair and embraced his wife. He could feel the tension in her limbs as she held him tightly. "I didn't think you were getting back until tomorrow morning – why didn't you call? We'd have picked you up from the airport..." "It's late – the kids are in bed. I thought it was easier to get a cab," Leah replied, her face buried in his shoulder. "Besides I had to stop by the office first." She relinquished her grip on Andrew's torso to reach into her jacket pocket. A moment later she presented Andrew with the picture she had taken from her desk. He held it in his hand for a moment as Leah turned around and walked out of the dining room. "Was that fresh coffee I could smell in the kitchen?" "Yeah – it's about half an hour old," Andrew said, looking at the picture in his hands before following her. Neither of them spoke as Leah poured herself a cup of the thick black liquid. Andrew looked at the image in the small frame saying World's Best Mom – the only personal effect she had on her desk – and realised the significance of it. As he put the picture down on the unit he watched as Leah drained the cup, pausing to refill it. "Are you okay?" "No," Leah answered. "But I will be." She looked at Andrew. "Sarah has quit as my assistant," he looked at the picture again. "She was offered a job as an editor at Random House. I suggested she took it." "So, you have anyone in mind for that vacancy?" "Maybe," Andrew replied, moving over to his wife and wrapping his arms around her again. "I'll need to interview you, assess your skills, determine what your best attributes are..." "Oh really?" Leah smiled – the first time she had smiled in several days. "Yeah – but the pay sucks, the hours are long, the holiday entitlement is lousy and I'm a horrible boss..." "I think I'll manage," She quipped. "My husband is a writer as well you know – I'm used to dealing with you artistic types." "Really? When can you start?" Andrew said as Leah pretended to look like she was thinking. "How about first thing tomorrow?" "That's perfect as I'm in between jobs right now." Leah said. She kissed Andrew and found herself looking into his eyes. "Great," Andrew reached over and switched off the coffee machine. The gurgling sound died away as he kissed Leah once more. "In which case we need to get to bed – you start at nine tomorrow morning and I hate people who are tardy on the first day." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 05 76 Burrow Street 3:42 am Instinct told her to run, but her body refused. She knew she had to master her gut reaction in order to carry out her mission. This was the first time she'd actually gone out into the field without any sort of safety net. This was it – just her, no backup, no support team lurking five minutes behind her. No pressure of course, Tom had said when he briefed her, just get in, retrieve the hostage before the deadline and get out. Skulking in the shadows, Leah swept the amplified listening device around, trying to pick out something, anything she could use. At that moment the headphones crackled, just as two men passed by the side entrance of the warehouse. One was carrying a large crate and the other was talking to him. Although the conversation was virtually inaudible, Leah managed to hear one very important fact. "...Yep, she's up in the top floor. You know, in the office...?" Leah's mind translated the words the device picked up from their native Serbian as the other man nodded. That was all she needed to know before she broke from her cover, intent on scaling the wall of the warehouse with a grappling hook in hand. On the roof was a large metal vent, no doubt used for air conditioning in this late spring weather. It was just large enough for her to climb into and soon she found herself crawling through various corridors, twisting and turning tunnels, searching for a place to climb out and begin her search for the hostage. This better be worth all of this trouble, she silently mused, before arriving at an air vent. Leah pressed her face up against the dusty cover to see what was going on below. Three men were standing around something in the centre of the room. Leah craned her neck to see what exactly it was, soon finding it to be the hostage – Hilary Tompkins, wife of the British Ambassador. She had been kidnapped two days ago in broad daylight, her two bodyguards executed before her eyes. She was strapped to a chair with a gag placed in her mouth to muffle her hopeless screams. One of the men pulled a knife and began walking towards her, ever so slowly as if to increase the suspense. The woman's green eyes grew as wide as saucers and were filled with furious tears. A mixture and anger and apprehension balled up in Leah's stomach. Suddenly another henchman poked his head in the door, causing the man with the knife to stop and look over. They exchanged a few words before the first man flicked the knife closed and all three went out of the room, closing the door behind them. Leah could see the hostage breathed a sigh of relief – something in Leah's mind suddenly clicked over – now was the time to get her out of there. With a swift kick, the vent came crashing down, scaring the woman again. But this time it was her saviour. Leah dropped to the ground and hurried over, wanting to escape before her captors returned. She wasn't worried about dealing with a number of them – her concerns lay in what might happen to Mrs Tompkins in such a situation. With a flick of her wrist, Leah unclasped as small knife from the back of her belt and cut through the ropes restraining the woman. Leah removed the gag and helped the older woman to her feet. Immediately she noticed that Hilary was favouring one ankle over the other. "Oh, thank the Heavens above! I thought it was all over...thank you for saving me..." Leah clamped her hand across Hilary's mouth. "We're not out of the woods yet," came Leah's rushed reply. "We still need to get you out of here." She released her grip as Hilary conveyed an understanding at their predicament. "How many men have you seen?" "Five, possibly six," Hilary replied. "But I think..." The door to the room opened again, the man took a moment to register what he saw before he began to call for help. Leah's arm flashed, hurling the compact knife at him as she pushed Hilary to the ground. The blade struck him in the throat as Leah heard the sound of more footsteps approaching. She rolled across the floor, reaching the fallen man just as his colleague reached the doorway. He barely had time to comprehend what was going on when Leah grabbed his hand that held his pistol in it. She twisted his wrist sharply; the sound of a bone breaking filled the room before she was able to snatch the pistol from his grip. In a split second she had turned it on him, firing one round into his skull at close range. Hilary got to her feet again as the second captor fell to the floor. Leah looked over at her as she relieved the first henchman of his own firearm. "Can you walk?" "Yes, yes I think so." "Good," Leah replied, then looked down at the watch on her wrist. "Because we need to get to the roof quickly." She gestured for Hilary to join her at the door. "That gunshot will have gotten their attention." Leah handed Hilary the second gun as they made their way towards what Leah reasoned was the fire exit. She could hear voices and the sound of feet striking metal steps in the middle distance. "You know how to use one of those?" "I...I think so..." "That will do for now." Leah said as she opened the door for her companion. Once she was out Leah tried her best to secure the fire exit. Shaking her head in defeat as Hilary struggled to climb the stairs both women heard something approaching through the air. Reaching the roof once more, the blinding lights of something swooped down towards the pair of them. The downdraft from the rotors enabled Hilary to identify that the vehicle was a helicopter. "Get in!" Leah shouted, making sure she could be heard over the rotor blades. Hilary hobbled as best as she could, a pair of arms grabbing her at the last minute and hauling her into the passenger cabin. Leah joined her a minute later, banging the side of the helicopter to tell the pilot to move as quickly as possible. The sound of small arms fire whizzing past the vehicle as they disappeared into the night only added to the sense of urgency Leah felt. "Nice job rookie!" The complement came from the other occupant of the helicopter cabin who was wrapping a thermal blanket around Hilary Tompkins' shoulders. Leah looked over at her blonde haired companion. "I told you that you would be fine." "Thanks for that Alison," she said as she leaned back in the seat, a sense of satisfaction flooding her body. Leah woke with a start. The dream had been so vivid it felt like it was yesterday, when she knew the events that had been playing out in her mind had taken place nearly thirteen years ago. A first time for everything, she thought as she rolled over in bed and pressed herself into Andrew's body. He mumbled something in his sleep as he instinctively wrapped his arms around her body, holding her against his cool skin – he never bothered with a t-shirt or pyjamas at night, just his boxer shorts. Whatever it was he was dreaming about was a mystery to her. Probably something that he'll twist and tease into the next book he works on. Resting against his shoulder, content with her thoughts, Leah closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep again. **** "So, now that the kids are at school, what's on the agenda today?" Andrew asked as he plodded towards the bed in a pair of faded denim jeans and a discoloured blue shirt. There were two cups of tea in his hands. "I have to go into the office to sort out some paperwork," Leah said as she sat up in bed, taking the cup from his out-stretched left hand. "Sign a few things, get my final payslip and pension statement, then I thought I'd swing by the clinic and see Alison – if all goes well she should be clear for visitors from today." She took a sip from it and felt the scalding hot liquid drip down her throat. Leah closed her eyes for a moment – there was something special about the way Andrew made a cup of tea – something that made her think of weekends in the summer spent at her grandmother's house in the country during her childhood. "After that, that's it for me – I thought we might take the kids to the park later when I pick them up from school. Cassie's ballet lesson isn't until seven tonight. Is there anything you need me to get on the way back?" "No, not that I can think of – we might need some milk but we can get that later," Andrew said as he sat on the edge of the bed. "I need to get the next few chapters of Quarantine finished before the end of the day, but the park sounds like a good idea." He moved around slightly, eventually leaning back so he was reclining on the bed next to his wife. "I read the last bit you'd written," Leah said, placing her mug on the bedside table and placing her head on Andrew's chest. "You didn't kill Jenny the Toad Princess after all." "Well, you know me, big softy at heart! It creates more of a family dynamic between the principle characters with her in it. Besides, I wouldn't say it was an entirely blood-free resolution to the situation – Bob the Mechanic got torn to pieces when the group saved her," "Yeah, but he was a prick so I didn't feel bad about him dying," Leah replied. Andrew began to stroke Leah's hair. "Mmm...that's nice..." No words were exchanged for a few minutes as Leah found herself starting to drift off to sleep again. The shrill ringing of the phone startled her. "Bollocks," Andrew said as he slid out from under her. "I'll bet that's Diane." "I'd better start getting ready," Leah added, looking over at the alarm clock. "Traffic will be a bitch otherwise." "Say hello to Alison for me while you're there." Andrew said as he trundled downstairs to answer the phone. **** By the time she reached the office it was nearly half past ten. Once the car was parked in the secure car park, Leah waved her security pass through the scanner before she walked through the large x-ray machine situated in the basement. The machine had always unnerved her – she had worried the daily routine of being bombarded by radiation might have some untold effect on her body. Andrew had done his best to explain to her that it was a completely benign process – going as far as to rest his head on top of the microwave while he was cooking rice one night to prove his point. Considering his family history with all things tumour related Leah had to concede that he'd made his point in the most forceful way possible. After a short elevator ride up two floors she made her way towards a small conference room reserved for the more complex inter-departmental meetings and for a secondary purpose that she was undertaking today. The induction talk for new recruits. Part of her agreement with Tom regarding the immediate effect of her resignation was that he wanted her to speak to some of the new field operatives who had been recently recruited. None of them had actually undertaken any operational work yet and had been employed as analysts up to this point, so Leah already knew some of them. However, today she would be addressing them from the opposite side of the fence. She had wrestled with how to approach this, however Andrew had suggested to her that she speak from the gut. Leah wasn't sure how this was going to go down, as she usually hated public speaking. Upon entering the room, she saw Rob Harris standing at the head of the room, talking to the assembled team members. The butterflies in her stomach quadrupled. "...And here she is," Rob said, gesturing towards Leah. Sixteen pairs of eyes turned to look at her. "For those of you who don't know her, this is Leah Hargreaves, one of our field operative team leaders and intelligence analysts." "Former operative." Leah stressed as she walked to the front of the auditorium. "I stopped working for the department with effect from three weeks ago – I'm simply doing this as a favour to Tom Benedict before I vanish off the face of the earth." She turned to face the assemble masses. They all seemed so young – some of them looked like they had come straight out of university. Then again, she thought, so did I. She recognised three faces – Will, Gavin and Emma had all worked for her in Tom's department. "I...I don't know what you're expecting me to say," Leah began. "However I'm just going to be brutally honest with you all." She paused. "In three years time, forty percent of you will not be involved in field work." She let it sink in. "In five years time, eighty percent of you will not be involved in field work – you'll have either decided to return to an analysts role or you'll have left, if you're lucky." "And if we're unlucky?" A woman with short auburn hair in the front row asked. "You'll be dead." Leah replied, fixing her with her gaze. "Now, this job is nothing like it is in the movies or on television. It's dirty, it's unpleasant and although there are times when it's rewarding, the sense of loss you come to feel from seeing people around you die can become overwhelming." Leah walked around the impromptu stage slightly, looking at the floor for a minute as she searched for some inspiration. "Stress related illnesses are common place, along with things like depression and alcoholism." "If you have any doubts about taking up this post, any questions in your mind about whether this is the path you want to take, then I suggest you get up and leave this room right now." Leah watched them for a moment – there were several hesitant expressions in the audience now. "There's no shame in admitting to yourself that this isn't the thing for you. It takes a special person – a strong person – to cope with this type of work." "Why?" The auburn haired woman in the front row asked. "We all know the risks that come with this job, we wouldn't be here if we didn't." Leah nodded. "What's your name?" "Clare." "Okay Clare," Leah said. "What are you? Twenty-one? Twenty-two?" "Twenty-two." Clare answered. "And are you in a relationship with someone at the minute?" "What's that got to do with anything?" Clare asked. Leah smiled at her. "Just answer the question." "Well, sort of..." "Sort of," Leah repeated. The young woman had already irritated her and she decided she wasn't going to hold back. "Well, that's good enough for now. I want you to think about the fact that every night when you go home to your special someone you will have to lie to them about your day; that when you get a phone call at two in the morning you'll have to explain to them why you need to grab a pre-packed suitcase full of clothes and disappear to an unspecified foreign country where you won't be able to contact them for an unknown length of time." Leah could feel the bile starting to churn in her stomach. Did I really hate this job this much towards the end? "And think about how your parents are going to react when they are told that their child has died, probably in some random traffic accident or pointless mugging, all alone in a foreign country – because they're never going to know what happened to you. Shit, they probably aren't going to have a body to bury if it happens when you're overseas." Leah looked at Clare – she could see that her words were having an impact on some; Will and Gavin both seemed to be having second thoughts. "Are you trying to scare us?" Clare challenged her – she's the cocky one in the group, Leah reasoned, the alpha female whose wounded pride is driving her on to fight back. "No, I'm not trying to scare you." Leah replied softly. "I'm trying to help you make an informed decision." She looked straight at Clare again. "However I suspect you're too stubborn to see what I'm trying to tell you until it's too late." Leah addressed the rest of the group. "This job can be worth it if you're strong enough." She looked down at the floor. "I guess that's all I have to say." Leah looked over at Rob. "Thank you." "No, thank you Leah," he said, shaking her hand. "Say hi to Andrew and the kids for me." "So, that's it?" Clare blurted out. "Clare, shut up." Emma hissed. "No," Clare knocked her away. "You come in here and deliver the "you're not cut out for this line of work" speech and then just walk out?" "Miss Fletcher, that's enough..." Rob interjected. "Rob, it's okay." Leah said, addressing Clare. "Yeah, that's it. I come in here, tell you the truth and you have to make up your own mind. You can either take what I've told you and use it, or you can ignore it, walk into this with your eyes closed and wind up in a body bag six months down the line. Your choice." "Bullshit!" Clare spat. "Bullshit? Bullshit?" Leah laughed. "I'll tell you what's bullshit – your attitude. I've worked with people like you before and every time something gets fucked up along the way or someone dies, because people like you think that the rules don't apply to them." She shook her head. "Look, I'm sorry if I upset you with some of my comments – maybe they were insensitive, but if you don't have a thick skin, I suggest that you leave." "Like you're doing?" Clare goaded her. Leah's smile was rueful. "Okay," she said. "Get up." "What?" "Get up – out of your seat." Leah repeated herself. "Come on, you know you want to – I'll give you a free shot at me if it makes you feel any better." Everyone else in the auditorium looked at each other, then at the two women. Leah's challenge was a direct threat to Clare's perceived dominance of the group. Leah watched her as she carefully rose to her feet and approached Leah on the stage. Rob took a step back, shaking his head. Clare suddenly appeared to be nervous as Leah beckoned for her to come closer. "Come on, you're about a decade younger than me and I've had two kids, you should be able to take me, right? Go on, give it your best shot." Everyone seemed to be holding his or her collective breath as Clare darted forward and drove her fist towards Leah's face in a palm-strike. Quicker than Clare could react though, Leah twisted to her right and dodged the blow, catching the younger woman's arm. Before Clare could counter the manoeuvre, Leah swept her legs out from under her and she crashed to the stage. Leah then dropped down, placing her knee against Clare's throat while retaining her grip on her arm. "Gavin; what was the first thing I told you about working in the field." Leah called out as she looked into Clare's eyes. The woman was struggling beneath Leah's hold, her mouth opening and closing like a fish as she realised she was struggling to breathe. "Never allow your emotional state of mind to cloud your judgement." "Very Vulcan, but close enough," Leah commented to the group, and then she addressed Clare. "Now, your first mistake was to allow me to get under your skin. By winding you up you lose focus, allowing me to get the upper hand. Your second mistake was to hesitate. You should have tried to slug me when I was too busy taunting you. Finally, you seriously over-estimated your abilities with your strike pattern – you practically telegraphed the move to me with your stance." Clare's lips were starting to turn blue and her eyes were beginning to roll into the back of her head. She lifted her knee up and released the hold. Clare immediately gulped down several deep breaths of oxygen. As she rolled over she saw Leah's hand reaching down to her. As she helped her back to her feet, Leah patted the younger woman on the back. "Still, no permanent damage done," Leah said as she walked out of the auditorium. **** London 2005 "We've received a report that Yassef Tariq has been working out of the Turkish Embassy in Madrid as some sort of low level courier," Tom addressed the team sitting in his office. Alison and Leah looked at each other, exchanging a puzzled expression as their fellow operatives – Surinder Rajak and Howard Metzelars – were looking through the pages of notes that they had been handed upon arrival. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 05 "I'm sorry," Leah said as the door to the office opened behind them. "But what the hell would one of Al-Khayal's top strategists be doing working as a courier at the Turkish Embassy?" "That's what we want to find out," Elliot Spencer's thick New York accent heralded his arrival. "For those of you that don't know him, this is Elliot Spencer of the CIA," Tom introduced him to the group. Leah inwardly groaned. "He's going to be accompanying us on this little jaunt. Leah, I want you running Field Ops for this one; Alison, you're taking the point on the ground. Our flight leaves in three hours, so familiarise yourselves with the available data and be ready to move out within the hour." The group broke up and left the office. "I need to let Andrew know that I'm going to be incommunicado for the next couple of days," Leah said as Alison accompanied her to her desk. "Then we can go downstairs to sort out our gear." "Okay – I'll see you by the lift in about ten minutes then." Alison replied, diverting her path towards the other side of the office. Leah picked up the phone and dialled Andrew's mobile number. Reaching the answer machine, Leah cursed under her breath before leaving him a short message. "Hey there," Leah almost dropped the phone. Elliot was standing behind her. "How are you? I, erm, kind of got the impression you weren't too pleased to see me." "Whatever would give you that impression?" Leah's reply was loaded with sarcasm. "Oh yes, that could be because the last time we met you tried to get me drunk in order to sleep with you." Elliot suddenly looked sheepish. "And don't try to excuse your behaviour as some sort of release from the stresses of your work – we both know that's just bullshit. If I had my way you wouldn't be anywhere near this operation." "Look, I'm sorry," Elliot said as Leah stuffed her laptop into a bag. "If I'd have known you were serious about your husband..." Leah held up her left hand, indicating towards the ring on her finger. "Regardless – this means I'm off limits," She snapped. "Especially to someone like you." "What? What's that meant to mean?" "You know full well what I mean Elliot," Leah replied as she started to walk towards the lift. "Try thinking with your brain once in awhile rather than your dick." **** Once they had landed, Alison had taken Elliot, Suri and Howard directly to their safe house that was doubling up as their operational base in Madrid while Leah and Tom headed directly to the Turkish Embassy. Upon arrival a slight woman with delicate features and blue grey eyes greeted them. She introduced herself as Ziynet Sali, the personal assistant to Director Teoman Ersin. Taking them beyond the initial security counter measures, several sets of secure doors and one flight of stairs onto the first floor of the embassy, she bought Leah and Tom to the office of a rather heavy set man with an almost middle-eastern complexion. He stood upon their entrance, a thin smile on his face. Leah noticed that Ziynet turned and left the office after introducing them, disappearing back into a smaller room just off the main corridor. "Mr Benedict; Mrs Hargreaves, right?" He addressed them once they entered his office. "I am Teoman Ersin, Turkish National Intelligence." "Pleased to meet you," Tom said. "I'm glad you got here as quickly as you did," Ersin said as he gestured for them to have a seat. "Can I get you anything? Something to eat perhaps? A drink?" "No, no we're okay thank you." Tom replied. "I see you've met my associate, Miss Sali; if there's anything you need here today, just ask her." He said as he settled in his chair. "However, I think you want to get down to the business. I suspect our mutual friend maybe planning to flee the country." "As soon as you give us the details we're ready to move." Leah added as Ziynet rejoined them, handing them two identical files. "This is everything we have on Tariq; his movements, his associates, his contacts." Ziynet said as Ersin leaned back in his chair. Leah and Tom looked through the documentation. "I compiled the data myself." Pride was evident in her voice as they looked through the detailed files. "Now, most of his recent activities have been directed towards stemming the infiltration of Al-Khayal by foreign intelligence agencies while looking to recruit new agents loyal to the cause overseas." He added before dismissing his junior officer. "Thank you Ziynet, that will be all for now." She left without another word. "From this data it looks like he's been travelling across most of Europe over the last eight months; Barcelona, Lisbon, Stuttgart, Manchester, Milan..." Leah murmured. "Precisely – I'd wager that he's either recruiting or looking to enable cells in those locations with the information to deal with leaks." Ersin commented. "And the safest way to deliver that information is to supply it in person." Tom added before standing up. "Thanks for your help Mr Ersin," he shook hands with the Turkish officer. "Any time Mr Benedict," Ersin replied. "If you need any further assistance –resources, materiel – just ask, my team are at your disposal." Leah nodded and considered the offer. "I think we'll be fine on the manpower side of things, but if you have any accurate maps of the local area then that would be useful." "I'm sure that Ziynet has that information at her fingertips." Ersin replied. Leah nodded and got up from her chair. "Thank you," she said as she left the room and went into the room she had watched Ziynet entered moments ago. Ersin looked over at Tom. "I know our organisations haven't always seen eye to eye, however maybe we could arrange some sort of formal programme to exchange information following the successful conclusion of this operation?" Ersin asked. "It appears that my homeland is the gateway for many of the Al-Khayal cells that enter Europe these days – with your help we could establish a mechanism to stem the flow of these dogs." Tom considered the request for a minute. "I think that could be arranged," Tom replied. "We have a copy of our intelligence database with us which I'd be more than happy to share with you once we've successfully concluded matters here. Now, if you'll excuse me..." **** 76 Burrow Street 2009 The Cellar "You know, it looks like she could be asleep," Dan said as he stood in the mortuary, looking down at the body on the metal runners. He reached out and touched the cold, hard flesh of the face of his wife. The frozen air from within the refrigerator was clashing with the warmer air of the mortuary, creating small ice-cold clouds. Looking at her for one last time, he pushed the draw shut. "Dan...I...I don't know what to..." Gemma said, her voice breaking up. She held Jenny close to her, shielding her eyes from viewing the body in the refrigerator. "Its okay – I already knew on some level that she was dead, I guess...I... I just needed to see it for myself." He replied. "I...at least she didn't suffer..." "For what it's worth, I'm sorry," Gemma replied. There was a beeping noise from her watch. Looking down at it, she sighed. "Come on, it's time for another Thorazin shot." "We'd better check that the door is boarded up – I don't fancy any of those reanimated corpses breaking in here while I'm out of it." He said as he rolled up the sleeve of his shirt. "Why did they put the people in the freezer?" Jenny asked. Dan sat down on the floor as Gemma prepared the shot of radiation sickness drugs. "Won't they just get up like...them?" "These people didn't die from a bite," Dan said as Gemma plunged the needle into his arm. His eyes went wide as she pushed the fluid into his bloodstream. "They...they were given an overdose of morphine..." "Why?" Jenny asked. Dan shook his head. "Probably...to spare them...the...horror..." His eyelids became droopy and his head sank forward. "We're just...delaying the inevitable...we...are...the walking dead..." "What's wrong with him?" Jenny looked at Gemma, fear etched across her face. "Its okay – it's just the Thorazin – it knocks him about for awhile and he starts talking shit like that, then he'll be back on his feet and back to normal." Gemma pulled the syringe out of his arm and wiped the puncture mark with a small antiseptic wipe. "From what I can gather, his wife suffered from a particularly nasty bi-polar disease. I would guess that the medical staff here made the decision to euthanize the patients they couldn't save, rather than let them face all this on their own." "Oh god..." Jenny mumbled, and then began to cry. Gemma put her arm around her and pulled the eleven year old close to her. "It's going to be okay," Gemma did her best to reassure her. "Come on, we've managed to get this far, the coast isn't far away. Once we get there and find a boat, we can head back up north..." Andrew leaned back in his chair and looked at the screen in front of him. His finger hovered over the delete key for a few minutes before the sound of the telephone ringing disturbed his thoughts. Getting up and making his way out of the converted cellar, Andrew sloped into the kitchen and answered the phone. "Yello...oh, hi Mom...yes, yes we're fine...okay, shoot...what? For a whole week? Are you sure? Well I'll check with Leah but I can't see it being a problem..." There was a rapping sound from the hallway. Andrew looked and could see a shadowy shape at the front door. "Look Mom, there's someone at the door so I'll speak to you later...okay, bye." He returned the receiver to its cradle and padded to the front door. A quick twist of the door handle and Andrew found himself face to face with Tom Benedict. "Oh great," Andrew muttered. "What do you want?" **** Madrid 2005 Even the streetlights failed to pierce the black shroud of night as three figures made their way towards one of the three storey buildings located in the less affluent Santa Eugenica area of the Vallecas district of Madrid. Hand signals from the lead figure sent the other two in opposite directions. "Status update," Leah's voice buzzed in Alison's ear. She pressed the microphone against her throat. "Suri is on power detail; Howard is covering the back door and fire exit." She replied, crouching down in the small porch that extended out from the front door. From her position in a small, unremarkable transit van some sixty metres away, Leah watched on several small monitors as Alison began to manipulate the lock on the door. "Remember, target is to be subdued, not neutralised," Leah said. Alison snorted. "Like there's a difference in the long run." Thirty seconds later, a second figure joined her. "Power supply has been isolated." Suri whispered. Alison nodded as she grasped the door handle. Twisting it carefully, she pushed the door open. "Howard, are you in position?" "Rear entrance and fire escape are secure." The response filtered back. "Remain in position in case target tries to escape." Alison muttered as she advanced into the property with Suri. It took a moment for the night vision goggles they were both wearing to spring into life. "Okay – there should be one main staircase just to your right," Leah fed the information to them from the schematics of the building she had laid out inside the van. "That will take you up to the first floor, which should be a kitchen and a living room from what I can tell." "Copy that," Alison said. The silence between them was unnerving, especially as Leah knew that they were relying on her guidance through the building. "First floor looks clear." "Kitchen checks out," Suri added, rejoining Alison in the living room. Treading carefully, they ascended the stairs. "Second floor?" Alison asked as they reached the landing. "Two rooms again," Leah explained. "Possibly a bathroom maybe and a bedroom." Alison carefully unclipped the safety catch from her holster and pulled her department issue pistol out as she motioned towards the door to their right. Suri moved forward and stood to the side of the entrance. Alison nodded and Suri pushed it open. Voompa...voompa...voompa Inside the van, Leah reached over to the microphone and opened her mouth to speak. The words were cut off in her throat as she felt the vibrations through the framework of the stationery vehicle. Voompa...voompa...voompa The sound became louder as Leah strained to see out of the window at what could be causing the vibrations. She looked up as a piercing white light struck the building. "Who the hell...?" Inside the building the room Alison and Suri were in was suddenly illuminated like the sun had rose. Both of them heard something moving upstairs from them, and within seconds they were bolting for the stairs. Clearing the steps two at a time, they reached the second floor in time for Alison to see a figure dart out onto an external landing that she reasoned was the only way out. "Howard – watch the fire escape!" She barked into the microphone at her throat as Suri overtook her, reaching the door and finding herself looking out onto the fire escape. She looked down, the night vision goggles allowing her to see clearly. Realising she couldn't see anyone, Suri shifted her view upwards – and caught sight of a foot disappearing over the parapet. "The roof!" She said before breaking to the metal stairs as Alison joined her. The sound of the rotor blades was deafening as the helicopter swept over them. As the two women reached the apex of the building they saw the slim, wiry figure they were pursuing running at full speed towards the edge of the roof, illuminated in the spotlight of the unmarked helicopter hovering over the building. "Crap – if he..." Alison began to say as Suri took off. The younger woman's speed impressed her, along with her single-minded decisiveness. As their target was making his desperate bid for freedom, Suri was beginning to catch up with him, and in another twenty yards Alison had no doubt that she would have been in a position to tackle him. Unfortunately, her quarry had already decided to attempt to jump the fourteen feet gap between the roof of the building he was on and the one immediately adjacent to it, which was the two-storey post office. Suri reached the edge of the building just in time to see him floating through the air – and then striking the sidewall of the post office with force. Alison arrived a moment later – just in time to watch his body slip down the whitewashed surface, striking the metal staircase of the Post Office's fire escape. She winced as he landed with a sickening thud in the narrow alley between the two buildings. They both saw Howard run to the prone figure. "Oh great..." Alison muttered. "Leah, you'd better call for an ambulance." She took another look over the edge of the building. "Maybe a hearse would be better..." "Who is that?" Suri asked, gesturing towards the helicopter that was circling them. "I didn't think we had any sort of air support on this gig?" "We didn't," Alison said as she trudged towards the fire escape, watching the helicopter swing around and head away from the building. "But I can make a reasonably accurate guess as to who is in there though and I'll bet you he's wearing underwear with the stars and stripes plastered all over them." **** The Edwards Clinic 2009 "So, how are you feeling?" Leah asked. "I feel like the floor of a taxi cab," Alison replied from her bed. "On the positive side of things, it only hurts now when I breathe." Leah couldn't help herself – the smile appeared on her face for a minute when she realised Alison's caustic sense of humour was still intact. "Well, if it's any consolation," Leah said. "You look like crap." "Thanks," Alison managed a weak smile. Neither woman spoke for a minute as Alison held Leah's gaze, then she looked away at the window. "By the way, you don't have to worry about putting your foot in it; they've told me everything." "Everything?" "The blast; the people who died; the baby." Alison replied. "And about this little clinic you've put me up in." "Oh no, you can't blame me for that," Leah muttered. "This is all Andy's fault." She gestured to the room. "Really? I didn't know he fancied me that much," Alison countered, coughing as she tried to hold back a deep-rooted laugh. "Well, if it had been up to me I'd have left you in that hospital in Newcastle – there was a Doctor there who was exactly your type." "What? Rich, dumb and handsome?" Alison laughed at her own joke, then immediately regretted it. "Seriously, thank him for me when you get back home." "I will," Leah found that she was struggling to hold back her emotions. "So..." "I understand you've quit." Alison interrupted her. "What?" "You aren't my first visitor today. Tom told me this morning." Alison shifted slightly in the bed, angling herself towards Leah. "Do you want to talk about it?" "No," Leah said. "Suffice to say that I've decided to re-prioritise my life and this job no longer fits into it." "You know, I thought you were going to pack it in a couple of years ago after that situation in Madrid went south," Alison wheezed. "Well, the less said about that the better," Leah shuddered. "So, have you had any thoughts yet about...you know..." "The baby?" Alison looked down at her abdomen. "No, nothing yet – they want to run some tests on it to see if it was harmed during the blast, although I'd have thought I'd have miscarried by now if that was the case..." "Whose is it?" Leah blurted the question out. Alison looked at her, then away at the window. "Michaels'." Alison paused. "We'd sort of been seeing each other over the last few months – nothing serious, you understand, just a casual sort of thing. However, this wasn't planned, but seeing as it's happened I figure it's the least I can do for the guy seeing as he died in the explosion." "I heard his parents didn't take the news well," Leah added. "Kind of makes me glad I haven't got that problem to worry about these days," Alison muttered. "Well, it's not like I talk to my mother beyond Christmas and birthdays, so we're both in the same boat there..." Leah's voice trailed off as she had this far away look in her eyes. "Don't tell me you're starting to have second thoughts about quitting?" Alison sounded stern. "Think about Andy, Cassie and Scott – remember why you did it. I'm not big on the idea of family, but you've done the right thing." "No, no I'm not," Leah reassured her. "It's just a big...adjustment to get used to." She glanced down at her watch. "Look, I need to go – my free parking time is almost up." Leah picked up her bag and jacket and headed towards the door. "I'll come by and see you tomorrow – I'll drag Andy and the kids with me if you like." "Great – just what I need," Alison quipped, the cough-laughter rattling her lungs. "A visit from the fucking Brady Bunch!" **** 76 Burrow Street "Look, if you think I have any influence over what my wife decides to do as far as her career is concerned then you are sorely mistaken," Andrew said as he listened to what Tom had to say. "And you know how she is once she sets her mind to something," "All I'm asking is that you talk to her, run the idea past her about coming back to the service," Tom said. "After everything that's happened I need her in my unit. I'm prepared to do whatever it takes to get her back onside." "Are you forgetting something?" Andrew said. "It's precisely because of the way you treated her with that whole Newcastle thing that she decided she'd had enough." Tom looked at the floor. "Look, I'll tell her you stopped by and what you've said, but I can't promise you anything – it's her decision, not mine. Although, I have to say that I support it – it's been great to have her around the house and the kids love it..." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 05 "There are bigger things at stake here than your family." Tom interrupted. Andrew laughed. "Oooh, I'm so going to pretend you didn't say that," he said. "Then again, coming from you, I kind of expected it." "What's that mean?" "Come on, you know what I mean – you view the idea of a family as something that's trotted out for photo opportunities and public relations exercises," Andrew countered. "You've got three kids in boarding school and a wife that you never see – it might work for you but it sure as shit doesn't work for us." Andrew glanced up at the clock. "Look, I don't want to seem rude, but I'm busy..." "I understand that some of your more recent works have incorporated elements of Leah's field work in them," Tom's voice seemed to have dropped an octave. "There are potential security issues associated with that..." "What? You're threatening me?" Andrew laughed. "I'm not threatening you; I'm simply pointing out..." "You know what, I've been nice to you up to now out of respect for the fact that you used to be Leah's boss," Andrew replied, taking a step towards Tom. He took a deep breath, trying to control his anger. "My little sister was always the smartest of the three of us," Andrew said. "Really sickeningly self-righteous, massive sense of personal accountability, only buys eco-friendly products. She's sort of a "save the whales, save the rainforests, save the planet" type of a gal." "She's also the head of one of those legal think-tanks, you know, the ones that like to expose hypocrisy in public bodies. Rumour has it that she was the person that tipped off the Telegraph about the expenses scandal recently. Now, I think she'd be very interested if I mentioned your name in connection with an incident at the Turkish embassy in Madrid a couple of years ago with a certain individual by the name of Yassef Tariq." Tom's face went pale, the blood draining out of it at a rate of knots. "And I figure that all that unwarranted attention to your...actions...would probably bring down the curtain on your blossoming career." "So, if you're even considering the idea of trying to threaten or blackmail Leah into going back to work for you I suggest you bear that in mind. If she was here now she'd just smack you in the mouth and leave you with a bloody nose – me, I'm more inclined to see you publicly hung, drawn and quartered." Andrew said before gesturing towards the front door. "Now, get the fuck out of my house, Fatman. Some of us actually work for a living." **** Madrid 2005 Even in the cold, cool air of the Spanish capital in the morning, Tom Benedict found himself sweating. He knew that the evening's operation had gone drastically wrong; recovering whatever good had come of the operation was paramount in his mind, both from a practical and a political sense. Entering the safe house they had used, he immediately encountered Howard. Grabbing his arm, Tom pulled him to one side. "Take the laptop over to Ersin's office in the Embassy – I've promised him a copy of the intelligence database we bought with us for MIT's purposes." He instructed him. Howard nodded and disappeared from the room. "Okay people, please tell me that something can be salvaged from this mess." Tom said as Leah, Alison and Elliot stood in the living room of the safe house. Even in the artificial light Tom could see that Elliot had the beginnings of a black eye as well as a split lip. "Well Tariq actually survived the fall," Leah said. "Which is a miracle when you consider it. I've detailed Suri to make sure nothing happens to him while he's in hospital." "What exactly is the prognosis?" Tom asked. Leah shrugged her shoulders. "Both his legs are broken, several ribs, possibly a fractured spine, swelling in his cranium – that's before you consider any internal injuries." She paused for a moment, looking at Elliot with barely concealed fury in her eyes. "They had to induce a coma to stabilise him. You're looking at weeks, possibly months before we can talk to him." "Well, we can handle that side of it once he's been transferred over to our jurisdiction." Elliot said. Alison's jaw almost hit the floor. "What?" Leah spat. "What do you mean, once he's been transferred?" "I thought you knew..." Elliot began, only for Tom to hold his hands up. "Look, we've agreed that once we'd apprehended him, Tariq would be handed over to our colleagues in the CIA for questioning." He said. Leah shook her head in disbelief. "We've Agreed? We never agreed anything! This was our job, our target." Leah exploded. "We had everything under control until Flyboy here came along and fucked it up six ways from Sunday!" She looked down at the floor. "We bust our arses to pull this off at short notice and then you go and sell us out by handing over the whole reason we came here in the first place?" She threw her hands up in the air and stormed out of the building. "Leah, where are you going?" Tom asked. "Away from you, otherwise I'm liable to do something I'll regret." She said before slamming the door behind her. **** Sitting in an uncomfortable plastic chair, Suri had to admit to herself that she was rapidly moving past being bored. Looking at the glass wall of the small room in front of her, she could see the prone figure lying in the bed. He was hooked up to a variety of machines, including a ventilator to control his breathing. The door to the room opened and a man dressed in a short-sleeved light blue shirt approached her. "Two minutes." He said in broken English, holding up two fingers for her at the same time. Suri nodded and entered the room. She looked at the broken body laying the bed and actually felt sorry for him for a moment. Trying her best to quash whatever sympathy she might have felt for the figure in the bed, she pulled out a small black box from her jacket pocket. Lifting up his hand, she carefully placed each finger in turn on a small sensor pad. An LCD display lit up, showing the impression of his fingerprint. Of course, it would be easy to just unplug the ventilator and let him slip away, Suri mused as she repeated this procedure with his other fingers before retreating from the room. Once she had secured the door again she activated another function of the device in her hand. The wireless signal engaged and began to transmit the data back to London. She sat down in the plastic chair again and waited, softly drumming her fingers against the arm of the chair. **** Sweeping through the Embassy reception, Howard Metzelars clutched the laptop under his left arm and was immediately met by Ziynet Sali. She was wearing a grey trouser suit and her hair was down. He had to admit to himself that she was an extremely attractive young woman, one who he would like to get to know better under different circumstances. "Good morning Mr Metzelars," Ziynet said as she greeted him. "I take it that's the laptop." "Yes, my boss and your boss have agreed to a little impromptu data exchange." Howard replied. "Excellent," Ziynet said. "Shall we go somewhere more private to discuss matters?" Howard nodded. "Follow me." **** Suri was waving the PDA around in the air as she was trying to get a decent signal on it. Being in the middle of a six floor concrete slab wasn't helping things. Eventually the PDA beeped and the screen exploded in a blue-white light as it came to life. As the data file downloaded to her hand-held device, Suri began to read it. Thirty seconds later she was scrambling to find a cell phone signal. **** "...Now, the last set of files are password encrypted," Howard said as he gave Ziynet a practical tour of the laptop. She listened to his every word absorbing the information he was relaying to her. "However, I'll just remove the encryption from them for you..." his fingers danced across the keyboard. "And I think that's about it." He saved the settings on the machine and then handed it to Ziynet. "So, do you have something for me?" "I do," Ziynet replied. She opened the draw on the other side of the desk and reached into it. Howard barely had time to register what was happening as she pulled the pistol with it's elongated barrel out of the draw and took aim. Pfhtt! Pfhtt! The two bullets struck him in the chest, knocking him out of his chair. Ziynet walked around the table and calmly adjusted her aim, firing once more into his head. The room was generally used for private meetings with the security staff and was effectively soundproofed for all intents and purposes, however there was something about the silencer attached to the end of it that appealed to her – and it never hurt to take precautions. She placed the laptop and the firearm into a small bag and left the room, securing the door behind her. Ziynet glanced down at her watch as she headed towards the main lobby of the Embassy. "Miss Sali," The voice made Ziynet stop in her tracks. She turned to see Ersin's head poking out of his office further down the corridor. "Is that the laptop from Mr Benedict?" "Yes sir, it is." She said. "Would you like to take a look at it?" "Yes, yes I would!" He looked like a schoolboy on Christmas Day as Ziynet walked back down the corridor towards him. He held the door open for her as she entered. Carefully placing the bag down on the desk, she unzipped it away from Ersin's line of sight. "I have to admit, I'm looking forward to examining the data on that device." "So am I," Ziynet said as she whipped her pistol out once more. Pfhtt! The shot struck Ersin in the head; the wall behind him was sprayed with a red-grey plume of matter. He toppled forward on his feet, striking the desk on his way down. Ziynet knew she didn't have time for anything creative so she tried to drag his overweight corpse behind the desk. Realising that his feet were sticking out in plain sight of anyone walking past his office she repositioned the waste paper bin to obscure them. It wasn't perfect, but it would do for now – by the time he was discovered Ziynet would be far away from here. Securing the pistol in the bag with the laptop once more, she resumed her course towards the lobby of the Embassy. She allowed herself a faint smile as she thought about several people who were willing to pay serious money for the device in her hands. **** Alison lit up her cigarette as she joined Leah outside the safe house. She offered the packet across to her friend. Leah looked up at her. "Are you trying to make me laugh?" "Never hurts to offer," Alison replied. "You never know, you might decide to start one day." "Doubtful," Leah replied. "Sorry about in there." "You don't need to apologise for anything missy," Alison replied. "I'm surprised you didn't hit him like you hit Elliot." "Well, that would certainly have made my mind up for me regarding whether I can deal with all the political bullshit this job seems to have garnered over the last few years," Leah said. "God, I miss the simplicity of field work you know – you see something and you just react to it." "It does have its advantages..." Alison muttered as Leah's phone rang. "It's Suri," she said, looking at the name displayed on the screen. "Please tell me you have some good news?" Resignation was clearly audible in Leah's voice. "What? Oh shit!" She slammed the phone shut and bolted back into the safe house. **** The ambulance was leaving as Suri reached the Turkish Embassy. Police cars and news crews were hovering around at the same time, making her feel distinctly uneasy. Waving her identification to the guard at the gate, she made a beeline towards Leah and Alison as they huddled near the entrance. Elliot was on his phone. "I got here as quickly as I could." She said. "What's happened?" "Howard is dead." Alison said. "As is the Turkish spook." Suri's jaw dropped and she felt her whole body becoming numb. Her mouth opened and closed several times, her mind struggling to find the words to express her feelings. "No one can locate Ziynet – she's disappeared, along with the laptop that we bought with us." Leah added. "They've locked down the airports and all the trains out of Madrid, but she's got at least an hour's head start on us." "...Do I sound like I'm joking?" Suri heard Elliot's raised voice as he wandered back across to them. "Fine, well you do that and you have the regional commander contact me as soon as he's available and then we'll see how you enjoy filtering radar data in Alaska for the rest of your career!" He ended the call and slammed his fist into the wall. "Cocksuckers!" "No joy?" Leah asked. Elliot shook his head. "Fuck all," He said. "I was told I'd have access to additional resources from the US based in the Embassy here and then I find they've been redirected to Morocco!" "What's in Morocco?" Suri asked the question the other two women were thinking of. "Aww, sorry, it's classified." "Whatever," Suri waved him away. "It's confirmed – the guy in the hospital is Mehmet Ozluk, a Turkish born German Interpol agent. He'd been working undercover tracking some sort of currency fraud across the Mediterranean." She handed the phone to Leah. "That was his primary suspect." Leah looked at the image on the screen and sighed before handing it Alison. "Who's this?" "Well, when we were introduced to her, she was using the name Ziynet Sali." She shook her head. "This whole thing has been a set up from the start. Ziynet mentioned that she'd compiled the data on Tariq – she was using us to get to Ozluk. I'll bet that Tariq was probably never here in the first place." "So, she's some sort of Al-Khayal agent working under cover?" Elliot asked. Alison shrugged her shoulders. "No idea – if she is then this is a major sea change in their MO," She said. "It's almost Eastern European in approach." "So what happens now?" Elliot asked. "We're just going to pack up and go home?" "No," Leah said as she saw Tom exiting the Embassy. "We need to engage in some damage control." She looked over at Alison and Suri. "I'll call Emma back at the office to see if we can pull every operative whose name was on that laptop." Her phone was in her hand and she was dialling a number before she'd finished her response. "They're at risk of being exposed, and then we'll start looking for Ziynet. I would imagine that she's not entirely aware of what she's got her hands on yet – it might take her a while before she can figure out what to do with it." "What then?" Suri asked. Leah shook her head. "Personally, I'd opt for just killing the bitch once we find her," Alison's voice was loaded with anger as she lit up a cigarette. "But that's just me." "Okay people, we're on the first flight back to London." Tom said as he joined them. "I still have a few things to sort out here, so I'll meet you at the airport in a few hours." The agents broke away from him, Alison putting her arm around Suri's shoulders, leaving Leah hanging back slightly. He looked at her as she made the call back to their office in London. "What are you doing?" "Cleaning up your mess Tom." She snarled as she walked away in the same direction as her colleagues. **** Highfield Park 2009 5:30 pm "I had a visit today from your old boss," Andrew said as he sat down on the bench next to Leah. Cassie and Scott were both engaging in reaching the summit of the large climbing frame that dominated the children's play area of the park less then ten minutes walk from their home. "He wants you to go back to the department." "Well, I hope you told him to forget about it." Leah replied. She looked over at Andrew and clearly saw the worry etched on his face. "What else did he say?" "He was getting his knickers in a twist about couple of the books I've written, wittering on about national security implications..." Andrew laughed involuntarily. "I threatened to disclose what I knew about the Madrid situation to Ruth." Leah couldn't help but laugh as well. "I can imagine the effect that had on him." She replied. "Then again, if I'd..." the sound of a low flying airplane overhead drowned out her words. "Yeah, I guess that can colour your thinking," Andrew added. "Mom rang this morning – she wants to take the kids to Burnham on Sea for the half term week." "I do hope you said yes." "Of course I did. Can you imagine what we can do with a whole week without the kids?" Andrew answered as Scott ran across to them. He stood expectantly before his parents. "What's up?" "I'm bored." Scott replied. "Really?" Leah asked. "How do you feel about spending a week with Nan and Spiky Harry on holiday at half term?" Scott considered the question for a minute. "Can I take my Nintendo DS?" "Yes." Andrew replied. "Does Cassie have to come?" "Yes." Leah's response produced a frown on Scott's face. "But Nan will probably let you eat whatever you want while you're away." The frown suddenly turned into a smile. "Okay." "Good – now go and grab your sister and we'll get you home so we can have some dinner." Andrew watched as his son scampered back to the climbing frame, then leaned over and kissed Leah on the cheek. "You can tell Mom that she'll have to buy them ice cream every night." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 06 How I Met Your Mother: A Long Weekend Dublin Wednesday evening Sitting in a hire car in a secluded side street, Keira realized that her latest target wasn't going to be as easy to take care of as the corporate executive she had killed in Monte Carlo less than a week ago. The office where Henry Rice worked as a one of Europe's most well versed trial lawyers were very large, so the chances of finding him alone there were very slim. She knew from the paperwork Jacob had provided her that Rice was a creature of habit; and it was his habit to stop for a drink at a particular bar on the way home from his office most evenings. Keira decided she would find the lawyer in his bar, and see if she could persuade him to leave with her. Once she had him alone, his fate would be sealed. The bar was the typical lawyers-after-work kind of place. It was the type of place where there were lots of power meetings, judicial gossip, and high priced advice. This is where they gathered to celebrate their victories, and lick their wounds. Keira stepped into the bar, and immediately drew the attention of most of the men, and some of the women too. She scanned the crowd for Rice. He was seated at the bar, facing her, with a drink in hand. Keira favoured him with her sexiest smile as they made eye contact. She spotted an empty booth, and casually made her way over to it. As she slid into the booth, she made sure to give him the best view of her legs, while continuing to smile at him as they exchanged eye contact. A waitress appeared and placed a drink on Keira's table. "Compliments of the gentleman at the bar," she said. Keira thanked her, and lifting her glass, smiled and nodded in the direction of Henry Rice. That was all the encouragement he needed. He had already started to make his way over to her table, before she even put her drink down. From the file she had been provided, Keira knew that he liked to think of himself as a real ladies man and that had provided her with her inspiration as to how to get him alone. "May I join you?" Henry asked as he finally reached the table she was sitting at. Keira smiled. "Please do." "I haven't seen you in here before." Henry said as he slid into the booth. "You haven't seen me in here before because this is the first time I've been here." Keira explained. "I was at a meeting close by and decided to get a drink before I headed home for the evening." She explained. "Well, I'm glad you decided to stop by while I was here," Rice added. "I have a very good feeling about you and I think we could be very good together." Keira cringed on the inside, thinking to herself that he couldn't be more wrong. As they spent some time talking about his work, his house, and his car, Keira realised that she could barely contain her total distain for Henry Rice and his general demeanour. In many ways his lack of humility, coupled with an inability to listen to anything other than the sound of his own voice, mirrored that of Simon Aston. His ego is so big, she thought, it's amazing that the booth could contain all three of them! Keira decided that she couldn't take much more of his obsequious behaviour, so she slid off one of her stiletto's and began to slide her foot up the inside of Rice's trouser leg. He couldn't restrain the knowing smile as he leaned into her. "Would you like to go someplace quieter? Somewhere we could get to know each other...better?" The line was so cliché that Keira almost choked on her drink. She managed to nod in agreement, gathering her jacket and following Rice out of the bar. "I'm afraid my car is being serviced at the moment," Keira said as she pulled a scarf out of her purse to shield her hair from the drops of rain that were beginning to fall. "I don't live too far from here if you don't mind driving." "Of course not," Rice said. "My car is just around the corner." He put his arm around her and guided Keira to his vehicle – a recent model BMW with personalised license details. Once inside, she directed him to drive towards the east side of the city, explaining that she lived in one of the new developments that had recently been completed. The reality was that Keira was taking him to a location she had scouted out the previous day with a very specific purpose in mind. As they shared small talk throughout the duration of the drive, Henry couldn't help but marvel at the ease with which he'd charmed this woman. With her auburn hair and trim figure he had to admit to himself that he'd struck the jackpot this time. Who knows, with luck she might be more than just a one-night stand. Fifteen minutes later, as they approached the newly built apartment blocks that dominated the skyline of the eastern part of the city. Keira directed him to park behind one of the buildings in a small service ally. "We'll go in through the back way," Her voice was barely more than a whisper. "That way we won't be disturbed." Keira reached into her bag as she got out of the car and pulled out a set of keys. As Henry got out of his side, Keira made something of a performance of dropping the keys and contrived to kick them under the car. "I can't believe it," she said, looking over the roof of the car at Henry. "I've dropped my keys and now they're under your car!" "It's not a problem," Henry replied enthusiastically. "I'll get them for you." He bounced around to her side of the vehicle side and crouched down to see if he could reach them. His fingers were about 2 inches away from them, so he got onto his knees in order to extend his reach. As he did so, Keira quickly removed her scarf from her head and stepped over Henry so she was straddling him. In the blink of an eye she slipped the scarf over Henry's head and pulled it tight against his throat. Immediately Henry tried to pull the scarf away, and when he discovered he couldn't, he tried to stand up. Keira was slightly faster though, placing her knee in the middle of his back and pushing him down against the ground, increasing the tension on the scarf around his throat. Keira could hear a rasping gasp escaping from Henry's mouth as he struggled to breathe. In his suddenly tight, constricted world, Henry could hardly believe what was happening. He knew if he didn't find a way out of this quickly, he was dead. He tried to roll to his side to release the increasing pressure on his windpipe, Keira counted jerking his head in the opposite direction. His vision was beginning to blur and the pain in his chest was building as he felt the tension on his neck increasing. The more he tried to roll away, the further she twisted his head in the opposite direction. Keira was impressed with the amount of fight this man had in him. It was all she could do to stop him from getting loose. She thought about breaking his neck there and then, but decided against it as she hauled back on the improvised garrotte once more, applying more pressure as she was now almost sitting on his back. The sharp tug on the scarf producing a satisfying wet, snapping sound that Keira recognised. It was just a matter of time now. The lack of oxygen was beginning to take its toll on Henry; everything was beginning to get very dark, very quickly. He struggled to remain conscious, but finally gave in to the blackness that was overtaking him. Keira felt Henry's body shudder slightly, and then sag beneath her. She knew he was either unconscious or dead. Releasing her hold on him, Keira reached forward and felt for a pulse. Feeling none, she stood up and stepped away from Henry's body, observing with some distaste that he had been unable to control his bladder during his final few moments of life. Removing the scarf from his neck, she straightened out her outfit and made a last sweeping check that she'd left nothing behind. Walking away from the secluded ally, she dialled the telephone number of a local taxi company on her cell phone. Once she had arranged for her pick up, Keira turned to survey the scene one more time. Her mind suddenly remembered a joke her father had told her a long time ago. What's the best kind of lawyer? A dead one! Keira smiled as she walked towards the far end of the street, thinking it was a fitting epitaph for the moment. **** 76 Burrow Street Wednesday, 10:14 pm "Don't forget that I'm taking the kids to Hayden Barlow's birthday party this Friday." The comment attempted to penetrate Andrew Hargreaves' subconscious as he stared at the blank screen on his laptop. "You're invited as well, but I told Hilary that you were busy so you probably wouldn't be able to make it." Andrew mumbled something in response. The sound of Leah brushing her teeth from the bathroom played around Andrew's ears as his fingers he closed his eyes and tried to provide his thoughts with the space needed for them to coalesce. As the sound of his wife cleaning her teeth continued, something began to spring forth. They scurried around the building, pausing only to pick up the scraps they found on the floor. Even in the darkness of their surroundings they moved with precision and ease, knowing the layout of the interior of the building by route. As the first few scavengers began to fan out, others burst forth from the crack in the floor, joining them from the sewers beneath in the desperate search for sustenance. "Are those beans...?" "This water looks okay..." "How long do we have...?" "I've got tinned food over here!" "What was that noise?" "Shine the light over here! Over here!" They looked inside mould-filled freezers; they scoured the broken shelves; they tore into the damp, rotten cardboard boxes, desperately looking for something, anything they could use. They searched until they were exhausted, almost collapsing on the spot from a combination of malnourishment and fatigue. A palpable sense of euphoria spread amongst them as they realised they had struck the mother load. SCRACK! The sound of the roof of the building being torn open drowned out the screams of the small party within. Metal I-beams were wrenched from their housings, sending sofa-sized chunks of steel into the open space. The scavengers watched in horror as the protective covering was peeled back by oversized mechanical fingers; powerful spotlights flooded the room, blinding everyone temporarily. "Humans!" The grating mechanical voice echoed around the confined space, prompting several of the scavengers to flee. The tortured rending of metal finally gave way as the last segments of the steel roof were torn asunder, sending lethal fragments falling to the floor. "I told you they would be here Sinistaur!" The spotlights faded away, being replaced by two sets of blood-red optics looking down at the scurrying figures. The figure on the left appeared more angular in construction to its counterpart. Although still basically anthropoid in appearance, two large wing-shaped panels attached to its back flanked each arm and its head was almost triangular in appearance. The figure to the right was squatter and bulky in design, with tank tracks evident attached to the back of the mechanical beast. "Neokhan, your ability to think like one of them is both repulsive and impressive," Sinistaur replied. "So, what should we do with them?" "Just as Minister Craven decreed." Neokhan answered, lifting his arm to display a weapons array bristling with energy. "Eradicate them!" The Scavengers screamed as the cannon fired, vaporising several of them before they could react. As they scattered there was the sound of gears clunking and metal grinding against metal. Moments later, the south wall of the building collapsed as the hulking alternative mode of Sinistaur smashed through, dispensing concentrated blasts of photon energy at every figure it could target. Through the night air they could hear the screams gradually fading away between the constant zinging noises of the energy weapon discharges. After a few more minutes these fell silent too, leaving the two mechanoids standing there, almost motionless as they observed their work. They turned their attention to the horizon, doubtless scanning for any scavengers they had missed. "Will we ever be rid of these vermin?" Sinistaur asked. Neokhan shook his head. "One day we will be triumphant; Minister Craven has decreed it." He gestured to Sinistaur. "Come, there is another food depository in the next population centre." Once they were certain the two mechanoids had left, three figures slowly emerged from the tree line located a few hundred yards from the smouldering ruins of what had once been a Wal-Mart. Dressed in what looked like heavy duty wetsuits, they cautiously approached the building. "Jesus...I'm glad that's one party we decided to pass on." Tyrone said as Michelle poked her head above one of the broken windows. "Oh god..." she muttered, struggling to contain the sensation rising in her stomach that threatened to eject the military rations she had consumed earlier that evening. "I can't go in there." "That's okay." Evan said as he handed her a small black box. "You can be on lookout duty..." "Whatcha working on?" Leah asked as she wandered back into the bedroom, dressed in an oversized grey t-shirt with Mickey Mouse on the front. Andrew shrugged his shoulders. "Could be something, could be nothing." He sounded non-committal. "Just thought I should get something down on paper as I've had some free time lately." "You've hit the wall again haven't you?" Andrew nodded and grunted as she pulled the covers back. "The kids want a kitten." The words popped out of Leah's mouth as she climbed into bed. Andrew's fingers hovered over the keys of his laptop, momentarily halted by her statement. "Really?" "One of the mom's in Cassie's ballet class has a cat that's just given birth to a litter. She's looking to give them away to good homes – she's promised Cassie one if we say yes." Leah replied as she shuffled across the bed. "What about a puppy?" "I'm not really a dog person." Leah replied. "But I know you're allergic to cats so I haven't said anything yet..." "It's nothing that anti-histamines can't counter, right?" Andrew replied, shutting down the laptop and placing it on the small nightstand next to his side of the bed. He could feel Leah moulding herself against his body, wrapping her arms around him as she pressed up against him. Andrew positioned his arm under her head, allowing Leah to rest her head on his chest. "As long as it doesn't get into the cellar then everything will be fine." He felt the light peck of her lips against his skin as his wife kissed him. Andrew reached over and flicked the lamp off at the side of the bed. "Great, because Cassie has already decided on a name for it." "Really?" Andrew asked. Leah nodded. "Oliver." "Oliver?" Andrew could feel his eyelids getting heavy. "What if the cat is female?" "Have you ever tried to argue with the logic of a seven-year-old?" Leah muttered as she nuzzled her head against his chest before closing her eyes. **** Dublin Airport Wednesday, 11:35pm Pacing around the room like a caged tiger, Verity Ward was an extremely unhappy woman. Checking the door handle for what seemed like the umpteenth time she found it was still just as secure as it had been on her previous attempts to open it. Verity sat down in the uncomfortable plastic chair on one side of the table and closed her eyes for a moment, reflecting on how the events of the evening had taken a turn for the worst. As she had checked in for her short flight back to London she had been detained by two rather burly looking security personnel due to some "irregularities" regarding her passport. She knew instantly that this a lie and quietly applauded whoever had set it up for detaining her in plain sight of the other passengers, thus limiting her options to evade detention. Now all she could do was continue to wait until her "host" revealed themselves. As it transpired, after an hour of being left on her own, her wait was almost over. The door to the claustrophobic room opened and the two burly security guards entered, accompanied by a third figure. This stranger was a medium built man with greying hair and narrow framed glasses perched on his angular nose. His eyes looked almost black in the strained lighting of the room and his demeanour was anything but sunny. The door was secured by one of the security personnel as her passport was thrown back onto the table. "I must admit that your photograph doesn't do you justice." The Third Man said as he pulled out the chair across from Keira and sat down. "You're far more attractive in the flesh." Verity continued to study him in silence. "Of course, I'm sure Mr Rice discovered that this evening to his cost." "I don't know what you're talking..." "Let's just cut the bullshit shall we, Miss Ward?" The Third Man interrupted her. Verity's heart rate increased for a moment upon his use of her name – her real name that was. "I know that you are Verity Ward, rather than Donna Sampson as your passport alludes to, and you are also the contract killer known as Keira." They exchanged looks for a moment before Verity looked at the ground. "And I know this because I was the person who arranged the hit on Mr Rice this evening through your associate Jacob, along with a few other jobs throughout your career." Verity could feel her stomach flip as she realised that she was completely exposed. As the illusion of anonymity slipped from her fingers, Verity came to the stark realisation that she was now being backed into a corner from which she couldn't fight her way out. "What do you want?" Her question made The Third Man smile. "I have a few...loose ends that need to be taken care of," He explained. "Currently, I'm not in a position to deal with them personally and I could use someone with your skills to act on my behalf. I'm prepared to give you access to intelligence and ordnance in order to resolve the matter in exchange to turning a blind eye to your recent activities within the borders of the United Kingdom, but it has to be taken care of by Monday morning." "Why so soon?" Verity asked, looking up at the two guards by the door. "I find that a pressing deadline focuses the mind." The Third Man replied. "My associates here will ensure that you are on the next flight to London. I will contact you in the morning with the details of the task at hand." "What if I say no?" Verity asked as the Third Man got up from his chair. "Oh, I'm sorry, you must be mistaken; this isn't a negotiable request." He said. "If you enjoy the concept of your own personal freedom and the health and well being of your father, your brother and your nephew, you'll do exactly as I say, when I say." Verity seethed as the Third Man made to exit the room. "I'll be in touch Miss Ward. Enjoy your flight." **** As the Aer Lingus flight achieved enough velocity to break free of the shackles of gravity, he watched it from the departure lounge. Tracking the vehicle as it disappeared into the dark night sky, a blonde woman dressed in a black trouser suit approached him. "Mr Blevins," She said. "Your flight will be ready to board shortly." "Thank you Susan." He said as he drew his attention away from the window. "Did you send that information to the Interpol office in Brussels and the Justice Department in New York?" "Yes sir. I sent all the files relating to Verity Ward and her recent actions as you requested." Susan replied. He nodded. "Excellent." James Blevins took one final look into the inky black sky before he allowed a satisfied smile to drift over his face. **** Thursday 10:44 am Slowly moving through the city centre morning traffic, the black BMW appeared to be just one of the many thousands of cars that travelled along the roads of the metropolis of London each day. However, inside the vehicle, the occupants were engaged in radically different business to their fellow commuters. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 06 "I was hoping for a nicer car this time." Sarah McGowan said as she sat in the back seat. "Or at least for better company during the journey." She directed her comment at her two companions sitting in the front of the car. The engine of the motorcycle purred as it snaked through the lines of traffic. "I'm sorry the conversation isn't to your liking," Frost replied from the passenger seat. "I'm afraid I'm all out of scintillating topics to discuss." Guiding the bike between cars, shifting her weight on the two hundred and thirty five horsepower engine as it tore through the streets, her mind began to focus on what she needed to do. "Well, I've got one," Sarah said, leaning forward slightly. "How about we go over the whole "I tell you everything I know and you keep my arse out of jail and/or a coffin" deal again?" Neither Frost nor Drake – in the driver's seat – said anything. "Really, I think we should discuss it again, after all I've given you an awful lot so far and from my end I've gotten squat back to date." "Hey, we've kept you safe from any retaliation, at great expense to the tax payer I might add." Drake said as he drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. "We've given you a new identity and provided you with means of gainful employment. Considering what you've already told us you're coming across as really fucking ungrateful." Adjusting the throttle as she identified her target, her thoughts became singular and streamlined. Her right hand gripped the handle of the automatic pistol as she steered one-handed towards her target, the speed of the bike diminishing to just above stalling speed. Drawing alongside, she took aim with her finger poised upon the trigger. "Whatever," Sarah replied. "All I know is that I've got the distinct feeling that I'm on the wrong end of a raw deal here..." The mixture of staccato bursts of gunfire and the sound of shattering glass filled the car. Everyone reacted differently, with Drake pushing his foot down on the accelerator out of instinct. He twisted the wheel slightly, yet succeeded only in burying the BMW into the back of the Vauxhall Astra in front of them. Everyone was thrown forward by the impact; yet more bullets zinged inside the vehicle, buzzing through like angry hornets. As quickly as it had begun, it was over. Amidst the confusion the sound of an engine could be heard. As she opened her eyes, Frost could hear Drake moaning in pain. He was gripping his shoulder and she could see the blood seeping from the bullet wound in his leg. She reached over to him. "Are you...?" "Don't worry about me..." He cursed through gritted teeth. Frost picked up on his meaning and looked over her shoulder. "Sarah, are you...?" Lifeless eyes and a blood stained face gazed back at Frost from the back seat of the BMW. The bullet holes that decorated the clothing across her body told her all she needed to know. Speeding away from the scene, leaving behind the panicked commuters, the darkened visor hid the look of relief on Verity's face. Part one of her task was now completed. Now it was just a matter of waiting until Blevins contacted her regarding part two. **** Friday 12:33 pm The sound of music blared out of the tiny yet powerful speakers attached to the desktop PC and echoed around the cold stonewall of the cellar. Leaning back in his chair, Andrew found himself moving his head in time with the drumbeat, hoping to dislodge something from inside his mind. He stood up for a minute and stretched his arms out before moving across to the far corner of the cellar. Picking up a four-string bass guitar and a plectrum, Andrew sat down on the bench against the back wall and began to pluck away at the strings. Mirroring the bass line of the track currently being played, he closed his eyes and began to lose himself within the music. "...I'm dying tomorrow, in this house, this street, Chicago. I'm dying tomorrow, did I, did I do it right?..." the words flowed as easily as his fingers danced across the four strings, moving across the A and E strings before going up an octave on the D string for sixteen notes, then dropping back down again on the G. "...Did I remember to sleep in, take lots of pills, commit irreversible sins? Did I, did I at least try to make sure everybody had a good time? Had the best time..." By the conclusion of the song Andrew felt invigorated by the solo jam session. Carefully replacing the decade old guitar on its stand, he returned to the PC and began to type. Losing track of time as he immersed himself in his thoughts, he didn't hear the sound of the door to the cellar being opened or the sound of footsteps making their way down the stairs. "I've made you a cup of tea." The words accompanied the mug being deposited besides the PC. "How's it going?" Leah rubbed Andrew's shoulders, feeling the tension within them. "Slowly." He replied. "But I might have something..." The sensation of her hands on his shoulder muscles made a smile drift over his face. "Were you playing your guitar a minute ago?" Leah asked as she continued to massage him. "Yeah...thought it might clear out the creative pipes..." Her hands stopped moving in the practiced, deliberate motion and he felt her fingers pressing against part of the back of his neck. "What are you doing?" "You've got a spot here that I've been meaning to squeeze since Tuesday." Leah said, applying pressure to the small mound of matter on the back of Andrew's neck. "Just stay still..." "Okay...Ow...Ohhh, argh!" He moaned as she continued to squeeze. "Right, that's hurting now...stop it...stop it!" "Jesus, you're such a baby at times..." Leah muttered. "There we go!" She held her finger in front of Andrew's face, enabling him to see the small particle of matter she had extracted from his body. "You'd be useless under torture." "I've had to sit through Sunday lunch with your mother when she was off her head; that's the very definition of torture!" He countered as she kissed his cheek and ruffled his hair. "You know, I wouldn't disagree with you on that count baby," Leah said, chuckling. "I'm going to get the kids ready for Hayden's birthday party, so we'll see you about sevenish." "Groovy. Have a good time." Andrew replied without looking up from the keyboard. Once Leah had left the cellar he opened the draw of his desk and removed a large notebook from it. Opening the book and sifting through the pages, Andrew began to read. **** The Baekdu Mountains North Korea November 1999 The snow was drifting in the evening wind as the sun finally dropped below the horizon. Trudging through the snow, leaving a rapidly vanishing trail of imprints leading away from the Kyu-Po military compound, two figures approached a vague, undefined mass just inside the perimeter fence. Cursing under their breath, the taller figure to the left of the pair shook his head as the smaller, squatter figure approached the huddled mass of rags. "Fucking bum," The squat figure spat in a regional dialect. "How'd you get inside the fence?" He prodded the pile of rags with the butt of his rifle and was met with a groaning sound. "This is a restricted area – get up!" The taller man screamed. "Come on, it's time for us to throw you out!" The bundle of rags simply remained in place, despite the repeated interference from the two guards. "Fuck..." The squat guard moaned as he tried to grab hold of a limb. "You know we could just kill you and no one would bat an eyelid, right?" The pile of rags seemed to squirm out of his feeble grip with ease. "That's it..." The taller guard said, pulling back the bolt of his rifle and lifting it upwards. As he did so, his colleague pulled away some of the rags – and took a sharp intake of breath at what he saw beneath them. The soft feminine features and brown eyes looked up at him, shortly followed by the barrel of a pistol. Pfhtt! Pfhtt! Pfhtt! The first shot struck the taller man in the head, the second and third shots striking the squat man in the chest. "It's disgraceful the way people treat homeless people these days." Leah mused to herself as she untangled herself from the pile of warm blankets she had purchased from one of the local markets in the nearby town. Dressed in the dark coloured, insulated form-fitting bodysuit she favoured for these types of operations, she pulled a pair of goggles out of her kit bag to shield her eyes from the near-blizzard conditions. Once they were in place, she attached something to her ear. "Alison, the perimeter guards have been eliminated," She said to the other person listening at the other end of the device. "There's a small guardhouse on the opposite side of the complex; I'll make my way there and meet you at the extraction point." "Understood Leah." Alison replied, just about picking out the figure of her friend from the roof of one of the wings of the Kyu-Po compound. "Be careful." "You too." She paused for a second. "Look, are you sure that's the way you want to get out of there?" "Trust me, it's the only way." Alison answered. "Okay, I'll be in touch once I'm in position." The microphone in Alison's ear went dead. She turned around and secured one end of a high-tension line to a small heating duct. Tugging on it, Alison attached the other end to her belt before taking a short run towards the edge of the building. Leaping clear, she arced through the air, moving away from the compound before allowing the trajectory of her dive to bring her back towards it once more. Twisting her body in the air, she faced towards the building as she rushed towards it. Lifting her feet, Alison smashed through one of the large windows of the fifth floor, landing inside what looked like some sort of mess hall. In a practiced manoeuvre, her Walther was in her hand and sweeping across the room. Finding it empty, she detached the cable from her belt and pulled a small electronic PDA from a pouch on her thigh. The display lit up like a Christmas tree, breaking down the layout of the Kyu-Po compound. Kneeling down and reaching into the pocket on her other thigh, Alison removed two small packages and placed them against the wall, the adhesive nature of the material giving them purchase. Red blinking lights on each of them indicated that they were active. Holding up her wrist, she keyed a three-digit code into what appeared to be an oversized watch. Both the wrist controller and the two lumps of putty-like substance chimed in unison. Knowing that her target was located on the ground floor, Alison then focused her attention on opening up a small ventilation hatch that was just big enough for her to fit into. After twenty minutes of shimmying, shuffling and crawling through the confined metal tubes, Alison found herself looking at a dark corridor. Moving her body as best as she could in the ventilation shaft, she kicked out at the metal grill. As it slammed against the floor, Alison dropped out of the shaft, pistol in hand. The shocked expression on the face of the guard standing next to a heavy steel door was replaced by the realisation that he was staring at an intruder – albeit a female one. His mind was dulled slightly by the prospect that this woman – dressed in something out of some pulpy spy novel – had just literally dropped out of the ceiling. Alison needed no prompting for what came naturally to her under the circumstances. Her arm was raised before the guard had time to comprehend he was in mortal danger. The two snapshots struck him in the chest, knocking him to the floor before he had chance to raise his rifle. She stepped over his body as she looked at the door. For a moment, she contemplated whether she should have used up her supply of plastic explosive on the fifth floor. Her hand reached out and gripped the handle, twisting it. To her surprise, the handle gave way immediately, allowing her access to the room. Carefully stepping inside she could just make out two shapes in the dark space – one crouched over the other. The piercing whine of a drill coupled with that of a woman's scream shook Alison. The gun was raised in the blink of an eye, aiming directly at the hunched figure. She squeezed the trigger, knocking the shape away with a muffled cry. Advancing on what looked like a table, Alison recognised the figure strapped to it immediately. "Grace Cook?" She asked. The frightened woman whose mouth was bleeding profusely looked up at her. For a minute she failed to comprehend the words, then nodded in recognition. "Great – I'm getting you out of here." Alison swiped away the small dentist drill from Grace's chest as she unbuckled her. "Where's Abraham?" "...Next room..." Grace replied through a blood-filled and pain-racked mouth. Alison helped her up off the table. "Can you walk?" Grace nodded. "Stay here – I'll get Abraham." Alison opened the door and peeked out. Finding herself alone except for the body of the guard, she walked to the next door in the sequence of rooms. Upon opening it, the smell of urine and faeces hit her. Trying not to gag she approached a figure huddled in the corner. Reaching out to him she could feel that his skin was cold – his lifeless eyes looked up at the ceiling, no doubt praying for a rescue that had come too late. Trying her best to close his eyelids, Alison wasted no further time in the room. "Okay – we have to go now." She said to Grace as she re-entered, handing her the guard's boots and rifle. "...What about...?" "It's too late for him," Alison knew she sounded blunt, but there was no other way to put it. "But not for you, now lets..." the sound of a groan from the other side of the table startled her. Striding purposefully towards the noise, she saw that the figure she had shot was dressed in a white coat like some twisted parody of a doctor. He rolled over, clutching his shoulder and looked up at Alison. He tried to say something to her but the bullet she put in his head silenced him forever. Turning back to face Grace, she was pleased to see that she'd put the boots on and had dragged the dead guard into the room. Despite her fumbling fingers she was making good progress on removing the jacket from the dead man. "Hurry up," Alison added as she moved back to the door, checking for any unwanted attention. "How are we going to get out of here?" Grace asked as she hobbled over to her. "Don't worry about that – my partner is outside making sure we've got clear passage." Alison encouraged her to step out into the corridor as she secured the door behind them. "I don't wish to sound ungrateful, but have you got anything for the pain?" Grace asked, holding her jaw. Alison knew that wasn't the only part of her that hurt but she shook her head. "Not here, but once we're outside Leah has a medical kit we can use – right now I need you sharp." Grace nodded as they moved along the corridor, and then she stopped in her tracks. "Wait – this leads to the front door – and the main barracks..." "I know – it's the quickest way out." Alison explained. "Besides, you're in no shape to get upstairs through the ventilation system and then out from the roof." "But...but that's suicide!" Grace exclaimed. "There are at least twenty, thirty guards there..." "I know – that's why I've planned a little diversion..." **** The garbled voices in Korean made little sense to Leah as she was crouched outside the primary guardhouse that controlled entrance to and from the Kyu-Po compound. Her knowledge of the language was limited – enough to get by but not enough to actually converse in it. Andrew had explained to her that she probably had some eidetic aspect to her mind that functioned as a savant-style translator; however the process was only one way – effectively she could receive but not transmit. For a minute her mind wandered, wondering what the expression on his face would be like when he unwrapped his Christmas present this year; a new bass guitar, although unwrapping might be abit of a misnomer – she was just going to present it to him first thing Christmas morning. There were times when she wondered if there was actually a limit to the artistic side of his personality, although he maintained he couldn't paint or draw, she wasn't sure if he was simply trying to make her feel better about the fact she was hopeless when it came to things like that. Everyone has his or her own talents, he'd remind her whenever she got frustrated by her relative clumsiness. She knew he was planning something for Christmas – he'd asked her for her passport details two weeks ago before she'd left for Singapore – and she couldn't wait to see him once she got back. If only she could skip the debriefing...I wonder whom our kids would take after? The sound of the door opening was her cue and dragged her back from her daydreams. She watched the guard walking in her general direction, her right hand gripping the handle of her knife. As he turned his back to her she struck from the shadows, her gloved left hand covering his mouth as the blade of the knife was driven into his back, efficiently transacted his upper vertebrae. She lowered his body to the ground then scooped up the MP5 from her kit back. Checking that the suppressor was in place she scurried to the door. Taking a short step back, Leah drove her foot into the artificial barrier, throwing it open to the surprise of the operators inside. Phudaphudaphudaphudaphuda! The soft thudding of bullets striking bodies accompanied her arcing aim. The short staccato burst of violence was over almost as quickly as it had begun. Leah stepped inside and secured the door. Looking at the monitors she was able to isolate the main gate controls. Locking them open she turned her attention to securing some form of transport out of the compound. Approaching a standard military utility vehicle, Leah set about trying to jump start the engine. That's when she heard the explosion from the fifth floor. A small smile drifted across her face as she understood why Alison had taken it with her. **** Helping Grace into the passenger seat of the utility truck was the easy part. As Alison got in she could see that Leah was administering a shot of something or other to the operative they had been sent to recover. Grace quickly lapsed into unconsciousness. Leah fired up the truck and pulled out of the main gates before speaking. "What about the other one?" "Dead." Alison replied, looking at the kitbag on the floor. "Are you sure these UN credentials will work?" She examined the documentation in the dim light of the interior of the truck. "They'd better do." Leah said as she navigated the icy roads. "There's a flight out to Sweden first thing tomorrow morning – although I'll feel better once we're in the air." "Okay." She looked out of the window. "You know Andy's planning on proposing to you, right?" "What?" Leah almost lost control of the truck. "He's told you that?" "No – but he asked me if you'd ever been to New York before." Alison said. "I'm thinking New York, Christmas, Tiffany's, the Empire State Building...you see where I'm going with this?" Leah nodded. "What did you say?" "I told him we'd been shopping there for a weekend once, got drunk, slept with a football team..." the smile on her face told Leah that Alison was trying to wind her up. "No, I told him the truth – you've never been to New York." "Well, thanks." Leah paused for a second. "He knew you were joking about that other stuff, right?" "He saw through it within ten seconds." Alison sounded genuinely upset. "So, if he pops the question what are you going to say?" "What do you think I'm going to say?" Leah shot back. "Yes of course!" **** The Barlow Residence How I Met Your Mother Ch. 06 Friday 5:35 pm Where previously there had been a swirling maelstrom of frenetic activity, the kitchen was now a tiny bubble of calm; a small safe haven from the chaos reigning in the back garden. Drying up the last of the bowls that had been used to dish up trifle to the children who were now enrapt in watching the clown show, Leah allowed a sigh to escape from her lips. "I don't know how you do it." Hilary laughed as she placed two mugs on the counter. "I'm a single mom; it's a question of having to." She replied. Leah placed the bowl on top of the pile in the cupboard before she switched the kettle on. "But as my Mom constantly reminds me, it could be worse." Her philosophical reply made Leah laugh in turn. "And thank god for the kids going back to school as well." "Yeah, that's true." "So, how's the new job working out?" Hilary asked as she retrieved the milk from the fridge. "Has your boss made any inappropriate comments to you yet?" "Mmm, can you be sexually harassed by your husband when you work from home for him in nothing but your underwear at times?" Leah mused with a wide grin on her face. "There are moments when I'm not sure if I'm working for him or he's working for me – I swear, if I wasn't prodding him to get on with things he'd just sit there watching cartoons all day." She looked out of the window at the performance in the garden. "He's worse than the kids when it comes to being easily distracted. Then he suddenly has this burst of creativity from somewhere inside that brain of his and he's down in the cellar night and day writing." The kettle finished boiling and Hilary poured the hot water into the two mugs before stirring. "I also caught him playing his guitar today for the first time in three years. I know it sounds like I'm complaining, but Andy really is a great boss to work for; it's just his complete and utter lack of organisation and relaxed attitude to deadlines that scares me – I swear, I don't know how he managed to write one book let alone twelve the way he works." "I hear you; I would imagine it's like organised chaos right?" Hilary laughed as Leah shared a look that confirmed her statement. "The beauty of an artistic mind – it's all over the place at times. You still take milk in your coffee don't you?" Leah nodded. "How's your friend doing after her car accident?" Hilary changed the subject. "Well, she's getting better," Leah recalled her last visit to see Alison at the Edwards Clinic. "They are moving to the third stage skin grafts now, but they've got to be careful, what with the baby and all that." She looked out of the window; Cassie was being handed a balloon animal by the clown. "If everything goes well she should be out by Christmas." "You know, it's a miracle the baby seems to be okay." Hilary said. "When you told me about it I just had the words miscarriage rolling around the back of my head." "Tell me about it." Leah responded as Hilary handed her the mug. "I had this nightmare the other night about it – that it was me who'd had the accident when I was pregnant with the kids." Leah felt a shudder run down her spine as she recalled the event. "Andy found me curled up in the bathroom, crying my eyes out." She shook her head. "I don't know what's wrong with me recently – my hormones are all over the place." "Wait, you're not...are you?" "What? Oh no, no." Leah replied. "I just think it's a matter of adjusting from my old job to this one, plus it's that time of the month again." She took a drink from her mug. "Didn't you used to work at the Foreign Office?" Leah nodded again, confirming the story she'd told everyone except a select few who knew the truth about her previous career. "Yes, yes." She mused, watching the clown as he continued to make balloon animals for the children. "It's just a big change really, but I know I've made the right decision. It's just...different." Both women were silent for a moment. "How is the marathon training going?" "Slowly." Hilary said between drinks. "Between teaching at the school and looking after Hayden I barely seem to have the time or the motivation to train. Six months to go and I'm already worried I won't be ready." "Do you need some help?" "How do you mean?" Hilary replied, genuinely interested. Leah put her mug down. "Well, since Alison's accident I've been looking for a new gym buddy." "I thought Andy was going to the gym with you?" "Andy just ogles my butt as I'm on the treadmill." Leah smirked. "Which is nice, but it gets...distracting. So, what do you say?" The sound of the children cheering outside heralded the end of the clown's performance. "You've got a deal." Hilary replied as she scooped up the tray of soft drinks from the kitchen table. "And that's our cue to go and save the kiddies entertainer from the screaming hordes." **** The Odyssey Apartment Complex Friday 10:32 pm The suitcase was loaded with the essentials. As she placed a variety of passports and IDs in the top, Verity closed the lid and locked it. Taking one last look around the near-empty bedroom, she silently cursed herself for falling into this predicament. Making her way back into her living room she sat down at the dining table and fired up her laptop. The bare walls of her soon-to-be-former home were almost alien to her. The collection of artwork she had acquired over the years had been hastily placed into storage as she began to plan her immediate departure from the city in the first instance. As the laptop completed its action to log onto her secure connection, Verity made a short list of things she needed to do as soon as she left the building. The first thing would be to find a buyer for the flat; she knew of several good estate agents in the area that she could deal with once she was safely out of the country. As she entered her password to access her e-mail account the screen returned an error message to her. Thinking about the keys she'd just pressed, Verity tried it again only slower this time. By her failure on the third attempt to access the e-mail account Verity was starting to get a gnawing sense of foreboding in her stomach. This was only confirmed and changed into a palpable rage when she was unable to access the electronic details of her bank account. She picked up her cell phone and made a call. The other end of the line rang out, remaining unanswered. Counting each ring tone in her head it wasn't until the fifteenth tone that the call was finally picked up. "What the fuck is going on Jacob?" The venom in Verity's voice was clear to hear. "I can't get into either my e-mail account or access my bank records." "You're off my list Keira," the reply wasn't entirely unexpected, but it still stung. "Too many people interested in you now and your face is all over the watchboards of the local Five-Ohs. I imagine they've frozen your bank account by now..." "What?" Verity almost fell out of her chair. "Someone has given you up baby and the Powers That Be have snared you in their net." Jacob replied. "Shame, because you were a nice little earner. I heard that Interpol have someone on their way to talk to you about your recent work." There was a rapping sound at the door to the apartment. "Shit!" Verity abruptly ended the call and reached for the .22 pistol she kept in her purse. Stalking up to the door she cautiously looked through the spy hole. On the other side of the door was a woman with mousy blonde hair and glasses waiting patiently. Verity counted to three before sharply yanking the door open and grabbing the jacket of the woman, dragging her inside. Kicking the door shut, the barrel of the pistol was jammed up into the woman's chin as Verity pushed her against the wall. "Who the fuck are you?" she hissed, revelling in the fear she saw in the stranger's eyes. "Gos...Gosling..." The woman stammered. "I work for Blevins..." Verity released her gip on the woman slightly once she mentioned Blevins' name. "He sent me to give you this." Gosling held out a small file that Verity eagerly took from her. She then began to pat down her pockets, pausing to remove Gosling's cell phone. "Get out." Verity spat as she opened the door. Slamming behind Gosling, she opened the file and began to read through the contents. **** Saturday morning "Inno sent us an e-mail last night from Florida," Andrew said as he rested on his knees in front of the fridge freezer. His fingers glided over a small dent in the side of the casing that surrounded it and he shook his head. "He's going to be over here next month for a couple of weeks and wants to take us out to dinner." "Really? Well, I'm up for that if you are." Leah replied. "We'll need a babysitter..." "I think I know where we can find one of those." "Did he say how Sascha and Irina are getting on?" Leah asked. "He said that the family were adjusting to their new life quite well under the circumstances," The grinding sound of ice against plastic filled the kitchen. The draw was resisting his efforts to close it. "I think it helps that Sascha already speaks English pretty well from her time living over here when Inno was at the Embassy so there isn't much of a language barrier for her and you know how quickly kids adapt to their environment – apparently they're staying at a hotel owned by some Russian oil magnate who owes Inno a few favours from back in the day." "Have you met her then?" Leah sounded surprised at Andrew's level of knowledge of Inno's daughter's lingual capabilities. "Err, twice, probably about a year before I met you actually. When was the last time we defrosted the freezer?" Andrew asked as he struggled to close the third draw, rapidly changing subject. "About a month ago." Leah replied. "Seriously?" Andrew shut the door. "Maybe the compressor is playing up..." He shook his head. "What time did Suri say she was going to be here?" Leah looked down at her wristwatch. "Soon – remind me to get your Mom a bottle of wine for having the kids today. I'd have never gotten the place cleaned up with them here." "I don't think you need to bribe her to look after them. Since the day we were married she's been locked into Grandmother mode..." Andrew replied as he pushed his hand down the back of the freezer. "I knew it – the compressor feels like it's burning out..." He shook his head as he brushed bits of fluff off his hand. "I'm gonna wander down the road to the shop for some milk – do we need anything else?" "I don't think so..." Leah mused as she filled up the kettle. The sound of the doorbell spluttering after completing the ding part of its cycle drew the attention of both Leah and Andrew; the dong aspect of the tone failing miserably to reach its crescendo. Grabbing his jacket as he headed towards the door, Andrew paused to scoop up his wallet and mobile phone before addressing the visitor. Unlocking the Yale lock and opening the door, he recognised the woman standing on the doorstep immediately. Her dusky complexion and near-jet black hair were offset by her blue eyes and warm smile. "Surinder, nice to see you again." He looked at the doorbell mechanism, muttering to himself. "I really need to fix that this weekend..." "You too Andrew." Suri said as Andrew gestured for her to enter the house. "I trust you are keeping well?" "As well as can be expected, under the circumstances." Andrew replied. "Leah's in the kitchen..." Once Suri was inside, Andrew made his way out of the door. "Oh, you aren't leaving on my account are you?" "No, no," Andrew replied as he grasped the door handle. "I need a walk to clear my head so I figured I'd head down to the shop. I'll see you later if you're still here." The door closed, leaving Suri standing in the hall way. "Tea or coffee?" The question came from the kitchen at the far end of the hallway. Suri headed straight towards it. "Tea – definitely tea. I'm sick to death of coffee right now. As much as they try, you cannot get a decent cup of tea in New York." She said as she entered the kitchen, seeing Leah handling two mugs and a bottle of milk. "Milk no sugar, right?" Leah asked. Suri nodded. "I'm impressed you remembered." She replied, clutching a briefcase in her hands. "It's a curse, trust me." Leah answered. "How are the kids?" "Oh, they're fine – they're spending the day with their grandparents – it gets them out from under my feet when I'm trying to clean the house." Leah said, stirring each drink in turn as she poured hot water into them. "They've been abit of a handful this half-term." The chinking sound of the spoon striking the edge of the second mug punctuated her comment. "So, how are things at Interpol?" "Crazy." Suri replied. "I've been assigned to the New York office and I'm stuck with some screwball from the Justice Department who had me chasing shadows to begin with; shadows that have become something of a startling reality as of late." "Okay, colour me intrigued." Leah said. "Set up whatever you've got in the living room; I'll bring the biscuits in as well, provided Andy hasn't eaten them all." **** Watching through a telescopic lens from the park at the far end of Burrow Street, Verity recognised the Indian woman who had approached the property as the Interpol agent Blevins had provided information on via his courier Gosling the previous evening. The depth of information that Interpol held on her was frightening as she absorbed it along with the details of her second target – some renegade operative lurking in the middle of nowhere. As she sat in her car Verity couldn't help but feel that the provision of the information from her mysterious benefactor was more than a little circumstantial in nature. Just as she was about to put the camera down though she noticed the male figure leaving the property, then a thought popped into her mind. It wouldn't hurt to have a little insurance right about now. **** "So, what you're telling me is that you have some evidence of an international contract killer stalking the globe and that she's active here in the UK right now?" Leah said as she looked through the collection of paperwork and photographs. "Yeah," Suri said. "Here's the strange part." She continued, finishing her cup of tea. "The office in New York received a tip off that she was planning something here this weekend. Initially I was sceptical, then we realised that the tip also contained details of two deaths that the Agency has been looking at as part of a wider corporate fraud investigation – those of Simon Aston in Monte Carlo three weeks ago and Henry Rice in Dublin on Wednesday night. I hopped on the first flight back here and upon arrival at Heathrow I was told that there had been a drive by shooting in the city that had now been officially attributed to her by the local office." "Oh yeah – I heard about that on the news yesterday." Leah exclaimed. "I have to admit, from the bits I've read in the newspapers it sounded like a professional job." She looked through the photographic images from the Los Angeles surveillance footage one more time. "It hardly sounded like the work of some small time drug dealers involved in a gang-related turf war as everyone is trying to portray it." She put the still images down. "But I still don't really see how I can help you." "Something about all this seems off to me." Suri said. "I mean, I know there are plenty of guns for hire out there, but this Keira character seems too well organised for it to be some thrill killer who woke up one morning and decided to set themselves up as a hitter." "You think she's on the disavowed list right?" Suri nodded in response to Leah's thoughts. "Okay, I'll see what I can find out – I'll call Emma and Will to see..." the cell phone on the telephone table began to ring. Leah shook her head as she got up, recognising the name on the display. "It's Andy – he's probably forgotten his keys again...What have you left this time?" "If you wish to see your husband alive again please put the Interpol agent that's in your house on the line." Leah felt her blood freeze as the words sank in. She looked at Suri and gestured for her to take the phone. "It's for you." She said, handing it to Suri before disappearing into the kitchen. In turn, Suri could hear a cupboard door being opened and closed. "Who is this?" "You know full well who this is." The female voice on the other end of the line replied. "Now, if you wish to avoid having this man's death on your conscience I suggest you do exactly as I tell you." There was a pause. "Leave me alone – just let me do what I have to do then I'll disappear; you'll never hear of me again." "Look, just let the gentleman go and we can talk about..." "There's no talking here; no negotiation – you leave me alone otherwise you'll find pretty boy here dead in a ditch." The call ended abruptly. Suri felt sick. A moment later Leah had rejoined her in the living room, a small duffel bag in her hand. "Come on, we're going to find them." Her tone was business-like, masking the emotional turmoil coursing through her body. "How?" Suri asked as Leah took the cell phone from her hands. "Silly as it sounds we can track him with this." She waved the phone in the air. "What?" "I'll explain in the car." Leah replied. "I just need to get something from upstairs first." **** "I really wouldn't have done that if I were you." Andrew said from the back seat of the car. Verity ignored him. "My wife does have something of a temper on her at times." Verity snorted. "And I'd hardly call myself Pretty Boy...do I look like I have tank tracks instead of legs?" She either ignored his quip or simply failed to appreciate it. "Oddly enough, the raging temper of some hopeless suburban housewife is the least of my worries right now." "Okay, well, don't say I didn't warn you." Andrew muttered as he looked out of the window at the suburban landscape passing them by at nearly seventy miles an hour. "Don't you think you should be abiding by the speed limit around here?" "Do you want me to shoot you in the face right now?" Verity snapped back. "I'm just saying that I would imagine the last thing you need is to get pulled over for speeding." Andrew replied. "Trust me; if anyone tries that then they're going to have a very fucking bad day." She replied, and then a few moments later Andrew felt the car shifting down gears. He gazed out of the window again and took a deep breath. As he had been holding the bottle of cloudy lemonade up to the light, shaking it slightly as he tried to dislodge the particles within in order to read the expiration date clearly at the generic convenience store at the far end of Burrow Street, Andrew had found himself being confronted by an attractive red head. Taking her to be a fan – which wasn't as uncommon as it had been in the past – he had asked her how he could help her. The sudden appearance of a 9mm pistol had convinced him that she was at best a crazed stalker and quite possibly something much worse. He had done exactly as she had asked; reasoning that compliance at that point in time was preferable to open defiance. Upon being directed to her vehicle – some silver coloured Japanese monstrosity – she had taken his cell phone and dialled home. As the car broke free of the countryside and hit the motorway, Andrew noticed that his phone was sitting in the foot well beside the gear stick, the display blinking away as a soft blue light on the side of the device began to flash rapidly. "So what happens if I need a piss?" Andrew threw the question out there as he saw Verity glancing down at his phone. "What?" "Well I might need to go to the toilet – how's that going to work?" He explained, trying to keep her attention away from the electronic device in the foot well. "Are you going to pull over so I can go at the side of the road or do you want to pull over at a service station and accompany me to the bog?" He could see from the glare in her eyes in the rear view mirror that he was needling her. A moment later an empty water bottle was thrown onto the back seat. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 06 "If you need to go you can use that." Verity hissed, focusing her attention on the traffic around them once more. "Now shut up or I'll kneecap you." Andrew tried to suppress the chuckle in his throat. **** "Andy's mom will look after the kids for the evening." Leah murmured as she looked inside the duffel bag between her feet. "I'm just glad that they are still young enough not to pick up on some of this..." "Shouldn't we be calling for backup?" Suri asked as she steered the car. Leah shook her head, trying to focus. "If this Keira character is as professional as she seems to be she'll kill Andrew at the first sign of trouble." She replied as she held the cell phone in her hands. "They're heading north..." "Okay, you still haven't explained how we're following them." Suri said, negotiating the traffic as best as she could. Leah gestured towards the cell phone. "About a month ago Andy got this screwy idea to get that partner tracker thing for both of our mobile phones – he said it would allow me to keep track of him while he's working so I knew he hadn't wandered off out of the house." Leah explained. "He's got this thing when he gets writer's block where he goes for a walk and disappears for anything up to several hours at a time. I freaked out the first time it happened – turns out that it's a regular occurrence with him and he just never told me about it. Said he didn't want me to worry, and he never does it when the kids are at home. I didn't think that it actually worked...until now." "Really? Some crappy downloadable application actually has a purpose?" "As long as the phone is switched on this application will track it in a rudimentary way," She shook her head. "I thought it was abit too stalkerish originally, but right now I'm eternally grateful for it." As they broke free from the city traffic, Leah felt the engine in the car surge, additional power being directed to the main drive shaft with the increased pressure from Suri's foot. "How are you holding up?" Suri asked. Leah shook her head. "Don't ask me that." She muttered. "Seriously, I'm barely keeping it together right now." Leah looked out of the window. "You know, I thought I'd gotten this clear in my mind along time ago – I'd imagined every worst case scenario I could think of but there was always the one constant factor that I always knew if I fell apart Andy was always going to be there to help me through...to pick up the pieces...but...I've got this sinking feeling about this; like everything is going to go wrong." She tried to wipe away the tears that were starting to roll down her cheek. "What do I tell the kids? What do I tell his mother? Or his sisters?" Leah shook her head. "Suri, if this woman does anything to Andy I'm going to kill her, you understand that, right?" "Leah, you know that I'm here to arrest her," Suri replied. Leah nodded but her face told Suri a radically different story. "But I'll be the first one turning a blind eye if something happens to Andrew." Leah looked out of the window, the knot in her stomach getting ever tighter with each passing minute. **** Upper Arley Worcestershire The final few embers of the sun illuminated the sky as it dropped towards the horizon. Pushing herself from the kitchen to the living room, Jane carefully balanced the tray that her microwave dinner was balanced upon. Skilfully guiding herself into position in front of the television, she locked the brakes of the wheelchair in place before picking up the fork. The pasta dish tasted like a bizarre hybrid of cheese and cardboard. After the third forkful she realised that she would need something to drink afterwards to wash away the taste from her mouth. Something strong. The television blared into life, falling on one of the preset news channels she had taken to watching recently. Since choosing this self-imposed isolation after events in the hospital over one of the more populated locations available to her, Jane had found herself becoming increasingly cut off from the outside world. If she was brutally honest, she didn't miss it. After the attempt on her life she reasoned that she would probably remain a threat to others around her for as long as she continued to experience flashbacks to her previous life. A life that was radically different to what she dealt with on a daily basis now. A life before her chair. Finishing her meal, Jane moved back into the kitchen. After throwing the plastic carton into the bin she opened one of the cupboards and reached inside for a bottle. Her hand seemed to instinctively reach for the vodka. Dispensing with the idea of a glass, she returned to the living room and picked up her lukewarm cup of coffee. Unscrewing the lid of the vodka bottle and dumping a reasonably sized serving into the cup, the mixture of alcohol and caffeine burned on its way down her throat. **** "Shit." Leah exclaimed. "I've lost the signal." "What's happened?" Suri said as she expertly weaved between the lines of traffic. "They must be somewhere with poor signal coverage – last signal was just over the county border into Worcestershire." She muttered. "Great, so now I have to hope that they pop up again soon..." "Leah, we'll find them." Suri tried to reassure her. "We'll keep heading in that direction until your phone picks them up again." "Yeah, I guess." Leah sounded dejected, defeated almost. "I'm calling Emma Gilson at the office – just in case." **** By the time of her third drink, Jane could feel that she was well on the way to getting drunk. The sound of someone knocking her door made her look at the clock. 