Episode Ten

By pipsqueak and A. X. Zanier

Teaser

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Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 3:05 p.m.

He stood at the foot of the grassy plot, hands thrust into the pockets of his beaten black leather jacket, shoulders hunched against a non-existent wind, eyes locked on the polished black slab of granite that served to represent his brother now. He cocked his left ear imperceptibly as he heard familiar footfalls approaching -- light, quick steps that stopped directly behind him. Without turning his head, he asked bluntly, "What are you doing here?"

The feet shifted uncomfortably. "Uhm, I, ah, came to see you, actually." Uncertainty fractured Claire's normally confident clipped British tones. "I did what I thought was best for everyone, Darien; you must know that. I never wanted to hurt you. You have to believe me."

"Why?"

"Because in spite of everything that's happened, I'm still your friend."

"Oh please. You say that like it means something -- just like he," Darien crooked his thumb at the headstone, "used to say, 'trust me, I'm your brother.' You know what? It doesn't mean anything ... 'cuz I don't even know you, any more than I ever knew him. The two of you never let me ...." he trailed off with a sigh.

She reached out to grab his forearm and turn him to her. "Darien, please, listen...."

"No, no," he shook her off, physically backing away as if she were a dreaded spider. "You made your choice of the Fawkes brothers a long time ago. You don't get me as a consolation prize. I am not some sort of scientific legacy you can just inherit from him." He stopped, finally facing her with his back to the gravestone. He ran his hand through his hair, across his chin. "You should have told me, Claire."

"I'm telling you now," she stated simply.

"Now? Now's too late." He shoved his hands back in his pockets and slouched silently away, leaving her to stare at the inky monument.

"Oh, Kevin," she whispered, "what have we done?"

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::Cue Theme Music::

There once was a tale about a man who could turn invisible. I thought it was only a story, until it happened to me. OK, so here's how it works: There's this stuff called 'Quicksilver' that can bend light. My brother and some scientists made it into a synthetic gland, and that's where I came in. See, I was facing life in prison and they were looking for a human experiment. So we made a deal; they put the gland in my brain, and I walk free. The operation was a success... but that's when everything started to go wrong.

::Music Fade Out::

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Act One

There's an old saying that you can choose your friends but you can't choose your family. Now if I'd had complete freedom of choice, I'm none too sure I'd have chosen Kevin as my brother, but I'd come to believe that I would have chosen Claire as my friend. Yeah, well, like they say, hindsight is 20-20, and I sure as hell wasn't wearing rose-colored glasses any more.

Almost 4000 years ago an ancient Egyptian poet wrote: "To whom can I speak today? Brothers are evil and the friends of today unlovable." Yeah, that about sums up my life.

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Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 1:01 p.m.

Bobby stood holding the 4X6 inch snapshot in his left hand, his view of his partner's black leather-clad back getting slimmer and slimmer as the apartment door crashed shut with a hollow thud. He stood for a moment more, shaking his head in regret, then turned, ignoring the pool table that stood spread chockablock with a lifetime's worth of mementos and heading instead straight for the black sport jacket he'd hung across the arm of one of Darien's woven tan leather and chrome barstools. He reached into a pocket, pulled out his cell phone, and hit a single button. The numbers chirruped in his ear while he mentally egged the phone on as it speed dialed.

At last a cool British voice answered. "The Keeper," Claire intoned, professional as always but at the same time distracted. More than likely she was engrossed in one of her never-ending experiments, Bobby thought, unaware of the damage she'd wrought with her damn secrets.

"You never told him, did you?" Hobbes upbraided her, blind fury building at the thought that he'd been the one forced into the position of wielding this particular emotional knife at his partner's soul. "Bad move, Keepy."

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Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 12:59 p.m.

Bobby stooped to pick up the discarded photo. Still on bended knee he saw the evidence and understood the enormity of the betrayal at first glance. "Crap."

Darien froze in the act of pulling his black leather jacket off of the kitchen counter stool closest to his door. Slowly he swiveled his head to glare at Hobbes. "You're not surprised." It was a statement, not a question, Fawkes' tone low, dangerous, knife-sharp.

Still holding the photo, Hobbes rose and dusted off his pants with a weary sigh. "Look, kid, you don't understand. I thought she'd told you ...."

"You knew," Darien hissed as if he'd been physically wounded, the cut deep and flowing. He was all frenetic action then, yanking the door open as he shrugged on his jacket, launching himself over the threshold.

"Fawkes, wait ...," was all Bobby managed to get out before Darien was through the door. "Crap."

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Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 12:53 p.m.

Bobby sorted through his wallet, pulling out a $20 and a $10 dollar bill – which included a healthy $4 tip for the kid -- and handed them over to the Golden Palace delivery boy. "Keep the change, my friend," Bobby ordered good naturedly, taking the shopping bag full of crispy fried wontons, orange-flavor beef and other assorted oriental goodies. He shut the door and put the bag on the counter. "Soup's on, Fawkes," he called.

As Bobby busied himself with laying out their own private Chinese buffet, his partner remained as he had been, lanky frame bent over the pool table, mentally inventorying the jumble of items spread out before him, like an anthropologist examining the bones of some long extinct primate. Normally he wasn't one to ignore the call of his stomach, but these items were the bones of a lifetime much closer to his own. Perhaps, he mused, somewhere in this tangle of trinkets and snapshots lay the final piece of the puzzle that was Kevin.

He sifted through the items, prospecting for understanding hidden among the panoply of souvenirs, something that had given them worth in Kevin's world. A small gold locket caught his eye. It wasn't real gold, he knew, just a dime-store bit of costume jewelry, but once it had been shiny, polished, and new. He'd been endlessly fascinated by it as a baby, as attested to by the tooth mark still evident on its surface. He'd only been two when he'd bit it, tugging it off his mother's neck in the process. She'd scolded him briefly, then, laughing, had taken him right back in her arms and let him play with it. Perhaps that was where he'd developed his larcenous taste for jewelry. He opened it and looked into the faces of two chubby innocents, rosy cheeked baby boys who had no inkling of the tragedy, pain or madness that life -- and hubris -- held in store for them. He closed the locket and gently set it aside.

Moving around to the left end of the pool table, Darien picked up the first in a series of tan leather-bound journals that closed via a toggle and thong on the front and sported gilt-edged pages. The book seemed small in Darien's hand, and it wasn't the sort of utilitarian notebook he'd always known his brother to use. He opened one and flipped through the pages:

"Well, it seems my proper English rose has a sybaritic streak in her. I told her these books were too fine for a practical man like me -- probably ruin them in the lab by splashing acid on them. She just laughed, bought them anyway, and made me swear to use them for personal recollections only. I guess she was trying to cheer me up, take my mind off Darien. She's insightful like that and almost as brilliant as I am, though I must admit she's got a much better feel for people than I do. Of course, now that she knows about my wannabe punk brother, she'll probably dump me faster ...."

Darien let out a small "oomph" and dropped the book as if he'd been burned. Is that how his older brother had truly thought of him? Is that all he had been in Kevin's most private mind, a "wannabe punk"? Somehow, Darien had hoped that somewhere deep inside Kevin had had some understanding of his younger brother, but apparently Kevin had been as clueless about him as he had been about Kevin. Sure, Kevin had written once about how the gland had caused Darien to become a good man, closer to his true self, but that had been a note of apology, a plea for Darien to understand why Kevin was refusing his most desperate wish -- for his brother to remove the gland. Here, in this journal, was the unvarnished truth about what Kevin had truly felt. And once again, Darien had been weighed by his brother and been found wanting.

Running his hand across the remaining items, he chose one at random and picked it up. It was a pile of papers, emblazoned with the CalTech insignia and stapled in the top left with Kevin's name neatly printed in the opposite corner. Darien smirked at his brother's meticulous block letters -- like someone would really try and rip off a syllabus for .... he turned his head as if that would help him decipher the foreign words ... Binary Patterning for Computational Protein Design. "Oh yeah, Kev," Darien wisecracked sotto voce, "better keep a close eye on that hot property."

"What's that, Fawkesy?" Hobbes asked around a mouthful of moo shu pork, waving his overstuffed Chinese crepe in Darien's direction. "C'mon, food's gettin' cold."

"Ah yah, in a minute," Fawkes answered. He went to put the course plan down when a small doodle on the lower left caught his eye. Holding it closer to get a better view, he studied the all-too familiar figure: a miniature serpent eating its tail, the body divided into 10 equal segments. He shook his head, held up his right wrist where the cartoon's colorful twin lived. Shoving his watchband up, he shifted his eyes from his flesh to the paper and back again, searching for some telltale difference he could use to convince himself that different artists had penned the two snakes. Grimacing, he let the document fall to the table and stuck a hand into the pile of photographs.

He flicked through the snapshots, past the ones of two smiling boys holding up their prize catches of sunfish, past the ones of Kevin in full academic regalia with his uncle and aunt at his side, past the unfamiliar ones of Kevin apparently celebrating some no-doubt earth-shattering achievement with a table full of smiling friends and a full pitcher of beer. For a moment, Darien almost laughed at his half-formed suspicions, mentally berating himself for letting Bobby's ubiquitous paranoia get the better of him.

And then he found it. It was an innocent photo, really, its colors still vibrant despite the passage of time. A small finite square forever bearing witness that for some scant moment in time these two savants had been young and quite obviously in love. Kevin, bespectacled as always, but laughing with a lightness and freedom Darien himself had never witnessed in his brother during life. Opposite Kevin sat a beautiful blonde woman in a blue lab coat, her grey eyes laughing as she leaned over a mass of test tubes and Bunsen burners to drop a kiss with her lush lips on his brother's open mouth, her fine-boned hand cupping Kevin's cheek.

Darien stared at the picture, swallowed hard, choked on his own spit. Sputtering, he turned from the pool table and strode over to where his jacket hung from the counter stool, the photo slipping from his hands, fluttering to the floor as if forgotten.

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Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 12:17 p.m.

"Aw man, I'm telling you, I cannot stand flying these days," Darien toed open the door to his apartment as he struggled to remove his jangling keys from the lock without dropping his overnight bag or the brown-paper wrapped package he held in his other arm.

In complete antithesis to his partner's kerfuffle, Hobbes entered the apartment in an apparent state of Zen. "Yeah, well, you know, better safe than sorry, my friend," he stated sagely as he maneuvered the obstacle course of Darien's tiny apartment to drop his bag next to the sofa, "besides what are you griping about? It's not like we had to wade through that whole security mishmash." Hobbes shrugged off his black sport jacket and draped it neatly over one of the woven tan leather and chrome barstools lining the walls of his buddy's makeshift pool hall.

Darien turned from hanging his own jacket on the kitchen counter stool where it usually lived. "Yah," he smirked, turning to give Hobbes their idiosyncratic handshake, the low five. "Security's a breeze when you're flying Quicksilver Express, huh?"

Hobbes chuckled in response, moving past Darien to open the first drawer in the kitchen counter. "Hmm," he said thoughtfully, riffling through a stack of take-out menus, passing over one with dancing chili peppers in sombreros and three nearly identical pizzeria fliers, all featuring the axiom: "You've tried the rest, now try the best." Off the bottom of the pile he pulled one with bright red Chinese characters at the top and Golden Palace written across the bottom. "Hey, you hungry? How's about Chinese?"

"Oh yeah, order some of that orange-flavor beef I like. Oooh, and maybe some of those crispy fried wontons, too, OK?" Darien looked up to see Hobbes shaking his head at him. "What? I'm hungry. Besides you still owe me for that Dutch 200 on Wednesday," he shrugged his shoulders and returned to the task at hand, tearing open the last bits of tape and spilling the inchoate contents of his brother's life all over his pool table.

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Timestamp: Thursday, November 14, 2002, 11:23 a.m.

"That the last of it, Fawkesy?" Hobbes asked, his head hidden by the brown corrugated carton he had hoisted on his shoulder.

Darien surveyed the rustic cabin's mud room. Originally intended for the storage of canned goods and winter-hardy vegetables, it now housed a variety of boxes similar to the one Hobbes placed just inside the small door frame. Darien, hunched over with his hands on his knees in the tiny room, counted: "One, two, three," -- good God, was that an old jar of his aunt's home-made canned peaches over in the corner? -- "four, five, six," still bent he turned and included Hobbes' latest addition in his tally, "seven. Yup, that does it."

He stepped out into the kitchen and stretched his tall frame up, hands over his head, vertebrae popping, and his sage green shirt almost bursting at the buttons. He dusted off his hands and turned to Hobbes. "Well, I guess that's it, then. Let's go hit the airport. Maybe we can catch an earlier flight home."

He collected the rental car keys off the kitchen table, where he and Kevin had gorged themselves on Aunt Celia's wild blackberry cobbler with vanilla ice-cream every August for almost 10 straight years. He'd stopped coming to the family's rural hideaway just after his 17th birthday. Instead of spending two sun-drenched weeks catching fish and picking wild berries, he'd spent that August sweltering in the county's juvenile detention center, getting his first taste of what the criminal lifestyle truly entailed.

But when he'd been really young, 7 or 8 maybe, and Kev a very adult 11, they'd begged to be allowed to camp out in the back yard during those warm summer nights. It was one of the few activities both boys had enjoyed together, Darien stuffing his pockets full of oatmeal cookies for their nocturnal sustenance, Kevin bringing a flashlight and the latest Spiderman epic to read to his younger brother. Darien snorted at the memory of crushed cookie crumbs and Peter Parker, unlikely hero to both the Fawkes brothers. Darien had loved the comic for the adventure, the death defying stunts; Kevin had loved it for the outrageous science, absolutely convinced that someday he would create similar medical miracles.

"So what, that's it?" Rather than rising from his shoulder, Hobbes' voice floated across the room at him, and Darien suddenly noticed that his partner had failed to follow him to the cabin's door. "You pack the sum total of your family's life up in seven boxes that you're just gonna dump here and leave without a backwards glance?"

Darien turned, stood in the doorway with the mid-morning sunshine streaming in behind him, the smoke from his breath wreathing his face in the chilly mountain air. "What did you expect, Hobbes? Me to get all misty eyed over this junk? Frankly, if I hadn'ta had you hanging off my shoulder, I woulda just pitched the lot of it and been done two days ago. It's just baggage, Hobbes, and I left it all behind a lifetime ago." Darien turned and exited the cabin, back straight and head firmly pointed in the direction of the car, trusting that his partner would simply follow this time.

"Yeah, you keep telling yourself that, kid," Hobbes muttered, then double checked that all the doors and windows were shut and locked and that nothing was out of place, "maybe someday you'll even convince yourself that it's true." He grabbed the bulky 10X6 package Darien had so pointedly ignored off the table and left.

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Timestamp: Wednesday, November 13, 2002, 10:30 a.m.

The fragrant aroma of roasting turkey and chestnut stuffing wafted down the stairs of the old house, invading the basement, which for once, was silent. Apparently even his uncle and his brother took New Year's Day off to indulge in the traditional glut of football games and food, the young boy noted.

He knew he wasn't supposed to be down here, particularly not alone, but the allure of the unknown was too tempting. Besides, if there wasn't something interesting down here, why would his uncle and his brother spend so much of their time in this basement lab? He wasn't put off by the fact that he couldn't understand the attraction these vials, beakers and microscopes held. His uncle and brother were clearly much smarter than he was; he just needed to look harder in order to figure it out.

He spotted a miniature rack of test tubes and vials containing brightly colored liquids at the far end of the table. Ah yes, that was the perfect place to start. Kevin had oohed and ahed over the new chemistry set just a week before on Christmas morning. If Santa had brought it, it had to be good, he decided with perfect reason in his child's mind.

He remembered his brother pouring a seemingly endless succession of fluids from their individual vials into the one big beaker and crowing with delight as the resulting mixture frothed up like a volcano. He was certain he could do it too, but his brother had slapped his hands away when he'd tried to mimic the feat. Now he had his chance -- and if his brother had gotten that small reaction by only pouring a few liquids in, well, then he'd outshine his brother by using all of them.

One by one, he poured the entire contents of each vial into the beaker. When the mixture started to smoke, he was confident he was on the right track and began emptying the vials two at a time. Finally he upturned the last vial and was rewarded with a loud bang, accompanied by a cloud of smoke and the sound of breaking glass.

He was still choking back tears from the smoke when he heard his brother at the top of the stairs, "Darien, what are you doing down there?"

"Nothing," he answered in a small voice, finally able to see the complete and total destruction he'd so innocently wrought.

"Fawkesy, what are you doing down there?" Hobbes' voice woke Darien from his reverie.

"Ah, nothing," he called back up, surveying the mess of files that lay scattered at his feet, on the stools and on the tables. "Just, ah, you know, packing."

"Yeah, well, you better hurry it up, if you want to make it to the closing on time. Whoa," Hobbes stood at the bottom of the stairs. "What the hell happened here -- tornado? Jeez, Fawkes, don't you ever clean up any of your messes?"

"Not quite." Darien picked up a wad of files and mindlessly started shoving them randomly into a packing box. "Guess I got a little carried away the last time, huh? Probably should have cleaned this mess up long ago, but after that whole charade with Arnaud, I just couldn't bring myself to come down here ...."

"Yeah, buddy, I know," Hobbes said companionably. "But look, don't do it that way." He grabbed the files from Darien's hands, forehead wrinkling in consternation as he looked at the haphazard pile in the carton. Pulling them out and reorganizing them, he scolded, "See, these here have the red file labels; you don't want to be mixing them in with the yellow." He neatly stacked the two piles side by side on the lab table. "Now these," he grabbed a handful off the table, "are blue, and those," he pointed over at the pile closest to where Darien sat, "are green. Once we have everything color collated, we can then bellyband them with these rubber bands and store them in the box."

"Bobby," Darien stared at his partner as if Hobbes had suddenly grown a second head, "you're scaring me, man. When we get back, remind me to tell the 'Fish that he's got you spending way too much time in the file room with Eberts."

Hobbes looked from the files he held in his hands to those on the table to Darien's face and back again. "Ah, you know what, kid? You may be right." He chucked the files he'd been holding carelessly into the carton, then swept the two piles off the table into the same box. "Not like anybody's gonna be reading this stuff anytime soon, is it? I mean, Claire's already got all the notes from your uncle that we found at the cabin."

"That's what I'm saying, Hobbesy," Darien grinned and practiced his rim shot in the garbage can with what looked to be the oldest stress ball in existence. "OK, this is the plan," he draped a friendly arm around his smaller partner, "We get this crap cleaned out and packed in the car. Then we drop our stuff off at the motel, sign on the dotted line at the closing, and then, my friend, I am going to kick your butt all afternoon long. Pool or bowling, choose your poison." He began haphazardly grabbing things off the counters and shoving them into the packing box.

Hobbes smirked, tossing in random items over his shoulder from the lab table. "That's what you think, Junior. If there's any butt kicking to be done around here, Bobby Hobbes is going to be the man doing it."

"Oh, you think?" Darien queried as he waggled his eyebrows, knowing he had his fish on the line. "Care to place a little wager on it?"

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Timestamp: Monday, November 11, 2002, 2:35 p.m.

"So, Mr. Hobbes, you work with my nephew?" Darien's Aunt Celia made genteel conversation with Hobbes over glasses of iced tea in the sitting area of her apartment in Merrymount Retirement Home.

"Ah, yes, ma'am, that's right. We're in industrial textiles." Darien winced as Hobbes slid smoothly into the habitual cover story, honed throughout numerous casual interrogations and flirtations. "Top producer 15 years running," Bobby gave Celia a brilliant smile.

"Hmmm, yes, well, I can't say that I ever pictured Darien in ... textiles, did you say?" Hobbes nodded, and Celia addressed her nephew. "You like it, though, dear, don't you? I mean, beggars can't be choosers, and given your history and all .... but you do like it?"

Hobbes raised his eyebrows expectantly at Darien, who winced once again under the dual scrutiny of his aunt and his partner. "Yes, Aunt Celia, I like it," he assured her.

"And we love having him on our team, let me tell you," Hobbes slapped Darien on the back. "Yessiree, let me tell you, your boy here is a real go-to guy ...."

Darien rolled his eyes. "Ah yah, before we get too far off track here," he looked pointedly at Bobby, "I just wanted to make sure you're OK with the sale of the house and all, Aunt Celia. I mean, if you'd rather not go through with it, then I'll tell them no, and we'll just have to make other arrangements."

"Heavens, no, Darien. Don't be a goose," his aunt shook her head vehemently at him. "Merrymount is my home now, no sense in letting such a big house stand there empty. Besides I have never wanted to be a burden to you ...."

Darien leaned over and patted her hand. "You're not a burden," he assured her.

