"JEEEESUS!" Expressed Toril as the man materialized beside him, nearly driving his q-tip right down his patients throat. Fortunately Mr. Green was well sedated or the hospital could have a law suit on their hands.

Toril spun around his arms slightly raised in defense and saw that the man's form was reconstituting before his eyes and that he seemed peaceful. When he spoke his name and mentioned the name Surge, he relaxed, but he was still a little perturbed by the announced drop in.

"Knock next time, Skywalker or I'm liable to crack you one." Toril mentioned while holding up one of his big fists, though it was not half as intimidating with a latex glove on it. Toril noticed the comedy in the situation and laughed creating a break in the tension. "Sorry, kid. Old habits, eh?" He wondered then if he got his little Star Wars humour when Luke dropped by to save Lea... probably not he thought. He was also laughing at the fact that someone spooked Wraith. In his younger days, he was the one appearing unannounced and alarming his fellow super heroes. How the tides had turned.

Toril removed his gloves disposing them in the trash then adding his last sample to his tray on the counter at the side of the room. Without turning around he commented, "Nice tie. You always this formal when you go up against R.A.I.D. and the F.B.I.?", then he turned around, his angled features stern and serious, "Because that's what you're getting yourself into."

Toril could tell the guy was green and wanted to make damn sure that he was prepared to do what it took to get the job done. "Sorry for the fifth degree, but I need to know you've got my back. I know you've got your own, you're a molecular, eh? Me too. Only I bet, you phase both ways. Am I right?"

The two heroes exchanged formal introductions and a few words. Toril quickly explained the nature of his mutation that allowed his body to replicate the molecular configuration of air and move as the wind, even manipulate the air and pressure around him, among other things. He let Jeb know that he could move the air around in this building to generate a wind tunnel if necessary, but it wouldn't last that long.

Then it came down to figuring out what their next move was. Toril told Jeb that he wasn't sure, but that he thought there was an intern in room across the hall that might be a member of the team here to rescue DiVine. It was just hunch though, and for all he knew they were alone.

"Hey can you extend your ability to phase things other than yourself?" Toril inquired while trying to figure out a plan, and it seemed that Jeb was way ahead of him on that one and mentioned that he could wheel DiVine right through a wall if necessary. Toril was pretty pleased when he learned that little tid bit of Jeb's abilities. Then Jeb pulled out a map and told him that Surge had given in to him. He had the full schematics of the hospital and looking at the map, it was plain to see that there was an elevator (designated with an 'F') just on the other side of room 305's western wall.

Toril looked around the room then until his eyes settled on what he was looking for. There was a vent up in the corner of the room that connected 304 to 305, that would be Toril's entrance.

"I say we go in there and bust some heads." Toril said with a confident smile, while he rolled his massive shoulders to limber himself up. "Once we get him to the elevator, we have to pray that they don't realize where we are for a while. We need to get the main floor and find ourselves an ambulance to transport him out of here, then I am hoping the others will find us." Toril rolled his neck back forth. "It's not much of plan, but if you're in, I'll see ya on the other side, I say we have about five minutes to make up our minds."

While Toril awaited Jeb's decision and input, he asked him about his super hero identity. "You gotta name? I mean like an alias. You know I've always wanted a side-kick, especially one with abilities somewhat like my own. How about, 'Phantom-boy'", he joked, "You don't like that one? No worries. I got more."

Jeb shook his head. "Americans!", he thought. "And I got the biggest glory hound of them all apparently."

However, he knew that antagonizing the big man would do no good. "No, I don't have any fancy moniker; I've never considered myself anything but a normal person with unique abilities. I'm sure that before we're done that you'll come up with several more that you'll get a chuckle out of though." Jeb's eyes twinkled. "Oh, and I have never and plan to never wear tights nor capes."

Jeb pondered the big man's plans for a moment. "Ok, so here's my take on things. The goons are obviously near the elevator for a reason, that being to secure their own hasty exit when the time is right. So going into the elevator seems like the LAST thing we'd want to do. Seems to me like we have a nice little decoy right here." Jeb nodded towards the man in the bed near them.

