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jaybee65Title: Succession
Fandom: La Femme Nikita
Rating: Probably a hard R, for sexual situations and violence.
Pairings: Contains Madeline/Paul (Operations) and Charles Sand/Madeline as well as references to Adrian/George, but this doesn't fit comfortably into "shippy" categories.
Length: The whole thing is 120k-plus words. There are 31 chapters, which are distributed among four "Parts."
Warning: Michael and Nikita do not appear in this story, except as minor references at the very end.
Summary: Set during the 1980's, this story traces the events that ultimately led to the overthrow of Adrian as leader of Section One and to her replacement by Paul Wolfe (Operations).
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Adrian glanced at her watch. Half-past noon. She picked up the mission checklist from her desk and approached the row of television screens embedded in the wall. She pushed a button, and the camera feed from Van Access lit up one of the screens.
She expected to see a flurry of activity as technicians loaded the van. However, Van Access was completely empty.
Was there something wrong with her watch? No. The timestamp in the corner of the screen read 12:32. For an uncertain moment, she contemplated the possibility that her memory might have failed her. While it had never done so before, she had to accept the possibility that even she might eventually be vulnerable to the more distasteful effects of the aging process. But no, upon reflection, that wasn't it. This mission was all she had been thinking about -- all she had been able to think about -- for the past several days, and she knew without even an iota of doubt that the team was scheduled for egress at precisely 13:00.
Why, then, was no one engaged in prep?
A painful wave of heat and constricting muscles seized her body. She flung the checklist onto the desk and exited the office. Heading downstairs, she trod so forcefully that the metal stairway shook with the motion of her descent. Below, a hush fell over the room. Operatives stopped what they were doing and craned their necks upward, until the only sound remaining was the echo of her footsteps.
She found Paul just near Comm.
"You're behind schedule. Explain yourself."
"Behind schedule for what?" He looked around at the other operatives milling nearby, frowning as if confused.
Apparently, this was some sort of game. She was in no mood.
"Have you lost your mind?" she asked. "Or is this a joke? If so, your sense of humor leaves a great deal to be desired."
He raised his eyebrows. If she didn't know better, she could have sworn he was suppressing a smile. "Have I ever joked with you?"
He offered no further explanation. He just stood there with that vaguely amused-looking expression. As for the others, they continued to stare dumbly, like cud-chewing cattle. She didn't think anyone had so much as twitched a muscle since she left her office.
She took a menacing step toward Paul.
"Since you seem to be suffering from some sort of mental impairment," she said, "let me refresh your memory. In twenty minutes, your mission is due to depart for Beijing. Why is your team not assembling?"
"Oh, that." He broke into a broad smile. "We're not going."
He had lost his mind. Or she had lost hers.
"I'm not sure I heard you correctly. What was that?"
"We're not going," he repeated. The smile vanished. "Your orders are reckless and I cannot, in good conscience, carry them out." He straightened his shoulders, defiant. "If you're smart, you'll abort the mission. If not, I'll do it for you."
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Walter hide behind his worktable. Most of the other operatives continued their gawking, but a few -- scattered here and there, not so randomly at all, she suddenly realized -- shifted their stances. They appeared to be taking tactical positions.
He had allies. Remarkable.
She chuckled. "My, my. A coup d'état. How very daring. But a trifle banana republic, don't you think?"
He shrugged. "I'll give you one more chance to save yourself. Are you going to abort the mission?"
"You've just signed your cancellation order. Pity. I've always been fond of you."
He pulled a gun from his belt and aimed it at her chest. "Then you leave me no choice but to take control of Section."
The room erupted with gasps, shouts, and crashes as people ran or dove for cover. A handful of security operatives drew weapons and aimed them at Paul -- but then still others did the same to them. More than she would have expected. And from all walks of Section. Paul had been better prepared than she would have given him credit for.
She curled a lip in disdain at the gun barrel pointed her way. "I wouldn't have taken you for someone prone to melodrama," she said. "Give up this idiotic stunt."
"I don't think you realize how serious I am."
There was silence. A bead of sweat ran down his face.
Just as she was about to dare him to shoot her, to tell him she wasn't going to make it easy for him, to hold her head high while she taunted him for his cowardice -- there was a commotion across the room. From around a corner, Madeline walked onto the main floor, flanked by an armed security detail. Her escorts stationed themselves by the various exits, but Madeline made her way toward Paul and Adrian.