"Nevertheless, I didn't like having to have Kevin worry about my affairs, and I certainly don't intend to have you lose any sleep over them," she held up a hand to stop Darien's coming protest, "Not when we can sell that house and have it all be settled. No fuss, no muss, and that's all there is to it."

Darien knew better than to argue with his aunt once she'd set her mind. At first glance she might seem like a frail, scatterbrained woman, but for all her gentleness, Darien knew she had a steely strength in her bones. That force of will had allowed her to weather the death of her younger sister and take up the care of her two young nephews at an age when most women were settling down to the joys of an empty nest. Sure, she'd supplied treats and hugs without reserve, but she'd also meted out no-nonsense discipline when occasion demanded. And in Darien's case, with his frequent forays into the illicit, it had been demanded in spades.

"Alright, then. If that's what you want, that's what we'll do," he agreed.

With a firm nod of her head, she said, "Good, now that that's settled, I expect you'll be needing to know what to pack and what to throw away. I understand that the wife has taken a shine to you boys' bedroom furniture, so just leave that there for her two little ones to use. But the sofa and loveseat are antiques, so call Kressaty's and they can come and take them. I'm friends with their mother, who lives here too, so I'll be able to keep tabs on when those two pieces sell. The dining room set you can have if you like ...,"

Hobbes snorted, and Darien shushed him with a surreptitious kick to the shin.

Celia frowned disapprovingly, then continued, "but if it's not to your taste, then you can have Kressaty's take that too. Everything else you can have the Goodwill people come in and take. Well, with the exception of Peter's and Kevin's things downstairs, of course. Those you can pack up and take to the cabin."

Darien nodded, "Yes, ma'am."

"Good, then that's ... oh, dear, I almost forgot again." She left the couch, opened her coat closet door and pointed to an ordinary brown shipping box on the top shelf. "Be a dear and get that down for me, would you, Darien?" Darien complied while his aunt leaned over to Hobbes and whispered conspiratorially. "I swear, that boy's built like a bean pole nowadays. Wasn't always you know -- when he was a youngster he was a pudgy little thing. Had the biggest sweet tooth; his uncle and I worried he might turn out fat," she poked Darien in his midsection, and he fumbled the box briefly, "now look at him, skinny as a rail. Sprouted up like a weed when he was 14 -- I swear he grew a foot and a half over night!"

Hobbes chuckled at Darien's obvious discomfort. "You don't say?" he asked wryly.

Before his aunt could return to her narrative Darien steered the conversation to a less potentially embarrassing topic. "Ah, what's in the box, Aunt C?" he asked as he held up the object in question.

Celia flushed. "Good heavens, where is my memory these days?" She motioned for Darien to put the box down on the coffee table as they reseated themselves. "That's from Kevin. Or at least I thought it was until you told me about his ...," she hesitated a moment, lips trembling, "what you told me ...."

Darien reached out and put his arm around her frail shoulders, hugging gently. "I know," was all he said.

She shielded her eyes with her hand for a moment, then smiled wanly at her nephew. "Anyway, I realize now that it couldn't have been Kevin who sent it, it must have been his boss or work or something. I opened it when I first got it, but it seemed to be just a bunch of junk; you know what a pack rat he is ... was. But now I guess it's his ... his," her eyes began brimming and Darien pulled her to him, "personal effects," she finished, her face cradled in his shoulder.

Darien held her there, rubbing her back to comfort her. He was pleased to notice that Hobbes had had the good manners to slip out while his aunt was 'indisposed,' to use one of her favorite euphemisms.

Finally she moved away, pulling a hankie from the sleeve of her sweater in a gesture so typically like her that Darien felt as if he were 9 again and she was going to clean his mouth after an ice cream cone. Instead she wiped her own eyes and sighed. "Forgive me for being a silly old woman, dear. It's just that I loved him so," Darien frowned slightly, and she hastily amended, "I loved you both. You know that." She patted his hand. "But you, you're much too handsome now to be worrying about an old lady's affection. Tell me, is there a special girl?"

Darien shifted uncomfortably in his seat, crossing and re-crossing his long legs. This was most definitely not the bent he'd expected this conversation to take. "Ah, it's, ah, complicated ...." he dissembled.

"Life's complicated, Darien, except at the end. So you'd best start living it while you can. You of all people should know that." She stood then and grabbed her nephew's hand, tugging him up out of his seat. "Now, come on, give me a kiss and let's go eat. I know I haven't had lunch yet, and I swear, I could hear your stomach rumbling five miles away."

Darien dutifully dropped a kiss on his aunt's cheek and rubbed his boisterous tummy. "Yeah, I could eat..."

"You always could, dear. Are we going to Callahan's?" Celia grabbed a heavy grey tweed cardigan from her closet and handed it to Darien. "They always made the best pot roast special ...."

"Anywhere you want, Aunt C," he held the sweater coat open for his aunt to put on, then held the door for her with one hand, while balancing the box of Kevin's things in the other, "but I'm having the fried clams ...."

"And the cherry pie, I know." His aunt giggled like a young girl. "But you'd best watch yourself, dear; you can still get fat." She gave him another poke in the ribs, and, laughing, they went down the stairs arm in arm to meet Hobbes.

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Timestamp: Monday, November 11, 2002, 9:15 a.m.

Darien descended the Agency's side steps, stopping briefly at the bottom to fish his clump of keys out of his jacket pocket. And, as with almost every other escape he'd tried to make in his life, that one small stop kept him from a clean getaway.

"Hey, hey, hey. Hold on there, Junior. What do you think you're doing?" Hobbes asked, trotting down the steps to just above where his partner stood.

Darien turned to face Hobbes, only to find himself more than a little disoriented at seeing the smaller man at eye level. "Hobbes, are you deaf? You were just sitting in the Fat Man's office. You know where I'm going."

"Oh yeah, I know that," Hobbes confirmed, "but why didn't you wait for me?"

Darien put his hand to his forehead, the keys dangling along the side of his face. The last thing he needed right now was to be saddled with day care duty for the hyperactive super spy. "You're not coming, Hobbes," he said firmly.

"Well, I'm not staying here," Hobbes' tone was that of a spoiled toddler throwing a tantrum. "You are not leaving me here alone with the way the Fat Man just acted! He just gave us a week off at half pay, my friend. No way, uh uh, that is not normal. Bobby Hobbes knows a mental meltdown when he sees one. I'm coming with you and waiting it out until this particular showing of 'One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'," he hitched a thumb in the direction of the Agency's doors, "is over."

"Hobbes, I really don't have time for this," Darien put his hand down and continued over to where his latest blue Ford Crown Victoria waited in the parking lot, putting his long legs to good use with sweeping strides. "Trust me, you don't wanna go with me; hell, I don't wanna go with me. But it's family stuff, you know."

"Yeah, I know," Hobbes nodded his head, almost jogging to keep up. "I know how you went right ahead and stuck your nose in my family business not so long ago. Remember that, sport?"

Darien laughed wryly. He had pretty much forced himself on Hobbes when Bobby had wanted no part of his help in ironing out some dirty family laundry back in New York. "Yeah, buddy, I remember," he returned Hobbes' nod as he stopped at the driver's side door, "but this is a little different. I mean, I feel like I owe it to Kevin, you know?"

Bobby came around to the passenger side and unsuccessfully tried to open the door. With seeming nonchalance, he pulled on the handle a few times before giving it up for locked. "No, I don't know. What does you going to Cold Springs alone have to do with Kevin?"

Darien focused on sliding the car key into the door lock as though he hadn't done it a few million times before. "After Kev died, I was just, you know, intent on getting Arnaud and then there was Casey and the madness and ... everything ... well, by the time I got to thinking clearly the Official had already gone and buried Kevin, cleaned out his condo -- even put up the damned headstone. There was nothing left for me to do -- the Fat Man didn't think I could be trusted to do right by my brother even when he was dead." Darien let out a long breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding and opened the car door.

Still hanging onto his door handle, Bobby cocked his head and squinted his eyes at Darien over the car roof. "What? You mean you didn't ... the Official ...?"

"Oh, please, you think I couldn't have come up with something a little more meaningful than just Kev's name, not to mention get his birth year right?" Darien rolled his eyes at Hobbes. "'When a man dies he dies not of the disease he has but of his whole life.' -- Peguy. 'Men after death are understood worse than men of the moment but heard better.' -- Nietzche. 'There is no cure for birth and death save to enjoy the interval.' -- Santayana. 'It is not right to glory in the slain.' --Homer. 'Whom the gods love dies young.' -- Menander ...."

Darien opened his mouth to spout off another in his string, but Hobbes held up a hand to stop him. "Alright, alright, I got the idea. But just because you got a head for quotes don't mean you have to do this solo." Bobby rested his arms against the car roof. "I didn't let you re-bury Kevin alone after your last trip to Cold Springs. There's no way in hell I'm gonna let you do it alone now, either literally or figuratively."

Darien looked at his diminutive partner. There Hobbes stood -- compact, muscular, solid as a rock -- just like he always was. No matter how many times Darien had tried to give him the slip, Bobby always turned up, watching his back. Hobbes never let him hide, physically or emotionally. Even at the graveyard, when he'd had to re-inter Kevin after Arnaud had dug up the body in an insane attempt to convince Darien that his brother was somehow still alive, even then, Hobbes had been there. As Darien had been shoveling the dirt back onto Kevin's coffin, Hobbes' had appeared wordlessly at his side, picked up a shovel and joined in. It was the kind of consistent, unrelenting, unquestioning support that Darien hadn't even realized he'd grown used to having.

"Whatsa matter? Afraid I'm gonna steal your Aunt Celia's heart?" The corners of Bobby's mouth crooked up, and he waggled his eyebrows at Darien.

Darien couldn't help himself and laughed out loud. "Well, you do have a way with the ladies," he said with a lopsided smirk of his own as he slid into the car and reached over to open the passenger side door.

Bobby opened the door and got in. "I promise, Fawkesy, I'll be a perfect gentleman," he assured his partner, then slipped on his Ray-Bans and added, "unless of course, she requests otherwise...."

"Oh, brother," Darien snorted as he started up the car and nosed into traffic. It was going to be a long trip.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, November 11, 2002, 9:00 a.m.

Fawkes entered the Official's domain at a very un-Darien-like 9 a.m. sharp, his brisk business-like clip in marked contrast to his normal saunter. A trio of blank faces greeted his entrance, as the Official, Eberts and Hobbes all took a moment to process the fact that the Agency's infamous Rip Van Winkle was not only conscious but at work before noon.

"To what do we owe the pleasure of such an early arrival?" The Official seemed genuinely pleased to see his prodigal agent, and Darien hoped that might work in his favor.

He flopped down in the chair next to Hobbes. "Believe me, it's not pleasure on my part."

"Whatsa matter with you?" Hobbes waved a hand at Darien's unusually somber colors -- faded grey jeans, black button down shirt and matching leather jacket, sparked only by white Adidas sneakers -- "You going to a funeral or something?"

Darien ignored his partner and, placing his palms flat on the Official's desk, leaned forward. "Alright, this is the deal: My aunt's house up in Cold Springs has finally been sold. I've gotta go up there, clean the place and be at the closing on Wednesday. I'm flying out this afternoon. I'm not taking 'no' for an answer, and I ain't filling out any forms." He crossed his arms, jutted out his chin, and slumped back into his chair like a petulant five-year old.

"Alright," the Official said mildly, "Do you need Eberts to make your plane reservations?"

"Ah, no, no, that's OK. I made 'em myself last night." Darien eyed his rotund boss suspiciously, unable to believe that the Fat Man would let him go that easy. "Wait a minute. You mean to tell me you're OK with this?"

"Of course." The Official came around to the front of his desk and when he reached an arm out, Darien ducked, only to be further astounded when the elder man clapped him around the shoulders. "Listen, son, I know you think I'm a cold-hearted dictator who doesn't give a damn about the people working for him, but the truth is, nobody understands the importance of family more than I do. Right, Eberts?"

The Official's toady puffed up and smiled proudly. "Oh yes, sir. Why the Official's family ...."

"Shut up, Eberts," the newly wrought father figure growled. "Now Darien, I want you to go and take all the time you need to get your aunt's affairs settled. We won't need you here for, oh, at least a week." This time even Eberts looked stunned at the Official's magnanimous tone.

Darien freed himself from the Official's grasp and, with a sidelong look at Hobbes, asked, "You're telling me you want me to take an entire week off?" The Official returned to his large leather seat. "At half pay, of course."

"Of course," Darien parroted. For once, he wasn't interested in tweaking the Fat Man's nose. He needed the out he'd just received too much to risk losing it by arguing with the penny-pinching bureaucrat. He got up and exited the office before the Official had a chance to change his mind.

Bobby looked pleadingly at the 'Fish, and the older man grunted and nodded. "Yes, yes, you too."

As the door shut behind Hobbes, a bewildered Eberts noted, "Half pay? That's ... that's ... that's very generous of you, sir."

The Official just chuckled to himself. "Money well spent, Eberts. Money well spent."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Sunday, November 10, 2002, 2:47 p.m.

Bowl to mouth, bowl to mouth, bowl to mouth, Darien's hand repeated the trip at regular intervals conveying great palmfuls of buttery, sweet and salty kettle corn from the gargantuan red plastic tub in his lap to his waiting mouth. He lounged on his couch, feet crossed and propped on the far end, watching the Chargers take a serious beating from the Cowboys in the last quarter over at Qualcomm Stadium. Grimacing, he washed the savory snack -- and his disappointment -- down with a swig from his Miller Genuine Draft bottle. His spirits were sinking right along with his winning streak, both going steadily down the drain.

The good news was that even if he lost his bet on today's game, he'd only wind up owing George, his bookie, about $50. The bad news was that his $270 worth of winnings from his previous three weeks betting would be totally forfeit, and he'd had that money earmarked for a sweet little vintage boutique he'd just discovered downtown. He'd seen some killer electric rainbow tie-dye Huckapoo shirts, a pair of genuine russet suede Earth shoes, a well-worn silver leather NASCAR racing jacket sporting a kaleidoscope of sponsor patches, and, the piece de resistance, a lavender leisure suit with his name written all over it. His only hope now was for the Chargers to pull it out with the over/under....

The ringing of the phone abruptly halted his mental accounting. He grabbed the handset off his coffee table and, still chewing, answered, "Fawkes."

"Ah, uhm, yes," came the stilted albeit professional female voice, "I'm trying to reach Darien Fawkes...."

"Yeah, well, you got him," he answered. "Crap," he moaned sotto voce as his quarterback got sacked.

"Excuse me?" The lady on the other end of the line was clearly baffled.

"Oh, not you! I'm sorry, what was it you wanted?" Chagrinned, Darien tried to refocus his attention on his caller.

"This is Mrs. Dillard. I'm with the Merrymount Retirement Home, and I'm calling about your Aunt Celia...."

Darien instantly hit the power button on the remote. The woman had all his attention now. "What's wrong with Aunt C?" It wasn't so much that he was surprised. After all, Aunt Celia had been in the nursing home for a few years and given the brief life span of even his healthiest relatives, he'd played this particular scenario over in his head a few hundred times in the past two years.

"Oh, no, your aunt's just fine," the woman laughed lightly. "It's nothing like that. It's just that, well, as you know, we've been holding your aunt's house in escrow pending its sale so that the proceeds can be used to fund your aunt's continued care here at Merrymount...."

"Yeah, yeah, so? My brother set all that up a while ago ...." Now that he knew there was no immediate danger to his aunt's health, Darien's disinterest kicked in again, and he flicked the TV back on. He hated having to deal with the intricacies of the trust Kevin had set up to provide for their aunt's retirement care. It had never been his plan to be the responsible one in the family, and it was sometimes hard to squelch his resentment at Kevin for leaving him in the lurch where his elderly aunt was concerned.

"Well, it's just that someone's made an offer on the house, you see," the woman sounded hesitant at Darien's gruff manner. "We'll need you to come and sign the final papers -- I have it on record that you hold her power of attorney now that your brother's deceased. Is that correct?"

Darien blew out a low, resigned sigh, fingers tracing the furrows in his forehead that had suddenly added 10 years to his normally youthful visage. "Yeah, that's right," he stated plainly.

"Good," the woman sounded chipper now that her problem was solved and oblivious to the ghosts she had dug up for Darien, "Shall we set the closing for Wednesday then? It's a really sweet couple with three young children, one four-year old girl and twin six-year-old boys. They'd like to get settled as soon as possible."

"Sure," Darien said absently, his mind churning with memories he'd thought long buried.

"Oh, and you'll also have to clean out the house. You'll probably need a few days for that. Would you like me to recommend some local storage companies for you?"

Darien's frown deepened, he so did not want to have to deal with this. "Ah, no, that won't be necessary. I'll, ah, arrange something." He wanted to get this chick off the phone in the worst way. "Wednesday, right? I'm sure I can get it done by then." Frankly, there really wasn't much in the house that he wanted to keep. He'd written off his life in Cold Springs years ago, with the exception of his sporadic visits to Aunt C.

"Oh, well, good," the woman floundered, trying to keep her cheery tone. "We'll see you then."

"Yeah, bye," Darien said, then hit the power button before the woman could answer. He turned up the volume on his TV. As luck would have it, he'd tuned in just in time to see the Cowboys bench spilling a bucket full of Gatorade on their coach ... and any hopes he had of winning his bet flew right out the window.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Act Two

When I was a thief, I always thought the road to happiness was paved with stolen riches like gold, jewels, or bearer bonds. My brother, Kevin, he always subscribed to a higher belief. Not religion per se, though my aunt did stick us in Catholic school in the hopes that some of those halos might rub off. For Kev, science was like a religion. He really, truly believed in it, believed in a better world that he could build with it, a world of peace and harmony and all that crap. But see, like some French dude said back in the Age of Reason: "Science has promised us truth ... it has never promised us peace or happiness." I know in the end that was true for Kevin, but I wonder, what about Claire?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 1 p.m.

The soft hum of the massive fish tank created a soothing background noise for the sole human occupant of the dimly lit basement laboratory, the purple toned lighting creating shadows in odd places about the room. The scent of tomatoes and garlic lingered in the air, the surprisingly efficient circulation system having whisked all but the faintest traces of it from the room as the meal sat uneaten, and growing cooler by the moment, on the lone cleared spot on the lab table that took up one entire wall. The sharp click of keys being tapped combined with the off-key whistling was a noticeable counterpoint to the soft squeaks and rustlings coming from the various animal cages that filled another section of the room.

The perfectly manicured fingernails colored a delicate pink moved swiftly and with precision, a series of commands being entered into the machine and flowing across the screen. With a final keystroke - enter - the screen changed and the words "Program Running" appeared on the monitor.

The whistling ceased as the simulation program contemplated the new set of parameters that had been fed to it. "Come on you bugger…" she muttered in impatience. She glanced over at her now room-temperature food and groaned as she realized she'd, once again, forgone eating in favor of trying to make sure her Kept, her friend, would remain hale and whole.

The computer beeped then, and, after a second's hesitation, she turned back to it to see the results, her hopes as high as she dared let them be, only to have them quickly dashed. Her most recent attempt to balance out the cascading problems that had been created by giving her Kept Arnaud's gene therapy to cure the Quicksilver madness was as unsuccessful as all those preceding had been. Correcting one problem often seemed to make others worse or cause completely new ones to appear. So many areas were being affected, areas that in some cases overlapped, so it was nearly impossible to work on them individually, and attempts to work on them as a whole had, more often than not, resulted in even more horrific outcomes, death being the most typical.

"Damn it," she hissed between clenched teeth, feeling as if she were a complete and total failure. Arnaud had been right, she thought ruefully, she was no Kevin Fawkes. She'd been a fool to ever think she could understand the complexities inherent in Kevin's creation, even with all her degrees. She should have foreseen the effect the gland's chromosomal make-up had to have on Darien's endocrine system. It was high school biology, really. But she hadn't thought to investigate until the results of the paternity tests for Mei-Lin's baby had shown Darien's infertility. If not for that and Bobby's brush with savant memories warning her that all was not well with Arnaud's supposed cure, she'd have remained as clueless as ever and assumed that the only thing Darien had to worry about was less than perfect eyesight.

For all her supposed intelligence, she'd made the same mistake she had with Gloria. She'd been so jubilant about finding a solution that she'd allowed that excitement to blind her to any of the potential dangers. She'd lost herself in the science yet again and had failed in her Hippocratic duty to safeguard her patient's well-being in the process. There was no way she could hide behind her IQ, no matter how large, to escape that fact. And while it may have taken ten years to help Gloria, it appeared based on the information she'd collected so far that she wouldn't have anywhere near that amount of time to help Darien. If her tests, her projections were correct these few, precious months of freedom she had given to Darien might turn out to be far more deadly to him than his escalating immunity to the counteragent had been. At least then he'd been functional, if terrified; unless she found the key to the building deterioration being caused by the gland demanding more from Darien's body than he could provide…

"No," she stated aloud to stop her own thoughts from heading even further down the road of blame and self-recrimination, trying vainly to bolster her fast waning confidence. "There has to be something in Kevin's notes, some clue that will help me to save Darien." She glanced down at the box of Kevin's lab books that sat near her feet, books that covered nearly a decade and a variety of research disciplines.