"How good are you at creating a distraction that will empty "Di Vine's" room of all the goons? Once it's empty, I can quickly and easily swap the beds between this room and that one. With this room being in such close proximity to "Di Vine", it may give us an advantage time-wise since they won't expect us to hide him so close."

Jeb paused, gauging the big man's posture and expressions.

"Then we can go one of two ways. I can go back and get the decoy, and make a big show of phasing him through the wall and into the elevator, while you safely abscond with "Di Vine" in the opposite direction or out the window and to the roof."

"The second way would be for you to continue your distractions while I phase "Di Vine" to the other end of the hospital and down to the ground floor. I'll leave it up to you how you wish to proceed, since I'm just the side-kick and all . . . "

Toril folded his arms and leaned against the wall, contemplating Jeb's plan. He rubbed his chin and looked around the room. "For starters we're in an interior room, but if there was window I wouldn't be hauling up a man in DiVine's condition and carrying him around, the stress could kill him. But I like your idea of hiding him. Check the schematics again, Jeb and see what's under us." Toril suggested. "Maybe, if I can get below us, you could lower him down to me, bed and all.", even as he said the words, Toril was already having his doubts. "Maybe.", he repeated shaking his head slightly.

Toril shifted his weight and put his back to the wall thrusting his hands in his pockets. "Any distraction now, is just going to stir up a hornet's nest and they'll lock this place tight. We have to move quickly or not at all."

"I just wonder what the others are up to." Toril mentioned. "No doubt they have some sort of plan, but our time is getting pretty short here. I figure in about ten more minutes, people are going to get rather suspicious of Doctor Paul Carson loitering about in room 304. We can give the other group about five minutes, then we have go with our plan."

Toril hoped the others did something fast, Jeb was tactile, but he wasn't sure he was up for a fight. Not that his plan held water but it seemed a pretty direct solution. Perhaps he was just too old school for these new super heroes, back in the day he and Surge would of just blasted their way through the agents, of course they had tended to make a big mess of things.

Ah, the good ol' days.

Tim and Takashi pulled the assault vehicle, which wore its military camoflauge paint sceme into a parking garage across the street from the hospital. Parking it on the third level facing the hospital, of the six level garage, they had an excellant view of the emergency entrance and the medi - vac helicopter that sat on the helicopter pad. As they sat, Tim and Takashi, "Smokey" as Tim had started to call him, could hear the secured chatter of Zoe and the other Super Heroes.

Tim sat calmly explaining some of the many fuctions of the onboard computers, weapons systems and stealth capabilities of the vehicle to an obviously nervous Takashi.
"Don' ya fret now Smokey, yur gonna do jus' fine. Ya jus' keep yur mind on the mission an get ready ta use yur talents if ya needs ta." Tim said with a smile "Hell boy I rememb'r my first time goin' undercover. Fur a week I just 'bout shit my jeans every time some asshole coughed."

Henkel anxiously chewed on the edge of his styrofoam coffee cup while he watched the images of the facial recognition software sift through the FBI and R.A.I.D. databases of know meta-humans. He had entered the enhanced photos taken from the video file of Carson and Martin and was hoping he'd get a hit in the next five minutes, but he had seen the searches take as long as a day so he knew not to get his hopes up.



Birkshire who was monitoring the video feed from the cameras in the burn unit was doing his best to ignore the FBI agents incessant crunching, but eventually he just turned and stared at the man hard, until he became aware of his annoying habit.

Henkel actually missed Jameson. He could drum the chorus to 'Born to be wild' repeatedly and his partner wouldn't bat an eye. He tossed his cup in the trash and Birkshire continued his surveillance while Henkel trying not to fidget watched the faces rush by as the software searched for a match.

"Y'know, if either them are from the old costumed days, chances are the search will come up negative." Mentioned Birkshire his eyes remaining trained on his screen.

