Slipping past ECHO's security sensors and dismantling the system, Jade quietly positions herself deep in the cryptic shadows of the ECHO situation room and takes inventory. Max is engrossed in whatever she's doing on the computer. She doesn't even realize that she's being watched.
If only I could have looked like that at 27. Keep dreaming Jade. Miracles don't happen in reality.
Micah and Lorne haven't showed up for work yet, but the rest of ECHO's employees are roaming around like cockroaches with a workload that could probably kill a paralegal. Jade decides to take out her camera and try to snap some helpful shots of Max while she waits to see if the bait has been taken.
"Hey Max. You're here early," points out Micah as he strolls into ECHO.
"Yeah, I wanted to research something," Max says, not removing her attention from the computer.
"Like what?" he hunches down a little to see what she's doing, then begins to pivot on his heels in a slightly tensed manner.
"I got this in the mail yesterday," she states as she tosses an unsealed, blank envelope in his direction.
He takes the letter out of the envelope and looks at its contents. "I don't get it. All it says is 'Project Meridian,' Even the envelope's blank."
Bait Taken.
"I know that, " she says as she swivels in her chair to face him, "But doesn't it make you a little curious that someone would drop something like that in my mail slot?"
"Max, someone is trying to play a game with you and I'm not too hot with the idea of you treading through classified waters."
In mild retaliation, she assures Micah, "Don't worry, I'm on little cat feet."
"Yeah, well, the last time you were on 'little cat feet' you tripped a national security alarm," Micah says, becoming annoyed and a little nervous.
"But I'm being careful this time," she insists.
"Just do me a favor, if the president calls, I'm in Tahiti," says Micah, already showing the disapproval in his voice.
"I don't think you'll be going on vacation too soon - I've already found something."
"Already?" He surprisingly asks.
Max decides to partially ignore her employer's lack of confidence in her, but shoots him a dirty look to let him know that she didn't appreciate it, "Project Meridian: The government's plan to clean out the waterholes that weren't of use anymore and sell them to the general public. This would help generate funding for other, more immediate things. Most of the file lists some basic real estate information and the dates the clean-ups were completed." She pauses for a few minutes to read something on the display, then continues, "Well here is something interesting: most of the waterholes were sold before the houses were cleaned out. The real estate agents were told not to let the new owners move in until two weeks after the fact."
"What's so interesting about that?"
"One of the houses became occupied a little sooner than expected. Too soon for the government to have had the house in question cleaned out."
"Why couldn't they just send an agent in to clean up while the owners were away."
"It's not that simple. The new tenants were exposed to the supplies in the waterhole. Someone had to make sure they wouldn't talk. And we all know what happens to people who know things they shouldn't."
"Yes we do: accidents happen and fatalities occur."
"Right. An agent was sent in to burn down the house with the tenants in it and make it look like an accident. But the agent screwed up and only one of the two people got torched."
"Gruesome, who was it?" He asks, becoming curious himself.
"Alec Menley."
"What happened to the other person who was living there?" He questions, with increasing curiosity.
"She was there when the house went up, that's definite, but her remains were never found. And since she's been missing for over 7 years……"
"She's been declared officially dead," volunteers Micah. "Was it anyone we know?"
"I can't tell, there's no name," she says, slightly disappointed.
"What about the agent that was sent in?" He inquires.
"There we go……" She reveals with a touch of surprise as she turns around to face him.
"Are you going to tell me, or should I..." Micah cuts himself short when Max's gaze fixates on something behind him.
"Speak of the devil..." Max mumbles to herself, though loudly enough for Micah to hear.
Micah turns around to see who Max is talking about and is greeted with the image of Lorne finally showing up for work. When Lorne approaches his friends, he's welcomed with some strange looks.
"What?" he asks.
"Max, why don't you save your crusade for another day," Micah suggests, knowing full well that mutiny was inevitable.
"Okay, Micah." Max says, disguising her determination with full cooperation, she speedily escapes out of the Project Meridian file.
Wait a minute, she can't just STOP there. Jade thinks to herself. She writes a note and drops it on the floor, pockets the photos, reassembles the security system and leaves, though not as silently as she came.
Jade walks into the only entrance to the cavern, her home for the past ten years, and removes the black ski mask that completed her ensemble for visiting ECHO. Her gaze accidentally shifts to the mirror on the east wall. Jade can hear her heart beating in her ears as her eyes trace the scars from the 3rd degree burns running down the left side of her face. The urge to break the mirror is hard to resist and she wonders why she kept the damn thing, but after little contemplation, her reasons for its existence occur to her and her mind shifts from the painful sight in the mirror to the task at hand.
She removes the pictures, taken earlier, out of her back pocket and sits down at her computer. The overworked machine seems to sigh as she disengages the psychedelic screen saver.
It's all right that Miss London lost interest so quickly. The reminder should remedy that. But now, at least she'll have some idea why she's involved. It's just too bad that someone so ……innocent of his crimes will have to be sacrificed.
Jade doesn't realize that her mind has been wandering again and she's shocked back into reality when the alarm on her computer goes off. It takes a second for the clouds of confusion to clear and then the sound registers. It's time for another round of painkillers. It shouldn't have had to be this way.
"Screw the pills, back to work," she says aloud. Her voice echoes off the walls for a second or two, making the cavern seem large and empty. Once again, she realizes exactly how alone she really is. With her brother dying, she lost one of the only people she ever needed.
Jade slips the pictures she took earlier into the scanner and initiates the program she created. It will take several hours for the program to get the height, weight, and dimensions down for Max. Then she'll have to build the replica.
She sits back in her chair and looks around the room. Everything looks just as she left it. Her journals are stacked up in the north-west corner, the couch is backed up against the wall adjacent to the small underground stream, and her medication and surveillance equipment are resting on a table in the middle of the room. A large vat of melted rubber is boiling in the southwest corner with two chains dangling over it. Attaching the chains to the cavern's ceiling is a mechanism that allows Jade to move the chains from one section of the cavern to another and adjust the length of the chains. At a safe distance from the vat, there is a complete mannequin accompanied by two five-gallon jugs, one containing water and one empty, and a small machine. There are three suitcases neatly lined up next to the computer desk. Two of which carries the solution to her problem and the other one houses the few treasures that she was able to salvage from the fire-proof safe in the basement. All three are locked.
She grabs the closest one to her and opens it. There is a small stack of letters resting atop a fairly large jewelry case. She takes the letters and places them on the computer monitor and turns away to try to get the jewelry case open. The slant on the monitor causes the letters to slowly start slipping off the back. The stack completes the end of their journey and hit the floor with at dry thud. "Damn. I'll get that later," Jade says as she continues to fiddle with the jewelry box. "Fifteen years and I still can't get this right. I wish I had gotten the other one -- At least it opened." The case suddenly snaps open and its contents fly everywhere. "I just can't win."
A small, metallic-tapping sound suddenly appears. Not noticing it, she gets down on her hands and knees to pick the all-too-expensive jewelry off the sand-covered stone that makes up the floor. As she dusts off the items and puts them back in the case, she realizes that she doesn't seem to have the solid gold pendant that Jack had given her. Oh god, where could it have gone off to? She asks herself. She stands up and looks around the room. Nothing catches her eye.
"I can't lose it, not now. I just can't." Jade stands there for a moment, panicking at the loss of yet another treasured artifact, then, the sound registers. The distinct sound of metal clanging against rock. Her instincts immediately focus her attention to the stream.
She darts to the bank and begins to search. The waters are crystal-clear and yet she still can't see it. She searches the bank frantically from the north end to the south end and still nothing. The sound is still there. It must be wedged in a rock or something. She listens closely to see exactly where the sound is coming from - the small tunnel by which the stream exits the cavern. Jade attempts to look into the tunnel and sees nothing. She sticks her right arm into the hole, hoping to feel out the pendant. The tip of her middle finger barely brushes it, so she strains harder to get any sort of grip on it. After about 15 minutes of having her arm in the icy old water, it starts to go numb. She pulls it out of the water and dries it off. "The necklace must be caught on something……If I can knock it loose, then I'll be able to get it."
She waits for the feeling to come back into her arm, then grabs a pen off the desk. "If I can...just knock...it loose..." She says as she attempts to knock the pendant off its perch. "Thank god." she says with relief as it lets go and is carried away by the stream. Jade exits the cavern and heads out to the sublet, where the pendant would have escaped.
"What crusade?" Lorne asks, completely clueless as to what was just happening.