She began reading the final data in greater detail in hopes of determining where she had gone wrong this time. Every misstep, every failure, every minor success put her closer to the correct path, to the solution. The phone on the table rang and without breaking her concentration she picked it up and brought it to her ear. "The Keeper."

"You never told him did you?" Bobby asked, sounding upset. "Bad move, Keepy."

She hadn't even realized they were back from Cold Springs yet. "Bobby? What are you talking about?" Her attention swung from the distressing data on the monitor before her to the agitated agent on the far end of the phone line.

"Fawkes. You never told him you and his brother were an item." It was a statement.

"No, it wasn't something I felt needed to be discussed." Claire explained, now second guessing the wisdom of that particular decision. "Why, Bobby? What's happened?" She suddenly had the horrid feeling she'd made yet another mistake where Darien was concerned.

"Bad move, Keepy," he repeated, "Fawkes was going through some of his bro's things and found photo's of the two of ya … ah, together," Bobby told her.

"Oh bloody…Let me speak to him." She wasn't quite sure how she was going to explain her relationship with Kevin or why she hadn't told Darien about it, but she had to try.

"No can do. He's gone. Took off for parts unknown when his light bulb went off. I'm heading out to look for him now. Figured I'd give you a heads up in case he decides to storm the fort wanting some answers from you," Bobby told her his voice dropping to a frustrated growl towards the end, obviously upset over the entire situation.

Claire sighed deeply. "All right. Thank you, Bobby." She didn't wait for a response and rang off immediately. Hitting 5 on her speed dial she tried Darien's cell phone only to get his voice mail, not surprising her in the least. When he wanted to stew he had this annoying tendency to turn off his phone and hide from the world. Still having no idea what to say and needing to speak to him in person, she remained silent when the tone sounded after a series of lilting beeps. Setting the phone back in its cradle she rubbed her eyes and fought the sudden inexplicable urge to cry. She knew she was going to have to go find him, that this discussion had to take place in person. This was not what Darien needed right now. He'd dealt with far too much emotional trauma and heartache in the past few weeks to last anyone else an entire lifetime. And having to find a way to tell him that Arnaud's cure had been as false as the identities the man assumed like camouflage made dread knot in her stomach, dread that was only amplified by this sudden new blow to Darien's emotional equilibrium. The last thing she wanted was to be the bearer of still more bad news, but with Darien it seemed to be inevitable, and he was already edging dangerously close to another bout of depression, his happy carefree attitude now layered under discontent, a palpable sadness and defeat.

Getting to her feet she tossed the stone-cold food into the nearest trash can, shed her lab coat and left the Keep intent on finding Darien and trying to save what was left of their swiftly deteriorating relationship.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 11:45 a.m.

"Well?" The Official didn't glance up at Claire who stood in front of his desk with her hands clasped behind her back, the fingers so tight she was certain the knuckles were white. She found herself unwilling to look at the file and plastic-enclosed disk sitting before him since she knew that what they contained was not what the Official wanted.

"I ran several projections and created models based on all the data I have, and I believe I can create a new version of the gland," Claire said with carefully chosen words. She had a very good idea of where this conversation would go and had planned accordingly.

The Official lifted his head slightly and eyed her over the top of his glasses. "New version?

Explain? And in English, not technobabble."

"Exactly what I said, sir. I cannot duplicate the gland that resides in Darien. Not without removing it. Which I will not do," Claire hurriedly added before the Official could suggest it himself. "Besides, after so many alterations I would not wish to use it as my base sample."

"Then what do you need?" the Official asked, making it plain he was not going to tolerate any end runs around his plans on her part.

She could safely say she had his attention now. "I need a sample from the original donor," Claire told him and waited for the explosion.

"I'm afraid I can't do that," The Official told her brusquely.

"Why not, if I may inquire? According to Kevin's notes there was a sample code number GP-662 stored at …"

The Official slammed a hand onto the desktop to cut off her words. "Doctor," his tone warned of imminent doom if she persisted, but that threat wasn't about to stop her.

"With that sample and Kevin's notes on adapting the serotype I should be able to avoid the months of animal testing he was forced to go through perfecting the reagents and have a viable gland within your six-month requirement." Claire didn't allow her gaze to waver, meeting the glacier blue eyes of the Official without flinching. "However, it will be without the madness."

As if expecting her insubordination the Official flushed, while Eberts, caught in the middle of this, tried to fade into the off-white paint of the wall behind him. "Doctor, I don't seem to recall giving you an option. I gave you a direct order to recreate the gland…"

"And I will. The way Kevin originally intended it to be," Claire shot back. "Do you recall the day I signed on? Asking me if I would continue his work since he no longer could?" The Official's look went blank and the angered flush deepened, but Claire persevered. "I do, and I fully intend on seeing it through now that I can." Her faint hope that invoking Kevin's name would affect the Official's decision was quickly dashed.

"Kevin Fawkes is dead, and his glorious dream died with him. I decide how this technology is used and not you." The Official jabbed a finger in her direction and then stabbed the file lying on his desk to punctuate his words.

"Then you had better figure out how to do it yourself. I will not create a new gland if it has the madness sequence as part of it," Claire shot right back, her voice a low hiss. "I refuse to turn innocent people into walking time-bombs the way Arnaud did to Darien. I would be no better than him if I did."

The Official froze, his skin going from flush to pale in an instant, and she knew she'd pushed him beyond anger. "Doctor, you give me no choice."

"Ah yes, Section 10. Have my status in the US revoked and made a persona non grata to try and force me to do your dirty work." She relaxed a bit and smiled ever so slightly. "Go right ahead and try it." Stepping forward she leaned both hands on his desk. "And what do you think Darien will do when he finds himself with a new Keeper?"

"I could simply order the gland harvested once you are out of the way," the Official countered in a voice colder than his look.

"And I'm quite sure Bobby would just allow that to happen." Claire stood upright and spread her hands wide. "Yes, you could send Bobby somewhere and try, but you know as well as I do that the moment you attempted to separate them they'd become suspicious. Alex might very well be willing to become involved if they asked her. Seems all your efforts to keep them at odds have not worked quite as well as you'd hoped."

There was a frosty silence for several minutes as the Keeper and the Official faced off with one another. Eberts finally broke the deadlock with a shaky, "Sir, if I may…"

"Shut up, Eberts!" the Official shouted. "And get out." When Eberts didn't move and simply stared at the Official stunned, "Now!" was added making Eberts scuttle for the door at record speed. Once the door had shut the Official spoke in a tight voice, reining his anger in by force of will from the looks of things. "I will not tolerate insubordination from you."

Claire said nothing, waiting for the Official to realize she had backed him into a corner and hoping it would take far less than the 49 hours it had taken for Darien to break and submit, the first step in his conditioning over two years ago. While perhaps not the most auspicious beginning to their relationship it had turned out to be a most stimulating and challenging one. She had few regrets about allowing the Keeper to move into the background and for Claire to come to the fore. Though it was doubtful the Official saw it that way.

When the Official began to chuckle Claire held her composure, but was utterly confused at this sudden reversal of his mood. "I'm impressed. Claire, it's been a long time since someone managed to back me into a corner. What is it Fawkes calls it? Ah, being 'officialed'." He leaned back in his chair. "All right, you'll get your sample and the chance to design the gland as Kevin wanted. However," Claire cringed internally wondering what demands he'd place on her this time. "I expect you to come up with an alternate control method for the receptacle. One that they will not know about. Understood?"

Since she had expected something like this and begun planning for it, she nodded, though she made sure it was only displeasure that he saw on her countenance. "I will attempt to create an alternate method of control for emergency purposes only."

"Agreed," the Official suddenly sounded smug, and Claire began to wonder exactly how successful her manipulation had been. "I suggest you get to work. I want progress reports every week."

"First I'll need the sample," Claire reminded him, knowing she could do little but improve her computer models without it. "And I will also need an assortment of lab equipment that we do not currently own."

"Yes, of course. Get Eberts a list of what you will need by end of the day tomorrow. Please remember that we are on a tight budget and attempt to be frugal with your choices." He pulled the file closer to himself and, after setting the disk aside, opened it. "Your sample will be here the end of next week."

Claire turned and left the office without a single word, unsure if she had won this round or simply created yet another draw.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, November 11, 2002, 10:25 a.m.

Claire leaned back against the cool metal of the door and tried to contain the tears of anger that threatened to spill down her cheeks. "The bloody git. Who does he think he is, playing with people's lives as if they were of no more importance than a piece of inconvenient fluff to be blown away without the slightest bit of worry?" Her loudly clicking heels revealed her continued unhappiness as she crossed the lab to the large tank containing her favorite snake, Lucinda. Opening the lid, Claire reached in and lifted the serpent out, allowing the animal to coil about her arm and burrow under her hair, the slightly rough scales surprisingly soothing against the skin of her neck.

"He just refuses to see how foolish he is being." Claire walked over to the computer she had been working on before the Official had called her to his office. "The man has no concept of the potential dangers. You'd think he would have learned something after that Beta-Chatazine debacle, but no. They're not people to him, they're test subjects, receptacles, a means to an end. And he expects me to do nothing more than get the most work possible out of them, to keep them alive and healthy until they've been used up and then just discard them in favor of the next human tool." She sighed heavily. "He seems to have forgotten that I am human as well."

With a tap on the mouse the screen saver vanished to reveal the results of several tests she'd run on Darien recently and that now she would not get a chance to review in detail as she had wanted - needed - to do. With a sigh she saved the data for later review and instead accessed the files she'd downloaded from Arnaud's laptop, which contained all the saved and rebuilt data he'd had on the gland, including the exact strand and location of the madness gene. It also detailed Arnaud's, albeit somewhat limited, success at creating his own version of the gland. Another file called up the information retrieved from Peter Donovan's cabin in Cold Springs, which detailed how to create an artificial gland, data which Kevin had used for the basis of the Quicksilver gland, though in theory it could be used for much, much more.

Lastly she accessed the back-up files from the Perseus Project - the codename for the original Invisible Man experiments - files that, as Claire had learned, Kevin had known nothing about, believing in his naïve way that he was the only one to have all the information on the project. Luckily for her, the Official was nowhere that naïve or foolish, otherwise she would not have been able to accomplish even a third of the things she had managed to over the last two and a half years.

Lucinda slithered down and around her arm until the snake's tongue was flicking out in curiosity to taste the slightly static laden air in front of the monitor. "I know, sweetheart, I don't want to follow his orders." The snake turned its head back around as if to look at her, and Claire sighed. "I won't do it. I'll figure out how to create a new gland without the side effect; I just can't betray my conscience again that way. Or Darien, for that matter. He's suffered enough; his emotional state is precarious as it is."

Getting to her feet Claire returned Lucinda to her glass-enclosed home and heard the sound of the lab door sliding open as she was sealing the cage.

"Doctor, the Official thought you might find these of use on your new project," Eberts said. He clearly had no idea of the monstrous extent of what the Official had asked of her, Claire surmised from his perfectly blasé expression. He was holding one of the many white file boxes typically found buried in the dark corners of the Archive room.

"And what would they be?" Claire knew that had come out far more sharply than Eberts deserved, but she was still upset, and the Official's lackey was a comparatively safe target to vent her frustrations on.

Eberts carried the box over to the lab table and set it down in a comparatively clear spot. "Some of Dr. Fawkes' lab books."

"Lab books?" Claire rushed over and removed the lid of the box to reveal about a dozen hardbound notebooks in various shades. Picking one up a pale jade colored one at random she discovered it dated November, 10th, 1996, on the inside cover and guessed the color groups represented either certain projects or years. "Why haven't I seen these before?" She lifted her eyes from the book to stare directly into Eberts' pale blue ones.

"I'm afraid I don't know. I myself have not seen these before today, and I can assure you they were not stored in the Archives." Eberts gestured at the box with a slight wave. "I believe the Official had these in his personal possession. Will they be of use to you?"

Claire closed the book in her hand after ascertaining it dealt with some of Kevin's work when he had been with the SWRB and, though she would need to go through the book in detail to examine its contents fully, set it aside in favor of another that she hoped contained notes on Kevin's gland research. "I have no way of knowing that until I've gone through them. Just keying in the data could take months."

"And you do not have months. I understand. If there is any way I can assist you, please feel free to let me know." At Claire's nod of acknowledgement Eberts backed away and was gone from the lab seconds later.

Choosing one of the dark gray notebooks she flipped it open to find a date of May 23rd, 1999, about halfway through. Chewing idly on a fingernail she read over the material on the pages before her. It was a modification of the beta reagent sometime during the QS-9200 trials, trials that were still using rats. The information was pretty straightforward and nearly identical to the information stored in the Keep's computer system, however, and this is what had caught her eye, there were notes scrawled in the margins and in separate paragraphs. It was obviously Kevin's handwriting, but not his more precise work writing, this was far closer to his "thinking" handwriting that she remembered from college; those odd flashes of insight or shifts in perspective that, more often than not, led the way to the ultimate goal.

Moving back to her chair she sank down into it and thumbed forward until near the end of the notebook. She could see that Kevin had been becoming increasingly frustrated over his inability to resolve the permanent Quicksilver situation with Cole and then his obvious remorse when the man had been killed after plainly becoming mentally unstable. The book ended with more possible versions of the beta reagent and listed possible candidates to join the team and assist with the solution. Some had been scratched out while others had been circled, including Arnaud De Thiel.

She read through the list twice to confirm her suspicions of over two years ago. If this was indeed Kevin's list for whom to bring on the project, then her name should have been here and yet it was mysteriously absent. Claire momentarily allowed herself to wonder how the Official had known of her relationship to Kevin, but pushed it aside for a later date. She was already here and, right now, she had work that must come first.

Glancing at the box, she noted two more books in the gray, at least one of which must contain his personal accounts of Darien's arrival and the seeming success. Steeling herself she retrieved both, but hesitated to open them. What if there was nothing inside that could help? What if Kevin had worked out a solution back then, to the madness or removal, but never had a chance to implement it? What if, though Claire had trouble considering the possibility, Kevin had simply not cared, as Darien was often wont to accuse? Had been far more interested in seeing his life's dream being realized than to care that his brother might be doomed to eventual madness and death?

Claire was almost afraid to discover the truth.

The things she had learned about Kevin from Darien seemed so very different from the man she had known a decade ago, and yet she could also see where Darien's perspective had come from. When she and Kevin had parted ways he'd been sure he was going to save the world, hell, so had she. Both of them so confident in their abilities, so sure they could do no wrong, that she had jumped in headfirst and proceeded to destroy a young woman's life. She chuckled then, realizing that if she hadn't come to the Agency, hadn't met Darien, that Gloria might very well be dead instead of home with her family.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, November 11, 2002, 10:00 a.m.

When Claire stepped into the Official's office the first thing she noticed was that Eberts was strangely absent from his usual place behind the Official's desk. The Official himself stood over by the windows looking out over the cityscape revealed by the mid-morning sunshine. He had an oddly contemplative look on his face as he reached up to separate a pair of blind's slats.

"They go about their everyday lives and have no idea what is really happening, their greatest concern probably no more than remembering to pick up milk from the grocery store."

"Sir?" Claire was more than a touch concerned and suddenly uncomfortable being alone in the room with the ruthless power behind the Agency.

He released the slats, allowing them to snap shut and causing Claire to jump slightly in surprise. "It's our job to make sure it stays that way, wouldn't you say, Doctor?"

Unsure of his meaning Claire nodded slightly. "Yes, that would be…"

"And what would you see as this agency's best means to do that job?" The Official asked as he stepped away from the window and towards her.

Claire didn't like the direction this conversation was taking, but answered the question. "The Invisible Man Project."

"Exactly, and yet the project has not gone forward as it should have."

"Sir, I'm not sure I understand." In truth she was terrified that she did, but was unwilling to allow herself the option of thinking about it.

The Official sighed in dismay. "It's time to fulfill the potential of the project. I want, on my desk first thing Friday, an estimate of when you can have another functional gland ready for implantation."

Claire stared at him in shock, completely disbelieving the words she had just heard.

"You have all the files necessary to create a new gland, don't you?" the Official asked, his voice still sounding as if they were discussing nothing more than what they had watched the night before on the telly.

"Theoretically, but..."

"Then you should have everything you need to get me an estimate." His voice turned hard. "This is an order, Doctor. I fully expect you to have at least one new gland ready for use in six months."

"Six months? It may take me that long just to redesign the beta reagent and test its long term stability without the madness sequence," Claire explained in irritation.

"No need for that. Leave the sequence." His tone brooked no argument, but Claire ignored it.

"How can you suggest that? Didn't you learn anything? You had to kill Simon Cole because of what the gland did to him. Darien very nearly died when he became immune to the counteragent. How can you even consider putting anyone else through that hell?" Claire shouted at him in anger.

He slammed his fist onto his desktop making Claire visibly flinch in reaction. "I can consider it because I will have control over both the Quicksilver and the agent using it."

Claire's mind raced trying to come up with something to persuade him off this course. "The madness was never part of Kevin's vision."

"Kevin Fawkes is dead -" the Official turned on her, his face flushed and his words a low snarl, "- because all he saw was his vision, his hopes and dreams. He never saw how hard the world really is and was never prepared to deal with it. I am and I will."

Claire bit her lip, unable to deny the truth of the Official's statement about Kevin. "There are other options. The backpack, for example. Thanks to the data left by Dr. Chong I might have a working copy in a few months…"

"And the recycler?" the Official interrupted her attempt to change his focus. "How long will that take?"

"Longer, I'm afraid. Due to the nuclear material needed to run it, it will require special facilities to build and test." She trailed off as the watched the Official's face go blank.

"So we would still need to supply Quicksilver for the backpacks. Wouldn't you agree additional glands would be useful for that?" He moved around his desk and settled into the leather chair.

"But, sir, the madness…"

"Enough," he roared. "Now, is not the time to push me, Doctor. Unlike Fawkes, you did sign a contract; don't force me to invoke Section 10."

"You wouldn't dare," she hissed.

The Official smiled.

Claire felt her throat tighten and knew he would if she pushed him on this and she would find herself buried so deep in some government hellhole that she'd never see daylight again. "You bastard."

"Friday morning, Doctor Keeply."

Claire took that as the dismissal that he meant it to be, and, shaking with repressed anger and outrage, she turned and left the room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Tuesday, October 17, 2000, 2:25 p.m.

Claire looked distinctly uncomfortable as she was escorted into the tiny windowless office in the Department of Interior building. She wasn't entirely sure why she had been called here, but with her funding all but cut off for her current work she was willing to speak with this "Official" about the possibility of moving under the purview of his agency and continuing her research there with the proper equipment. The series of phone calls that had begun a little bit over a week ago had been mysterious to say the least, and she had been decidedly suspicious until the man called Eberts had mentioned that Kevin Fawkes worked for them and had placed her on a short list of potential scientists for consideration for the newest phase of it.

A man approached her with an almost pinched look on his face. "Doctor, ah…"

"Eberts!" was barked from behind a nearby desk and Claire turned her attention to the man seated there. "Anonymity remember?"

"Oh, yes, sir. My apologies, sir," the man, who was apparently named Eberts, said in a rush.

"Shut up, Eberts." The response to those words was instantaneous and shocked Claire, She'd never seen a man react like a well-trained animal before. "Doctor, sit please." The man sounded more than congenial enough to her, but having already seen a hint of his harsher side made her wary.

Her back stiff, she approached the desk and sat in the single hard chair while Eberts took up position behind and to the right of the older gentleman. "While I have studied zoology it was not my main field so I am not entirely certain why the Department of Fish and Wildlife would be in need of a research scientist in human biology."

"Actually we are under the Department of Fish and Game," Eberts corrected, causing Claire to look at him in confusion.

"It's a long story that has no bearing on this meeting," the man explained. "And an expert in human biology as well as your other fields, including zoology, is exactly what we are looking for. Our project leader…"

"Kevin Fawkes, yes. I am somewhat familiar with his work," Claire stated, trying to keep her tone neutral, but her curiosity about an old friend got the better of her. "How is he doing?"

A single gray eyebrow went up on the man's forehead causing her to regret the question. "We are preparing to move onto the next stage of the project and have been looking for an addition to the staff. Let's just say that we are aware of Dr. Fawkes' high opinion of your ... talents."

