by Palladian
“Definitely a good choice,” she had pouted. “Your arms and shoulders are so much better defined than mine.”
Serena had gone with a sleeveless jade green silk dress that rose to a high collar before it dived low to show off her cleavage. The dress fell just above her knees and had been slit on both sides to just under her hips. She wore matching high heels and had swept up her hair in a way that looked sophisticated and sexy all at once, leaving Lex just shaking her head, wondering how her friend did it.
Serena came to a stop on the stairs as she spotted Casey, looking her up and down, smiling with approval. The blonde had worn a deep blue satin dress that hung a few inches above her knees with a modest v-neck and short sleeves, the bodice fitted, and the skirt fuller.
“You look good enough to eat,” Serena said with a smirk.
Casey rolled her eyes at Serena as she put her coat on. “Cut it out. I feel like an ass. I'm not used to wearing dresses.”
“You should wear them more. You look really nice,” Lex said, trying to put her friend at ease while giving Serena a quick shake of her head to dissuade her from teasing Casey any further.
Riss wore an eggplant-colored dress that looked almost black in the low light, sleeveless with a scoop neck and simple lines; it had been fitted through her waist and then came to a skirt that billowed at her feet. Riss looked at Serena with a questioning glance at Lex, who shrugged as minutely as she could. Riss raised her eyebrows with an expression that almost said it couldn't be helped, donned black opera-length gloves and her coat, and then looked back at the others before going out the front door.
The drive took about an hour, and Lex wasn't exactly sure where they'd gotten to when they arrived, aside from it being somewhere in Virginia. When Lex got out of the car, along with a sky full of stars the only thing she saw was the restaurant, a plain looking two-story building in a field with nothing else nearby for about a quarter mile. The isolation set up a nervous churning in her stomach.
“I can see why they chose this place,” Riss said quietly to Lex as they went inside.
The interior had been dimly lit and lavishly decorated with dark woods, fine linens, china and glassware, and a big fire crackling in a stone fireplace that dominated one wall. Lex could see an open dining area as well as some smaller rooms along the four surrounding walls. After talking to the man near the door about their reservation, he led them to one of the private rooms along the back wall of the restaurant.
After they'd ordered and had been left alone again, Riss cleared off the table in front of her and brought her bag up. She pulled out the sniffer tool Lex had ordered for the security job and turned it on, setting it in the middle of the table. Everyone watched with interest as she pulled out the ultra-thin laptop that Lex had given her for the holidays and woke it up, attached the sniffer to it, and typed something, then looked up at the rest of them.
“All right, ladies,” Riss said in her usual low calm tones. “We can talk freely for the first time. Lex, I have to thank you for ordering the sniffer and for getting me this computer; otherwise, we wouldn't be.”
“What do you mean, speak freely?” Casey asked, looking at Riss with a frown.
“We're monitored at all times, something I think everyone is aware of at the facilities, which have cameras and microphones everywhere. However, I don't think most of you know that we continue to be monitored through listening devices in our jumpsuits when we go out for a job, and by the mobile devices we're forced to carry when we're not in the building. It's likely that even some of our casual clothing has been bugged.”
Casey's face went white. “I'm sorry,” Riss said, more softly. “I know that's bad news, but I had no way of letting anyone know that before now, not without disappearing.”
“What do you mean?” Lex asked, swallowing carefully as a panicky surge ran through her.
Riss sighed. “Let me start with what I know, and then we can get to any questions. Just so you know, I've put together a program to broadcast cut versions of previous audio recorded of us to all our sponsors' snooping devices, and the sniffer, which I altered, sends that signal out as well as screens us from any other way they might have of trying to spy on us. Unfortunately, I have some bad news for you and then a proposition. But before we start, are you certain that Serena can be trusted?” Riss asked, looking at the other woman a little dubiously.
Lex put a hand on Serena's arm because the redhead looked like she was about to yell, and asked Riss, “What is this all about? I'm sure we could trust Serena if she knew what was so important.”
“Your life is in danger, Lex,” Riss said quietly. “I have a lot of proof here I want to show you so that you can see what's going on. My life is in danger, too, but it's probably not as close for me as it is for you.”
Lex's hand dropped nervelessly and she could see Serena turn towards her, concern marking her face. “If that's the case, you can trust me,” Serena said, her normal bantering tone gone. “What's going on?”
Riss gestured for all of them to move close, and then started bringing information up for them to look at on her laptop. “While Lex and I put the security plan together for our facility, our sponsors also saw fit to hook us up with the network at their main facility, Metamorphix Sciences, Inc., better known as MSI, uptown. Since one of my crappy jobs at the facility is to be one of the monitors, I used the new connection to find out some things they don't want us to know.
“I should back up a little, though,” Riss continued, a frown on her face. “From the time I arrived here, our sponsors have both wanted and not wanted me to work on their computers. Lex, at least, knows that I can communicate with computers just by thinking about it. What I haven't told anyone until now is that there's nothing stored on a computer anywhere that I can't find and access, and nothing I've found yet that I haven't been able to get a computer to do if I ask the right way. I've taken care that our sponsors don't know the extent of my talents, because if they did…well, I'll show you in a minute.”
