Chapter 2: Don't Feed the Animals

Stella looks up.
"Considering you might snap my neck, I'd rather not speak at all. I like being alive."

"Please, like I'm gonna kill you," Kat said, patting Stella once on the shoulder. "Who else am I gonna bounce ideas off of?"

Not really having a response, Revena t sat quietly, while inside his head he thought with Gestalt. Okay, any ideas on who these guys are?

None. It's not that they're equipment of style is unique....it's that it isn't. Your FBI, CIA, or any other number of organizations that I know of, use similar equipment, vehicles....even the driving tactics for evading surveillance.

Great. So we're being driven into the unknown....

"That other guy?" She suggested. "Or like, mount my head and talk to.yourself? It's not lIke I'd be able to resist you..."

Chortling, though still nervous, Kat said in response "Stella, short version I'm not a killer. So relax, and just do what I say, okay?"

"I already do what you say, Kat. Geez, at this rate we might as well be married, we squabble and order give enough." She teased.

"Yeah well I guess it is sort of a marriage; you're still technically the prisoner, and I'm the jailer," she said, smiling a little. At the same time, she sent Gray a message

Unknown wrote:

Return to the HQ, subject acquired.

Stella bit her lip.
"...don't suppose I can use my body and get special treatment, can i?"

Flicking her between the eyes, Kat said "Nope. Keep telling you, not gonna happen." Walking now for the door, she stopped, eyes downcast as she said gently "Stella....this...is looking to be a big day for me. I need you to be serious in it."

Stella rubbed her head. "I will be serious. But at least you know I have every reason to help you succeed. Alright? Relax. You're badass Kat Connor. Kicker of asses, Man-Eater of Awesomeness, and heartthrob of most lesbians. You got this."

Rolling her eyes at the last bit, Kat said "And I've got Stella Evans, hacker extraordinaire, and fighter of lost causes, on my side."

Stella chuckled. "Kat, in any MMO, which treasure is the most valuable? Which is the greatest of all?" She crossed her arms. "The hardest to get. Anyone can find an iron dagger. It takes true determination 5o find Holy Sword Excalibur."

"Do I look like a sword, or some piece of bling for you to wear?" Kat asked plainly. "I'm not some treasure to be found or won or taken possession of."

"Will you take the analogy and say thanks? Dammit Kat, I speak geek, not French. I leave french to the cheerleaders thinking it's the language of love."

In response, Kat replied, quite fluently in fact, "Et vous ne parvenez pas si merveilleusement à gagner ma chatte."

"You're a super secret agent, no fair." She grumbled.

"No, I just took French when I had the chance," Kat said, a cheeky grin on her face. "Come on, I need to make sure our interview rooms, again, are up to snuff with our assessments of Revenant and Shadow."

"I took advanced computer language. Makes more sense. Fuck, hacking Nexus makes more sense then girls. And yes I'm a girl. Is till don't get it." She sighs. "For Revenant, directed EMP and a fucking piano should do. For Shadow, tazers. Lots and lots orf tazers."

Snorting, Kat said in response "And yet our assessments show that Revenant's endurance can allow him to survive a car hitting him, though we've yet to test the EMP theory. That said," and at this, her face took on a near sickened look, "we know that.....armor piercing rounds work effectively on him. And while his abilities let him form melee weapons, he can't form anything explosive, so a titanium box should hold him."

Reaching the elevators, she said "As for Shadow, the room can be saturated with UV spectrum light if needed, and can be made airtight if needed. We don't know if the theory of him being capable of....phasing, through matter is accurate or not, but we'll find out I suppose."

Stella nods. "Electrify the outside. If he tries, he's deep fried."

"If that even works," Kat sighed. "Honestly, we're as ready as we can be and at the same time still ill-prepared." Smiling at a memory, she said then "You know, I said the same thing to James, the morning after I helped him study for a test." She looked Stella in the eyes and said "We pulled an all-nighter, sat through it at the kitchen table with his books splayed out and notes being written..... He wanted so badly to just say 'fuck it, I'm done.'"

"We all have those moments. What really proves our worth is our persistance to achieve what is set out as impossible." Was all Stella said.

