MAU: INFINITE CRISIS, PART 6
By: Set3

Peter was on the warpath. He had since recovered from his impromptu meeting with the wall in Mike's lab shortly after Nelly was moved out. Crystal was there to check him over to see if he had a concussion and as she checked him over she let slip of Nelly's injuries. This had upset Peter immensely; someone on his team was injured on his watch. After a flurry of questions about Nelly's state all Crystal could tell him was that she had been sent to Nicolette's infirmary. With that information Peter was off running through the halls of the ship with Crystal struggling to keep up. On reaching the door to Nicolette's infirmary he was stopped by two guards. "Let me through," he ordered them but they remained steadfast.

"We're sorry sir, but we were told by Nicolette to not let anyone in. That includes you sir," the one on the left told him.
With anger on his face he was in a flurry of motion as he wrested the guards' weapon closest to him. Just as he was about to make use of the gun and force his way in the other guard already had his pointed straight at Peters head. Crystal who'd finally caught up uttered a surprised cry when she saw the three.

"Stand down sir," the guard warned. His finger was on the trigger.

It was at this time that Nicolette had opened the door and was startled to find the standoff transpiring outside her door. Her shock only lasted a second before she let out an exasperated sigh, "Put those down, I already have my hands full and don't need you putting holes in each other," she said as her accent grew. A sign of how stressed she was.

Peter immediately relinquished the SMG to the guard he took it from and stepped past them to Nicolette. "What happened to Nelly? Was this all some kind of test to see what would happen if someone put the exo-suit on?" he shouted. Nicolette put her hand up causing Peter to pause in his accusations.

"I have already been over this with Mike. And he assures me that they had no way of knowing that the suit had this capability. Now, as for Nelly herself, her injuries are... Unusual."

Peter's eyes narrowed, "What do you mean?"

Nicolette dismissed the guards before replying, "She has been paralyzed in a way that I have never seen before. Every point the connectors from the suit had touched her body had injected a foreign substance that has cut the nervous system in such a way that prevents voluntary movement with the exception to breathing. But even though she can't move, she still has full feeling in all her limbs," she said clearly still puzzled by that. "There is one thing though."

"What?"

"If the cord Mike was using hadn't been plugged into the chest piece then it would have caused her rib cage to open. As it stands, the only thing she can move is her head and neck."

Peter thought this over a minute. "Can I see her?"

Nicolette looked back to the door behind her, "She has been under a lot of stress and trauma since the accident. Despite her immobility, she is still as vocal as ever and made it clear that she doesn't want to see anyone right now."

"You know I have to see her. She's a member of my team and that makes her my responsibility," Peter told Nicolette.

Nicolette hesitated before stepping to the side, "Just keep it brief. She has been through a lot and it still takes her awhile to calm down."

"It wouldn't be Nelly if she didn't," Peter said with the faintest of smiles as he opened the door. Almost immediately a very angry voice called out.

"I TOLD YOU TO GET THE FUCK OUT!" Nelly screamed.

Peter entered anyways and closed the door behind him. He looked at Nelly laying on one of the beds looking out the window beside her. "Is that any way to address your commanding officer?" Peter asked trying to sound jovial. Nelly continued looking out the window.

"Get the fuck out, Sir," she said still not turning to look at Peter.

Peter walked over to her bed and sat in the chair beside it. "Nell, look at me." She didn't respond. He repeated himself, "Nell? Look at me."

"I don't know how they do it," Nelly said finally, still not turning to face Peter.

"What do you mean?"

"You've been on tour," she said referring their service in the military.

"Yeah, a lot of good and bad things happened then," Peter said not sure where she was going with it.

"We lost a lot of fellow soldiers while on tour. A lot of us died for reasons no one really knows anymore and when we die, we get shits bitching about how it was god's will that we got what we deserved."

"Yeah well, there's always going to be people like that no matter where you go," Peter said with distaste.

"What I'm getting at is I can't figure out how those who get crippled like me or just loose an arm can go on all happy go lucky."

Peter was starting to worry then she finally turned to face him and was shocked at what he saw. She was crying. In all the years he'd known her, He had never once seen her cry. Even when back in the army she had gotten shot, she was more pissed off than anything. But, here now, she was a totally different person.