"You do understand I am in the midst of a project I cannot abandon." Claire knew that this might cause him to withdraw any forthcoming offer, but she had to make it clear she would not shirk her responsibilities or her personal need to correct her mistake.

"I am aware of it and am willing to fund that project if you agree to come aboard."

These were the words Claire had been hoping to hear, but she needed to make sure he understood the situation as fully as possible without revealing anything classified. "There are special requirements that must be met, and I will need top-end equipment."

"Understood, and all of that can be arranged. I believe we can have you set up within a week." The man glanced at Eberts who nodded.

Claire found that most interesting and had to wonder why he seemed so anxious to bring her on board. While it would be wonderful to see Kevin again, she had learned caution and would not jump in blind ever again. "May I inquire as to what my position would be?"

"I am afraid we cannot disclose that information until you have signed on," Eberts told her, his hands clasped together in front of him.

"Doctor, your project has been all but shut down, your funding and access to data cut to near nothing. Do you really think that situation is going to improve?" Claire shook her head, knowing the older man was correct. "How close do you think you are to completing the… project?"

"With the right equipment, I believe I could have a solution within a year," she told him truthfully. She was certain she had been on the right track when her funding had been cut, but no matter how many times she had explained this to her superiors her words had gone unheeded.

"Perfect. Eberts," the man stated as Eberts handed the man a pile of papers. "This is the initial agreement; a more detailed one will be negotiated once you are in place." He set it on the desk before her, quickly followed by a pen. "All we need is your signature, and we can put things into motion."

Claire picked up the papers and thumbed through them, skimming the information. It appeared to be a standard preliminary agreement with the usual non-disclosure component in the event the later negotiations should fall through and she ended up leaving the position. Knowing she really had nowhere else to go and not wanting to be forced out by General Grimmond, she picked up the pen and signed her name.

"Wonderful," the man said as he quickly grabbed the agreement and handed it off to Eberts in exchange for a slim file. "This is the overview of the project; you will receive a more detailed one upon your arrival in our San Diego offices."

Claire had opened the file with the words "TOP SECRET" across the front and been looking at the first page when the man's words sank in. "San Diego?"

"Yes, Doctor, your flight information will be faxed to your apartment here, you have three days to pack any necessities the rest will be handled by my agency." The man was all business now.

"A residence meeting your preferences will be found in the area, and your remaining belongings shipped there," Eberts continued.

Claire brushed her blonde hair back behind her ear, more than a little stunned at how swiftly things were moving. Her eyes caught some words on the page before her. "This says my title will be The Keeper and I'll be in charge of subject DF-37, as well as project leader of the QS-9300 Project." She lifted her head to meet the cold blue eyes of the man sitting across from her. "I thought Kev… Dr. Fawkes was running the project."

"He was, he..," Eberts got out before the man glared him into silence.

"What is going on here?" Claire hissed in suspicion. "What has happened to Kevin?" She didn't care that she'd forgotten and used Kevin's first name.

"The project was compromised, and there was some damage, nothing substantial and nothing that can't be reconstructed by someone with his skill level, which I have been reassured you have." The man's tone was far too light and casual for Claire's liking, and she called him on it.

"That does not answer my question," she stated flatly. "And I can still tear up that preliminary contract and walk out of here." Getting to her feet she made it clear she would act on her threat if necessary.

The man flushed a dark red, obviously not liking being backed into a corner. "If you knew Dr. Fawkes then you must have some idea of what he was working on."

Claire nodded, wondering where she was being led this time.

"What if I told you DF-37 is Kevin's goal realized?" It was a question, but plainly dangled before Claire as an enticement; like the carrot before the mule and, much like that mule, Claire couldn't resist trying to reach for it.

"He did it? He actually got to see his dream come to fruition?" Claire asked, for that moment so very proud of her friend.

The man nodded. "And we need you to see that his dream continues."

"But why wouldn't Kevin," she trailed off, putting the pieces together, all the hints, all the comments, the words in the file. "Kevin can't continue the project, can he?" It was the closest she could come to stating what she feared.

"No, he cannot. I need you to continue it for him. Can you do that? See his dream all the way through to the end? For him?" The sympathetic tones in the man's voice rang true to her ears.

It took her moment, fighting back the sudden urge to cry. Now was not the time, she could mourn later. "I can." She hugged the folder to her chest, finding it oddly comforting, a connection to the brilliant man she'd known a decade ago.

He clapped his hands together. "Good to have you on board, Doctor."

She turned to leave the room, her mind whirling with all the work she had to do before picking up her life and moving across the country. Slipping the file into her briefcase she paused, something tickling at the back of her mind. "And how do I address you?" she asked as kept up her pretense of undisturbed calm.

"The Official."

So this was the man running things, she would have to make a point to be careful around him in the future. He'd already proven he would lie to get what he wanted, because, as she had realized in the last few moments, there was no way Kevin could have given the Official her name, not if Kevin was dead. Which meant he had somehow known about her, about their relationship and had quite effectively used it to play upon her emotions and bring her into the fold.

Out in the hallway Claire stopped short, the reality sinking in. All Kevin's enthusiasm, his dreams of changing the world for the better were now nothing more than a slim file and some unknown test subject. "Bloody hell." she muttered as she got herself back into forward motion, her mind absently wondering how things might have gone differently.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Saturday, June 10, 1989, 1:25 p.m.

There were boxes everywhere, stacked in precise neat piles, but inevitably in the way or containing just the one piece needed. It was unavoidable that items had been collected that represented accomplishments and relationships made after so many years living here, but even Claire was impressed at the amount of stuff. "Kevin, I think you were a bit too efficient with your packing," she said as she sliced the tape of yet another box with a scalpel as she helped Kevin search for the particular tie he wanted to wear.

"I think I'm going to have to agree with you," he responded ruefully as he went through another box nearby. "I should have segregated the contents better."

"Or you could have just left some items out," Claire told him with a chuckle that turned into a wistful smile after a moment as she caught sight of their graduation robes hanging from the back of a nearby door. "Hard to believe it's over."

"Thank God. I can finally get to the real work," Kevin stated as he began placing the articles of clothing back in the box without finding the runaway tie. "Dr. Gaither seemed quite enthusiastic about my theories and their potential."

Claire frowned slightly as she realized Kevin had not understood what she'd been referring to. "Ah yes, that secret government agency and their bottomless pockets of funding that you keep going on about." These days that's all he seemed to care about, that he was moving on to work on his life's dream and not the fact he was leaving her, their relationship behind.

"Are you trying to tell me the DOD is penniless?" Kevin retorted as he closed the box and quickly resealed it. "Damn it, I'll just go with the dark gray one."

"Of course," Claire said in a tight voice as she watched him fetch the tie she had suggested

before going on the wild goose chase through his packed belongings. She wasn't sure why she was so upset, her flat that she shared with two other girls looked much the same, her belongings packed away in preparation of being shipped across the country, but she was. Having been able to talk to someone who understood her, who shared her enthusiasm, who didn't assume that just because she was blonde she had to be a bloody idiot, or, when they learned she was smart, suddenly decide she was a vestal virgin and therefore untouchable. While it might have been a bit of foolishness brought on by alcohol that originally brought them together it was mutual attraction on several fronts that kept them that way.

Kevin was suddenly behind her and set one hand on her shoulder. "All right, what did I miss now?"

Claire turned about to see the tie hanging loose about his neck, the collar of the shirt standing upright awaiting the tie to be put in its proper place. Almost without thought her fingers began doing a perfect double Windsor knot and had the tie neat and in place in seconds. She allowed her hands to rest on his chest though she couldn't yet meet his eyes. "This is it, Kevin, you leave tomorrow, and I'm off next week. We might never see each other again."

Kevin reached up and took her hands into his own. "Don't be silly, give it a few months for me to get settled, and I'll give you a call. It might not be easy, but I don't see any reason why we can't get together now and then." He kissed her then, a quick brushing of lips that did little to ease her mind. "We are going to do great things, you know that don't you?"

"I hope so." Claire searched his eyes hoping to see… what, she wasn't sure of. Kevin had professed his love just as she had, but over the last few months she'd come to realize she was always going to be his second love. His work, his research, his dream was always going to come first and, though she was loathe to admit it, it was at least partially true of herself as well. He would always be her first love, perhaps even her best love, but he would not be her last.

"Hope so? Of course we'll meet again." He tapped the top of a nearby box where she had drawn yet another rendition of the ouroboros, this time done in blue sharpie and with the tail hanging out the snake's mouth. "What is it you told me this little guy meant?"

"That for every ending there's a new beginning," Claire said in a soft voice.

"Exactly. So this can't be an ending for us, just a new beginning, right?" Kevin asked with a smile.

"Right." Claire wasn't quite sure she agreed with him, still frightfully sure she would never see him again after today. Once they walked across that stage and collected their diplomas their lives would go their separate ways never to cross paths again.

Kevin's hands had begun to wander, and Claire glanced over at the clock. "Kevin, it's almost time to leave."

"Let 'em start without us," Kevin undid the tie and tossed it away.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, January 13, 1989, 8:43 p.m.

Claire was nibbling on a red licorice twist from her bag and looking over her notes while sitting with her feet up on the chair kitty-corner from her. She'd ordered an appetizer and drink for herself knowing that there was at least a chance Kevin had gotten distracted and forgotten they were meeting for dinner before ostensibly heading back to her place to review project data together. While heading in different directions field-wise, there was just enough overlap to allow them to assist each other on occasion.

The waiter came by with her iced tea, and she gave him a nod of thanks without ever looking up at him so she was startled when he kissed her on the cheek. "What the … Kevin?"

"I'm sorry I'm late." He shifted her feet off the chair, scooted it closer to her and sat down. His appearance surprised her; he was frowning, the top two buttons of his shirt undone, tie loosened, and his hair so far beyond disheveled that it was very nearly standing upright.

"Kevin, are you all right?" She set the notebook aside and leaned forward to grasp one of his hands, afraid that there'd been an accident in his lab.

"I'm fine. Pissed off, but fine." Kevin twined their fingers together and sighed. "Look I have to tell you something, something I should have long before now, but…"

Claire felt her stomach sink. She'd been worried about the phones calls he'd been receiving the last few weeks, calls he always took great pains to hide from her, calls that made her suspicious that he'd found someone else. "Is she pretty?" Claire suddenly blurted out, not wanting him to prevaricate and drag it out.

Kevin did a double take. "Is who pretty? Claire?"

"Your new girl, the one who calls at odd times and you switch phones for so I won't overhear," Claire explained in a voice gone faint. She was truly dreading this, but would be sure to not make a fool of herself, not here anyway. She'd have herself a good cry once back in her off-campus flat.

Kevin actually burst out laughing, causing Claire to blink in confusion and then grow angry. It took him a moment, but he noticed her reaction. "Oh Claire, I am not laughing at you. Just the irony of the whole damn situation. Those calls weren't another woman, they were my uncle and my brother."

"Brother?" Claire was too stunned to process the information quite yet. The fact that he wasn't seeing anyone else lifted a weight off her heart that she'd not realized she'd been carrying until that very moment. "You've never mentioned a brother before."

"For reasons that will soon become apparent," Kevin said ruefully. "He's … Darien's wasting his life on some romanticized vision of Robin Hood."

Claire, having grown up with the tales of Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men, shook her head not understanding what Kevin meant. "He robs from the rich and gives to the poor?" She really couldn't imagine anyone doing something like that, not in this day and age. The closest she could see in modern times were those huge charity auctions where the rich were guilted into contributing vast amounts of cash on some trinket to clear their conscience for yet another year or two.

"Not exactly. He tries to steal from the semi-wealthy for himself and gets caught." Kevin ran his hands through his hair, which explained how it had taken on its unique look and then removed his glasses, carelessly tossing them onto the surface of the table to rub his eyes.

"Oh. I take it he's …," Claire tired to work out how to say this delicately. "Not as academically inclined as you?"

Kevin snorted. "If you mean, 'is he dumb as a post?' then no. In fact he's probably just about as smart as I am, just … less focused, I guess. He got tired of living in my shadow a couple years ago and dropped out of school. 'Following in dad's footsteps' or so he claims."

"Your father was a thief?" Claire made sure to sound appropriately shocked, but was actually fascinated. Kevin tended to be reticent when it came to talking about his family, finding school and his goals in research far safer topics of conversation.

"That's what all the police reports say." Kevin admitted with what appeared to be great reluctance. "He left for good when I was all of eight, and I made sure to get on with my life. Can't say the same for Darien, though."

Claire pondered that and mulled several potential questions that would, hopefully, increase her knowledge, but could tell by the look in Kevin's eyes that he'd say no more on the subject tonight. "So why is your brother calling you now?"

"'Cause the fool went and got himself arrested. No juvenile sentencing this time, real time in a real prison if he's convicted, and it's looking like he will be." Reaching out Kevin picked up Claire's iced tea and downed a long swallow before setting the glass back on the tabletop.

Picking up his glasses next, he unconsciously began to clean them with the end of his tie. Claire had seen him do it before as he thought about things.

"Oh." What was she supposed to say to that? "Not a very good thief I take it?"

"Actually, he's damn good. If he'd spend even half the energy on college as he does on learning new ways to break into places he'd have a degree in no time. Claims it was bad luck. Something about the mistress showing up unexpectedly." Kevin slipped the glasses back into place. "Personally I think it had to do with that Elizabeth Morgan he's been caught with before. He was found without the stolen items, but if she was involved he's not telling anyone. Too God damned honorable by half." Leaning forward on the table he used the ring of condensation left from the iced tea glass to sketch a primitive version of a water molecule. "I'm worried about him, Claire. He's all bluff and bluster, convinced he can do the time standing on his head, but I know him. He's too…" Kevin visibly fumbled for the correct word. "Good. Inside where it counts, he's a good person. I just wish he'd realize it."

Claire took a few seconds to choose her words carefully. "Perhaps…. perhaps this experience will be the one that turns him around." She could see that this was eating at Kevin and knew she had to do something. "Kevin, he's got to learn for himself, has to discover who he is on his own. No one can do that for him. Not even the great Kevin Fawkes." As she hoped the last earned her an amused smile.

"I know, but he's family, and I made him a promise a long time ago, after mom died. I don't want to break it now." Kevin's tone was soft, serious, and Claire knew this was very important to him.

"Kevin, he's made his choices, just as you have made yours. You cannot fix everything for him, nor should you. He has to learn to take responsibility for his own actions." She could see Kevin's brow furrowing, her words not having the reaction she'd hoped. "Is there anything you can do to help him?"

Kevin shook his head. "Not really. I have no way of undoing his mistake."

"Then just be there for him as much as you can. Perhaps there will be another time when you can help, " Claire told him and watched his brow relax.

"You're right." Kevin picked up the menu and began to look it over. "You'd like him, Claire. He has a fondness for quotes and is a complete cynic, but he also sees the world completely differently than you or I do. Talking to him is always a most frustrating and refreshing experience." He gave her a smile that she gladly returned, her curiosity about his brother, this mysterious Darien, piqued, but not to be satisfied. "Now, I believe I owe you a dinner."

"After all this you owe me far more than that," Claire smirked, and Kevin chuckled warmly in response.

"Oh good. I hope you force me to pay for hours at a time," Kevin commented in a bland voice, making Claire blush in reaction. It was amazing what just a well-timed look from him could do to her. Her mother would be appropriately scandalized.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Sunday, September 4, 1988, 10:31 a.m.

"Claire! Phone for you!"

With a groan Claire dragged herself from beneath the warm nest of blankets, her head throbbing in discomfort and her stomach making its unhappiness known. Holding onto one blanket, which she draped about her shoulders, she staggered out of her room and down the hallway to the desk the phone rested one. Sitting, she tried ignore the knowing smirk from her roommate, Ginger, who Claire vaguely remembered running into the night before, after she had consumed several potent concoctions that the frat house had been handing out for free.

"Hullo," Claire mumbled into the phone.

"Claire?" Are you all right, honey?" Claire recognized the voice immediately and felt a sudden guilt wash through her.

"Mum? Why are you calling here?" Squinting her eyes in an attempt to focus them, Claire looked at the calendar and realized her mother was calling on their regular date. Second Sunday of every month, due to the time difference, it was early morning in California, but evening already in England.

"Dear, you've been working too much again haven't you?" The concern in her Mum's voice was palpable.

Claire shook her head, regretting it as the room decided to do a tight spiral that made her stomach rebel. Ginger reappeared then with a glass of water and a couple of painkillers and Claire nodded her thanks "Actually Mum, this time I had a bit too much fun," Claire explained, her accent that she worked so hard to erase while in the States, reappearing the instant she heard her mother's voice.

"Good. All work and no play…"

"Makes Claire very likely to get the job she wants." Claire ran over the top of her mother's words. "But you're right, I've been a bit too focused lately." She paused long enough to down the aspirin followed by the water, suddenly realizing exactly how thirsty she was when the cool water hit her throat.

"So who is he?" The voice was knowing and sounded relieved as well.

Claire chuckled, not the least bit surprised that she'd been found out. "His name is Kevin Fawkes, and he's brilliant." Claire suddenly felt one hundred percent better, now that she was thinking about Kevin. They'd only been on one "date," but she was most definitely taken with the man.

"Tell me." It was an order, a polite one, but still an order. "Can I assume he's an American?"

"Yes, Mum, third-generation French-Canadian, working on multiple PhDs, and sweet." Claire tried to keep her emotions inside, but wasn't sure how successful she was based on the fact Ginger walked by and rolled her eyes making Claire grin like a fool.

"Ah, so I take it you like him for his mind?" The tone was full of humor, for which Claire was very grateful as she had some concern her mother wouldn't approve her dating an American. They may have lived in the States since her early teens, but her Mum was a born-and-bred Brit, one step shy of royalty, and had moved back to England once Claire had been safely ensconced in graduate school.

"He is very handsome, but yes, it was his mind that first caught my attention, or rather the fact that he realized I had one." Claire had been shocked by her alcohol-induced nerve when she'd been bold enough to interrupt a discussion Kevin and several others had been in the midst of during a Neurology department cocktail hour to point out an alternative view only to have Kevin drag her - literally grab her hand and convince her to sit down - and join the discussion. The very next day he invited her to join an after-hours discussion group, and she had gladly agreed. That had been two weeks ago and the relationship had been steadily progressing.

"Claire, just remember you have a mind and use it wisely. A little fling while at school is one thing, but doing something foolish like getting married or, heaven forbid, pregnant would ruin all you have planned," Her mother admonished gently.

Claire sighed. "I know, Mum, and I fully intend to achieve my goals, but…"

"There are no buts, sweetheart. The type of research you want to get involved with would not be easy to do with a husband or child. You're still young; give it some time. If in five years you and this young man are still devoted to one another, then consider it." Claire had to admit her mother had a point. Even though she was most definitely interested in furthering her relationship with Kevin, there was no way to predict where it would go or even if it would last past the semester. The advice was sound, and Claire decided then and there to heed it.

"I will, Mum, and I'll rely on you to keep reminding me if I start sounding like a bloody fool." Claire counted on her Mum to keep her straight when her flights of fancy would sometimes get out of control.

"Of course, that's what mothers are for. Now, you go get some more rest, if your hangover is anywhere near as bad as those I used to get you'll need it." The deep rich chuckling made Claire smile in response.

"You could have warned me," Claire commented plaintively, her head feeling slightly better, but her stomach still voicing its displeasure. "Same time next month?"

"Yes, my dear. Take care."

You too, Mum." Claire hung up the phone and pulled the blanket closer about herself, realizing she needed to brush her teeth and shower desperately. The party might have been fun and allowed her to relax, but the morning after was not something she ever wanted to deal with again. As she got to her feet, Ginger returned carrying a paper sack. "Yes?"

"I believe these are your …clothes." Ginger held out the bag to her, which Claire took and opened in curiosity. Inside she found, much to her dismay, her undergarments from the night before.

"Oh bloody hell. What did I do?"

"According to the gentleman who dropped these off, you had a gin and tonic, walked out to the pool and shouted 'Woohoo, let's swim naked' and proceeded to do so." Ginger tried not to smile, but ended up bursting out in laughter, as Claire blushed bright red. "It's all right, hon, we all get one major embarrassment like this. No one will hold it against you. Next time just stay away from the free drinks."

"I believe I'll just do that," Claire mumbled, closed the bag and hurried back to her room.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, August 27, 1984, 10:49 a.m.

Claire stared out the window of the car looking over the entrance to the campus that she had only seen once before on the short visit a few months back to make arrangements for her to attend. Out of the several choices presented to her she'd had she'd picked MIT because of its excellent Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Biology departments. "Oh Da, this is going to be bloody wonderful."

"Claire," her mother admonished with a smile. "At least try and be a lady until we've left the campus."