"Trying to draw parallels to us?" Kat asked, eyebrow quirked up at the girl before her.

"Nope." Was all Stella said.

"Uh huh," Kat said, not buying it. But she wasn't going to pursue it. Walking off, she said "Come on, need to make sure the measuring equipment is working."

Stella followed quickly.

In truth, there wasn't much to really check up on; the instruments just needed to be activated and they would self-adjust on the fly. But it gave Kat, who was nervous as hell, something to do as she waited for their arrivals.

Marcus sat quietly as they made the trip or as quietly as he could be. "So. Hows everyone's day been? Look I know I may have threatened to stab all of you but now that we get to go to your base. It will be fun. Also tell me, who will we be talking to for these test. I heard most people who talk to me need therapy lessons afterwards." Marcus would say in his demonic voice with a laugh, his idea to confuse, scare, make laugh. He didn't care, boredom had it affects.

"Well I didn't know their were two streets with the almost same name and house. Gray would complain to Murphy, their last stop being a completely different street to the one that he thought it was until he got a message. Reading it, Grays eyes opened wide. "Murphy. Take me back to Odin, I have a Shadow to talk to." He would say as he looked to his driver.

No one spoke back to him, they were quiet during the ride. The windows were so tinted, James could barely see out of them to know where they going and had to rely on Gestalt to map out where they were passing through.

Eventually, they left the city, and arrived at the HQ, though neither James or Gestalt knew that. Driving down into the parking garage, the vehicle stopped though no one got out. "So.....is this where the ride ends?" he asked. For an answer, there was a loud whirring sound, and he could have sworn it felt like the ground shifted. Then it hit him: they were on a platform, sinking into the ground.

Murphy glanced back at Gray, before nodding and turning the car around. He didn't exactly like being a taxi driver but hey, they didn't even get very far anyway.

Marcus sat silently while they continued to drive, cracking his fingers every once in a while to move the boredom. Soon the car stopped and with Rev beating him to the question, a whirring sound could be heard and a shift in the ground. It was like an elevator. "Hey. Anyone wanna see a broken finger fix itself back into place?" Marcus would ask in boredom as he grabbed at his left hands pinkie. Waiting to see if anyone would answer.

"Dude," Revenant said, looking at Shadow with his blank expression, "we're taking an elevator down into a secret underground base! Show some excitement would you." That said, the tinted windows sorta cut down on the experience. All James could make out was that it was a diagonal elevator shaft, with orange lights spaced out evenly along the descent. They weren't in there long, arriving at the bottom in a new, larger garage. Well.....hangar, was the better term for it.

As the car door opened, the men inside coasted Revenant and Shadow out......and as they stepped onto the cool floor outside, there was a resounding clack of several dozen weapons being primed, all trained on the pair. "Gee, I wonder how you treat the girls you bring home," James joked.

IT WOULDN'T BE THE FIRST TIME. That voice worked though Marcus again as Rev made the comment of Underground base, involuntary making his hand flex and with a crack he snapped his pinkie back. "Dammit." He would growl as the door opened and they were.. asked to leave, Marcus followed Rev out and heard the click of weapons. And when Rev made his joke Marcus gave a small chuckle to it. Marcus looked back to his finger as it slowly began to... fix itself, so he hid it in his pockets, knowing it would work it's magic faster.

"Call this a precaution," one of the people surrounding them said. In addition to the guns, what looked like small searchlights were trained on Shadow, a filter over their lens' to blot out the full effect of their UV light. The same person said "I'm Commander Wyle, and you two are, for the moment, guests. Do not make us turn you into our prisoners."

Holding his hands up in a placating move, Revenant said "All this......for the two of us? Should I be flattered?" Wyle shook his head and said "Take however you want; fact is, your dangerous and we're not gonna ignore that fact. So why don't you do as asked for now, and in return we don't turn this into a fight?"

"Heh. Fight or not. I see multiple ways to escape as you talk CW" Marcus would say in his demonic voice as he hid his eyes away from the searchlights. "Mind turning those off, they tend to make a friend of mine blind." Marcus would say in response to the lights. The back of his shirt bulging before flattening as he said it.