Henkel looked over at Birkshire, but bit back what ever he was going to say. He hated pissing contests, but still wasn't sure if the guy was purposely trying to get under his skin or not.

"Well let's hope." Said Henkel.

Siege was conscious of the buff, dark-suited men on the hospital grounds who seemed to be watching her and Shawn like deceptively lazy crocodiles eyeing water birds. Siege did her best to make it look like she was ignoring them, and when communicating with O, pretended she was talking to her ‘patient,’ Shawn.

When there was a lull in communication, she asked O, “Did they find him? Are they on their way out again?”

“They found him,” O’s monotone voice whispered in her hidden earpiece. “Now it’s just a matter figuring out when and where the feds are going to—” O’s voice cut off as if distracted.

“What?” Siege demanded, staring hard at Shawn, whose bandaged head was lifted towards the hospital.

“Shit,” O cursed flatly. “Code blue. He’s having a heart attack or something.”

“What?” Siege repeated, eyes scanning the scenery sightlessly. No one would be able to move him if he was having a heat attack. What if he didn’t make it? “Do Yelena and Cassius need backup?” she whispered, feeling her heart climbing into her throat.

Birkshire looked over to Henkel with a sideways glance, but did not share his thought, although Henkel had a good idea what the man would have said.


"Being a little hasty aren't we?" The imaginary voice of Birkshire jabbed in Henkel's mind and he called down to Jameson. "He's on his way.", he informed his partner.



Jameson, tucked his gun in his holster and ordered everyone to take their places. Their moves would have to be precise incase anyone was watching, but in preparation for the operation they had blanked out all the existing hospital cameras and their own cameras could not see where the switch would occur. Under the guidance of Birkshire, the staged operating room was a virtual dead zone for a cyber-spies and he had provided Jameson with another strange device. He didn't explain specifically what is was, to Jameson it appeared to be shiny ball sitting ontop of a black box, maybe a funky looking DVD player he had first considered. Apparently, though, according to Birkshire the device created a field that disrupted clairvoyance.

As Jameson made sure the 'psychic disrupter' was on line, he was a little disturbed with the knowledge that aside from having people who could use their own technology against them there were mutants who just use their minds to see whatever they wanted.

"Holy shit!" exclaimed Toril when a code blue was announced in room 305.

There was no more time for elaborate planning, they had to move. "Look kid," he said to Jeb, "I'm going to see what's going on, and if it's bad I'll tag along with DiVinne. I'm afraid you're on your own for now."

Toril vanished before Jeb's eyes and assumed his wind form. Moving slowly, he was virtually undetectable and drifted through the vent and hovered on the ceiling just above DiVine. He stayed above the doctors and nurses who worked fervently as they transferred the old man, from his hyperbaric chamber to a regular gurney.

All the under cover agents had been instructed to play their roles at all times and they all delivered oscar winning performances as doctors and nurses as they prepped DiVine. Toril didn't suspect a thing and from his perspective it looked like the real deal. It appeared that the old man was going into heart failure from what he could gather one of the doctors suspected a clot.

"We need to get him into surgery, immediately!" Stated a doctor as she observed something in one of DiVines eyes. "Tell them to prep a table.", she ordered a nurse who quickly ran out of the room and back to the station to alert the O.R.

When they started to move DiVine, Toril slipped under the gurney and hitched a ride with them to the operating room. In his wind from, he telekinetically clung to the metal supports and didn't worry about his form stirring anything since they were already moving quickly down the hallway. When they would reach the elevator he knew he would just have to concentrate and stay perfectly still and the hospital staff would be none the wiser that he was even there, not that a slight stirring of wind would even register to most.

While they traveled down the Burn Unit corridor, Toril looked to see if he could spot the intern anywhere. Room BU300 was coming up and the invisible ghost struggled to see past the many legs that obscured his vision.

Tim heard Zoe over the secure com link "Well, shit." he said as he turned to Takashi "Ya best be buckelin' up Smokey, we might be havin' ta git movin' right quick."