6:52pm The relative isolation of Upper Arley was one of the main things that had attracted her to it as a place to live. With a population of less than 700 and a wide variety of properties that were set in large tracts of land, Jane knew that it would provide the perfect place to stay out of sight for the foreseeable future. Placing her cup on the table, she wheeled herself around to the door. Reaching up to remove the chain and the bolt, she opened it. She saw the figure of a man standing in her doorway – who was then violently pushed into her. "What the fu...?" The collision knocked her backwards and obviously came as something of a surprise to him as well, mainly due to his strained cry upon crashing into her. As she came to her senses she realised that there was a second person standing in the room with them now – and she was pointing a sleek, deadly looking pistol directly at Jane. She threw something onto the floor next to the stranger who had hit her chair. "You – tie her wrists to the arms of the wheelchair," she barked as she closed the door, taking the time to lock it as the man did as she ordered. "Good – now push her into the back room there." He wheeled her out of the living room and past the kitchen, taking a left turn into what was actually Jane's bedroom. As soon as she was in place, the man stepped back – only to be knocked forwards face-first onto the bed. The redhead mounted his back, grabbing his arm and wrenching it sharply backwards, then repeated the move with his other arm and secured his wrists with a similar plastic zip-tie that had been used on Jane's wrists. The woman disappeared from the room, leaving them alone for a moment. "Sorry about all this." The man said. "I'm Andy, I'd shake your hand, but..."" "Jane." She replied. "What the fuck is going on?" "No idea, but if I had to hazard a guess..." He cut himself off as the redhead re-entered the room, carrying a chair Jane recognised from her kitchen. She wasn't sure why she still kept it – for the occasional, non-existent visitor she presumed. Slamming it down, she dragged Andrew from the bed and dumped him on it. She then turned around to face Jane. "You're Grace Cook, right?" Jane shook her head. "No, no, not any more." She replied. The woman in front of her pulled a picture out of her jacket pocket, holding it up to Jane's face. It was like looking into a mirror. "Well, however you are now, you were once Grace Cook." She spat. "And for that, someone wants you dead." Jane's head slumped slightly. "Blevins sent you, right?" A flash of recognition ran across the redhead's face at the mention of the name. "You're a smart cookie, so when it comes to it I'll make it quick," The redhead replied. "However, right now I need to try and get my life back before it's too late." Without uttering another word the woman left the bedroom, closing the door firmly behind her. "Okay, as I was saying, I think loony tune there is here to kill you." Andrew continued from where he left off. "I sort of figured that out, thanks." Jane replied. "So, what are you doing here?" "It seems that I'm her get-out-of-jail-free card." He added as he wriggled around in his seat. "Well, we appear to have some time on our hands. So, what's your story...?" **** Sulphurous words filled the air as Verity tried to get a signal on the phone. Walking towards the exit, she stepped out into the early evening air and watched for some sign of life from the device. The moment one small bar appeared her fingers dialled a number she had found in Gosling's phone and committed to memory. Bringing it to her ear, Verity waited for the call to be connected. "Blevins, this is Verity Ward." Her voice was forceful and authoritative. "I'm just about to deal with your last little problem, but before I do I need you to do something for me first..." **** Sitting in the car, driving through Worcestershire, the ring tone tore through the silence. Almost fumbling it away as she answered it, Leah looked at the display. "Emma, tell me you have some good news." "I've picked up your husband's mobile phone signal again thirty seconds ago – its weak and I haven't been able to get a solid lock on it, but I'm sending the details to your phone." Emma Gilson explained from her desk in a quiet corner of the impersonal office. "There are two buildings within five hundred metres of the signal; a farmhouse and what looks like an over-grown bungalow. I'm sorry that I can't be anymore specific than that." "That's more than enough Emma, thank you." Leah replied. "Boss, I can have a team there in an hour..." Emma offered. "No, you've already done enough as it is – I can handle it from here on in. Besides, this was a favour and I don't want you getting into trouble on my part – you could get fired for this." Leah balanced the phone between her ear and her shoulder as she pulled a pair of gloves free from her bag. "I'll speak to you later Emma. I owe you one." She ended the call and looked at the display on the small screen. Taking a USB cable from the satellite navigation system and plugging it into the device, the data was transmitted onto the in-car system. "I'll take the farmhouse," Suri said. "You take the bungalow – it's the nearer of the two." **** "...so, from what I understand," Jane said. "Blevins was contracting out the skills of his team members to the highest bidder. Foreign nationals, organised crime figures, political dissidents, corporate takeovers; he was gas-lighting the team with intelligence reports and profile briefings so they thought everything they were doing was above board." "When in reality it was all off-the-books, right?" Andrew added. "A sort of knock-down priced contract killing operation for a fraction of the cost of the open market version." Jane nodded. "You're a fast learner." She said. "Everything was going swimmingly until one of his junior staff cottoned on to it." She replied with a sick, sad sounding laugh. "She was auditing the monthly expenses claims when she picked up on a discrepancy in the payment profile for Blevins himself – he'd submitted a claim for a business trip to Oslo when he was supposed to be in the office. After she had dug around abit – a quick cross-reference here, a few phone calls there – she realised that his trip coincided with that of a leader of a radical Hungarian political party by the name of Gurgarov." She shook her head. "She found video footage of Blevins and Gurgarov having dinner together; two days later, Gurgarov's primary political opponent was found dead from a suspected drug overdose, removing Gurgarov's last obstacle in his bid for election to the Hungarian parliament. There were travel documents on file authorising an operative to travel to Hungary to eliminate a member of a terrorist cell that Blevins had authorised..." "...who just happened to match the description of Gurgarov's political opponent, right? Let me guess what follows next; she decides to blow the whistle on it all and Blevins has her killed?" Andrew said. Jane nodded, the motion of her movements made her chair move slightly. "I...I think I killed her – plus the bodyguards that had been assigned to protect her – and I don't really remember that much of it." Neither of them spoke for a minute. "Then I had my accident and the rest is all so much fuzzy history. I've already had one person try to kill me since then – I've sort of been expecting this sort of thing to happen." "Okay, so at least we know why little Miss Stone-Cold-Killer is here," Andrew said. "The issue is what do we do about it?" He began to move his hands, feeling the plastic tie digging into his flesh. "What are you trying to do?" Jane responded to his question with one of her own. "Well, as much as I'd like to think my wife is currently trying to find me and bringing the cavalry to boot, I'm a firm believer in making your own luck." The look on his face was a mixture of concentration and reactions to the painful consequences of his movements. "I read something once that these plastic zip-lock things have a tendency to fail if you can just get the little insert section to twist ninety degrees..." There was the sound of movement outside the door, prompting Andrew to stop what he was doing. The barrier to the room opened and Verity entered. "Well, good news boys and girls, this little ordeal will soon be over." The glee in her voice was clear to hear. "For me, this means I'll be able to leave the country safe in the knowledge that my face isn't on the top ten most wanted boards of every law enforcement agency in the Western world. For you, however, it does mean that your lives will be coming to an end. So I suggest you make your peace with whatever God you follow because it won't be long before you go to meet your maker kiddies!" The door slammed shut once more, leaving Andrew and Jane alone. "At least someone seems chipper about all this." Jane muttered. "So, what now? We just wait for her to kill us?" Jane asked. Andrew looked at her and smiled. "Well, I'm all for getting out of here." he said, pulling his hands around from his back and demonstrating clearly that he had been able to escape his shackles. "Please tell me you have some sort of plan." "Actually I do." Andrew replied, standing up from the chair and stretching his legs out to ward off cramp. "Have you got anything in here that can help us?" "Top draw of the bedside cabinet. Be careful – it squeaks abit." Jane answered. Andrew walked across to it and pulled it open as gently as possible. As he looked down at the contents of the draw his face lit up. "Oh yes – that's my second favourite battery-operated device to find in a woman's bedside cabinet." **** "...and what time does that flight leave?" Verity was scribbling down the details on a piece of paper. "Fantastic – thanks for your help, I'll see you soon." She switched the phone off and tossed it onto the counter in the kitchen. Her momentary sense of relief was shattered by the sound of something heavy falling over in the bedroom. Scooping up her gun, she shook her head in mock despair. "Well, no time like the present I guess." Opening the door to the bedroom she could see that her target was still in her wheelchair, however the window to the room was now open. The chair she had placed Andrew in was now tipped over and the plastic zip tie was on the floor. Glaring at Jane, Verity stepped forward, raising her firearm. "Tell me he's gone out of the window." She hissed. Jane looked at her. "Actually, he's behind the door there." Jane replied. "You don't honestly expect me to fall..." The words were cut off mid-sentence as something was jabbed against Verity's neck. The surge of electricity suddenly coursing through her body from the two electrodes touching her skin caused muscles to spasm, resulting in an errant gun shot cannoning into the floor. Her jaw locked into place, grinding her teeth together as the current flowed through her physique. Almost as quickly as it had started, it was over – the five second charge from the stun gun has dissipated and Verity Ward collapsed to the floor, rendered immobile. "Grab the gun!" Jane cried out as Andrew stepped out from behind the door, holding the stun gun in his hand. Verity lay on the bedroom floor, twitching wildly with strange, garbled sounds coming out of her mouth. "Quickly! I don't know how long she'll be out for." Andrew managed to pry the pistol free from Verity's grasp, handing it to Jane. "Now tie her to the chair." "Jesus you're bossy," Andrew said as he tried to lift Verity into the chair. He turned around and saw that Jane was holding out the two plastic ties that he'd removed from her own wrists just prior to creating their trap. "No wonder someone is trying to kill you." He said as he secured Verity's wrists as best as he could – her muscle spasms were less violent now although her head was lolling back against the back of the chair, making her eyes roll back into her head. He placed his fingers against the pulse in her neck. "She's still alive." "Shock her again." Jane said. Andrew looked at her. "That's not necessary." "I don't care if it's necessary, the bitch was going to kill me; shock her again." "No." Andrew responded with his Dad voice – the one the kids encountered when he was putting his foot down. "I won't stoop to that level." "Well I will – give me the stun gun and I'll..." "I said no." Andrew barked at her. "Now, let's see if we can sort out some sort of help here." **** Without looking back at Suri as she drove off, Leah moved as quickly as she could towards the bungalow. By the time she had reached the perimeter of the property her heart was beating faster. Trying to calm her breathing, she could feel the cold nervous sweat breaking out on her forehead. Gripping tightly on the butt of the pistol in her right hand she started to skirt around the house, looking for a suitable entry point. The sound of a single gunshot rang out in the evening air and Leah charged towards the building, fearing the worst. **** "Found my phone." Andrew called out as Jane wheeled herself out of the bedroom. "There's no bloody signal in here – I'm going to try outside." Andrew headed directly for the front door. "Great – I need the toilet." Jane said, rotating herself around in a tight circle and heading off to the small room at the back of the building. As he opened the door and stepped out onto the small porch, a sudden movement to his right caught him off-guard. He turned and found himself looking straight at his wife. "Leah..." "Oh God..." Leah threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around him and hugging him tightly. Her momentum knocked them both to the ground. She kissed him passionately. "Jesus...I was so worried..." "I can't believe..." Andrew replied, surprised at the strength of her hold on him. "I thought...I hoped..." "Where is she?" Leah said. Andrew saw something switching over in her mind. "In the house, tied to a chair." Leah helped Andrew to his feet, and then he saw that she was holding a gun in her hand. "Its okay – everything is under control." He reached for the front door, opening it and allowing Leah to cross the threshold. "I managed to..." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 06 Blam! The gunshot startled both of them. Leah stepped in front of Andrew, her pistol raised. Moving cautiously forwards she gestured for Andrew to stay where he was. Footstep followed footstep until she reached the open bedroom door. She spun into the opening, pistol at the ready. Leah found herself staring at a vaguely familiar woman in a wheelchair cradling a 9mm pistol in her lap. Across from her was the figure of a redheaded woman tied to the chair, a single neat bullet hole in her chest. Leah felt a presence over her shoulder; she turned to try and stop Andrew from seeing the scene. The shock on his face was evident. "Why?" Jane simply looked away without answering his question. **** 76 Burrow Street Sunday am After several hours of questioning from various local and more further a field law enforcement agencies, Suri dropped Andrew and Leah off at home, promising to return at some point early the following week if Andrew felt he needed to discuss things further. As they crawled into bed in a strangely silent house, Andrew put his arms around Leah and pulled her close to him. "You know if she'd done anything to you I would have killed her, right?" Leah confessed to him. Andrew nodded. "I know – but that's different. I can understand that." He said. "I can't understand why she shot her though – what purpose does that serve?" "It tells whoever was after her that she isn't willing to be found without there being consequences for them." Leah explained. "No matter how hard they push, she's prepared to push back. Force of will and all that." "But it's so...pointless." "I know, but some people are just wired that way." She looked up at him. "Promise me something." "Sure – shoot." "That if anything like that happens again you won't try to be a hero." "I wasn't trying to be one tonight – I was trying to stay alive for you and the kids." Leah reached up and stroked his face before kissing him. "Besides, I'm sort of hoping it won't happen again." She rested her head on his chest. "Are you tired?" "No. Why?" "Because I really need to make love to you after everything that's happened." The urgency in Andrew's voice tugged at something deep inside Leah's soul. "Because I thought I wasn't going to see you or the kids again and that thought scared the shit out of me, so much that I would have done anything to make sure it didn't happen." He looked into her eyes. "I have no idea how you managed to do it for all those years." "Oh, that's easy." Leah replied as she straddled him. "I knew I was coming home to you." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 07 How I Met Your Mother: Loose Ends Mountford Police Station Monday 1:33 am Sitting alone on an uncomfortable chair in the small, cramped interview room, Susan Gosling felt that her world was falling apart. She had been dragged from her warm and comfortable bed in the middle of the night and been given scarcely any time to put some clothes on. Dressed in a pair of faded jeans, battered old trainers and an over-sized sweatshirt she usually wore to the gym, she held her head in her hands as she waited for someone, anyone to enter the room. The light in the fluorescent tube flickered occasionally, giving the room a cold, austere look to it. Shifting her position on the chair slightly Susan was able to relieve the fledgling pain developing in her back, however the respite was only fleeting as within five minutes the tight sensation at the base of her spine was growing again. By the time the heavy wooden door was opened, Susan could feel that she was starting to seize up. She looked over her shoulder at the figure that entered the room; her visitor's demeanour seemed to match that of the interview room that Susan found herself in. Shortly after her arrival in the police station, the woman had introduced herself as Sarah Frost; a special investigator assigned to verify claims made to the Select Committee concerning the actions of various government officials, specifically James Blevins. As she watched the raven-haired woman take up a seat on the opposite side of the table, Susan began to feel distinctly uncomfortable. "Now, Miss Gosling, I'll dispense with the pleasantries as it's far too late in the evening for all that crap. I'm sure I don't have to spell it out for you exactly how much trouble Mr Blevins is in," Sarah was keeping her voice even and calm, whilst simultaneously trying to sound threatening. It was something that her partner Drake managed to look effortless when he did it; however as he still in the hospital recovering from his gunshot wounds she was flying solo at the moment. "And the outlook isn't too rosy for you either as his primary assistant." She could see the colour draining from Susan's face. "Look, I don't know anything. Whatever James was doing…" Susan replied. "Please drop the act, Miss Gosling." Frost leaned back on the chair slightly. "You can't convince me that you're completely innocent in this matter. I'm not saying you have any blood on your hands, but I know you have a full and frank understanding of what Blevins has been up to." Susan sat there, nervously looking at her hands. "Now, I'll be blunt; if you help me then I'll help you." Frost said. "What do you want?" "Everything Miss Gosling," Frost replied. "Everything." "Okay." Susan sighed, resignation clearly audible in her voice. "I guess it all started back in Gambia…" **** 76 Burrow Street Tuesday Rolling over in the bed, Leah's arm encountered an unusual phenomenon – an empty space next to her. Twisting around, she looked through blurred eyes at the alarm clock that sat on the bedside table next to Andrew's side of the bed. 3:42 Getting out of bed and feeling the cold night time air in the house assaulting her skin now it was free of the bedcovers, she paused to scoop up her robe from the back of the wardrobe door before moving around the first floor of the house. Moving quietly across the landing, passing the family bathroom, she carefully pushed open the door beyond that and saw the two figures tucked up in their beds. Realising that Andrew wasn't in there, Leah made her way downstairs to the ground floor of the house. Her bare feet moved quickly as she skipped across the cold wooden flooring. Approaching the entrance to the cellar, she noted the slight crack of light emanating from under the door. As she crept down the stairs her ears picked up the sound of fingers furiously striking keys. Making her way down the steps into the cellar, the puddles of light from the two lamps in the subterranean living space cast a strange, almost eerie glow around the objects occupying the space. In the far corner was the desk where Andrew's PC was sitting amidst piles of source books and cables. Running along the back wall was an old sofa that they had had since they had moved into their first apartment. A wistful smile crept over Leah's face as she looked at it. Andrew called it their first family heirloom when they purchased it and had stubbornly refused to dispose of the battered sofa ever since. This was placed in perfect position to allow him to access a television and a variety of games consoles that were consigned to the other end of the cellar. As she made the first step onto the cold stone floor the sound of the fingers striking the keys stopped. "I know what you're going to say…" Andrew's voice sounded drained; exhausted almost. "It's nearly four in the morning," Leah said. "You haven't slept properly in over a week." She walked across to him, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and kissing his neck. She could see the words on the screen that he had been bashing out. "I thought you'd already given a full statement to the Police at the scene?" "I did – this is for those folks from the Select Committee." Andrew replied, leaning back against the chair. "It keeps popping up in my head like a bad penny and I want to make sure I have everything down properly." "You know that you're becoming obsessed with this." Leah said, trying to sound soothing as well as scolding. "You need to let it go." "I know – and once I've done my bit then I will – but until then…" Leah nodded. "I can always rely on your moral centre, can't I?" she said. Andrew smiled. "Yeah – I wonder who I get that from?" He looked over his shoulder at her with a sly grin on his face. "I'll be twenty minutes, maximum, and then I'll be up." "Okay then." Leah replied, heading back to the cellar stairs. "But if you're not then I'm coming back down here and kicking your ass." **** The sound of Scott and Cassie talking to each other in excited, animated tones woke Leah with a start. Grabbing her robe and slippers, a familiar smell struck her nostrils as she made her way downstairs. Following the combination of noise and smell to the kitchen she was pleasantly surprised to see Andrew standing at the cooker, frying pan in hand, and her two children sitting patiently at the breakfast bar. Scott looked up at his mother as she entered. "Dad's making pancakes." He said, a smile beaming from his face. "Really?" Leah revelled in her children's delight at something as simple as this. "Yes," Andrew replied without looking up from the frying pan sitting on the gas burner. "It was either this or kippers and I know how you hate the smell of fish first thing in the morning." "Jesus, yes." Leah said, remembering how the smell had become routed in her subconscious during her pregnancy to the point that even the faintest whiff of it before lunchtimes even after giving birth to the twins made her feel violently sick. She looked over at the children. "Have you washed your hands?" "Yes Mom." They chimed together. Leah nodded as she turned around to approach the kettle. "There's tea already in the pot," Andrew said as he dropped a stack of pancakes onto the table that were swiftly descended upon by Cassie and Scott. Pouring the tea into a waiting mug with milk in it, she watched their children begin to eat; Leah turned her attention back to her husband who was preparing a second batch of pancakes on the hob. She moved over to him and wrapped her arms around his waist while resting her head against his shoulders, facing away from her offspring. "Why are you doing this?" she whispered. "Couldn't sleep." Andrew muttered. "Besides, it's good for the kids to do something like this before school once in awhile." "It's good for us to." She replied, smiling as she sighed. She looked over at the children, and then buried her face in Andrew's back. "I feel like I've missed so much of this. I just wish they didn't have to go to school sometimes…" "What?" Scott suddenly looked up, instinctively picking up on his mother's last few words. "We don't have to go to school today?" Cassie paused in mid-flow, a forkful of pancake soaked in maple syrup hovering above her plate. "No, you two still have to go to school," Andrew said, prompting moans from both of them. "But we'll do something fun when you get back tonight." "What like?" Cassie asked before continuing to eat. Andrew shrugged his shoulders. "Not sure – but I'll think of something." The sound of cutlery being placed against plates signalled that both children had finished eating. "All done?" Andrew watched as the pair of them nodded. "Okay – go and finish getting ready; then I'll take you to school." As Scott and Cassie disappeared from the kitchen, Andrew served the second batch of pancakes up onto two plates and placed them on the table. Leah sat down opposite him. He passed her the maple syrup as she picked up a pair of cutlery. "So, what's on your mind?" her question rolled out of her lips before the first mouthful of pancake was inserted. "What makes you think there's anything on my mind?" Andrew replied. Leah scrutinised his facial expression. To her surprise, his face was an impenetrable mask of calm. "You only cook early in the morning when you're thinking about things or when you're up against a deadline, usually when you're stressed." She said. Andrew nodded. "And you're not sleeping properly. Do I need to get an appointment sorted out with Dr Ingram for you?" "No, I'll be fine once all this is behind us." Andrew replied as he ate. "So, are you going to tell me how you know Grace Cook?" "What makes you think I knew her?" Leah was surprised. "When the Police escorted her away you kept looking over at her, plus you had that don't I know you look on your face when you saw her in the bedroom after she shot Little Miss Psycho Killer." Leah nodded, acknowledging Andrew's observations. "She was an intelligence asset that Alison and I had to recover from some hell hole in North Korea back in 1999." She replied, placing her cutlery down on the plate. "I only met her once and I only remember it because it was just before you proposed to me…" Andrew's hand crept over and embraced hers. "What time is Bryant coming over today?" "Lunchtime." Andrew said. "He wants to run through everything in my statement before it's submitted." "Well, that will give me some time to run some errands while he's here." Leah finished off her plate of pancakes. "Leah, I won't do this if it's going to get us into trouble." Andrew stated. "If there's any risk of reprisals…" "Andy, it's okay. You're doing the right thing." She said, reassuring him as best as possible under the circumstances. "You know that you have my unconditional support one hundred percent in exactly the same way you've supported me over the years – what's that old saying you keep wittering on about? The one you tell the kids when they aren't sure what to do? The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to sit and do nothing." "Well, Burke's actual quote goes something like "When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle" but that's close enough." The wry smile on his face lifted Leah's spirits for a moment. She walked around the breakfast bar and kissing him. "Look, I'll take the kids to school – you can clean up the kitchen and make a fresh pot of tea for when I get back." She replied before whispering in his ear and running her fingers lightly across his neck. "And when I get back I expect to find you in bed, naked." Her wicked grin was all the prompting Andrew needed to agree to her suggestion. **** Amidst the chaos that was the entrance to Hollygate Primary school, Leah gripped the hands of Cassie and Scott tightly to avoid them being swept away from her amidst the sea of other parents. Navigating their way towards the entrance, a voice called out to them from the teacher's car park area. "Leah!" "Morning." Leah said as she stopped to wait for Hilary and Hayden Barlow to catch up with them. "Are we still on for the gym tomorrow night?" Hilary asked. Leah nodded. "Sure – Andrew's picking the kids up from school tomorrow so we can go the minute you're done." "Fantastic – I need to get some serious work in before the holidays start." Hilary added. "Did you manage to sort out that Christmas present of Andy's?" "Well, I'm hopeful that…" As the two adults engaged in conversation, a separate discussion was being conducted some thirty inches beneath them. "When do you get your cat?" Hayden asked. "Next week." Cassie said excitedly. Scott pulled the bag off his back and began rummaging around inside it. "She's going to sleep in our room with us." "Look what I got from Dad's room in the cellar." Clutched in his hand was a worn and dog-eared copy of the Encyclopaedia Cthulhuiana. Hayden's face lit up. "Wow!" "Scott!" Cassie exclaimed. "That's Dad's book! What are you doing with it?" "Miss Hawthorne wanted us to talk about what we read during the half term holidays. I read this so I'm going to talk about it." Hayden managed to pry the book from Scott's hands and began to flick through it. "Man, it's got pictures in it too!" Hayden's hands stopped and turned the book to face Scott. "Argh! That's gross! What are those?" He pointed to an image of a conical shaped creature with several appendages sprouting out of the apex of the beast. "Erm, they're called The Great Race of Yith." Scott replied as Cassie continued to frown at her twin brother. "They all turn into beetles in the future!" "Cool! I love beetles!" Hayden exclaimed as he carried on looking through the book. Cassie softly punched her brother in the arm. "You're going to get into trouble again." She said as Leah and Hilary finished speaking and herded them inside the leaf-covered gates of the school. Leah watched as her children followed Hayden and Hilary inside the building, a mixture of feelings running through her mind as they waved goodbye to her. After exchanging a few pleasantries with the other parents before everyone began to break up, Leah pulled her cell phone out of her jacket pocket and picked out a number from the speed dial. "Emma, its Leah." Her voice was low and quiet. "I need another favour from you…" **** 76 Burrow Street 11.43 am By the time the door was opened, Bryant Mayhew's finger was aching from repeatedly pressing the buzzer for it. Upon opening it, the image greeting his eyes was one of a somewhat dishevelled looking Andrew Hargreaves, dressed in a faded red and white striped dressing gown and black jogging trousers. "You're earlier than I expected." Andrew said in a flat voice. Bryant nodded, stepping into the house and removing the expensive grey trench coat that covered his navy blue suit from Davies and Son on Savile Row. "And yet you still aren't dressed." Bryant jibed. Andrew chuckled. "Hey, I was busy." "It's a quarter to twelve in the morning. What could you possibly have been doing other than lazing around in bed?" "Morning Bryant." The sight of Leah walking down the stairs in her dressing gown told Bryant all he needed to know. As she reached the bottom step she gave him a friendly peck on the cheek. "You know, that's just nasty." Bryant said before he cast a grimace at Andrew. "Get me a cup of coffee before I turn around and leave your arse hanging high and dry." **** "So, let me get this straight," Andrew said as he leaned back in his chair. The last three hours had been spent discussing his written statement with Bryant and his back was starting to ache. Leah was looking through several sheaves of paper that were piled up on the dining room table as the two men continued to discuss the matter at hand. "You managed to negotiate an anonymous sealed testimony where I don't have to appear before the Select Committee? No one is ever going to know about my involvement in all of this? How the hell did you do that?" "Let's just say that I'm a damn good lawyer," Bryant replied. "And the Chairman of the Committee owes me at least one or two favours for keeping his son out of prison and out of the newspapers." "Outstanding." Leah said as she skipped through another few pieces of paper. "So, did they tell you what the full remit of this Committee was?" "From what I can understand it's was convened to investigate intelligence failings following numerous recent security cock ups." Bryant loosened his tie slightly. "There was that exploding terraced house in Newcastle at the start of the year that seemed to have been part of a wider network of Eastern European ne'er-do-wells, the bombing of HMS Ulysses in Gibraltar last month and that whole attempted assassination thing in Brighton back in June." "Oh yeah – the militant who nearly got to the Prime Minister at the party conference," Andrew muttered. "I'd almost forgotten about that." "Yeah. So, whatever initial remit the committee had, it's now been expanded to encompass everything that the intelligence services have been doing for the last three to five years. The minute they got wind of this they were on it like a flash." "That far back?" Leah tried to contain her shock. "Jesus…." She looked at one piece of paper and Andrew heard her take a sharp intake of breath. "Is this everyone they are going to interview?" "Yeah – big list isn't it?" Bryant said as Leah handed it to Andrew. As his eyes scanned through the documents there were several names that popped out at him. "Anyone and everyone who has dropped the ball in some respect are all coming under close scrutiny. From what I gather, they are looking at the department heads only though – the powers that be want this wrapped up before they break for the winter recess." "Why crucify the Indians when you can nail the Chiefs, right?" Andrew asked. Bryant nodded. "It's possible there could be criminal prosecutions as a result of all this – especially in the case of Mr Blevins." Andrew's eyes suddenly saw three names he recognised on the list, although he knew his wife would have spotted others. Thomas Benedict; James Blevins; Grace Cook "I've only been allowed access to a redacted copy of Miss Cook's transcript but if even half of it is true then its explosive stuff. Really, I mean, this Blevins guy was running his own murder-for-hire organisation using state assets." Bryant continued. "However, they are closed hearings, meaning that the public will never hear a word of it beyond the official sanitised report." He took a drink from his cold cup of coffee. "I've even had to sign a non-disclosure agreement – never to repeat what I've learned from all this to anyone for fear of a long and unpleasant prison sentence." "So, no one gets to find out about the Government's dirty laundry, right?" Andrew said. Bryant nodded. "Dead right." None of them spoke for a moment as Bryant looked through Andrew's typed statement. "Well, all of this looks fine to me. I still can't understand though why some crazed loon with a gun would kidnap you." "Beats the crap out of me." Andrew lied. "Then again, you know what I'm like for being in the wrong place at the wrong time." "Yeah – I guess you're just unlucky like that." Bryant began scooping up the pile of papers and placing them inside his briefcase. "Can we get a copy of that?" Leah asked. Andrew looked puzzled for a moment. "You know, for our own records." Bryant looked at her, and then at Andrew before a knowing look swept across his face. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 07 "Oh, I get it – just in case Mr Paperback Writer here ever runs into a dead end with his work, right?" Leah nodded, pretending to look embarrassed that Bryant had seen through her apparently simple request. "Not a problem – I'll get a copy couriered over to you this afternoon; just make sure you don't go revealing too much when you use it as source material for your next book." "Thanks." Andrew replied. "Anyway, I'll give you a call when it's all finished." Bryant pulled his chair out and got up from the table. As the two men walked out of the dining room and into the hall he stopped, suddenly remembered something. "We still on for squash on Wednesday?" "Wouldn't miss it for the world; you're due an arse-kicking." Andrew replied, shaking Bryant's hand. As Andrew opened the front door, Leah jumped out from the dining room. "Bryant, wait." Leah said. "Look, would you like to come dinner Friday night?" "Dinner? Sure." He said. "Where?" "Here – just the pair of us and a friend of mine." She said. Bryant nodded as he put his coat on. "Okay – e-mail me the details at work and I'll put it in my diary to remind me." Andrew and Leah watched Bryant walk down their garden path and get into his car, waving their friend off from the doorstep as he drove away. "So we're having a dinner party on Friday night?" Andrew asked as he closed the front door. Leah nodded. "When were you planning on telling me?" "I just did – Bryant isn't seeing anyone is he?" her smile was infectious, preventing Andrew from feeling irritated at the sudden announcement that they would be entertaining in less than four days. "I don't know – he hasn't mentioned anyone." Andrew replied. "Why?" "I think he and Hilary would make a good couple." She added as she grabbed her jacket. "Right, I need to pop out for a bit – I'll pick the kids up from school – I've promised them that I'd take them to feed the ducks at Sterling Park." "You're going to see Alison, right?" Andrew said, stopping Leah in her tracks. "That's why you want a copy of the documents Bryant has." "Nothing gets past you does it?" "Not after this length of time." He said. "You haven't got anything to worry about – no one has summoned either of you to testify – you saw the list of names as well as I did. If they are going to crucify anyone for what happened in Madrid then it's the Fat Man." "I know, but being forewarned is forearmed and if I were in her situation then I'd like to know about it." Leah kissed him as she opened the door. "I'll be back in a bit – you get on with finishing that first draft for Diane." "Yeah, right." Andrew muttered as he headed towards the cellar. "Say hello to Alison for me." **** Sterling Park 4pm The park bench stood out amidst its surroundings. The paintwork was faded and a medium sized crack rang along the second of the three strips of wood that made up the backrest of the bench. A small metal plate sat in the centre of the wooden construction – the dedication that adorned it had long since been eroded away by the elements. As she sat down on the bench, Leah quietly acknowledged the other figure occupying the bench. "Before we start I want to thank you for your help in this matter Emma," Leah said, looking out at the world around her. Quickly her viewpoint returned to the duck pond where Cassie and Scott were merrily throwing pieces of bread at the hungry beasts. "This was all I could cobble together at short notice." Emma Gilson replied, handing Leah a small white envelope. "The edited version runs as follows: James Blevins is a relatively new division head within the department, only being in post at Division Six for just over eighteen months." "That explains why I've never heard of him." Leah muttered. Emma nodded. "Division six always like to keep to themselves." "He's something of a fast track candidate; spent most of the last ten years in the Foreign Office in one post or another in various embassies around the globe. There was some hint of a scandal at his last post in Gambia – some sort of cash for visa's thing that seemed to be being sniffed around by the local press. The whole thing was very quietly hushed up – the journalist investigating it turned up dead in what appears to be a mugging that went bad." Emma paused for a minute to light a cigarette. "You know those are bad for your health, right?" "Yeah, so I'm told." Emma continued. "For the last six years his assistant has been one Susan Gosling – rarely leaves his side when he's out and about and seems to have carved herself out a nice niche as something of a buffer between Blevins and his people. She doesn't look like a threat if you're thinking about a direct approach, but you can never be too sure." Leah nodded, taking in Emma's information. "Now, here's the interesting part – his father is Sir Henry Montague Blevins, Leader of the Opposition in the House of Lords. Little Jimmy is the middle child of the Blevins' – older brother Edward will inherit the family title, younger sister Rachel is an architect of some distinction in France…" "Jesus, that's where the name is familiar from," Leah gasped. She pocketed the envelope in her jacket pocket as Cassie and Scott continued to plough through the loaf of bread. "Well, thanks for this Emma, I think that's all I need to know." "Look, I know it's not my place to say anything, but people have a nasty habit of turning up dead when they go up against this guy. They found the body of one of his field operatives buried in a shallow grave on the Yorkshire Moors." She paused for a minute before continuing. "I guess what I'm trying to say is do you have a plan to deal with him if it gets nasty?" Emma asked as she got up from the bench, discarding the cigarette and crushing it under the heel of her boot. "Maybe." Leah mused. "Although it might be more along the lines of a pre-emptive strike." "Well, if you want my two pennies worth I'd just whack the guy in a dark car park one evening." "Funny – Alison suggested the same thing." "Figures. I must have picked up some bad habits from the pair of you." Emma chuckled. "Have you spoken to her about the Select Committee hearing?" "Yeah – they want to talk to Tom Benedict about that thing in Madrid. She doesn't think anyone will want to talk to any of us, they're more likely to censure him as he was the lead agent in charge." "Well, that explains why he's barely been in the office lately." Emma said. "Do you need anything else from me?" "No, no – you've already done more than I could have hoped for Emma." Leah replied. "I owe you one for this; if Benedict found out…" "Well he won't." Emma responded. "But you're right, you do owe me one." She added with a smile as she looked at her watch. "Okay I've got to go – I have a date tonight and I don't want to be late." "Really?" Leah sounded surprised. Emma nodded. "Yeah – in spite of what you said at the induction talk a month ago I seem to have met someone completely by accident." Emma began to stroll away towards the opposite side of Sterling Park. "It's good to see you again Boss." "You too Emma. Take care of yourself." Leah responded. Her attention shifted again to Cassie and Scott, who were now walking up towards the bench. "Mom, the ducks ate all the bread." Cassie said, holding up the empty bag for Leah's inspection. Scott tried to brush off the last few crumbs that were sticking to his jacket. "They must have been hungry." Leah encouraged them to join her on the bench. "So, now that we've fed the ducks shall we go home and see what Daddy's been up to today?" **** Banjul, Gambia 2004 Isatou Mansally struggled to make her way through the crowded evening streets of Banjul, desperately