Claire chuckled. "I'll try, Mum, but I'm just so excited." She all but bounced in her seat in unrestrained enthusiasm. "I'm really here."

"Yes, sweetheart, you are. I am glad your father was able to get that transfer to the States. I feel much better knowing we'll live nearby, at least until you come of age." Claire knew her mother would have preferred remaining in the family home in England, and she not only understood, but appreciated the sacrifice they were making for her schooling.

As they pulled to a stop, Claire unbuckled and leaned forward between the bucket seats. "I'll make you proud. I'll get myself hired by the best research lab in the country, government run, of course, since they have the real funding, and change the world."

Her father turned about to look at her, obviously restraining a laugh. "Can we find your dorm room first and drop off the truck load of belongings we brought to fill it?"

"Oh Da," she stuck a stray lock of golden blonde hair behind her ear and placed a kiss upon his cheek. "This is the easy part, the learning. Using it after will be the real challenge." Somehow in her heart she knew she would do something great one day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Act Three

I've never thought of myself as a patriot; in fact, I've always been pretty much apolitical. I mean, you can probably guess my stance on the death penalty, and it's kind of moot to choose a political party when you make your living breaking the law. Besides, being a con for most of my adult life, I didn't even have the right to vote in an election, not even for the school board, so what good was patriotism gonna do me? But some people, well, they buy into all that rah-rah feel-good crap the politicians spout, and some people, like Hobbes for example, really do love their country. Hobbes, man, he's a stand-up guy. I mean, I like to think that JFK was talking about Hobbes when he said: "Ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country." Now, I know Bobby's not old enough for that, but hey, it's a neat mental picture. 'Course since working at the Agency, I've also spent a lot of time wondering just what kind of things the Official has done for his country.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, November 15, 2002, 9:53 a.m.

"You're sure about this?" the Official asked as he thumbed through the papers, looking over the columns of numbers totaling projected income and expenses with a gimlet eye.

"Yes, sir. As administrator we have full access, and the fact that it is a private off-shore account means no one, other than those you choose, will know about it." Eberts explained patiently. "The interest is already accumulating, and I can easily begin siphoning off additional funds into a secondary account, one Mr. Steinman will not have access to. With a bit of creativity I can easily have a million set aside for immediate use. We did warn him there might be fluctuations do to the volatile world market."

The Official chuckled, knowing full well the account was in no way tied to the international stock markets and that Eberts had simply spun a tale to allow potential use by the Agency. All part of the deal made, though not quite the one Fawkes and Hobbes had convinced the Official to take, months ago. He had to admit they had brought in far more than he'd expected and more than Mr. Steinman could spend in three lifetimes, so the Official felt eminently justified in using some of the $24 million to further the goals of the Agency.

"Perfect." Eberts was one asset the Official would hate to lose, the man knew his way through and around IRS and government rules and regulations like no one he'd seen before. He knew every loophole and backdoor, plus had invented a few of his own and kept the Agency running even when the official budget had been exhausted. Whether discovering a casino run by a certain Swiss-French terrorist or kicking some ASS, the money would appear as if by magic, and they would survive, and sometimes even prosper as they moved into yet another fiscal quarter.

Of course once you added in the fact that the man could make a computer sing like Pavarotti he became an asset that others would clamor for … if they knew about it, and, much like Fawkes, the Official was very careful not to advertise exactly how talented Eberts was.

He looked over the numbers before him. "The million should cover the initial start-up for the project, correct?"

"Yes, sir, unless the Doctor needs some piece of equipment that I am unaware of. I based my projections on the equipment used at the Perseus Project lab with a reduction of animal testing funds as the majority of that work is complete and should be unnecessary for this portion of the trial from what I understand." Eberts pointed to the numbers then flipped through the pages to his explanation. "I've given the project the reference number QS-9300B for our in-house accounting purposes."

"Good, good. Once you have the Doctor's basic requirements met, how soon can we expect delivery?" The Official wanted this transition to go as smoothly as possible on this end as convincing the doctor was going to be anything but "smooth."

"I've already made inquiries based on known equipment needs and can have most of it ready to deliver within two weeks," Eberts told him.

"I'm impressed, Eberts, just how did you manage that?" The Official was curious, as most of the equipment would need to be specially ordered and usually required massive amounts of negotiations and often bribes to get bumped to the top of the list.

"Simple, I informed them half would be paid up front with the balance in sixty days." The Official's head snapped about to cast a glare at the man. "And how are you going to manage that when we don't have that much liquid cash in reserve?"

"But we will, sir. Once you sign the bottom sheet I can begin the money transfer and have a more than adequate amount in place to cover all the preliminary expenses," Eberts said reassuringly, once again pointing out the numbers he was referring to.

"Yes, of course." The Official's initial gut reaction calmed as he was reminded, that for this project at least, funds were not going to be an issue. He then flipped through the papers, reviewing the numbers one last time, picked up the pen and signed on the dotted line that would get this project started.

Once his signature was on the papers he handed them to Eberts, who slid them into a file marked CONFIDENTIAL in bright red lettering. "Very good sir, I'll get started on this right away."

"Eberts, inform the Keeper that I need to speak to her." The Official said in a casual tone as he shifted items on his desk in place of doing something of seeming importance, which was

impossible given that he actually had nothing to do at the moment.

"Yes, sir." Lifting the phone he did as the Official had requested. "She's on her way up."

"Good. I want to speak to her alone so find something to keep yourself occupied with until we're done." He knew Eberts might find that a bit odd as the Official normally kept him in the room in order to act as a witness. People were far less likely to try and bluff or make promises they had no intention of keeping with another person present. But, given the way Eberts had been dragged into a myriad of shenanigans begun by Fawkes lately, it was probably safer if he was kept in the dark on certain aspects. The boy might just suddenly decide he had a spine and take the good doctor's side in the matter. The Official knew there was going to be more than enough resistance from Doctor Keeply about his wish to include the madness effect and wanted no part of a rebellion on the part of his senior staff members. He'd already taken the unprecedented step of practically bribing Fawkes and Hobbes with a week's vacation at half-pay to get them out of the way. He'd be damned before he gave his own protégé an excuse to mutiny.

Eberts looked hurt for a second, but quickly hid it and responded with a curt nod. "Say… fifteen minutes?"

"Good enough." As soon as Eberts was out of the room the Official got to his feet and moved over to the windows, setting the scene for the Keeper's entrance.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Tuesday, October 24, 2000, 1:45 p.m.

"He still hasn't shown up?" The Official asked as he signed his name and moved the sheet of paper aside.

"No, sir." Eberts set down the next sheet and pointed to the spot that needed the application of the Official's official signature.

"How long?" He was tired of playing this waiting game and wished he could speed up the process, but he was hoping that threat of madness would be enough to draw his unwilling agent into the fold. The man might be a poor thief but he was most definitely not a fool.

"Best estimate is forty-eight hours before the Quicksilver side effect occurs." Eberts moved that sheet and set down the next.

"Has the Keeper arrived?" The hand moved, signing yet another form.

"Yes, sir. We've set up Lab 101 in Basement 5 for her." More papers were shuffled. "That's what most of this paperwork is: finalizing her transfer."

"And her other project." That had been part of the deal, taking on the woman's current project. Not that he minded all that much. Being able to tweak Grimmond was always something he was willing to spend some effort on, and when she finally did have success they would have all her data on that project, as well as the solution. The potential blackmail use from that failed project was immense.

"Lab 2."

"Good enough. What of the situation involving Dr. O'Claire?" The Official paused, massaging his hand for a moment. So much paper work.

"Uncertain as of this moment. According to the agents watching her, there was another incident two days ago, most likely related to the side effect, and he attempted to attack her," Eberts explained in a concerned tone of voice. "She apparently told him to stay away from her, and it appears he has done so. Of course this does mean we've encountered problems locating him as he's also been avoiding his apartment."

The Official snorted. "So he does have a conscience as his brother suggested. Well, at least that removes any possible complications on that front. Keep an eye on her just in case. If she attempts to make contact herself, see to it that she is warned off." Allies on the outside, especially those that might actually be able to help were to be dissuaded at all costs if this extortion with the counteragent was going to work.

"Yes, sir. Three months, perhaps? That should be long enough to determine whether or not the current course of action will work as planned." Eberts suggested as he switched papers, exchanging an unsigned one for one bearing the Official's signature.

"Hmmm, yes, that should do for now. We'll reevaluate the situation at the end of that time." He paused to rub his hand, his patience with paperwork swiftly running out. "How many more?"

"About a dozen, sir."

The Official grumbled for a moment then waved for the next sheet to be set in the appropriate spot on the desk before him. "If it wasn't for promises I made to Peter..."

"Sir?" Eberts asked in surprised curiosity.

The Official sighed. "Darien Fawkes is about the worst possible choice for the gland, never mind an agent; if it weren't for Donovan and Kevin Fawkes, there'd be no need for all of this." He waved at the mound of paperwork that was quickly reaching epic proportions.

Eberts shook his head slightly. "Even if you removed the gland from Mr. Fawkes, without Dr. Fawkes we have no way to implant it into another receptacle."

"Which is why I'm doing all this paperwork and redoing the budget ... again ... to cover the cost of not only counteragent, but a Keeper for Mr. Fawkes."

"Last one, sir." Eberts set the final piece before his superior and watched as it was signed, then added it to the carefully stacked pile on the end of the desk.

"Eberts..."

"Yes, sir?"

"Bait the trap."

"Yes, sir."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Wednesday, October 4, 2000, 11:45 p.m.

The Official sat behind his desk and quietly observed the man sitting slumped in the hard wooden chair in the center of the room. Hard to believe his great project had come down to this, to this man sitting before him. A man that the Official was unsure had ever grown up and about whom the Official harbored a deep suspicion laced with concern that he never would. Admittedly the Official knew plenty about Darien Fawkes, had a file a couple inches thick in the top drawer of his desk, but the dry words on the page told him little about the man before him, hints, interpretations, best guesses, but nothing solid. The opinions of Darien's uncle and far more recently his brother had been eerily similar, describing him as smart, self-centered, cynical, a quick study when he wanted to be, trouble on two feet and, surprisingly honorable - for a thief and con man.

None of that would prevent the Official from manipulating the snot-nosed punk into doing exactly what he wanted.

With a slight nod the agent snapped the ampoule of smelling salts beneath Darien's nose causing Darien to jerk his head to the side and return to the land of the conscious.

"Good morning, Mr. Fawkes."

"Who the hell are you?" Darien snapped, copping the expected attitude. Though considering he'd been hit with a sap and dragged into a strange office at an even stranger government agency, it was somewhat understandable.

"Security prohibits him from giving his actual name, Mr. Fawkes. For now you can simply call him The Official." Eberts said from where he was standing in the corner of the office.

With a quizzical look Darien asked, "The official what?"

Eberts, his hands clasped loosely before him answered with, "Oh don't worry, you're safe. You're at the Agency."

Darien's face did an impressive imitation of a blank wall. "The Agency."

"We're the guys who underwrote your brother's project," The Official explained, deciding that it was better to get things moving. Neither of them had a large amount of time to waste.

"CIA?" Darien guessed, trying to keep a bland expression pasted on his face as he looked over his left shoulder at the dark-suited agent standing there.

"Not exactly," the Official responded. Darien went for the next obvious choice. "NSA?"

The Official pointed over his shoulder at the agency emblem mounted there and watched as

Darien's bland look altered to comic disbelief.

"Ah, jeeze, ya gotta be freaking kidding me."

The Official laughed bitterly. "No. They are just our temporary sponsors. The Department of Defense had a few cutbacks this year." The Official picked up the photo sitting on his desk, got to his feet and began walking towards Darien. This was looking like it was going to be just as difficult as he imagined it would be. "But Fish and Game had a surplus so we kinda got absorbed." He paused between the two agents and glanced back at Darien who still sat in the chair. Crooking a finger he said, "Darien," and with only a touch of surprise watched as Darien got to his feet and followed.

Leaving the office the group turned left and began walking down a long hallway with dark linoleum floors and off-white walls all done in government cheap. Darien made a point of being directly beside the Official, the questions coming thick with cynicism. "Hey, wait, wait, wait. How the hell did you guys find me? You got, like, an Audubon Society spy satellite or something?"

The Official resisted the urge to smile at the creativity coming from the punk. 'Audubon spy satellite, indeed,' he thought. "We staked out your girlfriend's hospital. Then we jumped you."

Eberts who was just behind the Official and Darien added, "One needs to be resourceful when one is underfunded."

Darien plainly took exception to their ingenuity as his tone of voice dove straight back to that of an unhappy six-year-old. "Yeah, well you know what? I don't appreciate being kidnapped."

"No? Well, maybe you'll appreciate this." The Official handed Darien the photograph he'd been carrying. It wasn't much at first glance, just a black and white picture of the man suspected of killing Darien's brother and all but destroying the Quicksilver project. The Official wasn't surprised when Darien stopped dead in the hallway to look at the picture.

"Arnaud," Darien said softly as the Official and Eberts continued down the hall, leaving the two agents to baby-sit. It took a moment, but Darien finally got moving again, his rapid footsteps making it easy for him to catch up with the slowly striding Official and Eberts. "Hey, you got any more of these?"

The Official knew that the bait had been taken, but the kid had yet to bite down on the hook. It would take a bit more to get Darien to play the game the way the Official wanted him to.

They continued down the hall with Darien firing off all sorts of questions about the Agency, de Thiel, the project, all of which went ignored by the Official and Eberts. Walking through the open door to the conference room, the Official waved at the stack of black and white surveillance photographs resting on one end of the long table. Darien went directly to them and began to thumb through the various images. The Official and Eberts took up their usual positions at the opposite end: The Official seated while Eberts stood behind and to the right.

"Sit, Darien." The Official gestured slightly with his hand and watched as Darien, fully absorbed in looking over the pictures of his brother's killer did as requested without a single comment. The Official gave Darien a few more minutes, until the pictures were spread across the table, each one with the mocking countenance of a killer upon them.

Darien lifted his head to meet the Official's eyes and tapped one of the headshots. "Who is he?"

Eberts spoke up. "We believe your Arnaud de Thiel may very well be Arnaud de Fohn."

"The Phone." Darien repeated.

"De Fohn."

The Official did his best to enunciate the name correctly, revealing the subtle difference between the words, a slight rolling 'r' sound at the end. "His nom de guerre. It's Swiss-German for 'savage Alpine wind.'"

"It also means 'hairdryer,'" Eberts added.

"Interpol calls him the Swiss bank of terrorism. He supplies other organizations with weapons, funds…" The Official could tell he was quickly losing Darien's interest in the proceedings and chose to up the ante a bit sooner than planned.

"Somehow he managed to infiltrate your brother's team," Eberts explained quickly, though those words did nothing to enlighten anyone in the room to exactly how he had managed that without them discovering who Arnaud really was. Kevin himself had recommended the man for the project.

"And that's just the start. Word is eight terrorist groups just sent buyers to his hacienda. Seems de Fohn is having a little auction." The hope that this might regain Darien's attention was faint at best, and the Official could see on Darien's face that he was getting tired of the run around.

"Quicksilver to the highest bidder," Eberts chimed in as if realizing that they were losing the mark as well.

"Invisible suicide bombers…," the Official offered up looking for some … any reaction at this point. Without Darien the Agency would have nothing, and the Official wouldn't even be able to justify the massive expense the Agency had paid out for the project.

"See-through assassins...," Eberts tossed out.

"Not a pretty picture." The Official finished and watched as a now plainly frustrated Darien waved a hand near his face.

"Yeah, well I didn't draw it," Darien grumbled.

"No, but you can erase it," The Official countered trying to pique the man's interest.

"You can steal the Quicksilver formula back for us," Eberts added. Playing on Darien's current method of funding his life as the Official had suggested.

"Me?" Darien scoffed. "'What about the CIA or NSA?"

"You're our best weapon and, frankly, this incident has been a bit embarrassing for the Agency. We'd prefer to keep it, ah…" Eberts deferred to the Official for the completion of the sentence.

"Under the hupa," the Official stated and frowned when Darien chuckled darkly.

"You're telling me the rest of the government doesn't even know about this project? Oh jeeze," Darien sneered and tipped his head back to rub his face with one hand that then ran through his hair as he once again looked at the Official. "Oh, so… so you screwed up and now… now I'm supposed to save your ass? You know what? I don't think so."

The Official's mood darkened considerably at the continued attitude coming from Darien. It was time to remind him of just how precarious his situation was. "Excuse me, but who is the one with his brain turning to Alpo?" The swift change of Darien's point of view was immensely satisfying. "You need the counteragent. We need the formula. You get them back to us, with de Fohn, we'll get you back to normal."

Darien sat silent for several seconds, contemplating the words and his options most likely. When he spoke the attitude was back, but layered with a hint of fear. "Let me ask you a question. Why would you trust me? I could just make a deal with him."

"Yeah, sure you could. But will he give you what you're really looking for?" The Official paused for just a second before playing his trump card. "Like, oh I don't know … justice?"

The stunned expression on Darien's face told the Official all that he needed to know. He'd won this round. Though to give the punk credit the Official had been forced to work for it, actually having to stretch his manipulative skills a bit to reel Darien in. Of course that just made the win that much more sweet. Make that bittersweet. While he might yet save all the work, he'd lost a friend… Kevin.

Darien stabbed a finger at the Official in anger, obviously far more used to doing the manipulating than having it done to him. "That is a blatant crock of manipulation."

The Official continued with the game, allowing Darien his moment of rebellion. "Yeah, but as crocks of blatant manipulation go," he laughed and watched as Darien practically wilted, "it's pretty good."

Darien sank back into the chair in defeat muttering, "Jesus Christ," softly.

The Official ignored it and continued into the next phase; while a tacit agreement had not yet been reached he knew Darien would help, if only to achieve vengeance for his brother. "Our intelligence puts de Fohn's safe house somewhere in northern Mexico. Now, you're not going in alone. We're linking you up with our best deep cover agent. He'll identify himself to you by the standard methods."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, September 29, 2000, 12:45 p.m.

When the door to his office opened the Official tried to resist the temptation to lift his head, to keep his eyes focused on the case file before him even though he'd spent the last 15 minutes staring at the exact same paragraph without ever having once read it. So he wasn't very surprised to find himself looking at the paler than normal countenance of his current assistant. Eberts was usually quite good at keeping his emotions inside and off his face, perhaps only the slightest hint of humanity lingering in the blue eyes, his former job at the IRS having trained him in the ways of not revealing one iota of compassion or sympathy as he systematically tore through lives to discover where every penny, every asset was hidden. But now… now the normally pasty skin tone had gone sheet white, and he stood there rubbing his hands as if to remove some invisible speck of dirt that could only be felt.

"How bad?"

Eberts' mouth worked silently for several seconds before finally clearing his throat and forcing himself to speak, though for the moment it was just barely above a whisper. "The agents reported that there appears to be no one left alive, and the main computer destroyed."

"Kevin?" the Official managed in a suddenly hoarse voice, the sudden rush of emotions catching him by surprise.

"Dead, sir. They also found several unknowns. They suspect it was an inside job." Eberts cleared his throat again and continued in louder voice. "I'm sorry, sir."

For one timeless moment the Official dropped his guard and looked like nothing more than an old, tired fat man who had just lost one of the most important things in his life. His relationship with Kevin might have been … inherited from Peter, but that had not prevented Kevin from becoming a friend to the Official in his own right. In fact the Official had watched the intelligent boy grow up into a brilliant young man. What a waste.

Pulling himself together, once again taking up the mantle that being the Official of the Agency required him to wear, he sorted through his thoughts and got down to the necessary details required to deal with the aftermath of a top secret project having been compromised. "How much have we lost?"

Eberts appeared momentarily shocked that the Official could just set aside his feelings so easily. "Data-wise, not much, I believe. When I upgraded the security for the computer system last year I included a back door accessible via the Internet to monitor for possible bugs. The backdoor also allowed me to make back up copies of the data, which I did on a weekly basis. It is up to date as of last night. Today's data will be lost, and anything not keyed into the main system, but no more than that."

The Official wasn't sure why he was so surprised that Eberts had taken it upon himself to back up the data at the project, he was only thankful Eberts had. This would greatly reduce the time needed to get the project moving again. "All right, I want the place cleaned out and locked down. Make sure the families are contacted, and the bodies returned with all due ceremony. I'll… I will handle the arrangements for Dr. Fawkes myself."

"Yes, sir. I'll handle the rest." Eberts fidgeted in place for a moment. "Sir, two people are unaccounted for."

The Official waited expectantly, but when Eberts failed to continue he prodded the man verbally. "Who?"