"Can't do that," Wyle said. "Intel says this is one of the few weaknesses you've got. We're not about to let our guard down." Stepping forward Revenant said "While we're all still young dude. Come on, did you bring us here to point guns at us? We get enough of that outside."

Smirking, Wyle said then "We'll guide you to the rooms we're prepared. Try anything, and we will attack." Doing nothing beyond staring flatly back at Wyle, Revenant said "Sure thing. So, who're the guides?" A dozen soldiers stepped out, armed with heavy auto-rifles and decked in armor. Six split off and went to Revenant, the rest to Shadow, their guns sporting UV flashlight attachments. "Just follow us," one of them said.

Murphy got Gray back to HQ fairly quick; less traffic leaving the city than there was entering it after all. Parking up front, he led the way back inside through the front doors, going through the same checkpoint as usual. "They're being escorted to assessment now," Murphy said in the elevator, just done listening to his comm.

"Yay. My own escort." Marcus would say as he followed the six armed guys, wondering how a flashlight would be something that could stop him, concentrated it annoyed him but besides that not much else they could do. And then again, something gnawed at his mind and he had to focus to try and figure it out.

Think human. Think.

"How the hell did they acquire Shadow so quickly after I left?" Gray would say in annoyance as they stood in the elevator. "My wife is going to go insane. She doesn't like this country very much. We stayed here for a few years until our daughter.. died." gray would also say in annoyance, she was probably already sharpening one of the kitchen knifes as they stood their.

"My condolences on your daughter," Murphy said, "but as for the how we got them, I'm not quite sure. Someone will have more answers for you though I'm sure."

Revenant was escorted along with Shadow, and he made note of the turns they took, just in case a speedy exit was needed. They stopped at a door, the entrance already open. He didn't need much prompting, stepping inside....and the door closed shut behind him. "Yay," he said glumly.

Kat was.....waiting, with bated breath in the observation room. She watched monitors of Revenant and Shadow being escorted to the cells, though her attention was for no one but Revenant. If Stella was watching, she may have seen the way Kat's lips silently moved, as if speaking a word or name.

"Thank you." Gray would say as he listened to the man, seems he would have to find out from the higher ups indeed.

Marcus remained quiet for the rest of the walk till he was motioned to enter a room and in turn he entered. The door slamming shut behind him. "Wonder if you know I could escape here if I was in a straight Jacket." Marcus would say to the closet camera before finding a seat that allowed said camera to keep a good eye on him but it was also so he could stare at the little screen someone was watching him though. "I hate being locked up."

"Okay, Shadow is being kept in Cell #2," Murphy said as the elevator stopped and opened. "And you don't know the way.....okay, follow me."

James didn't bother sitting down, instead running a palm over the walls surface.

Titanium alloy, Gestalt said as the nanites spread over the surface in little tendrils, studying the material. With tungsten carbide mixed in for good measure. Eating through it would take time.....and we would not be able to break out.

So they've been studying......that's scary, James thought. Then, the door behind him opened, though he didn't turn around. "So, who are you guys?" he asked casually, still running a hand over the wall. "Not on the list of known government groups.....well funded, and know what to make your cells out of to hold us. But wiling to talk nice, so I wouldn't call you the UNESD, even if they hadn't been rendered defunct."

Then Kat, who had entered the cell and sat at the table, calmly said in a quite tone, "You know who I am, James."

Gray simply nodded and began to folly Murphy, even ushering him if it felt like he was going too slow. The old man wanted to see the kid again, call it crazy but they had a sort of connection when it came to Gray hunting him and Shadow always seeming to enjoy it. "Your too fun to die." He could have been kill then and their but no. Shadow allowed him to live because he was too fun.. Now it was time to see what this Shadow thought of him.

Murphy stopped outside the door to the second cell. "Go on," he said to Gray. "You get first crack at him."

He froze. Under his mask, James' eyes were wide as saucers and his mouth was frozen in a silent 'O'. Slowly, and with twitching arms he turned to cast his masked eyes on her. She couldn't tell, but his lips quivered as they neared a snarl. "You," he said in a quiet voice, and without the nanites altering it, "are not, Katherine Connor. She died, months ago in an explosion. So why don't you take off that mask, and tell me who you really are!"