"I'm fucking paralyzed and I can still feel everything! I can feel my fingers, I can feel everything but I can't move a fucking thing. You know how hellish this is? I've seen plenty of guys get fucked up on tour but at least they probably don't have to feel their bodies wasting away."

Peter didn't know what to say. He wanted to say something reassuring but he couldn't think of anything. He then noticed that Nelly's blonde hair had fallen on her face. He brushed the strands out of her face and put his hand on hers. "I'll let you get some rest for now," he then got up and walked to the door, "I'll come back later and see how you're doing okay?"

Nelly just gave a dismissive snort before turning back to the window.

Peter left and closed the door behind him and turned to Nicolette who was talking softly to Crystal. "Keep me in the loop please. If there's any change, especially for the better, then let me know right away. I don't care what I'm doing at the time, just let me know," he told Nicolette.

She nodded, "Of course."

Peter took a deep breath sparing a glance in Nelly's direction before walking off down the hall.

Nicolette led Crystal into her office to change Nelly's bandages. Nelly had calmed down considerably and as they drew back her sheets they could see her bandages had just started to bleed through. Starting from the feet both Nicolette and Crystal removed the bandages and cleaned the wounds before replacing the dressings.

When Crystal finished cleaning the wound on Nelly's foot she noticed a small black speck in the middle. Fearing an infection she called Nicolette's attention and pointed to it. Nicolette made a comment about how it was too early for it to start to scab over and asked Nelly if she felt any pain. She shook her head no. Still concerned, Nicolette took a swab and probed the black spec for a sample to test. Crystal, for her part, retrieved some more things to hopefully remove the object. Nicolette put away the swab for later testing then grabbed a scalpel. She tried lightly scraping and cutting the black spec while watching Nelly for discomfort. She was able to get a small scraping before Nelly cried out in excruciating pain, Nicolette let out a swear in Russian and had Crystal put fresh dressings on her wounds with a coating of antibiotics while she checked the other bandages. To Nicolette's dismay there was a solid black spec at the center of every wound on each point on her limbs and the ones at the nap of Nelly's neck and her tail bone. Nicolette tried not to show it for Crystal and Nelly's sake but she was worried. If this was some sort of invasive infection she would have to consider amputation if she can't remove them but that would cause problems for the ones on her torso. Once they were done applying fresh bandages, Nicolette had Crystal run the samples over to Frank's lab for testing. It went without saying that she wanted a rush on it.

It was later in the evening that Frank had shown up at her door with the results. After a long day, Nicolette had looked up to discover that it was well past midnight as she walked to the door sparing a glance to Nelly before opening the door to admit Frank.

"You look like hell," Frank said as he handed Nicolette a clip board.

Nicolette took the clipboard with a soft chuckle and flipped through the results, "Thanks, I feel worse. With having to brush up on medical theory for our little girl down in the main lab, and Nelly's accident I haven't had much time to..." she paused as she read the last page. She then pushed Frank out of her office and closed the door as she continued the conversation in the hall. "These are..."

Frank nodded, "Nanites, the mechanical version."

Even though Nicolette was weary after such a long day, what Frank just told her made her eyes shoot wide open, "Frank, do you know what this means?"

Frank gave a quizzical look, "That this stuff is dangerous?"

Nicolette shook her head, "No. It means that the nanites already have programming to make surgical alterations to the human body with exact precision. Once we can program these nanites to do what we want, we can virtually eliminate the ailments of the modern world, much sooner than I could have hoped to," she said excitedly.

"You hoped for?" Frank asked with a raised eyebrow.

"We could hope for," Nicolette corrected herself fiddling with her hands nervously.

Frank just shrugged and left to return to his lab leaving Nicolette making a silent promise to herself to make sure that no one would have to go through what her and her late husband did.

000000

As the week progressed, the black specks on Nelly's body grew in size closely resembling the connectors on Noel's body. Nicolette was sure to maintain a careful watch over the nanites progression to the final stage. Unfortunately for Nelly, she remained paralyzed.