trying to keep her balance as she moved against the flow of the commuter tide moving along the sidewalk. She knew that she needed to get back to her office before the building closed for her story to be included in tomorrow's morning edition. In two years since joining The Point, Gambia's major independent newspaper, Isatou had diligently worked her way up the ranks from the bullpen of staff reporters to the point where she was allowed to investigate and write her own stories. However, her latest piece was sure to catapult her from the relative obscurity of the mid-range pages to the limelight she craved of the front page headlines. Over the last three weeks she had acquired proof that a member of the British Embassy had been provided covert support to a group of Senegalese extremists in exchange for cash. She had managed to obtain copies of the working visas that the embassy official – a man by the name of Blevins – had provided for them and now had documented evidence of the bank transfers between the two parties involved from her sister who worked at the Great West African Bank branch here in the city. Today was going to be Isatou's day. As she made her way down one of the quiet side streets that bisected the city road network, an unfamiliar vehicle pulled up alongside her. Isatou stopped in her tracks as she recognised the registration plates on the rear as being those of the British Embassy. The door opened and a mousey looking woman with a fair complexion and soft golden hair got out. She looked apprehensive as she approached Isatou. "Miss Mansally?" She enquired. Isatou nodded as the stranger moved towards her. "My name is Gosling – I need to talk to you urgently regarding some information that has recently come into your possession." "Concerning?" "The contractors Mr Blevins has been employing on behalf of the embassy." "You mean the terrorists who are looking to destabilise the democratically elected government." Isatou corrected her. Gosling shook her head. "You don't understand. What Mr Blevins did was in the interests of the country as a whole." She took a step closer to Isatou, who moved instinctively the same distance backwards. "Please, you have to drop this story now. You can't imagine the trouble this could cause…" "Trouble?" Isatou's eyebrows rose. "He was trying to orchestrate a military coup to overthrow the President because he wouldn't ratify a series of concessions for grain subsidies for local businessmen. I hardly think that is the way a senior member of the British Foreign Office should be conducting themselves." Gosling looked visibly hurt by Isatou's stinging comment, recoiling away from her slightly. "I'm sorry; I'm in a hurry. I haven't got time to…" Isatou said as she tried to move past the woman who was now blocking her path. The stranger grabbed her arm and Isatou felt something hard being jabbed into her side. She looked down – her eyes becoming wide at the sight of the revolver that was pushed into her ribs. "Please…I need you to understand…" Gosling added. Isatou instinctively tried to pull away from the mousey woman, who – in turn – pulled her back. Blam! The jostling between the two women was cut short by the gunshot. Isatou looked at Gosling, seeing her own shocked expression mirrored in that of her attacker. Gosling watched in disbelief as the woman fell to the floor, almost in slow motion, her mind racing. She hadn't meant to harm her – the gun was simply to persuade her to get in the car. The blood was already soaking through Isatou's blouse, turning the white material a deep red colour. As she looked down at the journalist, with the colour draining from her face, Gosling saw that she had dropped the small folder she had been carrying. Picking it up, she realised that these were the documents that Blevins had asked her to recover from Isatou – copies of the visas he had authorised and a series of bank statements. Again, she looked down at Isatou – her eyes were beginning to roll back into her head and her breathing was shallow and ragged. Something inside Gosling's mind snapped into action and she stashed the pistol inside her bag before returning to her car. Without looking back she fired up the ignition and drove away, the pangs of guilt over abandoning Isatou to the whims of fate being quashed by the knowledge that she was protecting Blevins from a wide reaching scandal. **** Fitness First Gym Tuesday 6pm "Patrick McLeary." Hilary's response made Leah stop in her tracks on the treadmill. "What?" She said, looking over at her friend. "The deputy head at the school? You'd sleep with him? What is he? Fifty something?" "Forty eight and yes I would." Hilary continued her running without interruption. Leah resumed from where she had picked off. "You asked if there was anyone I worked with who I'd sleep with – I can't help it if I have a thing for older men." "Hey, there's old and then there's old Hilary." Leah added caustically. "Age is just a number." Hilary responded, not missing a beat on the treadmill. "He's a funny, charming guy when you get to talk to him outside school." "I'll take your word for it. Personally he reminds me of that character from those books I read as a kid – what was he called now? Oh yes – the Demon Headmaster!" Leah countered. "Are you doing anything Friday night?" She slowed down, stepping off the treadmill and powering down the equipment. Hilary followed suit a few moments later, pausing to take a drink from the bottle of water resting in the holder on the arm of the machine. "No, why?" "We're having a little dinner party at our place – bring Hayden with you; the kids can play on the games consoles while we have an adult dinner." Leah said as she grabbed her key to her locker and began to walk towards the changing rooms with her friend. "Okay, sounds fun." Hilary replied. "Who are you trying to set me up with this time?" "Who said I'm trying to set you up with anyone?" "Because the last time you invited me to dinner at your place you tried to set me up with Andrew's cousin – Shaun was it?" Hilary said as they reached the ladies changing rooms. Leah shook her head. "I admit it; setting you up with Shaun wasn't exactly my finest hour, however I promise you that this time will be different." Hilary didn't look convinced. "Look, I'm not taking no for an answer – you're coming to dinner on Friday night and that's that. Now I'm going to take a shower and I'll see you in the bar in a bit." **** Standing with his hands in his pockets, tapping his foot in frustration, James Blevins found himself staring at the electronic counter on the elevator as it slowly moved through the floors of the apartment building. Eventually, the metal carriage came to a gradual stop at the fifteenth floor, the doors opening with a soft pinging sound. He stepped out onto the carpeted floor and made his way towards one particular room. His hand reached out as he checked the number of the room once more before he pressed the buzzer. The dull grinding noise from inside could be heard out in the hallway, followed by the sound of hurried footsteps. The door opened and Susan Gosling was standing there, still dressed in her office attire. "Mr Blevins…what are you…?" "We need to talk." He interrupted her, pushing his way into her home. Susan closed the door behind him. "What do you mean? We can't talk here – maybe we should…" Susan's voice was strained as she realised that Blevins wasn't in the mood to listen to her. "I've been suspended, pending the outcome of an investigation." He spat out the words as he threw his hands up in the air. "It appears that Miss Ward failed disastrously in her duty to eliminate Grace Cook. Not only that, but Miss Cook has now submitted a full statement to the investigation committee – hence my suspension." Susan looked at him, seeing the stress etched across his face. Her hand movements were becoming more frantic now, gesturing for him to be quiet through a combination of slashing her hand across her throat and pointing at the walls. "They're watching me – I know it. I'm sure I saw them outside the flat tonight. I need to figure out some way to get out of…what?" Blevins continued, momentarily ignoring her until Susan pointed again at the walls and then at her ear. "Oh shit – they've bugged this place haven't they? Fuck!" The forlorn expression on Susan's face told him all he needed to know as he stormed out of her apartment for the last time. **** Fitness First Gym Wednesday 11:45 am Thwack! The small red high-density rubber ball struck the far wall of the squash court. Its trajectory sent it arcing back across the hard wood surface and straight into the path of a racquet being directed at it. Thwack! "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest." Bryant called out as he struck the ball. Andrew darted forward, catching the ball on the volley. Thwack! "Jack Nicholson." He hopped out of Bryant's way as he returned the ball. Thwack! "The Joker." Thwack! "Batman." Thwack! "Superman." Thwack! "Wuss." "What?" Bryant caught the ball in his hand as Andrew leant against the glass wall at the back of the court. "You said Superman; I said Wuss." Andrew explained. "I thought that was the whole point of this free-association thinking thing while we were playing squash. You say the first thing that comes into your head." "Yeah, I know that, but how can you call Superman a wuss?" "Easy; because he is. He represents the stagnation of human evolution and the false hope of some alien from another planet arriving to save the day. It's the complete abdication of responsibility on our part." Andrew replied, feeling something in his knee for a moment before his lungs suddenly began to constrict and forced a series of sharp hard coughs to rack through his bronchial passages. His body nearly doubled over from the reflex of the coughing motion. "Jesus, you okay?" Bryant asked, suddenly concerned at his friend's well being. Andrew held his hand up. "Yeah, yeah I'm fine." He straightened up and Bryant realised how pale his friend was looking. "I've just got this irritating cough that I can't seem to shake." "You don't look well – are you alright?" "Yeah, yeah, I'll be fine." Andrew repeated as he took a few deeper breaths. "You're not worried about this committee thing are you?" Andrew shrugged his shoulders a little. "I've got to admit, the idea this could all blow up in my face has crossed my mind several times, but I've got that whole angle covered now." "Oh, you mean your Russian ex-military pal, right?" Bryant asked. Andrew smiled. No, more like my wife. "Something like that, yeah." Andrew seemed to be getting paler with each passing minute as his chest felt tighter, like someone was slowly crushing his ribs and lungs in a metal vice. "How's the new book going?" Bryant asked, putting their competitive game aside for a moment. "Oh, just great actually. I'm hoping to have the first draft of Zombie Disco Divas From Hell completed by the end of December." Bryant could see that Andrew was breathing heavily, more so than normal after their weekly games. "Can you believe that Diane wanted me to write some poxy Vampire story?" "What, like 30 Days of Night?" "No, like that Twilight or True Blood tosh." Andrew dropped down onto his haunches. "She was talking about how I should spin off the character of Count Nadasdy from the Mythos stuff into some lame series where he falls in love with a mortal woman – how pathetic is that? She might as well ask me to call him Barnabus Collins and re-write Dark Shadows for what it's worth." Andrew shook his head. "Vampires are monsters, pure and simple. They don't see humans as equals; they see them as a bloody food source." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 07 "Come on, let's forget about the game and get a drink." Bryant said, helping Andrew to his feet. "I'm buying." Andrew looked confused as they left the squash court. "But I thought you won?" **** Manifold Avenue Thursday 2:13 pm James Blevins nervously looked over his shoulder as he entered the cramped public telephone box a few streets away from his home. This was the third one he had tried in quick succession and the first one he had found that was still in working order. The stench of stale urine and cigarettes immediately assaulted his nostrils as he began to load pound coins into the slot. Pulling a scrap of paper from his jacket pocket he cradled the receiver in the crook of his neck and shoulder. Looking at the number and whispering it to himself as he dialled it, the sound of the ring tone actually connecting was like music to his ears. He still couldn't believe what had happened to him – just how quickly everything had fallen apart. The smug expression on that bitch Frost's face when she had sauntered into the office to have him ejected and confined to his home had become etched into his mind's eye. As soon as he'd sorted all this shit out she was going to be the first on his list of people who he'd deal with. After what seemed like an eternity the tortuous sound of the opposite end of the call ringing out was replaced by a voice heavily distorted by a combination of distance and outdated technology. "Usimanov, it's Blevins." His words was hurried and rushed; they were immediately met with a garbled response in some Slavic language. "Look, I haven't got time for your shit – I have to get the fuck out of here by tomorrow morning…what? What do you mean you can't help me? After everything I've done for you…Listen, you Slavic piece of shit, if you don't help me then I'll…Good, that's better." Blevins looked around himself again, not sure whether the sensation of being watched was real or simply a product of his increasing paranoia. "Right, I'll make my way to Monaco and I'll meet you at the usual place." He slammed the phone down and quickly escaped the cloying confinement of the telephone box before he retched. For the first time in a few days James Blevins could see a light at the end of the tunnel. **** 76 Burrow Street Thursday 4:30 pm Andrew slumped onto the sofa, the sound of the children heading upstairs to get changed ringing in his ears. His limbs felt heavy and numb. The short walk to and from the school had felt like it had taken three times longer than normal. Closing his eyes and leaning his head back against the sofa, he revelled in the momentary lapse into silence. A minute later, Leah popped her head around the doorway. "Are you okay?" "Yeah – just feeling abit tired." She moved across and looked at him. His face was a pale colour yet from where she was standing she could see the beads of sweat on his forehead. Placing the back of her hand against his head she could feel the fever just as he coughed, his chest rattling violently as his eyes shot open. "You're ill." Leah stated as Andrew looked up at her. "No, I'm fine – I'm just abit under the weather." "Bollocks are you." He could tell she was angry. "I told you that you were pushing yourself too hard and not getting enough sleep – now you're run down and you've come down with something." She exited the living room. Upon reaching the kitchen she grabbed a mug and filled it with scalding hot water from the kettle. Then she opened one of the cupboards above the sideboard and pulled out several sachets of varying makes of cold medicine. Looking through the packets, Leah chose one that she knew worked well with Andrew's physiology and poured it into the mug. Before returning to the living room, Leah lifted down a second tub from the back of the top shelf of the cupboard and removed another small tablet. Using the back of the spoon to grind it up, she sprinkled it into the hot liquid. Stirring it as she returned to the living room, she presented it to him. "Drink this." Andrew took the mug from her hands and began to sip from it. "Thanks." Leah sat down next to him, her demeanour softening slightly. The skin beneath his eyes looked dark and sallow, contrasting with his pale complexion. "I've got to go out for a couple of hours tonight to sort out your Christmas present. Will you be okay looking after the kids?" Andrew nodded, and then coughed again. Leah winced as his chest wheezed, sounding like a near-perfect impression of Darth Vader. "That's it; I'm calling your mother. She can come and baby-sit while I'm out." **** The Peters Gallery Thursday 6pm Entering the small, private collectors gallery just off a side street some five minutes away from Oxford Circus, Leah felt slightly out of her depth. Even after years of undercover work and developing a knack for melting into her surroundings, she never truly felt comfortable in an alien environment like this. Several plush sofas were arranged in the centre of the viewing space to afford its patrons the opportunity to view the works on display without the need to strain their necks. Brushing the last few persistent droplets of rain off her coat, Leah took a moment to look at the paintings hanging from the walls. There were several other people inside the viewing space taking stock of the creative works and two young ladies were moving around them, talking to them in an attempt to gauge their interest with the hope of enticing them to part with their money. Nominally they were classed as hostesses, yet the reality was they were simply glorified sales assistants. Good luck with that, Leah thought as she watched one of the hostesses flirting with a young man – much to the chagrin of his female companion. "Mrs Hargreaves, so good to see you!" The overly exuberant voice came from Leah's right. Turning, she saw Hector Peters, the owner and manager of the Peters Gallery, making a beeline straight for her. His garish shirt, white linen trousers and matching loafers reminded her of Robin Williams' character from The Birdcage, an analogy that was completed by his thin moustache and even thinner hairline. As Hector hugged Leah, she realised the other patrons of the gallery were looking at her. "I came as soon as I got your message Mr Peters." Leah replied as Hector relinquished his surprisingly firm grip. "Please, it's Hector, just Hector." He admonished as he took her hand and virtually dragged her towards the rear of the gallery. "I have the Suydam work for you, just as you requested." "Fantastic, and please call me Leah – Mrs Hargreaves makes me sound old." The relief in Leah's voice was evident – this one item had been causing her some considerable heartache and consternation since she had seen it three months ago. Hector presented the framed artwork to her for her inspection. The imagery was exactly as she had hoped – the figure of a classic interpretation of the Dark Knight known as Batman, backlit as he stood at the entrance to his subterranean home, looking outwards of his dwelling surrounded by a swarm of his mammalian namesakes. Looking at the picture she knew that Andrew would enjoy looking at it wherever he hung it. Staring even closer, she could see the brushstrokes on the canvas and the signature of the artist in the bottom right corner. The certificate that came with it confirmed it was the work of one Arthur Suydam. "However, that's not why I called you." Hector's tone was hushed and secretive as he closed the door behind her as she continued to look at the painting, the atmosphere in the enclosed space reminding her of countless briefings she had experienced in the past. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. "What do you mean?" Leah asked. Hector's face was animated and his eyes sparkling. "When it came in I just knew you had to see it before I showed it to anyone else." He moved to the back of the room and lifted up a frame covered in a shroud. Taking a deep breath, Hector pulled the sheet free, revealing the image underneath. Leah gasped. "My god…" "I know – it's wonderful isn't it?" Hector said as she took in the canvas presented to her. The scene etched onto the material was equal parts stark horror and ethereal beauty. The foreground of the painting depicted what looked like a soft, sandy beach – not unlike those Andrew and Leah had encountered on countless holidays. However, the scene playing out on the beach was something far from idyllic or peaceful. The figure was clearly that of a woman, her age undeterminable due to her facing away from the viewer, bound to a wooden stake that had been driven into the ground. The impressions of the muscles in her shoulders were clear to see, obviously as a result of straining against the rope binding her in place in the light of her terrifying predicament. Standing either side of her were cowl-covered acolytes, clearly awaiting something. Beyond the foreground, Leah's eyes took in the sight of scattered clouds and the inky blue star-filled sky beyond breaking through the broken coverage. Striding majestically through the early evening sky was a figure she recognised immediately – vaguely anthropoid, with a skin texture that reminded her of weathered leather, it had a sense of movement and scale that was breathtaking. The wings on the it's back would not have looked out of place on a mythical dragon and the mass of octopus-like tentacles where it's mouth would be only heightened the sense of other-worldliness as it moved through the surf, dominating the painting. A sickly green mist that seemed to froth up around it as it moved, churning the waters beneath it, obscured its feet. Although not clearly visible, the malevolence in its eyes actually made Leah feel distinctly uncomfortable as she looked at the artwork. Leah found herself struggling for words as she took in the visage she recognised as that of Great Cthulhu, rendered in a manner she hadn't thought possible before now. "Andrew would love that..." Leah was almost whispering. "I managed to locate it in a small gallery in Belgium," Hector explained. "The artist is a promising young man by the name of Tegehel – and like all young artists he was inclined to accept my first offer for it. So, to you, I'll sell it for seven fifty." "I'll take it." Hector clasped his hands to his face. "Thank you!" He squealed. "Hector, I have to run another errand before I head home," Leah said. "I was wondering if you could package both of these paintings for me and I could pick them up in about an hour." "Darling, for you, anything is possible." Hector replied as his mind filled with thoughts of a prosperous Christmas. **** 50 Berkeley Square 7:44 pm Stumbling inside his London flat, James Blevins struggled to pull the key free from the front door. Once inside, he brushed the grass from his jacket and trousers that had adhered itself to him as he had climbed over the fence into the communal garden shared by the block of Edwardian buildings. Ensuring he evaded the prying eyes of the sleek black car sitting across the road from his city residence, Blevins had become very familiar with climbing over the fence and into the shared access that ran the length of the properties in this particular section of the homes and offices here. He paused for a minute as the events at Susan Gosling's residence the other day ran through his mind. For a brief moment he felt angered by her betrayal, and then he knew that if he had been in her position he would have done the same thing. He couldn't ask anymore of her – she had done everything she had asked of him and more over the years. Switching on the light in the hallway, he placed his jacket on the rack next to the door and dropped his keys onto the sideboard. Moving swiftly along the hall, he found himself in his study. He knew that he would have precious little time to arrange to leave the country – however he was confident of being able to pull it together tonight. He just needed his passport and a supply of easily liquefiable assets that were kept in his locked desk draw. However slim the chance is of getting out of this shit storm, I have to take it, he thought as he contemplated what the best course of action would be to evade the proverbial watchdogs at the door. Dragging the chair out from behind his desk, he sat down and reached for the light switch of the desk lamp. His finger pressed the small switch into the on position – with no effect. "Don't bother trying it again; it won't work." The words were fluid, soft and very definitely feminine – in direct contrast to the hard metal stub that was pushed into the back of head. "And I wouldn't think about going for the panic alarm under the desk – that was the second thing I disabled in here." "Okay," Blevins replied, trying to remain calm. "Who are you and what do you want?" "Who I am is irrelevant. However, what I am offering you is an opportunity for redemption." The woman's voice stated. A large padded envelope was thrown onto his desk, making a hard, heavy metallic sound as it landed. "That is a complete copy of all the evidence that is about to be presented against you at the Select Committee hearing next week. Witness statements, evidentiary documents, copies of your bank account statements from the last ten years – everything. It would appear that your assistant has been very thorough over the years in collating this sort of information – maybe a little too good if you ask me, but then I think we both know that everyone has their breaking point, right?" There was a pause in the rather one-sided conversation. "I'm sure the threat of deportation to Gambia to face trial for the murder of a journalist would be enough to convince her to co-operate with the Committee's investigation." Blevins swallowed hard, the sweat on his forehead started to creep down his face. "From what I understand, they are looking to formally arrest you tomorrow night – just after your Father gives a speech in the House of Lords supporting the Committee's role in making sure Britain's security services are beyond reproach. I'm sure that will make for some interesting headlines in the Saturday morning newspapers." "So? What's your interest in all this?" He asked – and immediately felt the barrel of the pistol being pushed into his skull again. "Let's just say that I have a personal interest in seeing this matter progressing to the right outcome." There was another pause. "I'm giving you twenty four hours to figure out what you're going to do before I am forced to take matters into my own hands." She said. The directness of the unknown woman's statement convinced Blevins that she was more than capable of pulling the trigger right now – there was a calm resolve about her voice that told him she had killed before. Blevins tried to nod as best as he could. "Either take responsibility for your actions or do the decent thing and save the taxpayer the cost of a long and excessive trial." "I don't suppose I could persuade you to help me get out of the country? I have some friends in Estonia who are more than prepared to shelter me for a short time…" There was a condescending laugh from behind him. "Really Mr Blevins, if your solution to this problem is to try to run away then I'll just bring the deadline forward to tonight if you like." "No, no – that won't be necessary…" Blevins said. He felt the pressure of the gun barrel ease off. "Good evening Mr Blevins – I trust there won't be any need for us to meet again." He saw the figure – clad in dark clothes from head to foot, with a baseball cap pulled down over her facial features – move around the desk. "I'll see myself out." **** As she threw the cap into the boot of her Golf, Leah pulled up carpet covering the access point to the spare tyre. Securing her pistol underneath it, she made sure everything was in place before locking the compartment and returning the covering to its original state. Moving around to the driver's side of the car, she glanced down at her watch. It would be pushing it, but she should be able to get back to the Peters Gallery before Hector closed for the evening. As she opened her door and was about to get in she heard the unmistakeable sound of a single gunshot ringing out from the apartment owned by James Blevins. **** Friday 11:33 am His head lifted up from the pillow and for the first time in a week he didn't feel groggy. Looking around the bedroom he caught sight of the time on the alarm clock. Struggling to lift himself out of bed, he picked up his dressing gown and made his way downstairs. The sound of the radio coming from the kitchen prodded him to head in that general direction. "How long have I been asleep?" Andrew asked as he wandered into the kitchen. "Let's see, you were in bed when I got back last night at half past eight, so probably the best part of fifteen hours." Leah replied with a smile on her face. "The kids wanted to wake you up when I took them to school but you were flat out." "It feels like it too – what did you give me in that drink last night?" Leah chuckled. "Just some Beachams powders." She replied, sounding sheepish. "And…maybe a little something to help you sleep. How are you feeling?" "You drugged me?" Andrew shook his head with a look of amazement on his face. "Well, I feel fantastic." He stretched his arms as Leah scuttled across and hugged him. "It's weird – the last few days just seem like a blur." His gaze drifted across the kitchen. "So, what am I cooking for dinner tonight?" "I thought you could do that quick-fried shredded beef that you do so well." Leah said as she reluctantly relinquished her grip of his body. "I swung by Sainsburys on the way back last night and picked up a few things along with a bottle of wine for your Mom. It's mainly picky bits, finger food, that sort of thing, but I thought it might be a nice change." "Did she say anything to you about what we're doing for Christmas?" Andrew asked. "She said something to me but I was so far out of it last night I can't remember…" the shrill sound of the phone ringing interrupted him. He reached across the unit and pulled the phone free of its base. "Yello…" he whispered to Leah its Bryant. "What? You're shitting me? Seriously, he topped himself? Jesus…well, yeah, I guess you could look at it that way. Sure, sure - you're still on for tonight, right? Okay – I'll see you later." He returned the phone to its base before looking at Leah, his shocked expression clearly displayed. "It seems that Blevins killed himself last nigh – left some sort of note admitting his guilt and apologising to his family for the embarrassment he'd caused them." "Really?" Leah tried to sound genuinely concerned. "I can't say I'm surprised – I'd have put money on it never getting to trial…you know what these people are like when it comes to maintaining the family's honour and all that crap." She walked over and hugged her husband again. "Are you okay honey?" "Yeah, yeah I guess so – it just seems so…" Andrew searched for the words. "So sudden – it's such an anti-climax." "Well, it's funny how things have a way of working out." Leah said, kissing him on the cheek. Andrew looked at her. "You…didn't have anything to do with this…did you?" His question seemed almost hesitant as he asked it. "Me? Of course not – I was busy getting your Christmas presents sorted out last night – your Mom helped me get them in from the car. Oh, that reminds me – you can't go into the garage today." She turned and headed out of the kitchen, pausing for a moment to look back over her shoulder at her husband. "Look, I'm going to take a shower, so if you'd care to join me before we start sorting out dinner…" How I Met Your Mother Ch. 08 How I Met Your Mother: Shattered Glass 76 Burrow Street The low tonal quality of the sound was the most frustrating part of it. The droning noise slowly pierced the veil of sleep, tearing through the fog that surrounded the synaptic relays. Eventually the noise reached a crescendo, forcing her into action. "For God's sake, you're snoring again Andrew." Leah said as she jabbed him in the ribs with her fingers. "Uhmm, what? Sorry." Andrew mumbled as he rolled over in bed. **** New York January She could tell by the way the old waitress behind the counter eyed her that she was worried a health inspector had just walked in. And she should have been, Leah mused as she slid into a booth. The plastic squeaked under her. She wiped the table lightly with a napkin and wished she had waited another freeway exit to find food. The night was sinking in around the windows of the diner, stunted by the harsh orange glow of streetlamps that gave deep shadows to the already unwelcoming visages of the industrial area. It seemed a place where everything and nothing was possible, where the dark could hold your deepest nightmares or the absolute emptiness of solitude. The thought made her bones hurt. She felt as if she were in a transit station for the universe, the only place where one could feel completely alone; yet hold in their hands any ending they desired. Despite the silver lining, she would be glad to get on the road again. The diner sat like an old Formica music box stuffed in a forgotten dark closet of the world, shining unearthly white in the despair. The buzzing of the florescent lights fed her growing anxiety. She eyed a jukebox in the corner but couldn't get her legs to move. The old waitress squeaked over timidly. Clearly intimidated, she flopped a smudgy menu on the tabletop and asked if Leah wanted a beverage. She ordered coffee and the woman scurried off, returning with a beige cup and saucer and a steaming pot. Leah watched her fill it, cleared her throat and ordered the Monte Cristo. Wrinkles formed as the waitress forced a smile, swiped the menu and walked away. Leah watched her behind her coffee cup, a twinkle in her eye and a smirk on her lips. Projection was an amazing attribute of the human mind, she thought. Everywhere she went she became everyone's greatest fear without trying or even knowing what he or she was scared of. She would have been lying if she said she didn't take advantage of it. Leah hadn't had time to appreciate the diner being completely empty; she regretted this when the sound of the tarnished bell echoed off the tile as the front door swung open. She looked up from her black coffee and felt her legs tense. Her hands around the ceramic cup gripped like iron claws. Jaw muscles ached. Yet her face remained painted stoic; unsurprised, unimpressed, and unafraid. The poor old waitress nearly fainted. While it was clear her new arrival wasn't the health inspector, he held even darker promises than her current customer. His leather coat creaked as he stuffed his hands in his pockets and stared across the restaurant at Leah. The mass of facial hair surrounding his face served as a hint at just how long it had been since she saw him last. From the right angle, they appeared as two gunslingers sizing up the enemy before a firefight. Finally he acquiesced. Without any air of defeat, he began to walk over to her booth. He slid across from her without a word, dropping his rough hands on the tabletop and giving her a full once-over with his dark eyes. Leah did her best not to noticeably stiffen when the ends of his lips curled in a nearly invisible smile. Instead, she parried with her own smirk. "Look what the cat dragged in." His smile widened substantially. He scratched an itch on the side of his scruffy visage and seemed to be remembering some old memory as he looked away and continued smiling. He almost looked happy as he appraised her. "You're a hard woman to find." "And I would have been impossible to find had I known you were ghosting me Andrew." She said with a quirked eyebrow. Andrew's smile turned condescending. "Leah, we both knew I would come looking for you." Leah compromised with a nod. "Never underestimate stupidity or insanity, yeah?" His smile faded. She sipped her black coffee as the waitress crept over like a mouse walking through a viper's den. She set the sandwich before Leah and handed the stranger a menu. He gave her one of his most charming smiles that could have melted the coldest heart and asked for a soda. She hurried away. The two remained silent until the soda had arrived. He reminded Leah of a child as he sipped it loudly through a bent white straw. She chastised herself for the sympathy. Andrew man sighed. "So how long have you been after me?" Leah continued to ignore her sandwich, choosing instead to pick at her short nails. "Two or three weeks." She replied. "Where did you put it?" "You mean you don't know?" Andrew answered. "I take it you've looked in all the usual places?" She shrugged and ran her fingertips under her tired eyes. "It's not every day that an agent goes rogue and steals three canisters of experimental CN-20 nerve toxin from a research laboratory, so you can understand that this is a little wider than whatever our issues were." She paused. "Besides, I've had nothing to do with the main operation Andrew. All my information is second hand." Andrew immediately scoffed, slumping into the booth. "Please, Leah. The entirety of the Department is mobilised to track me down and you expect me to believe you had nothing to do with it?" Leah challenged him silently, giving him a look with her deep brown eyes that dared him to find a lick of dishonesty on her face. It was close enough to a signal of submission that Leah felt uncomfortable with her decision. Andrew sat dark and confused, a frown furrowing his brow. He stared at her face, searching intently. He quirked his head finally, tapped his fingers on the tabletop. "I knew it! I bloody knew it! I thought all along you had been behind the search." Leah shook her head softly, long hair shuddering over her shoulders. She entwined her fingers and rested her chin. "Believe me, my involvement was simply peripheral. Besides, you of all people are aware I'm not the only one who considers you a weed in the garden." A cocky smirk crossed Andrew's face, but he shrugged humbly nonetheless as he raised an arm to rest on the back of the booth. "I suppose -- if I'm honest -- I had an inkling that I wasn't exactly considered to be the head boy in our class." Leah picked up her cup and slurped coffee loudly; she found her stomach turning at his ego. She licked her lips and offered bitingly. "So, are you at least going to do me the courtesy of telling me why you did it?" Andrew's face sat unreadable, however the anxious habit of rubbing his silver ring was not lost on Leah. His pride could have smothered them both. However, he managed to do something he hadn't achieved in nearly a decade; he surprised her. Taking his arm down, his voice floated over, in a tone she had not heard him use in what seemed an eternity. "Honestly, the offer was simply too good to pass up." His reply was direct and too the point. "Plus things between us were hardly going swimmingly, so I thought I should start planning ahead, you know, like filling up my retirement fund." Leah flinched; Andrew looked up with pain and met her eyes. The moment was brief; before they both inhaled, they were back on guard with steeled expressions. The waitress made a timid appearance to refill their drinks. Leah was grateful for the interruption. After she vacated, Andrew sighed dramatically and leaned his forearms on the table, "Well, seeing as I'm now a marked man I suppose I should count my blessings that you agreed to meet -- once more for old times sake." He looked around the diner. "I suppose it's too late to roll back the clock?" "Just a little." Leah agreed sarcastically with a sip of coffee. Andrew's eyes hardened; he hadn't expected a fight. "So, does the condemned man get a last request?" Unabashedly, Leah's harsh laugh ripped into the air. "What? Let me guess, you want me to call them off?" "Bingo!" He relaxed confidently and sucked down soda. She shook her head, incredulous, holding her coffee above the table. "That's not going to happen." He acted as if he'd expected her answer. "C'mon, Leah. I know you've got more power over there than even you will admit. Pull some strings and get this whole thing dropped." "You've got to be kidding me, Andrew." "We both know you would be miserable with me dead." The dark humour fell like a stone. The line was a slice through her heart, and an ignition of long-lingering animosity. Immediately Andrew's eyes betrayed his worry that he made a mistake, however brief the thought was. He didn't waiver again, but sat cocky and calm, half a grin threatening the borders of his lips. "Who else would you have to chase around the globe after I'm gone?" The air hung thick with murderous lust. Leah bored daggers into him, embers burning in her gaze. He held it steadily. She attempted to swallow her rage with a sip of coffee. "I'm not calling this thing off, Andrew," She hissed tersely in a voice that sounded not her own. "Sleep in the bed you made." The metaphor seemed to amuse him. "The bed you almost slept in next to me?" Leah rolled her eyes and shook her head. "You never quit, do you? That card no longer grants you the upper hand, Andrew. In order for that to work, I would have to give a shit." "And we both know you do." "Then you've got your head up your ass." Andrew's face darkened, and it was clear the plan in his head had a much different outcome. He leaned forward on the table and lowered his voice. "I made you what you are, Leah. You almost joined my side, remember? You were ready to drop everything and travel the world, killing with me. You would have done anything for me. I'm sure your employers would be none too pleased to know how close you came to becoming one they would be hunting." Leah scoffed. "Are you blackmailing me?" When he didn't answer, but remained staring, she laughed again. "My dear Andrew; desperation does not become you." "You think I won't do it?" "Not at all; I'm sure you would. The key to blackmail, however, is that you actually have something to leverage against me. Which you don't." "Oh, so telling that fat, fascist prick of a boss you almost became a contract killer isn't leverage? What, are you fucking Benedict now?" Andrew spat. His remark earned another eye-roll. "You