She didn't flinch, not once at the tone of his voice. This wasn't the first time he had gotten angry at her.....though she admitted, this was the time he was ever this angry. "James," she said, urging him gently, "I'm not some imposter. It is me, Kat. You're sister."

"LIAR!" he screamed, and he surged forward and ripped the table from the floor and sent it flying to the wall. Kat blanched back as her tablet went flying, bouncing off the wall like the table. She remembered, somewhat foolishly, that he was still capable of enhanced strength....breaking the truth to him like this so soon, was reckless, careless of her. But it was too late now. "Because the real Kat, my own sister, wouldn't have let me believe she was dead all this time," James all but screamed.

"thanks." Gray would say as he entered and eyed the mask that brought back many memory's, Marcus turned his head to the man and stood, they were almost the same height with Marcus being a bit taller then the older man.

"Hello their. I guess your going to ask me question and all that nonsense." Marcus would say in his demonic voice. And Gray took a step back, he didn't make his normal insane quips, it was like the Shadow before him had never met with the older man. "Have we met before? Your face is eerie recognizable with a face from long ago." Marcus would say as he looked to the man.

"Shadow. It's only been two Years. It's Gray, don't you remember?" Gray would ask and saw the man look to the ground before looking back up.

"Oh. I guess you met him. Hate to break it to you Gray... But I am not the same man you knew all those years ago. He's locked away in my sub conscious." Marcus would declare but kept a thought on the name... Gray. It was so oddly familiar and not from just years ago. "Tell me Gray. What your last name?"

"Wasn't my choice," she said, clearly frustrated. "After that explosion.....the people I work with were on standby, nearby which was how they got to me so fast." Still glaring at her with the quiet look, James growled "Nothing you're saying, even comes close to convincing me you're Kat." At that, he flicked his arm at her, the nanites extending out to form an all too familiar blade. "Why should I believe it's you, and not just carve my way out of here?"

A security team was about to burst through the door, guns blazing at Revenant but Wyle called them off. Kat still had this, if her calm--albeit caught off guard--expression, showed anything. "That night," she calmly said, " last September, you snuck out of the house to go do more of your parkour stuff, remember? Ran all the way to a construction yard where it was nothing but steel beams." He still held the blade on her, but beneath the mask there was uncertainty on his face. Fear....and a flicker of hope.

"You had climbed all the way to the top when I got there," Kat said, smiling faintly. "I called you, asked where you were and you said you were at--" "7/11," James breathed, cutting her off. "Yeah," Kat said, stepping closer and past the blade, the weapon now hanging over her shoulder. "Then I told you to look down, and we both stared at eachother when you saw me on the sidewalk." By now, the blade retracted, forming back into his hand. "Kat?" he asked, a pleading sound to his voice. Tears welling in her eyes, she nodded once and said "It's really me, little bro."

Gray took a step back from what Shadow said, subconscious? Looks liked he did suffer from split personality disorder.. That or he was something more then human. "How bout this. I tell you my last for your first. Deal?" This was a small test to see if the kid still liked to make deals, his old self always tried to offer deals like it was a job. Marcus walked to the man and held a hand out.

"Deal. Names Marcus." He would say with a shake from Grey. Seemed he stilled liked to take deals like the guy in his subconscious and now he had to hold his end of the bargain. But the name still brought an old pain inside the mans heart, figuratively speaking.

"My names Grey Soul and I know. Sounds a little stupid." Grey would say with a small chuckle but was a little surprised when Shadow let his hand go uickly and began a small laugh.

"Soul.. heheh. Soul, your the one who hunted him... Hahahaha." Marcus would laugh before stopping suddenly, his face blank but hidden in his mask as he remembered the whole reason this started. the cat. "Tell me. Hows Sora?" Marcus would ask and only received a confused, angry stare from his old man.

"How do you know of Sora, she died... How do you know." Grey would almost yell at Marcus, him knowing about Sora was impossible. He wasn't around when Sora died.

"Oh. Was that before or after Bella?" Marcus would ask only to feel hands on his shirts neck pulling him closer and a fist striking his mask a crack appearing over the right side of his mask.