During this, Mr. Tonaon had given a press conference to address the reasons why the projects were moved off the ship so suddenly by way of giving the small group of selected reporters a partial tour of the ship. He showed them the hanger for the three helicopters and the offices, marketing rooms until finally stopping at the doors to the main labs using this as the point in the tour to answer their questions.

"Mr. Tonaon," a male reporter started, "I'm sure that you've been asked this before, but why make the headquarters of your company a boat? And furthermore, why make it look like a world war two aircraft carrier?"

Mr. Tonaon smiled at the question and replied with an air of suave confidence, "My Company has holdings in many countries around the world and I believe that it is a prudent practice that the main office of a company should be mobile. I like to think that it sends the message that we genuinely care about the places we put our factories and offices in. And to answer your second question, I have always had a fondness for the aircraft carriers of that era and while I can't have the real thing, I would like to think I am keeping a piece of American history alive. Next question please," he said before pointing to a woman in the back of the group.

"Mr. Tonaon. Why has your company off-loaded its industrial projects? According to my sources, none of them were ready for mainstream production at your shore offices."

There was a briefest flicker of anger that ran across Mr. Tonaon's face before it returned to its friendly looking business look. "It is true that a majority of the projects we have been working on were not ready to be put into production for the public consumption," he stated.

"Can you tell us why?" the woman prodded as the others shoved their cameras and microphones closer to him.

Mr. Tonaon looked at the expectant faces a moment before answering, "I can't go into details right now but my team has stumbled on a new way to produce energy more efficiently. I can't make any promises about it yet but the research being done behind these doors behind me will be put to the benefit of everyone everywhere," just before he finished talking the reporters instantly began shouting questions which Mr. Tonaon brushed off and gestured for the security that were keeping the crowd out of the more sensitive areas of the ship to usher them out and back to the dock.

As the press left and were finally out of sight, his pleasant smile fell away to a frown. The apparent news of one of the reporters "sources" is in fact true and he was prepared to give the same answer regardless, the fact she had a source to call upon told him his company had a security breach. He gestured to his personal assistant that was immediately beside him as he instructed him to find the leak and plug it. Once that was out of the way he returned to his office, the tour he conducted may have helped his company's public image but it was still a distraction to business and work was pilling up.

00000

While the past week had come by without notice, Jeffrey's team was frustrated by their progress, or lack thereof, in finding where Henry might have taken Noel. Major continued to look for her searching the net from the computer, John kept her company, while Andria trained on the firing range behind their home base. Jeffrey had gone to the government hospital to see his sister. Every time he came, he was crushed when he asked the doctors if there was any change and shook their head in the negative. After he entered his sister's room he replaced the flowers with the ones he brought with him. He then sat down next to her.

"Hello Hayley," he started, "Sorry I haven't been around much... Work's been keeping me pretty busy and all," Jeffrey then stopped for several long minutes holding back tears threatening to come out. Once he got back under control he continued, "I met someone a week ago, she's really pretty. She kind of reminds me of you in some ways." He paused. "From the moment I met her, she's already had so much trouble fall into her lap, mostly because of Henry, but she made some great friends with me and my friends. I think... I think that Henry might have taken her. I can't let him keep hurting people. I know that he's family and you wouldn't want anything bad to happen to him either but at the rate he's going at... I don't know how I'm going to stop him." He took her hand in his and sat keeping the fourteen year old girl company; the heart rate monitor was the only break in the silence.

00000

Peter had just returned to the lab to start the day shift for guarding the girl. Despite that the staff was told to treat her like and object he couldn't force himself to think like that. He was told she was nothing more than a machine but the way he acted kept him from thinking that. Unfortunately some people, much to his distaste, didn't share his moral fiber. Peter steeled himself as he relieved the guard coming off the night watch.

"Well Peter, I have to tell you, I love the grave shift," said Don Wait, the guard Peter was relieving said.

"And why is that?" Peter asked tiredly as he took his position by the door to the main lab housing Noel's chamber.

"Well, during the grave shift, not too many people are up right?" he asked in a jovial tone.

"Right," Peter acknowledged not sure where Don was going with this.