"Dr. de Thiel and Mr. Fawkes." Eberts answered in a tightly controlled voice. "And the Agency van is missing."

A sudden flare of joy shot through the Official. Darien was still alive; he hadn't yet failed his old friend Peter Donovan completely and could still keep his promise to Kevin. Though, he well knew, it was not going to easy. For having never met Darien directly, the Official still knew plenty about him aside from his quite colorful police record. Darien was not Kevin by any stretch of the imagination. The kid was little more than a two-bit petty thief with a chip on his shoulder larger than Ayer's Rock, yet both Peter and Kevin has assured the Official that Darien was worth the trouble and had the potential for doing things just as great as Kevin's own. After this last conviction, the Official had to wonder what Peter would think of his wayward nephew, but after a moment realized he'd argue the same way Kevin had. That Darien had in no way been molesting that octogenarian and had far more likely simply been caught in an admittedly strange compromising position and unluckily convicted of it.

It had been at Kevin's insistence that Darien was brought on board, and the Official pulled the strings to get him out. Kevin had been persuasive enough to get the Official to agree and make the arrangements in under 24 hours. Then there had been word of success, real success this time. Not only did the gland work, but Darien was able to perform feats that hadn't been expected and showed a level of control far beyond what anyone could have hoped for. Only to have that mysterious side effect crop up, the one limiting the use of the Quicksilver and needing that counteragent Dr. de Thiel had come up with.

That thought created a sudden cascade in his mind. "Eberts, you said Dr. de Thiel was missing, correct?"

"Yes, sir," Eberts agreed.

"He was chosen based on Dr. Fawkes' recommendation, I want a deeper probe into his background done and the results on my desk first thing tomorrow." The Official had the sneaking suspicion that it was indeed an inside job and the fear that he had hired the man himself, essentially handing him the keys to the kingdom leaving the gates wide and the treasure within easy reach.

"Right away, sir. Anything else?" Eberts asked, his color slowly returning as the Official piled the work upon him.

"Yes, arrange for Maid service to meet me at Kevin's condo in an hour and for the items to be shipped to his aunt in Cold Springs. Damn it, Celia." The Official rubbed his eyes not even wanting to think about how to tell Peter's widow that he'd managed to kill off another of her family members.

"Sir, I can arrange for her to be told if you wish," Eberts offered hesitantly as if unsure how the suggestion would be taken.

The Official shook his head; he had to prevent Eberts from making any premature move where Celia was concerned. The matter would need to be handled delicately … if at all. Celia was not young, perhaps with a little luck she could live the rest of her life believing her nephew had become the great man he'd always swore he would one day be. "No. No, I'll deal with this. The Agency will cover the expenses for Dr. Fawkes' funeral. See to it."

Eberts shivered slightly, the proverbial goose having walked over his own grave. "Of course, sir. Anything else?"

The Official was silent for a moment. "Darien Fawkes. We need to bring him in."

"His last known companion, a Dr. Casey O'Claire, works at Cabrillo Hospital here in town; perhaps he would go to her?" Eberts suggested quietly.

The Official grunted. "It's a place to start. If he's not found in a few days I imagine we'll hear about it over the police scanners. A red-eyed madman running through town is likely to make the evening news. Let's try and prevent that if we can." This was turning out to be a very long day.

"I'll send a team over immediately." Eberts waited, and the Official simply waved his hand and watched his assistant scuttle out the door to take care of the dozens of problems that had landed in their lap.

"Damn it, Kevin. I warned you to be careful with your choices, warned you not to trust anyone or anything, and look where your precious trust got you. A hole in the ground and a marble marker." With an angry sigh the Official pushed himself to his feet. He needed to be at Kevin's condo before the maid service arrived; there were certain items that he did not want sent to Cold Springs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, October 15, 1999, 4:45 p.m.

Kevin stepped between the metal doors as they parted, behind him were several others garbed in green scrubs doing things that were better left not thought too deeply about. He swayed for a second, caught hold of himself, tore the mask down off his face, and ran a hand that was still steady even after everything that had happened that day through his hair, ending behind his neck for a long moment. He smeared blood from the cuff of the scrub top along one cheek, though it was a minor amount compared to what was splattered liberally across the chest of the shirt, blood that was quite obviously still damp.

The Official didn't say a word, simply waiting for Kevin to answer the unspoken question.

"We salvaged the gland." Kevin stumbled to the nearest solid wall and collapsed back against it, the look on his face, the pain in his eyes giving voice to the anguish he felt inside.

"Can you fix the problem?" the Official asked, refusing to allow the events of earlier today to alter his focus or prevent him from reaching the goal.

Kevin laughed harshly. "Is that all you can say? Can I fix it?" On hand balled into a fist and slammed into the hard metal wall behind him. "I screwed up, Charlie, and it cost Cole his life."

"He knew the risks when he signed on," the Official stated, keeping his voice flat and emotionless.

"Oh, so you're saying he knew I was going to drive him insane and destroy his life, 'cause, you know what, Charlie? You may have pulled the trigger, but I'm the one who killed him!" Kevin shouted in frustration.

The Official held his place, letting Kevin vent his emotions so that they could move past this little bump. "Kevin ..."

Kevin pushed away from the wall and began pacing back and forth, his movements stiff and jerky, the anger just below the surface. "I should have waited, done more tests before implanting. Maybe I would have caught the conflict."

"Kevin," the Official repeated, pleased that Kevin was thinking, but he needed Kevin to move forward and not rehash the what-ifs and what-might-have-beens. It was over and nothing could be done to repair the damage they had caused. While they might very well be playing God as they were often accused of, they had not yet achieved that skill to alter past events and undo mistakes. They were still, sadly, human and could do nothing more than learn from their past errors.

"I should have checked the new sequence again for anomalous readings. Or…"

The Official moved to block Kevin's path, setting a hand on his shoulder to stop the rapid pacing. "Stop it." Kevin refocused on the world about him, the change of perspective easily visible to the Official. "You said it was a one in a million fluke, right? An unexpected problem unique to Cole?"

"Yes, but more thorough testing should have revealed it. I could have taken the time to cross check Cole's mitochondrial DNA against every aspect of the gland and verified compatibility," Kevin argued.

"Hindsight is 20/20 even for you. You'll just have to be more careful next time," the Official told him in a gruff tone, making it clear that the project would go forward.

"Next time? How can you…" Anger had once again flared in both Kevin's tone and stance.

"Because it's my job, and yours," the Official barked, causing Kevin's mouth to snap shut in reaction. "The long view, the goal. Stopping terrorists, freeing hostages, saving lives… remember?" He had to make Kevin understand this project would continue until it was either successful or proven completely unviable. Too much had been invested in time, money and lives to just let it go after the first casualty.

"I remember," Kevin sighed, his shoulders slumping as the anger and outrage drained out of him. "I have to redesign the beta reagent before I dare implant again."

"How long?" The Official was far more relieved that he would ever admit that he'd gotten Kevin back on track so quickly.

"Not sure, six months, a year maybe." Kevin began pacing again, thinking as he walked the hallway. "I'd like to bring on some more people. Specialists who can help me solve the problem."

"Can I assume you already have some idea of whom you'd like added?" the Official knew Kevin almost always planned ahead and had kept in contact with others at the top of their fields, attending conferences to discuss advancements in multiple areas several times a year.

"Yes, I'll get you a list." Kevin was all business again, probably already having chosen whom he wanted to work with. "I wonder if Dr. de Thiel would be interested. I met him at a conference in Geneva last year. He's an amazing biochemist for his age. He'd be my first choice."

The Official cleared his throat to stop the reminiscence and regain Kevin's full attention. "Get me the names, and I'll get them here."

"Good," was the response and then Kevin was gone again, working on solution. "I'm going to get cleaned up." Kevin walked away mumbling to himself, his hands waving about erratically as he tried to work through the problem.

The Official slumped slightly, the gun at his hip suddenly weighing a hundred… no, a thousand times more than it actually did. It had not been the first time he'd killed a man, nor was it very likely to be the last, but it still wasn't something he found easy to do. He hadn't quite lost his conscience, though it had been carefully hidden from most of the world, and he knew that Cole's death would haunt him for the rest of his life, just as every other one still did.

Some small part of him suspected Cole would have ended it one way or another. A bullet, a scalpel, a stray piece of broken glass, Cole was so far gone that he'd have tried anything to regain his freedom, to see himself again, to end his misery. The well-placed bullets fired from the Official's gun had been a blessing to Cole, a chance for peace to a mind that had been driven past the brink of insanity due to a loss of self.

"He knew the risks when he signed on," the Official told himself as he turned away and began walking slowly towards the exit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Thursday, February 8, 1990, 11:03 a.m.

Charles Borden shook the imaginary wrinkles out of his suit jacket and smoothed down his tie yet again, not entirely sure why he was suddenly so nervous. It wasn't the first time he'd been called into Director Jamison's office. He knew he was good, knew how to dig out the truth using whatever means necessary including the manipulative talents he'd often been praised for and honed to a keen edge while working here. Everyone had a skeleton or two in his closet, and he had made a point of learning where all the bodies were.

Nodding to Jamison's assistant, who strangely did not meet his eyes, he knocked on the door to the office and, at the faint "Come," swung the door open and entered.

"Borden, have a seat," was the curt order, making Charles even more unsure as to what this impromptu meeting was about. "There have been some… cutbacks, and several reassignments have become necessary."

Charles sat upright; he'd been in the business a long time and knew how that went, though the timing always seemed to be the worst possible. He was currently in the midst of a rather complex investigation involving a General Grimmond at the DOD and some oddities with his bio-weapons unit, finding time to take up the slack for reassigned IID agents would be difficult at best and a major pain in the ass at worst, but he was not about to allow his boss to see that he would have any problems adjusting. "I'm sure those of us remaining can pick up the slack, sir."

"Yes, I'm sure they will," Jamison said pointedly, and Charles got a sudden sinking feeling in his gut. When a file appeared from out of nowhere and was held out for him the reality of the situation sank in. He wouldn't be taking up the slack; he was one of those being transferred. "Think of it as a step up. You'll be running the place and will do quite well for yourself, if you're careful."

Charles took the file noting the word CONFIDENTIAL stamped across the front in red ink. Opening it he read over his orders, a frown appearing on his features and his temper flaring. "The Agency? You're putting me in charge of the Agency. The place is nothing but a shadow of its former self. This is the place where agents who have no other place to go and are too stubborn to quit end up. This isn't a step up, it's a punishment!" His voice had risen to a near-shout by the end, heedless of the fact the man sitting across from him was still his superior. Charles had decades of experience under his belt, was one of the best the Internal Investigations Department had ever had, and yet he was being flung away to a relic of an agency like so much rotting garbage.

"This comes from the DOJ," Jamison barked, silencing Charles' tirade for the nonce. "You pissed off someone big time, Charlie. Didn't back down when warned and this," he stabbed a finger at the file, "is their response. I was given no choice." His tone softened a bit. "Look if you play nice, don't spend too much money, they might back down in a year or two and let you come back."

"Damn it," Charles swore softly. "Who? Tell me that much. Who yanked the strings to get this done?"

Jamison debated for a moment, his eyes darting about to remind Charles that even this room could be listened in on. "In general it's not a good idea to request files red flagged by the DOD."

"Grimmond," Charles whispered and got the tiniest nod of acknowledgement from his boss. Now, more than ever Charles was convinced Grimmond was hiding something big, something that those above them would not approve of, but as of this moment the bastard was free and clear as no one else would touch the investigation and risk being transferred to some other hellhole like the Agency or the main Archives.

"I'm sorry about this, Charlie," Jamison said with just the right amount of honesty in his voice to make Charles believe him. Getting to his feet he gestured with the file.

"Thank you, sir." Now was the time to break ties, for he realized that he was not likely to ever return here as an agent. It was time to look ahead and into what remained of the Agency and see what he could do with it. He'd learned a long time ago it was useless to look back, to hold onto the past, for it kept one from seeing the possibilities the future could bring. And now that he was free to make some serious decisions more than a few ideas were coming to mind and, in truth, the possibilities were endless.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Wednesday, May 14, 1969, 7:45 a.m.

"Damn it!" Charlie swore as he looked down at his best friend, Charles Fogerty, who lay on the bed, alive by the mere technicality that he still breathed on his own, that his heart still beat with perfect regularity, but his mind…. Near as the docs could tell, his mind was gone.

He looked over the others in the room, those from his former Marine squad, known as "Charlie Unit", ironically enough. At the time it seemed fate had taken a hand in the company's formation as every member had "Charles" somewhere in his name, be it first or middle. Now all had the same looks of deeply hidden pain at losing another one of their own.

When they had been recruited by the Agency after they had dealt successfully with the situation involving Castro, they all knew the risks, but also hoped that the advantages of being somewhat independent of the military chain of command and rules would allow them to do even more good.

A few had been lost over the years while doing their jobs in foreign countries. Fighting harsh conditions and harsher enemies, but the five that had remained had been the toughest of them. So when the head of the Agency, Miven, had asked for volunteers for a new project, one that would give them an even better advantage over the enemy they jumped at the chance.

"I'll volunteer for the next trial," Charlie said softly as he turned to face Dr. Anthony.

"No, we've been ordered to shut down the project pending an investigation." Anthony sounded more than a little bitter. "They want to know what went wrong."

"We all do," Dr. Donovan spoke up then. "It should have worked. All the research says it should have worked, yet …" He waved at the still figure on the bed.

"But it didn't. He was the best of us, damn it all, and now … now he's gone." Though he normally kept himself, his emotions under tight control, Charlie heard his voice break on the last few words.

"There are other options," Donovan stated.

"Ah, yes that artificial gland you keep going on about," Anthony snapped as if he had heard this far too many times as of late.

"Yes!" Donovan countered. "Let the gland contain and create the poison. The receptacle would still build an immunity without having to maintain constant high levels in his bloodstream."

Charlie had heard all this before, but the Catevari project had been the one chosen since it had more than just a tentative theory backing it or so he had come to understand. By the time Charlie Unit had been brought in, animal testing on rats and monkeys had been completed, and they were ready for human trials or so they had thought.

"Does it matter? It's over," Charlie snarled, not wanting to deal with the bickering again. Lately he'd played referee between Donovan and Anthony far more often than not, the friends arguing violently at times over the direction of the project.

"That it is." Miven entered the room then. "I have my orders; the Catevari Project has been canceled. Your men are being reassigned to other agencies."

The men looked stricken. They'd been together for a decade and considered themselves family. They damn well knew that by separating them the Agency hoped to cut its losses and keep questions from being raised about the failure of the project. It could have been worse, Charlie realized, they could simply have been killed to a man if one was to believe the rumors that circulated through the darker corners of the government.

"Where to?" Charlie asked.

"You will receive your individual assignments later today." Miven frowned, apparently as unhappy as the rest of them with this decision. "The current conservative climate today has them backing down from their former position. Worries that we're playing God abound, and even the argument that everyone is doing it has had little effect."

Anthony snorted in derision. "They'll change their minds soon enough I imagine, and then they'll be crying about how they have nothing to compete with the super-agents the KGB has come up with."

"What will happen to Fogerty?" Charlie asked, not liking the tenor of the conversation. He, all of them, had sworn to protect this country, with their lives if necessary, and yet those in charge were willing to throw away a potential weapon due to a mistake, that for all they knew, was correctable if given the chance to find out.

"He'll be taken care of," Miven stated, making it plain he'd say no more on the subject. "It's been a pleasure working with all of you." He then turned and left the room, leaving them to say their goodbyes to those that still lived.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, June 12, 1961, 2:55 p.m.

"For your service to the country above and beyond the call of duty I present you with the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Good work, Charles Borden." President John. F. Kennedy handed Borden the gold embossed sheet of vellum and held his hand out.

With the slightest bit of discomfort Charlie took his hand and shook it, turning to face the cameras with a false smile plastered on his face and allowed his picture to be taken by the White House photographer. It would probably end up forgotten in some dusty file someday anyway.

He might have been receiving an honor from the Commander in Chief himself, but Charlie in no way felt he had earned it. The mission had been a complete failure and though his unit's small part had been comparably successful, the rest had been a total debacle. The US forces defeated almost to a man, only 26 survivors of the 1,511 men sent to overturn the Castro regime. His unit, focused on a different target, had not been part of the massacre and had even helped rescue a few of the survivors as they headed to the rendezvous point when their portion had been completed.

Which is why he was receiving this civilian award instead of a military one. If it became generally known he'd been part of the military contingent, he'd be far more likely to be heading for a review board than meeting the President for the work he and his unit had done.

The President waved away the photographer after several pictures had been taken and shook his head, the Secret Service agents remaining in the background. "Sit, please."

Not feeling comfortable, Charles still did as asked; this was his ultimate commander after all, even if he felt that the man was a complete fool when it came to military matters, despite having served in the Navy during WWII.

"Sir," Charles said in acknowledgement of the President's order.

"I have a few questions to ask you about your mission." The President sank into one of the leather chairs and clasped his hands together as he leaned forward slightly. "As you may or may not know, the CIA was in charge of the invasion and quite obviously failed. But your unit got in, completed your mission, and got out with minimal casualties. I'd like to know how."

Charlie sat at attention, startled at the revelation that the CIA had caused this mess and not the military or the President's council. "Well, sir, as I am sure you are aware, we are a specialized unit used for covert operations. Once we landed on the island we just went to ground, made our way to the target as scheduled and got out. Johnson was injured when a snake bit him."

"He recovered?" The man seemed genuinely interested in knowing the answer.

"Yes, sir. Was out of the hospital in a week," Charlie confirmed. "Sir, if I may speak freely?"

"Of course." The President settled back in the chair, relaxing slightly but still attentive.

"They, the CIA went about it all wrong. We, my unit, could have gotten into Castro's office and dealt with him easily, then you could have set the new government right into place." He refrained from using the far stronger words that had come to mind and did his best to keep his anger and disgust out of his voice. He wasn't sure how his words had gone over as the President simply sat there staring off into the distance. "My apologies, sir. I realize I am not privy to all the information…"

"No, don't apologize, you spoke your mind and, confidentially I have to agree with you." The President's full attention swung back to Charlie and for the first time Charlie could feel the power that lay within the man. "I am impressed by the skill of you and your men. There is little this administration wouldn't be able to accomplish with just a few dozen men able to perform necessary tasks invisibly." He shocked Charlie by chuckling softly. "Hell, imagine what I could accomplish with just one truly invisible man."

"Sir?" Charlie queried, the spark of an idea flickering in the depths of his mind.

"Mr. Borden, always remember that, with the right skills, one man can make a difference." The President said with a hint of fervor to his voice.

"Yes, sir."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Act Four

Emerson once observed that, "Great geniuses have the shortest biographies." Well, by that

standard, Kevin must have been one of the greatest geniuses of all time, 'cuz he only made it to 35. And as far as I can tell, he spent most of that time already buried, in his research, his science experiments, one secret government lab or another. He was always yelling at me about how I was going to wind up wasting my life in prison before I ever had the chance to live it. Now I have to wonder: did he ever really live his?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Tuesday, August 8, 2000, 11:39 a.m.

The lone cell door opened, the light flaring in with the brightness of a supernova, suspending one man in the doorway and bathing him in its glow. On the floor across the room sat another man, back against the cold cement wall, hand held up to shield himself from the intensity of the light. For a moment, each man stared at the other, silent recognition flowing between them, of themselves, of each other, of how, at that moment, their respective places in the room echoed their places in life.

The man in the doorway was the first to break the silence. "You want to tell me about it?" Kevin asked quietly.

He watched as his brother on the floor swallowed briefly, then slid into his smart-ass persona like a second skin. "Well, you know, we are still painting," Darien began.

Kevin blinked, balled his hands into fists in his pants pockets, hovering between anger at the mocking commentary and amazement that Darien could be so damn cocky just minutes away from spending his life in prison.

Seemingly oblivious to his brother's ire, Darien continued, "Oh God, wait until you see the living room. I think you especially are gonna love it. It's got this lovely colonial trim that kinda comes down..."

Fighting for control, Kevin dragged his eyes away from his brother to stare at the graffiti scratched into the cement wall, dozens of tick marks etched into the smooth grey cement, marking off days, weeks, months. Had Darien ever done the same, locked in a similar bare cell, with nothing else left to pass the time and soothe his mind? Afraid to follow those mental pictures of brother's previous incarcerations, Kevin bit the inside of his lip, counted up the tick marks 5, 10, 15, 20 ....

"No, no, don't do that, don't give me the glare. I'm handling..."

"Handling it," Kevin couldn't restrain himself any longer. How many times were they going to play this game? And why was he the only one who seemed to truly realize what was at stake?

Darien, ever the naughty three-year-old, insisted, "I am. My case is ...."