HOW DO YOU KNOW OF BELLA?" Grey would basically yell into Marcus's mask as a fragment of it fell, his cheek and a bit of his mouth seen by any who looked. "HOW?"

Instead of mocking, instead of some insulting grin or words, grey looked at the kids eyes and saw a sort of fear, sadness yet it wasn't this that made him like this, it was something else. A hand grabbing onto Greys hand that held Marcus by the shirt. "The Cat, is in danger. I need to go. She needs... She needs.." Marcus couldn't finish, their father was here, and if he was here then she could go. She could live a normal life without this. "You take her and leave."

And just like that, the nano-epidermis dissolved back into James' skin, leaving the young teenager standing there, eyes now wet with tears and his face awash with emotions. Kat stood frozen, unsure of what would happen next. A hug? Questions? Fainting? Whatever she expected, she wasn't quite expecting James to fly at her and start pummeling her sides with half-hearted punches. "You lying, stupid, arrogant......" he yelled, eyes shut and fists still hitting her rib-cage. He said a few more words, before he felt her arms wrap around him in a hug, his own just going limp at his sides. "Asshole," was the last thing he muttered, right before she said "Yeah.....I missed you too."

A few seconds later, they were sat at the table. And James was flying his mouth off with questions. "Slow down there James," she said, giving a sheepish grin. "There's what I can tell you, and what I can't. So let's start with the can: I faked my death so that the people who were gonna be after me, wouldn't come after me. You were supposed to come with me, but my plans got......derailed, no thanks to that nano-tech slime you've got on you."

Slime? This is what the great Kat Conner calls me? James, can I please join the conversation and set her straight?

Oi, she's my back-from-the-dead sister, I'll do the talking here, James said to Gestalt. "Yeah well, no one ever said the best laid plans always go according to plan," he said. "Wait, who said that?" he asked, mockingly while Kat had a disapproving frown on her face. "Oh right, it's coming back to me....." At that, she slapped her palms down on the table and said "You think this is funny James?"

"What cat what the hell do you mean." Grey said a little calmly as his rage died down a little, Shadow wasn't making any sense to him. Before whenever he spoke he always tried to confuse you yet tell you something that ended in a threat or an explanation to how he would try to kill you. Now he spoke of a cat.

"Bell.. Is still with us. And the Cat needs saving. The cat." Grey let go o the rambling man and watched as he walked to the metal door, rising a fist to start banging on it it before calling out that he needs to leave, his mask could be seen at the corner of an eye regrowing. But now Grey was thinking about what he said, Bella was still alive? It couldn't be possible, no she would have gone to the police unless she was the Cat. The beast that's been reported to have been with the vigilantes. And if one and the other were the same then his girl was in trouble and Shadow knew. Shadow wanted to save her and the only thing he could ask was why. Instead he would wait to see what the guards did. And if not he would have to talk to Kat, get her to try and talk them to getting him to leave and he had to do so that he didn't say his daughter but every second after that thought made it more and more unlikely to go his way.

"I don't know, I can go back to pissed off if you want?" James shot back. "Christ Kat, what do you want me to say? How do you expect me to really, right now, respond to all this?" he demanded. Sighing, Kat rubbed her eyes. In all honesty, he had a point. Her fantasy version of a tearful reunion, where he'd forgive her and welcome his sister back with pen arms.....was just that. A fantasy. The bulk of a year between them, and he had been running around, being a vigilante. And nearly getting killed in the process; she knew exactly how many times he had come close to death. The mutant goring him through the gut, the missile from Goliath that nearly blasted him apart.....every time she'd think of the footage, her heart would nearly stop. What he had been through, put himself in the line of fire of....was enough to make anyone changed.

"What I was expecting," she said, "was different. And unfair to expect of you, given everything that's happened.....that you've been through." At that, she smiled slightly, looking at him with saddened eyes. "Sometimes, I forget that you're not the same little brother I had five months ago." Looking away with discomfort, James said "Kat, this is so fresh for me, it's practically a new car. Can't expect me to just....well, be a hundred percent there, right? But I'm glad--more than glad, happy--that you're actually alive." And there was no lie in his voice, the not so subtle shifts in his posture or in his smile, the twinkle in his eyes. "So who are these guys? Gestalt--the AI that runs the nanites--can't place them. There's no hint of them anywhere that he's looked on the web."