"Since no one's up at that hour, it means that one could exercise some... Personal freedoms," Don's expressions were dripping with innuendo at this point, a fact that left Peter feeling uneasy.

"Let's just say that it gives one... Opportunities to find out just how life-like that thing we got caged up really is. I mean, I can't get that weird get-up it has out of the way so I can get a the good stuff but it's the small things that keep the grave shift interesting," he said with a smug look on his face.

"Now listen here Wait," Peter said as he took a step forward before Don pushed him back against the wall and got in his personal space putting his face inches from Peter's.

"Oh yeah? And what are you going to do about it huh? You gonna sick Nelly on me? Everybody knows that she's a cripple now because of her usual stupid shit. And Third? The guy's a pussy. You got no friends here. Your team, if you can call it that, is no longer the best now that Nelly's out of the picture. And nobody gives a fuck around here what you did in Afghanistan or Iraq or whatever it was you crawled out of to slink over here to get your high and mighty position here on this boat," He backed up and pointed to the science team working in the lab, "You think any of those people give a fuck what I did to that thing they got strung up? They don't care what anyone does so long as it still works in the end. So fuck off and keep your "moral fiber" for someone who gives a shit, okay?"

And with that, he left Peter to watch over the lab and stew.

Meanwhile Mike had been working with his own team as they continued to work on the hardsuits. They were having better luck with the green Linna hardsuit and were able to remove the transmitter from it. Despite their initial use of Noel's hardsuit they couldn't perform any work due to the incredible interconnectivity of its systems. He had Tom searching for suitable candidates to increase the staff so they could make some headway on the project. They were still working on the battery but they were able to co-op the power supply by hooking it into cables from the ships power grid. After awhile Mike left the lab and walked over to Nicolette's office to run over an idea he had with her.

On entering he saw that Crystal was tending to Nelly by helping her eat. He had to force himself not to smile at Nelly's immobility since he knew what would happen if they went through with his idea. He walked over to Nicolette, once again taking note of her backside as he approached and cleared his throat to announce himself. Nicolette didn't respond as she was too engrossed with whatever she was looking at in the microscope until Mike cleared his throat again which elicited a distracted grunt from her. Taking this as a cue to talk, Mike took a breath, "So, how's work?" he asked mentally groaning to himself.

"What do you want Mike?" she replied, still distracted but less than thrilled to hear him.

"Progress on the Exo-suit 1 has stalled since the accident with Nelly but we've made great strides with the Exo-suit 2 though."

"Uh-huh," she said already dismissing Mike assuming he was trying to flirt again with her.

"The reason I'm here now is that I want to borrow Nelly. I'd like her to wear the Exo-suit 2 so we can gather more data to help us figure out some of the inner working of the machine."

Nicolette was still looking through the microscope until she heard Mike's suggestion. She then sat straight up and turned around to face Mike, her accent thickening slightly, "You can't be serious putting her in that thing again. She has suffered far too much trauma for me to consider entertaining what you're suggesting."

"She won't be wearing the one that paralyzed her," he argued, "The green Exo-suit is far less advance than the first one so we should be able to control what might happen."

"Listen to yourself, "should be able to control what happened", tells me that you don't know what will happen let alone control it. I won't let you risk her again."

"Or what? She's already paralyzed. There's not much more the Exo-suits can do. Besides, if it does work, when we put her in it and turn it on she might regain her independence and be able to move on her own again. She was in the army, you think someone like that is happy to let people spoon feed her and change her diapers for her when she craps herself."

"...I," Nicolette stuttered.

"And who's to say that if we put her in again the thing won't fix what the first Exo-suit did to her. And if it doesn't? Fine then, by all accounts from the data my team and I collected so far, she should be able to move on her own again. Think about it, if we can find a way to miniaturize the Exo-suits, we could give thousands of people who were stuck in a wheel chair mobility and independence again. And considering the properties of the first suit, once we harvest and modify enough nanites, we can start helping people with neural diseases." Mike notice that what he just said struck a chord somewhere deep with Nicolette and smiled inwardly to himself as he continued, "If we succeed here that we can do away with expensive and dangerous surgeries since they won't be needed anymore. A simple injection and however long it takes for the nanites to take effect and you're done. What I'm trying to say is we need a foundation to work with and helping people walk again will give us notice in the medical community not to mention the capital needed so we can do the nanite work. At the rate we're going now with two and a half teams that barely know what they're doing it'll take several decades if not centuries to make this a reality. We need to focus our effort on one thing at a time at least." He saw Nicolette begin to fidget. "Do you really want anyone else to go through what you went through?" he asked her, knowing he was striking a low blow.