"Just something Max got in the mail, "Micah points out.
"Like what?" Lorne inquires, hoping he'll get a straight answer.
"It's nothing, really," Max answers, looking him squarely in the eye, hoping he'll believe her. She changes the subject quickly; "Did you hear that?"
"Now you're just avoiding the question. And not very well, might I add," he says, sporting that sly little smile of his.
"This isn't an inquisition, "Max defensively states, then focuses her attention in the direction of the sound and argues, "and I did hear a sound -- over there."
She then stands up and walks cautiously over to where Jade was recently standing. Micah shakes his head slowly at Max and then gets to his work. Lorne follows her, hoping his partner hasn't gone completely off the deep end.
"I could swear I heard something."
Lorne appears behind her and jokingly whispers in her ear, "Did you ever think of seeing a specialist for that problem?"
"I wasn't hearing things," she states as she looks around, in an attempt to prove her sanity. Eventually, her eyes drift to the floor. There's a small envelope stuck in the floor with Max's name on it. She bends down to pick it up.
"What's that?" He asks, beginning to believe that she wasn't trying to avoid the question.
"A very personal note from my Latin lover, Pedro," She playfully states as she opens it.
"Sure." He says, raising his eyebrows and rolling his eyes in disbelief. Then he leaves Max to her love-mail. Not paying attention to Lorne, she reads the rhyme that's written.
When questions are asked
About who you're with
The stories told
Are merely myth
"What?" She asks herself. Who could have left this here without tripping the alarm? Probably someone within ECHO, playing some practically joke. Wouldn't doubt it if it were Lorne, he probably planted the file and the notes - little sneak.
"Max, might you be able to take some time out or your busy schedule to …… oh, I don't know…… work?"
"Sure Micah."
She returns to the situation room to find Lorne sitting in her chair and stealing a look at the letter she got in the mail.
"What's this?" He asks.
Facetiously she answers, "Pedro loves to write."
"Pedro knows a little more than he should," Lorne states defensively as he checks his watch.
"He doesn't know as much about Project: Meridian as you do," she speculates, trying to pry her way into what really happened.
"We sometimes know more about certain things than others," he answers, avoiding each question and speculation with ease. Not even breaking a sweat.
She tries again. She knows he's much more experienced at this game, but with a little beginner's luck, she knows she'll break him down, "But you know a whole lot about this."
"Obviously not as much as you," he says, smiling. He's actually having fun at this.
She walks closer to him and attempts to look calm, "Well, then, maybe you could fill me in on what I don't know."
"I could only tell you what you already know."
"What if I told you that I didn't know anything about it?"
"Then there would be no need to tell you anything. Besides, you've probably already hacked your way into the file." He speculates as he checks his watch. Three minutes and I've already managed to turn the conversation against her. This MUST be a record.
"What if I didn't?" She asks, realizing that she's losing the battle to a pro.
"But you did," he tells her.
Their interrogation is ended by Micah, who cuts them off by saying, "Anyone ever hear of the Rigand brothers?"
Max recognizes the name immediately, "Aren't they the ones who botched the Kendall mission?"
"Yeah, they're the ones. Seems as though they've stolen a few biological weapons," Micah informs them.
"Any leads?" Max questions.
Micah tells them, "The only thing we have is a forwarding address."
"Then I guess we should check it out," Lorne says, dreading every word, "What is it?"
"6 Hillsboro Road," Micah informs the agents, "and turn your communicators on this time."
Max and Lorne walk out to the T-33 and notice a piece of paper underneath the windshield wiper.
"That sort of advertising should be banned." Lorne says as he crawls into the passenger seat.
Max takes the piece of paper and reads it.
Karma attacks the inside first
But still I don't know which is worst
To live knowing you drove the hearse
Or to die violently - without the curse
She tosses the note on the ground and hops into the driver's seat. "Ha ha, very funny," she says sarcastically to Lorne.
"I'm glad you're amused. Now, what did I do?"
She turns the key in the ignition, puts it in drive and says, "Those little notes you've been leaving all over the place."
"Gee, and I thought those were from Pedro," he mockingly jokes.
She puts it in drive and slams her foot on the gas, "I'm not joking. It's getting annoying."
"I didn't write the notes. But, while we're on the topic, what did they say?" He asks, hoping to initiate another mind game - she really needs the practice.
"Nothing."
"Okay. What was the Kendall mission?" He asks, figuring she's had enough for one day.
"When Mikel and Jaysen used to work for ECHO, they were assigned to rescue the Russian nuclear arsenal from some international terrorists. Unfortunately, their bickering got in the way of completing their assignment and the terrorists decided to have a Fourth of July festival with their new 'fireworks.'"
"Where did they set off the nukes?" He inquires as Max turns the car onto a small dirt road, barely large enough to fit the T-33.
"Ground-zero was never disclosed and is currently classified," she says as branches begin to brush up against the side of the car.
"I'll have to get a new paint job if this keeps up," Max increases her speed and dirt is thrown into the air, so much so that she doesn't see the pothole coming.
"OW! Hey, do you think that you could slow it down a little???" He says as he puts his hand on the ceiling, trying to prevent another bump on the head.
"Why? We have another 20 miles before we reach the house. Getting there as quickly as possible will prevent mistakes."
"Well, if one of us passes out due to massive head injuries, it won't matter whether or not we get there quickly."
She ignores the suggestion. After all, if these guys are as volatile as she expects, they may accidentally set things off earlier than expected.
Finally, they come across an even tinier road with a mailbox with the number 6 on it. "This must be the place." Max says as she stops the car. "Why would anyone want to live this far out?"
"So they can store biological weapons and beat the living crap out of each other in private."
She shoots him a look that just screams of "I wonder why you even try somedays."
Max decides whether or not to try to bring the car up the driveway. Her instincts get the better of her and she just parks the car on the road and proceeds to walk up the driveway. Lorne looks around for a moment then catches up to Max.
"It's a nice day Lorne, you sure you shouldn't be playing golf?" She says, trying to initiate an intelligent conversation.
"I would love to, but there's a little thing stopping me."
"What's that?" She inquires innocently.
"Employment." He states with attitude.
"Oh please. You mean the Alibi doesn't take up your time?"
"Of course it does, but I can always skip out for a while without getting caught," he informs her.
"The trademark of a good spy," she says, but then adds on, "But not when you work for ECHO," to see if Micah is listening.
I heard that.
"Sorry Micah." She apologizes.
Have you seen anything yet?
"Nothing but the squirrels, but in this part of town maybe I should call them 'dinner'," Lorne mocks.
Just keep an eye out, these guys may be incompetent at times, but they're tricky too.
After about twenty minutes of hiking up the driveway, they notice a small brook. Max spots something out of the corner of her eye. She stops suddenly and scans the bank. There is a small woman looking for something in the water, downstream.
Max makes her way through the thicket to talk to the woman. After all, maybe she knows how long this driveway is. At about five feet away, the woman notices Max approaching her, with Lorne not far behind. "I hope you're not looking for anyone or anything in particular, because you're not going to find it," she states, rather rudely.
She's obviously not interested in helping, but Max tries anyway, "Actually, I was looking for Mikel and Jaysen Rigand. Do you know if they're home?"
"Why would you want to look for them. They're nothing but trouble," She says, giving them more of an attitude than she did before. Max comes in closer for a better look at the woman's face, but the woman's hair is hindering any sort of view.
"May I ask your name?"
"Kate." She says as she fishes through the stream with her right hand.
"What kind of trouble are they?" Lorne asks.
The woman repositions her left hand on the opposite bank so that she can fish deeper into the water. Max and Lorne notice the bandages. "They're up at all hours of the night firing rounds and drinking. The rest of the time, they spend harassing me."
"Why?" Lorne inquires.
"Who cares."
"Do you know if the Rigand brothers are in?"
Lorne notices something twinkling a few inches from his foot. He picks it up looks at it. A pendant. This must be what she's looking for. He turns it over and reads the inscription.
To Jade
With Love
Jack
It has to be a coincidence.
"Do I look like their damned secretary?? How am I supposed to know?" She says, becoming increasingly hostile.
Max tries again, "Well, you seem to be looking for something on their property, I thought perhaps you would have some idea of any cars that may have come or gone."
"I'm not that observant."
"Is this what you're looking for?" Lorne asks, holding the pendant out as though it was an offering.
"Actually, it is." She unsteadily rises to her feet. Untrusting, she takes it from Lorne. "Thank you. I don't know what I would have done without it." She says, never making eye contact and never letting them get any sort of look at her face.