Thank God. Madeline was the only person who could reason with him. Perhaps it might end without bloodshed after all.
To Adrian's surprise, however, Madeline went to stand beside Paul. Then she addressed the pro-Adrian operatives.
"Lay down your weapons. If you cooperate now, you won't be punished."
Adrian felt as though she'd been struck in the face. Why, that ungrateful turncoat. Paul's rebellion had been expected. In a way, even honorable. But Adrian had taken Madeline from nothing and built her up into what she was. Had pushed her relentlessly to better herself. And afterwards had rewarded and entrusted her with real responsibility. All for nothing: after all Adrian's efforts to mold her, it turned out that Madeline was just as devoid of moral fiber as on the day Adrian first met her.
How sad, really. Adrian had wanted to believe that humans were capable of redemption. If she survived this, she'd never indulge in such folly again.
Guns clattered to the floor as, one by one, Adrian's defenders surrendered. Except for one, Adrian noticed, who was hidden off to the side. He had Paul in his aim. She met his glance and nodded.
Just before the shot rang out, she dropped to the floor.
***
When Charles saw dozens of operatives running down the corridor, he feared he might be too late. He caught a man by the arm and dragged him to a halt.
"What's going on?" he demanded.
"A takeover! Run before they start shooting!" cried the man, who then yanked his arm free and took off again.
Charles did run -- but not away. He fought against the stream of people fleeing in the opposite direction. He shoved them aside, even knocked a few down; they were so consumed with panic that they didn't get angry, but rather just scrambled up again.
When he reached the entrance to Section's main floor, he found a crowd huddled just at the threshold to watch from relative safety. He threaded and elbowed his way to the front so he could see, and there it was: Comm, lit like a stage, the players frozen mid-drama. Paul and Madeline faced Adrian, the three of them encircled by armed men and women. No one moved; no one spoke. Paul held his gun with a steady hand; Adrian stared down the barrel just as coolly.
So this was what George had been hinting about. What Madeline, in turn, had warned him to stay away from. This was the source of all the secrecy and the lies and the subterfuge and the coded remarks. Both George and Madeline had known all along what was going to happen, but neither had seen fit to enlighten Charles. And yet they'd each clearly tried to maneuver him into some sort of role. George wanted him as a proxy, someone whose insecurities could be exploited to goad him into doing what George wasn't willing to do himself. In Madeline's case, it was more an absence of a role. She hadn't involved Charles in her plans, hadn't made him her confidante, hadn't even wanted him present. He was her husband, her life's companion, supposedly the person she cared for the most, but she'd excluded him from the only part of her life that really mattered.
Which was worse -- being manipulated by George, or being shut out by Madeline? Being treated as a puppet -- or as a spectator?
Adrian's supporters -- outnumbered -- capitulated quickly. Their loyalty didn't run very deep to begin with, Charles suspected. They placed their guns on the floor and raised their hands.
It was over. Without a shot being fired.
Or maybe not. Adrian glanced toward the far side of the room, and Charles followed her gaze. A man had a gun aimed at Paul.
Paul didn't seem to notice. Neither did Madeline, nor their fellow mutineers.
Charles reached into his jacket pocket and curled his fingers around the grip of his pistol. He could stop this man if he wanted. But why? Why should he involve himself at all? He felt no real sense of duty toward Adrian, and no respect for Paul. Had Madeline asked for his help or support, he'd be standing right there by her side. But she hadn't. She hadn't trusted him, apparently -- or was it something else?
She'd asked him to trust her, actually. To accept that if she kept secrets from him, there was good reason. And yes, she'd asked him to stay away, but what if it was because she didn't want him to be a spectator? Because the event he would witness might involve her death? Or even his, if things got out of control?
George had wanted him here, wanted him suspicious and angry, no doubt hoped he would be jealous enough to intervene or even challenge Paul, regardless of the risk it posed. Madeline, in contrast, wanted him elsewhere -- even though she must have known she could have used him easily if only she'd asked. So who, really, had his best interests at heart?
Once upon a time, George had asked Charles what he wanted, if he didn't want command of Section. He hadn't known how to answer. Now he knew. He wanted to live his life with integrity. And that meant when he told his wife he trusted her, he had to mean it.