"Case is on appeal," Kevin completed for him.

"You wanna get your own sentences?" Darien groused.

"Then tell me one I haven't heard before," Kevin shot back, anger finally spilling over, the safest emotion he knew when dealing with his younger brother. Sympathy, sadness, regret, none of those could save Darien now, but anger might spur the younger man to action.

Silence hung heavy over the two brothers, unspoken expectations and disappointments crowding them in the tiny cell, the light refusing to let either of them find solace in the shadow.

"Why the hell didn't you call me?" Kevin asked softly, the hurt almost palpable in his voice.

"Yeah, and said what?" Frustration frosted Darien's words, "Hey bro, what's happening, man, haven't talked to you in a few years. You wanna come down and bust me out?"

"Beats hearing it over America Online," Kevin deadpanned.

Darien's head jerked up, visibly interested for the first time in what his brother was saying. "I'm on the web?"

"Darien," Kevin warned, as if he were threatening a recalcitrant child with a time out.

"Wait a minute, I mean, c'mon you been hogging the press since we were 12. Don't I get a shot?"

"No." Kevin's answer came quick and firm.

"What? I'm not good enough?" Darien dropped back into the street punk persona Kevin had seen him cultivate since childhood.

Kevin just shook his head. "You're not guilty enough."

Darien snapped his eyes down to the ground between his feet, seemingly fascinated by the dirty concrete on which he was seated. "OK, Kev," he said, his voice dropping from baritone to bass, "if I didn't do the crime, think I can do the time?"

Kevin scrutinized at his younger brother sitting there, staring earnestly, waiting for some kind of twisted approval. Not for the first time in his life, Kevin cursed his father, for things done and things left undone, sins both of omission and commission: for saddling his eldest son with the responsibility of raising his youngest; for setting this ludicrous, larcenous standard that Darien was still trying to somehow measure up to; for stranding Kevin here, in this cell, with Darien and the truth.

"Not where they're sending you," he answered finally, shaking his head, the honesty of his

statement brutalizing both brothers. And once again, with one piercing look from Darien, Kevin felt the sting of his brother's disappointment. Shutting away his own, he became the pragmatic older brother. "Look," he said calmly, "I didn't come here to lie to you. I came here to help."

"Yeah, well, I think you're a little late, brother. They're shipping me outta here in a few minutes," Darien said in a husky voice to the wall opposite Kevin.

Venturing fully into the lion's den, Kevin walked over to where Darien sat and handed down the envelope containing his little brother's salvation.

Darien pointedly ignored it for a few moments, then finally looked at the offering. "What is this?" He bobbed his head disdainfully at the envelope. "What is it?"

"It's an option," Kevin said gently, like a handler trying to steady a nervous colt, "if you'll trust me."

With a long-suffering sigh, Darien grabbed the envelope and reluctantly opened it.

Still moving slowly, as if he were afraid of spooking the other man, Kevin crouched down next to his brother tucking his heels under his body, laying his arms across his thighs, his body neat, tight, contained in stark contrast against the jutting angles and hard edges of his brother's protuberant elbows and knees.

As Darien read the document, Kevin explained slowly, "Folks I work with looked at your case. They agreed you got the shaft. Now these guys have some pull with the Justice Department. I got them to put in a request -- it took a little greasing," with a wave of his hands Kevin glossed over all the political wrestling he'd had to engage in, a fight no less impressive in its way than any of the boxing competitions he'd seen his younger brother win during Darien's brief teenage flirtation with the sport, "but they agreed to make you an offer."

Coming to the end of the document, Darien raised impossibly innocent eyes to his brother's face.

Kevin looked at Darien from a vantage point he hadn't enjoyed since the younger man had had a growth spurt in his early teens. Somehow, the angle made Kevin want to ruffle his brother's hair and assure him that everything would be fine, just as he had when their mother had died. Kevin frowned; the time for such silly sentimentality was long past.

"There's a project we've been developing. It's fed-funded, kind of under the table, and we finished animal testing a month ago." He hesitated only slightly before adding, "And now we're ready for a volunteer."

"A volunteer as in like a guinea pig?" Darien asked suspiciously, his attitude re-emerging with his uncertainty.

"As in a possible pardon, if you'll do it," Kevin tried to re-focus Darien on the importance of the offer.

Darien gestured vaguely with the letter, his oversized hands on the small white piece of paper suddenly making Kevin's offer seem insignificant. "What? Is this, is this some kind of Viagra thing ....?"

"Look, I can't get into it here -- suffice to say it'll involve some surgery," Kevin hesitated to say more knowing his brother's fear of all things scientific and medical, things Darien had convinced himself were beyond his understanding.

"Whoa, it sounded like you said surgery." Darien's stubborn streak came roaring to the surface.

"It's nothing I can't reverse," Kevin blustered, willing himself to believe in the truth of his statement. "Believe me, it's a small price to pay for getting out."

Darien stuffed the letter back into the envelope with a gesture that told Kevin exactly where he'd really like to stick it. "Know what, Kev? I'm your brother, not a lab rat."

Kevin looked down to the floor between his legs, once again praying for patience. Frustration finally breaking through, he shook his hands as if his brother's neck were contained within them. "Darien, we don't have time for the pride thing."

"Pride thing ... Pri ...," Darien's voice trailed off with a sharp laugh. "OK, nice." He launched himself up to his full height. Six feet three inches of orange prison jumpsuit assaulted Kevin's eyes and then leaned down and slapped the letter to his chest. "OK, you know what?" Darien asked. He crossed the room to stand by the door while Kevin remained crouched by the wall, the two men a mirror image of each other when the door had opened just scant minutes earlier. "This is my body we're talking about. Now you want to play doctor with it?" Darien sneered.

"Would you rather your pen pals played something else?" Kevin almost regretted the words as soon as they were out. It was a low blow, he knew, something he'd once sworn to himself he'd never humiliate his brother with. But if that threat was the only way to remind Darien of just what Kevin was trying to save him from, well, then Kevin was going to use it. He'd already had to humiliate himself with much harsher threats in order to convince the powers that be to help save his brother; he'd be damned if he let Darien off the hook any easier. "Look, I'm not saying it's not a risk, but it's better than throwing your life away. If you're going to trust someone, trust me."

"Why is that? 'Cuz you're my brother?" Darien sneered, making it sound more like an accusation than an affirmation.

Kevin shook his head sadly, knowing better than to try and embarrass them both by any protestations of brotherly love. They'd moved beyond that years ago. And so he tried the truth once again. "Because you don't have much choice," he stated sadly, handing the letter up to his brother. He pulled a silver ballpoint from his breast pocket and held it out expectantly.

Darien stood for a moment, holding the letter, searching his brother's face. Then he grabbed the pen and signed.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, August 7, 2000, 3:35 p.m.

Kevin paced back and forth in front of the Official's desk, his normally docile demeanor replaced by that of a caged tiger. "I'll go back to the SWRB, Charlie. I swear I will, and I'll take it all with me."

The Official huffed behind his desk like the big bad wolf blowing down one of the little pig's houses. "Don't make idle threats. We both know you wouldn't go back there. You told me so yourself, remember. They were making a hell on earth, and you wanted no part of it."

"I know what I said. I know what they ...," Kevin swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing with the effort, "do. But so help me God, if you don't let me bring Darien into this program, I will go to them."

"So you're going to allow this snot-nosed punk to drag you down with him, huh?" One gray eyebrow quirked in Kevin's direction.

"He's my brother, Charlie," Kevin pleaded, squeezing his eyes shut, just barely stopping himself from pounding his fist on the Official's desk in frustration. "Please. If you want me to beg, I'll beg. But I can't leave him in there; he won't survive it."

"Stop being so melodramatic, Kevin," the older man admonished. "I doubt they'll ever be able to make that third strike stick. Besides, it's not the first time the kid's been incarcerated. I'm sure he'll be fine."

"Just like you were sure about Simon Cole?" Kevin heard the Official's quick intake of breath at the mention of Cole's name and flicked an eye at the new assistant hanging over the bureaucrat's shoulder.

The unassuming young clerk said nothing, but his eyebrows flew up at his superior's brief loss of control. Kevin searched his memory for the man's name ... Eberts, yes, that was it. Perhaps this Eberts had a working brain, unlike his predecessors.

"That book is closed," the Official answered tersely.

"Wouldn't take much to re-open it," Kevin observed pointedly, slumping suddenly into a chair and tenting his fingers under his chin, "and the bean counters at the General Accounting Office might be very interested at where some of the funding came from ...."

The Official growled low in his throat causing his toady to shrink back into the wall. "You'd cut the funding to your own life's work?" the older man snarled.

"Help me bring Darien on board, and I won't have to." Kevin took off his glasses and began cleaning them with the bottom of his tie in a show of bravado. Now was the crucial moment, he knew. If the Official refused to take this bait, Kevin would be forced to make good on at least one of his bluffs, and he didn't relish either. He waited, not daring to breathe, to see if his manipulation of the man he knew was a master manipulator in his own right would work.

The Official sank back into his chair, his lips working themselves into an enigmatic smile.

"Congratulations, Kevin, it's not often that I'm backed into a corner, but for now, you leave me no choice." He shifted his girth in his chair. "Eberts, start the paper work to have one Mr. Darien Fawkes remanded to the custody of the Agency."

"Yes, sir," his assistant snapped like a trained poodle.

"With a full pardon pending his participation in the QS-9300 trials," Kevin reminded the Official.

"Yes, yes, full pardon," the Official waved his hand in dismissal at his man Friday, and the clerk went scurrying off to complete his mission.

"You'll see, Charlie, I know you don't think so now, but Darien will be an asset. Just think about the unique perspective he'll bring to the trials. His experience with surreptitious entries, with subterfuge and prevarication will be invaluable, not to mention his physical prowess. He's a prime candidate really ...."

"Sure, sure. You keep telling yourself that, and maybe someday you'll really believe you made the decision to bring your brother on board for the good of the project. I just hope you don't live to regret it."

"Don't worry, Charlie," Kevin assured the Official, gathering his jacket and heading for the office door, "I won't."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, August 7, 2000, 8:09 a.m.

The door to the lab opened with a muted hum, sliding along on perfectly lubricated treads so that no extraneous noise might disturb the great minds working on the scientific miracles within. Everything about the lab was sleek, sterile, from the gleam of the stainless steel tables to the hum of the superfast computers processing scads of data in tiny fractions of a second.

A dark-haired man sat at the main terminal, dapper and clean in his pristine white lab coat and precisely knotted tie, green eyes shielded by a very practical pair of black plastic-framed glasses. Spare and elegant like the room surrounding him, the man looked up when the doors slid open and greeted his friend in a lilting accent, "Good morning, Kevin. Now come, you really must see this."

Kevin held up two coffee mugs as he approached the workstation, "Mornin', Doogie. I brought coffee. Lord knows you've probably been up all night working. I keep telling you, you have to pace yourself or you're going to burn out...."

Arnaud snorted gently. "Yes, you mean like you pace yourself? Who do you think you're kidding, Kevin? No one drives themselves harder around here than you do."

"You know the old axiom, Arnaud: 'Do as I say ...'" Kevin put down the mugs and clapped the younger man on the shoulder. "Now let's see what amazing discovery you've come up with this ti.... Holy mother of God!" Kevin flopped down into the black office chair Arnaud had rolled up to catch his friend. "He didn't. He couldn't. He wouldn't," Kevin sputtered, pointing at the screen, "there's just no possible way ...."

Kevin's voice stopped but his jaw kept working as he stared at the on-screen picture of a hapless young man with wild hair, next to a headline screaming: "Burgling Molester of the Elderly Gets Life!" Kevin pulled his hand away from the screen and ran it through his hair while his eyes rapidly scanned the article describing the sordid details of Darien's supposed crime. "For the love of God," he sighed softly, "what have you gotten yourself into this time, Darien?"

Arnaud cleared his throat, pursed his lips and looked questioningly at Kevin.

"He's my brother," Kevin ground out, tossing his glasses on the table and rubbing his eyes, "my younger brother. And before you even ask, he's innocent."

"Oh, yes, I'm sure," Arnaud smirked sympathetically, "it's all some sort of awful mix-up. Why my own brother is always getting himself into fixes ...."

Kevin put his glasses back on, straightened his already perfect tie, and stood. "No, Arnaud. He's not that innocent," Kevin frowned at his friend, "but he's not that guilty either. Look, I've got to go to San Diego to handle some things, can you hold down the fort here while I'm gone?"

"Why, I'm flattered, certainly, but perhaps one of the more senior members of the team would be a better choice," Arnaud suggested mildly, standing next to Kevin, "I'm afraid some of the other staff may be jealous of our working ... relationship."

Kevin turned to Arnaud and held out his hand. "Jealousy be damned. We're all professionals here. Nobody else on the team is your intellectual equal. I need you to do this for me, Arnaud. I can't leave this project in anyone else's hands. You've got to reconfirm the entire beta reagent sequence, make absolutely certain it's safe this time. I don't trust anyone else to get it right."

Arnaud took Kevin's hand and gave it a firm shake, smiling widely. "You can count on me,

Kevin. You can always count on me."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Monday, December 7, 1998, 6:03 p.m.

The lounge of the Hotel Intercontinental in Geneva was full. Throngs of men and women sipped wine, champagne and mixed drinks from the open bar while demolishing mounds of Swedish meatballs, baked brie and other hors d'oeuvres from glittering silver buffet platters. Unlike other receptions the room had seen though, the conversation here was low, more of a hushed whisper than the hoots and catcalls that generally accompanied the consumption of alcohol.

At one table in the far-left corner, the discussion was particularly intent. A sandy haired man in wire-rimmed glasses took a sip of his Heineken and continued to debate with his team members. "I'm telling you, there's got to be a work around. We've come too far to give up now."

"But Kevin, you've seen the test results -- all four times, one after the other. Even when we can get the wet wiring to fire, the effect is permanent, the acid from the beta reagent builds and 73 hours later, poof," the middle-aged balding man pushed his own glasses up onto his nose, "synaptic failure and death."

"Leo's right," a pasty faced, pudgy man with curly auburn hair took up the conversation. "We can't make the damn thing work in rats, how the hell are we going to get it to work in people? Maybe we need to be considering an alternative delivery method at this point."

"No, dammit," Kevin slammed his beer bottle down on the table, "the gland is going to work. I'm going to make it work. Yes, we've had a few stumbling blocks along the way, but that's always the case in every line of research. Frankly, I think we'll have an easier time getting it to work in humans than in rats; the source subject's physiology is closer...."

A shadow fell across Kevin as he spoke, causing him to look up into a pair of guileless green eyes behind black-plastic rimmed glasses. "Can I help you?" he asked of the interloper.

"Excuse me, monsieur," the slender young man shuffled his feet slightly and rubbed his palms together. "You're Dr. Kevin Fawkes, aren't you?"

Pleasantly surprised by the young man's recognition, Kevin answered with a small smile, "Uh, yes, yes I am."

"Oh, monsieur, if you don't mind me saying," the man effused, running a hand through his close-cropped dark hair, "it has been a dream of mine to meet you -- you've been sort of a role model for me, ever since I saw you on the cover of Tomorrow's Science. Fascinating article you wrote about your research in mapping the human brain. Tell me, how is that project going?'

"Just fine, Mr.?" Kevin was both flattered and intrigued by the admiration of the mysterious young man.

"De Thiel. Arnaud De Thiel. I'm a graduate student at the University of Geneva here, working towards a number of degrees -- like yourself, monsieur, I refuse to be confined to one discipline." The young man hesitated for a moment, eyes shifting from side-to-side as if weighing some internal debate, then he ducked his head shyly, "Truth be told, Dr. Fawkes, I'm going to be finishing up with my last PhD at the end of this month. I was hoping you'd take a look at my dissertation on genetic cap coding and maybe, well," one more well-timed hesitation while he produced a thick document from his black shoulder bag, "I thought maybe you'd perhaps recommend me to some of your friends in research back in the States. It's so hard to break into the biotechnology field, but with a recommendation from the eminent Dr. Fawkes, well... I would be forever in your debt."

Kevin took the heavy, photocopied document and flipped through it. Nodding his head, he could see there were some significant theoretical improvements on DNA splicing techniques that might have some very practical applications on his current project. Already Kevin could recognize his own youthful veneration for his uncle's genius and an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. Long ago, he'd hoped to share that journey of discovery with his own brother, but despite Darien's innate intelligence, he'd never been able to cultivate a scientist's discipline in his brother's young mind, the younger boy preferring instead the heady rush of adrenaline that accompanied his illicit nocturnal activities. Perhaps here, standing before him, Kevin mused, his intellectual brother had finally presented himself.

"Mr. De Thiel, won't you join us for a drink?" he offered congenially.

"Oh, please, monsieur, call me Arnaud," the young man said, grabbing a chair from a nearby table and seating himself at Kevin's right hand.

Leo nudged his corpulent comrade in the side, causing the folds of his friend's flesh to jiggle. "Looks more like a Doogie Howser wannabe to me," he sneered. The two men shared a surreptitious chuckle until an icy glare from Kevin silenced them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Wednesday, November 5, 1997, 12:19 p.m.

The white-jacketed waiter glided over to the table with practiced grace and set a glass of iced tea next to each of the two place settings. "Gentlemen," he said, brandishing a small notepad, "may I take your order?"

"Ah, yes, I'll have the New England clam chowder and the rib eye steak, well done, with the baked potato." Kevin handed his menu to the waiter who nodded.

"Very good, sir, and your dressing?"

"Russian, please."

"And you, sir?" the waiter turned to the older, white-haired man sitting opposite Kevin.

"Yes, I'll have the ... consomme," the man's heavy jowls quivered as he scanned the menu one last time, "and the spinach salad."

The waiter took the man's menu, bowed his head slightly and then left.

"Chicken broth and spinach salad? You've got to be kidding me," Kevin grinned in amazement at his old family friend. "In all the years I've known you, I think I can count on one hand the number of times you've invited me out to a real restaurant for lunch. And now you order the equivalent of the 'diet plate'? C'mon, Charlie, what's really going on here?"

The older man scowled. "Damn, doctors. No offense, kid," he added hastily, and Kevin chuckled lightly. "They keep predicting dire consequences if I don't lose some weight -- heart attack, stroke, you name it. I've never felt better, but then I can't see the harm in shedding a few pounds," he winked at Kevin, "just to get them off my back."

Kevin laughed out loud. "You're a fine figure of a man, Charlie. But listen, try taking a little

Chromium Picolinate with your meals -- not much, just maybe 100 milligrams or so. It'll help boost your metabolism so you burn calories more effectively."

"You don't say? Your uncle always told me you were a genius," Charlie beamed at the younger man.

"But you didn't ask me here to give you nutritional advice, did you?" Kevin grew serious as he tucked into the salad the waiter had just delivered.

"No, no, I didn't," the Official looked somberly over his soup bowl at the young man before him. "Frankly, I'm worried about you, son. You didn't sound good the last time we talked on the phone. I know it's been a while since we've seen each other, but, well, with your uncle gone now, I wanted to make sure you're OK, that they're treating you right over ... there."

Kevin grimaced, sifting through his mind, weighing the pros and cons of baring his soul to this man. He'd known him since he was child, and his uncle had counted his old comrade as one of his best friends, but always there'd been something, some indefinable aura of duplicity about this man. To rely on Charles Borden as a friend, a surrogate father even, could quite possibly be tantamount to making a deal with the devil.

And yet ... and yet hadn't he already done that, in his hubris, in his race to discovery? He'd been so naïve when he'd gone rushing to join what he foolishly thought had been a think tank dedicated to making the world a safer place. Instead he'd wound up ruining innocent lives; he'd never make that same mistake again.

"They're not nice people, Charlie," Kevin started softly, the words tumbling out almost before he realized he'd spoken them. "They're ... doing things, things I can't condone, even in the name of science and the greater good. At one time I thought Gaither was a great man, a true idealist. Now I realize he's a madman, intent on perverting our ideals, our goals." Kevin set his fork down, wiped at his face with his napkin as if to clean some imaginary spot. "It's like Nietzche once wrote, 'the idealist is incorrigible; if he's thrown out of heaven, he'll make an ideal of hell.' This man is creating hell, and the SWRB is letting him do it."

"Didn't Nietzche also say that 'anything done out of love is beyond good and evil?'" Charlie shot back, nonchalantly dipping a spoon into his soup.

"Trust me, this isn't done out of love; it's done out of a blind lust for power and knowledge.

There's no way he can justify the innocent blood on his hands. I refuse to be a party to it anymore."

The Official's spoon stopped just before it met his lips. "So," he inquired blandly, "what will you do?"