Max wanders upstream a little, looking for some sign of civilization. Lorne nods and begins to leave with Max. Kate just stands there for a few moments, watching them go, but then she speaks up. "They're not home. Even so, if you take the driveway, it'll be another 5 miles and by then, they would have run you down. There's a trail over there that leads directly up to the cabin. It'll only take you about 10 minutes by way of the latter, and much longer by the former."
"Thanks," Max calls out as she and Lorne wander up the trail. "How can a person lose jewelry in the middle of the woods."
"Expensive jewelry."
"And how would you know that."
"I bought someone a gift similar to that."
Just as Kate had said, they reached the cabin in a little under ten minutes, mostly because Max was rushing. They quickly scanned the area, searching for signs of occupation. It looked as though no one had lived there for a few years. Windows were cracked, if not broken and dust was coating everything. Lorne tests the knob to find the door locked, and says, "It's your turn." Max cocks her Herlick and kicks down the door as she prepares for an ambush, not trusting the information that Kate had given them.
The cabin was, in fact, empty. The sunlight reflects off the dust particles that inhabit the air. Lorne sneezes. "Bless you." Max says. Some rickety stairs lead up into seemingly nothingness. There is a small doorway leading to the kitchen. She walks through it. The refrigerator creates a small humming noise and there are dirty dishes in the sink, taking on a life of their own. She scrunches her nose in disgust. Lorne walks into the room and remarks, "Looks like my dorm used to." Max looks at him funny. "Well, without one of my roommates passed out on the floor." He explains.
Lorne hears a car pull up, "Max, we gotta hide, they're home." Lorne opens the door closest to him and squeezes in. Max isn't far behind. They soon discover that it's the pantry and it barely has enough room to house the two agents, even for a short period of time. "Will you quit breathing down my neck!" Max whispers, "And back-up some, I can't move."
"I can't. There's no room."
"Shhhh!"
"Dammit Jay. Why do you always do this? We were almost in, and then you had to go and say, 'Well, we're secret agents.'" One man screams.
"I was trying to increase our chances." Jaysen shouts back.
"Yeah, well, do you see the looks on their faces, those girls thought we were nuts."
The other man yells, he looks as though he's ready to kill Jaysen.
Lorne's nose starts to tickle. He tries to bring his hand up to itch it, but he can't move. Still trying to resist the urge, he sneezes. On Max.
"Maybe if the almighty Mikel would actually stop acting like a convi...did you hear that?" Jaysen says, losing all signs of anger and becoming a bit scared.
"Yeah, it came from the pantry. Must be the rats again." Mikel reasons.
"Rats don't sneeze like that." Jaysen says as he opens the door. He's greeted by the faces of Max and Lorne, smiling innocently from inside. Mikel grabs Max's arm and drags her out. Just the chance she was waiting for.
She grabs his shoulder and knocks him off balance. With a loud thud, he hits the ground. Lorne takes Jaysen's arm uses it to ram him into the nearest wall. His head crashes right through the rickety wood. Mikel grabs Max's foot and causes her to crash to the floor. He lifts himself to his feet, pulls a gun out from underneath his jacket and aims it at Max's head. Meanwhile, Lorne has Jaysen pinned with his head still in the wall. He looks to see if Max is okay, only to find her on the losing side of a semi-automatic.
"If you don't want to scrape your girl-friend off the wall, I suggest you let my brother go." Mikel screams from across the room.
Lorne sees no way out and releases his grip on Jaysen.
"Good. I'm glad you have a brain."
Max carefully rises to her feet. Just then, Jaysen hits Lorne over the head with a strip of wood from the hole in the wall. Lorne passes out immediately. Max winces. He walks to one of the cabinets, opens it and pulls out some hypodermic needles. He carefully chooses one and quickly sticks it into the base of Max's neck. As he pushes the plunger down, Max starts to fade into unconsciousness.
When Max comes to, she notices that they're still in the kitchen. Except, they're tied to two very uncomfortable chairs. The handcuffs holding her there don't provide a lot of movement. Lorne is already awake and is bleeding severely.
"So, who are you guys and what were you doing in the pantry?" Jaysen directs to Max, seeing he probably couldn't get an answer out of Lorne.
She shoots him a dirty look, but doesn't say a word.
"Why'd you ask that, we already know what they were doing in there." Mikel states with mischief in his eyes.
Jaysen points out, "Oh, please, like she'd go for someone like him."
"And what, she'd go for someone like you?" Mikel argues, already picking a fight.
Rather matter-of-factly, Jaysen defends himself, "Of course."
As if noticing their hostages for the first time, they stop bickering.
"Who are you?" Jaysen inquires to both of them. They sit there, staring into space as if they didn't hear him.
"Who do you work for?" Mikel asks. They give him the same reaction as they did his brother.
Jaysen throws one out to Max in particular, "If I let you go, would you sleep with me?"
Max bites with, "Vulgar imbecile."
"Told ya." Mikel says to Jaysen as he grabs his brother's arm and pulls him into the living room. "You remember her?"
"Yeah, when we worked for Micah, she was another field agent. So."
"So...She's probably still working for him. And that guy, " he says, pointing to Lorne," must be a new asset." Mikel shows partial intelligence as he clues his brother in."
"And what does that have to do with us?" Jaysen asks, still not getting it.
"That means that Micah knows that we have the viruses."
"Damn. That could prove to be fatal!" Jaysen exclaims, almost loud enough for Max to hear.
Looking for an easy way out, Mikel suggests, "In that case, let's just throw them in the attic. That way, we don't have to deal with them."
Jaysen improves upon his brother's remark "And have them get loose, I'm not willing to chance it. We should tie them up real good and lock the door."
Mikel agrees.
"They know we work for ECHO." Lorne says softly, he's barely able to keep his eyes open.
"How do you know that?" Max asks him, worried about his state-of-mind.
"I can read lips. Remember?" He explains.
"That's right," she remembers "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm just tired." Lorne says as he fights to keep his eyes open.
"No wonder. You've lost a lot of blood." Max points out, as though the small pool of blood forming on the floor didn't give it away.
"I have?" Lorne asks meekly as he finally succumbs to dreamland.
"Don't worry, I'll get us out of here." She says. She's never seen him that pale, or that cooperative.
"Oh Jaysen?" Max seductively calls from the kitchen.
"Yeah." He hollers.
"I've decided to re-think your offer." She propositions, hoping to twitch her way out of another bad situation.
"Really?" He says, sounding a little too interested, as he walks back into the kitchen.
"Really." She says, using her new-found skills that Honey helped perfect.
Mikel interrupts Max's plans. "I'm glad you've met Honey Trapp, but we're not that stupid."
She snaps back into ready mode, "Coulda fooled me."
"Could you shut her up or something?" Jaysen says, sounding a little embarrassed that he almost fell for it.
This time, Mikel is the one to grab the hypodermic. "I believe you've met our little friend before. Now if you'll just sit still, it'll be over in a minute."
Max wakes up to find herself chained to yet another uncomfortable chair in a dusty, over-heated attic. Lorne is passed out solid. She tries to squirm her way out of the chains, but they're too tight, and all she does is make a lot of noise.
"Not tonight Miranda, I'm too tired." Lorne mumbles, obviously still asleep.
"Lorne……" Max says, trying to wake him up.
"I told you, Max, the handcuffs hurt too much."
"Lorne." She says, beginning to sound aggravated. "Wake up."
Lorne begins to open his eyes. They look bloodshot. "Huh?"
"Wake up."
"I was having the weirdest dream. And Honey was there and you were there……" Lorne says, sounding confused.
"Please don't tell me anymore than that."
"I don't remember the rest." Lorne says, finally inching his way back into reality.
"We have to find some way out of here." Max says, looking for an alternative to wiggling out of the chains. There is some broken glass across the room, but that won't help with the metal chains. If she could just break the chair, then the chains would be looser. She could try the large chest on the opposite side of the room, but it's too tiny.
Other than that, she doesn't see anything sturdy enough to break it on……unless, she uses one of the plastic covered sofas. That might just work. She tries to stand up straight, and finds it very difficult with the chair stuck to her back. She slowly works her way over to one of the sofas and swings her body around so that the chair hits the couch. The wood doesn't even creak. She takes a better stance and rams the chair into the couch with everything she's got. The wood falls apart, with splinters flying everywhere. The chains fall down around her ankles and she releases a sigh of relief as she is finally able to stand normally.
