Abigail Mary Bowe turned her face from the right to the left. "Assalamu alaikum wa rahmatullah," she repeated. Peace be upon you, and God's blessing. A reminder that though one faces Mecca in prayer, the lives of those around you are just as important as God's.
A low snort from behind. "I wonder what the 9/11 victims would say if they could see you now," Thomas Jay Bowe said.
"I would assume the same thing that the children of Iraq would say to you," Abigail Mary said, getting to her feet and rolling up her prayer mat. "Assuming, of course, that one could piece them back together after their homes were blown up in drone strikes."
Thomas Jay snorted. He was tall, lean, slender, with ebony skin and a shaved head and a soft, gentle smile that belied his angry words: the polar opposite of Abigail's short, freckled paleness and ginger curls. He was her brother, with all that implied, both good and bad. "James Aaron just reported in," he said. "The Project Romero test just concluded."
"How did it go?"
"He didn't say." Thomas Jay frowned. "Seems there was a complication."
It wasn't a particularly good image; the photographer had been using a telephoto lens from an unstable position. But it was enough for Abigail Mary to see what was going on.
Two rows of men in dark blue tactical gear, carrying riot shields and hand weapons, standing in a shield wall formation against a wave of rotting, walking corpses. Most of the corpses were children. Some of them wore brightly colored blue t-shirts with the words "HAPPY ACRES YOUTH CAMP" in big balloony letters.
"A Foundation Mobile Task Force?" Abigail May asked.
"Looks like," James Aaron said. He was olive-skinned, with dark brown curls, and a serious disposition. "Beta-5. I'm not sure which one that is."
"'Babysitters,'" Thomas Jay recited. "Primary mission: on-site security. Secondary mission: escorting vital personnel through danger zones. Tertiary mission: rapid-response force."
"Thanks," James Aaron said. "Anyway, all of that was pretty ordinary. What you predicted. Then I saw this." He tapped a button on his beat-up laptop computer, and the image turned into jerky, blurry film footage. What looked like a woman in a black catsuit, wearing a face-concealing helmet, stepped out from behind the lines and began rapid-firing a pistol, reloading as quickly as magazines could be tossed to her. "Twenty-two shots, twenty-two-kills."
"This is their new task force?" Thomas Jay asked.
"Andrea Adams. Mobile Task Force Lambda-2. She's the product of some kind of super-suit project." Abigail May tapped on
They grabbed Dietrich out of bed, pinning him down before he had a chance to react. A filthy rubber ball gag was thrust into his mouth, followed shortly by a black bag over his head. Despite his struggles, he was quickly pinned to the ground by iron hands, his wrists and ankles bound with zip-ties, and his body thrown roughly over someone's shoulder and carried bodily out of his bedroom.
He struggled as best he could, before he felt a pair of cold metal probes pressed against his bare thigh. "Try that again and I'll taze you until you shit yourself unconscious," a low, sinister voice growled.
Dietrich froze. He had no desire to spend his last moments with filthy underwear.
The next few minutes passed by in a blur. He had the vague impression of being thrown into the back of a van. There seemed to be someone else there: similarly bound and gagged. The van was driven for a long time, making sharp turns at odd intervals that indicated that the driver was trying to throw off his passenger's sense of balance. Eventually, though, the van came to a halt. The doors were opened. He was dragged bodily out of the vehicle. Strapped to a chair.
The bag was removed from his head. His first impression was a bright flash of light: cold, hard, instantaneous, leaving a rectangular after-image in his abused retinas. Aside from that, only darkness and the vague impression of a sinister figure sitting in a high-backed chair.
A low voice growled in his ear. "Name."
Dietrich mumbled helplessly around the ball gag.
"Shit," the voice growled. A pair of cold hands wearing leather gloves removed the gag.
Dietrich immediately screamed as loud as he could.
The gag was re-inserted.
The silent figure moved to the next chair over. "Name," that same low voice growled.
"I'm the fucking Queen of England, you shithead," Dietrich heard Bridge say, the sneer evident in his voice. Then the sound of another muffled cry as the ball gag was apparently reinserted.
Dietrich looked around desperately for any kind of reflective surface, found none. His heart sank. Then his spirits rose. If Bridge was here, that meant Alexandra was listening. And if Alexandra was listening, there was a chance rescue was already on its way.
He let out another low, muffled cry, and the shadowy figure came up behind him, undid the buckle on the ballgag. "Let's try this again," the voice sneered, and Dietrich felt the muzzle of a gun pressed against the back of his head. "Tell me your name."
Stall. Stall for all you're worth. Stall for time right now. "Dietrich… Dietrich Lurk," he whimpered. "Ma Pa's Scottish, that's where the last name comes from… oh God, please don't kill me…"
"That depends on how you answer this next question," the voice said. "What's Lambda-2?"
"Lam… Lambda-Two? I don't know anything about any Lambda-2!" Dietrich whimpered, then let out a high-pitched scream as he heard a pistol's slide being drawn back behind his head. "WAIT! WAIT! WAIT!" he howled. "I can tell you something!"
"Talk now!" the voice shouted angrily.
"I heard a rumor! It's a secret mobile task force! They're all beautiful women, they're all naked, and they do nothing but give Clef blowjobs all day!"
"WHAT!?" the voice shouted, and this time the cry was incredulous. "Where the FUCK did you hear that?"
What the hell was that supposed to mean? Dietrich wondered, and then he felt a hand clamped over his mouth, and then a gunshot went off, and he really did piss his pants, but then someone tipped over the chair onto its side, and he felt the ballgag go back into his mouth… and then he heard someone come up behind Bridge and say, "I've just blown your friend's brains out. Lie to me like you did, and you get the same. Now, tell me. What's Lambda-2?"
A slow, shuddering breath… and then, in a panicked scream, Dietrich heard Bridge shout, "YOUR MOM'S SHITSTAINED CUNT!"
Click.
The lights turned on. There was a woman in a matte-black catsuit standing over him. Bridge had a guy wearing a hunter green suit. The room turned out to be a standard Foundation office block: Dietrich could see eight standard issue-cubicles of the type he'd spent countless hours in over the past few years. They were laying on plastic sheeting. The smell of urine and fear hung in the air.
A man wearing a ridiculous hat, smiling mirthlessly, stood before them. "Well you both pass," Director Alto Clef said. "Take a moment to get a shower and get changed, then report back here for briefing."