presume, dear, that they don't already know." "Bullshit." She shrugged flippantly. "Try it and see, then." Andrew fell silent. His jaw clenched in anger. He pushed his index finger on the table like a pointer, as if to validate his words. "You're a hypocrite, Leah. You were almost there, becoming me, and now you hunt me like you're the mighty hammer of God. You're no different than me. You kill just the same as I do." "Almost isn't close enough Andrew. And now I spend my life doing what I was meant to: taking down people like you. In the end, we both sleep well at night, and that's really what matters isn't it?" Her tone rang bitter and merciless as she dropped her coffee cup into the saucer loudly. "So self-righteous, aren't you? Tell me then, why are we talking? Why haven't you pulled your piece and blown me away?" Leah hesitated. A telling shadow flickered over her face. She looked away from his stare and out into the night, watching a cat skirt around a building corner. "I came here to warn you -- to tell you that it's not too late to turn yourself in." Andrew could see her swallowing hard. "That's the reason I asked to meet you" It was Andrew's turn to laugh out loud. He slumped back in the booth. "You're a fucking piece of work." Leah recovered quickly, a sarcastic glint in her eyes. They both knew she had the upper hand, despite her not using opportunity to take him out. It was he who was the weaker at this moment; he, the dark stranger able to flip his conscience off like a switch who was now more or less begging for his life, and from someone whose strength he continually misjudged. The thought enraged his entire being; this was not a man accustomed to being below anyone, much less his former student. Andrew slowly began to lose control. So he attacked the only part of her he could think of as vulnerable. "It's not my fault you loved me, you know." He suddenly blurted. "It's not my fault you got your heart broken. One cannot deny the very nature of their essence." Leah swallowed laboriously, but scoffed with a dangerous half smirk. "I don't need a history lesson. And in this instance it's irrelevant. If I wanted to avenge the years you took from me, you'd have been dead long before now." He sneered, a gesture to show his disbelief at such a possibility. "And yet you will do nothing to stop these others from coming after me. The gun might as well be in your hand." "No, Andrew. I won't stop them, but I won't help them either. This matter has nothing to do with me. I'm not saving you this time." The finality in her voice startled them both. "What about your men? I don't exactly have a reputation for throwing tea parties. You wouldn't save them from a fate they will most likely be given for coming after me?" Andrew countered. Leah smirked disgustedly at his arrogance. "They took the job with full knowledge of its risks. They're grown-ups, they made their own decisions." "So Saint Leah washes her hands of the entire affair?" "Now you're getting it." Andrew paused, flustered. He clenched his jaw and looked out the window, watching a truck lumber by in the inky night. Pain and hatred clawed at his mind, and he felt his heart begin to beat faster. He didn't know if he could break her. Andrew turned back to Leah and locked her stare with black eyes. He leaned over the table towards her, painfully slow, like a panther stalking his prey. He said in a voice icy enough to freeze rivers. "You know I could kill you any time I wanted." Leah didn't blink, didn't waver. But her face softened as she answered him truthfully. "Probably, yes." Her answer forced Andrew to swallow, to hesitate. He was silent for a long moment. "You're the only person I've ever known who isn't afraid of that threat from me." His cracked voice betrayed his confusion that rode the reverberations unguarded. Leah considered, her expression revealing, but without shame, "I suppose that comes from the satisfaction of knowing that even if you kill me, one day, someone else will kill you too." She took a sip of coffee and added, "If they haven't already." Andrew blinked. He felt the heat of flush rising in his face, heard his leather jacket creak under his weighted breathing. There were secrets in her words for no one else but him; secrets hidden behind semantics. Literal death did not suit the blow she was delivering; she was the messenger for something larger, for an oracle long gone from their world. It simultaneously infuriated him and saddened him to the brink of depression. Leah watched him, jaw tensed tight and threatening. She gave not an inch. Her cold demeanour was unmistakable and not even the sight of his tear-wrapped eyes could thaw her. Pride at her own strength ran like warm poison through her veins. Andrew finally dropped her stare. He suppressed a shudder as the realization of hopelessness travelled through him. Like a devil whispering in his ear, he could feel the cold butt of his .357 Magnum pushing into his ribs. His fingers itched at the temptation, but he couldn't force his hand to move as soon as he looked back at Leah's makeup-less face, watching him like the numb little girl waiting to be hit by her father. He swallowed and looked down, resigned. He reached in his other pocket, away from his weapon; he watched Leah tense immediately, unlocking her gun from its holster behind her back with smooth fluidity. He looked into her eyes calmly as he placed a large folded black knife on the table between them. She recognized it as one he'd had for years, but could not recall where he got it. She eyed him questioningly. Andrew finished the last of his soda with a loud slurp and rose from the booth. Leah still had a hand on her back, ready to draw. She eased it as he zipped up his jacket. He dug into his pockets and fished out some tarnished quarters. He jingled them in his hand and looked down at the knife, and then back to her. "If you kill me," Andrew said in a dark velvet voice. "Bury the knife with me. But if I kill you first, I'll be taking it back with me." He left the door to her imagination wide open and exited hauntingly with lost remnants of his dignity. Leah looked down at the blade, and its flowing silver inlay. His eyes seemed to reflect its brilliance from somewhere deep within, as she looked back up to him and nodded. He returned it gently and shuffled off. She watched his broad shoulders and shiny hair as he stopped at the jukebox and slid the quarters in with a clanking noise. He mashed the old buttons down and stuffed his hands in his pockets. Turning for the door, he gave her one last look from across the diner, then put his head down and disappeared into the concrete night. Leah picked up the knife and held its contours in her hand. Pink Floyd's Comfortably Numb began to float muffled from the jukebox. She couldn't hide her quiet laugh, and couldn't help the weight of sadness that drifted down on her from somewhere far away. It was heavier than the weight of the knife as she dropped it into her coat pocket, knowing full well she may have just sent the Grim Reaper his invitation. The song was halfway through before she remembered her sandwich. It had already grown cold and hard; but so had her stomach. Her appetite would be gone for some time. She stuffed a ten-dollar bill under her coffee cup and, gripping the thick blade in her jacket pocket, stood from her table. She couldn't see the waitress anywhere as she pushed open the glass doors and heard the tired bell ring above her. He watched her slip into her car from a dark alley down the street. She pretended she didn't see him. **** Sitting in the business class departure lounge at JFK Airport, Leah found herself tapping her foot nervously. The meeting with Andrew hadn't gone how she'd wanted it too and now she knew that things between them were only going to play out one way. With one -- or both of them -- dead. Did she really expect he'd just turn up and then turn himself in? Leah thought as she picked up a copy of National Geographic that was lying on the seat next to her, she felt the familiar buzz of her cell phone ringing in her jacket pocket. Sliding it out of the confines of its semi-permanent home, Leah scowled as she saw the name Benedict flashing up. "Even on another continent I can't seem to get away from you." She hissed. "What do you want boss?" Even over a crackling cell phone connection her dismissive tone would be clear for him to hear. "Enough with the pleasantries Bennett," Benedict retorted. "I need you back in Manhattan -- our American colleagues need your unique...skills to resolve a small problem they have." "Let me guess -- that prick Spencer has managed to screw something up again right?" "I don't have the details -- however he's waiting for you at the Hilton in Manhattan. I suggest you get there as soon as you can." The line went dead a moment after Benedict has finished speaking. Leah sighed as she dropped the phone back into her jacket pocket. She approached the check in desk and gestured to the company representative sitting behind it. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 08 "I need to re-arrange my flight details..." **** "I still don't understand why you need me." It was the third time she'd asked this question and as of yet Leah still hadn't received a satisfactory answer. There was always something about Elliot Spencer that made Leah feel uneasy around him. Whether it was the half-hearted yet predictably laughable attempts to charm her into his bed, the obscenely expensive suits he had a liking for or the fact that he seemed to have an inverted Midas touch when it came to matters of intelligence, she wasn't sure -- however her only extensive dealings with him had invariably resulted in people ending up dead. Somehow -- perhaps in spite of his apparent incompetence -- this man was now the East Coast director for the NSA's counter-terrorism operations. After nearly a decade of screwing up operations within the CIA and costing at least a dozen agents their lives -- none of which could be directly connected to Spencer's inept organisation skills -- Leah marvelled at how he had also developed a clearly Teflon-like coating to his career in recent years. Sitting in the passenger seat of a black Cadillac that was absorbed by the shadows of a small alley in a back street of a particularly run down area of Brooklyn, Leah found herself listening to Elliot's explanation as to what it was they were doing there. "I need to maintain an air of plausible deniability about what's going on here; specifically as to what's going on in apartment 6C on the third floor of that building across the street." He gestured towards one of the Brownstone buildings opposite them. Compared to many of its companions it was still in serviceable condition, albeit it had seen better days. "We received intelligence that the occupants of the apartment are working on building some liquid explosive devices for some sort of airplane hijacking plot." "You think it's an Al-Khayal cell up there?" Leah asked. Elliot shrugged his shoulders. "Either them or some dissident East European group looking to re-ignite the Cold War." He paused for a moment to light a cigarette. "Does it matter which of them it is?" "Not really." Leah sighed as she grasped the handle of the passenger door. "I just like to have an idea as to what sort of a hornet's nest I might be walking into." Getting out of the car and making her way across the street, she instinctively clung to the shadows between the pools of light created by the streetlights. Trying to shake the malaise she felt from earlier in the evening, Leah subconsciously moved her hand to the holster located on the back of her belt, taking comfort from the butt of the Glock that nestled there. By the time she had reached the third floor apartment, her sense of unease had grown. The first and second floors had contained the usual sort of human flotsam and jetsam that she had anticipated with this type of run down urban environment; clear indications of local gang affiliations and open evidence of the sale and use of illegal narcotics; yet by the time she had ventured onto the third floor everything felt different. The atmosphere of the floor was unusually quiet compared to that of the others -- the tone seems hushed, reverent even, almost as if everyone was waiting for the coming storm to erupt with baited breath. Standing at the edge of the door of apartment 6C, Leah braced herself for a moment before realising that the handle had been crudely damaged and the door was actually open. Carefully pushing the door open and stepping inside the poorly lit room with her pistol pushed out ahead of her, Leah found herself confronted with the sight of two bodies in the centre of the living space. Noting the blood as it pooled out from under them -- courtesy of several large calibre gunshot wounds in each of them -- she heard something at the periphery of her hearing that caused her to turn to her right. Even before she had consciously registered what was happening a black clad figure lurched out at her from the doorway to the kitchen. A foot kicked out, sending Leah's Glock spiralling away from her and a moment later a small fist struck her in the jaw. Spinning away from the blow as best as possible, Leah tried to focus on her attacker as she felt the blood flow from her lip. The swirling figure -- which Leah realised was unmistakeably female in an all in one black body suit with just green visors covering the eyes -- almost looked like it was dancing as it moved towards her. A powerful kick struck her in the chest; Leah could feel something inside her chest tear, possibly muscle or sinew perhaps; maybe a cracked rib she thought as she ducked beneath another leg arcing through the space her head had just occupied. Dodging the flailing legs and fists of her masked opponent for as long as she could and trying to take up as best a defensive position as she could muster, Leah managed to catch one of her legs for just long enough to allow her to drive her knee into the woman's stomach. Doubled over, Leah then gripped the back of the woman's mask -- the material felt smooth, almost slippery to the touch -- to enable her to hold her head in place as she steadied herself to power her knee into her assailants face. The sound of bone and plastic breaking was mixed with the muffed cry of pain from the body-suited individual. She reared backwards, just in time to place herself in the perfect position for Leah as she spun around on her heels, kicking her foe in the face. As she slammed up against a mirror adorning the far wall of the cramped apartment, Leah swept in for the kill; driving the stiffened fingers of her right hand into the woman's throat in a beak-like shape, her opponent's bloodied eyes went wide with fear. Her body then slumped to the floor, twitching several times before becoming still. Leah took a moment to compose herself. After she wiped the blood from her lip she scouted around the apartment. Fifteen nearly fruitless minutes later she found what she was looking for -- a small metal briefcase stashed in the back of a cupboard of cleaning products in the kitchen. Smiling grimly as she made to leave the apartment, she stopped to pick up her pistol before leaving the room and securing the door as best as she could. **** The look of surprised on Elliot Spencer's face was timeless as the drivers door of the Cadillac opened and a metal briefcase was dropped onto his lap. His mouth opened and closed like a fish for a minute before Leah got in the other side. "I don't know about you, but the contents of that case look like the beginnings of a suitcase-sized dirty bomb." She said as she slammed the door behind her. "Minus the nuclear payload of course. Oh, and I wasn't the only person in that apartment who was interested in that." "What? Who...?" "No idea." Leah cut Elliot off, pulling down the small mirror on the sun visor to examine the cut on her lip. "But your clean-up crew will find three bodies rather than two in the room that need to be identified." Elliot looked dumb struck. "I...I don't know what to say..." "You can start with thank you." Leah replied. "Now, get me back to JFK -- my flight leaves in just over an hour and I want to get drunk in the bar before take off." **** 76 Burrow Street Pain flooded through his leg. The sensation of blades piercing his flesh dragged him screaming from his sleep as each one tore through the soft membrane and struck nerve endings with blunt disregard for his own well being. Eyes open and alert, he looked down and saw a small, orange shape gripping his shin. "Jesus Oliver...you scared the shit out of me." Andrew muttered as he scooped the kitten up in his hands. The small feline creature immediately began to purr as he stroked her. "Come on, you're going back into the kid's room..." **** Greece July She had run to Greece. He wasn't surprised; it was a routine she had developed as a coping mechanism after a botched job. Her last mission in Berlin had gone wrong on levels that very few people could comprehend and her first -- her only -- instinct was to run. The bodies of colleagues were still cooling in the morgue by the time she had boarded the first flight out of Germany. In a strange way though, she always seemed more at home in Europe than anywhere else in the world. Something in her bones was very old, and hadn't yet shed the dusty centuries of her ancestors. It was one of the things her eyes could never hide -- and it was something Andrew was counting on for his plan to work. For weeks he watched her live a leisurely dream in the cobblestone streets and olive groves of this sun-drenched coastal town. Even though she left the modest villa every day, she didn't do much: Maybe a walk through town, a beer on the beach, the occasional adventurous meal on top of a long-disused Catholic mission. The local bookstore was her only constant routine. Her training served her well. Even on holiday, she instinctively kept her paths hard to trace. But he waited out the weeks with patience, not too proud to admit he was enjoying himself in this Mediterranean paradise. While not endless, he did have time enough. His opportunity presented itself almost entirely by chance. He figured it was a sign of fate, and so took it. Taking a break from surveillance, he'd ducked into a comfortable little bistro for dinner, one busy enough that his presence would go unnoticed. And just after placing his order, Leah walked through the door with the same idea. The waiter seated her at a table near the large front window. Andrew was nearer the kitchen, facing the opposite wall, and thankfully under a burnt-out light bulb. He was certain she hadn't seen him. After the waiter took her order, Andrew immediately flagged him over for a refill of water. He sneaked a glance at the waiter's notepad nestled on the tray he carried, to see what Leah had ordered. The waiter refilled the glass and retreated to the kitchen, and Andrew fished a small paper envelope from a pocket up his sleeve. He palmed a white pill the size of a pupil, and when the waiter emerged, again Andrew called him over. He pointed out some random menu item and barraged the man with questions about the ingredients while his other hand silently dropped the pill into the small white teacup. The teacup and metal pot were served to Leah minutes later. Andrew watched with careful eyes as she smiled and thanked the waiter. For a moment she started, and then leaned to her purse on the floor and scooped out her phone. She read something, put the phone down, and poured her tea. Leah finished a full cup, and as she refilled, Andrew paid his bill and skirted out into the sinking night. She went home directly after her meal. From his perch on the roof of the villa next door, Andrew watched her fumble with her keys to get in the front door. There was a flash of light, and she reappeared in his limited view of the kitchen, pouring herself a glass of wine. Then she gathered up a bundle of fabric and sewing tools and moved upstairs to her bedroom. After opening the glass doors of her balcony to let in the warm summer air, she settled at an old table to repair a few pieces of clothing. Andrew readjusted his positioning to make sure the chimneys behind him blocked his silhouette. The moon shone full and accusing this summer night, and one glance of his crouched figure in the dark would ruin the entire month's work. He barely blinked, watching her, waiting for the sedative to take effect. After half an hour, it was obvious Leah was fighting sleep; twice she dropped her sewing to the floor as she nodded off. She fought for another ten minutes before finally pushing the work aside and switching her lamp off. The wine she poured remained untouched as she climbed into bed and all went still. Andrew waited another half an hour; to be sure she fell absolutely asleep. Then he dropped from the neighbouring roof and silently slithered his way up to the balcony off Leah's bedroom. In her drug-induced state, she had even left the French doors open for him. In the dark of her room, he padded his way over to the bed and, holding back his long black hair, he bent over her face. Her breathing came deep and steady, with an occasional snore escaping her open mouth. At this distance, he could smell her sweat laced with the flowery soap she used in the shower. Heat floated off of her, as if she were some fallen, dying star. The familiar sensations drowned him in memories he'd worked hard to bury. Memories that wanted to suck him in like quicksand. Andrew straightened and watched her quiet face for a moment. Then, and without thinking about it, he pulled the cool sheets up over her still-dressed body. Leah didn't stir. He began his search in her little office downstairs, but came up empty. She hadn't even unpacked her laptop the entire trip, so he knew that was a waste of time. He searched the kitchen and modestly furnished living room, and found nothing. Then he came back upstairs to try the spare bedroom. She had stored boxes in the closet here that she never came in to open. It was a long shot, but Andrew began anyway, yanking the first box from the closet and hauling it across the room to a bureau that came to his chest level. He had to know what she knew; how much she had gleaned since their meeting in New York all those months ago; how close she was to discovering the truth. He had the lid off the box when he felt the cold kiss of steel against the bones of his neck. Were it not for his finely tuned instincts, he would have turned right around to investigate and slashed his own jugular on the blade. Instead, he stiffened but did not jerk, and in another heartbeat a matching blade caressed his windpipe. Any move he made could be fatal, and he hadn't even heard anyone approach. "Have you lost your fucking mind?" A dangerous whisper flowed in his ear like angry poison. So furious was the voice that Andrew did not right away realize it was Leah. His eyes widened as the scent of flowers drifted closer. "It would seem so," came his knee-jerk reply. He raised his hands slowly and placed them on the bureau, where she could see them. "What the fuck are you doing in my house?" She pressed on the front blade with a deadly promise. Andrew didn't answer. "What the fuck are you doing awake?" He knew instantly that it was the wrong answer. Leah put vengeful pressure on both blades now, and pain screamed down his spine. "You think I didn't notice you in that restaurant? Like you become less visible in proportion to your fucking ego?" Andrew blanched. He replayed the dinner in his mind. No, she couldn't have! Not once had she even glanced his direction. And then he groaned in realization: the cell phone. It was a distraction. With one hand she pretended to read a text, and with the other, she had dumped the pill. He had fallen for his own scam. "Well, I did think that, yes. I suppose it was a pet theory at best." "You son of a -..." It worked. Her anger gave him a sliver-thin window and Andrew took it. In a flash he wrapped a powerful hand around the wrist with the dagger at his throat and twisted hard. At the same time he popped his right elbow back and made contact with Leah's face. She hollered in pain and twisted to her knees; one knife clattered to the floor, and she swung wildly with the other. Andrew leapt back to avoid the blade. With the toe of his boot he spun the loose knife around and dove for its handle and for Leah. Before she could climb to her feet, he had her pinned on the hardwood floor with a blade dangling over her face. Her forehead dripped blood from the crack with his elbow, and even with both hands clamped on his thick wrist, she was losing the battle; her arms shook from the effort to keep his hand with the blade away. She gritted her teeth and looked up through his dark hair, at the pain and blackness in his eyes, at the tears barely kept at bay. He met her eyes suddenly, in surprise, and immediately he knew it was a mistake. Look at her blazing eyes distracted him enough that Leah gained the leverage to free a hand and reach for the blade on her thigh. Andrew screamed as he felt the small, sharp blade bury itself in the meat of his hip. The pain charged through him and he writhed off her, dropping the knife. Leah scurried to her feet and retreated to the other side of the room with her back to the wall and knives at her front. Andrew pushed upright and examined the wound. The cut was deep, but nothing stitches wouldn't fix. He tried to slow his clamouring heart and painful breathing. Leah, perched like a cat trapped in a corner, eyed him as her breath too came in quick, shallow spurts. Sweat and blood dripped from her face. "You should have killed me," said Andrew. "What makes you think I won't?" said Leah. He bent at the waist, hands on his knees, as a nauseating wave of pain shot through his muscles. He shook his head and stood up again. "You won't -- despite your public protestations; you don't have it in you." "Fuck you, Andrew. What the fuck are you doing here?" She twisted the knife, and a glint of dim moonlight danced across the room. "Keeping an eye on you." She straightened again and her eyes blazed, ready for another fight. "Keeping an eye on me? How dare you!" "It's strictly self-defence, honey. Don't flatter yourself." Leah's face flared with rage. She took a step forward. "Watch your mouth, you bastard, or I'll cut that silver tongue out of your face." As sweet oxygen rushed his lungs, Andrew realized he'd get nowhere keeping her anger at a boiling point. Hard as it was, he had to reign his spitfire words in, or this night would end even worse than events were already promising. "Remember, I told you I would be coming back for my knife." "You haven't killed me yet; you haven't earned it back." She laughed with caustic tone. "And anyway, it just gave you a kiss hello." Andrew frowned and eyed her right hand; it was his knife. His knife soaked in his blood. He cursed. "If ever I needed a bad omen..." "I'm not going to ask you again, Andrew. Tell me what you are doing here." She wasn't going to let him leave and she had a direct line to contingent agents stationed in this region. She would either kill him or release the hounds on him were he to escape. He'd lost his upper hand. Andrew cursed again and finally dropped the knife he still held. He paced to the window and back again. "You need to back off -- they know about you, the Russians. If you keep on following me then you and your team are going to get hurt. I'm trying to save your life! That's what I'm doing here, Leah!" Leah eyed him in suspicion, and it melted into a hurt frown as she lowered the knives and straightened. "They know about the red flag that's been raised against me." He looked at her, cocking one eyebrow slightly. "You think I'm feeding them Intel?" The shock was clear for him to hear in her voice. "They're getting nervous, Leah. That makes them unpredictable and extremely dangerous. They're liable to shoot first and ask questions later." Something wild lit up in Leah's eyes; almost a wild fear, Andrew thought. Like a mama bear that knows her cubs are playing too close to a rushing river. However her face remained cold. "So, you think someone has sold you out?" He nodded. "Look, my information on your habits is years old. If you ask me, you're paranoid." "Well, don't say I didn't warn you." Andrew added. Neither of them spoke for a moment. "So what would you like me to do now, Andrew?" said Leah with a dramatic shrug. "Just let you waltz out of here with a 'good night, sleep tight'?" "Pretty much, yeah, that's exactly what I'd like you to do." Leah put her hands on her hips and scowled. "You know that isn't going to happen." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 08 "Look, you got me, alright? I fucked up. You win this one. I'll leave this town tonight and you'll never see me again." He straightened up. "Just keep away from the Russians." Andrew's chest ached. He watched her there, hunched in the pale moonlight, her long hair amiss from the struggle. The blood from her head had dried and crusted along the edge of her face. She looked like a sad little girl. It was an astute reflection of the night's fates crossing, a dark little tragedy played out for the starry Greek sky. All along he'd known what had really brought him here, to Greece, to her. Every step he took down the cobblestone streets had been a lie. Every note jotted down and bribe paid out to a willing store clerk or beachcomber had been to shade himself from the expanding light of reality that could not be forever ignored. And what had he done? Where had his gentle lies taken him? To their collective ruin? "If only you'd stayed with me..." He lamented to the darkness above her head. "At least our kind stab you in the front." He heard a quiet chuckle from her. "You never quit, do you? Will I never be absolved of this?" "I suppose it's not the kind of thing one lives down," said Andrew. "Everyone stinks of some eternal sin." "You're the only one who can smell mine, and yet I can't seem to escape from you." Andrew looked at Leah now, with that rare shadow in his eyes. "No, you can't." Leah met his eyes with her own fire. Whatever tears had been threatening were now disappeared, and with speed that again surprised him, she was on her feet with a blade driving into his gut, a hair's breadth from piercing flesh and organ. Andrew gasped, a sharp breath, and stared her in the eyes. He had slipped into striking range without even realizing it. "I know one certain way to escape you, Andrew." her voice came out again in an angry hiss. Despite himself, his heart galloped in his chest. "Indeed, the only certain way." His voice wavered. "You've impeded my life since the day you tossed me aside. Have you no decency? What more would you do to me before you're fully satisfied that my life is in shambles, just like yours?" Still Leah whispered, as if afraid the universe at large would mistake her desperation for prayers. Andrew blinked at her, and pain crossed his face. "Why can't you leave me be?" Leah pleaded. Suddenly the knife at his gut seemed a small nuisance. "Is that really what you want, Leah? Not once in all my sudden visits have you ever made move to arrest or kill me. You could have been rid of me dozens of times by now." He lowered his head now, hovering his face over hers. "But you haven't done it. Because you don't really want me to leave you alone." Leah's face twitched, but she kept her eyes strong on his. He thought he saw her lip quiver. "Not wanting you around doesn't equate to wanting you dead." Strong words, but her voice trembled. She wanted to mean it, badly. "I've seen you kill without conscience or pause. Never cold feet." "You weren't in my head." "Oh yes, I was." His face drew closer. "You never showed hesitation. And you can't even seriously injure me without losing sleep." Her mouth clenched. "Keep talking and that may change quickly." "Come with me, Leah." Leah missed a step, and her eyes widened. "What did you say?" "Let's get out of here tonight. The two of us can handle whatever the outside world throws at us. Leave the Department behind and come with me." "You are fucking insane," she said, and now tears popped from her eyes. "I'm not leaving with you." "You can never go back, you know that. One photo of this moment right here, and one more of me leaving with all limbs attached, and that rat bastard Benedict will have you ousted. Maybe even thrown in The Glasshouse for good measure. This will not end well unless you come with me." "I hate you, Andrew. I want nothing to do with you." The knife at his gut was shaking. With doom waiting in the close night, his restraint had dissolved. Andrew wrapped his hands on either side of her face and smashed his lips on hers, kissing her with forceful passion. Leah let loose a muffled yelp and the knife between them fell limp, and it was all she could do to keep from wrapping herself around his body, much less keep from kissing him in return. When he finally released her, her face was stained with tears, her lips swollen and red. "Come with me," begged Andrew with his dark, teary eyes. "We both know you never stopped loving me. Come back to me." Leah had stopped trembling, her face dissolved into a mask of wet pain. She flicked her wrist and brought the knife back to attention. "I never loved you." Pain struck Andrew's face, but he didn't take the bait; not entirely, he assured his racing heart. "You know something, Leah? You can give yourself airs about your strength and your resilience till kingdom come. You can fall asleep every night dreaming of the day your righteous anger is fully rewarded, and pat yourself on the back for your painful journey. But you will regret one day. You'll regret all the truths you never got to tell, the truths that make your heart scream in pain just keeping the secret. And then you will remember this night, when you had your last chance, and your life will feel meaningless." Andrew stalked away from her and wandered through the shadows to the nearest window with view of the street. He watched silently, waiting for movement in the darkness to reveal those that hunted him. Leah's armour of anger had returned. She straightened and with dried eyes folded Andrew's pocketknife with the delicate silver-swirl inlays on its handle. She gave no warning before tossing it at him from across the darkened room. Andrew caught it in his open left palm. He looked to her soulful eyes in their swollen sockets. "I suppose I can always leave those little truths in my will," she said. "And then I don't have to regret anything." Eyes on the street, Andrew's back stiffened at her words. He felt a bitter, painful acid race down his throat. "I always believed that if someone didn't have the balls to say something in life, they have no goddamn right to say it in death." And before she could respond, Andrew dropped out of her window and into the inky summer night. From the dark house, Leah watched and waited until he had cleared her property. By now, he either thought he was terribly clever, or he had realized she was bluffing about the Intel that she had authorised to be leaked. Either way, it was unlikely he would discover the planted tracker in the handle of the knife. As she sank to the floor, a little truth washed over Leah, and she cried. **** 76 Burrow Street The pitter-patter of rain striking the bedroom window was repetitive, monotonous almost. She rolled over in the bed, facing towards the prone form of her husband as her eyes opened slightly. He was nearly motionless for the moment, the steady rise and fall of his chest the only noticeable sign of life. A smile drifted across her face as she moulded herself into his body; placing her head on his chest and feeling the soft embrace of sleep slowly claiming her. **** Prague December "Are you sure?" The question made Leah scowl. Had it been anyone other than Alison asking then it would have been met with the contempt it deserved. "I mean it could have been just a random..." "What? That someone would break into my apartment and do nothing other than leave me a note with a set of GPS co-ordinates that happen to lead us to this run down industrial estate on the eastern arm of the Czech capital?" She spat. "Of course it was Andrew -- who else could it be? Plus the bastard had been rifling through my wardrobe as well." "I was just asking." Alison said as they waited in the darkness. "Are the others in place?" "Moore, Connery and Lazenby are waiting for our signal." Leah replied. "The locals have been informed to move in if we get involved in any sort of protracted engagement." "Funny, that reminds me of my relationship with Eric." Alison mused. "So, how long do we wait here?" "For as long as we need to." Leah replied, tapping her fingers on the dashboard and staring intently at the run down buildings that were below them. **** Everything had gone wrong. As the sound of bullets whizzed past the metal crate she was crouched behind, Leah inwardly berated herself for allowing things to get out of hand. Shortly after observing Andrew arrive, then watching him being joined by a black SUV full of what were clearly ex-Soviet military types, they had waited until the electronic surveillance equipment had given them enough evidence to proceed. However, neither Leah nor Alison had allowed for the tenacity of the Russians when it came to holding their ground in a firefight. Moore had been the first to fall; cut down in a hail of automatic small-arms fire when they had entered the building. In the confusion of several thunder-flash grenades going off they had lost track of Andrew and his purchaser -- a rather burly looking man who looked like his best days were well behind him -- as they fled into the disused warehouse. Connery and Lazenby had then both been taken out by what Leah could only surmise had been the explosive blast from a hand grenade. Alison had retaliated by placing several well-aimed shots into the fuel tank of the SUV -- generating a ball of fire and three scorched bodies. She gripped the pistol in her right hand and pushed off against the impromptu cover, breaking into a run and firing blindly into the air to try and generate a momentary opening to allow her to move across the sparse interior of the warehouse without getting shot. Sliding on her knees for the last ten feet, the sound of bullets sizzling through the air around her, Leah found herself crouching beside the remnants of an old industrial hot water boiler. Her breathing was hard and rapid, mirroring her heartbeat as she tried to focus. Taking a moment to reload her firearm, she glanced around the edge of the metal façade. Through the haze of the air Leah noticed two figures scurrying away from the fire fight up a set of rickety looking metal stairs to the first floor -- one of them was unmistakeably Andrew whilst the other resembled a former KGB officer she knew by the name of Annenskij who had long been considered a prime mover and shaker within the Russian Mafia. Noticing that the Russian was carrying a steel briefcase in his hands, she realised that the contents was, in all likelihood, the three canisters of CN-20 that Andrew had stolen nearly a year ago. Ducking back down behind the metal construct as several further bullets ricocheted off it, she cursed the fact that she'd failed to apprehend them. "Evening!" Alison's flippant comment heralded her arrival behind the boiler in a similar manner to Leah. "Turned out nice again, hasn't it!" She said. Leah nodded. "So, I noticed Andrew and his somewhat rotund Russian friend have scampered to the first floor. Do you want to take them or shall I?" "Like you have to ask." Leah responded grimly. "Okay, one order of covering fire coming up then!" Alison gleefully said. Poking her head around the boiler for a moment she then opened fire at the two remaining members of the Russian's entourage. Leah took advantage of the opening, running low across the warehouse floor as Alison's repetitive and unnervingly accurate covering fire raked the side of the oversized iron radiator they were hiding behind. Reaching the stairs with a few moments to spare, she began clearing them two at a time, quickly reaching the first floor. Pausing for a moment as she tried to blot out the sound of the gunfire downstairs, she carefully peeked around the edge the first floor landing and straight into what appeared to be the shell of an office. Advancing through the room and exiting it on to a sheltered corridor, Leah found herself faced with a series of small rooms leading off it at regular intervals. Checking each one as best as she could, she knew it was taking her longer to sweep through the first floor than it should; yet if she failed to do so, she would leave herself open to the possibility of walking right past Andrew or his Russian contact. By the time she had checked the third room she was already growing impatient. As she turned her back on the room and prepared to check the fourth and final room she heard the unmistakeable sound of two male voices in the middle distance, accompanied by the noise of a door being kicked open. Breaking into a run, Leah scurried along the corridor, eventually finding herself at the flapping door of the building's fire exit. Advancing outside and scrambling up the stairs, she could see two figures making their way across the roof. Blam! Blam! Her two shots were intended to get their attention -- something they achieved with ease. Both of the figures stopped dead in their tracks as Leah moved towards them. "Get down on the ground!" She hollered -- hoping they both realised that she held the upper hand at the moment. Gesturing towards the Russian, she added. "Throw the briefcase towards me and..." Before she could finish the sentence, the