She paused for a moment to let everything sink in, looking at each of them in turn, and then went on. “So, although they don't know it, I infiltrated everything available at the main facility almost immediately. Until the past couple of weeks, though, I didn't know I should be concerned about certain things. I was distracted by the fact that I'm a prisoner.”
“What?” Lex leaned forward in her chair, looking at Riss, incredulous. Riss sighed, still busy with her computer, but glanced at Lex and continued.
“No reason you would know, but I am imprisoned at the facility. That's why I had to figure out a way to get that message to you. I knew the only way I could ever get any time to talk privately would be to ask you to get me out of there for a while. I figured they might go for it since they try to keep the fact that I'm a prisoner under wraps. I've been talented with computers since I was a kid, and I did do some hacking, but I never did anything malicious. However, someone set me up for some clumsy hack and that's how MSI got their hands on me, since I'd refused when they'd asked nicely. When I investigated recently, I found out that someone on the payroll of the people who run this place set the hack up.”
She met Lex's eyes again, and Lex could feel her expression turning incredulous, sad, and worried. Riss shook her head and continued. “So it was wasted time figuring if there was a way I could get out of here based on proving someone else's guilt.”
“What do you mean?” Casey asked with a frown. “Surely if you could prove your innocence–”
Riss' sigh stopped the other woman. “That had nothing to do with it. I guess since I'm a prisoner the people that run the facility felt they could be more honest with me. They made it clear to me a while back that they have no intention of ever letting me go. I just didn't know at the time that it meant they were the ones who made sure I ended up here in the first place. That, of course, made me curious about other people who have been on these teams. So, I did some research.”
She brought up a team roster on
the screen. “This is the list of all of the teams in the country, and all of the people who've been on them since this system was put into place about 15-20 years ago,” Riss said, pointing out their team and their names. “At first, you can see that a number of people moved on to other things, but within the last decade, the government made some new laws to govern us. As you can see, no one from then on has been allowed to leave.”
“What?” Serena looked at Riss quizzically, almost skeptically.
“The people that run the facility said as much to me, that they'd never allow me to leave, and that there were much worse places to be. Let me show you.”
She pulled up the roster that she'd showed them before, then pointed out a name on it. “Casey, do you remember Ivy Walker? The records say that she was on the team when you arrived.”
Casey frowned for a moment, and then nodded. “I didn't know her well, especially since I spent the first couple of months here on the medical floor. She seemed really nice, but I remember that a few months after I'd really recovered she got sick, and we didn't see her anymore. A while after that, I remember being told that she retired, and I never heard anything more after that.”
Riss nodded. “I'm sure that's probably what they told you. In reality, she was moved from the facility we're at to the main facility. I'll show you a live video feed of her today,” she continued, clicking up another window and maximizing it to the whole screen.
All four women watched the screen closely, and then the other three of them glanced at Riss, puzzled. “It just looks like a greenhouse,” Casey finally said, confusion in her voice.
“Look now,” said Riss, pointing at something.
And Lex jumped in surprise as they all saw human eyes suddenly appear in the greenery, and something that had appeared to be a plant moved. As they watched they could see she wasn't a plant, although she didn't appear very human anymore, either.
Lex stared at Riss in horror as the other woman minimized the window. “What the hell happened to her?” Lex asked, listening as her voice shook.
Riss sighed. “That's what it took me a while to figure out,” she said, pulling up another document. “Once we were attached to the other facility, though, I found out lots of interesting things. This shows the list of 'treatments' that Ivy was given, the first of them dating a couple of years before she disappeared, around the time she was put on the team.”
“What were they for?” Casey asked, frowning.
“To find out, as well as translate what I found, took time,” Riss said, pulling up yet another document. “They gave her a standard regimen that they put together at MSI headquarters, which is a biological research facility.”
Everyone just stared at Riss blankly for a moment, so she sighed again and continued. “They assigned Ivy an experimental gene therapy protocol designed to modify human bodies to go beyond normal human abilities. Lex, you are currently being given this regimen, and so is Casey.”
In the silence that followed, Riss pulled up two more documents, one with Lex's name and one with Casey's, and put them side by side with Ivy's “treatment” document. Lex glanced at them briefly, noting that what she could see of them matched almost exactly. She swallowed against her dry throat and just looked at Riss.
“Why?” she finally managed to ask, and the word hung heavy in the quiet room.
“Well, from what I can tell, we're all being used as test subjects in the main facility's very theoretical gene therapy experiments. For now, they have their own 'monster army,’ as I've seen them put it in company documents, but eventually they hope to be able to bottle and sell what we can do, especially to the army. Due to the political climate several years ago, around the time filling Guantanamo got popular, someone passed laws that denied standard human rights to anyone who can do things beyond a normal human's abilities: in essence, declaring us not human. They are, as a result, legally able to keep us here within the teams, or, if we start looking or acting less than human, they're able to keep us permanently within their main facility and use us as lab rats if they wish. Since it got passed along with a lot of the homeland security garbage, I guess you could say we've been nationalized. These laws have never been repealed by successive administrations, either.”