"NYET, OKAY!" she shouted with her now strong accent. "But, Nelly is still my patient. We talk to her first and if she says no, then that is the end of it, okay?" she was visibly holding back tears now.

All I ask is a chance," Mike said softly giving Nicolette a moment to collect herself before they confronted Nelly with Mike's proposal. Surprising to both of them Nelly agreed to the proposal, she wasn't enthusiastic about it but she offered no objections. Thanks to the inside of the ship being designed like a five-star hotel they were easily able to move her to the labs by way of wheelchair only a few people they past made any murmurs of Nelly's condition. Once they arrived, Nicolette and Crystal helped Nelly into a sensor suit that would give them more data when she was put into the hardsuit. A day earlier Mike had his team construct a contraption that would help ease Nelly into the suit without having to worry about a limb not mining up with the connector in the suit or a finger not making it into the right slot. The staff had jokingly called the contraption "The shoehorn" which surprisingly didn't get any reaction out of Nelly who'd seemed distant the entire time and only responded as needed when asked or told something.

"Okay Nelly," Mike said from the computer off to the side, "We have made some progress on the Exo-suit 2's battery but we still can't recharge it properly. So, we currently have the suit hooked up to the ships grid. The test we made showed no problems but if you feel any abnormal heat buildup in the exo-suit then please tell me and we'll cut the power and get you out. Both exo-suits seemed to have a failsafe that opens to let the wearer out but just in case I have some people standing by to cut you out. Understand?"

"Just start the damn thing up already," Nelly said flatly.

Mike nodded and turned on the power. The hardsuit seemed to hum as its systems came to life and sealed her inside it. Soon enough Nelly was standing, clad in the Hardsuit minus the helmet with only the stand to hold the suit upright to keep her steady. "How does it feel?" Mike asked.

Nelly took a deep breath, "It's much easier to breath than the last one," she commented.

Mike nodded and typed some things into the computer that caused the stand to drop down leaving physical contact with the suit. "Can you try moving around please?" he instructed.

Nelly hesitated before looking down at her armor clad self and cautiously brought her hands and arms up till they were level with her shoulders. She then straightened her arms out in front of her before bringing her hands in closely and experimented with wiggling her fingers. As she did this she had taken a few steps forward dragging the thick power cables attached to her back behind her. For the first time since the accident she smiled, "I can..." she stopped as she wiggled her fingers some more.

Nicolette, who was happy to see that she was mobile again called out, "What's wrong?"

Nelly dropped her hands to her sides and looked back at them, "I still can't move," she said returning to her previous emotionless state.

Nicolette was confused and looked to Mike who offered no answers, "But you are moving right now." she stated incredulously.

"The suit's moving for me!" Nelly snapped. "Just tell me what you want me to do so we can get this shit over with." she said.

Nicolette was taken aback by her sudden outburst but accepted Nelly's response for now. She then turned to Mike who began to instruct Nelly through basic movements. A few hours later they were done and pulled Nelly out of the hardsuit and wheel her back to the ships infirmary.
As Nicolette and Crystal lowered her back into the bed Nicolette asked her a question, "Why weren't you more excited to stand on your own again?"

Nelly just turned her head so she could look out the window, "Forget it. You wouldn't understand if I told you so just leave me alone until Mike wants me to put the suit on again.":

Nicolette nodded and pushed a button off to the side that activated the hidden wall panels that silently slid into place so Nelly could have some privacy.