When Adrian nodded to signal the man to shoot, Charles fired his own gun. The man fell backwards, blood and brains spattering along the floor.
He walked over to Paul and Madeline, aware that the entire room was staring. Adrian gaped at him from where she had sprawled across the floor.
"Shall I escort her to Containment?" he asked Paul. "Sir?" he added. Paul didn't deserve the title, but it didn't matter. Very few things did, and Charles had finally figured out what they were.
Paul blinked a few times, then he cleared his throat. "Yes. Thank you."
***
Alone in her cell, Lisa tossed a rolled-up sock against the door and caught it when it bounced back. It had been days since she awoke there, or was it weeks? She couldn't keep track, and although she had been attended to by her captors and made surprisingly comfortable, no one had told her anything. They brought her food, took her out for showers and exercise, delivered clean clothes and sheets, but kept as mute as monks bound by a vow of silence. She tried asking questions, but they ignored her.
The worst part was the lack of anything to do. For entertainment, she resorted to pushups, then counting as long as she could while balancing on one foot. Next, she sang to herself -- nursery rhymes from childhood, commercial jingles, even disco hits from the seventies, complete with dance moves. When she bored of that, she tried teaching herself to yodel, which made her laugh until she cried.
If anyone was watching -- and of course they would be -- they'd have to think she was completely nuts. If they left her in here too much longer, they might be right in that assessment.
The yodeling had started to hurt her throat, so she finally switched to the sock toss game. It bounced pretty well, considering. She tried hurling it at the door from different angles: basketball free-throw style, softball pitch style, under-the-leg style. She wound up to pitch a fastball -- and then the door opened. The sock hit a man square in the chest and fell to the floor. He eyed it for a moment with an indecipherable look on his face and then looked back up at her.
She waited. This one wasn't carrying anything to give her, so he probably wanted her to follow him somewhere. It was always a guessing game with these people.
"Good morning," he said.
My God! Actual speech! His accent was British, but that didn't tell her anything useful.
"Hello," she replied guardedly. She wasn't going to volunteer too much, not at first. Ultimately, yeah, she'd spill her guts, but they had to work a little for it. Otherwise, they might not believe she was telling the truth, and then she really might be dead.
"I hope you've been made comfortable," he said.
"Yeah."
He headed to the bed and sat. "Do you know where you are?"
She shrugged. "A Red Cell prison somewhere, I guess. Could be anywhere."
"You think you're being held by Red Cell?"
Bzzzzzzt! The tone of his voice told her she'd got something wrong already. She'd better be more circumspect.
"Uh...well...that seemed the most likely."
He smiled. Far from being reassuring, it made him look completely untrustworthy. "Do you really think Red Cell would treat you so hospitably?"
He had a point. It wasn't like Red Cell at all. It wasn't like anyone at all, and that's what bothered her. He bothered her, too. There was something creepy about him. Creepy, and smarmy, and entirely pleased with himself -- which, in Lisa's world, usually meant that he had a nasty trick up his sleeve.
Terrific. All of this time they'd been lulling her into a state of bored somnolence, so that it would be all the more traumatic when they finally tossed her into the dungeon filled with man-eating rats, or the pool of piranha, or the vat of boiling oil, or whatever horrible thing she knew had to be in store.
He continued to stare at her, and she realized he was probably expecting an answer to his question.
"I don't know what to think," she said. Nicely noncommittal -- and also true.
"Then let me enlighten you. You're in a facility belonging to the Center. You do know what that is, don't you?"
She blinked. So that was the nasty trick up his sleeve. She felt it like a kick to the stomach.
"The Center," she said. "You're the ones running the experiment on my sons. I hacked into your database until...until--"
"Until we shut you down," he finished. "Very good. I was beginning to worry that my agents had killed a few too many braincells when they knocked you out with the chloroform. They tell me you've been acting erratic since we brought you in."
Everything now made horrible sense, but then at the same time made no sense whatsoever.
"Why would you chloroform me on a mission?" she asked, baffled. "Aren't the Center and Section One on the same side?"
He laughed. "In a manner of speaking. But you see, security levels at the Center are much stricter than those at Section One. When you joined the Section, you had to die to the outside world. When you join the Center, you have to die to the Section."
"Join Center?"
He held out his hand. "You can call me Mr. Jones. I'm your new employer."
************
To go on to Chapter Thirty, click here.