Tim then spoke to the vehicle "Active stealth mode." the vehicles computer responed "Stealth mode activated, sensors activated.....all weapoons systems activated and on standby."

Void took the wheel of the ambulance while Challenge took the red Italian sportscar with Lyrix as her passenger once they were all ready to go right back to the Big A.

“I have a bad feeling about this.” Lyrix said to Challenge after staying silent for the first two hours of their drive.
“Good.” Challenge smirked and decided to accelerate the car.
“Hey!” Lyrix said but there was little point with Challenge behind the wheel.
“Don’t worry L, this is just a warmup. Need to get the blood going.” Challenge said as she sped by the ambulance and waved to the ever silent Void driving it.

Not far up ahead there was Tim’s vehicle, but even it was quickly caught by the speeding Brera.
“Shall we go save the old grump with just the two of us?” She asked Harold excitedly.
“Only if you want your call sign to be changed to Adrenalin Retard. Dead Adrenalin Retard if you don’t stop speeding like a maniac.” Lyrix objected.
“I’m too young and pretty to die. Also, too damn good. Oh yeah!” She yelled and then suddenly slammed her foot on the break.

The car’s wheels locked and it was sent skidding to a halt while Challenge put all possible effort in keeping the car from spinning out of control. Luckily the road ahead was clear and Challenge regained control of the Alpha Romeo seemingly gracefully.

“Don’t ever do that again. I thought I was going to die!” Lyrix complained while concerns where uttered over their car’s wireless from the others.
“Yeah, me too.” She said with another one of her broad grins. Then she answered the radio; “We’re fine, got my foot stuck on the gas. It’s what I get for driving a European import I suppose.”
“I can’t remember who recommended you for the job to me anymore, or I’d have to hunt him down and kill him.” Lyrix grumbled.
“Probably Humphrey Wooldrich, he liked what I did for him in Chicago.” Challenge helped Lyrix as she went back to driving like a normal human being.
“Good chance… What did you do for him?”
“Nothing special, certainly nothing even remotely dangerous enough for my tastes, but the pay was good.”
“Like stealing a nuclear warhead from a military installation or something, huh?” Lyrix joked.
“Something like that.” She simply replied.

Lyrix wasn’t sure what to make of that last statement but it goes without saying the Italian sports car remained silent for the rest of the trip towards the hospital. When they reached their final destination Void, Challenge and Lyrix remained behind in their respective cars while the others began their mission and started scouting the hospital.

“Sooooo….” Challenge began as they had simply been listening to radio chatter, “When do I get to go in there?”
“Only when we have to, hopefully we won’t set a foot in that hospital at all.” Lyrix said annoyed as he was trying to follow the other’s actions when Challenge interrupted.
“Who made that plan anyway, I-“ Challenge was complaining when there was the sudden outburst about Roberts heart attack.
“Oh God!” Lyrix uttered as his face turned pale. Before he knew it Challenge had stepped out of the vehicle and was over at the ambulance to drag Void out of it and the two of them sped off towards the hospital leaving Harold behind. He tried to get his safety belt off as he saw them turn the corner but when he finally managed to get it off he realized there was nothing he could do at this point.

Robert was in a hospital after all. Harold might be able to save him from the people who kept him, but not from his failing heart. If anything this was the worst time to act, he told himself and he slowly let go of the handle of the door and settled back in. There was nothing he could do, besides getting himself caught and blowing their entire operation if he let his feelings for his dear old friend get the better of him. The old wrinkly grump was counting on him to keep his wits about him… As always…

Typing on one computer while telepathically controlling another, O's eyes flicked quickly over the monitors before her.

"Hold on," she said, the calm in her voice a poor reflection of her rapid-fire movements, "I'm trying to see what's going on. I can't get into the monitors on one of the operating rooms. They must have it blocked." There was a pause again as she tried in vain to break into the monitoring system. "Fay," she said finally, "can you get that boy inside to see what's going on? I don't trust this. The fact that they've managed to block me means they are expecting some kind of rescue attempt. Anything could be anything."