"Remind me not to get in your way." Lorne jokes.
Max walks over to where Lorne is and attempts to untie the chains, with no luck. There's no way he's going to be able to do what I did, not in his condition. She opens the chest she saw earlier. How convenient. She thinks to herself as she notices the bolt-cutters. She takes them and manages to cut through some of the links in his chains.
"Thanks." He says weakly.
They manage to remove the chains, and he tries to stand. He looks at the ground and sways a little, but manages to regain his balance.
They approach the door, and Max tries the knob. Locked. She pulls out her handy lock-picking kit and jimmies the door open. As she puts the kit back, she notices that her Herlick is missing. "Damn." She says.
"What?" Lorne asks, still trying to get his mind back on track.
"They may have been stupid enough to leave the lock picks, but they were smart enough to take my Herlick." She says, waiting for a comment like "That's why I never carry a gun."
"Our communicators are missing, too."
They carefully walk down the steep, winding stairs to the second floor. There isn't any voices coming from below, but as Micah had said: "these guys may be incompetent at times, but they're tricky, too." They round the last spiral and cautiously peer into the darkness.
For a woodsy cabin, natural light doesn't go too far. Mikel and Jaysen must not be home again. They ignore the urge to search the second floor and head straight down another flight of stairs. At the bottom, they can hear voices coming from somewhere beneath them.
Max begins to look for her gun by opening drawers and cabinets left and right. Finally, the treasure is found along with their communicators, and a small smile creeps onto her face.
"You happy now?" Lorne asks her sarcastically.
"Yes. Now let's get those two."
This time, they open the door next to the pantry. Yet another long steep stair case. Max checks for ammunition and cocks her Herlick. The voices are much louder now, so they begin to descend. At the bottom of the stairs, Max has a clear shot at both Mikel and Jaysen, but doesn't take it. The brothers are messing with the biological weapons, the last thing that Max wants to do is have one of them crack open the case on their way down and start an epidemic.
The basement is full of odds and ends. Of the more noticeable things, there's a Macintosh computer and a fairly expensive marble pool table.
Lorne notices Max hesitating and begins to work his way around one side of the room. After all, they'll have to neutralize the threat, if not with a gun, then with a fist. He manages to position himself so that the brothers could easily see him if they would just look out of the corner of their eyes. He takes a pool cue out of the rack near the table and swings it quickly at Mikel and Jaysen's ankles.
Unexpecting the attack, they easily fall to the floor. Max takes over from there……"You try to move and you'll wish you didn't!"
Back at ECHO:
"Where's Lorne?" Micah asks.
"He got hit in the head pretty hard. So I took him to the hospital. Doctor said that he won't be working for a few days," Max answers.
"The doctor was wrong." Lorne says as he unsteadily walks into ECHO.
"What are you doing here? You're supposed to be at County General." Max asks, surprised.
"They ran a few tests and gave me some pills. After all, it's just a bump on the head. And besides, I hate hospitals." Lorne explains.
Micah takes charge, "Lorne, go home."
"What?" He asks, surprised that Micah would ever say something like that.
"You can barely walk. Go home, and I don't want to see you back in here until you have some sense of balance."
"Sure. Bye." Lorne would never turn down the chance to NOT work. So, with that, he leaves.
"Max, while you're at it, why don't you take the rest of the day off." Micah suggests.
"Why should I do that?" She asks defensively, "Lorne's the one who got hit in the head."
"Well, there's nothing else you can do here." He states.
She tries to make a suggestion, "You sure? I could always..."
He cuts her off by saying, "Max, there's nothing else to do. Go home."
"Okay Micah, I'll see you tomorrow." Max gives in, disappointed. Now what is she going to do for the rest of the day?
Kate. Kate! I should have been able to think up something much better than that. Either way, I'm just lucky that he didn't recognize me. My entire plan could have been blown. She holds the end of the chain above her head so that the pendant dangles in front of her eyes. She stares at it for a moment and remembers the man she once thought was Jack. She knows better now.
Her medication begins to wear off and Jade becomes conscious of the dull thud of pain shooting up her arm. I shouldn't have skipped that last dose. After this long, I'm surprised I haven't learned that lesson. She grabs her pills off the table, and pops a few in her mouth. She can only hope that the medication takes effect before the pain becomes unbearable.
She sits down at the computer and turns off the screen saver. Looking at the screen, she finds that the computer is only part way finished with the calculations. She lets out a slight sigh of aggravation, after all, she can't continue with her plan until the computer is finished.
Her eyes are becoming heavy, so she retires to the couch. She stares at the ceiling for a few minutes. The ceiling is made up of thousands of jagged stalagmites that formed centuries before Jade was even born. The more she stares at the ceiling, the more it looks as though they're slowly falling down on her. Just as she gives in to dreamland, the illusion is about to put her out of her misery.
When she awakes, she is still feeling a little groggy from the medication, but the pain is gone - for now. She checks to see if the computer has finished rendering the requests, and it has. She prints the dimensions that she'll need to build the replica and sets to work. She examines the print-out for a few minutes and then begins to chip away at a mannequin in the corner with a hammer and a chisel.
After a few hours, the figure begins to take on Max's shape. Jade lays the mannequin down on the plastic that she had spread out earlier. She then paints it with a smelly, gooey, white liquid that seems to instantly bond with the plastic on the mannequin. She'll have about 5 minutes before the concoction begins to dissolve the plastic.
Jade sticks a small hook in the bottom of each foot and pushes the green button attached to the east wall. The chains begin to move from over the vat to roughly where the mannequin is and begin to lower. She attaches the hooks in the bottom of the mannequin to the links in the chains and then pushes the green button on the east wall again. The mannequin is lifted up into the air and the chains are reset into their original position. Jade pushes the blue button just below the last one, and the mannequin is slowly lowered into the vat. Once the operation is complete, Jade pushes the button again. The mannequin is lifted back out of the vat. It hangs there, dripping for a few moments.
She waits until it stops dripping and then hits the green button and the mannequin starts to make its way towards the plastic on the floor. While the rubber dries, Jade opens up one of the briefcases. Inside are four jars of liquid synthetic skin, two glass eyes, two jars of a crystal clear substance, and two long tubes. She snaps the briefcase shut again and walks over to where the dangling mannequin is hanging. She feels the top of the head to find that it is dry, so she pushes the button, and it lowers slowly onto the plastic mat.
Jade unhooks the chains from the replica and paints a clear liquid on the its head, neck, and hands. That will hopefully force some bone structure to show through and maybe keep the neck stiff enough. It better work. Jade rolls a five-gallon jug of water from near the vat to the mannequin. She walks back to the vat and grabs the small machine and an empty five-gallon jug. She takes a tube out of the briefcase and laces through a hole in the machine until it comes out the other side and puts one end in the jug of water.
She pulls the hook out of the left foot and sticks the tube in its place. She puts one end of the other tube in place of the hook in the right foot and places the other end in the empty five gallon jug. Jade switches on the machine. There is a loud, high-pitched humming sound and nothing happens for a few minutes, then water begins to drain from the full jug, rush through the mannequin and empty out into the empty jug.
The water coming out of the mannequin is murky and disgusting, but as it comes out, the mannequin begins to lose its shape. When it is completely empty and all the water has been fed through, Jade turns off the machine and detaches everything. She rinses one of the hoses out in the stream and laces it through the machine again. She places one end back in the left foot and the other end in the vat of rubber. Taking a small penny out of her back pocket, she pushes it up against the hole in the bottom of the left foot. She turns on the machine again. The body begins to regain its solidarity. When the operation is finished, Jade turns off the machine again. And takes the penny off the foot.
The body almost looks human now. She takes the two glass eyes out of the briefcase and compares them to the pictures she took earlier of Max. Perfect match. She puts them aside for when the rubber dries and she can finally cut the eye-sockets out. All I need now is some clothes, and hair. Unfortunately these pictures tell me nothing. I'll have to steal the source. Jade sits at her computer, trying to figure out how to write the riddle.
Max returns home after a very short day at work. She's still mad that Micah sent her home when Lorne was the only one who needed a day off. She sticks the key in the lock and turns. Like most days, it refuses to turns. She rests her shoulder up against the door and tries to push a little as she attempts to turn the key one more time.
"Having any luck?" Ken says as he peeks his head out of his door. Ken is a balding middle-aged man who is a little too persistent for his own safety. Max hates him. He tries to screw up her life any way he can.