Kevin ruffled his hands in his hair. "I don't know. Find another sponsor, I suppose," brown eyes locked with blue, "maybe pick up Uncle Peter's original line of inquiry ...."

"Your Uncle Peter was a brilliant man."

"Yes, he was."

"But still, he couldn't get it to work."

"I can."

The Official put down his spoon and for a moment, Kevin had the feeling that his entire essence was being weighed. He just prayed he wouldn't be found wanting.

Finally Charlie issued a slow, measured breath. "Yes, I believe you can. Peter always had the greatest faith in your intellect," the Official nodded. "Just let me know what your exact requirements are; I'll get you the funding. But no one, no one, is to know about this. Not your friends, not your SWRB colleagues, not even Celia, do you understand?" He wagged his finger at Kevin like an old lady admonishing a child.

Kevin nodded, both relieved to have found a safe haven from the SWRB and worried that he'd somehow leapt from the frying pan into the fire. "I'll have a list to you by the end of the day."

"Good, I'll have Benedict start the transfer papers right after lunch," the Official turned his

attention back to his soup. "Chromium Pico ... what?"

"Picolinate, Charlie," Kevin gave a short laugh, then relaxed back into his seat with a grin. "I'll put it on the list."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Friday, March 15, 1991, 7:53 a.m.

Kevin glared at the computer model swirling on the monitor before him. He watched hopefully as the multi-colored spheres combined together, held for just a moment, and then disbursed in a spectacular array of molecular fireworks. "Dammit," he swore softly, frantically jotting down notes in a jade green journal by his side, "it should have worked."

"Should have, would have, could have, my boy. Surely you know better than that by now."

Kevin started at the soft voice, recognizing it as that of his friend and mentor, Dr. Augustin

Gaither. "Dr. Gaither, you ... surprised me," Kevin tried to recover quickly, but the diminutive scientist had a way of sneaking up that never failed to give Kevin the heebie-jeebies.

Gaither laughed, a low, almost sibilant sound. "That's just because you refuse to ever lift your nose from the grindstone," he said, setting down two cups of steaming black coffee on the lab table. "You keep up this pace, and you're going to burn yourself out, young man."

Kevin picked up one of the mugs, raised it in silent thanks and took a sip of the hot, bracing

brew. "I know, but we're so close to success. I keep thinking if I try just a little bit harder," Kevin said solemnly, then added with a wry smile, "besides I'm just trying to keep up with you."

Gaither grinned at the young scientist. "You're right, you know, Kevin. We are close to the answer. Like you, I can feel it in my bones. But we're never going to find it by limiting our research to animal trials and theoretical simulations," he sneered. "We're men of science, doctors, not zoo keepers and computer technicians. Our research ground is the human body itself. That's where the answer lies, that's where our research trials need to be conducted."

Kevin's eyes widened at Gaither's words. "Surely, Gus, you can't be suggesting human testing. We're nowhere near ready for that. There's no telling the effect this process will have on a man's physiology."

"Yes, exactly, there is no way of telling, short of completing the procedure on a willing test subject," Gaither said matter of factly, as if he were discussing the weather and not the possible death of a fellow human being.

"I don't know," Kevin shook his head and ran his hands through his hair, "I think we're facing at least another six months before we can confidently pick up animal testing again...."

"We begin human trials in three weeks," Gaither said firmly. "I spoke to the powers that be yesterday afternoon. The call has already been put forth for volunteers."

"Three weeks!" Kevin was stunned; up until now he had thought the older man and he were working hand-in-hand towards a shared goal. Certainly Gaither was the senior researcher heading up the project, and it was his right to make the final decision as to the project's direction, but to have the other man leapfrog over his junior partner's scientific opinion like this was something Kevin had never expected. "Gus, that's just not possible, not to mention unethical ...."

"Don't quibble with me about ethics," Gaither snapped. "How ethical is it to allow terrorists and madmen to freely wreak havoc on the world when we hold within our grasp a weapon that could potentially infiltrate and eradicate them? How impressed do you think their victims' families will be by your ethical dilemma when they find out that you refused to take the necessary steps to bring that weapon to reality, simply because you didn't have the stomach to make a few sacrifices? Will those families sleep any more soundly because your conscience was eased?"

Bowled over by the vehemence of his mentor's speech, Kevin sat stunned for a moment. Throughout his life, he'd looked to those who were older and wiser for guidance. His own genius had allowed him to reach a mental equilibrium with them at an early age, but he'd been taught to respect the wisdom that came with experience, something he knew he was sorely lacking. After all, Dr. Gaither was a genius in his own right, with hundreds of successful SWRB projects under his belt. Certainly Kevin was ill equipped to second-guess such a renowned researcher. Someday, he would be ready to head up his own research team, but for now, he had to rely on the older man's experience.

Still he couldn't quiet the nagging voice in the back of his head that told him there was something dangerously wrong with the man's methods, a last lingering doubt that refused to let him verbally agree to Gaither's Frankensteinian plan. And so he simply nodded and returned to his research modeling, leaving his coffee to grow cold beside him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Thursday, April 24, 1980, 2:59 p.m.

"Hard to believe that a pig's genetic structure is so similar to our own," Kevin mused, walking around the jar, his nose literally pressed to the glass. "Someday, I believe we'll be able to literally grow replacement organs for transplant recipients, and all we'll need for raw material is just a few cells from that," he waved a hand at the embryo suspended within the viscous fluid.

His uncle chuckled at Kevin's enthusiasm. "I'm sure we will, Kevin," Peter affirmed, sitting back in the office chair and stretched out his long legs, "as long as we have minds like yours working at solving the problem."

Kevin picked up a nameplate reading "Curtis Anthony, M.D." on it. Tossing it lightly from hand to hand, he asked, "Who is it Dr. Anthony is bringing here again?"

Peter reached out, grabbed the nameplate from Kevin's nervous fingers and replaced it on the desk. "He's an old friend of both Dr. Anthony's and mine. Soon, he may be a friend to you."

"And he knows about our work?" Kevin cast a sideways glance at his uncle. If the man he was to meet today was privy to the secrets of his uncle's basement lab, then the man must be special indeed. As far as Kevin knew, only three people truly understood the experiments being conducted there: Dr. Anthony, his uncle and himself.

"Yes, Kevin, not only does he know, but it's thanks to him we're able to continue our work," Peter nodded, grinning at his nephew's widening eyes.

"But, but I thought you started the research ... and Dr. Anthony helped out sometimes ... and that's why you needed me?" Kevin's question underscored his uncertainty about his place in the equation. If this man was so crucial to the project, what would happen if he didn't like Kevin or was unimpressed by his mental acumen?

Peter took the boy's hand and sat him quietly down in one of the office chairs. "Relax, Kevin, I do need you. You've been a great help and will continue to be so. Nobody understands my work like you do, you know that. And our friend, Mr. Borden, will be suitably impressed."

The door opened and Dr. Anthony's tall frame filled it, followed by another man, almost as tall, but fleshier and with a full head of dark hair. "Peter, Kevin, I'm sorry we're late ...."

"... but it was unavoidable," the other man's officious statement cut off any further explanation.

Neither Dr. Anthony nor Uncle Peter raised any objection to the man's obvious rudeness, and Kevin was both fascinated and appalled. His aunt had raised him to believe that politeness was always the accepted rule of behavior; rudeness was not to be tolerated at any cost. The fact that this man could silence the other two men with a sentence spoke volumes to Kevin about the power the man wielded.

Peter rose to shake both men's hands. Kevin shook Dr. Anthony's hand, then sat while the other man looked him up and down in frank appraisal.

"This is the boy?" the man asked, nodding towards Kevin as if he were nothing more than one of the samples in the medical jars lining the walls of the office. Both Dr. Anthony and Peter nodded. "And he's all that you say he is?"

"And more," Peter asserted. "His name is Kevin. Kevin, this is Mr. Borden."

"Pleased to meet you, Mr. ... Borden," Kevin said, stiffly formal, doing his best to live up to the polite manners his aunt had tried to ingrain in him and his brother over the last five years.

"And it's a pleasure to meet such a bright boy as yourself, Kevin," the strange man smiled,

"please call me Uncle Charlie."

"Uncle Charlie," Kevin nodded and repeated the name.

"I understand you're off to CalTech in a month or so," Charlie noted.

"Yes, sir. I've been accepted into an accelerated learning program," Kevin enthused, warming to his favorite subject, "I'm going into a combined degree program that will allow me to merge my research in related, yet discrete academic disciplines so that I can attain multiple degrees simultaneously." He hesitated for a moment, looked over at his uncle for a clue as to whether he was being rude, but Peter just nodded, smiling proudly. "I'm going to get a medical degree with a doctorate in biotechnology, maybe more. And someday I'm going to map the human brain!"

"And continue our work, as well, I should hope," Peter threw in.

Kevin laughed, "yes, Uncle Peter, and continue our work as well."

"It sounds like you have great plans for yourself," Charlie noted, "which is good, because we expect great things from you, young man, great things."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Saturday, January 22, 1977, 9:57 a.m.

The sounds of running water and the clattering of dishes being washed followed Kevin out of the kitchen. He started to grab the door handle to the basement steps when he spied his younger brother transfixed by the flickering glow of the living room TV. Taking a detour into the dimly lit room, he began loudly snapping on every light.

"You know you're not supposed to watch TV in the dark. And don't sit so close to the set," Kevin scolded the nine-year-old. "You're gonna ruin your eyesight."

Darien remained slouched in front of the coffee table. "You're not the boss of me," he replied sulkily.

"Yeah, I am. I'm the older brother, remember?" Kevin stood directly in front of the TV and crossed his arms.

"You mean nerdier brother, don't you, butthead?" Darien taunted. "Why don't you go bury yourself in the basement with the old man again?"

"Move to couch," Kevin ordered.

"Why don't you move?" Darien snarked, "right outta my life?"

"Hah, hah, extremely witty. Now do as you're told and move back to the couch."

"No." Darien crossed his arms and set his chin.

"Darien," Kevin ground out, "I'm warning you ...."

"Oooh, I'm scared," the younger boy mocked. "Whatta you gonna do, make me? Dweeb."

Kevin's anger boiled over at the heat of his brother's scornful laughter. He lunged at his brother with the intention of scooping Darien up and physically depositing the smaller boy on the couch. But as always, Darien was too quick for him, and he found himself grasping at nothing but the carpet. Darien rounded on him then, jumping on Kevin's back and knocking off his glasses. Grunting and groaning, the two boys rolled over the floor, wrestling each other for dominance, all the while loudly hurling invectives.

"Geek," Darien shouted in fury.

"Retard," Kevin shot back in contempt.

"Boys!" Their uncle's exasperated baritone broke through their overheated emotions, and the two immediately stopped their struggles and lay panting. "That's enough. Darien, go to your room. Kevin, downstairs, now. I need you to help finish up those assays we started last night," he ordered.

"Yes, sir," Kevin agreed readily. "Have you gotten any results back on the protein sequencing trials we ran?"

"As a matter of fact, I was just going to call Dr. Anthony on that," Uncle Peter ruffled Kevin's hair as the two descended the steps to the basement. "I expect that sort of tom-foolery from your hooligan brother, but you're smarter than that, young man. Don't let him drag you down to his level."

"No, sir, I won't," Kevin's voice floated up from the bottom of the stairs.

"Butthead," Darien repeated sotto voce, rolling his eyes and flicking the channel over to Scooby Doo.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Timestamp: Tuesday, June 8, 1976, 12:53 p.m.

The young boy pushed his glasses up farther on his nose and stared at his reflection in the polished surface of the seemingly endless maple conference table at which he was seated.

Cupping his chin in one hand, he scrutinized the face before him, the solemn countenance of an 11-year old grown far too old too quickly. He pulled at the stiff white collar of his dress shirt and bow tie, hot under the heavy dark suit jacket the caretaker had dressed him in for this auspicious occasion, despite the anemic air conditioning the California State Office of Family Services boasted.

At least he had managed to stay neat, unlike his brother. The younger boy's jacket lay crumpled in a corner of the conference room, while Darien crashed about the room, whirling like a dervish, his brown plaid clip-on tie hanging askew from his tiny neck.

"Sit down, D, you're gonna get us yelled at," he admonished. Privately, he admired his brother's energy, inexhaustible despite the sweltering heat and the fact that they hadn't had lunch yet. The office staff hadn't counted on feeding the two boys, but their far-flung aunt and uncle had yet to arrive, thanks to a delay at the Sacramento airport.

"Olly, olly, oxen free," was Darien's incongruous reply as he continued his never-ending circuit.

Annoyed, Kevin tried to reach out and grab his brother, but the younger boy was too fast. "I mean it, sit down now," he hissed in what he hoped was some modicum of their mother's stern tone. She'd be appalled to see how her youngest son was treating the one good suit he had. Kevin knew she'd just barely scraped the extra money together, forgoing a new dress herself so that her sons could have decent Easter suits. Little had any of them known back in April as she made them try on outfit after outfit at Pennys, that just two months later they'd be wearing the same suits for her funeral.

"Can't, Kev," Darien panted, "I'm on the last lap of the Indianapolis 500, and I'm wiiiiiiiiniiiinnng!"

The frosted glass and polished wood door suddenly opened, and Darien slammed into it.

Before his brother's butt hit the floor, Kevin had scrambled out of his chair and caught him.

"Darien, are you OK?" Kevin asked, his heart in his mouth. He'd lost too much these past two weeks to bother to hide his fear.

Darien smiled up at Kevin, a hound dog look in his eyes as he swept his unruly bangs back with one hand. "Yeah, Kev, I'm OK," he said, getting to his feet. "Guess I shoulda listened to ya."

Relieved, Kevin smacked his brother lightly on the back of the head. "Yeah, you should have. Remember that next time, will ya?"

"Kevin, Darien, sweethearts, we're so sorry we couldn't get here sooner." A woman vaguely

resembling their mother, but with long salt-and-pepper hair reached down to sweep them both into her embrace. Kevin received the hug willingly, but Darien backed away. "Darien, darling, what's wrong? It's me, your Aunt Celia," she reached out again, only to have Darien squirm out of her grasp.

"Darien, what are you doing?" Kevin whispered.

His brother stared at the woman with eyes wide with fright. "How do we know she's really our aunt," he whispered back, "I don't remember her." Kevin laughed at his brother's imaginings.

"It's OK, D, I do. That's Aunt Celia and Uncle Peter. They came to visit for Christmas three years ago. You were four, probably too little to remember," he reassured Darien.

Aunt Celia knelt down in front of the young boy, holding her arms open wide. "Darien?" He hesitated for a moment more, then flung himself into her arms, hiding his face in the hair draping her neck like a shawl. She hugged him tightly, rocking back and forth while whispering soothing reassurances into his ear. "It's OK now, sweetie, your Uncle and I are going to take care of everything...."

Uncle Peter reached down to Kevin from what seemed like a giant's perspective and offered a beefy hand in greeting. "Hey, Kevin, how are you doing?" He took Kevin's smaller hand and shook it. "You two boys all packed?"

"Fine, sir. Yes, sir." Kevin answered each question politely, then crossed to the corner of the room where Darien's bag and his sat. One small satchel of clothes was all either boy was allowed to bring with them, not that they had had all that much to leave behind. Their mother had worked hard to provide them with the necessities -- food, clean clothes, a decent education -- but their hardscrabble existence had left little money for anything else.

Aunt Celia stood and took Darien firmly by the hand. "Come on, boys, let's get something to eat. I bet you two are hungry."

As she led Darien down the hall, Kevin could hear his little brother already spinning one of his tall tales for their new-found surrogate mother. "You bet. I'm so hungry I could eat a horse!"

"A horse!" his aunt exclaimed, "you're too little for that!"

"No, I'm not," Darien insisted, "I've done it lots of times. Why once, when I was really little... Did you know I'm going to be eight this month? And are we really gonna get to fly on a plane?"

Kevin smiled at his brother's rapid fire questioning of their aunt. It was good to hear some excitement in Darien's voice again. He remembered all too well the younger boy's sullenness and anger sparked by their father's sudden disappearance. It had taken almost the entire two years since then for Darien to return to his happy, hyperactive self. After their mother's sudden death, Kevin had feared that the shock would break Darien's spirit for good. The last week and a half of legal wrangling with relatives for custody of the two boys had been hell on both of them, the threat of being permanently separated a very real terror. Being shuffled through the endless maze of the state custodial system had left both Kevin and Darien exhausted, and the fact that Kevin had been awakened each night by Darien's screaming hadn't helped. Perhaps now, the nightmares would stop, and the boys could settle down in their new home with a bright future ahead of them.

Hoisting the two small bags, Kevin crossed the room to stand by his uncle. Peter put a hand on Kevin's shoulder. "You're a good boy, son," he told Kevin, the edges of his dark walrus mustache lifting with a smile, "but I can tell already that brother of yours is going to be a handful."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tag

Timestamp: Saturday, April 1, 1950, 4:45 a.m.

Peter walked into the steel and concrete room, still pulling on the nearly floor length scrub cover and tying it first behind his neck, then his back. Two others were already in the room, one holding up a glass beaker for close visual inspection, containing some silvery substance remarkably similar in appearance to mercury. The other was crouching down next to the

fur-covered mound lying on the floor.

"What've we got tonight?"

"You tell us," Dr. Kraken said as he pulled his gaze away from the beaker and gestured at the creature lying on the floor.

Peter moved closer and got a good look, which made him burst out in laughter. "It may be April Fool's Day, but there's no way you can get me to fall for that." He shook his head in complete disbelief at the incredible mock up that appeared to be a cross between a man and a huge ape, about 10 feet tall and covered in brown fur that varied from near blonde to a deep brown. There was no genitalia visible, although the protruding musculature of the chest was eerily suggestive of a female. The chest rose and fell with regularity, but that was the only discernable movement. "All right, unzip the thing and let the idiot you conned into this prank out."

"Pete, this is no prank." Dr. Armstrong's voice was more than a little shaky. "Not according to the report we received. A couple of park rangers headed out to check the site of another bear attack. Been going on for a couple of weeks now and they figured it was a brown that had a bad winter or something. Instead they find this. One of the rangers was killed and his partner hit," he waved at the creature, "this with the Jeep and injured it. SOP it goes to us for classification."

"Wait? Did you say injured?" You mean it's still alive?" Peter asked.

The beast suddenly growled low in its chest, a mournful sound of a creature in desperate pain causing Peter to jump back a good two feet in shock. As Peter watched a strange silvery substance oozed out of the skin and across the fur without seeming to dampen it, though the flow was uneven, heavier in some places completely hiding portions of the creature and nothing but rivulets in others, silver streams of liquid…mercury dripping off and onto the floor. An arm became completely covered in the substance and faded from sight only to reappear a few seconds later as the strange quicksilver seemed to dry and then flake away like glitter being disturbed by a sudden breeze.

"What the hell?" Peter asked at a hushed whisper.

"I have no idea. We tranqed the thing once it came in, but ...," Dr. Kraken replied in a stunned monotone. "We don't even know what the devil it is."

Peter straightened and shook off the stupor he'd momentarily fallen into. "We need to keep it alive. Can you get a veterinarian here?" A part of him had suddenly recognized the value of the unknown mammal lying before them and was fully absorbed by the fact that it apparently could turn itself invisible by will alone.

"Pete, are you nuts?" Kraken asked in utter disbelief.

"Do it," Armstrong ordered in a no-nonsense tone. "Peter, start getting stats and samples, but be careful. Tranq it again if you need to. This…. this creature is not worth your life."

"Yes, sir." Peter moved swiftly to get the necessary sample kits to begin the routine of trying to categorize an animal of questionable descent. He remembered the memorandum that had come in just a week ago, reminding them to keep a look out for "unusual remains." Granted it probably had more to do with the sudden influx of UFO sightings around the country than odd looking wild animals, but if this beast didn't qualify as "unusual" with such a unique ability he'd give up his dream and go into orthopedics like his father wanted.

As he approached the creature, its eyes opened and locked with his, and Peter found himself staring into a remarkably human-looking pair of bright blue eyes that seemed to be filled with fear. Shaking his head he forced himself to stop anthropomorphizing and get on with the task at hand.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I never really knew my brother when he was alive. I can't say I understand him any better now that he's dead. And yeah, maybe some of that's on me, for being so wrapped up in myself, my own problems, that I never took the time to really try and see him for the man that he was. But it's also on him, 'cuz he never did get me either. He was always so damn busy trying to do what was best for everyone that the people themselves got lost in the shuffle, you know? Kinda like my dad. Can't say I understand him any more than Kevin, but who knows, someday maybe I'll get that chance. I doubt it. It's like Thomas Wolf said in his seminal work, Look Homeward Angel: "Which of us has known his brother? Which of us has looked into his father's heart? Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent? Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?"

End