As she spoke, Cassius lifted one eye, an undetectable smirk barely tugging at the edges of his mouth. With a believable groan and an awkward, drowsy gait worthy of an Oscar, Cassius slid off of the bed.

"Duuuude!" he groaned, stumbling across the room and into the wall where he leaned precariously out of the doorway. "How'zaguy suppos'da seep wiff allzis noise?" At this, one of the real nurses rushed over to him and held her hands in front of him.

"Sir, it's alright. There's nothing to worry about, please return to your bed." Staring through her, his eyelids heavy and his expression glazed and empty, Cassius pushed past her, limping heavily and mumbling just loud enough for those immediately around him to hear.

"Shit... I gotta take a whiz..." Hobbling past the frantic nurse and only barely missing the crowd of white coats and scrubs that rushed past with Di Vine, he stood in the dead center of the hallway, facing the elevator as the doors shut and the numbers across the top began to light up. Just as the numbers ceased, the nurse took his arm in a gentle but firm grip and pleaded with him.

"Sir, please! The bathroom is right in here! Here we go!" As the nurse ushered Cassius back into his room, Zoe's voice echoed into everyone's ears who had connected to her.

"Burn unit. North elevator-- the one closest to you, Yelena. Three floors up."
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Only vaguely aware of the conversations going on by Fay's unmoving watch on him, Shawn noticed the two enormous forms of the vehicles as they pulled around the back of the building. One looked identical to the one that had driven him here but one looked . . . different. It was bigger, slightly different shaped, and seemed to be carrying a little bit more heat in different little pockets.

Glancing back up towards the room Yelena and Cassius had been in, he saw the flurry of movement and furrowed his brow. Yelena's silhouette as long lost in the movement and colors, but Cassius' for the time being was still parked in the room. Turning back to the vehicles as they parked not far from each other, he kept a visual lock on them and tapped Fay.

"Ambulance?" he asked, pointing surreptitiously towards the vehicles. When she gave no response for a few seconds, it dawned on him he was looking straight through several walls and motioned for her to follow him. Moving at a casual pace, he led her around a corner of the building and pointed again. "You see?" he asked, unsure if he was getting his point across. There was only so far they could walk, only so many times he could point, only so many risky phrases he could utter at a volume he couldn't hear let alone control especially well, before they would begin to look extremely suspicious.

In the elevator with no natural air movement it was easy for Toril to remain perfectly still in his wind form, but once they were on the move again he required his telekinises to remain fixed to the bottom of DiVine's gurney. He had been expecting to head down to emergency, but as Toril was able to see the floor numbers they had traveled to the upper floors. Our Lady of Mercy must have a cardiac ward he considered and suddenly everything was getting all the more complicated. At the top floor of the hospital, there wasn't much chance to get DiVine out, not that he was in any condition for a rescue anyway. 'What was he doing?', Toril wondered. He had hoped that somehow he would have already made contact with the other group and aside from that his plan had been pretty sketchy. Toril was used to stealing information not people and even if did go all 'world war three' on the security there were the patients to consider.

As DiVine was wheeled into the cardiac emergency unit, their ghostly stow away jumped ship and materialized within an empty bathroom and quickly shut the door. He checked the ceiling and took note of a vent, he always had the habit of making sure he had quick exit since one could never be sure who would come a knocking and he could ghost in the blink of an eye if he had to.

Toril ran the taps and splashed some cold water on his face and reviewed his options, all of which had gone out the window with DiVine having a heart attack. He stared at himself in the mirror, and realized more than ever at that point that he was not the man he was twenty years ago, as resilient as his physique was he just didn't have the same edge that youth allowed. Age and experience finally superseded his adrenaline and it became very apparent to him that the FBI and RAID had far too much of an advantage here and essentially he was alone now. Still he owed it to Jeb to make sure that he made it out alright, and decided to find the guy and convince him to disregard Surge's bullshit and lead as normal of a life as he possibly could.