"Tons. Have you seen the landlord? He was supposed to fix it." Max says, waiting for the one biting remark that would send her after his neck with a knife.
"Actually, I paid John $50 to not fix the door. How else am I supposed to know when you're home?"
"Try knocking." Max suggests.
"Been there, done that, you never answer." Ken remarks.
"Maybe you never knock when I'm home." Max states, beginning to get annoyed.
"The good Lord tells me that you are home. You just prefer not to answer it."
She slams her shoulder into the door much harder this time while turning the key, and is able to escape the religious-psycho. She slams the door shut and breathes in the sterile air of her apartment. It looks barely lived in. She locks the door. After all, she doesn't want that freak entering her apartment. She walks into her kitchen and atop the pitch black counter is another blank envelope. Curiously, Max opens it.
With mercy gone
The past is written
Along with those
He may have smitten
Things come back
To haunt his grave
The lives he took
Were all but grazed
Regret is something
He never felt
Telling lies on midnight's tail
Ghosts of past wrongs unite
Come again, this very night
Gangs and convicts gather all
To the place you once called hell
Risen from the fiery ashes
The Phoenix will rise again.
The truth unfolds
Be there.
She slams the envelope and the letter down onto the counter. "Be there. Be where? There has got to be some sort of clue in there as to when and where to meet this person." She picks up the letter and reads it over again, this time looking for clues. One a.m. at the old FireGate Prison. But I thought that burned down. Even if it did, it's worth a shot. I can't wait to give this "Phoenix" a piece of my mind.
She picks up the phone dials up the local pizza place. After 3 rings, Carl picks up, "Carpacci's Pizza."
"Hi Carl, could you send me the usual with a side of Baklava and a large Coke?"
"Sure, aren't you home a little early?" He asks.
"Yeah, Micah told me to take the rest of the day off."
"Strange. Your order will be there in about 15 minutes."
"Thanks, bye" She hangs up the phone.
Now that dinner's been taken care of, Max sits down at the couch and turn on the TV. She turns to ABC and scoffs at their Sunday night lineup. "How can they expect people to watch this crap." She changes the channel to FOX, "Much better, Mulder and Scully will keep me company for a while."
As promised the food arrived on time. Just as she finishes her dinner, there is a knock at the door. She ignores it and goes back to watching the show.
A few seconds later, the person knocks again, figuring that it's just Ken wanting to join her for dinner, she ignores it. A few minutes pass and Max begins to think that she's in "the clear" and then the person knocks again. She gets up and peers through the peephole to see Lorne. She opens the door a crack and asks, "What are you doing here?"
"I don't remember." He says. She's beginning to wonder exactly how hard he was hit with that piece of wood.
"Lorne, are you feeling okay?" She asks, sounding concerned.
"Yeah, I'm fine." He assures her.
"Why don't you come in." She says as she opens the door wider. As he squeezes by, she peers out into the hallway to see Ken staring wide-eyed at her.
"You know, you have some pretty weird neighbors. Some guy just gave me the third-degree about pre-marital sex."
"That's just Ken, ignore him. I do."
"You know, I've never actually been in your apartment before, and yet, I knew that it would look like this."
"Like what?" She asks curiously.
"Like a hotel room." He says, not thinking.
She wonders how exactly her apartment looks like a hotel room, "What do you mean?"
"Well, I see nothing personal: No pictures of your family, no flowers, no magazines or books, and all your furniture is black." He points out.
"I like it that way." She says, trying to justify its appearance.
"I noticed."
He sits down on the couch. And stares at the X-Files for a minute. "Is this the episode where Queequeg bites the dust?"
"Yeah. I'm surprised you watch."
"Not on a regular basis." She notices that his eyes still look bloodshot and he's really pale. She's never really seen him like this.
"What did the doctors say?" She asks, before he gets too engrossed.
"Nothing much."
"Oh" she says as she sits down at the other end of the couch. "Are you sure you're okay?"
"Why does everyone keep asking that?" He asks, beginning to sound annoyed.
"Because you don't look well." She explains.
"I'm fine," he says while he sits back and relaxes.
Nothing is said for a while and they just stare blankly at the TV.
Max wakes up with a start. She looks at the clock. Almost midnight. She instinctively looks at the other end of the couch to see Lorne passed out cold. I hope he's going to be okay here alone for a little while. Max throws out the envelope and letter on the counter and leaves, locking up afterwards. If he goes through my stuff, I think I'll kill him.
Jade waits patiently at the remains of the FireGate Prison. She looks at her watch. Quarter to one. Jade checks the traps to make sure they're unseen. Just as she's finished checking the last one, she sees headlights. Max gets out of the car and cautiously walks towards Jade, making sure her Herlick is ready for action. "You the Phoenix?" she asks.
"Actually, no. The Phoenix was just a metaphor." Jade states.
"Why did you want to see me?"
"There are a few thing you need to know about your partner." Jade says as she walks closer to Max. She stops short of one of the traps. And nonchalantly takes a picture out of her back pocket. "This is who he really is."
Max is unable to see the picture, so she steps forward a few paces and engulfed by a large electrical field. She doesn't feel anything, but passes out immediately. Jade picks up the remainder of the traps and loads them (and Max) into her car.
"Sorry about that. I must have over-estimated the shock. Don't worry though, it's only about a year off your life." Jade assures Max.
"Where am I?" She asks as she looks around the cavern.
"You don't need to be concerned with such matters."
Max has been lying flat on the ground, and her back is starting to hurt. She stands up and notices that she is completely free to roam. No chains, no handcuffs, and no chairs. What a relief. She takes a few steps in Jade's direction and ZZZZZZT. "Ow, what's the big idea?"
"The big idea? Well, it's a variation on that neat little device that keeps your dog in the yard without a fence. The only exception is that I've upped the voltage, after all, you aren't a poodle. But the basic idea is that chains and handcuffs are very inhumane. "
"Aren't you Kate?"
"Yes and no. My name's actually Jade. I didn't want Jack...I mean Lorne to recognize me at all." She pauses for a few seconds, "I didn't want him to know that I'm still alive."
"Why wouldn't you want him to know that?"
Jade doesn't respond.
"Why am I here?"
"I'll give you this much: Lorne killed my brother and our child. And he scarred me for life. Because of him, I can never show what's left of my face in public again. I need you to invoke revenge. An eye for an eye if you will."
"You and Lorne had a kid?!"
"Yeah. I was in my 5th month when he set my brother's house on fire. Too bad I was in it at the time."
"So what are you going to do?"
"If you're thinking that I'm going to kill you, you're wrong. No one deserves to die for his mistakes. But I'm going to ask you to do a few things and remember: cooperation is the key."
"What EXACTLY do you want me to do?"
"For starters, you can change into this. The bathroom is over there." Jade says as she tosses a pair of jeans and a T-shirt at Max and nods in the direction of the bathroom.
"I'm not going to get zapped, am I?"
"No, the field extends out into the bathroom. I'm a kidnapper, not a terrorist."
Max goes into the bathroom to change. She comes out a few minutes later and hands her clothes to Jade. "Do you need my shoes too?" She asks cruelly.
"Actually, now that you mention it, yeah." She says as Max takes off her shoes and hands them to Jade.
Jade begins to dress the mannequin. "So, what do you do when you're not working?"
"Nothing really. What are you doing?"
"You can't just work, sleep, and eat. There's got to be something else you do."
"Nothing. What are you doing?"
"You'll see." Jade says as she finishes dressing the mannequin. She glues the wig on the head, places the glass eyes in the sockets she cut out earlier, and begins to work on the make-up, occasionally looking at Max to get the effect right.
"What are you going to do to Lorne?"
"Kill him, what else. Though I do suspect that he'll find someway to survive. He's always been clever like that."
"Not recently." Max mumbles to herself.
"Wait a minute, 'not recently.' What's wrong with him?" Jade asks, very concerned.
"Jaysen Rigand hit him in the back of the head. He's still not with it."
"Then I guess this will have to wait a while." She says as she finishes up the make-up.
"When should he be feeling better?"
Max says nothing.
"Then I guess I'll wait a little while. Then he'll be able to sweat your absence to his little heart's desire."
"I'm ready to walk the yellow line, officer" Lorne says as he shows up for work.
A disinterested Micah greets him, "That's nice. Do you know where Max is?"
When I woke up this morning she wasn't around so I assumed that she had gone to work."
"Wait a minute..." Micah, says, with the wrong impression.
Lorne quickly sets things straight by saying, "It's not what you think. I passed out on her couch last night."