Russian had dived behind Andrew with alarming speed, knocking him to the floor and discarding the briefcase as he skittered behind a large metal water container -- one of several structures atop of the abandoned warehouse. Prevented from shooting by something inside her she didn't want to acknowledge, Leah ran over to Andrew -- who was now getting back to his feet. "Slippery little critter isn't he." He said as he found himself looking up into the barrel of Leah's Glock. "Tell me why I shouldn't put a bullet in your head right now?" She hissed, irritated by his cocky smile. "Because, right now, our chubby little Russian friend is probably trying to find the emergency ladder down to the ground floor," He replied, climbing to his feet whilst appearing to be oblivious to her threatening posture. Pulling his own pistol -- an antiquated Walther PPK -- free from the holster secreted on his ankle, he continued. "And the pair of us will be in a better position to stop him working together than working alone." "What? You're flipping sides now?" Leah snorted. "Have you had a sudden attack of conscience or something now you know you've handed three canisters of nerve gas capable of killing everyone in this city to a terrorist?" "No, just feeling contrary today." Andrew said as he moved towards the metal construct. Poking his head around the corner, he was met by a bullet careening off the metal casing. "Over to the right!" Andrew called out, gesturing for Leah to flank around the opposite side of the rooftop. As she scrambled across the loose screed, she lost her footing. Falling hard and colliding with the rooftop with enough force to knock the wind out of her, Leah felt her Glock slip out of her grip. The world seemed to slow down for a moment; as she slid across the loose gravel that adorned the rooftop she saw the overweight figure of Annenskij moving out from behind the small cooling tower he was lurking behind. Her mind registered the fact that he was taking aim at her with his Scorpion pistol; her mind was rapidly running through all the outcomes and even in the few brief moments she had left they all came out with the same terminal outcome for her. The sight of Annenskij's chubby fingers pressing down on the trigger as Leah tried to roll away were the last things to fill her mind before she turned away from him. Brakka! Blam! Brakka! Blam! Blam! The short bursts of gunfire were unmistakeable -- yet Leah's trained mind identified two distinctly different weapons being discharged. Her eyes were screwed tightly shut, waiting for the searing, burning paid of the bullets tearing into her flesh. As the seconds passed, Leah realised that far from the expected pain her body should have felt, she felt nothing. In fact, she also heard nothing. Rolling back over she could see two bodies lying on the ground. Immediately knowing what had happened she struggled to get to her feet; racing over to the fallen body of Andrew, Leah grabbed his shoulder and rolled him onto his back. Blood poured from the series of neat holes in his chest. Cradling him in her arms, Leah failed to hold back the sudden ball of emotion that threatened to overwhelm her. "Andrew...I...I...why?" "Ssshh..." He mumbled, blood leaking out from his mouth as he did so. "I couldn't...Koff! Koff!...let him...shoot you now...could...I?" "Just hold on -- I'll get you some help; we'll get you out of..." His hand reached up to her face, stroking her cheek with blood soaked fingers. "No, no time...besides, it's...better...this way..." Andrew gestured for Leah to lean closer to him as he struggled to impart something to her. His voice was barely a whisper now. "Check...your wardrobe...again..." Leah looked at him with a confused expression on her face. He was smiling at her, his eyes locked with hers for the final time as the life faded away from them. Behind her she heard the sound of the heavy metal door to the roof being opened. Half expecting to be shot, even as she heard Alison's voice screaming at her as she saw the blood on her jacket, Leah looked up to the heavens as the first few drops of rain fell onto her face, mixing seamlessly with the tears that were flooding from her eyes. **** The flight and debriefing seemed like a blur to Leah. The numb sensation continued to seep through her body as Alison drove her home. As the car turned into the cul-de-sac that was home to Leah's apartment building, her friend looked over at her. "It's funny that those canisters the Russians had were empty." Alison commented as she brought the car to a gentle halt outside her apartment building. Receiving no response from her passenger she prodded once more. "Are you going to be okay tonight?" Alison's question rolled around Leah's head. She nodded in response before opening the door. "I won't ask again, but you know where I am if you need me." Leah's hand moved to the door, pausing for a moment as she began to close it. "Alison, I know I don't say this often enough but thanks," she said. "Thanks for everything." Leah closed the door of the car and began the suddenly lonely walk to her home. Leaving the apartment in darkness as she moved around it, Leah spent what seemed like eternity in the shower; desperately trying to wash away the events of the last twenty-four hours. Padding softly to her bedroom Andrew's final words suddenly sprung to mind. Pulling her towel tightly around her body, she began to look through her wardrobe once more. Searching through her clothes, then her shoes, before finally looking at the selection of jackets lined up on the far right side. As she shuffled through them a small white envelope slipped from the pocket of her favourite leather jacket. Kneeling down to pick it up, she could feel that there was something inside. Tearing the top open Leah found a small metal key inside and what looked like a business card. Lifting the card up to the light filtering in from the window she could see an address scribbled on it along with a series of digits. A moment later she realised the address was that of a bank in the centre of London and the digits were clearly those of a bank account. A wistful smile drifted across her face as Leah resolved to visit the bank first thing in the morning. With that she discarded her towel and crawled into bed. **** 76 Burrow Street 3:31 am In an instant, Andrew was sat bolt upright in bed. His heart was racing and his mind awash with colours and images. Feeling the rolling movement of Leah stirring in the bed next to him, Andrew reached over to the bedside table and grabbed a pen and a small notebook. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 08 "...Uhmm, baby, what are you doing?" Leah mumbled as she looked at the alarm clock. "It's after 3 in the morning..." Andrew's voice crackled with electricity. "I just had the strangest dream..." How I Met Your Mother Ch. 09 How I Met Your Mother: Ghosts of East Berlin Couderay Wisconsin 2010 "That will be fifteen sixty-four please." The cheery tone of the cashier contrasted her surroundings. Illuminated by poor strip lighting with the occasional flicker thrown in for good measure, the convenience store was more akin to something out of a 1970s horror movie or a gulag. Hmm, he thought as he handed her a crumpled twenty-dollar note, funny I should think about the gulags again. The young girl -- no more than about eighteen years old he estimated -- smiled as she handed him his change as he picked up the brown paper bag containing Vodka, potatoes, eggs and several slabs of dubious-looking frozen meat. "Thanks." His gruff response to her failed to hide any trace of his distinctive East European accent that was clearly at odds with the name on his driver's license being that of one John Bettany of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Paying little attention to anyone else in the store as he shuffled out of it, bracing himself for the sudden wall of cold air he encountered as he left the seven/eleven. Trudging through the thick covering of snow that had fallen in the twenty minutes he had been inside the store, he fumbled for the keys to the battered old car that sat in the furthest corner of the car park. Cursing the decision to park his car there, he muttered under his breath as he reached it; opening the boot to deposit his supplies inside he paused for the briefest moment, certain that he had heard something behind him. He looked over his right shoulder, expecting to find that his aging ears had played a trick on him again. In the dim evening light he was certain that his eyes were deceiving him as he made out a shadowy figure advancing towards him, closing the few feet left between them in a few moments. It was only at the point when something hard, heavy and metallic struck him across the face that he realised it was no illusion of his fractured psyche that was assaulting him. Somehow he managed to remain on his feet until a second blow -- this time across the back of his skull -- knocked him to the floor. The sound of eggs breaking beneath him as he hit the floor filled his ears. As the last vestiges of consciousness slipped away, he was vaguely aware of someone man-handling him into the boot of his own car and slamming it forcefully shut. The inky darkness within the musty smelling storage space mirrored his condition as blackness overtook him. **** Slowly he felt himself regaining consciousness again. He lifted his head slightly, finding each movement laced with pain from the blows he had received earlier. Unsure of who had actually attacked him, he became acutely aware that he was bound to a chair and gagged, effectively silencing any chance he had to call for help. It took his one uninjured eye a moment to adjust to the light in the room before he recognised where he was. He was in his own home, sitting in the middle of the living room. Trying to turn his head as best as he could he finally managed to pick out a figure standing at the window, casually looking out at the winter's night that was closing in around them. Lena He recognised her immediately and felt his stomach knot in fear. The realisation of who she was and -- in all likelihood -- what she was here to do hit him harder than either of the two hammer blows he's sustained earlier. "Such a cold night out tonight. I had no idea that anywhere in America got this cold. I always thought this was the land of eternal summers or something to that effect. But this? This almost reminds me of a St. Petersburg winter, so bitterly cold. A pity we don't have the comfortable heat of a roaring fireplace to warm us, yes?" she thought out loud, still continuing to look out the window. "Speaking of which..." Turning away from the window and allowing the curtain to fall back across the opening, Lena turned to face her host finally, taking a cigarette from the packet in her hand and sweeping back her long dark red hair, then placing it behind her right ear. She paused for a moment before she continued. "You're a difficult man to find Mr...Bettany," Lena said as she looked at the small plastic identification card she had plucked from his wallet whilst he was unconscious. "You know, tracking you down has helped me to reach an epiphany in my life; I'm simply too old for all this running around the globe. I'm approaching one of the true milestones of age and it's about time I put my feet up. However, I do have a few loose ends that I need to tie up before I can truly start planning my retirement from active life and handing over the reigns to my more youthful protégés -- I think I've earned it by now, don't you? After all the hard work I've put into things..." Lena squinted slightly at the picture on the credit card sized laminate in her hands. "You know, the picture doesn't really do you justice you know -- you're much more handsome in real life Piotr." She used his real name for the first time. It sounded alien to him -- a relic of a life he thought he'd left behind in the past. "Have you any idea how much you've hurt me Piotr? After all the time we spent in the academy and in training, our time in the VDV together, Afghanistan, Europe and you turned on me without a second thought? I couldn't believe it; I refused to in fact for a long time, until I learned the truth." She turned away from him and started to pace the living room floor. "So now that leaves us with the question of what to do next. After careful thought, I believe I need to make...a 'statement' of sorts to those who work for me. Something to discourage my...associates and business partners from contemplating a similar course of action. What do you think of that, Piotr?" When Lena heard no reply, she stopped pacing and turned to face her friend. "Ah, silly me. Here, let me help you." She moved over to kneel beside him and removed the gag from his mouth as he struggled in vain to escape the tight industrial ropes that tied him to the chair securely. "There we go...much better, da?" Piotr gasped for air greedily as soon as the gag was taken away, and turned to look at her, fear evident in his one open and uninjured eye. "Please, Lena...you don't have to do this...after everything we've been through..." he said shakily after spitting blood caused by the various injuries she had inflicted. "Let me go. We've been friends for years!" Lena paused for a moment, and then shook her head. "I truly wish it didn't have to be this way, but you really left me no other choice, old friend. You know how much my business -- our business -- needs to be conducted in the shadows, away from the prying eyes of the outside world. Well, now...I guess we should go ahead and get this over with." "I'm begging you...no!" With a sad smile on her face, Lena stood up and left the screaming man, going to the cosy little kitchen in the back of the house. She admired the simple yet efficient design of the kitchen, taking notes of some of the design ideas and thinking of using them in her own little dream home. Returning to the living room, she stood before Piotr and surveyed his state. "Piotr, Piotr...stop this pitiful display!" she lightly chided him, moving to the coffee table and picking up the full gas can she had brought with her, then walking back over to him. "What would our instructors say if they saw you now, blubbering like a scared old woman? Show the bravery of a true son of Russia! At least endure this with a little dignity, da?" The expression on his face as he saw the gas canister made Lena chuckle slightly. "Oh, so you think this is how I'm going to kill you? That I would burn down this little slice of suburban heaven and run the risk that you might survive somehow?" She mused. "No, no, that would never do." Lena added as she reached into her jacket and pulled out a compact looking pistol. "This is how I intend to kill you." Blam! Blam! Blam! The bullets struck Piotr in the chest, the force of the sudden successive impacts knocking him backwards and onto the floor. Lena stood over him, watching the life fade from his eyes. Once she was certain that he was dead she set about dousing the room with gasoline. Pausing to ensure she had soaked everything thoroughly, she moved back to the front door, carefully leaving a trail of liquid in her wake. Opening it and discarding the near-empty can inside the hallway, she stopped to light the cigarette she had stored earlier behind her ear. Taking several quick drags from it Lena stepped out of the house and tossed the cigarette back into the open doorway. Just as she anticipated the fuel she had liberally applied quickly caught hold, accompanied by a soft whoosh sound as the canister provided a small explosive accompaniment to the rapidly increasing inferno. She watched from the sidewalk as the flames lapped around the building, studiously observing her handiwork until the sounds of terrified local residents met her ears. Taking this as her cue to leave, Lena melted away into the night, satisfied that her business here was now concluded. **** Dugong Province Taipei, China 1977 If there was one duty Svetlana Lebedova hated since she had been promoted, it was this one; security detail at official functions as part of the Diplomatic Corps. She stood at the edge of the room and watched as the various dignitaries, assistants and staff moved around the room. Officially the talks had been a success -- a thawing of Soviet/Chinese relations was now looking more and more likely despite their differing ideological viewpoints on the Communist philosophy -- however something about the atmosphere in the room simply didn't feel right to her. "If there's one thing I've learned in my time in the KGB it's what a worried expression looks like even when you're trying to hide it. What's wrong?" The soft tonal quality of the question reminded Svetlana of her father. She turned her head slightly, recognising the deceptively attired appearance of Innokenty Annenskij. Svetlana sighed slightly. "Nothing sir..." She murmured to her superior officer. "I...I don't know - I'm not sure." She gestured over towards where Ambassador Mishin was standing, engrossed in conversation with an attractive young Asian woman by the name of Mei Sheng who they had been introduced to earlier in the day's proceedings. "Something's not right." "Oh, you mean our Ambassador's young companion?" Inno added. "I have to admit that I find her attraction to our rather...plump diplomat to be somewhat confusing as well." He allowed himself a little chuckle. "Still, you know what they say about power being an aphrodisiac." His hand brushed against her arm. Svetlana felt a chill run down her spine. "I don't mean that," She barely whispered as she looked up at him. "I mean, what's a representative from Hong Kong doing here?" "The Chinese requested her apparently -- something to do with trying to secure some sort of trade access into Western Europe through them." Inno added. "You know how desperate the British are at the moment -- their Winter of Discontent and all that -- they want to improve their export business to China through Hong Kong as well, so it's a win-win situation all around." Svetlana shook her head. "It's just not right -- something about her is screaming at me to slice her throat open with a steak knife." She was bristling with anger as she glared in Mei's direction. Inno chuckled. "Calm yourself my little swan." Inno said, trying to soothe the savage beast boiling inside her. "I hear they are looking to post you to the office in Kabul." "Yes, I can't say that I'm thrilled at the decision to dump me into that backwater." Svetlana seethed. She turned to look at Inno and he could clearly see the anger in her eyes. "Intelligence gathering in Afghanistan? What could possibly be going on there that warrants our attention?" "They are asking us for our help -- who are we to refuse?" Inno chided her. "Besides, at least it's a change from babysitting these dull diplomats." Svetlana actually broke a smile for a moment. "You're right," She said as she casually glanced back at the party. "And I'll be able to change...where the hell is Mishin?" "He was there a minute ago." Inno said, inwardly cursing himself for allowing himself to be distracted by his young protégé. "And she's nowhere to be seen either." Svetlana looked at Inno, who was shaking his head as he was starting to move away. "Come on, they can't have gotten far." **** After searching through the smaller staterooms that made up the ground and first floors of the embassy, Svetlana's instincts were screaming at her that something very bad was about to happen. As she followed Inno up the stairs to the second floor, Svetlana located their third associate of the evening, Yuri Demetriov, and relayed to him that they needed to lock down the Embassy as quickly as possible. "Don't you think that's a little extreme?" Inno said as he waited for Svetlana at the top of the flight of stairs. "Only if this turns out to be nothing more than the idiotic sexual fantasies of an old man." Svetlana shot back at him as she began checking rooms on one side of the corridor. "Nothing here." "Same here." Inno said as he moved along the other side. They were moving towards the end of the hallway with an ever-diminishing number of rooms left to check when they both heard something that made them stop in their tracks. "Oh yes...yes...YES!" They both recognised Mishin's voice in the midst of grunts and screams coming from the last room on the left. Svetlana was at the door in an instant -- pushing it open just enough to be able to see what was playing out within the confined space. She saw the naked, athletic body of the Mei Sheng straddling Mishin on the floor, her body writhing energetically atop of him. He was clearly lost in the moment and oblivious to the audience peering in at him. As Inno reached the door Svetlana saw Mei reaching back and gripping something on the inside of her calf as she continued to grind down on the older man's pelvis. The faint glint of moonlight reflecting off something metallic made Svetlana's stomach turn. She pushed the door open and entered the room -- pausing only to allow her mind a moment to register exactly what was in the young woman's hand; a small compact syringe. Reaching instinctively towards the instruments located at the side of the fireplace, Svetlana scooped up a heavy poker and swung it, striking Mei's hand and knocking the syringe to the floor. Before the Asian woman had chance to register what was going on, Svetlana had swung the poker once more, striking her forcefully across the back of the skull. Mei Sheng crashed down against Mishin's rotund body, bouncing off his barrel like chest and slumping to his side. The expression on Mishin's face was a mixture of fear, surprise and embarrassment all at the same time. As Svetlana dragged the unconscious woman away from him, Inno threw a bathrobe at the Ambassador. "To preserve your modesty sir." He said as he picked the syringe up from the floor. He looked over at Svetlana who still had the poker in her hand. "Looks like you were right." "Call it women's intuition." She muttered. Inno nodded. "Is she dead?" "Doubtful -- I didn't hit her that hard." She replied. "Can either of you explain what is going on?" Ambassador Mishin spat out at the two security operatives. His angry, blistering response a clear reaction to being found in a compromising situation. "It would appear that your companion here was planning to inject you with this Ambassador." Inno said, holding up the syringe so Mishin could see it clearly. The anger immediately drained from his demeanour. "I would imagine at best its some sort of truth serum; at worst a fast acting neurotoxin or some other sort of poison." The sound of hurried footfalls moving along the corridor prompted Inno to look out of the door. He breathed a sigh of relief when he recognised the figures approaching as fellow Russians. He turned back to the Ambassador. "Sir, if you'll just get dressed and go with the gentlemen outside, they will take you back to the official residence." Once Mishin was out of the way and the door secured, he moved over to where Svetlana was doing her best to haul Mei back into her dress. Blood was slowly oozing out of the contact point on the back of her skull. Inno handed Svetlana the woman's shoes. "Have you any idea who she might be working for? I mean, I can't see why the Chinese would want to kill the Ambassador now..." Svetlana said as she struggled with the zipper on the back of her dress. "I wouldn't put it past the Chinese -- however my money is on the British, after all, she is from Hong Kong and they're always recruiting people from that colony of theirs to spy on the Chinese." Inno muttered. "Pity, she's quite attractive..." His evaluation of her physical appearance was cut short by Svetlana's icy glare. "So, what do we do with her now?" She asked. Inno shrugged. "We'll get Yuri to bring the car around to the service entrance and take her out that way -- she'll be shipped back to Moscow for questioning then we'll decide what to do with her." He sounded nonchalant. "If she's lucky she'll get a bullet in the back of her head; if not they'll dump her in one of the Siberian camps." He helped Svetlana lift the woman up and they moved out of the room. "How did you figure out there was something off about her?" "Oh, that was easy." Svetlana replied as they struggled out of the room. "I didn't like the way she laughed." **** Offices of Clearwater House Publishing February 2010 Wednesday morning Slap! The manuscript landed on the hard wooden desk with a satisfying sound once it completed the short descent through the air from some thirty-five centimetres above it. The noise it made was accompanied by the sound of a man slumping down into a heavily padded chair across from the functional piece of office furniture. "There you go," Andrew Hargreaves said as he dropped down into the chair across from her. The springs whined at the sudden weight applied to it from a relative height. "The completed final draft of Zombie Disco Divas From Hell." "Thanks, and a Happy New Year to you too." Diana, his editor and representative at Clearwater House Publishing, said as she picked up the manuscript and flicked through some of the pages. "I'll be looking at a publication date around March -- is that good for you?" Andrew shook his head. "No -- kid's birthdays." He said. "And you'd better rule out April too." Diana shook her head. "Fine, May it is then." She sighed. "However you're not skipping out on the promotion work this time." She opened the draw of her desk and dropped the manuscript inside. As her hand came back into view, she threw a thicker document in Andrew's direction. "What's this?" He asked. Diana took a moment to reach into her handbag and pull a packet of cigarettes out. Andrew watched her. "I thought quitting was your New Year's resolution?" "I tried." She said as she lit up. "It lasted all of about six hours before I started climbing the walls." She took a deep drag from the cigarette before returning her attention to Andrew's original question. "I received this manuscript from a prospective author I was contemplating signing; lovely woman, East European from what I can gather; Serbian or Slovenian or something like that. Her surname ends in that ich sort of sound -- you know what I mean, right?" How I Met Your Mother Ch. 09 "Okay..." Andrew nodded, unsure where this was going. "It's an interesting piece, supposedly a biographical expose charting the evolution of an organised crime group following the collapse of the old Soviet Union...but I can't progress further with securing the rights to it until I'm certain of a few facts." Andrew was looking more puzzled with each passing moment. "And what does this have to do with me?" He eventually asked after what felt like an eternity. "I want you to read it for me and try to ascertain if the author is just spit balling or if they really are onto something." Diana added. Andrew narrowed his eyes. "Clearwater was burned with that serial killer diary that turned out to be a hoax last year; if that happens again then heads will roll." She paused. "If the office rumour mongers are to be believed then it's probably going to be mine." "I'm hardly an investigative journalist Diana." Andrew commented. Diana shrugged her shoulders and looked at him with an expression that conveyed her desire for his opinion on the manuscript. As he picked it up again. "You know, I get the distinct feeling that there's something more to this than meets the eye." Andrew said as he leaned back in the chair. "What aren't you telling me?" "Just read it." She said, finishing the cigarette and stubbing it out on the edge of her desk. "When you've done that we'll talk." **** Al-Rasheed Hotel, Baghdad, Iraq 1978 The thing that seemed to captivate Yashin the most about the mysterious foreigner was her smell. The perfume she wore made her smell of vanilla and it reminded him of the first time he had entered one of the cities many tea rooms as a young man. The woman pushed her body up against him, holding him close to her; her lips pressing tightly against his. He had met her three nights ago at the Embassy. The reception for the new Russian Ambassador was a prestigious affair as the new Islamic authorities in Iraq tried to impress upon them their desire to forge relations with their closest military super power. As an attaché at the Afghanistan Embassy, Yashin has been instructed to attend in order to ensure that their interests in the country's natural resources were being represented through their Russian allies. Yashin was so lost in the moment that he barely perceived the faint prick of a needle pressed against his neck. After a few moments, he found that his legs had decided to cease working and he collapsed to the floor. As his vision began to cloud over, he saw his female visitor scuttle across to his telephone. She seemed to be saying something in a language he didn't fully understand as his world slipped into enforced darkness. On the other end of the telephone line, the person receiving the phone call understood exactly what his colleague was saying to him in Russian. "He's under -- we need to get him out of the city." **** As his senses began to come to order, Yashin realised two things -- first of all he was cold. The second thing he was aware of was that there was a tremendous roaring sound assaulting his ears. That was when the third thing struck him -- he was blindfolded and shackled to what felt like a chair. "Yashin? Can you hear me?" There was that voice -- that beautiful, sweet voice speaking to him again. "What are the Americans doing in Afghanistan?" "Americans...they...they are talking to the Mujahideen..." his words were slurred slightly. "And what is Amin doing?" The words dripped like honey. "What are his connections with the charges d'affair?" "Not sure..." Yashin murmured, powerless to resist her questions. "He's close to the Pakistani's...and the Chinese...not fond of the Russians now...Ukbeh thinks he's planning...a purge of loyalists to the old guard still faithful to Moscow..." Yashin heard some movement behind him -- it sounded like a key was being inserted into a lock. Suddenly his hands were free -- as they moved towards his head someone grabbed them. "No, not yet." The voice replied -- Yashin realised it was her hands holding his wrists and they were deceptively strong. "Listen to me closely Yashin; you're on a train and you're in great danger at the moment -- we need to get you out of here before you take the blindfold off." He felt her pull at his wrists, guiding him forwards. The vibrations he felt through his feet seemed to be intensifying as he felt a gust of fresh air hit him in the face. Yes, a train -- it made sense to him now. "Yashin, I need you to keep walking, that's the only way you'll be safe." The voice said. "Keep walking until you reach the end of the path." Yashin did as she asked -- how could he refuse her after all -- shuffling along the metal beneath his feet. "That's it Yashin -- you're almost there." He kept walking until his last footfall encountered no resistance beneath it. Must be a step, Yashin thought. He felt his body slowly topple forwards and he threw his hands out to stop himself. Eight thousand feet later, Yashin's hands and the rest of his body collided with the desert floor at the rate of thirty-two feet per second. As the cargo door of the aircraft closed up behind Yashin, Svetlana Lebedova turned around to see Yuri Demetriov hanging onto the cargo straps for dear life, his face looking pale and sickly. "So, it looks like the whole Afghan situation is more unstable than we thought?" Yuri said. Svetlana nodded. "And it sounds like the Americans are trying to bait a trap for us." She added. "We need to get back to Moscow -- they need to know what's going on." **** Wearing her dress uniform, Svetlana strode through the corridors of the headquarters of the KGB in Moscow, muttering under her breath. As she made her way towards one of the small offices located on the third floor of The Lubyanka she paused before one particular door. Counting to ten and tapping her foot in unison, Svetlana reached out and gripped the door handle. Twisting it sharply, she entered and took stock of the figure sitting behind a desk. The sound of her heels striking the stone floor as she approached him told him all he needed to know about her current mood. As she looked at the figure of Innokenty Annenskij, dressed in his uniform as was the practice of all officers within the headquarters of the KGB, he could see the all-too familiar anger burning in her eyes. "I've been reassigned to the London Embassy!" She spat at him, slamming the paperwork down on the desk. "Can you believe it? After all the hard work I've put into the Afghanistan operation..." She looked into Inno's eyes as she sat down in the chair across from him. "It also feels like someone is trying to keep us apart..." "I read your report." Inno said, trying to deflect away her comment. "You think that the Americans are trying to stir up the hornets nest to draw us into a protracted conflict?" "It's the only logical answer." Svetlana spat. "Think about it - if they draw us into a guerrilla conflict it could be as damaging for us as Vietnam was for them." She threw her hands up in the air. "I can't believe they can be so stubborn, so blind as to fall for such an obvious ruse. I'm so angry, I could..." "Calm down." Inno interjected, trying to reassure her. "If it makes you feel any better, you aren't the only one being reassigned." He lifted up a piece of paper from the pile on his desk and handed it to her. As Svetlana read it, she looked at him. "You're being posted as the official KGB liaison officer to the London Embassy as well?" He nodded quietly in response to her question. She steeled herself for the next part. "Do they know?" "Only Brezinski knows." Inno replied quietly. "I suspect that this is his way of saying thank you for all your work on Afghanistan. We'll be away from the prying eyes of those who might frown upon our...fraternisation." He opened the bottom draw of his desk and pulled out two small glasses and a bottle of vodka. As he poured the clear liquid into each glass he gestured for Svetlana to sit down. "You know what some of the old guard are like about married couples working together, no matter how well we try to hide it. Now, why don't we have a drink and you can tell me all about what happened in Iraq, my little swallow..." **** To any casual passer-by it was another wonderful sunny afternoon in the Nebraskan countryside. The blue sky was decorated with small fluffy white clouds and the trees were displaying the last vestiges of their green summer foliage before they began to turn to the more autumnal colours of reds and browns. Located within the ridge between a small series of geological protrusions caused by the shifting of the planet's tectonic plates however, was something far from natural. The edifice was metal, yet also it was clearly intended to blend in with its surroundings as best as it could. The structure looked weather beaten and worn, resembling something that had been left outside for decades -- and yet to anyone who had wandered along the various hiking trails within the last few months it would have represented something new and distinctly alien to look at. "STARSCREAM!" The voice tore open the idyllic scene. The words -- bellowed in a commanding, almost forceful tone -- rang out around the small valley nestling in the Nebraskan countryside. The speaker -- a towering visage of grey metal whose personality was brimming with anger -- stood motionless, awaiting and expecting a response to be forthcoming. His anticipation was not without its reward as the metal structure embedded into the side of the hill began to shift and shunt, the sound of cogs and gears engaging filled the air, allowing a small platform to appear and float slowly down. There were four figures standing upon it, weapons drawn and bristling with energy. He catalogued them in his mind; Astrotrain; Blitzwing; Thundercracker and Skywarp. As the platform came to a standstill on the soft soil, both sides appraised each other. "How quickly you all forget, and now I find myself having to remind you of your position." "Look Megatron," Thundercracker stepped forward, his hands raised in appeasement. "We don't want to hurt you..." "You will stand down or you will be destroyed." Megatron interrupted him. "I shall make this offer to you once in recognition for your previous service to the Imperium. However, should you continue along your current path of treachery then you should expect no mercy from me." The four figures on the platform exchange glances, each making a decision in their own minds before they lowered their weapons. "Strutless cowards!" The rebuke came from above them. Looking into the air, a shape recognisable as something similar to an F-22 Raptor streaked out of the bunker opening in the side of the Nebraska hillside, cutting a path through the clear blue sky. "You have drunk from the well of absolute power and yet you still cower before him like protoforms!" As the aircraft powered through the air, a compartment beneath it opened and a series of cluster bombs dropped, falling to the ground and tearing up the soil and rock with explosive force. "Ultimately, Megatron is argonised steel and composite polymers, just like us." Starscream continued as he dropped a second payload onto his commanding officer, sending his companions scurrying away to avoid being caught up in the conflagration. "And just like us, he can be hurt." As the ground continued to buck and shake from his bombardment, a fizzing sound could be heard as blasts of purple energy filled the air. Despite their apparent accuracy, they seemed to be striking the air where Starscream had been rather than where he was. As the debris began to settle, Megatron was able to focus more on his aerial foe, striking Starscream's wing with one of the blasts from the powerful fusion cannon attached to his arm. "Pah! You want to do it old school then?" Starscream muttered as his body began to twist and shift, changing from his aircraft mode to his more natural robotic image. "Fine -- have it your way. INCOMING!" He twisted in the air, descending at full speed and slamming straight into Megatron's chest, the force of the impact creating a crater around them. The two combatants got back to their feet, trading blows as well as verbal barbs. "I thought we'd put all this behind us?" Megatron asked as he slammed his fist into Starscream's face, knocking him to the floor. "That these petty squabbles and power-plays were a thing of our tumultuous past?" "I've just been waiting for the right opportunity." Starscream spat back as he tore a tree from the ground and drove it into Megatron's chest, sending him sprawling. "You know, I used to respect you; I looked up to you." Starscream said, gripping his foot as he lifted Megatron and began to spin him around. "But now I realise it was just fear I felt. Now all I see is stagnant leadership that's left us looking at pointless planets in dead end areas of the galaxy as we exist on scraps of Energon as part of a never-ending war of attrition." Picking up speed, he flung Megatron into the side of the hill before bringing to two cannons that adorned his arms to bear. The air sizzled again as Starscream opened fire on his leader, scorching the area as he unleashed everything he had at him. "Oooh...that...felt soooo good!" He said, staring at the white-hot rock and smouldering plumes of smoke. The air was silent for a moment. "I've been waiting so long to do..." "Have you quite finished?" The question in that unmistakeable gruff and blunt voice made Starscream's mouth drop open -- shortly followed by the image of Megatron stepping out of the smoke; seared, scarred but not beaten. "I have taken your best measure and, not for the first time, found it wanting." He strode forward. "You have broken protocol; risked exposure of our operation to the Autobots and the local life forms; disregarded the chain of command and worst of all, placed your own interests above that of the Imperium." In the background, the four other Decepticons looked at each other. "You know what's coming next, right?" Skywarp asked Thundercracker, who simply nodded in reply. Megatron grabbed Starscream's shoulder with his left hand as he jammed the barrel of his weapon into his foe's chest. "Now take your punishment..." "But...I...no!" Starscream muttered as he locked optics with Megatron. "...Like a Decepticon." The concentrated discharge from the fusion cannon ripped through Starscream's chest, blasting a sizeable hole in his torso. As he fell to the floor, Megatron addressed the remaining members of Starscream's unit. "Blitzwing; Astrotrain -- take the remains inside and see to them. If he survives, then I'll decide how I will punish him." Standing in the tree line of a small hill less than few hundred yards away, four other figures were watching the melodrama play out. They observed the Decepticons carrying away the remains of their former unit commander, and then watched in silence as Megatron followed them, pausing before entering the bunker to look in their direction. He appraised them for a moment before muttering to himself. "Time for phase two." It was a moment or two before any of the observers spoke as they watched the leader of their enemies enter the siege bunker. "Are we just going to let them do this?" Sunstreaker asked. Prowl - the Autobot unit commander on Earth - looked over at him. "Yes. Yes we are." He replied. "Unfortunately, Earth has just gone from being some backwater planet to the frontline in this war. We're not equipped to deal with a threat of this level." "Phew." Sunstreaker breathed a selfish sigh of relief. Ratchet watched as the bunker doors sealed. "You know, whatever Starscream found in there was enough to convince him he could take down Megatron on his own." The Autobot medical officer mused. Ironhide looked over at him and they shared a look. "We need backup here." "No." Ironhide corrected him. "We need Prime." Andrew sat on his chair at his desk in the cellar with a notepad and pencil in his hands, scribbling down notes as he poured through the contents of the manuscript Diana had given him three days beforehand. As he changed pages for the third time in less than an hour, a familiar figure popped her head around the corner of the stairs. She moved towards him with the grace of a dancer and dropped the comic book into his lap. As Andrew looked down, then to his left, he was confronted with the sight of his daughter's tear-filled eyes and quivering lower lip. "Cassie, what's wrong?" He asked, immediately discarding his notepad and picking his daughter up. "Daddy...does...does...Starscream...die?" She asked between sniffs. Andrew looked at Cassie, and then at the book she had dropped in his lap. Suddenly everything made sense. "Daddy...tell me...please...he doesn't..." "Cassie, baby, look it's okay." He said, hugging his daughter as she started to cry. "Shhh, come on cupcake, it's alright. It's just a comic book." Shifting her in his arms, he got up from his chair and carried her out of the cellar. "Come on, don't cry..." "But...but..." Cassie stammered as they made their way up two flights of stairs and ended up in a small box room on the second floor of the house. Andrew placed his daughter down on a beanbag in the room before turning his attention to the bookshelf. "Okay, Infiltration...Escalation...there we go, Devastation!" He plucked a trade paperback from the bookshelf and joined his daughter on the soft, podgy seat. "Look, see, here's Starscream in a cryogenic regeneration chamber..." he flicked through the pages of the book. "...And here he is single-handedly taking on Sixshot and the Reapers..." Cassie's mood almost immediately brightened. "And here he is pointing out that it's the Decepticons versus the rest of the world at the end of book four. So, as you can see, Starscream doesn't die." Cassie wrapped her tiny arms around Andrew's waist and squeezed as tightly as possible. "Thanks Dad." She chimed as Andrew got up and handed her the next book in the sequence, the appropriately titled Stormbringer. He paused for a moment before letting go of the book. "Now, you need to read Stormbringer before you read Escalation, okay?" Cassie looked up at him and nodded. "None of it happens on Earth but it does feature Bludgeon, Jetfire, the Wreckers and the Chaos Trinity. And just remember -- it's only a comic book Cass." He knelt down to kiss the top of her head as she started to devour the next trade paperback in the series. Leaving his daughter in the room, Andrew heard the sound of Scott playing in the other room on the second floor. Smiling, he slowly went downstairs, eventually winding up in the kitchen where Leah was preparing lunch. "Hey there." She said, without looking up from the chopping board. The sound of the knife in her hand striking the wooden surface as she sliced through the block of cheese reminded Andrew of a metronome. "Why does our daughter have a crush on Starscream?" Andrew asked as he opened the fridge and removed a can of coke from inside. Leah looked over her shoulder. "What?" "I've just had Cassie on the verge of tears because Megatron blew a five foot hole in Starscream's torso at the end of Transformers: Infiltration, worrying about whether he was going to die or not." "She must be going through her bad boy phase early." Leah mused. Andrew stopped what he was doing. "Her what?" Leah reached for the loaf of bread to her right. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 09 "Come on, you know what I mean." She said. Andrew's empty look made her laugh. "Every girl has a phase where she goes for men that simply aren't right for her -- eventually they work it out of their system and they settle down with someone who is right for them. Cassie is obviously going through her phase a little earlier than normal." "But...he's a twenty foot tall fictional, duplicitous robot!" Andrew started to laugh. "I just don't see the attraction." "I do -- you love Transformers; the kids love Transformers. It's simple." Leah explained. "Well, be that as it may, Cassie's not allowed to date anyone until she's married." Andrew snorted. Leah laughed as he moved over and examined the sandwiches she was making. "See, that's what was missing in my life growing up -- a father figure to tell me who I could and couldn't date." She said sarcastically as she playfully jabbed Andrew in the ribs with her elbow. "Well, it didn't work with my sisters and their boyfriends after Dad died so I can't see it working with my own daughter." He muttered. "Still, hope springs eternal." "Oh, I found this in Scott's bag." Leah handed a book to Andrew from beside the microwave. He looked at it and his face creased into a frown. "Aww man, the Encyclopaedia..." He muttered. "Aww look -- there's jammy fingerprints all over the entry for Ghroth the Harbinger!" "I think it's been passed around his class to be honest with you." Leah said as Andrew tried to clean the page as best as he could. "Why is the name Ghroth familiar to me?" "I used him in The Siren's Song." Andrew said as he finished wiping the page with a piece of kitchen roll. "He's a bit like an eldritch doomsday weapon; Ghroth floats through space, this great big rust coloured meteor and his song awakens all the Great Old Ones on any planet he passes -- causing widespread destruction and apocalyptic prophecies to come true, especially as far as the Earth is concerned." He rubbed his temples for a moment. "Are you okay?" Leah asked, pausing for a moment. "Yeah, yeah I'm fine -- just a bit of eye strain..." Andrew replied unconvincingly. "You know, I'm going to ask the question when I probably don't want to know the answer, but just what have you been poring over in the cellar for the last couple of days?" "Something Diana asked me to look over for her -- it's a manuscript entitled The Ghosts of East Berlin." Andrew explained. "It's an...account of sorts of the actions of a group of ex-Soviet paratroopers in the early 1980s and how it spawned a criminal organisation at the end of the Cold War." He paused for a moment. "The scary part is that it seems the Big Bear had something to do with its formation." "What? Inno?" Leah sounded shocked. Andrew nodded. "I...what? Are you sure? It actually names him?" "Yeah -- on page one-sixty-five. It clearly implicates him in its formative growth -- plus they may have had something to do with the death of his wife." Leah's eyebrows arched. "My god -- that explains what happened with his grand-daughter." She said. "He said at the time he thought it was something to do with organised crime -- that they wanted him to pay a ransom he couldn't afford and that he couldn't trust the authorities anymore..." "Well, when he gets in this weekend I'm going to have a talk with him about it." Andrew said, leaning back against the counter top as he did. "If it's true then he's going to be opened up to all manner of legal complications -- and that's just in this country alone." "You're just going to ask him outright?" "Sure -- how else do I go about it?" Andrew explained. "I'm not completely blinkered by my personal relationship with him; I always knew he had a shady past -- and the explanations about the circumstances surrounding his wife's death changed over the years -- but I always rationalised it as being the actions of a patriot, albeit from a different ideological viewpoint from my own. This is different though." "Are you alright? I mean, you seem abit shook up by all this." Leah said as she slowly resumed making the sandwiches. Andrew nodded. "Yeah, I think so." He shook his head like he was trying to dislodge something from it. "I'll be fine, I just...can we talk about this more later?" Leah nodded, sensing that Andrew was clearly finding the subject matter a lot to take in. "Okay, I'll go and get the kids ready for lunch." **** Pakistan Port of Karachi August 1980 In the humid late evening air, three figures walked from a small compact car towards one of the furthermost warehouses located in the vast commercial port of Karachi. Walking cautiously and constantly looking around to ensure they weren't being observed, they entered the warehouse and secured the door behind them. The three figures were Lena Marakova, Piotr Ribicky and Boris Karagin. The trio had known each other for nearly ten years and shared a bond that had been forged under the extreme stresses of combat. Lena was the fiery heart of the trio, contrasting to the cool, calm demeanour of Piotr. As the unit commander, Boris was the decision maker of the group -- and right now his mind was racing through all the permutations of the process he had put in motion. Securing the entrance to the large storage unit behind them, Piotr switched the lights on as Lena and Boris moved over to look through a series of wooden crates in the centre of the room. In doing so, the lights in the room briefly flickered before failing, plunging everything into darkness. "What the...?" Piotr asked -- just as the lights came back on. Within seconds they realised there was a fourth figure in the room. "Greetings my fellow comrades!" The salutation prompted Lena to pull a military issue pistol free from inside her jacket and take aim at the figure stepping out of the shadows. As the interloper stepped into a pool of light, all three of them recognised him. "Annenskij!" Piotr said as Boris tried to get Lena to lower her pistol. "What are you doing here?" "I could ask you the same question." Inno replied as he moved casually towards them. "Just what are three Vozdushno-Desantnye Vojska Blue Beret paratroopers doing in a Pakistani warehouse, surrounded by surplus Russian military equipment and Afghan heroin?" Lena slowly lowered her pistol as Boris stepped forward. "Look Annenskij, this is nothing to do with you or your cronies in the KGB, just turn around and leave." Inno laughed at Boris' implied threat. "Oh, you misread my intentions Captain Karagin," Inno said as he sat down on one of the large wooden crates. "Although I have more than enough evidence to bury all three of you if I see fit, I feel it's more beneficial to everyone for you to keep me onside so to speak." "In other words," Boris surmised as he appraised Inno's demeanour. "You want a cut." "A crude but succinct summation, yes." Inno added. "However, for the moment I'm content to remain your silent partner in this endeavour." "How do we know you aren't just setting us up?" Lena asked. Inno nodded. "That's a fair assumption Lieutenant Marakova. However, don't you think if my aim were to stop you I would have simply apprehended you as you were leaving Afghanistan? Ask yourself this -- how have you been able to get past the border checkpoints without any problems during the last few months?" None of the three military operatives could find fault in the argument. "You see, I've been aware of your activities for some time now, however I decided to keep my suspicions to myself until I was sure we could all work together." He looked at one of the crates to his left, lifting the lid to reveal a selection of assault rifles stored within. "No, for the moment it suits my own agenda to have your little smuggling operation working in perfect order." The three military officers looked at each other with concerned glances. "Now, I have other matters to attend to, so I shall let you continue with your...endeavours. I will be in touch." Inno turned and melted away into the shadows of the warehouse -- followed a few moments later by the sound of the door being opened and closed. There was a collective sigh of relief in the cold space. "Great, so what do we do now?" Piotr asked his colleagues. "I say we kill him." Lena's blunt reply made Boris laugh. "What? And draw more unwanted attention to our operation?" He postulated. "No, we'll take his help for now and if he becomes a hindrance then we'll deal with him." He looked back at his two sub-ordinates. "Come on, let's get this gear loaded up onto the tanker; it's not going to wait all evening for us." **** 76 Burrow Street Thursday morning 2:12 am Andrew sat up in the bed and looked over at the clock. He sighed slightly as he realised the clock had only moved on twenty-three minutes since he had last observed it. As he lay back down and his head hit the pillow, he found his mind drifting back to the manuscript he had spent the last two days poring over. His attempts to arrange to meet the author of the piece of work had been met with a series of dead ends until just under half an hour before he had climbed into bed. The brief telephone conversation he had with the author -- Kateryna Grenic -- had been illuminating. The daughter of a Russian diplomat who had sought asylum during the 1980s, she had enthused about the fact that Clearwater was actually looking at publishing her work. Her surge in excitement had blossomed when Andrew discussed meeting her to run over some points of her work in relation to the evidence she had listed in her bibliography. As he closed his eyes again for the umpteenth time that night, his wife's words rolled around his head. I'm coming with you, she said, and we're meeting her in a public place. **** Kateryna Grenic outwardly portrayed the appearance of a modern, confident woman who was perfectly at home in her chosen profession of a freelance investigative journalist; inwardly however, she was a writhing bundle of nerves as she greeted the man and woman who she had spoken to on the telephone the previous day. Introducing herself to Andrew and Leah Hargreaves, she gestured for them to sit down at the table she had secured on the back wall of the local Common Grounds coffee shop; Kateryna felt the anticipation bubbling up inside her as they began to discuss her work. "...so, your father was a diplomat at the Russian Embassy during the Eighties, right? That's how he knew Inno Annenskij?" Andrew asked. "How did you come across this series of...connections you've put together here?" "My father passed away several years ago from a lifetime of stress and too much vodka -- my mother had a box of paperwork that my father had always been rather too protective of throughout my youth; it was something I was never allowed to look at growing up and it held this near-mythical aura to me; a keepsake of my father's deepest and, as it transpired, darkest secrets. My mother gave it to me just after he died, content that I was old enough by that time to understand the literature fully." She took a sip of her four pound fifty cup of coffee before continuing. "One of the documents amidst all his paperwork was an account from a young Soviet officer called Duraya Ignakov about the events of April to May, 1945, in the town of Demmin in what became East Germany." "Demmin? Why is that name familiar to me?" Andrew said; Leah could see that his mind was whirling away, processing the information. "Hang on -- isn't that the place where the retreating Nazi's blew up the bridges to the town as they left, effectively sealing it off from the outside world? Wasn't there some sort of mass suicide afterwards as well?" Leah could see that Andrew was onto something by the look of recognition and acknowledgement on Kateryna's face. "You're a well-read man Mr Hargreaves. With the Soviet forces advancing the Germans retreated, leaving most of the civilian population behind. The Nazi propaganda machine had whipped the town up into a frenzy of anti-Russian sentiment -- when the Red Army entered the town they found it full of burning buildings and the corpses of families who has chosen to kill themselves rather than to submit to the life of occupation by Stalin's troops." Kateryna added with a distinctly grim tone in her voice. "But that wasn't the whole story...was it?" Andrew prodded. "Far from it -- according to the documents in my father's possession the truth was somewhat more disturbing. Rather than being greeted as liberating heroes as their British and American counterparts had been in the West, they were met by guerrilla warfare from the citizens of the town. A schoolteacher opened fire on them with a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, killing several officers and the local pharmacist poisoned the town water supply. Obviously the Russians didn't take kindly to these acts. After they had executed the remaining Nazi sympathisers in the town several groups of the soldiers looted the local distillery. There are numerous accounts of further looting and rape throughout the next three days that the Soviet forces occupied Demmin. It was some time during the morning of the third day that the first reports fires being started in the centre of the town and of bodies being found in the rivers Peene and Tollense." "The final death toll was estimated to be anything between seven to twelve hundred men, women and children. Several of the Soviet troops tried to stop the citizens killing themselves -- to varying degrees of success. Officially the matter was covered up -- that the deaths in Demmin were the result of famine or Wehrwolf attacks in the years following the end of the war -- and those that knew the truth and spoke out about the events were kept in check through fear of being deported to the gulags in Siberia." Kateryna removed a small book from her bag and handed it to Leah. Realising quickly it was an English translation of the East German publication "History of the Local Worker's Movement" she could see that one page had a small plastic tag attached to it. Opening it at this point she saw a single line of text highlighted. ...the town of Demmin experienced a mass panic, in the course of which 700 people committed suicide... "This is all very tragic; however I don't understand how this is connected to Inno Annenskij." Leah said. "Ignakov's son was an ambitious member of the KGB also stationed at the London embassy under Inno's authority. He discovered through his Kremlin contacts that Svetlana Annenskij had been assigned the task of investigating something an East German journalist had come into the possession of, something that the authorities wanted to keep quiet. It's likely that she passed something on to Inno that incriminated Ignakov's father and posed a threat to his career. After Svetlana's death, Inno began drinking heavily; officially he stepped down from his post in London in order to look after his daughter however I suspect that was just a smokescreen to preserve his dignity." "Do you think that Ignakov had something to do with Svetlana's death?" Leah asked. "I can't prove it but I suspect he did. Shortly after Inno stepped aside, Ignakov became the section head at the Embassy. I'm convinced that Marakova had something to do with it as well. Piotr Ribicky told me that Lena had been in talks with a Russian contact within the KGB just after something went wrong in Canada; he made her an offer -- in exchange for her services in resolving something in East Germany he would make any official investigation into their actions disappear." "I can see how that would be appealing to both of them; Ignakov gets a clear shot at the top job in London with Inno out of the way and the evidence of his father's indiscretions are buried with him whilst Marakova assumes full control of the illegal operations they've been running, safe in the knowledge that their silent partner is no longer in a position to stop her from expanding into whatever business avenues she desires." Andrew mused. "It's a perfect example of Starscream Philosophy in action. Of course, it doesn't explain what actually happened to the Big Bear's wife." "And how do you intend to find that out?" Leah asked. Andrew smiled at her. "How do you think?" **** The Basement of the Sam Kee Building Vancouver 1982 The room had exploded. In the space of thirty seconds, everything had gone wrong in the most spectacular of fashions. What had been the beginnings of a simple drug transaction had rapidly gone downhill fast. As Piotr strained to jimmy open the door of an early eighties Cadillac Cimarron, Lena tried to support Boris' body. "Hurry you idiot!" She screeched. "He's bleeding..." "I know!" Piotr spat back as he finally forced the door open. Moments later the rear door was open and Lena managed to haul Boris inside. As the sound of the engine roared into life, the sound of gunfire began to bounce around the underground car park again. "Fucking Triads! What were we thinking trying to deal with them?" Piotr cursed as he powered the vehicle out of the parking lot. He deftly manoeuvred the car around the poorly lit structure. "How is he?" "We need to get him to a hospital." Lena said, looking into Boris' white face; his skin was clammy and he was trying to mouth something to her. "It's going to be okay Captain...just hang on..." "A hospital? Are you fucking screwing with me?" Piotr screeched, as the car broke free of the concrete structure. "We can't take him to a hospital! In case you haven't noticed we're not exactly supposed to be in the country." "I know that -- head towards the Strathcona area -- there's someone there who might be able to help us." Lena said, looking up from Boris for the first time since they had gotten into the car. Piotr twisted the wheel, prompting a cacophony of car horns being blasted as he swung the Cimarron across an intersection in an impromptu u-turn. "I hope you're right Marakova," Piotr said. "Because we came here on your word and right now it's looking like we walked right into a set up." **** Two hours later, Alvin Martin was struggling with a small pair of medical tweezers to pry out a bullet out the stomach of Boris Karagin. As he struggled to grip the small slug tightly, he could feel the sweat forming on his brow. With each attempt to snag the bullet he seemed to simply push it further inside the gut of his patient. "You know, this goes a lot easier when I don't have a gun pointed at my head." He muttered. Lena lowered her sidearm as Piotr tried to keep the small table lamp in place over the bullet wound. "I thought you could do with some motivation." Lena hissed. Alvin shook his head. "Believe me, I have all the motivation I need with the fact that I owe you guys money and you're probably going to kneecap me by the end of the month!" Alvin replied. Piotr snorted. "You save the Captain's life and as far as I'm concerned all debts are paid in full." Alvin's fingers fumbled for a moment, his grip on the tweezers failing him. "I thought you said this guy was a doctor?" "A doctor?" Alvin laughed as he looked over at Lena. "You told him I was a doctor?" He looked over at Piotr. "I took a year's pre-med and then switched over to veterinary school before dropping out." "You're...you're a vet?" Piotr almost dropped the lamp. "I can't..." Alvin grabbed the lamp from him. "Look, I can't do this with you distracting me." Alvin sounded genuinely irritated. "Please, let me work in peace." **** It was nearly an hour later by the time Alvin came out of his kitchen-cum-impromptu operating room. He walked into the living room, wiping his hands with a towel that was now dripping small droplets ahead of him, as it was soaked with blood. His head was slumped downwards, almost touching his chest and his breathing sounded laboured. Looking up he found himself staring into the expectant eyes of Lena and Piotr. How I Met Your Mother Ch. 09 "I'm sorry...there was nothing I could do..." Alvin muttered. "He'd already lost too much blood..." "What? What?" Piotr asked, shock setting in and the blood draining from his face as he slumped back into a chair. "You were supposed to save him!" Lena screamed. "You weren't supposed to kill him!" "He's dead. The bullet was too deep for me to extract it -- he must have bled out. I think it must have nicked one of the main..." Blam! Blam! Blam! The three short gunshots struck Alvin in the chest, knocking him backwards into the kitchen door and propelling him back into the room he had just left. The sudden eruption of violence startled Piotr -- it took him a moment to register exactly what had just happened in front of his eyes. Looking over at the smoking barrel of the pistol, he realised his could see tears rolling down Lena's face. "We need to get out of here..." She muttered, staring at Alvin's body. "We need to bury him..." Piotr grabbed Lena as she made to move towards the kitchen, suddenly finding his attempts to drag her out of the apartment as best as he could meeting stiff resistance. She struggled, breaking free of his grip and twisting clear from him. "What the fuck are you doing? We need to get out of here!" Piotr screamed. "In case you didn't notice, those gunshots tend to echo around in buildings when you don't use a suppressor!" In the blink of an eye he found himself staring down the still-smoking barrel of Lena's sidearm. "We can't leave Boris here!" She screamed. The air was still for a moment -- Piotr remaining motionless as Lena's hand began to shake slightly. They were both breathing hard, neither of them sure what the other was about to do. There was the distant sound of several voices talking in the hallway outside the apartment, enquiring as to what was going on. "It's not right...we can't let him be found like this..." "We have to go Lena, please! Someone will call the Police and I'm not in the mood for a shootout." His plea was met with the same stoic silence. Piotr took a step backwards -- seeing Lena flinch slightly he stopped. "Listen to me -- after everything we've been through..." "I'm asking you for your help -- Boris would have done anything for us; we owe him the same. You remember Helmand? Do you remember how he dragged you out of the back of that burning truck? Do you recall the scars he suffered saving your life?" Lena's words seemed to get through to Piotr, striking a chord within him. His demeanour shifted, his shoulders slumped slightly. "Okay. What do we do with him?" **** The Russian Embassy London One week later "Can you do it?" Inno sat at his desk and pondered the question. Sat across from him in a cramped, confined space in the basement of the embassy was Rejic Grenic; a relatively low level member of the diplomatic corps attached to the delegation in London. Dressed in a worn brown suit with glasses that looked slightly too large for his features, the junior delegate was clearly uncomfortable in the presence of the KGB officer. "Are you doubting whether I'm capable of this task?" Inno answered him with his own quandary. Grenic appeared to go visibly pale now, fearing the worst. Inno opened up a draw on his desk and pulled out a pad that he began scribbling something down on. "No, no, it's not that -- it's just that new KGB officer -- Ignakov. Frankly he scares me. There's something about his eyes that makes me feel like he's looking straight into my soul." "Calm down my friend, let me deal with that young upstart." Waving away Grenic's concerns, Inno continued. "We live in uncertain times at the moment, however I give you my word that I will help you now in exchange for a favour from you later if needs be." he added as he tore the piece of paper off and handed it to Grenic. There was a series of numbers and the name Benedict on it. "Call that telephone number from somewhere private -- somewhere outside the Embassy and speak to that man -- tell him that the Bear has told you to speak to him. He will take it from there on." The relief on Grenic's face was evident as he stood up, enthusiastically shaking Inno's paw-like hand. "Thank you -- you've no idea what this means to my family..." The ringing of the telephone on Inno's desk cut off the junior diplomat. Ushering him out of the room, Inno answered it as politely as he could manage. "Yes?" "Please tell me that you've not been letting Sascha stay up until all hours of the night?" The mock stern tone of the question made the Russian smile. "Of course I have -- she has been reading the latest intelligence reports as they come in." He joked. "Rest assured that our daughter is fine. How is East Berlin?" "Grey and wet as usual." Svetlana quipped. "I can't help but feel that Ignakov has gotten me chasing shadows out here. We've spent the best part of a day interviewing some dissidents who think they know something shocking only to draw a complete blank. Really, I'm just wasting my time here." "Well we all have our orders to follow my dear. How is Demetriov coping with the weather?" "He's complaining as normal. Honestly I can't remember a time when he didn't moan about something." Inno could hear the sounds of people moving around in the background of the call. "I did find something amongst our interviewee's personal belongings that might interest you," Svetlana looked at the diary of notes that she had confiscated from one of the East Germans she had been interrogating all day. "But we'll talk more about that..." In the background Inno could hear the sound of Yuri's voice urging Svetlana to go to the door. "Look, I have to go - I'll speak to you in the morning before we head back." "Okay my swan -- be careful." The call ended and Inno placed the receiver back in its cradle. Looking at the clock on his desk he decided it was time to check on his daughter. **** Russian Embassy 206 Fugelstrasser East Berlin 1:13 am Ending her phone call and silently muttering to herself, Svetlana turned around to see that Yuri was beckoning for her to join him in the hallway of the building. Exasperated, she trudged across to him, stuffing the diary into her suitcase on her way. "What could possibly be so important that...?" Svetlana began to say. Yuri prevented her from continuing. "Did you know there's another member of KGB here?" Svetlana shook her head. "They've just taken Gruber and Mohr from the holding cells." "What?" Svetlana was now moving, pausing only to scoop up her sidearm and slam the door behind her. "Come on -- if we're quick we might be able to catch up with them." **** By the time Yuri had managed to get the car out of the car park of the embassy, Svetlana had learned everything she needed to know about the supposed KGB officer who had removed the two German journalists from the rooms in the basement of the embassy. A crude video recording had enabled her to identify the car the red-haired woman had taken them away in. It took them less than ten minutes to relocate them on the nearly empty Fugelstrasser. "So, what's the plan?" Yuri asked as he maintained a reasonable distance from the Polish Trabbant so as not to be noticed. "We follow them for now -- we need to know who they are before we make our move." Svetlana replied, nervously running her fingers along the dashboard of the car. "Do you think it's the Stasi?" Svetlana shook her head. "No -- they'd never have the gall to just walk into the Russian Embassy and pretend to be KGB. No, this is something different." She added as they moved through the quiet city streets and headed towards one of the larger industrial bases on the outskirts of Berlin. Shortly thereafter the Trabbant picked up speed, then darted away to the left, disappearing behind one of the bulky edifices that proudly proclaimed itself the manufacturing heart of the city. Reacting just a moment too late, Yuri almost crashed the car before finding another left turn some six hundred yards up from where their quarry had vanished. Navigating their way through the dark without headlights on to avoid drawing attention to them, the two KGB officers slowed to little more than a crawl. Just as Svetlana was about to lose her patience with the pace of their pursuit Yuri turned the corner onto wasteland that the buildings backed onto and they both saw the Trabbant parked up at an awkward angle. The momentary flare of gunfire from within the vehicle prompted Yuri to throw the headlights back on, illuminating a figure at the side of the car firing into the two figures who occupied the back seats, and push his foot down onto the accelerator pedal. Everything seemed to slow down as Svetlana saw the figure twist and heard the unmistakeable noise of machinegun fire raking across the front of their car. The sound of bullets slamming into the radiator, then the engine block and finally arcing across the windscreen, peppering the two occupants with glass filled her ears. Her brain registered something -- a brief flare of pain in her right arm -- before the car swerved wildly, slamming into the side of a brick wall at speed. The world was silent for a moment -- then the sound of footsteps approaching increased. Svetlana's head was swimming; her body was on fire, yet she tried to extricate herself from the mangled wreckage of the staff car. She struggled to open the door handle by reaching across her body with her left hand, subconsciously noting that there was blood running down her right arm as it was crushed against the metal superstructure of the car. Grasping the handle she tried to pull it only to find it unresponsive. The sound of footsteps stopped and Svetlana heard the clicking, methodical noise of a fresh magazine being loaded into something before the interior of the car was filled once again with the buzzing staccato bursts of gunfire. Feeling the bullets tear through her body, Svetlana's last conscious thoughts were of her daughter -- the angelic face of Sacha filling her mind before she sank into oblivion. Content that the machine pistol had done it's job, Lena Marakova moved around to the passenger side of the car. Prising the door open, Svetlana's body fell out of her seat. Allowing herself a sense of satisfaction that a chapter in her life was over, she knelt down and removed the solid gold band wedding ring from Svetlana's finger before walking away. Half an hour later she found a public telephone box wherein she dialled a number from a scrap of paper in her jacket pocket. "Ignakov, it's done." After delivering her curt message she hung up and vanished into the night. **** The dulcet tone of the small private telephone in Inno's private quarters woke him from his sleep. Reaching for the bedside lamp and his glasses, he muttered under his breath as he snagged the phone before it woke his daughter. "Karagin is dead." Inno instantly recognised Piotr's voice. "Lena's gone off the deep end -- I don't know..." "What happened?" Inno interrupted him. "We were in Canada -- I don't know, everything happened so fast..." the strain in Piotr's voice was clear. "Okay, calm down. Where are you now?" Inno asked, hoping for some sort of clarity so he could start to formulate a plan in his mind. "Uhmm...Oslo, I think? Yes, yes - Oslo. The old KGB safe house just outside the city." "Stay there -- I'll be with you in the morning." **** Gepetto's Restaurant 2010 Saturday Night "Your Charlie Chaplin once said that observed from a distance, life is funny -- it's only when you look at it up close that it's tragic." Inno said as he nursed the drink in his hands before looking down at the manuscript that sat on the table. Andrew looked over at him for a moment, seeing the hurt in his friend's eyes. "I found Piotr holed up in the safe house -- a babbling wreck of paranoia and fear. He'd been drinking; it took me the best part of a day to convince him to come back to London with me." "Did he tell you what had happened?" Andrew probed. Inno shrugged his shoulders. "He was vague -- he told me about Karagin's death and how Marakova had been taking a greater lead in things regarding our little...experiment in free enterprise -- generating contacts, making deals that the others knew nothing about, that sort of thing. He helped Grenic to defect and after that I never saw him again -- the last thing I'd heard was that he'd disappeared to America." "Yeah -- that's something else I wanted to ask you about -- this whole defection thing. What on Earth were you thinking?" Inno smiled at Andrew's question. "The world was changing -- to the outside world nothing was wrong, however the reality was the core of the Soviet Union was starting to crumble." He took a drink from his glass of wine. "Besides, I knew I was going to need Grenic in the future if things went wrong." "His daughter, right?" Andrew's question was met with rueful smile. "Not initially but that's how it turned out. I gave her the diary from those German journalists that Svetlana found in Berlin all those years ago. From there she -- how you say -- just connected the dots." Pausing for a moment for Inno to order another large vodka from their waiter, Andrew continued onward. "Okay, so getting back to Piotr -- what happened after he disappeared into the middle of nowhere?" "Then the bottom fell out of the world." Inno replied. "The official report into Svetlana's death indicated that it had been foreign intelligence services who had killed her; however a few weeks later I received a package with her wedding ring and a note, telling me to keep my nose out of things that were no longer any of my business." Inno said as he devoured the last vodka he had ordered. Andrew could tell he was visibly distressed by everything they had discussed. "Lena right?" Inno's answer was a nod mixed with a sorrowful smile. "And I take it that everything that happened with Sacha and Irina last year was a repercussion, right?" "I'd been making a few discrete enquiries as to whether Lena was still active. She'd been running weapons the last anyone had heard -- through some Croatian or Serbian group in the Adriatic I think. I must have gotten closer to the truth than I realised." "So what happens now? I mean, this book changes everything -- for both of you." Andrew's concerns were waved away by Inno. "I'm not worried about my reputation -- that's been in the gutter for some time now -- and I don't think justice can be achieved any longer. I just want the truth to be known, for myself and my family." "Well, I can appreciate that mindset." Andrew said as he gestured to the waiter to bring them the bill. "Come on, let's get out of here old man -- I think we've talked enough for one night." **** Perched on the edge of a rooftop in the driving rain, Lena Marakova waited, her attention focused solely on the entrance to the restaurant she had been staking out for nearly three hours. Looking through the green/black hue of the night vision scope of the Dragunov rifle, her patience finally paid off as she saw two figures exit the building. Carefully tracking their movements she slowly exhaled as she pulled the trigger. **** St Martins Hospital 8 hours later The wheezing sound of the ventilator mingled softly with the respective electronic tones of the life support machines that were working overtime to ensure the body in the bed was kept alive. Leah sat next to the bed, her eyes red and bloodshot as she reached out and softly took hold of the hand resting next to her. Closing her eyes and offering up a silent prayer, the sound of the door opening interrupted her. She looked up into the weary, fragile looking face of her husband. His shirt was stained with blood and his voice sounded shaky as he spoke to her, trying his best to keep his own emotions in check as he looked at the comatose figure of Inno Annentskji in the hospital bed. "The doctors said that he's stable at the minute; however everything is going to be touch and go for the next seventy two hours." He moved over to her and sat down on the other chair next to her. "I've tried to get in touch with Sacha but I've drawn a blank on that -- I didn't really feel like leaving a message for her." "That's okay -- we'll try her later." Leah said, wrapping her arm around her husband's shoulder. "There was so much blood..." he muttered. "I mean, you think there's going to be a lot of blood but nothing can prepare you...and it just happened so fast...one minute we're talking about football, the next..." "Ssshhh, try not to think about it baby." Leah whispered. "Come on, we need to get you home. You need to sleep and then we can come back later today when you've gotten cleaned up." "Yeah, yeah you're right -- after all, nothing's going to happen to him in here, not with that armed police officer they've put on the door." Andrew replied. He stood up, initially unsteady on his feet before Leah helped him. Arm in arm they walked out of the small private room, almost colliding with a red-headed nurse as they left. Closing the door securely behind her, the Nurse stood still in the room for a moment, surveying the still figure in front of her. Moving carefully forwards she leant down so that her lips were almost touching Inno's right ear. "I know you can hear me in there Annenskij, so I'm only going to say this once." The hushed words were clearly spoken in a deep Russian accent. "I could have killed you tonight but I didn't. This is your final warning; if you continue to try to pursue me then I'll take them all away from you -- your daughter, your granddaughter, even your little English friend and his pretty little family." One of the electrical devices in the room detected a fleeting increase in his heartbeat as Lena Marakova smiled to herself. "So, do I make myself clear?" There was, as she expected, no verbal response other than the monotonous beeping of the life support machines. "Good. Now I will see myself out." Leaving the room and exiting the hospital, she caught sight of the English couple driving away in a silver coloured Golf. For a fleeting moment Lena caught the eye of the woman driving and thought there was something familiar about her. Discarding it as a foolish notion brought on by the late night and lack of sustenance over the last few hours, she continued to walk towards the car park where she entered a black BMW and melted away into the night.