Previous Chapters
Fandom: La Femme Nikita
Rating: Probably a hard R, for sexual situations and violence.
Pairings: Contains Madeline/Paul (Operations) and Charles Sand/Madeline as well as references to Adrian/George, but this doesn't fit comfortably into "shippy" categories.
Length: The whole thing is 120k-plus words. There are 31 chapters, which are distributed among four "Parts."
Warning: Michael and Nikita do not appear in this story, except as minor references at the very end.
Summary: Set during the 1980's, this story traces the events that ultimately led to the overthrow of Adrian as leader of Section One and to her replacement by Paul Wolfe (Operations).
Adrian glanced at her watch. Half-past noon. She picked up the mission checklist from her desk and approached the row of television screens embedded in the wall. She pushed a button, and the camera feed from Van Access lit up one of the screens.
She expected to see a flurry of activity as technicians loaded the van. However, Van Access was completely empty.
Was there something wrong with her watch? No. The timestamp in the corner of the screen read 12:32. For an uncertain moment, she contemplated the possibility that her memory might have failed her. While it had never done so before, she had to accept the possibility that even she might eventually be vulnerable to the more distasteful effects of the aging process. But no, upon reflection, that wasn't it. This mission was all she had been thinking about -- all she had been able to think about -- for the past several days, and she knew without even an iota of doubt that the team was scheduled for egress at precisely 13:00.
Why, then, was no one engaged in prep?
A painful wave of heat and constricting muscles seized her body. She flung the checklist onto the desk and exited the office. Heading downstairs, she trod so forcefully that the metal stairway shook with the motion of her descent. Below, a hush fell over the room. Operatives stopped what they were doing and craned their necks upward, until the only sound remaining was the echo of her footsteps.
She found Paul just near Comm.
"You're behind schedule. Explain yourself."
"Behind schedule for what?" He looked around at the other operatives milling nearby, frowning as if confused.
Apparently, this was some sort of game. She was in no mood.
"Have you lost your mind?" she asked. "Or is this a joke? If so, your sense of humor leaves a great deal to be desired."
He raised his eyebrows. If she didn't know better, she could have sworn he was suppressing a smile. "Have I ever joked with you?"
He offered no further explanation. He just stood there with that vaguely amused-looking expression. As for the others, they continued to stare dumbly, like cud-chewing cattle. She didn't think anyone had so much as twitched a muscle since she left her office.
She took a menacing step toward Paul.
"Since you seem to be suffering from some sort of mental impairment," she said, "let me refresh your memory. In twenty minutes, your mission is due to depart for Beijing. Why is your team not assembling?"
"Oh, that." He broke into a broad smile. "We're not going."
He had lost his mind. Or she had lost hers.
"I'm not sure I heard you correctly. What was that?"
"We're not going," he repeated. The smile vanished. "Your orders are reckless and I cannot, in good conscience, carry them out." He straightened his shoulders, defiant. "If you're smart, you'll abort the mission. If not, I'll do it for you."
Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Walter hide behind his worktable. Most of the other operatives continued their gawking, but a few -- scattered here and there, not so randomly at all, she suddenly realized -- shifted their stances. They appeared to be taking tactical positions.
He had allies. Remarkable.
She chuckled. "My, my. A coup d'état. How very daring. But a trifle banana republic, don't you think?"
He shrugged. "I'll give you one more chance to save yourself. Are you going to abort the mission?"
"You've just signed your cancellation order. Pity. I've always been fond of you."
He pulled a gun from his belt and aimed it at her chest. "Then you leave me no choice but to take control of Section."
The room erupted with gasps, shouts, and crashes as people ran or dove for cover. A handful of security operatives drew weapons and aimed them at Paul -- but then still others did the same to them. More than she would have expected. And from all walks of Section. Paul had been better prepared than she would have given him credit for.
She curled a lip in disdain at the gun barrel pointed her way. "I wouldn't have taken you for someone prone to melodrama," she said. "Give up this idiotic stunt."
"I don't think you realize how serious I am."
There was silence. A bead of sweat ran down his face.
Just as she was about to dare him to shoot her, to tell him she wasn't going to make it easy for him, to hold her head high while she taunted him for his cowardice -- there was a commotion across the room. From around a corner, Madeline walked onto the main floor, flanked by an armed security detail. Her escorts stationed themselves by the various exits, but Madeline made her way toward Paul and Adrian.