"This is strange. Max's never late. "
"She seemed to be getting these notes from someone she refused to disclose. Maybe I should go back to her apartment and try to find something there." Lorne suggests.
"Do that. And Lorne, if you find anything, anything at all, contact me. She's one of our best and the last thing we need to do is lose her."
"Sure Micah."
Lorne drives back to Max's apartments and jimmies the lock with a video store membership card. He always knew it would come in handy. When he enters the apartment, he begins to look through some of the drawers and finds nothing. He looks through the rest of the apartment and still finds nothing. After a few moments, it registers that she probably threw the important things away.
He opens up the trashcan, dreading the journey into the unknown recesses of pizza boxes and coke cans. Fortunately, the letter is sitting right on top of a box of pork fried rice. He picks it up and attempts to read the words through the grease stains. "One AM at the FireGate Prison." Lorne presses his ear slightly, "Micah..."
"Yeah."
"Looks like Max might have gone to the FireGate Prison. I'm heading down there now."
"Okay, and be careful."
When Lorne arrives at the prison, he notices the T-33 already there. He checks in the windows to see if Max is inside and doesn't see anyone or anything. About 20 feet in the distance, there is a small patch of leaves that look like they've been kicked up by some sort of animal fight. He goes in for closer inspection and notices scorch marks on the surrounding area. "Zap-Trap." He pushes his ear in again and says, "Micah, Max has been kidnapped. There's recent scorch marks on the ground."
"The Zap-Trap. Is there any other sign of her?"
"Not from what I can see. But, with the complexity of the trap, I think we'll be hearing from the kidnappers soon."
Jade sits at her computer, working, while Max is asleep on a make-shift bed that they threw together. Jade wasn't expecting for Max to stay with her so long. Jade says to herself. She takes a small manual drill out of the desk drawer and begins to drill a hole in the replica's head. She does this quietly to be sure that she won't wake Max.
She drags the replica out to her car and places it in the trunk. It'll do fine here. At least for now. She heads back into the cavern. Lorne's never been one to stay idle for long. He's probably already found the T-33 at the prison. She sits back down at the computer, intent to write this note as all the other ones have been written, but decides against it. A more personalized message would be more appropriate in a situation such as this.
Lorne continues to search the area for any clues as to where Max has gone when he hears a child's voice calling out to him.
"Mr. Cash? I have a message for you."
"What is it?"
The kid, no older than 10 or 11, hands Lorne a small envelope. He opens it and reads its contents.
Let's cut the bullshit. No more rhymes. No more games. If you ever want to see your partner again, come to the old abandoned warehouse on 36th Street tomorrow night at midnight. If I see anyone but you or with you, you'll never see her again.
Have a wonderful day.
Lorne looks up from the note and notices the kid standing there with his hand held out, looking for a tip. Lorne looks at the kid and says, "If you tell me who sent you and how you knew I'd be here, then I'll give you five bucks."
"Your dead-girlfriend sent me and she told me you'd be here. Now where's my money?"
"Here." He says as he pulls out his wallet and gives the kid a five."
The kid snatches the money out of Lorne's hand, hops on his bike and books it around the corner.
Dead girlfriend? Who could that be? He presses his communicator and says, "Micah, I just got a message to meet the kidnappers."
"They work fast. What do they want?" He says, finding it highly unlikely that they could really work that fast.
"Doesn't say. But I have to meet them tomorrow night at midnight at the abandoned warehouse on 36th street."
"What are you going to do 'til then?"
"I'll probably check it out now, at least to see if the place is secure."
"Okay then."
Lorne pulls up at the warehouse in his jeep. It really does look abandoned. He pulls open the door and steps inside. There are crates stacked up everywhere and the floor is positively disgusting. He walks deeper into the warehouse, trying to avoid the pigeon droppings on the floor and doesn't see any sign of anything going on.
Figuring it wasn't worth using the communicator to update Micah on the situation, he heads back to ECHO. After all, Micah probably would have made him go there anyway.
Lorne walks into ECHO the way he normally does: dreading it. Micah is diligently working on a way to pay the bills with imaginary money and the rest of the employees are doing their usual.
"Is there anything you wanted me to do?" He says as he comes up from behind Micah and scares the living crap out of him.
"Yeah, why don't you help Nik out with the security check." Micah suggests as he gets his nerves back in check.
"Who?"
"Nik. She's in the back room."
He walks into the back room and sees a slender woman with jet-black hair working at the small table in the cramped back room, with blue prints all over the place. For some reason, she's wearing all black.
"Security check, huh?"
"How many times do I have to tell that man, I don't need a partner." She says, not bothering to look at Lorne.
"Well you're getting one. Now what are we doing?"
"We're going to break into the White House for a routine check on their security." She says, sounding mundane.
"Sounds like fun."
"It isn't. Last month I got shot 3 times."
"How exactly do we plan to go about this?"
"Most of the time, you can just walk in the front door, but today, I think we'll take a more unconventional method... the secret passage."
"Equipment?"
"Nothing much, really. Just a key sequencer, a few jammers, and a two guns. Nothing fancy. You know, the stuff any moron can throw together with 20 bucks and a local Radio Shack."
"I never carry a gun," he points out.
"You do now. Here." She says as she tosses a .45 in his direction.
Nik continues to brief Lorne on the particulars of the mission. They leave ECHO in Nik's car, a 1997 Pontiac Sunfire, and head towards the secret passageway's entrance.
"I've never seen you around ECHO before, are you new?" He asks, trying to spark some sort of conversation.
"No. I'm just not that noticeable."
"Oh." he says. And for a few minutes the car goes silent.
Nik decides to humor him for the time being and play along, "Do you really own that bar?"
"Yeah."
"Funny, my brother goes there all the time." She mentions.
"Really? What's his name?"
"Alex Krycek" she states.
"Ratboy? Isn't he on the X-Files." He asks, beginning to distrust her.
"Some aspects of the X-Files are base on a true story." She informs him, "It's the viewer choice as to which conspiracy to believe."
"Now you're just trying to pull my chain."
"I'm not. Ask your brother. They've worked together often." She explains.
"I'm not surprised." He says, remembering that his brother is a triple-agent, and any sort of remark could easily jeopardize his safety.
"Jim's not as bad as you think he is, Cash. He's actually quite charming." She says, trying to defend her long-time friend and colleague.
"You can call me Lorne." He says, quickly changing the subject.
"I don't know you well enough."
"Does that mean I'll have to call you Krycek?"
"You can call me what you will."
"How about Nicole?" He suggests, looking for some reaction to show that she was truly paying attention.
She quickly proves to him that she is, in fact, interested in the conversation, "If you want, but it's a little inaccurate."
"How so?" He inquires.
"My name's 'Nikita', not 'Nicole'."
"Like the show?"
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that." Once again, the car goes silent. Then, "Max will be fine, Cash."
"I know. But I can't help but worry."
"She's a strong person and can survive anything anyone dishes out. She's lucky like that."
They pull up outside a small water treatment facility and Nik gets out of the car. She pulls a stopwatch out of her pocket and starts it. With that over and done with, she pulls the key sequencer out of a small backpack and sticks it to the front door of the building. Some numbers run through the display then the device beeps three times. "We're in."
The door easily slides open and Nik tosses a few of the jammers in Lorne's direction.
He disables the visual and audio security sensors while Nik takes the other jammer and blocks the entry transmitter. They follow the tunnels until they reach a dead end. They look up, and as expected, they see a cement tile with a small crack in it. Nik sticks her foot in a small hole in the wall and moves the tile. It cooperates, but it only makes enough space for a rat to fit through. "Could you give me a hand?" she asks.
"I thought you used to do this by yourself." He accusingly states.
"I did. But they've replaced the tile with actual cement now."
Lorne sticks his foot in another hole and together, they push the tile far enough for Nik to slip through, which she does. Once above, she pushes the cement tile completely out of the way and helps Lorne up. Once in underneath the floorboards of the White House, they try to push up on one of the boards. "They must have changed it again. Search down that way." She says as she nods in the direction she was talking about. The search is over quickly as Lorne finds a loose board and pushes up on it. Nik follows and they find themselves in the basement of the White House.
As they expected, there was no security down there. Nik pulls her gun and urges Lorne to do the same, "Remember: maim, don't kill."
"I know." He says as they slowly creep up the steps to the first floor.