A few hours later in the evening Mike was in one of the computer labs with bleary eyes as he looked over the new data scrolling across the screen as Tom came in. Mike looked over at Tom when he noticed a man walking behind him with a large briefcase. The man was tall and had short, dark wavy hair that looked to have a tinge of red to it as well. He was wearing and expensive looking business suit but the man looked as if he wasn't afraid of getting dirty either. Mike sat back in his chair and turned to Tom with a sigh, "Tom, I'm way too busy to talk to one of the suits right now," He turned to the man, "No offense sir." he added.

Tom just let a big smile on his face, "It just so happens that this guy is going to be joining our team."

Mike jerked up in his chair, "What?"

The man extended his hand to shake Mikes, "It's true. I've already signed the necessary paperwork and I'm quite eager to start working on your..." he paused looking for the right word, "Mechanical project."

"Uh-huh," Mike said with a raised eyebrow, "Can you excuse me for a moment please?" he said before turning to Tom. Mike waited till the man was out of the room before he turns to Tom. "How much did you tell him about what we're working on?"

"Just that we are working on advanced robotics, he actually gave me some very apt descriptions about the Exo-suit 1," he said to Mike shocked response.

"I... Is he one of the people that worked on the suits before we recovered it?

Tom shook his head, "No, he just told me that he witnessed a demonstration of the Exo-suit 1's capabilities."

Mike just sat back in his chair laughing, "How much is he asking to keep quiet then?"

Tom just shrugged his shoulders, "He didn't say anything about wanting a bribe. What I got from talking to him is that he's more interested in working on the suits than any hush money."

Mike just rubbed his eyes and flinched slightly, his nose had healed up fine but was still tender in some spots, and nodded to Tom as he got up, "Okay then. If he signed the papers then that means he cleared the background checks right?" Tom nodded. "Alright, let's go show him the suits then." He quickly turned back to save his work and encrypt it on the computer before shutting it down and leaving the computer lab.

Mike and Tom lead the man to the lab wear the hardsuits were kept. As they walked in the man was immediately drawn to Exo-suit 1, "Ah yes, this was the one I saw in Action," he said in admiration as he ran his hand over the smooth armor.

"Tom tells me you saw a demonstration of the exo-suit," Mike queried.

The man nodded, "Admitingly I snuck in, so I'm not privy to the inner workings of the suit but I can give you a fair amount in what it is capable of," he said as he knelt down touching the left gauntlet. "It's capable of sustained flight and in these gauntlets holds two sets of weapons that I noticed. It can fire some form of energy and closer to the knuckles," he said as he felt the silted panel that ran just above the fingers of the gauntlet, "Holds a nasty blade. I assume that each arm holds the same weapons," he said as he stood up brushing the wrinkles out of his slacks. "Have you found what powers it yet?" he asked as he turned to Mike.

Mike, had the look of a deer in the headlights, this guy knew far too much, "Well, I... We have found what powers it but..."

"Say no more," the man said putting up his hands in cheerful resignation, "I was just curious. Before we go any further I just want to reaffirm that I have no interest in profiting off of anything you have here or taking credit for any of it. I'm quite happy in remaining nameless in the history books. I only ask because I like to think outside the box and if I could see the whole picture then I might be able to speed up the process. I'm quite the engineer," he said with somehow no hint of exaggeration. Mike was beginning to become a little afraid of this guy, he already knew too much and he didn't want anything extra. His gut was telling him to ditch the guy but with Mr. Tonaon continually pushing for results. With a heavy sigh he held out a hand and gestured for the man to follow. Tom stayed behind with the hardsuits to work on them some more.

The two remained silent as they walked through the corridors of the ship the man remarking once about the fancy decor to which Mike mumbled an affirmative and they continued on until they finally reached the door to the main lab. Before He opened the door he turned to the man again, "Just so we're clear. You are an independent worker and everything you work on and see is to be considered company secret. If you
breach the contract you signed then you should expect to say good bye to any finances you have and be sent to jail for the rest of your life."

The man nodded again, "If I break the contract I signed then I will accept any punishment the company you work for decides to give me."

With that clear and out of the way Mike took a breath and sighed as he opened the door. They quickly passed through and were a bit surprised when Crystal came up behind them but continued to the second set to reveal Noel still hanging from his harness in his cage. Crystal had gone over to Noel to take another sample of nanites from Noel while Mike and his new employee went off to the side to a bank of monitors that were tied to the connectors on Noels body.