Thank God. Madeline was the only person who could reason with him. Perhaps it might end without bloodshed after all.
To Adrian's surprise, however, Madeline went to stand beside Paul. Then she addressed the pro-Adrian operatives.
"Lay down your weapons. If you cooperate now, you won't be punished."
Adrian felt as though she'd been struck in the face. Why, that ungrateful turncoat. Paul's rebellion had been expected. In a way, even honorable. But Adrian had taken Madeline from nothing and built her up into what she was. Had pushed her relentlessly to better herself. And afterwards had rewarded and entrusted her with real responsibility. All for nothing: after all Adrian's efforts to mold her, it turned out that Madeline was just as devoid of moral fiber as on the day Adrian first met her.
How sad, really. Adrian had wanted to believe that humans were capable of redemption. If she survived this, she'd never indulge in such folly again.
Guns clattered to the floor as, one by one, Adrian's defenders surrendered. Except for one, Adrian noticed, who was hidden off to the side. He had Paul in his aim. She met his glance and nodded.
Just before the shot rang out, she dropped to the floor.
***
When Charles saw dozens of operatives running down the corridor, he feared he might be too late. He caught a man by the arm and dragged him to a halt.
"What's going on?" he demanded.
"A takeover! Run before they start shooting!" cried the man, who then yanked his arm free and took off again.
Charles did run -- but not away. He fought against the stream of people fleeing in the opposite direction. He shoved them aside, even knocked a few down; they were so consumed with panic that they didn't get angry, but rather just scrambled up again.
When he reached the entrance to Section's main floor, he found a crowd huddled just at the threshold to watch from relative safety. He threaded and elbowed his way to the front so he could see, and there it was: Comm, lit like a stage, the players frozen mid-drama. Paul and Madeline faced Adrian, the three of them encircled by armed men and women. No one moved; no one spoke. Paul held his gun with a steady hand; Adrian stared down the barrel just as coolly.
So this was what George had been hinting about. What Madeline, in turn, had warned him to stay away from. This was the source of all the secrecy and the lies and the subterfuge and the coded remarks. Both George and Madeline had known all along what was going to happen, but neither had seen fit to enlighten Charles. And yet they'd each clearly tried to maneuver him into some sort of role. George wanted him as a proxy, someone whose insecurities could be exploited to goad him into doing what George wasn't willing to do himself. In Madeline's case, it was more an absence of a role. She hadn't involved Charles in her plans, hadn't made him her confidante, hadn't even wanted him present. He was her husband, her life's companion, supposedly the person she cared for the most, but she'd excluded him from the only part of her life that really mattered.
Which was worse -- being manipulated by George, or being shut out by Madeline? Being treated as a puppet -- or as a spectator?
Adrian's supporters -- outnumbered -- capitulated quickly. Their loyalty didn't run very deep to begin with, Charles suspected. They placed their guns on the floor and raised their hands.
It was over. Without a shot being fired.
Or maybe not. Adrian glanced toward the far side of the room, and Charles followed her gaze. A man had a gun aimed at Paul.
Paul didn't seem to notice. Neither did Madeline, nor their fellow mutineers.
Charles reached into his jacket pocket and curled his fingers around the grip of his pistol. He could stop this man if he wanted. But why? Why should he involve himself at all? He felt no real sense of duty toward Adrian, and no respect for Paul. Had Madeline asked for his help or support, he'd be standing right there by her side. But she hadn't. She hadn't trusted him, apparently -- or was it something else?
She'd asked him to trust her, actually. To accept that if she kept secrets from him, there was good reason. And yes, she'd asked him to stay away, but what if it was because she didn't want him to be a spectator? Because the event he would witness might involve her death? Or even his, if things got out of control?
George had wanted him here, wanted him suspicious and angry, no doubt hoped he would be jealous enough to intervene or even challenge Paul, regardless of the risk it posed. Madeline, in contrast, wanted him elsewhere -- even though she must have known she could have used him easily if only she'd asked. So who, really, had his best interests at heart?
Once upon a time, George had asked Charles what he wanted, if he didn't want command of Section. He hadn't known how to answer. Now he knew. He wanted to live his life with integrity. And that meant when he told his wife he trusted her, he had to mean it.