At the top of the stairs, they find themselves in the kitchen and there doesn't seem to be anyone around. Just as Nik begins to think that the security really needs to be upgraded, they hear voices coming into the room. Nik ducks behind the refrigerator while Lorne sneaks back under the floorboard, just in time not to be seen.
"Where does he come up with those sayings?! 'Or I'll fry your butt in a pork-grinder!'" Says the first man, attempting his best impression of the president complete with accent, which isn't all that bad.
"Or how about 'I'm glad we'll never see the back-end of that donkey again!'" The second man says as he grabs something quickly out of the cupboard, and then they leave the room laughing.
Lorne comes back up through the floorboard and he and Nik continue on to the upstairs. The house is pretty quiet, and Lorne and Nik are easily able to outmaneuver the security personnel without being seen. When they reach the President's bedroom, Nik takes a small piece of stationary off the desk, writes "Your dead. Courtesy of ECHO" and leaves it on the bed. She then takes a bullet out of her gun and places on the pillow. "Next." She says.
"What was that?" Lorne whispers to her.
"Just a little note to tell them that they're security sucks."
They continue on to the Oval Office and the Lincoln bedroom, leaving the same message throughout.
When they return to the tunnels, Nik mentions, "That went a little too well for our own damn good. We should be even more cautious now that we've left evidence."
She keeps her gun fully loaded and cocked while Lorne pockets his. She says, "I said more cautious, not utterly stupid."
"I work better without one."
They continue through the tunnels, being even quieter than when they were in the White House. On their way out of the building, they retrieve the jammers and the key sequencer and leave everything as they found it. She stops the stopwatch.
"20 minutes."
"Good?" he asks.
"Average."
They hop back into the car and head back to ECHO. During the trip, her car phone rings. She picks it up and the president's voice starts streaming through the receiver. She puts it on speakerphone.
"So I'm dead, huh?" He says in an accent that could never be fully mimicked.
"Yes, sir. You and your house guests." She jokes.
"Uh-huh. How'd you get in this time?"
"Secret passage."
"Really now, Jaxon said he fixed that."
"If he meant making the tile heavier and changing the location of the loose floorboard, then he didn't fix it well enough." Lorne volunteers.
"Lorne, is that you boy? I thought Nik worked alone." Asks the President, sounding surprised.
"Yes, sir. But Micah assigned me to this case temporarily."
"Good ole Micah. Now you two keep up the good work, and next month we'll be ready for you!"
"Thank you Mr. President and I look forward to hearing from you." Nik says as a formality.
"Bye kiddo." He says as he hangs up.
They enter ECHO via the brick wall and Nik reports to Micah. She then goes back to whatever work she normally does.
Micah stops Lorne on his way in and asks him to do another job. Lorne is appalled by the way Micah is just assigning him to things left and right when his partner could be getting tortured at that very moment. "What are you doing? Don't you even care? We need to find Max."
"Lorne, there's nothing we can do for the time being. Max will be fine until we find her."
"Maybe you're right. She's pretty resilient."
"I know I'm right. But if you're that upset about her disappearance, why don't you take the rest of the day off." Lorne says, already figuring that he won't be able to win a fight with Micah. Why is he being so understanding?
"Sure Micah."
Nik walks up to Micah after Lorne's left and says, "I've finished all the paperwork on the security check, and unless you need anything else, I'm going home."
"No, you can go."
While Lorne is driving home, it begins to rain. Hard. It just makes him think more and more about Max. He stops at a red light at a busy intersection. If she gets hurt or even dies because of some stupid mistake I made, I don't think I'll be able to forgive myself. Ever. But who would want to do this to her? Who did I piss off that could be mad enough to kidnap my friend? An ex-partner perhaps, I've had plenty of those. But the kid said it was my dead girlfriend. That doesn't really narrow the list down. For all I know, it could be some crazy girl that I twitched 15 years ago. There are just too many possibilities.
A loud honk and some obscenities jolt Lorne out of La-La Land. The light must have changed while he was thinking. He drives to the city park and goes for a walk. He always comes here to think about things that are bothering him. He walks a little ways in and then sits down at a bench. He just sits there, staring into nowhere and thinking while the rain pelts down on him from above.
"And how did I know you'd be here?" a voice says, coming out of nowhere. Lorne turns around to see that Nik has decided to join him on the bench.
"Still worrying about Max, aren't you."
"Yeah. And I shouldn't. She can take care of herself." He says, trying to convince himself.
"You don't sound like you believe it."
"I do, but its hard to defend yourself in that sort of situation." He says, referring to his not-so-pleasant stay in Russia.
"We both know what that situation is like. But is all this emotional upheaval over the fact that Max is being held hostage?"
"Yes…… no…… I…… I don't know. I just don't want her to……" He stops himself before he goes any further.
"To what? To go through what you went through? Cash, there's a big difference between what you went through and what she is possibly going through."
"What's that?" He asks.
"She's got people working hard on the outside to free her. She's got friends that are wishing that she was back with them. She's got a partner who really cares about her, catching pneumonia because he's thinking of a way to get her out. Do you need anymore evidence?"
"Maybe you're right. I should just wait to meet the kidnappers. Things will hopefully be cleared up then. I just don't want to give up."
"I know. But in a situation like this, sometimes the more passive approach is better."
"How can it be better? It's giving up." He fights.
"No it isn't. It's waiting for a more appropriate time to strike." She tries to tell him.
"You sound just like Micah."
"Maybe I do, but that's because he's right most of the time." She checks her watch," I have to go, but I suggest you go home. If you ever need to talk to anyone, and don't take this the wrong way: here's my address and phone number. " She says as she hands him a small piece of paper. And gets up to leave.
He thanks her and just sits there for a few more minutes. He checks his watch: 7:00 P.M. 29 more hours. What am I going to do for 29 hours? He realizes that sitting on a bench is not the most productive way to pass time, so he heads home. He sticks the key in the door and finds his apartment empty as usual. Lorne flicks on the light closest to the door and plays the messages on the answering machine.
Micah's voice is the first one to echo through the air, "I usually don't do this, but Lorne, you're taking this a lot harder than I thought you would. I want you to take tomorrow off." The answering machine beeps twice, signaling that it is through playing the message, then rewinds the tape. He changes out of the wet clothes and throws together a small salad. He takes a few bites and then his mind drifts back to his partner. I can't just leave her there like that. He stares with a grimace at his food and realizes that it isn't going to help.
He pulls Nik's address and phone number out of his back pocket and decides that maybe he really does need to talk about this. He tosses his dinner in the fridge and drives to Nik's house.
"How long are you planning to keep me here?" Max asks.
"Just until Lorne pays his dues." Jade answers.
"How long will that be?"
"An hour or so." Jade answers matter-of-factly.
"What are you planning on doing after that?"
"Letting you go."
Max clarifies the question, "I meant with yourself."
"I plan on being dead before dawn."
"Why?"
"You ask way too many questions. I should get going, I have a few errands to run before I kill your partner."
She pulls a small jar of pigs blood out of a desk drawer, takes one of the briefcases and leaves. She drives down to the warehouse and parks the car so that the trunk is closest to the door.
She pops open the trunk and drags the replica into the warehouse. The body is heavy, but Jade manages to carry it into the warehouse without pulling too many muscles. She positions Max's body so that it looks like she was shot in the head and was dead before she hit the floor.
Jade pours a little of the pigs blood near the hole in the head of the replica and spreads a little of it onto the warehouse floor. "This should do nicely." She says aloud. Her voice echoes off the walls of the warehouse just as they do the cavern. Jade gets up and moves her car to around the back of the building. She doesn't want Lorne to know that she's already there.
She positions herself a small area of space behind some of the crates that are near the wall so that she has perfect view of the entire place. She puts the briefcase on top of a crate near her and opens it. Jade takes out her remote control for the door. All I have to do is wait for him to show up. Then, I'll just push this button and the door will close and lock.
Lorne pulls up at the warehouse five minutes to twelve. He takes a deep breath and gets out of the car. His mind is working at a rapid rate, already calculating possible scenarios. Nik really helped him clear his head.
He opens up the door and walks through it. It slams shut behind him. It's dark for a moment, and Lorne is ready to strike at any sound - any movement that occurs. But there isn't any sound, and once his eyes adjust to the dark, he doesn't notice any movement. The lights suddenly come on, and he's instantly aware of the corpse lying in the middle of the floor. It looks like Max.
He runs over to her, "Max. I didn't want this to happen. I never meant for this to happen. Oh, god, I'm sorry. If I knew……then……I would have been here sooner. I'm sorry……"He takes her hand and kisses her softly on her forehead.