Toril unlocked the bathroom door and faded into nothingness. He went up through the vent and followed the ducts back to the burn unit, keeping completely away from any more cameras. His specialized vision allowed him to see everything quite clearly in the hospitals ventilation system but knew that he would eventually have to emerge into a hallway to get his bearings. Hopefully he would be able to find Jeb, but he feared that the new recruit may have already pursued his own course of action.

Yelena’s head popped up when the alarm sounded through the loud speakers and she heard the dreaded words “Code Blue room 305. Code Blue room 305”. Even Cassius snapped his gaze over to her. For a second, she didn’t do anything, but in the next second, she was headed out of Cassius’ room and towards Roberts. She was terrified. Not because of the fact she was allowing herself to come in direct contact with federal agents but because there was something dreadfully wrong with Robert. If they had come all this way and risked everything just to have her dear friend die on them now, she would never forgive herself.

Several ‘nurses’ and ‘medical professionals’ rushed towards Roberts room with Yelena. They even brought a crash cart with them and Yelena was all set to do what ever she had to do to save Robert, but something caught her attention as she entered the room. One of the ‘nurses’ didn’t do too good of a job hiding their weapon in the small of their back and Yelena caught a peek of the flat, black grip as the ‘nurse’ moved into Robert’s room.

Daring not to stop knowing the agents would know for certain she wasn’t a real doctor, Yelena proceeded into the room as though she were none the wiser. It was far better to keep doing what she was doing than confirm suspicions she was sure they had about her. Thankfully the spit fire nurse that more or less ran the burn unit made her way into the room as well. Ordering the men wearing the business suits out of the room as she entered, she cleared a path to the hyperbaric chamber.

“Alright now, everybody give us some room to work here. We can’t get all of this equipment in the room with all these bodies in here at the same time. All you suits, outta here! Now! We have to work on this poor guy. I don’t need my intern getting any more nervous than she already is. Come on….move it!”

The next instant Yelena knew they were loading Robert onto a gurney and taking him to another area. And from what Zoe had told them, it was up another story. But....if Robert was really in distress enough to have a heart atack, how could they possibly rescue him and take him back to some secret place where there was no medical help to be found for him? As she stood there watching all of this play out, as though she were having an out of body experience, she had a painful moment of clarity. What if Robert died after they rescued him? All of their good intentions would have been for nothing. And it was clear, by all things she had seen, that Robert had suffered a great deal of trauma from the explosion.
Glancing around at the other ‘medical professionals’ in the room, she suddenly felt like a raw piece of meat hung on a very large hook in a pool of hungry sharks. Now what was she going to do? If she made a sudden move they would be on her like flies on stink. No…she had to hold it together and hope that by some miracle she was able to get herself and Cassius out of there alive without bringing suspicion on them any more than ther possibly already was.

Letting the the activity swarming around Robert be her decoy, she eased her way back into Cassius' room and, as the nurse was leaving, closed the door behind her.

"We need to abort the mission. I repeat, we need to abort the mission. Get everyone the hell out of here as fast as you can. There's agents crawling all over this hospital. If we make a move now, we'll lose more than one of us and that's not something I'm willing to take the chance on."

Tim spoke into the secure com-link "Roger that, everybody out now. Smokie and I got yur backs." Tim then backed the assault vehicle up and screamed down to street level, backed into a stall on the opposite wall across from the street and waited for the others. He looked at Takashi with a grin. "Now we gi ta have us sum fun. Ya buckle up good an'tight boy. This here could be like ridin' a Brama Bull, fur it's done."

Siege was distracted enough by Zoe’s request to bring Shawn inside that she didn’t understand what the boy was trying to show her—until they rounded the corner. A bland gray armored vehicle had just pulled up outside the small north egress. Several other cars—all forgettable shades of tope and navy—rested in the parking lot, attended by the dim silhouettes of their drivers. “What’s this…?” Siege whispered, eyes narrowing. An ambulance pulled slowly from the parking lot towards the far end of the hospital, but that wasn’t the vehicle that caught her attention.