"After we found the Exo-suits, we found that the girl, or rather the subject as we've come to call it, was emitting an energy pulse that shorted out our satellite. That's how we were able to find it in fact," He told him. "Somehow, whoever designed her used technology that hasn't been invented or perfected yet. Inside her is some kind of power generator that rivals any nuclear power station on the planet. What we'd like to do in the long term is duplicate it."

The man looked at Noel as Crystal had just left with her sample. Don had arrived to take over for the night shift. "...Fascinating," the man said finally. "I'm not sure if I'll be able to help you create a duplicate power source that's in that girl but I should be able help you with the "Exo-suits". At least in some fashion," he said as he looked over the readouts on the monitors.

"So, what's your name anyways? I can't believe I completely forgot to ask you," Mike admitted embarrassingly.

The man chuckled as he stuck his hand out to shake Mikes, "No, that's okay. My name is Henry, Henry Donald's.

It was already late into the evening and the scientists working on Noel were beginning to call it a day and were feeling the effects of exhaustion. This was evident with two scientist where one was just entering while the other was leaving forgot to keep one door closed. In the three seconds the doors were opened, Noel suddenly looked up at the opened hallway. Mike and the man were distracted by the sudden data spike pouring through the monitors. Don was already on the move to the scientist shouting at them to close the doors. But the damage had already been done. Noel had already uploaded a program into Crystal's iphone making it buzz causing her to take the cell phone out to check it, letting it take a picture of Noel in his cage. Don had already turned to notice Crystal holding the phone as it took the picture and ran over to her taking it away from her. Once again, the damage had been done and under the direction of the hidden program in Crystal's phone, it sent the picture to every email address in Crystal's phone with the subject line "HELP ME".

00000000000

A day later Jeffries team were all accounted for at their home base save Jeffrey who stayed overnight at the hospital with his sister. Major was still more or less tied to her computer while John and Andria had taken a break and settled down for lunch while they had the TV turned to the news station half-listening to it.

"With a cook like you John, It's a wonder that none of us hasn't gotten fat yet," Andria told John as she shoved a fork full of spaghetti into her mouth, "You can make something as simple as spaghetti taste like it came from one of those exclusive restaurants."

"It's nothing really," John said sheepishly, "All I did was put in a few spices into the sauce. The only thing I did different was added shredded lettuce to the sauce before serving."

"Yeah but it's so good," Andria gushed. "Come on Major, You're missing out on you boyfriends cooking. If you don't come over here, I'm going to steal your boyfriend from you," she teased.

"Okay, I'm coming," Major said quickly as she pulled the plugs from the back of her neck and ran over to the kitchen to help herself to the meal and sat needlessly close to John earning a chuckle from the two already seated.

"So, any luck finding her?" John asked.

Major sighed before taking a bite; she took a moment to savor the flavor, "No... The only thing I was able to dig up so far was the fight she had with Henry in that town way back. The "experts" think it was a small meteorite that vaporized on impact," she said when commenting about people who weren't in the know about the alien machine. The conversation hadn't gone much farther than that when their attention was drawn to the news anchor on TV.

"And in other news, computer experts and police officials are cautioning people about a new email virus that has cropped up yesterday. People are urged not to open any emails they receive that contain the words "Help Me" in the subject header. While there haven't been any reports about any harm caused by this email virus police still urge everyone to not open the email. Once opened the virus forwards the email to everyone in your contact list before displaying an attached photo. We here at the station have obtained the photo in question. What we are about to show may disturb some viewers," the news caster said as his image was replaced with the photo. All three suddenly bolted upright as they recognized the person in the photograph. The news castor continued, "As of yet we haven't been able to identify the person in the picture but it appears to be of a young girl of sixteen years of age hanging by several cables in a mesh cage." two other people were in front of Noel but any identification was impossible due to both having their heads turned away. In the foreground was the blurry outline of a man's face that had a helmet of some kind on that suggested military. "So far, no hacker groups have claimed responsibility for what has been called the "Help me virus". We will keep you updated on or web site." The news castor then went to drown on about recent sports games results but the trio had already moved to their computer. Major was already jacking herself back in.