This moment of vulnerability doesn't last long. He's overcome with anger, and screams, "You promised you wouldn't hurt her. I did everything you asked!"
Jade says in an unfeeling tone, "Now, now, now. I never actually said that. If memory serves me, I wrote, 'If you ever want to see your partner again.' That's a horse of a different color. After all, you are seeing her, aren't you?"
"But why did you have to kill her?"
"Because you killed me, remember? Of course you don't. You couldn't possibly. I was nothing to you." A click echoes throughout the room. Lorne recognizes that sound -- a gun.
"Of course I remember you, I could never forget you." Lorne tries to twitch his way out of this situation, but has a hard time getting into character when he can't see the 'skin.'"
"Then why did you try to kill me? Why did you kill our child?" Another click.
"Jade……"
"Right Lorne. Or should I call you Jack? You know, one thing that's haunted me for the past ten years, well besides the burns and the miscarriage, why did you lie to me?" Yet another click. It's beginning to get nerve-wracking.
"I had to lie to you for your own protection." He tries to explain.
"For my own protection? You were trying to protect yourself. So that when you killed our child and my brother, you wouldn't feel any remorse."
"It's not that, I didn't know you were in there."
"Oh, so you would have gladly killed my brother, but not me?" She accuses.
"I wasn't told who was in the house. I was just supposed to burn it down." He says, trying to defend himself before it's too late.
"But it couldn't have hurt you to check, could it?" Click.
"You're right. It couldn't have hurt to check. And I'm sorry."
"Sorry? That's right, you are sorry. You're sorry that you lost your partner and friend. Well, you know what I'm sorry about? I'm sorry that you didn't have just one more person that you care about so I could kill them too and make us even." Click.
"Where are you?" He asks, desperate to find Max's killer.
"It's just too bad about Max. She was a good kid. Really nice, never said a unkind word to me." Jade says as the final click echoes throughout the room, the gun is ready, she rests it atop one of the crates in front of her and aims.
"Where are you?" He asks again.
"Right here."
He finally gets a fix on her location and sees her with the gun, pointed directly at him. Her finger is resting on the trigger. Their eyes meet and lock. Time seems to stand still. He knows that there isn't an escape. And at this point, He isn't willing to try anything daring. I never thought I'd actually die during my off-hours. I can read the headline now, "Ex-CIA Agent Gunned Down By Psycho-Chick" that should make a few people happy…… Then he realizes the severity of the situation. But I won't be able to read it. I'll be dead. This is it. This has been my last day on earth. Pretty soon, I'll be gone and able to apologize to Max in person for this whole mess. That's if I end up in heaven. With all the people I've killed - Oh god this can't be it... It just can't be it. I'm not ready to die. There's so many people I want to say good-bye to. So many things I want to tell my brother, Micah, Shank, Nick……everyone. He thinks to himself during his final minutes on earth.
C'mon Jade, stop being a coward and pull the trigger. He deserves it. He's an evil, horrid man that ruined your life and now he's going to pay. Pull the damn trigger you fool!
The more she looks into his eyes, the more she begins to realize that that's the man she fell in love with 10 years ago, that's the man she was going to have a child with, and the same person she was going to end up marrying. Her eyes start to well up and she realizes that she can't kill him. She just can't. She hits the button and the warehouse goes dark again and the door unlocks. She manages to slip out the door with the gun in hand.
Lorne stands there, in the middle of the cold, dank, warehouse dazed as to what just happened. He follows Jade out the door shortly after he gets his marbles together.
When he steps out of the warehouse, he sees a faint shadow drop off into the distance. He follows it. He wants to make sure she pays for what she did to Max. He finds her at the back of the building, sitting with her back leaned up against the wall, crying.
"I'm sorry. If I knew I was so chicken-shit, I wouldn't have done any of it. I'm just so sorry," she apologizes.
"I just can't forgive you." He says, cold-heartedly. With good reason, too.
"I know. I just got so pissed when I lost everything. I mean absolutely everything that I cared about all in one night. And now……I'm a freak." She slowly rises to her feet.
"If I had known anyone was in that house, you wouldn't have lost anything. And you aren't a freak. You just need some help." He says as he realizes how deeply disturbed she is.
"Do you know how hard it is to walk down the street with bandages all over the left side of your body? People just stare. That's all they do -- stare."
"There are treatments out there. Effective treatments that could eliminate the burns." He offers.
"But it won't get rid of the pain."
"You're right, it won't, but if you'll just come with me, we'll find some way to stop the pain."
"I don't think I can." She says, sounding like she's losing it all over again.
"Why?" He asks, trying to stall for time.
"Because. I don't belong in your world…… this world. I never did." She says as she brings the gun up to her head. "I told Max that I would be dead by dawn. And I will be."
"You don't want to do this." He says. Even though she killed his partner, she really needs professional help. He steps a few paces forward.
"I have to. There's no way I'll ever be able to lead a normal life. Once the burns are gone, I'll probably end up living in a mental hospital called "Shady Pines" or something queer like that for the rest of my life. I don't want that."
"You could be released in a matter of months." He moves even closer, becoming desperate.
"You and I both know that that could never happen. I've been too long like this. But, I should clear some of your conscious while I still can."
"What? You can't do this, it's not right." He inches a few more steps closer to her.
"Remember the other day when you were looking for the Rigand brothers? If you follow the stream up the mountain further, you'll come across a cavern. Max will be there." She says as her final words. The gunshot echoes through the open air and Jade falls to the ground.
Lorne turns on his communicator, "Micah, are you there?"
"Yeah. I never sleep." He says, as though he's been waiting to hear from Lorne all night.
"Apparently. I need a clean-up crew here, pronto," he orders.
"Why? Max isn't…… is she?" He asks, concerned.
"It's a long story and I have to go check on her." He says as he hops in his jeep and goes to the cavern that Jade had described.
"All in all, a very eventful weekend." Max says as she and Lorne meet up with Micah at ECHO.
"I've had better." Lorne pipes up.
"What exactly happened?" Micah asks.
"You know Project Meridian, right?" Max begins to explain.
"Of course. I was standing there when you hacked into the file."
"You what!" Lorne exclaims. He never thought that she had ACTUALLY hacked into the file. With Micah standing right there, nonetheless.
"Well," she says ignoring Lorne, "it turns out that 'lover-boy' over here was romantically involved with one of the victims."
"I'm hoping it wasn't Alec." Micah jokes.
"Nope. His sister, Jade. I didn't know she was in the house when I torched it. Somehow, she survived and went a little nutty." Lorne finishes, trying to stop Max from telling too much.
To no avail of Lorne's, Max finishes with, "And created this weird replica of me, to fool Lorne into thinking I was dead, so that she could kill him when he was most vulnerable."
"Twisted. We could really use someone like that here," Micah says.
"She blew her head off." Informs Lorne.
"Or not."
The characters of the television series "Spy Game" belong to the creative geniuses of Sam and Ivan Raimi, John McNamara, Renaissance Pictures, and Universal Television in association with McNamara Paper Products and Warner Brothers.
The characters Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and Alex Krycek (AKA Ratboy) of the television series "The X-Files" belong to Chris Carter and 1013 Productions in association with 20th Century Fox Television.
The characters Alec and Jade Menley, Mikel and Jaysen Rigand, Nikita Krycek, John, Ken, Jaxon, and Carl are all part of my deluded fantasies. The connections they have to any of the pre-existing characters depicted in this story are of my own creation and are not to be taken seriously.
The aforementioned characters in paragraph 3 are fictitious. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is coincidental.
Any government conspiracies I have presented in this story are fictitious. Any correlations or conflictions with pre-existing conspiracies are coincidental.
I would like to thank all the "Spy Gamers" and "Players" that watched the show and fought for its survival. I'm sure you all enjoyed "playing" as much as I did."
I would like to send a very special thanks to Sam and Ivan Raimi, John McNamara, Linden Ashby, Allison Smith, Bruce McCarty and everyone else that had involvement with the making of "Spy Game:" Thanks for letting us into your "Shadow World" and giving us the opportunity to enjoy your talents. I will never forget it.
I dedicate this piece, "Hell Hath No Fury……", to my fellow "Spy Gamers" and "Players" at the AOL Message Board. They have given me the love and support I've needed during my difficult times and have always managed to make me laugh. Thanks for making me feel like I finally belong somewhere.
No actual spies were harmed during the writing of this Fan Fiction.