Lex's head spun and her stomach was in the process of tying itself into a tight knot, but even so, she looked at Riss again, trying to catch her eye even though the other woman attempted not to look at her. “There's something else, though. You said my life was in danger, not mine and Casey's.”
Riss nodded, still looking at the screen. “Actually, yes. I wasn't initially happy to hear you were coming along today, Serena, but now I'm glad. Do you remember a woman by the name of Cynthia Cross? The roster puts her on the team in New York around the same time you were.”
Casey looked across at Serena with a raised eyebrow, murmuring, “So that's where you came from,” while Serena nodded in affirmation at Riss' question.
“Yeah. I didn't spend enough time there to make many friends, but I remember her. She seemed pretty smart. Kind of stuck up, though; she never wanted to talk. I think she could move things around with her mind or something like that.”
Riss nodded. “From what I see on her records, she has several talents like that. There's another protocol our sponsors developed that they give to people with special mental abilities. Unfortunately, Cynthia is now in one of their experimental facilities, too, having suffered brain damage as a result of the drugs they gave her. I won't bother to show her to you, unless anyone particularly wants to see.”
Everyone shook their heads in the negative, Lex trying not to wince at the motion. Her head had started to ache and moving it now felt painful.
“The people on this team currently getting this type of 'treatment' are me,” said Riss, pulling up some more documents, “and…you, Lex.”
Lex stared at the screen, her hand now on her stomach as if trying to keep the twisting pain in, and saw that Cynthia's protocol document matched almost perfectly with one with Riss' name on it, and one with her own, paged down from what Riss had shown earlier.
“For some reason,” Riss continued, “they're not giving any drugs to you, Serena, or to Joan. Joan didn't surprise me; I know she's a ringer, here to watch us. She's really a high ranking military officer, but as you can tell from how often she's at the facility, they don't consider our team a big flight risk.”
Serena shrugged. “I figure they're not giving me any crap like that because of my family. My father arranged to get me assigned to one of these teams to give me something to do because I'd embarrassed him one too many times hanging around the house, but I am still his daughter,” she sighed.
Riss nodded in agreement. “I don't know if they have a hard strategy like this, but it seems most of the people they choose don't have many, or any, family ties—that is, few people will ask around for them if they disappear.”
Lex felt a cold sensation running down her jaw to accompany her now pounding head and churning stomach. “So, what's their idea?” she heard a voice ask that sounded somewhat like hers, but almost hollow in tone.
All the other women looked at her in concern while Riss continued. “Well, this type of double treatment isn't something they've done before. In your records there were a lot of arguments about whether they should go with the brain or body regimen with you. In the end, they decided to give you both.
“The reason I'm worried is that their hypothesis is that because you're being bombarded with twice as many drugs as anyone else, it will affect you faster. But they really don't know what will happen, so they're monitoring your video and audio feeds closely.”
“So this is why Kate and Victor ran,” Lex said, almost to herself, but Riss nodded in response.
“That's actually what I was hoping we could talk about,” Riss said, looking sideways at Lex. “I tried to get out of that place once before so I'm well aware of what won't work, but from what I've seen of you and your planning skills, I'm betting you can wor
k out how to get us out for real.”
“I'm in,” Casey nodded. “I'm not going to stick around to be experimented on like a sick animal.”
Serena shook her head. “I can understand why you'd want to leave, but I'm staying here. I've been a rich girl too long and I'm too used to the money. As you said, Riss, they give me preferential treatment anyway, so I think they'll continue to make allowances for me. But I'll help you if I can, as long as it doesn't blow my cover. At least I'll turn a blind eye to anything you need to do.”
Lex stood suddenly, realizing she had a short amount of time to make it to the bathroom before she got sick. Her stomach felt so tied in knots it seemed it might tear its way through her abdomen, and her head pounded like she was being struck.
“I'll be right back,” she said to the others, almost fleeing the room.
She felt some kind deity must have been watching over her, because she found the empty ladies' room right away and no one else came in while she retched up the contents of her stomach. It didn't take too long, since she hadn't had much to eat that day, and Lex mentally thanked the people who cleaned the building, since her velvet dress remained clean when she got back up off the chilly tile floor. Quickly, she rinsed her mouth out, splashed her face with cold water, checked her dress in the mirror, which thankfully looked fine, and hurried back to the table.
“I'm sorry,” she said as she sat back down.
“Are you all right?” Casey asked, looking over in concern.
Lex sighed. “No, I'm actually not. I haven't told anyone because I've gotten suspicious of the doctors who come to see us, and I didn't want to worry anyone, but I have headaches now every day. I can't leave the facility for too long, either, or I feel sick. The headache gets worse and I have a queasy feeling until I go back. I have nightmares every night now. I'm really not all right, unfortunately.”