When Adrian nodded to signal the man to shoot, Charles fired his own gun. The man fell backwards, blood and brains spattering along the floor.
He walked over to Paul and Madeline, aware that the entire room was staring. Adrian gaped at him from where she had sprawled across the floor.
"Shall I escort her to Containment?" he asked Paul. "Sir?" he added. Paul didn't deserve the title, but it didn't matter. Very few things did, and Charles had finally figured out what they were.
Paul blinked a few times, then he cleared his throat. "Yes. Thank you."
***
Alone in her cell, Lisa tossed a rolled-up sock against the door and caught it when it bounced back. It had been days since she awoke there, or was it weeks? She couldn't keep track, and although she had been attended to by her captors and made surprisingly comfortable, no one had told her anything. They brought her food, took her out for showers and exercise, delivered clean clothes and sheets, but kept as mute as monks bound by a vow of silence. She tried asking questions, but they ignored her.
The worst part was the lack of anything to do. For entertainment, she resorted to pushups, then counting as long as she could while balancing on one foot. Next, she sang to herself -- nursery rhymes from childhood, commercial jingles, even disco hits from the seventies, complete with dance moves. When she bored of that, she tried teaching herself to yodel, which made her laugh until she cried.
If anyone was watching -- and of course they would be -- they'd have to think she was completely nuts. If they left her in here too much longer, they might be right in that assessment.
The yodeling had started to hurt her throat, so she finally switched to the sock toss game. It bounced pretty well, considering. She tried hurling it at the door from different angles: basketball free-throw style, softball pitch style, under-the-leg style. She wound up to pitch a fastball -- and then the door opened. The sock hit a man square in the chest and fell to the floor. He eyed it for a moment with an indecipherable look on his face and then looked back up at her.
She waited. This one wasn't carrying anything to give her, so he probably wanted her to follow him somewhere. It was always a guessing game with these people.
"Good morning," he said.
My God! Actual speech! His accent was British, but that didn't tell her anything useful.
"Hello," she replied guardedly. She wasn't going to volunteer too much, not at first. Ultimately, yeah, she'd spill her guts, but they had to work a little for it. Otherwise, they might not believe she was telling the truth, and then she really might be dead.
"I hope you've been made comfortable," he said.
"Yeah."
He headed to the bed and sat. "Do you know where you are?"
She shrugged. "A Red Cell prison somewhere, I guess. Could be anywhere."
"You think you're being held by Red Cell?"
Bzzzzzzt! The tone of his voice told her she'd got something wrong already. She'd better be more circumspect.
"Uh...well...that seemed the most likely."
He smiled. Far from being reassuring, it made him look completely untrustworthy. "Do you really think Red Cell would treat you so hospitably?"
He had a point. It wasn't like Red Cell at all. It wasn't like anyone at all, and that's what bothered her. He bothered her, too. There was something creepy about him. Creepy, and smarmy, and entirely pleased with himself -- which, in Lisa's world, usually meant that he had a nasty trick up his sleeve.
Terrific. All of this time they'd been lulling her into a state of bored somnolence, so that it would be all the more traumatic when they finally tossed her into the dungeon filled with man-eating rats, or the pool of piranha, or the vat of boiling oil, or whatever horrible thing she knew had to be in store.
He continued to stare at her, and she realized he was probably expecting an answer to his question.
"I don't know what to think," she said. Nicely noncommittal -- and also true.
"Then let me enlighten you. You're in a facility belonging to the Center. You do know what that is, don't you?"
She blinked. So that was the nasty trick up his sleeve. She felt it like a kick to the stomach.
"The Center," she said. "You're the ones running the experiment on my sons. I hacked into your database until...until--"
"Until we shut you down," he finished. "Very good. I was beginning to worry that my agents had killed a few too many braincells when they knocked you out with the chloroform. They tell me you've been acting erratic since we brought you in."
Everything now made horrible sense, but then at the same time made no sense whatsoever.
"Why would you chloroform me on a mission?" she asked, baffled. "Aren't the Center and Section One on the same side?"
He laughed. "In a manner of speaking. But you see, security levels at the Center are much stricter than those at Section One. When you joined the Section, you had to die to the outside world. When you join the Center, you have to die to the Section."
"Join Center?"
He held out his hand. "You can call me Mr. Jones. I'm your new employer."
************
To go on to Chapter Thirty, click here.