As she brought up the website and several others, John was already asking Major about what they just saw to which Major only hushed him as she worked. The picture of Noel was brought up on the screen and Both John and Andria were uncomfortably close gazing over Major's shoulders trying to make out details in the picture. Frustrated, Major shoved them both back causing Andria to land on her rear and John to stumble. While Major never touched the keyboard or mouse, she was working furiously through the jacks in her neck as she works to bring the blurry face in the foreground into focus. She had already tried looking for any markings that would leave a clue to Noel's location. As John and Andria watched her work at a more reasonable distance they heard a motorcycle come up signaling the return of Jeffrey.

Jeffrey walked in to see everyone huddled around Major at the computer, "What's going on?" he asked as he rounded the table.

"We might have found Noel," Andria stated with a hint of worry in her voice.

Jeffrey stopped in his tracks before resuming at a quicker pace and saw the image of Noel strung up like a prize of some sort. Jeffrey wasn't sure what to say when he saw the image. He didn't know what to feel. He just wanted to free her. Whatever else would have to wait. "Can we use this to find her?' he finally asked.

"That's what I'm trying to do," Major said suddenly just as she brought the face into focus. Everyone stared at the face of the man and the only thing they could take from it was that he looked Chinese. "Got him!" Major suddenly shouted after a minute of silence as she opened a window that had the man's employee file on it.

"That's my girl," John said as he gave Major a quick kiss.

"You know it," she said with a smile, "His name is Don Wait. And he works as a security guard for the Tonaon industrials company... Unfortunately it doesn't say where he works," she said with disappointment. Everyone swore at that. Jeffrey looked at the picture dejectedly. He was so close to finding her but was still so far off. For ten seconds he looked sullenly at the picture until he noticed something in the reflection of Don's protective goggles on his helmet.

"Can you clear that up?" he asked Major as he pointed at the reflection.

Major stared at the reflection for several seconds, "It's a little distorted but I'll try," she said as she went to work. Five minutes inched slowly by until Major was almost finished. Before she could clear the fuzz from the image on the screen she stiffened and brought up an employee file of Mike. "The guy on the right is some guy named Mike Givings, he works for Tonaon Industrials too. Unfortunately his file doesn't say where he works either. But, according to his facebook page, he works at the Tonaon Industrials headquarters."

Jeffrey breathed a sigh of relief, "Good job Major," he said giving her a pat on the back, "Now where is that?"

"It's currently docked at their industrial offices just south of Victoria on Vancouver Island in BC Canada."

Jeffrey looked at her funny when she mentioned it was docked but decided to drop it as it wasn't important. He then noticed that there was a second person in the reflection to the left of Mike. "Who's that?" Jeffrey asked Major pointing to the still blurred image of the man.

Major hesitated, "I-it doesn't really matter does it? We know where Noel is now so now we can go get her."

"Major!"

Major looked at the determination in Jeffrey's eyes and sighed as she looked down. The image cleared up and Jeffrey only took half a look before he was already running out the door. He barely needed more than one look to recognize Henry. He stopped briefly enough to grab his batsuit and stuff it in a back pack before he was out the door. It was only after he slammed the door shut that John and Andria noticed Henry's face.

Not long after they heard Jeffrey speeding away did the phone ring. Seeing that it was from Agent G they put it on speaker phone. Usually when they got a call from him on just the phone the group would do a Charlie's Angels joke but they never joked when it came to Henry so they skipped the routine this time.

"I found Noel," Agent G stated.

"We know," John replied, "We just saw the news."

"Fine, is everyone there?"

"We were," Andria said, "But as soon as Jeffrey saw Henry in the picture, he bolted."

"Damn, I was afraid of that. In any case this is a joint rescue op," he started, "Noel's still on Canadian soil so it's their call and they graciously let us tag along. So get your stuff together and get ready to move."

"When are we leaving?" Major asked just waiting for the word.

The line cut out when suddenly the door Jeffrey had left through had opened revealing Agent G in the flesh dressed in his dark suit, "As soon as you get your stuff together, we're leaving," he told them bluntly.