“Forget bringing Shawn inside,” Siege murmured to Zoe through the zinging wavelengths of their hidden communicators, “we just found something outside. Are you sure he’s having a heart attack? It looks like they’re planning a move!” She flashed her wristwatch camera at the scene with a discrete look around to make sure they hadn’t been noticed.

There was little time for more, because Yelena’s voice then broke into her earpiece: "We need to abort the mission. I repeat, we need to abort the mission." Siege barely comprehended the rest of what Yelena said because she noticed two suits walking towards her and Shawn from back the way they’d come. The two men bulged from what was no doubt weaponry and body armor hidden beneath their plainclothes. Surely she and Shawn hadn’t done anything too suspicious had they?

She put a hand on his arm and began to steer him as calmly as she could, still trying to look the part of his nurse. A glance over her shoulder showed that a few other personnel, including white-coated hospital staff mixed with RAID enforces were beginning to collect at the north egress. Something was definitely dodgy here, and she and Shawn were the only ones who could do anything about it!

A glance at Shawn’s youthful profile, half-obscured by his sloppy bandages, caused Siege to reign herself in. Something had apparently gone wrong in the hospital and there was no use risking Shawn if it wasn’t necessary. But Di Vine…

“Are you lost, Miss…Wagai?” The suit who’d just stepped onto their path let his cold eyes linger on her fake ID badge.

“Lost?” She inwardly cursed the trepidation in her voice, not to mention her rather obvious London accent. A.W. had always done the talking. “Of course not,” she hurried on, “I work here, don’t I?”

“Hm,” the sound was almost a laugh, made more sinister by the unformed smile at the corner of the man’s mouth.

At the same moment that Siege resumed her grip on Shawn with the picture of escorting him smoothly away, the suit’s partner decided to give the boy a suspicious prod, saying, “And what’s his diagnosis, huh?” The result was that Shawn deftly shrunk from the man’s touch only to be unbalanced by Siege’s tug. Shawn stumbled, quickly caught himself—but the vigorous motion disturbed the bandages over his eyes, and for a moment, a bright green light pierced through a crack in the wrappings.

Shawn, no doubt sensing what had happened, turned off his vision so that the light vanished almost as soon as it had appeared. However, Siege could tell that it was already too late, the way both of their interrogator’s eyes narrowed. A silent tension. The twitch of a hand towards a coat flap. It all happened in an instant.

Acting on shear reflex, Siege shoved Shawn to the side, imagining bullets, plasma rays, wanting to spare him.

The suits stepped back, drawing arms. Static crackled. Siege paused long enough to throw a force field up between the two men and Shawn and herself, then she whirled around to run with him. But behind, the supposed doctors and the RAID enforcers in full armor had already noticed them.

She heard one of the men behind her force field snarl, “We’ve got a rogue meta! Maybe two!”

Shawn, with his eyes glowing bright green again, penetrating the shamble of his bandages, was the most obvious target. A blue plasma ray sizzled over the manicured lawn of the hospital from a RAID enforcer straight towards him. “No!” Siege screamed and flung a thick force field between him and the decimating beam. She felt the burning impact strain her resources as the electro-plasma tore into her force field. Her head pounded and she knew the shield would dissolve soon. Worse, the effort had cost her concentration on the field behind them, and now the two suits were after them again.

At least Shawn seemed to know what he was doing, bounding deftly towards a defensible position where his back would be clear. Her protective urge to keep watching him, rebuilding the field of energy between him and the RAID assailants, cost her. She didn’t have time to protect herself when a stunning bolt of blue slammed into her back, knocking her off her feet.

“Uh…!” was all she managed to say. Her body convulsed uncontrollably for what seemed far too long. Then all of a sudden, her arms were being cranked behind to be zip-tied and a tranquilizer burst into her bloodstream. The last thing she heard was, “Well, well, what have we here?”