"And they've worked very hard to keep it that way," Kat said, now to business. "They're a.....clandestine, doesn't quite cover it. These people have the power of a military, but from what I can tell, they're the shadows in dark rooms. But, doesn't make them evil. Gray maybe, but only because.....well, these days, you need to work in the gray to bring light to the world." James gave her a flat look and said "Didn't you tell me the road to hell was paved wi--" She cut him off then, waving her hand as she said "I know what I said. And believe me, not everything they do glitters in gold. But they do have lines they won't cross."

"So why?" he asked. "I mean, what are they? You haven't even told me their name yet." Leaning back in her chair, she said "James, that's......not classified, but dangerous knowledge." Silent and with once more a flat look, he said "Sis, have you seen what I've become. Danger is something I can handle." Shaking her head, Kat said "You've just been dealing with either bank robbers in mechanized armor, drug peddlars with super-steroids, or mutants. Dangerous sure.....but none of them wield power the same way that the people who'd want to get an in--any in they could grab--with the people I work with, do."

Marcus gave up on knocking and went back to his seat, it was ether he would go without trouble or he was leaving on his own account, sure that may have meant he would get stuck in dirt for some time but he didn't like being here more and more now that he learned what he learned but it was too early for his father to know everything. He needed her to tell him. "Mind telling them your done and that I request to leave and if they do not comply or send me someone well equipped to handle me I'm leaving myself." Marcus would say and Grey gave a small nod before walking to the door, allowing it to open before he closing as he left and he walked to the nearest man and relayed the message along with adding that they might want to be quick before the equivalent of Jack the ripper appeared.

"So what, you got yourself into a James Bond film here?" James asked, though no one smiled. Kat sighed and said "Look, right now it's too complicated to discuss in a single conversation. Right now, I'm here to asses you, orders from on high." "Asses me?" Jams asked. "What, like a threat assessment?"

She gave him a look, an all too familiar look like he had asked a dumb question. "James, you've got alien nanomachines in your body that let you do all kinda of freaky, dangerous stuff and have also admitted to there being an AI that controls them, the same AI that I'm assuming hacked the planet while you were in the hospital." At that moment, Gestalt, who had been busy worming his way into Kat's tablet, the only other piece of electronics in the room he could sense, popped onto her screen. At least, it was an icon James never saw before, what looked like an eight-sided dye of soft blue light. "Guilty as charged," he said, and made Kat jump.

Murphy soon came after Gray relayed the message, walking into the cell with Shadow, a new person accompanying him. Or rather, he accompanied the new person, as protection. "Hello there," the new person, a middle-aged man in a plain white lab-coat said. "My name is Waldo and I'm here to do an assessment of you."

"It better be a rather quick one. Or you both go to a hospital bed with missing legs.... And Waldo.. hehe. Waldo.. Hehehe. I love your name by the way." Marcus would quip in his demonic voice before laughing a little more.

Grey watched the two before finding another fellow to talk too. "I need to talk to Kat or someone who can get to him going out sooner." He would say as he looked back to the cage. You better be right you bastard.

"Sorry sir, Ms. Conner is busy talking to Revenant," the guard explained.

Waldo's cool facade didn't so much as flicker. "Oh I'm sure a lot of people would be interested in seeing you try," he said calmly. Jotting some notes on his data-pad, he said "So, Shadow.....according to our files, you are capable of 'manipulating darkness' or as my colleagues interpret it, have control over the absence of light. Phase shifting through materials......well, we'll get a chance to test out some bits of the cage....." Then he made a mock sound of surprise and said "Ah yes, and you have control issues."

Once Kat had calmed down, she immediately said to her tablet (something she never imagined herself doing) how the fuck did you get into my system?" Immediately, Gestalt replied through the speakers of the device "It wasn't easy. Between bouncing off your brother's cell-phone in a faraday-cage onto your tablet and working through your firewalls--my compliments by the way, impressive work for it to have taken me this long--it was rather.....strenuous, isn't the right word. Difficult, is the best term I can think of. Hello there Katherine Conner, a pleasure to meet you...so to speak. I am Gestalt."